The post Bible Hacks: Understanding the New Testament Context appeared first on Brandon Kelley.

[callout]For the next six weeks, I’ll be co-teaching a class called, Bible Hacks where myself and Daryl Docterman will teach short sessions designed to help you read the Bible better. Below are my teaching notes from session two as well as the audio of the class.

Session one: The Overarching Story of the Bible – by Daryl Docterman

Session one: Seeing the Gospel in Every Crevice of the Bible – by Brandon Kelley

Session two: Understanding the Old Testament Context – by Daryl Docterman

[/callout]

Audio Version:

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When we open our Bibles to the New Testament (everything from Matthew to Revelation), we are entering into the world of first century Palestine. This fact, in and of itself, means that there are some potential opportunities for a disconnect between us and the meaning of the text we are reading.

What I’d like to do today is to take us back in time to the first century and zoom out a bit before we then zoom in together and apply what we have learned.

In order to have an understanding of what is happening in the first century, it’s important to have a real basic understanding of what had been happening in Palestine leading up to it.

For hundreds of years, Israel had been under foreign rule. This started with the Assyrian Empire taking over the Northern Kingdom. Then the Babylonian Empire conquered the Assyrians and the Southern Kingdom and took people captives. From there, the Persian Empire came into power, defeating the Babylonians. They gave some freedoms to the Jews, but they were still ultimately in charge. From there, Alexander the Great came on the scene and conquered everything in his sight. Once Alexander died, three of his generals fought for power and divided the Empire into three sections. In 142 BC, the Jews regained their independence after fighting against the Seleucids. This lasted for 80 years until the Romans came onto the scene.

When the Romans came to town, the Jews decided, instead of fighting, to become voluntary allies of Rome. This came with perks like having Judaism as a recognized religion in the Empire and other things. But this didn’t mean that everyone was happy with being under Roman rule. The Jewish preference, of course, was to have independence from Rome. But for that to happen, they needed a deliverer.

It is here that we see Jesus coming onto the scene.

James Jeffers, in his book, The Greco-Roman World of the New Testament Era gives us some helpful insight into the world of the first century:

Imagine a society in which the gulf between upper class and all others was so wide that their members had virtually nothing in common. Imagine that you were forbidden by law to marry someone of another class, and upward mobility was frowned upon. Imagine a legal system that always favored the upper class. Imagine a society in which, with very few exceptions, your status at birth determined the course of your future life (p. 181).

The first century was a world divided in as many categories as you can think of. Status was a big deal and it was determined by many means: wealth, education, citizenship, freedom status, ethnicity (Roman or not), ally or conquered enemy, male or female, and marriage status. Your cumulative score so to speak was what determined your status in society.

For Jews themselves, there was a distinct chasm between them and everyone else. They believed that they were God’s chosen people and for good reason, everything in their history had pointed to that. They viewed themselves as having special status in the eyes of God because they were given the Torah – Mosaic Law.

On top of that general idea of being the chosen people of God, there was also a specific tension between them and their neighbors to the north – the Samaritans. The Samaritans had been looked down on by the Jews because they intermarried with foreigners and worshiped idols.

So suffice it to say that there were plenty of areas of division in the first-century culture.

Religion in the Roman world included A LOT of gods. Polytheism was dominant everywhere you turned – except in Israel where they freely worshiped Yahweh. Since the Jews voluntarily submitted to the Romans, they were able to have Judaism acknowledged as an accepted religion in the Empire. But again, the Jews (and later the Christians) were surrounded by pagan worship and practices of all sorts.

Then when Christianity came onto the scene, it was initially seen as a Jewish Sect, but by the late first century, it was understood that Christianity was something different.

Religious tensions were quite high in the heart of Jerusalem when the Christians began to live out their mission once Jesus ascended to heaven. Persecution of Christians in Jerusalem caused many Christ followers to go to other cities to live. In 64 AD, Emperor Nero wrongly blamed the Jews and Christians for fires in Rome which led to them being tortured and put to death in the Roman arena. By the second century, executions were happening in parts of the Roman Empire for simply being a Christian.

Genre: Epistle

Geography: Galatia, Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey)

Scholars think that Galatians was written during Paul’s third missionary journey and was probably written around the same time as he wrote Romans, about 56 AD. So, with just that as our starting point, let’s dive into the first 10 verses of Galatians 1:

Paul, an apostle–not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead– 2 and all the brothers who are with me,

To the churches of Galatia:

3 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, 4 who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, 5 to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

6 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel– 7 not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. 8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. 9 As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.

10 For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.

Right off the bat, we have a big context clue into what the situation of Galatians is. What is it? It’s typical in Paul’s epistles (like a personal letter) to take some time and greet the recipients as well as to offer thanks and prayer for them before he gets into the reason for his writing. But here he doesn’t do that. He jumps into his astonishment that they are deserting God and His gospel.

Then at the end of verse 6, we see two words: different gospel. Apparently, the Galatian Christians were believing some kind of alternative gospel than the one Paul and his ministry team had preached to them. But what is that different gospel?

In Galatians 2, Paul explains his own experience with the people who were preaching this different gospel. Take a minute and read Galatians 2:11-14. But this wasn’t the only time Paul ran into this group of people. They made their voice heard at the Jerusalem council in Acts 15:5: “But some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, ‘It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.'” So, in short, this different gospel is one that says Gentiles can become Christians, but upon conversion, they should begin practicing the law of Moses and be circumcised.

And the Galatian Christians began following this teaching. They began believing that the promise of blessing was found, not so much in Jesus, but in being Jewish.

Let’s jump into more of Galatians and see if knowing this context helps us in understanding the message of the book of Galatians.

For application, go through this worksheet and apply what we have learned.

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The post Bible Hacks: Understanding the New Testament Context appeared first on Brandon Kelley.