OLD TESTAMENT
Genesis | Exodus | Leviticus | Numbers | Deuteronomy | Joshua
Judges | Ruth | 01 Samuel | 02 Samuel | 01 Kings |02 Kings
01 Chronicles | 02 Chronicles | Ezra | Nehemiah | Esther | Job
Psalms | Proverbs | Ecclesiastes | Song of Solomon | Isaiah | Jeremiah
Lamentations | Ezekiel | Daniel | Hosea | Amos | Jonah
Obadiah | Micah | Nahum | Habakkuk | Zephaniah |Haggai | Zechariah | Malachi
NEW TESTAMENT
Matthew | Mark | Luke | John | Acts | Romans
01 Corinthians | 02 Corinthians | Galatians | Ephesians | Philippians | Colossians
01 Thessalonians | 02 Thessalonians | 01 Timothy | 02 Timothy | Philemon | Titus
Hebrews | James | 01 Peter | 02 Peter | 01 John |02 John | 03 John | Jude | Revelations
OLD TESTAMENT
Genesis
Genesis is one of my favorite books. I love the story of Joseph, Tamar, Cain and Able and all the weirdness in this book.
There is incest, so much sex and so much murder, and there is love. There is so much love in this book. Not the romantic kind, but the love of a father to his kids.
God loves his creation so much but he isn’t above punishing them. I mean let’s just talk about The Tower of Babel in chapter 11 or Sodom and Gomorrah in chapter 19 or we can go back to the basics and talk about Adam and Eve or Noah.
God is a brutal God, but He is a kind God. Being human, it’s hard to see that such characteristics can coincide with each other, but they can.
He blesses those who follow him (Noah) and rewards those who follow him blindly (Joseph).
Isn’t that just something you want? Someone that can turn something horrible into something glorious? I mean just looking at Joseph you see someone sold into slavery, accused of rape, thrown in jail, and made in charge of Egypt because He completely and utterly followed God the whole time.
He waited SO LONG for that. He waited SO LONG to see his brothers again. Any one of us (please, ESPECIALLY ME) would have been like “throws these stupid men in jail and let them rot I DECREE!” and he was like “Yo, here’s some grain. Why don’t you guys all just move in?”
Only someone TRULY in love with BLINDLY following THE LORD could do something like that.
I want that.
I want to be that person.
I need to learn how to be that person.
I must read more.
Stay tuned. Follow Jesus.
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Exodus
Exodus means to leave, basically. With that being said, this book is all about the freeing of the Jews from slavery. The Egyptians enslaved them because they were scared they were all going to kill them since they had a lot more people than them.
Oh okay.
The story of Moses happens in this book; if you don’t know this story, you can watch on of my favorite childhood movies called Prince of Egypt and you’ll get the idea of what happened.
OR YOU COULD READ THIS BOOK THAT IS AN IDEA WORTH HAVING.
Moses was the worst. He couldn’t do anything himself. I don’t understand why he was so scared of everything and had to have his brother do all the confrontational things.
Even though he couldn’t do anything on his own, God still picked him to be His mouth to his chosen people. Isn’t that amazing? What do you think God could use you for?
The Plagues are LITERALLY THE SO SCARY. Just read chapters 07-12 and you’ll see that God isn’t all rainbows and daisies. He is literally an angry God while being a peaceful God. How is that possible? Well, He’s God so…
What I find questionable is that God loves all of his creation; so, why did he continue to harden the heart of Pharaoh? He created him. Did He condemn him hell just to show people He can do really cool things (because wow yes He can)?
It makes you wonder if He ended up saving the Pharaoh or if he just is collateral damage.
ANYWAY.
Then there’s the whole golden calve thing that the Israelites really just screwed over. Like “Oh we just saw God do all these cool things and save us from slavery, but let’s worship a god we saw Aaron make with all of our jewelry.”
Cool guys.
Then again, is that showing us how easily we stray from the path? I mean we can say that they are stupid all we want, but I bet we have some similar situations that we don’t even know about. We can worship different types of things and it not be a statue of a cow.
A lot of this book is about the strictness of the rules they have to follow. How they have to make things to the inch of what God wanted with specific material or it doesn’t count.
Imagine if we had to do all the churches in the world like they talk about in Exodus.
That would be SUPER crazy.
I’m glad we have the freedom we do.
