July 28, 2025 • 33 mins
Have you ever felt confused or overwhelmed trying to make sense of the Bible, as if you walked into a movie halfway through and missed the bigger picture? In this episode of Seek Go Create, host Tim Winders shares the eye-opening story of his personal journey to understand the Bible as a cohesive narrative, not just a collection of isolated verses. Discover why the chapters aren’t in chronological order, the pitfalls of pulling scripture out of context, and how seeing the Bible as a story can shift your entire perspective. If you’re ready to rethink how you read the Bible and want practical insight into making it all make sense, this episode is for you.
"Taking personal responsibility for getting to know and understand the Bible yourself is crucial—don’t just take someone else’s word for it." - Tim Winders
Access all show and episode resources HERE
Reasons to Listen:
- Discover the Story Behind the Bible - Learn why reading the Bible as a story—with a beginning, middle, and end—can totally change your understanding, especially since most of us have been taught to read it out of order.
- Challenge Your Preconceptions - Hear why unlearning old beliefs, questioning popular interpretations, and digging into the context for yourself might lead to “aha” moments you never expected.
- Unlock Hidden Context & Clarity - Find out how reading the Bible chronologically and understanding the original audience and timelines can help clear up confusion and contradictions that many struggle with.
Key Lessons:
- The Bible Is a Story, Not Just a Collection of Quotes or Rules - Many people approach the Bible as a manual or a series of isolated verses, but understanding it as a continuous, interconnected story with a beginning, middle, and end gives everything deeper meaning and context.
- Context and Chronological Order Matter - The books and chapters of the Bible aren’t arranged in the order the events actually happened, which can cause confusion. Reading the Bible chronologically—especially the Old Testament—helps the bigger story fall into place and prevents misinterpretation.
- Personal Responsibility in Understanding - It’s easy to rely on pastors, preachers, or tradition to explain scripture, but it’s our responsibility to study and wrestle with the Bible ourselves. Taking the time for personal study and reflection, even alone, is crucial for genuine understanding.
- Misusing Scripture Leads to Confusion and Contradiction - Pulling verses out of context or order can cause us to twist their meaning and fuel confusion or even division. When we read the Bible as a narrative and understand its historical and cultural backdrop, seeming contradictions usually disappear.
- The Central Theme: God’s Kingdom and Restoration - Rather than focusing solely on “getting to heaven,” the overarching theme of the Bible is about God establishing, losing, and restoring His kingdom—bringing humanity back into relationship with Him.
Episode Highlights:
00:00 Introduction: Understanding the Bible as a Story
00:33 Personal Journey: Unlearning and Relearning
02:28 The Matrix Analogy: Seeing Beyond the Surface
03:44 The Bible as a Chronological Story
06:02 The Importance of Personal Study
08:43 Challenges of Reading the Bible Out of Order
21:41 The Kingdom of God: Central Theme of the Bible
29:27 Conclusion: Embracing the Story
Resources for Leaders from Tim Winders & SGC:
🎙 Unlock Leadership Excellence with Tim
- Transform your leadership and align your career with your deepest values. Schedule your Free Discovery...
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Imagine walking into a movie45 minutes late then trying to
explain the plot to someone else.
That's how most of us.
Read the Bible.
We know the characters.
We quote the lines, we quotethe scriptures, but often we're
missing the story because noone ever told us it's a story.
We weren't taught that it's a storyand we haven't read it as a story.
(00:23):
And here's the wild part.
The chapters in this book in theBible aren't even in the right.
Order.
Welcome to Seek, go Create.
This is Tim Winders and thisis episode three of the five
part series that we're doing.
Why The Bible doesn't make sense yet, andit's really part of the journey that I've
(00:45):
been on over the last, you know, we couldsay 10 years, maybe even longer than that.
But definitely in the last few yearswhere I have taken a lot of things that
I thought I knew I've had to unlearn it.
I've spent a lot of quiet time.
I've spent a lot of time actually readingthe Bible instead of listening to other
people tell me what's in the Bible.
And I've just come to what Ibelieve is a better understanding.
(01:08):
I'm not saying that I know it all.
I'm not saying that Iunderstand everything.
But I do believe that I have a bettercontext and a better understanding
than I did yesterday, last year,and definitely 10, 15 years ago.
So anyway, let's dive in.
Last time, last episode, episodetwo, we talked about what we often
(01:29):
have to do, which is unlearn.
What we knew.
And that kind of goes to whatI just said earlier, you know.
Much of what we get about theBible comes from other people.
It comes from teachers, preachersthat are all well-meaning,
but often they've got theirinterpretations, their understandings.
(01:50):
And then we also layer that with doctrinesand theologies and systems and ways
that people have attempted to explainthe Bible for the last 2000 plus years.
And so we have all of that.
And then we pick up the Bible or weopen up, to a scripture and we have
all of that stuff floating around.
(02:11):
It just makes it difficult tounderstand or worse, we fool ourselves
and we think we understand it.
We're convinced, we understand it.
We tell other people we understandit, but yet we are missing some
key pieces and key context.
the example we used inthe last episode was.
the matrix.
(02:32):
It's the red pill or the blue pill.
Which one are you gonna choose?
You choose one of them and you just staysort of blinded and trapped within that
structure that you've always been in.
But some of the things that I'veexperienced and read and studied over the
last few years, it's going down that pathof seeing beyond the matrix and seeing
that there's a bigger picture, there'sa bigger story, and it is uncomfortable.
(02:57):
It's been, challenging at times becauseit's kind of taken some of the things
that were, I thought, core of who I was.
And my wife, Gloria and I have gonethrough this where we've sat many
a morning with a cup of coffee andher comments were something to the
effect of, I'm not sure that I couldkeep going down this path because
(03:21):
what I thought that I knew is beingbusted up and these paradigms and all.
It's like that, that pain of steppingout of the matrix and looking back
in and going, Hmm, I was deceived,or I was wrong, or I was slightly
off, and just being slightly off.
Is almost worse thanbeing completely wrong.
(03:42):
And that's somethingthat we have realized.
Here's what we're gonna do In thisepisode, I'm gonna share kind of the
biggest lens shift of my journey.
the biggest thing that's kind of helpedme understand, what I believe, or at
least to put me in a better place tounderstand what the Bible is all about.
it's really this.
it's simple, but it's not,and that is that the Bible.
(04:06):
Is a story, it is an actual story witha beginning, a middle, and an end.
And if you don't understand the beginningand the middle, then it makes it
very difficult to understand the end.
And so we're gonna discuss thatthere's chronological aspects to it
and we need to understand there'schronological portions of it.
(04:30):
And if we are to read it out of order.
