Confessions 1 -- I am not the "you" of the Bible.

New Tuesday series... Confessions of a Bible Know-It-All: 25 Ways I Changed My Mind. Way #1
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Confession #1: I am not the "you" of the Bible
I'm not sure I ever gave it much thought, but for the first 18 years or so of my life, I assumed that when the Bible said "you," it was talking to me.

Take Jeremiah 29:11 -- "I know the plans I have for you." Wow, I thought. God is talking about me!

"Be strong and courageous. I am with you wherever you go" (Josh. 1:9). Wow, I thought! God is with me wherever I go.

I went through a time of struggle when I was ten. My mother gave me these verses to hold on to, promises to remember while I was at school. She wanted me to remember God was with me while I was at school.

Now, don't get me wrong. I do believe God is with me and you wherever we go. I do believe God is love and has good plans for those who trust in him. What I didn't realize until much later, though, is that those verses weren't actually written to me at all. I am not the "you" of those verses.

When I realized what was going on here, it completely changed how I read the Bible. And once you see it too, you'll start to notice it everywhere.

2. I always say that the Bible is for us but it was not written to us. Once you see it, you see it. "Hear, O Israel" (Deut. 6:4). I'm not Israel. The Israel of Deuteronomy lived about 3000 years ago. The Israel Isaiah addressed lived 2700 years ago.

Paul says he's writing to Romans, Corinthians, Thessalonians, and other churches in his day. Am I a Roman? A Corinthian? A Thessalonian?

Nope. None of those letters were written to me.

Why did I think those books were written to me? Why did I think that the Y-O-Us of Scripture are for me? That's not actually what the Bible says.

So, does that mean the Bible has nothing to say to me?

3. Of course it does. That's how the idea of a "Scripture" works. The idea of a Scripture is that it speaks beyond its own time to the people of the religion whose Scripture it is.

But, mind you, Paul didn't know his letters were going to end up in a Bible. "Scripture" for him was what we call the Old Testament. He was just writing letters. Important letters, to be sure. Letters that he believed carried authority for the churches to which he was writing. 

But did he think he was writing part of a future Bible? Almost certainly not.

4. Yes, I was once an unreflective reader of the Bible. Still am, of course, to some extent. We can never become fully self-aware.

But I narcissistically read the Bible as if it was just about me, which meant that I was mostly misreading it. And I didn't even know it. A little self-centered, really. To ignore the message it actually had. To ignore the people it was actually written to.

It's like picking up a love letter to someone else and applying it to yourself. "Wow, whoever's writing this really loves me." That's how we often read the Bible. Kind of funny, really, how clueless we can be when reading the Bible.

"I know the plans I have for you"? God said this through Jeremiah to the Israelites who had been captured and taken to Babylon. It wasn't written about anyone alive today. God was telling them to buy property but that in 70 years he would bring them back. They're all dead now, of course.

"The Lord is with you wherever you go"? God said this to Joshua before he started a military campaign. It's over. You can go visit the ruins of Jericho if you want today. The verse wasn't a promise to anyone alive now, let alone to anyone today who is about to start a military campaign. To read it that way is to rip it out of its context.

I know, it's hard for a lot of people to see it. "No, no, no! It's for me." Yes, I was a narcissist once too.

But it wasn't written to you. Those words weren't originally to you. Just read what the words actually say. 

5. We're talking about learning to read the Bible "in context." That is, reading the words for what they actually meant. Realizing that the love letter was first to someone else before we immediately clutch it longingly to our chests with stars in our eyes. 

Yes, I believe by faith God preserved the Bible for us as Scripture, even though the Bible mostly doesn't say that. It's an idea I learned in church, a tradition about the Bible that the Bible mostly doesn't say. It's a true tradition, but it mostly goes beyond what the Bible itself says.

Bottom line. If I really love this text -- if I really respect the Bible -- shouldn't I first stop and listen to what it actually says? That is, before I rip the words out of context and smack them on myself? 

Before I ask what it means for me, shouldn't I first ask what it meant to them?