For far too many evangelical churches and institutions, the Old Testament is virtually irrelevant. This scandal has robbed the Church of much power and faith. Stripping away the New Covenant from the Old allows an easy intrusion of pagan ideas and concepts into the faith, so that many evangelicals are guilty of syncretistic theology.
We focus upon evangelicals here not because other traditions are blameless in this regard. Far from it. The Roman Catholic tradition is sadly rife with syncretism, as is the Orthodox tradition. But evangelicals ought to know better. One of the Protestant fundamentals is Sola Scriptura--the Scriptures alone. However, in many evangelical circles Sola Scriptura has been glossed to become "Sola New Testament" which means, in effect, that Sola Scriptura is undermined, if not destroyed--for, as we have observed--remove the Old Testament from bearing authoritatively upon all that we do and think and the vacuum will be filled with pagan nostrums.
One evidence of this unbiblical reductionism is the tendency amongst evangelicals to limit its attention to defending the historicity of the Old Testament historical narrative. Beyond that the redemptive narrative and history is hardly ever consulted.
Michael D Williams, in his book Far as the Curse is Found, (Phillipsburg, New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 2005), illustrates this point with reference to Noah and the Flood.
Some episodes within the biblical drama get no respect. The Genesis story of Noah and the flood certainly falls into that category. It's a Bible story, something we tell our children. Its color, detail and action keep the kids quiet in children's church, but poor old Noah never quite makes it into the sanctuary.
Believers of a more liberal bent consider the story of Noah a myth, not completely to be believed, full of too many questionable elements. Evangelicals, by contrast, if they concern themselves with the story at all, attempt to prove that the flood actually happened, that it is not a myth but historical fact. Thus we conservatives approach Noah in much the same way that we approach Eden, namely, with the primary interest of refuting the liberal denial of historicity.
As important as defending the Bible's historicity is—and it is crucially important—if historicity is our fundamental concern, we will miss the point of the narrative. Not only the event but also the meaning of the event is important. There is a message in the story.
Moses could have concluded in the Genesis story any number of things from the ancient past. But Genesis does not tell us everything that happened in human history before Israel went into Egypt. We find not a word about where Can and Abel got their wives, no references to dinosaurs or continental drift, nothing about many peoples and cultures that existed before the election of Israel. If Moses had meant merely to chronicle the distant past, the great gaps in his story would become difficult to explain. Obviously, Moses selected events from the early history of humankind that were important to the larger story he wised to tell: the story of God's redemption.
The question to ask when we read a biblical narrative is not merely What happened? but What was God doing? Why is this episode part of the grand biblical narrative? How does this small story contribute to the larger story o f God's redemptive intention in the world? The story of the Noahic flood speaks volumes if we will but listen.
Sandwiched as it is between the creation and fall narratives and the calling of Abraham, the Noah story develops and graphically underscores for the believer the fatherly character and redemptive concern of the God with whom we find ourselves in covenant, and the implications and impact of our involvement with him and in the world. Set in the larger context of the historical unfolding of God's redemptive mission, the story acquaints us more profoundly with God, creation and man, and human sin, judgment, and grace. It confirms what God cares about, what he is up to, and how he goes about it, and what he has for humans to be and do. There is so much more to the story that its historicity. And the story is much more than an isolated event. (Williams, pp. 83—85)
In a second piece we will post a summary of some of the real significance of the divine and human events with respect to Noah and the flood, as expounded by Williams.
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