Christianity does itself a radical disservice when it appeals away from history, when it says what matters is not what happened but ‘what it means for me.”1
Sitting at coffee shops can bring plenty of opportunities to meet new folks, enjoy neat discussions and quite frankly, drive you nuts.
Hearing other people’s thought-lines isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but if the subject of their conversion is meaningful to you, not listening is difficult.
I’ve had time to discuss this with those close to me, and what I’m noticing isn’t surprising but interesting. Christianity like anything else, is conditioned by culture. This is obvious observation for some while others can’t even begin to fathom what I’m referring to.
Individualism: the “how this makes me feel” or “what this means to me” approach can’t seem to be shaken off.
For example, if I wrote you a personal letter 10 years ago and another friend of ours found it; not knowing anything about my situation, problem, setting and so on. This friend, reads the letter and adds their own input, draws conclusions and later tells you what the letter was really about.
Sounds odd? The analogy isn’t perfect, but the point should is clear. It’s doesn’t matter what you think it says on the surface or how you think/feel the letter reads.
Trying to get inside the writer’s head takes years of study and learning. I get a kick when people think (though they don’t realize)
The author’s actual aims/intentions are thrown in the back seat, which equals being ignored because “individualism” is in the drivers seat.
Here’s a few simple, helpful principles to get us started when reading letters/stories. Just in case you haven’t caught on, I’m referring to ancient writings, also called scriptures.
- A text can’t mean what it never meant before.
- Translation issues occur: ancient languages don’t transfer perfectly into English.
- There’s cultural/worldview/language and scholarship baggage to go through.
- Can’t take everything literally: various genres require different set of interpretation methods
- Word studies don’t determine meaning, “context is king.”
- Isolated verses clunked together to form a doctrine is just not a wise move.
- This list is ongoing…. hopefully, this should do for now.
This is what the doctor ordered for now… move will come later but I’m not going to force it, again, I’ll post/share as it comes. My aim here is not to sound like a heavy theology guru. However that looks?
Simplicity should be expected, speaking over folks only causes problems (and defeats the point of communication, which is to be understood) and marginalizes potential conversation partners.
As for the interpretation methods above, more on that later.
- – Tom Wright, “Jesus and Victory of God.” [↩]
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
I like the title “Jesus and Victory of God.” Makes me think I should write a book called “Brian and the Victory of DoubleShot.” Or something.
I don’t know anything about theology. I read the bible a couple times. And a bunch of people told me a lot of stuff when I was growing up. Then I lived life and tested all the things I’d been taught. And found those things to be untrue. For me.
I can’t pretend, so after a couple years of contemplation I came up with a plausible explanation that helped everything jive and I went on to live my life in a way that I think is good. At least I try. I actually suck at it.
So much of what I hear from Christians is ALL THE SAME. The subtle variations in doctrine don’t mean shit to me. So when I hear you talk about your view on the Bible and Christianity, I find it interesting because it’s so different. You didn’t just come up with an idea based on what everyone else says. It seems like you started over at the beginning and tried to figure some stuff out based on different information. That’s how I got into coffee.