As we start reading through the Bible in Chronological order, it’s worth asking why we should do it. To answer, ask yourself, why read any story in the order that the events happened?
The answers are obvious. With the exception of the use of flashbacks or other literary devices, we need to read and experience events and character development in their natural time-dictated sequence for the story to make sense, for us to know the characters, and to care about what happens to them. In a non-fiction book we have to know the premise, the background, the arguments for the practical recommendations that follow for them to make sense.
To illustrate the truth of this:
Jump into the middle of a Harry Potter story with Muggles, Quidditch, Dumbledore, and Hogwarts
Open at random a book from Hunger Game Trilogy and read about Mockingjays, Panem, and the Twelve Districts
Open a book on the popular Paleo diet find these terms: paleo/primal, autoimmune protocols, leaky guts, and ketogenic
All of the above are nothing more than a confusing list of names and terms if you don’t read the entire book but they would all make perfectly good sense if you read the entire book from start to finish and meet each term in context.
It’s no different with the Bible
For someone who did not grow up listening to Bible stories or perhaps grew up in church and wasn’t paying much attention, how much sense does it make when you hear about Shem, Jeroboam, and Barnabas or about atonement, sanctification, and justification?
We wouldn’t claim to know the least bit about the Hunger Games or the Paleo diet if we only dipped into a few pages of each book here and there, even if we had favorite pages we went back to again and again, so why do we think we know the Bible when for many Christian they have:
- Never read it all the way through
- Or ever read it in Chronological Order