Or to take it out of context or to readsections of it and attempt to make that
the story, then it won't make sense,or it won't make as much sense, or
it'll cause us to skew the truth or toskew what it really is talking about.
And listen.
(04:51):
Guilty, I've done it.
I know many people that are speakingfrom pulpits and teaching and
preaching that may not be aware of it.
They're doing it and it'shappened time and time again.
And you know, we could, we couldsort of say, well, maybe it's the
enemy, you know, that old devilthat's trying to just confuse us.
(05:12):
Or it could be that we just aren't doingsome of the hard, difficult work of taking
the scriptures, taking the Bible, studyingit so that we understand it better.
I will say I'm guilty of that.
I spent time under preachers, I wouldtake what they said, I would repeat it.
(05:32):
Sometimes I would repeatit with confidence.
Sometimes I would look itup and check and study.
Sometimes I wouldn't.
I spent a few years in Bibleschool and I assumed that some
of the people teaching and.
Sharing there knew whatthey were talking about.
Some of them did.
Some good people, some of them didn't.
Some of them were takingthings out of context, and that
(05:54):
happens time and time again.
I guess if there's one underlyingmessage that's important in this, that's.
Kind of aside from the fact thatyou need to understand the Bible is
the, is a story, and that is takingpersonal responsibility for getting
to know and understanding it yourself.
Don't even take my word, don'teven listen to what I'm talking
(06:16):
about here, just about my journey.
You need to take thetime to study yourself.
You need to take the time todig into this Bible, to these
scriptures and learn it yourself.
You need to spend quiet time and allowthe Holy Spirit to reveal things to
you, ask questions, poke at things thatyou think you believe, but may not be
(06:37):
lining up with what's in the Bible.
Or that you've heard that it bothered you?
There were so many things that Iheard and they, they sort of bothered
me, but I just kind of accepted themand just kept kind of going along
until over the last few years wheretruthfully, my journey is this.
I sort of disconnected.
I mean, most of you know, my wifeand I for the last six, six and a
(06:58):
half years have lived in an rv andI haven't, we haven't been totally
isolated from the world, but we've been.
we've had a lot of quiet and still timewe, as we traveled, we didn't really plug
into some churches or anything like that.
I didn't really go to YouTube and listento this minister and that minister.
I really allowed the Lord to bemy teacher, I believe, and the
(07:22):
Holy Spirit to lead and guide me.
And it really freed me up to ask sometough questions that I do not think
I would've asked had I been sitting.
Under someone's teaching or ina ministry or in a Bible school.
And so it really kind of helped me godown this path and so, so that's what
we're gonna do in this episode today.
(07:44):
We're going to kinda walk throughthat journey that I went on.
Some of you may be goingon something similar.
I'll give you some glimpsesof what I think, but again,
it's your responsibility.
You have got to do this on your own,and some people are uncomfortable
with me saying this, but it might.
Means spending alone time doing it,not plugging into the charismatic
(08:09):
preacher teacher that sounds sogreat, and we all say, oh yeah, all
he does is preach from the Bible.
But then when you do your study, yourealize, Hmm, that actually wasn't
in the Bible or worse, it was out of.
Context.
So check me on this, put it downin comments if you're watching
this on YouTube or email, becauseI'm not pretending to know it all.
(08:30):
I'm just sharing my journey andthe process I've been on and how
much it bothers me that years ago.
I didn't think I knew itall, but boy, I thought I was
really close, but yet I wasn't.
So let me give you my Bible experience.
This was back in the early nineties,so 30 something years ago, I was
(08:51):
saved and I knew that I needed tostudy and learn more about the Bible.
But here's what I did.
I treated the Bible like it was a manual.
Or a devotional and I readportions of it and I attempted
to understand the bigger picture.
I'm kind of a bigger picture guy.
(09:12):
I love to understand the bigger pictureif I can, but I pulled out pieces of
it and what I did was is I attemptedto apply it to whatever I was dealing
with or going through at the time.
Now, that's not a bad thing necessarily.
However, what it does is it causes usto, possibly twist some things around,
(09:34):
I was actually saved in a businesssetting, so I was sort of wired to be
pursuing and going after making money and.
being more successfulin that financial area.
And so the scriptures initially that Istarted pulling out were those scriptures
that looked like scriptures that saidI should prosper and be in good health
(09:57):
that I should, do well financially.
You know, I took a lot of the moneyscriptures and kinda made those fit
what I was going through at the time.
I took a lot of the sowing and reapingscriptures and made them apply.
And some of them I was probably close.
Some of them I was probably maybeaccurate, but there was probably a lot
of them that I was taking them away outtacontext and taking them in a wrong way.
(10:23):
So I would just grab isolated versusjust to kind of make myself feel
better, do better, or latch onto.
And I really did notunderstand how it all.
Fit together.
I mean, I would try to understand thecreation, story and then I would try
to understand the ending story, and Inever really liked either one of those.
(10:46):
I'll be upfront with you the creationstory, being an engineer and someone
who kind of likes to see thingsand maybe didn't have a lot of.
Faith that that just, it is the way it is.
I wanted a little more informationabout that creation, and if you don't
understand creation and the things inthe middle, then I'll tell you, you
definitely won't understand how it ends.
(11:09):
And that's really one of the catalystsfor a lot of where I'm going now
that we'll talk about in a futureepisode is that ending that a lot of
people are trying to explain with.
With headlines and all this going on inthe world, it really started bothering me
more and more, and that's when I realizedthat if you don't know how it fits
together, then it, it's just all jumbled.
(11:32):
One of the problems with theBible also, let's just go ahead
and get this out, out here.
the chapters are not written in order.
You know, I've written a novel myself.
I think it had 39 chapters.
It's fiction.
If I took those 39 chapters that Iwrote to be in a specific order, I had
some flashbacks and things like that.
(11:53):
But if I took those 39 chaptersand let's say I took the first two
thirds of those, and I just sort ofrewrote some of the chapters to tell
the same story over and over again.
And let's just say there was someperspective from some people during
those storylines, those story andplot points that may have had another
(12:15):
perspective and those were added in,and all of that would've sort of looked
like what the Old Testament looks like.
And then let's say I would've takenthe last two thirds of that novel,
and instead of putting it entirelyin order, I took the overarching
story of the main character.
(12:37):
And I put it in the first fourchapters of that, second of
that last third of the book.
And then the last portion ofthe book, I actually just listed
it out by length of chapter.
Well, that's what isgoing on in the Bible.
We have in the Old Testament, ifyou want to try to read it in order,
(12:58):
you do have some of the creationand things that are in order.
