The bible is still relevant. The reason that it’s still relevant is because it’s the story of people. Human beings don’t change. Human beings are the same whether you live in Australia or you live on the other side of the world. If you lived a thousand years ago there’s something about human nature which is universal and the stories in the bible are first and foremost stories about people.
I was once talking to someone who was not a Christian and he said to me “You talk about these people in the bible like you know them, like they’re your friends or your family.” And in a way they are because I have a story about my friends and my family who who I’ve known in my life but when I read the bible, the people in there come alive to me and so their story is a bit like my story. They become part of who I am and so when I’m faced with a difficulty, I don’t just have to look back at my own life to find a story that will help me make sense of it but I can look back to the story of God’s people, right to the very beginning and say well where in the bible did somebody face this particular challenge and more often than not there will be someone in the bible whose story is told honestly and without you know kind of rose-colored glasses and I go wow there’s a way of looking at this that I didn’t see before.
That’s why it’s relevant not necessarily because there are rules in the bible which show me what to do. It’s not that black and white but there are stories of people who face similar things to me and I can learn from them and I can make their story part of mine. It’s an extension, if you like, of the story of human beings. I don’t have a story that is connected to country. The way indigenous people do that would be a wonderful thing to have in your life, a beautiful rich thing. I don’t have that so I kind of adopted the stories in the bible as my stories of where I come from simply because I’m human.