God's Growth Book 3)

 Completing the C's:

• COVENANT - God makes promises to a chosen people, beginning with Abraham, in a two way relationship which is intended to bless the whole world.  The rest of the Old Testament spells out the story with its ups-and-downs through sacrifices, temple, prophets, priests and kings.
• CHRIST - the pivotal point of revelation when God becomes flesh to live among us and overcome the barrier of sin by his own sacrifice to put us at-one-ment with God. 
• CHURCH - a people within whom God's Spirit lives who now belong to a new covenant which is intended to bless the whole world.
• CONSUMMATION - Jesus' return and ultimate remaking of cosmos.

3. It's human and divine - 66 books written by different authors over 1500 years comprise one whole story where God is intimately involved so that we can claim the Bible is the Word of God given in the words of people in history.  Within each time period God is revealing more and more of himself.  He doesn't change but his people are on a journey and only when Jesus comes, called the Word of God, does God reveal clearly the amazing truths of his love and reconciliation.  The way that human and divine work together in Scripture means that God still speaks through the words.

4. You always come to the Bible as interpreter. Most of us need an English translation which involves interpretation but we recognize that while for unbelievers it may seem an irrelevant jumble, Christians by contrast are promised the Holy Spirit to help us understand it.  The key verses from 2 Tim. 3:15,16 sum up so much that is important.  Perhaps some more in another post?