Strange Book of Books

There’s a dirty little secret that almost every seminary student, professor, and pastor knows: the Bible isn’t what most people say it is when they stand up to preach on a Sunday morning. The Bible has a long and complex history, a pre-history that has nothing to do with us before it finally comes around and, in the end, has everything to do with us.

Aric Clark is a man on a mission to let the cat out of the bag. His video series and discussion guide is entitled, “Strange Book of Books.”

The trailer (above) promises that “this is the good stuff.” And he’s right.

Aric understands that it’s our assumptions about what scripture says that all too often get in our way of understanding what it is actually saying. He’s on a mission that many of us who teach the Bible share: a mission to make the familiar strange.

This is a great resource to use with your Bible study, Sunday School, or group of skeptical friends who want to watch a couple hours worth of videos while sharing a beverage on a Friday night.

All of the back-and-forths that we go through as Christians trying to tease out how to faithfully follow Jesus seem to find their landing space, eventually, in the questions, “What is the Bible? And what are we supposed to do with it?”

Aric helpfully puts all of this on the table for us, and invites us to reimagine what we thought we knew.