Decadence and the Word Part II

In my own quest, I am not ready to jettison the Scriptures as revelation. I feel that way, not primarily because of a doctrinal commitment, but because through the years I have found the Bible packed with meaning, comfort, power, mystery, and direction. I find that the power within it transcends arguments over redaction, editing, and transmission. The issue with the traditional Protestant approach to the Bible is not that it exalts it too highly, but that it has placed restricting walls that have made it more difficult for the seeker or unbeliever to see its worth. My last blog can be summarized: “the Word without the Spirit is dead.” In this blog I want to continue the theme of decadence and make a plea for a deeper humility when approaching the Bible.

When we approach the Scriptures from a Protestant point of view, we claim we are dealing with ultimate truth. Post-modern man does not have a problem with absolute truth, but denies that anyone can know absolute truth absolutely. We need to hear that, because decadence arises when the Christian confuses his interpretation of Scripture with Scripture itself. Consider that within a short time the Reformation went to war with itself over the “correct” interpretation of Scripture, the rationale being that if the Scriptures contain matters of life and death, then my interpretation (and yours) is also a matter of life and death. That means that from the beginning of the Reformation Christianity became exclusive rather than inclusive. The result is the decadence of incessant division.

I was struck recently how much the life of Christ affects our perception of Scripture (McLaren). To begin with the Incarnation forms a perception of Scripture. To focus on the life and teachings of Jesus creates another perception. The same is true of the passion, the resurrection, the ascension and session, and the second coming. (Grossly oversimplified, in order: Orthodoxy, liberalism, evangelicalism, Roman Catholicism, the Reformed, and dispensationalism.) Humility demands that we look through the eyes of another long enough to have our perception readjusted.

This is not difficult when we consider that our perception of biblical truth changes in our individual lifetimes. Our perceptions of God are always too small, and the Spirit brings us to crisis times when our old perceptions won’t work, and we have to reinvent our image of God. The Scriptures are always large enough to allow for the change. Jim Jordan once wrote an essay on “stage conversions” that stuck with me. A child who “accepts Jesus” will jettison that Jesus in his teens, unless he finds the Jesus for teen-agers; likewise when he is intellectually challenged in the college years. A thirty year old married man with two kids and a job needs a new Jesus, etc. I am in my sixties, and I am finding Him again. He grows with my need. So does the Bible.

My point here is not to introduce some kind of hopeless agnosticism, but to call for a humility based on the limitless vastness of God’s revelation, and our own inability to perceive more that a sliver of it. Humility would also allow us to see a new vision of God through the eyes of those we shut out—inclusive rather than exclusive.