Tag Archive for: The Story

In my last post, I offered seven free tools to help you understand the Old Testament. Here I’ll review Bibles, books, and study guides that help with that, too. Some are for those who are new to reading the Bible, and some are for seasoned Bible readers.

I end each review with an excerpt that shows how each explains Isaiah’s promise to King Ahaz to trust God to deliver him, and Ahaz’s refusal (Isaiah 7). That should let you know if the depth is what you’re looking for.

Bibles

If you’ve read the New Testament before and are ready to dive into the Old Testament, these two Bibles will help you understand it.

Review: NIV Zondervan Study Bible

Edited by D. A. Carson

Audience: Thoughtful Christians wanting historical, archaeological, and theological insights

Reading level: college

If you want a Bible with articles, charts, timelines, color photos, book introductions, and notes, this five-pound beauty is the way to go. This is the third edition of the NIV Study Bible that I own, and it’s the best of the three. It includes two dozen articles covering overarching topics such as “The Story of the Bible: How the Good News About Jesus Is Central” and “Prophets and Prophecy.” The introductions to each book are fabulous. (The link above is for leather, but there are less expensive options. I don’t recommend the Kindle version–I purchased that for version 2 and regret it. The pictures are too small and the hyperlinks overlap, making some unworkable.)

This Bible would overwhelm a new Christian. But for the thoughtful Christian wanting depth, this is the Bible to invest in. Here’s an excerpt from the Introduction to Isaiah (1308):

In ch. 7 Isaiah issues King Ahaz a challenge to trust Yahweh, not Assyria’s power. Ahaz refuses the challenge, and much of Judah’s history between that point (734 BC) and the destruction of Sennacherib’s army in 701 BC revolves around the results of Ahaz’s refusal. A burning question unites chs. 7-39: Will Israel trust Yahweh or the surrounding nations? Chs. 7-12 not only give the answer (no) but also give the answer’s implications.

Review: The One Year Chronological Bible NIV

Edited by Steve Benson

Audience: Anyone wanting to read the Old Testament and New Testament chronologically

Reading level: high school

Old Testament in chronological order

The One Year Chronological Bible: New International Version

I read the Bible in chronological chunks fairly often, so I made things easier by buying a chronological Bible. In the table of contents, I color coded the prophets so I could see at a glance how they relate (see figure). I seldom read from this Bible, but I use its table of contents to guide my reading in other Bibles. The editors provide short italicized segues when switching between texts, but not a lot of historical notes. Here’s the transition from histories (2 Kings and 2 Chronicles) to Isaiah 7 (799):

Isaiah encouraged King Ahaz to trust in the Lord when Rezin and Pekah marched against Jerusalem. Through these prophecies of Isaiah, the Lord also gave Ahaz a sign of coming salvation—the coming of the Messiah.

Books

Review: Kingdom of Priests: A History of Old Testament Israel

By Eugene H. Merrill

Audience: Thoughtful Christians wanting to understand Old Testament history

Reading level: graduate

This superb book is my number one recommendation for thoughtful Christians who have read and studied the entire Bible and aren’t put off by academic works. Merrill divides Old Testament history into 15 parts and examines each thoroughly, weaving in historical documents from surrounding nations and archaeological finds. He keeps the overarching purpose of God establishing a kingdom of priests clearly in mind. His analysis of the ministry of the prophets is illuminating.

This is an academic work that carefully examines dating problems and apparent contradictions. His goal for this second edition was “to take on the task of bringing the narrative up to date so that the message of the Old Testament as not only a theological but also a historical work can resonate more clearly and relevantly with a new generation of readers” (11).

The book contains numerous chronological tables and maps, as well as both Scripture and subject indexes. Here’s an excerpt (420):

Ahaz had paid a staggering price for survival not only in monetary terms but especially in the moral and spiritual compromises his bargaining had required. As the Chronicler notes, in the final analysis, Tiglath-pileser gave Ahaz trouble and not help (2 Chron. 28:21). Ahaz had had to loot the temple to pay the heavy protection fees that Tiglath demanded, and as an act of thanksgiving, Ahaz offered sacrifices to the gods of Assyria, whom he credited for his salvation. He also installed their shrines throughout the land. It is little wonder that Isaiah the prophet chastised Ahaz in the bitterest terms and predicted the day when Judah also would come to know the awful Assyrian scourge (Isa. 7:17).

Review: The Story: The Bible as One Continuing Story of God and His People

Selections from the New International Version

Audience: Churches desiring to teach the entire congregation the main story of the Bible and willing to use supplemental supporting material

Reading level: youth and adult versions are available

The Story divides selections of text from the NIV Bible into 31 chapters arranged mostly chronologically. Short italicized segues summarize skipped material and add a few historical notes. Simple timelines begin the book; some use increments of thousands of years, others decades. The back material includes discussion questions and a character list.

