I've started planning to start a Bible study in the next few months and I find that my opinions on Open Source are leading me down certain paths on choosing how to develop this study. The study I wish to lead has been jokingly called by my wife and I, POD People. Named after the movie of one of my favorite MST3K episodes—Pursuit of Doctrine. The subtitle we jokingly came up with was "We are STUPOD," i.e., We are Speaking Truth Under Pain Of Death. Yes, Terri and I are that weird.
Anyway, as another friend has eloquently put it, it's a "Bible Study to help the mid-range Christian understand the Bible." The way see it, our church has excellent resources for the unbelieve and for the new believer. It has excellent resources for helping someone looking for a church decide whether ours is right for them. Our church also has excellent resources for those who want to train for full-time ministry. Our church has helped to start a house seminary. Yet, for those who haven't been called to full-time ministry, but want to grow in a deeper relationship with Christ, there aren't many options.
The closest ministry to fitting this niche is our small group ministry. LIFE Groups are nifty, but the focus of these groups is connecting with other believers. Discipleship and Biblical understanding aren't the focus. The focus is on relationships, accountability, and study of the word. Study comes on many levels and the study of the Bible, at least in our group, isn't as serious as Terri and I are yearning for.
This has been a struggle for us for at least a couple years (probably longer). Recently, we feel this lack has become critical and have decided to do something about it.
So, as is often the case, I'm going to create a study that will meet our needs and open it to others on the assumption that someone else will likely feel the same yearning we do. We want to know God as he has revealed himself in Scripture. To do this, we need to first know how to study Scripture and then to apply that knowledge to a specific Scripture.
Considering this over the last week, I believe I want to use a book by Bernard Ramm, Protestant Biblical Interpretation, which is a textbook focusing on the standard of the Protestant Reformation. Basically, the Bible should be read by trying to understand the spirit in which the author original meant what was said. Seems obvious enough, but since Christ's resurrection, innumerable hermeneutical (i.e., interpretive) prinicples have been developed, which tend to push asided= the original spirit with other methodologies.
Then, I think I would like to study the book of 2 Timothy, which has a lot to say about how important Scripture is to the Christian life.
Okay, so back to my original statement, "I find that my opinions on Open Source are leading me down certain paths on choosing how to develop this study." In my view, the Protestant Christian movement is the ultimate Open Source example. In The Cathedral and the Bazaar, Eric Raymond discusses the advantages and disadvantages of two software development paradigms.
The "Cathedral" has a top down view, where requirements, design, and implementation decisions are controlled in a top-down approach. Each project's goals are ultimately set by the CEO of the company and pushed downward through management to project leadership and then down to the individual developers. In this way, the CEO acts as the infallable human representative of the corporation's ideals. Everyone else exists to make sure that the CEO's ideals are given form in reality.
The "Bazaar" has a chaotic view of many of the aspects. A small group may have control over parts of the goals of a project. However, everyone else in the world who might have an interest in the project gets to put in their two cents through a form of "massive peer review." By trading away some of the control, the project progresses through a large peer-to-peer development network.
This is somewhat similar to the way in which I see the Reformation. In essence, the Catholic church had managed to bottole up the Source (the Bible), through the use of an esoteric language, Latin, and by the fact that the Biblical text was extremely difficult and expensive to duplicate. With the invention of the printing press and with the Northern Renassiance in Europe a new interest in the study of the Bible arose. Not only this, but an interest in the study of the Bible in original languages.
Luther and Calvin and the other reformers soon discovered that the Catholic presentation of the Source was flawed. That they'd started using their power to hide the Source as a method for generating cash. Luther's strongest objection was to the sale of indulgences which generated large amounts of cash for the Catholic Church in exchange for a supposed reprieve from time in purgatory, a place which doesn't even exist as far as the Source is concerned.
So, the reformers stole the Source and "ported" it to new languages and used the printing press to assue it's speedy and widespread distribution. As of the last I heard, the Bible remains, to this day, the single most widely reproduced text in the world. In this way, it gave every person the ability to review the Source and determine it's meaning for themselves. This affords every Christian the ability to review Scripture and to hold fellow Christians in check.
Of course, the analogy falls apart after this. Altering the Source (except to translate into new languages) is heresy according to most Protestant sects. However, I think the main idea of massive peer review is of high value. Therefore, my own Bible study seeks to infer this capability onto the mature Christian. Those who want to learn to read Scripture and use that ability to interpet the Bible will be able to look at their own life and better realize their faults. They will be able to watch for errors subtle and decisive spoken within their circles of friends. They will be able to review the teaching from their pulpits and decide whether any given statement is true or not according to their own knowledge.
This will be the goal: A mature Christian, whether trained in Bible school or Seminary or not, should be able to read and understand the Bible in a vacuum if they must. That's what I feel that Terri and I need and that's the niche I am hoping my Bible study will fill.
