Commencing Day 106 editorial comment

In 1 Samuel we continue with the saga of Israel’s transition from a confederation of tribes into a kingdom. Israel is in continual warfare with the Philistines. Samuel the last of the Judges, against his will, anoints Saul as the first king. But things don’t go well with Saul and so a substitute needs to be found. Read on to find out more.

Up to this point in the New Testament we have been reading through the four Gospels. We now transition from John into the Acts of the Apostles. Acts is a New Testament equivalent to the history tradition of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles in the Old Testament. Luke writes his Gospel of the life of Jesus and then writes a history of the early days of the Church following the Day of Pentecost. So in a way, Acts might more properly follow on from the end of Luke’s Gospel, and should be read as such. The missionary work of Paul is the focus of much of Luke’s writing in Acts. Lukes account is often rather glowing and the events he records provide a counterpoint to Paul’s own accounts in his epistles or letters to the new churches springing up around the Mediterranean World.

The Bible can be found at the heart of much American political discourse. It’s important for mainline Christians, like Episcopalians, to reclaim our relationship with the Bible in order to be in a better position to identify and challenge the frequency with which the Bible is appropriated and misused by factions within the larger body politic. The daily reading program presented by the Bible Challenge is challenging. We find ourselves continually confronting our received misunderstandings of how to interpret the texts. Visit sermons to see how we are handling the Bible experience in greater depth.