That's all very well, but what does it mean?

Different types of people need things explained to them in different ways. In common with many people, I'm one of those who like things to be made clear in practical language, not just talked about in vague or spiritual terms. And that's why many sermons and devotional guides annoy me, or just fail to help me. Because much of the time they don't go into practical information.


I suspect it's because many of the people writing them don't think in the same way as me. A workshop I did a year or two ago on Myers-Briggs personality typing, and a book I've read looking at spirituality in the light of this, helped me realise that many of the Christians I know, and almost all of those I find frustrating to work with, are of widely different personality types to me. They process information in a very different way, and use different language in their spiritual lives- generalised or metaphorical language I sometimes find hard to understand or apply.

It's not a vagueness we can accuse the Bible of. As well as nice spiritual flowery language, it goes into detail in ways which at times can be uncomfortable. But although many books or teachers claim to apply to our lives the Bible as well as interpreting it, what some of them consider 'application' I consider vague, unhelpful or incomplete.

Take, as an example, John 15 verse 1-17. Jesus is talking about how the disciples are to relate to one another and to him. Many preachers would use 'remain in my love' as an application, without explaining what this actually means. Perhaps for some people (especially those who have grown up in the church) that is enough, they know what it means and how that should affect their lives. But although by now I have a fair idea of what that means, I don't think that is sufficient explanation, especially for someone who is a new Christian. What does it mean to remain in Christ's love? As a phrase it doesn't make a lot of sense. Christ's love isn't a place, so we can't remain inside it, which would be the literal interpretation of the phrase. If your mind works in a literal way it doesn't make much sense. It's much easier to understand if we can talk about it in terms of following Jesus' example of loving God and other people, which I think is what he's talking about.

The problem is we can't talk about spiritual realities without using spiritual language and metaphor. Jesus used this kind of language to help us understand what he meant, because there aren't words to describe exactly what he was talking about. What we have to do, though, is to try to translate them, where we can, into practical terms. Telling someone to live their life as a branch of the True Vine doesn't mean very much by itself, and we can't assume that everyone in our churches knows the context. We need to realise this and adapt the language we use in sermons and devotional material to be understood by all the people who are going to hear them, not just some of them.