Bible in A Year: Episode 1

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This transcript was AI-generated. It’s accuracy may vary.

00;00;01;02 – 00;00;10;00
Intro
Welcome to Read the Bible in a year with Matt on a weekly podcast from Fairfax Bible Church, where we explore Scripture together, uncovering its themes and design patterns.

00;00;10;02 – 00;00;13;00
Intro
We’re glad you’re here. Now, here are your hosts.

00;00;13;02 – 00;00;14;28
Intro
Matt and Hannah.

00;00;15;00 – 00;00;27;16
Matt
Welcome, everyone. This is Read the Bible in a year with Matt and Hannah. This is a podcast of Fairfax Bible Church. You are listening to episode one. We’re here. Hannah. We’re started.

00;00;27;21 – 00;00;30;02
Hannah
We’re ready. Yeah.

00;00;30;04 – 00;00;54;04
Matt
Oh. So, you know, I wasn’t sure what was going to happen when we started this thing on January 1st. You know, first of all, we have more than 90 people who are signed up to do this reading plan with us, so that is both a surprise and delight. That was really fun. And then I thought maybe people would like, kind of like maybe one person a day with, like, have a question or a comment, but it it’s like lit up in there.

00;00;54;06 – 00;00;56;13
Hannah
Yeah. Yeah. It’s really cool, super fun.

00;00;56;13 – 00;01;06;14
Matt
And I know there’s a ton of people who say that they are following along with us. They’re just not in the same plan with us. They’re doing it on their own. They’ve downloaded a copy and they’re reading on their own. So it’s happening.

00;01;06;17 – 00;01;06;28
Hannah
Yeah.

00;01;07;04 – 00;01;13;21
Matt
And this is a pretty great gauge group of Bible readers. There’s lots of thoughts and questions and comments and good stuff.

00;01;13;23 – 00;01;17;15
Hannah
Yeah it’s been fun to engage and and read all of your comments. Yeah.

00;01;17;16 – 00;01;25;10
Matt
So, let me ask you this, Hannah, would you describe yourself as more of a sunrise person or a sunset person?

00;01;25;12 – 00;01;41;23
Hannah
I think that answer depends on the day. If if I have had a great night of sleep, then I would say sunrise. Okay. You know, because I do have the most energy in the morning as long as I have had enough sleep.

00;01;41;28 – 00;02;03;19
Matt
Okay. Yeah, I, I definitely have learned about myself. I’m a sunrise person. Not even just a morning person. Like, I’m definitely more that way, but I more of, like, I like the light and the energy of the sunrise more than the sunset. So I take away from that. I’m a beginnings kind of person. I like the energy of the beginning of something.

00;02;03;19 – 00;02;18;18
Matt
And I like, like when I’m with my family and we are often a road trip. I like that moment where you pull out of the driveway and you’re like, getting on the road, going to your destination. Even at work, I like the beginning of projects more than the end of a project. Sometimes by the time we get to the deliverable, I’m tired.

00;02;18;25 – 00;02;34;11
Matt
It’s been through 80 million edits and I can’t even see the thing anymore. But I love the beginnings of things. So yeah, and I sometimes feel like the the reading the Bible is sometimes like that for me. I love the energy of getting started at the beginning and all of that. So what about you?

00;02;34;13 – 00;02;52;21
Hannah
I usually I’m not awake for the sunrise, honestly, but but I do like mornings. I do like a quiet morning. I tend to be more productive in the morning again as long as I’ve had enough sleep. But I. I think sunsets can often be prettier than a sunrise.

00;02;52;22 – 00;03;10;11
Matt
I certainly witness more sunsets than sunrises, because I don’t always get up in time to see the sunrise perfectly. And they are pretty no shade to sunsets. I just, I’m more of a the energy and notion of a sunrise means more to me. So I don’t know, maybe out there you feel that way. Maybe you like the beginning.

00;03;10;11 – 00;03;27;08
Matt
Maybe you’re a little bit dragged to get beginning on things or get started on things. But we’re here for you. It’s it’s awesome. So awesome. Well, Hannah, we’re what? This is the podcast one. We are about a week into this by the time people hear this. It should be roughly a week as we’ve gotten started. So why don’t you summarize the story so far?

00;03;27;08 – 00;03;28;16
Matt
What have we learned?

00;03;28;19 – 00;04;01;26
Hannah
Yeah. So we are talking about Genesis one through 24 this week. And these first few chapters of Genesis introduce the entire biblical story and set a pattern for actually how to read the entire Bible. So that’s just a really briefly summarize we’ve seen creation and God’s purpose for humanity creating humanity. We’ve seen the fall, which is humanity’s decision to define good and evil for themselves instead of trusting God’s wisdom.

00;04;01;29 – 00;04;29;09
Hannah
And we have seen God’s plan to redeem humanity from that decision and restore creation back to its created order, which is all about wholeness and completion and order out of chaos. Yeah. And then, towards the end of our section, we are introduced to the specific family that God is going to use as his vehicle to restore and redeem humanity, which is Abraham.

00;04;29;11 – 00;04;30;27
Hannah

00;04;30;29 – 00;04;49;17
Matt
Yeah. Well summarized. Yeah. Thank you. Like, like any good story there are characters and we’ve met the central character. God, he is a character in the story. A really, really important character in the story, the hero and protagonist of the story. And there’s a central plot tension. You know, he creates a good, perfect world.

00;04;49;19 – 00;05;07;04
Matt
His chosen co laborers forfeit their privilege and pleasure to do that. And then how’s it going to get that restored? What’s his response to that going to be. So we’re going to keep it going. Yeah it’s beautiful. So awesome. Well, I know you are a big fan. We teased this in the intro. You’re a big fan of this notion called Design Patterns.

00;05;07;04 – 00;05;22;08
Matt
It’s a really important, way to build skill as a Bible reader. It’s one of the principal ways that the Bible is designed to be read. So tell us a little bit more about that. And then what might we have seen in our first few chapters reading the Bible?

