Week 3 Readings

Sorry for a bit of delay on the Analysis and Readings.  I’m still a’learning this ol’ Bloggin’ and heck on fire if I didn’t run into a heap of trouble with yonder HTML automatic codin’!   Anyhow- here are the readings for Week 3!

The Story of Joseph

1. Sold Into Slavery- Genesis 37.1-36
2. Prison and a Promotion- Genesis 39.1-41.57
3. Ten Brothers Go to Egypt- Genesis 42.1-38
4. The Brothers Return- Genesis 43.1-44.34
5. Joseph Reveals His Identity- Genesis 45.1-46.7 

Something to Ponder:  Have you ever been jealous of a sibling?  Have you ever been jealous enough to create a fake crime scene using goat’s blood then sell him or her to neighboring Ishmaelites? One time my sister broke my Lego Castle, but, luckily there were no nomadic slavers in the area…

Also- each time we see a new main figure in the Old Testament, try to think of how they might prefigure Christ.  How does Joseph act as a type of Christ?

Week 2: You say Abram I say Abraham- Analysis

We are gaining some momentum αδελφοι (brethren)!  We are two weeks into our readings and currently working on the passages for week 3.   Last week’s readings told us the story of Abram (Ἀβραάμ) who is better known as Abraham- the Father of Many. 

Bottom line- he had MANY sons (and daughters).  I am one of them, and so are you!  So let’s just… interpret the passages already.

Passage 1 and 2- God calls Abram and God’s Covenant with Abram

What seemed to stick out to me the most in this passage was the idea of a “calling”.  We hear priests refer to this all of the time- men are “called” to serve the Church by taking up the office of Priest or Deacon.  We can really apply this lesson of Abraham into any of our lives though.  Abram must leave the land of his family (a city called Ur in Ancient Mesopotamia) and travel to a new county blessed by God.  Like Abram, we must be ready to listen to and obey God’s call.  Maybe God’s calling is for you to take up a certain profession (all my teachers in the house say heyyyyyy!) or maybe it is for you to help those in need.  God calls us to be good siblings, friends, children, parents, neighbors and citizens depending on His Holy need for us. Abram is certainly not the only follower of our God to take up his call, we will meet many throughout our study, but he is a great reminder for us to trust in God’s plan.  You can best bet that when Abram left Mesopotamia, he wasn’t expecting that little kids would be singing about him during Vacation Church School while hopping up and down on one foot (I never really understood how that song related to Abraham* anyway, but at least it reminds us that he had many sons).

In case you missed it, God told Abram to change his name to Abraham (Genesis 17:5) because he was made a father of many nations.  When God tells you to change your name- you pretty much have to do it.

Another issue of great importance occurs within the first conversation between God and Abraham.  Abraham shows us an excellent example of someone in the Old Testament prefiguring Christ.  To prefigure means basically to foreshadow or give us hints about what is to come in the future.  The Orthodox Church in America (OCA) includes an excellent explanation of Genesis 12:1-3 on their website.

“The fulfillment of the promise to Abraham comes in Jesus Christ. He is the descendent of Israel’s first father in whom all the families of the earth are blessed. Thus, Mary, the Mother of Jesus, sings at her time of waiting for the Savior’s birth, that all generations will call her blessed because the fulfillment has come from God “as He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his posterity forever” (Lk 1:55, see also Zachariah’s Song in Lk 1:67-79). All through the New Testament the claim is made that God’s promise to Abraham is fulfilled in Jesus.”

So you will hear, if you listen closely to our liturgy, orthros and vespers services, references made to Abraham very often.  These come because he is, in essence, the Father of our Holy Faith, as well as a prefiguration of Christ- reminding us that when God makes a promise, he always delivers. 

The last passage I’ll point out here is 15:5 in Genesis.  It reads:

“Then He brought him outside and said to him, “Look now toward heaven and count the stars if you are able to number them.” And He said to him, “So shall your seed be.”

If you are using you new, crazy-mad Bible skills, you’ll notice something in the footnotes of the OSB.  It explains that the first seed referred to here is Christ and the second is His Church.  The numbers are the millions and billions of Christians today, in the past and in the future.  The followers of Christ and His Church, we Christians, are innumerable.

