Adapted from
Faithful
Questioning
Derek
Flood’s Aug. 2, 2014 Blog
THE
REBEL GOD
Liberally
Abridged and Revised
By John B. Eppler
Derek Flood insists that questioning the Bible is a
necessary part of a healthy and faithful expression of our faith. Questioning
the Bible is ultimately questioning our self about the interpretations and
applications we have imposed on scripture. The goal is to be faithful. We question
so that we can better follow it. We question so that we can avoid wrong and
hurtful interpretations.
Jesus led the way for us by questioning the religious
authorities of His day in the interest of caring for those who were
marginalized and scapegoated by their misuse of the law (and it is always a
misuse when it does not lead us to love). Derek identifies the motivation of
both Jesus and the prophets is not unfaithfulness to scripture, but a more
faithful application of its core aim and purpose, which is to love.
Questioning is absolutely imperative if we wish to read the
Bible in accordance with the will of God, if we wish to have the Bible shape
how we see God, how we live, and recognize what faithfulness demands. There simply can be no obedience without
understanding. The Bible should lead us to moral reflection, not shut it down.
Those who know me, John B. Eppler, know I’m all about not
leaning to my own understanding and yet I agree with Derek about that. Believing the Bible is the inspired revelation
of God was never intended as an off switch to our sensitivity to His Spirit of
Wisdom residing within. (John 16:13) Yes, the Bible is written by inspired
witnesses but makes no clam of being written by God. If you want a document written by God, John
Smith says he has one of those. The only
document that God’s directly wrote with His own finger was the Ten Commandments
and He wrote that on stone, no less. Yet
it was broken before delivery and the reprint was stored in a box which became
a lost object of worship. That alone
would be reason enough for God to abandon direct authorship for inspiring
humans to pin His messages.
His preferred
method, if not His only method, is one-on-one personal communication…writing
His Word on our hearts. (John 5:38-40) By
using inspired go-betweens to record His words He intentionally permitted the
Bible to be spotted with human flaws…none of which altered His message. Allow me to emphasize it is His eternally
true message which cannot be broken. (John 10:35) The Bible is not the word of any man but the actual
record of God’s will. (1 Thess. 2:13, 2Tim. 3:15-17, 2Pet 1:20-21)
I had not intended to
defend my assertion that human frailties are displayed within the Bible’s
pages…an allegation supported by Christ’s seven amendments clarifying Matthew
5: 22,28 32, 34, 39, and 44, again in 18:22.
He gave five more updates in Luke 6:27-31. However if you are interested in that sort of
thing the following are submitted with Paul’s admonition to avoid worthless
controversies. (1 Tim 1:3-11 and 6:3-5)
Putting aside the genealogy differences which Paul tells us not to fuss
about and the creation accounts the following are three very obvious
flaws;
1) 5,000 gallon difference between 1 Kings 7:26
and the same account in 2Chronicals 4:5
2) 230, 000 man difference between 2 Sam.
23:8-12 and the same census in
1Chronicals 11:10-14
3)
550
shekel difference David paid in 2 Sam. 24:24
and the same transaction in 1Chor. 21:24+25
(One payment recorded in gold the
other in silver making the difference many times greater.)
These misreported
numbers could be simply written off as typos.
There is however a more inexcusable flaw that buries any genuine claim to
the flawlessness of inspired writ. The
scriptural imperfection attributes Satanic influence in 1 Chronicles 21:1 to a God given command reported in 2 Sam.
24:1. In essence the writer of 2 Samuel
testifies that the earlier 1 Chronicles account is wrong. That is significant not only because one or
the other has misrepresents the character and will of God, but more importantly
one or the other is not true.
No matter how we spin
or excuse these or other irregularities in their light it is impossible to say
that the Bible’s text is infallible. We
cannot know the motives of those who preach or teach Bible infallibility but on
the surface there appears to be only three options. Either they have not read any questionable
verses or read them without questioning them or they deliberately cover the
truth/the Truth. My failure was a
combination of the last two. Following
in the traditions of men, the preachers and teachers before me, I insisted the
Bible was flawless and took every word literally. (or thought I did) To justify
my willful misrepresentation I claimed a form of sanctified plausible
deniability. My argument was that the questionable
parts were automatically unquestionable because they were part of the
infallible Bible despite any Holy impulse to the contrary.
Unfortunately with that mindset no one has
to yield to the Holy Spirit’s more charitable and compassionate character but
can hold a hard cold Biblical line against “sin, the devil, and the world”
and its human perpetrators. We can be as mean as a net work news panelist as long as we are quoting the Bible.
Thinking it best to
ignoring questions about accepted yet questionable interpretations and
applications I would have condemned Derek’s caution that scriptural
infallibility leads to shutting down one’s moral reflection. My commitment to, “The Bible says it, I believe
it, and that settles it!” approach to Scripture actually blinded me to the sin
of ignoring the Holy Spirit within. This
mindset actually creates a quadrilateral Godhead; Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and
the Bible. Worship of the Bible causes
us to dress immoral policies and practices in cloaks of religious sounding words.
