I do believe that my understanding and concept of what the New Testament is has changed over the course of this semester, but I cannot quite put my finger on a way to describe that shift. I think that mostly I have simply gained a deeper, more thorough understanding of just how little I understand the Bible and how ill equipped I am to interpret it. I have gained a sort of reverence for these ancient texts that I was lacking before.
As a result of this course, I see the New Testament as, instead of a perfect, holy book authored by God himself, a collection of humble writings by his followers – humankind’s imperfect, meager attempts to capture the essence and commands of an all-powerful, all-knowing, and awe inspiring God.
This may sound like a bad thing, that the Bible is not a perfect work of literature, but I don’t think it is. Because honestly, what do we expect? The writers were only human. The transcribers and those who recovered the scripts and everyone else that was involved in the creation and ongoing sustaining of the scriptures. I don’t think that it’s reasonable of us to expect that the Bible be absolutely perfect. To be fair, it would be nice, and it is rather frustrating to think that, while God could have stepped in and written everything for us so that it was literally exactly all that He wanted us to know, He didn’t. However, I feel like that is just how God operates. He likes to let us help Him and mess everything up, in a sense. Which, honestly, I see as a lot more loving than sweeping us aside and doing everything for us. It’s like when a parent allows a child to help them with something, even if, as a result, the outcome might be less than perfect.
That’s what I now believe the New Testament to be. It’s our attempts at capturing the essence of God and His glory, an honor which God gave to us because of His deep care for us and desire to have us involved.
Caroline's Encounters 