Words from WW Blog

WORDS FROM W.W. January 27, 2010
(Clarification: Sometimes Words from W.W. is a “sort-a spoof”. Spoofs in the past haven’t been comprehended by some of the readers, hence, some have wondered what planet the author is from or on.)

January 1- The adventure begins. I sprinted through the first eleven chapters of Genesis. The first six days of creation took me just seven minutes. At this rate I’ll revel in Revelation by June!
January 4- Discovered a few things about the faith of Abraham. Couldn’t quite figure our Sarah’s laugh. Was it a snicker, a giggle, or one of those laughs that communicate “Fat chance”? Puzzling, but I’ve got to keep going!
January 15- Things at work have been hectic, but I did finish Genesis. Joseph was a little quirky. His brothers…different! It’s on to Exodus tomorrow.
February 1- Left my bible at church two weeks ago and finally got it back. It was on one of the tables in the fellowship hall and I “passed right over it.” I’m knee deep in plagues right now. Still can’t figure out how a crocodile didn’t get Moses in that basket cradle of his! I guess God really was in the midst of those reeds. Got to pick up my pace. Hopefully I’ll get a couple of those genealogy chapters soon. It’s okay to skim them! I can’t pronounce most of the names anyway.
February 17- Ash Wednesday and I’m dying! Sin offerings, grain offerings, burnt offerings, fellowship offerings…it goes on and on! They had more offerings than a Baptist church in a building campaign! I’ve got to make my way out Exodus!
March 15- Skimmed Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Didn’t get too bogged down in them since I’m a “new covenant” kind of person anyway. What do I care about what the year of Jubilee was? I want to be free from all that stuff!
March 20- I love Joshua! It’s like reading a Hollywood movie script. A prostitute, falling walls, a standing still sun…it’s an adventure! God is amazing! Just about the time I’m losing interest he throws this book in there.
April 4- Easter Sunday and I hope my reading schedule can rise from the dead.
April 30- Made it to Chronicles, but didn’t I read about most of these guys in Kings? I’m going to pray about just jumping to Ezra.
May 1- I felt God say it was okay! That’s good! Skimmed the list of names in the first two Ezra chapters.
May 25- I tried to get through Job, but it was so long! His so-called friends just went on and on and on. Come on! Say it and sit down! It was like listening to a C-Span TV marathon!
June 21- Out of Job, but don’t feel like praising (Psalms) or getting any more wisdom (Proverbs), or receiving someone’s philosophy of life (Ecclesiastes). I’m heading for Song of Solomon. I hear it’s pretty interesting!
June 22- Song of Solomon was too weird! I’ve heard Isaiah is full of great spiritual prophecies.
July 10- Had to take a break! Family vacation. Didn’t have room to pack my bible. God rested on the seventh day. I needed two weeks.
August 15- I’m skipping the minor prophets. They must not be that important. I’ve got to get to the gospels. I need Jesus!
September 1- I’m looking forward to Labor Day Weekend. I think I’m going to try to put in a bible-reading marathon on Monday.
September 8- Sorry Jesus! Our neighbors invited us for a cook-out. Being that we are to love our neighbors like ourselves I felt led to spend most of the day there. The sunburn is almost healed, but just didn’t feel well enough to read the Word.
October 1- Almost done with Mark. Three months to cover the last 25 books, but some of those are real short.
October 28- Made it through Luke and John just in time for Halloween. I was surprised there was so much repetition in the gospels. I thought they contained all original stories.
November 15-Acts is a trip. Love the Ananias and Sapphira part! Sometimes God really does knock ‘em dead!
December 1- Spilled my cup of coffee, thus wiping out 1 and 2 Corinthians. There is some spiritual lesson in that, but I don’t know what it is. I have to move on to Galatians anyway. Can’t waste time worrying about spilled milk.
December 23- Pretty much got the gist of the books written by Paul: “Dear Church, what’s happening? Love, Paul.” No reason to dwell on that every time. Besides, I’ve only got eight days to finish being fed by the Word.
December 31- Done! I remembered one of those reading suggestions I was given in college. Just read the first sentence in each paragraph, and you’ll know what the book is saying. I did that with 1 Peter through Revelation today. It only took me 30 minutes! I’ve finished the Book! There was a suggestion to read through the bible next year, but since I’ve done it…what else could I learn from doing it again?

