:: In.a.Mirror.Dimly ::

Have you ever become frustrated by the Bible? Sometimes the commands of Paul set me on edge.

He writes to the Ephesians, “be renewed in the attitude your minds.” Fine, I’m all for that. My mind is feeling a bit stale these days. How exactly should I go about that?

It’s tempting to read these verses and to think it’s all up to me. However, the bigger picture of holiness presented by Paul and throughout the Bible actually takes quite a bit of pressure off us.

The power to become like Jesus comes from his indwelling Spirit. However, are we really off the hook completely? I mean, we dare not insert our own works into the equation?

This is where Protestants can especially struggle since we’re so “salvation by works-averse.” The power is 100% from God, but we can neglect it. I’m not in any way capable of powering my chop saw, but I need to plug it in to the power source and keep it there if I want to cut anything.

The word that Jesus used to describe this process was “abiding.” The abiding is our work. It’s what we have to do if we want to become holy and renewed in our minds. A branch can’t grow any fruit on its own, but it needs to remain connected to the vine in order to grow grapes. The nutrients come up through the vine as the branch stays connected.

Our abiding work tends to put us at odds with our fast-paced culture that values multi-tasking and increased efficiency. Dare I suggest that our culture doesn’t really know what it is to “abide.” It seems lazy or wasteful. The heroes know how to squeeze every last ounce of productivity out of their time, money, and even other people. Those who know how to abide are an anomaly.

The examples of abiding in scripture are sometimes quite extreme to our eyes:

• Moses spending 40 days on the mountain.
• Joshua remaining in the tabernacle long after Moses had left.
• Samuel sleeping in the tent of the Lord.
• Anna fasting and praying night and day for her entire life.
• John the Baptist spending his adult years in the seclusion of the wilderness.
• Paul wandering in the wilderness by himself before beginning his ministry.
• Jesus praying for an entire evening.

Why would all of these founders of our faith spend so much time in solitude, away from productive ministry and work? What is the value of this time?

The connection is this:

• Without 40 days on the mountain, Moses fails to lead the people to the Jordan River.
• Without those evenings in the tabernacle, Josh falters when he leads the people into the Promised Land.
• Without those nights in the tent of the Lord, Samuel can’t hear God speak to him.
• Without fasting and prayer, Anna misses the Messiah and the message God gave to her.
• Without wandering in the wilderness, John and Paul can’t hear the message God wants them to share.
• Jesus modeled this for us. It’s striking to think that even God incarnate set aside time to hear the voice of God. It’s like a Trinitarian brain teaser.

Do I honestly believe I can imitate Jesus effectively by praying less than he did?

If I’m ever frustrated by my lack of progress with holiness, one of the first places to begin is the work of abiding. I can’t explain what happens when God gets ahold of us or how he “makes” us holy or renews our minds. We have models who have gone before us who suggest that this is the only way to be changed.

I take my metaphors to their natural conclusion, which I feel is my warrant as a writer. So, when someone says, “I go to church to get fed,” I can’t help thinking of a baby sitting in a high chair with his mouth open and someone stuffing food into it. Fussing and spit up is part of it.

That metaphor of being “fed” at church has been a powerful one. When Willow Creek Community Church  conducted their church-wide study called Reveal, they discovered that they needed to help their people become “self-feeders.” In other words, mature Christians had grown too dependent on being spoon-fed truth. Church was not a self-serve buffet, but rather a series of high chairs.

We need teaching and instruction, especially if we’re young in the faith. The Bible is tricky, but we also need to learn how to pray and serve others.

Have we possibly associated church too closely with being fed spiritual truth to the exclusion of some other important things?

And related to that, How responsible should mature Christians be for their own instruction in the faith?

The difference between now and most other times in Christian history is that we have access to incredible resources such as books, blogs, online videos, and podcasts. We have accessible commentaries, study tools, and hundreds of trained teachers publishing books that will crack open the Bible for us.

There are some amazing books being published by seminary professors right now that languish in obscurity between the academy and the church because they’re a little technical at times. Make no mistake, teaching yourself is hard work.

