How do people learn to read the Bible for themselves?

Hi.  I know it’s been a long time since I posted.  Sorry.  I got a new computer and forgot to add my own blog onto my new favourites list.  Muppet.

Anyway, I’ve been thinking this evening.  (Yes thanks, I’m fine.)  I’m convinced that a significant number of Christians don’t know how to read their Bible.  I mean properly read their Bible, study it, learn from it and apply it to their lives.  For myself, I would say that I only really learned to do this by being involved in regular Bible studies at university.  And because of this observation of my own experience (and pretty much the experience of anyone else I’ve asked about it), I’m fairly confident that there are many Christians who don’t have the fortune to be involved in regular Bible studies.  So where are Christians supposed to develop the skills to read, study and understand the Bible for themselves, if we don’t teach and practise it in churches?

I’ve been thinking about this all evening, and come to realise that as a Christian youth worker, I have a massive responsibility in this.  I think that so often in youth work we want to see our young people grow in their faith, so we’re willing to spoon-feed them the answers to the questions we’re asking.  I know I’m guilty of this in a lot of the things I do with the young people I work with – I write a session, work out what it is I want the young people to have learned by the end of it, and then work out what discussion questions I can ask that will lead to me having the opportunity to give them the answers, and a number of Bible verses to back myself up.

The problem with this approach is that the Bible verses that we so often use, as brilliant and relevant as they may be, are plucked out of their context when we read out just one or two verses to our young people.  This means that they can have no understanding of what it means to read a verse or passage in its context!

For example, 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 says “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?  You are not your own; you were bought with a price.  Therefore honour God with your body.”  These are the last couple of verses in a passage about sexual immorality.  Why is it, then, that all too often we hear the words “your body is a temple” quoted as justification for teaching on healthy eating and exercise, as well as things like smoking, alcohol and drug abuse, and a number of other issues unrelated to sexual immorality?

What these verses mean is that since as Christians we have God living in us (the temple being the dwelling place of God in the Old Testament, so if our bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit, then the Holy Spirit lives within us), we should live in a way as to avoid sexual immorality so that we honour God with our body.  Now, I’m not saying these verses aren’t appropriate or relevant when talking about things like smoking or substance abuse, because the call to honour God with our body absolutely applies to these things too.  What I’m saying is that when we talk about smoking or substance abuse, or even sex (to use the passage in its original context) with young people, we simply say “don’t do it, because the Bible says ‘your body is a temple’.”  This is not enough.

Is it any wonder that people don’t learn to really study the Bible for themselves when they’re spoon-fed verses in this way in what are often their most formative years?  What’s wrong with sitting down with a group of young people and showing them the entire passage surrounding this verse, and going on a ‘journey of exploration’ with them to find the meaning of the verses?

If we can use this approach in our youth work in churches, then I am convinced that we will raise up a generation of people who read the Bible for themselves, question its meaning, and dig deeper in their own understanding of God’s Word to us, and inevitably of God himself.  One of the biggest criticisms on Christian youth work is that young people are ‘brainwashed’, told what to believe, and/or manipulated.  Surely we have a responsibility as older, more (spiritually) mature Christians to encourage young people to think for themselves?  Then we not only respect them as people by encouraging their own thought processes and questions, but we will, in the long run, develop more grounded and secure Christians who possess the skills to read and understand the Bible for themselves.

Apparently, Noah took dinosaurs on the ark…

No, seriously. I’ve found a website that claims to look at historical/archeological evidence as well as biblical (?) evidence that Noah took dinosaurs on the ark.  Check it out…

http://christiananswers.net/dinosaurs/j-ark1.html

It claims that since the Bible tells us that “Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark” (Genesis 7:15), then dinosaurs “must” have been included.  The author of the website also goes on to explain (for those of us who haven’t yet thought this through, obviously) that Noah probably took young dinosaurs, since it would have been foolish of him to waste space on the ark with fully grown adult dinosaurs.  And of course, Noah probably only took a carefully selected species of each main dinosaur type, which is probably why dinosaurs didn’t get back to the same kind of numbers they had experienced before the flood. 

In fact, why let my paraphrasing cause you to miss out on this valuable educational information…here’s a direct quote from the website:

“Perhaps God just included the basic types of dinosaurs He first created; not every variety that had developed since Creation. Young dinosaurs would be small and easier to care for and would use less food. It would have been foolish to fill up space on the Ark with the oldest, biggest adults.”

The website also goes on to talk about man’s sinful nature and the fact that the final few dinosaurs were probably made extinct because of humans hunting them either for meat or for sport.

So, he says, his groundbreaking realisation calls for serious changes to the world’s erratic teaching in schools about the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Hmmm…

(I don’t come across as skeptical, do I?)

