Needed this for a project. Thought someone else might be able to benefit from a comma separated list of the books of the Bible:

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 1 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrew, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Jude, Revelation

photo credit: bemky

Several weeks back I attended a birthday party in honor of an elderly woman who has been coming regularly to a Bible study that I lead at the senior apartment complex where she lives. While this woman has verbalized on many occasions her trust in the Lord, I’m not exactly sure where her son’s family is at after meeting them for the first time at the party. It’s always interesting to hear the first remarks people make once they learn that one is a seminary student.

They asked what denominational affiliation the seminary has. I told them it is Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, a Southern Baptist school. They then replied that they attend a local Catholic church but are open to “all things spiritual.” I was happy to agree that I, too, am open to “all things spiritual” as far as the plain meaning of the statement goes. I have nothing against spirituality. In fact, a non-Christian ex-worker once remarked to me that he finds it shallow that many Christians while religions aren’t spiritual. I agree.

Their second question was what I wanted to do after I graduate. “So are you going to be a minister or something?” I said that I could be but that I’m pursuing work in Bible translation. “Oh, that’s interesting. There’s a lot that’s lost in translation.” This is one of those statements that people often repeat after hearing because they think it sounds clever, but they’re not actually sure if it’s true; it only seems to be true on the face of it. The idea that a lot is left behind in translation just seems to makes sense.

I wasn’t sure whether to take this comment as a dig at Bible translation or what. I should have asked what they meant by that. I find this to be a good course of action to get to the bottom of people’s thinking. They’ll either be able to articulate a well-crafted explanation of whatever it is you asked them to clarify (rare) or they’ll stumble and sort of trail off (more common). Instead I replied by saying that over and over again in my studies I’m amazed at how well translations are able to reproduce what’s there in the original. For example, I’m doing an independent study this semester on Exodus wherein I’m reading through the Hebrew, the Septuagint, and two modern translations four times each to get a feel for what’s lost and how what is communicated is communicated. So far I’m amazed at how well the message of the text sings loud and clear.

Translation is what it is but I think I can safely conclude that the message of the Bible sings out loud and clear in any language despite whatever may be lost (a topic for another time). That is the point of translation: that God’s redemptive message faithfully sing loud and clear.

Why do we use the phrase “redemptive history“? Wasn’t redemption accomplished in that single act of Jesus offering himself upon the cross in our place? Yes and no, says, Jonathan Edwards in his 1739 sermon “A History of the Work of Redemption.” He notes that there are many parts or acts of redemption that make up what we call redemptive history. Therefore redemption has a history to it. Specifically, redemption has a history because it was first planned in eternity past, begun after the Fall, and its fruit will continue on into eternity future.

On this last aspect where one might expect the work of redemption to continue into eternity future, Edwards writes,

“The Work of Redemption is not an eternal work, that is, it is not a work always a-doing and never accomplished. But the fruits of this work are eternal fruits…[A]s God’s electing love and the covenant of redemption never had a beginning, so the fruits of this work that shall be after the end of the work never will have an end” (A Jonathan Edwards Reader, p. 130).

Why many parts?

My dad asked this question last week as we talked about the relation of the Testaments and the span of redemptive history. Why did God wait so long? My mind was immediately taken toGalatians 4:4 where Paul speaks about God sending for his son in “the fullness of time.” We must remember that what is a long time in our minds is perfect timing is God’s grand scheme of redemptive history. Still, we wonder why.

Edwards likens the many parts of redemptive history to the construction of a building:

“Like an house or temple that is building, first the workmen are sent forth, then the materials are gathered, then ground fitted, then foundation is laid, then the superstructure erected one part after another, till at length the topstone is laid. And all is finished. Now the Work of Redemption in that large sense that has been explained may be compared to such a building that is carrying on from the fall of man to the end of the world. God went about it immediately after the fall of man. Some things were done towards this building then, immediately as maybe hereafter shown; and so God has gone as it were getting materials and building ever since, and so will go on to the end of the world. And then the time shall come when the topstone shall be brought forth and all will appear complete and consummate” (A Jonathan Edwards Reader, 132).

