Peterson, as we know, has a wonderful gift for language and continuing to read through 'Eat this book' means coming across some wonderful quotes. As stated before, the author is anxious that as Christians we don't just read the Scriptures but live them. We need to listen to the Word and not just read it, remembering that it emerged in the beginning as spoken word before it was written.
Bible verses are not fortune cookies to be broken open at random. The Bible is not an astrological chart to be impersonally manipulated for amusement or profit. The Scriptures read and prayed are our primary and normative access to God as he reveals himself to us. Prayer is engagement with God. The Psalms are our primary text for prayer and Jesus is our primary teacher. We are called to live the Word - living what we read. We need to remember the context out of which the Word came and also remember that the Bible is full of metaphor. A metaphor does not explain or define - it draws us from being outsiders to being insiders, involved with all reality spoken into being by God's word. We need to enter into the world of the text.
Maybe during Lent next year we need to have a go at a 'Contextual Bible Study Group' where we explore a text in the setting not only of the context of the actual text but also in the context of our own lives in order to discover how we can live that word.
And on a completely different subject - what a result for Rangers last night in the Champions League. A much better result than their Glasgow rivals had :-)))
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