00;05;22;10 – 00;05;58;01
Hannah
Yeah. Well, we briefly summarized last in the intro, podcast. But design patterns are one of the primary literary techniques that biblical authors use to weave together the entire story of the Bible. And these patterns are often a series of repeated words or images that link multiple stories together in order to emphasize certain key themes. And, I think it’s really cool that these design patterns invite the reader to see the continuity of the Bible.

00;05;58;04 – 00;06;05;21
Hannah
Despite the fact that it’s a collection of many different writings by many different authors over many, many years.

00;06;05;23 – 00;06;07;04
Matt
And different languages.

00;06;07;11 – 00;06;39;29
Hannah
Yeah. And different languages. And these patterns help us to see the development of ideas and themes throughout the course of the story from cover to cover. Yeah. So just a few, things that you might have noticed in these first few chapters. Especially in chapter one, we see the number seven. Show up everywhere. If you watched that first video, that’s the visual commentary on Genesis one, you’ll see that even like, Genesis one one is made of seven Hebrew words.

00;06;40;00 – 00;06;55;27
Hannah
Genesis one two is made of seven times two Hebrew words. Yeah. And there are seven days and all of these repetitions of seven and seven, and resting on the seventh day is a key, pattern as well.

00;06;55;29 – 00;07;20;09
Matt
Yeah. I, you know, I grew up watching football, and so I love the number seven, because that’s almost always what the point accumulation is when you score a touchdown. So, you know, you score the touchdown at six points. But then the extra point makes it seven. Now people go for two. So it can be eight. But you know growing up I learned how to multiply and divide by basically being so familiar with the number seven.

00;07;20;15 – 00;07;35;06
Matt
You know, interesting you know, seven the scored two touchdown 14 points, three touchdown 21 points. So I’ve got that rhythm. So I kind of have a little bit of affinity for okay. Number seven as a football fan growing up. But okay. Yeah. So I love but it it’s it’s a nice pattern. It’s a nice number.

00;07;35;06 – 00;07;44;21
Hannah
Yeah. Do you know do you know why seven is so in the Hebrew mindset seven is the number of completion. Do you know why that is.

00;07;44;22 – 00;07;46;24
Matt
I do not tell me.

00;07;47;01 – 00;07;55;05
Hannah
So the Hebrew word for seven is a homonym for the word for complete or full. Okay. So there’s been.

00;07;55;05 – 00;07;58;26
Matt
A long time since I was in ninth grade. Grammar. What is the homonym?

00;07;58;29 – 00;08;11;08
Hannah
They look, graphically similar. So they’re spelled with the same Hebrew consonants. So the the root of the words are identical. They just have different vowel sounds.

00;08;11;10 – 00;08;14;17
Matt
So seven is the same word as what?

00;08;14;20 – 00;08;17;06
Hannah
Complete or full? Ooh, yeah.

00;08;17;11 – 00;08;21;06
Matt
Okay. That’s much better than scoring touchdowns.

00;08;21;09 – 00;08;32;27
Hannah
So that’s where it’s, you know, rooted in the Hebrew language itself, that this idea that seven is the number of completion because it’s, really a literary play on words. Kind of.

00;08;32;27 – 00;08;39;19
Matt
Oh, yeah. Oh, that’s that’s cool. I love that. What’s another pattern we might have seen?

00;08;39;22 – 00;08;45;00
Hannah
Well, we saw light out of darkness. Yeah, I know that this is one that you like. Why don’t you go.

00;08;45;02 – 00;08;59;26
Matt
I do, I think you know I, you know you pointed out it may not be a design pattern per se so we may be into semantics here. I’m going to learn you’re more facile with design patterns than I am. So at some point we’ve gone along and you’ll be like, that’s not a design pattern, which is totally fine.

00;08;59;27 – 00;09;19;27
Matt
You can correct me. I’m here to learn. But, so if it’s not, strictly speaking, a design pattern, the sort of central tension between light and darkness. You know, there was darkness. God says, let there be light. There it is. And so he’s he’s contrasting that. I love that one. And that really, plays out in the New Testament, especially when they’re talking about the person of Jesus.

00;09;19;29 – 00;09;38;11
Matt
And then order out of chaos. I think that’s a big one as well. You know, it’s kind of a central plot theme. Just in general, in our world, but also in Scripture, you know, where, where God is, there is order and it’s good and where God is not or where God, you know, does not manifest himself.

00;09;38;16 – 00;09;53;17
Matt
There’s chaos and darkness and it’s not great. So where God is, it’s order. And part of the work of creation and new creation is bringing order out of chaos, you know, or sin creates chaos. But God in his light and his love and his redemption brings things back into order.

00;09;53;20 – 00;10;19;27
Hannah
Yeah. And if you watched that, visual commentary on Genesis one, you can see the order just in the literary structure. It’s like so intricately designed, if you the way that they pattern out the three and three days where the first three are structuring the three realms, and then the next three days are filling those same exact three realms.

00;10;19;27 – 00;10;30;18
Hannah
And so the way that it’s so intricately ordered, even in the text itself, the literary structure is also part of the meaning of the text.

00;10;30;20 – 00;10;31;14
Matt
That’s really beautiful.

00;10;31;14 – 00;10;32;10
Hannah
Yeah, it’s really cool.

00;10;32;17 – 00;10;42;10
Matt
I know I sometimes feel cheated, that I’m an English speaker and I can’t actually read the Bible in Hebrew because it feels like there’s so much going on that I just don’t see because it’s not my language.

00;10;42;13 – 00;11;00;10
Hannah
Yeah, well, I, once we get to, one of the patterns that we’ll talk more in depth, I’ll share a tool that I find really helpful for people who don’t know Hebrew, but might want to dip their toe in a little bit into seeing some of the Hebrew words. So exciting.

00;11;00;12 – 00;11;08;05
Matt
I know there’s a couple. You want to sink your teeth into, but one more, before we get into it, deliverance through the waters. Tell us more.

