If we recognise that every bit of scripture is both describing and prescribing something, the question is this “descriptive” or “prescriptive”? becomes unhelpful and not a little limiting. If we always answer both, we are forced to ask how do we tell which is which? It can be more helpful to reframe our original question into two, and add a third question between them, to get to the heart of the passage. The more accurate and helpful set of questions are: (1) what is this describing? (2) why is this here? and, (3) what, therefore, is this prescribing? Let me explain.

Here is a phrase-cum-question you often hear knocking about in discussions about the biblical text: is it descriptive or prescriptive? What they mean to ask by that is something like this: is this passage simply describing a thing that happened and isn’t binding on us or is it showing us something that we ought to copy and emulate? Is it merely describing an event (descriptive) or is it giving us some instruction (prescriptive)?
You are most likely to hear this descriptive/prescriptive chat when it comes to the book of Acts. But there’s plenty of Old Testament and gospel examples of the same kind of discussion. Sometimes, though people will use different words to say effectively the same thing, this question is behind any comment anyone ever makes along the lines, ‘that was just cultural’. In other words, it’s just describing the culture of the day and its practices, not binding us into doing exactly as they were doing.
Now, before I go on, it bears saying this is a legitimate question to ask. Not everything, in exactly the form it is described in the Bible, is binding on us. Just go and read the book of Judges, for example. Particularly any of the latter half. Almost nobody reckons just about any part of what is described there – in the form it happened – is stuff for us to emulate and copy today. Most of us are pretty clear it is describing what happened, not prescribing a pattern for us to follow.
Similarly, some stuff in the Bible is evidently binding on us and everybody reckons they are clear and obvious commands to follow. Turn to Matthew 5:21 or Romans 13:9 or James 2:11. It’s hard to argue that these things are merely descriptions of events that took place, not least because they aren’t describing any particular events! Nobody to my knowledge argues anything other than these are binding commands of Jesus. They are not describing any happenings, they are prescribing how we must behave as believers.
So far, so obvious, right? But what do we do with narrative passages of scripture? Most narratives don’t have any obvious binding commands in them directed at us. Whether stuff in Judges and Kings or New Testament narrative like Acts. Most of these narrative are describing events and don’t have commands from God directed to us the reader.
The problem with saying they’re prescriptive is they’re often full of mad stuff that really doesn’t seem like the sort of thing Jesus would have us do. Which of us, for example, reads 2 Samuel 11 and thinks that is just what Jesus wants his followers to do? So, we may say, these things are obviously just descriptive. But the problem here is that they are in the Bible and 2 Timothy 3:16-17 tells us pretty clearly all scripture is God-breathed and given to us for a reason, specifically so that we might be learn from it and be trained in righteousness. If the danger of saying narratives are prescriptive is that we might be led to prescribe all kinds of mad things, the danger of saying they’re descriptive is we think they prescribe (and therefore say) nothing at all!
But the story of the Levite cutting up his concubine and sending her body parts all over Israel is in our Bible for a reason, isn’t it? It might well not be prescribed – it isn’t something we are to emulate – but the purpose of the story surely exists to tell us something about God, his character, his people and how they ought to respond to him.
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When you’re stuck, frustrated, and apathetic, remember these words: Jesus will hold you fast. You can’t do it on your own—none of us can. We weren’t designed to and God doesn’t pretend that we’re supposed to. Hold onto God! Don’t let go! The finish line to true freedom is closer each and every day. 

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.  (Hebrews‬ ‭10‬:‭23‬ ‭ESV‬‬)
Recently I was in my car and the Norton Hall version of “He Will Hold Me Fast” came through my speakers. Of course, I began listening to it, for it has to be a rare moment to pass that song up.
The lyrics, like usual, struck me. They just hit different. They hit different because I felt different. On this particular day, I felt rather lousy—physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Call it what you want, but my head and heart just weren’t there. So as a listened, I broke.
I could never keep my hold — when I sang those words I began to lose it. Though I felt lousy I knew I didn’t have a lousy Savior. Those words rang more true on that day than others. On a day when I could feel my lousiness and apathy, this song struck me in the heart. I could never keep my hold of Jesus, because unfortunately my love is often cold.
But He will hold me fast. Matter fact, according to His promises, He must hold me fast. And thank God for that.
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Hebrews teaches us never to lose sight of the fact that the priesthood, sacrifices, liturgy and life of the Old Testament church are simply a rough copy. Christ is the original; He is the antitype, the pictures of the Old Testament form the type.

“Time past and time present are both together in time future,” wrote T.S. Elliot. His rhythmic words simply and eloquently describe the ordinary flow of history. But the letter to the Hebrews presents a very different perspective on God’s purposes and patterns in the flow of history. There, it would be true to say, the future determines the past and the present, rather than the other way round. To understand Hebrews — and thus to understand how the Bible as a whole works — we need to understand this riddle: The invisible is more substantial than the visible. The future comes before the past. The new is more fundamental than the old. What does all this mean? Simply put, it means that the story of the Lord Jesus, His person and work, is not a divine afterthought, a heavenly “plan b” hurriedly scrambled together when “plan a” went horribly wrong in Eden. No — the coming of Christ was in the plan before the Fall. Everything that precedes it chronologically actually follows it logically.
From one point of view, of course, the Old Testament serves as the model of what Christ would come to accomplish. But Hebrews teaches us never to lose sight of the fact that the priesthood, sacrifices, liturgy and life of the Old Testament church are simply a rough copy. Christ is the original; He is the antitype, the pictures of the Old Testament form the type.
This principle is given its clearest expression in Hebrews 9:23 which refers to the Old Testament tabernacle, priesthood and sacrifices as “the copies of the heavenly things.” Yet more picturesquely, Hebrews 10:1 describes the law as “but a shadow of the good things to come.” Copies depend on an original; a shadow does not exist apart from the person whose shadow it is and from whom it takes its shape.
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