like a fire

I am amazed at myself after reading this post by Andrew Jones aka Tall Skinny Kiwi (ht: Marko). Not because of what he is saying. But because I remember a time when I needed to hear what he was saying and wouldn’t have been able to hear it.

Apparently, some people out there are making a strong case for ignoring the context of the gospel. I’m not even sure about how they got there, but I remember myself back in the early nineties. I was doing youth ministry and was convinced that teens just didn’t want all the cheesy, context that came along with the teachings of most youth ministries of the day. I remember thinking, “Man, why can’t they just sit down and have a conversation about Jesus without making someone eat chocolate pudding out of a diaper?”

What I realized later was that it wasn’t the absence of context that was the problem. It was the wrong context for that situation. Dressing a certain way, changing the content to match the context, or relying completely on context alone is the worst direction the church has taken (If you don’t understand what I mean by the last sentence, try listening to Joel Osteen). But that doesn’t mean that context isn’t necessary or beneficial.

It seems now that people are so tired of the consumeristic mindset of the realization of that thought, that they would throw out context altogether. While I do agree that we don’t want to rely more on the context than the content, I don’t think we can ignore it completely. I can’t think of a single scenario in the Bible that gains anything or doesn’t lose some depth by removing the context in which it happened. I also, having taught scripture to teens for years, know that sometimes they just don’t understand some of the Bible outside of it’s context relating to their context.

My Point: Most people are either incapable or unwilling to receive most everything apart from the context it is in.

Having said that, I think I would love to hear what most people think context actually is. I’m not sure there would be a lot of agreement. Maybe that is the issue more than the use of it.