Watching The Chosen has shown me how little I know about characters and places of the Bible. Even with my curiosity, even if I do learn something, retaining or recalling the information is a whole other issue. I think a good starting point is to be intentional about all of this. Setting goals is good, but being flexible is good, too. For me, I'm going to try to learn something new about at least one person and/or a place in the Bible, each day. This won't necessarily be a deep study of each person or place, but perhaps enough to help me relate each to others of the time or even to life today. :)
I have learned quite a bit about Mary of Magdala, first from the Chosen, but then by looking up all the Scriptures about her. I used to like to just focus on God/Jesus, but as important as The Holy Trinity is, the Bible also shows us how much God cares for us, for each of us, that each of us has a story, and even from the Book of Revelation, "For the accuser of our brothers and sisters b has been thrown down to earth— the one who accuses them before our God day and night. 11And they have defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by their testimony." (Rev 12:10b-11a,NLT). Apparently the stories of others really DO matter!
With the latest episodes, I have decided that I want to learn more about Philip and Nathaniel - which just adds to the long "to-do" list of Biblical characters that I want to learn more about! A reason to dig deeper into Scripture?! Awesome! :D
Just looking up Nathaniel, even his name is wonderful - "Nathaniel (less frequently, Nathanel, Nathanael or Nathanial) is a given name derived from the Greek form of the Hebrew נְתַנְאֵל (Netan'el), meaning "God/El has given" or "Gift of God/El." "
and from the Urban Dictionary?! "A male of superiority, wits and killer good-looks. Most Nathaniel's will be on the sweet side, mostly joking his way through things, and genuinely an amazing guy to ..." I didn't know that, either.
But this...
45Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”46“Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?” Nathanael asked.
“Come and see,” said Philip.
47When Jesus saw Nathanael approaching, he said of him, “Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.”
48“How do you know me?” Nathanael asked.
Jesus answered, “I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you.”
49Then Nathanael declared, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel.”
50Jesus said, “You believe h because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You will see greater things than that.” 51He then added, “Very truly I tell you, i you j will see ‘heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on’ k the Son of Man.”
What does this tell us about our presumptions? What does it tell us about what Jesus knows about us, whether we have presumptions or not? What else can we learn about ourselves from each other?!
Have you found a reason to explore your Bible yet? I think I have! <3