00;11;08;08 – 00;11;38;00
Hannah
Yeah. So, you know, you might really obviously think about the flood we read this week. It’s a deliverance through the waters. But even before that the pre creation state is described as this watery abyss. The Hebrew word is to home. It’s this deep, chaotic, watery abyss. But once it’s structured and ordered, then the word changes no longer to to home, which is this chaotic water.

00;11;38;00 – 00;12;10;20
Hannah
Then it’s just called miam, which is like a general term for water. Wow. So, the land is emerges from the waters so that humans can be placed on the land and flourish on the land, and even animals and plants along with that. And we’ll see the chaotic waters be a synonym for death sometimes. Yeah. And even with the flood, we see that it does bring about a judgment of death for many.

00;12;10;23 – 00;12;22;12
Hannah
And so if you look at the flood narrative, it repeats a lot of the same words that uses that word to home in verse 11.

00;12;22;14 – 00;12;25;09
Matt
And you’re in Genesis six at this point.

00;12;25;11 – 00;12;44;11
Hannah
Should yeah. Should be let me pull it up so that I can actually know what I’m talking about. Okay. No it’s not verse 11 verse. Where am I. No. We’re in chapter seven. Okay. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah.

00;12;44;11 – 00;12;47;02
Matt
Fill in that part.

00;12;47;04 – 00;13;26;19
Hannah
Okay. So. Yeah. He builds Ark, right? Then in chapter seven of Genesis, verse 11, it says, halfway through on that day, all the fountains of the great deep. The great deep. That’s that to home. Okay. They burst forth, and it’s like the windows of the heavens were opened, which is a super interesting image. Yeah, but that idea is that the waters are being brought back together, reversing that division of the waters above and below that we saw in the creation narrative on day two of creation, God splits the waters above and below.

00;13;26;21 – 00;13;35;07
Hannah
So then the flood is being described. Like these waters are being brought back down together into this sort of de creation state.

00;13;35;09 – 00;13;36;00
Matt
Oh, wow.

00;13;36;05 – 00;14;03;23
Hannah
Yeah. And another connection in chapter. We’re going further down in the flood narrative, chapter eight, verse one. It says that halfway through the verse, God made a wind blow over the earth and the waters subsided. So I’ll I’ll teach you another Hebrew word. Oh, yay for wind. It’s the same word as breath or spirit. Okay. Ruach ra. Nice.

00;14;03;24 – 00;14;36;08
Hannah
You got the guttural sound at the end. Nice. That’s perfect. So God made this ruach blow over the earth to subside the waters. And we saw that ruach in Genesis one. Where the spirit, the Ruach was hovering over the waters right before creation happens. The spirit is present in creation. Wow. And so here the spirit is present to have the waters subside, so that the ark can then rest on the dry land.

00;14;36;08 – 00;15;09;10
Hannah
And the dry land reemerges, just like in creation. So we see all of these connections to the creation story, and that Noah and his family are this remnant that God chose to deliver through the chaotic waters. And then we see this pattern, you know, later in the stories we’ll see this emerge a lot, especially in the narratives of the Red sea being parted so that Israel would be delivered from slavery in Egypt, the crossing of the Jordan as well to into the promised Lands.

00;15;09;13 – 00;15;27;20
Hannah
And this is the pattern that leads to the development of baptism. Yeah. As a sign of new life and new creation being delivered through death itself and emerging back from the waters as a sign of your salvation or deliverance into a new life. So a super cool pattern.

00;15;27;21 – 00;15;45;04
Matt
Really cool. Yeah. Good stuff. Well, I know there’s a couple that you really want to tease out. Let’s let’s do first. There were a couple questions in the chat this week about this, but the the two trees is one. So God creates the man and the woman, he puts them in the garden. And we’re told, you know, there are plenty of trees.

00;15;45;04 – 00;16;02;20
Matt
There’s one, called the Tree of Life. And then there’s one that sits one tree, tells him not to eat from. It’s the tree of the the knowledge of good and evil. So I think on day seven, there’s a, video from the Bible Project called the Test that goes into this in some detail. So if you haven’t hit that yet, this will tease out some things.

00;16;02;20 – 00;16;07;13
Matt
But, Hannah, I know you wanted to draw out a couple things about that, so consider the table set for you.

00;16;07;16 – 00;16;32;23
Hannah
Okay. Yeah, well, I think, you know, there were several questions about, like, why does God even put the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden when it’s supposed to be this good sanctuary of refuge, refuge where God and humans can dwell together in peace? And so why even give them this opportunity to fail? Yeah.

00;16;32;29 – 00;17;00;17
Hannah
You know, you could have set it up so that it. Life would be perfect. Yeah. And this wouldn’t be, a problem, but, this the the Bible Project video explains this very well that God sets before us a test, not to trap us or make us. He doesn’t want us to fail. He wants to provide us an opportunity to demonstrate that we trust him.

00;17;00;19 – 00;17;24;15
Hannah
And so the, the video makes a good distinction where whether something is a test or a trap depends on who is creating that test or trap. If, if they have your best interest in mind then it’s a test. It’s an opportunity for you to demonstrate that you trust and and will obey the the person who set that test.

00;17;24;17 – 00;17;34;27
Hannah
But if they don’t have your best interest in mind, like the snake, the serpent in the garden, he wants Adam and Eve to fail. And so he deceives and traps them.

00;17;34;29 – 00;17;53;10
Matt
Yeah. Yeah. I love that, you know, they use, language in the video. A couple of different videos, actually, about, God affording humans the dignity of choice. And, yeah, it’s, I mean, I always tell people, look, if it hadn’t been Adam, it would have been me. So I hate to, like, yell at them too much because I’m sure I would have.

00;17;53;12 – 00;18;13;04
Matt
And who knows, maybe they were in there for a long, long time before they succumb to the temptation. But you know, if it was me, I probably would last like ten minutes or so, right? It’s man, it’s just so it’s right there. But yeah, they have the dignity that God affords his co laborers to, to choose, you know, to to trust him and to to choose to be obedient to him.

