WEDNESDAYS IN JUNE – 6/24/20

Bonhoeffer said, “We prefer our own thoughts to those of the Bible. We no longer read the Bible seriously. We read it no longer against ourselves but only for ourselves”. An example of this is the “Love Chapter”, 1 Corinthians 13. It is probably the most beautiful chapter in the Bible, and besides the 23rd Psalm, the best known. Who can forget, “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal”? Or, “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud”? Or, “It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres”? Or, “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love”?
Used in many marriages, postcards and worship services, it always captures the heart and makes it skip a beat. But Paul was not writing it to the Corinthians to praise them for being so loving; he wrote it because love was the opposite of what they were doing and how they were treating each other. It was written against the Corinthians and, for us, is to be read against ourselves. It was meant for us to search ourselves to see when we are not patient or kind, if we boast or envy and are proud, if we are easily angered, or if we are self-seeking. And this is what Bonhoeffer meant when he said to read the Bible against ourselves.
In the Bible stories we are meant to see how we are the bad guys and not the good ones. In the Rich man and Lazarus, we are the Rich man who does not help the dying Lazarus. In the Rich Fool we are the Rich Fool who fails to see the poor slaves and workers. In the Tax Collector and the Pharisee praying in the Temple, we are not the pentant Tax Collector but the Pharisee praying to himself.
In the Good Samaritan, we are not the Samaritan! While we may not be the terrorists we are certainly meant to see ourselves as the Priest and the Levi who abandon the man dying beside the road. We are meant to ask ourselves how are we like them?
To read scripture this way is to allow it to first to humble us and for us to realize that many times we have acted much like the bad guys in the text. Secondly, when we see ourselves as the bad guys it is meant to challenge us to do better, to be better.
The Bible uses metaphors much of the time when it talks about likeness or comparison. A metaphor is something is partially like something but not completely. Jesus called Herod a fox, as a metaphor. Herod is not like a fox in all ways: He did not walk on all fours, have red fur or eat raw meat. But he was crafty and sneaky.
In a parable we are metaphorically like the bad guys—not in all ways but in some. And that is the rub for us—to try and see in what ways we are like the bad guys. Of course, we are not exactly them in most ways. For a parable to be read metaphorically we have to overlook some parts to find “what fits me”. If we are to see ourselves as the older brother in the Prodigal Son parable we have to see ourselves as someone who may not have a brother or even be a brother but to see how we have looked down on someone (anyone, brother or not) because of the mess they have made out of life.
Many times we see ourselves as the younger son because he becomes the good guy and repents, but to read it that way does not let the text “speak to us”. How have we gone our own way instead of doing as the Father instructs us? Followed our own desires and wasted the Father’s loving gifts He has given us. Wasted our talents, wasted our time, and wasted much of our lives by selfish living and ignoring the Father and His Church. And all of have to varying degrees! So the parable is not just some sweet story with a happy ending but one that is supposed to cut us and pierce us in the heart. “The word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).
Peter’s sermon at Pentecost, Acts 2:37, “When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” The good thing about the Prodigal story is that the younger knew where to go to find the Father—to the Father’s house—to Church where the Father is always found.
Of course, there are scriptures meant to comfort us in our times of need and grief, but we must be careful that is not all we read and miss the parts that challenge us to change and grow.
Jim