Reflections on the Bible, and Other Writings, from a Christian Perspective.
Last month I began releasing my first audio recordings of me reading the New Testament. I started in modest fashion with some of the shortest chapters in the Bible. Today I am sharing my second set of readings, this time with nine more chapters available for download.
As I have shared multiple times before, I consider reading the Bible to be one of the most important decisions I ever made in my life. I encourage all people to do the same, even though I recognize that reading that much may be a significant challenge. For some, listening to the New Testament is a more realistic option. Today I am contributing toward this latter goal by releasing my first series of audio recordings.
One of the most famous verses in the Bible is Romans 3:23. As many of us know, it teaches that we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. As we go through the book of Romans together, I felt that it was necessary for us to study this humbling truth, and the justification that is available through Christ.
One of the challenging duties as a Christian is warning people about their errors. This is especially the case in light of the world's notion of supposed relative truth. In addition to that ideal, it is also necessary to consider the damage that such corrections may cause. Friendships could be lost, bonds broken, and more. Even though these may happen, one part of the text of Psalm 141 teaches us a proper response to correction.
A number of psalms discuss being faced with enemies and relying on God. Some of these topics may be familiar to us, but others are much less so. For myself, I cannot relate to being violently oppressed by enemies. Even though this is the case, there is still much that we can learn from Psalm 43.
It is safe to say that love is an extremely important topic in the New Testament. Multiple chapters discuss it at length, one of which is 1 Corinthians 13. In that text, the apostle Paul even goes so far as to say that love is greater than faith and hope. I have already prepared plans for both of those topics. Today I am finishing this series with the concept of love.
Continuing through our series of reading plans based on the end of 1 Corinthians 13, we now come to hope. At first glance, it may seem very similar to faith. Surprisingly, it is distinct from that. Although the two words are sometimes used in the same context, hope is actually found far fewer times in the New Testament. It is also used for different reasons.
Over the last several months I have released a number of reading plans for both the Old and New Testaments. Most of these have been straightforward, with one just reading a number of chapters each day. Having done those, I am now changing my direction for such Bible resources. For this area of the site I will be focusing on shorter topical reading plans for a while. The first of these is concerning faith.
Today's post continues our studies from the Psalms. I am exploring them in order of length, starting with the shortest. Despite their short lengths, I have found value in each text, and I hope that you have too. We now come to Psalm 15, which is the first to be 5 verses in length. It is attributed to King David, and begins by asking some very important questions.
I will be the first to admit that the Bible can be challenging to understand. It takes effort and diligence to find what it teaches on many topics. Nearly all of them are discussed in a variety of sections of the Scriptures. Because of this, some may be interested to read What Does the Bible Really Teach? by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society as a study aid.
James L. Hutton 