Authentic Encounter

Sitting pretty close to the middle of your bible exists a chapter with one hundred and seventy-six verses, the longest chapter in scripture, the beautiful Psalm 119. While this chapter of scripture unpacks a variety of thought, there is a centrality to the mental process of this chapter. Psalm 119 hones its message into this over-arching mindset on how to cherish the greatness and glory of God’s Word.

As you read through this chapter, and I encourage you to do so, I can only imagine how the strands of your heart will be plucked by the words of God. Honestly, the depth of this chapter will seem challenging and even difficult with the depths of its understanding at times, but if you look closely, you can see the sum of this chapter beautifully woven into a few verses:

“Your testimonies are wonderful; therefore my soul keeps them. The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple. I open my mouth and pant, because I long for your commandments.” Psalm 119:129-131, ESV

Authenticity Meets the Longing of the Soul

What an amazing truth revealed here, that the “unfolding” of God’s Word is what gives light to our lives. Our souls long for it, the wonderfulness and authority of the Word masterfully binds itself, tying directly into the depths of the soul. So, if there is such power in the depth of God’s Word to speak to even the simplest of lives, why is the growing trend towards the Word of God to attempt to make it more palatable, to water it down, to attempt to simplify it in some ill-fated effort to make it “catchy” and/or “understandable”.

Now don’t get me wrong, we should never swing the proverbial pendulum to the other end, where we build some kind of ivory tower that makes God’s Word only attainable to the highly intellectual; So, then what should we do? The answer to that is simple, how about instead of “watering down”, we look to “break down” the Word of God for people.

In a book that was gifted to me and will always reside in my personal collection of favorites that rest in that special holder on my desk, is a book with the title “A Preacher and His Greek New Testament”. While I can almost hear the wheels spinning in your head, asking “why on earth is a book focused on the Greek language a top favorite? There is no way I am adding that to my must-read collection, pastor!”

I have to admit the reason it sits on my desk in permanent residence is not so much the content, while amazing, but because of this quote in the preface.

“Tennyson once expressed surprise at a preacher not being able to read the Bible in the original tongues. ‘What,’ said he, ‘you the priest of a religion and you cannot read your own sacred books!’ The Church does not expect all her ministers to be scholars, but she has the right to expect them to be scholarly. How tremendously important a thing it is that a preacher should be equipped to give a true exposition of a passage of Scripture!” - R. M. L. Waugh

Waugh offers up a challenging yet thought-provoking question, where did the scholarliness go? I catch myself asking why this daring presupposition in the first paragraph of the preface? While Waugh is focused on Greek literacy, it begs a real question, should pastors of churches be scholarly authentic?

Undoubtably, we live in an ever increasingly busy world, that seems to infiltrate every aspect of life, which, go figure, in church leadership this temptation does not just disappear. In fact, one of the leading trends of the “busy” modern age church seems to be more reliance on packaged sermons; done-for-you, all-in-one sermon packages that seem to produce unauthentic encounters with the text. (All it takes is a quick google search of that sermon series to see dozens if not hundreds of the same photo with sermons all generated from the same outline.)

The words in Psalm 119 that detail the unfolding of God’s Word now appear more vital than ever, especially when we see them in conjunction with passages like 2 Timothy 3 that describe a deeply inspired Word, and that there is a usefulness to all of Scripture. Followed by calls in 2 Timothy 4, 1 Timothy 5, and 1 Timothy 3 to be authentic in our encounters with the text. We are called to “preach the Word”, there is a laboring to preaching and teaching seen in 1 Timothy 5, and there is an unequivocal gift to see and truly appreciate what God said, not what someone else says God said. The truth of this all is simply revealed in the fact that preachers are called to authentically unfold the Word of God, and this takes authentic study of the Word.

See, preachers are not called to be amazing TED talk speakers. God is not calling for perfect public speaking or perfect stage presence. He is not calling for the following of a packaged outline where you add your own witty quips and clever phrasing to “draw a crowd”. God is not calling for relevancy to a specific issue or topic that may be fun or entertaining. Scripture is very clear that what God is calling for is a truthful, scholarly authentic engagement with the text. To passionately deliver the truth of the Word to the people we shepherd with a clear humbling of oneself before the Living God. To know that an authentic unfolding of His Word is light to the people and a depth of understanding in even the simplest of thoughtful minds.

My continued prayers that we constantly seek an authentic encounter with God’s Word.

Pastor Matt Hippely