Creekside Church Sermon of November 2, 2003 "The Good Book " Psalm 119:97-112	Rev. David Bibbee
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Today we will talk about a book.... not just a book. It is a good book. But to call it "a" good book isn't adequate. It is "THE Good Book", or depending on the part of the country you are from, "The GOOD Book."

The book is the Bible. Have you ever wondered why the Bible is called, "good?" The subject of the Scriptures is God, and God is... well... big! So why isn't it called, "The REALLY Good Book?" Given its longevity and impact upon the world, why isn't it called, "The GREAT Book," instead of just good?

I don't how the Bible came to be called the good book. Maybe it has to do with our desire to live the "good life." We want our lives to count for something, or as my grandfather said, "amount to something." Intending good, being good, and doing good IS good, but we can't get there without guidance. Filling the world's prescription may get us comfort, financial security, a lovely home on the hill, and all that goes with it, but not the good life.

We believe the Bible leads us where we ought to be. We come to church to hear the Bible read. We do not come to hear the pastor's big ideas, what he has been reading or feeling, get his take on the headlines, or hear him go on about his personal struggles and how he got through. You come hoping for some light your quandaries and concerns through the words of the good book.

Our concern is recovering what it means to be disciples of Jesus who express their commitment by "practicing the disciplines", or as we have called them, the "marks" of discipleship. You may remember the advertisement for the new car model that said, "This is not your father's Chevrolet." Looking at the challenges and opportunities facing the church, we can't rely on the former model to make Christian disciples. "This is not your father's Chevrolet."

We have identified prayer and worship as necessary necessities in living the Christian life. Today we add Bible study. If I asked for a show of hands from all who agree that Bible reading is essential for growing our faith and guiding our lives, it would be unanimous. But what if I asked, "How many of us read the Bible regularly?" We would rather respond on a paper ballot. There is some distance between belief and application.

Peter Gomes likens our Bible report to embarrassing situations we face when meeting new people at a party. You introduce yourself to someone. They remember your name, but you forget their's. You ask again, and forget again. You keep talking, knowing you have passed the point of any further asking. You manage the situation well, until the awful moment when you must introduce your nameless friend to a third party. Artful evasion is necessary. You say, "Surely you two know each other?" and discreetly withdrawal while they do the job themselves. Another strategy is skipping the introduction and declaring, "Ah! Here's an old friend!" We pretend to know, but don't, and we don't know how to ask without risking embarrassment.

Peter Gomes says we were introduced to the Bible, maybe as a child, a youth, or college student. We know a little bit, but have forgotten a lot about our acquaintance. We may recognize a character, or a verse might ring a bell. It is just enough to make us know what we don't know.

I remember the guy in my first church who wouldn't admit what he didn't know about the Bible. He knew just enough to be dangerous. He mangled verses to support his holy cow attitudes. One Sunday I asked which version of the Bible he was quoting. He thought a minute and said, "The Saint James Standard Reversion!"

Laurie read the words of the psalmist who couldn't contain his love for learning and living by God's word. "How I love your law. It makes me wiser than my enemies, wiser than my teachers, wiser than the wise old sages. I never make detours from the route you laid out; you gave me such good instructions. Your word is a lamp unto my feet and light unto my path. I concentrate on doing what you say-- I always have and always will."

Whatever depth we may be granted in this life will not be due to our smarts, our dedication or desire. To quote Annie Dillard, "We are not on a self-guided tour of the Absolute." It is only by God's word that we know where we are going and how to behave along the way. Does anyone disagree? Then why do we spend so little time with the Bible? Its not that we don't want to. It isn't that we haven't tried. It isn't because we doubt the Bible's trustworthiness. The reason we don't read it more is because it is HARD.

An indicator that Bible study can be hard is the way many studies are conducted. A group sits in a circle, opened Bibles in laps. Someone reads a passage and asks, "Okay, what does this mean to you?" The participants then talk about what happened that day. It may or may not relate to the text. Someone tells a story which reminds another of something that happened to them. There is nothing wrong with this sharing. It gives people a chance to get things off their chests and be supported and prayed for by others. Support groups are fine, just don't call them Bible studies. Using scripture as a platform to having discussions mainly about ourselves, isn't letting the scripture address us on its own terms. Study is more than applying the Word to our concerns. It is putting ourselves at God's disposal through the Word.

Reading the Bible is also hard because it doesn't read like other books. Some parts read like a novel, others like a historical narrative, others like poetry. I hear people say they've read the Bible from cover to cover. Some of you have probably done it. Some tried, but gave up. The Bible doesn't read like a John Grisham novel. The Bible isn't one book-- it is a library of books written in at least five different literary styles, each requiring different kinds of interpretative skills.

