I’ve learned just recently that some believe that the editions of the Bible which have the words of Jesus in red are better than their all black letter counterparts because we should pay more attention to the letters in red, and apparently, it makes it easier to tell, even though to me it should be pretty obvious in almost every instance. (I’m a cave dweller and don’t get out much.)

But if Jesus is The Word, which it says in the beginning of John, and God inspired the whole of Scripture through Jesus, and even Jesus himself quoted parts of the Old Testament, doesn’t it make that premise rather worthless? Should we only pay attention to those parts of the Old Testament that Jesus quoted? What about the parts about Jesus that may be the most important of all, like what He did on the cross? Are we to only look at His teachings and emulate them while missing the whole of the gospel?

I wrote as little as possible so as not to misrepresent them. I’m writing this to help people who are unaware, as I recently was.

Here is a quote by D.A. Carson:


A particularly virulent form of this approach is hidden behind what Tony Campolo now approvingly calls “red letter Christians.” These red letter Christians, he says, hold the same theological commitments as do other evangelicals, but they take the words of Jesus especially seriously (they devote themselves to the “red letters” of some foolishly printed Bibles) and end up being more concerned than are other Christians for the poor, the hungry, and those at war. Oh, rubbish: this is merely one more futile exercise in trying to find a “canon within the canon” to bless my preferred brand of theology. That’s the first of two serious mistakes commonly practiced by these red letter Christians. The other is worse: their actual grasp of what the red letter words of Jesus are actually saying in context far too frequently leaves a great deal to be desired; more particularly, to read the words of Jesus and emphasize them apart from the narrative framework of each of the canonical gospels, in which the plot-line takes the reader to Jesus’ redeeming death and resurrection, not only has the result of down-playing Jesus’ death and resurrection, but regularly fails to see how the red-letter words of Jesus point to and unpack the significance of his impending crosswork. In other words, it is not only Paul who says that Jesus’ cross and resurrection constitute matters “of first importance” (1 Cor 15:3), and not only Paul who was resolved to know nothing among the Corinthians except Jesus Christ and him crucified (1 Cor 2:1–5), but the shape of the narrative in each canonical gospel says the same thing. In each case the narrative rushes toward the cross and resurrection; the cross and resurrection are the climax. So to interpret the narrative, including the red-letter words of Jesus, apart from the climax to which they are rushing, is necessarily a distortion of the canonical gospels themselves.

Some of the gospel passion accounts make this particularly clear. In Matthew, for example, Jesus is repeatedly mocked as “the king of the Jews” (Matthew 27:27–31, 37, 42). But Matthew knows that his readers have been told from the beginning of his book (even the bits without red letters) that Jesus is the king: the first chapter establishes the point, and tells us that, as the promised Davidic king, he is given the name “YHWH saves” (“Jesus”) because he comes to save his people from their sins. Small wonder for its first three centuries the church meditated often on the irony of Jesus “reigning” from a cross, that barbaric Roman instrument of torture and shame. And it is Matthew who reminds us that, this side of the cross, this side of the resurrection, all authority belongs to Jesus (Matthew 28:18–20). These constitute parts of the narrative framework without which Jesus’ red-letter words, not least his portrayals of the kingdom, cannot be rightly understood.

–D.A. Carson, Common errors in understanding the Kingdom
HT: Justin Taylor

2 Timothy 3:16a GW
Every Scripture passage is inspired by God. All of them are useful

If we’re not closely following the whole Bible, here are some red letters. I made the red a little darker than ‘regular’ red so it’s a little more readable. Still annoying, especially on a computer screen.

Please be careful with God’s words.

John 12:44-50 GW
Then Jesus said loudly, “Whoever believes in me believes not only in me but also in the one who sent me. 45 Whoever sees me sees the one who sent me. 46 I am the light that has come into the world so that everyone who believes in me will not live in the dark. 47 If anyone hears my words and doesn’t follow them, I don’t condemn them. I didn’t come to condemn the world but to save the world. 48 Those who reject me by not accepting what I say have a judge appointed for them. The words that I have spoken will judge them on the last day. 49 I have not spoken on my own. Instead, the Father who sent me told me what I should say and how I should say it. 50 I know that what he commands is eternal life. Whatever I say is what the Father told me to say.”

Red Letter Christians Web Site – not all bad I will admit – as always, see both sides if you wish, which is why I link to the web site, and decide for yourself