Recovering Our Knowledge Of Scripture

It is a special privilege to speak with you this morning, because our topic represents the reason why I am in ministry. Recovering our knowledge of Scripture, bringing the Word to life, is at the very center of my personal sense of call. For over thirty years now— yeah, I know I’m not old enough—Christian formation and discipleship has been my overarching concern and interest. How many of you have ever prayed the prayer that recurs in my dreams and wrestling matches with God: “Lord, please let me teach people who really want to learn!” It is my passion to reclaim with people a mastery of the Scriptures in order to remember what God has done and to see what God is doing that is completely consistent with divine history and the very nature of the One who created us. It is too easy to forget the basis upon which our faith is built, and how grateful I am for the trouble God has exerted to make sure we know what he is thinking.

By way of illustration, I have one serious regret in my life that illustrates the importance of the written word.

In 1971, early in my freshman year at Stanford, I met a very nice guy named Andy—he happened to be a fellow resident of my freshman dorm—who was asking some very interesting questions about my Christian faith. By spring quarter he, a lifelong but unregenerate Presbyterian, committed his life to Christ. By the end of the year, we were an item, only to part again for the summer: I flew home to the Seattle area, and he drove home to southern California. Defying any expectation I might have had for an engineering major, Andy began writing weekly letters to me which chronicled his new discoveries of God’s faithfulness in his life, what he was learning in Scripture, and how this was affecting the way he viewed relationships and life-decisions. He also expressed wonderful friendship to me and made his presence known through this frequent correspondence. Our friendship blossomed into love, and two weeks after our graduation in 1975, Andy and I were married. During the first six months of our new life together, we moved four times until finally settling into our Bay Area duplex. During one of those moves, I was going through my stuff and came upon the box of letters Andy had sent to me the three summers we were apart. My dumb thinking went this way: “Well gee, I’m married to him now, and we can talk face-to-face anytime we want, so these letters have no value any longer compared to having the living, breathing Andy right here with me.” So I threw the letters away.

Thirty-two years later, I would do just about anything to get those letters back. I hope they are in my inbox in heaven, because I would like to relive the joy of Andy’s blossoming faith and note how he has lived faithfully within the promises expressed at that early stage of our relationship. But alas—I discarded what I thought was no longer needed.

I’m afraid many, many Presbyterians have done to God’s Word what I did to Andy’s letters. A false assumption has arisen, that the Bible is an old book, telling an old story that is irrelevant to the new realities in which we live. You and I know church folk who have dismissed the word of Promise, the message of the Prophets, and the gospel of Power. They have replaced the written, revealed Word of God with an amorphous collection of self-help, supposedly scientific, or quasi-spiritual beliefs based on what “works” or what feels right at the moment. In today’s cultural climate our people are in danger of believing that they can get by with cheap imitations of God’s Word. They do this by failing to read it on their own, letting others talk about what the Bible says without going to the Source to verify what is true. For reasons both complex and simple, our people are functional illiterates when it comes to the content and meaning of the Scriptures.

In the Spring 2007 edition—available online now—of Seattle Pacific University’s magazine called Response, Jeffrey Overstreet regales us with examples of the cluelessness surrounding Bible content. I mean, “Noah’s wife is Joan of Arc” and “Eve was created from an apple.” Or how many people believe the great Sound of Music line, “When God closes a door, he opens a window” is in the Bible? Wouldn’t it be fun to insert those quotations into the Bible Content ordination exam, to see how many people take the bait? As it is, 25% of seminarians fail the Bible Content exam. Stephen Prothero in his new book Religious Literacy observes from a November 2002 poll that 75% of American adults believe the Bible says, “God helps those who help themselves.” As my husband would say, “That’s a verse from the Book of Hezekiah.” Also found there are “All you need is love—justice-love,” and “Homosexuality is a beautiful gift from God.”

