THEME The death of words and the birth of images
THOUGHTS FOR REFLECTION
Without an overview of the Bible it is very easy to gain an erroneous impression of what the Bible is all about.
Look behind the words to the people.
If all of the Bible is a word from God for us today, then we should reintroduce slavery, sanction genocide as practiced by the Israelites on the Canaanites, support the killing of live animals in religious ceremonies and exalt the victim mentality as a sound psychological practice.
The major theme of the Bible is the experience of love; forgiving love, transforming love, love made flesh in human beings.
Behind the words of scripture there is always the Word made flesh.
It is not how much of the Bible you know but how much of it you understand that really matters.
If the Bible is the final word of God does it mean that God has not spoken for 2000 years?
It is important to understand the Bible with your head but even more important to experience it with your heart.
What the Bible meant to its writers may not necessarily be what the Spirit is now saying to the Church through these words.
To make sense of the Bible today it is necessary to view it in relation to the world view out of which it arose and to contrast this with our current worldview.
When viewed from the differing perspectives of ancient world views and modern world views the Bible at times seems particularly irrelevant. The constant factor however is human beings, their glory, their failures and their developing understanding of God.
To say that every passage from the Bible is what the Spirit is saying to the Church is at best a misguided statement, at worst a deliberately misleading approach to scripture if it is intended to be taken literally.
To move from reading the Bible to praying the Bible is an important step in the Christian spiritual journey.
Deeper than the historicity lies the meaning of the myth.
The value of Biblical Readings in services of worship would be greatly increased if each passage had an explanatory introduction, possibly including how that passage relates to other portions of the Bible especially to the life of Christ.
Behind the words the stories; Behind the stories the images; Behind the images the mystery.
God is present in all things but supremely in the mystery.
The symbol stands at the point of intersection of the known and of the mystery.
When the words break the truth emerges.
Words can never capture mystery – they can only point to it.
Christian hymnody speaks of at least four books which we should read in order to encounter God: 1. The book of sacred stories (The Bible and the stories of the pilgrims) 2. The book of nature. 3. The book of the continuing Presence of God. 4. The book of the Inner Christ.
Without the symbolic image we are the prisoner of the literal interpretation of the words. It is only imagination and silence that can free us from the tyranny of words.
An empowering way to read the stories of the Bible is to ask in what ways do I embody all of the characters in this particular story.
The wonder of the Bible is that it is about ordinary people, not perfect ones.
Sermons become alive when the words evoke images and the images access life, the life we all share, exemplified in the life of Christ.
Within the history of Western Civilization there is probably no person who has been more widely misunderstood and misrepresented than Jesus of Nazareth.
It has been said that we see in other people what we want to find in them and that Jesus is no exception.
To fully receive the word of God we must not only hear it in our own tongue but also within the context of our own culture.
Nämä ajatukset olivat progressiivisen kristillisyyden sivustolta:
http://progressivechristianity.org/resources/worship-materials-bible-sunday/
THOUGHTS FOR REFLECTION
Without an overview of the Bible it is very easy to gain an erroneous impression of what the Bible is all about.
Look behind the words to the people.
If all of the Bible is a word from God for us today, then we should reintroduce slavery, sanction genocide as practiced by the Israelites on the Canaanites, support the killing of live animals in religious ceremonies and exalt the victim mentality as a sound psychological practice.
The major theme of the Bible is the experience of love; forgiving love, transforming love, love made flesh in human beings.
Behind the words of scripture there is always the Word made flesh.
It is not how much of the Bible you know but how much of it you understand that really matters.
If the Bible is the final word of God does it mean that God has not spoken for 2000 years?
It is important to understand the Bible with your head but even more important to experience it with your heart.
What the Bible meant to its writers may not necessarily be what the Spirit is now saying to the Church through these words.
To make sense of the Bible today it is necessary to view it in relation to the world view out of which it arose and to contrast this with our current worldview.
When viewed from the differing perspectives of ancient world views and modern world views the Bible at times seems particularly irrelevant. The constant factor however is human beings, their glory, their failures and their developing understanding of God.
To say that every passage from the Bible is what the Spirit is saying to the Church is at best a misguided statement, at worst a deliberately misleading approach to scripture if it is intended to be taken literally.
To move from reading the Bible to praying the Bible is an important step in the Christian spiritual journey.
Deeper than the historicity lies the meaning of the myth.
The value of Biblical Readings in services of worship would be greatly increased if each passage had an explanatory introduction, possibly including how that passage relates to other portions of the Bible especially to the life of Christ.
Behind the words the stories; Behind the stories the images; Behind the images the mystery.
God is present in all things but supremely in the mystery.
The symbol stands at the point of intersection of the known and of the mystery.
When the words break the truth emerges.
Words can never capture mystery – they can only point to it.
Christian hymnody speaks of at least four books which we should read in order to encounter God: 1. The book of sacred stories (The Bible and the stories of the pilgrims) 2. The book of nature. 3. The book of the continuing Presence of God. 4. The book of the Inner Christ.
Without the symbolic image we are the prisoner of the literal interpretation of the words. It is only imagination and silence that can free us from the tyranny of words.
An empowering way to read the stories of the Bible is to ask in what ways do I embody all of the characters in this particular story.
The wonder of the Bible is that it is about ordinary people, not perfect ones.
Sermons become alive when the words evoke images and the images access life, the life we all share, exemplified in the life of Christ.
Within the history of Western Civilization there is probably no person who has been more widely misunderstood and misrepresented than Jesus of Nazareth.
It has been said that we see in other people what we want to find in them and that Jesus is no exception.
To fully receive the word of God we must not only hear it in our own tongue but also within the context of our own culture.
Nämä ajatukset olivat progressiivisen kristillisyyden sivustolta:
http://progressivechristianity.org/resources/worship-materials-bible-sunday/
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