We had to burn the village to save the village...

Cutting back individual liberties to save democracy, abandoning the free market to save the economy... and now one more. 

Putting the Bible on the shelf in order to better follow Jesus. 

I wasn't going to get into this, but... 

Adam Walker Cleveland has posted "The Bible & Homosexuality: Enough with the Bible Already" and stirred up quite the poop storm in his comments. The basic gist of the post is this:

Christians need to get over their fear of gays and of what might happen if they welcomed fully into our society and churches. Christians need to get over their infatuation with a very select few verses, and get over their infatuation with a literalistic interpretation of these texts. Christians need to look more to Christ than to the Bible. Christians need to actually live out the radical love and compassion that Jesus exemplified in the scriptures. Christians need to realize that the world will not end when gays are given the right to marry - or when we finally fully welcome LGBT brothers and sisters into pastoral ministry.
If it is the Bible that is causing us to delay accepting and celebrating LGBT persons as being fully human and fully created in the image of God, just as they are, then perhaps we need to say, “Enough with the Bible already…”

Without going into too much depth here, and ignoring the contention that all that's really standing in the way of affirming same sex sexual activity is "fear of gays," let me just say (as many others have pointed out) that the idea of looking more to Christ than to the Bible is a practical impossibility. Why? Because we only learn about Christ  from the Bible. 

Put the Bible on the shelf and before too long, the true Jesus begins to fade from our view, slowly to be replaced by a projection-filled, wispy pseudo-Jesus who (hey! What do you know!) likes all the stuff I just happen to like and only wants to change those things about me that I already would like to change. This is how Jesus becomes both tattooed Ultimate Fighter to some and hippie peacenik to others. It's how Jesus can in the same election cycle make an appearance as both a registered Republican AND a Democratic party activist.

And it's how we get a Jesus who puts his stamp of approval on our sin, whether it be our hatred or unloving actions toward others, OR our coloring outside the lines sexually.

Here's the thing with the God's Word. It challenges everyone. You. Me. The religious. The irreligious. It challenges you no matter where you stand and ESPECIALLY when you think you have it on your side. 

I've been arguing publicly for a change in how we view marriage in this country. I think the loving thing to do for the gay and lesbian folks in our society is to ensure that they can have equal rights and dignity with everyone else. To me, that's where the Bible challenges the right on this issue- not to use the power of the State to discriminate against those making choices and living in a manner we disagree with, and we can do that by getting the State out of the "marriage" business.

On the other hand, the Bible has challenges as well for those who want to say that Jesus would and does approve of even their monogamous gay relationship. 

God seems to take sexuality pretty seriously. From the Old Testament all the way through the final book in the Bible, Scripture is far from value-neutral on what (and with whom) we do with our bodies. Why? Because God is making a point through sexuality that He is unwilling to see marred and because as the designer of both humans and sexuality He's got a pretty good idea of what it looks like expressed in a healthy way and how it hurts us when it's not... even if we don't. Though the ceremonial and dietary codes of the Old Testament are specifically set aside in Jesus and the New Testament, the issues of sexual morality, including homosexual relationships are specifically spoken to (and again proscribed) in the New. 

Yes, Jesus would and did hang out with homosexuals (an assumption based on those the Gospels tell us He hung out with- I'm pretty sure the 3-5% figure of homosexual presence in society was probably true then as well). And yes, I think He would challenge them to leave certain behaviors behind and follow Him (another assumption based on Mark 10:1-12, John 5:1-14 and John 8:1-11 especially). 

Adam's plea to know some gay people before pontificating on the issue is a good one we should all heed. The use of Scripture apart from real, experiential knowledge of those to whom we are trying to apply it is incomplete at best and dangerous at worst. 

But the inverse is no better. To have relationships and friendships with gay and lesbian people is good, but incomplete at best and dangerous at worst (as is all of life) apart from being informed by Scripture, that is when Scripture is placed on the shelf or even when our experience is preferred over it. It's the words of Scripture that tell us we should love all people, friends and enemies alike and treat them as we would want to be treated. It's in Scripture we find out how Jesus would have us love people. And it's the words of the very same Scripture that convince me that ignoring the truth about someone's sin (be it their selfishness, their materialism or their sexual sin, or mine for that matter), not letting them know what we think (and what we think God thinks about the issue) is about the least friendly and loving thing we could do. 

If your view of sexuality is based solely on what you read in Scripture (apart from knowledge of those living in both healthy and unhealthy ways), it will be incomplete, or at the very least, unbalanced and likely to be applied unwisely by being unseasoned by real-life experience. And if it's based solely (or even mainly) on your experience with others? Same thing. 

We need to have and be friends that disagree with each other. We find ways to be friends with and have good, healthy and lively discussions with folks who are on the opposite side of the spectrum from us on a huge number of issues whether it be politics, how we raise and teach our kids, religious thought and any number of other issues. Why should this one be any different? If you are gay, I'm open to friendship and even to hearing how the church and Christians have hurt you (yes, I've had these conversations). I would hope you'd be just as open to hearing what I think as well, and where both my experience and my engagement with Scripture has led me. 

The difficult truth is that sin, sexual sin (gay, straight or any other variation) especially with its built-in self-reinforcers of pleasure and addiction,  is deceiving and we so desperately want to be deceived. We want to justify our actions before, during and after the fact and will do a lot of mental gymnastics to get where we want to be. And unfortunately, trying to build a sexuality apart from Scripture and relying mainly on what feels right at the time or what our experience and reason tell us will inevitably lead us to some dead ends.  

"Cigarettes and chocolate milk...

