Author: mrwerner

Revelation has this stigma of a powerful and sometimes scary book of the Bible that people see as a prophecy. People have formed conspiracies about an anti-Christ based on the number 666. I think that this is very interesting because we want to make the world revolve around us. By conspiring about people in the present day who could be the anti-Christ and start the ending of known humanity, it upholds that we are very self-centered. The author of Revelation wrote to the people of their time, not to the current population on Earth. They made it understandable to all people so everyone would be able to realize the message that was being written.

I think that it was important for historians and archaeologists to find some physical evidence that Jesus could have walked the Earth. While this piece still has many unanswered questions, I believe that it will help historians understand what might be left behind to prove the existence of Jesus. I had never heard of this discovery before, and think it is interesting to see the different cultural practices from the past. Since it is extremely hard to find evidence and definitively say that it was from one specific era and shows evidence for the existence of stories that we hear, finding these breakthrough pieces help paint a clearer picture of what the past was like. In the instance of James, Jesus’ brother, I think that it is important that we understand what type of person that we think that he was and how he might have followed and practiced religion. Especially, when looking for evidence of Jesus.

I had never thought of having to interpret Paul’s letters from one side as he was in conversation with the other party. By reading it in this light, we infer what the conversation was up to that point. It is a fine line in which we walk to understand the context. We need to know what the social aspects were from whence he was writing and how teachings from Jesus would fall into what Paul was teaching to the people he was writing to. There was a strong emphasis on treating others the same no matter their background. I think when interpreting Paul’s letters, we should take into consideration that he was spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It might be easy to get wrapped up in the situation that you are facing at times, but taking time to include others might be what Paul would have preached in today’s society. In communication with others, we take the other party into consideration and how they might react if the situation is more important but should be done in all circumstances. Especially what is going on around us, we all are going through it and we should all take the other party into consideration before spouting off and potentially hurting others.

Women have been silenced and are still being silenced from the Bible and in society. There are many stories about women in the Bible, but these are usually short and do not get the attention that the Biblical stories with male characters get. Some of the stories do not even contain the names of the women. These stories are not to be discounted from the impact of the ministry of Jesus. While the women did not hold a place in society as men did, they are still to be accounted for. An instance of the silencing of women in the Bible is that women and children were not counted with the men in the story of the loaves and fish or anytime Jesus taught to a large crowd. Because these women were not counted as people in the Bible, this mentality has bled into our current thinking of women. I think that there are instances that we try to rationalize such as not covering the story about the woman because her name was not mentioned, or she did not occur in many places in the Bible. It is in those instances that you can think about how we have knowledge about the history of women and how they fit in the ancient society. By using the existing knowledge of ancient societies and the role of women we can conjecture what would have occurred in these stories. We know enough about human nature and ancient societies, why can’t we think outside of the box and bring the experiences of women to light in the Bible? Or if it is a struggle to focus on one story of the women, compare the stories, and look on a deeper level to how they might have felt based on your own experiences.

The Gospels Matthew, Mark, and Luke overlap in some of their stories and John is different from these. The stories that do overlap have some sort of connection between all of them. It is assumed that the authors wrote the Gospels separate from each other. The big question posed is why does it matter that we compare these Gospels? By putting these in conversation with one another, it allows us to see what the author valued and how they saw some events as opposed to the other disciples. This is parallels to the comparison between the story of a victim and the story of the perpetrator. On one hand the victim sees the event as a big deal, and they remember the details vividly. The perpetrator does not see the importance of the event and will downplay it to try and normalize their actions. How they present their story shows what they want to highlight and what they want the audience to understand about the event. The authors of the Gospels write in the same way. They have their own theme that they want to highlight so the audience understands what the big takeaways from Jesus’ time on Earth propagates the will of God.

It is interesting to see how the gospels are different from one another including what information that is in each one. There are times that we get in a habit of letting our preconceived notions and beliefs shade the reading of the texts. The most significant time being when reading through the story of Jesus’ youth. From the manger scene, which was part of the house, to the number of magi, when they came and what their profession was. Our version of the Christmas story as shown in pageants most of the time is not representative of the real story as accounted for in the Bible. Moreover, this preconception makes it harder for us to accept some of the aspects of the Bible. Some of this might even feed into the understanding of each of the gospels. For Matthew, there is a focus on the inclusion of all people. This permeates into the message that God was trying to send to people on Earth through Jesus. The genealogy of Jesus includes women, the angel spoke to Mary instead of Joseph, and the crowds that Jesus spoke to were all diverse. When viewed in pieces the stories line up to have the aspects of Jesus including all people, but once we get out of viewing the stories from a shaded aspect, we can see that there is more to the scriptures than what meets the eye.

