I watched a video blog from Matt Chandler today, and I must admit that I was frustrated. Chandler seemed to speak more to an in-house controversy among the Reformed movement. In many ways I appreciated his comments, but I was frustrated by his comment that he would go and preach good theology at places where bad theology was the norm. Furthermore, he would just preach the Bible, even though those around him might not. If you didn’t click on the link above you can watch it here. (In fairness I think it is best to watch how he says it, before you read my comments about it. It’s just good practice.)
Now please indulge me one more caveat before we begin:
1. I appreciate Matt Chandler’s teaching and I’ve learned much from it.
2. I appreciate Chandler’s devotion to Scripture.
3. I do not consider myself Reformed, and therefore when Chandler speaks of those with “bad theology” he is speaking to me.
4. I appreciate that Chandler appears to study hard and has confidence in his position, even if I might disagree with him.
5. When Chandler say he preaches the Bible while others do not, I think we have made an unhealthy jump. It is this issue that I would like to focus on.
I often hear that we should just teach the Bible. I hear it from the Bible College students I teach, from preachers, and here pretty passionately from Chandler. I don’t have an issue with that, I think preaching the Bible is the way to go. My problem is that when people say, “Preach the Bible,” what they are often really saying is let’s preach one particular interpretation of the Bible.
Chandler and I could preach from the same book, chapter, and verse. we could both study hard, pray fervently, and carefully craft a sermon to present God’s word to people. But what if our interpretations don’t agree? Did one of us preach the Bible and the other didn’t?
You know when talking about preaching or theological issues, there seems to be a standard operating procedure. The question is asked, “What is God saying here?” Well, Calvin said God said this, and I heard a sermon from Marc Driscoll that said it means this, and I read a book from John Piper that said it this way, so this must be what God meant. In short much of what is presented as “just preaching the Bible” is often more a representative of a particular tradition.
So where do we go from here? Is there another way? Here’s some thoughts:
1. Don’t just read and listen to your tradition, because you will limit the types of thoughts you are able to think.
2. Admit that your preaching of the Bible is a fallible interpretation of God’s inspired word. Perhaps this will give us a great sense of humility about our own preaching, and the tradition of others.
3. Recognize that at times your interpretation is heavily inflected by your own tradition. Make sure that you are not working to explain away Scriptures because they don’t agree with your theologically tradition, but instead be willing to consider that your tradition may be faulty at points.
4. Sometimes instead of instantly running to the commentary, try to work with the text yourself. Maybe even spend more time studying the context of the Scripture, and not what others have said about. It may open up new potential interpretations not possible in your own cultural context.
Finally let me say again that I appreciate Matt Chandler, his life, his testimony, and his teaching. It’s a small disagreement, but something that I think is worth thinking about.
