CHAPTER 1
The Bible as Meeting Ground
In 1699 the Bishop of London dispatched the Reverend Thomas Bray to the wilds ofMaryland to see how the Anglican Church was doing. His report, dated 1701, waspessimistic: "They are in very much want of instruction in the Christianreligion, and in some of them utterly destitute of the same." To Bray'scredit he addressed the problem by establishing the Society for the Propagationof the Gospel, which provided missionary support throughout the British Empireand continues to serve to this day, but success in biblical literacy continuesto elude Episcopalians just as it does the rest of the population of the UnitedStates. Stephen Prothero, historian of religion and popular culture at BostonUniversity, tells us in Religious Literacy that while Americans hold the mostwidespread belief in the supernatural of any developed country, we are the mostreligiously ignorant in the Western world. A recent Gallup poll contains thestark revelation that we remain "a nation of biblical illiterates," withhalf of our adult population unable to name even one of the four gospels. Ifthis is the result of three centuries of teaching, it might be time for adifferent approach.
There is good news and bad news about the way Episcopalians approach HolyScripture. The good news is that we who worship weekly and on the feast days ofthe church probably hear more scripture read and expounded upon—in prayers,sermons, and hymns—than many other mainline Protestants. The bad news is thatour once-a-week (at best) liturgical engagement with scripture is all mostEpiscopalians get. This is something most of us know to be true. Indeed, ourlack of disciplined scriptural engagement is one of the inside jokes mostEpiscopalians chuckle about in moments of self-deprecating honesty.
Most Episcopalians will readily admit to not knowing the scriptures. Some willeven describe a personal reluctance to engage the Bible in disciplined study forreasons ranging from simple apathy to a complex and fearful aversion. Notsurprisingly, the 1999 Zaccheus Report by the Episcopal Church Foundationaffirmed that the scriptures are clearly less central to the faith life of themajority of Episcopalians than the Prayer Book, hymnal, and Holy Eucharist.
In this book I will consider some of the reasons why to this day Episcopaliansare still "in very much want of instruction" in the Bible, as well as insome of the foundations upon which a new and transformative approach could bebased. Beginning with past and current approaches to scripture in our church, Iwill suggest a new emphasis that may allow the Bible to bear more fruit in usnow than it has in the past. I say "emphasis" rather than "technique"because I think this is more a matter of soul and heart than of method, eventhough the right tools are important. (We will look at some of these later on.)So recognizing that we are a people who like to "cut to the chase," I amgoing to summarize in the briefest possible terms just what that emphasis willbe. That way you can have some idea of where we are going, and we can traveltogether harmoniously without worrying too much about the destination.
where we are going
Christianity is not basically a philosophy or a body of knowledge but a way ofliving in which we meet and experience the living God. Consequently its primaryresource, the Bible, misses its potential when it is considered apart fromliving our lives in relationship with God. The Bible is a meeting ground whereour spiritual ancestors have gone for the past several thousand years toencounter the Lord and see their lives deepened and directed in accordance withGod's priorities. The "meeting" which takes place in these holy texts hasconsistently proven to contain infinite human value, even as our perceptions andunderstandings of the "meeting ground" have changed. The study of scriptureprovides us with a guidebook to this place of meeting, telling us of origins,interpretations, and nuances that help us to hear the Word the Lord is speaking.In the same way that a museum audio-tour helps us to observe a painting all themore closely, or a theater program helps us to understand a play, Bible studyopens us to the fullest experience of God in scripture. It is possible to be sopoorly prepared and biblically illiterate that we can hear almost nothing fromGod, while the clamor of our culture comes through loud and clear. And it ispossible for the wrong kind of study to make the encounter so full of bits ofinformation that we hear nothing but reverberations and echoes—think of arestaurant with so much rattle and clatter that conversation is reduced to lipreading.
The whole point of the religious enterprise is to be in a right relationshipwith God. William James wrote over a century ago in The Varieties of ReligiousExperience that religious belief, Christianity included, holds that "there issomething wrong with us as we naturally stand" and that "we are saved fromthat wrongness by making proper connection with the higher powers." Ourapproach to the Bible must reach for that "proper connection" or there is noreason to approach it all.
