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Re-enchanting the Text: Discovering the Bible as Sacred, Dangerous, and Mysterious
My book, “Re-enchanting the Text: Discovering the Bible as Sacred, Dangerous, and Mysterious” is on its way to warehouses for distribution. As it is in transit, I want to give you a fair warning. This book will stretch you. I talk about Scripture as sacred ethos, sacramental space, and a portal into the Divine Life. I see Scripture as having the dangerous power of abjection – the possibility of negation-deconstruction, & resurrection.
Far too many Western Christians- Conservatives and Progressives-are stuck in the world of Newtonian physics, and their Bible is pretty much a flat two-dimensional object. The former group views the Bible as an inspired, perfect historical document. The latter sees it as a record of humans attempting to understand the Divine. Both groups understand the Bible as an artifact-an object to be studied, analyzed, and in too many cases, used. Both groups retain the power of the human subject.
I attempt to move the Bible into another metaphysical reality- one in which the Bible exists as a key player in a sacred cosmology. I also try to note how this vision of the Bible is also attuned to newer forms of quantum physics in which time and space are permeable and relative. The metaphysics of the Feast of Pentecost.
I’m only 40 pages into Cheryl Bridges Johns ‘ new book, and it’s already captured every bit of my heart. You know it’s a good book when every five minutes you want to read some sentence or paragraph out loud to your spouse.
I hope to write a full review, but it begins exactly where it should, taking apart the project of modernity from both the left and the right. It covers the disastrous separation of the noumenal from the phenomenal. It reminds all of us that biblical illiteracy is a disease of huge proportion, but it doesn’t stop at the illness without providing a prescription that will work: the Text is true because it points to a Living God before whom all of us should stand in awe. He is a God that has not left us propositional documents, but a narrative of imagination. There is mystery and enchantment in a world soaked in miracles. It’s not simply text to prove a point or to be studied as historical artifact. It is the invitation from God to jump into an adventure.
Johns’ work immediately reminds one of the power that our world has lost because it stopped believing that the universe is more than we can ever know, and as C.S. Lewis said, “sometimes fairy stories say best what needs to be said.” In the spirit of Lewis, Tolkien, and Chesterton, Johns calls Christians to start reading the Bible with a child’s heart to look for a world where magic and miracle are synonyms, and God literally inhabits the pages.
I’m reading “Re-Enchanting the Text” by Cheryl Bridges Johns. This paragraph on “Pentecostal light” churches speaks a hard but much-needed truth. Lord, help us please.
Anonymous
CAN ONE LOSE THEIR SALVATION.??
13 Bible Verses about Guarding Yourself..
1 Peter 5:8
Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
1 John 5:21
Little children, guard yourselves from idols.
Proverbs 4:23
Watch over your heart with all diligence,
For from it flow the springs of life.
1 Timothy 4:16
Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things, for as you do this you will ensure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you.
Psalm 39:1
For the choir director, for Jeduthun. A Psalm of David.
I said, “I will guard my ways
That I may not sin with my tongue;
I will guard my mouth as with a muzzle
While the wicked are in my presence.”
2 John 1:8
Watch yourselves, that you do not lose what we have accomplished, but that you may receive a full reward.
Ephesians 6:11
Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil.
1 Corinthians 16:13
Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.
2 Timothy 4:15
Be on guard against him yourself, for he vigorously opposed our teaching.
Deuteronomy 4:9
“Only give heed to yourself and keep your soul diligently, so that you do not forget the things which your eyes have seen and they do not depart from your heart all the days of your life; but make them known to your sons and your grandsons.
Ecclesiastes 5:1
Guard your steps as you go to the house of God and draw near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools; for they do not know they are doing evil.
1 Timothy 6:20
O Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to you, avoiding worldly and empty chatter and the opposing arguments of what is falsely called “knowledge”—
James 4:7
Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.