Over at Biblical Foundations, Andreas Kostenberger has posted an essay on the challenge of properly applying Scripture to our lives:
How do you apply the message of a given biblical text to today? Different answers have been given to this question. Perhaps one of the most common popular conceptions is that every text of Scripture applies to every person (and does so straightforwardly). But clearly, there are problems with this approach. When Paul tells Timothy to bring his coat and try to come to him before winter, how do you and I apply this command? Or how do we apply the passage in the Book of Acts narrating poor Eutychus’s fall from the window sill during one of Paul’s long preaching sessions?
Those are some pretty obvious examples, but as Andreas points out in the post, there are many passages—even well-known ones—that pose subtle but important challenges to anyone trying to discern a modern application in exhortations written for very different audiences in very different cultural environments. (Hat tip: Between Two Worlds.)
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November 2, 2006 at 22:57
A true biblicist, or biblical theologian, should have no problem with the examples Andreas cites. He or she asks what the text meant to the original reader of that day, then works out from that text for biblical, historical, and theological context. In Timothy’s case, his comment was directed to one person, and was clearly not a universal command or statement of principle. All that can be “applied” is perhaps insight on Paul’s situation and how that affected his thoughts and ministry. To try to find anything else in such a verse is simple eisogesis.
When students or teachers move from reading the Bible as the “revealed word of God,” and turn it into “words that reveal God,” there is a danger of spiritualizing any text to make it say something because of the mistaken belief that its power and authority are primarily in the discreet words, and not in the complete revelation. I love word study (Greek anyway, not so good at Hebrew), but I fear that, with the advent of digital technology and cheap publishing, we have trivialized the Scripture in the last generation by dissecting it so much that we no longer naturally read it to see the whole truth, but only bits and pieces of truth that suit our needs at the moment. All pastors know this is especially true of the New Testament because the Greek language, with its precision and structure, is so fun and easy to take apart and analyze for hidden word meanings.
I know this goes against the evangelical party line (and I am proudly evangelical), but I think any pastor who spends, say, two years on a so-called “verse-by-verse” sermon series on the book of [fill in the NT book] does a disservice not only to his congregation, but even more to the inspired writer, usually Paul. Paul’s eipistle to Timothy was originally just that, a letter to Timothy, and should be read that way. It is not a collection of discreet, independent concepts that can be taken out of context and recontextualized to fit any modern situation. I’m not sure exactly where the line is between exegetical and expository preaching, but practically it’s probably the difference between studying trees and studying the forest.
I really just stopped by the blog to see if there was a post about Ted Haggard yet. Haven’t been here in months, but I’ll come again. Guess my response turned into a little bit of rant, but Andreas raised some important issues that stirred my thoughts.