Journal Week Eight As I read through our assigned chapters this week, I couldn 't help but think about what could have been. What if the nation of Israel (and Judah later on) would have truly followed after God? What if they would have submitted to His divine kingship, instead of the fallacious leadings of men? What if the children of the Lord would have "inclined their hearts" to His words, and not devoted themselves to forbidden idolatry? Time and time again, the choosen nation of Israel turned from God and His words. As a result, they wound themselves up into a whole multitude of issues. In their sin, they were consistently raided, enslaved, and butchered by other nations. If only they would have devoted their hearts, souls, and strength to God, they would have had rest in a peaceful land. The Israelites can serve as a great example to us that God 's way is alsways best, not matter how things appear to us. Also, I remember one particularily riveting passage that I read in Francis Chan 's "Forgotten God" that pertains to a popular story we read in 1 Kings. In Chan 's book, he draws a comparison between the prophets of Baal that Elijah faced on Mount Caramel and the modern church of today. Chan said that many times, like the pagans in the story, Christians …show more content…
There several passages that I have found in my ESV Bibles over the years that contain the following disclaimer before the ensuing verses: [SOME OF THE EARLIEST MANUSCRIPTS DO NOT INCLUDE (said chapter): (said verses)] One of the most predominant examples of this is the story of the adulterous woman brought before Jesus by the pharasees in John chapter 8. My question is, should pastors preach on these debated passages from the pulpit? Even if you believe that these verses are a part of the "true" Biblical Canon, would it be better to avoid teaching from them to steer clear from dispute? It 's a deep and interesting
LaHaye, Tim, and Ed Hindson. The Popular Encyclopedia of Bible Prophecy. Eugene, OR.: Harvest House Publishers, 2004.
...hooses to overlook the fact that Abraham tried to rape Temple and simply honor the ties of his family. And although under sinful conditions, these bonds are not corrupt. They are true and powerful. The names Abraham and Moses are blatant allusions to the figures of the Old Testament. In the Bible, these two men plant the seeds of civilization. And in a sense, Moses and Abraham are doing the same. Every family in the novel is. The world did not end. Temple comments on this progress saying, “As long as you’re movin, it don’t matter much where you’re goin or what’s chasin you. That’s why they call it progress. It keeps goin of its own accord” (85). The fate of the world is in the hands of the people who remain. Strengthened by the resilient bonds between who is left, the American family becomes the singular hope for progress to continue amongst the surrounding chaos.
The God You Thought You Knew: Exposing the 10 Biggest Myths about Christianity is a 203-page book written by Alex McFarland and published by Bethany House Publishers. It discusses ten common misconceptions about God and Christianity, and what the author thinks are the truths that refute those myths.
...e consequences would be incalculable…It had been a wise and human provision designed to keep the faithful in control even when, as had long ago become the case, they were heavily outnumbered by lesser men without the Covenant (Marion, 1969).
They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds; There is no one who does good. The Lord has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside, together they have become corrupt; There is no one who does good, not even one. Do all the workers of wickedness not know, who eat up my people as they eat bread, And do not call upon the Lord? There they are in great dread, For God is with the righteous generation. You would put to shame the counsel of the afflicted, But the Lord is his refuge. Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion! When the Lord restores His captive people, Jacob will rejoice, Israel will be
All comes to show, that Christianity took hold on the ancient world because it was easy, convenient and powerful. Christianity is a strong religion seeming as it still stands
In the introduction of her book The Epic of Eden, Richter argues that there are three main reasons that hinder Christians from reading the Old Testament: 1) the belief that the redemptive story is not present in the Old Testament and that God has changed since the New Testament, 2) the great barrier (differences in culture, history, geography, etc.), and 3) the “dysfunctional closet syndrome.” Of these, she believes the last is most challenging and most widespread among Christians today. Her
The pericope of that I choose for this reflection paper is Isaiah 11:1-9. The preceding literature unit of this pericope focuses on the topic how God uses Assyria for His redemptive purpose. In Isaiah 10:5, Isaiah explains the role of Assyria in God’s plan. Assyria is the rod of God’s anger. He uses it to punish Israel and Judah because they are two godless nations but full of idols (Isaiah 10:6,11). After God’s angers are poured out on two countries, the heart of Assyria becomes boastful. God turns His anger on His rod and punishes Assyria. In Isaiah 10:12-19, Assyria is depicted as a mighty forest and the judgment of God is portrayed as an axe will swing and chop down this mighty forest. Assyria will be destroyed and reduced to a very small number that a child can count (Isaiah 10:19). After the section about the destruction of Assyria, the text turns to the proclamation of the return of the remnant of Israel. The focal point of the text zooms out in the last verse of Isaiah chapter 10 to bring forth the final scene in which the remnant of Israel will return to their land while in the background Assyria is destroyed. The once mighty forest is no more.
