Spiritual gifts & hermeneutics

Keith Brenton is one of my favorite writers on the web today. Keith has a way of looking at tradition with Word-focused eyes, and so he challenges all the sacred cows around him. His recent post on spiritual gifts and hermeneutics is especially insightful:

Do we really need those people in our Christian fellowship who insist that they are right about the Bible; that their interpretation is the correct and only one; that any and all deviation from what they believe and teach will put you out of fellowship with them and with the Lord?

Well ... yeah.

Keith goes on to explain why by describing how the church needs a full range of biblical interpretations.

Here are some ways that I believe people with different views of scripture can fulfill their mutual needs for each other:

1. They open each other's minds to the scripture by the Spirit working through them and through it; by calling their differences back to scripture to see what it clearly, untintedly says.

2. They can keep each other in check, encouraging each other to avoid extreme positions on any matter which scripture leaves to conscience.

3. They can appeal to God together in prayer for a clearer, less-tinted perspective on what His will for them is, expressed in His word.

4. They can maintain active (dare I say "spirited"?) dialogue, which keeps them focused on Christ - rather than on peripheral issues of little or no importance - and that focus will naturally lead them to unity in purpose: serving Him in this world, rather than arguing about Him.

Sounds good to me.

Update: The links were originally to another of Keith's posts. They're corrected now.