The last post commented on a desire for preachers, when it comes to how we use scripture, to shift from diving to swimming.
Not everyone is a preacher. But many of us have a devotional reading which might be diving boards.
I am not a huge fan of most daily devotionals. Most of them are set up so that you have a line or two of scripture and then a little reflection written about those lines. The reflection generally includes some sort of "moral" or "life application" that we can "gain" or "take" from the scripture. Devotionals are assumed to be "quick" so that we can get our fix and move on.
This is all well and fine but it may be sapping us of the richness of the scripture.
The challenge is that when we read just a line or two, we miss the much larger picture. Just like in a movie.
We watch movie clips and know that these clips are a part of a much larger story. So while we can watch a classic clip, we know that there are a number of motivations and plot twits going on up to and beyond this point.
Not everyone is a preacher. But many of us have a devotional reading which might be diving boards.
I am not a huge fan of most daily devotionals. Most of them are set up so that you have a line or two of scripture and then a little reflection written about those lines. The reflection generally includes some sort of "moral" or "life application" that we can "gain" or "take" from the scripture. Devotionals are assumed to be "quick" so that we can get our fix and move on.
This is all well and fine but it may be sapping us of the richness of the scripture.
The challenge is that when we read just a line or two, we miss the much larger picture. Just like in a movie.
We watch movie clips and know that these clips are a part of a much larger story. So while we can watch a classic clip, we know that there are a number of motivations and plot twits going on up to and beyond this point.
So to with scripture. We can quote it and say it, but if we are unaware of the larger story going on then we are just a bunch of people sharing movie clips of a movie that not everyone has seen.