I love the story of Moses, even if Moses kind of annoys me sometimes.
And Aaron. Joshua is my rock.
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Leviticus
I feel REALLY weird about giving a book of the Bible such a low rating but… guys, it’s just boring. There were so many rules and weird things. BUT I made it through. I can do this guys.
I see the importance of this book for those who study history and what people had to follow and such; but as someone who is reading the Bible as something to learn more about God and to find herself within Him, this book wasn’t inspirational.
Again, I feel really weird about not giving a good review for a book of the Bible.
I JUST CAN’T LIE OKAY?
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Numbers
It’s the same as Numbers and Leviticus.
I’m excited for Joshua is all I have to say. I love actual stories and seeing what God did for his people. I don’t really care for the nit-picky rules they had to live by as much as I probably should.
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Deuteronomy
It’s the same as Numbers and Leviticus.
I’m excited for Joshua is all I have to say. I love actual stories and seeing what God did for his people. I don’t really care for the nit-picky rules they had to live by as much as I probably should.
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Joshua
YAY.
I loved the stories based on Joshua and God in this book. My favorite, and probably the most well known, is the one about the wall of Jericho.
If you don’t know the story, I highly recommend you read it, or you can go get the Veggie Tales retelling and get the main idea (minus the pies, they really didn’t use pies).
God just has a strange way of doing things. Walking and screaming equals taking over a city. Awesome.
It just shows you that he can do LITERALLY anything in ANY way and get what he wants because he is, well, God.
Pass that, you see all the cities and towns and civilizations that they took over and how. They have some boring points, but it is all worth it to read the glory and awesomeness that comes out of it.
BUT I am so ready for Judges I can’t handle it. Sorry Joshua, it’s not you it’s Judges.
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Judges
I shall rate these on the Judges God placed for the Israelites
Ehud ★★★★★
This dude man, he killed a really fat king because he was left handed and he got away with it. He deserves all the stars in the world.
Shamgar ★★★☆☆
Not much was said about this judge, though he killed a lot of things with something called an oxgoad. So I guess that is kind of awesome…?
Deborah/Jael ★★★★★
If you learn anything from this Judge, it is that women are not to be looked over. And also, do not go camping with a girl named Jael no matter what she says to you.
Gideon ★★★★☆
Gideon has more than one story in Judges, so he is obviously an important Judge. I love the way that God “thinned” out his army.
Jotham/Gaal ★★★☆☆
A lot of treasury in this story. A lot of war, curses, betrayal and pay back.
Tola ★★☆☆☆
Doesn’t really say what exactly this man did. But he’s a judge!
Jair ★★☆☆☆
Doesn’t really say what exactly this man did. But he’s a judge!
Jephthah ★★★★★
This is literally the saddest story. Jephthah was thrown out of his family because he had a different mother. He was a good fighter, so he was who people wanted to deliver them from their slavers. He promised God that if he delivered their enemies into his hands, he would sacrifice the first thing to come out of his house. Guess what it was?
Ibzan ★☆☆☆☆
Just mentioned. No story.
Elon ★☆☆☆☆
Just mentioned. No story.
Abdon ★☆☆☆☆
Just mentioned. No story.
Samson ★★★★★
BOOM. This dude. Long hair don’t care. Also, don’t always trust the woman you are sleeping with. Don’t be so blind to believe everything she says (see what I did there?). His complete story, including the jawbone story, is probably one of my favorites in the Bible.
The fact that God can use someone like Samson, even though he is a sinner and does as he pleases, to bring people to follow him is a miracle and amazing in itself.
So the rest of the book is about Micah and his concubine who was raped and murdered. He cut her into twelve pieces and sent them to each tribe of Israel so they would take up arms against the men of Gibeah who intended to kill him and did those horrible things to his wife.
So it is about a war. I am not sure if Micah counts as a Judge, but his story is very interesting. I actually don’t remember reading it before this.
I love the book of Judges. It has multiple stories to read and tells the story of the Lord using people you wouldn’t have expected him to use to save his people.
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Ruth
WHAT A WOMAN! WHAT DEVOTION!
This girl didn’t know what was to come, but wanted to help her mother-in-law after her husband and her father-in-law died. She would have been welcomed into her own household again, but didn’t see it as her household because she was married into another.
“Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.”
Her devotion is just miraculous. She is an ancestor of Jesus Christ! He is in her lineage!
