Young People are turning to the Bible

Generation Z want to read the Bible

Search is on for meaning and for hope.

Last year reports from the UK and USA suggested that the Bible is becoming more popular than ever. Indeed, a huge resurgence in Bible sales is taking place, especially among the U25s. These whispers are growing louder, with The Guardian reporting yesterday,

“Sales of the good book reached a record high in the UK in 2025, increasing by 134% since 2019 – the highest since records began – according to industry research. Last year, total sales of Bibles in the UK reached £6.3m, £3.61m up on 2019 sales.

Leading the charge is young people. Only 4% of 18- to 24-year-olds said they attended church monthly in 2018, but in 2024 that number rose to 16% – the largest increase of any age demographic.”

Our myopic view of history sometimes doesn’t appreciate that the Bible wasn’t always in vogue. The Bible has been frequently attacked over the millennia, and for different reasons. It may be the divine authorship of the Bible that is questioned, or it’s historicity, it’s sexual ethics, it’s presentation of the human condition, and even the central message: the person at work of Jesus Christ.

There are seasons when the Bible is truncated or deconstructed to remove all of the uncomfortable bits. Other times, ministers of the word ignore or explain away the word. There are seasons when the Bible is closed or altogether banned by the State or Church.

My own generation (X) rebelled and argued and insisted on the Bible’s irrelevance. Why would anyone follow a book filled with everything opposed to find my own religion kind of vibe? It seems that for Generation Z, that suspicion and scepticism no longer washes. Having grown up in a society where the Bible is mystery and where every contemporary theory and contention is proving feeble and dishonest, lots of 18 year old guys and girls are asking, is there something to the Bible?

The Bible is the new punk rock! We don’t have similar data available for Australia as what the UK and USA have produced. I can think of anecdotal evidence suggesting that something is happening here. Among Aussie U25s at least some are beginning to open a Bible app and read.

My thesis here is a simple one: I want to affirm this search for meaning and hope, and suggest that the answers found in the pages of the Bible cannot be outdone. For all the grey head revolutionaries with their flamboyant promises of the world without God, the missing and emptiness produced is now being counted for all it’s worth: dross.

Here are 3 reasons why everyone should the read the Bible, whether you are a Christian or not, religious, or not. However you describes yourself, I think the Bible is so significant it is worth giving time to read it. You might read from the beginning in Genesis through to Revelation. An easier and probably more helpful starting is choosing one of the four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Given Jesus says that the whole Bible is about him, beginning with him isn’t a bad idea. I liken the Gospels to putting on your glasses so that you can read clearly.

Each of the following points require deep and lengthy discussion, but hopefully the dots points at least create a taste that will bring you back wanting more.

i. The Bible is the meta-story

ii. The Bible is the story of God

iii. The Bible is your story.

1. The Bible is the meta-story

The ‘me story’ syndrome dominates our cultural preferences and teachings. Linear views of history are largely thrown out in favour of billions of personal iterations and ‘my truths’ etc. The thing is, while promises of self-fulfilment sound appealing and liberating, they inevitably lead to one of two dead ends: pride or failure. If I succeed the ego blows up like a Macy’s Parade toy and blocks out the imago dei of everyone else, or life crushes and self worth falls apart.

We need a bigger story to belong to. That’s one reason why people latch onto all kinds of ideologies and clubs and movements. We want to be part of something that is bigger than ourselves. As human beings we are not wired to be solo but to belong and participate.

The Bible doesn’t give the ‘me story’, it gives us the meta-story of all things.

From Genesis to Revelation we are reading one incredible story. The Bible is the story of creation, the story of humanity, the story of what went wrong in the world, Abraham, the Exodus, the time of the Judges, David, Solomon, the prophets, Jesus, the book of Acts and the story of the church, th and rounding off with the book of Revelation. This is the story of the universe from beginning to its end and to the new beginning.

The Bible is a story. It is amazing literature. The Bible is like no other writing in its n it’s span of time and writers, and the diversity of writing styles: history, poetry, law, prophecy, parable, letters. And yet with all the diversity it is a cohesive whole.

The Bible isn’t a series of disconnected ideas and events, glued together ad hoc at the whim of some anonymous editor.

One of my favourite movies is Birdman, The unexpected virtue of ignorance (the Antonio Sanchez music score is brilliant). Even though I’ve watched the movie several times, I still don’t really get the plot. The Bible’s plot on the other hand is cohesive: rich in its themes and developing ideas and movements, and yet it’s clearly a whole.

