LIVING WITH THE TEXT IN COMMUNITY

They love to tell the story at the American Baptist Seminary of the West. It is the central text in classes, the agenda-setting word for meetings, and the celebratory song in community worship. The passion for the story is palpable.

“The Bible is not like any other book,” says President Keith Russell. “We accord it a distinct authority.”

As a school rooted in the Evangelical/Reformed tradition, ABSW takes Scripture seriously. The Bible is “the faithful and sufficient witness to the work of God and the inspired authority for Christian faith and life,” reads the seminary’s confessional statement. The Bible is regarded as the place “where the voice of God will be discerned,” Russell says.

Because God speaks here, Scripture is a “norming instrument,” says Academic Dean and Professor of Theology Dr. George C.L. Cummings. That means the Bible is an instrument “against which to evaluate the practices and commitments which shape our lives,” he explains.

Dr. James Chuck, professor of theology and church ministry, lifted up the Bible’s shaping power in his 40 years as pastor of First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.

“The story the Bible tells judges and corrects the stories we tell about ourselves,” Chuck says. “The Bible presents an alternative counter-cultural way of looking at life and the world. It challenges the conventional wisdom.”

Cummings says his undergraduate Old Testament professor, Dr. Marvin Wilson of Gordon College in Massachusetts, put it this way. “He said, ‘We never come to know the Scripture if we simply read it. We must allow the Scripture to read us.’”

Engaging the Text

A reverence for Scripture informs all of the seminary’s courses. Students are challenged to pay attention to the story. Says Russell, “The ancient question is ‘Is there any word from the Lord?’ And the Baptist answer is ‘Listen to the text.’”

ABSW is not interested in training leaders to memorize facts about the Bible, Russell notes, but to gain the skills to dig deep and to interpret. “The task,” he says, “is not simply to know it, to know about it, but to develop the patience and the skills to interpret the text with an eye to how that text and its context speaks to our life now.”

An interest in meaning, in the act of making the hermeneutical bridge, is what drives Old Testament Professor Dr. LeAnn Flesher to read in community [see story, page 3] and leads Professor of Preaching Dr. J. Alfred Smith to encourage his students to “romance the text.” Students are consistently challenged to mediate the Word of God in their contexts, which means the study of Scripture at ABSW almost always leads to preaching.

“It is in stories told, danced, painted and sketched that God comes alive to us,” Russell says.

So the approach to the text is one of awe and reverence in anticipation that something new will be discovered. Such reading requires the development of exegetical skills yet it also requires an openness that goes beyond technical facility, Chuck notes.

He speaks of the child who in learning to play the piano mechanically pounds out the correct notes. “Later we hope he will move beyond that and bring out the meaning of the music,” Chuck says. “So in preaching we are not simply mechanically repeating the words of the Bible, but making clear what the Bible text means for us today. Just as every great orchestra conductor interprets the music being played, so the preacher interprets the text in a way that powerfully connects the text to the hearer.”

That “dynamic interplay” between people’s lives and Scripture is a key lesson the Rev. Allison Tanner took from her studies at ABSW. Tanner, who is minister of youth and family life at Lakeshore Avenue Baptist Church in Oakland, Calif., earned an M.Div. (’00) and an M.A. in biblical languages (’98) at ABSW.

“The seminary really looks at the point at which Scripture intersects with our current reality, our present situation,” she says. “Scripture is meaningful but especially meaningful at the point where it impacts our daily life.”