Your response is very interesting. I tend to read your final line as “We can trust the text to mean what we think it says.” Maybe I have become too jaded by postmodernism and critical theory. I like the idea of Richard Rohr and others of a second naivite. We start with “The Bible tells me So,” and then it stops working. We go through a process of losing our certainty in a perfect inerrant text. Then we reach a place where God’s Spirit continues to speak in Biblical imperfections and our own. I am always wary of idolizing an inerrant Bible. Such a view insists that translators and interpreters are inerrant.

Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary, near where I live, insists in the inerrancy of the original manuscripts. That is the very definition of a statement of faith. We don’t have the original manuscripts so know one can refute or support the statement. For me the discrepancies in the Bible don’t need to be harmonized. They can be explored to understand how John’s community, Matthew’s community, Luke’s community, understood the Gospel message.

Depending on your approach to Paul, he appears to have matured and changed some of his views over time. God reveals his mysteries to us through Scripture, the Church Community, History, Science, and the still small voice of the Spirit. I would be more wary of trying to muzzle God than questioning part of an inherited theological tradition.

As Psalm 19 asserts, “The Heavens declare the Glory of God.” I suppose I could return to 480 page Encyclopedias of Biblical Difficulties to flatten our the tensions. But for me, if it takes that long to answer all the supposed discrepancies, it would be better to wrestle with them instead of resolving them.

If you are interested in my application of the Beatitudes to our present political moment feel free to check out one example. https://medium.com/@timcastner/how-will-god-vote-part-iv-87d3f5055568

Blessings