The Bible itself joins the bits together. Not only as an historical timeline. But the thematic material with all its melodic lines and counter pointers, points in a single direction: to Jesus. It’s like all the events and ideas building and building in the Old Testament creating a dissonant 7th that can only find resolve in the person and work of Jesus Christ. This is evident by the reliable accounts we have of Jesus in the Gospel and New Testament writings.

Jesus himself made comments like this…

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. (Matthew 5:17)

‘“How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.’ (Luke 24:25-27)

The Bible isn’t just history, as in telling us what happened. We are given the meaning of history. The Bible (and specifically Jesus) is the interpretive grid for understand the world in which we inhabit. This Bible God made the universe with purpose, shape, and trajectory.

2. The Bible is the story of God

I need to qualify what I mean, or rather what the Bible means by this assertion. The Bible is God revealing himself. There are certainly human authors and their personalities and particulars often shine through the pages. Without diminishing human in put, the ultimate author is God. To read through the Bible is engage with God’s self revelation. Scripture is God showing himself and his person and character and purposes from start to finish.

This story will confront and make you nervous, and angry and sad and weep and rejoice. The reason for this array of human actions is because God’s story includes us.

3. The Bible is our story.

While the Bible is epic is scope and Divine in focus, we are not ignored or belittled. The Bible is also our story.

I can’t count the number of MRI visits we’ve had as a family between the kids with all their sporting injuries. What useful technology!

Reading the Bible can be like getting an MRI and seeing what’s inside. Wow, that’s me. Or, that really grates on me. The question really resonates.

One of the reasons the Bible has this kind of personal impact on people, whether causing anger or consoling, and everything in between, is because the Bible is addressing us. It is God’s word to us. It is telling our story.

Depending on which book of the Bible we’re talking about, some of it was first written to Israel, to Judah, to the church Ephesus or Rome. Different portions of the Bible had their initial readership, but the Bible’s intended audience is always greater and broader.

The Bible makes this case,

For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us (Romans 15:4)

These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come. (1 Corinthians 10:11)

There are many more sentences we could quote.

The Bible was written for us and it is about us. The Bible is about many things, especially, God and Jesus, but also us.

The Bible isn’t a museum piece. It doesn’t belong among the million books underneath the Victorian State library in its underground tunnels.

The Bible is honest about its aims. It doesn’t seek to hide or manipulate the author’s intention. Take this example from the book of Hebrews, one of latter NT books.

“For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.” (Hebrews 4:12-13)

The Bible opens us and jumps inside. Like Jumanji, it’s never just a board game where you remain external to it. The Bible affects readers.

The Bible addresses people in this way, because the God of the Bible understands the human condition. The Bible doesn’t sugarcoat the human condition, as we might find in many a classroom (and even some churches!)

The Bible is real and raw, and that is a good thing. The Bible healthily counters the ‘she’ll be right’ mentality and the ‘you be you’ sloganeering that dominates today. We need a story that is honest enough to explain that there is a major problem in this world and we can’t fix it. We need a story that recognises, I’m not okay. I wanna be, but I’m not.

One of the things that happens as we read, You can read lengthy passages in the Bible and be saying to yourself, This sounds like me. It’s like God has stuck a camera inside me and is writing down everything I’m thinking and feeling, my fears and hopes, my questions. Read the Psalms, large chunks of Jeremiah or Lamentations or Job.

To quote whoever, ‘he digs me’.

The Bible is confronting. Let’s not pretend that the words and message aren’t provocative and uncomfortable. These Scriptures challenge the status quo and confront assumptions and life commitments. The Bible exposes our deepest inclinations and desires. The pages have the ability to stimulate thought, stretch the intellect and breathe life into the soul.

The Bible is real to life

The Bible is confronting because it is real to life. The Bible doesn’t give religious escapism. We are confronted with the reality of evil, and the truth of human sinfulness, and the nature of a God who judges. The Bible doesn’t give us pat answers, it will all be well. No, there is something seriously wrong in the world, and the problems aren’t just out there in other people or governments and places, but in here too.

The Bible does more than confront and challenge. The Scriptures have a remarkable ability to comfort and bring peace and healing.

