"Grey" Scripture

One of the questions that was brought up during this last course was a question about the concept of the "sufficiency of scripture." One of my classmates provocatively asked whether the Bible speaks mostly in guidelines, suggestions, and is mostly "grey" rather than being "black and white." That got me thinking.

We learn, in Bible classes, the Interpreting Scriptures course, and the theology classes that the Bible is "sufficient." But we don't spend a lot of time poking at that idea.

I'm going to quote a guy named Ken Myers:
We don't hear much about the "insufficiency of Scripture." But it is an important point to keep in mind when thinking about Christianity and culture. Scripture does not present itself as the only source of truth about all matters. It does not even present itself as a source of some truth about everything. It presents itself as the only authoritative source of truth about some things, and they are the most important things.
So, seems to me that the issue is whether the Bible presents the down-to-the-last-detail truth about those important things. In agreement with the folks posing the "grey" question, I think the answer is occasionally: "no." That is, not all the details of how to live life are filled in by the Bible in such a way that we in our modern (or post-modern) mindset would like. I think that God does grant us the dignity of discovery and wants us to work a bit at connecting the dots that he's laid out.

As to the not-as-important-things? For example: the Bible doesn't directly speak to whether I should buy and use a Mac or PC - much less whether I should use electricity. From that, I would conclude that issue (Mac or PC) is not really as important as stuff like: what's our relationship to The Creator; do we understand that we have a HUGE sin problem; do we see that the answer is Jesus; do we connect with a well-done church; do we do (as well as believe) a true gospel? Those are The Important Issues and the Bible speaks clearly to them. Though not even those matters are always covered in complete detail.

While I am, even now, going through a thought experiment about the concept of biblical "ambiguity" (in a technical sense) I'm not at all comfortable with the thought that most of the Bible is 'grey.'

But I sense that's not the core of the question. It seems my classmate is responding to an overly-literalistic tradition. And to that, I certainly agree that scripture gives us more freedom and liberty in Christ than some of our Fightin' Fundies brothers and sisters are willing to admit.

Capstone Theology Course

I realized I’m fully into the seminary experience. So much so that I’ve noticed that I had briefly lost touch with where people are really at. I had a conversation with a friend of mine who’d asked about how my classes were going. I then launched into a description of the course on Old Testament theology and some of the controversial issues we were discussing. At one point, I commented that “I really am not all that into Biblical Theology.” My friend responded: “What??!?”

Now in my mind I was maintaining the technical distinctions between the four classic parts of theology: Biblical, Systematic, Historical, and Practical. What I was saying was that I had only gotten a taste of Biblical Theology at this point in my education so was having a challenge getting up to speed in this advanced course. What my friend heard me say is: “I really don’t care about the Bible!” Yikes! I cleared up the confusion – yes, I really DO care about the Bible!! I also laughed at myself because I’d fallen so far into Theologian jargon that even my rather bright friend got confused. So I slapped myself out of my ivory tower and I think I’m better now. :-)

I finished my “Integrating Theology and Ministry” class (this is the 'capstone' course) on the 23rd and that culminated with a brief oral examination that was similar to what I might face during an ordination process. The process goes like this: the room is filled with a few other students who have all had a chance to pick over my work in detail, the prof picks about three subject that he thinks will get the most traction, then they start in with “clarifying” questions about my beliefs and hypothetical questions about ministry, after some time the prof calls a halt, the examinee leaves the room (“cast out into utter darkness”), and then the student is graded by everyone on how well they did in several areas as well as a final “excellent/pass/retake” grade.

So my time came up and the professor announced the three subjects the other guys were to grill me on: one that he knew I was shaky on, one that he knew I’d done some extra work on, and one that he knew I held the minority position with the other guys in the room. So I managed to not completely embarrass myself on my shaky subject (election and atonement), probably did an over-kill on my good subject (humanity), the guys ignored my third subject but started in on me about a completely different area (church discipline and ordinances). I think they were trying to rattle me by bringing up an area that the prof hadn’t put on the table. Still, I did alright, actually. At the end of the allotted time, the prof announced that I was ‘ex-communicated from the room.’ I left and they deliberated my fate. So, after the blood had subsided, they passed me. Whew!

Altogether, it was a great exercise and showed me several weaknesses and a couple of strengths.

Rocked My World

I have just finished reading an assignment that has rocked my world a bit.

The reading was from a couple of sections of Alister McGrath’s book, “A Passion For Truth.” Specifically, the Introduction and chapter 4 (“Evangelicalism and Postmodernism”). In the Introduction, McGrath states that Evangelicalism – especially in North America - has steered a course away from “Academic Theology” (a theology whose agenda is dictated by the values and goals of the academy). For those evangelicals that have tasted of Academic Theology, the response is probably: “Duh – of course!” McGrath says it is because of a fundamentalist heritage, a pragmatic orientation, the secularism of the academy (which has lost touch with theology’s prophetic role), and the elitism of academic theology (it has lost touch with its pastoral role).

McGrath’s observations and conclusions are very helpful – and not surprising to any evangelical who has dipped a bit into the murky waters of “academic theology.” However, the interesting bit (for me) came in chapter four where McGrath challenges evangelicals to re-consider their unspoken (and unconscious) assumptions in the face of a new societal hermeneutic – the infamous “postmodernism.” Oh, yes! Postmodernism clearly has a meta-narrative.

The Enlightenment and Modernity (consider those terms synonymous) are based on the notion that reason was able to accomplish anything. What is troubling is that, generally, evangelicals have uncritically bought into that notion for three hundred years. As modernity has influenced great theologians of evangelicals, it has influenced – for the worse – evangelicals understanding of several key areas:

* The nature of scripture – ignoring the clearly emotive and narrative nature of most of scripture, evangelicals have been sucked into looking only for propositional truth
* Spirituality – having ignored the emotive characteristic of scripture, evangelicals have tended to purge emotions from their culture
* Apologetics – evangelicals have assumed there is a universal rationality and ignored the observable facts that Christianity is not purely rational and that not everyone interacts with their world in the same manner
* Evangelism – a misunderstanding of Biblical truth; “Truth” has been assumed to be propositional in nature and all truths of scripture are “logically consistent” with each other; yet this is not itself consistent with the evidence (N.B. the irony). Biblical “Truth” is more related to “trustworthiness” and is very personal: Jesus *is* truth

This is not to deny that there are rational and cognitive elements within the Christian faith, it is merely to note that we can appreciate postmodernism for its help in freeing the faith from a foreign worldview.

As a thoroughly indoctrinated modernist, much of postmodernism is disrupting to me, of course. However, in facing my own mental filters, it is this transition into a postmodern world which facilitates my better understanding – and greater commitment to – a Biblical Christianity.

I note that in a postmodern world, Christianity is clearly relevant. It is relevant to our fundamental questions: Why do we and the world exist? Why are things this way and not another? The question for a postmodern looking at Christianity is not just is Christianity true for the writer of this blog; but is it true also for the reader?

Evangelicals don't need to adopt postmodernism - there is plenty in that framework that is hostile to Biblical thought - but postmodernism can help Evangelicals to strip off the incompatible accoutrements of the Enlightenment.