BibleWorkbench is a lectionary based life-centered biblical resource designed for small group youth and adult education in church and home, for individual study or as an aid to preachers. One of the texts from the Revised Common Lectionary is chosen each Sunday. The exploration begins with encountering the story found in the biblical text. The focus then shifts to how this story is happening in the world around us. Finally the questions turn toward how the story is an event in the lives of the people in the group. The journey through the text seeks life-giving questions that wait to be lived.
Weekly written materials include a series of open-ended questions designed to enable users to enter the story in the text, and to make connections to the world around and to their own inward lives. - Parallel Readings feature poetry and literature, along with timely newspaper and magazine articles that resonate and extend the story in the text.
- Critical Background material taken from noted biblical scholars illuminates the context of each week's text.
BibleWorkbench can be subscribed to on a yearly, half-year or seasonal basis. Click here to subscribe today!
You can download a sample week of Bibleworkbench, a sample "Benchmarks" (Letter from the Editor), a Leader Guide, the BibleWorkbench Guidelines,and BibleWorkbench Scripture Index Volumes 1-18 at : BibleWorkbench Downloads.
BibleWorkbench is published six times a year, and each issue contains a full session design for the nine or ten Sundays covered, which incorporates four elements:
- EXPLORING THE PATTERN: THEMES AND MOTIFS
A series of open-ended questions inviting participants to enter deeply into the story in the text, to make connections to the world around them and to their own inner lives. These questions are designed to be shaped by group leaders to address the individuals in the group. The design may also include suggestions for drawing, sculpting, mime, or movement to engage the non-verbal part of our being. - READING BETWEEN THE LINES
Brief, evocative reflections from the editors on other potential themes and patterns suggested in the study text - PARALLEL READINGS
Selections from contemporary poetry and prose, along with articles from newspapers and magazines that illuminate or extend the story in the text. - CRITICAL BACKGROUND
Background on the context and reading of the text, drawn from biblical scholars such as Marcus Borg, Walter Brueggemann, Fred Craddock, John Dominic Crossan, Bart Ehrman, William Herzog, Amy-Jill Levine, Norman Perrin, Elaine Pagels, Sharon Ringe, Walter Wink and more.
Also in each issue are Benchmarks (from the Editor), Gleanings (items for reflection and inspiration gathered from here and there), a Bibliography of books for study, and an additional feature on some aspect of reading or living the Bible- a sample sermon, a book review, an interview, etc.
One year of BibleWorkbench:
| $130.00 | Add to Cart |
The BibleWorkbench Method
BibleWorkbench is not an exegetical or doctrinal approach to the Bible, it is not a discussion group, nor is it a support group or therapeutic session. The open-ended questions are designed to enable each person in the circle to respond to the story in the text as spontaneously as possible from as deep a place within as they are able. Leaders encourage participants to engage the scripture rather than each other and to experience the story as it is happening in the text, in the world around them, and in their inner lives.
BibleWorkbench is designed for flexible use by individuals and groups. Groups will vary in size but tend to work best when between 6 and 15 participants. Designed originally for Sunday morning adult education programs, sessions are designed for 50 to 90 minutes. Most groups have a leadership team of two or three people who share in the responsibility for presenting the material. Some groups encourage all members to take turns week by week in the leadership. Groups meet in churches, in workplaces, or in homes, as part of a congregational program or independently.
Regardless of the setting, BibleWorkbench sessions remember these key guidelines:
- "I" statements are encouraged. The goal is to explore how the text crosses your experience. This is not to discount tradition and the scholars, but to recall that it is what the text evokes in you is of primary importance.
- The goal is not consensus, agreement, or a "right" answer. We focus on the text, not on debating each other; our differences may add to the richness of the experience.
- You do not have to explain, justify, or defend anything you say. People need to feel safe, and free to explore where the text may take them.
- Silence is part of the process. In allowing space between responses there is a chance to ponder more deeply what others (or even you yourself) have said. It also reminds us that BibleWorkbench is not a discussion group.
- You can change your mind as often as you like. Sometimes we only discover what we think after we have said it.
- Make an honest effort to try the non-verbal exercises. Art, movement, or mime may be unfamiliar or even uncomfortable, but you may be surprised at what you discover if you try.
- What's said in the group stays in the group. People sometimes share at a deep level, and they need to know they can do so safely.
Feel free to contact the Educational Center and request assistance if you get stuck or bogged down. Request a copy of The Leader's Guide be sent to you.
The Educational Center also offers training for BibleWorkbench leaders. Look for opportunities under Center News, or contact the Educational Center to sponsor a training in your area.
The Editors of BibleWorkbench
FOUNDING EDITOR - The Reverend William L. Dols, Jr., PhD
Bill Dols created BibleWorkbench in 1993 while serving as Executive Director of the Educational Center. He edited it for the first 15 years, and is still a contributor.
A native of Baltimore, Maryland, Bill graduated from Washington & Lee University, received a Master of Divinity Degree from Virginia Seminary in Alexandria, Virginia and was awarded a PhD in the areas of biblical studies and psychology by the Graduate Theological Union and the University of California in Berkeley.
Bill served Episcopal congregations for over twenty-five years in Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina. A Fellow of the College of Preachers of the National Cathedral in Washington, DC, he has been a member of the Board of Trustees of the Virginia Seminary. He has served as Minister of Education at the Myers Park Baptist Church, a progressive Baptist congregation in Charlotte, North Carolina, and previously as Executive Director of The Educational Center in St. Louis. He and his wife Shirley now live in Alexandria, Virginia.
