The Value of Wisdom

I have often heard people speak of life verses - a verse that stands out to you and is particularly meaningful that you commit to memory and you keep it with you all the days of your life. Today I read Proverbs 2: 1-5 and these verses on the value of wisdom really struck me. I'm not sure if I would label this passage as my life verse but I will definitely commit to memorizing it.

My entire worldview must be shaped by the things of God, and not this world. The only way to understand the fear of the Lord and to gain any knowledge of God is to constantly seek wisdom through His word. Without the knowledge of God we know nothing, just the lies that men have created. Without understanding God's purpose and will for His people, we are literally hopeless. Wisdom is key to surviving :)

Proverbs 2: 1-5 -

My Son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding; yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.

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Oh How I Agree!

John Adams
2nd U.S. President and Signer of the Declaration of Independence

"Suppose a nation in some distant Region should take the Bible for their only law Book, and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts there exhibited! Every member would be obliged in conscience, to temperance, frugality, and industry; to justice, kindness, and charity towards his fellow men; and to piety, love, and reverence toward Almighty God ... What a Eutopia, what a Paradise would this region be."

_{--Diary and Autobiography of John Adams, Vol. III, p. 9.}

English Bible History

I just read through this "brief" history of the English Bible! It begins with John Wycliffe in the 1300s and makes its way to our present day Bible. Very very very fascinating. It took me a little while to read (maybe 30 minutes?) But it was well worth the read.

"William Tyndale fought and died for the right to print the Bible in the common, spoken, modern English tongue of his day… as he boldly told one official who criticized his efforts, “If God spare my life, I will see to it that the boy who drives the plowshare knows more of the scripture than you, Sir!”"

English Bible History Timeline

The Truth Project

The Birth of Jesus: Revelation 12: 1-6

The Woman and the Dragon

1 And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. 2 She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pains and the agony of giving birth. 3 And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems. 4 His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she bore her child he might devour it. 5 She gave birth to a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne, 6 and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which she is to be nourished for 1,260 days.

Revelation 12: 1-6 is not the first thing that comes to mind when you imagine the birth of Christ. We're more likely to picture the Nativity scene we see everywhere when Christmas comes around. When we look at the bigger picture of the significance of what happened on that day of his birth, the picture becomes more like what we read in this passage.

I am new to Revelation. My whole life I've only read small parts of it at a time and I've never completely understood it because I have never read through the whole book. I knew that one day I would have to spend a long time studying this book because there is so much prophesy and symbolism and in order to really understand it one must have thorough knowledge of the Old Testament. Last Sunday our pastor used this scripture and it has served as a huge reminder to me that the Bible is a living book - there is no other book like it, men could not have written this alone. I'm always so amazed when I read the prophesies and see them being fulfilled in a completely different text! The continuity and complexity of the Bible is mind boggling. There is SO MUCH to learn! I thank the Lord that I am so privileged to have access to this Bible whenever I wish to read it. The Bible is illegal in 51 countries right now. Many Christians out there are being killed for owning this book. I am so thankful for this incredible blessing.

I think for the next couple months I will focus on reading Revelation in my personal study time (it is the last book in the Bible) in addition to my Isaiah Bible Study with church. Revelation is the most controversial book in the Bible because it involves a lot of careful interpretation due to its amount of symbolism. I look forward to learning as much as I can about it within the next couple months.

Reading Isaiah

Earlier today I was doing my study on Isaiah and after reading that the book was written around 700 B.C. I thought, "Wow. I'm reading something that was written 2,700 years ago."

How AMAZING is it that we can sit down and read something that was written so long ago? I'm always fascinated with things written even 100 years ago! 2,700 years... That is around 36 lifetimes!

Praise the Lord for preserving His words for us all to read!

2Ti 3:16	All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
2Ti 3:17	that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.

Visualizing the Bible

This diagram is a result of a collaboration between a Carnegie-Mellon Ph.D student Chris Harrison and a Lutheran pastor Christoph Romhild from Germany. They wanted to create a grand map of Biblical cross-references: "We wanted something that honored and revealed the complexity of the data at every level –- as one leans in, smaller details should become visible. This ultimately led us to the multi-colored arc diagram... The bar graph that runs along the bottom represents all of the chapters in the Bible. Books alternate in color between white and light gray. The length of each bar denotes the number of verses in the chapter. Each of the 63,779 cross references found in the Bible is depicted by a single arc - the color corresponds to the distance between the two chapters, creating a rainbow-like effect."

Sayings Not Found in Scripture

I was browsing around Blue Letter Bible and I came across these. It is a list of sayings that are commonly referred to as Biblical sayings, but they are not actually (or entirely) Biblical.

Another saying that I hear people say a lot is "Love the sinner, hate the sin." At face value that is true but not in the context that it usually is used. Many of these listed here I have heard of before but there were a few that I never knew anything about. Click on the links to read more about each one. Very interesting read.

Sayings

Moderation in all things.
Once saved, always saved.
Better to cast your seed....
Spare the rod, spoil the child.
To thine ownself be true.
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
God helps those who help themselves.
Money is the root of all evil.
Cleanliness is next to godliness.
This too shall pass.
God works in mysterious ways.
The eye is the window to the soul.
The lion shall lay down with the lamb.
Pride comes before the fall.

Miscellaneous

The Three Wisemen
The Sinner's Prayer
Wedding Vows
The Seven Deadly Sins

- Shaina