Ok.  So here is a developing thought that I've been playing with for a while now and it has to do with the nature of words and I suppose language and the way we use and interpret the Bible.

This is probably nothing new, and is most likely well researched by linguists and the like so i'd appreciate anyone who can point me in a direction of something to read.  I think my thinking is somewhat shaped by my sociology degree.

So let me try and outline it, this is my first attempt so don't shoot me!  The bible uses words (in the New Testament it uses Koine Greek words).  These words don't actually mean anything in and of themselves but their context, culture, and the idea behind them give them meaning.  So when we argue about what a particular word means we are arguing about what big idea in the stream of consciousness of the day was trying to be conveyed by the uses of that word.  Often we can figure that out by the surrounding sentence or sentences or book or books.

Now, we read an English bible.  It also uses words.  It uses words that in our context and culture portray the same meaning to our stream of consciousness.  So we have words like gospel or worship or church or marriage or grace that are used in the bible to convey particular meaning.

Now, there are some who get pretty revved up about correct use of words.  So we can have big long conversations about the word 'worship' or 'gospel' or 'church'.  Or some will prefer not to sing songs that use words like 'lovely' or 'fully sick' or something to describe God because the bible doesn't use those words.  On one hand I get where they are coming from.

But I think I'm starting to think that perhaps we just need to become as good at reading our culture and interpreting it (cultural exegesis if you like) as we are at doing biblical exegesis.  Perhaps we need to be less hung up on words and more hung up on ideas.  Words change, meaning changes, contexts change.  If we are hung up on defining everything in the exact same way as a word is used in the bible (or with different words that are not explicitly used in the bible, but might fit the big idea) then perhaps we are missing something of the richness and deepness that is life with Jesus and we are missing opportunities to take the good news about life with Jesus into our contexts.

After all english words in the Bible are just someones attempt to communicate an idea from a different context (1st Century Greek speaking Paul for example).  And Paul was using greek words to communicate an idea that was in some sense beyond the words he used.

Just thinking philosophically.  I still believe in Jesus' real life and death for my sins and reading the Bible as the primary way to know about Jesus.  I'm just trying to work out how language works or something.