Learning Our Lines

They stayed at a distance and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen, but do not have God speak to us or we will die” (Exodus 20:19).

My ten year old son is learning Shakespeare. He’s doing “The Tempest” in his drama class at school and he has the role of Prospero. I just finished helping him go over his lines for scene 10. I’ve got to admit I’m impressed, and not just in that proud father kind of way. I majored in English literature back in my college days, might have read some Shakespeare in high school, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t know who the man was when I was ten years old.

My son’s script may be to Shakespearean English what the Living Bible is to the King James Version – but still . . . we were working with words like “bedimmed” and “abjure.” That’s Shakespearean enough for me. My own enthusiasm for words might have gotten in the way of our rehearsal time. I kept asking John if he understood what “bedimmed” meant. I took a dictionary and had him look up the word “abjure.” It was plain to me that my interest in such matters far exceeded his.

John just wanted to go over the lines. And not all the lines. Just his lines. This was interesting to me for two reasons. First, it was clear that he was simply trying to meet the bare minimum study requirement: 15 minutes of script review. Second, meeting that 15 minute requirement didn’t allow for context. Skip the dialog. The fullness of the conversation was sacrificed on the altar of time efficiency. Just 15 minutes with the lines, that’s it.

Say “The Ten Commandments” and most people see lines; lines chiseled in stone. The lines are written in all caps as if God was shouting English at Moses. Each line is designated by a foreboding Roman numeral. What God expects, we assume, is that we will learn these lines. Learn them well and then do them.

And so we try. But we do it the way my ten year old son does Shakespeare. We set about learning our lines without the trouble of the whole dialog. Just give us our lines. Just tell us what we need to do to be decent people.

What God had in mind goes beyond that. The Ten Commandments aren’t simply lines we learn, but our place in a dialog. Oddly, we learn the commandments, but these are God’s words. God speaks, and we live in response to what we hear. The Ten Commandments cannot be understood apart from this dialog; like it or not, we’re involved in a conversation.

To truly know the Ten Commandments, to learn our lines well, we’ll need to do more than just read. We’ll need a discipline that goes beyond memorization. To know our lines we’ll need a dialogue, a conversation with the God who authored these lines.

Maybe people who best know the Ten Commandments are not those who behave well, but those people who pray honestly. We learn our lines by listening. Read the Ten Commandments again, but this time hold conversation with God as you read. God isn’t barking orders; you’re not memorizing rules. The Commandments are an invitation to dialog. The way you live this day is your chance to be a part of the conversation.

Prayer:
There are times, Lord, when following the rules seems easier than dealing with you as an active presence in our lives. But you give us more than rules. You invite is to join you in your very life, your work in the world. We thank you for the lines you gave us through Moses. Help us today to listen to them, to learn them, and to live in response to what we hear. Amen.