Devotional and Bible

5 January 2015

Memorization 2015

In a recent post I explained the overall plan for this year. I just wanted to stop by again to give a few specifics.

As you know, during the last five months of 2014 I worked at memorizing Philippians. The recommendation from the booklet we’ve been using is to recite it daily for 100 more days.

So I’m going to do that more or less. I know that I don’t get to memorize every day without fail, so if I recite it every chance I get to mid-May that should more or less do it. After that the idea is to continue reciting it once a week.

Regarding memorizing John, I should be about 12% through the book by mid-May at the current pace (which is memorizing about 5-6 verses per week. You could do that, couldn’t you?). After that, I may pick things up a bit to finish the book either by the end of 2015 or 2016.

So here’s the plan:

January: Memorize to John 1:24
February: Memorize to John 1:46
March: Memorize to John 2:19
April: Memorize to John 3:17
May 15: Memorize to John 3:29

I would love for you to join me, but whether you do or not it is helpful to have the accountability of publishing my intentions here. 😉 I admit, I’m enjoying John so far!

Whatever you do, be sure to study God’s Word in 2015!

3 January 2015

If You Missed This, You Missed Christmas.

Jim Devotional and Bible 1

I woke up on Christmas morning and turned on the radio. I was greeted with the familiar words…

O holy night! The stars are brightly shining,
It is the night of our dear Saviour’s birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
‘Til He appear’d and the soul felt its worth.
Except one line was changed… sin was completely removed. I think instead of “sin and error” it was “fear and sorrow”.

Of course there was fear and sorrow in the world – then again, some people were (according to their own opinion) doing just fine, thank you very much.

So what were people waiting for? And what was the promise of the new Messiah?

Apparently the modern translation of Christmas is that it is all about love and peace. Oddly enough, love isn’t explicitly mentioned by the Gospel writers when they speak of Jesus’ birth.

Of course peace is in the message of the angels – “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” (Luke 2:14)

It also shows up in the prophecy about John the Baptist – he would guide our feet into the way of peace (Luke 1:79).

But it doesn’t seem like this peace is an absence of war on earth, but peace with God. A solution to the problem – not just a problem of fear and sorrow, but of sin.

Sometimes we get the impression that the people of Palestine were simply waiting for deliverance – deliverance from the Romans, of course. But even if that were true, it’s also the case that many people believed that Israel was being punished – for her sins.

Back to the prophecy of John’s birth. The angel said that he would “turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God” (Luke 1:16), a metaphor for repentance. He would also turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, averting God’s judgement (see Malachi 4:5-6, the last verse in the Old Testament).

John’s father did prophecy a deliverance, but listen to what else he said:

…that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.

(Luke 1:74-79)

By God’s mercy His people would be delivered from their sins to live in holiness and righteousness. In fact, according to Malachi, to walk in peace goes hand in hand with turning other people from their sin (Malachi 2:6). The “way of peace” is contrasted in Isaiah with sinful living and injustice (Isaiah 59:7-9).

In fact, the baby was named Jesus because he would “save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21). Jesus (translated from the Hebrew in the Old Testament as “Joshua”) means “Yahweh Saves”.

The shepherds were told that Jesus was a Saviour (Luke 2:11). Simeon confirmed that Jesus was God’s “salvation” (Luke 2:30). Candles without Light

Even the Gospel of John, where the author speaks of the Word who enters the world from eternity, speaks of Jesus bringing life and light to a dead, dark world. In the same chapter, John the Baptist explains that Jesus “takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

If Christmas was only a hope for peace, we’ve missed the point. If the birth of Jesus only demonstrated that God has some generally good feelings toward humans, we really have missed Christmas.

And the world is being told, even by “Christians”, that everything is fine. Jesus has come, and everything is going to be ok for everyone.

But what John says is something different. Some indeed receive the Christ and become children of God – they are born again. But those who do not receive Him can expect only wrath (John 1:12-13; John 3:36)

For the repentant, God through Jesus removes the barrier of sin, teaching us to walk in holiness and righteousness without fear (Luke 1:74-79; Titus 2:11-14).

A world suffering from violence and fear and sorrow is being conned – without knowing the problem, they never find the solution. They missed Christmas.

And now Christmas is passed, and we’re in the new year. Are we thankful for the forgiveness of sins? Are we learning to walk in holiness? Are we turning people from their sin? If so, we really can live in the light of the birth of the Christ all year long.

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people,
training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions,
and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age,
waiting for our blessed hope,
the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ,
who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness
and to purify for himself a people for his own possession
who are zealous for good works.

(Titus 2:11-14)

30 December 2014

Finishing Philippians … and … next?

