Expert: Marilyn - 4/6/2007

Question
Hi there,
I'm very interested in learing about the Bible, and religion in general. I'm 19 years old, and have ABSOLUTELY no knowledge on the subject. How do you reccomend I begin?

Thanks.

Answer
Howdy Jesse;

You probably want to get a New International Version of the Bible.  Go ahead and spend the extra money to get one with a "concordance" in the back.  With a concordance, if you can remember a key word from a Bible verse, you can most likely locate that verse and other verses that contain that key word.

“The Picture Bible” by Iva Hoth is the best “children’s” Bible storybook I’ve seen.  I know you’re not a child, but this book is a favorite of adults, too, because it’s really a graphic novel style of Bible rather than specifically a children’s Bible.  This book can give you a quick overview of the Bible in an entertaining style.

There is a paraphrase Bible called, "The Message," which is good for reading, but it is a paraphrase which means it has been filtered through someone else's head--kind of like if you saw a movie and then went home and told someone the story, even if you got it as accurate as you possibly could and did a good job not boring the person, it's still not the same as if the person had seen the movie themselves.  "The Message" would be a good version to give food for thought, though.

The New International Version is only one of many different translations of the Bible.  There’s nothing wrong with most of the other translations, it’s just one that uses modern English, is clear and to the point.  Sometimes I like to get three or four different translations and compare.  This activity is a bit like climbing a mountain, each version is truly climbing the same mountain, but each version is taking a slightly different path and therefore has a slightly different view.  

When you set out to read the Bible, start with Genesis.  Genesis has information in it that applies throughout the whole Bible.  Genesis chapter one is one of the most hotly disputed books of the Bible, especially today.  

To get you started I’m including Bible lessons on Genesis 1, 2 & 3.  Let's talk about Genesis chapter one.  I hope you’ll read the whole chapter so that what I write below will make more sense.

Genesis chapter one is the story of the creation of the universe.  I've studied Genesis 1 and evolutionary theory most of my life and this is what I've concluded.  Genesis 1 is a very accurate account of what science tells us happened when the universe was created.  The problem people get into is interpreting what the Bible is saying.

I believe Genesis 1 verses one and two, which would be notated as:  Genesis 1:1 & 2 or for short, Gen 1:1 & 2, are verses taken out of the main story because they’re distracting to the points God is trying to make in the main story.  In the Middle East and in the Orient, this type of storytelling is not uncommon.  A storyteller might tell three different versions of the same story, each with its own point of view and emphasis.  Western storytellers and readers like the Roman and Greek method of telling something chronologically, everything in its correct order.  And many people expect to find this type of story telling in Genesis 1 & 2 and that leads them to interpret what the Bible is saying in a particular way.  They take Genesis 1:1 & 2 to be the beginning of the story, but it’s not, it IS part of the story, but it plugs in somewhere else.  One thing that supports my opinion is the fact that Genesis 1:3-5 says light was created on the "first day."  

Science tells us that the "big bang" was the first "day."  You look at the description of the big bang and you look at what the Bible says God did in the first moment of creation and its exactly the same thing--"God said, "Let there be light," and Boom, light exploded into existence--which is exactly what the big bang describes.

The Bible tells us that the sun and the stars did not glow until the fourth "day."  This is exactly what science tells us.  After the initial burst of light energy, the universe was dark for a very, very long time, then suddenly all the stars started to glow.  

An interesting, little known fact I learned a few years ago is that dinosaurs are mentioned in Genesis chapter 1.  In Genesis 1:21 the NIV says, "So God created the great creatures of the sea..."  In other translations this term "great creatures of the sea" has been translated in many different ways, "sea monsters," even "dragons," which goes to show translators weren't exactly sure what to do with the words.

If you're interested in going deeper on this subject, I recommend Gerald Schroeder's book, "The Science of God."  I don't agree with his idea about how old humanity is, because I think we're older than what he says, but otherwise I have no argument with him.  It was in his book that I learned these two words, "taninim gedolim" in Hebrew, which Bible translators have translated as “great creatures of the sea,” show up in a different place in the Bible.  

