Saturday, November 26th, 2022.
In November of 2022, during Jeopardy’s Tournament of Champions the final Jeopardy clue was given under the subject of New Testament, “Paul’s letter to them is the New Testament epistle with the most Old Testament quotations.” One contestant answered, “Who are the Hebrews?”, while the other answered “Who are the Romans?”. “Who are the Hebrews” was counted correct, though Paul did not write Hebrews, nor does Hebrews contain more Old Testament quotations than Romans.
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Recently, Jeopardy threw Christianity a bone with its final jeopardy question in their Tournament of Champions*.
Long story short: it concerned the author of Hebrews, and the show got the answer wrong, costing the player with the right answer the championship and a lot of money.
This caused the followers of Jeopardy (including many Christian “experts”) to do something you would never see done in church. Swift, accurate, zealous, loud rebuke and correction!
Oh the tweets and articles that flew!
“Wrong!” “Inaccurate!” “Check yourself!” “Actually, Romans has the most OT quotes, and most now agree that Paul did not write it!”
This was all done in love, of course. Love for the game, and love for the truth…excuse me… right answer in final jeopardy.
After all, money was on the line, proper outcomes were altered, and reputation for the game could be questioned.
It is not as if we were in church, which does not collect any money, determine any permanent or eternal outcomes, and has no reputation to speak of. (Oh, wait…)
Pastors have been casually saying Paul wrote Hebrews in churches for a long long time. They are just as wrong as Jeopardy.
If we demanded church doctrine be as accurate as Final Jeopardy, or were as zealous to issue corrections, or cry foul as they are at the World Cup, Super Bowl, or game shows, then perhaps what is spoken about the Bible in the church would be as important as what is spoken about the Bible outside it.
Then again, maybe I am making too much over a game. As modern church teaches us, Jeopardy should just agree to disagree, hold love for its contestants over true answers, and just be glad we can all hum the theme song together.
(Nah… They were wrong.)
Final answer,
Justin “reprove, rebuke, correct” Johnson