I miss bin day…

No, this isn’t some sentimental reflection wishing we were back in the days when bin-men were real bin-men, who took your bins away without any fuss, rather than being “refuse disposal technicians” or whatever they’re politically-correctly called these days, and taking certain bits of your rubbish on one day every couple of weeks, other parts of your rubbish the same day the weeks between the first part, and the other rubbish weekly on a different day…

Actually, I’m all for this recycling lark – making the world a cleaner place, and all that…

No, this post is more an observation of the facts…I keep forgetting to put out our bins.  Gutted.

Oh no… 2 breakfasts!

As part of my course in youthwork at ICC, I have to do a placement this term in a secular youth work agency.  In my search for a placement, I asked 10+ youth centres/agencies in Wester Hailes and the surrounding parts of Edinburgh.  All of the centres I asked in Wester Hailes said no, either because they couldn’t find enough work for me to do (which I find amazing to believe, from living in Wester Hailes myself), or because they’re currently going through staff re-structuring (which seems strangely common, since this wasn’t the reason given by just one agency).  It seems that despite the huge amount of youth work needed in Wester Hailes, there either isn’t enough funding for the places that exist - which limits their capacity,  or the world of secular youth/community work is an ever-changing environment with constant restructuring in terms of either funding, staff, or facilities.  I find this fairly ironic, since one of the biggest needs of the young people of Wester Hailes is stability and a sense of continuity in terms of the people in their lives.  If there is constant restructuring going on in the world of secular youth work, how can these young people possibly hope to develop a stable, long-term relationship with adults who care about them (which is one of the things they need most at this key period of their personal development)?

Anyway, that wasn’t the point I was going to make.  For my placement, I finally found Granton Youth Centre. It’s half an hour’s drive (in good traffic) across the other side of Edinburgh, but I’ve spent 2 days there and what I’ve seen has been brilliant!  To say that Granton is a deprived part of the world is an understatement (if also a little non-PC these days.  Apparently people don’t like to use the word “deprived” any more in this sense).  However, the work of Granton Youth Centre  (GYC) that I’ve seen so far is a shining light in what is mainly a very dark world for the young people of Granton.  I volunteer with them as my placement on Thursday mornings, from 7-8:30am helping with their P7-S1 breakfast club (yes, 7am which – for those of you who haven’t made the connection – means being out of the house by 6:30am at the latest), and then from 9:30am-12 helping in their EmployAbility Unit for 16+ ages.

They hire a bus from a local community project every weekday morning, and drive around Granton picking up a selection of 10-12 yr olds who have been referred to them by the local school.  These are some of the most vulnerable young people in the school – those who are potentially the most prone to bullying, etc.  The staff and volunteers at GYC commit to picking them up every schoolday at 7am, bringing them into the centre where they provide them with breakfast, and also with a toothbrush, toothpaste and deodorant, spend some time building positive relationships with them (which builds their self-confidence and self-esteem), and drop them off at school on time.  It’s actually such a small thing, and an easy thing to do (once you’re used to the early mornings!) but I can’t begin to imagine the benefit it is having in the lives of these young people.

Then the rest of the morning at GYC is spent dedicated to young people age 16+ helping them in the most practical ways.  They hold workshops on money management, creating a CV, finding vocations that match their personalities and abilities, among other things.  Some of the young people they get coming regularly to these workshops have left school with no qualifications and face a future of unemployment and a real possibility of homelessness.  But the staff at GYC help to train, advise and encourage these young people to make their own way out of this situation, into jobs and relative financial security, whilst building relationships and having fun in the process.

The advantage for me volunteering at both of these sessions on a Thursday morning, apart from seeing the amazing work that’s done at GYC and learning from the staff there, is that both of these sessions start by providing breakfast for the young people that come in.

…bonus!

I’ve contracted MRSA

Ok, so I doubt very much that it’s MRSA, but it sounds nice and dramatic and it got your attention.

Abi was in hospital yesterday to have her remaining 3 wisdom teeth removed.  Having wisdom teeth removed doesn’t sound particularly bad, but it was a pretty traumatic experience.

She’s had one wisdom tooth removed in the past, which was in her upper jaw, so they could just pull it out while she was under local anaesthetic.  However, lower-jaw wisdom teeth can sometimes have their roots caught round the nerves that run along the jaw, which causes significant problems.  And since Abi’s wisdom teeth hadn’t actually come through completely, she had to be put to sleep while her teeth were cut out. 

