Monday of the First Week in Ordinary Time
These opening lines in Hebrews are some of the most interesting to me, "In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; in these last days, he spoke to us through the Son." This line is expressing, in Scripture, a reality that the Word of God properly understood should not be limited to Scripture. For some, this is a no-brainer but for others, this could be a challenging idea.
In our culture, we commonly use the phrase 'the Word of God' synonymously with The Bible. There is truth to that. Scripture does contain the words of God expressed in the words of human language. But it is also exactly what Hebrews expresses. The Scripture is various and as an utterance is limited. However, in Jesus Christ, the fullness of God's utterance was expressed. All of Scripture is at the service of helping us understand, unpack, and implement the incarnation of the Word of God and what that means for our lives.
This is why some will express that Christianity is not a religion of 'the Book.' This does not mean that the Bible is inconsequential, or that we do not reverence the Scriptures highly. Rather, we believe the fullness of God's revelation is not the collection of Scripture, but the incarnation of Jesus Christ. We are a religion of a person, and that person is the Word of God.
As we consider this, imagine the scenes of Peter, Andrew, James, and John being called. They had the Scripture that had been written at that point, but they were still living the lives they always had and always planned to. Then they encountered a person that gave their life a new horizon. They encounter the person of Jesus Christ and their world was flipped upside down.
Think later of the early evangelists. They taught and professed Jesus Christ and him crucified. They used Scripture, but they were more concerned with introducing people to the Word of God who lives though crucified than they were on convincing others to read the Bible.
Once again, none of this is to denigrate the Scriptures. I'm currently going through a Bible in a Year plan. We should love the written Word, but it should always be at the service of our discipleship of Jesus Christ as Catholic Christians. Knowing Scripture better is not the end in and of itself. Knowing the Scriptures to better see Jesus properly so that we may follow more closely is the proper end.
To illustrate this, I return to something I have brought up before, the Youtube series of the Chosen. As a narrative about those called by Jesus, it does many things well. One of the things it does best is that it captures the compelling, captivating sense of this man who can walk down a shoreline and turn people's worlds upside down. May we turn to Scripture to parse through the various ways God has spoken to help us clearly encounter God's fullest utterance... Jesus Christ.
- Spencer Hargadon