It does not require great learning to be a Christian and be convinced of the truth of the Bible. It requires only an honest heart and a willingness to obey God.

The saying contrasts intellectual attainment with moral and spiritual disposition. Barnes’s point is that Christian faith and confidence in Scripture are not primarily the rewards of scholarly expertise but of sincerity—an “honest heart”—and a practical readiness to follow divine commands. Implicitly, it democratizes access to religious truth: ordinary believers are not disqualified by limited education, while the learned are not automatically qualified by learning alone. The emphasis on obedience suggests a Protestant, experiential epistemology in which truth is apprehended through conscience, humility, and lived commitment rather than merely through academic argument.