I’m not trying to say that pastors preaching sermons are unnecessary. Rather, I wonder if it’s time to reimagine what being “fed” could look like and whether we focus so much on being fed that we forget about the other things that our churches could do. In the process we can take a lot of pressure off our pastors and allow them to focus on ensuring we are becoming spiritually healthy, living as obedient disciples, and serving others where needed in our communities.

I personally know that it’s much easier to spend ten hours pouring over a commentary because Paul said truth is important. However, I’m not quite as fast to jump to the aid of the poor in my community for a few hours, even though we see examples in Acts of the early church providing for orphans and widows, to say nothing of James.

Focusing on teaching truth is pretty easy for folks like me, especially those of us who enjoyed seminary. However, teaching and instructing is just one part of the larger picture. In addition, it may be possible to still do it well without reinventing the wheel.

I’ll be honest, I’m not a lover of sermons. There have been sermons that changed my life, but I think there could have been many, many more life-changing sermons if the pastor stopped talking after fifteen minutes and we focused on putting it into practice as a community. In other words, it’s good to teach that Jesus delivered people from evil spirits, but I’m just as interested in taking time on Sunday to pray for people who feel tormented by temptation.

Each denomination has its strengths when it comes to teaching and preaching. I come from a background that was heavy on teaching, so I’m writing from that perspective—hoping for a little more practice and a little less head knowledge when I gather with believers in community.

I’m aware that we need diversity and that my experience will differ from others. I’m also aware that these are big, systemic and tradition-based matters I’m raising today. Change, if it ever happens, would be slow.

However, I think we need to step back and imagine some new possibilities:

What could it look like if we took some of the teaching pressures away from our pastors and placed it on ourselves?

How could we ensure that teaching still happens?

Would our pastors be able to minister a little more effectively with less teaching responsibilities?

About ten years ago I read a book by a guy who named his ministry “Luke 10 Ministries.” Based on the command of Jesus that his followers should not take anything with them on their ministry trips, he boldly planted churches with no resources on hand. He trusted God to provide his needs, and since he was clothed with a roof over his head, things seemed to be working out.

He had a very clear calling from God to do his work, and I certainly can’t fault him on any point. I never would question what he heard God tell him to do, but as I process his use of scripture, a little red flag goes up for me.

After Jesus told his disciples to take nothing for the journey, he later advised that they take not only money and an extra cloak—he told them to carry a sword!

I don’t think Jesus intended them to use the swords in a juggling act. He had warned his followers about threats to their lives, and it may be possible that Jesus was permitting them to defend themselves.

If you’re up against the Roman army or an angry mob, it’s not like a sword is going to help you lead an insurrection or that an extra  bit of clothing is going to change your needs for shelter or food. However, since Jesus gave two different commands to his followers before leaving for their ministry trips, I have to wonder how we go about interpreting and applying the words of Jesus.

Jesus did permit his followers to take a few things on their second trip, so what gives?

I see a tendency of my own to explain away the commands of Jesus with theology. I can look at this Luke 10 ministry and say, “Yeah, but that doesn’t apply to me. Look, Jesus told people to carry swords!”

This is a tricky business. Theology can become a tool to keep Jesus at arm’s length, to resist critically thinking through the cost of discipleship.

On one hand though, we can adopt an overly simplistic reading of scripture that tries to take everything literally without considering the nuances of a passage. Foolish decisions may result. On the other, we can mistakenly complicate matters with theological complexities and use them as an excuse to do nothing.

I tend to lean toward the latter. Meanwhile, I wonder if others like our friend in the Luke 10 network may make some decisions based on too simple a reading of scripture.

I don’t know. I’m just thinking out loud here.

I will say that I think this minister started his ministry because the Holy Spirit prompted him to take a leap of faith based on what he read in Luke 10. I can’t argue against that, and I think that hints at the challenges we face when applying scripture.

Every person who claims to follow the Bible literally picks and chooses what will be read literally and what will be explained away through the magic of interpretation. Every person who reads the Bible more figuratively does picking and choosing too.

My point is that we’re all pickers and choosers. It’s no easy task to apply scripture to our lives. In fact, it’s impossible.  The very thought of this sends me to the Holy Spirit because I’m quite hopeless on my own.

