For the Bible Tells Me So
This post is going to be uncomfortable. It will, to some, be the most controversial thing that I will write about pertaining to our discernment, knowing God and doing life together. It will challenge us. I am not trying to say I know the answers on this subject. As I have already shared previously I am open to the understanding that I don't have all the answers. I do not fully know the mind of God and I am not going to pretend that I do. I just want to share how I am thinking openly about all aspects that go into the decisions that we make around any issue.
We should talk about the Bible and interpreting the scriptures.
We need to talk about this because, for many of us, including me, it is our interpretation of the Bible that plays the strongest role in understanding as we seek to follow Jesus. It is the primary resource we use to understand God's will. In future posts, I will be sharing how the scriptures help to shape my belief so let's spend some time talking about interpreting the Bible.
I want to begin by saying I consider myself a biblical conservative. What I mean by this is that I take the Bible very seriously and I believe that we should do what it says. I think the Bible extremely important. I read the Bible every day. I start each day in the scriptures as a foundation for my day. I long to have it written on my heart and to shape my life. I think that the Bible is inspired by God and useful for teaching and rebuking as it says in 2 Timothy. I believe that God reveals himself to us through the scriptures and speaks to our lives. I believe that it is divinely inspired and because of that, it has power. Those of you that know me, I believe know this to be true about me.
Much of the division that has taken place within the church on these issues have to do with Biblical interpretation. If we could all agree on how to interpret what the Bible says then things would be easier. Not so messy. Not so difficult. But, the truth is, we all don't agree on how to interpret the Bible. We have different beliefs and we say, "I believe what I believe because the Bible tells me so."
Some people will say that this can not be the case. Someone has to be right and someone is wrong. People who take this position say my interpretation is right and any other interpretation is wrong.
I want to suggest that it may be possible to experience the Holy Spirit and the truth of God as we live in the tension of different opinions. I don't want to say I am right and you are wrong. I want to say this is what I believe according to my interpretation of the scriptures and I am open to what I don't yet know and what I can learn from others who believe differently than I do.
I am not saying that God's truth is subjective, what I am saying is that my interpretation of it could be limited by my own subjectivity. I think as a church we need to be open to diversity even when it comes to differing views of how to interpret the scriptures I am ultimately suggesting a humility and a gentleness with our interpretation of scriptures that can build one another up and not tear others down. It is in the patient bearing with one another that we might discover more fully the truth of God. I am suggesting what I interpret Paul daying as he writes describing that which unites us together and also how our diversity will build us up.
It is possible for others to interpret the same scripture differently. Shoot, at different times in my life the same verse has spoken to me differently. I have interpreted it differently at times. I need to be open to what I don't know and be ok with others interpreting the scriptures differently. It is through conversation and listening to others who believe differently than me that I can understand more fully what I believe. I love when I am in a small group of people reading the Bible together and each of us interprets something different from the same passage. It is moments like this that I understand the Bible as living, active and God-breathed, as it speaks into each person's life the word of God that they need to hear. On this level, I think it is easy for all of us to be open to different interpretations.
It is on the understanding of how we interpret the scriptures that it gets more difficult for us. Do we take every passage as literal? What do we do with troublesome passages? What about the passages that seem to contradict themselves? Do we still follow all of the law or just 10 commandments? What do we do with the other 600+ laws? Can we do like Jesus and sum them all up in one? Do we make anything of the historical context that the scripture is written in? What about the authors, do they bring anything to the text? What is meant by divine inspiration?
There is really a lot that goes into how we interpret the scriptures. It could be, and I believe it is, more complicated than just "this is what it says." I have spent over 20 years as a student of the Bible and I have to say that I continue to peel back layers of understanding and meaning as I have been open to meditating and studying the scriptures. My understanding of the scriptures and how to interpret them has changed since I first opened the cover.
Early on in my relationship with Christ my understanding of interpreting the scripture was very simplified. I went with the philosophy that if it is the word of God and if it says to "do it" then you do it and if it says "don't do it" then don't do it. I wanted to take it all as the very literal word of God. On a certain level, this would be so easy. Certainly would require less work on my part to interpret and since I only know in part it seems great. But, there are times it is unclear, to me at least, if the Bible is saying "do it" or "don't do it". There are also places that the Bible says to do something in one place and says not to do it in another. Jesus on more than one occasion says "it was said of old to do _______ But I say __________". If we are honest, we must admit that understanding what God is revealing through the words of the scripture is just not that simple to do. It is unlike any other book we will ever read.
