This past Sunday I had the privilege of preaching at another church in Guelph and sharing my personal journey with cancer over the last year. Here is the link to the audio.
I chose Romans 8:18-25 to preach from, expressing Paul’s realism toward creation as one that is groaning. Suffering is a present reality. But, we have a patient hope in the midst of this suffering.
[This is part of an ongoing series, begun earlier this year, of non-technical commentary on the Gospel according to John. To see all posts, click here.]
These few short verses (2:23-25) provide a transition between where we left off with the Temple narrative and the Nicodemus narrative to come.
In the first place, it is easy to see how they complete the Temple narrative that preceded it. There is cohesion between v. 13 where the Temple narrative is set up by John and introduces that “it was almost time for the Jewish Passover” and that Jesus went to Jerusalem (TNIV) and v. 23 where it talks further about Jesus’s time in Jerusalem during the Passover festival.
The passage goes on say that at this time many people saw the signs he was performing and the result was that people believed in his name. Notice that the “signs” is plural and yet John has only discussed one so far (turning the water into wine, 2:11). Evidently Jesus had already performed more than one sign but, in keeping with John’s purposes (see 20:30-31), he only has given us the one. But while Jesus is in Jerusalem during the festival many believe because of the signs.
It then talks about Jesus’s not entrusting himself to the people who believed in him because he knows what is in people. There is something spurious about the faith of those who so far are believing in him (remember there is a progression of faith through the Gospels) and Jesus won’t find himself ensnared by the will of people, only the will of his Father.
In the second place (back to talking about the transitionary nature of the passage), the text introduces us to the narrative that follows: Jesus’s encounter with Nicodemus.
Some translations preserve the consistency in wording that, in the Greek text, lead me to see the connection with the Nicodemus narrative (remember, translations choose what to lose. Some help us here, some don’t). The ESV, which tries to preserve the wording says:
But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man. (John 2:24-25 ESV, bolding mine)
The ESV, while it gains something, also loses something (namely, making clear that the original text is not talking about men only – further discussion of which will be found in my forthcoming review of a book on translation). But, look at the the first verse of chapter 3:
Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews… (John 3:1 ESV, bolding mine).
Whatever we are to understand about the Nicodemus narrative (and that will be the next John post in which we’ll test this), we will need to interpret it in light of 2:24-25 and possibly see Nicodemus as representative of this type of person that Jesus won’t entrust himself to.
I see John as a clever and skilled writer. This is one example of that skill. He interweaves narratives and discourses which filter into his main purposes and highlight the awesomeness of Jesus.
The perils and pitfalls of online debate over the Bible, often among professing Christians, are well known. For all the blessings of this connected internet age (and I wouldn’t want to lose most of them!), there are some clear banes: like not needing to take a few seconds to think about what we’re about to write.
In the midst of online debates, both healthy and otherwise, I take notice of how we use Scripture. In the first place, it makes great sense to quote Scripture. Paul says that “All Scripture is inspired of God, useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that God’s people may be equipped for every good work” (2 Tim 3:16-17). Or, in the letter writer to the Hebrews (Paul?), “The word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart” (Heb 4:12, TNIV).
And so, quote away!
With one caveat. Proof-texting doesn’t prove a point. The most recent example I saw of this was in response to someone who was thoughtfully considering the place of the spiritual disciplines in the life of the Christian. That person said some things about the place of the Bible which wasn’t altogether unhelpful, but I think it just slightly missed the mark. A commenter probably saw the same thing, or thought it was just plain wrong, and wrote, “Careful, Steve [or whatever his true name was]…” and then quoted two texts from the Bible about playing fast and loose with it, with the implication that the original poster was, if not already, on the verge of denying Scripture.
That got me thinking about how Scripture gets used in debate. Sometimes it’s pretty unfair. The assumption in the above example was: “You’re misinterpreting Scripture and by misinterpreting you are mishandling. Therefore you need to hear the warnings of Scripture to not do that and listen to me, I mean, the word of God.” The sad thing was, the original poster was the one with the thoughtful post and well reasoned arguments (right or wrong in the end), and the responder was the one who thought he or she was providing proof of their own position, but they hadn’t provided any reasoned dialogue to confront the original position.
I’ve seen it elsewhere too and have had Scripture quoted at me as though it proved the other person’s point. But that fails to account for various interpretations and the possibility that that person could have gotten it wrong. It seems to me that we so often miss our own hermeneutical biases and fail to take them into account.
So, the caveat I suggest is this: Yes, quote Scripture. It is God’s. But do so in a way that respects the other person and provides arguments for why you think that Scripture confronts what the other person says.
I really appreciated this post by Ian Clary, a friend who has been interviewed on the blog before. In the post, Ian speaks of his experience writing his first book (co-authored with Michael Haykin) and calls on churches and members to consider commissioning the writing of their histories and being blessed by it.
Well, a week or so has passed since Rachel Held Evans’s book A Year of Biblical Womanhood was released and I think things have calmed down just a bit. I have begun reading it and I may just be crazy enough to write a review when I’m done. I can’t make it top priority due to other commitments right now but here’s why I’m reading it.
Chalk it up to my personality, perhaps, but when a whole bunch of people respond to an idea or book with vitriolic attacks, it makes me want to be sympathetic toward the minority, even if the majority holds a position that I would generally agree with. I’ve seen lots of reviews of Evans’s book and even foolishly read the comments sections on various websites (ugh, comments sections…) and what those reviews and comments make me want to do is sympathetically read Evans. I figure that’s the opposite of the intended of effect of those who respond so strongly. It also appears to me that some of the harshest attacks on Evans and her book have come from those who haven’t read the book.
Speaking as a Reformed Baptist (or so I think), I find that we are so afraid of different interpretations and approaches to Scripture that our knee-jerk reactions often confuse contending for the faith with being contentious about the faith (to quote one of my favourite scholars, Don Carson), even with those who profess Jesus as Lord. But I’m much more appreciative of calm reasoned response that doesn’t exude fear. Maybe Evans has it wrong. But maybe she has a voice that needs to be heard and engaged with. What are we so afraid of? Can’t we let infallible God be infallible God and fallible humans be fallible humans (us included)?
So, I might just be crazy enough to get myself involved in this discussion and review the book (well, I guess I actually just entered the discussion with this post). I pray that any response I make would treat Evans as a person, engage her ideas thoughtfully, and be received by others whom I normally associate with in the same way.