There is something holy and nearly unexplainable that happens when we read the Bible and God speaks to us. That’s the moment when our theologies and philosophies need to stop.

Making my inner theologian chill out when the Spirit speaks may be one of my greatest struggles each day. Theology can make me Jesus-ish, but the business of making me actually like Christ is something that only God can do—that is, if I’ll get out of his way.

While in college I called my Dad and told him I was dropping my English major in favor of Biblical Studies. By the time I hung up the phone, he had convinced me to stick with English and to add Bible as a double-major.

He didn’t raise his voice or tell me what to do. I remember him spending more time reminding me of what I liked.

By the time I stumbled out of seminary unsure of what to do with my life since a career as a pastor wasn’t an option, I was really grateful to have that English degree. If anything I understood the jokes in Prairie Home Companion about the Professional Organization of English Majors.

However, during that fateful phone call, my dad saw something that I should have seen all along. Writing and books are important to me.

My teacher in sixth grade assigned free-writing activities every week in our notebook called an “Anything Book.” I filled up every scrap of white paper in my Anything Book. My imagination went crazy, even spilling stories into the number charts on the back cover.

During seventh and eighth grade, my friend and I would toss around a football after school and then sit down at his MS DOS computer and rewrite fairy tales with a twist. The one that stands out had something about the big bad wolf being framed by those horrible pigs.

In high school I moved away from fiction and toward more academic forms of writing with lots of research. I thought that writing was just a nice thing I did in addition to my other work. I also had no clue about what to do with my life. I didn’t know how people found jobs or selected careers.

The post-college world was terrifying to me. Books and writing always made sense, and I’m thankful that my family never questioned my English major in college. The English program in college became a safe haven for me until I thought that I had another path figured out as a pastor.

My dad wisely persuaded me that I shouldn’t toss away all that I’d already invested in studying literature and academic writing. Even after sticking with the English degree, I’m writing stuff today that I never pictured myself doing.

Today I help pay the bills by writing for blogs and websites, while I plug away on a novel that most closely resembles the zany stuff I scrawled in my Anything Book in sixth grade.

It’s fascinating to see that our parents can’t tell us exactly what to do. There’s no way my Dad could know that I’d end up writing for websites or I’d love writing fiction so much. However, he tried to keep me faithful to what he’d seen of me so far.

Parents aren’t perfect, but I’m grateful for the times when they keep us pointed in the right direction at the right time. I couldn’t have asked my dad to do anything more, and I’m forever grateful for that conversation.

Read more Father’s Day themed posts at Faith Barrista for the Thursday Jam.

While in seminary, a small conservative church hired me to teach their Wednesday evening Bible study. It was the perfect opportunity to get some practical ministry experience, even though I never saw myself leading that kind of church one day. I was also planning to get married in the near future, so the extra money didn’t hurt.

The group was rarely larger than ten people, but I took it very seriously. I dug through commentaries and prepared some pretty substantial sermons each week. I didn’t know how to lead a discussion, but I think they wanted a teacher, not a discussion leader.

They were very nice people, but as I drove home each week, I’d think to myself, “Phew! That was hard work. I’m glad that’s over for this week.”

Around the same time I was visiting my bride-to-be up in Vermont, and while there I’d go into the local prison with her parents for a church service. They had a very different approach to ministry that led to a rather different kind of car ride home from the meeting.

I’ve learned a lot from them about how to prepare for ministry. While there still may be occasions when I need to consult a commentary or prepare something, the most important preparation comes when I pray and worship the Lord each morning.

I don’t need perfect planning to minister. I don’t need to be perfect. I just need to be present with God.

While praying before going into the prison yesterday, the Lord put Luke 11 on my mind, which is Jesus’ teaching on prayer. I read it for a little while and thought of some stories I could share.

As I drove to the prison that evening, John 16 also came to mind, which is Jesus’ teaching on the Holy Spirit leading us into all truth. I thought that I could teach on John 16 in order to encourage the men to share some testimonies at the beginning, and that Luke 11 would serve as my main text before we moved on to the Alpha lesson about the church.

