Tuesday, July 24, 2018

Light at the end of the tunnel

I'm getting very near the end of the 3 year Lectionary cycle at www.milepost100.com. 

When I started, I didn't want to start in Christmas or Easter, because I thought they would take more research. I started in the first week of "Proper" time in year C, which was about May 2016. As it turns out, the summer time readings are much more interesting than those classics most people are familiar with. You know, the coming of the baby Jesus and the whole thing with the tomb.

The downside is, I just missed a really interesting entry from the book of Nehemiah. It's the only entry for that book. The book firmly sets the stage in the time after people are released from exile in Babylon. There is no ambiguity about the historical context. Then Ezra starts preaching. As he does he explains the meaning of text and clears up what might be seen as contradictions.

This is time in history when the ancient scriptures were being assembled and sometimes redacted and here is a story that essentially tells you they are doing that. How we got from there to people to believing that the Bible is the exact word of God that anyone can read and get the same message, I can't explain. It took centuries to screw it up that bad. The opposite is true, that is, you can read it and it tells you that is a collection of writings written by men attempting to convey a variety of meanings throughout time.

Basically the theme of my Lectionary helper in one chapter of scripture.