The Bible, The Idol

As it turns out, we don’t even need a golden calf or figurines to set on our mantle tops. All we needed was a collection of some two millennia of writings.

More on that in a while.

For now, it suffices to write that I’ve kept busy with reading and other assignments for classes at the School of Theology. It demands my time so much that it’s difficult to dedicate half-hour blocks for blog entries. While I figured this would happen eventually – especially when thesis-writing becomes prudent – I didn’t suspect that it would happen on the third week! In fact, I’m not even supposed to have time to write right now – I had allotted this time frame to studying for tomorrow morning’s 8 a.m. exam, the first of my graduate career. However, I forgot the books I needed at home in Indianapolis. Great job, Rob.

But alas, such is life. Since I last blogged, I became the lucky owner of a part-time job at a not-for-profit organization near campus. It turns out that I can help the plight of the world – and make a few bucks for the family – while spending a few years in seminary. Who knew?

Back to my original topic. Though I know I wrote at some length about my views on the Bible within my Theology page, this topic continually implodes in my brain throughout everyday life. I need to preface this with the statement that the Bible contains a vast wealth of history, poetry, powerful narratives, characteristics of God, and much, much more – it is an invaluable resource. But consider the fact that just about every Christian organization, not to mention every church, swears up and down that the Bible is without flaw and “divinely inspired” by God. I will not argue the latter point, because I, too, ascribe some level of inspiration to the Biblical authors. However, the inaccuracies, contradictions, and outright errors found in the Bible are too numerous to count. Briefly, did Jesus die on a Thursday (Gospel of John) or a Friday (Synoptic Gospels)? Did Jesus go around mainly proclaiming whom he was (Gospel of John) or whom God was (Synoptics)?

The other day, I saw and retweeted a very apt and accurate tweet on Twitter concerning modern Christians and the Bible. Think about it for a second:

@jasmcfarland “To most Christians, the Bible is like a software license. Nobody actually reads it. They just scroll to the bottom and click ‘I agree.'”

This ignorance or refusal to care may be the kind of mindset that inspires claims of Biblical infallibility. Let’s look, for example, at the statement of faith of a Christian organization that doesn’t require naming, because it essentially agrees with a multitude of others:

The Bible is the first and final authority because it is the Word of God. We believe all the books in the Bible constitute the Holy Scriptures, inspired and infallibly written, fully inerrant in their original manuscripts…

I add the ellipses because there is more, but there is plenty to chew on here. Let’s work backwards.

First of all, the concept of “original manuscripts” is really a moot point, as for all 66 books of the common Bible, the “original manuscripts” – those that date back to the original human author or scribe (by mode of dictation) – no longer exist. In fact, they haven’t existed for many centuries, and we have no way of knowing what exactly these “original manuscripts” said. In many cases, textual critics can narrow down the variations in the these manuscripts to the most likely (authentic and original) passages. However, people of faith don’t necessarily like the results that these scholars produce.

With a deep look at the statement of faith above, it seems to stress not that the Bible we have today is inerrant, but that it was written without initial flaw. Not many Christians with orthodox beliefs make this distinction, and in the end, it is a matter of faith. But that brings about the obvious question: why would God go to such great and immaculate lengths to inspire a perfect text if he wouldn’t do the same to preserve it?

And, how can the organization behind this faith statement contend that the books that appear in their Bible are the only ones of inerrant truth? Something tell me they haven’t examined apocryphal texts for their contents and are, again, believing what they’re taught.

One final point on the faith statement. The organization holds that the Bible is the final authority on… life, morality, faith, beliefs? On what exactly, it does not say. But what about difficult modern questions, ones that either the Bible itself never comes close to addressing, or addresses only through an Old Testament frame of mind without the presupposition of Jesus and his message? Does this organization allow room for God to and through speak to today’s believers?