Bill is the author of two books of sermons, the most recent of which is Just Because It Didn't Happen: Sermons and Prayers as Story. As an aid to leaders using this method of biblical education he has written Awakening the Fire Within: A Primer for Issue-Centered Education, available from the Educational Center. Together with Associate Editor Caren Goldman, he has published Finding Jesus: Discovering Self.
EDITOR - The Reverend D. Andrew Kille, PhD
Andrew Kille began as Editor of BibleWorkbench in 2008. Andrew graduated from Stanford University (A.B., English Literature) and the American Baptist Seminary of the West (M.Div) before earning his Ph.D. from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley in psychology and biblical studies. He has become one of the leaders in the field of psychological biblical criticism, and currently is Chair of the Psychology and Biblical Studies Section of the Society of Biblical Literature.
Ordained in the American Baptist tradition, Andrew has been a pastor, teacher, liturgical musician and retreat leader. He has taught spirituality, psychology and the Bible for many years. He currently works with Interfaith Space, building interfaith relations in San Jose, California. He is the author of Psychological Biblical Criticism, co-editor with Wayne G. Rollins of Psychological Insight into the Bible, co-editor with Dereck Daschke of A Cry Instead of Justice: The Bible and Cultures of Violence in Psychological Perspective, and writer of many articles on psychology and the Bible. He has led a BibleWorkbench group in San Jose.
Andrew comes to BibleWorkbench by way of experience with seminars offered by the Guild for Psychological Studies and by Walter Wink, Jerry Drino, and Bill Dols. He has served as President of the Board for Four Springs Seminars, the seminar grounds where Guild Seminars have been held for over fifty years. He and his wife Pamela, a clinical psychologist, live in San Jose.
ASSOCIATE EDITORS
Kathie Collins ~ Kathie began participating in Bible Workbench groups under the leadership of Bill Dols at the Myers Park Baptist Church in 1995. Since then, she has led groups in a variety of settings in and out of church, and written several Sundays. Kathie is a yoga instructor who finds that her work with this Eastern Practice informs and inspires her relationship with the Bible. A graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill, she is currently pursuing mythological studies at the Pacifica Graduate Institute in California. Kathie lives in Charlotte, NC, with her husband and their five children.
Caren Goldman ~ Caren is an award-winning writer, editor, communications and conflict resolution consultant and seminar leader. She and her husband Ted Voorhees are co-directors of the Berkana Center for Psychospiritual and Mythological Studies. She is the author of Finding Jesus: Discovering Self (with Bill Dols), and Across the Threshold, into the Questions (will Ted Voorhees), and Healing Words for the Body, Mind and Spirit along with her soon to be published book, Restoring Life's Missing Pieces. Caren and her husband reside in St. Augustine, Florida and Asheville, North Carolina.
Beth Harrison ~ Beth Harrison taught philosophy and religion at Northern Virginia Community College for forty years before retiring in 2010. She established the Women's Center there, and is currently co-chair (with Dr. Jill Biden) of the Women's Mentoring Project. She has been involved with Bible Workbench since its inception, as leader, then as writer and associate editor.
Caroline Penniman Wohlforth (1932 – 2011) ~ Caroline Penniman Wohlforth was in her teens when her father, Dr. Charles Penniman, became the Executive Director of The Educational Center in St. Louis. She grew up knowing and supporting the work of the Center, and throughout her life that never changed. As a long-time associate and devoted friend of the Center, Caroline contributed to its mission in innumerable and immeasurable ways. She served on the Board of Directors (as did her husband, Eric), was a writer and Associate Editor for BibleWorkbench, and in all ways was a fearless pioneer in education--religious and secular. Caroline lived in Alaska where she co-founded KSKA public radio and KAKM public television, was appointed to the Alaska Public Broadcasting Commission in 1980 by the governor of Alaska, and was recently inducted into the Alaska Women's Hall of Fame. Her talents, dedication, and enthusiasm will be greatly missed.
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History of BibleWorkbench
Seven people with varied backgrounds but with a common desire to create a new vital approach to the Bible came together in Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina in 1979 and gave birth to what became the BibleWorkbench program. They wereclergy and lay, counselors and preachers, but they all had common prior experience in Educational Center issued-oriented education.
A fresh and lively way of engaging scripture emerged from this meeting. Because of their experience in issue-oriented experiential education, they developed materials that were not a scripted curriculum but powerful resources for small groups.
A guiding principle from the start was pioneer Christian educator Charles Penniman's insight that "the student is the curriculum." This means that any group discussion will be fashioned by each unique group, challenged to hear the Spirit speaking through the Bible itself rather than creeds and doctrine.
As the program has evolved, the value of the BibleWorkbench method for groups has proven itself also valuable as a resource for preaching. In a radical shift from traditional preaching, the preacher delivers the biblical text rather than his or her interpretation of the text, along with insight and questions that equip the listener to hear what is needed to be heard.
The resource developed in three years into today's BibleWorkbench. Behind this name was the sense that the Bible was not some finished product to be interpreted, but always and ever an invitation to hard work, seeing how the story is alive in their lives here and now. Click here to subscribe today!
