Pastor Percipia

   To see the full message, scroll to the bottom.  Do you read the Bible?  No? Why not? You may answer that question by telling me that you grew up with the Bible. You’ve heard it all. You know what it says, and you don’t need to keep reading it. You may answer by telling me that you grew up without it, and you turned out just fine. You don’t need an old book to tell you how to live. ______________ If you are not a believer, and you have no interest in becoming one... I dare you. I double dare you to read the Bible! Power brokers and political extremists through history and around the world today have good reason to be nervous of this book; it spurs people to action.  This is the book (and if you're not sure about any of this, look it up. Do some history.) that shaped the people who started the first free public schools in Europe. The first free public hospitals, providing healthcare for people who couldn't afford it.  This is the book that shaped the peop...

            To see the full message, scroll to the bottom.  In reading and studying the Bible , we are served well by an awareness of the lenses that stand between us and the words on the page.   Lenses like:   Culture  (Who wrote it and when? What did the world look like to them and how has it changed?) Genre   (What kind of writing is it? Should it be taken literally, or figuratively? Is it prose or artistic?) Context . (What ideas are connected to what I'm reading? What movement or story is it part of?)   And the lens of: Coh esion .    T he Bible holds together. It is one great big whole .    The Bible is such an ancient book that it’s easy for people to, from a distance, say, “ O h, it's so old ! How can it be relevant? ”   Just because something is ancient does not necessarily mean it's outdated. Just like the fact that so mething is outdated doesn't mean it's old. ( Anybody remember dvd...