Zondervan intended for churches to use The Story as part of Sunday sermons, adult small group studies, youth studies, and children’s materials. They provide DVDs, curriculum to go with the DVDs, and other support materials, including a church resource library. I offer a companion study guide (see below).

The Story highlights a dozen or so kings and includes only five excerpts from Isaiah. It skips King Ahaz and Isaiah 7, so here’s the first transition between histories and Isaiah (224):

The greatest of the writing prophets, Isaiah, began his work in Jerusalem (capital of Judah, the southern kingdom) in 740 BC, shortly before King Uzziah died. Isaiah achieved prominence during Hezekiah’s reign, helping the king to stand-down the Assyrian threat by relying on God alone. Such a strategy must be founded on rock solid faith, and this kind of faith Isaiah clearly practiced and developed. His call to service came in a powerful vision—an apt start to a prophetic vocation that would span nearly 60 years.

Study Guides

The first of these is ideal for new Christians; the second is good for those who have read a bit of the Bible already and are willing to put in 31 weeks of daily study.

Review: Seamless: Understanding the Bible as One Complete Story

By Angie Smith

Audience: Women’s Bible study groups with a mix of new and mature Christians wanting to understand how the Old Testament and New Testament relate

Reading level: high school

The women at my church just finished going through Seamless: Understanding the Bible as One Complete Story, by Angie Smith. It’s terrific, funny, and touching. Those who had never read the Old Testament before felt it made sense of the Bible. Those who have read the Bible many times loved the clarifying way Smith laid out the stories. I had a brand new Christian in my group who had never gone to church until a few months ago, and she kept up fine.

Icons that represent major events adorn the footer and make the story easy to follow and review. The back cover folds out with the icons in order and linked by a thread. My group loved turning to the back cover to review the icons together. In the margins, Smith provides a dozen-word summary of every book of the Bible.

The women loved the book and videos, and they had tons of questions every week (which shows how engaging they found the material, but also shows the need to have someone around to answer questions). Some had trouble following the chronology of Week 4: The Kingdoms & the Prophets, so I recommend supplying a few timelines (feel free to use the ones I provide in 7 Free Tools for Understanding the Old Testament).

Covering the entire Bible in six chapters, Smith broadly summarizes Israel’s history. In this excerpt, she introduces some of the prophets, including Isaiah (104):

Several prophets preached in Judah before and during its destruction: Isaiah, Micah, Nahum, Jeremiah, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah. Isaiah and Micah overlapped our division of times. They lived and preached in Judah both during the Divided Kingdom—the same time as Hosea and Amos—and after the Northern Kingdom was destroyed. See how this all fits together?

Review: The Story Personal Journal and Discovery Guide

By Jean E. Jones

Audience: Thoughtful Christians with some Old Testament understanding who want an in-depth Bible study guide to accompany The Story

Reading level: high school; languages: English & Korean

Free Download here

Picture of 'The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide'

The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide

I wrote this companion to The Story for my church and later updated it for Zondervan’s church resource library. It explains historical details and has ten timelines to keep the events in perspective. Practical application questions apply the Bible’s message to the reader’s life. It’s written so that people can read a chapter in The Story, and then answer questions from their Bible. Headings summarize what’s happening, and there are plenty of footnotes with additional details for those who want them. You can get it free from my website (see the link above) or Zondervan’s church resource library.

This excerpt is on Isaiah approaching King Ahaz:

God sent the prophet Isaiah to encourage Ahaz king of Judah not to be afraid, for he wouldn’t let [the kings of Israel and Aram] overthrow him. He told Ahaz to ask for any sign as proof. But Ahaz refused and instead sought Assyria’s help. He voluntarily became a vassal to Assyria’s king, paid him a large tribute, and set up shrines to Assyria’s gods in Jerusalem.

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6 Bibles, books & study guides to help you understand the Old Testament Click To Tweet

7/31/23 The Guide is no longer available splir into chapters, but you can download the full guide here

Recently, several churches told me they needed The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide split into individual chapters they could post on their website and/or print weekly. I’ve posted the chapters, which could be useful to others who don’t have that particular need. Perhaps you’d like to view some of the key chapters to decide if this study guide is a good fit for your church, without scanning the entire 230-page workbook. Maybe you’ve gone through Zondervan’s The Story and now want to spend a little more time in a few topics. You might have questions about how some of the Bible books fit together but aren’t ready to commit to the entire program yet. Or you may love timelines and want to see all ten of them without scrolling through the larger book.