WORDS FROM W.W. January 21, 2010

Haiti has dominated the news this past week. We’ve been numbed by the devastation, grieved by the scenes, and awakened to the needs. Haiti was in a desperate way before the earthquake. Now it is beyond comprehension.
The death toll is expected to reach 200,000, with 2,000,000 left homeless.
Two million homeless!
Aid has been rushed there, but a disaster of this magnitude has shown that relief efforts and medical help can’t get there fast enough. People are dying before they can be attended to medically. The Haitian government has been fairly invisible, but relief organizations are working around the clock. It’s chaotic, frantic, and heartbreaking.
There are people in the midst of this situation who want to rush ahead and figure out what is God is saying. Some have already determined what they feel God is saying and proclaimed it. Some of these proclamations have reached the media…and it hasn’t been good!
When someone assumes and proclaims that this is God’s way of dealing with a place where voodoo is a predominant religion it comes off as another example of self-righteous Christianity. There is a strong Christian presence in Haiti that gets disregarded and minimized by such a judgment.
So what is God saying? I won’t speak for God. He does fine on His own. He seldom gets recognized for an amazing sunset and the joy-producing giggle of a small child, but is quickly blamed for the pain of a fallen creation.
I can only share what he is speaking to my heart in the midst of this.
Help! Pray! Don’t forget!
He’s called me to help as best I can from a city thousands of miles away. Raise money, send money, keep people updated. When one of the poorest countries in the world endures such an event it escalates the massive needs to an incomprehensible amount. It will require effort from every corner of the world to turn darkness back into even a dim light.
Pray! My neighbor left for Haiti last Sunday to work with a relief organization. He had just gotten home from being deployed to Afghanistan, and his wife urged him to go help. I’m praying for him. His name is Scott. I’m praying for our missionaries such as Kristy Engel, who was serving in the Dominican Republic and spoke here at our church this past summer. She has traveled to the affected area to help. I’m praying that light will come into the darkness, that there will be more and more stories of hope. Someone the other day said they heard Haitian children singing praises to God on TV. Light in the darkness.
Don’t forget! It will take a lifetime for Haiti to recover any sense of what was a normal day. Our culture is focus-deficient. We too easily move on to the next thing. We can’t just move on from a place that has been destroyed. We must stay connected for the long haul.
God may be whispering something different to your heart. Whatever he’s speaking into your spirit it brings the fourth element to the surface.
Respond!