While our "want of instruction" is still daunting, this book will show thatwe are perfectly poised to alter our course and make the desired connection. Iwill take a candid look at the issues that seem to confuse our church, and thenconsider the theological foundations that have been provided for us by ourforebears—as well as what our contemporaries have built upon them with renewedBible study methods and systems. I want to show how our best traditions can beextended into the twenty-first century, allowing us to be sufficiently informedand enriched by scripture to let the soul of Thomas Bray rest more easily.
Now that you have some idea of where we are going, let's consider what isinvolved in getting there.
challenges from the culture
I grew up in West Virginia just after World War II. An annual feature of publicschool life was a Christmas pageant: shepherds in potato sacks, citizens inbathrobes, kings swathed in bolts of cloth, angels in white, and seriouscompetition over the roles of Gabriel and Mary. During the year, those who choseto were allowed to leave school early and walk across town to the MethodistChurch for classes titled "Religious Education." This was, of course, morean education by the dominant culture than true public education. My hometown wasoverwhelmingly Christian and, at that time, had little concern for the finepoints of the separation of church and state.
Without considering whether these programs were good or bad, we need toacknowledge that they are things of the past. While there are some attempts inthe academy to honor the literary heritage of the Bible with courses like "TheBible as Literature," our schools, for reasons well beyond the scope of thisbook, have pretty well gone out of the Bible story business. Of course theschool was not always diligent in its faithfulness to the fullness of thebiblical narrative. What was offered was clumsy, selective, and shallow, but byacting out the Christmas story and allotting time in the curriculum for what wasessentially Bible school, the school system and the community it served borewitness to the value of knowing the Bible. Our diverse culture is wisely silenton the faith story of any one group. Nevertheless, in that silence the Christiancommunity must increase its efforts and effectiveness in making the Bible anoption for those who would know the Lord. The Episcopal Church, which hashistorically been so identified with the surrounding culture and has neverdeveloped a zeal for personal witness, is faced with particular challenges insharing the importance of the Bible with its own members and beyond.
We live in times that are far from reflective and quiet, and there are many morevoices laying claim to our attention than in days gone by. We live in what isoften called "The Information Age," which affords us many benefits as wellas widening and deepening our sense of confusion. The information we receivefrom television and the internet, news and advertising media, church and state,principalities and powers is constant and virtually unfiltered. The InformationAge has no method, and apparently little interest, in distinguishing betweengood information and bad, rumor and fact, urban legend and formative myth. Weneed something to help us sort the miraculous from the ridiculous, revelationsfrom aberrations, mystery from mayhem, the ordinary from the extraordinary. TheEpiscopal Church, by virtue of education, income, and interest, tends to be wellin touch with this undisciplined media flow and so is particularly in need ofthe kind of grounding the Bible has traditionally provided.
Episcopalians do need some way to be reminded of who we are and of knowing whatwe are supposed to do. In fact we need our church to be the "family" weoften describe it to be. Families, clans, and tribes have historically providedtheir members with two essential formative gifts. One is identity, and thesecond is training in the kinds of behavior that characterize that identity. Itis through our family that we are told who we are—what our roots are, whetherwe be European or Asian, first-generation or tenth-generation, white-collar orblue-collar. And we are taught what it means to express that identity in ourdaily lives. We learn about forks or chopsticks, manners and skills, lore andheritage. In a similar way, the church family needs to impart more clearly theidentity that is rooted in our baptism, the behaviors required by its covenantand the rich lore that has sustained our "family" for centuries. For manygenerations the Bible provided that identity and guide but it is increasinglydifficult to hear its message amid the cacophony of voices that fill ourscreens, radios, newspapers, and iPods. The Bible still speaks and the churchstill interprets its message, but only those who really work at listening canhear what is being said.
Our ancestors generally had the opposite problem: too little data. And for manycenturies the information they had was drawn from the Bible, for the Word of theLord was almost the only word they had. That "word" can certainly be foundin the contemporary mix of blogs, bluster, blasphemy, and solid reporting, butit is very difficult for the average person to recognize. Jesus once said thathis sheep would know his voice. That is a comforting thought, but I doubt thatwe can assume that we ourselves will recognize his voice as a natural byproductof baptism. If we are going to recognize the Lord's voice, it will be the waysheep and other creatures do—by listening. We must listen to it, becomefamiliar with it, and then and only then we will be able to recognize it.
