Words of Life
Psalm 19[1]
You may not know that the American Bible
Society has conducted a survey called “The Bible in America Today” every year
since 2011. In their survey, they measure adults who use the Bible in some way
outside of church. They measure those who believe the Bible impacts their
relationship with God and others, and those who make decisions about their life
based on the Bible. Up to 2021, the percentage of adults who reported using the
Bible outside of church was about 50 percent. Since 2022, that number has
dropped to under 40 percent. Ironically, at the same time, many report that
their use of the Bible outside of church has increased. That’s not unusual for
a survey. What we want to think about ourselves doesn’t always match up with
reality.
While the decline in Bible use is bad enough,
the survey itself is troubling for several reasons. For one thing, the
threshold to qualify as someone who “uses” the Bible outside of church is only
three or four times a year. I shudder to think what the survey would report if
that threshold were raised to monthly or even weekly! Another result of the
survey is that while people are using the Bible to help them with
decision-making at about the same level as last year, more adults are reporting
that the Bible does not help them feel more connected to God or help them act
toward others in more loving ways. That is, the Bible doesn’t help them “love
God” or “love their neighbors as themselves.” It’s sad to say, but the report
points us to the conclusion that ,, for a majority of Americans, rather than
words of life, the words of the Bible for are just dead words on the page of a
book that sits largely unused.
For some reason, there’s a significant
“disconnect” between what the Bible says about itself and how people in our
culture see it. Throughout the ages, people of faith have turned to the
Scriptures in times of trouble for guidance, for encouragement, and for
strength. And the Bible offers not only the promise that God’s love for us
never fails, and that God will never abandon us, but it also offers us insights
about living that can help us in the real-life situations we face. We’ve seen
some of that in our interactions with Scripture readings on Sunday recently.
Especially the readings from Ephesians, which were fairly down to earth and
specific. But experience and time have shown us again and again that for us to
benefit from the Bible’s wisdom, comfort, and encouragement, we have to
actually pick it up and read it on a regular basis.
Our Scripture reading from the Psalms for
today addresses this question. The Psalmist views the Scriptures as a source of
life, joy, and wisdom. You might find that statement confusing, because the
passage actually speaks in praise of “Law of the Lord.” We’re used to thinking
of the “Law” in the Hebrew Bible as obsolete at best, and oppressive at worst.
You can find New Testament passages where St. Paul speaks of the “Law” as a
“dead letter” or as something that only brings condemnation. In fact, however,
if you examine St. Paul’s views more closely, I think you’d find him in full
agreement with the sentiments expressed in our Psalm for today.
Part of what we have to understand is that the
Hebrew word that has traditionally been translated as “law” should probably be
rendered as “instruction.” When the Hebrew Bible speaks of the Torah, it means much more than a bunch
of rules that might seem irrelevant or burdensome. If you’ve read through that
portion of the Bible, you know that there are a lot of rules that actually do
seem burdensome or irrelevant. But the Torah is more than that. The Torah in the Hebrew Bible is God’s
truth, God’s wisdom, God’s instructions for living. And, as the Psalmist says
in our lesson for today, the Torah is
not something oppressive, but rather it is a guide that helps us find our way
to fulfillment in life. In a very real sense, God’s Torah consists of life-giving words that help us find faith, and
hope, and love, comfort, and strength when we feel like our resources are
failing. And what this Psalm says about God’s Torah applies to Scripture as a whole, not just a portion of it.
The other significant concept we have to grasp
in order to make sense of our Psalm for today is that God’s grace and mercy
stand behind everything in Scripture, including the Torah. It’s a common mistake to think that in the days of the
ancient Israelites, the “law” taught them what they had to do to get God’s
acceptance and love. Many of us have been misled to think that the Torah was the means by which one had to
earn salvation through good deeds. Nothing could be further from the truth! The
commandments that God gave to the people of Israel were always based on God’s
love for them. Their salvation was always based on God’s love for them. Obeying
the instructions for living in God’s Torah
was the way they demonstrated that God’s love had truly made a difference in
their lives.
I think that with those two perspectives in
mind, we can better understand what the Psalm for today has to say about God’s Torah. As is often the case, I like the
way Eugene Peterson puts it in The
Message: “The revelation of God is whole and pulls our lives together. The
signposts of God are clear and point out the right road. The life-maps of God
are right, showing the way to joy.” (Ps. 19:7-8). When you hear it that way,
the Psalm clearly points us to God’s Torah
in the Bible as our source for life the way God intended it to be. Following
God’s way is not something burdensome, but rather it is a gift—it restores us,
it grants us wisdom when we’re confused, it brings us joy when we are
struggling, it gives us the light we need to find our way, and it gives us
strength when we are feeling weak. In a sense, the Bible is a kind of sacrament
like the Lord’s Supper. When we read the Bible, we often find ourselves
refreshed with a renewed sense of God’s love for us and God’s presence in our
lives.
While the 2024 report on “The State of the
Bible in America Today” can be discouraging, there are also some hopeful signs.
One of the most important is that there was a significant increase in the
number of the youngest generation of adults who reported that the message of
the Bible had made a difference in their lives. These “Gen Z” adults aged 18-27
are often disparaged by cultural observers who fault them for not doing things
the way older generations used to. Perhaps in this case, our youngest adults
will lead the way to a resurgence of the Bible’s influence in our lives. But
for that to happen, we all will have to stop thinking of the Bible as a sacred
relic, and start using it more as a guide for living. When we do, we’ll find
that the “words of life” in the Bible are in fact life-giving words!
[1] ©
2024 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm PhD on 9/15/2024 for Hickman
Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
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