WORDS FROM W.W. January 7, 2010

At the monthly gathering of our neighborhood pastors on Wednesday we were all commiserating about our congregation’s financial status at the end of 2009. We all felt a little near-sighted trying to see where our church’s financial vision said we should be. I don’t know if any of us left the meeting feeling any better, but we at least knew the boat was crowded.
And then there’s Rick Warren! He pastors Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California, and has become a leading figure, perhaps THE leading figure amongst evangelicals today. In the final days of 2009 he put out a plea to his congregation about a $900,000 deficit that was needed to fund some of the church’s special ministries like a food pantry, homeless ministries, support groups, and other things. His appeal brought in $2.4 million!
2.4!
That would take a while to count!
The news came too late! Why hadn’t I thought about asking people to bring an extra contribution as we were falling 10% short of our goal?
You can imagine how many pastors and churches are studying what caused such generous giving to happen. Sadly, as is often the case, you can also find a number of people making negative comments equating Rick Warren as a servant of Satan, a false teacher. Just google his name and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
What can we learn from Rick Warren’s too-late news?
Well, first of all, there’s not another Saddleback Church, and when we compare our situation with a 20,000+ church is ludicrous. Each church has its own DNA, its own rhythm, systems, and culture. My sister and brother-in-law are members of a small American Baptist church 200 yards away from the Ohio River in a more rural depressed area. Their church, that four years ago was down to 4-5 people, has experienced a rebirth. It’s one of those churches that have a small cemetery on the church’s property. What has worked in other places would be an effort in futility there because it is a completely different and totally unique situation. Their secret: teaching and preaching the scriptures, allowing church to be fun, and a spirit of God-infused hopefulness.
Second, people give to mission and ministry. This is especially evident in the twenty-somethings. Testimonies about what is happening in mission outreaches, and children’s ministries, and youth retreats, and neighborhood outreaches will be increasingly vital for the church’s financial health. Excuse the comparison, but reality TV shows and talent shows like American Idol have brought an element of “participatory expectation” into our culture. That will become more evident in financial matters. It’s interesting that in our church we partnered with Audubon School to take care of 20 families at Thanksgiving, and we “adopted” 12 of their students for Christmas, while at the same time hosting four homeless families for the Interfaith Hospitality Network, and collecting food for our food pantry. Our “giving” was unbelievable during December for those special needs, even as our giving to the church budget was falling short.
That should tell us something, and the answer is not “Pastor, why don’t you preach a message on stewardship and tithing?” It should tell us that in the midst of economic hard times people will still step up to help with causes that they believe will meet an apparent need. (It will be interesting to see what the recent Salvation Army report will do to their income!)
Some might say “But Pastor, there are still bills to pay, utility bills to take care of!” I’m not disputing that at all. I’m just saying we have to figure out how to better connect participatory giving for mission and ministry to the budget of the church. It needs to be seen as participating in the life of a living organism and less of supporting a structure.

WORDS FROM W.W. December 30, 2009

I’m about 36,000 feet in the air as I write this on a delayed extra-warm United Airlines flight filled with over-tired pre-schoolers and grumpy parents. Interestingly enough I’ve been reading Leonard Sweet’s book The Gospel According to Starbucks and just read some interesting thoughts that he has about the Revelation 3 passage that includes a warning to the church about lukewarmness (Revelation 3:16). In Sweet’s bible he has written a paraphrase that has God saying “Your church is overripe and stale. It makes me want to barf” He has drawn a picture of an airline’s barf bag above his words.
As is often the case, Leonard Sweet makes me ponder and create out of my ponderings. As another year ends and a new one is being birthed it makes me contemplate about my walk with the Lord, and, more on point with the Revelation 3 passage, it makes me think about the walk of the church. What is overripe and stale? Where does the fresh fruit of the Spirit need to emerge?
The church, which is the prime place for freshness to surface and creativity to be encouraged, is sometimes void of such. Overripe and stale may seem harsh to hear, but it is not a stretch from the scripture. If we had a choice between “what we’ve always done” and what would be innovative and step towards the outer edge of our comfort zone what would we choose?
I’m not saying “do something different just to be different.” I’m saying if the spirit of God is pulling us towards the possibility of drawing outside the lines, would the first-grade teacher in each one of us make us curl back in a sort of traditional spiritual compliance?
There’s probably not a coincidence in the fact that our refrigerator is piled with food right now from the usual “Christmas overload” experience. It happens every year. Christmas Day has the counters filled with food and possibilities. December 26 has the refrigerator filled with the “not yets”. The aromas and mouth watering experiences of Christmas Day are replaced by grumpy duty the day after each time the frig door opens. Gourmet mashed potatoes become like tasteless hospital food when they’ve been warmed up for the fourth dinner in a row.
Stale does not just describe week old bread. It could also be described as a quest in search of mediocrity, the search for insignificance.
Think about it. What in our spiritual lives, personally and corporately, do we pursue in search of finding mediocrity.
Has our reading of scripture de-mystified it? Have we heard the story before, and now when we hear it our expectancy level is like opening the door of the refrigerator and looking at all the Tupperware containers?
Has prayer become as uneventful as the container of milk that has today’s expiration date on it? We can’t decide whether to use it or let it sit there for another day?
Has the ministry of the church taken a backseat to church business? Has old life made the idea of “new life” seem too weird? Do we desire to raise up our children in the Lord…as long as they end up looking like us?
What exactly is overripe and stale? If you took a survey of your congregation this Sunday what would the answers look like? If a similar survey was done asking the community what they see is fresh about the church and what is stale, would they get similar responses?
A new year is always similar to how my pants fit- uncomfortably tight with great expectancy. The expectancy is demonstrated by the urgency to make some changes (Loosening the belt is a cop-out!), but also an eagerness to see what the new holds.
May the New Year be filled with a delightful dance with the Lord in the midst of on-going fresh tastes of His Spirit!

