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Week 2 Genesis to Jesus – The Catholic Way of Understanding the Bible

Part 1

“Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” St. Jerome

Here we see St. Jerome translating the Old Covenant (Testament) into Latin. The skull was to remind Jerome of his own mortality. Something that might help us remember even in our modern times.

As Catholics, we see the Bible as fully divine and fully human, much the same as we understand who Jesus is, fully divine and fully human. Jesus is God incarnate, the Word wrapped in flesh, fully divine and fully human, the God-man who came to earth to fulfill Sacred Scripture. But, as Catholics, we would not see ourselves as a religion of the “book”, as the Muslims describe themselves, as well as those

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of the Jewish faith. First and foremost, we see Jesus as the Living Word, He is the focus of our worship and our praise, and Sacred Scripture as divinely inspired through human authors. Jesus, the living word, teaches us through the Bible, and the Bible leads us to an intimate relationship with Jesus, the living word.

CCC 107 The inspired books teach the truth. “Since therefore all that the inspired authors or sacred writers affirm should be regarded as affirmed by the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of Scripture firmly, faithfully, and without error teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the Sacred Scriptures.” (702)

CCC 108 Still, the Christian faith is not a “religion of the book.” Christianity is the religion of the “Word” of God, a word which is “not a written and mute word, but the Word which is incarnate and living.” If the Scriptures are not to remain a dead letter, Christ, the eternal Word of the living God, must, through the Holy Spirit, “open [our] minds to understand the Scriptures.”74

Catholic Church. (1997). Catechism of the Catholic Church (2nd Ed., p. 31). Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana.

This is so important as Catholics to embrace this understanding, Jesus is the Living Word, and He gave us the inspired Word, the Bible written through human authors, and the Holy Spirit came to lead us into all truth. The Church is graced with the authority and revelation through the Holy Spirit to teach us the Sacred Scripture without error. But, this grace of the Holy Spirit comes to us not only corporately to teach us, but individually as well. As you and I read the Sacred Scripture, the Holy Spirit is present to us to lead us and guide us into all truth. He brings us understanding as we read and meditate on passages from the Bible.

What prevents us from going off in the ditch and starting yet another denomination and heretical teaching of the Bible? The Holy Spirit, through the teaching of Church, as she teaches through her priests, catechists, and the Bishops who have primary responsibility to teach the Bible accurately and effectively in all their dioceses. That is why I fell in love with the CCC. No Protestant denomination has such detailed teaching of their faith, or their understanding of Sacred Scripture.

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It is truly a safety net keeping us from our own private interpretations. But it is important that we don’t just rely on the Church corporately to receive revelation of the truth in Sacred Scripture, we also need it personally, so we can live out this Christian life. We need to read it, and read it, and read it some more, and then let the Holy Spirit lead us and guide us into all truth. Scott describes it as the informative, performative, and transformative power of the Sacred Scripture. As we read the Bible and become informed, the Holy Spirit becomes immediately involved with us to perform the living word in us, and that interaction with the Holy Spirit as we study the Bible, transforms us into being more like Christ so we can participate in His divine life.

The written liturgy of the Eucharist proves this to be true. As the priest speaks the words of the consecration of the bread and the wine, the whole congregation is informed of what is about to take place, that’s the informative part. But those same words perform what the words are saying, performing the act of turning the bread and wine into the actual Body and Blood of Jesus…that is the performative power of those living words. And finally, through our partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist, we are transformed into becoming more like Christ, participating in His divine life. Informative, performative, and transformative, that is the power of the liturgy we experience in every Mass.

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Men write words to convey an understanding or the meaning of whatever they are writing about. Man’s words are physical signs pointing to the truth they are trying to communicate (example of writing about a covered wagon). But God does things on a much bigger scale, He speaks creation into existence with His all-powerful words, and the creation He speaks becomes a sign pointing to His existence and a way for all of us to come to know God by the things He has made.

Romans 1:18–24 (RSV2CE) 18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of men who by their wickedness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse; 21 for although they knew God they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals or reptiles. 24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves.

So, as we look at the Bible we see that there is an order to it. It is made up of 73 books, and those books are divided into two large subdivisions, the Old Covenant and the New Covenant. Covenant, as we learned in our study of the Eucharist, is not a contract. Contracts are all about exchanging property, “this is yours, and in return this is mine”. But blood covenants are all about exchanging lives, “I am

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yours, and you are mine”. That is a big difference. The Bible is all about covenant, the Old Covenant was fulfilled in the New Covenant. As we take vows giving our life totally to God, God in return gives us His life, in all its fullness, to each of us, and we become His sons and daughters. Through the understanding of blood covenants, God is no longer just our Creator, He becomes our loving Father. That is the story of our salvation unfolded right before our eyes in the Bible. This book is the Love Story of God and His bride, the Church, and all of us as His sons and daughters.

Scott describes covenant as first establishing relations between persons, which leads to obligations for caring for those persons, which results in fullness of life and joyful celebrations with those persons for the rest of their lives. Think of the marriage covenant, I take you as my wife or husband, I am yours and you are mine, we now have marriage relations. That exchange of life leads to obligations, I take you in sickness and in health, for rich or for poor, all my possessions are now yours, and I will take care of you until death do us part. But then fulfilling all those obligations leads to lifelong celebrations. Jackie and I are about to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. We celebrate life everyday as we give ourselves to and for one another through relations, obligations, and celebrations. You could state that truth in a couple of other ways, commitment, commandments, and communion…or life, law, and liturgy.

