WRESTLING WITH THE BIBLE

Sermon Summary (3/517) “Wrestling with the Bible”  2 Ti 3:16-17; Gen 3:1

Bibles were sacred in my Grandma’s house.  I have her Bible.  It is a treasure.  I have to admit that the one she game me for Christmas when I was eight was not that well read.  I came to love the Bible 40 years later as a lay speaker.  It nourished me, it filled me in ways that I cannot explain.  I loved the book of Genesis.  “In the beginning God…” Stories about God, about us, about our relationship with God.  It fits together.  And the whole of the Old Testament (OT) too , so much so that the first Christians say Jesus on nearly every page.  Remember the disciples on the way to Emmaus? (Luke 24: 13-35)  Jesus came along side them, “Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.”  The Old Testament points to Jesus.

But today I read the stories differently than I heard them in Sunday School.  In the Noah story, instead of thinking of the animals in the ark, I think of the horror of those outside.  When Moses came down the mountain and say the golden calf, he not only broke the tablets but proclaimed, “Who is on the Lord’s side?... Put on your swords...kill your brother, your neighbor, your friend.”  And 3000 died.  It doesn’t sound like Jesus.  Then David, in a prideful act against the will of God, conducted a census, and it says that God sent, yes God sent a pestilence that killed 70,000 people.  Again, it doesn’t seem like the God of the rest of the Bible.

Then there are passages about stoning your children, the four corners of the earth, the doors of heaven, an understanding of the cosmos that is foreign to us.  What are we to do?

We are meant to wrestle with the Bible.  Jesus wrestled with the Bible.  We are followers of Jesus.  When we wrestle we need to view the stories of the OT through the lens of Jesus.  When it says, “Stone adulterers,” we remember Jesus and the woman caught in Adultery.  (John 8)  He wrestled with Moses when he said, “But I say to you.” 

The OT was the Bible he knew.  He quoted from or referred to 23 of the 39 books there.  He took the Great Commandment (Loving the Lord your God…. And your neighbor as yourself) from Deuteronomy and Leviticus.  The Great Commandment is not only our rule for conduct, but a great lens to use to view the teaching and acts in the OT. We are called to wrestle with it.

The Bible was God-breathed, but written by men, inspired men, good men and their personalities and cultures showed through.  Jesus wrestled with Moses.  With Jesus’ help, we can wrestle too.  Amen.