Paul wrote a note of encouragement and instruction to his protégé, Timothy, where he stated, All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work (2 Timothy 3:16-17). One particular word has caused some serious debate over the centuries: true.
When my son was very little – maybe 3 years old – he wanted to make me a note. Doing the best he could, he scribbled out a message which he proudly gave me later that day. The message was nonsense, however, and completely untrue. What he wrote would be unintelligible to any literate person who looked at it. A single “word” is on the card: ILFU. To dismiss his work as nonsense, however, would be a great mistake, would offend him (and me) and would miss the message he was trying to communicate.
One of the easiest to miss but most critical influence on our worldview is our respective birth date. When we are born massively biases the way we interpret reality. We know this is true when we witness a conversation between a current teenager and a person in their 80’s or 90’s. But there is greater significance to the period of time in which we have all been born, a time that is very unique against the rest of history.
Isaac Newton and Descartes are credited with beginning what is called the Age of Enlightenment, sometimes also called the Age of Reason. During this period, which lasted from the late 1600’s through the early 1800’s, Western thought (Europe and the US) celebrated and elevated the scientific method as the primary means for discovering truth about everything. The Church as a whole was excited to ride and perpetuate this wave, as many of the discoveries were clearly proving the truth about God’s existence. The order and engineering of everything all pointed toward a Master Craftsman who made it just so… The church was quite happy to speak about provable truth. In fact, the only things that could be true in many people’s minds were those things which could be validated by the scientific method.
But then science kept moving forward. Discoveries were made that began to challenge some things in the Bible. The Bible was true, of course, and taking a shot at it was to suggest that God made a mistake, which is impossible, because God is perfect. But because this period of history focused on literal interpretation of the scriptures, and assumed its infallibility, the wonderful marriage between Church and science came crashing down hard. The Church was no longer thrilled about the scientific method, because it was challenging what it held to be true.
And so, Christian fundamentalism was born in defense of the Bible and faith itself. She began to feel threatened by the world around her. She was right to feel that way. The Church and faith were both being seriously questioned (using the scientific method, of course) by the wider culture; some even wondered why they should exist at all. God was hard to prove. And if you can’t prove it, maybe that’s because it isn’t. Note: Recall that we’re talking about the early 1800’s, not the 1960’s that reiterated these same arguments.
Out of a time when truth was defined as only that which can be proven scientifically came the foundation for what we call Evangelicalism today. A reaction to a real threat. But a threat the Church welcomed at first.
The scientific method and its counterparts began to question things like a literal, seven day creation; Moses’ authorship of the first five books of the Bible (because the Bible says he wrote them); the Bible’s accuracy as a whole because it speaks of the sun revolving around the earth in the Psalms (how could God miss that?); miracles that cannot be replicated or proven; the list goes on and on. The response of the church was (and still is in many areas) was to simply hold to the literal ways of thinking about God and faith, even if the scriptures don’t jibe at all with science. The Bible is true. The argument has been neatly captured on a bumper sticker I once saw: The Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it.
The challenges have been many over the years on a range of different issues. But the reason why we need to think about it today is because this foundation is still heavily influencing how we interpret the Bible and therefore how we come to believe certain things about God. It would be very easy to come to the conclusion that God is very, very angry with humanity, and that it’s coming to a head when judgment day will wipe out all the evil doers. Better get ready to meet your maker. He’s ticked. Or not?
It all boils down to how we define the meaning of true. Maybe God’s not as ticked off as the scriptures indicate, because we have limited our view of scripture to a post-Enlightenment lens which leans too heavily on the scientific method, even if it doesn’t apply.
Every person in the Bible believed that the sun revolves around the earth, which we know to be false. Were they all morons? No, we let them off the hook because we realize there is no way they could see it any differently. The truth is, however, that they saw everything very differently than we do today. They understood the truth of scripture differently than we do today. They considered stories differently than we do today. They interpreted events differently than we do today. All of this is obvious if we begin looking for it, which requires us to stop wanting our ancient ancestors to live and think and speak and write with our worldview in mind.
My son’s card, by the way, communicated a great truth even though it was literally untrue. It spelled, phonetically, I love you. What he wrote was true even though it wasn’t true by literal standards. I see it every day on one of my office bookshelves – come take a look or yourself.
The people who gave us our stories of faith lived in a truth we struggle to understand today because of the arrogant blinders adopted three centuries ago by our predecessors. Our grasp of God has been severely compromised, and therefore so also our message. Let’s walk together and see what we can learn when we choose to let our ancestors speak for themselves, in their language and context and culture, and discover how we can live with God in ours.
Over the next few weeks we’ll look at some difficult stories: Noah’s Ark, Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham and Isaac, and God’s apparent willingness to endorse infanticide and genocide. Should be quite a ride.
And for a great reference book, check out Karen Armstrong’s The Case for God. She is an expert on historical religion and fundamentalism. Awesome book.
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