WORDS FROM W.W. December 24, 2009

About the only thing I spend any time comparing prices on is Breyer’s Ice Cream and soft drinks. Those items get announced in the weekly grocery advertised specials that are included in the newspaper.
Breyer’s on sale! I’m there!
A&W Root Beer discounted! The shelves need to be re-stocked after my visit!
Other items, however, I don’t spend time bothering about where it might be selling the cheapest. When it comes to Christmas gifts I’m an impulsive buyer. I see it. It looks like it would be appreciated by the one I’m buying it for. Five minutes later I’m putting the box or bag in the back seat of the car, and I’m out of there!
True confession time! Very few gifts that I buy will be remembered by me two years from now. There will be a few. I remember getting my parents and siblings Enstrom’s Toffee Candy last year. I remember a couple of things I gave Carol last year.
But wait! I said two years ago!
My mind is blank.
Call me insensitive or hint that I didn’t put much thought into it. The truth is that my impulsive spontaneity is just my purchasing nature. Send me to the store for a bag of potatoes and I’ll come home with a dozen items that aren’t healthy, a bottle of shampoo…and the potatoes.
Let me detour to faith. How many people’s faith experience in our culture could best be described as impulsive faith buying? And how many people would be considered careful ponderers of faith?
If I’m more of the impulsive kind of faith follower do I allow the love of God to grasp the depths of my soul; or is there a shallowness that causes me to quickly look for the next thing on the list?
In The Message paraphrase the rendering of Luke 2:19 in regards to Mary’s realization of who her son was says, “Mary kept all these things to herself, holding them dear, deep within herself.” There was a grasp of the truth that took some time to sink in, to root itself, to own its validity.
This is not to say that God doesn’t move people in a moment, or the gospel can become alive and personal in an instant, but I do believe that the gospel is accepted by some for an instant and discarded in the next. Forgive the cheap comparison (It’s lunch-time!), but it’s the difference between Ramen noodles and homemade pasta. The first can be cooked, eaten, and forgotten about an hour later; while the other takes preparation, involvement, time, thought, and a commitment all the way to the end. One is cheap, and the other is more costly.
Faith should not be a blue light special. It’s a gift that was thought through and given by the God of love to the ones he loves. May the incredibleness of that gift be especially grasped in deep ways by us at this time of the year!

