![\"Lecturn](\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/412\/2018\/08\/Lecturn-2-300x141.png\")
As a lay reader, ultimate humility comes in realizing that the reading is not about you. You\u2019re there to serve as the catalyst between members of the congregation and their own encounters with scripture.<\/p>\nAs a lay reader, ultimate humility comes in realizing that the reading is not about you. You\u2019re there to serve as the catalyst between members of the congregation and their own encounters with scripture.<\/p>\n
The reading is not about your skills or issues. It\u2019s about experiences pertaining to the human condition as a whole, illuminated by the struggles and triumphs of lives lived and recounted in the Bible.\u00a0 It\u2019s our role as readers to give life to and present the struggles and triumphs of others as part of a shared experience.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m disappointed when the readings are introduced as \u201clessons.\u201d\u00a0 As if the only purpose of any reading is to convey a moral, it\u2019s often perceived that our job as readers is to serve as instructional assistants, presenting a use case for moralizing.<\/p>\n
Reading aloud is not about oral interpretation in the sense that we are invited to impose our own interpretation on what we are reading. We are not offering our own characterizations or moral judgements on the behavior of other individuals. It\u2019s not about midrash or exegesis of the text: leave that to scholars and ministers.<\/p>\n
What the Lay Reader of scripture offers is an opportunity for the congregation to encounter and experience<\/em><\/strong> scripture. These are words that we bring to life, from which we receive life, and through which we experience what it means to live, to really live, to live fully. We don\u2019t read to impose meaning, or evince rules, we read to give a voice to the experience of lives lived in a world inhabited by the living God, infused with the holy spirit \u2014lives lived with God, and in the case of the Gospels, through Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n Many readers are worried about sounding to \u201cactor-ish.\u201d They feel safer reading in a dispassionate, flat, \u201cjust the facts, Ma\u2019m\u201d police report voice. This approach drains life from the reading rather than giving it life. The Bible is not for the dead. It is for the living: the newly born and baptized, the reborn and the resurrected and anyone else with ears to hear.<\/p>\n So, it\u2019s not about acting in the theatrical sense. Reading scripture is not about assuming character roles. Have you noticed how in nearly every Bible film or television spectacular, everyone in the holy land speaks with a British accent? Why is that? (Apparently, the disciples were not recruited from along the shores of the Sea of Galilee, but from up in and around the Lake District in the north of England.) We\u2019re not here to do character voices. It\u2019s not about characters. It\u2019s about human relationships and emotion; being called and attempting to answer that call; it\u2019s about human beings wrestling with the inertia of the physical universe and breaking the bonds of human traditions that have lost their usefulness. It\u2019s about encounters with good and evil. It\u2019s not about character. It\u2019s about charisma.<\/p>\n We are not called as readers to deliver a dispassionate recitation of case law, to provide a lesson, or revel in a nostalgic recounting of events that happened \u201clong ago and far away…\u201d<\/p>\n These are words that are meant to be on our tongues and filling our mouths. We are meant to bring them to life.<\/p>\n It is not about you. It\u2019s about the word of God for the people of God.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As a lay reader, ultimate humility comes in realizing that the reading is not about you. You\u2019re there to serve as the catalyst between members of the congregation and their own encounters with scripture. The reading is not about your skills or issues. It\u2019s about experiences pertaining to the human condition as a whole, illuminated…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":621,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-79","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n