"Luke, you're going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on a certain point of view." - Obi-wan Kenobi
In the last couple of years I have been going through a major deconstructive process in my spiritual life (if that wasn't already obvious from reading my thoughts).
One major area of re-construction lately has been in the Bible - how we read it and what it is. Recent elections have highlighted for us how so many amazing, passionate, intelligent people can hold such varying degrees of opinion on what they feel would be the best way to run our country. The church and religion don't operate much differently. How can so many people feel so passionately that what they believe is right?
Now, take that a step further - as a Christian, in the Church, I look around and see so many "kinds" of Christians. There are many denominations. And within the denomination there are still many different kinds of Christians. In my church, for example, there are some who believe in infant baptism, while others don't find any purpose or "biblical evidence" for such a thing and prefer to dedicate their children. (Neither of which friends is "biblical". However, if you want my stance I'd be happy to share it with you).
Recently, someone completely attacked me for going out for Halloween because "the bible says that we should 'avoid every appearance of evil'. If that makes you defensive it's because you have a hard heart that is resisting conviction". Awesome. Attack me with the verses that you think are appropriate for winning your argument.
Is this what the bible has become to us? A law book to attack friends and neighbors with?
The problem, as far as I see it is that we have slowly, over time, placed the Bible right over top of Christ. We have become people of principle rather than people of relationship. We ask "What does the bible say? What Would Jesus Do? rather than asking "What is Jesus asking me to do in this situation?"
This causes great problems in our learning to become believers in this age.
The mistake we make in calling the bible the "word of God" is that we substitute a book for the person of the resurrected Christ. So lots of people are trying to follow principals derived from a book rather than for a book to open them to a relationship and then live inside that relationship.(And anyone who doesn't align to the way that the scripture is interpreted is out of line, a sinner, a heretic).
The book of Acts talks a lot about the Word of God spreading among the people. Was that the bible? Were they referring to little tracts? No, they weren't. They were referring to the living Christ, Jesus - he spread among them! When Hebrews 4 talks about the Word being living and active and sharper than a two-edged sword it is not talking about the bible (like I was taught my whole life to be the case). It's really the presence of Christ that divides between soul and spirit.
I am certainly not saying that I don't believe that God inspired the writers of the bible. I absolutely do. But I'm not worshiping the bible. And I'm not trying to live my life by a set of rules and principles anymore. I realize the for a really long time I've believed that the way that I have read and interpreted scripture has turned out to be very flawed and uneducated. For much of my mature Christian walk I have put following what I believed to be truth in the bible ahead of the Truth that is life in the Son. And boy, that sure changes my perspective!
