Authoritative Community Member

We refer to the Bible as a member of our community of faith - an essential member that must be listened to on all matters on which it speaks.  This approach is meant to strengthen rather than diminish the Bible's authority.  When we read the Bible in our community, we attempt to fully engage ourselves in it and in the God who inspired its creation.  We work to listen to the community of faith that has produced us and the God who dwells in us.  We focus our efforts on trying to figure out if our lives could be relevant to the story of God, not if the Bible can be relevant to our lives.  We can only do this when we allow the information gleaned from the stories of the Bible to couple with our experiences, hopes, and ideas.  Our trust in the Bible does not depend on information that "proves" the Bible to be credible.  We believe the Bible because our hopes, ideas, experiences, and community of faith allow and require us to believe.

Doug Pagitt's Reimagining Spiritual Formation (123)