But once you get into Kings and Chroniclesand all the prophet books, some of those
overlapped, Before I realized that Kingsand Chronicles are basically telling
the same stories, and then there'sIsaiah and some of the others that are
telling some of the things that aregoing on also in Kings and Chronicles.
(13:22):
And if you don't understand that, thenman, it's hard to fit it together.
then you get over to the NewTestament and you've got.
Some of the epistles thatreally occurred before.
Some things in the Book of Acts.
You've got Revelation here thatwe like to think is the end.
and it is in some ways, but it'snot the end as many of us think.
And then you've got Paul Anywaythere, there's just a lot of.
(13:46):
Things that go on there.
It's like watching, this isthe example that I like to use.
I'm a big Star Wars fan.
Most of you know Star Wars.
George Lucas started with what he calledepisode four, which is a new Hope.
It was the original Star Wars moviecame out in 19, I think it was 77,
if I'm remembering correctly, andAnd that movie was awesome, man.
(14:08):
It was something like we'venever seen and it was incredible.
Well.
As incredible as that moviewas, the next movie that was
released almost three years later.
By the way, it was like excruciatingwhen we realized that this
other movie was coming out andit was The Empire Strikes Back.
And let me tell you,one of the best movies.
(14:31):
Is the Empire Strikes back.
It started awesome.
It dropped us off a cliff at the end,and everything in between was incredible.
had we not seen a new Hope, the originalStar Wars before then that movie never
would've had the impact It had theEmpire strikes back because we had
to have that context of that before
(14:53):
Some of you're gonna get upset thatI'm comparing the Bible to Star Wars.
I'm not.
I'm just saying that is the storytellingchallenge that we, that we have.
It's what I just mentioned about my book.
we've done this time and time again andwe just haven't understood the order.
So for me, my.
(15:14):
I guess first sort of ahas aboutsomething odd is going on here is
when I, a few years back, decidedto do a read through the Bible.
Actually, my wife decided and she allowedme to go along with her, and we went
through the Bible in chronological order.
Okay.
Not the order it was writtennecessarily, but in the historical
(15:36):
chronological order that it went in.
And I won't say that the New Testamentimpacted me that much at that time.
I'll talk more aboutthat in just a moment.
But what it did do was allowed me toreally understand the Old Testament better
as I put those pieces together, like Isaid earlier, of Kings and Chronicles
(15:58):
and the prophets and all the overlapand the story of the Old Testament.
And so that really started me.
Thinking about maybe I'm missing somethings because of the chronological
nature that I'm missing out on justreading these 66 books in the order
that they're placed in the Holy Bible.
(16:18):
So here's some things that I saw though.
These are some thingsthat were revealed to me.
One was just how confusingthe Old Testament, can be.
If you just read it in the order thatit's listed and how much more sense that
it makes if you read it chronologically.
And when you do that, you really dounderstand the buildup and the leading
(16:42):
to the coming Messiah, which is Jesus.
The Old Testament is a leadup and buildup to what occurs.
In the New Testament and many timesit's, we can sort of disconnect
those if you don't understandthe chronological nature of it.
As I started looking at the New Testament.
(17:05):
And in the same light started lookingat what was going on during that time.
We'll talk more about this in a laterepisode, but the importance of the first
century, specifically a 30 around thetime of the, death, the cross, and the
resurrection of Jesus Christ up to 80 70,which was the destruction of Jerusalem.
(17:26):
You actually realize, the NewTestament primarily was in between
those two, those two dates.
You understand the urgency that wasinvolved in the writing of many of the
epistles, the letters, even the gospels.
There was a real urgency there thatwe don't get if we don't understand
that context, the context of acts.
(17:50):
Being before Paul's letters is veryimportant because Paul's letters really
are sprinkled throughout the book of Acts.
And Dr. Luke, Luke, who wrote the Gospelof Luke, and then he wrote the Book of
Acts, which are meant to go together.
That's the.
Chronology of, the earlychurch leading up to, Paul's.
(18:13):
Really not even then.
It's kind of most of Paul'sministry in the spreading of
the gospel in the first century.
So that's important to understand.
And then, like I mentionedearlier, you start to see that
The end begins to look different.
if you understand that urgency that'sgoing on within the gospels and also
within Paul's letters, if you understandwhat is happening and most of the
(18:37):
epistles that Paul has written, if youunderstand what's going on with the early
churches, then you begin looking at whatmost of us have looked as the ending.
Of the vision of, of John,the revelation of the Christ.
You just, you kinda look at thatdifferently, and that's not what we're
gonna talk about here, but I'll tell youthat it just all begins to fit differently
(19:02):
and this is why story really matters.
And it's something that I didn't do withthe Bible for a long period of time,
and I noticed that many people don't.
I went to Bible school for a few years.
I spent time around not justyour average run of the mill.
Bible reading people.
(19:23):
These were people that studied it more.
These were people that taught it and,and I can tell you that my observation
is that many people don't reallyunderstand that flow, the beginning,
the middle, and the end of storiesand storytelling or the narrative.
And again, I'm not sayingthat the Bible is fiction.
I'm not telling you that it's just astory, but I will tell you it's got a
(19:46):
narrative that we need to understandand stories will then give meaning.
To the events, not just commands ornot just things that we can kind of
grab and totally apply in our lives.
We need to understand thatcontext of what is going on.
God is telling a story of covenant exile.
(20:06):
Rescue and then restoration or, orbringing everything back to him.
And I, I've heard this said, andI do believe this, that the story
of the Bible is the story of God.
I. Really wanting a family, reallywanting sons and daughters that are his,
(20:29):
and some would say, well, why didn'the just create that in the first place?
Well, he did.
Things changed things, went throughvarious iterations, and that's
what we're moving back towards.
The kingdom.
The kingdom of God is the central theme.
(20:50):
The Kingdom or the Edensystem or the new Jerusalem.
That is the theme that wesee throughout the Bible.
many people, especially Americanizedpeople that are westernized, we have
this thought that the theme of the Bibleis punching our card to get to heaven.
(21:11):
That's all it's about.
We're trying to get to heaven.
That's all that matters,and that may be part.
Of it, but that's reallynot the theme of it.
If you really understand thestory, that is not what's going on.
It's about the kingdom, the kingdomof God, and that kingdom growing and
expanding through us, and becauseof what Jesus Christ did and because
(21:36):
of what happened with creation.
So the kingdom is the central theme.
So let's talk a little bitmore about the big picture.
And then we'll, uh, we'll kind of wrapup a little bit with, uh, with some
thoughts and some things that I believeI've started to see that have helped me.
Old Testament, fairlysimple creation, covenant.
