When I left college as a 25-year old, one of my life goals was to tackle our culture’s Bible illiteracy problem. It’s not my job to help the whole world be biblically literate, but wherever God was going to send me, I was surely going to make that a center-piece of what I did week-in and week-out; whether that was as a full-time pastor in a local church or as a Sunday school teacher while I drove for Coca-cola.
It’s fun to think back on earlier times in our lives, isn’t it? I remember being a sponge for the kind of teaching I got in my under-graduate degree. I’m indebted to Mark Jalovick and the thirst for learning the Scriptures. I got to sit under men and women at Multnomah University (where I went to college) and learn about the different parts of the Bible and theology. It was great.
Then I got to come and be a full-time pastor at a church working with children and middle school students. For the last 13 years I have got to teach these students about the God revealed in Jesus through the Scriptures. What a blast!
I’m pretty passionate about helping people understand God, through His Word, better.
There was a Multnomah student a year or two before me named Tim Mackie. He ended up going on to seminary right after college and then on to do a PhD at the University of Wisconsin. Tim and a friend of his, Jonathan Collins, started a non-profit group centered around making creative videos teaching through the Bible. It’s called The Bible Project.
Torah Series
They are cranking out videos left and right these days. They started with the Torah series where they went through the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. You can view those by clicking here.
Read Scripture
They are working through a whole “Read Scripture” series which takes someone through the Bible in a year. They are making explanation videos of each book of the Bible… kind of a visual, artistic walk-through of how the book is put together and what it means. They aren’t done yet… probably only about halfway through, but you can watch what they have so far by clicking here. Along with the “Read Scripture” series they provide the finished “picture” chart of the book of the Bible for free for anyone to print out.
Theme Videos
They are also doing theme videos to explain, by placing the theme in the overall arc of the biblical story, different concepts that the Bible brings forth. You can watch these by clicking here.
If you go to their website @ jointhebibleproject.com you can view all their videos and study guides and posters and other stuff. You can also contribute if you so desire. Tim, Jon and the team are giving these videos away for free and so to do that they have to have an army of supporters who help make these happen.
Anyway, The Bible Project is an incredible resource to help both yourself and others to engage more deeply with the Scriptures.
Have fun learning more about the God revealed in Jesus through the Scriptures!!
