What is the Word of God? Is it a compilation of books? Is it letters on paper? Is the Bible the Word of God or is there more to it? There is a real danger that Christians could make the Bible something that was not God's intention at all! This danger is what is sometimes called "Biblidolatry"-making an idol of the Bible! When you listen to some Christians you get the feeling that they worship the Bible more than Jesus. "In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe." (Hebr1:1-2)
Despite the fact that I read(studied) Biblical Studies as part of my degree and achieved excellent results, my spirit was still "dead" until I met the Living Word, Jesus. Suddenly the Bible became a living book as I could identify with the experiences of Abraham, David, Peter, Paul and other heroes (and "villans") of faith. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."(John1:1,14)
Whichever way the Word of God came to the human race in the past, it was always an expression of the Eternal Word that was with God, and this Eternal Word became a human to reveal God, but not only God, also our true identity! It is generally known that the original ekklesia(church) did not have the Bible as we know it today. They had the Old Testament scriptures and the public preaching and teaching of the apostles and prophets. James Fowler put it like this: "The early Christians were not propogating a belief-system. They were not dispensers of theological information about God. They were not Book-bearers. They were bearers of the Living Word, the Life, the Person, the Power of Jesus, "who is the Spirit" (II Corinthians 3:18)."
We need to be careful not to fall into the Pharisaical trap that Jesus referred to in John 5:39-40 "You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life." The Bible's importance lies in the fact that it testifies of Jesus in whom is the Life! It can assist in helping us to find the Living Word and once we have found the Word, the Bible becomes a living book full of meaning and life. The Bible serves as an objective standard whereby we can test and judge our own experiences and understanding of God against the experiences of other men and women in the early ekklesia.
We live in a largely post-modern society where you cannot witness to people by saying," The Bible says..." We must become carriers of the Living Word, Bibles of flesh and blood, demonstraters of the Christ-Life, expressions of true humanity, and once people have been hooked by the sweet fragrance of Jesus through us, we can introduce them to the Bible which can then become to them what Paul said about the Scriptures.(at that time only the O.T.) "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work."(2 Tim.3:16-17) My hunger for the Living Word often drives me to the Bible to feed on the Life that has breathed upon the lives of so many people,and because I have the Living Word in me the scriptures becomes spirit and life. "who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." ( 2 Cor. 3:6) or in the words of The Message:" The plan wasn't written out with ink on paper, with pages and pages of legal footnotes, killing your spirit. It's written with Spirit on spirit, his life on our lives!"
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3 comments:
Hey, I didn't know that you knew Fowler!
Great subject. This is one of the biggest sacred cows out there.
The Bible did not grant experience of Christ. It arose out of experience with Christ. That is something that the Bible-worshippers can't understand.
careful brother careful...you are trying to make hamburger out of the biggest sacred cow in the world!! a man once came to my old church and preached a message which started with five straight minutes of monotone bible readings from the 'best' and 'most powerful' portions of scripture. as he came to an end he looked up and said 'and blah blah blah blah...' you could have heard a pin drop. all the believers in the quadrinity (Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Holy Bible - that's in reverse order for them) had a conniption when he went on to say 'isn't it true that if this book had the power we say it has you could just stand up and read it like this and people would fall down before it's strength and come to Jesus?' It started an uproar (the quiet kind of uproar you find in the very self righteous, the kind of uproar which only shows up in anonymous letters and gossiping phone calls later that night). anyway I loved it and I've never forgotten it. we are trying to plant a church here in Norfolk (VA USA) which is centered around Jesus only and not around the bible. It is interesting and takes a lot of patience to let the Living Word bring His truth into people's lives at His pace and let them have their own opinions about parts of the bible you don't see the same way they do. but this is the place I love to be and Jesus is informing all of us of the important things. btw we are not on blogger anymore but at www.symphonic.blogs.com
I once was guilty of making the Scriptures the 4th member of the Trinity, or maybe replacing the second member The Word with the word.
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