God wanted to teach us from those passages, but he didn’t need me to do it.

I sat down, introduced myself, and then the Holy Spirit taught us how the church works as one person after another shared what God was teaching him. One guy taught us for about 30 minutes what he’d been learning about prayer, faith, and pleasing God.

I kept my eye on the clock and nodded my head as each guy raised his hand to speak, but otherwise I did nothing. The Holy Spirit taught us our lesson. I saw John 16 unfold right before my eyes.

As if God wanted to drive home the point that he had things under control, the second hour of the meeting focused on how to dialogue with other faiths in the prison and how to respond to insults and anger. I’ve studied a lot about the mission of the church, but it seems that when the Holy Spirit is given room to work, the mission takes care of itself.

The men sang as they stacked the chairs and walked back to their dorms for the evening, smiling and encouraging one another. A lot of ministry happened last night, and I did very little of it. I did one thing: I got out of God’s way and followed his lead.

I drove home last night joyful and encouraged, thankful that ministry does not have to be hard, draining work bearing unknown fruit that we may never see. Perfect preparation doesn’t take place through studies but through God’s Spirit.

Today’s post on perfection is part of Bonnie Gray’s Thursday series. For more posts on perfection, visit Bonnie’s blog and begin with her post: The Top 5 Lies of Perfectionism.

This morning I read an article by Skye Jethani in the latest issue of Leadership (I have an article on volunteering in there) that brought up a point related to yesterday’s post about Peter and the way God gives us shoves in unexpected directions.

Skye wrote that radically following Jesus does not necessarily mean committing to sharing the Gospel on the other side of the world or living among the poor. In fact, those acts can become a kind of idol that we serve and pursue, rather than pursuing God first and letting our actions flow out of that radical commitment.

In other words, radically following Jesus begins with a personal commitment to him and then is manifested in our actions. If we seek to follow Jesus by pursuing works of service without first serving our Lord, we’ll miss out on what is most important as well as the empowerment God provides to do ministry.

I know that I’ve often wondered, “How can I follow Jesus radically?”

The sense I get is that we don’t do big things for God all at once.

The Kingdom starts in us as a small desire for God, for his presence in our lives, and we learn to seek him and his Kingdom first. As we learn to listen to God, we begin to train ourselves to tune out other desires. In drawing near to him, we learn what he would like us to do.

Never think that you can’t approach God because you don’t have your act together or because you aren’t serving him enough or any other excuse tied to your actions. You’ll only exhaust and discourage yourself.

God wants to guide his people step by step. The first step is to quiet ourselves before him in worship and in listening prayer. Every leap I’ve ever taken, and I really haven’t taken too many to be honest, was preceded by prayer and listening where God slowly worked on my heart and made his desires my own.

Radically following Jesus may involve incredible acts and radical choices, but it begins with quiet, still moments.

One day you’ll be praying just like Peter and you’ll have a vision of what God wants you to do or an opportunity will come knocking on your door. Though you wouldn’t have known what to do on the day before, you’ll make the right choice because of that time in prayer before God.

When I began to dig into the world of biblical studies at a Christian college, I began to read commentaries. Some focused on the literary forms and cultural settings of each book. Others dug into what the books of the Bible meant.

Both had value, but neither provided particularly interesting reading. Sometimes I felt like they focused on the pieces of scripture to the detriment of the whole. While there is a place for commentaries that dig into the language and historical setting of the Bible, I longed for something that would help me read scripture with fresh eyes and do a better job of connecting its implications to everyday life.

It was as if I understood Jesus alright in his setting and found the Bible fascinating, but I was still reading scripture in a rather detached manner.

The books that tried to fill this need didn’t quite work for me.

Perhaps the NIV Application Commentary tried the hardest to bridge this divide, but it was still tough to dig into. Today NT Wright has produced a wonderfully accessible commentary series “For Everyone” that makes good scholarship accessible, but I still hadn’t found a commentary focused specifically on connecting the narrative scope of each biblical book with today, that is, until I learned about the Resonate commentary series that is edited by Paul Louis Metzger and David Sanford.

