DTEB, “YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO FOREVER RIGHT NOW!”
I was whining around to my sweetheart about the fact that I haven’t read all the scholarly articles and books that I should have read. Of course, the question that might be asked is this: Who has read all the scholarly books and articles? However, this is cold comfort. “The heart knows its own bitterness.” (Proverbs 14:10a)
Then, whether as a dodge or as a wise word, I added, “Well, there is eternity, I suppose.”
And the love of my life said, “And you don’t have to do forever right now!”
Now that was a wise saying!
I am not sure what Ecclesiastes 3:11 means when it says, “God . . . has planted eternity in the human heart . . . .” But I do know that verse 11 comes after verses 1-10. (See! I really am pretty sharp!) And verses 1-10 talk about how there is an appropriate time for all things. God may have planted eternity in our hearts, but God has planted us in time.
A time for everything? Well, not exactly. Not even the Preacher of Ecclesiastes (who was the skeptics skeptic) said that there was a time for regrets about the past or worries about the future.
And I suspect that the author of Ecclesiastes would agree with my wife that “you don’t have to do forever right now.”
“WRESTLING WITH A PROJECT . . . AND MYSELF”
Monday, April 2, 2018
I am not so much trying to write a decent scholarly paper on Ruth and Mary, as I am trying to write a decent version of Daryl.
But I have writer’s block. And the block is also named Daryl. I never believe that I’ve read enough, that I’ve thought enough, that I know enough (that I am enough) to write something worthwhile. This was true for the first paper I ever wrote in high school. It was true for all my college papers. It was true for my Ph.D. dissertation. It is still true.
Am I really struggling to write and be something “worthwhile?” Or do I mean “perfect?”
So, as I listen to a song on You Tube, I wrestle with my own self-expectations. (I love Terry Wollman’s song “Survive”!)
Of course if you wrestle with yourself, you are bound to lose. Perhaps surviving this wrestling match is the name of the game. Or, better, perhaps the name of the game is surrender to God?
“SCHOLARSHIP: WHAT’S THE POINT?”
If a committee may be defined as “a group of people talking about what they should be doing,” perhaps a scholar should be defined as “an individual writing about what he/she should be doing.”
In other words, does scholarship really matter? Or, is scholarship just an unhelpful way of exercising my mental and digital dexterity?
I am working on a scholarly paper right now, so this is not an academic question for me. (No extra charge for the pun.)
My scholarship focuses on the Bible and related matters that (may) help in understanding the Bible. However, the question that always haunts me is this: Shouldn’t the Bible simply be read and understood, and then either taken seriously or rejected?
Certainly, there are many thoughtful people would argue that these are the two choices. Read it, understand it, and then choose to either take it seriously or conclude that it is an ancient, irrelevant book.
So, as I indicated in the title of this post, I am struggling with a very basic question: What is the point of scholarship?
Biblical scholarship, at least as I see it, deals with two things. On the one hand, biblical scholarship is concerned with understanding the original meaning of the Bible when it was written. The second concern of biblical scholarship is suggesting how we might understand this original meaning today. These two concerns might be encapsulated in two questions:
- So, what was the meaning of this book, story, psalm, verse?
- So what?!?
Biblical scholarship has been good about answering question 1—or at least arguing with other scholars about question 1. We have not been nearly as good about wrestling with question 2.
However, the fact that we haven’t been very good at dealing with the so-what question doesn’t mean that the entire enterprise is a waste of time.
There are two things that help me to remember that what I am doing, and what other scholars are doing, matters. One of those things is my own pastor. He doesn’t claim to be a biblical scholar. However, that says more about his humility than it does about his scholarship.
This past Sunday, for example, he pointed out that the Greek word for compassion is related to their word for “bowels.” He said (quite truly, from my experience) that when you feel real compassion for someone, your guts hurt. He even pronounced the Greek word correctly!
Another thing that I recall whenever I struggle with the apparent futility of biblical scholarship is something that happened when I was fifteen. My dad and I were making several panels to pin up our hogs when we needed to work them into a smaller area for any reason.
My dad cut the first two-by-six boards, and then handed the saw to me. I grabbed a board, and made my first cut. Then, I picked up one of the boards and started to cut another board, but Dad interrupted me.
“Is that the original?” my dad asked.
“Does it matter?” I asked. “Wouldn’t they both be the same size?”
Instead of answering, he grabbed the two boards, the one he had cut originally and the board I had cut. He held them side by side, and one of them was ever so slightly longer than the other.
“That won’t be a problem at first,” he said, but every board you cut will be slightly further from the original. Finally, you won’t be able to make the boards of the panels fit with one another.”
Biblical scholarship, unlike scientific scholarship, does not so much seek to discover new things, as it seeks to continually return to the original meaning. Sermons, teachings, and blogs that do not continually return to the original meaning eventually become meaningless. Scholars and scholarship do have something to contribute after all.
Well, I need to get back to writing my scholarly paper!
“DOING AWAY WITH MYSELF”
DTEB, “DOING AWAY WITH MYSELF”
“A man who is wrapped up in himself makes a very small package.” (Source unknown)
“Selfishness—self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles. Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows, they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us, seemingly without provocation, but we invariably find that at some time in the past we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt.” (Alcoholics Anonymous, The Big Book, p. 62, italics mine)
I like to think of myself as a fairly generous, compassionate person. Today, before worship even began, I realized that everything I had ever done or wanted to do that was good has been about me.
