Sermon: The romance of the Bible

SERMONS

FROM RIVERSIDE

THE ROMANCE OF THE BIBLE

Dr. Ernest T. Campbell

NOVEMBER 17, 1974

Digitized by the Internet Archive

in 2012 with funding from

Princeton Theological Seminary Library

http://www.archive.org/details/sermonromanceofbOOcamp

THE ROMANCE OF THE BIBLE

I am your Bible, You know me well -- at least
you know about me. I come in a variety of styles and
sizes. One of my larger editions can usually be seen
in some prominent position in your sanctuaries. Some
of you, as brides, carried me down the aisle on your
wedding day. Your presidents rest a hand upon me when
they take the solemn oath of office. Not a few of you
searched my pages frantically on the eve of major sur-
gery. But now that you are well you have shelved me
— and gone on to other things .

I was with your astronauts when they rendezvoused
in outer space. You find me present on the road in
motels and hotels across the land. You have me in
your homes. I have accompanied innumerable mourners
to a freshly dug grave. Companioned prisoners in the
desolation of their cells. Instilled hope in the
hearts of your fighting men captured behind the lines.

I beg you, do not think me immodest when I say
that there is little doubt that I have been more in-
fluential in creating western civilization than any
other book!

I said a moment ago that "you know me— at least
you know about me." Perhaps that was a Freudian slip
portraying a wisp of self-pity. I'm definitely not
paranoid. After all, my statistics are good. I have
been translated into 255 different languages and dia-
lects. Portions of my contents have been translated
into 912 different languages and dialects. The part
of me you call The New Testament can now be read in
359 different tongues across the earth!

I know myself well enough to be convinced that I
am not a back-number. My circulation is still healthy
even though I've been around for awhile. And, to tell
you the truth, I've got enough Pride to believe that I

am not on trial; my readers are. I have long since
proved my worth.

What troubles me, I hope for good reasons, is the
suspicion that even though I continue to enjoy "Best
Seller" status, I am not as widely read or correctly
understood as I deserve to be. I have what you might
call a "Relic Complex." People use me in much the way
they would a "good luck" charm or a magic stone. I
have become a "legend" in your time. Eut 1 want to be
more than a. legend. _I want you to know me for the liv-
ing word that I am.

People, it would seem, will do anything for me
except the one thing needful. They will fight for me
and defend me. Purchase and display me. Argue over
me . Translate and circulate me, Welcome literature
about me. The one thing they do not do as they ought
is pick me up and read me.

■k ii it

One reason for this strange state of affairs is
that many people think of me as dull. I find that
hard to take. Especially when you recall my turbulent
history. Talk about being banned in Boston! I've
been X-Rated by higher powers than that! Would you
believe that kings and popes were once so afraid of me
that they forbade my being translated into the language
of the common man? Why, right here in your own country
there were plantation owners who didn't want their
slaves to read the gospel. "Might give them bad ideas,"
they said.

Who do you think sparked Martin Luther's Reforma-
tion? What book do you suppose was read every day on
the Mayflower as it pushed its way to America? What
book was it that sent Livingston and Schweitzer off to
Africas Morrison to China, Grenfell to Labrador, Zwemer
to Arabia? Where do you think Martin Luther King got
the stuff of which his dream was fashioned?

Others tend to be cool toward me because they see

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me as a self-serving product of the church . They re-
gard me as a dead and dated book that continues to live
only because the church keeps me going by featuring me
so conspicuously and quoting me so often. Actually, I
owe my life to no such thing! In fact, I am more a
troubler of the church than an adjunct.

No, what keeps me in demand is my ability to speak
to human experience. That's really what I am about.
Don't look to me for some abstract theory about life.
Some philosophical system that might serve as a key to
all the mysteries of existence, I offer neither.

My bag is people. People laughing. People crying,
People sinning - and getting up again or staying there.
People promising and reneging. Marrying and giving in
marriage. People off on journeys and people with no
place to go but home. People praying and people curs-
ing. People falling in and out of love. People lust-
ing and hating, and killing - or people provoked by
faith to seek a better kingdom.

Think of me as a gallery with paintings everywhere,
Adam staring at a piece of frtiit. Noah laying the keel
of a ship on dry land. Abraham kissing the home folk
goodbye and starting off. Samson resting his handsome
head on Delilah's lap. Job in a shouting match with
God, David quivering for Bathsheba.

Isaiah being over-powered by the smoke of holiness
and the sight of angels in the temple. Joseph desper-
ate for a room. Peter warming himself by a fire in the
outer court. Paul telling it "like it is" to Agrippa.
John squinting at a vision in his exile on Patmos»
Jesus looking into the face of His betrayer under a
Passover moon. If you stick me I will not run with
ink, I will bleed with life!

But my avowed enemies are not the whole story. My
friends have hurt me too. Well-meaning friends who have
mis-represented my contents out of misguided zeal. So

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convinced were they that my words are the Bread of
Life that they began to use me in ways that are foreign
to my purpose.

Take science, for example. They have tried to
make me a text-book on the subject. As though Moses,
to name but one, could have been priwy to 20th Cen-
tury physics! As though the Psalmist, in his day,
could have known that the world was round instead of
flat.

Others who love me with an unwise love tout me as
a spooky source of knowledge about the future. They
are forever finding cryptic significance in all manner
of names and numbers. Seven and 666 are two of their
favorites. Their happy hunting grounds are the books
of Daniel and R.evelation. Even Jesus didn't know as
much about the end as these Zealots do. Why, they
make me look like a substitute for a Ouija board or a
deck of taro cards!

