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It really annoys me, the typical sermon heard in the churches lately. Content doesn't really matter, but here's the formula:
1 - Speaker comes up with a new spin on some doctrine.
2 - Starts off with going to the original language because this helps with the clarity of his new doctrine.
3 - Continues on by going to a number of other translations, as this also helps with understanding.
4 - Goes on to say that this word was mistranslated originally - it should have been translated this way. The word happens to be the focal point of this entire doctrine.
5 - Goes on to cite a number of commentaries, Bible dictionaries, and/or papers written by "learned men", although the speaker will tell you that these "learned men" don't understand what the Bible really means.
6 - Rinse and repeat ad infinitum.
And it bugs me. If you have to do all this to prove your point, maybe it's not a valid point. Let the Bible interpret the Bible. I mean, it was God that wrote it. Like these professors that all want to pick apart some great work of literature and determine what the author "meant" when he said the curtains were blue. Maybe he was depressed, maybe it was a commentary on how we view the world through our own sorrows, maybe the author felt at peace and wanted to portray that peace in his work. OR MAYBE HE NEEDED A COLOR FOR THE DAMN CURTAINS AND CHOSE BLUE AND IT MEANS NOTHING OTHER THAN THE CURTAINS WERE BLUE AS OPPOSED TO PINK. Damn! Really irritates me. But that's what these people do with the Bible. A scripture can't possibly just mean what it says - God's a tricksy hobbit apparently and therefore is incapable of just saying what he means, and so we all need the ministry to tell us what God really meant.
Okay, this is kind of getting away from my original point, which is:
Let the Bible interpret the Bible. If you have to jump through hoops and say that a scripture doesn't mean what it says to prove your point, maybe your point is invalid and just freaking let it go.
1 - Speaker comes up with a new spin on some doctrine.
2 - Starts off with going to the original language because this helps with the clarity of his new doctrine.
3 - Continues on by going to a number of other translations, as this also helps with understanding.
4 - Goes on to say that this word was mistranslated originally - it should have been translated this way. The word happens to be the focal point of this entire doctrine.
5 - Goes on to cite a number of commentaries, Bible dictionaries, and/or papers written by "learned men", although the speaker will tell you that these "learned men" don't understand what the Bible really means.
6 - Rinse and repeat ad infinitum.
And it bugs me. If you have to do all this to prove your point, maybe it's not a valid point. Let the Bible interpret the Bible. I mean, it was God that wrote it. Like these professors that all want to pick apart some great work of literature and determine what the author "meant" when he said the curtains were blue. Maybe he was depressed, maybe it was a commentary on how we view the world through our own sorrows, maybe the author felt at peace and wanted to portray that peace in his work. OR MAYBE HE NEEDED A COLOR FOR THE DAMN CURTAINS AND CHOSE BLUE AND IT MEANS NOTHING OTHER THAN THE CURTAINS WERE BLUE AS OPPOSED TO PINK. Damn! Really irritates me. But that's what these people do with the Bible. A scripture can't possibly just mean what it says - God's a tricksy hobbit apparently and therefore is incapable of just saying what he means, and so we all need the ministry to tell us what God really meant.
Okay, this is kind of getting away from my original point, which is:
Let the Bible interpret the Bible. If you have to jump through hoops and say that a scripture doesn't mean what it says to prove your point, maybe your point is invalid and just freaking let it go.
