The Essentric Old Testament

As 2006 is the Year of the Bible for the Wesleyan Church, I have challenged my congregation to read it through -- from Genesis to Revelation!

Many have risen to the challenge, and it's exciting to hear the buzz. I seriously doubt that more than 2% have read it entirely through before.

Some are jogging right along with me. Others are huffing and puffing about three hills behind. I keep calling back to them -- keep moving! Don't sit down! The view is spectacular for the next hill!

I'm preaching from the previous week's readings -- which creates a whole batch of homiletic challenges. Last Sunday, for instance, I attempted to cover Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Tithing all in one sermon (January has always been our Stewardship Month! Abraham was a tither! -- and you ought to be one too!)

Usually, when people shake my hand after church, they say, "Good sermon, Pastor", much like they would compliment the waitress after eating pie at Norske Nook.

Last Sunday, it was more like, "Nice try!" In all my preaching life, I've never covered so many chapters in twenty minutes. Still, they're tracking with me!

Between services, for the last two weeks, people have been flocking to me with questions from their reading. The basic Bible Stories of Sunday School leave out a lot of stuff -- sort of a sanitized approach -- so, though church people think they know the Bible stories -- they are caught off guard by the unmentioned passages that lurk in the shadows.

There's no flannelgraph lesson, for instance, about Tamar -- or Lot's daughters for that matter.

So -- people are coming to me with their Old Testament questions:

1. Where did Cain get his wife?
2. Were those six literal days or were they periods of time?
3. What's this polygamy business?
4. What's with the Sons of God and the Daughters of Men?
5. How did Noah get all those animals in the boat?

And I thought -- the Old Testament is like my essentric Aunt Susie, God rest her soul. We loved her a lot, but she didn't always make sense.