WORDS FROM W.W. December 18, 2009
“The Walmarting of Our Faith”
In his book, The World Is Flat, Thomas Friedman writes extensively about the business practices of Walmart. We’ve come to recognize the “Happy Face” symbol that Walmart uses in its advertising as the picture for “falling prices.” Sam Walton and David Glass (the company’s CEO from 1988 to 2000) recognized three principles that have resulted in the success story of the company. I won’t go into them in this writing, but they were key to the expansion and on-going health of the company, even in the midst of wide-spread economic tough times.
Adhering to these principles has also allowed Walmart to undersell its competitors. In many towns where the arrival of a Walmart is announced, small business operators begin to board up the windows and close up shop.
I’ve been thinking a lot about consumerism lately as we rush through Christmas. Walmart is successful because it increases the thirst within people for products that they crave, and surrender to the craving, regardless of whether it’s good or bad. It’s successful because it knows what people want, not necessarily what they need.
When I look at our faith journeys I see the residual effect of Walmart spreading like a glass of spilled eggnog into the church. People want what makes them feel good. They want what feels comfortable without being too demanding, but still looking a little bit spiritual. Falling prices is just a cost-saving way of saying “falling doctrinal beliefs.”
And the thing is . . . it’s what people want! Call me cynical, but unless there is a radical transformation in a person’s life that can come only from an intimate encounter with Christ, we’re prone to look for the bargains.
The question someone is bound to be on the edge of blurting out right now is, “Don’t you go to Walmart?” The answer is “Yes! When it’s extremely beneficial for me.” Since I hate crowds of bargain-hunting people, my Walmart visits are usually restricted to early in the morning or late at night. For a long time it was the only place I could find Orville Redenbacher’s Pour Over Cheddar Microwave Popcorn. (Another example of a product that is not good for you, but, boy, is it good!)
In recognizing what I just said about “when it’s beneficial to me” I see another human flaw. Walmart makes it convenient. I CAN go early or go late. In other words it’s all about me.
Our walk with God has that unfortunate tendency to descend to that as well. It becomes all about “me” . . .
• “What’s God done for me lately?”
• “I’m okay right now, so I don’t need an intimacy with God. Check back with me next week.”
• “Is there a real short worship service? My availability is limited.”
I’m flawed as much as everyone else, and that troubles me—that I write about Walmart, and yet I’ll probably be in their “chips and snacks aisle” before the week is out. It’s an analogy for our lives. I’ve “Walmarted” my faith walk, but still want to be recognized as a saint.
Perhaps if I buy another new Bible it will raise my level of spirituality. I hear they are on sale for two days only at . . .

WORDS FROM W.W. December 9, 2009

“Specific Requests”

An old friend from Michigan (I’m old. She’s not!) wrote us about her son Timmy’s letter to Santa Claus. It read, “Dear Santa, could you please bring me a Crystal Swiper with the Power-minder guys and rock monsters and crystal Lego set. You can get them at Meijer’s (a store) on the top shelf.”
I love the specificity! It reminds me of the plot line in the movie A Christmas Story, where Ralphie wants a Red Ryder BB gun, which his mom doesn’t want him to have because of a fear he would shoot his eye out.
It’s interesting that the Bible has a multitude of stories about specific requests of God to His people, but is lacking in the number of specific requests from the people of God to Him. It’s not a completely vacant category–Gideon did cast a fleece before the Lord–but specific requests are few and far between.
On the other hand, God “gets specific” with Moses about numerous points of emphasis for the Jewish law. He gets specific with Jonah about the city he is to go to and the message he is to speak there. He gets specific with what Philip is to do and say to the Ethiopian he meets. He gets specific with the wise men about where they will find the Christ-child.
God specifically requests that we go in a certain direction, listen in a focused way, speak certain words, practice procedures in a certain way and order. The intent is not to create a legalistic culture and following, but rather to hone and shape an obedience that deepens the divine-human relationship.
Perhaps Timmy has something that we need to recover! A child can see hope in the world in a certain way that being specific and precise in his requests does not bother him. He hasn’t lost faith in a parent, or Santa, or in many cases, God to come through with the boxed object on the top shelf.
The harsh stories of our lives have a way of lowering our sights. The more mature we become, the less we look up. That may sound a bit brutal, but it is often the case. What is beyond a child’s reach is still hoped for. What is beyond a grown-up’s reach is disbelieved. We’re afraid that looking higher will cause us to lose our bearings.
May there be more “Timmy” in us this Christmas, and less Thomas (the doubting kind).
Look up.