With such a firm grip that some Christians hold on the Bible, it’s a wonder how we, as a body of Christ, are able to effectively minister to the people that need Jesus’ message the most. His message consisted of a lot of things, but it is summed up in his reading from the scroll of Isaiah: sight to the blind, freedom for the captives and loosing of the slaves… not the need to shoulder unnecessary amounts of dogma.

As Jesus sings in Godspell…

Alas, alas, for you
Lawyers and pharisees
Hypocrites that you are
Sure that the kingdom of Heaven awaits you
You will not venture half so far
Other men that might enter the gates you
Keep from passing through!
Drag them down with you!

Consider it the believer’s dilemma. Are we holding onto the Bible so tightly that we drag others down and away from the narrow gates? Is the Bible getting in the way of our personal and professional ministries? Have we made for ourselves an idol that replaces, or at least finds equality with, the living God?

I’d love to hear your thoughts on the matter. My words are by no means the last word on the subject. Thanks for reading, friends.

So Far, So Good

My first week of theological school/seminary/whatever you want to call it is on the downslope! And, I’m still alive! So far, so good, indeed.

Cue the Monty Python and the Holy Grail “Intermission” Music…
NOTE: Just looking at my visitor stats, it seems like I get quite a readership bump when I link my posts on Facebook. So, I’m going to make a habit of that.
…and now, back to your irregularly scheduled blog post!

It’s a Wednesday afternoon, which means for the first time in my week I have time to breathe. My course load is heavily weighted toward the beginning of the week, with seven hours of class (beginning at 8:00 a.m. and ending at 9:00 p.m.) on Mondays, three on Tuesdays, and the final three spread out over the final three weekday mornings.

Classes this semester are Greek I (ἀπόστολος!!!), Theological Ethics, Old Testament Literature and History I, and History of the Christian Church. Each class will present its own unique challenges…

Greek: I took three years of Spanish in high school, which produced in my brain just a mix of Spanglish and silly phrases… ¡Tengo un gato en mis pantalones!
Theological Ethics: This class is on the 7000 level, and I am the only first-year in the class. I get the sense that I’m not supposed to be there, but I actually like it a lot so far.
Old Testament: So… many… maps…
History of the Christian Church: I thought this class would cover fairly broadly the development of the church from the many individual (and later, identified as heretical) sects of Jewish Jesus-followers to now, but judging by the syllabus and the required texts, we’re mostly covering 1800-present (Pentecostal movement, black churches, religious right, etc.). Not that that’s bad, but it’s unexpected. I hope I’m not getting shortchanged!

My mascot is the Raven. I get the Biblical connection, but we'd be much more cool and unique if we were the Talking Donkeys...

In addition to the classes, I now all of the sudden have access to a great resource – a fully-functional gym and wellness center. So I’m forcing myself to workout every weekday. As the blog post is titled, so far, so good (besides the soreness)… but I suppose we will see how long that lasts.

I do have a nifty little Twitter application on the right side of my blog, so you’ll be able to see what I’m tweeting about even if I don’t have the 25 minutes or so to crunch out a new blog post. This morning, my friend (and member of Rob Bell’s church!) Mike Lamson tweeted an opinion piece regarding the Glenn Beck pseudo-rally in Washington, D.C., that I found particularly edifying. I tweeted the concluding sentence from that post, but here it is in its entirety (note, I have not heard of the author before):

God, the Gospel, and Glenn Beck by Russell D. Moore of Moore to the Point

Anyway, tomorrow I have a quiz over the Greek alphabet. Time to go connect the symbols to the letter names! Thanks for reading, friends.

The Basics

When I started blogging a few days ago, I didn’t have the necessary sections about me completed. But now, after some straining and effective time management (ha!), I have polished off both a Bio page and one containing some of my views on Theology. Please note, both are going to be considered under constant construction!

These pages can also be conveniently found underneath the text in my header photo. Thanks for visiting and reading, everyone!

New Beginnings

Tonight’s post will be a quick one, as I had an exciting but fulfilling day!

It was the first day of orientation for my Master’s program at Anderson University. See above for some student ID card hilarity, but at least it’s better than my strung-out-high looking Eminem wannabe ID card that I carried around at Miami!

