(Lunar;56259)
I know this sounds like a silly question. But I actually consider it tremendously important.Almost every attempt to render Christian theology consistent requires extensive cross-referencing of the bible. For instance, in one case I saw someone attempt to justify gap creationism by filling a hole in the first two verses of Genesis with a quote from 2 Peter. This sort of thing happens all the time - one verse will make no sense unless supplemented with another verse from a completely different book - and, although I don't think these attempts at reconciliation are able to hold their own weight very often (though that is the stuff of many other topics), I consider the obtuseness of the justification itself to be a problem.If the bible is God's infallible word, why did he not make it more organized or readable? Why should one need to jump from book to book, spending hours and hours analyzing it, simply to be able to understand it? Many people do not have access to bibles in the first place, and many others do not have the time or skill to do this sort of analysis. God is clearly capable of making a book that is comprehensible to everyone - one that perfectly communicates his will. So why didn't he? Why did he even allow there to be any debate over Christian theology - much less produce the disjointed mess of theology that is the bible?Obviously God would not intend for someone's faith to be contingent upon their aptitude at critical literary analysis, but that is what it has come to. Why is this? Why couldn't the bible tell us exactly what we need to know, in words that even a child could understand?
I speculate that there are tons of reasons, here are some,It provides a rather fair environment where one comes in then out with one of the two answers, 1)yes, 2)noI remember when I was an unbeliever, I felt that it's so boring to read through the Bible cover by cover, so I rejected it right away perhaps after reading 1 or 2 pages of the NT. As for OT, I didn't know what it's talking about. What seemed to be attractive to me was genesis 1, perhaps at least I thought that I understand what it says at least.So it is intelligence-independent, those you think that they are stupid might understand much more than you do. It's totally about another kind of wisdom (not intelligence). It's godly and reasonable. God, as with much higher intelligence wants nothing intelligent from men, He wants your faith. And He got it. People come in and out with faith and no faith, disregarding to and independent of their intelligence.The knowledge is layered, the more spiritual people will read more and gain more from it, ranging in a pattern from non-believers, novice believers, Christians, preachers and so on. They come in and out with knowledge in different level, even in the same level but in different spiritual grading. So that a knowledgable person (not necessarily a believer) can thus debate with a spiritual person of the same knowledge level. It's interesting. It's thus not surprised that the novice will yell 'I am puzzled'.It's lastingly debatable. A book defined by human as 'very clearly written' doesn't give much room or value for debate, it can hardly be a fair environment for choosing, it can only be an environment for the intelligent (not necessary the spiritual) to be 'right' most of the time.A standard is required, thus the existing value of the Church and the Apostles' Creed. And everything else leads to falsehood, for those unsaved to fall for. Fair enough.A testimony is required, thus God will send prophets to reveal the Truth, to keep His Scriputre alive along time, such that the Scripture (especially the New Covenant) will not grow old. Things are revealed, prophecies are fulfilled as testimonies of God's Word. No one by far can claim that he understands the Scripture in full. The good point is, to the wicked it might be confusing, but to Christians it is where the truth is. All in all, it can't be a product of men. Amen.