Introduction

This talk was given at St. Peter’s Church on 22 June by Revd. Mark Fletcher. In this message, we explore why the Bible remains our trustworthy guide—a timeless source of wisdom that continues to speak into our lives and shape our communities today.

We love the movie Wicked. Has anybody seen it? Very excited about the sequel coming out in November. It’s a sort of re-imagining of The Wizard of Oz, and as you may know, the wizard turns out not to be that wonderful after all. And in fact, he has built a machine in order to make him look and sound more impressive than he really is, and to intimidate people into doing what he says.

That feels like a very fitting metaphor for our world right now. We need to learn that lesson: that the people who speak the loudest are very often not to be trusted, that the wise speak quietly, and we need to listen carefully in order to hear wisdom. And of course, that is especially true of God, who so often speaks in a still, small voice.

We need to learn to hear him speak. Now, the most common way that we hear God speak is through this book—this remarkable book—or, as we’ve already said, it’s actually a library of 66 books written over a period of about 1,400 years and written by around 40 different authors, and yet it maintains a remarkably consistent message throughout.

And it is a book which has literally shaped the world that we live in. It is the foundation and the source of so many of the values and ideas that we hold most dear—whether that is the preeminence of love, or universal human dignity, or the equality of all people, or the importance of compassion and forgiveness.

These things find their source, their origin, and their foundation here. Over all of these years, the Bible has stood the test of time and is still, you may know, by a vast distance, the best-selling book every single year. Some people say that the Bible is out of date. They could not be more wrong.

We need this more than ever. And as our society drifts away from these foundations, we find ourselves on shifting sand. The grass withers, the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever.

It is, however, you will know, a rather surprising book. Someone once said, “People forget facts, but they remember stories.” And a huge amount of the Bible is stories—which is perhaps not what you would expect of it. About 40 to 50% of it is stories. But it’s also full of poetry to stir the soul, songs of joy and lament, law, wisdom, letters (which are often very practical), and even apocalyptic literature. And each of those books has a different purpose.

All of them are useful, and they speak to us in different ways at different stages of our life. It is like a library that we need to learn to drop into and pick up a book that we need right now. One objection to the Bible is that it is so often misunderstood and misused, and that is absolutely true. But the solution to that problem is not to use it less, but rather to learn to use it well—to be able to know when it’s being misused.

Just as the sheep learn the shepherd’s voice so that they are not led astray, so we should learn the voice of God who speaks through the Scriptures, so that we know when people are using it awry.

It is also a very human text. One of the things that’s often quite shocking about it is that it’s full of very flawed, very imperfect people. I remember as a child reading the Bible and just being quite shocked by some of the things that people did and thought, Is that supposed to be an example? But of course, it’s a far more sophisticated book than that, and in many ways what it does is it helps us to learn by example.

As we hear the stories of those who went so badly off the rails, so we learn from their experience. It doesn’t teach us by telling us; it teaches us by showing us—the examples and the mistakes of others, that we might learn to be wise. It can be a difficult read. It is no more difficult than the real world that we live in, and it does not shy away from the reality of this life and this world.

And you are never too old or too young to be learning from the Bible. Did you hear in our reading it said, From infancy you have known the holy scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation. So it’s from a letter to a young Christian leader, and his name is Timothy. And his mother and his grandmother had taught him the scriptures and taught him the faith from an early age, and it had set him up to be the leader that he was.

And I just feel like there’s a really good example for us there, isn’t it? Faith is taught, and we have a responsibility to know it for ourselves and to teach it to the next generation. You should be reading the Scriptures. You should be reading the Scriptures with others—and with children and grandchildren.

I’m always struck by the fact that these stories have layers to them, that they are often simple enough for a child to understand, and yet, as you come back to them, you keep discovering more and more. And I’m struck that our attitude to the Bible is one of the things that we pass on. If the Bible is something that you treat with respect, but it’s on the shelf and it’s gathering dust—well, our actions speak louder than our words.

