Sunday, December 04, 2005

Worship of the Bible

Awhile ago i found this article (framed as a short story) about our ability as Christians to elevate the Bible actually higher than its supposed to be. I know at first glance that may sound impossible, and i don't think all the church is guilty of it, but it does make you think. I really reccommend it.

"The Sacred Idolatry"

It talks about how Christians can sometimes put more emphasis on the Bible as the way to know God, than they do on actually knowing God. But then, i find myself asking, am I able to know God apart from the Bible? I'm not talking theoretically - i know a person without a Bible can still know something about God and that a person who rejects the Bible can never really know God. But in my own life, sometimes i wish i could learn more about God first-hand. I wish i was better at discerning His leading so i could learn from that. I wish i was better at identifying the ways He was active in the events and circumstances around me, so i could learn from that. Sometimes i wish He would speak to me directly more often, so i could learn from that.

I know some people might read this and say that my lack of personal "divine experience" is an indication that there really isn't a God. Of course I disagree. I have seen God working. I have heard him speak. I just wish i had more of that to accompany the thousands of years-0ld stories i read in the Bible. But i am grateful i have those stories, because as i have described i don't have a whole lot besides them to help me know God.

Anyway, all that was to say that maybe the article goes too far in its emphasis on knowing God rather than knowing Him through the Bible. The Bible really is one of the best ways we have of knowing God, especially until we learn to see Him in the present.

1 comment:

Aaron Geist said...

I loved that article. It's a scary proposition to say that we 'worship' the Bible. What if we did? How would our relationship with God look different if we didn't worship the Bible?