The following is mostly taken from my book and I have made some changes.
Scriptures are from the New King James Version.
This chapter gives you a simple Bible overview of how it all fits
together so that the Scriptures will not be frightening or intimidating.
The Bible is the story of God and His chosen people, Israel, who were to
bring the message of God’s love to all the world, to include the revelation
of Messiah.
The book of Genesis tells how it all began. The story starts out with
God creating the heavens and the earth and finally man. Adam and Eve
were created to be God’s representatives on earth. The vast majority
of Bible (human) time passes in Genesis. Adam and Eve allowed sin
to enter the world by their disobedience and yielded their (our) God-given
dominion over the earth to Satan, who immediately sought to
ruin humankind. Seeing the proliferation of evil, God destroyed most of
humankind in a flood.
Noah and his family were the only righteous ones left on earth. As
a result of taking shelter in the Ark, Noah and his three sons — Shem,
Ham, and Japheth — and their families survived to repopulate the earth.
All three sons had families, but through the line of Shem came a very
important person: Abraham. Abraham was chosen by God and received
God’s promise that God would bless him and his descendants — and that
they would be as numerous as the stars in the sky. Abraham begat Isaac,
and Isaac begat Jacob.
Jacob had twelve sons. These would initially become the twelve tribes
of Israel. The people of God, the Israelites, grew in number and expanded
in influence. These were, and are, God’s chosen people: the Hebrews (not
called Jews until later). Abraham was told that his descendants would be
captive in a foreign land for many years.
One of Jacob’s twelve sons was named Joseph. His mistreatment by
his brothers resulted in his slavery and imprisonment in Egypt. However,
Joseph’s eventual elevation to second in command of Egypt by Pharaoh, after he
had interpreted Pharaoh’s dreams, caused all the Hebrew people in Jacob’s
family, around seventy-five, to eventually go to Egypt. There, during a
great famine, they were fed and protected by Pharaoh and Joseph in the
beautiful land of Goshen. God’s chosen people went to live in the land of
Egypt, thanks to Joseph’s divinely orchestrated position under Pharaoh.
The eventual leadership in Egypt forgot the Joseph story. They
required that the Hebrew people become their slaves and treated them
badly. The Hebrews cried out to God for a deliverer. God would choose
Moses. After many years, it was time for them to leave Egypt
and go to the land that God planned for them to dwell in. This was the
land of Canaan and was called the Promised Land. Initially led by God’s
prophet Moses, more than two million Hebrews left Egypt to head to the
Promised Land.
During the journey from Egypt, which should have taken a few
weeks but ended up taking forty years, the Lord taught His people His
standards and His plan for them. This is what the first five books of the
Bible are about. They are called the Torah, or God’s Holy Law. In the first
five books of the Bible, God teaches His children how He wants them
to live — with many examples and trials in the desert. God was present
with them in the desert via the tabernacle, which was His temporary
dwelling on earth.
Moses disobeyed God at one point and was prevented from actually
entering the Promised Land. After Moses died, Joshua became the leader
of the Israelites. The book of Joshua tells us about this.
The Hebrews eventually entered their land with Joshua as their leader
and began to take possession of it by force as directed. They did not fully
eliminate other inhabitants from the land, however, and these inhabitants
occasionally came back to trouble them. After Joshua died, the people
began to do evil things, such as worshipping false gods, intermarrying
with the people of the lands, and consulting false prophets. As a result,
they were overrun by enemies. When they were tormented by their
enemies, they cried out to God for help. God raised up people to deliver
them from the hands of their enemies. These people were called the
judges.
The judges were successful in getting the Hebrews, who were sinful
in their behavior, back in line with God. In each case, things would go
well for a while, but then Israel would act badly and become oppressed
by another enemy. Then the people would cry for help, and God would
raise up another judge to defeat the enemy causing the problem. Things
would go well for a while and the people’s behavior would deteriorate
again, and then things would go badly again for the Israelites. This is
where stories of famous judges from the book of Judges, such as Gideon,
Samson, Deborah, Jephthah, and others, are found.
The people of Israel eventually asked the last judge, the prophet
Samuel, for a king. God warned them that they should not do so. They
insisted, however, and King Saul was selected. King Saul did not obey God
completely. He angered God because of his incomplete obedience and was
eventually replaced as king of God’s people by David, a man after God’s
own heart. David was the leader God told to establish Jerusalem as the
place where God would put His name.
David’s son Solomon was established as king over Israel after David
died. Solomon is said to be the wisest and richest man who ever lived. He
built the first great temple in Jerusalem, which replaced the temporary
tabernacle. Even though he was the wisest man on the Earth, he followed
after some of the gods of his many foreign wives, and he angered God.
This is all outlined in the books of First and Second Samuel, First and
Second Kings, First and Second Chronicles, and Ecclesiastes. Some of
the angst of Solomon and the wisdom he gained from a complicated life
appears in Proverbs and Ecclesiastes.
As a result of Solomon’s incomplete obedience by following after
other gods with his foreign wives, the unified kingdom of Israel was
split into a northern and a southern kingdom after Solomon’s death. The
northern kingdom, Israel, consisted of ten tribes and had nineteen kings,
none of whom obeyed God. The southern kingdom consisted principally
of two tribes, Judah and Benjamin, and was called Judah or Jerusalem
(enter the terms Jews and Jewish). It had twenty kings, many of whom
were good kings who obeyed the Lord. Among the kings of Judah, eight
were considered good by most — Asa, Jehoshaphat, Joash, Amaziah,
Azariah, Jotham, Hezekiah, and Josiah. This is also outlined in the 12
books of history such as First and Second Samuel, First and Second Kings,
and First and Second Chronicles. These books are all about the history of
the two kingdoms and all of their kings.