Picture of 'The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide'

The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide

I’ve posted the individual chapters and listed what extras (such as timelines) each includes so you can take a look at them. I also posted general permissions since both Zondervan and I have been getting a lot of questions on that (mostly, “May we post this on our church’s website?”). You’ll find both downloads and permissions on the Subscribers Specials page, which you can access from here.

Now, if you’re considering using The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide, I recommend looking at these key chapters:

  • Chapter 1: Creation: The Beginning of Life as We Know It. This chapter shows how God’s story begins and sets the stage for themes that recur throughout the Bible, including the promise of the Seed who will be the Serpent Crusher.
  • Chapter 8: A Few Good Men … and Women. This lesson got tremendous feedback, with some saying they’d never understood the book of Judges before. It not only sets the stage for the upcoming stories from Kings and Chronicles, but helps readers apply the truths found here to their own lives.
  • Chapter 16: The Beginning of the End. Thought-provoking questions guide participants to understanding why the exiles happened and seeing how judgment was combined with hope. Practical applications include imitating Hezekiah’s prayer for deliverance. A fill-in table links Isaiah 53’s prophecies to their New Testament fulfillments.
  • Chapter 26: The Hour of Darkness. The Last Supper and crucifixion are tied back to what previous chapters covered in the Old Testament, guiding the reader to understand why Jesus died.

I pray that you will find this study of God’s word a blessing.

Related Topics

Here’s a question I hear often: Did Joshua cause leap years by praying for the sun to stop?

Christians naturally want to pass along any information that might influence agnostic friends to trust the Bible. That’s great when the details are solid, but sometimes inaccurate claims bounce around, and when we latch onto one of those, skeptics mock.

One such claim traversing the Internet is that Joshua’s prayer for the sun to stand still during a battle (Joshua 10:12) combined with Isaiah’s prayer for a shadow to retreat ten steps (2 Kings 20:11) resulted in a lost day that has to be made up for with leap years.

Sometimes this claim is combined with the debunked urban legend that NASA found Joshua’s lost day: See NASA discovers a “lost day” in time? and NASA and the Missing Day in Time.

So did Joshua cause leap years?

Joshua commanding the sun to stand still did not cause leap years
“Joshua Commanding the Sun to Stand Still on Gibeon” by John Martin, 1816 (public domain)

No.

We don’t periodically add a day to February because of an astronomical anomaly three millennia ago—that would be like saying a train was late once in 1842 and Amtrak has to adjust all its train schedules every few years to compensate.

Why we have leap years

We have leap years so our seasons will start on about the same calendar date each calendar year. If we never observed leap years, we’d eventually celebrate the Fourth of July in the middle of winter and Christmas in summer.

The technical explanation

Our seasons begin when the earth is at specific points in its orbit around the sun. The earth takes 365 days 5 hours 48 minutes 46 seconds to orbit the sun—a period of time called a tropical year.

A calendar year tracks only full days, so after four calendar years, that nearly six-hour lag behind the tropical year accumulates to almost twenty-four hours. We add a day to the calendar year to synchronize it with the tropical year.

Leap years synchronize calendar years to tropical years. Here's how. Click To Tweet

This allows us to keep the solstices (when the sun is farthest from the equator, causing the shortest and longest days of the year) always near December 21 and June 21, and the equinoxes (when the sun crosses the equator, causing day and night to be nearly the same length) always near March 20 and September 22. Summer and winter start on the solstices; spring and fall start on the equinoxes.

Baranof Island, Alaska, on Did Joshua cause leap years
In parts of Alaska, the summer solstice brings 24 hours sunlight and the winter solstice 0! Knowing the date to expect them is vital.

Even if you don’t live in the parts of Alaska where the sun doesn’t rise on December 21 and doesn’t set on June 21, you probably find planning easier knowing which months are hottest and which are coldest. (Unless you live near the equator where day lengths don’t vary much—Hawaii’s longest day is 13.5 hours and its shortest 11 hours.)

Leap days and leap years

The extra calendar day is added to the end of February and is called a leap day. A year in which we add a leap day is called a leap year. We have leap years about every four years. But because a leap day overcompensates by 11 minutes and 14 seconds, we skip adding a leap day three times over every four centuries.

For those who like such things, here’s how to figure out which years are leap years. Years evenly divisible by four are leap years except for years also evenly divisible by 100 but not by 400. Thus 2020 and 2000 are leap years, but not 1900 (2020 is evenly divisible by 4, but not 100; 2000 is evenly divisible by 4, 100, and 400; 1900 is evenly divisible by 4 and 100, but not 400).