In the book of Exodus God commands Moses to throw down his staff and it becomes a snake.  God commands Moses to do this, like 3 times.  Sometimes it is called a "snake" in Hebrew, but sometimes it is called a "reptile," when it's called a "reptile" the Bible uses the singular form of taninim, which is "taneen."  Translators already knew the word "gedolim" meant "big," or "great," so they got that part easy, it was the "taninim" part that threw them so they translated the word in the context of the rest of the verse which speaks of creatures in the water.  But what the words really mean are "great reptiles," the dinosaurs.

Once again, the Bible is scientifically accurate.  It places the dinosaurs in order of creation before mammals are mentioned.  We know dinosaurs were made extinct, many scientists believe because of a catastrophic meteor strike, well before mammals became the dominant life form on the planet.  

It is my belief that Genesis 1:2 describes the results of that catastrophic strike.  But God doesn't put that verse in it's correct chronological order because it would take the focus off of what He viewed as a successful creation and put it on some things that weren't successful, but only in the moment.  More about that later.  Right now I want to address some concepts.  

“In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the earth,” Genesis 1:1.  

In Genesis 1:1 the Name "God" is the English Name assigned to the Hebrew Name, "Elohim."  Elohim is an interesting Name.  "El" means "Strength" and the "ohim" part is plural meaning "Faithfulness, to Bind One's Self with an Oath."  Aside from the implications assigning such a Name means to the creation story--how reliable everything God has created is, that is "faithful" to do whatever it was created to do and so forth, as a picture of what kind of a God He is--the "ohim" part is a "latent" plural Name.  It indicates a minimum of Three Persons in One.  

The Christian concept of a God who is Three Persons in One is kind of mind boggling.  That's ok, a mind boggling God is good, if He isn't mind boggling, He's not big enough to be God.  But stop and think about your computer.  You probably think of it as a ONE thing even though it is composed of hardware:  the monitor, the tower, the mouse, etc.; the software:  the Explorer or Mozilla program you're using to read this article and an operating system:  the Windows program, or Linux or whatever it is you're using.  You're using a "tri-une" thing called a computer.  You are a "tri-une" being.  You have a body, you use your mind, will and emotions to interact with the outside world and you are an eternal spirit, which is your operating system; it runs your software and hardware.

Still, the concept of a God who is Three in One and at the same time completely in harmony and a unity is admittedly a difficult one.  Let your mind work on it in the background.  Let’s get back to the rest of the story.

Genesis 1:1 is packed with even more information.  First, it tells us there was a beginning. Now, of course, since science has decided that the big bang is factual, the old theory of the universe has more or less been forgotten.  That old theory was one that the Greek philosophers came up with.  It said that the universe is eternal; it's always been pretty much the way it is now.  When the Priest, Georges Lemaitre, first published his “cosmic egg” theory, Fred Hoyle, an atheistic scientist didn’t like it because if there was a beginning, that meant there was a God.  He came up with a theory called the “Steady State” theory, a new version of the old Greek philosopher’s eternal universe.  Hoyle was the person who nicknamed Lemaitre’s “cosmic egg” theory as the “big bang” theory and that’s what it’s been called every since.  So, except for the Bible, everybody else thought that the universe was eternal, that it had no beginning until the 1960's when the big bang theory was proven correct by a couple of guys examining background radiation at a Bell Lab.  So the universe had a beginning and at least to Fred Hoyle’s mind that proved a God, even though he didn’t much like the idea.

In order for there to be a beginning, time has to exist, without time, there is nothing but NOW.  So, God created time, at that point called “the beginning.”  In another place in the Bible, God is given the Name "El Olam" which is often translated "Everlasting God."  That Name means, "Master of Time, the One who Divides Time into Ages; the One who Manages and Comprehends Time."  I know what time is, right up until I have to define it, then I don’t have a clue.  Time is certainly NOT a minute or an hour or a month, those are just names assigned to our time measurement units.  I don’t know what time is.  But, before God created time, it did not exist.  Not only do I not comprehend what time is, I also don’t understand a “time” when time didn’t exist!  Ok, that's another mind-boggling idea, but hey, if it's not mind boggling, then we'd soon be bored and God wouldn't be big enough to matter.

