"In the end, what has sustained me in my reading is humility. Bible study, for me, means constant repentance. I see that I must constantly be willing to turn around, change my mind, admit that I've taken the wrong meaning from the text, and accept correction." Apart from your "for me," there seems to be the implicit sense here that the evangelicals from whom you have come apart, those who may pride themselves on Bible study or Biblical literacy, are those who don't change their minds, but ascribe to a kind of "The Bible says it, I believe it," kind of spirituality.
"The Scriptures show us a God who is deeply involved, interested, and near to God's people. But God does not smother. God is not an authoritarian. We see this even in Revelation. At the end of time, when Jesus arrives to judge, Jesus stands at the door and knocks. (Revelation 3:20) Jesus extends an invitation. Jesus does not bust in with guns blazing like a cowboy. Rather, Jesus knocks. I marvel at the humility and gentle invitation of our savior here, and I find it instructive."
<3 <3 <3 "Consider how an infant's retreat from the mother does not begin at birth but conception, when the fetal cells split from hers in utero. Pregnancy is an act of creation by separation. For mother and child to survive past pregnancy, an infant must be expelled, and the umbilical cord must be severed. The cord supplies oxygen during fetal development, but as the fetus matures, the cord impedes further growth. The mother cannot breathe for her newborn forever. The newborn must test her own lungs. God understands that untethered love is the only love worth having."
My word for the year is REST, so this stood out to me:
"Our existential hunger will not rest. We need to know who we once were and who we are becoming."
As I am learning more about what it means to truly rest, I am struck by the paradox of the call to rest being nested in the reality of this important need to know ourselves.
Lots of gems, but one that stands out: “So, the point I'm making about God's untethered love is actually my way of correcting my own tendency toward a theology of predestination. I cannot solve the paradox of my agency and God's agency, and I do not know if the Scriptures solve it either. What is needed, more than settling on one theology over the other, is the humility to say, I don't really get it. I have no clue which wins out. But I trust God.”
In fact, I believe faith itself is this ongoing wrestling with God. That has become the very definition of faith to me, as it was for the Jewish people who adopted the fate of the patriarch Jacob as their collective fate. Wrestling is the ongoing relationship we have with God, and that is The Work that forms, refines, and clarifies both God and ourselves. Even so, I believe we do have flashes of inspiration like lightning in which God allows us a glimpse of God's self. The dim mirror clears, if only for a second (as Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 13). And that's the reason we continue to struggle, in hopes of seeing in the dark.
"God is certainly beyond the Bible. And yet the Bible has sustained spiritual travelers for hundreds of generations, beginning with the Hebrews and into our own time."
“To contain God is to reduce God. And the God of the Bible is uncontainable, the one who created clouds but also becomes a fleshy, fragile body. I believe that, when we're being honest, our understanding of God, ourselves, and God's book cannot help but change.” There were so many excellent quotes it was hard to choose, but this one especially resonated.
“As we change, therefore, so does how we read the book known as the Bible, and I cannot presume to understand its full depths at one particular moment any more than I can presume to understand my husband fully at any particular moment. Art is an ongoing relationship.”
“Because the Bible is a book about God, I believe that it holds some of the same luminous mystery of God which, as I mentioned before, cannot be bottled. How could it? To contain God is to reduce God.”
"In the end, what has sustained me in my reading is humility. Bible study, for me, means constant repentance. I see that I must constantly be willing to turn around, change my mind, admit that I've taken the wrong meaning from the text, and accept correction." Apart from your "for me," there seems to be the implicit sense here that the evangelicals from whom you have come apart, those who may pride themselves on Bible study or Biblical literacy, are those who don't change their minds, but ascribe to a kind of "The Bible says it, I believe it," kind of spirituality.
"The Scriptures show us a God who is deeply involved, interested, and near to God's people. But God does not smother. God is not an authoritarian. We see this even in Revelation. At the end of time, when Jesus arrives to judge, Jesus stands at the door and knocks. (Revelation 3:20) Jesus extends an invitation. Jesus does not bust in with guns blazing like a cowboy. Rather, Jesus knocks. I marvel at the humility and gentle invitation of our savior here, and I find it instructive."
<3 <3 <3 "Consider how an infant's retreat from the mother does not begin at birth but conception, when the fetal cells split from hers in utero. Pregnancy is an act of creation by separation. For mother and child to survive past pregnancy, an infant must be expelled, and the umbilical cord must be severed. The cord supplies oxygen during fetal development, but as the fetus matures, the cord impedes further growth. The mother cannot breathe for her newborn forever. The newborn must test her own lungs. God understands that untethered love is the only love worth having."
Wrestling is the ongoing relationship we have with God, and that is The Work that forms, refines, and clarifies both God and ourselves.
"In fact, I believe faith itself is this ongoing wrestling with God."
I have never stopped wrestling with God and then what His love means to me and those around me.
My word for the year is REST, so this stood out to me:
"Our existential hunger will not rest. We need to know who we once were and who we are becoming."
As I am learning more about what it means to truly rest, I am struck by the paradox of the call to rest being nested in the reality of this important need to know ourselves.
Lots of gems, but one that stands out: “So, the point I'm making about God's untethered love is actually my way of correcting my own tendency toward a theology of predestination. I cannot solve the paradox of my agency and God's agency, and I do not know if the Scriptures solve it either. What is needed, more than settling on one theology over the other, is the humility to say, I don't really get it. I have no clue which wins out. But I trust God.”
In fact, I believe faith itself is this ongoing wrestling with God. That has become the very definition of faith to me, as it was for the Jewish people who adopted the fate of the patriarch Jacob as their collective fate. Wrestling is the ongoing relationship we have with God, and that is The Work that forms, refines, and clarifies both God and ourselves. Even so, I believe we do have flashes of inspiration like lightning in which God allows us a glimpse of God's self. The dim mirror clears, if only for a second (as Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 13). And that's the reason we continue to struggle, in hopes of seeing in the dark.
"God is certainly beyond the Bible. And yet the Bible has sustained spiritual travelers for hundreds of generations, beginning with the Hebrews and into our own time."
Wrestling is the ongoing relationship we have with God,
“but then again, I could be wrong about that. ;-)”
"But for you, the whole of this book is about wrestling with the reality that there is not one single plain word in the Bible."
“To contain God is to reduce God. And the God of the Bible is uncontainable, the one who created clouds but also becomes a fleshy, fragile body. I believe that, when we're being honest, our understanding of God, ourselves, and God's book cannot help but change.” There were so many excellent quotes it was hard to choose, but this one especially resonated.
“As we change, therefore, so does how we read the book known as the Bible, and I cannot presume to understand its full depths at one particular moment any more than I can presume to understand my husband fully at any particular moment. Art is an ongoing relationship.”
“Because the Bible is a book about God, I believe that it holds some of the same luminous mystery of God which, as I mentioned before, cannot be bottled. How could it? To contain God is to reduce God.”
but then again, I could be wrong about that. ;-)