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ОглавлениеMany people revere and respect the Bible, but very few people have actually read it. This is because the Bible can be very intimidating. It’s a gargantuan collection of books, written long ago by over forty different authors. People disagree about how it should be read and what the stories mean. Blessed to Bless is a basic introduction to the Bible and those complexities.
What you read here is the result of an invitation given to the parents of fifth through eighth graders at Casady School in Oklahoma City, a pre-K through twelfth grade Episcopal preparatory day school. Middle school students at Casady move through a four-year survey of the Bible, studying the Hebrew Scriptures (what Christians call the Old Testament) in the first three years and then they do an introduction of the Christian Scriptures (or the New Testament) in the fourth year. Parents are invited to read through the Bible during the school year following the same pace as their child. When we began, I expected fifteen or so to be interested. I was surprised when over ninety parents showed interest! A website was set up in which I posted the same reading assignments the students were given in class along with commentary. These have become the chapters of this book.
I often tell my students that religion (and in this case the Bible) is like baseball. It can be as complicated as you want it to be (with all the variables of pitcher and batter statistics, superstitions, and the like) or it can be simple (a bunch of folks playing catch). This introduction tries to be simple and basic, but at times will point out the potential complexities of certain stories and ideas within the Bible. It is far from a comprehensive explanation of the Bible, but it will serve you as a foundation for deeper study.
Does this book have a religious agenda? Yes and no. Casady School, like many Episcopal day schools, has students from a wide range of religious backgrounds. The school’s population is comprised of Evangelical, Catholic, and Orthodox Christian families, as well as Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist families. We also have a number of nonreligious families, including intentionally science-driven secular families. Our school loves and respects these families; we do not aggressively attempt to proselytize our students.
On the other hand, because we respect our students and families, I’m honest about my own faith and understanding of the scriptures. I am an Episcopal priest who was raised in a Baptist, evangelical home. I do think God is at work in the world, present in the day-to-day lives of people, and that the essence of those interactions and hopes are expressed within the Bible. That is why I’ve entitled this book, Blessed to Bless. God blesses the entire world through the life of Jesus Christ and then invites us to join in this relational equation. Ultimately, I will be pointing this out to you as you move through the Bible, but it is done with respect for my diverse audience. I share Jesus, but I do so in the same way I sense Jesus shared himself: honestly, generously, and nonanxiously. As I walk you through the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, it is my hope that you will sense this at work.
This book is for people like these students and their parents. If you are a Christian and you want a basic introduction to the Bible, this book is for you. If you are not religious but you want to have a sense of what the Bible contains and what it means to Christians, this book is also for you. It can be read together as parent and child; it can be used with a group of parents reading the Bible together with their children, and it can be used for a Sunday school class for teens or adults. It’s for all types of beginners as well as those who want a refresher of the scope of our salvation story.
How to Use This Book
Each chapter begins with a reading assignment from the Bible. Do not skip this. I write the commentary assuming you have read that particular text of scripture. If you skip it, the chapter’s content might seem to have a stranger rhythm than if you did read the biblical passage first. In order to get the most out of this survey, read the biblical text first, usually three to five Bible chapters (about the length of three to five normal pages), then read the guide here. Each chapter ends with a few questions for you to consider and discuss.
If you decide to read two chapters of this book each week, you will complete this survey of the Bible in about one year’s time, depending on your consistency. Keep in mind that you will not be reading the Bible in its entirety. This book is a survey, which introduces you to the larger framework of the Bible, not every word. Even so, if you read everything that is assigned, you will have read more of the Bible than the majority of the population, even most practicing Christians. And you will have a foundation upon which to read and study further.
Written on an eighth-grade reading level, there are times when I wanted to get into more complexity but chose not to do so. This is written for approximately the same age as those classroom students who inspired it, namely ten- to fifteen-year-olds. But there is no reason why it cannot be used for older teens and adults, especially ones who have no previous knowledge of the scriptures whatsoever. It is a basic introduction. You’ll also notice places set aside in the text called BVC. This is short for Bible Vocabulary Concept and will help define important concepts along the way as we read the Bible. They will also be listed alphabetically by book of the Bible in the appendix on page 313.
One of the resources I will refer to throughout this book that will help you is called The Bible Project. This group of theologians and artists have created short overview videos for each book of the Bible, as well as videos about various themes and word studies in the scriptures. These videos are wonderfully helpful to understanding your reading and for small group discussion. Visit www.thebibleproject.com.
It is important to mention that some stories in the Bible are rated “R” for violent or sexually charged content. These are difficult stories and some young adult readers may not have the critical thinking skills and sensitivity to understand them. If you are using this in a small group or classroom setting, it will require some discretion of the leader or teacher. Such warnings will be found in the Blessed to Bless Leader’s Guide, which is available online as a free download at www.blessedtobless.us or www.churchpublishing.org/blessedtobless. Some of those stories are mentioned in this book, but more generally (and vaguely) than if we dealt with them in their entirety.
What kind of Bible should you use? If you are new to the Bible, there are a couple of things you need to know. One, there are a wide variety of translations. The scriptures were written in three languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Translating from one language to another requires making decisions on what those words meant by those who wrote them. Sometimes this is straightforward and sometimes it is a puzzle with a variety of possibilities. Some Bibles tend to be more direct translations, which means they chose as close to the equivalent words in English as possible. When this is done, something may get lost in translation. Other Bibles tend to be a paraphrase, which means the translator shaped the English to capture the meaning intended by the author in ways a reader of English can understand. Most Bibles are somewhere in the middle of these two extremes. This book draws quotes from the Common English Bible (CEB), which is a combination of both approaches, depending on the passage.
Second, Bibles have what are commonly referred to as “chapter” and “verse.” The Bible was not written with these in place, but they were added later (circa fifteenth century) to help the reader locate places in the books.
Having said all of that, are you ready? Let’s start reading the Bible.
