Week 1: Introduction to the New Testament

Welcome to Bible School!

• Agenda and Plan for Bible School
• What do you need to bring?
• How does the Bible Homework work?

Why is Bible Study important?

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What kinds of things will we study?

• Literal - Stories, Historical Context, Cultural Context, Etymology, Numerology, etc.
• Tropological - What lessons can I learn? What are the virtues? Etc.
• Allegorical - What does this tell us about God? How does the OT point to Christ in the NT?

Review the History of the Old Testament

• Genesis
  • God created the universe and everything in it
  • God made man in His image, according to His likeness
  • Man fell by the envy of the devil and had to be removed from Paradise lest they eat from the tree of life and live eternally in their sin
  • The Lord promises that He will save them and He will trample on Satan
  • The generations continue and they have some evil and some good... a line of evil from Cain, and a line of good from Seth
  • From the line of Seth comes Enoch and Methuselah and Noah
  • Because of the evil in the line of Cain, the Lord decides to send a flood on the earth to purge it from the evil people. Noah and his family are saved.
  • Abraham comes along, a descendant of Noah and he is a righteous man who is faithful to God and God's promises. And God promises him children and descendants more than the number of stars in heaven or dust on the earth.
  • Abraham has Isaac, a son of Promise who is just as faithful and just as righteous.
  • Isaac has Jacob, who starts life pretty bad - deceiving his father and his brother several times, but then by the end of his life he is very faithful.
  • Jacob's name is changed to Israel and he has 12 sons. Those become the 12 tribes of Israel. Unfortunately, 10 of those sons go and sell Joseph (the 11th son) as a slave. He ends up in Egypt but remains faithful to God. So God keeps taking care of him, until he becomes the most powerful man in Egypt (second to Pharaoh).
  • There is a famine and the brothers of Joseph have to come to Egypt to get grain which is when Joseph tests them and then reveals himself to them. He invites them to come live with him in Egypt and to bring their father and whole family. They comply. He gives them some of the best land in Egypt to live in.
• Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy
  • A new Pharaoh rises up and he does not know Joseph. All he sees is the Israelites multiplying and taking up their land... so he makes them slaves. And they were slaves for 400 years until God raised up for them someone to save them - Moses.
  • Moses was born in Egypt and raised by Pharaoh's daughter. When he was 40 years old he killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew. So he fled from Egypt to the wilderness.
  • He lived out there for 40 more years until God appeared to him in the Burning Bush.
  • God told him that he would go to Egypt and demand that Pharaoh let God's people go
  • Moses takes his brother Aaron and they go to Egypt and they work many signs for Pharaoh but he still won't let them go... so God sends 10 plagues on them. After the 10th plague, Pharaoh lets them leave... but even then, he chases them out.
  • God splits the Red Sea for them and closes it on the Egyptian army, so they escape from Egypt.
  • God gives them the Commandments before they enter their new land - the land of Canaan, the land God had promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
  • God also gives them instructions to build the Tabernacle and they build it.
  • Then God leads them out to enter the Promised Land, but they refuse to enter when they get there. They don't have faith. They think they will lose the battles that will follow. Except for Joshua and Caleb.
  • So instead, they wander 40 years in the wilderness until that whole generation dies off. During this time, they are eating Manna sent from heaven, and quail. They are following a cloud and a pillar of fire. They are getting water from rocks. They are seeing miracle after miracle after miracle.
  • In the end, they reach the border of the land, Moses and Aaron both die and Joshua becomes the leader.
• Joshua
  • Joshua guides the people into the conquest of the land. He is positioned as Moses' replacement. 
  • They start with the big city of Jericho and they encircle it every day for seven days. On the seventh day they encircle it seven times and the walls of the city fall completely and crumble. They overtake the city.
  • They continue the conquest of the land and take over much of the Promised Land.
  • When Joshua dies, he tells them to finish their conquest, to have faith, and to not reject the Lord.
• Judges
  • They continue to do those things until all the elders who knew Joshua died. By then, they had forgotten everything Joshua had told them.
  • And this starts the period of the Judges... the people lose faith in God, go after wives from the Canaanites, worship idols of the Canaanites, etc. So God gives them over to those other nations. Then they plead to God and He raises for them a judge... a judge is a military leader who also has a relationship with God, and to whom God speaks. The judge rescues them from captivity, then they repent and are good for a little while, then the cycle repeats.
  • Some judges that are well known are Samson, Deborah, Barak, Gideon.
  • The last of the judges is Samuel the Priest.
• 1&2 Samuel
  • Samuel hears God calling to him and he ministers as His priest.
  • The people come to Samuel and tell him that they want a king... he is not happy because they should be following God as their king, not desiring an earthly king like the other nations.
  • God agrees with Samuel, but tells him to give them what they want.
  • So they choose Saul - a good man from the tribe of Benjamin to be the king. Saul is good for a while... but one time, instead of waiting for Samuel to come and offer the burnt offerings, he did it himself. But he is not a priest. So it was a grave sin. 
  • From there, it was all downhill for Saul. 
  • Samuel anoints David when he is young, because God chose him to be king one day.
  • David goes and defeats Goliath and then continues to defeat the Philistines for many years and the people seemed to love him more than Saul. So Saul starts to chase after David to try and kill him. David had many opportunities to kill Saul, but he didn't because he would not lay a hand on the Lord's anointed.
  • At one battle against the Philistines, Saul's sons were all killed, and Saul fell on his sword to avoid getting captured. So David became King.
  • David ruled as a good king - a man after the Lord's heart. He made many mistakes but he always repented of them. And this is why the Lord accepted him to be king. The Lord promised him that his descendants would keep the royal line.
• King Solomon
  • When David died, his son Solomon became king. King Solomon asked the Lord for wisdom and the Lord gave it to him. He wrote the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Book of Wisdom and Song of Songs.
  • He made Israel so powerful and so rich during his reign
  • He built the Temple
  • God appeared to Solomon and told him that if he walks before God in the way David walked, and keep His statutes and His judgments, then his throne will be established on the kingdom forever.
  • Unfortunately, Solomon did not do that... but he went after foreign women - Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians, Hittittes, and even a daughter of Pharaoh. He had seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. And they caused him to turn his heart after other gods. He was not loyal to God.
  • Then one of his officers, Jeroboam met with a prophet named Ahijah and Ahijah told him a prophecy - that the Lord will split the kingdom. And 10 of the tribes will go to Jeroboam, and 2 of the tribes will continue in the line of Solomon for the sake of his father King David.
• Split of the Kingdom
  
