|
Thought for the Week Sunday
25 October – Trinity 20 – Bible Sunday
Today is Bible Sunday. What that means to us as
Christians is that it is a day that we remember what the Bible means to us. What comes over loud and clear from our Gospel reading
is that it doesn’t matter how well you know your bible, how well you can
quote from it, how intimate a knowledge you have of it … that knowledge of
itself will not get you anywhere. Just like going to church on Sunday of
itself will not get you anywhere, other than the church building that is! I am minded of the little girl who every night
before going to bed said goodnight to her grandmother of some advancing
years. Every time she said goodnight, her grandmother had her nose well and
truly stuck in the bible. She was avidly devouring every word. One evening she could retain herself no
longer and asked her mother why granny was always reading her bible so
avidly. Mother was not a bit perplexed and immediately replied that granny
being 90 odd was studying for her finals! You see, Jesus had it right, didn’t he? “You
diligently study the scriptures because you think that by them you possess
eternal life” he said. Wrong!!! Of course then, when Jesus was talking, the
scriptures were the Jewish Scriptures … basically what we know as the Old
Testament. Those scriptures told of him, of the Messiah who was to come, of
the servant king, of he who was pierced for our transgressions, of him who
was lead like a lamb to the slaughter, of him in whom there was no violence
and from whose mouth no deceit was uttered. And yet those who knew those
scriptures back to front had them in their head like an academic exercise and
when that Messiah came because he came with a message of peace,
reconciliation, compassion and love he was not recognized. Despite all the
signs. But it was in and through him that eternal life was there for the
taking. There are none so deaf as those who choose not to hear. The Jews were
awaiting a quite different Messiah, one who would rescue them from the
jackboot of Imperial Rome and from the curse of the gentile Samaria. One
whose message would be the very opposite of that with which Jesus revealed
himself. The Bible in its present form, that is the Old
Testament and the New Testament combined, is undoubtedly the most successful
book ever written --- well, compiled, any way. For something in excess of a
thousand years it has been the most widely circulated of all books, it has
influenced the culture, language and art of more people than any other book.
It has been studied, analysed and adapted until the cows come home.
If I remember rightly, Cecil B De Mille made
a film about it … if he didn’t and I am wrong, then he should have! Amazingly it is, and has been almost since it was
first published as a printed book back in about 1455, the world’s best
seller, even now when we seem to be beset with cynicism in every quarter. It
provides the documentary basis for Judaism, Christianity and to a lesser
extent the prehistory of Islam. In 2001 there was published by Phaidon Press
Ltd. a book, written by the historian Christopher De Hamel, called “The Book.
A History of the Bible.” It is a lucid and very informative work without
being evangelical or controversial. It is well worth reading as an objective
assessment of this amazing book. Well, be that as it may, the study of the Bible can
remain an interesting intellectual exercise, indeed one may question oneself
as to why with a book that is so extensively read, analysed and studied not
every one has turned to Christianity as their chosen faith. The answer to
that one is that theology is one thing, Faith is another. The Bible is merely
a signpost, it is not the be all and end all. It does not give us eternal
life. Used as a signpost it can lead
us to eternal life. Why? The words of Jesus although spoken when the
scriptures were only the Old Testament are as true today as they were then.
“You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you
possess eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me, yet you
refuse to come to me to have eternal life.” I think that when the writer to
the Hebrews wrote in chapter 4 “For the word of God is living and active.
Sharper than any double-edged sword. It penetrates even to dividing soul and
spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the
heart.” He had exactly what Jesus had to say in mind. Today we have the benefit of not only the Old
Testament but the New Testament as well. The Old Testament tells us the story
of God’s relationship with the Jewish nation throughout its history and of
the coming Messiah. The New Testament tells us of the arrival and the life
and ministry of that Messiah … and the Bible is the only source endorsed by
the Church as a whole of that life and ministry. We can’t learn about it
anywhere else. But of course we can study the Bible as a whole as
nothing more than a stimulating intellectual exercise.. Theology is the study
or science that treats of God, his nature and attributes and his relationship
with man and the universal. Theologians use the Bible as part of this study
or science. There are theologians who are not Christians, there are those who
use theology as a means to an end but are not themselves Christians. Reading
and studying the Bible does not of itself make one a Christian, to state the
obvious. As I have said before, the Bible is a signpost pointing the way ------
what to? To faith in Jesus Christ as a personal Saviour ----- that is what
gives eternal life. Following the way indicated by the signpost and
accepting Jesus as the Son of God, as our Saviour, as the one who was
crucified and resurrected. To quote Paul “a stumbling block to the Jews and
foolishness to the Gentiles but to those whom God has called, both Jews and
Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.” So if the Bible is so widely read, why is it that
everybody that reads it is not a Christian? I think again that we can rely
upon Paul to give the answer. Intellectual pride is one answer, not being prepared
to surrender self is another. But I did say we can rely upon Paul to give the
answer. “The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from
the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, he cannot understand
them, because they are spiritually discerned.” …. So writes Paul in his first
letter to the Corinthians. I am not saying that it is wrong to look at the
Bible in intellectual terms. I am not saying it is wrong to use our brains in
reading the Bible. But before all of that or perhaps during all of that, we
need an open mind; we need to be prepared to move, intellectually,
spiritually and deep within us. We need to be open to the Spirit of God
working upon us and move to a position of having faith ---faith in God and
faith in Jesus Christ his son. Then the Bible becomes a useful, an indispensable,
tool. It changes its nature to become,
as it is so often called, God’s handbook. In fact Paul when writing his
second letter to Timothy at chapter 3 writes these words, “ All Scripture is
God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in
righteousness, so that the person of God may be thoroughly equipped for every
good work”. Of course, when Paul wrote these words the scriptures as such
were no more than the Jewish text, the Old Testament and probably the
Septuagint Greek version rather than the Hebrew version. But nonetheless, it remains true of the
Bible, as we know it today. Tom Wright in his commentary says, “It is possible
to allow the study of the text, and of different interpretations of the text,
to become a substitute for allowing the text to bring us into the presence of
the living God.” That’s the issue, not to allow ourselves, when
reading the Bible, to become intellectually side-tracked into making the
reading of the Bible an end in itself.
It is a means to an end, a means to knowing our Lord Jesus Christ, to
having a relationship with him and to knowing the Father. The deeper that
relationship becomes the more we will want to know and then you have an
upward spiral of knowledge and understanding. ------ The Bible leads us to a
relationship with the living God and with his son Jesus Christ, which in turn
brings us back to the Bible to improve our understanding and knowledge of our
relationship. And so it goes on. It is the challenge that this reading presented at
the time of Jesus, and it is the challenge it poses to us today. Mel
Fancy: Reader, Anglican Chaplaincy of Midi-Pyrénées & Aude To return to main Thought for
the Week page, click X at top right to close this window. |