A Dangerous Time

Perhaps, something called "form criticism" helped open the Pandora's Box.  I first became acquainted with the term while in seminary .  The term speaks of a scholarly approach to Scripture which provides a way to separate what the Scripture says it says from what it meant to say.  Or, if talking about the New Testament, it separates what Jesus says from what He actually said. While I am not necessarily ready to throw the process out the door, it does create a world where someone's interpretation of the Scripture becomes more authoritative than the Scripture itself. 

 

I have always remembered a rather extensive article from the early 1990's written by one of those sociologist type guys who after studying the church in our country predicted that denominational churches were in trouble because of a movement toward a more autonomous church.  In a culture which has been steadily moving toward a "it's all about me" value system, that movement has only been accentuated.  Add all this to the "feel good" theology being preached in too many places and a perfect storm has been created to undermine the authority of the sacred Word of God.

 

The interpreter has become more authoritative than the Word being interpreted.  The interpreter has become more knowledgeable about what God is saying than the writer who wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.  It is, therefore, no surprise that when the Word of God is shown to be in conflict with the culture's common consensus based value system, the Word is deemed to be irrelevant and can be discarded with a self-righteous flourish.  After all, if enough people say something is right, it must be right.  Where is the authority for the church and the believer?  In too many instances, it is not found in the Word, but in the secular culture.