More new editions and special chat this Friday

A few weeks back, we announced that the Matthew group of the New Testament had been released for Amazon's Kindle for $.99. You can now download the John and Mark groups with the Luke group coming in the next few days.
Also, for those of you who haven't checked out the de-versify facebook group, now's the time. We'll be hosting a live chat on facebook this Friday at 4PM Mountain Time. If you haven't signed up for facebook, it takes just a couple minutes. Hope to see you there!

New Edition of TBoTB

For those of you who are early adopters of Amazon's Kindle Reader, we've released the Matthew section of the New Testament for $.99. Why $.99? We figured after dropping $400 on the reader, you could use a deal.

Accommodate my Bible: Guest blog by Chris Smith

So you've got a copy of The Books of The Bible, and it's already making a huge difference in the way you engage Scripture. You're reading bigger chunks, even whole books, at one time; you're getting new kinds of insights, and seeing connections you never saw before. You're actually ahead on your reading plan.

But there's one problem. You've become a books-of-the-Bible person, but it's still a chapter-and-verse world.

There's something you can do about that. Ask and expect to be accommodated as you bring The Books of The Bible along with you to all of your regular activities.

If you're in your small group and the leader directs everyone to a passage using just the chapter and verse reference, speak up and say, with a perfectly straight face, "I'm sorry, but my Bible doesn't have any chapters and verses. Could you describe what episode you're referring to, and where it comes in the book?" The explanation your leader provides in response will make the discussion more meaningful for everybody.

Take your pastor aside some week, show that your Bible doesn't have any chapters and verses, and ask that for your sake, the scripture lesson be identified by content ("the discussion of prayer in the Sermon on the Mount") as well as by reference. You can even invite your pastor to do an experiment one week, and not give anybody the chapter and verse reference for the scripture lesson. Instead, see if it isn't more meaningful to lead them to it through the book's structure: "Has everybody found Matthew? Good. Now Matthew begins with the genealogy of Jesus, then the story of his birth and early ministry. Flip through those, and you'll come to a collection of his foundational teachings. There Jesus first tells us what it means to be blessed; then he tells us how we can truly fulfill the law; and then he tells us in what spirit we should give and pray and fast. We're going to look this morning at what He says about prayer. Does everybody have the place?"

It might feel somewhat provocative, even subversive, to ask to be accommodated to this extent. But by gently persisting, you will be helping to introduce new habits of Scripture engagement that will benefit everyone. Individual requests like these drive broader change. The social flow has to redirect itself around those who are standing gracefully in its way. You'll be like the people who always asked "Is this a smoke-free facility?" before deciding to eat in a restaurant or stay in a hotel. Look how far their expectation of being accommodated has brought us.

Chris Smith is consulting editor on The Books of The Bible. His book detailing his work, The Beauty Behind the Mask is available on Amazon.com

Awakening '08

John and I are at Awaken '08 in Pasadena this week. We've been sampling TBoTB, Kingdom Come-Kingdom Go, The Book of Psalms, Amos, etc. We'll be in Denver next week, then Grand Rapids the week after. Knee surgery will be a welcome vacation come month end.

We've been meeting tons of great people from all around the country. Bob from California told me about an experience he had with an agnostic friend. The person had been given a very large study Bible. He told Bob he had been reading it and wanted to get together to talk about it. When they did, his friend kept pointing at different parts in the Bible saying, "I disagree with this. I disagree with this. I disagree with this."

The thing Bob noticed was that his friend wasn't pointing at Scripture. He was pointing at the notes.

I'm just sayin's all.

If you're going to be at either of these conferences, stop by our booth. If you're going to be a both, we'll definitely have something special for you.

Organic References

As I continue to have more experiences with my copy of The Books of The Bible in various Bible study and church settings, I’m finding that the passage referencing issue keeps coming up. It is so tempting—repeatedly tempting—to revert to at least a chapter reference when you want to point someone to a certain place in the Scriptures. This pattern is deeply imbedded in our Bible practice.