Anyhow, I met several of the wise professors and dedicated staff members in the School of Theology today, along with many of my fellow new students. The whole time, I felt encouraged that this is the place I should be. The next two years or so will be an important and formative time in my theological life, and I am excited to be with such a seemingly genuine group of people.

Tomorrow is the second of three days of orientation. Looking forward to it!

A Ducklike Faith

Millie is the newest addition to our family. She’s eight years old, but has been taken care of for the last six by my parents in St. Louis. And with my grandmother and aunt possibly moving in with my parents, Millie needed to move. Lauren and I were happy to take her. Millie is enjoying life here, and she’s more content than I ever thought possible in an apartment complex for the very first time.

Having Millie around gives me a reason, for the first time, to walk around my apartment complex’s pond. After a few walks I connected the stale and soon-to-be-thrown-away bread in our pantry to the large population of ducks that quack around the pond. Feeding the ducks last night was a humorous adventure, because absent for the first time were three large, dominant and overly social white ducks who ended up taking most of the bread. Anyway, the ducks’ behavior last night gave me some insight as to how we must appear to God.

I first found the ducks resting along the shore in a loose huddle. As I got ever-closer (with Millie snooping around on her leash), the ducks started to stand up and walk away. A few seconds later, they were more or less running for the water, but then I tossed out a piece of bread, which caused the duck closest to me to do a complete 180, almost defying the laws of physics and now in a full run toward the bread. The duck didn’t accept this piece, but it did take one that I later threw that happened to land closer to him and further away from Millie and I. At this point, other ducks who had bailed from their peaceful shoreline resting place took notice of the bread, but didn’t turn around because they weren’t about to challenge the duck no longer confined by the Laws of Newton.

Eventually they are all in the water, and Millie and I are standing on the rocky shore, a safe distance away from my perspective – but probably too close for comfort in the eyes of the ducks, who at this point cared more about the sharp-toothed beast looking for a place to poop. I would throw out pieces of bread, several at a time so that not one duck could dominate the others, and that everyone could get a fair share if he wanted it. Quickly, they ate up the aeronautically-challenged morsels. But there was a distinct pause between the times I threw some pieces, like a backhanded frisbee, and instead had to tear off pieces from my slices of bread.

During these pauses, the ducks would universally turn from me, toward the center of the pond and swim away at a slow (but definite) pace. In doing so, they would each be going their own divergent way – one west, one northwest, one southwest, and so on – but all as if intentionally going back to whatever it is that beckons ducks to operate. And then, I’m finally able to throw another handful of bread toward the ducks, and they return on double-time to compete for each piece that lands anywhere near their beaks.

This pattern repeats itself several times over. All the while, other ducks that are further away, say at the center of the pond, are meticulously making their way over to the shore to discover the source of all of the commotion. They make it close enough to us as I’m running out of bread, and they are still far enough off that my best throw wouldn’t reach them. And as a duck quickly scoops up my last piece, those that I’ve fed are again swimming divergently away from me, each quacking loudly at one another (and the spectator ducks still a ways off) as if arguing over what just happened, the significance of Millie, which duck was my favorite, or some other nonsense.

You are free to make your own conclusions from this, or write it off as insignificant, but in my mind we must appear to God in a similar fashion. In general, we come every week (or at least semi-regularly) to be spiritually fed, leaving to spend the rest of the week or month at our favorite place on the pond. We’ll turn toward God enough to satisfy our needs, but we can’t bear waiting around there for something that, to us, provides no value or worth. And we spend much of our time comfortable in our own divisions of people and ideas, yapping at one another to prove how right we are, or at least how loud and intelligent we can sound.

For better or for worse, I’ll never view a simple act like feeding the ducks at my apartment complex’s pond the same way again. Surely, life is meant to be lived in the world, or on the pond, as it were. But can’t we at least make it our goal to quibble less about the insignificant and turn toward the shore?