Test everything. Hold on to the good.

1 Thessalonians 5:21
UPDATED 2/10/2020
Did Joshua cause leap years when he prayed for the sun to stop? Leap years & tropical years explained. Click To Tweet

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Part four of a five-part message accompanying chapter 2 of The Story

How do we courageously obey God when obedience is risky? I find help in Jacob’s seven courageous steps as he returned home despite his brother’s vow to kill him. In earlier posts, I mentioned that Jacob in faith immediately started on his way when God told him to go home; that when circumstances worsened, he prayed and repeated God’s promise to him; and that he arranged to repay the debt he owed his brother. We come now to Jacob’s fifth step of courage: risking all to obey the God he trusted.

Risk Come What May

Ruben's painting of Jacob and Esau reconcilingPeter Paul Rubens, “The Reconciliation of Jacob and Esau,” 1624

At eighteen, I worked for a secretarial agency during a bad recession. Business was scant. One day the owner excitedly told me she had an idea on how to increase income by restructuring rates, and she asked me to call competitors, say I had a large job, and ask for quotes. I thought, “She’s a Christian and an adult, and she thinks it’s okay. Besides, who could it hurt?” I complied, but was dismayed when a competitor excitedly asked for details. I realized I’d raised the hopes of someone desperate for work. Convicted because I knew the Bible forbade lying, I committed to never do this again.

Years later, that commitment was tested. I’d been at a new job only a couple months when a successful and driven sales VP asked me to make a similar call. I prayed for alternatives, and then offered to see if my assistant would take the assignment directly from him and, if not, to call the competitor and ask for pricing directly, explaining that as a Christian I wasn’t comfortable lying. His pricey pen froze midair as his deep-set eyes glared under thick gray eyebrows.

My assistant declined, so the next morning I prayed for God’s help, called the competitor, and requested pricing. When he asked from what company I was calling, I told him honestly. Sounding surprised, he gave me the numbers and said they were public knowledge anyway. I passed them on to my still angry boss. He didn’t fire me, but he did pile on unpleasant work for a couple weeks, apparently testing whether I would refuse anything else. It took time, but we eventually had a good working relationship.

A year later he told me what happened. He had gone home that night furious and told his wife he was firing me the next day. She asked him why he would fire someone he’d just learned he could trust even at the risk of losing her job. He grudgingly delayed firing me, and finally decided having an honest employee was valuable.

We all face times when obeying God brings risk. That’s what Jacob faced as he stood at the bank of a cold river in the middle of the night. On the other side was the home to which God commanded him to go. But also on the other side was danger, for his brother Esau was advancing with 400 men.

Working in darkness, Jacob trusted in God’s promise and sent his entire family and all his possessions across the water that separated him from Esau.

It’s one thing to pray as he had earlier, “God, all that I have is undeserved.” It’s another to actually obey knowing we may lose what’s dear to us. That takes courage.

The willingness to suffer the repercussions of doing right, to accept loss as a possible part of God’s plan, and to embrace an uncertain future as being part of the trustworthy plans of a just and good God requires recognizing that we are servants of the most high God. It’s where we do what’s right despite the potential cost. It’s where the mother releases her college-bound child, the husband his financial security, and the grief-ridden their beloved into the hands of God. It’s where we let go and trust.

We leave our story now with Jacob still on the safer side of the river, knowing God wants him to cross over and face his brother. The next post brings us Jacob’s final two courageous steps.

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Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 1

Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 2

Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 3

Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 5

 

Part three of a five-part message accompanying chapter 2 of The Story

Years ago I decided that any time I said something negative about someone to a person who didn’t need to know, I would go to the person I’d talked to and say, “When I told you about so-and-so, I was gossiping and that was wrong. I apologize, and I ask that you not let the story go further.” I dreaded doing this, but I knew it was the least I could do to repay my debt to the person I’d wronged.

Ruben's painting of Jacob and Esau reconciling

Peter Paul Rubens, "The Reconciliation of Jacob and Esau," 1624

It’s often hard to admit our wrongs. We may fear losing face or suffering retaliation. Some people avoid those they’ve wronged at all costs. Yet Jesus said we should make things right with those who have something against us even before we bring God gifts (Matthew 5:23–24). This was Jacob’s predicament as he paused before the river separating him from Esau.

In my last two posts we saw that God told Jacob to go home, a place he’d fled twenty years before because his brother Esau vowed to kill him. Jacob courageously started on his way, but panicked when he heard Esau was coming with four hundred men. He stopped franticly planning long enough to pray and repeat God’s promise to him.

