Passages from my Grandmother's Bible

When my grandmother passed away two years ago, there was only one thing I wanted--a little brown Bible, pocket-sized with a zipper that could keep it closed.  The reason?  My brother and I stayed with my grandmother after school and during summers until I was in high school.  On days we didn't have school, our standard practice was to have lunch by 11:30, have it cleaned up by noon, and listen to the first fifteen minutes of a local newscast on the radio at 12:00.  Nearly every day was like this.  Then, around 12:15, after the weather and before sports, Grandma would turn off the radio and then we would read from the Bible.  And I would use that little brown Bible.  A Bible my grandfather had gotten in the 1940s.  I would play with the zipper while waiting my turn to read.  It was the King James Version and we frequently read from the Gospel of Luke, to this day one of my favorites.

In addition to getting the little brown Bible, my mother also gave me Grandma's Bible.  It has a lot of sentimental meaning for me, and I am honored to be the caretaker of the physical representation of my grandmother's godly heritage.  The Bible is certainly special to me in any form, but this one is more so.  Even after my brother and I were old enough to stay by ourselves, Grand,a would still frequently talk to me about her Bible reading.  She read the Bible every day.  She would read it through every year, frequently getting done before the year was out and then starting over again.  In her Bible was a reading plan from the 1980s that she used several times, first filling in the check boxes, then using x's, then cross the readings out with a line.

Other non-biblical material is throughout the Bible.  Old bulletins, clippings of various poems or brief thoughts, taped into the front and back covers.  Pages with thoughts or scriptures written out in Grandma's hand.  Throughout the Bible are under linings and brief marginal notes--something struck her as interesting or important about this passage or that.  Something observed in reading or perhaps gleaned from a sermon--she listened to many in churches or on tapes.  She would often remark to me about the multiple listenings she did to my sermons--I knew Grandma would have something positive to say about it even if I didn't think I had worded something the best or had failed to explain clearly the import of what I was saying.  Here, though, in her Bible is a way for me to remember what my grandmother thought was most important--God's word.  Of all the things she could have passed on to me as important, it was that the Bible was to be read, understood, and applied.

I'd like to share some of the passages she marked.  I wish she were still around so I could ask her why she marked a particular passage, although, of course, it is possible she wouldn't have remembered.  For her, though, now, she is with the Word and needs not to simply read the word to know.

One of the first passages marked in her Bible is Genesis 13:8--"And Abram said unto Lot, Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we be brethren."  The context is the ever expanding flocks of both Abram and Lot which led to conflicts between their shepherds and other hired workers.  To solve the issues, Abram suggests that he and Lot go their separate ways and divide the land so that there is plenty of room for each other's blossoming herds.

While I do not claim to know my grandmother's mind, I would guess that what was important or interesting to her about this passage was the phrase "we be brethren."  Lot was Abram's nephew, and it appears Abram wanted to make sure that the conflict raging among their hired hands didn't end up separating Abram and Lot.  Family needs to be united, not divided, whether that's biological family or spiritual family.  

Grandma definitely liked to see family together.  Family cohesiveness was very important to her.  Holidays and family reunions dotted my childhood.  Togetherness was very important.  I think if Grandma had the opportunity to sag what this passage meant to her, it would be that whatever happens, work for unity, especially in the family.  There is so much in our culture that works to separate and isolate us, even from those we should be close to.  Families breakdown, refuse to speak to each other, go their separate ways.  But don't foster that strife.  Look for ways to draw back together, because we are family.  Maybe that's what Grandma was thinking.  If so, it is something a lot of us need to hear.  Thanks, Grandma.  I can't wait to see what else your Bible holds for me.

Theological reflections on the environment

Recently it has been announced that the ice caps are melting.  This is proof, to some, that we are experiencing great climate changes that are due to the actions of human beings.  Others have consistently denied that human beings are responsible for climate change or that anything substantial is going on.  I don't have the credentials to judge the scientific evidence behind climate change, so I have decided to accept the likelihood that we are going through climate changes.  Are we as human beings behind it?  Ultimately, yes, whether you accept our use of fossil fuels or indiscriminate wasteful culture especially in the US is behind considerable changes.  As a Christian, I affirm that the consequences of human sin aren't just relegated to human beings.  Sin affects creation around us.  I think Paul stresses this in Romans especially.

In 1967 historian of science Lynn White wrote an article in Science magazine called "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis."  One of White's points was that Christian views of the environment, particularly shaped by Genesis 1--have dominion over the earth and subdue it--had led to Christians taking a lax view toward the environment and not particularly caring how their actions affected the planet.  After White wrote the article, there were quite a few responses by historians and theologians who challenged White's assertions.  Many theologians claimed that the biblical text encouraged stewardship of creation not domination.  That might be true--and I think it is--but that doesn't change what actually happened.  There have been Christians who have had a strong theology of the environment as stewardship.  There have been other Christians who have seen the environment as something to be exploited or something that they did not need to be concerned about.

