Seriously? Seriously.

Today's question is: What are some of the barriers that keep you from taking the Bible more seriously than you do?

Oof. That's a rough one.

I get hung up with the texts of terror in the Bible -- the ones where God does something violent, or instructs someone to do something horrific in God's name.

What do you do with that?

How do you preach that?

Seriously?

For someone who believes in a loving, caring, compassionate god, i have a hard time taking these references to a vengeful, violent God seriously.

My gut reaction is to ignore those passages. But ignoring them does no one any good. To take those passages seriously, I need to dive into them. I need to unlock them.

One way to do that might be to ask this question: why might the people have thought God would want them to act violently? Recently in an email devotional from our United Church of Christ, Ron Buford remarked, "...the ancient Israelites living among people who honored their gods in these ways may have begun thinking that their God deserved similar devotion, zealously attributing such words to God."

Ron's response helped me so much, and I hope it helps you too.