ZOE, Part 2
Wendy was nice enough to remind me that I missed my 2 year blogiversary. This would be as good a time as any to comment on "blog backlash."I have met a few people who say rather snootily, "I don't read blogs." To which I always reply, "Okay." I don't take time to enumerate the reasons I do read blogs because it would be wasted breath. To each his/her own, I figure. But as with many things, it makes no sense to refuse to do something for the sole reason that other people do. I'm sorry that they are missing out on the communication, the sharing, and the prayer community. But, as George Thoroughgood once said, "That don't befront me." I don't know what that means, but it sums up how I feel. I have been blessed by blogging and by reading blogs. 'Nuff said.
Wade Hodges had an excellent session at ZOE. He began by saying that we need to get past being right in our Biblical interpretation. There are good and bad ways to be right, just as there are good and bad ways to be wrong. He reminded us that the Pharisees were right, but in a bad way...just as others, the Samaritan woman at the well for instance, may have been wrong, but were open-minded and thus could be said to be wrong in a good way. Peter was sometimes right in a good way and sometimes right in a bad way. I suppose he may have even been wrong about things in a good way. Confused yet?
Wade went on to say that "right and wrong" was a little too "black and white." He suggested that a better way of looking at things was that we can be "wronger and righter" in ways that could be "gooder and badder." Wendy would have visibly cringed. But the point was well taken. How we read scripture is every bit as important as what we interpret it to say.
John York expanded on this by defining his approach as "relational." If we always read our Bibles with one eye firmly on the love of God and the grace shown through the gift of Jesus Christ, it becomes much harder to point fingers and pridefully assert out own opinions. I can't stress enough how important I think this is. I have taught so many classes where my viewpoints have been challenged with sentences that begin, "But it says..." Believe it or not, I know what it says. But I choose to interpret what it says with freedom and love. I also believe it is important to put what it says in the proper context. Would Paul have made the same commands to the church in the 21st century? I don't think so.
I try to teach with an open mind. It gets easier to do that all the time as I find myself wronger and wronger. But I often feel like I'm not even teaching from the same text as my students'. And I am continually frustrated by dogmatic interpretation of some scriptures but not others. Paul's words about men and women (except for that pesky "there is no longer man nor woman" verse) are taken as absolutes while his words about adornment and hair length are clearly no longer applicable. Pardon me but, HUH?
And so our continuing mission is to explore strange new ways to see the Word through fresh eyes...through eyes of love...and through eyes focused on the Word made flesh.
posted by Thurman8er @ 9:25 AM
4 Comments:
It is a challenge to read scripture and apply it in our lives in such a way that we are following the Spirit. It is so easy to be as legalistic as the Pharisees. But, on the other hand our culture keeps trying to get us to throw out parts of the Bible that aren't convenient to the way we want things to be. I like to think that the struggle we have as we try to follow God faithfully is a healthy thing. After all, look at all of the individuals recorded in the Bible that struggled with following God. If we think we have it all figured out, that is when I think we have gotten off track somewhere.
Thanks for the post, Steve. It encourages me to hear men in the Church of Christ saying things like this... one of my biggest arguments with the CofC is that it is too legalistic, in a bad way. But then, that's the Lutheran renegade in me. By the way... how did your sermon go with the comments and questions all of us posted? I've been wondering lately how it was received.
To: All my pals in Blog-land
From: Wendy Power
Re: Grammar
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I didn't make the rules, I just follow them, folks.
-Wendy
I think it's "gooder" that we're not right all the time but it's even more "gooder" that God is still God despite our "badder-ness." Apologies to you grammar buffs.
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