nunblog: Read the Bible with Me! Starting the New Testament

Welcome to the Pauline Family's "Year of the Bible"! I'm reading the Bible clear through this year, and I invite you to read along with me. But first, let us pray:

Father,

When the fullness of time had come, you sent your Word in the One who said, “Whoever sees me, sees the Father.” No revelation can surpass this, until Jesus comes again in glory.

Open my mind today to the gift of life and truth your Word offers me through the Church. By your Holy Spirit, grant me wisdom and strength to put this Word into practice and to become, myself, a presence of Jesus for people who are looking for you.

Jesus, eternal Word and Son of the Father, live in me with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

St Jerome Writing (Caravaggio)

I didn't plan it this way, but we are beginning the New Testament on the Feast of St Jerome, the great biblical scholar and translator of the Bible! What a sign of blessing on our year-long project!

Today's chapters are Matthew 1-3.

Like kids for whom Advent seems so long, we have spent nine months reading the Old Testament. The Old Testament is Advent, but Christmas is not yet over and complete. What the people of God longed for through the centuries of the patriarchs and kings and prophets was not all finished in 33 years: Jesus will come again. Until then, he wants to carry out his mission through us!

The prologue of the Letter to the Hebrews (Hebrews 1:1-3) sums up our reading so far in these magnificent terms:

In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; in these last days, he spoke to us through a son...through whom he created the universe, who is the refulgence of his glory, the very imprint of his being.

Matthew prefers to start us off in a more prosaic manner, by rooting us in the very concrete history of Abraham and his descendants. In several ways, Matthew's Gospel portrays Jesus as the new Moses: His life is saved from the murderous orders of a king; he leaves Egypt to grow up in the Holy Land; from a mountaintop he delivers the "new" law, the Beatitudes; he preaches five sermons, corresponding to the five books of the Torah.

The first three chapters of Matthew contain much that will be familiar. Pay attention to the details that suddenly stand out in a new way: What do you recognize about them now that escaped you before you read the Old Testament?

Start reading here.

For additional background

I am happy to recommend this volume of The Four Gospels in an edition directed to young readers and their parents. The text of all four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) in the New Revised Standard Translation is accompanied by FAQs that a middle-school reader might ask (or, to be honest, anybody reading the Gospels for the first time). The footnotes were prepared by a team of Scripture scholars for parents and guardians, making the book ideal for family Bible reading.