(21:58):
Exile, promise creation, covenant exile,and then the promise of something coming.
And that promise, came ina lot of shapes and sizes.
That's one thing that gets a littlebit confusing at times, is that
promise is coming from the prophets.
It's coming from all the wayback, really from the beginning,
(22:20):
all the way back to creation.
And that promises thebuildup and it occurs over.
Thousands of years.
And that was something that was sortof interesting for me, especially with
people in our today's world that, beginto say things like, well, you know,
I'm, I'm praying for something and Iexpect something, and if it doesn't
(22:43):
happen next week, then you know, I'mstarting to get impatient about it.
Well, I am always amazed when Ilook at the Old Testament and read
through it chronologically, howthere were certain timeframes.
Where people were promised that amessiah is coming, everything will
(23:05):
change, everything will be better, andthat better occurred 400 years later.
So let's put that in perspective.
Right now, someone told you, let's justsay you're in a difficult situation.
Let's say things look bleak, things lookbad for you, either financially or your
health, or just something that's goingon bad and someone that you believe
(23:30):
that they've got a good word for you.
They say something to the effect of,oh yes, it's going to be resolved.
Be patient.
It's gonna get better.
And you later find out that thatbetter is 400 years from now.
I mean, I've just, my head it was kindof hard for me to wrap around that.
It kinda let me know thatwe don't understand time.
(23:52):
The way God understands time orthe way God, reveals time might
be a better way of saying it.
But, so anyway, so that's Old Testamentcreation, covenant exile, promise.
The gospels.
Are the kingdom arriving inthe person of Jesus Christ, and
that is of course, that's God.
(24:12):
That's Jesus.
He was man.
He was also God, and that is the kingdom.
Jesus said it many times.
I've studied the kingdom of God.
I'll mention that in the nextepisode we'll talk about the
kingdom and the kingdom of God.
Those terms are mentioned over a hundredtimes in the New Testament, and Jesus
said, I have come to bring the kingdom.
(24:33):
That is his purpose, one of his purpose.
And in acts, when we look at the book ofActs, the kingdom continues to expand.
Through the believers in JesusChrist, through that church,
through that Ecclesia that wasestablished, truthfully at Pentecost.
That's when that started.
So the letters, the ones that camefrom Paul and others, is really,
(24:56):
and I love this term, coachingbelievers on how to live in that
kingdom and then also preparing for.
The ending of the old covenant andthe time when there will only be
one covenant, which is that newcovenant of Jesus Christ, the Messiah
Covenant, if you want to call it that.
And so a lot of the letters, andthis is where we really have to
(25:19):
understand this and not take Paul'sletters and try to apply them 2000
years later to what's going on here.
we also have to do this whileunderstanding that these were letters
that Paul and others wrote specificallyto coach these believers on how to
live in that kingdom during that time.
Also with an old covenantthat was still in place.
(25:42):
And then of course we get to Revelationthat again, we're gonna talk about
in the last episode of this series.
It's really that final hope thatrestoration and, a lot of people like to.
Say that it's, it just shows thatwe win, that Jesus wins, and I'll
say, in many ways, it shows thatJesus won and that he's continue
(26:02):
winning and we're winning throughhim and with Him and in his kingdom.
But we will, look at thatagain later in a later episode.
Here's what I, I do want to kinda look atwhat happens when you ignore the order.
And the context it leads to and,and probably a lot more than
(26:23):
this, but at minimum it leadsto confusion, contradiction.
'cause a lot of people say, oh,the Bible contradicts itself.
No, it doesn't.
Not if you understand the story, notif you read through it chronologically,
not if you look at what it was doingat the time it was written, when it
was written and who it was writtento, it does not contradict at all.
(26:46):
At all.
It doesn't.
but if you're out of order, ifyou're out of context, you can
misuse a lot of scriptures and that'sone of the things that spurred me
on to do this group of episodes.
the more I started seeing andinteracting and seeing people on
social media and, some people thatI had been around a long period of
(27:09):
time, some I'd gone to Bible schoolwith I'm like you know what, not only.
Are they not using thatscripture correctly?
They really are misusing it.
and I think that that's where itstarts becoming, I'll use the word
dangerous, that may be strong.
But misleading might be a softerword, but it could be dangerous.
(27:29):
There are people that are doingthings with scriptures out of
context that I believe are, misuse.
We'll just say it that way and wewill often miss the why behind.
The what?
And we'll, we'll, we'll use the what?
We'll try to establish rulesand regulations and good and
(27:50):
bad based on things withoutunderstanding the why and that bigger
picture, I know you've seen it.
We see it in the politicalarenas here in the United States.
Probably in other parts of the world.
We see it with onedenomination versus another.
We see it with groups ofpeople against other groups.
We debate doctrines that would makesense and not be as divisive as they are.
(28:14):
If we really understood the story ofscripture, and so that's something that
I'm attempting to make sense of myselfand maybe share that as I'm learning this.
Jesus read it as a story and Luke.
24, 27, he explains the storyfrom Moses through the prophets.
(28:37):
In Hebrews one, we see that Godused it to speak one way and
now he speaks through his son.
And then I love the beginning of John one.
The word became flesh to fulfillthe story that is the Holy Bible.
And so that's the scripturesthat back up some of the things
(28:58):
that we're talking about.
Many times we've heard scriptureslike, for example, John 5 39 and
40, where Jesus is saying, you studythe scriptures, but you miss me.
And often we will see people and we havestudied the scriptures, but we've missed.
What it's all about.
All scripture is useful, butit must be read in context.
(29:23):
That's from two Timothy three 16.
So just to kind of close this out,to kind of prepare for the next
episode, the Bible isn't a textbook.
It's not a rule book, it's not the law.
It is a narrative that includes someof those things, but it's a narrative
(29:43):
and if you don't understand thenarrative, then you don't understand
how some of those other things fit.
I. Read it as a story and you'llbegin to see the heart of the author.
And I do believe this word is divinelyinspired by the author and creator
of the universe, but you won'tunderstand the heart if you don't.
(30:07):
Understand the story.
If you take things out of orderand out of context, when you see
it, the confusion begins to lift.
You're stepping out of the matrix andthe kingdom starts to come into view.
And I'll tell you, it's so liberatingwhen things at one point were.
Just kind of fuzzy and you would just sortof explain things away with statements
(30:32):
like, you just gotta have faith, you justneed more faith, brother, come on now.
Just, you know, the, that creation,you just need to have faith or
some of the things from Revelation.
Well, you know, you justneed to understand we win.
That's all.
there's more to that.
And if you read it in context.
(30:54):
And in the order that it waswritten at times and understand it.
