PSA Bible Reading Challenge 2023-2024

In Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth he scolded them because of the immorality that was taking place in the church. He went so far as to say that if things don’t change then you need to cast out the person who is acting so. In his second letter he lets the church know how proud he is of them because they listened to his words and now it is time to forgive and to bury the hatchet, to remember no more the transgressions of the person. In fact, he says how proud he is of the church because they made a complete transformation as a result of his words. This isn’t the primary point of the letter, but it is an element that is found in our reading for today that is interesting.

I wanted to lift up two points that I saw in this letter that are well known and should be known by anyone who reads II Corinthians. The first is found in chapter 4 where Paul describes these treasures that we contain in clay jars. We have the power of Christ within our bodies, and yet our bodies are so weak and frail that it seems as if at any moment they can crack and break. And yet Christ chose to reside with us and within us. That is a pretty powerful image of having treasure in clay jars, jars that are so vulnerable and yet which can still carry that which is from God, if not God Himself.

In chapter 5 Paul speaks to the ministry of reconciliation which is a paragraph that we would do well to reread. You can focus on vs.15 where we read that no longer live for ourselves but for Christ, then again in vs.20 where we are called ambassadors for Christ. What a poweful image which reminds us that wherever we go we go and represent Christ in all that we do. Finally, I know I said two but it is actually three, we can look at chapter 6:14 where we read that we are not to be unequally yoked. I remember growing up and hearing that verse constantly as we looked to date and we were told, not by my parents but by my youth group leader, to not be unequally yoked. Meaning, we were to find people who loved Jesus and make sure that we date them and not people who didn’t know Jesus.

If you want to know where we get the phrases “pearly gates” and “streets of gold” when we are describing heaven you need look no further. Revelation 21 contains much of what we imagine when heaven is talked about as this idyllic place. But the part that I use most consistently is the beginning of the chapter which describes the promise of what it will be like as a result of the victory of Jesus on the cross. Death will be no more, he will wipe away every tear from our eye. These descriptions provide much joy and consolation for one how is mourning the death of a loved one.

Once again it is absolutely impossible to understand the original meaning of Revelation without knowing a little bit about what is happening in the first century. Remember, Jerusalem and all of the promised land including the regions where all of the disciples and apostles are now living is under the rule of the Roman Empire. So when we hear talk about the great city that is fallen and is buring, see Revelation 18 and other places, it needs to be clear that John, the author is clearly speaking about Rome.

We know that in 64, when John would have clearly been alive, the great city of Rome burned for over a week. There is a common story that Nero, the great emperor, was playing the fiddle while it was burning. At the end of the day Nero blames the Christians for setting Rome on fire which leads to the greatest of persecutions which lasted for centuries. All of this we see in Revelation, even in the places where it talks in 17:9 about the seven hills. It is common knowledge that to this day Rome is constructed on seven hills. This was true back then as well. We would do well to know a little history before trying to attribute modern events to what is happening in Revelation. What was is and will be…

There is always that fine line between telling the future and telling the present in ways that make it impossible to understand in the future. That is the line that Revelation dances upon. There are areas of this prophecy that we have to say that God is telling us that Jesus is coming back in the future, but until he comes there will be great tribulation. There are some who have spent a lot of time (I would probably say wasted a lot of time), in putting together a theory on the coming of Christ and what the times are going to look like. They are called dispensationalists who have come up with theories of millenialism, postmillenialism, and amillenialism that has nothing to do with what generation you were born. But the bottom line is that Jesus is coming back like a thief in the night and we cannot predict when that will be, nor should we attempt to correlate modern events with those described in Revelation.

Let me give you one example of what John wrote in Revelation that some try to match up with today but was probably an event that took place in the 1st century. Look at 8:8-9 where we see a flaming mountain thrown into the sea. My take is that this is the description of Vesuvius erupting which took place in 79 AD. It is thought that John was still alive then and that Revelation was written soon after that and so he described this horrific event as something that today some would say is a prediction, when in fact John incorporates it as a description of current events. We have to be really, really careful in trying to read Scripture and attributing it to future events in ways that we try to predict. Careful as in we should not do it at all.

There really isn’t much specific to say about Revelation. To start with, it is not plural it is singular. Many make the mistake of calling this book with its plural, similar to when we read a Psalm a person identifies it with the plural often. But the term Revelation in the Greek is Apocalypse of John. This term apocalypse identifies the end times and when Christ will come again, and identifies the main thrust of this book of the Bible.

It would not serve anyone to try to diagnose each of the images that are given to us. It is a writing that describes to a persecuted community that one day Jesus will come back and conquer the Roman empire. All of the metaphors relate to modern events in the 1st century which are signs according to the author John, that Jesus is on his way back to take us with him. If you want to identify Revelation with a single theme you can use this one: NO COMPROMISE!