Part 2

The Story of the Bible is the story of six blood covenants that established relations, obligations, and celebrations between God and man. The first blood covenant involved the covenant marriage of a single couple, Adam and Eve.

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The second involved an entire household, Noah and his wife, and the families of his three sons.

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Abraham was known as a great chieftain with a very large family that God entered into covenant with, God was now bonding with man on a tribal level.

The covenant with Moses took it to a national level, the new nation of Israel with God giving them commitment, commandments, and communion.

David’s covenant with God had international ramifications, all the nations of the known world as an international kingdom.

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And finally, Jesus ushers in a new and eternal covenant that is even beyond the physical universe, binding together earth and heaven beyond all time, culminating in the Marriage supper of the Lamb. And we get just a taste of all of that at every Mass we become a part of.

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We need to see Genesis as one bookend at the beginning of the Bible and Revelation as the bookend at the other end of the Bible, creation ending in consummation. In Genesis God created the heavens and the earth, in Revelations He creates the new heavens and the new earth. In Genesis 1 and 2 we read of the rivers of life flowing from the Garden, and in Revelations the rivers of life flowing in the City of God in chapters 21 and 22. The first covenant involves the intimate marital relations of Adam and Eve, and Revelations describes at the end of time, as all saints of God gather around the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. That is the moment when Jesus unites Himself in a much deeper intimacy with His bride, the universal Church.

The diversity of the 73 books of the Bible come together in a beautiful unity as God reveals Himself to us through His sacred word. History books, and the songs of the Psalms, prophets and parables and books of wise sayings, Gospels of good news, law books and letters to the Churches…all coming together to make up our amazing Bible. Inspired human authors handpicked by God as He wrote through their time and history and their unique personalities. Why 73 books, why do symphonies require brass and strings, percussion and woodwinds, and a conductor that makes it all happen? That diversity brings about a symphony of sound that will have an impact far beyond any one instrument playing by itself.

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Looking once again at the six blood covenants as life, law, and liturgy we can see the explosion of growth from Genesis to Jesus. Life grew from Adam and Eve into all the nations of the earth, literally all of mankind, from one couple to billions and billions. Laws grew from one commandment to Adam and Eve, do not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, to expanded laws ever growing through the household of Noah, and the ever-expanding tribes growing out of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But that is just the beginning, think of all the laws and commandments given to the new nation of Israel through Moses recorded in the Books of Law in the Torah, and even more laws for the international kingdom of David. And you would expect even more laws for the last covenant, but instead God takes all those laws and reduces them all down to one law, “Thou shalt love the Lord they God with all your heart, and soul, and might…and love your neighbor as yourself.”

And what about the growth of the liturgical celebrations throughout all the covenants. Catholic liturgical formation and development can be traced from the very beginning through the act of creation, God creating in 6 days, and celebrating His creation on the 7th day, the Sabbath. Liturgy is infused in creation from the very beginning. Noah sacrificed “clean” animals that God directed him to bring on the Ark, on an altar built with stacked up stones...an altar and liturgy. Father Abraham leaves stone altars all over Palestine as he travels toward the promised land, with the mysterious Priest Melchizedek serving Abraham bread and wine after his victory, as a picture of what was to come. Moses institutes the Tabernacle and all the liturgical instruction and celebration that God commanded to be performed by the Levitical priesthood. David’s son Solomon builds the Holy Temple and the liturgy, priesthood, blood sacrifices, with all the obligations and celebrations are now enclosed in what appears to be a permanent structure, the Temple of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in Jerusalem. But we all know that nothing made by human hands is eternal. Jesus comes and declares that if you tear down this temple and I will rebuild in three days. The Jews thought He was talking about the Temple structure, but Jesus was talking about His own body, as the Holy Temple of God, would be destroyed on a bloody cross, and raised from the dead after three days.

We see the early Church centering their lives on the liturgical celebration of the Eucharist, as they “broke bread from house to house daily”. As Catholics what is the center of liturgical celebrations? It is the Eucharist, that is where we

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experience life, law, and the liturgy. Jesus, through the Eucharist, calls us to enter into a life of commitment as sons and daughters of the family of God, to come and eat at the table of the family of God. Out of that life of commitment comes the supreme law that swallows up all the Ten Commandments, the commandment to love our Father, with all our hearts and souls and might, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. And all that leads to the liturgy of Holy Communion with Jesus Himself as He gives Himself to us, so we then take Him into ourselves, as we eat His body and His blood…life, law, and liturgy. You you can say it as commitment, commandment, and communion…relations, obligations, and celebrations.

Scott is encouraging us to see the Mass as a taste of the Marriage Supper of the Lamb that will happen at the consummation of the ages. At Mass creation is joined to a future consummation, earth is joined to heaven, time is joined to eternity, God is joined to humanity, and of this can only happen through blood covenant. So, what happens to us when we break the covenant, God doesn’t disown us, He can’t, He has entered a blood covenant with us for life, eternal life. When we break His laws, He will correct us and lovingly discipline us, but He will not put us up for adoption. You discipline your kids because you love them, not because you hate them and don’t want them in your life anymore. God’s discipline is infinitely superior to our feeble attempts to be good parents to our kids. The Bible is the book that will reveal all of this to us as we study it, read it, meditate on it, and share it with others. This is going to be a life changing class.