I Don't Like What I See

"All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work."  2 Timothy 3:16-17

There are times when I read things that I don't like to read.  Sometimes, these are because the items I am reading about are things that bother me (slavery issues, sex trade issues, crimes, and the like).  Sometimes I don't like reading things because they point out things that I don't do well.  And that brings me to the next point I want to make in why we read and study the Bible.

We read and study the Bible, as Christians, because they show us where we fail to live up to God's will and design, or, in a more general sense, where we fail to live up to His law.  We find that God has a lot to say about what goes on in our lives, and truly, we may be surprised to learn that God has an active interest in every aspect of our lives.  He watches us every moment, and wants to be part of everything that happens to us in life.

However, not everything that we do lines up with what God wills and designs for us.  And that's where we encounter His Word, to be corrected, to be trained in righteousness, as St. Paul wrote in the words quoted above.  We encounter that Word of God to see what needs to be worked on in our lives, so that we recognize those areas where we fall short of what God says for us, and where we go against what God has designed and willed for us.

That's not an easy reading of the Bible, though.  In fact, though we read for this purpose, being corrected is only one aspect of why we read the Bible.  Yes, it points out our faults, sins, and shortcomings.  But it does that to graciously remind us that God has taken care of that, in Jesus.  It then shows us that, by God's Spirit, it is possible to improve this earthly life in line with God's will and design.  Not perfectly, but that we can, and should be, constantly growing in our alignment with His will and design.

Often, I don't like what I see when I read the Bible.  Jesus says that, to view a woman with lust is equal to adultery, and I don't like that.  However, God isn't merely trying to get me angry, but to drive me to the forgiveness of Jesus, and then, the Spirit-led reform of my life, where I strive to bring myself in line with God's will and design.

My Place in This World

"And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?"  Elizabeth to Mary, recorded in Luke 1:43

What is man, that you are mindful of him, and the son of man, that you care for him?  Psalm 8:4

To get it out of the way right up front, there are many times in my life where I am taken by my own sense of self importance.  At times, I think of myself as essential to such things as my family, the congregation I am part of, and other ventures in life.  I start to think too highly of myself, that I am the linchpin that holds things together, and while there may be a small degree of accuracy in that, one thing I often need to be reminded of is that God's Church goes on, even as individuals of that Church pass on.  God's Church is bigger than any one person, except for Jesus.

That's why I need to approach God's Word in the Bible.  It reminds me of my place in this world.  Yes, it is great that I am one of God's highest parts of creation.  Yes, it is great that God has called me to an important role in the context of my family.  Yes, it is wonderful that God has called me to be a leader of His people in the context of His Church.  I have important roles in each of those, and I have to assume those responsibilities with a great deal of seriousness.

But there is also another thing that I have to face.  I am not the glue that holds these things together.  That is God, working in Christ Jesus.  God is the originator and creator of all things.  While I may play a role in His creation, it will also continue on after me.  God is the originator and sustainer of my family.  While my absence would be a great loss to them, God still proves faithful to them in providing and caring.  And God is the originator, creator, and sustainer of His Church.  The ministry of the Word and Sacraments continues even in my absence, and when I one day must either move on or be called from this world.

After all, He is God, and I am not.  I tend to overestimate my importance in these roles.  And so, I approach the Word of God to be reminded that I'm not the one who makes the wheel spin, so to speak.  I'm actually part of the wheel itself.  Perhaps a very important part, but I still need to be reminded that I'm not the one who makes all things, preserves all things, sustains all things, and redeems all things.

So I approach the Bible to be reminded of my place in this world.  I am the creation, not the creator.  And that reminder is a regularly humbling thing, which I believe we all benefit from gaining.

The Form of My Life

"Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me."  Psalm 51:10

"Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path."  Psalm 119:105

As we think about the reasons that we read and study the Bible, I want to remark on a quotation that many of you may have read or heard before.  There is an acrostic of the word Bible which highlights that the word Bible could be listed out as "Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth."  While this quotation has an admirable point to it, I also believe that it can easily be misunderstood.

As I have presented in a previous blog post, the primary reason for our engagement of the Bible is to know and believe that Jesus is the Christ, and that, by believing in His name and His work for us, we may have everlasting life.  And that is where I have come to believe that this acrostic fails.  It seems to point us to things that we do, and not to what God has done for us in Jesus Christ.

Yet, at the same time, we cannot discount the basic assertion of the acrostic.  Truthfully, the Bible does indeed say a lot about the living out of our lives.  However, I do think we need to make this point very clear.  We align our lives to what God says after God has acted to make us His people.  We don't start our conversations about faith or life without first realizing that we are who we are because of what God has done for us in Jesus.

As people who receive the work and benefits of Christ, the Holy Spirit then begins His work in us of creating a new heart and a right spirit.  And that's where the word of God in the Bible enters in.  That new heart and right spirit search God's Word of the Bible to see what such a life looks like.  In that regard, the Bible becomes the lamp to our feet and the light to our path.  We do so, not because it makes us more worthy of what God gives, but because it demonstrates our love for a God who would do such things for us, and to then begin to love our neighbors, that they also may come to know this God, and what He has done for them.