This book is designed to shape us. It is not simply read for information. It is formational. The goal of the Bible is not knowledge, but wisdom and character, and the knowledge of God himself. Our reading in 2 Timothy 3:16 said, All Scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching and rebuking and correcting and training in righteousness.

So you see that Scripture is there to teach and to train us. Like an athlete or a soldier, we need to be trained in order to get stronger and to become more resilient—to learn self-discipline and dedication. And that can be really hard. But just as with exercise, if you do a little bit every day, it will get easier, and you will see yourself becoming stronger and more able.

Don’t bite off more than you can chew. A little bit—perhaps reading one book over a course of days. I always quite like the idea of ticking off the books in the index at the start of the Bible and saying, I’m going to read this one, and the next, I’m going to read this one… A little bit every day, and it will do its work.

So it teaches and it trains us, and it will help us to become more resilient, more disciplined, and more rooted in God. It also rebukes and corrects. So if you were sailing a ship, you would need to check your bearing regularly—otherwise you simply will drift off course. If you are driving somewhere you haven’t been before, there’s nothing worse than being overconfident.

You may know these kind of drivers: I know where I’m going, it’s going to be fine. And what happens? It’s really important to be humble enough to check the map—to correct our course. Otherwise, our lives will go badly off course. And Scripture works, and it has endured over all of these years, because it is no ordinary book.

It is inspired by God. All Scripture is God-breathed. You know, when we say that the Bible is “inspired,” we don’t just mean that someone had a great idea and was feeling inspired and then wrote it. No, it’s much more than that. But what we don’t mean either is that it was dictated word for word by God.

“Inspiration” means God-breathed. And it reminds me of the picture of creation where God takes the dust of the earth—the ordinary dust—and breathes life into it. And so God takes ordinary people and breathes life into their words and creates something inspired.

There is a lovely story about the Swiss theologian Karl Barth—and he’s arguably the most influential theologian of the 20th century. And he went to be a pastor of a church when he was quite young, after having a really exemplary university education. A really incredibly intelligent, well-educated guy.

But he starts preaching to his congregation, and it just goes over their heads. And he describes it as like preaching through plate glass. They can see his lips moving, but they can’t understand what he’s saying—and he’s really despairing about this. And so he goes to God, and he really has to humble himself, and he says, God, what am I doing wrong? And the thing he realises is that his job is to simply teach people the Bible.

And once he starts doing that—instead of sermons which show how clever he was—once he starts just teaching people the Bible, the connections happen. And he can see people’s lives being changed, and God is speaking to people through what they’re doing together. And it’s a really important lesson that goes on to influence much of his later theology.

And one of the things later on he will talk about is the fact that God speaks. He paints a picture of three concentric circles. So he talks about the fact that God has spoken in Jesus. And if you were there to see and hear Jesus, you would encounter God in that moment. But of course, most of us can’t be there.

And so then God inspires the Scriptures to speak of those things. And those are a trustworthy guide where we can hear the truth of God. So—Christ, and then the Scriptures. And then there is this third concentric circle, which is that God, by his Holy Spirit, works as we read the Scriptures, as we prayerfully reflect on them, or as we preach faithfully about them. And God speaks in those moments. Do you see?

And you need all three of those in order to hear the Word of God. To this day, God speaks through his Holy Spirit, working in you and in us when we read prayerfully and when we preach faithfully. And this book, inspired by God, is a trustworthy guide through life.

There is a moment when Jesus says to his disciples, Do you want to leave too? Because everybody left. And they say, Where else would we go? Because you have the words of eternal life.

And though we may struggle with the Scriptures—though it may not be easy for us—this is a trustworthy guide. And where else will we go? For here are the words of eternal life.

So to be Church is to be Bible people. And in our lives, in our families, and in our community, these words are here to shape and form us as we learn to hear the voice of the Good Shepherd speaking to us. Read it little and often, and when you do so, you will be encouraged and strengthened and drawn more deeply into God—to be part of his people.

You’ll find yourself walking alongside the heroes of the faith. You will learn wisdom from the experience of those who’ve gone before. This remarkable text defines us as a community—because if we will listen humbly and prayerfully, we will hear the very words, that still, small voice of the living God.

Amen.