WORDS FROM W.W. December 3, 2009
“Leading an Accommodating Jesus”
My wife knows me like a book. She knows what I enjoy (jumbo shrimp, Monk, and basketball) and she also knows what pains me (reality TV shows, Walmart, and picking croutons off the top of my salad). One of the things she has been very cautious about asking me to do is going with her to the mall to do some shopping. I thank her profusely for extending “mall grace” to me.
But once in a while when she needs me to look at something in particular with her I tag along. I am not a man on a mission in those situations. Where she leads me I will follow . . . except into Victoria’s Secret. There I draw the line at the door!
When we go the mall the one store we’re going to go to turns into five. I usually don’t quibble, especially if I can get at least walk through Border’s. I don’t want to give the impression that I am always like this, but in that setting I am the picture of an accommodating husband.
She wants to look at new pillow cases.
“Okay.”
She wants to see if Macy’s has sandals on sale.
“Okay.”
She wants to check out the price of a new spatula at Sears.
“Okay.”
When it comes to malls, she leads and I accommodate.
It may be a fairly rough comparison (because Carol is about as sweet and giving as you can get), but many times our relationship with Jesus has the same dynamics to it.
We lead. Jesus accommodates.
And whereas in a marriage relationship each spouse has those situations and occasions of leading, and other situations of accommodating (always leading and never accommodating would be a relationship based on authority, not equality), in our relationships with Jesus, He is the leader and we are His followers.
That understanding gets skewed by each one of us at times, or continually. The hymn gets reworded. “Where I lead Him, He will follow. He’ll go with me…with me…wherever I say.”
We can blame it on our fallen nature, our propensity for making mistakes, our home environment, or our friends, but it really comes down to our preference for a Jesus who accommodates us, who nods in agreement to our every whim, who rides in the back seat as we steer the vehicle, who always says “yes” when that’s the answer we desire to hear. Our life decisions often have us asking Jesus which direction to go in as we’re already turning right.
The cure is constant surrender of the controls to the Master; and repentance in those decisions that we’ve determined He will be the accommodating One.
I must unceasingly be asking myself how my life is accommodating the Lordship of Jesus Christ. It’s something I’d prefer to ignore, and therein lies the struggle.
Pastor Bill

WORDS FROM W.W. November 23, 2009
“DEAR CHURCH”
TO: The Church
FROM: Ira Tator
RE: Abusive Giving
I’m writing this letter because there is a disturbing trend that is emerging in the church. I feel that I must address it now before everything gets blown out of whack. We are playing with fire, and people are about to get burned.
My concern involves abusive levels of giving. People are doing insane things!
For example, last week I had no freezer space left in either refrigerator at the house. Both of them are crammed full right now with steaks and chicken breasts, and a few gallons of ice cream that happened to be on sale the week before last. I bought a frozen Dutch apple pie to go with the ice cream, but I didn’t have room for it! So I decided to bring it to the church and store it in one of the freezers there, but, good Lord Almighty, when I opened up the freezers they were full of frozen turkeys for some poor families in the community. I couldn’t count how many turkeys were in there frozen solid and taking up space. I had to take that Dutch apple pie back home and my husband, Dick, commanded me to bake it. He had three pieces that night and was sick for three days. Too many turkeys caused it!
If we want to give turkeys to poor people do they have to be frozen? If it’s in our church building, shouldn’t our freezer space be for people from our own church who are in desperate need of a little room?
And then there was the offering a few Sundays ago! When the offering plate got to our family’s pew there was so much money in it my sister Hesi didn’t know what to do. There weren’t any one dollar bills in sight. It was all twenties and fifties and even a few hundreds. It was embarrassing! She sat there staring into that plate for at least ten seconds before she finally tucked her dollar bill underneath, but then she turned beet red! And my other sister Emma followed the crowd and almost emptied her purse of all her money. If I hadn’t stepped in and stopped her she wouldn’t have had any money left for lunch at Red Lobster.
That is just another sign that things are getting out of hand!
A couple of weeks ago the pastor told how many people had been helped this year by our church with groceries and other basic needs. I couldn’t believe the figure he said…and look how much good it’s done. We still have poor people around us. In fact, doesn’t it say in the bible somewhere that we will always have poor people around us? If we keep trying to help them out of poverty pretty soon there will be no poor people, and therefore, we will be going against what scripture says…since they are ALWAYS suppose to be there!
My sister Emma hopes to land a man someday, and have little ones, but what’s going to happen when a few Tator Tots are learning bad habits like sharing with the other children.
People need to cut back a little bit. If we take care of everyone in need we won’t have money for IHOP, and that will put them in jeopardy of closing, and then there are all those people who will be out of work. As you can see, generosity is a tool for evil. There will always be the haves and the have-nots, and if we are the haves we’ve just got to grin and bear it.
If we help people in our community too much the church won’t stick out as the light of the world because everyone else’s lights will be shining brighter.
I’m sure this all made sense to you. We’re all about proclaiming the name of Jesus. That’s why we believe he has made us prosperous- because we’re such good living witnesses for him.
One more thing! Someone keeps parking in our family’s parking spot that we’ve had for years. We know it’s not marked, but everyone knows that’s where the Tator family backs up the wagon. It’s ours and we’re not giving it away!
See you Sunday!