00;18;13;07 – 00;18;29;15
Matt
It’s and he’s for them. It’s not a trap. He’s he’s for them. He’s not against them. And I will say, as a parent, even as a parent to young adults, now, this is language I use a lot with my kids. It’s like, I’m for you. I’m not against you. I’m trying to set up good for you. There are chances that you might fail, but they’re.

00;18;29;15 – 00;18;49;26
Matt
I’m trying to afford you lots of opportunities for good. So it’s. Yeah, I know this one is. People can struggle with this one. Yeah, but it’s a it’s a sign of God’s good and God’s, dignity for us and God’s love for us. Yeah. Yeah. And then, I mean, let’s just add the temptation pattern. It’s Genesis three.

00;18;49;26 – 00;19;08;19
Matt
It’s one of the first shocking moments in Scripture. And it is I know it’s a big pattern because we’re going to see it again and again and again and again and again. So yeah. So Eve this she listens to the serpent. She takes and eats the fruit and nothing is ever the same again. So yeah, walk us through it.

00;19;08;21 – 00;19;44;09
Hannah
Yeah. Okay. So this one we’ll spend a little bit more time on because I think this is a really good example of how we’ll see a series of repeated key words that help, us point back whatever narrative we are reading back to this Genesis three, temptation pattern. And we can see, what the narrator is trying to tell us, kind of more implicitly, just based on the pattern, even if they don’t explicitly in the text, say, and what this character did was really bad, you know?

00;19;44;11 – 00;19;46;29
Matt
So there’s no theme music. Dun dun dun.

00;19;46;29 – 00;20;14;29
Hannah
But all right. So let’s just walk through. And I said I would if you’re interested, in finding these patterns for yourself, you can sometimes do it with your English translations, the ones that are really obvious. But a lot of times you know, no two languages mapped directly onto 1 to 1 another. And so you they might be using the same Hebrew word, but it’s translated differently into English because its meaning is different.

00;20;14;29 – 00;20;41;12
Hannah
And so they’re doing the right thing by translating it differently. But the underlying word is actually the same as what we see in these patterns. So if you ever want to discover what that original Hebrew word, is in the Old Testament, there’s a free website that I love. And if you any of the women out there who have been in our Bible studies already know what I’m going to say, but it’s step bible.org.

00;20;41;17 – 00;21;05;17
Hannah
Oh, it’s a free website that, provides a ton of, tools. But the primary one is that you can pull up a passage and then you’ll see that, most of the words are have hyperlinks. The they’re blue and you just hover over them and it will show you what that original word is that’s underneath of it.

00;21;05;20 – 00;21;28;08
Hannah
So that’s Hebrew for the Old Testament, primarily a little bit of Aramaic for a few random chapters in the Old Testament, and then Greek in the New Testament. So you hover over it tells you that Hebrew word, and so you can confirm if that matches the the pattern or not. So if you want to do that and find your own patterns, I highly recommend that tool.

00;21;28;10 – 00;21;52;15
Hannah
Just kind of poke around on that website to see all the different features that it has. So let’s start with Genesis three, and we’re going to look at some of the key words that are highlighted for this temptation pattern. So chapter three we see after the serpent comes he says, Did God actually say that you shouldn’t eat of any tree?

00;21;52;18 – 00;22;24;08
Hannah
And so let’s go down to, verse six. So when the woman saw. So the word saw is pretty critical there. Okay. They she saw that the tree was good. Good is another key word. Good for food. And then it was a delight. Sometimes delight is a key word. And in certain occasions a delight to the eyes. Eyes is similar related to the word saw, and that the tree was to be desired.

00;22;24;10 – 00;22;48;04
Hannah
So that word desires pretty, important sometimes. So she took an eight and gave to her husband, who was with her, and he also ate. So a lot of those words are super critical. And then if we go down a little bit, another key phrase that we see is,

00;22;48;07 – 00;23;14;09
Hannah
I think it’s verse 13. Okay. Yes. Okay. Verse 13, God says, what is this you have done so that phrase sometimes is repeated, and that’s another one that’s important for us to look for. Okay. Okay. So we have the Genesis three key words. Now let’s go look at an example of when this repeats. So Genesis chapter 12 okay.

00;23;14;12 – 00;23;51;04
Hannah
Starting in verse ten. So now we have been introduced to Abraham and Sarai before their names have been changed. And we see that in the beginning of chapter 12, God says that he is going to bless Abraham and make his name great, make him into a great nation, give his offspring this land. And at the beginning of chapter 12, it appears that Abraham trusts God because he leaves his homeland and his family just like God tells him to do, right, so that he can receive this promise of blessing.

00;23;51;07 – 00;24;17;05
Hannah
But starting in verse ten, we see that there’s a famine in the land. So they go down to Egypt, and Abraham says to his wife, look, I know that you’re beautiful. And when the Egyptians see you, they’re going to kill me. So that word for beautiful is the same word. It’s good. It’s tov. Oh, okay. Actually, I lied, not in this occasion.

00;24;17;05 – 00;24;43;24
Hannah
Okay. This is a different word for beautiful, but false alarm for. I’m sorry. It’s in a different passage where the word for beautiful is tov. But this is, a similar concept. Okay? Right. Beautiful of appearances. It looks good to me. Yes. So that’s, more of a similarity of concept than exact words. When the Egyptians see you, they will say this is his wife, and then they’ll kill me, but they will let you live.

00;24;43;27 – 00;25;04;18
Hannah
So say that you’re my sister so that it will go. Here’s the word tov so that it will go tov for me. It will, it will be good for me. Yeah. And that my life will be spared on your behalf or for for your sake. Okay, so starting in verse 14, we see a few, additional keywords.