I write about Resonate as an endorser with a free copy by my nightstand, but I honestly dislike reviewing books so much that I would only put myself through it for a book that I truly enjoy and value. Metzger is a theologian who has successfully managed to engage culture without becoming captive to it, and he has given us a readable series of essays on John that make for great reading.

I’m a big fan of Metzger’s book Consuming Jesus, and after reading this commentary of John, When Love Comes to Town, I’m impressed with his approach. He describes his angle in the following way:

“The aim of the Resonate series is to provide spiritual nourishment that is biblically and theologically orthodox and culturally significant. The form each volume in the series will take is that of an extended essay” (12).

Resonate offers a big picture view of the biblical text, digs into some of the key points (remember, the goal is spiritual nourishment, not comprehensive explanations), and works readers through a reflective essay that seamlessly integrates the message with application to today. It doesn’t feel contrived or clunky, which is nothing short of a miracle if you’re familiar with books that try to do this.

Perhaps my greatest pet-peeve is the “Kids today!” approach to some Christian writers take in opposition to culture—as if the writer needs to attack everything suspect in the culture today with “solid biblical truth.” Metzger gives priority to the Bible and its controlling narrative for creation, while studying and interpreting culture in order to apply the Bible to culture. His approach is more conversational and ultimately more constructive.

The Gospel of John commentary in the Resonate series is readable and presents a fresh reading of scripture that is far more readable than a commentary, but still quite substantive. You won’t find insight into the language and history of the Bible, but then again, you can find that elsewhere—Resonate does not aim to offer those things because we’re practically buried in commentaries and dictionaries.

I mean, have you seen one of those Christian book catalogues???

This is a book that pastors and students can dig into when their eyes are crossing after parsing Greek verbs and reading primary source material from ancient times.

This is a book for the church-goer who won’t pick up a thick commentary, but still craves a thorough explanation and application of John’s Gospel.

I’m currently reading NT Wright’s commentary John for Everyone in my small group, and I think Wright and Metzger provide an excellent one-two punch—Wright offering some accessible background material and details, with Metzger tapping into the big picture of the story and some critical application points for today.

Reader be warned, this is a thick book with lots of text on each page, but it is quite readable and engaging. The pages go by pretty fast, the insights are helpful, and Metzger writes with a personal engagement and honesty that is lacking in many books in the biblical studies category.

For more info, swing by the IVP Resonate page or read a sample chapter.

My thanks to Paul, David, and IVP for the review copy!

I wrote a monologue for Palm Sunday that told the Easter story from the perspective of Caiaphas the high priest. It was part of a larger project involving 3 total monologues to be performed by actors.

While writing them, our team of writers tried to encapsulate the central belief of each person. We settled on the following:

Judas: I didn’t betray Jesus, Jesus betrayed me.

Caiaphas: I saved God’s people from destruction by killing Jesus.

Pilate: I hate my job and the scheming Jewish leaders—if they want Jesus dead, I want him to live.

Each character study drove home a chilling point to me. I could understand each character’s perspective. Once you see their values and their hopes, you can understand why they conspired to kill Jesus. This drives home that the Bible is both true factually and incredibly relevant to us.

Even the worst villains in the Bible have their own logical consistency when taken in context.

I doubt that none of them set out to be the villains. In fact, the high priests and Pharisees saw themselves as the protectors of God’s people, the temple, the land, the traditions, and the law. They prove that God’s supposed people can become so concerned with things about God and close to God that they miss out on God’s actual work among them.

At a certain point, characters like Caiaphas became so wrapped up in political schemes, national hopes, and religious ceremonies that that they forgot the simple law to love the Lord their God. When Jesus arrived, many remarked that he taught with power and authority compared to the teaching of the priests and Pharisees that lacked both.

One summer we were vacationing at my wife’s family’s cabin which is surrounded by other cabins and houses on a lake. We usually gathered on Sunday evenings for a time of prayer and Bible study. While one distant relative taught us, I remember this feeling of the Holy Spirit opening my mind. It was like the words on the page came alive to me.

There was a God-given authority to the way he taught us.

On other occasions I’ve received prayer from Christians who knew what to say and how to pray for me. Their words carried weight and power. In fact, God powerfully used a friend’s recent prayer for us as we prepare for our move to Ohio next fall.