Before "the beginning" there was only God.  At some point in His infinite NOW, no way to know "how long" that was since time didn't exist, He decided to create our universe.  He planned it all out in His Mind.  If you know anything about anything that exists in our universe and you meditate on this idea of planning out, for example, how our solar system would look and work, or let's get even closer to home, how a strawberry will grow and produce its fruit, you can find the idea of planning out everything mind boggling.  Strawberries, duck bill platypuses, kangaroos, ostriches....God envisioned them all and figured out how all would fit together from the minutest creature to the greatest galaxy in the universe.

The first act of creation is God’s spoken words, "Light be!"  And Boom, light was.  And in those words is a vast quantity of information physicists can spend their entire lives trying to comprehend.  Everything in the material universe is directly or indirectly made from light.  Light itself is an amazing substance that scientists still study, but don’t really fully comprehend.

We already talked about the information packed into the Name "God."  The next words are "created the Heavens and the earth."  In other words, in the beginning, God created everything that exists, whether that be material or spiritual, He created it.

God created the "Heavens."  That means God also created the angels in "the beginning," and the place called "Heaven" where He has His throne room and Headquarters.  These spirit beings called angels are not cute little babies as portrayed in countless artists' conceptions.  They're not even soft, lovely women, but instead are powerful creatures that often look like strong men.  Ezekiel 1 describes a type of an angel called a "cherub."  And no, they're not the cute little babies, far from it!  They are totally mind-boggling.  They have four faces, four - six wings, calf feet, human hands and move like castle pieces on a chessboard.  These angels are God's honor guard who stay close to Him all the time.

In Isaiah 14:12 and in Ezekiel 28:12-19 is the story of a cherub who got full of himself and rebelled against God.  The Bible says he once was one of the highest-ranking angels, being a cherub he already was a member of the honor guard and he was one of God's most favored ministers.  He was in charge of God's garden, which is the earth.  He was "anointed" which means the Holy Spirit would give him extra power and wisdom.  But he got full of himself and decided to take God's throne away from Him.  One third of God's angels joined in the rebellion.  God threw him and his confederates out and they crashed into earth--I think they were the meteors that made the dinosaurs extinct.  Maybe now you’ve decided that I’m out to lunch.  

Some people might argue with the idea that something happening in the spirit realm could have that kind of impact on the material realm.  Fine, but if I'm right, and satan's crash into the earth made the dinosaurs go extinct, then that would explain why God didn't want to include Genesis 1:2 in the main story, wouldn’t it?  If Genesis 1:2 were placed in its correct chronological order, it would appear somewhere after Genesis 1:21 and before Genesis 1:24, then the focus would shift from the creation being very good, to wow, something has gone wrong and what's up with this rebellious angel anyway.  Putting that in the main story and explaining it all there in Genesis would take the focus off of God and what He felt was a beautiful, “good” creation and put it on this rebellious angel now called satan.

To God's point of view, satan is just an annoyance.  From God’s point of view, the fact that the dinosaurs were made extinct gave Him a chance to get the mammals going and then bring human beings on the scene--and God has always thought human beings were pretty cool.  

After satan's rebellion, the spirit realm was no longer inhabited only with God and His angels, but now also inhabited with His enemies, satan, the rebellious cherub, and the angels, now called "demons," who joined him in his rebellion.

The first part of Genesis 2 finishes the creation "week."  I have to digress here for a couple of paragraphs.  

Creationists want to insist that God created the universe in six 24-hour days or six thousand-year days, depending on which creationists you talk to.  The Bible doesn't back either of these views and it's too bad none of them actually research the meaning of the words "day," "evening" and "morning" in the Hebrew.