The worship music spoke of what God had done for us in Christ. It was wonderful music, but I couldn’t sing much. I was too busy trying to hold back the tears. I hoped to hear something encouraging in the sermon. I didn’t. The pastor talked about compassion. Talking about compassion to a person who just realized his own core selfishness is like pouring water on a drowning man.
At the end of the worship service, there was an invitation to come forward for prayer. I wanted to, but felt that I was just too far gone in my selfishness. I felt so lost in myself.
However, afterwards I found one of the elders at the church with whom I have a good relationship, broke down crying, and asked him to pray for me. (Nothing wrong with the rest of our elders; I just know Gary better.)
My first generous act was to give away my “secret” (??) about being so selfish. Hey, feeble generosity is better than no generosity at all.
And afterwards, I felt so much better. I also felt that, perhaps, even though everything I had ever done had been tainted by my me-ness, there had been some genuine generosity in some of it. The seeds—or at least the desire—had been there in me all along. But the ground was too frozen or too hard for the seeds to germinate.
However, spring is here, no matter how much it may look or feel like winter. Time to break up the soil a bit. Time to tend the seeds. Time to begin to harvest generosity.
I can’t do away with myself, but I can allow my generous God to do something with me! I have repeatedly shown myself incapable of whole-hearted generosity. However, with God, all things are possible. Not easy. Just possible.
I grew up on a two-hundred-acre farm in Adams County. We had a huge garden. One year, there wasn’t much (if any) rain, and the ground was very hard and crusty. The lima beans weren’t able to push their way through the hard soil. My dad bent down and began carefully scraping off the crust, allowing the lima beans to pop up.
I have a Heavenly Father, too. He doesn’t really want to do away with me. He doesn’t want me to do away with myself.
What does He want?
He wants me to allow Him to scrape away my hard, crusty soil. He wants to allow the seeds of generosity to germinate and grow.
He wants that for all of us.
DTEB, “OF CAR WRECKS AND GRATEFUL LIVING”
Friday, March 23, 2018
I was in a car wreck yesterday afternoon. I was on a stretch of divided highway on SR 32, just about two miles from my home. I was passing a car that was in the right lane, when he tried to turn left into a driveway. His car clipped mine, and sent me into a spin. I ended up in the ditch, hitting the bank on the other side of the ditch pretty hard.
However, the hospital tests didn’t turn up anything problematic. Thankfully, the young man in the other car was not hurt either.
After we left the hospital, my wife and I went out to Steak and Shake, I ate too much, drove home (in my wife’s car), went to bed, and slept well. My car is probably totaled.
Life is a fragile, temporary business. It can come to a screeching halt quicker than I can write this sentence, quicker than a car wreck can happen. We/I should give thanks for it every day, every moment.
So, what will I do with today? I will enjoy the day, and appreciate every moment. I will do regular stuff as well as I can. I will love as if it matters, because it does matter.
In the rock musical “Godspell,” there is this wonderful song “Day by Day.” In the song, the singer says that she/he is praying for three things: “To see thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, follow thee more nearly, day by day.”
‘Nough said. ‘Nough prayed.
“JUST MESSENGERS—BUT WHAT A MESSAGE (AND WHAT A SENDER!)”
My wife had me read out loud John 13 this morning. (Her women’s Bible study group is working their way through John’s Gospel.) She had me go back and reread vss. 12-17.
“12 After washing their feet, he put on his robe again and sat down and asked, “Do you understand what I was doing?
13 You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and you are right, because that’s what I am.
14 And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet.
15 I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you.
16 I tell you the truth, slaves are not greater than their master. Nor is the messenger more important than the one who sends the message.
17 Now that you know these things, God will bless you for doing them.” (New Living Translation)
My wife and I are older than we’ve ever been up to this point. We often wonder about our significance these days. Sometimes we take turns doing this. At such times, the person who isn’t struggling can comfort the other one. At other times, we are both in the same feelin’-like-we’re-washed-up funk at the same time. At those times we are in real trouble.
What does this have to do with John 13? A lot!
John 13:12-17 comes right after John 13:1-11. Amazing how that works, isn’t it? So, what was going on in John 13:1-11?
Jesus was busy knowing what was about to take place, but also knowing where he came from and where he was heading for. So, what did he do with this knowledge? He washed his disciples’ feet.
That doesn’t sound very dramatic, does it? It isn’t. It was a just a nasty task that needed to be done.
It was also a nastily necessary lesson for his disciples. He wanted them to do the same kinds of things for others, beginning with their fellow disciples.
In the ancient world, it was the old, broken-down servants who were charged with washing guests’ feet before a meal. I imagine that was because, even these servants could wash feet. Perhaps these servants were already bent over. Why not have them bend a little further, and wash some feet? After all, you can at least scoot around and wash feet when you’re already close to the floor.
Being a used-to-be pastor is not easy. It is easy to remember how honored you were when you were a pastor. Resentment and self-pity are continual pitfalls. (Of course, remembering how honored you were to be God’s messenger involves choosing to forget all the times you were anything but honored.) My wife mentioned this lack of a sense of being honored, and said, “But the message, and the One who sent us with the message are the main thing, aren’t they?”
I just hate it when my sweetheart hits this close to the truth!
Anybody need their feet washed?
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