Some people enjoy books or movies that shock. Some people like an exciting thriller. Others want that happy ending. In real life, we want our ending to be a happy one, to find peace and hope. Psalm 19 describes it being like honey from comb and more precious than gold.

The Bible is God’s word of love to a messed up and sinful world. The words are written so that our conscience might be aroused and restored, and convinced that God is both right and good, holy and merciful. We won’t understand the great bits of the Bible without reading the hard parts. At the heart of the Bible is a message of reconciliation. God is, as Jesus wonderfully explains in the parable of the prodigal son, the Father who longs for the wayward to come back to him. The Bible is a word of reconciliation.

“All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. (2 Corinthians 5:18-19).

The Bible will come back

The Bible is without doubt the most influential writing in all history, and the most vital. Civilisations have risen and fallen on account of these words: the notions of equality between men and women find their origins in the Bible. The concept of ultimate justice and that this justice is good and fair, believing in a distinction between church and state, the idea of emancipation, and even ‘secular’ all find their roots in the Bible.

The Bible isn’t a western document, or Anglo-Saxon manifesto. The Bible rebukes us as readily as any culture. The Bible doesn’t mimic any given culture but has the remarkable ability to speak into every time and place. Just as the ministry of Moses, Elijah, Jeremiah, and Daniel each confronted the cultural and spiritual norms of their society, it is also the case with the ministry of Jesus and the Apostles, and this remains so today.

Now, you may not like what I’ve just said. Maybe you don’t care or you’re not interested, although if you’re listening you are probably at least a little bit interested.

My challenge is, read the Bible. If it’s all that it says it is, reading the bible will be the most important hours you ever spend. If it’s not, then you might learn some interesting ideas and facts and just carry on as you were.

King Henry VIII was in many respects are pretty rotten bloke. One decent decision Henry made was to let the people in England read the Bible in English. The reason being, the Bible couldn’t be accessed by everyday people. It was largely off limits and even if they could get their hands on a copy of the Scriptures it was unreadable unless you read Latin.

When the King of England determined that every Church in England should have a Bible available, traditional Catholics were horrified. At London’s St Paul’s Cathedral, 6copies of the Bible in English were given. Word quickly escaped such that so many people crowded into the Cathedral, huge numbers surrounded anyone who could read and urged them on to read the Bible out loud so that they could hear the words of God. As people began to read the Bible they started realising that what the priest said wasn’t always true to what the Bible says. There are stories with commoners shouting out during sermons to correct what the priests were saying.

It was electric, because the Bible isn’t a dead book, it is a living word and speaks to us today.

Conclusion:

Where there is uncertainty, we need a reliable foundation.

Where there is existential confusion, we need a divine word that can understand and empathise and and bring internal peace and rest.

Where there is political and ideological conflict we need a word that is greater and that can outlast and out perform.

Everyone is reading from a script, a story. There are stories being told to us by our culture, narratives written by those who shape our society, and we’re all looking for our place in that story.

The Bible is a better story, more true, confronting and consoling than we might imagine. The Bible is the story of us: where we come from, who we are, what’s gone wrong and where redemption is found.

The Bible knows me in this uncensored way. All the glory and the shame. And it knows us, not in some weird troll like way. It’s not 1984 or the CCP. But of the God who still cares for the universe he made and longs that we might know him and therefore find ourselves.

A couple of years ago the English historian Tom Holland made this interesting statement. Tom Holland isn’t a Christian (not yet anyway) but he recognises something good in Christianity, and one thing that seems to frustrate him are Christian clergy who take all the wonder and difficult bits out of the Christian faith. He said this,

“I see no point in bishops or preachers or Christian evangelists just recycling the kind of stuff you can get from any kind of soft left liberal because everyone is giving that…if they’ve got views on original sin I would be very interested to hear that”.

The Bible is really old and it’s brand new. The claims of Jesus are outrageous and warmly compelling. Church is little bit weird.

Get a Bible. Download it for free. Our church happily gives away Bibles to anyone who asks.

Read and see where the Bible takes you…

“They are more precious than gold,
than much pure gold;
they are sweeter than honey,
than honey from the honeycomb.

By them your servant is warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.

But who can discern their own errors?
Forgive my hidden faults.

Keep your servant also from willful sins;
may they not rule over me.
Then I will be blameless,
innocent of great transgression.

May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart
be pleasing in your sight,
Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.

(Psalm 19:10-14)