When I was in seminary, for a preaching class I was asked to write a sermon on Judges 19. If you are not familiar with this passage, I will try to give you a readers digest version of the story that takes place in this chapter. I do want to warn you, however, this is not one of the stories that were shared in Sunday School class with a flannel board. For younger generations, there has not been a VeggieTales made of this story.
In Judges 19 read about a Levite man who was traveling with his concubine from Bethlehem in Judea to his home in the hill country of Ephriam. Along the journey, he is welcomed as a guest in a man's home in Gibeah. While he is at the man's house a group of men came to the house and demanded that the old man send the Levite out of the house so that they can have sex with him. The man refuses to send out the guest in his home but instead offers his virgin daughter and the man's concubine. The men still want the man to come out but instead, he sends out his concubine and closes the door behind her. We are told that they rape her and abuse her throughout the night. The next morning the man finds her dead on the doorstep. The story ends with the man taking the dead woman back to his home and then cutting her up into twelve pieces and sending her to the 12 tribes of Isreal.
***Side note. In this particular preaching class, before I received this assignment, the teacher told us not to worry we would not be asked to do sermons on any of the difficult passages of scripture. I am so glad I didn't get one of those difficult scriptures she was referring to.
This is in the Bible. You can look it up and read it for yourself in Joshua 19:20-30. I have only heard one sermon on this passage. It was the sermon I preached for the assignment. How are we supposed to interpret this scripture? How is it inspired by God? Does the context matter? Do human authors matter? Am I to interpret this as a literal description of how we are to treat women? Is this a passage about homosexuality? Is this a metaphor? Is it an allegory? What is it going on and why is this in the Bible? I am not going to go through my interpretation of this particular passage. I share this to show the difficulty that we can have with interpreting scripture. How do we interpret this? Are we supposed to read this and say it is ok to treat women like this because they do it in the Bible? Are we to see that women should be property used to protect men? Do we read this story as one story or is it part of a bigger story that can help us discover meaning?
Interpretation is really not as easy as saying, "well the Bible says so." The Bible has over 31,000 verses it says a lot of things but we may not fully understand what the Bible is saying. At times the Bible might be saying one thing and actually showing us what not do. We might read about God's people doing unGodly things. Just because we see God's people do it does not mean it is good. One of my takeaways from the story in Judges, which was significant for me in interpreting scripture, is that sometimes what we see is what not to do without the words "thou shall not." Sometimes the stories we read reflect human behavior and not God's desire. Sometimes this is difficult to figure out.
Just because we read about it happening in the Bible does not mean it is something we still do today. Slavery. The roles of woman. An eye for an eye. I said earlier that there are over 600 laws given to Moses and we don't even come close to enforcing them and living out those laws. Many of those laws we will say don't pertain anymore. It is a different time and a different place. We don't have any problem wearing poly-cotton blends. We will eat rare meat and not think twice about it. I can't remember the last time we put people to death for adultery. To name just a few. We don't make all the offerings and sacrifices that God commanded his followers to do. All of these would be direct disobedience to the scriptures if our only interpretation is, "the Bible says so." If we are honest, we have interpreted some scriptures as more important as others. Some we say that is not for us now. If this is possible how does that play into how we interpret other scriptures? Who chooses what we "have to" follow or don't "have to" follow anymore?
We do have some scriptures we don't take as serious or read as timeless as we do others. In fact, we see Jesus do that. Is it ok for Jesus to say that scriptures don't pertain anymore? I think so. He is Jesus. But if Jesus believed that every word is unchanging the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. If that is how Jesus interpreted the scripture in His day he would not say in His sermon on the mount over and over "you have heard it said __________, But I say _______________." Jesus says scripture, as it was interpreted, is now to be understood differently.
How we interpret the scriptures does play into our discussion about different topics. I have friends and colleagues who interpret scriptures differently than I do. I am a biblical conservative as I stated before. I am pretty conservative in how I read the scriptures. But, I also know that a conservative reading of the Bible, if I take what the Bible says to be true for my life, means that socially I will have to be pretty progressive. The unconditional love of one another is pretty progressive, but if I take seriously the teaching of the scripture and the words of Jesus, I must love everyone unconditionally. When it comes to grace and mercy, a conservative reading of the Bible will lead to being progressive with my grace, love, and mercy. A conservative reading of the scriptures leads to a progressive understanding of justice and a strong stance against injustice. If we really take what we interpret the Bible to mean seriously the way we love and treat one another has to be taken seriously. I think a conservative reading of the Bible leads me to openness towards people who don't think like me, act like me, and interpret the scripture different than me.