Yes, a "day" can mean the 24-hour period, but it can also mean the daylight hours only OR it can mean an "era."  The Romans existed for a several hundred years, but we might say, the Roman "Day" when referring to the period of time in which they ruled and reigned.  Or, you might hear some old timer say, "Well, back in my day..."  An era is a period of time defined by what happens in it rather than how long it lasts.  
Science has shown that it took a really long time from the moment God said, "Light be," until human beings walked the planet.  God divides the time up into what seem like to Him to be "days" or what we'd call "eras" in Genesis.  

The words "evening" and "morning" have double meanings in Hebrew.  They do mean exactly what we initially think they mean, but they also mean, "disorder" and "order."  So, the literal Hebrew translation of Genesis 1:5 would be, "...And there was disorder to order, the first era."  This phrase is repeated after the end of each “day,” “disorder to order, the second era,” and so on.

Oh, yeah, that changes the book of Genesis from a cute story to something with scientific meat on it.  God moved creation forward from one stage to another until He decided it was complete on the sixth day (era) and “rested” on the seventh.

Science has shown (this is where the evolutionists show the holes in their theory) that the slow, gradual evolution most think of when they think of evolution, never happened.  Creatures spring up completely formed in the fossil record, few truly transitionary forms exist.  One era ended and God jumped everything to the next phase, then He let that one play until it was time to jump to the next phase.  Animals don’t transition from one thing to another, one thing shows up in the fossil record, suddenly it’s not there anymore and a new thing shows up, bam, fully formed.  If evolution is an ongoing thing, where are the transition forms in today's world?  I don't know of any.  To my view, that means we’re in another era in which creation is relatively stable.

God has built into the system, limited evolution.  Genesis 1:24 says, "..."Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds..."  To me, that verse says animals have the ability to adapt to their environment.  So, we see humans taking wolves and making dogs--they evolved, but according to their kind, they haven't changed into some other kind, like a bird or something.  Darwin's finches didn't stop being finches.  And you might even argue, human beings haven't stopped being "apes."

That our bodies are "animal" is indisputable, though it might disgust us.  We mate, bear offspring, etc. etc. just like other animals.  But what sets us apart isn't necessarily our bodies, though they are definitely different in many ways from any other species of creature, it's something intangible, it's that software and the operating system that sets us apart.

For whatever reason, God did create all kinds of hominids.  And they existed before humans came into being.  But those hominids weren't necessarily our ancestors either--I've never seen any convincing evidence that any hominid creature was the progenitor of any other hominid.  It seems to me each begins and ends with itself.  However, I'm willing to grant, if I ever see compelling evidence to convince me, that our bodies may have "evolved" "after our kind."

Like I mentioned above, it's not so much our bodies that make us different.  In Genesis 1:26-31 human beings’ creation is explained.  "Let us make man in Our Image, in Our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground...," verse 26.

What exactly IS the Image of God?  Well, to start with I think of a mirror.  Do we look like God?  Well, yes, we do.  In Isaiah 6:1-4, Isaiah views Heaven and he sees God "sitting" on a throne.  He says, "the train of His robe filled the temple."  Ezekiel has a view into Heaven in chapter 1.  He says, "...high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man.  I saw that from what appeared to be His waist up He looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down, He looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded Him..."  In Exodus 33 Moses demands God "show me Your glory."  God tells Moses, "...you cannot see My face, for no one may see Me and live...There is a place near Me where you may stand on a rock.  When My glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by.  Then I will remove My hand and you will see My back; but my face must not be seen."

So, God has a human shape, hands and a face--we look like Him.  In other more important ways we are like Him.  We create art and music, we have language, we have self-consciousness, and we ponder things such as "Why am I here?  What is God like?" and we have free will.

While satan exercised his "free will" and chose to rebel against God, he has no opportunity to change his mind.  He’s an angel and angels were created to serve God.  Servants who disobey get fired.  He and his cohorts are stuck with their decision.  But they didn't want to change their minds--angels don't have free will in the same way we do.  Free will is an immense gift.  

