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Sunrise of life began on October 13, 1959, for my cousin Michael Thompson, and sunset was on April 17, 2020. He died from COVID-19.
Later, I was standing in line at a seafood store, and the attendant finally waited on me. I was upset because she took so long. She said, "May I help you, sir." I said, "May I have three catfish fillets?"
As she proceeded to get my order ready, we started talking about the coronavirus, and I was taken aback by what she was saying. She said that the whole coronavirus was a hoax and asked why do we have to wear these masks. Immediately, I told her about Mike dying, and respectfully disagreed with her. She looked at me, and I could see her facial expression change even with her mask on.
She offered an apology.
I wanted to give my limited human response, but a calmness came over me like a magician waving a wand over my head. Matthew 7:1-2 came to me: "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you" (NIV).
I graduated from Palmer Seminary. One of my professors at the seminary would tell us to keep our ministry simple whenever we could. When someone is adamant about a topic, nine times out of 10, you are not going to change that person's mind. My professor also told us that, if we have to use gigantic words or jargon, we must carefully explain them in the vernacular as we share the message.
Matthew 7:3 goes on to talk about the sawdust and plank being in your eye rather than someone else's eye. "Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?"
My friend, Pastor Diane, invited me to be a guest preacher one Sunday, and my message had three words that called for some explanation: hermeneutics, exegesis, and eisegesis. I put into practice the advice my former professor had given.
No doubt every student of the Bible could add his or her own list of troublesome and perplexing words and issues. As at the seafood store where I needed a spiritual response rather than a human response to bridge our different views on issues such as COVID-19, I needed the scriptures. How can we be successful in our attempts to understand the scriptures correctly?
We need a well-thought-out approach to interpreting the Bible. And this is where hermeneutics comes in.
Hermeneutics is a large word -- a "fifty dollar" word. It is the technical term Bible scholars use for explaining the meaning of the scriptures. That is the plain meaning of this scholarly jargon?
Exegesis is another big word. According to the Anchor Bible Dictionary, "exegesis is the process of careful, analytical study of biblical passages undertaken in order to produce useful interpretation of these passages."
Eisegesis is the interpretation of a text by reading into it one's own ideas.
Matthew 7:5-6 talks about being a hypocrite. A synonym for hypocrite is actor, so I need to tell myself to stop acting like a judge and give people what they need: words we can both understand and relate to.
I need to get busy and do what Jesus has called me to do.
Clarence Thompson, member, Antioch Baptist Church