The unity that Paul talks about in the passage that I shared above is a unity on the things that are important. A oneness that comes from the profession and sharing in the "unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace." It is being united in one body. United by one Spirit. United in one hope. United in "one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all." He doesn't say that we will be one in the opinion all the time. It does not say that we will have uniformity of thinking. He says that we will have unity of the Spirit. I think he knew we would disagree on some things. After all, he is the author of the words, "we only know in part." I think that he why reminds us that our unity will require patience and bearing with one another. I think that is why he tells us that as we seek to live in unity with one another we have to get rid of bitterness, anger, and rage. He tells not to brawl with each other or slander one another. He reminds us that we are going to need to be kind, compassionate and forgiving. I believe that if oneness was uniformity than Paul would not have to write those words. I also believe it would be pretty limiting and boring. I don't read anywhere in the scriptures that life in Christ's is either of those things. This, of course, is just how I interpret it.
So, If you read this far, thank you.
I want to offer you a challenge. Talk with someone who interprets scripture differently than you. Talk with them sharing kindness and compassion. Listen to them. Be ok with not agreeing or changing their mind. Love in the tension of not seeing eye to eye. Be open to the idea that none of us fully know the mind of God. Trust and seek God. If you don't have anyone to discuss different ways to interpret scriptures around the issues of same-sex marriage and homosexuality with I will share a link at the bottom with you. The writer does a good job of looking at traditional interpretations of the passages around these topics and also presenting other ways to interpret these scriptures. Please be respectful, kind and open to his opinions and interpretations or just don't follow the link. I also have a link to Adam Hamilton's book Making Sense of the Bible. Rev. Hamilton does some good work on understanding biblical interpretation.
I'll finish with the words of the old hymn, "Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so. Little ones to Him belong, they are weak but He is strong."
As God's little ones, trust and seek God in and through the life-giving words of the Bible.
Love Today,
In Christ's love and mine,
Doug
http://www.matthewvines.com/transcript/?fbclid=IwAR3esGii1hNumY_g14mASiXAtgQnmmClCbzd5nZSd8OWqPJB_-ZSfpE6VbA
https://www.adamhamilton.com/books/item/9780062234964/
We should talk about the Bible and interpreting the scriptures.
We need to talk about this because, for many of us, including me, it is our interpretation of the Bible that plays the strongest role in understanding as we seek to follow Jesus. It is the primary resource we use to understand God's will. In future posts, I will be sharing how the scriptures help to shape my belief so let's spend some time talking about interpreting the Bible.
I want to begin by saying I consider myself a biblical conservative. What I mean by this is that I take the Bible very seriously and I believe that we should do what it says. I think the Bible extremely important. I read the Bible every day. I start each day in the scriptures as a foundation for my day. I long to have it written on my heart and to shape my life. I think that the Bible is inspired by God and useful for teaching and rebuking as it says in 2 Timothy. I believe that God reveals himself to us through the scriptures and speaks to our lives. I believe that it is divinely inspired and because of that, it has power. Those of you that know me, I believe know this to be true about me.
Much of the division that has taken place within the church on these issues have to do with Biblical interpretation. If we could all agree on how to interpret what the Bible says then things would be easier. Not so messy. Not so difficult. But, the truth is, we all don't agree on how to interpret the Bible. We have different beliefs and we say, "I believe what I believe because the Bible tells me so."
Some people will say that this can not be the case. Someone has to be right and someone is wrong. People who take this position say my interpretation is right and any other interpretation is wrong.
I want to suggest that it may be possible to experience the Holy Spirit and the truth of God as we live in the tension of different opinions. I don't want to say I am right and you are wrong. I want to say this is what I believe according to my interpretation of the scriptures and I am open to what I don't yet know and what I can learn from others who believe differently than I do.
I am not saying that God's truth is subjective, what I am saying is that my interpretation of it could be limited by my own subjectivity. I think as a church we need to be open to diversity even when it comes to differing views of how to interpret the scriptures I am ultimately suggesting a humility and a gentleness with our interpretation of scriptures that can build one another up and not tear others down. It is in the patient bearing with one another that we might discover more fully the truth of God. I am suggesting what I interpret Paul daying as he writes describing that which unites us together and also how our diversity will build us up.
As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it...So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. Ephesians 4:1-7, 11-16Paul closes out the chapter in verses 31 & 32 with this.
Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.I have already stated that for me the most biblical and faithful response is that I don't fully know. I have shared how I interpret the Bible to support this position. This position must pertain also to my interpretation of scripture. How I interpret scripture is just that-- my interpretation of scripture. I am not God and I don't corner the market on the knowledge of God. My mind is not the mind of God. For me, I need to be open to the idea that my interpretation is limited by me and my knowledge. Limited by the lenses of my tradition, my experiences, and my reasoning. (Also, broadened by them.) But, I don't fully know.
It is possible for others to interpret the same scripture differently. Shoot, at different times in my life the same verse has spoken to me differently. I have interpreted it differently at times. I need to be open to what I don't know and be ok with others interpreting the scriptures differently. It is through conversation and listening to others who believe differently than me that I can understand more fully what I believe. I love when I am in a small group of people reading the Bible together and each of us interprets something different from the same passage. It is moments like this that I understand the Bible as living, active and God-breathed, as it speaks into each person's life the word of God that they need to hear. On this level, I think it is easy for all of us to be open to different interpretations.
It is on the understanding of how we interpret the scriptures that it gets more difficult for us. Do we take every passage as literal? What do we do with troublesome passages? What about the passages that seem to contradict themselves? Do we still follow all of the law or just 10 commandments? What do we do with the other 600+ laws? Can we do like Jesus and sum them all up in one? Do we make anything of the historical context that the scripture is written in? What about the authors, do they bring anything to the text? What is meant by divine inspiration?
There is really a lot that goes into how we interpret the scriptures. It could be, and I believe it is, more complicated than just "this is what it says." I have spent over 20 years as a student of the Bible and I have to say that I continue to peel back layers of understanding and meaning as I have been open to meditating and studying the scriptures. My understanding of the scriptures and how to interpret them has changed since I first opened the cover.
Early on in my relationship with Christ my understanding of interpreting the scripture was very simplified. I went with the philosophy that if it is the word of God and if it says to "do it" then you do it and if it says "don't do it" then don't do it. I wanted to take it all as the very literal word of God. On a certain level, this would be so easy. Certainly would require less work on my part to interpret and since I only know in part it seems great. But, there are times it is unclear, to me at least, if the Bible is saying "do it" or "don't do it". There are also places that the Bible says to do something in one place and says not to do it in another. Jesus on more than one occasion says "it was said of old to do _______ But I say __________". If we are honest, we must admit that understanding what God is revealing through the words of the scripture is just not that simple to do. It is unlike any other book we will ever read.
When I was in seminary, for a preaching class I was asked to write a sermon on Judges 19. If you are not familiar with this passage, I will try to give you a readers digest version of the story that takes place in this chapter. I do want to warn you, however, this is not one of the stories that were shared in Sunday School class with a flannel board. For younger generations, there has not been a VeggieTales made of this story.
In Judges 19 read about a Levite man who was traveling with his concubine from Bethlehem in Judea to his home in the hill country of Ephriam. Along the journey, he is welcomed as a guest in a man's home in Gibeah. While he is at the man's house a group of men came to the house and demanded that the old man send the Levite out of the house so that they can have sex with him. The man refuses to send out the guest in his home but instead offers his virgin daughter and the man's concubine. The men still want the man to come out but instead, he sends out his concubine and closes the door behind her. We are told that they rape her and abuse her throughout the night. The next morning the man finds her dead on the doorstep. The story ends with the man taking the dead woman back to his home and then cutting her up into twelve pieces and sending her to the 12 tribes of Isreal.
***Side note. In this particular preaching class, before I received this assignment, the teacher told us not to worry we would not be asked to do sermons on any of the difficult passages of scripture. I am so glad I didn't get one of those difficult scriptures she was referring to.
This is in the Bible. You can look it up and read it for yourself in Joshua 19:20-30. I have only heard one sermon on this passage. It was the sermon I preached for the assignment. How are we supposed to interpret this scripture? How is it inspired by God? Does the context matter? Do human authors matter? Am I to interpret this as a literal description of how we are to treat women? Is this a passage about homosexuality? Is this a metaphor? Is it an allegory? What is it going on and why is this in the Bible? I am not going to go through my interpretation of this particular passage. I share this to show the difficulty that we can have with interpreting scripture. How do we interpret this? Are we supposed to read this and say it is ok to treat women like this because they do it in the Bible? Are we to see that women should be property used to protect men? Do we read this story as one story or is it part of a bigger story that can help us discover meaning?