This analogy, however, does not serve to explain why God did things this way. It just makes it more understandable, more reasonable when we think of redemptive history as a work in progress.

Still, why many parts?

God’s glory.

Edwards, as you may well be aware, argues thoroughly and compellingly for God’s glory as the end of all his works (cf. “The End for Which God Created the World”). Most importantly, this is the testimony of the Bible. Therefore, Edwards can conclude his sermon on the work of redemption by saying (n.b. read slowly),

“In all this God designed to accomplish the glory of the blessed Trinity in an exceeding degree. God had a design of glorifying himself from eternity, to glorify each person in the Godhead. The end must considered as first in the order of nature and then the means, and therefore we must conceive that God having proposed this end had then, as it were, the means to choose” (A Jonathan Edwards Reader, p. 135).

In my own words, God’s goal (his end) is to glorify himself. (Don’t worry: your joy in life is not opposed to God glorifying himself but included in it.) The goal is always first or primary. The way to accomplish the goal is secondary or subordinate. God has the right to choose how to accomplish his goal. He chose to do it in many parts. God’s timing like his plan is perfect. We therefore trust him.

A Jonathan Edwards Reader

The book I’ve quoted in this post is A Jonathan Edwards Reader published by Yale University Press. I ordered my copy from Westminster Seminary Bookstore for a class on Jonathan Edwards I’m taking this semester. Use the following referral link to check it out in the Westminster Bookstore (every click gets me closer to a free book): Jonathan Edwards Reader

At my seminary aspiring preachers are encouraged to preach through entire books as a series instead of preaching topically every week from different books. I’ve applied the same principle to my personal Bible study and now work through a psalm or two almost daily. (I miss a day here and there.)

What’s great about Psalms is that by reading one a day or something similar one covers more topics than would be covered by doing a topical study. Topics emerge which you might not expect to research or do more reading on or even think about. When we think of topics of Scripture, we think of faith, love, peace, and patience, all virtues that are relatively easily understood, learned, and applied (not always, but usually). For such virtues we hang out in Paul’s letters or in the Gospels with the Old Testament almost entirely forgotten. Psalms brings such oversight to a screeching halt.

Covering lots of topics by reading through Psalms, however, is by no means “a walk in the park.” There are hard sayings which we Christians aren’t quite sure what to do with. David seems always to be crying out to God for him to crush his enemies. He wants God to shut their mouths because they’re mocking him. Let them get caught in their own traps that they laid for him. David appears a guiltless man pursued by bandits unjustly whom he wishes God would smite.

At this point in reading (coming across such things), a two-option tension arises:

1. How should I interpret (tweak?) this Scripture to make it more palatable to my own experience and understanding of God? Or…
2. How should this surprising passage of Scripture change me, my understanding and theology?

You see, it’s either change or be changed. I can say, “David didn’t mean such-and-such, he meant this,” changing the text. Or, I can say, “Woah, I didn’t realize the saints operated in such a way or that God would be like this,” allowing myself to be changed by what I read.

But I must be careful here because a careful reading and interpretation of a hard passage is not “changing” the Scripture. For, what is careful reading and changing of interpretation of a passage but changing what I think a specific word means or refers to? Thus, it is me, the reader, who changes not Scripture. I allow what I think something means to change to be more consistent with Scripture. On the other hand, what we must never allow happen is a changing of the Scripture to suit oneself or one’s personal understanding. I am not the measure of all things nor does the Scripture have to account for what I deem my incontestable experience.

The word of God stands. I change.

School started back up the end of this week…which means that the quotables will now start rolling in. Dr. McDaniel reminded us this morning (at 7:30am!) that during Jesus’ temptation, he pulled directly from Deuteronomy to combat the Adversary

“If your struggle against sin depended on your knowledge of Deuteronomy, how well would you do?”

