Questions about the Chronological Bible and these studies

1. What is so different about the Chronological Bible?

The standard arrangement for the Bible’s sixty-six books is divided into groups according to types of literature: In the Old Testament there are books of history, poetry and wisdom, and prophesies and apocalyptic literature. In the New Testament there are narrative, doctrine, letters, and apocalyptic types of literature.

These literature categories are not always chronological, and each Bible book has its own theme or purpose. For this reason, a Bible that you would typically carry to church or to a Bible study should not be replaced by a Chronological Bible.

However, a Chronological Bible is a helpful tool for understanding how the events, people, and writings of the Bible fit together in their chronological sequence. This tool also helps us to understand why the authors of the Bible wrote what they did.

It is eye-opening when we see historical events coupled with the writings of Scripture. The typical response of the reader is, “ Oh, wow! I didn’t know! That all makes sense now. Cool!”

Appropriate maps and timelines have also been included with each day’s study. In this way, the reader can, at any time, check where and when events occurred.

2. Is the chronology of the Bible essential?

Yes, absolutely! Someday, I will provide a long list of chronological notes from the Bible for those information geeks. They are everywhere in the Bible. We can even date certain important events like Israel’s deliverance from Egypt from other specific events and times in the Bible. If the chronology of the Bible was essential to God, shouldn’t it be valuable to us?

3. If the chronology of the Bible is so important, then why wasn’t it all written that way?

Basically, the books of Genesis through Esther provide the chronological Bible history of the Old Testament. Along the way, God provided reviews of their spiritual journey. Nehemiah 9:6-37 provides a comprehensive but concise chronological review of the Old Testament significant events. If you don’t know how the Old Testament events fit together, this is a great Bible passage to read.

The chronological history of the New Testament is found in the books of Luke and Acts. Luke provides a chronological narrative of the life of Christ. The Acts of the Apostles contain the exciting events of the early church in chronological order and is also written by Luke.

The other books of the Old and New Testament were written for different purposes than chronology. For instance, the prophets were like preachers, focusing on specific issues of their day.

The order of the Bible books is not inspired. Still, they were collected and arranged early in church history according to the literary genre. Most of it, in a general way, is chronological, with many exceptions.

4. Why don’t many preachers like the chronological Bible?

Most chronological Bibles and guides excessively separate the Bible and splice it back together to make everything as chronological as possible. When that is done, the intended theme or message of many Bible passages can be lost.

You will like what I am doing with my chronological Bible study guides. I have attempted to keep themes together whenever possible and only interrupting them when there is a short break where I might fit another chronological passage. This also helps the reader use his own Bible and not have to do as much flipping back and forth to read each verse (or part of a verse) chronologically.

When you sign up for daily email to read through the Bible chronologically in one year, you will receive my chronological Bible study guides free.

5. How did you decide the chronological order of Scripture passages?

Sometimes the chronological order and or the date is stated by the author of the Bible book. This makes decisions easy. At other times, the people, events, and internal evidence in the Scriptures help determine the sequence.

Sometimes, I must admit (especially with some of the Psalms and some minor prophets like Joel), it is not possible to positively identify where a particular passage belongs.
After lengthy consultations with Bible commentators and God, I made my best guess.

There are differences of opinion between Bible scholars about the chronology of some passages. This explains why every chronological Bible and every guide is different. Nevertheless, this small concession does not take away from the value of studying the Bible chronologically.

6. Why does the Bible repeat itself so often?

The reader will notice a lot of repetition in Chronological Bibles, especially in the Kings, Chronicles, the prophets, Isaiah–Malachi, and in the gospels, Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John.

In the case of the Kings and Chronicles, the written record was meant for different audiences. Still, some of the documents are precisely the same. Some scribes copied the records from one scroll onto another scroll. If they didn’t do that, their record would be incomplete. Sometimes there are slight variances and additions. This makes it interesting because one record reveals details that another omits.

In the prophets’ case, many of them ministered in the same period and basically had the same message. Why? Jesus himself gives an answer in a parable recorded in Luke 20:9-16.

 

The vineyard was Israel, the farmers and tenants were the religious leaders of various generations, and the servants sent to collect fruit from the vineyard were prophets that God, the owner of the vineyard, had sent. The prophets were often abused, and finally God sent his own Son, but they would not listen to him either; they killed him so the religious leaders could rule Israel.

