At 10:54 PM 16/12/03 +1100, aleggett
wrote:
<snip>
It is time we stopped being
nervous Nellies and started to teach our faith
in language that makes
sense. Even growing up in the 50's and 60's, by the
time I was 12 or 13
there was a tension going on within me as to what I was
being taught in
Sunday School or RE at school and what my brain was telling
me made
sense.
Likewise. I stopped calling myself a Christian for my
years 11 and 12 (we called them 5th and 6th year) at High School rather than
have my religion identified with that of the local ISCF. My faith in these
years was between God and me, basically.
So what am I saying. Well
frankly, I can't be bothered getting into
arguments with people who take
the literal approach to scripture and use it
to defend their own
prejudices which frankly is what is going on in the
current debate.
I'd agree that some people are doing this. But I don't think you're
being fair to tar us all with this brush.
Sorry if it sounds like I was talking about you. I
have not found this to be the case with members of this list. I would
associate it with those who are trying to bulldoze the UCA into adopting their
own 'conservative evangelical' stance on
scripture.
The God I know and teach is as
much a part of the reality of
GLBT people as this God is part of the
reality of straights or whatever.
Agreed.
If one part of the church wants
to sit in their fortress and try and defend
what quite frankly I believe
is nonsense, then let them do it. In the mean
time, lets get on with
developing a theology (or spirituality) that makes
sense in today's world
and just as importantly, lets have the courage to
confidently sell that
spirituality in the marketplace. In other words, lets
talk with
confidence about the God we have found in Jesus. This man in whom
I
believe we have seen the fullness of God in our humanity in the way
he
lived and loved and whose spirit continues to live in all who live in
love.
This for me makes sense. This is a message I can share with
confidence.
I'd like to join you in this endeavour. But I don't think we need to
throw away the Bible to do it, and you haven't said we should. We just need to
understand how it fits in.
My impression of those who would take the
Bible "literally" is that they have no idea what the word means, and that they
tend to like translations such as the NIV, which isn't actually very literal
at all.
So, how does the Bible fit in, in your opinion?
Let me tell you how it fits in to my life. I am under its authority. If I
know what it's telling me to do, and I don't do it, then I'm disobeying
God.
I don't think its that simple. The only real
authority the Bible has is the authority you bestow upon it yourself. If you
don't follow some instruction that is in the Bible such as stoning your
delinguent sons to death, does that mean you are going against God? When and
how did the Bible become the sole word and authority of God? Who decided it
was and what authority did they have to do so?
I suspect that Someone has convinced you that the
Bible is the word of God. How is this any different to someone convincing
someone else that the Koran is the word of God? When I read the Bible as
though it was the literal word of God I come away thinking that this is a very
confused God. On one hand I read a verse in what is called the ten
commandments that says "thou shalt not kill" and then a few verses later this
same God is telling the same people to go and slaughter every living thing in
the town they are about to conquor.
Ultimately I have to say that the Bible is a human
creation that tells about a particular race of people in a particular time and
place and how they tried to understand their experience of the mystery they
called God.
The NT basically relates to the experiences of a
group of people who had claimed Jesus as the messiah. These people had
experienced in this man what they believed to be the presence of God, or more
correctly, they had experieced the spirit of this man which they believed to
be still with them, even after his execution, in such a way that they found a
way of living and being that transcended anything they had experienced before.
They then went about telling his story in such a way as to demonstrate that he
was the messiah.
I'm also under the authority of the Holy Spirit, and of the Church. I
expect these three to give the same message. If they don't I'm worried. Two
out of three doesn't win.
It's not always easy to tell what God is
saying. But my experience is that for every time I seriously wonder what God
is saying to me, there are many others when I do know, and the problem is
rather that I don't want to do it.
I believe that once again we are stumbling around
our different perceptions of God. I don't see God as a supernatural being who
is trying to talk to me. But what I have found is, that when I live the way of
Jesus, the way of love and compassion, I become aware that God is beconing me
to action whenever I see people or nature being abused. I confess I fail so
often to respond. But I also see God everytime I see new life being born
and in some small way I hear the angels singing.
