Beware: The Bible

Scott McRoberts was preaching at Hilton Church yesterday morning from Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. At Hilton, we are very keen to let a wide variety of people with preaching gifts share in our worship services. Scott is one of our youngest and newest preachers and it was great to pick up on his enthusiasm and energy. We are really blessed to have someone of Scott's calibre working for SU in the Highlands. I was struck afresh by the clarity and the uncompromising nature of Jesus' teaching. It made me think of the following quote by Soren Kierkegaard:
“The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. ‘My God,’ you will say, ‘if I do that my whole life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world?’ Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the church’s prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you? Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God. Yes, it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament.”
DM