Apparently during Jacob’s prayer time, the Holy Spirit encouraged him to make amends. After all, the split between Esau and him was his fault: he had deceitfully defrauded his brother.

Isn’t that a common result of prayer? The Holy Spirit reminds us of the issues we haven’t really dealt with appropriately and tugs our conscience, reminding us we actually have to make things right. Jacob’s return home required another courageous step.

Repay Debts

Jacob stayed up that night and selected a gift for his brother Esau (Genesis 32:13). Officially, he didn’t owe Esau anything: his father’s oral blessing was legally binding even though Jacob had tricked his dad into thinking he was Esau. But spiritually, he needed to make things right. From all that Jacob had, he separated out that which would make restitution to his brother. In so doing, he let go of the greed that had driven him to defraud Esau.

Coming clean when we’ve wronged someone takes courage. Our pride likes to keep us from admitting our wrongs, and tempts us to justify ourselves by looking at the other person’s wrongs (real or not). But repaying debts we have the means to repay and apologizing for wrongdoing is essential for spiritual growth and healthy relationships.

Jacob couldn’t make up for all the pain he’d caused, but he readied what he could before meeting the challenge that comes next in this series.

Related Posts

Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 1

Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 2

Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 4

Courage: Jacob’s Example Part 5

 

 

I’ve finished The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide and you can get it free on the Subscriber Specials page, which you can access here! This guidebook takes you through the overall grand themes of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. It accompanies Zondervan’s The Story, which groups Bible excerpts into thirty-one chapters. The Personal Journal & Discussion Guide adds questions that help you apply the concepts you’re learning to your life and that stimulate robust discussions. It explains history and adds charts to help you grasp the big ideas more easily.

Picture of 'The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide'

The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide

Shelley Leith, National Church Coach and Story Specialist at Zondervan, called this guide “a phenomenal, high-engagement tool”! Cool, huh?

Nearly 200 women in my church started going through The Story with simple discussion questions when we realized we needed more in-depth questions that would help everyone apply the passages they were reading to their everyday lives and that would provide more explanation for those who wanted it. So I wrote this discussion guide for them. Our women’s ministry director, Lori Marshall, sent a couple lessons off to Zondervan, and now Zondervan is adding them to their free online resource library.

Acknowledgements

I owe a quite a few people some great big thanks.

Thank you first of all to my wonderful husband, Clay, who is always my first reader and offers invaluable insights (it helps that he holds a doctor of ministry degree from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and is a full-time professor in the Master of Arts in Christian apologetics program at Biola University). He also did everything he could to free my time when I was in a crunch.

Thank you, Lori Marshall, for entrusting this project to me, and for the encouragement, insights, and kind notes you gave along the way.

Thank you to all the other readers who advised and proofed: Lori Marshall, Holly Robaina, Donna Jones, and Kerrie Parlett. Thank you, too, to Cathryn Wade who is a joy to work with and who kept everything updated and posted at Crossline. Thank you, Angie Wright, who suggested creating discussion pages so people like she who do the lessons as a personal journal would have a place to interact. Thank you as well to our awesome women’s prayer team led by Gerri Donnelly—I so appreciated your prayers!

Thank you to the nearly 200 women who tested lessons 8 to 31 and gave such wonderful encouragement and support. Also, thank you to the women in my smaller summer Bible study group who tested the first seven lessons for me (they attend seven different churches so their perspectives were great).

The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide

Sensing a need for a more comprehensive view of the totality of Biblical truth, this year two hundred women in Crossline Church read The Story, NIV: The Bible as One Continuing Story of God and His People, which excerpts passages from Genesis to Revelation. Though we began with a set of discussion questions from another source, they didn’t quite meet our needs. Our women’s ministry director asked me to write the weekly study that the women completed at home and then discussed in their small groups. Many women told me that they had never before had such a robust appreciation for all that God was doing in the sweep of history.

The response was overwhelmingly positive as people said they understood parts of the Bible for the first time and were no longer afraid of it.

The positive reaction prompted our women’s ministry director to send two of the studies to Zondervan, the publisher of The Story. Zondervan has asked to post the series in their on-line resource library as soon as I write the first seven lessons! How exciting is that?

I’m in the middle of writing those seven, and I’ll test them at a women’s Bible study group this summer so I can hone them before sending them off. (Let me know if you’d like to join us!) I’ll post the lessons on this site as I finish them. This will give you a chance to preview the material and see if it’s something you can use at your church or for your own devotional times.

Update: The lessons are finished and you can download The Story: Personal Journal & Discussion Guide at ‘The Story’ Guide.