Please remember that tonight we are reading through 1 Corinthians 10 wherein Paul warns the Corinthians about overconfidence in their forms of worship. If you have the opportunity, please read through the parts of the story of the Exodus that Paul references in this chapter: Exodus 13-14, Exodus 17, Numbers 25, and Numbers 14. Also, think about what it means when Paul says that the cup of blessing is a “participation/communion/fellowship” (depending upon the translation) in the blood of Christ. This is the same word, koinónia, that Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 1:9 or Luke uses in Acts 2:42 to describe the church. How is the fellowship in the church related to our fellowship with Jesus Christ at communion?
As we explore ways of reading the Scriptures, last week we looked at Augustine’s idea that we should approach all Scriptural interpretations with humility. Although Augustine says we should be open to alternative interpretations of Scripture, one of the rules he lays down is that the Scriptures should not be given a nonsensical interpretation that contradicts our reason and observations of the natural world. Within the creation story of Genesis, Augustine saw inherent contradictions between a literal reading of the narrative and what reason and observation teach, such as how can there be a day without a sun (which was created on Day 4). In his The Literal Meaning of Genesis (chapter 19), Augustine says that in interpreting the mind of the sacred writer, Christians should not talk nonsense to unbelievers because it brings our Scriptures into derision and disrepute. For example, if we insist that Genesis teaches 6,000 year old, geocentric, flat-earth understanding of the universe, how can we ever speak to someone about Jesus Christ who knows this understanding of the universe to be false. Since if people “find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learned from experience and the light of reason?” Therefore, as we read through the Bible, we should not give the Scriptures an interpretation that contradicts God’s disclosure of himself in nature even if it means having to change our personal understanding of the bible and our theology.
Dinner is at 6. The menu is chicken casserole. Please bring a friend. Hope to see you here.
Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions . . . and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking non-sense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of the faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason? Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although “they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion.” (1 Timothy 1:7)
Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, Vol. 1.1.19.39