The stories themselves have value and that’s one reason why
we learn them. Stories in Scripture; history of the Church; stories from
ancestors, parents, friends and very much so stories from our own lives.
Stories also have value as a kind of lexicon,
a dictionary of images, ideas, themes, emotions etc. that are able to catch our
attention and strike theological, experiential and emotional chords.
In the
first, we are often looking for what God said
to people at the time, which may also apply to us today. In the second, we are
listening for what God is saying now. The
current word may be the same, similar, or quite different from what we find in
the original setting. (And students of Scripture will readily point out how
written Scripture itself sometimes re-purposes things from earlier times to
make a point that may be VERY different from the original sense. A stunning
example of this can be seen where Paul re-purposes the foundational Jewish story
of Isaac and Ishmael in such a way as to reverse
the original meaning, presenting all the Law-abiding Jews as children of Hagar rather than Sarah. See Galatians 4.)
It’s an odd analogy, I think, but works well to compare this
to the way that contemporary musicians use sampling. Jesus "samples"
Scripture to sing us new tunes today along with the old ones. (By "sampling" here I'm thinking about
occasions like having an image of Scripture come to mind in conversation or during private devotions... these may be times when we're hearing the Lord speak in the present moment, catching our attention with the familiarity of the "sample.")
Scripture as song – there’s more that could be done with
that. We value the original compositions very highly. The “old time” versions
often have special, deep emotional resonance (e.g. The Lord’s Prayer or Psalm
23 from the KJV). But old songs can often find new richness with a different
arrangement, or worked into a medley. From there It’s a short step to
incorporating just a verse, refrain or chorus as a counterpoint, and from there
to sampling to refer to a theme.
