Saturday, December 04, 2021

Read the Bible with Me!

Welcome to the Pauline Family's "Year of the Bible"! We've been reading the Bible clear through this year. We are finishing the New Testament, so 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. By your gift, the Church continues to receive unfathomable riches from the inheritance handed on from the Apostles and guaranteed by the Holy Spirit.


Let the Spirit who inspired the writing of today's pages "guide me in the truth and teach me" to follow Jesus ever more closely, until he calls me to follow him to the Kingdom where he lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, forever and ever. Amen.


Today's chapters are 1 Timothy 6 and 2 Timothy 1-2.

It can be hard for us today to read Paul's advice about slaves. We want him to kick the whole system down in the name of Jesus Christ! But he doesn't. As a general rule, he thought the best thing was for everyone to "remain in the state in which he was called.... the slave called in the Lord is a free person in the Lord, just as the free person who has been called is the slave of Christ" (1 Cor 7:20, 22). But he also knows that any disruption of social life could lead to the kinds of rumors that had already led Claudius to expel the Jews from Rome "on account of disturbances at the instigation of 'Chrestus'."

The second letter to Timothy is one of Paul's prison letters. (If only we knew which imprisonment it corresponded to!) There is a great deal of personal warmth here, even memories of Timothy's family back in Galatia. Paul knows that he may be facing death, so he uses his position to exhort his spiritual son: "Do not be ashamed... Bear your share of hardship for the Gospel with the strength that comes from God" (1:8). Among Paul's sufferings was the death of the kind and helpful Onesiphorus, to whose family he sends condolences. Notice that Paul prays for the deceased to "find mercy from the Lord on that Day" (1:18).

Even from prison, Paul has to set some doctrinal confusions straight. The claim that "the resurrection has already taken place" (2:18) didn't die out in Asia Minor; it resurfaced in a popular 20th century theologian's writings and is still fairly common: Joseph Ratzinger responded to it in his inimitable way in his book Eschatology. (Speaking of which, one of our sisters had a chance to meet the author at the Vatican, telling him, "Eschatology was the first book of yours that I read." The Pope-Emeritus responded with, "That is not an easy book to read." I concur!) 

Finish reading 1 Timothy here and start 2 Timothy here.
For additional background

N.T. Wright's Paul: A Biography is the book I would recommend to someone who wanted to read one (only one) book that combined the life and letters of St Paul. Written by a noted Scripture, this is a flowing narrative that is scripturally enlightening and historically sound. Wright gives the reader a way of following Paul through the Acts of the Apostles and the writing of his letters, making Paul the person that much more approachable, and the letters themselves more readable as a result of having a social and historical context.

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