Astrology may be able to say, if you are "Scorpio," you are "water," and describe certain characteristics that may sound like you, but you are not an animal who operates more by built in responses than by choice--you have free will.  (Incidentally, God is opposed to astrology.  One reason is because it dictates who a person is instead of leaving the idea open for a person to become.)  If you don't want to be like that, you can choose to be different.  That is a "god" power.  Other "god" powers God gave to us include: a kingdom to rule--the universe; things to create--art, music, architecture; things to discover and figure out--the universe and it's plenty big to keep us occupied and interested; people to love and families to make.  Only a universe as big as ours is big enough for human beings.

In Genesis 2 the story of the creation of man is retold with more detail and then carried on to the part when everything goes wrong.

"And the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living being," Genesis 2:7.  Here's another verse packed with meaning.

First, you may have noticed that God has a new Name added to His original:  Lord. "Lord" is the name assigned to Jehovah or YHWH (Yahweh) in Hebrew.  (Hebrew doesn't have vowels.)  Jehovah is the Name God calls Himself when He has work to do fixing things.

The word "formed" means to "make from previously existing material."  Ok, I admit, that's an argument that our bodies "evolved."  Back in Genesis one where the Bible said, "Let us make man..." it means, "sculpt or shape."  When the Bible says, "and man became a living being" it means he "became to a living soul, changed in form."  Here's another kicker.  God didn't breathe into Adam simply his own life, but every life that would ever exist--He gave to Adam the capacity to begat "living" souls and bodies.  This tells me that the intangible "breath of God," is the eternal spirit of a human being and is carried in a man's sperm.  The sperm is the reproductive element that has "life."  Note how it actively moves, seeking the egg, how it competes with the other sperm, and so forth.  And when the sperm meets the egg, something wild occurs!  It's like the spark meeting the wood, a flame starts and if nothing intrudes or hinders it, a full-fledged human being will emerge from the womb.  We know that every man carries a huge number of sperm.  And here, in Genesis, I see that each of those sperm carries the awesome, intangible "breath of God."  

God made a garden and put the man in it.  He had the man name all the animals. And in the course of all of this, the man figured out he was lonely.  This didn’t surprise God; He planned it that way because He wanted the man to truly appreciate the woman.  Then God put the man to "sleep" and removed some flesh from his side and from it shaped the woman.  But, since the Bible doesn't mention Eve receiving a "breath" from God, He must have taken one from Adam.

To us this sounds maybe like incest, but God is shaping a woman with some cells from Adam and a sperm from him.  Maybe it's more like cloning.  I don't know.  It's like splitting hairs in a way.  But whatever way you look at it, it will keep your mind occupied for a while puzzling on it!

But here's a thing that is deeper than the initial surface idea.  God takes one thing and makes two--He takes Adam and makes Eve.  They see one another, it's love at first sight and now they're "one flesh."  That "one flesh" union is what the human heart craves, to meet that one person with whom you have rapport, companionship and passion--it's a God thing.  Adam was one man, from him Eve was taken, now they're in love and committed to each other, husband and wife, and they're one flesh again.  Only now, they have double the resources, double the brainpower, and double the options because they're a team.

This is why God is so picky about sex.  Sex is the physical manifestation and expression of this very god-like power of being "one flesh."  And when you think of the spiritual implications of a man being casual about his sperm--you can see why God might be really picky about sex.  It's not to be taken lightly, to be entered into casually.  We’re dealing with eternal human spirits here.  This is why the institution of marriage was created, to add the force of human law, to add the witness of all a person's relatives and friends, to add the blessing of society to the one flesh union because it is an awesome responsibility.  

If human beings are created in God's Image and God's Image consists of a man and a woman who have been made "one flesh" once again because of love and commitment, then you can also begin to see why God is picky about things like homosexuality.  It's like a slap in His face for a man and a man or a woman and a woman to have sex.  We'll get into that more later.  I know it's a touchy issue in our culture, but God loves EVERYBODY, even the ones who are slapping Him in the face.