That was the sin of the Pharisees. They
applied the letter of the law rather than the spirit of the law. Sadly it has become the sin of many
well-meaning Christian leaders and policy makers today.
Being godly is not as simple as taking the Bible at face
value. Reading the Bible in that manor caused
not only me but others to stick to what was on the page no matter who it
hurt. In doing so we have been as wrong
as the Pharisees, and as a result, like them have done exactly what Derek said we
would do, "shutting the door to the kingdom of God in people's
faces". My “holiness” justified the
rejection of people who very obviously were in need of love and affirmation. It
is nothing less than being immoral to interpret and obey the Bible without
questioning God’s intent.
So how should we read and respond
to the Bible? Derek’s suggests that we
can tell which Biblical accounts are to be taken at face value and those that
need to be questioned before acting on.
He believes we will know by anticipating the fruit of a so-called
scripturally based action. Foreseeing
the loving or hateful fruit an action brings will inform us as to whether God
intends us to take a particular scripture, “as is” or whether it requires a
more thoughtfully application. And he is
right. Blindly following a text
regardless of its fruit will eventually produce wrong behavior as it did in my
life and is doing in many American churches.
The Western Christian in general has a tendency, as the
Bible says, “to conform…to the pattern of this world.” Unquestioned traditional scriptural
assumptions are regularly used to perpetuate her policies, choices and
political alliances…with unexpected, unpredicted, and often unpleasant fruit. The solution is to “be transformed by the
renewing of the mind to test and approve what God’s will is – his good,
pleasing and perfect will.” (Rom. 12:2) How
can we be certain our mind is making transformed judgments when interpreting
and applying Biblical commands steeped in tradition?
First we must accept the very
unflattering fact that as Christians we embrace a wisdom that cannot be
understood with human intellect. It is a
knowledge which surpasses understanding.
In other words not every worthy question has an intelligent answer. However, we must never accept our ignorance
as an excuse for not questioning personal or organizational interpretations and
applications of God’s Word. The Bible
tells how to activate His wisdom within, “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should
ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault and it will be given
to him.” James 1:5
But even after prayer there are
often several “voices” trying to get our attention. Therefore, if after prayer
the wisdom received does not resemble God’s character revealed in His Son it is
not His. It becomes a matter of seeing the Jesus by the Holy Spirit within.
Does the wisdom received match the image of Christ Jesus being presented
within? Look again at James 1:5. If a reading leads us to be “generous to all”
like God and compassionate “without finding fault” like Him then we know we are
closing in on the Truth. Sense our
beloved yet flawed Bible reports that, “Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore if love is the fulfillment of the
law.” (Rom. 13:10) we need to be led in your reading by Christ’s love. If from
the heart it looks like love, it smells like love, it tastes like love, it acts
like love, and it feels like love take hold of it “as it is”. If on the other hand a scriptural reading
does none of those things then the interpretation and application probably need to be
questioned before implemented.
So take my advice. If you see a
surviving Canaanite, who the faithful were commanded to exterminate, question
and pray before you obey. Faithfully
questioning the Bible is a Spirit to spirit heart thing.
APPENDIX
·
If you want a good laugh, in this regard,
perhaps the most comical example of an unquestioned approach known as, “The
Bible says it, I believe it and that settles it” it can be found in the seldom
considered Deuteronomy 25:5-6. Read it
and question how much like Jesus your husband, brother-in-law, or paster would be
trying to obey “God’s Holy Word.”
·
Just for fun consider the often quoted verses
that precede it.
·
Mental
Gymnastics for Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth
1)
It is not always possible for us to accurately
differentiate between loving and self-serving fruit. However the Holy Spirit can inform our
choices. Luke 6:8, Matt.9:4 +12:25
2)
More importantly He knows how to interpret and
apply Scriptures to the reader’s heart even when it is not understood. Rom. 8:26-27, Mat. 10:19-20, John 16:13,
1Cor. 2:12-13, 1Thes2:13
3)
While the written text of the Bible is not a
living thing naturally, illuminated by the Holy Spirit its words become alive
within us. Heb. 4:12, 1Pet.1:23, Rom.
7:14
4)
What is true of other living things is true of
the Bible’s text as well. The text
itself is neither right nor wrong in its existential form…it simply “IS”. It becomes a living fruit producing thing
within a believing agent stimulating intention. Rom.2:14-15, Acts 10:34-35
5)
As an agent we cannot be sure of our own
faithfulness. We must appeal to a
superior agent. Without the Holy Spirit interpreting God’s Word and His wisdom
guiding our intentions we will wrongly understand what He means for us to
understand. 1Cor. 1:21, Rom. 7:15 +
12:2, Eph. 5:17