Scripture – a privileged place of meeting: befriending the text

For the Word of God is a happening, not a thing.

Karl Barth

For the Word of God is a happening, not a thing. Therefore the Bible must become the Word of God, and it does this through the work of the Spirit.

Karl Barth

Image: Carlos Cazares, Anticipation

The Word of God in Scripture is a special sacrament of his presence, just as real, although different in form, as his presence in the Eucharist. The words of Scripture, if we read them in faith, are like a light falling on the darkness of our inner selves so that we can find and recognize that God – Father of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ – is also our God. I read and ponder God’s action in past ages in order to recognize that same action now in me.

Gerard Hughes

Alan Ecclestone also suggests we approach Scripture with

Selfless attention

Unwearying patience

Passionate commitment

Honesty of purpose

Hunger for truth

Charles Williams says that there must be “something of that intellectual willingness to be wrong in order that words may be heard”. As believers, we so easily read the Scriptures already knowing what is or what should be there, always having our minds made up. Think about how difficult, risky it is – even precarious – to really letting the Word be itself, letting the Word speak to you and to your need. Not to have an answer – but a question to live through. Befriending the text means befriending silence, in which we bump up against the Divine reality.

As we befriend the text of Scripture, living with it as a symbol – a symbol of a real presence and not an absent reality – we grow to appreciate who it points to. Building up a Christian memory, we learn Jesus by description (learning to trust his witnesses) only to wake up, under the befriending Spirit, to learn Jesus by acquaintance. We do not possess the truth: rather the truth possesses and grasps us.

We call him the dumb
God with an effrontery beyond
pardon. Whose silence so eloquent
as his? What word so explosive
as that one Palestinian
word with the endlessness of its fallout.

R.S.Thomas

Image: Carlos Cazares, The True Vine

The images in this post are from the Mexican artist Carlos Cazares. The image at the top of the post is titled The Truth and the Reality.

Through his art, Cázares seeks to expose his heart to the light of the Creator, and constantly seeks a way to impress the life of God on his canvases. Through his experimentation with pigments and mineral deposits, he has found that materials such as gold and silver offer a beautiful refraction of light that enriches his work. His abstract works reflect his appreciation of ancient techniques and his pursuit of applying them in a contemporary setting. Source: Carlos Cazares

And for a different interpretation of the presence of Jesus as friend here is an Icelandic Christian hymn Heyr himna smiður.

“Heyr Himna Smiður” is an Icelandic poem written in or just before 1208 AD. It was written by Kolbeinn Tumason who was a chieftain in one of the Icelandic family clans at the beginning of the most violent and turbulent time in Icelandic history. The poem is a prayer to God for strength, peace, and guidance in the face of the prospect of open inter-clan warfare. The words themselves are now over 800 years old, but music was not added to it until the 20th century.

Heyr, himna smiður,
Hvers skáldið biður.
Komi mjúk til mín
Miskunnin þín.
Því heit eg á þig,
þú hefur skaptan mig.
Eg er þrællinn þinn,
þú ert drottinn minn.

Guð, heit eg á þig,
Að þú græðir mig.
Minnst þú, mildingur, mín,
Mest þurfum þín.
Ryð þú, röðla gramur,
Ríklyndur og framur,
Hölds hverri sorg.

úr hjartaborg.

Gæt þú, mildingur, mín,
Mest þurfum þín,
Helzt hverja stund
á hölda grund.
Send þú, meyjar mögur,
Málsefnin fögur,
öll er hjálp af þér,
í hjarta mér.

Hear, smith of the heavens,
what the poet asks.
May softly come unto me
thy mercy.
So I call on thee,
for thou hast created me.
I am thy slave,
thou art my Lord.

God, I call on thee
to heal me.
Remember me, mild one,
Most we need thee.
Drive out, O king of suns,
generous and great,
human every sorrow
from the city of the heart.

Watch over me, mild one,
Most we need thee,
truly every moment
in the world of men.
send us, son of the virgin,
good causes,
all aid is from thee,
in my heart.

Literal translation

Hear, smith of heavens.
The poet seeketh.
In thy still small voice
Mayest thou show grace.
As I call on thee,
Thou my creator.
I am thy servant,
Thou art my true Lord.

God, I call on thee;
For thee to heal me.
Bid me, prince of peace,
Thou my supreme need.
Ever I need thee,
Generous and great,
O’er all human woe,
City of thy heart.

Guard me, my saviour.
Ever I need thee,
Through ev’ry moment
In this world so wide.
Virgin–born, send me
Noble motives now.
Aid cometh from thee,
To my deepest heart.