I-YOUniverse

What God can do with open Bibles, open minds, and open hearts sometimes takes my breath away.

Here we are, four people–reading Genesis 14, Psalm 110, and Hebrews 4, 5 and 7. Lisa, her daughter Emily, and Linda, whose son recently returned from Iraq.

(We’re expecting my wife Sandy, Methodist minister, pastoral counselor, who visited a former client now in hospice. Having had a day from hell, she gets there an hour after everyone has left.)

Meet Up with Melchizedek

Melchizedek, king of righteousness, king of peace, blesses Abram, serves bread and wine, receives a tithe from him.

“It’s stupid, I guess,” says Lisa, “but I’m thinking, could this be Christ some way?”

“Many people think Melchizedek is Christ on earth long before his birth in Bethlehem,” I assure her.

We bat that around. I acknowledge others think he was a Canaanite priest, in whom Abram recognized a worthy servant of Yahweh.

My Favorite Four Letter (Hebrew) Word

Which brings us to Psalm 110.1, “The Lord said to my lord…” When you see Lord in small caps like that, it stands for the holy name of God which Jews won’t pronounce.

No one had ever noticed that. Which sparked interest in Exodus 3.13-15, and the holy name YHWH, now thought to be pronounced Yahweh, similar to verb forms of to be like hayah and ehyeh; influenced by German scholars, we used to pronounce it Jehovah.

People are intrigued, gonna take that bit of Bible knowledge home.

How come they don’t know this stuff?

I think, these women have attended Sunday School their whole lives. The last four Tuesdays Linda’s been doing committee work at her church. These are sharp people. Linda’s a nurse. Emily’s a college student. Lisa has a keen eye for people. Whenever Lisa says something about a stupid idea or thick skull, I get ready to jot down what she says because often she’s right on the money.

I’ve taught Sunday School most of my life, followed each week by a sermon. For a decade I wrote Bible study materials for junior highs, and I’m proud of the work the team and I did, grateful for the editors, and pissed at the politics at the top. I also believe the Bible study aids I’m familiar with aren’t doing the job.

®  People don’t know Bible basics.

®  People don’t connect Bible knowledge and a life-changing relationship to Christ.

®  People don’t take what little they know out of the classroom.

  BEFORE and AFTER BSing¹ in SS they’re NO DIFFERENT!

Compare your average SS class with an AA group. What a difference!

I’m a fan of a good study Bible, a systematic plan to cover the whole Bible appropriately in each age group, and teachers with access to commentaries, computer software, and other aids.

I’d be interested to know if anyone’s curriculum includes measuring knowledge and application.

 This Teacher Needs a Little Mercy

Anyway, back to Tuesday. We read

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Heb 4:15-16 (NRSV)

That gives some juice to the potentially dry discussion of the order of Melchizedek in Hebrews, after which we return to psalm 110. Using typology we apply what’s said about Zion to our lives. “What does that mean to you?” I ask lamely.

I was struggling. I can think of many specific ways to apply Psalm 110.5-6:

The Lord is at your right hand;
     he will shatter kings on the day of his wrath.
He will execute judgment among the nations,
     filling them with corpses;
he will shatter heads
     over the wide earth.

But I don’t.

 Nail Prints N’ All

At the close the women note my wife Sandy’s not home. We get into a discussion of hospice. In the group two had mothers die recently in hospice. We talk about pain management, the patient’s looking forward to death, how relatives cope, how God blesses us when we need it most.

When people in a small group trust each other, and focus on God’s Word in their lives, amazing things occur, despite the group leader’s lame use of typology.

I don’t know for sure if it was Christ way back there with Abram. But, right there Tuesday night in my living room where two or three were gathered, for sure–it was Christ.

___________________________________

¹That’s “Bible studying.” In higher criticism aka “Bull Geschichte.”

Last night’s neighborhood Bible study was different. We didn’t focus just on a psalm, but on the mysterious Melchizedek, mentioned in Psalm 110 and elsewhere. 

