The Scriptures

As I attempt to articulate the ways the Lord has helped me become quieter and pay attention to Him an obvious place to turn would be to the Scriptures. I was not raised in a tradition where you did a 'quiet time' or where reading the Bible on your own was reinforced. Church was kind of your main staple in the spiritual diet. However, on my own (well I think the Holy Spirit had something to do with it) I decided to read through the Bible when I was 14. I mostly remember being intrigued by the OT narratives and convicted by the NT epistles. All in all, my first foray into the Scriptures piqued my curiosity and opened me up to the largeness and reality of God but it did not seem to have much impact on my day to day life. About 4-5 years later when I became part of a college fellowship I began to read the Bible daily. It was there that I discovered the term 'quite time' and began a practice of daily Bible reading. The sadness for me as I look back on that time and the years that followed, is that I think too much of my Bible reading during those years exacerbated the noise in my heart. I went to the Bible then to feel better or to justify myself. It was as if I wanted to pilfer from the Scriptures what I needed instead of humbly asking the Bible to read me and letting the words expose to me what I needed while I searched deeper or to waited for the Lord to reveal more. At that point, my reading often affirmed what my flesh wanted the Bible to mean. Yet, I sensed in some meaningful ways that there was an Author behind the words calling me to rest. The time I spent in the Scriptures the first decade did help me to begin softening but it did not significantly alter my inner constitution. Slowly it did help me to realize there was more I needed to see and taste. The most helpful thing I did those ten years in terms of involvement with Scripture was to memorize some large portions of Scripture. Since the verses were lodged inside me they came to me at times when I was more open to listen and provided me with rest. It was as if, the Scriptures meant more to me when I was open and willing to listen, and less when I was trying to make them 'speak.'

In the summer of 1992 I took a hermeneutics class. What I heard that professor teach was,"In general we do with the Bible what we do with God. We try to use Him. We try to make Him work for us. He helped me see I treated the Bible the way I treated God. Through that course I saw the way men and women all through history have stood 'above' the Scriptures judging the words, and stealing from them what they needed to justify and comfort themselves. In most cases it wasn't Biblical justification or comfort. As my pride and control was exposed in the way I approached the Scriptures I began to recognize how I needed to approach the Scriptures from below and let the Bible read me. I needed to listen to its analysis of my condition and hear the words it was speaking, whether that was comfort or disruption. As the depth of my flesh was exposed in the way I approached the Bible I went from a daily Bible reader to reading less frequently. However, when I read it felt like I was encountering more than just words on a page. I felt as if I was being encountered. After that hermeneutics class and many experiences that followed the next year the Scriptures began to speak to me in a variety of ways. After reading the Bible I didn't have to leave 'feeling better' (or might I say pretending I felt better). Because I was more open to a variety of responses I left feeling comforted, exposed, confused, mad, touched, moved, etc., depending on the situation. Slowly my time reading the Scriptures looked more and more like my other relationships - bigger than something I could manage or control. As I look back on my first decade as a Christian I wish instead of just hearing I needed to be in the word and do a regular quiet time I wish there were those who exposed my need to really hear the word. I wish someone had incarnated The Word and said, "Gordon I don't trust all your Bible reading. As I have walked with you it seems to me that those words are not speaking to you the way they could." Instead of a propensity to offer comfort, I wish there had been those who more patiently, wisely and willingly discomforted me so that the Scriptures started meaning more to me sooner in my life. What I can't ignore at this point in my life is how meaningful those words seem to me now. I also can't separate the first decade of my Christian life from today. It is very possible (most likely probable) that no matter what I did those first ten years I wasn't going to really hear what those words meant as much as I would over time. So, I am grateful for some of the foundation I laid those first ten years that supported much of the undoing the next ten years. I look forward to growing in the rest and quietness those words speak to my heart.