Now is the time for us to begin an in-depth look at 1 & 2 Corinthians I hope you have had time to read the books through together at first. We will spend some time looking at the background to Paul’s letters to the Corinthian church and how they fit together. We will look at Corinth as a city. You can find all of this info on E-Sword. For those of you who don’t know about it this programme, it’s available free on the Internet and is the most comprehensive Bible software programme I have come across. You can download it from http://www.e-sword.net/. Through the Bible Gems I will give you pointers to using it. My standard source for the background I include in Gems is found from E-Sword but I do have other sources based on years of study of God’s Word. I chose to limit myself to E-Sword because it is a free source available to you.
In the next Gem I will tell you about our lodgings at Gaius’s house so you can settle in (and get prepared for us starting a new series). I trust you are ready for this experience. I hope these Gems will bless you and encourage you to go deeper into God’s word. In Wycliffe we are concerned that people have and use the Word in the language they understand the best. I trust these gems will help you dig deeper and use the Bible that you have. My purpose in writing the Bible Gems is to provide you with more in depth insight into the text of the Word of God. By which I hope to stimulate you to apply the methods to your own Bible study and develop a deeper approach for yourself.
You can decide for yourself whether you simply read them from the website and work your way through a book I have gemmed in the past or follow live as we look at Philippians when Bible Gems begins again with the launch of the new website. Following live means you can interact with me and ask any questions you like. If you feel having the Gems emailed to you is too much, you can always save them in a folder and proceed at your leisure. The pace you take to follow the Gems is entirely up to you. That way you have all the Gems related to each book and can use them as you see fit. Some have told me they keep them in a folder and use them like a commentary. What you do with them is up to you. Some time after the new website is launched I will begin the work of posting the Gems in Indonesian as well. I have a team behind the scenes who translate the Gems into Bahasa Indonesia. But the present website I use can’t cope with that. I have received the funding to begin the process for that. You too could contribute to the development of the website if you wish. I am aiming to have a website capable of housing Deeper Bible Online so that all can do it. But before that can happen the website to house it must be developed. It will soon be released. Before I can move toward launching Deeper Bible live from the new website I need another $9,000. You could hasten the day by contributing a gift to aid me in making Deeper Bible available to you and others around the world.
For now let’s turn our attention to settling into Corinthians and Corinth. May you be blessed, see you at Gaius’ house tomorrow.
With each Gem I add at the bottom one or more quips or pithy statements or insightful one liners. There are many pastors who tell me they would get Gems just for the one liners because they find them so useful. To each his own. Here is the offering for today.
God’s business is the only business that will still be in business when all businesses go out of business – Unaffected by the Global Meltdown or Covid19.
Ian Vail
He who throws mud loses ground.
Anon