My good friend, Father Jason Roll always says that we as Christians are like stars- bright shining pieces of light amid a dark world.  You look up, and even though there is darkness all around, one star stands out with its light, just like we do when we work to live a Christian life.  I always thought it was pretty when he made this analogy, and I love how the OSB included this footnote on a very meaningful passage.  When I read it, I immediately thought of Father Jason preaching to campers at the Ionian Village in Greece.  The passage and footnotes were even more important to me, because it made this connection to my life.  This is what Bible Study is all about, reading the Word, understanding the interpretation and then applying it to your own faith and experiences!

So there ARE three other readings from this week, but again, the goal is to highlight some of them each week.  Please don’t neglect the amazing power in the “sacrifice” of Isaac nor the story of Jacob!  Next up is the story of Joseph whose coat was red and yellow and green and brown and scarlet and black and lilac and faun and chocolate and mauve… #manycolors #OTfashionGuru!

Week 2 Readings

We’ll keep on keeping on with these readings.  Here are the ones for this week.  Make sure you read and comment on the Week 1 readings as well.  This week we continue with Genesis and you KNOW I’m not talking about Sega!

 Abraham, Isaac and Jacob

1. The Call of Abram- Genesis 12.1-20
2. God’s Covenant with Abram- Genesis 15. 1-21
3. Isaac’s Birth and “Sacrifice”- Genesis 21.1-22.19
4. Jacob and Esau Compete- Genesis 27.1-28.22
5. Jacob and Esau Reconcile- Genesis 32.1-33.20

 

Something to Ponder:  What would you be willing to sacrifice anything for God?  Abraham was, just ask his son Isaac.

Week 1: In the Beginning- Analysis

Here we go αδελφοι (brethren)!  Week 1 of our e100 (100 essential Bible passages for Orthodox Christians) has passed.  Now it’s time to blog about our readings this past week which all came from the book of Genesis and discussed the Creation of Earth through the Tower of Babel. 

We could EASILY spend the entire year on these five readings alone. They are so rich in theological, Biblical, historical and cultural importance that most of us should have known what was coming in each passage.  However, if I write fifteen page blog posts each week, I doubt my Religious Education students will keep up.  The idea here is to highlight some major concepts and allow the comments to catch any additional topics of interest.  Please, students, friends and bloggers, forgive me for only discussing a few main points from this week. In fact, there is SO MUCH in these readings, that I think, for now, I will just discuss the first two.  I may post later on Readings 3-5, or maybe they will be best done on your own.  Comment and let me know what would help!  __________________________________________________________________________ Our readings from last week:

1. Creation- Genesis 1.1-2.25
2. The Fall- Genesis 3.1-24
3. The Flood- Genesis 6.5-7.24
4. God’s Covenant with Noah- 8.1-9.17
5. Tower of Babel- 11,1-9 ____________________________________________________________________

 Creation and the Fall (Readings 1 and 2)

So we start off with some fairly intense reading discussing God’s creation of the Universe, Earth, Life, Mankind and Adam and Eve’s (and mankind’s) First Sin.  I’m going to highlight the basics here (for a more in depth look here is a nice start from goarch.org)

• These chapters help enlighten us about the Holy Trinity.
• Creation came from God out of nothing.
• God declared Creation “good”.
• Mankind was created in God’s image.
• Mankind was tempted, disobeyed God and was cast out of Paradise.

If you are using an Orthodox Study Bible (my class SHOULD be) check out the great article discussing the Holy Trinity!  These articles are great and you should always read them when they show throughout your reading- think of them as hidden Easter Eggs (dyed red of course).  In these readings, God uses the pronoun “Us”- this is very important and helps us show our Trinitarian belief in God (the idea that God is three parts).  We affirm this every Sunday while we recite the Creed.  Genesis 1:1 refers the Creator Father, while 1:2 shows the Lifegiving Spirit, and we use the Book of John (1:1-3) and Holy Tradition to explain that Christ the Son made the light.  So, Creation was done through the κοινωνία (koinonia- communion) of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  We don’t pray to the Trinity on accident, like all of our Faith, we can find its evidence in Scripture!