The fact that we have not been able to keep the story straight has led to confusion about the basic biblical revelation of God, God’s nature, the human condition, the state of the world, and what constitutes faith. In one of the post 1996 G.A. meetings where the inclusion of the “fidelity and chastity” amendment in G-6.0106b was defended, I sat in on the committee meeting where an elder stood up and declared in, I assume, a wave of humility: “We cannot presume to know what God thinks. He is so big and inscrutable, and his thoughts are so far above our thoughts, that we cannot know what he thinks about homosexuality. We are arrogant if we try to come to any conclusions about this.”

Meanwhile, we hear others say that the Holy Spirit is speaking a new word to the church, because “we now know …” such-n-such, which generally hangs on some tenuous thread of a recent scientific report or a personal experience. If what “we now know” directly contradicts the clear instruction of Scripture on a matter so consistently reinforced throughout, we have tossed out God’s letters to his people in favor of a more recent revelation of the Holy Spirit. This is a false theology of the Spirit, who can no more be separated from the content and message of Scripture than we can be separated from our souls. John Calvin (I, ix, 1-3) said, “The Spirit, promised to us, has not the task of inventing new and unheard-of revelations, or of forging a new kind of doctrine, to lead us away from the received doctrine of the gospel, but of sealing our minds with that very doctrine which is commended by the gospel.” A true theology of the Holy Spirit wraps around this idea that the Spirit’s task is to confirm in us, or “seal our minds” (in Calvin’s words) the doctrine of the gospel. Jesus assured us of the Spirit’s role when he said in John 16, “But when the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears.” The Spirit is permanently linked in Trinitarian mystery to the Father and Son and does not speak a new message outside the Word we have received. Again, Calvin: “The Holy Spirit so inheres—or permanently resides— in his truth, which he expresses in Scripture, that only when its proper reverence and dignity are given to the Word does the Holy Spirit show forth his power.”

Calvin is saying that if we disrespect the Scriptures, if we do not honor and obey the Word of God, we cannot expect the Holy Spirit to be manifest in our midst. So when we hear the testimony of a gay or lesbian person at G.A. who says that during a period of discernment the Holy Spirit led that person to forsake marriage and enter the homosexual life, we must strongly counter that forsaking the clear admonition of Scripture shuts out the voice of the Spirit. Your years in youth ministry taught you that if a student came in to share that he was losing faith or maybe say, “God feels real far away right now,” your early reaction is to assume that they had jumped off the wagon behaviorally in some way. I have no doubts that the Spirit may test our faith at certain moments, but the means of doing so is not by leading us into sin.

So how can we help our fellow Presbyterians recognize the voice of Jesus, the prompting of the Holy Spirit in their lives? We do our best work when we teach them the Bible. George Gallup Jr. said, “Without biblical knowledge, those in the Judeo-Christian tradition are highly susceptible to a non-biblical, ‘anything goes’ worldview. The effects of such a worldview are apparent today in watered down ethics, sexual promiscuity, and feelings of hopelessness about the future of the nation and the world.” We can certainly attest that this is true, because we have seen the evidence in our own denomination.

But look at what could happen if we led our people into the Bible, to read it, study it, keep it, apply it and obey it! Calvin’s passion on this point led him to daily expository sermons in Geneva. He said, “We ought zealously to apply ourselves both to read and to hearken to Scripture if indeed we want to receive any gain and benefit from the Spirit of God.” Which brings us to a passage from our theme book Nehemiah. [Read Neh. 8, NRSV].

Up to this point in the book of Nehemiah, we have the story of the exile survivors’ return to Jerusalem, the heartbreaking discovery that Jerusalem lies in ruins, and the commitment to rebuild the walls and gates of the city. Through the 7 ½ week period of reconstruction, the Jews and Nehemiah are intimidated, threatened, attacked and otherwise distracted from the work. Political intrigue, back-biting and personal temptation were all employed to get Nehemiah and his crew off the job. But finally, in only 52 days, the gates were installed and the wall was completed with great fanfare and praise to God. We pick up the story in chapter 8, verse 1. [Read Neh. 8:1-13, 9:1-3, 38].