Most Christians (or those religions that follow the basic principles of the Bible) believe in the stories told in the Bible. In fact, these stories are usually regarded not only as mere stories, but also as actual historical accounts of important people, events, and concepts of the Christian faith. However, stories of Greek and Roman mythology are typically regarded as nothing more than fictional, fantasy stories. The idea that Ancient Greeks viewed these stories to be their religion seems insane to many people of Biblical Faith. This idea seems to cast a stigma of irrationality, almost ignorance, upon the Ancient Greeks. Although placing this stigmatism on a long-dead culture may seem to be unimportant in much of the contemporary world, it is important because this long-dead culture represents the history of a large portion of the world (the Ancient Greek empire was much more vast than modern-day Greece). Just as many Americans would find it offensive to have their history as irrational and ignorant, it seems logical that Greeks might as well. Therefore, it is necessary to try and understand that both Ancient Greeks and Ancient Christians may have held similar beliefs about the world they were living in. The fact is that Greek myths contain unrealistic and unbelievable characters, events, and other elements, but upon comparison of Greek mythology stories with different Biblical accounts, it is apparent that some parallels between the two do exist, and that the Ancient Greeks view of the events of the early world are very similar to the views of both ancient and contemporary Christians.
Christianity is the most popular religion in the world. Consisting of over two billion followers worldwide, it has been around for over 2,000 years. Religion plays a significant part of many individuals’ lives. Various authors utilize literary elements to resemble religious ideas. The short stories, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor and “Sweat” by Zora Neal Hurston, sublimely portrays the lives of a false Christian and a true Christian.
Monroe Silver's The Abandoned of God furnishes readers with a unique spiritual tale which chronicles the turning points of the lives of its fictional characters with reminiscences entwined with history, humor, faith, and spirituality. This story manages to take you all over the place emotionally, and historically with an intriguing view of spiritually, embodied in a narrative fortified with moments of violent brutality, touching anecdotes, and mixes of fact and fiction, interspersed, with occasional spates of humor. The overall story is narrated by Mason Cole Stuart, the central character.
The Bible takes a unique turn in the book of 1 Samuel, Israel requests the appointment of an earthly king. The prophet Samuel warned them against trading their Divine King for an earthy one. In Matthew 7:13 Jesus told us, “..For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction..,” cautioning believers not to long to be like everyone else.
Surveying the Old Testament reveals the theme of God’s faithfulness to his people. In light of this understanding, the restoration of the Israelites prophesized in the Old Testament is essentially the fulfillment of every covenant with God. This perspective relates to the work of Christ and encourages any follower of God to trust in his faithfulness.
Lane, T. (2006). A concise history of christian thought (Completely ed.). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.
An Essay Answering Questions From the Assigned Text by Faure This essay will attempt to answer questions coming from the Bernard Faure text assigned to class. The questions are as follows: How does Hu Shih’s approach to Chan differ from D.T.? Suzuki’s. Why was the scholarship of the Japanese on Zen not objective? What does Faure mean by the teleological fallacy?