Jim Devotional and Bible 0

We’re almost done with memorizing Philippians.

Well, actually, according to the system we’ve been using, we still have 100 days to go over the book every day. That’s excellent, because obviously the early parts of the book are going to be better memorized than the latter parts. I’m still a little shaky in chapter three, and am working to get chapter four down properly, although I am working on the last two verses today and tomorrow.

Overall, I’m happy with the way this is going. This seems to work for me for a number of reasons.

Practically speaking, I’ve found that I’ve been able to use the verses 1) in personal life 2) in family life 3) in the life of the church (for example using the book in sermons). There have been times I’ve literally quoted parts of the book in my sleep, and that’s pretty cool.

So this has been a tremendous benefit already, and if I can really get it even more deeply memorized I’m sure it will be useful for the rest of my life.

So then, the question is, what to memorize next?

I kind of wanted to go with a longer book after doing a trial run in Philippians. But which book?

There were a number of possibilities that came to mind. There are certain books that I may tend to use more in ministry here, just because of the nature of the book, although hopefully we are sharing “the whole counsel of God” withe people. But Romans, for example, is a great book to memorize. Maybe not as exciting as it could be, because I did basically memorize it a number of years ago. But Romans is always worthy of more study.

Another book I tend to use a lot because of the culture/circumstances that we’re in is Hebrews. Hebrews is also handy because it could be memorized in one year at about the same pace as we went through Philippians. There aren’t many books that fit well into a year. (The closest would be Daniel, but we would have to go a little faster to fit it in.)

An Old Testament book would be great to memorize, such as Genesis or Isaiah, but those are very long books. Once you get under 400 verses in the OT, you get into the very tiny prophets mostly.

There are also the Gospels, any of which would be great to start with. They all have their own benefits. But they’re all pretty long too, with Mark being the shortest.

But I think I might bite the bullet and go with the Gospel of John.

Now John is long, but not like Genesis or Isaiah. According to our list in the memorization booklet, it’s 879 verses. At the pace we memorized Philippians (which we did in five months), that’s somewhere around 3.5 years of memorizing.

One bonus of memorizing John is that we’re going through it this year (and possibly beyond?) on Sunday mornings at church. It’s by a different author, and it’s a different genre, even though we’re still in the NT. And obviously it’s a fantastic book!

Also, memorizing a large book is a bit different from memorizing a small book like Philippians. You can look at the booklet yourself for instructions (see this post), but I’ll try to talk about it more early in the year. There are also ways to memorize at a faster pace.

So probably what I’ll try to do is go at about the same pace for the first 100 days of 2015, while I’m also reviewing Philippians every day. Then we’ll see how it’s going, and maybe pick up the pace to memorize the rest of the book in less time. Either by the end of 2015, or maybe by the end of 2016.

If you memorized Philippians, how did it go? Are you going to try to memorize another book in 2015? Which book? Anyone want to take a shot at John?

6 November 2014

Memorizing Philippians? An Update.

Jim Devotional and Bible 0

If you’re trying to memorize Philippians by the end of the year with me, you should ideally be around Philippians 3:6 or Philippians 3:7. I’m “finished” Philippians 3:4, so just slightly behind.

One thing I have noticed about this whole memorization scheme is that it is very hard to catch up, because it’s all based on repetition. You could, I suppose, do a verse in the morning and a verse at night, but it really is ideal to just do a verse a day — which means if you fall behind, it’s hard to catch up.

Of course I’ve built in a little leeway, so I’m mostly still just doing a verse a day.

Anyway, I’m overall very happy with the Davis method (read more here).

Anyway, back to the passage itself. A lot about unselfishness, sacrifice, and persecution. We have the wonderful passage in the first part of chapter 2 about Jesus’ self-sacrifice on the cross (Philippians 2:5-11).

All of this is an illustration of how we should look to the interests of others. And Timothy and Epaphroditus are examples of this. Timothy, who faithfully served with Paul for the sake of the Gospel, even when others were more concerned with their own affairs (Philippians 2:19-22). And Epaphroditus, who risked his life for the Gospel, and is obviously concerned about others (Philippians 2:25-30).

Now Paul is launching into a wonderful passage, where he will show how Christ is of more value than anything else.

So if you’re still memorizing, even if you’re well behind, keep going! I know there are a few of you who started out with me – feel free to leave a comment and let us know how it’s going.

5 November 2014

Origins of the New Testament: Recommended Reading

Jim Devotional and Bible, News and current issues 0

Earlier this year as I was preparing to do the Where did the Bible Come From? seminar for the first time in English (I’ve done it more than once in Spanish), I decided to do a little reading to update/improve my knowledge on the topic. I thought some of you might be interested in a few of the books I read.

