Christianity and Culture- Part 1

This is for my dear friends Bill and Uni.

"So from its first years taking root in Palestine to its astonishing dispersion into nations around the world, Christian faith has always had to contend with well-developed and, usually, stable and satisfying cultural systems" Culture Making by Andy Crouch

Sorry for the long pause between blog posts. I wrote and rewrote this post before getting some insight from my husband and getting a better idea of what I wanted to say. Plus I was at a conference this weekend that was an information dump which made me want to dump on you. I'm still learning to write well. :)

I want to start this discussion of Christianity and Culture by talking about the Bible. At Blackhawk Church in Wisconsin, they have a regularly repeated saying that goes, "the Bible was not written to us but was written for us." What that means is that the Bible's original audience was not 21st century readers, but written for a mostly Jewish readership in a specific cultural context. However, it was written for us. The Bible is not a scientific document nor a specifically historical document, but a book written to reveal who God is. I have opened the Bible countless times and gotten a new insight or learned something about God and life as a Christian. The Bible describes itself as 'living and active" in Hebrews 4. However, in order to correctly interpret and apply the word of God, we have to read it through the eyes of the original audience and not through modern eyes. This is the first cultural construct of Christianity. Our Holy Book is written to mainly a Jewish audience, with some exceptions, but it written for Christians of all times.

Professor and author John Walton describes the Biblical account of the creation as "creating a home instead of building a house." What does that mean? He's talking about the creation story not in scientific terms of determining a specific viewpoint, but in literary terms of communicating the magnitude and awesomeness of God. The author of Genesis was speaking, again, to a Jewish audience and helping them, and in turn all of us, understand His goodness, creativity, and love for them by creating a home just for us. A place suitable. This communication of love continues throughout the Bible. If you have grown up in the church, you have often heard the Bible described as God's love letter. I would agree with that in terms of the Bible being the tool God used to reveal who He is to us.

So every time you pick up the Bible, remember that you are reading God's revelation, but also remember to read it through the perspective of the original audience. This may mean that you have to do some research into what Jewish culture is and was back in the time when the book was written. It may also mean you need to read up on your history and find out what was going on in the world around the text. It can be a really interesting study. Remember you are reading words inspired by God but written through and to people. There are many really good commentaries that will help you understand the cultural context of what you are reading. Biblestudytools.com is a good place to start and then move into ivpress.com is a good place to look for published resources. 

This is only the beginning of a conversation about Christianity and Culture. If you have questions, put them below. Please remember that this is a brief survey, and not intensive. I will try to answer them the best I can. Part 2 will probably be about the world of Jesus and the first century church.