00;25;04;21 – 00;25;27;13
Hannah
When Abraham entered Egypt, the Egyptians saw. So we see that word saw that the this the woman was very beautiful. And when the prince of Pharaoh saw her again, saw they praised her to Pharaoh, and the woman was taken. So that word take, is another key word. Yep. And for her sake, he dealt tov. He he dealt well.

00;25;27;14 – 00;25;54;12
Hannah
Okay. Good with Abraham. So we see a lot of those keywords, and then, the Lord strikes Pharaoh with plagues, which is maybe some foreshadowing to, the plagues. Exodus. Yeah. Okay, so that’s kind of cool. Yep. And then Pharaoh says to Abraham in verse 18, what have you done? That’s that same phrase that we saw in Genesis 313.

00;25;54;13 – 00;25;55;22
Matt
Yeah.

00;25;55;25 – 00;26;17;29
Hannah
Yeah. And why didn’t you tell me she was your wife? So, if you read this passage just at face value and, and you might even see in verse 16 that it says that it went well for Abraham. Yeah. You might suppose that his scheme worked and like, oh, maybe this, like, whatever he did was fine. It worked for him.

00;26;18;03 – 00;26;43;06
Hannah
Yeah. Because the narrator doesn’t explicitly say, like, what Abraham did here was wrong. And often biblical authors won’t provide explicit moral commentary on characters actions. But they’ll use these design patterns, or sometimes called narrative analogy, to offer this more implicit commentary. And critique of Abraham’s actions.

00;26;43;09 – 00;27;00;13
Matt
Yeah. So something that strikes me as interesting here. Tell me if I’m off base. But, you know, in the Genesis three narrative, it’s the woman who sees that the fruit is good. But in this narrative, the woman is the fruit. Yeah. In a way, that’s an interesting twist. Or turn.

00;27;00;16 – 00;27;25;20
Hannah
Yeah, yeah. So that’s what’s often called narrative analogy. So those characters from Genesis three are being swapped around with new characters. So now. Yeah, Sarai is kind of like the fruit, and Pharaoh is actually kind of like Eve. And Abraham is actually being the serpent. He is the one deceiving. So yeah. Yeah. Really interesting connection.

00;27;25;25 – 00;27;40;06
Matt
Yeah. So it’s it’s interesting how it doesn’t necessarily have to be the same character speaking the same lines, but it’s almost like maybe dominoes or something like that where you’re moving the pieces around, but you still see the pattern. Yeah.

00;27;40;06 – 00;28;01;20
Hannah
Yeah, yeah. So like, clearly Abraham was not trusting God in this situation because he was looking out for his own well-being over his own wife. Yeah. Who he put in a really vulnerable position, you know, to potentially be taken advantage of by Pharaoh. Yeah. By not trusting God in that situation.

00;28;01;22 – 00;28;04;08
Matt
Yeah. That is that is really interesting.

00;28;04;12 – 00;28;06;17
Hannah
Yeah. All right. Should we look at another example?

00;28;06;21 – 00;28;07;14
Matt
Let’s do it.

00;28;07;16 – 00;28;37;27
Hannah
Okay. Genesis 16. Okay. So, we are not too much further along in the narrative. Abraham and Sarai still don’t have any children, but they were promised by God that they would become, you know, Abraham would be the father of many nations. And so, Sarai, she has, they have an Egyptian servant named Hagar.

00;28;37;29 – 00;29;02;08
Hannah
Okay. And verse two, Sarai said to Abraham, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Go to my servant so that I might obtain children by her. So they’re taking matters into their own hands, right, to say, look, we’re too old to have kids, so why don’t you go have a child with our servant? And that’s how will preserve our line and fill this promise that God gave to us.

00;29;02;09 – 00;29;02;18
Hannah
Yeah.

00;29;02;20 – 00;29;07;29
Matt
God. God said he was going to do this, but he seems to be pretty checked out. Why don’t we just take matters into our own hands here?

00;29;08;05 – 00;29;40;21
Hannah
Right? Right. So, at the end of verse two, it says, Abraham, listen to the voice of Sarai, which is very similar phrase to, a phrase that we see in Genesis three, of Abraham or, Adam listening to the voice of Eve to eat from the fruit as well. And so, verse three, after Abraham had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abraham’s wife, took Hagar, so he took.

00;29;40;23 – 00;30;13;05
Hannah
Yep. And gave her to Abraham, her husband, just like Eve gave the fruit to Adam. Yeah. Okay. So she conceives. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress. Let’s see what other keywords we have. So then verse six says, Abraham said, just write. Behold, your servant is in your hand.

00;30;13;07 – 00;30;22;27
Hannah
You might see the word power. Yeah, but it’s, the Hebrew word for hand. Okay. Due to her, as you see, as good in your own eyes. Oh, boy. Yeah.

00;30;23;04 – 00;30;25;29
Matt
Oh, boy. Not good, not tough.

00;30;26;02 – 00;30;33;24
Hannah
Right? Exactly. Yeah. So a lot of, connections there to chapter three as well.

00;30;33;26 – 00;30;34;27
Matt
That’s a heartbreaker.

00;30;35;00 – 00;30;35;19
Hannah

00;30;35;21 – 00;30;43;24
Matt
Yeah. And it’s a little bit like, Hey, Sara, what did you think was going to happen?

00;30;43;27 – 00;30;44;09
Hannah
Right.

00;30;44;10 – 00;31;08;03
Matt
You know, when you have your husband sleep with this other woman who is able to afford him an error, which is a big deal in this time and place and culture? Yeah. Like unintended consequences show up in a big way here, much like you probably, I don’t know that strictly in the design pattern, but you certainly see the theme where I’m sure that what Eve intended to happen from that, episode of The Garden is not what she intended.

00;31;08;11 – 00;31;08;22
Hannah
Yeah.

00;31;08;29 – 00;31;17;28
Matt
And I’m sure that this incident with Sarai and Hagar. This is not what say, Sarai had in mind when she pulls this move. But the consequences are beyond her control at that point.

