I love the red letters, but we cannot be "red letter Christians." The red letters themselves tell us so.
Red letter Christians are people who believe the red letters, the words of Jesus, carry more weight than the other words in the scriptures. If anything in the black letters seems to contradict the spirit of the red letters, the red letters win. Some would even say we should only regard the red letters as binding.
The problem is this position ignores the nature of the gospels, is wrong on the nature of scripture, and goes against what Jesus said.
The Nature of the Gospels
We need to think about the nature of the gospels. This should be obvious, but it's worth stating: We do not have a single word written by Jesus. Every word of his comes to us second or third hand. First, we have to trust that the authors didn't make it all up — not without reason, but a certain amount of trust is required.
Second, what we have is curated by someone else. Mark, tradition tells us, passed on what Peter taught him; we only know what he thought was important of what Peter thought was important. If Matthew and John were eye witnesses, we still only have what they chose to share. Jesus preached for three years; his recorded words can be read in an hour. We only have what was passed on to us. Who made these decisions? The people responsible for the black letters.
The real target of the red letter Christians is generally Paul; they don't like a lot of things he said: He's misogynistic and judgy. We can't trust him. How is he even an apostle? A story in Acts? You can't trust Acts; it was written by Paul's follower. But they trust the same follower to transmit the words of Jesus faithfully? How do we know Luke didn't make up the parable of the good Samaritan? I realize how this sounds, but the point is valid: They trust the red letters which only came to us through the hands of the people they do not trust.
The Nature of Scripture
But it's not just the New Testament authors they want to demote. The Old Testament is similarly attacked. "Moses isn't Jesus." Here they make two related errors. First, they discount or disbelieve the inspiration of scripture. "All scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness" (2Tim 3:16). Scripture may have been written down by Moses or David or Isaiah, but the ultimate author is God.
Which leads us to their second error: They disregard or disbelieve the deity of Christ. If Jesus is who he claimed to be, he is the God who breathed the scriptures. He's the God who did the saying when Moses says, "Thus sayeth the Lord." Pitting Jesus against Moses is trying to pit Jesus against himself.
Jesus on Scripture
The RLC response will be that "only Paul said that all scripture is God-breathed, and Paul's writings aren't scripture." You'd expect people who claim to respect the words of Jesus so much to read them more carefully. Let's look at a few things Jesus said about the scriptures:
Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”
Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’ and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. (Matt 15:1-6)
When Moses wrote "God said", Jesus takes that as God speaking. These are the words of God Almighty.
Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are “gods”’? If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken— what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? (John 10:34-36)
"Scripture cannot be broken." Jesus had the highest opinion of the scriptures people today want to dismiss.
While Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, he asked, “Why do the teachers of the law say that the Messiah is the son of David? David himself, speaking by the Holy Spirit, declared: “The Lord said to my Lord ..." (Mark 12:35-36)
According to Jesus, when the prophets spoke, God the Holy Spirit was behind it. They did not write what they pleased but, as Peter put it, were "carried along by the Holy Spirit" (2Pet 1:21).
And Jesus promised the same Holy Spirit would work in the apostles to remind them of everything he taught them (John 14:26) and to teach them more things, guiding them into "all truth" and even revealing what is yet to come (John 16:12-13).
"But Paul wasn't one of the Twelve. That doesn't apply to him." Peter thought it did, even calling his letters "scripture" (2Pet 3:16).
If you never see anything in the scriptures you don't like, you're not reading carefully enough. There are many commands we'd remove if we could. We'd love to soften God's requirements or modify the consequences of our rebellion. Jesus does not give us that option. If we're going to follow Jesus, we need to take up his attitude toward the scriptures.
The decrees of the LORD are firm,
and all of them are righteous.
They are more precious than gold,
than much pure gold;
they are sweeter than honey,
than honey from the comb. (Psalm 19:9-10)
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