These are just a couple of my cravings
Everything it seems I like is a little bit stronger
A little bit thicker, a little bit harmful for me

If I should buy jellybeans
Have to eat them all in just one sitting
Everything it seems I like is a little bit sweeter
A little bit fatter, a little bit harmful for me

And then there's those other things
Which for several reasons we won't mention
Everything about them is a little bit stranger, 

a little bit harder
a little bit deadly..." 

-Rufus Wainwright

Comments

[Matthew Todd]

Well freaking said.

[david]

nice post, bob.

i'm not necessarily saying it's time for this conversation, but i just wonder at what point do we say to our brothers, "you know, i'm not sure that's compatible with Christianity. even though this isn't a "strictly" gospel issue, it feels like another gospel."

just wonderin'

[Bill Kinnon]

I find Penn Gillette's rapidly going viral video on proselytizing interesting in light of Adam's post and the fan boy response in certain parts of the emerging conversation. It does begin to feel like another gospel - a bible-free gospel. A gnostic gospel that worships Buddy Jesus and appears Trinity-free, no less.

I am profoundly saddened by it.

God help us all.

[Danny Kam]

Hi,
You said above that "we only learn about Christ from the Bible."

Yes, we have learned about Christ from the Bible since the year 400, when the Bible was finally put together in a language that the people did not understand (Latin) and in a language different from the original manuscripts. Yes, we have learned about the Bible, since the 1500s, when someone finally got around to inventing a printing press and putting those wonderful pages together for us to read.

What about the 400 years between the time of the Bible being put together? What about the 1100 years after this when no one except laity read the scriptures?

Don't get me wrong. I am not calling for putting the Bible on the shelf, it's a good book. But to say that we ONLY know Christ through scripture is to undo 1500 years of history where the majority of Christ was known through the church (and sometimes through experience in dreams and other such things).

[bobhyatt]

Hmm. Danny- A serious question: what (specifically) do you know about Christ that you haven't learned from the Bible?

400 years is perhaps when a finalized cannon was accepted- but that's not when individual books where written. The Gospels and the New Testament Epistles were all completed before the end of the first century and the Gospel material existed in oral form before that.
So while we know about Christ only from the Bible, they knew about Christ (other than those who knew Him personally or who knew those who knew Him) only from what would become the Bible

Same difference in my opinion.

Same for those who don't have a personal copy of Scripture. The teaching they receive still (at least ideally) finds its source in Scripture. Knowing Christ "through the church" (as you say) is simply removing it one more degree since the Church knows Christ through the Bible- the teaching of the Apostles and others who knew Him.

As for dreams and other such things- God may choose to communicate through those things, but it seems like He mainly uses Scripture. Unless you or someone you know has had a dream in which God communicated truth about Jesus that isn't otherwise found in the Bible?? I'd love to hear about that...

Kind of a strawy argument you are making there...

[ryan]

Bob-

Thanks for the eloquent post. Personally convicting to remember that if Jesus and the Bible are not challenging me to change some parts of my life/beliefs I have probably made Jesus and the Bible to much in my image.

It makes me think that image is what it all comes down to, or the conforming to it for that matter. Will it be God conforming to our image? Or us conforming to his?

[Steve K.]

Thanks for this, Bob. I think you strike a good balance between the different sides in this discussion. I too am praying for that "win-win" situation you are talking about.

[Danny Kam]

Hi Bob,
I was just bringing up the point because it sits with me the wrong way when people say they only know God through the Bible.

I also know Christ through experience.

I also know Christ through the sacraments.

I also know Christ through the church.

I have just read so many stories about people seeing Jesus in dreams who had never before heard anything about Jesus. These types of encounters lets me know that God does use these type of things.

[bobhyatt]

And what you know of Him through those (experience, sacraments and church) is built on the foundation of the Bible. Without Scripture to inform them, they would communicate very little to you that you would understand.

And yes, in extraordinary circumstances, God reveals Himself to people in dreams. Usually people who don't have the Scriptures. But, generally speaking (and we're talking missionary stories here), the Scriptures aren't far behind. God may reveal His existence to them in a dream, but content and knowledge of Him is provided by... yep- The Scriptures.

Again, just tell me one specific thing you know about Christ that doesn't find its basis in Scripture or that you know of Him apart from Scripture and I'll cede the point.

Danny- I'm sorry it "sits wrong with you" but that's exactly the crux of the mater here. It doesn't matter if it sits wrong with you or right with you if it's TRUE. And sometimes, a good first sign that something is true is that it sits wrong with us.

[Danny Kam]

Hi Bob,
I do agree that scripture is the foundation, but it is our interpretation of the scripture that really matter. You said above that we only know Christ through the scriptures, but couldn't it also be said that our experience defines our interpretation of scripture.

We all come to scripture will experiences outside of scripture and those experiences also shape our reading of scripture.

I know this was not my original point.

I also know that I do find my foundation in scripture.

But.

I also know that my scripture is interpreted through my experience.

This is moving too far away from your original post, but I just want to finish by saying that scripture is never read in a vacuum.

[bobhyatt]

Of course it isn't.

But glad we can finally agree that the idea of putting the Bible on the shelf to better focus on Jesus is logically nonsensical. :)

[Julie]

Trackback:

http://vanillatea.blogspot.com/2008/12/good-thoughts-bible-gay-marriage-and.html

(Just wanted to give you credit - blogger apparently doesn't have a trackback feature.)

Good thoughts, Bob...and interesting you ended with a Rufas Wainwright quote. I love him singing Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah"...and would like to also talk with him someday about his "lifestyle" and beliefs.....
grace, cindy