This woman is truly someone to aspire to be like.
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01 Samuel
Hannah, the mother of Samuel, promised the Lord that if he gave her a son, she would give him to the church to serve the Lord. He did. She also ended up having five more children!
Eli, the priest who raised Samuel, had two evil sons.
God had plans for them and Samuel.
This book holds the famous story of God calling to Samuel has a boy. He thought it was Eli three different times, and by the fourth time he answered God and had his first conversation from him.
I wish God would talk to me like he talks to these people. With words and not signs. Or with words and still signs, I should say.
Something else I took away was the fact that after all these years; people still knew about the plagues that the Israelites God put on the Egyptians and are still afraid of Him. It just goes to tell you that even if you hear/see the might of God and you are afraid of Him, it doesn’t mean that you are going to follow him. That’s really annoying to me. I know seeing isn’t believing, but if I saw a cat fall from a plane and land on its feet, I would believe it was possible.
Now onto Saul.
He was such a good guy man. I mean, I know he becomes unbearable and horrible and things, but he really started out as a good guy. Came from a small tribe, not a big deal family and believed in God and followed Samuel’s voices.
Then he messes up ONE TIME and he all of a sudden is rejected as king. Even I feel that is a little harsh, but I am not God so I couldn’t tell you.
Jonathan, his son, is probably one of my favorite people in the Bible. His dad HATED his best friend, yet he stood by said friend. Do you know how hard that must have been? Can you imagine the knots in his neck and the headaches from worry he must have gotten?
Speaking of Jonathan’s best friend, David is a catch.
Out of all his brothers, him? Out of all the soldiers that went against Goliath, him?
Abigail’s story is really interesting too. I like her a lot and wish that it was normal to only have one wife back then instead of a zillion.
This book is basically the set up to David’s reign, which is probably the best one because he speaks and follows God. A man after his own heart.
Oh, and RIP Saul.
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02 Samuel
Even though Saul sought after David to kill him, his own son’s best friend, David mourned his death because he was the Lord’s anointed. He killed the man that put him out like a light because he killed the Lord’s anointed. To be able to put aside personal matters and only see what God sees is CRAZY. I want that.
David’s wives: Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail [because why only have one… *eye roll*]
There are literally so many people that are just killed in this book. Like the titles of chapters are “[so and so’s name] Murdered”.
I THOUGHT that the strory of Uzzah was in Genesis or Exodus, but it is actually in 2 Samuel. This is the dude that tried to help the Ark when it was falling and ended up being struck down dead because he touched it. Talk about just trying to help.
David had such a heart that he sought out the only descendent of Saul and Jonathan, a lame man, and told him to always eat at his table and gave him everything that was once his family. Can you talk about showing kindness even though there is bad blood? Can you not see the kindness of God in this heart? AND HE STILL HATED DAVID. Seriously. No joke.
Bathsheba… need I say more? That poor girl couldn’t tell the king no! And they both paid for it horribly. This story tells me that even the most godly man sins.
Oddly, one of my favorite stories in the Bible is that of Absalom, Tamar and Amnon. I think it is because the brother defends his sister of rape from the other brother. The woman actually meant something besides reproducing. She was above the dirt to him. You don’t see a lot of women defended like this in history in general.
Over all, this book is about consequences. David did a sinful deed and his whole family dealt with it. His whole family line was against each other, he was betrayed by his son and his other son(s) died.
Even the small things will come back to haunt you.
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01 Kings
Basically, this book is how Solomon becomes king, in a rather violent way.
I think the most important thing about this is how full-heartedly Solomon follows God. God told him to ask for anything and he asked for wisdom to run the kingdom right. Like out of everything he could ask, he asked for that. He wasn’t selfish about it, he wasn’t about to ask about the best looks or the best singer or anything like that.
Wisdom.
Thinking of others before yourself.
Marvelous.
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02 Kings
This is the book with Elijah and Elisha. I always thought it was weird that their names were so much alike. I think it is awesome about how Elijah was taken up into heaven without dying to God. That whole scene was just perfect.
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01 Chronicles
A lot of genealogy in this book. And accounts for Saul’s death. Wasn’t the most interesting read, but alas it is important.
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02 Chronicles
So this was better then the first one. Talked a lot about Solomon and how he is great and things and how everything fell apart after he died and the nation split into two nations. It talked about the kings of the southern nation more than the northern.