In contrast to the villains of the Easter story, God’s people are in touch with the Father and his ways. They are united with Jesus, the Son, and can therefore act, pray, and teach with his authority and power.

I’m reminded of Paul saying that the Kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power (1 Cor. 4:20).

At a certain point, Caiaphas and his fellow leaders settled for talk and forgot what God’s love and power felt and looked like.

When we depart from the love, power, and authority of God, we settle for cheap substitutes.

We need something large to satisfy our longing for influence, so we cling to political power and seek influence in our culture.

We need something authoritative to cling to, so we overemphasize the importance of traditions and/or theology.

We need something powerful to help us, so we ask truth and teaching to do it all for us.

With our emphasis in the wrong place, we forget what it feels like to be God’s beloved children.

We forget what it feels like to be led by God’s Spirit.

We forget what it feels like to be empowered by God to act and pray in faith.

The villains of the Easter story remind us of the terrible consequences of losing sight of God’s love, power, and authority. There are plenty of other options out there for us to choose.

We won’t make the wrong choice tomorrow. It will happen gradually. We’ll set ourselves up to make the wrong choice when we begin to allow our love to grow cold and we stop seeking more of God’s influence in our lives.

I can relate to the villains of the Easter story. Over time they got mixed up in a tangled web of distractions, unable to find the true love and power of God. The more I understand them, the more I can appreciate the compassion of Jesus, who forgave them while he hung on the cross.

He saw a group of people who had lost their way from God, and even as he hung on the cross, he called out in love for them to come back.

I’m going to made a statement based on tons of anecdotal evidence—both my own and what I hear from others. I’m pretty sure it’s true.

Large numbers of church-going conservative to moderate evangelicals (especially the conservatives) would flip their lids if they really knew what the professors in many leading seminaries and Christian colleges/universities believe.

Some schools are more diverse than others, permitting a wider range of views, and for my purposes here, I’m focusing on those with greater theological diversity. And believe me, when I’ve mentioned what I learned in seminary, I’ve had to help a few friends put their lids back on…

Perhaps you aren’t easily rattled, which is great, but we need to look at what our leading Bible scholars are saying and then how their teachings reach us in the pew. It may help us relax a bit when new Christian theology “scandals” hit if we learn where some of our theological trends come from and how we learn about them.

An example? Let’s start with a tame one.

A leading Old Testament scholar at my seminary, who worked on little-known projects such as the NIV and NLT translations of the Bible, taught the following in his class:

• The days in Genesis were most likely long, indeterminate periods of time. Least likely? 24 hour days.
• God’s image is fully reflected in the creation of man AND woman—together.

The implications drawn from these two points are striking. They would rattle the interpretations and practices of many Christians who put a lot of faith in the world being created in 24-hour days and who teach that women are somehow below men—especially when it comes to teaching men.

The Diversity of Evangelical Scholars

It gets a little stickier in many seminaries and universities. How does salvation work? Well there are a couple prominent schools of thought that range from paying a debt to God to buying us back from Satan—both have biblical support among other views.

How was the Bible written and edited? Wait, did I just say the Bible was edited? And don’t get me started on who wrote which book when. I mean, Isaiah can’t be scripture if it had two different authors, writing in two different settings, can it???

Hell? Well, it’s not easy for some scholars to say something for certain about hell since Jesus spoke so much about Gehenna, a literal place in his day that we translate as hell. Are there consequences for rejecting God? Absolutely. However, the exact details of the punishment are not a matter of consensus among evangelical scholars. 

I could go on with debates about the impact of culture on our theology, the problems of American nationalism in the church, or different views on the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts. There is a lot of diversity among our leading scholars, but we don’t always glimpse that from the pew.

How Christian Authors Use Theology

Which brings me to my other point. You see, we have a lot of theologians who pioneer ideas or challenge the status quo of our theology, but not all of them are able to communicate effectively to wide audiences like a Max Lucado or dare I mention a certain pastor in Michigan… And then Brian McLaren is another good example of a Christian author who reads a lot of theology books by conservative scholars, but he also mixes in liberal scholars.