This vibrant account of the turnaround of a wayward people suggests to me some steps we can take as elders and pastors to bring the Word of life to our congregations. First of all, OPEN THE BOOK. Read it publicly, let it speak for itself. Make it accessible, make it heard, have pew Bibles and let people take them home if they don’t have one. Get translations for those whose mother tongue is not English. Open the Book. Someone once challenged me with the thought, “For people who claim to have a high view of Scripture, we sure don’t open it up and just read it very often.” For this reason, I always read the Sunday’s Scripture passage in its full context. On certain days of the year, the reading of the Scripture takes up most of the sermon time, just so we can be wrapped in the drama of the narrative and hear God speak in his own words. It was Martin Luther’s particular mission to translate the Scriptures, both New and Old Testaments, into German so his countrymen could read it for themselves. He was not the first to do so, but in light of his focus on sola scriptura, of course he would want the people to be able to have the experience he did, of hearing the Word of God in his native, heart language. May the Lord give us that same passion.

Secondly, from the Nehemiah account, the WORD READ IN THE WORSHIP CONTEXT is a critical element. The people bowed down and worshipped God as they heard the Word read. We are worshiping in that tradition if we make Scripture the centerpiece of our time together on Sunday morning, establishing the theme for songs and hymns, the drama, the children’s message, the moment for mission, whatever elements you use—I mean, the offering and the benediction— everything revolves around the central message of that week’s sermon. By doing so, we give the people a chance to digest the basic point of the passage and to remember it. This is why, in the Reformed service of worship, the sermon is not last but is followed by acts of response to the Word: these experiences of prayer and giving and commissioning and service all give you the opportunity to reinforce the Scriptural message of the morning. THE WORD IN WORSHIP will change your church forever. But it will also change your own spiritual life forever, if you move from reading the Scriptures for its information to “eating this book,” as Eugene Peterson would say: that is, reading the Scriptures transformationally. We have many spiritual helps for doing this, starting with the Ignatian exercises. Anything that helps you to slow down and digest what God is saying to you so that you are moved to further love and devotion, passion and commitment to Jesus Christ is a good thing!

Thirdly, EXPLAIN THE WORD to the people— TRANSLATE IT. As Jesus commissioned us in Matthew 28, “teach them to obey all that I have told you.” Don’t be afraid that you’ll lose your people, they want to know what the Word means. You can avoid technical jargon or fruitless forays into textual criticism and still get to the heart and soul of the message and help the people see that God is speaking to them in their situation this week. But they won’t get it by osmosis; we have to teach them. We model a sound exegetical method, we demonstrate the Word’s power, we exhibit our love for and submission to God’s Manifesto of Grace when we do this. On the road to Emmaus (Luke 24), Jesus, in cognito at the time, took the opportunity to clarify what had been happening in Jerusalem by “explaining to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.” He opened their eyes to recognize him; he opened the Scriptures to them; and he opened their minds so that they could understand. Following in Christ’s footsteps to make disciples, we can do no less.

Fourthly, FOSTER A JOYFUL ACCEPTANCE OF THE AUTHORITY OF SCRIPTURE. Continue to reinforce the idea with your people that the Word of God is such a gift to us and it should be celebrated as it is heeded. The conditions described in 2 Timothy 3 are alive and well in the twenty-first century: “But in later days, people will be lovers of themselves, proud, not lovers of the good, having the form of godliness but denying its power, always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth.” Paul goes on in chapter 4, “But the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship[!]….”