00;31;18;00 – 00;31;32;03
Hannah
Yeah, yeah. And this is another example of Abraham and Sarai not trusting God and taking matters into their own hands. Doing what they think is good in their own eyes. And so trust in God’s wisdom. Yeah, yeah.

00;31;32;05 – 00;31;33;00
Matt
All right. You got another one.

00;31;33;07 – 00;31;36;24
Hannah
Okay. So do we have time for 1 or 2 more?

00;31;36;25 – 00;31;37;19
Matt
Let’s do one more.

00;31;37;25 – 00;31;45;07
Hannah
Okay. All right. The last one is a really important one. Okay. Because it’s actually a reversal of the pattern.

00;31;45;11 – 00;31;47;05
Matt
You mean it can work both ways?

00;31;47;05 – 00;32;06;01
Hannah
Yeah, yeah. So design patterns work in such a way that you’re building up this pattern that you’re getting so used to, but when it’s reversed, it sticks out to you more because you’re like, wait, this is the opposite of the pattern that’s been building up. Okay. So really critical stories will reverse the the pattern.

00;32;06;03 – 00;32;09;16
Matt
Okay. I’m insanely curious now. Okay okay. What are we looking at.

00;32;09;19 – 00;32;14;29
Hannah
So in chapter 22 this is where we see the near sacrifice of Isaac.

00;32;15;00 – 00;32;16;01
Matt
Okay, I know the story.

00;32;16;06 – 00;32;34;10
Hannah
Okay, great. So, the first verses God tested Abraham. So we’re familiar with this test of the two trees, right. So he tested Abraham and he said Abraham. And he said, here I am. So take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love.

00;32;34;10 – 00;32;35;03
Matt
Same word.

00;32;35;06 – 00;32;59;19
Hannah
Yeah. Okay. Take. Let me check. Yeah. Go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I shall tell you. So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac, and he cut the wood. Now, interesting thing about the word for wood is the same word as the word for tree, right?

00;32;59;19 – 00;33;29;09
Hannah
Hebrew. So there’s a lot of wood being used in this passage. It’s the same word. Eights is the, the word for tree. For wood. Okay. So, let me maybe I’ll skip down a little because this can take a minute. Okay. Verse verse six. Okay. So Abraham took, we’re saying that same word again. Abraham took the tree or the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac, his son.

00;33;29;11 – 00;33;47;27
Hannah
And he took okay again in his hand. Hand is another key word. Okay. The fire and the knife. Okay. Really interesting word for a knife is being used here in the Hebrew. Okay? Not the typical word for knife in Hebrew. The word is Maha.

00;33;47;27 – 00;33;53;05
Matt
Let Maha, let Maha. All that.

00;33;53;07 – 00;33;54;26
Hannah
Yeah, sure.

00;33;54;28 – 00;33;59;00
Matt
I think we need to rename this podcast. Listen to Matt Butcher. Butcher Hebrew.

00;33;59;00 – 00;34;08;21
Hannah
So. Right. And the root word is, Hal, which is in the middle of that of the word. Margalit. Okay. Hal means to eat.

00;34;08;23 – 00;34;09;21
Matt
Okay.

00;34;09;23 – 00;34;29;28
Hannah
So this word is basically like calling the knife the thing that eats, because, you know, a knife or a sword could be described as something that eats or devours flesh. Yeah. So that’s how this word came to be. But the word to take and eat is critical to that Genesis three story.

00;34;29;29 – 00;34;31;03
Matt
Yeah, I’m seeing that.

00;34;31;05 – 00;34;42;25
Hannah
So really interesting connection. Obviously you can’t see that in the English. Okay. Which is why these tools like Step Bible are super cool. If you want to really dig into these, these patterns.

00;34;42;26 – 00;34;47;27
Matt
I mean, we’re Bible nerd in here a little bit, but we are go way deep in. Oh sure I love it.

00;34;48;03 – 00;35;02;25
Hannah
Yeah. Okay. So and he, he almost, you know, sacrifices Isaac. But God says wait, you know. Yeah.

00;35;02;28 – 00;35;35;02
Hannah
He says, don’t don’t, actually sacrifice him. Okay. Then I got to I didn’t write down the verse, but when it says, okay, verse 14. Okay. So because, the Lord instead provided this ram instead of sacrificing Isaac, verse 14 says, so Abraham called the name of that place. The Lord will provide as it is said to this day, on the mount of the Lord, it shall be provided.

00;35;35;05 – 00;35;58;17
Hannah
Now again, this is kind of deeper into the Hebrew than the English. But, the literal translation of that phrase, the Lord will provide, as the Lord will see to it. Okay, which, or literally just see, but it means like, see to it or provide a way. Okay. So this is a reversal of the human seeing and taking and eating.

00;35;58;20 – 00;36;25;06
Hannah
Yeah. Because we’re trusting that God will see, and provide a way. So this is a really cool reversal. And I know this one is more subtle, especially in the English. Yeah, but the more this pattern gets built up, the later in the narratives, the more subtle the authors will become to to make these stories more complex and these patterns more complex.

00;36;25;09 – 00;36;26;29
Hannah
So this one’s really cool.

00;36;27;02 – 00;36;49;07
Matt
Yeah. You know, it’s when I first learned this one, to me it has explained so much, not even just about the Bible, but just about, like, my own behavior. You know, I, I see and it looks good. And so I take it, and so it governs a lot. What are what do I see? What am I putting in front of my eyes?

00;36;49;08 – 00;37;09;26
Matt
You know, what am I looking at in terms of my phone or my screen time or any of that? What am I? What am I watching? But also like, what am I sort of holding up as desirable? It is. Is it desirable to me to have a certain status or project a certain image or, you know, even just like wear a certain kind of shoes or something like that.

00;37;09;26 – 00;37;25;15
Matt
So that’s seen. And what is the desirable, what is good? And then am I going to take it myself, or am I going to let God provide it to me? In the way that Abraham is describing this to me is not just open my eyes, but reading Scripture like I see it in the news, like all the time.