It might be fair to say that our struggle against sin should include a working, quotable familiarity with Deuteronomy. Nonetheless, point taken.

Codex Sinaiticus Project website goes live July 24, 2008.

I had my ESV opened this morning and sitting to the left of my laptop while finishing up some homework for my summer Old Testament II class. At one point I picked it up to get a better look and then set it back down. Upon setting it down, it began dancing as I happened to capture in the video below. To be honest I was considerably spooked out. I quickly grabbed my cell phone to record the action.

This may be silly but what immediately came to mind were the innumerable accounts of supernatural happenings in the middle ages. I, however, unlike a scribe of yesteryear, had the means and technology to record my preternatural experience. I could go to class this morning and share with a classmate my dancing, pneuma-filled ESV and prove it with a video, whereas a scribe in the 13th century going to class (or wherever a scribe would go to hang out with his buddies) after experiencing something like I did, would have to rely on his integrity as a truth-teller alone to gain an audience. You can imagine a scribe going to Haplography 102 and reporting his morning supernatural experience to his friends, the conversation being overheard by the class historian, and the account of a dancing scroll finding its way into the annals of Christian history as a mighty act of the pneuma of God. You can imagine it, right?

Well, unfortunately, I have to report that my dancing, pneuma-filled ESV has a natural explanation: the side fan from my laptop. Check it out (sorry so small; it’s my phone’s camera):

Matthew 8:23-27:

23 And when he got into the boat, his disciples followed him. 24 And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but he was asleep. 25 And they went and woke him, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing.” 26 And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. 27 And the men marveled, saying, “What sort of man is this, that even winds and sea obey him?”

Psalm 148:7-8

7 Praise the Lord from the earth,
you great sea creatures and all deeps,
8 fire and hail, snow and mist,
stormy wind fulfilling [doing] his word!

What sort of man is this indeed? The God-man. Before Abraham was, he was.

So, you’ve seen cross references in the margin, or footnotes, of your Bible. But what would all those look like represented visually? Chris Harrison, a doctoral student at Carnegie Mellon University’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute, has done it. He’s taken the cross reference data and worked out the image below. Beautiful. Amazing. It’s the kind of the thing you can just stare at for ages. He’s also done similar work with Biblical names and places. Go check out the whole Visualizing the Bible page where you can find the entire above mentioned (he’s also got plenty of other interesting visualizations to check out).

Hopefully, this can (really) get us thinking about the interconnectedness of Scripture. Exempli gratia, notice the overarching connection that is Genesis and Revelation. I praise God for individuals using their talents (and technology) in service to the Church. Wow.

(HT: Addison Road)

I didn’t post a weekly review for last week because we were on Fall break, which isn’t to imply that I did no learning during this week off, but that it was a week off! Today I’ve got a bunch of miscellanies for you since I had something due in each of my four classes this week, exam or paper or otherwise. Garn.

• Evangelical Textual Criticism has quickly become one of my most read blogs since hearing an interview with two contributors, Simon Gathercole (Cambridge) and Peter Williams (Aberdeen), on the new perspective of Paul. It’s a team blog so there are regular updates by a multifarious group of scholars. “A forum for people with knowledge of the Bible in its original languages to discuss its manuscripts and textual history from the perspective of historic evangelical theology.”
• Lots of freely downloadable Christian hip hop can be found at the Sphere of Hip Hop. You’ll definitely want to hear how “Jesus did walk with the ladies.” Intrigued?
• We’ve booked our flights to go back to England over Christmas. I have a mental list of things to try to remember to do: get a peak at Codex Sinaiticus, visit Bunhill to see the graves of Johns Owen, Bunyan and Gill and Isaac Watts…(Can you say supererogatory acts?), and my list is still growing. Of course spending time with the extremely jovial and congenial Hayes family is top priority. =)
• I took two semesterin of German in college and now it’s time to shift into Retention Phase. Thank you, http://ergebung.wordpress.com, a theological German blog. Klingt mir gut!
• That’s it. I’ve got a paper to write.