Are we reading someone else's mail?

Are we reading someone's else's mail?

Whose letters were they anyway???
"For" us but not "To" us

What does the Bible say? To whom were the letters of the New Testament addressed? Who wrote these letters? What was the situation that caused the need for these letters to have been written? How did the readers understand what was written? These are such basic questions whose answers can make the letters so much easier to correctly understand.

There is a course taught on this in the universities called "hermeneutics." This is a big word that I understand to mean, "just use common sense". Use the same principles in understanding the Bible as you would when reading any other letter. The course has great value. It helps one to consider the answers to the above questions.

The letters of the New Testament were not written to us. Before you scream, consider what the letters say, such as; To Timothy, To Titus, To the Romans, To the church at Galatia, To the seven churches of Asia, and the list goes on. These were letters written to first century people and first century churches about first century situations and events. God has preserved these letters for us today for our learning, instruction, and comfort but they were not written to us. They were written to first century people.

We are in effect reading someone else's mail. When we read these letters we must understand them as they were written. When the writer told the readers that these events would happen 'soon', he was talking about events that were about to happen at that time in the first century. We have absolutely no problem understanding this principle when reading the Old Testament, why so much problem understanding it in the New Testament?

The common practice today is to tear these passages out of their historic settings and to try to apply them to the year 2002. Many preachers expound on how these words say that these event are to happen 'soon', possibly this very night. They fail to explain that the apostles in the first century was telling the first century people that these events were to happen 'soon' at that time in the first century, not in our time nearly 2000 years way off in the future.

We are blessed today because Christ kept his Word and brought about the events when he said he would, in their generation, before some of them died. He did not fail.

Today, we can live with Christ in his kingdom. We can be in Christ and he can be in us. We share with all people the blessings promised to Abraham. It was through Abraham that all nations were to be blessed. This was accomplished through Christ who was of Abraham's seed. We have the salvation promised through Abraham. We are blessed with completed salvation. God's plan of salvation did not get knocked off track, get delayed, or failed as so many teach. He did not insert a church age to make up for his supposed failure to complete his work in the first century. It was not an after thought. How important was the church? He purchased it with his blood. Christ accomplished exactly what He said He would, when He said he would. We serve an awesome God.

Gene Fadeley

Bible prophecy books of the end times made easy!