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NOTES
The Bible is indeed a fascinating book with intriguing stories and profound ideas that could satisfy curiosity for many lifetimes. But, if we aren’t careful, satisfying curiosity is all we will use the Bible for and miss out on all its other benefits.
People misuse the Bible in many ways and for many reasons. In recent posts, I’ve addressed how heaven-aimed Christianity causes people to misunderstand and, therefore, misuse the Bible. Heaven-aimed Christianity purports that God made us for heaven and sent Christ to save us and to take us to heaven to live with him there forever without ever living on something like an earth. That chasm between life right now and what life will be like causes immense confusion about what it means to follow Christ right now. If humanity forfeited an earth, then why are we still here and how should we live until we get to heaven. For this post, the question is, “Why is the Bible so long if its main point is to teach us how to get to heaven?” Heaven-aimed Christianity misconstrues the answer to that question.
How? Well, God must have given us the Bible for more than giving us the gateway to heaven. Why else would it be so long and contain all its fascinating stories and ideas. So once we know how to get to heaven—and that info takes only about two minutes to learn—when then do we do with the Bible? Let it collect dust? Surely not. Surely it’s more useful than a dust collector. Heaven-aimed Christians know this instinctively so they in good faith put the Bible to use, but their heaven-aimed assumptions lead them astray.
Here’s another way heaven-aimed Christianity leads folks astray. Assuming God made us for heaven tempts people to use the Bible as nothing more than an escape. Assuming God made us for heaven tempts people to use the Bible as nothing more than a fanciful distraction. Something to make the time pass—useful for nothing more than scratching the itch of our curiosity.
Okay. What does this look like? I often see this happen in three ways.
First, people read the Bible in order to glean mysteries about God and this world from it. Did some obscure statement in Ezekiel foreshadow World World One? Did Jesus predict the aids virus in Revelation 2? If you lay out the Bible in a scroll like fashion with 30 lines and each line having 30 letters and then you take the fifth and seventeenth letter of each line, then you’ll find the date of the of the end of the world. Do you see what I mean? Folks do that! The emphasis is less on what the Bible plainly says and more about what you can creatively make it say.
Second, people read the Bible only to understand its history. What really happened? Why did it happen? What are the consequences of the event? If I err in any way, it is often in this way because I am a student of the Bible and I think it fascinating on its own right. But reading it merely for scholarly purposes or as pleasure reading prevents you from accessing all the benefits it offers.
Third, people read the Bible only to correlate end-times prophesies with current geopolitical events. In my Christian circles this is very common. To have an interest only in what the Bible says about the last days and then to read the newspaper and predict what nation or what leader might do what in order to set the world stage in order for the last days to initiate. Now, the Bible does have quite a bit to say about the end of the world. And what it does say, we do well to learn, believe, and heed. But reading to Bible only for understanding the end of the world keeps from you getting all the good things the Bible provides.
By now, you can see the common thread through all three. These reasons primarily inform and entertain rather than foster your relationship with God or transform your life. Relationship and transformation. That is why God gave us his word. When the apostle Paul was training his protégé Timothy, he told him, “The purpose of my instruction is that all believers would be filled with love that comes from a pure heart, a clear conscience, and genuine faith.” A deeper relationship and life transformation. Those are the key aims of the Bible. Those are the intended outcomes for knowing the information in the Bible.
Heaven-aimed Christianity pigeon-holds people from fully experiencing those aims because it misconstrues what Christianity is about and the purpose of the Bible. But there is a better kind of Christianity, which I call heaven-now Christianity. Heaven-now Christianity emphasizes that the whole point of Christ is to help us to have a foretaste of the life of heaven here on earth. Some who hear me say heaven might immediately think pleasure or giddiness. That’s not I’m saying. Living on earth the life of heaven is possible because we can experience a real relationship with Jesus through the Spirit. His Spirit helps us connect with him and receive from him by faith all the good things his presence brings.
For example, you might be at church Sunday morning but your mind is concerned about a hospital bill you have to pay from an ER trip last month. While in worship, you begin to hand your stress and worry over to God who takes it from you and calms your heart by assuring you that he is in control and that he will take care of you. Heaven-now Christianity also helps you become the kind of person God intends humans to be. Sin corrupts humanity. The Spirit helps you overcome sin and vice and live a life of character, a life of virtue, so that you begin to be the person right now that you will one day in heaven be—morally flawless.
Heaven-aimed Christianity takes away the overlap between this life and the next while heaven-now Christianity helps you live out your God-given purpose in the here and now—which you will then complete in the next life when you have an imperishable body that is pure and perfect in every way.
So the Bible is not merely to transfer interesting information or entertain with intriguing stories. Instead, God gave you the Bible to help you go deeper in your relationship with him and to transform you into a reflection of him. I’m Aaron. Thanks for listening.