Uh, then that's gonna help in thenext episode, episode four, we're
gonna zoom in and go into the firstcentury, and this is where I've
been living for about a year or so.
I've just been hanging out therestudying the history of it.
Reading some of these, epistles andletters and gospels and trying to
(31:18):
understand when they were written,the audience they were written
to, and all of those things.
And boy has that helped.
We wanna understand the real people andthe real audience and why understanding
who the Bible was written to, may thekey to unlocking what it's really saying.
To us today, and I'vebeen having fun with that.
(31:39):
I've actually been writing somethings sort of in the fiction space.
Related to some of thethings I've been learning.
So I love that.
So anyway, thanks forjoining me on this journey.
It's been a fun journey for me.
I am hopeful that you'reon a similar journey.
It doesn't have to look like mine, butI'm hopeful that you are digging in,
(32:00):
that you're spending more time in theword, in the scripture, you're spending
quiet still, time just to hear the HolySpirit and allow yourself to be led and
guided to where God wants you to be.
Not where Tim wants you to be.
Not necessarily where, you know, a TVpreacher or YouTube preacher wants you
to be, but where God wants you to be.
(32:21):
That is my desire for maybepushing along this topic.
So hope you've enjoyed this.
Leave comments, love to hear from you downin the comments if, if you're watching
this or, or listening on YouTube or on anyof the other platforms, if you're catching
some of these clips on social media.
Let me know what you're thinking on this.
I'd love to get your feedback.
(32:42):
Until next time, next week, we'll seeyou for episode four of the series.
Why The Bible Doesn't Make Sense yet?
Imagine walking into a movie45 minutes late then trying to
explain the plot to someone else.
That's how most of us.
Read the Bible.
We know the characters.
We quote the lines, we quotethe scriptures, but often we're
missing the story because noone ever told us it's a story.
We weren't taught that it's a storyand we haven't read it as a story.
(00:23):
And here's the wild part.
The chapters in this book in theBible aren't even in the right.
Order.
Welcome to Seek, go Create.
This is Tim Winders and thisis episode three of the five
part series that we're doing.
Why The Bible doesn't make sense yet, andit's really part of the journey that I've
(00:45):
been on over the last, you know, we couldsay 10 years, maybe even longer than that.
But definitely in the last few yearswhere I have taken a lot of things that
I thought I knew I've had to unlearn it.
I've spent a lot of quiet time.
I've spent a lot of time actually readingthe Bible instead of listening to other
people tell me what's in the Bible.
And I've just come to what Ibelieve is a better understanding.
(01:08):
I'm not saying that I know it all.
I'm not saying that Iunderstand everything.
But I do believe that I have a bettercontext and a better understanding
than I did yesterday, last year,and definitely 10, 15 years ago.
So anyway, let's dive in.
Last time, last episode, episodetwo, we talked about what we often
(01:29):
have to do, which is unlearn.
What we knew.
And that kind of goes to whatI just said earlier, you know.
Much of what we get about theBible comes from other people.
It comes from teachers, preachersthat are all well-meaning,
but often they've got theirinterpretations, their understandings.
(01:50):
And then we also layer that with doctrinesand theologies and systems and ways
that people have attempted to explainthe Bible for the last 2000 plus years.
And so we have all of that.
And then we pick up the Bible or weopen up, to a scripture and we have
all of that stuff floating around.
(02:11):
It just makes it difficult tounderstand or worse, we fool ourselves
and we think we understand it.
We're convinced, we understand it.
We tell other people we understandit, but yet we are missing some
key pieces and key context.
the example we used inthe last episode was.
the matrix.
(02:32):
It's the red pill or the blue pill.
Which one are you gonna choose?
You choose one of them and you just staysort of blinded and trapped within that
structure that you've always been in.
But some of the things that I'veexperienced and read and studied over the
last few years, it's going down that pathof seeing beyond the matrix and seeing
that there's a bigger picture, there'sa bigger story, and it is uncomfortable.
(02:57):
It's been, challenging at times becauseit's kind of taken some of the things
that were, I thought, core of who I was.
And my wife, Gloria and I have gonethrough this where we've sat many
a morning with a cup of coffee andher comments were something to the
effect of, I'm not sure that I couldkeep going down this path because
(03:21):
what I thought that I knew is beingbusted up and these paradigms and all.
It's like that, that pain of steppingout of the matrix and looking back
in and going, Hmm, I was deceived,or I was wrong, or I was slightly
off, and just being slightly off.
Is almost worse thanbeing completely wrong.
(03:42):
And that's somethingthat we have realized.
Here's what we're gonna do In thisepisode, I'm gonna share kind of the
biggest lens shift of my journey.
the biggest thing that's kind of helpedme understand, what I believe, or at
least to put me in a better place tounderstand what the Bible is all about.
it's really this.
it's simple, but it's not,and that is that the Bible.
(04:06):
Is a story, it is an actual story witha beginning, a middle, and an end.
And if you don't understand the beginningand the middle, then it makes it
very difficult to understand the end.
And so we're gonna discuss thatthere's chronological aspects to it
and we need to understand there'schronological portions of it.
(04:30):
And if we are to read it out of order.
Or to take it out of context or to readsections of it and attempt to make that
the story, then it won't make sense,or it won't make as much sense, or
it'll cause us to skew the truth or toskew what it really is talking about.
And listen.
(04:51):
Guilty, I've done it.
I know many people that are speakingfrom pulpits and teaching and
preaching that may not be aware of it.
They're doing it and it'shappened time and time again.
And you know, we could, we couldsort of say, well, maybe it's the
enemy, you know, that old devilthat's trying to just confuse us.
(05:12):
Or it could be that we just aren't doingsome of the hard, difficult work of taking
the scriptures, taking the Bible, studyingit so that we understand it better.
I will say I'm guilty of that.
I spent time under preachers, I wouldtake what they said, I would repeat it.
(05:32):
Sometimes I would repeatit with confidence.
Sometimes I would look itup and check and study.
Sometimes I wouldn't.
I spent a few years in Bibleschool and I assumed that some
of the people teaching and.
Sharing there knew whatthey were talking about.
Some of them did.
Some good people, some of them didn't.
Some of them were takingthings out of context, and that
(05:54):
happens time and time again.
I guess if there's one underlyingmessage that's important in this, that's.
Kind of aside from the fact thatyou need to understand the Bible is
the, is a story, and that is takingpersonal responsibility for getting
to know and understanding it yourself.
Don't even take my word, don'teven listen to what I'm talking
(06:16):
about here, just about my journey.
You need to take thetime to study yourself.
You need to take the time todig into this Bible, to these
scriptures and learn it yourself.