So, here's God. He's created these human beings; He's given them free will, a kingdom to rule and all kinds of god-like powers--including LOVE, sex and the ability to beget "living souls."  How will God know that these human beings CHOOSE to love Him?  He wants them to love Him, He created them so He could talk to them and be with them and enjoy them, the way parents look forward to the birth of their baby and expect to enjoy their child as he grows up and becomes an adult.

But how will God know they love Him because they CHOOSE to love Him?  This is where satan re-enters the story.  Satan provides an alternative to God.  He's a horrible alternative, but should provide an obvious difference from God.  It's incredibly risky, in fact, the Bible says that God foresaw the possibility that Adam and Eve might choose satan and talked it over with Himself, that is Jesus, and Jesus agreed that if humans sinned (disobeyed God), He'd pay for it.  This is why the Bible verse says that Jesus is the "Lamb slain from the foundations of the world."

If we truly have free will, this means that God doesn't know beyond a shadow of a doubt what we'll do at any given moment.  Instead of knowing exactly what every person will do, God has figured ALL the probabilities.  This is a mind-boggling concept for me.  The ability to figure all the probabilities of what my youngest son might do in the next 10 minutes is beyond me, never mind what all of humanity through all of time might do until the end of time.  My youngest son isn't going to Paris, France, within the next ten minutes, but he might go outside and play with the cats, he might have a snack.....I can predict what he might do because I know him very well, but I don't know beyond a shadow of a doubt what exactly he'll do.

God had to give Adam and Eve a choice.  If you were the only person of your gender alive and there were a hundred people of the opposite sex alive, how could you know that the ones who claimed to love you actually did love you and it wasn't simply because you were the only choice available?  You can't.  But if there are a hundred people of your gender and a hundred people of the opposite sex and one of them chooses you, then you know, “this person loves me.”

In Genesis 3 we read about the fall of man.  God gave Adam and Eve one rule and obeying that rule would prove whether or not they loved Him.  That rule was:  Do not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or else you’ll die.  Pretty strict and harsh.  But think about what it meant for them to disobey.  To disobey meant that Adam and Eve would join sides with satan, God’s enemy.  You just don’t let your enemies have the same privileges you give your allies.  Life is a huge gift, a person should think twice before he does something that will cost him his life.  The choice was made very clear and the price was explained up front.  

But, Eve got her instructions from Adam, not from God.  She didn't really have them down pat because she added the part about not being allowed to even “touch” the forbidden tree.  And because of this, satan was able to deceive her.  She ate the forbidden fruit.

What fruit it was isn't really relevant.  The point was the choice, not the fruit.  Adam didn't even argue, he just ate it.  Milton, the great writer, thought Adam ate of the fruit because he couldn't bear to lose Eve.  Who knows why he did it, but he did.  A person could write novels about why Adam ate of the fruit.  And because Adam carried all those precious "breaths of God," we all got infected with some of satan's rebellious evil at the same time Adam's spirit was infected.  

God told the serpent, the animal satan used for his ventriloquist act, "...I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel."

The "offspring," singular form being significant, of the woman is Jesus.  "Crushing the head,” means utter defeat, striking the heel means an insignificant wound.  This is probably the first prophecy of God in the Bible.  Fulfilled prophecy is one of the most impressive evidences that the Bible is true and that God is real.  There are over a hundred prophecies about Jesus in the Bible and many of them have come true, the others refer to the future..

God made the first sacrifice of an animal to cover human sin, see Genesis 3:21.  This is a significant principle of the Bible.  God told Adam that if he ate of the forbidden tree, he would die.  Admittedly, it took a few hundred years, but he did die.  Science tells us that our bodies renew themselves completely every seven years, but inexplicably, over time, our cells stop renewing properly and we age.  Duh, this is called "death."  It's no less death just because it takes a hundred years than if it happens instantly.  A body that was created perfect, designed to renew itself every seven years, should not turn into a worn out bag of crumbling bones!  And it wasn't meant to!  It was created to last forever.  But when Adam broke the rule, chose satan as his "over king" instead of God, death entered his body and potential death entered every sperm he carried.  The tendencies toward diabetes, alcoholism, cancer, homosexuality, rage, depression--all those little “deaths” and sins come from the sin nature that entered us when Adam rebelled.

