I find my story in a larger story (Part 2)

For a few years now I've been on a quest to convince the Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC to offer a hands-on exhibit of used and worked-through Bibles. Bibles found in thrift stores. Bibles with broken spines and torn covers. Bibles with hardly a page that is not marked up or commented upon in the margins. Bibles with question marks next to strange and difficult passages and lots of coffee or tea marks bearing witness to the many hours in the early morning or late evening when the reader annotated their own story via the story of the Bible. Bibles that give testimony to the wrestling and loving relationship Christians have with their story. There are not many other books that have been worked over with that kind of intensity. And they offer a powerful witness to the Christian journey with faith.

Christians are (ideally) in an ongoing conversation with God. This can take the form of acknowledging in our minds that God is present anywhere and everywhere and therefore also in the very situation we're in right now. It can be thanking God for joyful moments by muttering it under our breath or in our mind. It can be turning to God in prayer in times of need, sorrow, or just a desire to share. Christians see God answer in a multitude of ways—through other people, events that happen this way or that, the clarity and understanding that was not there before they prayed, or—like you were expecting me to say—by reading the Bible. 

Again: In the Christian understanding, the Bible is the story of God and humanity passed down by a variety of authors who were inspired by God. This means that every time I open the Bible I expect to encounter God. In fact, I should be surprised when I don't encounter him. Especially as Christians become more familiar with the Bible, we will more often than not know where in the Bible to turn. Not that we necessarily know exactly what we'll find there on the very day we read it, but we know what kind of writing to find where, what part of the story of God and his people to find where, where we can find comfort, where we can have the joy we're experiencing reflected, or where to reassure ourselves of our faith. From this, you might get an idea of how precious and deeply, deeply personal the Bible is for Christians in a way that no other work of any kind could possibly be.

The whole Bible as one long story also has a tremendous impact on how Christians read it. Everything is connected in the story, everything is intertwined—and that is exactly how we read the Bible. There is nothing that stands by itself; everything is somehow related to the whole, often in many ways. It might sound like a lot of work to find those connections, but a) there are many libraries’ worth of books written about it, and b) maybe more importantly, there is much joy in seeing this grand story unmask itself step-by-step and day-by-day in the ever-maturing life of the Christian Bible reader. 

Not only is there a tracing of all the many strands of the story to each other, but there are two strands that every part of the story is guaranteed to have: one that points to Jesus (remember: this is the story of God and humanity resolved through the person of Jesus) and one that points to the reader, to me. I've mentioned that as Christians we become a part of the story of the Bible, and it becomes our story, along with billions of other Christians, past, present, and future. Part of that involvement means that every bit of reading somehow relates to me as the reader. It will have an impact on my understanding of God and therefore myself as I'm reading this. 

Confusing? 

It sure looks like it when you just read about it without ever having experienced it. But here's a little proof. Virtually everyone reading this book will have people around them who are Christians, many for years or decades or their whole lives. Most of them regularly read their Bibles. There are books and chapters in the Bible that they may have read dozens of times (think about the dog-eared Bible exhibition I'm championing). Do you really think they would do that if they didn't benefit from it? Are they displaying other signs of mental impairment in the rest of their lives (aside from the regular amount we all exhibit)? No, they return to the Bible because they benefit from it, because they are continuously fascinated by how this story interconnects to itself, to Jesus, and to their own lives.