Opening the BIG door

How many times have we been to a church service where we heard words something like this:

"Open your Bibles to (insert reference here) and follow along as I read ... "

Reading the aforementioned passage might take as long as 3 minutes if the portion is long or the speaker particularly inclined to dramatic or editorial comments along the way.  Then follows 30 minutes ... or 45 ... or 60 ... or ... ... ... of the application of (manmade) literary and theological "tools" designed to help "unlock" for us the secrets of the verses previously read.

Before I continue, let me just say that there is nothing wrong with this scenario, in and of itself.  But, as the primary application of Scripture in community gatherings, it is sadly incomplete and inadequate to the task of unleashing the power of the Word.

The true power of the written Word of God is only "unlocked" by the key of speech - by speaking it aloud in the presence of others.  Simply reading it here and there as a springboard into an explanation of its meaning is not enough.  We have trained our church communities to expect that the "good stuff" comes after the reading.

But if we only knew how to look for it, how to savor it, how to wait upon Him to unleash it!  Then we might find that the very power and manifestation of God will leap into our midst from the pages of a single open Bible read aloud with no further agenda than simply speaking the Word into our community.

Literary tools, rules of interpretation, laws of theological application - these are all tiny little doors into the treasure room.  We can peek through and see some of the stuff.  We can reach in with a single hand and grab some of it.  We can pull some of it out, intact and beautiful.  Some we simply cannot get through the small opening, no matter how hard we try.  And much of it we can force through the tiny handhole, but not without breaking, crushing, and deforming it as a result.

But reading the Word aloud, with no intent other than to savor its richness - this can unlock the whole gigantic front door and let the treasures within spill out and overwhelm us.  How rich it could be to speak a passage of Scripture into the congregation, to sing it in new songs, to simply relish its power to transform, to heal, to energize ...

There is no reason to stop teaching and expounding the Word as we do.  But there is every reason to rethink making this procedure our primary application of Scripture in every gathering of the body.

When the Spirit of God was finished "brooding" in the darkness of the early moments of creation, he did not then write a scientific paper on the nature of photons.  He instead spoke light into existence.

F. Kefa Sempangi, in his book A Distant Grief, tells of a young Ugandan child who witnessed the unspeakably brutal torture and murder of his parents in their own home.  When he was found, this child refused (or was unable) to speak.  One arm was locked into place, covering his face.  He was taken to an orphanage and laid in a bed, where he remained silent, with his arm still covering his face.  And then Mr. Sempangi read to him all through the night from the book of John.  He employed no literary or theological tools of interpretation to explain to the child how he could obtain victory over the trials that beset him.  He simply read the Word - spoke it into the atmosphere in the little room.  And gradually the arm relaxed, the eyes closed in sleep.  Not long after, when Kefa visited the orphanage again, he found the young boy playing soccer with his friends.

This irresistible power of the Word is all but lost upon today's Industrialized Church, for we have come to see it as something in need of explanation and illumination to us.  We want someone to shed light upon the Scriptures.  But, as John has already explained to us:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning.  Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.  In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.  (John 1:1-5).

The Word is Light.  The written word should be for us a manifestation of the Living Word, lest we fall into the same darkness in which the religious leaders of Jesus' time found themselves living.  They had the greatest access to, and spent the most time studying, the Scriptures.  And yet, it was they, the ones most familiar with the written word, who failed to recognize the Living Word when he walked and worked and taught among them.

How many times have we been to a church service where we heard more of the Word of God than of the words of a man trying to explain it?