Jesus didn’t read his Bible like we do–(from The Bible Tells Me So)

Last updated on: September 5, 2014 at 6:43 am By Peter Enns

We see here Jesus handling Psalm 110* in a very ancient, creative way. We might think he is “misreading” the first line of Psalm 110—and from the point of view of the writer of the psalm he is, since Psalm 110 doesn’t say what Jesus says it says. But in Jesus’s day, such creative handling of the psalm to draw out a deeper meaning is perfectly fine. What would have turned heads is Jesus’s claim that this psalm has something to... Read more

the Bible’s diverse God–(from The Bible Tells Me So)

Last updated on: September 4, 2014 at 7:06 am By Peter Enns

Looking to the Bible to find out what God is like seems like about the most obvious thing the Bible should hand you on a silver platter. But it doesn’t. You have to work for it. The God we meet there sometimes knows everything, and other times he’s stumped and trying to figure things out. He’s either set in his ways and in full control or he changes his mind when pressed. He gives one law in one place and... Read more

stories work–(from The Bible Tells Me So)

Last updated on: September 2, 2014 at 5:56 am By Peter Enns

Stories work. Stories are powerful. Stories move us deeply, more so than statistics, news reports, or textbooks. We all know that. We only need to think about what holds our attention and makes us long for more—that book, film, or TV series that we wish wouldn’t end quite so soon, that story told of some deep, personal, transforming experience, whether painful or joyous. The Bible, then, is a grand story. It meets us and then invites us to follow and join a... Read more

the Bible, history, and storytelling–(from The Bible Tells Me So)

Last updated on: September 1, 2014 at 7:26 am By Peter Enns

Stories of the past differ because storytellers are human beings. No storyteller is all knowing about the past, but limited by his or her own time and place, and the fact that no human sees every angle of everything. Stories also differ by what storytellers are consciously trying to “do” in their stories, what their take-away is. They are not objective observers and don’t pretend to be. They are artists bringing past and present together to leave the audience with... Read more

when inerrancy no longer works: Carlos Bovell on Robert Yarbrough

Last updated on: August 29, 2014 at 11:16 am By Peter Enns

Today’s guest post is by Carlos Bovell, a frequent contributor to this blog (for a recent post go here and work backwards). Bovell is a graduate of Westminster Theological Seminary and The Institute for Christian Studies, Toronto. He is the author of Inerrancy and the Spiritual Formation of Younger Evangelicals (2007), By Good and Necessary Consequence: A Preliminary Genealogy of Biblical Foundationalism (2009), an edited volume, Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Authority of Scripture (2011), and Rehabilitating Inerrancy in a Culture of Fear (2012). ***** Robert Yarbrough is a New Testament professor at Covenant Seminary,... Read more

honoring your evolving faith

Last updated on: August 28, 2014 at 6:20 am By Peter Enns

Many historians, philosophers, and spiritual teachers now agree that collective history itself is going through an evolution of consciousness. We can readily observe stages of consciousness or stages of “growing up” in the world at large (e.g. today Christians do not believe that slavery is acceptable, but many at one time did). The individual person tends to mimic these stages, and they seem to be sequential and cumulative. You have to learn from each stage, and yet you can’t completely... Read more

“aha” moments: biblical scholars tell their stories (16): Jeannine Brown

Last updated on: August 27, 2014 at 6:16 am By Peter Enns

After a 2 week break (my daughter had the audacity of getting married in the middle of one of my blog series), we are back today with the 16th “aha” moment, this one by Jeannine K. Brown (Ph.D., Luther Seminary, MDiv, Bethel Seminary), Professor of New Testament at Bethel Seminary, San Diego and St. Paul. She is author of Scripture as Communication: Introducing Biblical Hermeneutics (Baker, 2007) and Becoming Whole and Holy: An Integrative Conversation about Christian Formation (Baker, 2011, with Dahl... Read more

my Liturgists Podcast interview on The Bible Tells Me So (plus an extra bonus thingy)

Last updated on: August 26, 2014 at 7:37 am By Peter Enns

Last week I was interviewed over at The Liturgists podcast by “Science Mike” McHargue, Michael Gungor, and Lissa Paino, and here it is. We talked about the Bible and hit a lot of themes I cover in The Bible Tells Me So: Why Defending Scripture Has Made Us Unable to Read It (available for pre-order now and officially out September 9). And speaking of which, if you think you may be one of those people who takes the Bible too literally, a Buzzfeed list has... Read more

faith is messy–which is where God is found

Last updated on: August 17, 2014 at 2:56 pm By Peter Enns

As long as you can deal with life in universal abstractions, you can pretend that the usual binary way of thinking is true, but once you deal with a specific or concrete reality, it is always, without exception a mixture of darkness and light, death and life, good and bad, attractive and unattractive. We who are trained in philosophy and theology have all kinds of trouble with that, because our preferred position is to deal with life in terms of... Read more