The problem in this of course is that there are people who are not going to have the desire to read their Bibles. So the question is, should we "force" people in the church to read and learn their Bibles?
How is anyone going to "force" anyone else to read there Bible?
As far as some congregations lack of desire to read Scripture, there is definately a connection to the church itself and what the leadership believes and teaches. You spoke again about your prior church problems. I could substitute the words "emergent church" in your paragraph of your church embracing the DaVinci code and describe my prior church almost exactly!
Well at that church, and probably most embracing emergent and other errors as such, what became clear to me is that the pastors where not standing on Scripture Alone. There, the Bible is not THE final authority, but the Holy Spirit and one's relationship with Christ is (thus experiences become the final authority).
When the Bible becomes just one of the means for people getting to know God, then what incentive is there to read Scripture and have a passion for it? When they aren't taught that Scripture is the actual Word of God and that the relationship with Jesus and His Holy Spirit in itself is enough, then what drives the desire to Scripture? This is what I clearly saw that was subtly taught and embraced by some of our main leadership at my prior church. It's like the Bible is something else other than the actual Word of God.
I think this is the whole "key" missing - the focus on Scripture and Scripture Alone. Today we have experiences driving what is being taught from the pulpit, what is in worship, etc. etc.
No small wonder that disciplinary powers of churches are missing when the Word isn't even being believed by the church leaders themselves. How can pastors carry out proper discipline when they don't even have a conviction of what that should be? We also saw this at our prior church. Just one example --There was a situation of our sr. pastor re-marrying a prior church member who got divorced. My husband and I knew about the situation and clearly knew it was wrong for our new sr. pastor to remarry her to someone else! He did it anyways. It was his way to show Christ's grace to her we were told. There are a few other situations that my husband, as an Elder there, was not happy and gave his disapproval to some of the decisions the pastor wanted to do.
