Our Great Commission Mission

Janelle and Laurie Ann, you are currently my only subscribers, though I will advertise this on Facebook today. I am finally getting started on this. Today you will get the PLAN.

It is important to start each Bible study by asking God to open up your eyes to spiritual things, to show you why Jesus is so important, and to show you anything he wants you to learn in the Bible study.

The whole Bible is about Jesus. We will study that at some point.

The line breaks are pauses. The subject changes slightly at each line.

You should look up that passage and set your eyes on it. It is good to do this with any passage you are not fully familiar with. If you are not comfortable with finding things in the Bible, make good use of the table of contents.

The New Testament was written all in Greek, except perhaps Matthew. It might have been written in Hebrew. We only have the Greek copy of Matthew, though, so it might as well have been written in Greek. The Greek word for "Gospel" is euangelino. It literally means "good news."

The good news that Jesus is talking about can be found in Matthew 16:14-20 and John 20:31. "John" means the Gospel of John. His letters are abbreviated "1 John," "2 John," and "3 John."

Look up Matthew 16:14-20 and John 20:31.

You need to know that christus is a Greek word that means "anointed." That is where we got the word Christ. "Christ" is not Jesus' last name. It means "anointed."

The Old Testament is mostly written in Hebrew. Their word for "anointed" is Meschiach. You may recognize that as close to the word "Messiah." Christ and Messiah mean the same thing and the same person, Jesus the Christ or Jesus the Messiah. Same thing. They also both mean "anointed."

Israel had kings from about 1000 B.C. to about 500 B.C. These kings were anointed with oil when they ascended to the throne. Priests were also anointed with oil, and some of Israel's prophets were as well.

Thus, many Israelites were "anointed," or "Messiah" or "Christ," but Israel was waiting for THE Messiah (Hebrew) or THE Christ (Greek).

Read Psalm 2.

As you read it, you will get an idea of why it was such a big deal that Peter said Jesus was the Christ and Son of God. You will understand why John said that believing that Jesus is Christ and Son of God can bring you life.

Next time we will talk about who the apostles are and what their job was. This will allow us to talk about how they preached the Gospel in the third Bible study.

For today, you might want to close by reading Mark 1:1 and Romans 1:1-5 (meaning The Epistle to the Romans, chapter 1, and verses 1 through 5).