GOD'S WORD?

For most of my life, I believed that the Bible was literally "God's word." First, I thought that the people attributed to writing Scripture had been no more than pens or pencils that God used to write the Bible. Then I believed that God had "inspired" the authors, meaning that they had experienced God, and so they wrote how God worked in their life. Since God had caused the experience of inspiration, each writer told how God is.

I no longer believe either of those ideas. I definitely believe that God continues to work in our lives, and we definitely continue to experience God in our lives. Yet, I believe that all writings about God, whether Scripture, tradition, or otherwise, are actually the author's interpretation or reasoning of how they experienced God in a particular place and time within a particular tradition - all of which are a part of the final product that we read.

How did I arrive at this understanding? The more I studied Scripture, the more I found it to contradict! We have at least TWO creation stories. None of the four Gospels tell the story of Jesus in exactly the same way. Were there one or two angels in the empty tomb or was it one or two young men? Did only one woman go to the tomb or was it multiple? (Must I go on!)

Ultimately, I had to make a decision for myself of whether I believed Scripture contradicted itself or whether God contradicted God's self. I had to believe that God could not contradict God's self, and I could believe that different people contradicted each other in interpreting their own experiences of God.

As I thought about this further, I came to believe that for much of my life I had idolized Scripture, making it "equal" to God since I thought it was "God's word." I have since come to the conclusion that God is so much bigger than the Bible that, ultimately, my faith is in God, not Scripture.

Now, I must make a clarification. I do not see the Bible as God's word, but I do see it as sacred. Yet, it is sacred ONLY because the church has claimed it to be sacred, not because God made it sacred. Therefore, because the church has made it sacred, it is our MOST important document as Christians. Consequently, it DESERVES our continued reading AND study - study including other people: peers, scholars, and commentators.

For more information on this, read Marcus Borg's READING THE BIBLE AGAIN FOR THE FIRST TIME: TAKING THE BIBLE SERIOUSLY BUT NOT LITERALLY.