[The final day is here! What a week it has been. I’ve described the talks to others as a slow punch that you can see coming a mile away but when it connects it packs a surprising wallop! I’ll try to track down the mp3 link in the near future.]
Day 5 | Morning Talk | Mark Baddeley | God’s Clear and Present Word
Introduction
If you look across Christian churches and blogs and Christians generally you’ll find a few general things:
- Christians who find reading the bible for themselves as intimidating – they’ll come to conferences like this and think I need to read commentaries and know all the background and context and exegesis techniques… woe to the person who tries to read the bible on their own!
- Christians who find the things we’re learning at this conference as elitist – just open the word and find out what it’s saying to you now! Whatever comes to you as you read it today is what we need to find.
For some Christians the bible is a dead word from the past. For others it’s a dynamic word whose meaning changes and evolves. So the question for us is does God speak today, or is what he has said only locked in the past and we have to figure out what to do with it in the present?
- A present word
As we’ve discovered in the evening sessions the writer to the Hebrews quotes from Psalm 95 – which is referring back even further to the wilderness wanderings. The psalmist picks up this issue from the past and applies it presently to his hearers. The word which was spoken in the past is still operative – still resonating centuries down into the present. What was said back then is still speaking today. And the writer to the Hebrews does the same thing – which says that what was said in the past is not locked.
The words of God are not like our words – our words we speak into the air and it dissipates. God’s Word continues ever presently – when God said ‘let there be light’ light continues to exist. It continues to be present to every generation.
Application of God’s word, in preaching and in interaction with the bible, is necessary – we don’t want eloquent explanations but people to walk away not knowing how to follow Jesus from the passage. But application can often implicitly teach that the bible needs to be applied by us – that it inherently isn’t clearly applicable. We are asking ‘God, what are you saying through your Word to me presently. Not that I am taking your word to make it meaningful, it already is meaningful – help me understand it rather than try to make it happen.’
- A clear word
God’s Word is fundamentally clear. We don’t need an amazing interpreter – God doesn’t give us 66 books and then a 67th book on interpretation. There is no interpretive body/person that God gives because he cannot trust us with His word: the Roman Catholic magisterium, the preacher who has a Masters/PhD. Jesus didn’t expect the apostles to interpret for the people what he said. The prophets did not do that either. Paul wrote some difficult to explain letters – but clearly he wrote in a way that expected that the churches would read and re-read his letter to help their pastoral situations.
We can certainly skill up in our bible reading – but all of us have the clear and present word with us.
This is why bible translation has for the most part of church history been at the forefront of missions.
- A riddling word—parables
Parables are not sermon illustrations – they are riddles, mental roadblocks designed to trip people up until it is explained.
Proverbs is similar – you’re meant to chew on them over and over until you can figure it out and apply it.
Paul might go off on a tangent and then come back without telling you. Sometimes there are historical details in the text that we just don’t have, and are assumed in the text – for instance what is baptism of the dead a reference to in 1 Corinthians 15? Nobody really knows for sure…
- Very human words
But in all of this we see that God speaks – he doesn’t just stay locked away from us, he reveals himself to us in human words. The bible really is genuinely human words – story telling, rhetorical techniques, persuasive techniques, poetry, metaphor, sometimes highly complex methods of writing.
One problem with this is that when the vocab and grammar expands there is room for misinterpretation. But there is also room for greater and wider understanding. It doesn’t mean that scripture fails to be clear, it means that God uses normal human words to speak to us in normal human ways – full of his authority in order to build relationship with us! His Word repays effort, learning and perseverance.
- Clear enough to get the job done
It’s not that everything in the bible is clear – we don’t just open it and the full meaning will jump us into our head. Often scripture is written deliberately so that we will slow down in our reading – it invites us to wrestle with it, to come back to it again and again, to fill our heads with it.
If we understand human speech we can understand the gospel – you don’t need great intelligence to get that. No matter where we are on any spectrum God’s word is clear enough to accomplish what it sets out to do: save us, grow us, equip us, etc.
- A clear and present word
Some want to push the clarity of scripture to an unhelpful degree – that everything must be clear and if you don’t get it you’re an idiot. On the other end some say that some bits are not clear, therefore scripture has failed.
If we keep the purpose of scripture in mind then it is fantastically clear. In this way, some bits will be unclear and that’s ok.
For instance, with baptism of the dead in 1 Corinthians 15 – it isn’t explained what it actually is, so that’s not clear. But that’s doesn’t matter – because what is clear is how the use of it functions in Paul’s argument (ie – you don’t ‘baptise for the dead’ [what ever that is] unless you honestly believe in the resurrection).
Scripture brings the authority of God upon our lives to save us and change us. It will also repay us the more we bring to it. Yes, I can read it for myself, but there is also a place to get equipped to read it better, a place to send people for 3-4 years to get trained to teach the bible better.
- Clarity and authority—three debates
Three debates in particular cause a lot of heat among Christians.
- Genesis 1 and the age of the universe and evolution
- Women’s public ministry
- Same-gender sexual activity
The heat in each of these debates often boils down to whether the authority of scripture is under threat. There are no easy solutions to these debates. In some (like the first debate) we may need to agree to disagree. However the debate is run – if we see the authority of scripture in question that is where we need to start.
Reflections
The Word of God exists to fundamentally bring us to God in a saving relationship. Scripture, in this regard, is ultra clear. In this core business anyone can access it. It is sufficiently clear to bring us to Jesus and saving faith. We must not let the fact that it is not completely clear on everything to be intimidating – rather it should inspire us to read it better and more often. We must not let the fact that it is basically clear to also encourage laziness.
Work at it, pray, ask God to speak to us through it.
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