A Story Bigger Than What I am Currently Reading

Have you ever noticed that when you are reading a good book, there are things that make sense later in the story that shed light on something that happened earlier in the story.  When you read chapter one, there are things going on that are better understood when you are reading chapter seven, than they were when you were reading chapter one.  It also happens in movies.  You watch a movie the second time and say to yourself, "How did I miss that?" but your eyes are only opened when you know the whole story.

The Bible is written like this.  It is a vast narrative written to draw us into the ultimate Story.  Unfortunately I don't always read it that way.  And to be honest, it's hard to read it that way.  As I said before, I was taught to read in order to gather information, facts and morality.  Only recently have I begun to understand that, rather than a collection of individual books of historical accounts, poems, songs, and letters, the Holy Scripture is actually ONE large story. Northrop Frye (great name), an advocate of reading largely, said, "Every sentence is the key to the whole Bible."  He understood that the "immediate context of the sentence [any sentence in Scripture] is as likely to be three hundred pages off as to the be next or preceding sentence."

Understanding this to be true, brings to light one of the greatest dangers of modern Christianity.  If we continue to reduce our reading of the Scriptures as simply a gatherings of facts, a production of a morality or even a kettle of inspiration, we will miss the Story, thus robbing Scripture of the transformational power in our lives.  We cannot simply read because we have to, but must begin to read because we are drawn into.  I have known people who have read the Bible through, more than once.  I am not one of those people...yet.  I have also heard these people say that each subsequent read is better than the previous.  Why?  Because the Story pulls them into the intricacies once you know the ending.  Great stories do this to you.

How have you been taught to read the Bible?  If you are like most people, you didn't come upon your reading style by attending a formal class.  The classes often tell us that we should read the Bible, but not how.  I'm interested to know if I am alone in my assessment so far.  I'm also hoping to hear that some of you have discovered the Bible as a Story and would love to hear your thoughts.  

Eat This Book

I am currently reading in a new book called Eat This Book: A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading. Eugene Peterson, the translator for The Message version of the Bible, writes this book in order to "pull the Christian Scriptures back from the margins of the contemporary imagination where they have been so rudely elbowed by their glamourous competitors, and reestablish them at the center as the text for living the Christian life deeply and well." I am intrigued by this book because I have become one of those who has pushed the Scriptures to the margins of my imagination. I didn't mean to. I didn't set out to replace the Scriptures with anything else. I grew up in a denomination that has, throughout history, fought vigorously over the authority of the Scriptures. I believe that the Bible is authoritative. How did I get here, then?


I got here by slowly replacing the Bible with other good books. Early in my faith, it seemed to be Max Lucado. Then I moved along to other writers like John Ortberg, Philip Yancey, John Piper, Donald Miller and Rob Bell. These are great writers who I believed were continually challenging me to look deeper into life and how the Bible fit into that life. The problem is not the writers or their books, the problem is that I was looking to see how the Scriptures fit into my life and not looking at the Scriptures to see how my life fit into them. It's a subtle difference, but it has landed me at a place where it's easier to pick up another book than to pick up The Book. It's ironic to me that God is using one of those books to change the way I think about reading His Book.

As I continue through this book, I'm going to let my challenges be your challenges for the next several days.  As I read, I will post.  One of the marks of a great book is that it makes me stop, exhale and think about what I'm reading.  For this book, you will get to experience the exhale and thoughts.  If you want to get the book and read along with me, that would be great, but you don't have to.  I'm just letting you into my thought-world for a few days.

Chapter 1 - The Holy Community at Table With Holy Scripture

Revelation 10.9 (TNIV)     So I went to the angel and asked him to give me the little scroll. He said to me, “Take it and eat it. It will turn your stomach sour, but ‘in your mouth it will be as sweet as honey.’ ”  10 I took the little scroll from the angel’s hand and ate it. It tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I had eaten it, my stomach turned sour. 

In the final book of the Bible, the angel of the Lord uses an interesting metaphor in relation to the Scriptures.  Or is it a metaphor?  The word he uses is the word katesthio which is not light snack or nibble, but an eating up or devouring.  It was often used with animals of prey, as they would devour their food.

As John, heard the angel say these words there is a good chance he recalled similar commands given to two other great prophets centuries earlier (Ezekiel 2:8-3:3; Jeremiah 15:16).  The emphasis by the angel is that the "scroll" (John's bible) was to be devoured.  It was to be consumed in a manner as if the one eating was on the brink of starvation.  Ezekiel, Jeremiah and John all came to the understanding that they were to take the written words of God and ingest them in a way that would work the text out into their lives.

I grew up with a different understanding of reading.  I read in order to gain the right information to pass the test.  The goal for reading was never taught to be a transformational experience, but rather an informational one.  I have learned, in recent years, the art of letting a book get into me and change me.  Now my desire is to begin reading the Bible this way.  As a pastor, it's easy to always read the Bible with an eye to teaching others.  It's much more difficult to eat it on my own...to let it sink in...to live it out.

Now the journey begins.  Let the Holy Scriptures return to their Holy Place of prominence in the life of this Christ-follower.  May my life be shaped by what the text says and not what someone says about the text.  Let me listen to the community of faith in a healthy way, helpful to my understanding but not my sole understanding.  I want to Eat His Book.