Morning News, August 5: Olympics and Normal People Biblical Studies

The school year has begun for millions of teachers, administrators, and students.  You are prayed for. 

I have seen many commercial for the Olympics on NBC, and they run this way:  "You will never see an Olympics like this....with very special guests" followed by a clip of Snoop Dogg.  When did he become a "very special guest"? I would expect someone like an Olympic athlete of the past who accomplished other things (not surnamed Jenner).  I don't see Snoop Dogg as having much to do with the Olympics, athletics, or healthy living. 

I visited the Southeastern Quilt and Textile Museum in downtown Carrollton, GA, last week. If you are in the area, I recommend it if you have an interest in the industrial history of the region or in quilting. I will have a podcast episode about it soon. I also visited the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, NC.  Amazing place, also a podcast. If I were smart, I would incorporate and get some kind of tax write off on these trips!

I listened to a podcast episode on No Small Endeavor about the the podcast The Bible for Normal People. That is, the first podcast was an interview with the two men behind the second.  So I listened to what I believe is the latest episode of The Bible for Normal People. Harumph. My first impressions leaned negative. It ironically calls itself "The Only God-Ordained Podcast." I know there are trying to be funny, but.... Second, the episode was interesting and gave me food for thought, but it was pretty much a rehash of the JEDP material. Third, the title "The Bible for Normal People" implies those who might disagree are not normal, thus perjorative. 

Fourth, they are both academics, and we are innately and by training cursed with arrogance (as the above might imply).  Fifth, they both went through a bad period of being unemployed because of their change in beliefs about Biblical criticism and inerrancy, etc. (that is, they were now inconsistent with their employers' doctrinal stands), and I detected some bitterness. I think this is self-deluded. If you no longer believe the tenets of an organization who pays your salary, you have a moral obligation to deal with that and not expect your supervisors to be okay with it.  I didn't, and left employment for that reason. I lost insurance and money, but it was the honest thing to do.  Sorry, not sorry.  Finally, I just don't see what they are doing as being in good faith. Who are they helping? Well, I only tasted a bit of it. They may be reaching out to people disillusioned with the Church to say, there is still hope in Jesus if you don't want to accept the Bible the way your former church did. 

And I can see that.  Some people, probably more than I realized, have had tragic experiences in some "churches," and these bad experiences can be of all stripes.  And some people have different levels of tolerance for disappointment and different expectations for what a church should be.  I get that.  Everyone's experience of the Christian walk does not have to be like mine; in fact, Paul said the same in Philippians 3: 

¹⁴ I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. ¹⁵ Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. ¹⁶ Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

I will write about this more at length, but .... let me just say that as I age my views have altered, probably significantly, from when I was younger and tied to institutions and fearful of discrepancy.  There is such a thing as too much certainty. There is also such as thing as too little.  

(I think the basic logical fallacy one has to deal with is this:  If Abraham and Jonah and Noah were not real historical people, why did Jesus and Paul invoke them? And if they did, don't they become liars? I supposed one could say, "They were legends or archetypes and they were using them in that way," but that's a bit too facile.)