i'm baaaack

ok, i know i said i was done with blogging. but at the request of my lovely wife, i have decided to get back into this madness and let you guys into my mind once again. you'll get a lot less random stories from me though, more food for thought than anything else. plus, you'll realize why i'm back after you read this post.

all of this began from an email that steve sent us about our society becoming "functionally illiterate". for all of you functionally illiterate people, that basically means that even though you can read, your lifestyle and choices do not reflect it. you don't read often and your reading skills are sub par to the extent that it effects how you relate and survive in society (shout out to all the people who still get 'there' and 'their' mixed up!).

in these statistics, the researcher gives some interesting statistics on reading in america. did you know that 42% of college grads don't read a book after college or that 58% of americans don't read at all after high school? did you know that most college grads don't use capital letters when writing blogs? just kidding, that's just me.

i think i would have assumed it was bad, but this is worse than i would have thought.

the whole point of steve sending us this article was to think about what effect, if any, this should have on ministry in america? how does the church take this information into account when deciding how we can best share the gospel of jesus christ with people?

let's think back for a minute to the 1st century world. most people were illiterate, not even functionally illiterate. they were read the ancient texts from the torah and other documents by those that were literate. they were told stories in the temple and in the market places. even jesus told parables and quoted the scriptures. think about when he fed the 5,000. you think they brought their leather bound torah's with them? shoot, they didn't even bring food! can you imagine jesus doing the equivalent to what some people consider today to be the only pure form of evangelism left? "let me show you in the bible...". LOL. bust out the scrolls, lay them out in the dirt and ask the poor shepherd that spends most of his life on a mountain to read a language that he was never taught? c'mon now. all he needed was what i like to call the 3 S's: sheep, salt and seeds.

i am not in any way speaking against reading the bible. i fully acknowledge that these are the very words of god given to us to guide and teach us. we should read the bible. it is rich with wisdom and truth. if you can read, then please pick it up.

however, does that invalidate or lessen the impact of a group discussion about god, a sermon in church where the text is either read or displayed on the wall, or even a short youtube video for that matter? or what about a blog??? can we really rule out the impact of storytelling when the very foundation of the church, the patriarchs of our faith and the first generation of our forefathers in christ were largely illiterate? the fact that i am a christian today is a testament to a person of faith thousands of years ago that believed the unbelieveable based on stories alone!

the lost art of story telling needs to be revisited. we should mix any and all forms of communication of the gospel to let people know about how he has changed all eternity and conquered sin for us.

do you guys remember the scene from the movie 'amistad' where the slave who had been given a bible tells another slave the story of jesus through the illustrations in the bible? i remember watching that for the first time, my eyes filled with tears at the simplicity of the gospel. i remember thinking about how arrogant i was in thinking that i have all the right apologetic information when all i really need is the story of a creator that loves us.

or how about that scene in 'the passion of the christ' where jesus tells mary that he is making all things new? i have tears in my eyes right now even remembering that. how amazing it was to visualize it. i've read that statement in the book of revelation many times. but to see it...to contemplate how driven jesus was to the cross for that very purpose...wow.

we have equally oversimplified and overcomplicated the gospel over the years. somewhere in there lies a balance.

so for all of you literat-os, talk greek and extra-biblical evidence till you're blue in the face. read those commentaries cover to cover. dope. but for the functionally illiterate of the world, drop by my pad tonight. i've got a great story for you. :)