Interpretation is really not as easy as saying, "well the Bible says so." The Bible has over 31,000 verses it says a lot of things but we may not fully understand what the Bible is saying. At times the Bible might be saying one thing and actually showing us what not do. We might read about God's people doing unGodly things. Just because we see God's people do it does not mean it is good. One of my takeaways from the story in Judges, which was significant for me in interpreting scripture, is that sometimes what we see is what not to do without the words "thou shall not." Sometimes the stories we read reflect human behavior and not God's desire. Sometimes this is difficult to figure out.
Just because we read about it happening in the Bible does not mean it is something we still do today. Slavery. The roles of woman. An eye for an eye. I said earlier that there are over 600 laws given to Moses and we don't even come close to enforcing them and living out those laws. Many of those laws we will say don't pertain anymore. It is a different time and a different place. We don't have any problem wearing poly-cotton blends. We will eat rare meat and not think twice about it. I can't remember the last time we put people to death for adultery. To name just a few. We don't make all the offerings and sacrifices that God commanded his followers to do. All of these would be direct disobedience to the scriptures if our only interpretation is, "the Bible says so." If we are honest, we have interpreted some scriptures as more important as others. Some we say that is not for us now. If this is possible how does that play into how we interpret other scriptures? Who chooses what we "have to" follow or don't "have to" follow anymore?
We do have some scriptures we don't take as serious or read as timeless as we do others. In fact, we see Jesus do that. Is it ok for Jesus to say that scriptures don't pertain anymore? I think so. He is Jesus. But if Jesus believed that every word is unchanging the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. If that is how Jesus interpreted the scripture in His day he would not say in His sermon on the mount over and over "you have heard it said __________, But I say _______________." Jesus says scripture, as it was interpreted, is now to be understood differently.
How we interpret the scriptures does play into our discussion about different topics. I have friends and colleagues who interpret scriptures differently than I do. I am a biblical conservative as I stated before. I am pretty conservative in how I read the scriptures. But, I also know that a conservative reading of the Bible, if I take what the Bible says to be true for my life, means that socially I will have to be pretty progressive. The unconditional love of one another is pretty progressive, but if I take seriously the teaching of the scripture and the words of Jesus, I must love everyone unconditionally. When it comes to grace and mercy, a conservative reading of the Bible will lead to being progressive with my grace, love, and mercy. A conservative reading of the scriptures leads to a progressive understanding of justice and a strong stance against injustice. If we really take what we interpret the Bible to mean seriously the way we love and treat one another has to be taken seriously. I think a conservative reading of the Bible leads me to openness towards people who don't think like me, act like me, and interpret the scripture different than me.
The unity that Paul talks about in the passage that I shared above is a unity on the things that are important. A oneness that comes from the profession and sharing in the "unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace." It is being united in one body. United by one Spirit. United in one hope. United in "one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all." He doesn't say that we will be one in the opinion all the time. It does not say that we will have uniformity of thinking. He says that we will have unity of the Spirit. I think he knew we would disagree on some things. After all, he is the author of the words, "we only know in part." I think that he why reminds us that our unity will require patience and bearing with one another. I think that is why he tells us that as we seek to live in unity with one another we have to get rid of bitterness, anger, and rage. He tells not to brawl with each other or slander one another. He reminds us that we are going to need to be kind, compassionate and forgiving. I believe that if oneness was uniformity than Paul would not have to write those words. I also believe it would be pretty limiting and boring. I don't read anywhere in the scriptures that life in Christ's is either of those things. This, of course, is just how I interpret it.
So, If you read this far, thank you.
I want to offer you a challenge. Talk with someone who interprets scripture differently than you. Talk with them sharing kindness and compassion. Listen to them. Be ok with not agreeing or changing their mind. Love in the tension of not seeing eye to eye. Be open to the idea that none of us fully know the mind of God. Trust and seek God. If you don't have anyone to discuss different ways to interpret scriptures around the issues of same-sex marriage and homosexuality with I will share a link at the bottom with you. The writer does a good job of looking at traditional interpretations of the passages around these topics and also presenting other ways to interpret these scriptures. Please be respectful, kind and open to his opinions and interpretations or just don't follow the link. I also have a link to Adam Hamilton's book Making Sense of the Bible. Rev. Hamilton does some good work on understanding biblical interpretation.
I'll finish with the words of the old hymn, "Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so. Little ones to Him belong, they are weak but He is strong."
As God's little ones, trust and seek God in and through the life-giving words of the Bible.
Love Today,
In Christ's love and mine,
Doug
http://www.matthewvines.com/transcript/?fbclid=IwAR3esGii1hNumY_g14mASiXAtgQnmmClCbzd5nZSd8OWqPJB_-ZSfpE6VbA
https://www.adamhamilton.com/books/item/9780062234964/
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