Genesis is easy reading, but around Exodus 25 it gets ponderous with detailed descriptions of the materials and dimensions of the tabernacle, lists of kings and tribes and territories, dietary and Sabbath laws, and then comes all the bloody battles and deceitful things people did to each other, even those close to God's heart. If you manage to get through the major and minor prophets you are ready to tackle the gospels.But the first verses of Matthew tempt you to throw in the towel with Jesus' genealogy and all those "begats" and names which defy pronunciation. Jesus' parables don't have satisfactory endings. The Bible is a challenging, fascinating book that repeats itself a lot and portrays God's people at their best and worst. In places it reads like the checkout counter tabloids.

John Bunyan who wrote, The Pilgrim's Progress once said:

"I have sometimes seen more in a line of the Bible than I could well tell how to stand under, yet at another time the whole Bible hath been to me as dry as a stick."

We know we should read the Bible, but the ways we've been taught to think creates an obstacle. Let's call it contemporary arrogance. Its the assumption that the experiences of people in the Bible have nothing to say to us. These people were primitive. We are sophisticated, technologically advanced, cultured. We've got computers and can clone sheep. We know what can and cannot be. We assume that our knowledge and our experience is superior, and that we are the crowning achievement of history.

But if what "really" matters is here and now, the only trip that matters is the one we take inside ourselves. The only hope we have is finding our own happiness, and we know what happens when we do that.

What we read in the Bible is odd and out of place and pictures life in ways that look nothing like life as the world sees it. There is a reason for the disparity-- "The Bible is smarter than we are." If the Bible seems big, unmanageable, and not logical, it is because this is how God is!

The reason the Bible is hard to grasp is because God can't be grasped. The God of the Bible isn't the god of the well-intentioned but anemic sermons. The God of the Bible is no "Sunday school softie."The God of the Bible isn't some housebroken, domesticated deity who thinks we're just swell as we are. The God the Bible reveals is not your father's Chevrolet!

This week Evelyn Miller made a comment worth repeating. She said, "No matter how hard we try to do what's right, we keep missing the mark. That seems to me to be a good definition of sin-- sin is a life turned in on itself." One of the messages of the Bible is that God wants to interfere with turning in on ourselves.

Learning and regularly reading the Bible is not an optional discipline for Christians. It takes time, patience, persistence, and perseverance, but the effort will change you. There will be times when reading about a person in the Bible that you will say, "Hey, that's me!" You will stumble upon some unremarkable verse that jumps off the page and hits you between the eyes with much needed courage or consolation. There are times it feels as though the Bible is against us. It seems that way because God is against the things which block us from knowing that God is ultimately for us. Reading the Bible can be inspiring and frustrating, clear in its message and terribly confusing, comforting and confounding, for us and against us. The Bible speaks one eternal truth with a variety of different voices.

Earlier I mentioned Peter Gomes' analogy of not knowing the name of someone you've met, and the embarrassment of letting on that you "know" the Bible when you really don't. But William Placher offers us a different analogy. He says that when we have a friend we can trust, we recognize their jokes as jokes. We know when they are be factual and figurative. We know they will tell the truth about themselves and will not tell us anything that will lead us down the wrong path.

Placher says we can trust the Bible in a similar way. It tells the truth. It won't lead us down the wrong path. We may not always understand it. It may not seem relevant. It may not seem to speak to us at all. But we trust it contains all we need to live as God intends. It tells us the world is passing away, and gives us pictures of the one that's coming which we can begin to know right here, right now. Like a good friend, it won't tell us what we WANT to hear, but what we NEED to hear so we may become better disciples of Jesus.

The time has come to do what's necessary to turn an acquaintance into a friend. Spend one-on-one time together each day. Remind yourself the friend has something to say. Stick with it, even though your heart may not be in it. Don't sweat blood trying to extract a message for yourself. Be open and let it speak as it will. Join a Bible study or ask if God may be calling you to start one. The Bible can't instruct us if it stays on the shelf. It must assume a prominent place in worship, Sunday school, and in meetings where we conduct the business of the church.

Polling the people of her church, Barbara Taylor learned that they wanted more Bible study. She put together a great program. Professors from the seminary came to teach. The studies were highly publicized and as she said, "The people stayed away in droves." Reflecting on what happened she decided that what the church wanted wasn't "information" about the Bible-- they wanted an experience of God.

Listen to what she did-- "I laid off the seminary professors and began a class on biblical meditation. The plan was simple: every week we locked the door, took off our shoes, closed our eyes and listened to a Bible story. We shot down reality in front of our eyes. We hung, 'Gone fishin' signs on our eyelids and let our imaginations take us places we had never been.'"

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