When I get back from writing leave, I want to do a sermon series on “Strange Places in the Bible.” I want to take a tour through those parts of the Bible most Christians pretend aren’t there because they are so strange and ugly. How do we honestly deal with calls to slavery or genocide? What do we make of pre-scientific claims about our world that are clearly false? I’m hoping to collect the suggestions and then maybe have a panel choose the hardest and strangest verses. I’ve asked my church to come up with verses, but I thought it might be fun to open it up to a wider audience. What verses do you find hardest to deal with? My hope in this series is to consider what it means to take the Bible seriously after we realize we can’t take it literally.
Um, most of Revelations?
Steve, that might be too long a sermon. Do you think of a good passage from Revelation? A sermon series from Rev. might be a good idea at some point.
Genesis 6:1-4 Nephilim
Psalm 137:9 – Dashing babies heads against the rocks
Psalm 145:20-21 – Conditional Love
Isaiah 5:25 – An angry God (really, really angry)
Excellent choices. Thank you, Jim.
matthew 21: 28-46 especially v. 45 which literally identifies the Jewish leaders as the ones who should be punished. I choose this rather than “his blood be upon us” because the parable is really a powerful call to revenge, and it is also a clear claim to the supercession of Judaism. If I had to preach on this I might rip the page from the altar bible.
Another great idea.