Fair enough, it still sounds like a pretty minor surgery when compared to life-saving operations.  But getting wisdom teeth removed is one thing I hope never has to be done to me.  She was put to sleep while they cut open her gums and extracted her teeth.  And because all the surgery was taking place around her face, the increased blood flow to her head and face meant she woke up with a headache I can’t even imagine.

They asked us to be in for 8am, so just to make sure we got there by 7:30am.  She was taken through to be anaesthetised at 2pm.  (Yes, that’s right: 6 and a half hours of waiting.  Nothing but waiting. And contracting MRSA.)  While she was in theatre I found a local retail park and got myself a KFC (in case you were wondering) for lunch.  She came back out around 3:30pm, and we were able to leave the hospital at 7:30pm.

So after 12 hours in a hospital, where they’re supposed to fix you up and make you all better, Abi came out feeling much morse than when she went in (albeit better off in the long run), and even I now have a sore throat and headache that I didn’t have before!  Admittedly MRSA’s significantly worse than a sore throat and a headache, but my point still stands…

…whatever it was…

Blog frustrations…

You know what’s frustrating about having a blog?  It’s the fact that you can see how many people visit your blog each day, but you can’t tell who they are!  Ok, I know there’s the map on the right hand side of the page that shows you where people are visiting from, and that’s pretty cool for telling me exactly how world-famous I’m becoming!  I can see on that map there’s a little blob over Israel, which tells me that Matt Walmsley of Agape fame (www.agape.org.uk) has visited, and I’m sure he would tell me that’s all I really need to know; and I’m fairly sure that one or both of my parents are regular visitors (Hi Mum and Dad!), but believe it or not, I get more visitors than just them – unless, of course, they’re both visiting from several different places around the world each day.  Which seems unlikely.

So you can see my frustration, right?  Or perhaps you just think I’m odd? Hmm…

Masters courses, scholarships, and the salvation of all humanity.

We recently found out that Abi’s been given an unconditonal offer of a place on the MSc Music in the Community course that she wants to do, which is great.  However, we found out today that she’s not going to be given a scholarship, which means we have to pay the full fees, which isn’t so great.

I’m also in the middle of preparing a Bible study on Romans chapter 4, and have just been struck by the last section – verses 18-25.  Paul’s writing to the church in Rome, and speaking to a mixture of Jewish and Gentile believers.  He’s just been arguing that whether you’re Jewish or not makes no difference to how you are made righteous.  Using Abraham as the example (being the man to whom God gives circimcision, the sign of being Jewish; but also being the man of whom the Bible says “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness”),  Paul explains that whether you’re Jewish or Gentile, salvation comes from believing God and receiving God’s gift of mercy and grace.

Paul’s argument includes an explanation of exactly what Abraham believed God for: Abraham was 99 years old, and his wife was 89 and barren when God promised them numerous descendents.  Paul says that “without weakening in his faith, he faced [these facts].  Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God…”

Abraham saw that the circumstances were stacked against him and his wife, but he trusted God’s provision over his own circumstances, and from God’s promise came the whole Jewish nation, through whom God carried out his salvation plan for the whole of humanity.

…which is an encouraging thought given today’s news.

The header image

In response to my Dad’s comment on a previous post, the picture is of Newcastle quayside which many of you probably recognise, and was taken by Kalle Lintinen, a Finnish guy I knew from living in Richardson Rd halls of residence in my first year at uni. 

You can find more of his pictures at www.lintinen.fi

And Dad, you’ve probably seen this picture before on my computer occasionally.

People visited!

Wow, people actually looked at my blog yesterday! I’m guessing I’m going to have to post new material up regularly now – talk about pressure.

The wife (I mean Abi – sorry dear…) and I keep getting people knocking at the door to try and sell us stuff, but not really believing that we could possibly own the house.  The other week I answered the door to a man trying to sell double-glazing, who asked if my parents were in!  I just said “no…” and he went away.  And today the guy offering “roofing solutions” took one look at me and asked if the owners of the house were in!  Fair enough, we don’t own the house…and we’re young and live in a 3-bedroom detached house in an area where we couldn’t even afford a garden shed, so I can understand where they’re coming from, but I still object to it on principle.

Thinking of garden sheds, if you own an allotment and put a garden shed on it, would you have to pay council tax on it? Or could you live there for free? Worth looking into…

Wow! A post!

Hi.  So it’s been a while since I actually wrote anything here.  In fact, i wrote 2 posts right back at the start because I felt it was fairly compulsory in the communication module at ICC, and once I finished that module I didn’t bother with it any more. 

However, I’ve been reflecting lately (not the kind that involves breaking mirrors, don’t worry) and have decided that a blog is probably a good outlet for the product of these reflections.  So let’s see what comes out of it, shall we…?

I might even let some people I know into the secret that I have a blog…