CHURCH AND EDUCATION -OR- THE LACK THEREOF

I went to Mesquite this past weekend so I could watch my little brother play some football. He's a quarterback for the Mesquite High School Skeeters. Friday night, he had a game winning drive with 2 minutes left on the clock, but then the other team came back with a 60 yard run on 4th and 1 to undo said game winning drive. It was a good game and I was really proud of my little bro. It was a good weekend because I got to spend some time with my family.

I also got a chance to talk with my sister. She is in her first semester in college, and she has a religion course (this is at a public community college). They're learning about the Exodus from Egypt, and the professor is talking about possible scientific explanations behind the ten plagues. For example, when the river turns to blood, it is really a red algae that turns the water red, and "Red Sea" is probably more accurately translated "Sea of Reeds." I was kind of surprised because this teaching is really tame compared to most secular arguments. Most secular places will tell you that the exodus never really happened because there is no archeaological evidence for it, that it is just oral traditions passed down over generations. So it's a good thing my sister wasn't just thrown to the wild beasts. Nonetheless, she was shaken up a bit, and I was glad to see that she was being stretched. She had never been exposed to this kind of thing, but it made sense to her, and I thought she was handling it really well.

But my mom, on the other hand, could have had a heart attack. "Well that just takes away from the miracles!" (said in strong Arkansas accent). She couldn't believe that someone was saying this kind of stuff about the Bible. I tried to explain that God can and does work through nature to bring about His purposes, but I don't know how much of what I was saying she believed. I didn't really want to get into the historicity of the Old Testament, and I didn't want to get into the genre of the literature. I could have gotten into the first few chapters of Genesis and how they are not literal to explain my point further, but I think that would have made her head explode. I think baby steps are the key here.

I wonder, though, if we as leaders in the church do a disservice to people when we don't expose them to this kind of thing. For instance, we don't teach that there were pagan cults before the time of Jesus whose gods were born of a virgin or raised from the dead. What happens when they go to college and learn this stuff from secular, and even religious, universities instead of in a community of faith. When I got to Baylor, I had to totally rework my theology because of the things I learned, but there are others who completely lose their faith. Dr. Bart Ehrman, who is a world renowned biblical scholar, is a classic example. Ehrman grew up in a very conservative church that taught a strict doctrine of inerrancy of scripture. When he discovered that this teaching was probably wrong, he totally abandoned his faith. He calls himself a 'happy agnostic,' now.

Especially in dealing with younger generations, I think it's important to teach them the hard things about scripture. Things that can challenge the faith. When they learn within the community, it can be very healthy, but when they're thrown to the dogs without any sort of prior knowledge, who knows what can happen? We set them up for failure when we don't educate them. Luckily for me and my sister, we already had a strong, yet flexible faith. My world was stretched, but not broken, when I learned that, historically, Jericho was destroyed well before the Israelites got there.

In dealing with people who will never really encounter and deal with these kinds of ideas, on the other hand, I'm not sure how vital it is to point these things out to them. Especially older generational types who have a very strong faith in the Bible - which is a GREAT thing.

The most important thing to remember in all of this, though, is that the Bible is true. It teaches the truth about God, and it teaches the truth about how God relates to people. Most importantly, it reveals the good news of Jesus Christ, which is the foundation of our faith.