Every voice has value

So now I’m a blogger with a forum of seemingly limitless potential to enlighten, encourage, and exegete, and all I can think about right now is how little I know. Sure, I have something to say, but why should anyone pay attention? I’m no expert at anything, I’m not wise beyond my years, I’m not particularly well-read. I’m not even a college graduate (gasp!).

Yet I have this subtle but persistent urge to express myself anyway. Is that simply the creative impulse in us all, or is it something more? Perhaps it’s more a human impulse, rather than a specifically creative one….born out of a felt need for significance and influence. But as I said, there’s so much I don’t know, including the answer to that question.

Despite the feelings of inadequacy and frustration brought on by the knowledge of my ignorance, I’m beginning to see that that’s probably a good thing, that I know I don’t know. You know? I have recognized within me a devilish desire for dominance and a pervasive proclivity to pride. Yet, ever ready to quash my vain ambitions is a stubborn sense of smallness and an insipid intimation of inferiority. (Yeah, I’ve been hanging out at alliteration alley.) The battle rages.

The truth is, I’m neither the brightest nor the dullest, the most well-informed nor the least knowledgeable. And here’s the beauty of that: chances are, neither are you. And neither are most of the millions of people who have an opinion and make it known.

But precisely because none of us knows everything, every voice has value. Precisely because perspective is point-determinative and we are all at different points, the more varied the perspectives the more likely truth and understanding will be apprehended.

Biblical scholar N. T. Wright, in examining the natural way we come to interpret Scripture from our cultural leanings which may lead to a misreading, says that, “…provided we keep open the conversation with other people who look from other perspectives, we have a real, and not illusory, chance of finding out more or less what really happened.”

And this applies to all matters on which people form opinions. If we keep the conversation open and listen respectfully to each other with minds that are open as well, eager to know the truth, the truth will be made known.

So, the point is, the more bloggers the better, I suppose. And though I am only one among many, I should not hesitate to say my something. And neither should you.