The only way to make the music come alive is to sing or play. To realize a script requires you and your friends to act, film, and edit.
Students of Jesus have been given a gift filled with music to sing and roles to play. It’s called the Bible. The Father has given us an inspired instrument for taking the yoke of discipleship. He waits for those who will take the instrument and learn to play. One of the great challenges in the life of a believer is learning how to experience the life God intends for us through the instrument of the Scripture.
To some, the Scripture is a book of rules. To others, the Bible is an object of study, not much different from learning math or history. And sadly, for some Christians the Bible is the primary resource for criticizing others. They use the Scripture as a measuring stick--one they hold up against others but rarely to themselves. Perhaps you’ve met believers like this: people who get the words right but the music all wrong. After all, it’s easier to relate to a book than a person. Books don’t talk back. You can pick and choose where to read. And if you’re among the smart kids in class you can demonstrate your superiority through your mastery of books.
I’ve posted previously my suggestions on how students of Jesus can relate to the Bible. I hope those suggestions are life-giving because the Bible is meant to be a life-giving experience for God’s people. Time with the scripture is meant to be time with the Creator, an event to be lived, breathed, sung, acted, collaborated, shouted, and danced. The Bible is the Holy Spirit’s permanent address, and he’s always home--yet he is not confined to ink on a page. He’s the Breath of God, the wind which blows where it wills.
Would it be too heretical to suggest that the words of the Bible on the printed page are not really the word of God until we act upon them? Music on the printed page isn’t really music until the musician brings it to life. When an actor speaks the words of the script a thousand meanings jump to life. The word of God is meant to be living and active. Perhaps that’s why Jesus is called “the Word of God.”
Eugene Peterson says it this way:
“Christians don’t simply learn or study or use Scripture; we assimilate it, take it into our lives in such a way that it gets metabolized into acts of love, cups of cold water, missions into all the world, healing and evangelism and justice in Jesus’ name, hands raised in adoration of the Father, feet washed in the company of the Son.”Who could argue with a Bible that's alive in every neighborhood, acting out the love of God? Don't tell me you have the right answers, show me how those answers impact the way you live. Is there really any other kind of Christianity except applied Christianity? That’s the kind of book I want to spend my life with. How about you?
--Would it be too heretical to suggest that the words of the Bible on the printed page are not really the word of God until we act upon them? Music on the printed page isn’t really music until the musician brings it to life. When an actor speaks the words of the script a thousand meanings jump to life. The word of God is meant to be living and active. Perhaps that’s why Jesus is called “the Word of God.”--
ReplyDelete------------------------------
I wouldn't say it was heretical, but I would offer that His Word does not need us to implement it, preach it, teach it, or show it for it to be all that it is. 'His Word does not return void to Him' does not imply our involvement in His Word, but the fact that He is The Word and His ways are Sovereign in all things.
Jesus is indeed The Word of God, as stated in The Book of John. It has always been on God's heart that His Word would be made flesh, hence, Jesus as The Son. Consider also our adoption as sons through the Spirit of adoption and the New Covenant, which bears the blood of Jesus as Lamb of God. Since we are to strive to be all the Jesus was and is, our sonship is a logical reality of who and what we are. We are to be The Word made flesh, but not in some weird New-Age kinda freakshow way! (Yikes!) We are to be holy, perfect, and as Jesus. The Word made flesh, indeed. Amazing stuff, really.
Yet even then, Jesus is not waiting for us to act upon His teachings to make them relevant, powerful, or meaningful. Kinda like the whole, 'If a tree fell in a forest and no one was there to hear it, would it still make a sound?' question. If there were no one to be The Word in action or speech, would it still be His Word? Sure. Of course it would.
Not thinking your question is heretical at all. It is actually a good one that hopefully brings to light the reality of His Word, not only in printed form, but in the Person of Jesus Christ our King.
Blessings to you and yours, in His Name!
Hi Donald. First of all, thanks for stopping by!
ReplyDeleteI resonate with so much of what you've said. And of course, his Word is forever settled in the heavens. His Word is alive and powerful and independent of us. Yet we see time and again that the power of the Word is expressed in its ability to move the hearts of men, drawing them after him, putting them on the path to Christlikeness, and finding it's way through their lives into their actions.
I agree with you, too, with respect to our calling to be like him. Some many Christians simultaneously revere Jesus but give up any hope of transformation--to become like Jesus.
Finally, I think the Incarnation of Jesus--so beautifully expressed in those opening verses of John--is not only an established fact, but also an example. We, too, should respond to the Word by fleshing it out in a thousand ways.
Peace to you!
Ray,
ReplyDeleteYou said:
"We, too, should respond to the Word by fleshing it out in a thousand ways."
I'll be stealing this later on my blog. That was good stuff, right there.
Donald, Many theologians talk about a theology of Word and Spirit. I would say that the Bible is the Word when it is the normative meeting place for the Spirit with the reader. If we respond to that meeting appropriately, action will follow.
ReplyDelete