Then there are the literalists. To insure me
against being lumped together with other books, they
stoutly hold that everything within my covers is the
literal truth. This does a lot of damage.

As you know, I am not one book but 66. Within my
1,189 chapters there are many different kinds of writ-
ing. There are letters, prophecies, stories, parables,
maxims, songs, poems, homilies — and many, many more.
Each of these types must be approached on its own
terms. One doesn't read a love letter the way she
reads a summary of Income Tax Regulations. Besides,
we dare not confuse the essential meaning of a state-
ment with the Oriental imagery and form in which it
happens to be expressed.

As one of my more perceptive interpreters put it
not so long ago, "...naturalists who legitimize the
Book of Jonah by telling us which fish are capable of
anthropophagy and regurgitation are wasting their
learning on misapplied piety." 1_ When will those who
claim to love me most realize that I can be taken

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seriously without being taken literally?

Oh yes, I should mention one more thing here while
I have your mind on the subject. Some of my friends
prevent my being better known by their habit of spiri-
tualizing everything I say. It's as though I were in-
tended only for the soul.

I am quite aware of my ability to heal your inner
hurts. Consolation and hope are among my specialties.
Frankly, ministers would be lost without me. I mean —
think of how rough it would be on them if they had to
try to comfort people in an experience of grief or loss
with only their own words or a few lines from a Hall-
mark card. "Why art thou cast down, 0 my soul, and
why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God
..." (Ps. 42:5) There's a prescription for you.

But I don't treat the soul as an entity that
stands alone. I'm interested in peace in the world
as well as peace in the heart. When I speak of free-
ing the captives I don't have in mind only spiritual
captives - I mean real prisoners in real jails. I
have a lot to say about how wealth should be used.
How the poor are to be regarded. How the earth is to
be cared for. How justice is to be administered.

Why some of my best friends ignore this side of
me is more than I can figure. I only know it hurts me

- especially with the young who want to see wrongs
righted in the world. What a pity that they take me
to be a sedative rather than a stimulant . One of them
let the cat out of the bag the other day when he said
with a sneer, "Grandma reads her Bible now. She's
cramming for her finals.58 That made me wince.

You're good to let me talk to you like this today.
And you can be sure that I appreciate your thoughtful-
ness in honoring Bible Sunday. Watching these young
people get their Bibles a few minutes back made me glow
inside. You won't mind if I give them a few hints on

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how to use me before I close, will you? I have five
suggestions to offer, and I'll do it briefly.

1. Remember that, unlike most other books, my
various parts are not arranged in the order in which
they were written. Genesis, for example, though it
comes first, was not the earliest book written. Many
of St. Paul's letters were written before the gospels
were. The Gospel of St. Mark is earlier than the
other three.

_2. Remember when you sit down to read me that it
is more likely that I will wind up reading you. That's
what I am here for. If you come to me only to have
your own views confirmed, I cannot do you much good.
I will reinforce you where you are right, but disturb
you where you are wrong. In fact, you may well reach
a point where you must either give up some sin that I
have uncovered or stop reading me altogether.

J3. Remember that while every part of me is in-
spired, every part is not equally inspiring. The Book
of Esther for example, doesn't mention my author's
name at all. I'd be the first to admit that there are
stretches here and there that are almost as dull as
some of your television programs! Don't let that get
you down. There's always light at the end of the
tunnel. Besides, mature Christians have been known
to find rich treasure in geneological tables, lists
of kings, specifications for the temple - and the like.
So stay with it.

4. Eear in mind that the main actor in the story
that I tell is not man but God. Those who do not know
me well keep talking about man and his search for God.
Frankly, I think most people spend their time trying
to run away from God! The 66 books that bear my name
tell of God and His search for men and women, boys and
girls. It's really a love story. He comes. He speaks.
He gives his life - for you. My foremost purpose is
to tell what God is like, what He has done for the
world, and what he expects of those who respond to His
love with an answering love of their own.

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_5« Finally, read me for yourself. You don't need
a degree in theology to understand me. Just a ready
and willing heart. Start with something like St. Mark's
Gospel. And never mind anything as mechanical as a
chapter a day. Those chapter divisions are man-made
anyway. Take a book at a time. Don't play hop-scotch
with me. If you do I'll know that you're not serious.

From the book you choose, read a few verses at a
time. Read until some word speaks to you. Then medi-
tate upon that thought. Invite it into your life.
Thank God for it. Determine to share it with someone
else. Memorize the verse that spoke to you so clearly.

I am your Bible. My purpose is to point beyond
myself to Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of God. There
are more than a quarter of a million words in the
English language. I use but 16,000. These are more
than enough, however, to put you in touch and keep you
in touch with God.

Read me and take me to your hearts, for

My counsel is more dependable

than that of sorcerers and astrologers.
My comfort more deep-reaching

than that of your nearest kin;
My relevance more timely than

this morning's newspaper.
My perspective more reliable than

any other viewpoint known on earth.

Multitudes have turned to me and not been disap-
pointed. I will not fail you. Try me and see.

To the young I am a star by which

to steer.
To the middle-aged a steady beat

by which to march.
To those in the sunset years

a fountain of unfailing hope
and strength.

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CLOSING PRAYER

Lordj bless to our minds and hearts the

word of life.
Help us to find within its pages

what we are to believe concerning Thee
and what duties are required of us,
Let the grace which provided the book
to begin with

enable us to profit from it now
as we read
and mark

and inwardly digest it
to Thy praise.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

FOOTNOTE

1. Perry, Michael C. , "Believing and Commending the
Miracles," THE EXPOSITORY TIMES, p. 340,
August 1962

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