We also see that God created everything from nothing out of His own Divine Will.  He wanted to share His goodness with all of us.  After he created various things, God declares them “good”.  The footnote for Genesis 1:31 in the OSB explains this better than I can: “Everything God made, including man, is very good, because God is good.  Nothing He made is therefore evil in itself.”

Now in our class we have discussed the Creation of Adam- he was created by God, then God gave Adam a companion named Eve.  You all know this story too from your Illustrated Children’s Bible you had when you were a kid (LOVE those illustrations).  The final big takeaway from these readings though occurs once Adam and Eve eat the apple then choose to hide from God.  We should note that they do not only disobey God, but they then feel the need to hide from Him.  This shows us the first Sin (αμαρτία in Greek meaning to err or to miss the mark) and its results.  Adam and Eve were only given one commandment; they broke it, and then their sin caused them to hide as well.  This led to five things (which I will take from the OSB article on ancestral sin:

1. Mankind is mortal
2. Mankind is not guilty because of Adam’s sin, but is greatly inclined to sin.
3. Man is fallen, but the divine image has not been totally destroyed
4. The Fall brought hard work, pain and other discomfort into the world.
5. The soul, even after the fall, is “neutral”.  It can do very good things or bad things.

Many of my students always want to know the major differences between our Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church.  In this passage we can highlight one.  We don’t believe as Orthodox Christians, in original sin, we prefer the term προπατορικό αμάρτημα (propatoriko amartima) or ancestral sin.  We aren’t born with Adam’s Sin as a mark against us, only and Adam and Eve face that judgement.  Catholics attest that their sin and guilt are passed down to all men and women at birth.  We do believe that we face the consequences of their sin though- the major two being death and an inclination toward sin. As Orthodox Christians, we combat and erase our own sins through the sacraments and fight this inclination toward it through accepting the Sacrifice of Christ and becoming closer with God.

Whewwww!  That took a LOT of research, editing and reading on my end, but I can already tell how much this process will be helping me grow in the Faith.  I hope it does the same for you.  The key is to stick with it, pray and enjoy the brain stretching.  God created us (we now know this because WE READ GENESIS!) with a great ability to reason and think.  What could be a better way to glorify Him?  For those keeping up with the reading- καλή δύναμη! (kali dynami- good strength)

Quote of the Week:

“Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness.”- Genesis 1:26

Opening Post and Genesis Readings Introduced

So this all started as I was reading through my Orthodox Study Bible- trying to decide on a new lesson for our 9th and 10th grade Religious Education class at the Cathedral.  As I opened it, a handout fell from between the pages and floated to the floor.  It was the inspiration for this week’s lesson and this project.  I later discovered that my wife, Katie, had found the e100 handout I had picked up during camp this summer and thought I might enjoy seeing the idea. 

The e100 project is nothing new- it has actually been used by various Christian denominations in America, England, Australia and other nations to help familiarize modern christians with the Holy Word (the Bible).  The cool part of this program for us though is that our Archdiocese created our own version of the list to be used for religious education. 

To me, the perfect way to take on this challenge was to create a blog.  In our Religious Ed. class, like many others, it is hard for all of us to be together every single Sunday, so it is usually hard to link lessons together.  Another difficulty is cramming in enough learnable material into a thirty minute lesson.  We all do our best, and I know that my class works hard to learn everything I teach, but a project this big works better with an online community that we can visit from our home, phones, and laptops on our own time.

So each week we will be recapping the last five passages and introducing the next five for the upcoming week.  Since we just started there is no need to recap anything, but here are this weeks readings!

1. Creation- Genesis 1.1-2.25
2. The Fall- Genesis 3.1-24
3. The Flood- Genesis 6.5-7.24
4. God’s Covenant with Noah- 8.1-9.17
5. Tower of Babel- 11,1-9

Good Luck αδελφοι (brethren) in this challenge.  Feel free to comment, post links, ask questions or share ideas using the comment page.  If you’re in my class- you might want to create a wordpress account or comment using facebook.  Make sure you download and print the list!

Quote of the Week:

“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of good courage; do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”- Joshua 1:9