I have been exposed to many Psalms and translations into songs because I grew up in the church and was part of a choir. Just a short time ago, I took on the task of reading through the whole book of Psalm. Through the influences around me, I have found a liking in Psalm 139. This is because in choir we sang a song composed by Alan Pote titled Psalm 139 and it is one of the chapters that I refer to it often as it relates to my life. What the verse encompasses is simply that God knows you and knows your every movement, struggle, and who you truly are. Each year the people who graduated from our choir would come back and we would all sing this song. With every year we would have a bigger and bigger group because of the number of people who graduated. When we sang this song together it was such a powerful moment in which we could all relate to each other and unite in this one song that we all knew. The message always rang clear through the congregation and through the singers. I know it resonated with me. It is something that I can find strength in and other people can too. When there is a shared feeling of comfort, people can unite with a common goal. Not just in this one Psalm, but in many Psalms, people can relate to the struggles and joys that are felt by the narrator. I believe therefore the book of Psalms is one of the most relatable books in the Bible. It is so convenient to get to as well (most of the time you can open the Bible in the middle and you will be in Psalm). It is easy to find something that is in Psalm that at one point in time anyone could relate to.

We talked about the different proverbs in languages and then connected these to how Job was speaking about his troubles. Proverbs are little sayings that are based on observation rather than much knowledge of something. These usually connect with real life and have a deeper meaning. Some of these even remind me of little ‘life hacks.’ For example, honesty is the best policy, actions speak louder than words, and a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. It highlights an obvious action and offers the audience to learn from it to create a better community where they find themselves in society. I see this in the book of Job. He speaks of his tragedies in poetic form and is speaking to God in the questions that he poses, especially in the last verses of the book. However, these questions can be viewed from the reader as questions for themselves to answer. Specifically, in chapter 38:31-35, the questions point towards what you can do and ask impossible actions from a human. Then he answers by asking questions from chapter 38:36-38 about who can do these impossible actions. It is by that point that readers try and think of someone or something that could possibly do what is being posed. Which turns the reader to God; he can do all these things. This is where Christians find their hope and faith. They know who can form everything, so they believe in God with greater faith. The emphasis of the poetic verse gets the reader believing in God so that they will turn to him in troubled times. Therefore, the reader uses God as an answer to their questions in life. Like a proverb, in real life, people will experience hardship, and when they are posed to act, they turn to God to help them through their trials.

When the first commandment is saying that you shall have no other Gods above me, the meaning is that if there are other gods, then don’t let them consume your life over God. I have always interpreted this commandment that the other things that we can worship are the distractions that we encounter in life. It could be your phone, social media, another person, or an object. When in the context of today, these things make sense. However, in the context of ancient Israel, this could mean other gods that people worshipped. As Christianity started forming, a monotheistic religion was forming and moving away from the polytheistic religions that dominated before. Why people believed in multiple gods were to have someone to access explicitly for one reason such as fertility, rain, or harvest. All major things that the ancient people relied on to make a good life for themselves, they had a god for. In the emergence of the prophets speaking of one God that would unite the world through sending his only son down to earth to live, teach, and ultimately die for the sins of all, people were scared, but also hopeful. Under one God, who loves us and cherishes each person for who they are, it can serve as a uniting factor for people. While each person goes through different things, they can rely on a uniting figure to follow and to pray to in their lives.

There are many prophets in the Bible and sometimes the people see it as a threat or as someone bearing false witness to what God has bestowed on them. I recently watched a show that featured a person playing John the Baptist. Nicodemus, the rabbi, was talking to him while John was imprisoned, and John talked about how Jesus was the son of God, the savior of the world, Nicodemus got angry because all he wanted to know what Jesus’ name was. If he wanted to know this out of curiosity to figure out how to warn others about him or to spread the news about him was unknown, but others before him and around him wanted to know out of pure fear because they thought that Jesus would overthrow them on their thrown. There were those who were scared of the prophecies, others who were interested, and some who thought that the prophet was crazy, and they wanted the prophet dead. A specific example that is widely known is the act of King Herod to kill all of the children under two years of age in his kingdom because he heard about Jesus and was worried that Jesus would dethrone him. This action connects to today how people worry too much about what could happen, and they do not focus on the present