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Ezra
A lot of Genealogies again. Not as interesting as you may believe..
There was talk of building the new temple and her there were two different sets of Israelites coming back and Ezra taking it on himself to lead them back to the Lord. That was pretty cool.
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Nehemiah
This book is really about rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem and from the view of the title of the book, Nehemiah, who is highly respected. I personally like stories so this books was better than most. Ready to read Esther though!
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Esther
This book is so powerful. Esther was a no body taken from the low level she was and became a queen because of her beauty.
That wasn’t all the plans that God had for her though. For the right hand of the king was planning on killing her people, including her cousin Mordecai. As a woman, she had no voice. But as a follower of God, she had a cry.
Going against all she knew was law and going forward with all she had was faith, she will do what she is called to do even if it means death.
This is a short book, but it is a powerful one.
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Job
So here is my review on Job.
WOW. SO POWERFUL.
Basically, God challenged Satan to try and turn his most loyal follower (Job) away from him by doing everything he wanted to besides taking his life.
Oh and Satan took the challenge.
Oh and Job still was completely faithful when his family died, his belongings and live stock were taken or killed, his healthy was horrible, and he couldn’t move because he was in so much pain.
The enemy has been defeated!
Then Job got twice as much as he had before! What a defeat!
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Psalms
If you like things to sing in your head while you read them, this is the book for you. It flows like an album would with different songs. I loved it.
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Proverbs
It is flowy tooooo! It is a lot like Psalms but not as flowy, sadly. But it was still a song in my head and a lovely read.
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Ecclesiastes
This book is basically Solomon telling us all he did wrong and what we can do to avoid his wrongs. Sharing his wisdom again. Sounds like a dude who fought a lot with his worldly pleasures and his God.
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Song of Solomon
This is where a lot of the detailed sex comes in. Some/Most of it is beautiful though. It deals with Solomon and he is writing to his “beloved” which could be interpreted a few ways. It’s a beautiful book.
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Isaiah
This book is heavily laid with prophetic words. That is what this book is known for I am assuming, though I haven’t done my research on that. It was interesting to hear things that are going to happen and know that they happen in the New Testament.
I don’t really have much to say on it rather then that it was a good read and I would like to read it again and study it further.
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Jeremiah
Another prophetic book. My thoughts are more or less the same as they were for the previous book, Isaiah. I would love to study this book further if I ever get the chance.
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Lamentations
This book just depressed me like… It was a sad little short book.
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Ezekiel
This was a wonderful edition. Talked about how all things (dry bones) are capable through Christ and how generational curses are not a thing because we all die by our own sins, not the sins of those before us. A lot of prophecies-like things in this book.
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Daniel
Remember that story of Radshack, Meshack, and Abednego? This is where that story lives which is such a powerful one to read. I encourage everyone to read this book.
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Hosea
This is a short read but it doesn’t mean it wasn’t powerful and life altering.
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Amos
This one was very interesting read. A lot of examples and story-like telling. I liked it enough.
I love reading the Bible! I can’t wait to finish so I can study them at my own pace.
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Jonah
So the lovely book of Jonah… The man swallow by a whale, or a big fish depending on who you talk to, because he didn’t follow what the Lord wanted him to do. Seriously, it’s either follow The Leader or get eaten by a fish. This is a good read.
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Obadiah
WOAH BUDDY. I CANNOT EVEN.
This books was heavy for me. It was short and heavy. It talks about living for yourself and how that is not the way to live. PRIDE. This is a life altering book. I needed this awakening.
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Micah
This book was pretty violent. But it ends on the forgiveness and love of Christ. Isn’t that kind of what life is anyway?
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Nahum
This was a very good read. Had some enlightening verses and some uplifting things. Very needed.
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Habakkuk
This is a book for those who doubt God. This prophet questions God and why he, for example, lets evil into the world. It’s a great and educational read.
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Zephaniah
WONDERFUL. SERIOUSLY. Lots of uplifting and encouraging verses to follow in the Lord’s ways.
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Haggai
This book was a little bit of history. It was a good read. Free Jews! lol.
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Zechariah
These last few books of the Old Testament are always overlooked. This was beautiful.
