THE HOLY BIBLE IS PERSONAL

My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Risen Lord, God, and Savior,

CHRIST IS RISEN! TRULY HE IS RISEN!

THE HOLY BIBLE IS PERSONAL

According to Saint Mark the Monk ("Mark the Ascetic", 5th/6th century), "HE WHO IS HUMBLE IN HIS THOUGHTS AND ENGAGED IN SPIRITUAL WORK, WHEN HE READS THE HOLY SCRIPTURE, WILL APPLY EVERYTHING TO HIMSELF AND NOT TO HIS NEIGHBOR." We are to look throughout Holy Scripture FOR A PERSONAL APPLICATION. Our question is not simply "What does it mean/" but "What does it mean FOR ME?" As Saint Tikhon insists, "Christ Himself IS SPEAKING TO YOU." Holy Scripture is a direct intimate dialogue between the Savior and MYSELF–Christ ADDRESSING ME AND MY HEART RESPONDING. That is the criterion in our Holy Bible reading.

I am to see ALL the narratives in Holy Scripture AS PART OF MY OWN PERSONAL STORY. The description of Adam’s fall is equally an account OF SOMETHING IN MY OWN EXPERIENCE. Who is Adam? His name means simply "man," "human": IT IS I WHO AM ADAM. IT IS TO ME THAT GOD SAYS, "WHERE ARE YOU?" (Genesis 3:9). We often ask, "Where is God?" But the real question is the one that God puts to the Adam IN EACH ONE OF US: "WHERE ARE YOU?"

Who is Cain, the murderer of his brother? It is I. God’s challenge, "Where is Abel your brother?" (Genesis 4:9), is addressed to the Cain in each of us. The way to God lies through agape for other people, and there is no other away. Disowning my sister or brother, I replace the image of God with the mark of Cain, and deny my essential humanity.

The same PERSONAL APPLICATION is evident in the Lenten services in the Orthodox Church, and above all in the Great Canon of Saint Andrew of Crete. "I AM THE MAN WHO FELL AMONG THIEVES," we say (Luke 10:30); "I was Your youngest son, and wasted the wealth that You gave me… and now I am starved and hungry" (Luke 15:11-14). "Who are the sheep, and who are the goats?" the Desert Fathers of Egypt used to ask (Matthew 25:31-46). "The seep are known to God," they replied. "As for the goats–that MEANS ME."

There are three steps to be taken when reading Holy Scripture. First, we reflect that what we have in Holy Scripture is SACRED HISTORY: the history of the world from the Creation, the history of God’s chosen people, the history of God Himself incarnate in Palestine, the history of the "wonderful works" (Acts 2:11) after Pentecost. We are never to forget that what we find in the Holy Bible is NOT AN IDEOLOGY, NOT A PHILOSOPHICAL THEORY, BUT A HISTORICAL FAITH.

Next, we observe the PARTICULARITY, THE SPECIFICITY, of this Sacred History. In the Holy Bible WE FIND GOD INTERVENING AT SPECIFIC TIMES AND IN PARTICULAR PLACES, ENTERING INTO DIALOGUE WITH INDIVIDUAL HUMANS. We see before us the DISTINCTIVE CALLS ISSUED BY GOD TO EACH DIFFERENT PERSON, to Abraham, Moses, and David, to Rebekah and Ruth, to Isaiah and the Holy Prophets. We see God becoming incarnate once only, in a particular corner of the earth, at a particular moment and from a particular Mother. This particularity we are to regard not as a scandal BUT A BLESSING. DIVINE AGAPE IS UNIVERSAL IN ITS SCOPE, BUT ALWAYS PERSONAL TO ITS EXPRESSION.

This sense of the specificity in the Holy Bible IS A VITAL ELEMENT IN THE ORTHODOX "SCRIPTURAL MIND." If we truly love the Holy Bible, we will love genealogies and details of dating and geography. One of the best ways to enliven the study of Sacred Scripture isn to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Walk where our Lord Christ walked. Go down near the Dead Sea, climb the mountain of the Temptation, scan the desolation, feel how Christ must have felt during His 40 days alone in the wilderness. Drink from the well where Jesus spoke with the Samaritan woman. Take a boat out on the Sea of Galilee, have the sailors stop the engine, and gaze in silence across the water. Go at night to the Garden of Gethsemane, sit in the dark under the ancient olive trees, and look across the valley of the lights of the city. Taste to the utmost the characteristic "isness" of the historical setting, and take that experience back to the daily Scripture reading.

When we are to take a third step. After RELIEVING BIBLE HISTORY in all its particularity, we are to apply it DIRECTLY TO OURSELVES. We are to say to ourselves, "These are NOT just distant places, events in the remote past. They belong TO MY OWN ENCOUNTER WITH THE LORD. THE STORIES INCLUDE ME."

Betrayal, for instance, is part of the personal story of everyone. Have we not all betrayed others at some time in our life, and have we not all known what it is to be betrayed? And does not the memory of these moments leave deep, continuing scars on our psyche? Reading, then, the account of Saint Peter’s betrayal of Jesus and of his restoration after the Resurrection, we can see ourselves as each an actor in the story. Imagining what both Saint Peter and Christ experienced at the moment immediately after the betrayal, we make their feelings our own.

Take, as another example, the "woman who was a sinner," who emptied the flask of ointment over Christ’s feet (Luke 7:36-50), and whom some identify with Saint Mary Magdalene, although that is not the usual Orthodox interpretation. Can I see her mirrored in myself? Do I share in her generosity, in her for she loved much." Or am I calculating, mean, timid, holding myself back, never willing to commit myself fully to anything, either good or bad? As the Desert Fathers say, "BETTER SOMEONE WHO HAS SINNED, IF HE KNOWS HE HAS SINNED AND REPENTS, THAN A PERSON WHO HAS NOT SINNED AND THINKS OF HIMSELF AS RIGHTEOUS."

A personal approach of this kind means that in reading the Holy Bible we are not simply detached and objective observers, ABSORBING INFORMATION, TAKING NOTE OF FACTS. The Holy Bible IS NOT MERELY A WORK OF LITERATURE OR A COLLECTION OF HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS, although certainly it can be approached on that level. It is much more fundamentally, A SACRED BOOK, ADDRESSED TO BELIEVERS, TO BE READ WITH FAITH AND AGAPE. We shall NOT profit from reading the Sacred Gospels unless WE ARE IN LOVE WITH CHRIST. "HEART SPEAKS TO HEART." I enter into the LIVING TRUTH OF SACRED SCRIPTURE ONLY WHEN MY HEART RESPONDS WITH LOVE TO THE HEART OF GOD. Reading Sacred Scripture in this way–IN OBEDIENCE, AS A MEMBER OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH, FINDING CHRIST EVERYWHERE, AND SEEING EVERYTHING AS PART OF MY OWN PERSONAL STORY–WE SHALL SENSE SOMETHING OF THE POWER AND HEALING TO BE FOUND IN THE HOLY BIBLE. Yet always in our biblical voyage of exploration we are only at the very beginning. We are like someone launching out in a tiny boat across a limitless ocean. But, however, great the journey, we can embark on it today, at this very hour, in this very ;moment.

At the highpoint of his spiritual crisis, wrestling with himself alone in the garden, the blessed Augustine heard a child’s voice crying out, "Take up and read, take up and read." He took up his Bible and read, and what he read altered his entire life. Let us do the same: "TAKE UP AND READ." "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path" (Psalm 118 [119]:105]. (Resources: The Orthodox Study Bible)

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"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
– Saint John Chrysostomos
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With sincere agape in His Glorious and Saving Resurrection,
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+ Father George