IS THE BIBLE STILL RELEVANT TODAY?
by jeremy L.
The argument almost makes sense on the surface. After all, everything changes, doesn't it? Societal values shift across distance and time. What was acceptable dress in 14th-century Japan would likely be frowned upon in a 21st-century American business meeting. So it only makes sense that right and wrong, like all things societal, would change as a culture does.
But truth is not a suit. It is not an outfit to be mixed and matched, discarded and replaced to keep in step with the latest trends. It's an unchanging constant unaltered by time or culture.
Imagine a man about to walk off a cliff. A panicked crowd of friends behind him screams warnings, begging him not to do it. The man pauses in mid stride and turns around. "Don't worry!" he tells them. "I don't believe in gravity. It's an archaic idea that just doesn't fit into my personal worldview." With that, he takes his final step over the edge.
Do you think gravity will be paying particular attention to the man's worldview?
Your thoughts and feelings on the physical forces in nature are pretty irrelevant. Gravity will continue to hold the matter of the universe together, regardless of your opinion on its necessity. You might disagree with the laws of inertia, but a falling object can still give you a nasty bruise if it hits you. You can't systematically wish away aspects of the universe just because you don't agree with them.
They're still there, and, whether or not you believe in them, they're still going to interact with you—like gravity pulling a man down a cliff. If the physical laws of this existence are unchanging, why would the spiritual laws be any different?
Christians do find that relevant! For us, life is not simply an empty journey, a trip to acquire more toys until eventually it's all over. From the pages of the Bible we read about our role in God's design and kingdom, and how our lives are touched with purpose and meaning. And at the end there is more than a gloomy extinction at the conclusion of a hectic life, but a great reunion where I plan to meet Jesus face to face.
Along the miles of concrete I traverse every day, I have a guide, a beacon. It's not in the form of a dead book, but it's a living guide for the journey. By the way, Voltaire is dead now, but the book he derided is today more widely read and pondered than ever. The house in which Voltaire lived later became a distribution center - for Bibles.
You can follow the Bible's words and reap the benefits, or you can ignore them and let the things you refuse to see break you to pieces. Either way, you'll find the answer.