An important reminder of the kind of attitude we need came from what some might consider an unexpected source: former president Bill Clinton. Clinton, after abandoning his notes to speak from the heart, said something like this: "If you’re looking for guidance in how to relate to other peop
le, the most important verse in the Bible to read is 1 Cor. 13:12 – not the final verse: 'And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love,' but the one before that."Quoting from memory from the King James Version, Clinton cited the previous verse: "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known."
"What could Paul have been talking about?" Clinton asked. "I’m not a minister, I just read and think."
"Paul compares life on earth today with life after death in God," he said. "Think about it as a guide for life and politics -- for now, I see through a glass darkly, but then face to face."
Even if one regards the Bible as literally true, he said, none of us can claim to see or understand it perfectly, because we all see only in part.
"The reason we have to love each other is that all of us might be wrong," he said.
Later, he added, "If there is any chance that this covenant can become an embracing one, it has to be the chance of love: the chance that we might not give up our differences, but find that our common humanity matters more."
That, I think, was a word well spoken, and much needed.
2 comments:
In rebuttal to Mr. Clinton's anti-biblical and unchristian wrench on what Paul said about knowledge and love, I quote the words of an old Baptist song writer whose words reflect the real understanding of what it means to be a Baptist. Whereas this old Baptist wrote two centuries ago, he surely cannot be accused of writing in defense of 20th century fundamentalism or Republican partisan politics:
"How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord, is laid for your faith in His excellent Word!
What more can He say than to you He hath said,you, who unto Jesus for refuge have fled?"
Therein lies the unsurmountable chasm between authentic Baptists and modernist Baptists - the old acknowledges that the Lord has spoken, the new still keep hoping He will change His mind.
Mark Osgatharp
Wynne, Arkansas
Many, many years ago the significance of 1 Corinthians 13:12 registered on me. Wow! If the apostle Paul could only see through the glass darkly, only know in part this side of eternity, I could hardly expect to know it all, to have all the right answers. That's an "unbiblical and unchristian wrench"? Huh? The arrogance of certain Baptists and other Christians who KNOW their interpretation is the right one is what gives us a bad name in the world. So I rejoiced when the New Baptist Covenant called us to gather in unity around those words of Jesus in Luke 4:18-19 (and, implicitly Matthew 25:31-46). Jesus was very clear. Those verses don't require much interpretation. These were the things that mattered to Jesus. They should matter to us.
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