Quick Overview of the Bible

Jacoby Douglas A.

Description

Moses' world would hardly be recognizable today. David and Solomon, Isaiah and Nehemiah, Peter and Paul...all the biblical authors wrote to people whose mind-sets were very different from readers' today. Add to that the immensity of the Bible story...no wonder the Scriptures can be difficult to understand! Bible scholar Douglas Jacoby has taught Bible survey courses for more than 25 years, bridging the gulf between the biblical world and the twenty-first century. He uses clear, easy-to-understand language to explain the big picture of the Bible and show how the pieces fit together. Among the many compelling issues covered, readers will discover...the basic chronological outline of the Bible; the most important themes of the Old and New Testaments; and how the Bible relates to a twenty-first-century worldview. Perfect for personal or group use, this survey removes many of the barriers that keep people from understanding and enjoying the Bible.

Sujets

• Reference work

Informations

• Publié par: Harvest House Publishers, Inc.
• Date de parution: 01 mars 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9780736944250
• Langue: English

Extrait

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS EUGENE, OREGON
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version NIV . Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Verses marked ESV are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Verses marked HCSB are taken from the Holman Christian Standard Bible , Copyright 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Holman Christian Standard Bible , Holman CSB , and HCSB are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers.
Cover by Dugan Design Group, Bloomington, Minnesota
Cover photo Mele Avery / Fotolia
A QUICK OVERVIEW OF THE BIBLE
Copyright 2012 by Douglas A. Jacoby
Published by Harvest House Publishers
Eugene, Oregon 97402
www.harvesthousepublishers.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Jacoby, Douglas A.
A quick overview of the Bible / Douglas Jacoby.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-0-7369-4424-3 (pbk.)
ISBN 978-0-7369-4425-0 (eBook)
1. Bible-Introductions. I. Title.
BS475.3.J33 2012
220.6 1-dc23
2011033505
All rights reserved . No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means-electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any other-except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Printed in the United States of America
12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 / LB-SK / 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To my brother, Steve
CONTENTS
Part 1: Getting Started
1. The Big Picture
2. A Story in Four Dimensions
3. Tongues, Translation, and Transmission
Part 2: The First Testament
4. Introducing the Old Testament
5. The God of the Old Testament
6. God s Universal Purpose: All Nations
7. History and Geography
8. Religions of the Ancient Near East
9. Genesis: The Primeval and Patriarchal Periods
10. Exodus and the Law
11. The Conquest, Confederation, and Monarchy
12. Prophets False and True
13. The Exile and Return
14. The Writings
15. The Intertestamental Period
Part 3: The Second Testament
16. New Testament, Same God
17. History and Geography
18. Jesus Christ
19. The Gospels
20. Acts
21. The Apostle Paul
22. Other Letters
23. The Apocalypse
Appendixes
Notes
More Great Harvest House Books by Douglas A. Jacoby
About the Publisher
About the Author
Part 1
GETTING STARTED
1
THE BIG PICTURE
The law from your mouth is more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver and gold.
PSALM 119:72
M any people value the word of God so highly that they will go to great lengths to hear it. They cherish it. I m thinking of a man whose black eyes were alight and whose handshake was firm as he thanked me for a Bible lesson. Who would have known he had walked for three hours on dusty desert roads and through the heart of a dangerous Muslim city just to hear God s word?
I m thinking of a Brazilian woman who greeted me with a bright smile and a joyful embrace as she told me how God s word had transformed her marriage and family. Who would have known she had been up all night working before coming to hear a Bible exposition that morning?
I m thinking of an entire Vietnamese congregation who took a day off work-not a member was missing-and assembled early for a full day of biblical teaching.
In Saddam Hussein s Iraq, Christians (especially converts from Islam) were persecuted. Two prisoners Bibles had been confiscated, so they had to make do. One used chicken bones to scribble Scripture on the walls of his cell. The other, who was forced to clean the latrine, found that the guards were using Bible pages for toilet paper. He cleaned them and treasured them. Both men risked beatings for the sake of the word that sustained them in their darkest hour.
I could tell countless stories like these of people all around the world who make extraordinary sacrifices-missing sleep, skipping work, defying their governments, and even risking their lives-just to hear the word of God. Are these people crazy? A little too obsessed? Or have they discovered something worth all these sacrifices and more?
