For the past couple of months, I’ve been preaching on movies suggested by the congregation. There were so many wonderful requests and I’ve seen some beautiful and profound movies. This will be the last reflection of that series and the movie is called “Eighth Grade.”
“Eighth Grade” is a moving story of a young woman, Kayla, who is in eighth grade. It’s amazing how true to life it is, to the point of being awkward to watch, students, parents, and teachers stumbling through life, figuring it out as they go along. The part of the movie I want to reflect upon portrays a very tender scene between Kayla and her father, a father who, throughout the film, really has no idea what to do with his teenage daughter.
Show Clip from YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiQPsqlszAw
Now, I’m going to read to you a quote from a book I’m currently reading, called, “How the Bible Actually Works,” by Peter Enns.
My wife, Sue, and I raised three amazing children, who have somehow managed to become semi-functioning adults with less than oppressive college debt and no significant brushes with the law. In other words, on the Enns family intergenerational scale of emotional health, they are physiological triumphs.
I wasn’t perfect as a father, as I’m sure you’ve already concluded. I made mistakes, but I also learned a lot as time went by - like the fact that, though there are general guidelines for how to parent well (lock up the cleaning products, don’t give your two-year-old a knife, Smarties are not a food group), no parenting script can take you from birth to adulthood. It usually can’t get you past lunch.
Or, perhaps better, we write the script as we go, in tune with the moment, and subjecting that script to constant revision simply as a matter of survival and sanity. Parents have to stay flexible and be ready to adjust on the fly, because situations change and children get older.
I really can’t think of a better analogy for how the Bible works as a wisdom book. And I do mean the bible as a whole. (Chapter 4, page 1)
Parenting. Parenting is about constantly being on your toes, adjusting to present circumstances, knowing that what works for one child may not work for the other, and that we have to be flexible to constantly changing needs as our children grow. So how does this analogy fit how we read the bible? Near the end of that passage I read by Pete Enns, he wrote, “I really can’t think of a better analogy for how the Bible works as a wisdom book.” What does he mean? How is parenting a good analogy for how the Bible works?
It has been a recent practice, maybe the past couple of hundred years, to take the bible literally, to look at it as an historical document, true as fact, inerrant (meaning incapable of being wrong), and infallible (meaning incapable of having mistakes). But this is not always how the bible has been read. It was during the age of enlightenment, modernism, when people began reading texts, through the eyes of reason and logic, and this included the bible. If you were to actually read the bible, cover to cover, study it, you would begin to wonder how people could see it as incapable of being wrong or incapable of having mistakes. You would encounter a number of stories that are repeated, ands some of them with different key details, you would read about a God, whom we are taught is a loving God, commanding the Israelites to kill an entire nation, including women, children, and livestock, you would read commands to slaves to be subservient to the masters or commands to women to not teach the gospel, you would read a creation story that has light and dark being created three days before the sun and the moon, and all of this might make you scratch your head in confusion and possibly even question the validity of the bible.
For thousands of years, the bible has been seen as an ancient library of poems, letters, and stories. It wasn’t until 3 or 400 years after Jesus, that this ancient library was brought together into one book we now call the bible. The books in the bible were written at different times, by different people, in different contexts, and, of course, before the printing press in the 1600’s, it was rewritten over and over again by hand by scribes, who we hope, wrote it as accurately as possible over the years, but there would have been mistakes or editorial liberties.
I come to the bible, knowing all of this, and I still love it. In fact, knowing all of this makes me love it more. I find it fascinating. I love learning how the meaning of a Hebrew word changes the meaning of an English text. I love being surprised by a different interpretation of a story. I love learning about people from long ago that loved and lost, that struggled and made big mistakes, that showed mercy and fought for justice.
I think the point I’m making is that the bible can be awkward, like parenting. Sometimes it can very much feel like we are stumbling through it, figuring it out as we go along, constantly being on your toes, adjusting to present circumstances, knowing that what works for one child, or one book of the bible, may not work for another, and that we have to be flexible to the constantly changing needs as a people, as we grow, as we evolve. And that through it all, we can love it, unconditionally.
Exploring the bible can take us on an adventure if we let it. Being open to interpretations and ways of reading the bible can lead us to moments of surprise, awe, and sometimes confusion and wonder. Seeing the bible as an ancient library of stories, letters, and poems might lead us to finding the wisdom that is there for us and let it become our teacher and guide on our journey of faith.
So have I piqued your interest in the bible? Want to learn more? Next year, I'm going to focus a bit more on the bible. For those who are interested in a challenge, we can read the whole bible in a year. I’ll have a reading schedule available. Within the congregation, I'll offer book studies, which might include some great books about the bible by Rob Bell, Peter Enns, and Rachel Held Evans. We’ll have a Bible 101 for those who are just being introduced to the bible and meditation groups will meditate on scripture verses. These are all opportunities to learn about the bible, develop faith practices around the bible, and join with others in discussion on the bible. I’ll also offer some one on one time with the minister for those who want to ask questions. And of course, for readers of my blog, I invite you to offer comments to further an online discussion.
In Paul’s letter to the Romans, he writes, “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope.” (15:4) Psalm 119 is a long psalm and refers to God’s law and word throughout, but perhaps, the most popular verses are verse 103: How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth! and especially verse 105: Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”
People of faith, Jewish and Christian, have been wrestling with scripture for thousands of years and we are continuing along that path, looking for words of wisdom for us today. It’s an invitation to join with our faith ancestors and continue to find the relevance these words have for us today.
May we continue to wrestle with the law and wisdom of the bible. May we find relevance in it, a message that still speaks to us today, May we find the Spirit present in the words, speaking to us, assuring us, challenging us, helping us to know we are not alone and that we are loved. May it be so. Amen.
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