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Malachi
Those who believe and follow will succeed. <3 WrensReads | Goodreads | Twitter | Instagram
NEW TESTAMENT
Matthew
The Gospels are going to be an interesting read. The first three, Matthew, Mark and Luke, are a lot a like with how the story of Jesus goes. John, on the other hand, is the same but from a different eye of detail.
Matthew was a great introduction into the New Testament. I can tell you that the story of Jesus is beautiful and magical.
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Mark
Most of the things have been repeated from the last book, just written differently. So it was just as good and magical!
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Luke
I liked Luke’s writing and point of view better. He was more too the point then the previous two. I will say that I already know I like John’s point of view and writing more than all three of them, but out of the most-like gospels, Luke was a good change of structure.
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John
I love this gospel. I feel like he saw a whole different side of God than the other three. This just makes me strongly believe that even if you see the same thing as someone else, it may have looked, felt, and seemed different for them. Which leads to me believing that the Bible can be interpreted in many different ways because how do you know that you would have saw and believed the same thing as the person telling the story? Four people wrote the same story down and they all had the same ending, but did it all get there the same? Did it all feel the same?
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Acts
Acts starts basically with Jesus being lifted up into heaven and the few followers of Christ spreading the word and starting the first church of Christianity. I had memorized a lot of this book from grade school but it is nice to actually think about the words instead of memorizing them. Great read into the rest of the New Testament!
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Romans
This is one of the most encouraging and uplifting books of the Bible in my opinion. I feel as if Paul was writing it to me directly some of the time because the pieces given fall straight into my life perfectly. If you ever feel down or unloved or just defeated, you should read this book of the Bible.
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01 Corinthians
What a WONDERFUL letter from Paul! Really, the major point in this, is that love is what matters. And isn’t that true?
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02 Corinthians
Another letter and another one to help evaluate my life and soak in the greatest of God.
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Galatians
Am I here to please people or to please God? Something I have needed to be asked. This book was something that was needed.
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Ephesians
Such a short book! But just because it is short, doesn’t mean it isn’t profound!
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Philippians
This book was one that was read in a day, which is crazy because it was still meaningful and well worth the read.
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Colossians
Paul writes a lot of letters. But they are just as good as the last one. Just as uplifting and inspiring!
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01 Thessalonians
I’ve just come to the conclusion that Paul wrote the New Testament, or at least most of it. I wish he was my mentor. He has such wise words.
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02 Thessalonians
Again, Paul the wise. I need to actually study these letters. I bet there is a lot I am missing
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01 Timothy
All these books are super short. But they are so good. I can’t wait to actually study the Timothy books.
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02 Timothy
Just as good as the last one guys. And also, too short. I want to read more about the topics touched.
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Philemon
I read both Titus and Philemon in one day.
Philemon is very short, being a chapter long. Paul is asking Philemon to forgive his runaway servant/slave Onesimus. Both interesting on forgiving and moving past something. I have read that there is a book called Twice Freed based on this letter. I am going to look into that and see what that’s about.
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Titus
I read both Titus and Philemon in one day.
Titus really speaks humility about the followers of Christ. About how, through him, things will be set accordingly
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Hebrews
A little more depth came out of this letter. I would say that this is something that I need to read more on and read about other people’s studies in order to go into mine more. I feel very mixed feelings. I want to study this one more. Of course, it was a wonderful letter from Paul.
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James
This is what I needed. James talks a lot about following God and living a life of holiness. How living the life of others and of man is not what we were called to be and to lead an example to those around us. I LOVED IT. I am going to read it again… probably right now.
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01 Peter
This book tells you that even if what you know is right and you do what is right and you get punished in this world, God will reward you for what you do. Peter is wonderful.
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02 Peter
Peter’s second letter implies that pursuing a spiritual maturity through the Word of God as a remedy for false teaching and a right response to heretics in light of Christ’s promised second coming, in the wise words of a fellow reviewer Joan Haughton. I couldn’t have phrased it better myself, but I also am not going to take the credit of saying it so well. I loved this book. It is very encouraging.
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01 John
John has a way with words. This is my favorite passage.
1 John 4:4 (NIV): You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.
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02 John
Literally so short but still very profound.
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03 John
01:04 I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.
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Jude
One chapter book of advice and warning.
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Revelations
This is my favorite book in the Bible. Such promise and chaos. It’s like a fantasy book, but it is actually going to happen. It’s kind of terrifying but it leaves you in awe and with your mind rolling. I love it.
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