"DOING" the Bible is Complicated

I teach a Sunday morning Bible study group in my church and have for many years. I attend a pretty traditional down town county seat First Baptist Church.  We have many community leaders and lots who are upper level professionals.  

Recently, a young woman who was living on the street started coming to our worship service.  After a few weeks, she came to my Sunday Bible study group.  Our class is very interactive and she began to speak up often and sometimes was a bit disruptive in being over talkative.  After attending solo two or three times, the next time she came she brought some others with her who were living on the street.

Our scripture focus that day was about care for the poor.  Talking about care for the poor when it is just a topic is one thing and talking about it when "the poor" are present is a whole other thing. I worked hard at being careful and considerate in what was said.  It was not just a philosophical discussion.  It was about real people with real people present.

A few Sundays later, she was back with with two or three other friends she had invited  Part of our scripture that day dealt with anger and how to handle it.  I said, "What happens when we let our anger control us?".  One of the men spoke up quickly and said, "You wind up in jail" .I had to work to suppress a chuckle.  I thought he sounded like he was speaking wisdom from experience.  

The lady who is the leader of the group spoke to me after we finished and said she wanted to share some things next week.  I am not sure quite what I said in response.  But, a friend on the church staff who has been working with her told me later  that she was planning to "teach next week".  I have been thinking exactly how to handle that.

Several years ago, our church had a brief discussion about whether to stay down town or move to a new location with the pluses of building a new building that would not have the issues of dealing with an "historic" church building.  Some said they wanted to stay down town because churches were needed down town.  That is easy to say.  The reality of it can be difficult.

It is easy to talk about what the Bible says about ministry to the poor, etc.  But, "doing" it is complicated. A minister friend of mine was "accosted" many years by a man with one of those fourteen pound Bibles and said, "My Bible is a red letter Bible.  Is yours?"  My friend responded truthfully, "I have a Green letter edition.  It has the ACTIONS of Jesus underlined in green."

I am good with the Red Letters.  It is the Green Letter stuff that gets real complicated!

Arliss Dickerson's book, Almost Everything About College Ministry, is available at Amazon.com/dp/B08CMD9CXX.