Searching the scriptures

I have, for a long, long time now, participated in a weekly Bible study with other ministers with an aim toward enhancing our work as preachers.  I have been in groups that have met in various towns and in a number of churches.  In recent years I have been the convener of such a group.  We initially met in person, but of necessity moved to the Zoom platform, and that method of gathering continues to this day.

 The format of the various incarnations of this study has not varied much through the years.  We use the Revised Common Lectionary as a rule.  While we are open to studying any of the four lections before us, we usually gravitate toward the Gospel Lesson for the day.  We work a week out from our meeting day, so when we gather, we do not consider the readings for the upcoming Sunday, but rather we examine the lessons for the Sunday following.

 The intent is that we approach our designated reading “cold.”  This is the first reading of the text as we prepare to preach.  It is what Fred Craddock called “the first naïve encounter with the text.”  We ask questions, make speculations, and bounce ideas off one another.  I have found this practice to be tremendously helpful in preparing for my weekly journey into the pulpit.  More often than not, my sermon introduction grows out of this give-and-take with other pulpiteers.

 Sometimes, though, one (or more) of our participants will say something like, “Well, I was looking at this study Bible or that commentary, and this resource says…”  This always amuses me.  And I think it is representative not only of ministers, but of students of the Bible who function at any level of sophistication.

 What I mean by that is that frequently we hurry to sources, to “authorities” or “experts” and entreat them to tell us what the bible means.  We are timid in making our own approach.  If we pass the task of interpretation off to someone else, we never fully answer the question, “What does this reading say to me?”

 Now, don’t hear me saying that commentaries and lexicons and study Bibles and Bible atlases don’t have their place.  I would be lost without my books!  But I believe that pulling a volume off the shelf has its place in our process of “Searching the Scriptures.”  Do it too early, and the personal element gets lost.  Do it too late, and we can fall in love with our own impressions, even if they are at odds with the intent of the scriptures.

 When we engage the Bible for our own benefit and spiritual growth, I encourage everyone to read the selection.  Read it out loud.  Read it from more than one translation (and let me emphasize “translation” here).  Ask questions.  Go through the process of what I call “Slamming the doors and kicking the tires.”  This is the Word of God; it can stand up to that.  And it is not irreverent to say, “I am not sure about that!  But, how about…?  So, does that really mean that…?”  The closer we draw to the text the more it lives in us.  Then, if we wish to consult someone who has spent much more time than we in the examination of the text, we do not slavishly bend ourselves to the words of some published author.  Instead, we use that person’s expertise as another tool in our toolbox. 

 Then, THEN, we appropriate scriptural truth as our own.