You need to spend quiet time and allowthe Holy Spirit to reveal things to
you, ask questions, poke at things thatyou think you believe, but may not be
(06:37):
lining up with what's in the Bible.
Or that you've heard that it bothered you?
There were so many things that Iheard and they, they sort of bothered
me, but I just kind of accepted themand just kept kind of going along
until over the last few years wheretruthfully, my journey is this.
I sort of disconnected.
I mean, most of you know, my wifeand I for the last six, six and a
(06:58):
half years have lived in an rv andI haven't, we haven't been totally
isolated from the world, but we've been.
we've had a lot of quiet and still timewe, as we traveled, we didn't really plug
into some churches or anything like that.
I didn't really go to YouTube and listento this minister and that minister.
I really allowed the Lord to bemy teacher, I believe, and the
(07:22):
Holy Spirit to lead and guide me.
And it really freed me up to ask sometough questions that I do not think
I would've asked had I been sitting.
Under someone's teaching or ina ministry or in a Bible school.
And so it really kind of helped me godown this path and so, so that's what
we're gonna do in this episode today.
(07:44):
We're going to kinda walk throughthat journey that I went on.
Some of you may be goingon something similar.
I'll give you some glimpsesof what I think, but again,
it's your responsibility.
You have got to do this on your own,and some people are uncomfortable
with me saying this, but it might.
Means spending alone time doing it,not plugging into the charismatic
(08:09):
preacher teacher that sounds sogreat, and we all say, oh yeah, all
he does is preach from the Bible.
But then when you do your study, yourealize, Hmm, that actually wasn't
in the Bible or worse, it was out of.
Context.
So check me on this, put it downin comments if you're watching
this on YouTube or email, becauseI'm not pretending to know it all.
(08:30):
I'm just sharing my journey andthe process I've been on and how
much it bothers me that years ago.
I didn't think I knew itall, but boy, I thought I was
really close, but yet I wasn't.
So let me give you my Bible experience.
This was back in the early nineties,so 30 something years ago, I was
(08:51):
saved and I knew that I needed tostudy and learn more about the Bible.
But here's what I did.
I treated the Bible like it was a manual.
Or a devotional and I readportions of it and I attempted
to understand the bigger picture.
I'm kind of a bigger picture guy.
(09:12):
I love to understand the bigger pictureif I can, but I pulled out pieces of
it and what I did was is I attemptedto apply it to whatever I was dealing
with or going through at the time.
Now, that's not a bad thing necessarily.
However, what it does is it causes usto, possibly twist some things around,
(09:34):
I was actually saved in a businesssetting, so I was sort of wired to be
pursuing and going after making money and.
being more successfulin that financial area.
And so the scriptures initially that Istarted pulling out were those scriptures
that looked like scriptures that saidI should prosper and be in good health
(09:57):
that I should, do well financially.
You know, I took a lot of the moneyscriptures and kinda made those fit
what I was going through at the time.
I took a lot of the sowing and reapingscriptures and made them apply.
And some of them I was probably close.
Some of them I was probably maybeaccurate, but there was probably a lot
of them that I was taking them away outtacontext and taking them in a wrong way.
(10:23):
So I would just grab isolated versusjust to kind of make myself feel
better, do better, or latch onto.
And I really did notunderstand how it all.
Fit together.
I mean, I would try to understand thecreation, story and then I would try
to understand the ending story, and Inever really liked either one of those.
(10:46):
I'll be upfront with you the creationstory, being an engineer and someone
who kind of likes to see thingsand maybe didn't have a lot of.
Faith that that just, it is the way it is.
I wanted a little more informationabout that creation, and if you don't
understand creation and the things inthe middle, then I'll tell you, you
definitely won't understand how it ends.
(11:09):
And that's really one of the catalystsfor a lot of where I'm going now
that we'll talk about in a futureepisode is that ending that a lot of
people are trying to explain with.
With headlines and all this going on inthe world, it really started bothering me
more and more, and that's when I realizedthat if you don't know how it fits
together, then it, it's just all jumbled.
(11:32):
One of the problems with theBible also, let's just go ahead
and get this out, out here.
the chapters are not written in order.
You know, I've written a novel myself.
I think it had 39 chapters.
It's fiction.
If I took those 39 chapters that Iwrote to be in a specific order, I had
some flashbacks and things like that.
(11:53):
But if I took those 39 chaptersand let's say I took the first two
thirds of those, and I just sort ofrewrote some of the chapters to tell
the same story over and over again.
And let's just say there was someperspective from some people during
those storylines, those story andplot points that may have had another
(12:15):
perspective and those were added in,and all of that would've sort of looked
like what the Old Testament looks like.
And then let's say I would've takenthe last two thirds of that novel,
and instead of putting it entirelyin order, I took the overarching
story of the main character.
(12:37):
And I put it in the first fourchapters of that, second of
that last third of the book.
And then the last portion ofthe book, I actually just listed
it out by length of chapter.
Well, that's what isgoing on in the Bible.
We have in the Old Testament, ifyou want to try to read it in order,
(12:58):
you do have some of the creationand things that are in order.
But once you get into Kings and Chroniclesand all the prophet books, some of those
overlapped, Before I realized that Kingsand Chronicles are basically telling
the same stories, and then there'sIsaiah and some of the others that are
telling some of the things that aregoing on also in Kings and Chronicles.
(13:22):
And if you don't understand that, thenman, it's hard to fit it together.
then you get over to the NewTestament and you've got.
Some of the epistles thatreally occurred before.
Some things in the Book of Acts.
You've got Revelation here thatwe like to think is the end.
and it is in some ways, but it'snot the end as many of us think.
And then you've got Paul Anywaythere, there's just a lot of.
(13:46):
Things that go on there.
It's like watching, this isthe example that I like to use.
I'm a big Star Wars fan.
Most of you know Star Wars.
George Lucas started with what he calledepisode four, which is a new Hope.
It was the original Star Wars moviecame out in 19, I think it was 77,
if I'm remembering correctly, andAnd that movie was awesome, man.
(14:08):
It was something like we'venever seen and it was incredible.
Well.
As incredible as that moviewas, the next movie that was
released almost three years later.
By the way, it was like excruciatingwhen we realized that this
other movie was coming out andit was The Empire Strikes Back.
And let me tell you,one of the best movies.
(14:31):
Is the Empire Strikes back.
It started awesome.
It dropped us off a cliff at the end,and everything in between was incredible.
had we not seen a new Hope, the originalStar Wars before then that movie never
would've had the impact It had theEmpire strikes back because we had
to have that context of that before
(14:53):
Some of you're gonna get upset thatI'm comparing the Bible to Star Wars.
