I have to admit I am more and more annoyed with the media coverage that the “Jesus Papers,” “Holy Blood, Holy Grail,” the “Da Vinci Code” and the “Gospel According to Judas” are getting these days. Anytime we, as a culture, begin to take our ideas and frame of reference from a fictional novel like the “Da Vinci Code” or a book like “Holy Blood, Holy Grail” (which has no real scholarly support and is based on innuendo and radical theories) we are in treacherous waters.

That being said…I think we have to be careful as the evangelical church about throwing the proverbial stones from our proverbial glass houses because I would argue that we have done it for years inside our own walls. There are those that read Frank Peretti novels (and still do) not in the genre it was intended (fiction) but instead as theology/demonology. Or people who read the “Left Behind” series as a Biblical commentary on Revelation when it is also is fiction. But I would also argue that we do it with Scripture as well when we take a book like Revelation, which is written in the genre of Jewish Apocalyptic literature, and instead of reading and interpreting it in its genre we read and interpret it as a fortune telling newspaper. I would also argue that this can, and has taken place, in the interpretations of other genres like poetry, parables, narratives, etc. in Scripture. I guess that is the challenge and I think as the Church we need to be careful as we critique the media for doing things with the “Da Vinci Code” today that we have done in the evangelical church for years.