But no matter what Christians think about their relationship to the environment, scripture teaches that creation suffers because of our sins and waits for the revelation of the children of God.  We are reaping the consequences of the sins of humanity.  So where does that leave us?  Humility should be the order of the day.  It is God's creation; we have failed to live up to what he has wanted us to be and creation has suffered for it and we then suffer from creation suffering through tornadoes, hurricanes, and other natural disasters.  We also need to consider what is driving our views on the environment if we are Christians.  Are we being influenced by theology or are we being influenced by politics?  I think many Christians are being influenced by political opinions and not a reasoned understanding of creation that is shaped by scripture.

I believe God gave humans creation for us to take care of it.  We have done a poor job of that, often being driven by economic and political concerns wrapped in religious ideology, claiming God was on our side.  I think it is time that we started recognizing our failure to accept and responsibly care for God's gift to us.  I have failed in this.  I need to be more responsible in how I treat the environment.  Maybe we cannot make significant changes to what appears to already be happening to the planet.  But I also believe God values repentance, so if we make changes now, God will respect and value that and maybe we can express more gratitude for how he has blessed us with a creation that provides with what we need to live full lives on this beautiful planet.

Homespun Gospel and Touchy-feely Faith

Jay Green from Covenant College recently reviewed Homespun Gospel, my book, and gave it a pretty positive review.  The weaknesses he pointed out and places that were undelevoped were places I was aware of and were often places I intentionally didn't address.  I don't bring this up to say "look how great."  Instead I am more interested in the comments.  In among several of the commentators, a tense interchange has developed over intellectual faith and emotional faith.  Basically there is one commenter who is charging others with not loving God, claiming that the others don't have a heart for God, and Jesus told us to love not develop our intellect.  Others have attempted to respond to this commenter that the Christian walk is about the intellect as well.

It is a common refrain and tension particularly in evangelicalism.  Some have emphasized the heart.  Some have emphasized the head.  The problem is that this us not an either/or proposition.  The greatest command is to love the Lord (Matthew 22:37), but that love is to come from both the heart and the mind.  God doesn't want only our heart or only our mind but both.  Now, is a particular individual going to tend toward one aspect than another?  In other words, do individuals tend to love God more from her or his heart or the mind?  Yes!  Is one better than the other?  Not necessarily, but unless you engage both, you are only giving God part of who you are.  He wants it all.  He wants you to engage all of it when you give yourself to Christ.

But with all that people talk about Christianity being a relationship rather than a religion, does this mean tending toward the intellectual actually working against God's intent for it?  Isn't it all about love?  Well, here again, it is overly simplistic to look at it this way.  Think about it this way: what does Jesus tell the Eleven to do in sharing the message with the rest of the world?  Well, in Matthew's Gospel he says that they are to make disciples--make learners, baptize them, teach them some more.  Look through the book of Acts.  Here are Jesus' closest followers going out to tell people about Jesus.  What are they telling them?  Are the going out and saying "God loves you"/"Jesus loves you"?  No.  Would they tell them this; does Paul emphasize this?  Yes, but what Luke says the early disciples went around talking about Jesus being king and his resurrection proving that God was in charge.  Furthermore when you really look at what people mean by "love" today and what the biblical writers mean by love, it is often very different.

But there is an important warning for those of us who favor the intellect.  It is very easy to get prideful and assume we have totally figured out or that we are closer to God than others.  It is also tempting to look at those who relate to God more easily through their emotions as being immature or lacking in depth.  That is not necessarily the case.  A judgmental attitude is wrong no matter whether we approach God more easily through our heart or head.

But wait, didn't you write a book that is judgmental about emotion?  No.  I wrote a book about a certain type of emotionality and some of the trouble it has produced.  As I say in Homespun Gospel, the problem isn't sentimentality.  The problem is not being reflective about how people have used sentimentality or what a spiritual diet of only sentimentality might produce.  I am a very sentimental person at times.  I don't have a problem with sentimentality per se.  What becomes problematic is when we don't use our brains like we should.

The biblical text emphasizes the importance of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding.  Readers are encouraged to meditate and study God's word.  We are called to know truth--know truth.  I don't believe these are necessarily best discovered in a Ph.D. program or in the classroom, but I don't believe they have to be excluded from there either.  In fact, the more research i do and the more intellectual exploration I do, the more I love God.  My heart is engaged when I better understand.  That's me.  Others can be moved first, and then seek understanding--they are moved to love God and then want to learn more about him.

Isn't the Bible just one big love letter?  You don't need to think much to understand a love letter.  Well, in one sense the overarching narrative throughout the Bible is the story of God's love for humanity, his expression of that love on the cross in the person of Jesus Christ, and his desire to see that love expressed in community both in this life and in the one to come.  But there is so much  more to the Bible to learn as well.  Also, conceiving of it as one giant love letter. Also overlooks the creation of the Bible over centuries in different circumstances by different authors.

Ultimately the body of Christ needs those who desire to plumb the intellectual depths of God's love and those greatly moved by God's mind.  We help each other to remember God is so vast that he cannot be completely understood and so loving that he cannot be out loved.   When we can respect each other, we can do more work for God and less damage to our witness.