I'm not.
I'm just saying that is the storytellingchallenge that we, that we have.
It's what I just mentioned about my book.
we've done this time and time again andwe just haven't understood the order.
So for me, my.
(15:14):
I guess first sort of ahas aboutsomething odd is going on here is
when I, a few years back, decidedto do a read through the Bible.
Actually, my wife decided and she allowedme to go along with her, and we went
through the Bible in chronological order.
Okay.
Not the order it was writtennecessarily, but in the historical
(15:36):
chronological order that it went in.
And I won't say that the New Testamentimpacted me that much at that time.
I'll talk more aboutthat in just a moment.
But what it did do was allowed me toreally understand the Old Testament better
as I put those pieces together, like Isaid earlier, of Kings and Chronicles
(15:58):
and the prophets and all the overlapand the story of the Old Testament.
And so that really started me.
Thinking about maybe I'm missing somethings because of the chronological
nature that I'm missing out on justreading these 66 books in the order
that they're placed in the Holy Bible.
(16:18):
So here's some things that I saw though.
These are some thingsthat were revealed to me.
One was just how confusingthe Old Testament, can be.
If you just read it in the order thatit's listed and how much more sense that
it makes if you read it chronologically.
And when you do that, you really dounderstand the buildup and the leading
(16:42):
to the coming Messiah, which is Jesus.
The Old Testament is a leadup and buildup to what occurs.
In the New Testament and many timesit's, we can sort of disconnect
those if you don't understandthe chronological nature of it.
As I started looking at the New Testament.
(17:05):
And in the same light started lookingat what was going on during that time.
We'll talk more about this in a laterepisode, but the importance of the first
century, specifically a 30 around thetime of the, death, the cross, and the
resurrection of Jesus Christ up to 80 70,which was the destruction of Jerusalem.
(17:26):
You actually realize, the NewTestament primarily was in between
those two, those two dates.
You understand the urgency that wasinvolved in the writing of many of the
epistles, the letters, even the gospels.
There was a real urgency there thatwe don't get if we don't understand
that context, the context of acts.
(17:50):
Being before Paul's letters is veryimportant because Paul's letters really
are sprinkled throughout the book of Acts.
And Dr. Luke, Luke, who wrote the Gospelof Luke, and then he wrote the Book of
Acts, which are meant to go together.
That's the.
Chronology of, the earlychurch leading up to, Paul's.
(18:13):
Really not even then.
It's kind of most of Paul'sministry in the spreading of
the gospel in the first century.
So that's important to understand.
And then, like I mentionedearlier, you start to see that
The end begins to look different.
if you understand that urgency that'sgoing on within the gospels and also
within Paul's letters, if you understandwhat is happening and most of the
(18:37):
epistles that Paul has written, if youunderstand what's going on with the early
churches, then you begin looking at whatmost of us have looked as the ending.
Of the vision of, of John,the revelation of the Christ.
You just, you kinda look at thatdifferently, and that's not what we're
gonna talk about here, but I'll tell youthat it just all begins to fit differently
(19:02):
and this is why story really matters.
And it's something that I didn't do withthe Bible for a long period of time,
and I noticed that many people don't.
I went to Bible school for a few years.
I spent time around not justyour average run of the mill.
Bible reading people.
(19:23):
These were people that studied it more.
These were people that taught it and,and I can tell you that my observation
is that many people don't reallyunderstand that flow, the beginning,
the middle, and the end of storiesand storytelling or the narrative.
And again, I'm not sayingthat the Bible is fiction.
I'm not telling you that it's just astory, but I will tell you it's got a
(19:46):
narrative that we need to understandand stories will then give meaning.
To the events, not just commands ornot just things that we can kind of
grab and totally apply in our lives.
We need to understand thatcontext of what is going on.
God is telling a story of covenant exile.
(20:06):
Rescue and then restoration or, orbringing everything back to him.
And I, I've heard this said, andI do believe this, that the story
of the Bible is the story of God.
I. Really wanting a family, reallywanting sons and daughters that are his,
(20:29):
and some would say, well, why didn'the just create that in the first place?
Well, he did.
Things changed things, went throughvarious iterations, and that's
what we're moving back towards.
The kingdom.
The kingdom of God is the central theme.
(20:50):
The Kingdom or the Edensystem or the new Jerusalem.
That is the theme that wesee throughout the Bible.
many people, especially Americanizedpeople that are westernized, we have
this thought that the theme of the Bibleis punching our card to get to heaven.
(21:11):
That's all it's about.
We're trying to get to heaven.
That's all that matters,and that may be part.
Of it, but that's reallynot the theme of it.
If you really understand thestory, that is not what's going on.
It's about the kingdom, the kingdomof God, and that kingdom growing and
expanding through us, and becauseof what Jesus Christ did and because
(21:36):
of what happened with creation.
So the kingdom is the central theme.
So let's talk a little bitmore about the big picture.
And then we'll, uh, we'll kind of wrapup a little bit with, uh, with some
thoughts and some things that I believeI've started to see that have helped me.
Old Testament, fairlysimple creation, covenant.
(21:58):
Exile, promise creation, covenant exile,and then the promise of something coming.
And that promise, came ina lot of shapes and sizes.
That's one thing that gets a littlebit confusing at times, is that
promise is coming from the prophets.
It's coming from all the wayback, really from the beginning,
(22:20):
all the way back to creation.
And that promises thebuildup and it occurs over.
Thousands of years.
And that was something that was sortof interesting for me, especially with
people in our today's world that, beginto say things like, well, you know,
I'm, I'm praying for something and Iexpect something, and if it doesn't
(22:43):
happen next week, then you know, I'mstarting to get impatient about it.
Well, I am always amazed when Ilook at the Old Testament and read
through it chronologically, howthere were certain timeframes.
Where people were promised that amessiah is coming, everything will
(23:05):
change, everything will be better, andthat better occurred 400 years later.
So let's put that in perspective.
Right now, someone told you, let's justsay you're in a difficult situation.
Let's say things look bleak, things lookbad for you, either financially or your
health, or just something that's goingon bad and someone that you believe
(23:30):
that they've got a good word for you.
They say something to the effect of,oh yes, it's going to be resolved.
Be patient.
It's gonna get better.
And you later find out that thatbetter is 400 years from now.
I mean, I've just, my head it was kindof hard for me to wrap around that.
It kinda let me know thatwe don't understand time.
(23:52):
The way God understands time orthe way God, reveals time might
be a better way of saying it.
But, so anyway, so that's Old Testamentcreation, covenant exile, promise.
The gospels.
Are the kingdom arriving inthe person of Jesus Christ, and
that is of course, that's God.
