I have learned to be suspicious of brand-new discoveries. Especially in fields where novel ideas arise from centuries-old documents.
When a 21st century theologian writes a best-seller to correct what Christianity's wisest and brightest teachers have believed for 2,000 years, you'll have to pardon me if I don't shout Hallelujah! and fawn over this new theological Columbus.
What kind of inflated ego must it take for any person to imagine that their eyes see more clearly - that their brain processes more accurately - than those of millions of committed believers before them?
Common sense tells us to pay more attention to those who touched Jesus and heard him and saw him face to face than to scholars who view him through the distorted lens of shifting cultures and passing years.
For the same reason I am skeptical when people keep discovering astounding new protections and prohibitions in our nation's Constitution.
Can you imagine the reaction of that document's author when he read in the New Jerusalem Gazette last year (do they have years in Heaven?) about the remarkable discovery made by the regents of the University of Maryland?
Those esteemed guardians of learning in our land read the words of Thomas Jefferson and found in his much-studied document the guarantee that students on their campuses can indulge in pornography without any interference by school administrators or professors.
When Jefferson found out that this is what he really meant by his guarantee of freedom of speech, did he disrupt Heaven with howls of outrage or guffaws of disbelief?
He likely had the same reaction when U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb read the Constitution and discovered up in Wisconsin that the Bill of Rights outlaws the U.S. National Day of Prayer.
For almost 60 years our nation's sharpest legal minds read Jefferson's words and missed this prohibition, but now at long last we know what he really meant.
You'll have to forgive me, your honor, if I don't get any more excited about your latest discovery than I do about other Johnny-come-latelies of this sort.
Gene Shelburne is minister of the Anna Street Church of Christ, 2310 Anna St. in Amarillo. Contact him at mailto:GeneShel@aol.com">GeneShel@aol.com, or get his books and magazines at http://www.annastreetchurch.com">www.annastreetchurch.com. His column appears at least monthly in the Faith section.