The tradition I grew up in is real big on the Bible, very heady, intellectual, knowledgeable. Even as kids, we sang songs like: "read your bible, pray every day". This gave me the idea that the bible is easy like brushing your teeth, everyone can and SHOULD do it. But the more I'm with others who are from much different educational standpoints (like having none or very little), I'm realizing that this is not the case. The bible is NOT easy to read- in fact it can be very difficult. Even when using the NIV or easy to read versions, the words are lofty, the concepts complex, the challenges impossible (except with a whole lot of help from the CEO and even then, they demand all we have even our life!)
A lot of the people I hang out with have very minimal reading abilities- several are at about a 2nd grade level. We get books from the children's library and have a hard time with the words (sounding them out), vocabulary (understanding) and concepts. So as I read my bible, I'm thinking "how the heck is someone like... supposed to get into this?".
I think our reliance on the written word has been overbloated for a long time. I have thought by reading a sentence or story or chapters that I've spent time with the Lover, but I often haven't digested a word read or even worse, read it thinking of all the things others could learn from it!
It strikes me that the "common people" came in masses only when Jesus arrived. He was what we needed- a living, breathing, hurting, feeling demonstration of the Living Word. It strikes me that we are called to be that same living, breathing, hurting, feeling, demonstration of the Living Word. But how often do I want to just shove a scripture at someone hoping against all hopes they will "get it".
I recognize so much religion in me regarding the word- like by quoting a scripture, I've done something for the CEO, or by having my child memorize parts of the Bible, we are on the right path. If it never transforms our hearts or affect our living, they are just words on a page.
I know there is power in the word, but I think the power comes through it when it is framed in flesh, so that others can see and hear and know that the words are livable, touchable and relevant.
2 comments:
Ms. Agent,
First time commentor here, I think.
I like your thoughts here and on Agent B Files. You are a wise woman. You are very challenging and engaging, which I also like. Thanks for posting your own blog. You bring a needed voice to my world.
I think you have raised some important issues here. I am mindful that up until the last three or four generations, and then mostly in the West, common folx did not read. In bible times, a scribe would read a text to listeners to be sure, and thus many folx were deeply familiar with the bible through listening, but not through reading for themselves.
In the middle ages, the cathedrals had stained glass windows depicting stories from the Bible. Common folx would look at the windows to draw inspiration.
Our modern, and especially CoC, heritage of splitting hairs etc, would be foreign to such a world. But it was God's world nonetheless. He risked his plans for creation in just that kind of jeopardy, and to insist that people READ their Bibles daily now, undercuts that very thing.
I think people in that position had a higher regard for TRUST than most moderns do nowdays. As a commoner, you had to TRUST your shepherds to guide you properly. And the text tells us they are held to a high account by God for how they handle that trust.
I am mindful of the ethiopian eunich who though he could actually read, still needed someone to explain it to him. So do I.
We approach the Bible as if it is the end all be all and with a hermeneutic of suspicion. We have no trust of leaders in our society -especially since the Nixon presidency and despoiled catholic alter boys....
Your post invites new perspective on these mondern traditional views of Bible reading. And while I do not think that either you or I have offered a complete answer to the issue, I think you have taken our awareness to new depths. You have made us re-evaluate, at the least.
Bravo.
Agent X
I tried to start a Beth Moore study once with a group of ladies like you talk about in your blog. It did not even last a week. What was I thinking!
I agree with Agent X and I want to thank you for bringing these challenges to the forefront for discussion. This reminds me of several other similar issues. Sometimes it is easier for those in our heritage to believe that all we have to do it "teach" and others will learn. I was once offered a class on budget. But how could I budget when I didn't even have the money to budget? When you are living from paycheck to paycheck because you can't get a better job, cause you don't have the education, cause you don't have the money to go to school...sometimes its like a neverending circle.
Jesus' very words of "the poor you will have with you always." tells me that a solution is hard to find. But it seems that you have found part of it by your previous posts talking about how you have relationship with your friends and pray for them. One of my favorite scriptures is I John 1:14 which tells us that "Jesus was the Word." It doesn't get any better than that!
By the way, so sorry I haven't responded to the previous post on relationship. My excuses don't matter but I will try to answer as I have time.
Post a Comment