Evangelicals are complicit in the disintegration of Bible knowledge, orthodox interpretation and faithful application—how? By winking and ignoring the blatant departures from biblical teaching we hear in COM and CPM examinations or in the arguments on issues during a presbytery meeting. The teaching office of the church must be restored to equip our people to discern truth from error and help restore the will of our presbyters to challenge shoddy and unbiblical theology as it comes before us. This is not only a matter of skill, but of will. We have whimped out in presbytery meetings by not challenging the interpretation of Scripture that denies the transforming power of Jesus Christ and his gospel—for starters. Presbyters should demand that their presbyteries publish statements of faith ahead of time for both candidates in final trials of ordination and minister transfers, so that presbyters can study those statements and examine candidates about deviations from creedal theology.

Let us not lose the good news that undergirds our faith: God has given us what we need to remain close to him. He has revealed himself to us; though he is certainly bigger than we are, God broke through the barrier of time and space to introduce himself from one generation to another, in terms we could understand. This is our God, who has not hidden a full disclosure of the divine purpose, but made known the mystery of redemption found in Jesus Christ. Hooray! We know how to relate to God: through the Son, our Lord and Savior!

Fifthly, following the outline of Nehemiah’s account here, especially as pastors, we must TAKE SERIOUSLY THE CONFESSION AND REPENTANCE OUR PEOPLE EXPERIENCE in the face of the gospel. For some, “Go and sin no more” requires a radical redirection of their lives. We have the deep privilege of walking alongside and providing support for that kind of transformation. We must not scoff when people want to make changes in their lives as a result of hearing the Word. We must not cast doubt on their intentions or even their abilities, but point them to Jesus, pray for their spiritual safety and the filling of the Holy Spirit, and come alongside them as a moral support through a time of change. We can’t just talk about the Scriptures, we must live them. For, as Paul said in Romans 2, “It is not those who merely hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous.” We teach our people that we are serious when we say, “This isn’t just a Sunday activity we’re engaged in, but faith as a way of life.” That’s when we will see big changes in the tenor and vitality of the Presbyterian Church, when its members become contagious out of the joy of new life in Christ.

I believe that a spiritual revival is possible for us if we would get back to the Bible and reclaim our heritage without embarrassment or doubt. We have plenty of historical evidence that a reclaiming of the Scriptures leads to revival. The Protestant Reformation is itself our greatest illustration for this. The Great Awakening was sparked by Jonathan Edwards’ commitment to expository preaching. Within eight months of taking over the pastorate of his deceased grandfather, there was an outbreak of revival. Spaener in the early 1600’s wanted to get less formal, so he organized small group Bible studies, and the German pietism movement was born. Perhaps a more dramatic example can be found two centuries later: I think of what happened at “Stanford in the East”—oh, sorry, I meant Yale University —when it was still Yale College around the turn of the nineteenth century. Yale had really taken a beating as a result of the Revolutionary War. Morale was low, the campus was in disrepair—things were not going well. Jonathan Edwards’ grandson Timothy Dwight was called as president of the college. He set out to rebuild the faculty, the student body and the buildings themselves. He was also very concerned about curriculum, and about the inroads of Deism and general Enlightenment secularism that had influenced the American population in the post-war decades. Sound familiar? Dwight came up with a plan to stimulate interest in the Bible and biblical theology, by requiring that students attend a chapel service during the week and on Sunday. At these services, Dwight faithfully preached the Word. This program led to student prayer groups and dorm Bible studies, eventually involving a large number of students. At one point, around 1801, it was estimated that one third of the student body had committed their lives to Christ. A tutor, Benjamin Silliman, remarked in awe, “Yale College is a little temple of prayer.”

The Presbyterian Church can become a renewed, invigorated and effective temple of prayer if we will reclaim this great love-letter of God, learn it, memorize it, take it to heart and live it out. By doing so, we will be carrying out the Plan for Reformation which unfolded in Nehemiah’s time.

Make it so, O God, that we may know the mind of Christ! Amen.

This address first appeared in Theology Matters, Vol. 13, No. 5 (Nov/Dec 2007).