Advent and Waiting in the Mosaic Bible

Last week was the first week of Advent, and the focus in the Mosaic Bible is waiting. The theme of waiting is appropriate, but the way it was addressed brought up some questions and thoughts for me.

First, the Mosaic Bible's suggested Scripture readings and meditations did not just focus on the birth of Christ, like might be assumed. Rather, it included a smattering of perspectives of longing and waiting in a variety of contexts.

At first, I did not like this. I thought it would be most appropriate to focus on the reason for Advent--the birth of Jesus. Including other forms of waiting distracts from this focus. At the same time, as I kept reading through the week, I found I appreciated more and more the different perspectives of waiting and the way longing has appeared in many forms throughout the Bible.

I do like how the editors tried to focus the idea of waiting on excerpts that could be applicable to readers' current lives. Again, waiting on the Christ child (sorry, the event is past) is hard to relate to now. At least for me... And then there can be whole argument about Christ's Second Coming, but that gets into other theological debates. And that's still an abstract concept. It's not something I, at least, think about regularly.

At the same time, the various perspectives and contexts in this case made this week feel much more disconnected and disjointed than other weeks' meditations have been. Other weeks have been very well-organized and all excerpts clearly connected. This week had been bouncing between waiting for Christmas and waiting for everything else I long for in life. Maybe I haven't connected the two as much as I should, and that may be some of the point of this week, but in any case, that's some of my reaction.

The other big reaction I had was to the idea of waiting and longing itself. The introduction to this week's topic of Longing discussed how much of Christianity is centered around waiting for things to be better and restored later. I agree with that. The pain of the present and recognizing this is now how things were meant to be is important. Focusing on this for the season of Advent may be appropriate.

At the same time, I find myself longing and waiting most of the time. To the detriment of the present. While our culture may not advocate waiting, it also does not advocate for appreciating the present very well.

For me, my focus is always in the future: Everything I'm doing now is just so things will be better later. I'll work hard and sacrifice now so I can relax later. But later does not always come. And killing yourself now to enjoy later is not necessarily a good way to live. It can cause depression and anxiety, which are definitely not good ways to live. As Brother Lawrence described in The Practice of the Presence of God, it is particularly important to watch for and experience God now, in the moment, and not just expect him to show up later.

Practicing God's presence now and longing for restoration in the future are not necessarily mutually exclusive ideas. In many ways, they work nicely together. However, some of us probably spend more time in one of those areas than the other, and then should probably spend more of their devotional time in the opposite side to re-train themselves. For me, I think I need to spend more time seeing the blessings I have right now instead of just waiting for others to come later... What about you? What do you think?

Scientific Study of Religious Uncertainty

This is a very interesting study examining how uncertainty about one's faith can be intensified or lessened in the face of challenges.

It hits the core ideas of this blog and verifies some of my anecdotal experience and intuition that we need to create a solid, safe space for people to engage their doubts and questions. When the fundamental faith can be affirmed, then people are more willing to engage their doubts and thus grow. Now, that's me extrapolating a bit from the study, but it's interesting and nice to see some scientific work being done in the area.

What do you think?

Opening Day for It's a Wonderful Life

As many of you know, my wife and are directing (and acting in) the Grand Terrace Community Players' production of It's a Wonderful Life. Today is opening day! You can see more info at the GTCP website.

It's A Wonderful Life Poster

Another Definition of Religion

As I have argued before, we use really poor definitions of religion quite frequently, unfortunately often posing religion as quite different from and the enemy to authentic spirituality. This is a dichotomoy that should not exist, along the same lines as spirituality and psychology and religion and science.

In any case, this is an interesting article looking at the definition of religion in a way I haven't really considered it before. While I have advocated for broadening the definition of religion, this author argues broadening it in a different way. It echoes some observations about the more communal versus individualistic traditions.

Fundamental Attribution Error

I'm studying for the EPPP (Examination for the Practice of Professional Psychology--the national license exam). As I've been studying, I've been reminded of several concepts that are appropriate for this blog.

One such concept is the fundamental attribution error. This concept states that we often blame a person for problems instead of the environment, often saying the person is bad, sinful, etc.. I'm sure we can all think of examples, but here's a couple of examples I thought of:
The girl who got raped deserved it or was asking for it.
The homeless man is just lazy and evil.

There are clearly times when a person is responsible for their situation, but sometimes they're not. We have to remember that we live in fallen world, which is leads to a lot of problems for all of us that may not be due to any one individual's sin. We should remember this common error that most Americans usually make before we use guilt unfairly. And different cultures and traditions may also lead to greater or lesser use of this error.

Have you seen this error at work in your life?

Incarnational Interpretation

Here is the follow-up to last week's post from the BioLogos Foundation. It goes into much greater depth into an Incarnational view of Bible interpretation. I really resonate with it and think it's excellent. It really is an appropriate way of approaching the Bible.

And I think that's part of the reason I like the Mosaic Bible, which I reviewed yesterday. It emphasizes the Incarnational elements of Scripture and Christianity.

Mosaic Bible Review

I recently picked up the Mosaic Bible. There's a nice review here, too, which goes into the history of Bible versions really nicely!

I really like this Bible for a variety of reasons. First of all, it's beautiful. I love the Celtic cross cover (on the imitation leather version). From my Religious Studies background, I particularly love and appreciate illuminated manuscripts, and this Bible is basically a modern illuminated manuscript. I really like how it includes meditations and thoughts from around the world, around the centuries, and around the Christian traditions. It truly is a Mosaic.

This Bible has gotten back into reading the Bible. I've been following the church year, and breaking up the weekly meditations each day, reading part of the meditations and one of the Bible readings. I really like how the meditation sections and the Bible sections cross-reference each other. I can turn to the page in Scripture, and there is a note in the margin of which verses were the recommended ones for that week. It makes remembering the readings easier!

As the week's meditations are all on one theme, I'm trying to consider that theme throughout the week and view life through that lens. You can imagine the ways that can make one more aware of spiritual realities and connect more to God.

One note: If you get the imitation leather, don't let it get moist. Some light condensation from a water bottle (in another section of a bag!) was absorbed by the back cover. It took hours to dry and still is a bit warped... :(

But it's still my favorite Bible to date (and I have a ton!).