When it comes to the Bible, it is easy to lose the forest for the trees.
I was talking with Randall on his work break, who told me of his varied religious experiences, beginning with his grandmother in Puerto Rico who was heavily involved with voodoo. He had moved from Puerto Rico to New York, where he experienced the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Catholicism and Pentecostalism.
In the midst of all this religious exposure he said he has read the Bible all the way through several times. He respects it as being more than just a history book or man-made religious text, but because of some of the harder questions that put the Bible in conflict with our culture, he doesn’t believe it to be entirely God’s inspired word, either.
Because of his uncertainty, Randall has had to pick and choose what he will accept and reject from the Bible. He was unsure about its basic message and found it very difficult to describe the overall narrative that runs through it’s pages. Like people browsing at a library, he likes the various books of the Bible, some more than others, but sees them as basically a fairly random set of stories that inspire good and admirable behavior.
He had lost the forest for the trees.
But the Bible is more than just a library full of interesting but unrelated stories. It’s 66 books have an overall purpose, a common theme, and an ongoing story that has extended down through history and of which we are a part. It moves from creation, to fall, to redemption and, one day, restoration. Included in the midst are many accounts of people in relation to God, showing by example both what to do and what NOT to do, that we might learn not just from the success but also from the moral failures and faithlessness of others.
The Bible has many characters, but its central figure is Jesus, with many from the Old Testament who looked forward to (or prefigured) the coming Messiah; with contemporaries of Jesus who beheld his perfect life and triumph over the grave; and now believers are of those who look back at His earthly ministry, who live in a faith relationship to Him now, and look forward toward his return as King.
Taken together, the dozens of individual books of the Bible are miraculous in their contributions to the larger story and in their consistency and connectedness to one another. There is nothing comparable in all other religions, most of which rely on but one, or at most a few sacred texts. The Bible makes sense when we understand that God orchestrated it’s writing, compilation, and transmission through the ages, so that everything in its pages is there for a reason, written by inspiration through various men of God and to be read by illumination of the Holy Spirit.By prayerfully and faithfully reading the Bible the Holy Spirit helps us see the big picture of righteousness in Christ and glory to God, so that the smaller stories might fit in and make much more sense in context.
With God’s help, we will be able to see both the trees AND the forest.
"Sit in" on our conversation - it is on You Tube HERE
No comments:
Post a Comment