Renew Your Mind

I approached Isaiah chapter 2 as an intellectual, theological puzzle and struggled to find any answers- and then read chapter 3, which is pure poetry. Not pretty, sentimental rhyming type of poetry, but words used as art in the best sense, to tell truth. Bruggemann talks about how we live in a prose-flattened world, where we expect truth to come in scientific, logical, rational or mathematical ways and are losing the ability to see truth in art. My daughter and I watched part of King Lear yesterday, and she commented how, compared to drama and film of today, Shakespeare takes so long to say anything. Characters have speeches lasting for pages, where they find multiple ways of essentially saying the same thing- but Shakespeare knew something about writing that today's scriptwriters, political speech-makers and twitter users have lost. So perhaps we should try reading Isaiah chapter 3, which really extends until verse 6 of chapter 4, as poetry. Listen to the cadences of the roll ca...

I visited the Mauritshuis in The Hague yesterday with a friend, and what made the trip especially enjoyable was the audio guide we used, which explained the story of each painting, pointing out details we would have missed without it and explaining the meaning of the symbolism in each picture. What I would like is an audio guide to Isaiah chapter 2. It seems, at first reading, to be a bit of a jumble, containing hope and terror, worship and idolatry, cedars of Lebanon and a few rats and bats thrown in for good measure. What is going on? Does Isaiah really believe that there will come an actual time in history when nations 'never make war or attack one another'? (Is 2:4) Or is this just a pretty piece of poetry? Verse 11 and 12 sound a lot like the song Mary sang when she realised she was to be the mother of Jesus, but his coming was nothing like the terrifying scenes that Isaiah describes: 'You had better hide in caves and holes- the Lord will be fearsome, marvelous and g...

Isaiah 1 The book of Isaiah begins by telling us that Isaiah was the son of Amoz, and that he wrote during the time of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah who were kings of Judah. The academic theologian in me wants to stop right there, and get out my commentaries, so I can find out at what point in Israel's history this was, who those kings were, if the name Isaiah referred to a real person or was a pseudonym for some other author, and what were his motives for writing. But I have to acknowledge that a lot of that stuff is an avoidance tactic to hearing God's word. Reading the Bible is a funny process- rather than read it as any other kind of literature, Christians read it because we believe something supernatural about it- we believe that it is the word of God. Now we interpret that in all sorts of ways, but it must mean that by reading these words, written many years ago to a people and a context that is far removed from mine, I expect to encounter God. Find out who He is? ...

My friend Charlie preached today about the importance of reading the bible, and made the point that the first step is just to open your bible and get on with it... good advice, which needs saying not because we don't know it, but because we don't do it. So, I started to think....where to start reading? The obvious, and appealing choice, is one of the gospels. Why? Because they are narratives, and stories are easy to read, they have a natural flow and momentum, we want to know what happens next. Also, for Christians, the gospels have the huge appeal of Jesus. Of the Trinity, he is the one we find it easiest to understand....which was the point, I suppose. Second best must be a tie between Psalms, which come in handy bite-size portions, and can usually be relied upon to say something inspiring and easily applicable to whatever situation we find ourselves in- or one of the epistles, which funnily enough have the same characteristics to recommend them. So why not try someth...

a friend gave me Frederick Buechner's book "Telling the Truth" last week, and I found this great comment about preaching: Drawing on nothing fancier than the poetry of his own life, let him use words and images that help make the surface of our lives transparent to the truth that lies deep within them, which is the wordless truth of who we are and who God is and the gospel of our meeting.