Rev. Jean's Bible Study

  Genesis 6:9-22 Human freedom was not working out very well.   The first murder was only a premonition of what was to come.   God saw that ‘the inclination of the human heart was only evil continually’ and God was ‘sorry that she had made humankind and it grieved her to her heart.’ (Genesis 5:5-6) God knows it doesn’t have to be this way.   Humans can make different choices.   We are not governed by fate or predestination, or our genetic make-up or our early childhood.   Over time we have used all these factors as excuses for our behaviours and all these factors play a role but we make free individual choices and they are not always for the common good. Human freedom without governance leads to destruction.   The story of the flood and its conclusion where God promises never again to destroy the earth in spite of our human sinfulness ( Genesis 8:20-22 ) is an affirmation of our human freedom.   We rarely read the next part of the story.   ...

  Genesis 4:1-16 As soon as Adam and Eve have children, sibling rivalry begins.   Cain and Abel were different, had different skills and interests, used the land in different ways and their difference led to envy.   If greed got Adam and Eve kicked out of the garden, envy was cause of the first murder.   Watch any two toddlers at play and it won’t be long before the envy between them leads to physical violence.   If there is only one red truck, one child will shove the other aside to get it.   We live on a planet with limited resources and we all need to learn to share. photo by cloudvisual @ unsplash This story raises the question: Is God’s love limited as well?   Just because God loved Abel, did that mean that God did not love Cain?   God’s rejection of Cain’s offering led him into the sin that is always lurking at the door, the tendency to envy and hatred that we must conquer.   Our human nature responds with empathy for Cain because...

We read the Bible as the Living (not the literal) Word of God.   Each generation needs to interpret it by and for the time and place in which they live.   Its truths are eternal, but they speak differently to each generation.   Interpretation, which is unavoidable, can be used to rationalize and justify the worst of human behaviour:   racism, slavery, war, patriarchy, nationalism, genocide, apartheid, cultural superiority, colonialism…   Many people reject not only our faith, but God because the Bible and religion has been used to sanction, even sanctify, our human sinfulness.   The Bible can also be interpreted to condemn our sinfulness and challenge us to be loyal and faithful children of God.   Jonathan Sacks in his book “Not in God’s Name” takes another look at the ancient myths and legends in the Book of Genesis and invites us to reinterpret them for our time.  He challenges us to set aside the destructive interpretations of the past that h...

  Fear or Faith?  Easter   Mark 16   If you are looking for a satisfactory ending to a story, don’t read Mark 16:1-8.  “So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone because they were afraid.”  You have probably never heard that scripture reading on Easter Sunday.  The rest of the verses in Mark were added later by others who just couldn’t accept such an abrupt and disturbing ending. photo by Evan Dennis (unsplash) What was Mark thinking?  Obviously, at some point, the women did tell someone because we are here two thousand years later still reading their story.   Perhaps Mark’s ending is the one we should be reading now—this unsatisfying, unorthodox, disturbing ending.  Mark’s first readers towards the end of the first century faced economic and political turmoil that caused drastic disruption and displacement in their lives.  Their cities destroyed, t...