That calls for a renewed investment in Bible reading on the part ofEpiscopalians. Where else can we learn the sound of God's "voice" apartfrom scripture? How would we know our identity as children of God apart from thestruggles and triumphs of those who have gone before us? How will we know whatto do in a noisy, shifting, morphing world unless we know the priorities,interests, and instincts of God? Where will we learn those things apart fromwhat generations have come to call the Word of the Lord? It is true that we hearlessons read every Sunday and usually hear them interpreted from the pulpit, butfew of us have the kind of immersion in scripture that will bring us to themeeting ground and allow us to hear the Lord's voice. We know we areChristians, but that is not enough. Without God's voice we are like sheepwithout a shepherd, seeds thrown on hard ground, or fools before dumb idols. Theunhappy lot of all of these is well described in scripture, as are the virtuesof a mustard seed, the widow's mite, and those who soar on eagle's wings.Hearing God's Word in a world of too much information is not easy—but it isessential.
Besides the competing racket all around us, Episcopalians (like everyone else)are questioning the frameworks and measuring rods that provided a source ofclarity for previous generations. Those who keep track of the world's trendstell us that we are living in a "postmodern" age. The significant thingabout that description is that it says nothing about what is going on—exceptthat it is not like it was before. We have emerged from a way of understandingthat was called "modern" and find ourselves in a nameless wilderness that isso new and vague that it is called literally "that-which-comes-after-modern."There are few if any norms or basic assumptions upon which weuniversally rely. Individuals have their certainties, to be sure. You have someand so do I. But as a whole, as a culture, we do not. Our world is like ashattered mirror, a Humpty Dumpty that is not going to come back together theway that it was before. Globalization and multiculturalism are only two forcesamong the many new influences on society at large.
The Episcopal Church's call to greater and wider diversity is requiring notonly a second look, but also a reexamination and reordering of longstandingnorms and practices. The fact that the current disputes in the Episcopal Churchare focused on core issues such as the interpretation of scripture, theauthority of bishops, and the meaning of morality indicates new examinations ofold assumptions, a very postmodern sort of thing. Suffice it to say that "thetimes, they are a-changing," and nobody is quite sure what they are changinginto. The old norms, standards, and reliable resources seem inadequate to thetasks of the age and are being set aside without an obvious new set of trustedguides at hand. One of the casualties of this newness is the Bible, whichpreviously had to be reckoned with by anyone who wanted to be taken seriouslyabout business, politics, family life, or foreign relations. Now it is oftenignored even by those who write about ethics and morality. Faithful people whotake the Bible seriously must do so in a world that no longer does.
The questioning of most norms and basic assumptions is important for manyreasons that are beyond the scope of this book, but there is one basicassumption that we should pause and take note of. Our God is the Creator who hasnever stopped building a "new thing" on ancient foundations. This was one ofthe remarkable revelations received by our ancestors. The ancient world couldsee the cyclical patterns of nature and assumed that history worked the sameway. The human story, they reasoned, simply repeated itself over and over theway the moon, the Nile, and the seasons did. The first words of the Bible,however, challenge that assumption and set us off in what was then an entirelynew direction: "In the beginning" is a stunning blow to the idea that lifegoes in circles because circles do not have beginnings. Our spiritual ancestorsdeclared with God's own authority that life's story has a beginning and thusa middle and an end. We now accept such a notion as commonplace, but itcertainly was not in its day. Among other things it introduced us to the conceptof the future, of newness, of God's plan for creation, and of God'screatures as continuously "unfolding." That revelation allows us to becalled followers of Jesus—because Jesus is going somewhere and we can neverquite be certain of the direction. Our faith is a rich combination of old andnew, with the clear admonition to avoid putting new wine in old wineskins.Christianity is alive and bubbling with the creative energy of God.
To join in that creative enterprise, we need to have solid foundations, such asa thorough knowledge of scripture, because the difference between creativity andchaos is the presence of a standard, a norm. Creativity is a departure from thebaseline of routine and common assumptions. Where these are missing we have notcreativity but chaos—where even the best minds can only wander from onenovelty to another like crows picking up shiny objects with no value other thantheir glitter. Consider that the Sunday liturgy has a basic pattern that stillallows us to do different things that inform, enrich, and delight (as well asoccasionally irritate) us. If the liturgy were different every Sunday, we wouldend up deeply unsatisfied.
