We’re poised for Christmas and for a diocesan focus on the Bible and the Creed starting with a Year of the Old Testament. Last week I spoke about the Bible as a way into being God’s people, knowing his provision, his promises and his purpose for our lives and that of the cosmos. There is no Word of God without power so that engagement with this book (show) is energising. I want to complement last week’s teaching by saying something about the Old Testament.
I’m a Canon of the Diocese of Guyana, South America where Anne and I were married and I helped train Amerindian priests thirty years ago. On a recent visit I went to an exhibition in the capital, Georgetown and for understandable reasons picked up the souvenir booklet (show). ‘Cannons of Guyana’ - a display of might from the British colonial era - contrast with the dozen priests who take seats in the sanctuary of St George’s Cathedral. Cannon with three ‘n’s is a bugbear that follows me round in correspondence due to the honour of being a senior priest. This morning we’re talking about another canon, spelt like me with two ‘n’s, the Canon of Scripture. This canon isn’t a priest or a weapon but an authoritative collection of books. The word ‘canon’ here derives from the Egyptian word for a reed used for measuring. The Canon of Scripture counts out the list of 66 books in the Bible noting a supplement 7 strong of secondary value we call the Apocrypha or deuterocanonical books. This library - in Greek biblia - or English ‘The Bible’ - has 39 books we call the Old Testament and 27 books we call the New Testament. The first is the book of our separation from God and the second the book of our reconciliation. Both though are part of a whole to be read together as we do at Sunday eucharists, one illuminating the other, as today when the Isaiah 7 passage at the end of the sheet predicts the virgin giving birth in Matthew 1.
In today’s other reading Paul explains to the Romans how the good news of Christ was ‘promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures’. In Paul’s day these scriptures were the Jewish scriptures. Today they are supplemented by the New Testament, writings from saints like him owning the testament, covenant or relationship with God in Christ prophesied in Jeremiah Chapter 31: ‘The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah… I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people’ (Jeremiah 31:31, 34). The Holy Spirit who the Creed says, ‘spoke through the prophets’ descended, as today’s Gospel affirms, into Mary’s womb so God is no longer just above and beyond us but also in covenant - in close relationship with us, living within us and among us in the community which gathers today in St Mary’s.
The writings in the Bible have authority within a faith community stretching back three or four thousand years. They are not the writings of scholars or philosophers but those of holy people, prophets in the Old Testament, saints in the New Testament, seen to speak for God and there is no word of God without power! The Canon of Scripture has unique authority and inspiration. The Church teaches that it cannot mislead anyone as it presents the salvation truth of God in Christ. It is that vision of Holy Scripture speaking words through holy people to build up holy readers we need to grasp. Our minds engage with the text at a lower level than this, riding on an emotional roller coaster with shocks and upsets, sheer horror sometimes, alongside beautiful words and stories. By invoking the Holy Spirit we pass beyond what attracts or repels intellectually or emotionally in the text to receive holy inspiration into our spirits from the same words.
Let’s focus briefly on the structure of the Old Testament. Our Lord spoke of the Law and the Prophets. The Jewish Scripture was finalised with another section called Writings including the Psalms so familiar to him. Our Bibles start like Jewish Bibles with the books of the Law or Pentateuch - five books - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. They continue with a mixture of historical, prophetic and wisdom writings. The historical books are Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 & 2 Samuel, 1 & 2 Kings, 1 & 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah & Esther. The prophets are the 15 books from Isaiah to Malachi. The wisdom writings include the Psalms, Proverbs, Job and other poetic books. The book of Daniel, like the last book of the New Testament, the book of Revelation, looks, as we do so much in Advent, to the last things. By reading through the Old Testament at this season the Church makes present the ancient expectation that the Messiah will come by sharing the centuries of preparation for Christ’s coming using this to build ardent desire for his second coming. On this last Sunday before Christmas, as the figure of Mary appears, we sit, reading Matthew 1, on the hinge between the Old and the New Testaments.
I said last week that when we read and study Matthew’s Gospel, as we shall do over the next year, we see a Sermon on a Mount from Jesus presented like Moses who brought the Ten Commandments down from Mount Sinai. When we read in the Acts about Pentecost we see a reversal of the Tower of Babel in Genesis so that people heard the same message in their different languages. The Holy Spirit who drives the Church forward from Pentecost is the same Lord working secretly throughout the biblical story of God’s people. When we read the Old Testament story of the Exodus we see ourselves going through the Red Sea – the waters of baptism – fed by manna – the heavenly bread of the eucharist – destined for Canaan – a glorious homeland. When in the story of Cain and Abel we read God’s words to Cain, ‘where is your brother?’ they are words reminding us God’s family find God again and again through love of other people. In the Psalms we read day by day at the eucharist and morning and evening prayer we enter the faith of the people of God through the ages and the prayer of Christ himself.
A few thoughts to conclude on how we familiarise ourselves with the Old Testament. First we come to read it after invoking the Spirit who came upon Mary and who made Jesus the Christ, anointed by the same Spirit. Then we need an accessible translation. To match what’s read in Church that might be the New Revised Standard Version which uses inclusive language but not for God. If you have a smart phone you can download a Bible App or a form of morning and evening prayer such as the Daily Prayer or Universalis Apps. These will take you through the Canon of Scripture day by day. In October I downloaded on Audible Eugene Peterson’s Message which is a paraphrase of the Bible onto my iPhone and iPad to listen to in spare moments. I’m now half way through the Bible on it. Being an American voice its different. I find it wakes me up to the text, especially the repetitive sections in the Old Testament. You follow two or three chapters of the Old Testament at a time being with a Psalm and every three or four sessions you switch to the New Testament so its quite varied and engaging. I’ll play a bit from where I’ve got up to.
However we engage with the Bible, it is necessary food for our spirit. Its truth isn’t pages to be copied into our minds but in the interaction between reader and text. It's necessary food we have, if you like, to mash up and digest to serve healthy spiritual bodies. This consuming is akin to the second feeding of Christians we now approach in the sacrament of Christ’s body, food which also helps make us what we are meant to be as godlike members of the body of Christ.
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