While many of the kings of the southern kingdom, Judah, were
obedient kings who honored God, both kingdoms had periods of
worshipping foreign gods and doing things that displeased God. This
is where the prophets come in. The five books of the major prophets —
Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, and Daniel — as well as the
twelve books of the minor prophets — including Joel, Amos, Hosea,
Nahum, Jonah, Obadiah, and Habakkuk — talk about the events of these
days and give many warnings to the people to repent and follow God.
These are the books that detail the warnings of God through His prophets
to the two kingdoms and many other surrounding nations. The prophets
prophesied to the northern and southern kingdoms, as well as many of
the surrounding kingdoms that mistreated Israel, that they should repent
and follow after God. The prophets spoke to the kingdoms and their kings
about the current and future ramifications of their choices.
Most of the prophetic books have several components to them, such
as a past (remember what God did for us); a present (look at what you
are doing now, and here is what God says about it); a near future (this
is what is going to happen in the immediate future if you do not stop
doing what you are doing); and a far future (the Messiah is coming, and
all will be right again when you are dwelling in your land after you have
been dispersed and you return and your enemies are destroyed). Many
prophecies of Jesus as Messiah can be found in the books of the prophets.
Ultimately, neither kingdom obeyed God fully. First, the northern
kingdom fell to the invading army from Assyria and was carried away
around 720 BC. The Assyrians filled the land with people of other
lands who mingled with the remnant of Israel. This is where the term
Samaritan comes from, and is why Jews and Samaritans were at odds
with each other. The southern kingdom lasted until around 586 BC as an
independent kingdom because it had many good kings, but eventually it
fell to the invading army of King Nebuchadnezzar from Babylon. In that
invasion, the first temple, which was built by Solomon, was destroyed.
The southern kingdom then spent seventy years in captivity (exile) in
Babylon before returning.
Some of the prophets plied their God-given trade during the exile
in Babylon and after the return to Israel. Eventually, Israel was allowed
to go back to Jerusalem by Cyrus, King of Persia, after Babylon was
defeated by the Medo-Persians. This is where Ezra, Esther, Nehemiah,
and other books describe events such as the returning, the rebuilding
of the city, the rebuilding of the wall, and the re-building of the second
temple at Jerusalem. Other Old Testament books include the five books
of poetry and wisdom — Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the
Song of Solomon.
The last Old Testament prophet is Malachi, who spoke after the
kingdom of Judah was back in the land of Israel. Then there was a silence
in the land during which God did not speak through His prophets.
After about 400 years, the Messiah Yeshua (Jesus) came as prophesied.
However, He was not recognized by most of the people, since He was not
a conquering king at the time; and He was crucified, killed, and buried.
He was raised again on the third day, just as had been prophesied.
Jesus’ ministry was to the Jewish people primarily, and this is all
outlined in the four Gospels. Jesus kept His Father’s law (the Torah) and,
as the prophets foretold, He showed us how to obey God with a heart
of love, being led by the Spirit (see Deuteronomy 18). He tells us that
salvation and access to God will be only through Him by grace through
faith. We must believe on Him.
After Jesus died, rose from the dead, and went to heaven, He revealed
Himself on the road to Damascus to the great Pharisee Saul of Tarsus,
better known to us as St. Paul, who would become a major evangelist and
apostle. The Lord told him to take the gospel of grace to the Gentiles.
Paul’s journeys are detailed in the book of Acts, which tells of Paul’s and
a few of the other apostles’ travels, speaking and preaching the gospel of
Jesus Christ to Jews and Gentiles around the known world.
When Jesus revealed Himself to Paul and told him to share the gospel
with the Gentiles, the age of the Gentiles, or the Church Age, began. The
Church Age, during which all people are allowed to join God’s family by
faith in Christ, continues to this day. We are essentially grafted in to the
Jewish chosen people by God’s mercy. All people — Jews and Gentiles —
can now join God’s family — but only through faith in Christ.
Much Christian theology, encouragement, and warnings to avoid
false teaching are found in the epistles written by Paul, such as Galatians,
Ephesians, Romans, Titus, First and Second Timothy, and others. There
are also epistles written by John, James, Peter, and Jude. All of these
books tell us about Jesus and instruct us regarding how we should live
as Christians. All of these books stress God’s loving provision of Christ
as our Savior and the importance of obedience to Him. Most also stress
the importance of living by faith and love rather than putting our trust
in our own good works by keeping the Law.
The book of Hebrews is a fantastic book whose authorship is
uncertain but was probably written by Paul. It compares and contrasts
the Law given by Moses with the salvation by grace through faith in Jesus
Christ. The final sacrifice for sin and the fulfillment of God’s righteous
requirements are due to Christ’s death and resurrection and are held in
contrast to the repeated animal sacrifices in the temple, which were only
shadow pictures of the perfect lamb (Christ) who was to come.
Eventually, and likely fairly soon, the time of the Gentiles will come
to an end, and Israel will take center stage again. Never make the mistake
of assuming God is done with the Jewish people and that Christians are
now the only ones who matter to God. This mistaken teaching is also
known as replacement theology. The destiny of God’s precious chosen
people is most clearly chronicled in the books of Daniel and Revelation,
as well as in the writings of many of the prophets such as Zechariah. The
end times and the future establishment of the Kingdom of God for one
thousand years, as well as the New Heaven and the New Earth, are all
outlined in Revelation.
Enjoy the wonderful book, the Bible, on a lifetime adventure of
discovery through its 39 Old Testament books and 27 New Testament
books, most of which lead us directly or indirectly to God through Jesus
the Messiah. Feel free to do an Internet search for a great Bible outline.
You will be amazed at how it ties together. As we often hear these days,
“You can’t make this stuff up.”
