I was talking about theology to Sarrah earlier tonight. Well, sort of. We both realized that we are different kinds of leaders in a church setting. Sarrah is more of an administrative, organized person who really cares about individual people and issues. While I think those are very important, I naturally tend to gravitate toward the theology side of things, the Bible study and interconnecting of Scripture.
What I realized at the end of that conversation was that a lot of Christians have a very incorrect view of what theology really is. Most people tend to think theology is all that weird stuff with the big words like "ecclesiology," "eschatology" and "penal substitutionary atonement." And, while it can include those things, it's a lot simpler than people make it out to be. And by people, I mean those who delve really deeply into those things and know all those weird words as well as those who don't care to know what "soteriology" means. Heck, I don't even know what that means; I just pulled that word off of Wikipedia.
"Theo" means "god." "-logy" basically means "study of." The study of God. What does that come down to? Bible study. Going to church and listening to the pastor preach. Reading the Bible. All of that is what theology really is. It's the study of God.
"-logy" also descends from the Greek "-logue," which has to do with discourses. Communication, whether it is spoken or written. Something written about God...sound familiar? In other words, your Bible is a big book of theology.
In fact, all those weird words and terms that people use for whatever reason all boil down to the Bible. Theology, as most people understand it, gets muddied up by all these big words and terms. All they are are words that define specific fields of study in the Bible, like who the Church is and what its relationship is to Christ (ecclesiology) or the study of the person and work of Christ (Christology). There's no actual need for these words though. One could simply say he's studying the church as it's presented in the Bible. Or, and this is what I like to do, one could just read the Bible and see all these fancy-shmancy topics in the context God put them in.
I think I tend to fall into the trap of thinking theology involves all these complex words and topics. It really doesn't have to. It certainly can, and maybe for some people it's extremely important that it does. But reading about Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a colt and seeing in the same passage that it fulfilled a prophecy in Isaiah is as much theology as learning what penal substitutionary atonement actually means and finding out whether or not Jesus went to Heaven or Hell for the three days he was dead.
I like what you have to say but I disagree with you about
ReplyDelete"Or, and this is what I like to do, one could just read the Bible and see all these fancy-shmancy topics in the context God put them in."
I think that you have to think about the fact that theology is not just what comes from the Bible but it is also man's best attempt at understanding the nature of God about difficult questions that the Bible doesn't answer specifically or as clear as we have a desire for them to be....these questions could be "what happens to those who've never heard"..."where do babies go when they die"...and "what does it mean to have free will?"
Also, something I've been learning here at Bible college is never to do theology apart from the 2 centuries of Christian development and thoughts about some of these subjects such as eschatology or ecclesiology from very knowledgable theologians. We have a rich faith...we should enjoy others contributions and allow that with our knowledge of the Bible give us a better understanding of God.
Thank you Adam. I think that way too many people get caught up in the overly-intellectualized aspect of Theology and therefore steer clear of it as "lay-people". It's not that we shouldn't learn from those intellectuals that have done the deep studying, but we also must remember that Theology, or the study of God, is not something just for the intellectuals, or "professional Christians."
ReplyDeleteAs far as the above comment that we should "never do theology apart from 2 centuries of Christian development..." that borders on some aspects of the Catholic and/or Jehovah's Witness dogma that tells their people that they are not qualified to study the Bible, that they should leave that to the priests or elders." Here's my take, we have the example of two very prominent leaders of the first church who came from both backgrounds, lay person and highly trained religious person (intellectual). Paul was just an ordinary lay-person, whereas Paul was the highly trained religious person. Both contributed greatly showing that anyone has the ability to connect with God, through Christ, and have great understanding of His workings and desires.
And also, as God points out in the Bible, sometimes great wisdom is actually detrimental to the true understanding of God.
I think the most dangerous thing to do is to study the Bible for the wrong reasons. Some people are only interested in the Bible's wisdom so that they can lord it over others or make themselves look good; some people seek knowledge simply for the sake of knowing.
ReplyDeleteBut none of those attitudes have any place in true Bible study; the honest and true study is when one opens the Bible with a desire to know God and to get closer to Him.
If you don't study the Bible with that desire for God, then you'll end up with all this knowledge that, in the end, is useless. For what will really matter in the end: how much we knew ABOUT God, or how much we truly knew and loved our Father? And, of course, how much we loved our brothers and sisters. :-)
P.S. If this doesn't make sense, keep in mind that I was practically asleep at the time of writing.