00;37;25;17 – 00;37;44;10
Matt
I was like, okay, somebody saw a situation. They decided they wanted to define good and evil for themselves. They didn’t like what God told them to do. So they they see it looks good to them in their own eyes and they take it, you know, regardless of what the consequences might be to somebody else. And it’s become very, very powerful for me.

00;37;44;12 – 00;38;07;29
Hannah
Yeah, yeah. Genesis three is the, the fundamental diagnosis of every generation of humanity. Yeah. And in the narrative, especially throughout Genesis, everyone is repeating this story and this temptation pattern, which ultimately invites us as readers to see ourselves as prone to those same temptations and failings.

00;38;08;01 – 00;38;23;02
Matt
And it makes it all the more beautiful what we’re told in the New Testament that Jesus was tempted in the same ways we were in all the same ways that we are. And yet he passes the test. He’s a yeah, he stands up to that temptation on our behalf.

00;38;23;04 – 00;38;34;13
Hannah
Yeah. And to key in on the design pattern, Jesus prays, not my desire but your desire be done. And that desire is one of those key words in this pattern as well.

00;38;34;15 – 00;38;48;04
Matt
Yeah. And because his life is in me, the power to not fall into temptation like that, to break that pattern, the power to do that is in me because of what Jesus has done, because he’s put his spirit in me. Yeah.

00;38;48;06 – 00;38;50;07
Hannah
Yeah, I love it.

00;38;50;13 – 00;39;07;22
Matt
All right, well, that was awesome. Let’s let’s do a couple quick hits here before we let people go. I have a I have a point. I want to make. And then there are two questions that I want to at least give some attention to. We may not be able to answer them fully. But I want to give them some attention because I thought they were interesting and smart questions.

00;39;07;22 – 00;39;26;28
Matt
So the first is just an overall point that I want to make to people and I and it’s a a wish and a hope for you. I hope you’re seeing that that God, the character in the story, he’s emotionally invested in us. He cares about us. He and he does not just sort of pull away from us when we sin where there’s breakage there.

00;39;26;28 – 00;39;45;23
Matt
He he steps into it. He is so incredibly patient and tender hearted to Adam, to Eve, even to Cain, confessed murderer. And yet there’s definitely the cycle. So as especially as we get to the flood that he is grieved. But notice and they point this out in the video. Notice that he’s not angry during the flood.

00;39;45;23 – 00;40;00;04
Matt
I mean, I’m sure it’s in the ingredients there, but the flood is is a result of his grief and mourning. It’s not anger. So he’s mostly invested in us. He cares about us. He wants good for us. I hope people are really seeing that loud and clear in the story.

00;40;00;07 – 00;40;12;06
Hannah
Yeah. Even in Genesis three the first thing God says is where are you like he want, he’s seeking the humans instead of just first. He doesn’t first say what, what have you done. Yeah yeah.

00;40;12;12 – 00;40;26;19
Matt
Yeah. So he’s a and I am not like that myself. So I, I, I need to pay more attention to that part of God’s character. So that’s one thing we want to make sure that you guys saw. And then let’s, it’s a couple fun questions, I think, from the, chit chat, in the Bible app.

00;40;26;19 – 00;40;43;14
Matt
Let’s pull a couple of them. One, I thought this one was really smart from Brian Dennis. And this is really just about doing Bible plants like this. Eventually you’re going to have to figure out, what am I supposed to do with the genealogies? How do I read these things? Like what’s happening here? So I have a 1 or 2 thoughts, but I know you have a thought too, so I’ll let you go first.

00;40;43;17 – 00;41;12;28
Hannah
Yeah, well, especially the genealogy that we see right after the story of Noah and the flood. This genealogy is like setting up all of the major families or nations that we will see throughout the remaining stories, even beyond the Torah, you know, into judges and, the rest of the Old Testament, we see, Egypt is mentioned as a son of Ham.

00;41;13;00 – 00;41;39;04
Hannah
And then Canaan obviously is mentioned as a son of Ham. We see that, Nimrod is one of the, I think, grandsons of of somebody, of Noah, maybe. Yeah. And he finds the cities or the nations of Babylon and Assyria who are going to be the two nations that exile the two kingdoms of Israel. We see a mention of the Philistines as well.

00;41;39;04 – 00;42;07;12
Hannah
So we’re setting up kind of the expectation of how these nations will repeat the sins of their fathers. Actually, if you pair this genealogy with the narrative that precedes it, which is about the sin of him, against his father. Right. So, don’t take genealogies out of their literary context, too. They are placed in a certain location for a certain reason.

00;42;07;12 – 00;42;20;02
Hannah
So reading that genealogy right after that story of of him and Shem and Japheth with their father Noah, gives a little bit of a key as well of what it’s supposed to show us.

00;42;20;04 – 00;42;41;13
Matt
Yeah, I think this is one of those things where, as readers who read in English in the 21st century, we may just may not have the eyes to see what somebody in ancient time is trying to do with the language there. If we were telling the story with the tools and strategies that we use now, this would be an infographic or a, you know, something does would be more visual maybe than the way it’s presented in Scripture.

00;42;41;13 – 00;43;02;26
Matt
But this is what we have. So I’d say a couple of things. This one, yeah, they are telling a story and they’re kind of giving you a heads up as a reader about like, here’s where we’re going to go. Many of them are sort of tracing lines of lineage or they’re inserting some characters. The New Testaments are especially interesting because there are a couple characters in those lines that you wouldn’t expect to be there.

00;43;02;26 – 00;43;22;18
Matt
We’ll save that for when we get to those. But yeah, so the genealogies are actually doing something, and doing something pretty significant. The story that said, if you’re a new Bible reader, it’s okay to just sort of skim them. They’ve got names that are hard to pronounce. You don’t quite know what all the narratives are. You can always come back to them later.

