LRC, Houston - the weekends-free church in Houston, Texas

The Bible is RAW material. It is print on paper. What we DO with what it says is dependent upon how we look at, view, or interpret what we think it says, what we think the authors meant. No easy task. In fact, many would just rather have somone else tell them what it means. Who has the time today to figure it all out for themselves. I was once there. It’s not a bad place to begin, but it’s a lousy place to end.

Doctrine actually begins with a major conceptual overview of how one sees the Bible. Caution sign!

If a person sees the Bible as verbal, plenary inspiration (All of the actual words of the Bible are inspired and without error), you really have built a mountain to climb wherein I don’t think you can reach the top. If you see the Bible as an metaphorical-historical account of God’s dealings with man wherein the accounts over 3,000+ years is progressive (or process theology), I think you’ll enjoy talking with other people much better.

They might even like you! Maybe even want to talk about God!

Doctrines can’t be built on one verse or even a couple. But, people do it anyway. You can support any doctrine by using any verse in the Bible. And then I can find a verse that says the opposite. And then in un-Christian like behavior we can trash each other and divide over our differences (which are nothing but opinions). And it’s done every day!

As en example there is no Trinitarian doctrine in the Bible, no incarnational doctrine, nor rapture doctrine. Those are all opinions-beliefs that man, or the church, has put together as a result of their “findings“. But, are those “findings” valid: very much so, or very little? And who has the final word- if you’re not Catholic?

Maybe if we just LOVED people and did the Stephen Covey (5th principle) thing of first trying to understand where other people were before trying to convince them of understanding us, we might see greater growth for the Kingdom.

You think maybe?