Theological Fine Print

I don’t go in for biblical prophecy aka fortune telling, allegory or typology much. I’m a big fan of prophecy aka preaching especially unpopular truth. But perhaps because I’m re-reading Bernard Ramm’s Protestant Biblical Interpretation, 3^rd ed., I felt like tackling Melchizedek the type. Ramm is much more conservative than I, but through the years I keep reviewing his principles of hermeneutics.

I’ve gotten clarity this trip around that in typology it’s “anti” with an i, not “ante” with an e. Which helps because the antitype (Christ) occurs later in time, not earlier, than the type (Melchizedek).

Most recently, a friend drove me to buy yet another copy of Ramm when he said (in holy sophisticated verbiage) that the Bible means whatever you want it to mean, like a Rorschach ink blot. Imagine what that’ll do to your Hebrew vowel points!

BS!

Now here’s the secret I-believe-the-same-thing-you-believe-about-inerrancy handshake.

Sick of this crap? skip the following two paragraphs.

2…I wish I was inerrant, but I keep making dumb mistakes. So even if the Bible is inerrant, I amn’t. My brain is errant. My cats are errant. My knights are errant. So I get the Bible, if it’s about my error-ridden kind of life and mere mistake making mortals like me. If it’s about nonexistent manuscripts of mystical perfection produced by zombie flautists, I don’t get it. Mystical perfection and I aren’t on a first name basis yet. As for zombie flautists, I get them green warranted for a 72 hour all-expenses-paid stay in the nearest psyche ward.

1…So why read Ramm, who devotes a whole chapter to inerrancy? It’s a good idea to read people whose ideas creep you out, even make you want to puke—although Ramm doesn’t rise to that level for me. 56.4% or more of the time he makes sense to me. Always he’s grounded, logical, and sane.

Restart reading here:

Despite my suave (rhymes with gave) breezy style, I do NOT disrespect error-free brethren and sistern. Ramm said it well in 1970 or earlier:

There is a prevailing danger to let differences in interpretation interrupt the unity of the Spirit. When differences are sharp, feelings are apt to run high. With foreboding storm clouds of oppression on the distant horizon, it is well for conservative Protestantism to discover bases of fellowship rather than divergence.  If we stand together in the great truths of the Trinity, of Jesus Christ, and of Salvation, let us then work out our interpretive differences in the bounds of Christian love and endeavor to preserve the unity of the Spirit. A hermeneutical victory at the expense of Christian graciousness is hardly worth winning.

Bernard Ramm, Protestant Biblical Interpretation, 3^rd rev. ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1970), p. 289.

What were we blogging about? Oh yeah, actual Bible study

Anyway, I chose psalm 110 for our topic last night. Melchizedek’s always good for an hour or two.

Of course, you start a study of Melchizedek pronouncing names of kings Amraphel, Arioch, Chedorlaomer, and Tidal in Genesis 14. These guys wrangled with some other guys with equally jaw-buster names. They took captive Lot, Abram’s ne-er-do-well nephew hanging out in Sodom, capital Sin City of the Dead Sea metroplex.

Which kicked Abram into gear. He pursued them North to Damascus, and brought back Lot and all his haul, “and the women and the people.”

Abe meets up with Melchizedek king-priest of Salem, priest of El Elyon, the Canaanite high god, whom Abe swears to: “Yahweh El Elyon.” If you not a fan of syncretism, that’ll perk your coffee.

Not only does Abe break bread, cut a covenant, with Melchizedek, he allows this pagan priest to bless him (and thereby all Levi’s descendants squirming about in Abe’s DNA), drinks wine, and more to the point, pays to him a tithe of one tenth of everything. When you pass the plate, you’re in the Holy of Holies, right?

At least, Abe has the good sense to refuse the king of Sodom’s offer to share the booty.

So the $64,000 question is, who is this guy?

ª       A Canaanite priest who loved God heart and soul as he understood God

ª       An angel, but no mention of feathers, no reveal with special glow lights

ª       The Christ, or Holy Spirit, 1500 years ahead of the fullness of time, in some form or fashion beyond our normal ken

ª       An extra-terrestrial

Next: Lisa’s stupid ideas and thick skull (thank God!)