00;43;22;18 – 00;43;36;16
Matt
If you’re reading the narrative later and you’re like, wait a minute, where this guy come from? He’s probably mentioned that that genealogy, so don’t worry too much. You don’t have to, like, be in sort of like super meditative prayer mode when you’re doing the genealogies. But they are there. They serve a purpose and, just hang in there.

00;43;36;16 – 00;43;52;24
Matt
But it’s also some of the Bible reading plans that I’ve done on days that are heavy in genealogies. They just assume that you’re going to skip those so they will do like extra days. So but don’t skip them. You may not fully process what’s going on there, and that’s totally fine, but don’t skip them. So yeah, yay for genealogies.

00;43;52;25 – 00;44;05;29
Matt
Good times. And then there was another question this week, from our friend Sam that I thought was pretty interesting. I know you gave this a little bit of love in the chat. But it’s what to highlight this because I, I thought it’s a really interesting question and I thought your response. So it’s really dead on.

00;44;05;29 – 00;44;16;29
Matt
So the, the way that Sam framed it was, you know, we’re we’re bounced around these stories. We got different things going on. How are we to understand God’s will when it seems contradictory?

00;44;17;01 – 00;44;45;10
Hannah
Yeah, I’d, I don’t know if I fully understood. Hopefully I answered the question in in the way that it was intended. I was kind of interpreting it like, how do we understand when God changes his, like, plan for his purposes? So I don’t know if that’s exactly what he was going for. But I highlighted, that I found Jeremiah 18 one through 11 very helpful, which is about the clay in the potter’s hands.

00;44;45;11 – 00;45;10;07
Hannah
And so can’t the Potter mold and change, the clay the way that he wants to. And so, it talks about how if God plans. Good. But that nation does evil, can’t he change his mind? Or if God plans to judge a nation but they repent, can’t God change his mind to to make a different decision?

00;45;10;09 – 00;45;35;03
Hannah
And then I think it’s important to highlight that God can change his mind about what he intends to do based on human actions, and repentance. But he doesn’t change his character, and he doesn’t change his covenant promises. Yeah. And then the idea of a righteous intercessor changing God’s plans is also prevalent. So let’s see.

00;45;35;03 – 00;46;04;28
Hannah
I highlighted Exodus 3211 through 14, which, is Moses interceding? Say, you know, asking God to reminding him, actually of his covenant promises. And so he relents. The word that is translated as relent in that passage is the same word that is used in Genesis six six and seven of regretting is how it’s translated in that passage.

00;46;04;28 – 00;46;08;22
Hannah
But God’s changing his mind to to change his actions.

00;46;08;28 – 00;46;24;01
Matt
Yeah, yeah. It’s interesting. We won’t belabor it too much right now, but it’s actually one of the critiques of the character of God is that he changes his mind. You know, I think of Jonah in the story, like one of the reasons Jonah doesn’t want to go to Nineveh because he’s like, no, I want you to smite those people.

00;46;24;01 – 00;46;40;06
Matt
And if I go and tell them how awesome you are, they’re going to they’re going to you’re going to change your mind about them. And I don’t want you to do that. So, yeah, we should be in a way, we should be grateful that God changes his mind so he doesn’t change who he is, and he doesn’t change his intentions and his purposes.

00;46;40;08 – 00;46;56;26
Matt
But he does he change his mind and praise the Lord for that. Because otherwise we’d be in deep trouble. So, yeah. Thank you for the questions. Keep them coming. We will pull some. We may not be able to get to all of them. And there’s some that are super interesting that, frankly, we just I don’t feel the capacity to look at, but.

00;46;57;01 – 00;47;16;09
Matt
Well, we’re all looked at as a couple and maybe we’ll bring in Pastor Matthew for like, the hardest questions with Pastor Matthew. We’ll get a sponsor for that. All right. So that is week one. We have, read 24 chapters of Genesis. We haven’t even mentioned the Psalms. I’m sure we’ll get to the Psalms in the weeks to come, because that’s an important part of reading the Bible.

00;47;16;12 – 00;47;32;15
Matt
That is up. So what? Tons of stuff we didn’t even get to, because Genesis, especially those first 12 chapters, are super duper packed. So lots of stuff going on, some of that will show up in the rest of the story, so we haven’t forgotten it. We’ll get to you. Those of you who want to know about the Giants and all those things, they’ll show back up again.

00;47;32;15 – 00;47;41;07
Matt
We’ll get to you. But yeah, we’ll start thinking about next week. Hannah, and what we might discuss in episode two. What should the people be ready for?

00;47;41;09 – 00;48;02;14
Hannah
I think we’re going to focus on Abraham and his family, the covenant with Abraham and his line, as the vehicle that God is going to use to redeem and restore his people back into relationship with him. So just focusing on Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and then Jacob’s 12 sons. Yeah.

00;48;02;17 – 00;48;19;08
Matt
It’s traumatic. It’s a mess and it’s awesome. Cool. Well, thanks for hanging out with us for episode one. Looking forward to episode two. Keep it up. Keep reading your Bible. Keep doing it day by day. If you’re just coming into it, you know, take all the time you need. It’s your plan to do what you need to do.

00;48;19;08 – 00;48;30;22
Matt
But we’d love for you to catch up so you can be on path with us. And we’re just excited you all are doing with us. Thanks for hanging out with us on this journey. Hannah, would you mind praying for us and we’ll close it out for this week? Sure. Go for it.

00;48;30;25 – 00;49;02;01
Hannah
Lord, we just thank you for this opportunity that we’ve had to dive really deep into your word. And thank you for the gift that is your word, that we can see your revelation to us, that we, can have a glimpse into your wisdom and truth that is provided to us in your written word. We pray that you would give us your wisdom and your spirit to read and understand, that these passages and to point us ultimately to who you are and to who Jesus is.

00;49;02;01 – 00;49;13;15
Hannah
So, be with us and thank you for this community that we have with us to read together and study your word and come to know and love you more. And we pray all this in Jesus name. Amen.

00;49;13;21 – 00;49;16;20
Matt
Amen. Thanks everyone. We will see you next time.