So God's Word in the Bible does indeed form our lives.  But it does so as a response to God's gracious working and action in Jesus.  In fact, I would even go so far as to suggest that it is improper for us to enforce the form of our lives upon those who do not share our faith.  That would be trying to get someone to form their lives around things that they do not believe, which is something we Christians often complain about when others attempt to do the same to us.  We may see how society around us isn't in line with the form that God designs, but the aim isn't to change their behavior.  It is, rather, to work that God might create a new heart and a right spirit within them, so that they then form their lives according to what God has designed.

A Word To The Wise

"Wisdom cries aloud in the street, in the markets she raises her voice; at the head of the noisy streets she cries out; at the entrance of the city gates she speaks: “How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple?  How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge?" Proverbs 1:20-22

 We've all likely heard that there is a difference between wisdom and knowledge.  It's very true.  Knowledge may be helpful, but wisdom comes in to show you the value of your knowledge, and gives a guide to help you understand what to do with that knowledge.

Last week, I blogged about how we may approach the Bible to gain more knowledge.  We can acquire quite a bit of knowledge about God, about His will and design, and other such matters, like salvation.  However, merely "knowing stuff" isn't necessarily the main point of us reading the Bible to gain knowledge.  That knowledge needs to have a grounding in real life, in what it means for us as the people of God.

That's where wisdom enters in.  Another reason we read the Bible is to gain wisdom for the living of life in this world.  And believe me, there is much wisdom in the Bible.  Knowing what it means to forgive someone is one thing.  Having the wisdom to understand and implement forgiveness into your relationships is a completely different thing.  Knowing that God desires for us to love our neighbors as ourselves is one thing.  Wisdom is found in growing and learning how you actually go about that, and reveals what it looks like, as well as what it doesn't look like.

So we read the Bible to know more, but we also read the Bible to learn the application of that knowledge.  And that is where wisdom enters in.  Wisdom connects the dots of knowledge and real life.  Wisdom applies what we learn from the Bible into our lives.  And you probably shouldn't be surprised to know that such wisdom and application is led mightily by the Holy Spirit, who comes to us in our interaction with the Bible.

I hope that, as you regularly engage God's Word, you don't do it merely to understand more of what God is saying, but that you also look to see how it applies to your life, and what it means for you.  Pray that God will give you wisdom by His Holy Spirit, and then, be ready to see how God may open your eyes to that wisdom and its application into your life.

Trivial Pursuit

I remember watching the TV show "Cheers" in its heyday.  Cliff Clavin always struck me as a fascinating kind of person, mostly because I actually know several "Cliff Clavin's" in my life.  You know the kind.  People who know things that astound you, but the things they know actually serve no purpose other than to dazzle you with how many meaningless things that they know.

Over the years, I've also been amazed at how many facts people can know about the Bible, its history, and its content, and yet completely miss the main point of it all.  And this brings me to the heart of today's blog post.  One of the reasons that we study the Scriptures is because we want to know the things of God more and better.  Knowledge of who God is, of what He has done, of what He continues to do, and of who we are is an important thing. 

So we encounter God's Word to grow in our knowledge.  However, even as I say that, one of the things we must have pointed out to us is that knowledge alone is insufficient.  To paraphrase a verse in the Bible, even the demons "know" about God and who He is and what He has done, but that knowledge isn't gaining anything for them.  Merely knowing what God has done is insufficient for what God intends to do through His Word.

That's one side of the coin.  Knowledge merely for knowledge's sake isn't really that much gain, especially since the central key to the Bible is Jesus, and what He has done, and, as the last post mentioned, to guide us to belief in what He has done for us.  However, we can be found in Christ Jesus through faith, and yet still have a warped intent on gaining knowledge from the Bible.

A believer who encounters the Bible to know more about the things of God is commendable.  A believer who doesn't take that knowledge and "do" anything with it, though, falls far short of God's intent for the Scriptures.  Yes, God wants us to know more about Him as He reveals Himself.  Yes, He wants us to know what He has done.  Yes, He wants us to know how He has acted. 

But God doesn't intend for such knowledge to merely serve the function of expanding the brain of the one who reads.  One of the reasons for reading the Bible that we will address is that of making God known to others.  If we study the Bible only for our own personal edification, in a sense, we still fail some of the purpose of the Word.  Yes, we need to know about God so that we can share it with others.  And perhaps that right there is the key.  We approach the Word to know, with the intent that the knowledge is not merely for our edification, but for the building up of the community of faith.

Why Read?

Why read?  Of course, you might be asking yourself why you take up your valuable time to read these scatterbrained words here, but that's not the point I want to make.  The big question I have, that we will be looking at over the next number of posts, is simple.  Why do we read the Bible?

As we dive into this topic, there is something that I believe we should be clear about up front.  There is not one and only one proper, correct answer to this.  In fact, as we work our way through this series of posts, one thing I hope you come to realize is that God has given us His Word, and that Word does a variety of things to us as we engage that Word.  But today, I think it might be helpful to start with one very basic thing.

