Tag: Teaching

This Friday’s question is: “Did Jesus really rise from the dead?” We’ll tackle common objections to the resurrection including today’s, which is:

“Jesus’ body was taken away”

How would you answer this objection? Send me your thoughts and come, if you can, to Bracknell Leisure Centre this Friday 25th May, 8pm. Let’s learn together.

Please add your comments on this week’s topic. We learn best when we learn in community. 

Do you have a question about teaching the Bible? Is it theological, technical, practical? Send me your questions or suggestions. Here’s the email: malcolm@malcolmcox.org.

If you’d like a copy of my free eBook on spiritual disciplines, “How God grows His people”, sign up at my website: http://www.malcolmcox.org.

Please pass the link on, subscribe, leave a review.

“Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.” (Psalms 100:2 NIV11)

God bless, Malcolm

PS: You might also be interested in my book: “An elephant’s swimming pool”, a devotional look at the Gospel of John

This Friday’s question is: “Did Jesus really rise from the dead?” We’ll tackle common objections to the resurrection including today’s, which is:

“Jesus never really died”

How would you answer this objection?

Send me your thoughts and come, if you can, to Bracknell Leisure Centre this Friday 25th May, 8pm. Let’s learn together.

Please add your comments on this week’s topic. We learn best when we learn in community.

Do you have a question about teaching the Bible? Is it theological, technical, practical? Send me your questions or suggestions. Here’s the email: malcolm@malcolmcox.org.

If you’d like a copy of my free eBook on spiritual disciplines, “How God grows His people”, sign up at my website: http://www.malcolmcox.org.

Please pass the link on, subscribe, leave a review.

“Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.” (Psalms 100:2 NIV11)

God bless, Malcolm

PS: You might also be interested in my book: “An elephant’s swimming pool”, a devotional look at the Gospel of John

“In Genesis 1.27 it says God created mankind male and female and he created them, which appears to suggest they were created at the same time. Some online sites suggests that Adam had a first wife Lilith. Then in Genesis 2 it explains that God created Eve from Adam as his helper.”

Judaism

• Lilith is a figure in Jewish mythology, developed earliest in the Babylonian Talmud (3rd to 5th century AD).
• Alphabet of Ben Sira is considered to be the oldest form of the story of Lilith as Adam’s first wife. 8th-10th centuries CE.  Mud before rib.

“Desert creatures will meet with hyenas, and wild goats will bleat to each other; there the night creatures [lilit] will also lie down and find for themselves places of rest.” (Isaiah 34:14 NIV11)

• Cannot form a doctrine from one word in one verse which has nothing to do with Adam & Eve

Gen 1 – big picture Gen 2 – zooming in to a place
“So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” (Genesis 1:27 NIV11)

“We got married and had two children.”

• No time described
• No order regarding the children described

“Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” (Genesis 2:7 NIV11)

“The naming of the animals, a scene which portrays man as monarch of all he surveys, poignantly reveals him as a social being, made for fellowship, not power: he will not live until he loves, giving himself away (24) to another on his own level. So the woman is presented wholly as his partner and counterpart; nothing is yet said of her as childbearer. She is valued for herself alone.” Kidner, Derek. Genesis: An Introduction and Commentary. TOTC 1. IVP/Accordance electronic edition, version 2.3. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1967.

“Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.  The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh. Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.” (Genesis 2:22–25 NIV11)
“This at last…” NRSV

“They were both naked, they needed no cloaths for defense against cold or heat, for neither could be injurious to them: they needed none for ornament. Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Nay, they needed none for decency, they were naked, and had no reason to be ashamed. They knew not what shame was, so the Chaldee reads it. Blushing is now the colour of virtue, but it was not the colour of innocency.” Wesley, John. Wesley’s Notes on the Bible. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.3. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 1997.

Please add your comments on this week’s topic. We learn best when we learn in community. 

Do you have a question about teaching the Bible? Is it theological, technical, practical? Send me your questions or suggestions. Here’s the email: malcolm@malcolmcox.org.

If you’d like a copy of my free eBook on spiritual disciplines, “How God grows His people”, sign up at my website: http://www.malcolmcox.org.

Please pass the link on, subscribe, leave a review.

“Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.” (Psalms 100:2 NIV11)

God bless, Malcolm

PS: You might also be interested in my book: “An elephant’s swimming pool”, a devotional look at the Gospel of John

https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/people-cultures-in-the-bible/people-in-the-bible/lilith/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilith.

I’m having trouble with the YouTube embed feature. In the meantime please follow this link to find the video version of this post.

My old friend Johnson sent me this question all the way from India. In the passage below, who is Jesus referring to when he mentions “thieves and robbers”?

Therefore Jesus said again, “All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them.”

(John 10:7–9 NIV11)

Who did he have in mind? Three possibilities come to mind.

1. Unspiritual shepherds

There may be an allusion here to OT passages like Jeremiah 23:1–8 and Ezekiel 34, in which the prophets pronounced judgment upon the shepherds of Israel for their failure to care for the people. 

    ““Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of my pasture!” declares the LORD. Therefore this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says to the shepherds who tend my people: “Because you have scattered my flock and driven them away and have not bestowed care on them, I will bestow punishment on you for the evil you have done,” declares the LORD. “I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries where I have driven them and will bring them back to their pasture, where they will be fruitful and increase in number. I will place shepherds over them who will tend them, and they will no longer be afraid or terrified, nor will any be missing,” declares the LORD. “The days are coming,” declares the LORD,         “when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch,     a King who will reign wisely         and do what is just and right in the land.     In his days Judah will be saved         and Israel will live in safety.     This is the name by which he will be called:         The LORD Our Righteous Savior. “So then, the days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when people will no longer say, ‘As surely as the LORD lives, who brought the Israelites up out of Egypt,’ but they will say, ‘As surely as the LORD lives, who brought the descendants of Israel up out of the land of the north and out of all the countries where he had banished them.’ Then they will live in their own land.”” (Jeremiah 23:1–8 NIV11)

See also Ezekiel 34 – and the series by Douglas Jacoby.

2. False Messiahs

“For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.” (Matthew 24:24 NIV11)

“For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.” (Mark 13:22 NIV11)

3. ‘The Jews’

• Who treated the man born blind so badly.
• Of such leaders, Jesus says, the sheep did not listen to them.
• The man born blind certainly did not listen to them.
• Those who belong to Jesus, the true shepherd, do not resonate with voices such as theirs.

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:10 NIV11)

What kind of life?
The kind of ‘life’ envisioned is connected with v9 – salvation, safety and sustenance.
“I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture.” (John 10:9 NIV11)

Please add your comments on this week’s topic. We learn best when we learn in community. 

Do you have a question about teaching the Bible? Is it theological, technical, practical? Send me your questions or suggestions. Here’s the email: malcolm@malcolmcox.org.

If you’d like a copy of my free eBook on spiritual disciplines, “How God grows His people”, sign up at my website: http://www.malcolmcox.org.

Please pass the link on, subscribe, leave a review.

“Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.” (Psalms 100:2 NIV11)

God bless, Malcolm

PS: You might also be interested in my book: “An elephant’s swimming pool”, a devotional look at the Gospel of John