John is writing to a community that daily has a difficult decision before them. Do we stay with the faith and be killed or do we turn our back on Jesus and the community of believers and deny the faith, apostasy is the term, and so save our lives? This is where Jesus’ words ring especially true when he says those who would save their life will lose it and those who are willing to lose their life for His sake, will keep it. We do not live in such an intense environmnet, but the theme of NO COMPROMISE rings true for all of us.

We find a shocking image in Zechariah, an object lesson, two of them actually, which set up the coming of Jesus as Lord and Savior. Zechariah is told to take two staffs. The first represents the covenant that God made with his people, this one was called Favor. The second staff represented the oneness of the people of God even though they were divided between North and South, Israel and Judah, this staff was called unity. Zechariah is commanded to break the staff of favor and thus breaking the covenant that God had with his people. The favor of God no longer rested upon a single people, but in the coming of Jesus it rests upon the whole world, all of creation, every single person who was created and had the life of God breathed into them. This is super significant. The breaking of unity is less significant because we know that the diaspora of the Jews created all sorts of different nationalities and races and tribes within the Jewish family. There are Jews literally from all over the world. But there does remain unity and that is in their understanding of being Jewish.

But the breaking of that first staff, the covenant, required that there be a new way, a new covenant, in which God interacts with his people and saves them from His wrath so that he would not destroy them. We even see two clear references to Jesus who will be coming up in a few centuries in the same chapter when it describes the same amount of silver that Judas was paid to betray Jesus. In chapter 12 we read about mourning for the one that they have pierced. Again, the breaking of the covenant by God, because it had been broken previously by the people, requires a new covenant, this new covenant that Jeremiah had discussed which is one that is written upon our hearts and not on tablets.

Psalm 84 reminds me of this song that is nice, but not a classic.

We find another very familiar passage in Zechariah and this time it is from chapter 9 verse 9 where we see mention of the liberator of Israel riding into Jerusalem on a donkey. Now, he parleys this ride into Jerusalem on a donkey into a battle where blood is shed and where the Lord conquers all, so it is not at all the Prince of Peace riding into Jerusalem, as we are accustomed to thinking on Palm Sunday, but rather a real warrior who battles and will battle for His people. So while the donkey verse is similar, the whole concept is very, very different from what we are used to and what we have been trained to expect.

We also see in chapter 10 a theme that is mentioned in Ezekiel as well which is the way in which the shepherds of the people, that would be the religious leaders so in our time it would be the pastors, have let down their down and only pursued their own desires and wishes to be exalted into positions of power. It is a real warning against the court evangelicals that would lift up their own political agendas against the desires of the kingdom of God which we see so clearly in Matthew 25. Just a warning as we continue to move toward a time where the shepherds of the people of God need to remain focused on those who are on the margins of society and not seek the power that corrupts absolutely.

We have to begin in Zechariah with the verse, maybe the single verse, that should be familiar to you. Look at 4:6 which reminds us that it is not by might nor by power but by Spirit of God that we are able to do anything and that the kingdom of God can be realized. If you don’t know this verse maybe this will jog your memory.

Zechariah is another one of the books where you see visions and strange creatures and occurrences which remind us that the Lord is calling His people to repentance, but even more importantly, the Lord will restore one day. But that restoration will occur not because we do something incredibly, but because the Spirit of the Lord will work through us.

We really do have a continuation of the first letter that Paul wrote to the community in this second letter. Not much more than again a warning to not follow after false teachings because as tempting as they might be they are from the devil and will lead both the individual and the community to wrong thinking and wrong living. That is not terrible advice.

We find a number of really interesting nuggets in I Thessalonians. A little background. It is a church that Paul founded and he really longed to get back to see them and to encourage them but he was tied up so he sent Timothy. He was afraid that the people of the church had been tempted by Satan to abandon the faith because of the persecutions that were present within the body at the hands of both the Jews and the Romans of the day. So when Timothy comes back after a visit with a glowing report about the community, that it continues to pray for Paul and all of the saints, the believers, he is thrilled. This is one of those letters that Paul writes where it is obvious that he loves this community and can only say nice things about them.

In chapter 4 we find the often quoted verse 13 that tells us to grieve, when we do grieve, not like unbelievers, but with hope in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That’s a comforting and strong verse for me. Immediately following that we read the primary verse in all of Scripture that many point to in order to prove that the rapture, the concetp of the rapture at least, is a real thing. This whole “left behind” concept comes from 4:16-17. I have a hard time basing my theology on two verses. I prefer focusing on I Thessalonians 5:2 that reminds us that the timing of when Jesus comes back is more like a thief in the night and not something we can predict or describe ahead of time.

Philemon is Paul writing to a friend to accept a former slave, Onesimus, within the community of faith and extolling this person’s faith.