We read the Bible in order to know who Jesus is, and that He is the Christ/Messiah.  In John 5:39, Jesus is quoted as saying, "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me..."  At the end of his Gospel account, in John 20:31, John reiterates this point.  "...these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name." 

We Christians read the Bible because it tells us about Jesus.  That goes for the Old Testament as for the New.  We see in the Old how God prepared the way, and how the themes of God all come together in Jesus, in what He did, and in what that means for us.  Jesus is the heart and soul of the Bible.  We cannot truly understand the Bible if we do not understand Jesus, and we simply do not understand Jesus if we do not understand the Bible.

But even in that, there's more to it.  We don't read merely to know who Jesus is.  As John points out, what we read about Jesus is to guide us to believe in who He is, and in what He has done for us.  We could know who Jesus is, but if we don't believe in what Jesus has done and continues to do for us, we actually haven't gained anything.  Knowledge is okay, but faith takes precedence.

Of course, we'll hit on these keys again.  But as we start off today, we do so remembering that one of the many reasons we read the Bible is to know and to believe in Jesus.

Christian Journaling

When you think of it, the Christian faith has a long history of writing down the interactions of God in the life of His people.  In one sense, that's what the Bible is.  It is a journal of God's interactions with His people, inspired by His very own Spirit, so that we can look back on it, learn from it, and grow in it.  Even St. Paul himself wrote in a couple of places that the things written down long ago were written down for our instruction and learning.  And then, in places like Deuteronomy 4 and 6, the directive is given to continually be reflecting on these things so that they are learned by God's people, by their children, and their children's children.

Part of the reason that we have such a rich abundance of the history of God's church is because His people have consistently written down their thoughts, their discussions, and their conclusions.  Part of the historical part of my studies to become a pastor had to do with reading the accounts of very early church people and what they wrote down.  If you think about it, if they had not written down the things that they did, so much would have been lost about God's continued working in the lives of His people, the Church.

Sadly, in our current day and age, the discipline of journaling has been largely lost.  Especially in our day and time, we suppose that we are far too busy to take time to reflect on what God has done in our lives each day.  We're so intent to get on to the next task, or to finish our work so that we can engage in entertainment that we don't take time to write down what God has been doing in the context of our lives.  So it is any surprise that we look back and wonder where God has been all along, since we haven't taken the time to reflect on His presence and working in our lives?

I'll admit that I am not the most avid of journalers.  I've attempted it in the past, but it always seems to get short shift.  However, I have arrived at a point in life where I see the importance of journaling.  I also see that it's not just a benefit to my life, but to the lives of God's people, as well.

In future posts, I'm going to be describing a project that I will be undertaking that will involve not just me, but people in the congregation I am part of.  Rest assured, journaling will be a big focus point of it.  I look forward to seeing how it goes over as God's people seek to engage this lost discipline.

A Lent Journey and Reflection

Whoa, almost a week into Lent at this point.  This annual part of the Christian calendar seems to fly by so quickly, even though it is one of the more lengthy time periods of the year.  We move, week from week, with Jesus toward the cross, toward the empty tomb, toward the hope and foundation of our faith.  And as we journey, we reflect on our need for a Savior.

One of the things that I am doing this Lent season is keeping a log book of my Lent journey.  It isn't just a daily reflection, but one that has a greater purpose than that behind it.  For those of you who regularly check this blog, you know that I have recently introduced the idea of weaving Gospel threads into the lives of those you regularly interact with.  My Lent log book is actually a reflection upon my efforts to do that daily throughout this season.

Every day, I intend to keep a record of my interactions with others in which I weave a Gospel thread into their lives.  As accurately as possible, I want to remember and write down what I said to that person.  I want to write out the context in which the Gospel thread was spoken.  I want to write down my thoughts about the situation and why I said what I said.

Now, why keep a record such as this?  I see a couple of good points to doing this.  First of all, it actually makes me think daily about weaving those Gospel threads.  Instead of simply giving something up and laying it aside, I'm actively working to incorporate something into my life that fits with the sharing the message of Good News.  If I want to grow in doing that, well, the best way to learn to do something is to actually do it.  So my log book forces me to think about those on a daily basis, especially since I don't want to see many blanks in the book at the end of the season.

Second, keeping a record also helps me to consider the words that I say, and gives me the opportunity to think of other ways to weave Gospel threads.  Lets say that I look back on one day where I said something along the lines of, "God has been good to me today."  Now, as I reflect back on it, I can think of other ways to say the same thing, or ways to give a bit more of an explicit Gospel thread into it.  Having such a practice causes me to expand my repoirtaire, so to speak, so that I have additional things in mind, and don't always have to come up with them at the spur of the moment.

Another great thing is that the log book reminds me of just how often God sends people across my path, into whose lives I can weave a Gospel thread.  I've heard a few times where people say that they don't know 10 people in life who aren't Christian.  Doing an exercise like this helps me see just how many people I can weave Gospel threads toward, and pray that God's Spirit will be actively working through such words.

That's my Lent log book.  I would actually encourage you to keep something simliar, and see where God leads you as you reflect on thoughts, words, and actions this Lent season.