 

God sent prophets over and over with the same messages: repent and live, or suffer the consequences. We do the same thing when we are distraught over someone we love who is ruining his life. We plead with him over and over, and we send trusted friends or spiritual leaders to him. We hope that they might say or do something that will make a difference with our loved one. Jesus loved Israel that much, and he also loves us too much to let us ruin our lives (Hebrews 12:5-11, NIV).

Repetitious messages given by different spiritual leaders in various venues is also another way to help us remember. Like a teacher using words one time and object lessons another time in different situations and applications, God also uses repetition as a memory tool in his Word.

7. Why are the gospels so similar but sometimes different if they are describing the same event? Shouldn’t they all be the same?

Would we say that eyewitnesses to a traffic accident viewed from different vantage points would be exactly the same? No. because there are differences, this lends credibility to the gospels being written by four different authors. If they were all the same, we would say they copied from each other. Instead, we have four accounts of the life of Jesus Christ and all from different vantage points.

Matthew’s record appeals to the Jews, showing them how Jesus fulfills the Scriptures and is, therefore, the Messiah for which they were looking.

Mark appeals to the Gentile Christians in Rome, showing Jesus as the servant of God and man.

Luke provides a chronological account of Jesus’ life as the Son of Man, emphasizing his humanity and oneness with God.

John writes of many miraculous accounts not covered in the other gospels. He presents Jesus as the Son of God, thereby being equal in nature with God.

All four perspectives are right—Jesus is the Jewish Messiah, he is a servant of Almighty God and man, and Jesus is the Son of God.

8. It appears that there are many contradictions in the Bible.

Yes, and that is especially noticeable in Chronological Bibles, which place passages of Scripture side by side. There are many logical explanations for these supposed contradictions. I have provided some in the Chronological Bible studies as we come to them.

Sometimes, a careful reading of each text and context is all that is needed to resolve an issue. Other times, we must look at the purpose of each author and when and where he wrote. You may wish to consult gotquestions.org to give you answers I don’t provide. While we may not have all the answers, we know we can trust God.

9. Why am I using the New International Version of the Bible for Bible references?

Bible quotations used in these chronological Bible studies, unless otherwise noted, have been chosen from the New International Version of the Bible, by the International Bible Society, © 1984. Special permission has been granted to copy them (see credits).

This version was simply chosen because it has been proven as a reliable and popular translation of the Bible in the modern-day English language. There is no intended offense to anyone who prefers another translation.

Because this translation and newer translations are based on older copies of Biblical manuscripts, the reader will occasionally notice Scripture verses that are missing. In no way does this imply that it is deficient or incomplete, and in no way does it affect the teachings of the Bible.

It is believed by textual critics that the older the copies are, the closer they are to the original source. However, the differences between the manuscripts by which the newer translations and the older translations are based are minuscule. They shouldn’t cause the reader any serious concern.

10. Why are personal pronouns referring to God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit not capitalized?

The ancient Bible languages are Greek and Hebrew. The Greek language doesn’t capitalize personal pronouns referring to deity. The Hebrew language doesn’t have upper or lower case letters (see more in this article). For this reason, many Bible versions do not capitalize personal pronouns referring to any member of the triune God. To be consistent, I chose not to capitalize them in the Bible studies. This is not an attempt to dishonor God in any way.

11. Why are some Bible studies long and others short?

I have tried to keep the theme of each Scripture passage in each Bible study instead of breaking it up because of length.

When the Bible passages are long, I have frequently made them into two-day Bible studies. In such cases, I encourage the reader to complete today’s Bible reading on day-one and read the Bible study on day-two.

Thank you for reading the chronological Bible studies. I know you will be blessed.

12. Why is LORD capitalized in the Old Testament readings but not in the New Testament?

“LORD” or “Jehovah” or “Yahweh” means He is the self-existent one, the great “I am,” the ever-present, Sovereign of the universe. With the changing of the language from Hebrew to Greek between the Old Testament (400 B.C.) and the New Testament (4-6 B.C.) came a changing of the word. Lord (Adonai) is usually a term of respect, meaning master or teacher, but it is also a term used for God.

Got Other Bible Questions?

Excellent resources for Bible and other religious and philosophical questions are answered at gotquestions.org

answersingenesis.org provides answers to many questions people have about the origin of the earth and God’s creative design.

Bible References. For “easy-to-understand discussion of the Scriptures, without relying on jargon or slogans. Here, you can find book-by-book, chapter-by-chapter, and verse-by-verse commentary on the entire Bible (eventually).”

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re-edited 10-21-2023

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