I finished reading the Bible for the first time on my birthday, at the end of August. I started in January, and yes, that means I was not studying much in depth.
I'm going to dive right back in. I thought for sure I was going to be led straight in to a church, but no! God's making it pretty clear that I'm to stick with prayer and scripture for now. I guess He wants me to get to know Him personally?
Here are my new books (Well, I'm still waiting for my concordance to arrive:)
I chose the Complete Jewish Bible for a couple of reasons. First, I have a tendency to get to reading so quickly that I'm not really thinking about what I'm reading. This translation uses a lot of the Hebrew names and terms, which will hopefully slow me down some, which will help me reflect on the passages I read. Also, I am not convinced that Christians are meant to abandon the Old Testament laws... Well, I'm slowly, prayerfully, carefully considering this movement... whether you call it messianic Judaism or Hebrew-rooted Christianity... I personally think of it as "using the whole Bible, remembering the whole history..." Anyhow, for now, I'm sort of planning my Bible study to follow the Torah portions and readings used by the Messianic community.
I also ordered this Interlinear Bible... it has the OT in Hebrew and the NT in Greek, with a word-for-word translation along each line, and Strong's Concordance numbers printed along, too!
Lesson A: Hebrew reads from right to left:
I hope this will be a useful tool to help me dig deep in my studies. I'm pretty excited to use it!
I think my hubs had a book like that in undergrad. He's all about knowing the direct translation of things.
ReplyDeleteAnd I am with you on the not "abandoning" the old testament laws. There are extremists on each side. There isn't a "need" for the laws. But since we have the holy spirit now (and they didn't in the old testamen), He can lead us in what laws to keep up with. I believe that nothing I can do will make God love me more, but that it might make my life more abundant. I'm actually reading a really interested book all about that! The Naked Gospel
CONGRATS!!! on finishing the bible though!
I think your point about the holy spirit is important! I probably wasted a good amount of energy trying to basically run ahead of God... I am learning to slow down and wait for guidance. He can only lead if we listen, eh?
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