Tuesday, January 6, 2015

Reading the scriptures

I'm beginning a new small group Thursday evening that takes a critical look at the, uh, humanity behind the Bible.

I offer up this as a way of looking at the ones who wrote it.

From the Psalms: "how long do we have to put up with this, God? Do you have it in for us for good? Will your smoldering rage never cool down? If you're going to be angry be angry with the pagans who care nothing about you, or your rival kingdoms who ignore you. They're the one who ruined Jacob, who wrecked and looted the place where we lived. Don't blame us for the sins of our parents. Hurry up and help us, we're at the end of our rope. You're famous for helping, God, give us a break. Your reputation is on the line. Pull us out of this mess, forgive us our sins -- do what you're famous for doing!"

First, I never pray in exclamation points. That's just me. I never command God in my prayers. I never, thus far, have asked about his smoldering rage. And I've never asked God to be angry or smite another group of beings.

Although there are a few Panthers and Panthers fans that I might -- just saying.

The point of the study, the point of this piece is that the circumstances in which we now live are dramatically different from the circumstances of the Old Testament, and yes, the New as well. We are not a tribal society on the move and at battle with our neighbors and our neighbors gods. Well, not really.

So, the words, the descriptions, and even the prayers are different. That's the difficulty in reading scripture as a book of instructions.

The Psalm, the 79th, continues, "Don't let the heathen get by with their sneers. Where's your God? Is he out to lunch? Go public and show the godless world that they can't kill your servants and get by with it."

That's not the culture we find ourselves in, although I know some would say something about Islam at this point, but that's not us. That's not Christian. That's not what we believe the scriptures say to us today.

It doesn't mean the holy scriptures don't talk to us. It doesn't mean we can't learn great wisdom. It doesn't mean we should ignore them.

It means we must read them with a critical eye that understands they were written, in some cases, more than 3,000 years ago. Hence, what they understood and what we understand must be two different things.

We don't call down fire and brimstone. We do love our neighbor as ourselves. Different times, same Savior.

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