Does the Bible frighten you? It frightens me at times! Some people are frightened by the Bible and reading it and studying it with other people because they think they'll show how little they understand it. I'm not frightened by the bits I don't understand; I'm frightened (at times!) by the bits I do understand. Maybe 'frightened' isn't the right word, but disturbed certainly is, and challenged!
At Church Wednesday this week, we were looking at Acts 15, the story of the Council of Jerusalem, when the apostles and others had a bit issue to resolve - how does someone become a Christian and become part of the Church? For faith in Jesus, by the grace of God, on the one hand or by being circumcised? They had to resolve this conflict, these two views, because the Church couldn't have both. In the end, they decided that by for faith, by grace, was enough and that has been the good news ever since.
It was the process by which they arrived at that decision that fascinated me. The Church listened to one another, to those who had one opinion and to those who had the other opinion. Then they listened to the Bible and what it had to say. Then they made their wise decision.
One question that we had no time to tackle, but is fascinating, is 'what happens when Christians stop listening to one another?' I've seen it happen: there are people in Edinburgh Presbytery, who when they stand up to speak, you can see others switch off; on principle they will not listen to this person because 'he has nothing good to say'. I've detected at times elsewhere too, when someone is speaking, others are not listening and they betray that by either repeating almost word for word what has just been said, or by totally ignoring the previous contribution to the discussion.
The result is that we adopt 'positions'; we think we know what others have said, but in fact we've got it wrong. It's more of a recipe for conflict than for conciliation.
I have a colleague who, when he was Moderator of Caithness Presbytery, used to make a great show of consulting the Clerk about something in the middle of someone else's speech. I'm convinced it was all show, but it used to annoy me intensely because it was obvious that he wasn't listening to the debate. If nothing else, it was totally impolite.
I don't have a worked-out answer to this issue, but it really is very simple. We need to listen to one another properly; no 'bull-in-the-chinashop' kinds of behaviour.
We've not even begun to talk about reading body language....
Here's another question - what happens when we stop listening to God?