In the local assembly of Jesus-followers of which I’m a part, we’ve been reading and discussing the servant passages in Isaiah and exploring how the gospels use them in reference to Jesus. When I was teaching on Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ baptism, my first instinct was to simply rattle off the four references (42:1-9; 49:1-13; 50:4-11; and 52:13-53:12) and start pointing out the connections. It is so fast. Zoom. Zoom. You’re there.

But it’s actually so much richer to take a moment to see each of these in light of their setting in Isaiah. For example, I could have simply noted that when Jesus is baptized by John (in Matthew’s first main section, at the end of the part about the Baptizer, right before the temptation story), the words recorded from the heavenly voice seem to combine two key passages. “You are my son” from Psalm 2 refers to Israel’s king as the one who will rule the nations with a rod of iron. But the next part (“whom I love; with him I am well pleased”) seems to clearly pick up on language from the first servant song: “Here is my servant . . . my chosen one in whom I delight.”

OK, so the passage tells us that Israel’s promised king, God’s son, is also the servant that Isaiah proclaimed. Nice. In my notes that I handed out that day, I could have simply listed the four servant songs, we could have read them, and that would be that. But wait. Isolating Isaiah 42:1-9 and reading it alone doesn’t really cut it.

When I read “Isaiah 42” in The Books of The Bible, I can easily see that there is a lengthy oracle that precedes it. It focuses on God’s supremacy over the false gods of the nations. It’s a set-up for the presentation of the servant that follows. This chosen servant of God does not come to smash the nations with their idols, instead he is shown as the one who will bring them light. He will free them, and they can put their hope in him. The servant reveals God’s true intention, not just for Israel, but for the world.

Much more could be said. The c&v Bible is particularly bad with the last servant song: how many times have you heard people refer to “Isaiah 53,” ignoring the fact that the song begins in chapter 52? But the point is that the format can either help or hinder the likelihood that I will read in context. Yes, it’s possible (if difficult) to try and read past or over the often incorrectly placed chapter and verse breaks. But why should readers have to do that?

The Bible’s books have natural, intentional, literary breaks. Let’s start talking about them. And let’s start practicing referring to them in natural, contextual, literary ways.

-Glenn

Ursula’s Plea

The current issue of Harper’s Magazine (Feb 2008) features an article by Ursula Le Guin called “Staying Awake: Notes on the alleged decline of reading.” What we read here is right in line with what we explored earlier with C.S. Lewis’ comments about ‘receiving’ a book rather than ‘using’ it. Le Guin’s contention is that it’s no surprise not everyone is up to reading:

“In its silence, a book is a challenge: it can’t lull you with surging music or deafen you with screeching laugh tracks or fire gunshots in your living room; you have to listen to it in your head. A book won’t move your eyes for you the way images on a screen do. It won’t move your mind unless you give it your mind, or your heart unless you put your heart into it. It won’t do the work for you. To read a story well is to follow it, to act it, to feel it, to become it—everything short of writing it, in fact.”

Entering into a story on its own terms. Imagine. Giving a story your mind—more, your heart. A two-way set of expectations. Not just readers with their requirements, but stories looking for good readers. Readers who honor the covenant between author and audience. Le Guin continues, “Reading is not ‘interactive’ with a set of rules or options, as games are; reading is actual collaboration with the writer’s mind.”

This is as far away from our snippet-searching, give-me-a-verse-for-today typical Bible ‘use’ (one can’t really call it reading) as it could be.

Ursula Le Guin, advocate for mo’ betta reading.

-Glenn

Another reading alternative

Glenn mentioned last time that reading the Bible in TBoTB format might cause such unintended
side effects as enjoyment, understand and consuming vast quantities of Scripture in one sitting. Dr. Winn Griffin has stepped up to the plate with a 100 day Bible reading challenge. Looks pretty interesting. I signed up earlier today. Way to go Winn!