I deeply admire people like this, people whom I have the honor of meeting through my international teaching ministry. They are truth seekers. And they are willing to invest significant time and energy for a wonderful eternal payoff. They are not alone, for through the course of history many have paid with their very lives for the privilege of reading God s word.
Seekers
Today I am writing in Paraguay. I am here to teach the Bible. In one respect, this South American nation is no different from the dozens of other lands in which I ve taught in the past year-places like Switzerland, Haiti, Egypt, Trinidad, Israel, and Canada. People everywhere are looking for answers to the fundamental questions of life: Who are we, and how did we get here? Is there an afterlife? How should I relate to other people? What is meaningful? Who decides what is right and wrong? What is my purpose during the few decades of my earthly existence? My experience leads me to believe that the only place to go for answers to these questions is the Holy Bible.
No Other Book Even Comes Close!
The Bible is my all-time favorite book. I ve read thousands of books but none as often as the Bible (50 times and counting). No other book is remotely as deserving of a lifetime of study. The Bible has been my daily companion since I came to faith in Christ in 1977. I continue to learn from it and am amazed by its depth. This book led me to God, transforming my thinking and living. Even now it challenges me to the core. The Bible is the most exciting book in the world, standing uniquely as divine revelation amid its rivals-works of human wisdom that invariably fall short. I urge you to read it, preferably every day, in order to hear God s voice.
Fears and Hopes
Sounds great, you may be thinking, but aren t there many interpretations of the Bible and endless church denominations? What hope do we really have of understanding the Bible? Perhaps you re a newcomer to the Scriptures, and you fear, I ll never finish 1000 pages! I can assure you that with the benefit of an overview -an introduction to the Scriptures-length is no object. Or you may be afraid of what you ll find when you do begin to explore. Confusion? Disappointment? Unbearable demands? To the contrary, I believe you ll be profoundly encouraged. Or perhaps your faith has withered-possibly under the critique of a college religion professor-and you long to rediscover what is true in the Bible. Most readers aren t quite sure how all the pieces fit together: the books, chapters, and verses; prophets, priests, and kings; history, geography, and archaeology. A Quick Overview of the Bible makes your task easier, clarifying the sometimes puzzling structure of God s word.
Most people who simply pick up a Bible and start reading do not feel completely at home. They aren t familiar with the lands, empires, and issues around which the biblical story revolves. Even many Christians, if not most of them, don t grasp the big picture. They re puzzled.
Further, an enormous gulf separates us from the people in biblical times. Society, dress, customs, language, attitudes-all are different. We may think we understand what we re reading, yet the chasm between our time and theirs, our culture and theirs, is considerable. To cite one example among hundreds, in Bible times, as in the Middle East today, people greeted each other with a holy kiss. The practice is not explained; it s assumed. But we shouldn t think this means men were at liberty to kiss random women-which could have led to fights! Men kissed men, and women kissed women.
A Puzzle
My family likes to work on puzzles, usually the 1000-piece kind. We spread one out on the table, a jumble of cardboard pieces that should fit together but are as yet unconnected. They aren t self-assembling-we have to do the work. We find the straight edges and complete the border. Then we match up pieces with the same colors, taking cues from the picture on the puzzle box. Piece by piece it comes together. Though every family member vies for the privilege of setting in the final piece, the endeavor is a group project.
The Bible is a bit like that. Until we grasp its outlines and contours, it is an amorphous mass of puzzle pieces. But as it comes together, what was a scrambled pile is transformed into a striking and compelling image.
A Guidebook
Have you ever traveled to another country? We consult maps and surf the web to find out as much as we can before we step off the plane. Outsiders can easily miss something basic-perhaps something important. So it is when we approach the Bible, when we travel from our world to an ancient one. Babylonians, cubits, apostles, psalms-these are not part of the average modern person s world. When we jump into the Scriptures without any orientation, one of three outcomes normally results:
1. We give up . We stop reading. Our spiritual roots remain shallow; they are not strong enough to keep us upright when the storms of life assail us.
2. We pick and choose . We force ourselves to wade through the Bible even though so much belongs to an alien world. As in a treasure hunt, we search for bits of Bible that speak to us, hoping we re not wasting our time. Most of the verses seem extraneous until we find our favorite promise or uncover a biblical truth. Yet all of the Scriptures are there for a reason. When we read with adequate preparation, they come to life.
3. We deceive ourselves . In the worst of the three outcomes, we imagine we understand what we have read, but in fact, we do not. Joining with others, perhaps in a group discussion, does not help becaus