In Genesis chapter four we surmise that human beings were instructed to offer an animal sacrifice as a substitute to pay for their sin, offered in faith, believing God would accept it.  Abel brings a perfect lamb.  Cain brings vegetables.  Abel understands the program.  A life must be given; blood must be shed, to pay the price.  

One factor in the offering of an animal sacrifice, that every farmer and rancher understands, every 4-H kid or FFA kid who's ever raised an animal--killing a creature that you've nurtured, that you've come to love is no easy thing.  Because our culture separates us from the deaths that are required to feed us, we lose this important knowledge.  Our sustenance comes at a price.  Only in modern times do human beings have the luxury of being vegetarian.  Until the days of modern transportation, people dealt with the issue of winter.  During winter there's no garden.  You may have canned lots of food, if canning was available in your time, or dried it, or socked it away in the back of your cave, but that's not going to cut it during winter!  During winter, your energy needs skyrocket while the energy value of the food you've stored away plummets.  Abel's offering of a prize lamb is no small thing; it costs him to offer that animal!  And that's the point.  He understood his sin and the price of it, Cain did not.  He was too full of pride to get it.  He brought vegetables, which he grew in the field; in essence, he brought his own labor and is ticked off when that’s not good enough.

One of the points of the Cain and Abel story is that no matter what we do, we cannot stop sinning.  We cannot be good enough to satisfy the perfection of God.  Remember how God told Moses that he couldn't see His face?  That's what we're talking about here.  Sin separates us from God.  Sin dies in God's presence because He is LIGHT and He is perfect.  Just like certain nasty molds and bacteria etc die when light strikes them, so does sin.  And if we're infected with sin, so do we unless something has paid for our sin.  God told Adam the price was death.  

You and I can do our best to stop sinning, but some time, some point, we’re going to lie, we’re going to cheat, we’re going to covet our neighbor’s stuff, we’re going to do something wrong.  Adam and Eve were created perfect, with no sin.  They could walk with God in the garden and have a chat.  They didn’t need clothes, like God they were covered in light.  You’ve seen a faint hint of that glow when you see a bride on her wedding day or the moment a mother sees her newborn baby or a dad sees his son get that first home run.  That’s the glow Adam and Eve wore for clothing all the time right up until they sinned.

In the four “Gospels” is the story of what God has done to deal with sin and to pay for it.  Those books are called:  Matthew, Mark, Luke & John.  After you read Genesis, skip to those books.  You can read Mark in about an hour; it’s the shortest.  

In those four books you’ll read about this:  To pay the price and retrieve human beings from satan’s torture chambers, God sent Jesus to take on human form.  He "breathed" into Mary, Jesus, and Mary conceived.  Jesus can be born of a woman and be sinless because the sin nature isn't passed through the woman, it's passed through the man!  Jesus was the infiltration of God into the human realm now dominated by satan as its over king.  Because Jesus was perfect and HUMAN, He could finally pay the price for Adam's sin.  But, first, He showed us what God is like better than human beings had ever seen Him before.

In the Old Testament, in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, God seems overbearing, a rule-maker and rather brutal in His discipline.  But that's from our point of view, after centuries of Christianizing of our culture.  The people God had to work with in Exodus were annoying, obnoxious, selfish, ill-mannered, louts who had no concept of their personal value as creatures created in the Image of God or of anything except satisfying momentary desires.  They had no concept of cleanliness.  It was a bit like taking a troupe of gorillas and trying to get them to live in a house like human beings.  But as you go through the Old Testament, God softens up some and lets His gentler side show.  

But in Jesus, we really see the softer side of God.  He has more dimension.  But, at the same time, Jesus is gutsy, He teases people, He talks trash, He has compassion on suffering people, He's amazing.  He's God in Flesh. After He'd shown us what God was like, He went to face death to pay for Adam's sin.  

