Week 1 Summary

O.T.   This week we began with the story of creation. 

Day 1 – Let there be light.   Day 2 – And God called the firmament Heaven. Day 3 – Earth and Seas and vegetation.   Day 4 – Sun, moon and stars.  Day 5 – Living creatures. Day 6 – God created Man in his own image (perhaps a spiritual image), (This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.)

Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh.  I love this line…. I think Nancy and I are one….a wholeness and unity in the first marriage. 

Genesis 3, things get a little complicated. Adam and Eve were tempted and ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. To Eve he said that “I will multiply your pain in childbearing, in pain you will bring forth children”….  (Remember this line when we come to the new testament and Mary has Jesus).  She did not have original sin and therefore she did not have this.  I heard this in a talk last weekend, and for the first time it made sense to me.

Genesis 4, they have Cain and Able (the first humans). Cain gives God an offering of fruit of the ground and Able offered the firstlings from his flock.  God was pleased with Able and not pleased with Cain.  Cain gets angry and kills Able. I really enjoy Jordan Peterson’s explanation of this. We sacrifice in our lives to make our future better. We delay gratification while we are in college, or having children, or whatever, for our future. Sometimes we make high quality sacrifices today for our tomorrow.  Able was able to sacrifice a high quality sacrifice while Cain offered some old cabbage.  So, the question that is offered is this; do we sacrifice today for tomorrow or sacrifice tomorrow for today’s immediate pleasure? 

Adam and Eve then had Seth.  And if you follow through from Seth, came Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. From Seth came sons and daughters of God, and from Cain came sons and daughters of man. When they started marrying each other, the world became wicked. God told Noah to build and Ark and then came the flood.  So, the descendants of Cain were all destroyed.  

Genesis 9:11  I think the tower of Babel is one of the first in the series of pride problems that we will see throughout the Old testament.  “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower  with it’s top in the heavens and let us make a name for ourselves”   And the lord scattered them abroad….

Genesis 11 we are introduced to Abram and Sar’ai. Genesis 12, The Lord said to Abram …. “I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your names great, so that you will be a blessing”

Genesis 16, Abram has a child with Hagar, Ish’mael.  Then Sar’ai is named Sarah, and Abram ..Abraham.  They are told that will conceive and have a child.

Genesis 18 and 19, we see the fall of Sodom and Gomor’ah.  We also hear Abraham tying to deal with God to save the city, and Lot’s wife not listening and looking back when she shouldn’t have.  I wonder how often I look back instead of forward to where God wants me to be.  

So much happening and it’s only the first week! I am trying to keep up with the location of all of this. I have National Geographic magazine that shows the layout of the land as we go through the stories. It really helps me to visualize the stories better.

Psalms 

We read in the first psalms, a couple of themes. The first being righteousness over wickedness. and the second being a fear of his enemies.  These will all become more meaningful as we read about David later in the Old testament.

NT

This is funny. I went to a talk at the women’s conference that referenced Matthew 1. He said that everyone dislikes this one it is read and everyone dislikes reading it. I think there is a very important point in this passage and that is that Jesus lineage is from David. And the 14,14,14 reference is that Jesus is the 7th day, the eternal Sabbath.

We hear about the birth of Jesus, the three wise men, and the flight to Egypt. 

In Matthew 3 we hear about John the Baptist and the baptism of Jesus.

Matthew 4 we read about the temptations of the devil after Jesus had fasted for 40 days and 40 nights.  In Lent, we focus on temptations and trying to do as Jesus did and resist each one.  Temptations come at us all the time, in all kinds of ways. 

We then begin hearing about Jesus and his ministry. He takes on Disciples, first Peter and Andrew, and then James and John, and he began teaching all about Galilee, healing the sick and expelling demons.

Matthew 5 we read the beatitudes. You are the Salt of the Earth….. You are the light of the world!

And then the challenges start.  5:21-5:48.   A huge challenge for me is “Give to him who begs from you, and do not refuse him who would borrow from you”. These same challenges will be given again and again from Jesus.  

Matthew 6 Jesus gives us the Lord prayer, and how to fast and how to pray.

This was a great first week for me. It matches the daily readings from church and it perfect the the season of lent.  It seems that the OT and NT are going hand in hand.  Amazing!