MI Bible is Better Than Yours.

For the past few weeks, those of us who are going on the trip have met once a week to get to know one another and prepare our hearts and minds for our time in Romania. Part of our training has been exploring a book called “Serving With Eyes Wide Open.” It is was written in the hopes that short-term missionaries would be able to make more long-lasting impacts by planting the right seeds and being aware of cross-cultural differences. Thus far, it has offered several good points. Early on, they were easy to understand-don’t assume that your beliefs are the only ones that are correct, don’t try to enforce any one system of life on anyone else, don’t expect to know the deep significance of your actions until after you have allowed your “seed” to grow into a plant.

However, there have been some concepts with which I have wrestled. This past week, for example, the author, David Livermore, spoke of how we should interpret the Bible. He claimed that, for missions, it is best used to see how God worked historically. He also said that, while Christ was important, we should be careful when we try to apply His examples of ministry, for different cultures see different aspects of Jesus’ personality. 

One of the things that he warned against was the Western tendency to try to make the Bible fit our own lives. He believes that, in order for use of the Bible on missions to be effective, we have to widen our limited view and accept its story as raw, allowing those with whom we are trying to share it to do the interpreting.

This was hard to wrap my mind around. For the past two years, my smallgroup has studied the author Don Miller. I, personally, find Miller fascinating. His belief is that the Christian church is giving everyone a false conception of Christ. He states that people use the term “Christian” defensively, and that Christians really aren’t Christians at all. He rejects religion and calls himself a lover of Christ. His theory on the Bible is that it was created to highlight the Gospels, the works of Jesus. 

Prior to reading Livermore’s chapter on the Bible, I had never considered myself a modernist. However, I found his idea of the Bible difficult to accept; at least, much more difficult to accept than that of Miller. At first, I found myself critical. To me, my mission should be out of a love for Christ’s kingdom on Earth and to not allow others to see why I am devoting my time and energy would be depriving God of some due glory. Then, I realized that this mission isn’t really about whether I feel fulfilled. In fact, trying to accomplish what I previously stated would almost be hypocritical: it would be placing emphasis on my idea of justification rather than bettering the kingdom.

Upon rereading Livermore’s chapter it several times, I think I’m beginning to see his point. One of the concluding lines of the chapter reads, “We must always leave our perceptions of who [Jesus] is subject to correction.” While it will be hard to relinquish my understanding of the story of Christ, I realize that it is for the benefit of those around me that I interpret as little as possible .