The first is The Heresy of Orthodoxy. This was without doubt my favourite. The author is Michael J. Kruger, and in the book he discusses the theory that Christianity slowly emerged from a jumbled stew of ideas in the first and second century.

You’ve heard this one before – “Jesus didn’t found Christianity. It was created by political forces long after he died.” Or, “There was no one Christianity during the first hundred years of the church – there was diversity!”

This is an absolutely fascinating book, because not only does it explore the origins of Christianity, it also provides a mirror to see what our culture looks like and how it thinks. I would highly recommend this book to anyone. I can almost guarantee that it will change the way you think about the early days of the New Testament.

Next, The Gospel and the Greeks: Did the New Testament Borrow from Pagan Thought?

Well, that’s the question. Was the story of Jesus really based on Greco-Roman gods and goddesses? Isn’t the story of the cross and resurrection just one among many stories of gods dying and rising?

I have to admit, the answer this book gives surprised me a little. Oh, of course I didn’t think that the Jesus story was invented out of mythical stories of the ancient world. But – wouldn’t you think that the ancient prophecies of the coming Messiah would be copied into pagan religions over the centuries? In fact, the story of the Messiah is much more different from the stories of the religions around it than I imagined.

This is not a long book, but it’s very academic – lots of “this scholar says this” and “that scholar says that” (you’ve been warned). But if this is a topic you really want to delve into, it’s a great place to start. Ronald Nash has done his homework.

For a book on a much more popular level, check out Cold-Case Christianity: A Homicide Detective Investigates the Claims of the Gospels. The author, J. Warner Wallace, was a cold case detective and former atheist. He brings his knowledge of evidence and investigation to the New Testament.

I don’t always buy the author’s approach. But for a believer, the book does shed some interesting light on the evidence that we have for the New Testament. It also helps us to think through what kind of “evidence” we should expect if the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection is true.

You might be surprised to hear about some of the evidence we have for the New Testament books in those (for most of us) murky, unknown days after the apostles died.

Here’s another one to check out. It’s not one of the new ones I read, but one that I read when I first put together the seminar. Although I don’t always agree with the author, it is a very short, easy-to-read overview of the topic. It’s How We Got the Bible by Neil R. Lightfoot.

This book also has the sublime advantage that it’s available in both English and Spanish (Comprendamos Como Se Formo la Biblia)!

There you go, I’ve given away a few of my sources. But of course you’ll learn a lot more about the origins of the Old and New Testaments if you take the seminar yourself someday! 😉

By the way, if you’d like to help as I continue to develop this seminar and other materials, feel free to be kind and buy me a book or two! I have my eye on a couple of related books at the moment. One is The Popular Handbook of Archaeology and the Bible, but most of all another by the author of the first book I mentioned, Canon Revisited: Establishing the Origins and Authority of the New Testament Books. Maybe those two would be useful to you too (although I haven’t read them myself yet).

Anyway, I hope that was a help to someone!

3 November 2014

Clement and the Corinthians

Jim Devotional and Bible 0

Recently I re-read the epistle of Clement to the Corinthians. The letter was probably written shortly after Revelation was written, and the author had likely been an associate of the Apostle Paul. (Although the book is anonymous, the evidence points to Clement, a leader of the Church in Rome and likely the fellow mentioned in Philippians 4:3.)

What I didn’t know about the epistle specifically is that Clement apparently includes over 800 allusions and quotes from the Bible. In fact, about 3/4 of those are from the New Testament.

Now that’s pretty amazing, because the New Testament has just been written. Clement obviously was immersed in both the OT and NT, in order to use all these quotes. Not only that, he expected his readers to catch the quotes (even though he didn’t always mention where they were from)!

I caught a lot of them – probably not all – did the average church member in Corinth know the whole Bible better than me? It makes one think.

This is also another bit of evidence that the majority of the Bible was well known, copied and distributed all over place, read and considered authoritative very early on.

Anyway, if you’d like to read more about the epistle, here’s an interesting article – Clement of Rome. Also, the majority of the works of the early Church Fathers (Ante Nicene) can be found for the Kindle free here.

But in the meantime, how about a quote from the epistle itself?

Finally may the all-seeing God and Master of spirits and Lord of all flesh, who chose the Lord Jesus Christ, and us through Him for a peculiar people, grant unto every soul that is called after His excellent and holy Name faith, fear, peace, patience, long-suffering, temperance, chastity and soberness, that they may be well pleasing to His Name through our High priest and Guardian Jesus Christ, through whom to Him be glory and majesty, might and honour, both now and forever and ever. Amen.

«‹ 29 30 31 32 ›»