This is what He did.  Imagine your brother is on death row.  Now imagine you go to the prison and offer to die in his place.  If you have not committed a murder or other capitol offense, you could do that.  Everyone would think you were nuts, but you could do it.  This would be the supreme act of love.  I don't know of anybody who's ever done that, except Jesus.

Because Jesus didn't deserve to die, hell couldn't hold Him.  (Hell was originally created as a holding place for satan and his allies, not intended to be inhabited by human spirits at any time.  But, after Adam's sin, humans who reject God go to hell, because that's the rule.  If you're on satan's side you go to hell. And a person will go to hell by default because of being born with the sin infection, unless at some point that person chooses God as his new over king.  Offering an animal to pay for sin is the action a person chooses to show he picks God as his over king) All those who offered an animal sacrifice to pay for sin were set free and finally got to go to Heaven and be with God.  Today, the method is a bit different because Jesus has paid the price.  All people who will believe in Him, say aloud, "Jesus is Lord," and believe He rose from the dead will be saved from the final death (which is eternal separation from God) and hell too, Romans 10:8-10.

Christians are supposed to be people who have done this.  God is a Gentleman; He doesn’t force people to do anything.  He gave us free will and He doesn’t infringe on that at all.  If Christians allow Him, He will transform them from the warped, evil creatures sin would make, into the human beings God initially intended when He breathed them into Adam.  A Christian can return to the kind of relationship with God that Adam first had before he sinned.  Being a Christian is a journey that starts with a belief in Jesus being raised from the dead and with the statement, "Jesus is Lord," and never ends.  

This letter is rather long, but is Christianity in a nutshell.  The Bible has many layers of meaning.  I think you probably gathered that from this letter.  If you attempt to read the entire Bible from beginning to end, don't be discouraged if you get bogged down.  Parts of Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy can really drag--skip those parts.  There's enough fascinating, interesting stuff to keep you puzzling without adding in those draggy parts for quite awhile.

Churches offer opportunity to study the Bible with other people, which will add to your understanding.  I'm Protestant, so naturally I recommend you look for a Protestant church--that would be a church like Assembly of God, or Methodist, Potter's House, Four Square or Baptist etc..  There's such a confusing array of denominations!  They exist because someone found something in the Bible that really changed lives and they formed a group around that idea.  So each church has a focus, a way of looking at the Christian walk and the Bible, and each church is a little different.

You want to find one where you feel welcome, where they have Bible study  and/or adult Sunday school, not just worship service.  But, you want to be in a worship service where you enjoy the music.  Worship, at its best, is like living under a beautiful fountain full of light.  When people worship, they are “with” God in a particularly intimate way.  You may have to look for a while to find a church that you enjoy.  Don't give up and don't be intimidated.  It's not any worse than your first day of school or the first day of college.  You can handle it.

Talk to God about the Bible.  You can even say, "Ok, God, if you're real, what the heck does this mean?"  He may not answer you immediately, but a thought may come to your mind the next day or while you’re taking a bath as you mull over what you've read and the light might come on as a result--that will be the Holy Spirit.  God isn't upset if you challenge Him.  He invites you to challenge Him, actually.  He’s not like the Muslim god who never permits a person to question what he’s read or heard.  God encourages you to question, to dig, to poke at Him.

After you've read Genesis, Matthew, Mark, Luke & John, you'll probably need a Bible teacher to really get a handle on the other books, though certainly you can read any of the others that strike your fancy or even just individual verses.  Revelation is probably one of the most difficult books to understand, especially for the beginner, but it does contain a lot of mind-boggling stuff.

Bible debunkers like to take passages out of context and claim they've proven the Bible is nonsense.  That's not really fair.  If you wrote a book and someone found a sentence in it that didn't make sense out of historical, cultural or contextual context, then you would think they were just being jerks and missing the point. Be fair to God, be an honest seeker and He will reveal Himself to you.

I am available all the time if you have future questions.  In fact, I would be delighted to hear from you again.

Blessings,

Marilyn