So we have quite a few theologians in our seminaries and universities who are immersed in the Bible, theology books, and church history who have limited access to the folks in the pews—the folks who would have a heart attack if they knew what their scholars are teaching. There are exceptions (say NT Wright for one), but by and large, our scholars are rarely the ones who carry new ideas to the church.

That falls to writers.

There are a number of Christian writers who take the existing theology that’s already out there and make it accessible for the average Christian. That’s what Brian McLaren did in  A New Kind of Christian. McLaren took the theology that had impacted his own life powerfully and wove a simple narrative with two friends having a spiritual conversation. He didn’t think a lot of that stuff up on his own for the most part, though he certainly included his own spin or innovations at times.

So when we’re concerned that a popular writer is introducing new ideas that will somehow corrupt Christianity, there’s a good chance those ideas are being pulled from some scholars who have already been teaching them to college students and pastors. Their ideas are already being considered among many learned Christians, but have not made a splash in the popular Christian market.

The good news is that the Gospel is still being preached and the many students and pastors who interact with these supposedly “dangerous” ideas are fully committed to following Jesus.

In many cases we have Christian scholars who are deeply committed to the scriptures and to Jesus who find that some of our “traditional” views aren’t quite on the mark. This presents an interesting quandary. There’s the traditional line by which “faithful Christians” have been defined for a particular belief. However, being a faithful Christian demands a commitment to the teachings of scripture.

What happens when a commitment to the teachings of scripture lead a scholar to believe something a little different from the traditionally “faithful Christian interpretation”? It’s not an enviable position.

However, there are many Christian scholars who have tweaked their conceptions of salvation, hell, theology and culture, and the nature of the Bible’s composition after carefully studying the scriptures. We often don’t know about their views widely until a talented Christian writer/communication takes the work of these scholars and presents them in a book for popular audiences who wouldn’t persevere through a 300-word theology book with tiny font and footnotes that sprout like weeds.

I write all of this because we often hear that this or that author is spreading a teaching that will somehow destroy the church. While we should certainly be careful about what we teach, often enough today’s raging theological controversy was yesterday’s tame class discussion at a Bible-believing, Jesus following university or seminary where everyone left class, checked their text messages, and then promptly ate lunch.

Do the Disturbing Passages Negate the Rest of the Bible?

I’ve read quite a lot about the disturbing passages in the Bible, and I know that many learned authors have tried their best to sort out the nature of God and possible explanations for events such as the conquest of Canaan. Some of us may accept their theories, but I’m going to guess that many of us are dissatisfied by them.

I’ll admit it. I don’t have satisfactory explanations for certain events in the Bible that I simply can’t match up with Jesus.

What now?

For me, 99.9% of the Bible fits together relatively well. There are just a few instances that are hard to stomach. I don’t want to set myself up as a judge of God, and therefore I have an important choice to make. We all do.

Do we let a few troubling passages overshadow everything else in the Bible and the experience of God in our midst today?

After spending so many years studying theology and wrestling with tough passages, I hit a point where I just needed to follow Jesus, worship him, and live in a daily loving relationship with him. There are some gaps in what I understand, but I take these gaps as further evidence that I am not God.

I’m sure my wife appreciates that.

What blows my mind is that God has created us with intelligence and the ability to discern moral choices. I believe he wants us to wrestle with these issues. He wants us to read about the conquest of Canaan and ask him, “What the hell?”

However, he doesn’t want us to stay there feeling bitter, self-righteous, or superior. We have to bring our honest questions to God, while also remembering that we aren’t in this to get 100% on the test, to prove the Bible is flawless, or to prove we are most clever with our theology.

We are committed to Jesus because he is passionate for his people. He doesn’t have to explain every single detail to us, even if we can’t quite understand why he’d leave us hanging sometimes when we bring questions to him.

At the end of the day, we can rest assured that we know quite a lot about God based on the Bible, Jesus is right Savior to follow, and we’ll have to rely on faith when we run into mysteries. I’m OK with that.

I don’t need to spend my time knowing every little thing in the Bible because I am fully known by God, and, despite this, God still wants to be with me.