  • When Solomon died, his son Rehoboam became king. And Rehoboam was not good to the people. He taxed them harder than even his father Solomon.
  • Ten of the tribes revolted against him and they chose Jeroboam as their king. The other two stuck with Rehoboam.
  • The rest of the Books of 1 and 2 Kings describe the period of the split kingdom... they list the kings of the North and the kings of the South. All of the kings of the North were evil. Most of the kings of the South were evil. Only a couple of Kings were good - like King Asa, King Hezekiah and King Josiah.
• Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian Captivity
  • The Assyrian conquest came up from the North and took over the Kingdom of Israel (map). And the Assyrian king resettled people in Samaria (capital city of the North) - he brought Babylonians and other foreigners.
  • Later on, the Babylonians led by Nebuchadnezzar started their conquest and they defeated the Assyrians and took over the Assyrian kingdom. They continued further south and conquered the Kingdom of Judah.
  • The Israelites were all taken captive.
  • Jerusalem was destroyed and the Temple was destroyed.
  • After 70 years, King Cyrus of Persia conquered the Babylonian kingdom. And he said that God commanded him to build for God a house at Jerusalem so he issues an Edict to allow Jews to return to their land.
• Returning to Jerusalem
  
  • The Israelites returned in three waves:
  • Zerubabel led the first wave of Jews to rebuild the Temple
  • Ezra led back a second wave and guided them as priest and read to them the words of the Law
  • Nehemiah led back a third wave to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem 

Geography of New Testament Palestine

• We will draw together the following map, each on his own paper with his own pen:
  
  

  

History of the Intertestamental Period

• Maccabbean Revolt
• Rise of King Herod
• Renovating the Temple
• Geography of Palestine
• What were the Jews expecting/waiting for at this time?