In a facebook group started by evangelicals for the purpose of "reaching out to Catholics" and trying to save us from the Catholic Church, someone asked me what I know about the Bible. My reply was lenghty and I thought to make the time sharing that more worthwhile I would cut and paste it into a blog post too. I have been spending a few days defending the Catholic faith in that group, I am not sure how much more time I will spend there, I am not sure if it is doing any good or not. But here is some my reply about what I have learned about scripture in the Catholic Church:
It would be impossible to tell you everything I learned in all my studies but I can give a brief description and overview. I have taken so far 3 Great Adventure study classes that were written by Jeff Cavins. I took “The Bible Timeline”, “Psalms”, and “Revelation”. I also started to take “Epic” By Tim Gray but my Daughters school and basketball games prevented me from having time to complete that class, I will have to take it again some other time. There are several other studies available and I want to take them but I haven’t had time recently. In the Timeline study, Jeff Cavins covers the entire history of salvation from Genesis to Revelation. The first principal of Bible study that I learned from this class was to always pray before reading. We began each class and ended each class with prayer. As basic as that seems I would not have thought to do that if it were not for that class. There is a timeline Chart that goes with that class and breaks down all of scripture into 12 periods. We spent 2 weeks on each period. The twelve periods were: 1) The Early World; Creation through 2000 BC; This is in the first part of Genesis and we follow not only the story but the bloodline from Adam and Eve to Seth to Noah to Shem. We learned insights on creation, the fall followed by curses and promises, the flood, and the tower of Babel. 2) The Patriarchs; 2000bc to 1700 bc; we read and studied the second half of Genesis and touched on Job; we followed the stories and bloodline of Abraham and Sarah (The woman who the bloodline followed through DID matter here!), to Isaac, Jacob, Judah, and Perez. 3) Egypt and Exodus; 1700bc- around 1300 bc; we studied Exodus and touched on Leviticus; Something interesting I learned during this part of the study was that Leviticus was rules for the tribe of Levi, the priestly tribe. I would have never made that connection on my own. 4) Desert Wanderings; 1280-1240 bc; we expanded from Exodus into Numbers and Deuteronomy. We learned that Moses strikes the rock three times instead of speaking to the rock and was punished for disobeying God and failing to trust in God at that moment. 5) Conquest and Judges; 1240bc- 1050 bc; covered Joshua, Judges, and Ruth; throughout all of these we also continued following the bloodline and priestly blessing passed on. 6) Royal Kingdom; 1050-930B.C.; 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, mainly while touching on Psalms, Chronicles, Proverbs, and Song of Solomon; We learned a lot about Saul and David and the Ark of the covenant being moved to Jerusalem and the first temple being built. 7) Divided Kingdom; 930-722 BC; studied mainly 1kings and 2Kings while touching on Jonah, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Issiah, Hosea, and Micah; I learned more about my FAVORITE OT prophet here, Elijah, that was great! 8) Exile; Mainly 2Kings with lots of supplementary books; Covered the Babylonian exile. 9) Return; 538-167 BC; covered mainly Ezra and Nehemiah 10) Maccabean Revolt; 167 BC – 0; covered 1 Maccabees and learned why Martin Luther didn’t want to include this book and that he also wanted to remove Revelation from the Bible. 11) Messianic Fulfillment; 0-33 AD; studied mainly out of Luke but compared and contrasted to Matthew, Mark, and John. This is where every promise and prophecy of our savior came to fulfillment! 12) The Church 33 AD- present and future; Studied mainly Acts and saw how the Catholic Church began; also touched on Pauls letters, other letters, and Revelation.
That is what I studied in the Bible Timeline. Psalms and Revelation were equally fascinating studies. I highly recomend any study or book by Jeff Cavins, they are well worth any time and money spent on them.
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