imprecatory
The way Mark Charles railed against the God of the OT on Sunday evening was striking—but not unsettling. There were many points of intersection between his tirade and reservations I’ve had about the depiction, especially God’s seeming capriciousness and disregard for the lives God created and endowed with God’s image in the first place. I’d never thought about the Flood narrative, in particular, from the perspective of someone deeply connected with the transcendent beauty of creation. The way God explicitly weaponized creation against itself must have seemed shockingly inconceivable to someone brought up with that worldview. I talked with Greg a little about it over lunch today. He actually sent out a follow-up email to church members (a group of which I’m not yet a part) distancing himself from some of the non-orthodox statements Charles made. I understand he has to do that, given that he’s accountable to the presbytery for the church’s doctrinal claims and what he preaches from the pulpit, but had I been a church member, I’d have thought it unnecessary. Greg did (gently) push back on Charles’ perspective and the analogies he offered to bolster it by reminding me of the effects of the Fall on creation, how it was “subjected to futility” and how its fate it bound up with ours, to a degree, and it how it doesn’t exist as a standalone, mediatory entity like Charles may believe. I think that’s true; after all, there is still a good deal of “natural evil” (hurricanes, earthquakes, other disaster) in the world that has to be accounted for somehow.
I’m still wrestling with whether to believe the Bible is God’s revelation to us, or whether it’s our attempt to understand God. Either way, it’s progressive, sequential, unfolding throughout history. I’ve given up believing the Bible is inerrant, instead taking the view that it’s “perfect with respect to its purpose” to quote this excellent Roger Olson post. But for as much as I’d like to repudiate the God of the OT as a fiction, a product of its savage, repressive cultural milieu, the question always arises: Then what standard do we use to judge whether the Bible’s description of God is accurate? Jesus’ perspective is always a good starting point; after all, he maintained “If you’ve seen me, you’ve seen the Father.” It would still take some getting used to, though; interpreting the Bible by itself is one thing (and a long-accepted practice in hermeneutics), but using parts of the Bible to explicitly reject other parts is definitely a step beyond where I’ve gone so far. Needs more thought (and prayer for wisdom).
Side note: Greg said that two of the congregants are a Unitarian and a Buddhist, respectively. This makes me very happy.