Embracing the Mystery of Scripture

It is hard to believe that it has been about ten and a half months since my last blog, although I have still continued to write in my journal periodically during this time. My emotions have run the full gamut during this past year- everything from disappointment to sheer elation. My journey of faith has continued and I wished that I could say my transition from where I have been to now has been really smooth, but the truth is I cannot, because I have witnessed again my own brokenness at work.

During the past year, I have learned much about myself, my family, my friends, and even my enemies, but I honestly in many ways feel that I have unlearned a lot, also. As many have heard the old adage, “the older I get the less I know”, I have rediscovered this firsthand with regards to my own perspective of God and His People and Scriptures. I say it this way, because in my walk of faith, these three things seem to comprise the biggest space and I think there are obvious reasons why.

For example, I have come to question and doubt many things in Scriptures, to which most would be horrified at the mere suggestion of such a thing. I know that ultra-conservatives would want to burn me at the stake for this, but I think the greater point is not what I think, but how I use the Scriptures. What I mean is that I still study and read and ascribe many, if not most, of the Scriptures to God. I know that arguments might be hurled at this point towards me as the end-all polemic to say, “This is a slippery slope you are now on, and you will eventually deny everything good in the Bible, if you just pick and choose.” Well, I just think things are much more complex than that. I have read several books that have actually helped me with my objections to the Bible, and honestly if it were not for these perspectives I don’t know if I would have held on to my faith. The heart of these books has shown me that the Bible is a piece of literature written by men and yet directed by God in many cases. With that having been said, however, our lives are supposed to be directed by God, as well, but often contain shimmers of darkness and poor choices and selfishness, and yet God somehow works through all of it still.

I think, for me, the Scriptures are as sacred as they have ever been, but not in the same sense they were growing up. What it means for me is that the Bible is, as one early Christian writer put it, “alive”. That indicates that God still works through the pages of the biblical canon in a way to reveal Himself to us, to speak to us, to point out darkness in our own life, to remind us of why we are here, to connect us with the community of Christ historically and ultimately to point us to Jesus Christ.

For this point in my journey, the Scriptures still serve a sacred purpose in my life individually, but that purpose is played out more through my connections with others who are not just reading the Scriptures, but interacting with them. Charles Spurgeon, a 19th century British preacher, said that the bible is like a lion. You don’t have to defend it; just let it loose. So many ultra-conservatives have spent their days and energies trying to defend the bible from “liberals” and such as a textbook or a book containing all of the right facts that they have missed the greater point that the bible is a book of the community of Christ pointing the way through their own brokenness back to Christ Himself. The Scriptures need not be defended but loosened in our own community’s life, so that God’s Spirit may work. For me this will always contain much tension and complexity, but I think this mirrors real life and I think this is where God wants His people: embracing the mystery.