The job of any proposition is to refer to what it is about. Suppose I cannot find my keys. I then try to remember when I saw them last. "Ah, I used them to get in the house last night. Oh! They are in the coat I wore last night." So, I go to the coat that I wore last night that is hanging in the downstairs closet. I reach into the pocket and my keys are there! My proposition" The keys are in my coat that I wore last night." took me to the coat and to the keys, when the keys are in my hand, the proposition has done its job, and I have the keys! When I read Scripture very often, and this is up to His Sovereign will, the propositions of Scripture take me to Him and allow me to communicate with Him, I feel His presence, as He takes me out into an open space beyond my conceptual framework, beyond any area of life that I can control, and I trust Him, I want Him to do that! I affirm my Love to Him and the propositions of Scripture have done one of their most important jobs, take me to God and personal knowledge of Him and Me in His presence, Psalm 36:9. There are many ways to read the Bible. I do exegesis and study it to get at what a passage means because I am a preacher and teacher of the Bible and because I am a poor soul that needs to know what the Bible is saying. But also, I will read the Bible at a different time of the day, and often several times during a day for the sole purpose of praying a promise back to God, or meditating on something from Scripture and also just to begin a conversation with God because I need to talk to Him and want to. Sometimes His presence comes powerfully and I just get still and become wordless in His presence. Other times He gives me what to say! Even before I was saved, I remember on a Friday in 1974, I started to read Romans chapter 1 and before I had read 20 verses, He came and had me be still. I was that way the whole week end with Him, even as I ate, and went to the bathroom etc. It was amazing, and I remember Sunday afternoon, being with Him and all of a sudden out of the blue, finding myself in tears before Him, saying "Yes, I will serve you the rest of my life."
I hope this unpacks this a bit. I have wanted to write something about How God uses Scripture as window, a two way window, where as we read it, He reads us, and while that is happening often we are taken beyond the words and the propositions of Scripture right into His presence. I hope I will be able to do so.
I hope this helps!
Jon
Stephen Shields wrote:
Jon,
You wrote:
“yes, understandings in propositions can be frozen and this happens when propositions are divorced from their origins in lived experience and become flowers cut off from their roots in the soil and put in a vase. Theyu survive for a while and then wither and die because thye are cut off from their nourishment their organic place. our theological propsitions are important but they must never be cut off from their source and the source ought to be Scripture read in such a way that God reads us as we read Scripture and as we read Scripture the words of Scripture, the propositions of Scripture become self-effacing and take us into the presence of God himself and what happens our understanding of those propositionsbecomes modified because we are at their source and they have done their job to take us there again and again. so, that we live open for modification, guidance, and direction from Him, always including ways we might have to disown previousfrozen understandings and let them go as He shows us we must!!!!!!”
jon, would you unpack “, the propositions of Scripture become self-effacing” a bit?I think I’m with you but not sure.
Stephen Shields
sshields@...
You can visit the faithmaps Yahoo groups web site to modify your
delivery settings and review former messages @http://groups.yahoo.com/group/faithmaps
Delivery Options: individual emails, 1 digest email a day, or no email (all emails can be read and responded to at the site above)
Want to unsubscribe? Just send a blank note to faithmaps-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Send Email