Church Hopping

I went to church with my parents recently. My mother looked over at me mid-sermon and saw me looking at my cellphone. She slapped my hands (yes I am married and haven’t lived with her for at least seven years) and said stop texting people in church. I smiled and showed her my screen which was displaying the very verse that the pastor was talking about.

That is correct. I have decided to leave my Bible at home in exchange for a digital Bible on my phone. And once I got over the initial embarrassment of being a complete nerd, I really enjoyed it.

There are quite a few ways now for you to get the Bible on the go. The slightly older method is to purchase the software for your smartphone from a company such as Olive Tree. But I would be cheating you if I didn’t share a free way as well that works with most all phones.

The NET Bible offers a wap version (wap is the cellular version of the internet) of their Bible. All you have to do is enter wap.bible.org in your cell phone’s web browser and not only do you have access to the entire Bible, but also the extensive notes that the NET is famous for. The ESV also has a mobile version of their translation at www.esv.org/mobile. The ESV includes a few devotions and a chronological and one-year Bible.

Most cell phone contracts include at least a bare minimum data plan, usually around 1 MB per month. This should be plenty to cover at least the four Sundays. Though if you are a Blackberry or other smartphone user, you know that you can do quite a bit more. Of course the real reason why I switched is because I have just reached the pinnacle of the cell phone world when I purchased an iPhone.

Although you can browse pretty much any site on the iPhone, I prefer to use two iPhone specific sites for my Bible. You can find an iPhone-friendly NET Bible at http://www.enetbible.com and you can find the ESV at http://www.ibiblespace.org/cgi-bin/iphone. So now I can leave my ink and paper Bible at home and read from my iPhone….probably much like the rich young ruler probably would have. Snap!

Links:

• NET Bible: WAP and iPhone
• ESV: Mobile and iPhone
• iPhone Bible App Roundup (for more versions)

Genesis 22 is a very difficult passage because God commands something that He forbid in Genesis 9:6. Christians generally accept this passage as a great display of faith, but from a secular point of view God is usually in the wrong. The question usually debated is what do you do when God tells you to do something that is immoral. Christians generally laugh this off by saying God was just making sure Abraham had true faith. I think Christians should debate this a little more. God strictly forbid murder, but commands it later. When we feel led by God to do something today, how do we know if it is from the Lord or somewhere else? Usually we would turn to the Bible and see if it lines up with Scripture, but what if there is a contradiction like this one?

I would think that Isaac would have a firm understanding of his place in his father’s eyes after this event. He now knows for sure that he is not the most important thing to Abraham. I wonder how that affected his relationship with his father. I would guess that this was not a story that was often relived at family dinners.

Regardless of the morality of the command, it did serve as a final testing of Abraham’s faith and we likely realize how small ours is in comparison. God assures Abraham that He will fulfill His promise and make a great nation through him and Isaac. And the lineage of Abraham’s brother was probably placed here because Rebekah will be introduced into the story soon to help continue that promise.

So after all of the doubt, Isaac, the promised son, is born in Genesis 21 and everyone is happy. Until Sarah sees Ishmael laughing. Last chapter when Sarah agreed to lie for Abraham and be taken by Abimelech, it seemed that women were very submissive and their role was to do as they are told. But this time Sarah comes across as very bold and tells Abraham to get rid of Hagar and Ishmael. So I am still confused because sometimes the women are portrayed as almost slaves that do what they told and sometimes they have the right to speak their minds as they wish.

I wonder if God had in mind the same thing Abraham did when He gave the go-ahead to kick out Ishmael and Hagar. Abraham was a pretty wealthy guy and I feel like he could have given her more than bread and one thing of water. He probably could have given her servants and livestock. I am sure God was indifferent because He planned to provide for her anyways, but I would think He would want Abraham to send her off with a little more.

In the last part we see Abraham as a good business man as well. Abimelech is obviously more powerful and wealthy than Abraham, so it is wise for Abraham to make this alliance. I think the importance of the well is something lost on us because we have running water. A well is no easy thing to dig by hand and it can be your only source of water, so it is something worth giving up a couple lamb for.

Dr. Peter Venkman: This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions.
Mayor: What do you mean, “biblical”?
Dr Ray Stantz: What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor, real wrath-of-God type stuff.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Exactly.
Dr Ray Stantz: Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies. Rivers and seas boiling.
Dr. Egon Spengler: Forty years of darkness. Earthquakes, volcanoes…
Winston Zeddemore: The dead rising from the grave.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together - mass hysteria.