Understanding the Bible

In case you missed yesterday, I wanted to put down the basics of what we talked about.

First off, we introduced the book, "30 Days to Understanding The Bible" by Max Anders.  It is an awesome book and I more than highly recommend ALL of you purchasing a copy.  Here is a link to Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Days-Understanding-Bible-Max-Anders/dp/1418545945/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1321388532&sr=1-1

We started in Chapter one and took a very "zoomed out" look at the Bible.  You can get some of the handouts that I gave out last night by following this link  http://thomasnelson.com/consumer/dept.asp?dept_id=1117220&TopLevel_id=210000&category=30_Days_to_Understanding_the_Bible_Presentation_Images

Like I said, we started looking at the Bible as if we were looking at the Earth from outer space!  We can see in the picture above North America.  If we were to use Google Earth, we could zoom in to America, then Wisconsin, then Rhinelander, and then even to your house!!!

That's what we tried to do last night - give you the "globe" perspective of the Bible.  We will in coming weeks "zoom in" and look at more specific things, but for now we wanted to get a firm understanding of the basics.

You will remember a couple of weeks ago when I was talking about the guy at the grocery store!  "Where's the canned beets" I asked.  "Oh they are in aisle 6, halfway down on the third shelf from the top".  We wouldn't stop and worship him because he knew where the canned beets are (I really don't know why I chose canned beets - they are nasty!!!), rather we expect him to know where things are in his store.

That should be the same thing for us as Christians - we should know where things are in the Bible.  That way when a friend is in need you can say, "Why don't you check out ....." and God can really use you in a mighty way.  But unfortunately, most Christians - adults included have very little knowledge of where things are in the Bible.  We are attempting to change that!

Here is the Powerpoint from last night.  Remember, the information that is in this comes from Max Anders' book "30 Days to Understanding The Bible".

To set the stage, it is important for you to understand the basic "skeleton" of the Bible.  Go through the slide show and review the information there.  A couple of things aren't spelled out in it - they are:

1.  In the Old Testament there are:

17 Historical books (Genesis through Esther)
5 Poetical books (Job through Song of Solomon)
17 Prophetical books (Isaiah through Malachi)
               Isaiah through Daniel are the Major Prophets
               Hosea through Malachi are the Minor Prophets

2.  In the New Testament there are:

5 Historical books (Matthew through Acts)
13 Pauline Epistles (Romans through Philemon)(Books written by Paul)
9 General Epistles (Hebrews through Revelation)



Why is this important?  When you need to study the history of the nation of Israel, you wouldn't go to the General Epistles!  When you want to learn about Jesus' life you wouldn't go to the Poetical books!  Knowing where to look to get specific information will help you in studying the Bible.  Rather than getting frustrated and giving up - you can be confident about knowing exactly where to look!!!

Here is the worksheet that we passed out as well.  Download it and fill out the information.  My goal would be for you to start a folder with all the handouts in it!





More to come this week.  Work on memorizing the books of the Bible.  Memorize the number of the different types of books as well.

God bless,

Chris