Sincerely,
Mrs. Ira Tator

WORDS FROM W.W. November 15, 2009
“Scripturally Evasive”

One of the things I enjoy doing, besides being a pastor, is officiating basketball. This will be my ninth year doing high school basketball, and I’m first year doing junior college games. As you become more experienced and, hopefully, better the games you referee become more intense, and the coaches more demanding. After all, for many of the junior college coaches this is their occupation.
An important part of being a good, and respected, official then is to know the rules. An official who says “It’s in the rules, coach!”, but isn’t quite sure where in the rules it is will quickly be discounted by a coach. As officials we have a saying, “If you don’t know the rule, don’t call it!” In other words, better to not call something than to call something wrong.
I find that more and more Christians are becoming less and less knowledgeable about what the Bible says. One of the ripples of that is an increase in the amount of scriptural evasiveness. Decreasing use of the Bible is resulting in decreasing use of, as we used to say, “the address”.
And so we find people saying things like “According to scripture…” or “It says in scripture…” I’m guilty of this myself. In reflecting on my messages and writings I’ve realized that I used the phrase “Scripture teaches…” more often than a teenager uses Clearasil.
To put it in a different conversation of life, it would be like a 7th grader coming home from school and saying, “Hey! No school tomorrow!” The parent’s response no doubt would be “Who said?”
“One of my teachers.”
“Which one?”
“I don’t know. It was someone I had in some class today.”
People are being intentionally evasive about where scripture says what, We’re known as “the people of the book”, but we seem to be forgetting that we’re there are 66 books in “The Book.” We’re getting more generic, even as our culture is getting more specific and inquisitive.
Evasiveness will cause us to lose a grip on what is truth.
It’s always interesting as we get towards Christmas at how “what scripture says” (There I go again!) gets mixed together with what we’ve added to it. When you read the Matthew and Luke account of the birth narrative you begin to realize how much of view of Christmas has been shaped by Chjristmas carols instead of scripture.
On-going evasiveness may blur the picture of the Bible even more. Pretty soon Hezekiah will become more frequently quoted than Isaiah; and Madonna will be sung more than Psalms.
George Barna reported that eight out of ten Americans believe the phrase “God helps those4 who help themselves” is in the Bible. Actually, it was Benjamin Franklin who said it…about 1,700 years after the Bible was written.
Bottom line, being scripturally evasive will lead to being spiritually irrelevant.