Credo

Here’s my latest Credo article published in the Newark Advertiser today

Let me know what you think.

Mark

The Bible is a big book.

Or perhaps it’s more accurate to say that it’s a big volume – as it contains more than 60 individual books within its covers.

Some Christians argue that every word in the Bible is literally true, but I’m not one of those. I also believe that some of what is written in the Bible is much more important than other sections.

In a recent service at my church I selected my ‘Desert Island Bible Passages’ – setting myself the task of selecting just 8 short extracts from the Bible that I would choose if that’s all I could have. There isn’t space here to go into all the details, but here’s a flavour:

Genesis 1 and 2 – the creation stories. Not that I believe the stories are literally true but because I am convinced that without God there wouldn’t be a universe.

The only other passage from the Old Testament is from Amos chapter 5 where the prophet says that all the at matters to God is to ‘let justice flow like a stream, and righteousness like a river that never goes dry.

Matthew chapters 5-7 – The ‘Sermon on the Mount’ where Jesus spells out his radical and transformative message that turns the world upside down.

Luke’s parables of the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son (in chapters 10 and 15) that teach so much about how to love and to forgive.

Pauls’s letter to the Romans Chapter 8 where he says ‘there is nothing in all creation that will ever be able to separate us from the love of God.

Chapter 13 from Paul’s 1^st letter to the Corinthians. The passage often heard at weddings – a wonderful poem about Love.

Finally the first two verses of the letter to the Hebrews where the writer stresses the importance of Jesus in telling us about what God wants of us.

If you haven’t got time to read the whole Bible I think you could read these 8 passages in less than an hour and they’d tell you a lot about what it means to be a Christian.

On Desert Island Discs the final thing the castaway has to do its to select just one disc of the 8 to keep. So if I could only keep one of the 8 passages what would it be? It’s an easy choice for me – it would be part of the Good Samaritan story where Jesus says ’Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind’; and ‘Love your neighbour as you love yourself.’ is the secret to everything.

The Bible in 10 seconds. The rest is detail.

Mark Taylor – Minister – Newark Congregational Church.