(24:12):
That's Jesus.
He was man.
He was also God, and that is the kingdom.
Jesus said it many times.
I've studied the kingdom of God.
I'll mention that in the nextepisode we'll talk about the
kingdom and the kingdom of God.
Those terms are mentioned over a hundredtimes in the New Testament, and Jesus
said, I have come to bring the kingdom.
(24:33):
That is his purpose, one of his purpose.
And in acts, when we look at the book ofActs, the kingdom continues to expand.
Through the believers in JesusChrist, through that church,
through that Ecclesia that wasestablished, truthfully at Pentecost.
That's when that started.
So the letters, the ones that camefrom Paul and others, is really,
(24:56):
and I love this term, coachingbelievers on how to live in that
kingdom and then also preparing for.
The ending of the old covenant andthe time when there will only be
one covenant, which is that newcovenant of Jesus Christ, the Messiah
Covenant, if you want to call it that.
And so a lot of the letters, andthis is where we really have to
(25:19):
understand this and not take Paul'sletters and try to apply them 2000
years later to what's going on here.
we also have to do this whileunderstanding that these were letters
that Paul and others wrote specificallyto coach these believers on how to
live in that kingdom during that time.
Also with an old covenantthat was still in place.
(25:42):
And then of course we get to Revelationthat again, we're gonna talk about
in the last episode of this series.
It's really that final hope thatrestoration and, a lot of people like to.
Say that it's, it just shows thatwe win, that Jesus wins, and I'll
say, in many ways, it shows thatJesus won and that he's continue
(26:02):
winning and we're winning throughhim and with Him and in his kingdom.
But we will, look at thatagain later in a later episode.
Here's what I, I do want to kinda look atwhat happens when you ignore the order.
And the context it leads to and,and probably a lot more than
(26:23):
this, but at minimum it leadsto confusion, contradiction.
'cause a lot of people say, oh,the Bible contradicts itself.
No, it doesn't.
Not if you understand the story, notif you read through it chronologically,
not if you look at what it was doingat the time it was written, when it
was written and who it was writtento, it does not contradict at all.
(26:46):
At all.
It doesn't.
but if you're out of order, ifyou're out of context, you can
misuse a lot of scriptures and that'sone of the things that spurred me
on to do this group of episodes.
the more I started seeing andinteracting and seeing people on
social media and, some people thatI had been around a long period of
(27:09):
time, some I'd gone to Bible schoolwith I'm like you know what, not only.
Are they not using thatscripture correctly?
They really are misusing it.
and I think that that's where itstarts becoming, I'll use the word
dangerous, that may be strong.
But misleading might be a softerword, but it could be dangerous.
(27:29):
There are people that are doingthings with scriptures out of
context that I believe are, misuse.
We'll just say it that way and wewill often miss the why behind.
The what?
And we'll, we'll, we'll use the what?
We'll try to establish rulesand regulations and good and
(27:50):
bad based on things withoutunderstanding the why and that bigger
picture, I know you've seen it.
We see it in the politicalarenas here in the United States.
Probably in other parts of the world.
We see it with onedenomination versus another.
We see it with groups ofpeople against other groups.
We debate doctrines that would makesense and not be as divisive as they are.
(28:14):
If we really understood the story ofscripture, and so that's something that
I'm attempting to make sense of myselfand maybe share that as I'm learning this.
Jesus read it as a story and Luke.
24, 27, he explains the storyfrom Moses through the prophets.
(28:37):
In Hebrews one, we see that Godused it to speak one way and
now he speaks through his son.
And then I love the beginning of John one.
The word became flesh to fulfillthe story that is the Holy Bible.
And so that's the scripturesthat back up some of the things
(28:58):
that we're talking about.
Many times we've heard scriptureslike, for example, John 5 39 and
40, where Jesus is saying, you studythe scriptures, but you miss me.
And often we will see people and we havestudied the scriptures, but we've missed.
What it's all about.
All scripture is useful, butit must be read in context.
(29:23):
That's from two Timothy three 16.
So just to kind of close this out,to kind of prepare for the next
episode, the Bible isn't a textbook.
It's not a rule book, it's not the law.
It is a narrative that includes someof those things, but it's a narrative
(29:43):
and if you don't understand thenarrative, then you don't understand
how some of those other things fit.
I. Read it as a story and you'llbegin to see the heart of the author.
And I do believe this word is divinelyinspired by the author and creator
of the universe, but you won'tunderstand the heart if you don't.
(30:07):
Understand the story.
If you take things out of orderand out of context, when you see
it, the confusion begins to lift.
You're stepping out of the matrix andthe kingdom starts to come into view.
And I'll tell you, it's so liberatingwhen things at one point were.
Just kind of fuzzy and you would just sortof explain things away with statements
(30:32):
like, you just gotta have faith, you justneed more faith, brother, come on now.
Just, you know, the, that creation,you just need to have faith or
some of the things from Revelation.
Well, you know, you justneed to understand we win.
That's all.
there's more to that.
And if you read it in context.
(30:54):
And in the order that it waswritten at times and understand it.
Uh, then that's gonna help in thenext episode, episode four, we're
gonna zoom in and go into the firstcentury, and this is where I've
been living for about a year or so.
I've just been hanging out therestudying the history of it.
Reading some of these, epistles andletters and gospels and trying to
(31:18):
understand when they were written,the audience they were written
to, and all of those things.
And boy has that helped.
We wanna understand the real people andthe real audience and why understanding
who the Bible was written to, may thekey to unlocking what it's really saying.
To us today, and I'vebeen having fun with that.
(31:39):
I've actually been writing somethings sort of in the fiction space.
Related to some of thethings I've been learning.
So I love that.
So anyway, thanks forjoining me on this journey.
It's been a fun journey for me.
I am hopeful that you'reon a similar journey.
It doesn't have to look like mine, butI'm hopeful that you are digging in,
(32:00):
that you're spending more time in theword, in the scripture, you're spending
quiet still, time just to hear the HolySpirit and allow yourself to be led and
guided to where God wants you to be.
Not where Tim wants you to be.
Not necessarily where, you know, a TVpreacher or YouTube preacher wants you
to be, but where God wants you to be.
(32:21):
That is my desire for maybepushing along this topic.
So hope you've enjoyed this.
Leave comments, love to hear from you downin the comments if, if you're watching
this or, or listening on YouTube or on anyof the other platforms, if you're catching
some of these clips on social media.
Let me know what you're thinking on this.
I'd love to get your feedback.
(32:42):
Until next time, next week, we'll seeyou for episode four of the series.
Why The Bible Doesn't Make Sense yet?
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