From Genesis to Revelation: The Bible as a Christian Framework

What I think I now understand is that the substance of the Bible, its fundamental message, is how God created us, pursued us through Israel, redeemed us in Christ, poured out the Spirit upon us, and seeks to recreate us in the image of Christ both now and in the new heaven and new earth. [1]

The Bible is perhaps the most studied book on the planet. For thousands of years, religious leaders and academics have tirelessly poured over the intensely complex volume spanning over 40 different authors, 1200 years, and four different languages. Whole university departments exist for this endeavor. The magnitude of the importance of the Bible is understandable given its central role to the Christian faith.. Where secular scholars at these universities see the Bible merely as a valuable literary work, Christians believe the Bible to be the Word of God. They base this belief on the remarkable reliability of the text, the unique durability of its tradition, and its uncanny ability to provide personal guidance for people across history derived from and found within the story of redemption the Bible tells of the person of Christ. The challenge with reading the Bible is that its complexity can easily confuse readers into believing that the text is an exact framework for life rather than a narrative.

This shortfall of many Christians has been to see the Bible as an instruction manual for their lives rather than as the story of the promise of life. In his book, Searching for the Pattern: My Journey in Interpreting the Bible, Dr. John Mark Hicks describes how viewing the Bible as a blueprint—to use his language—has not only led to division in individual church congregations but also in the whole body of churches. This mentality can lead to using the Bible to magnify theological minutiae like whether instrumental worship is permitted. After growing up during an intense period of distancing and controversy over these rather unimportant issues between the Churches of Christ (a denomination defined by total autonomy of each congregation and a reliance only on the Bible for guidance), Dr. Hicks came to realize that these churches viewed some pattern as sacrosanct: “Problems arose…when the method was inappropriately applied, and that is what we debated, unfortunately, to the point of division” [2]. Differences in the interpretation of the Bible’s passages spelled that a congregation was not worshiping in the correct way. As such, many of these churches trended toward a theology of rule-following while disdaining the congregations that were insufficiently rigid. To combat this dogmatism, Dr. Hicks argues that Christians should approach the Bible as a formula for living instead of as a set of rules. In reading the Bible, “we seek the heart of God, desire to imitate God, share life with God, and embody the life of God in our practices” [3]. That is, placing the person of Jesus at the center of the church is the answer to the orthopraxy question. Being Christian centers around following Christ. To follow effectively, one must be familiar with the story that provides the theological foundation of the Church.

The Biblical narrative starts in Genesis with God’s creating the heavens, the earth, everything on the Earth, and mankind in six days. God creates Eve to join the first man Adam in the Garden of Eden. They live in peace and without sin. Some time later, a serpent approaches Eve and tricks her into eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil despite God’s having instructed her and her husband to stay away from it. After Eve’s eating some of its fruit and giving some to Adam, God expels them from the garden to prevent them from eating of the Tree of Life. Many generations after their expulsion, God deems mankind to be so sinful that He will wipe them from the face of the Earth. For his fidelity, God instructs Noah to create a large boat to house him, his family, and a pair of each kind of animal during the worldwide flood. Having survived catastrophe, Noah’s sons repopulate the Earth. 

Many years later, God appears to a man named Abram who has no children. God promises Abram, “You shall be the father of a multitude of nations,” and renames him Abraham [4]. Despite her old age, Abraham’s wife Sarah has a son whom they name Isaac. Abraham obeys God throughout his life, and God strengthens their covenant as a result. Isaac marries and has twin sons. The younger, named Jacob, cheats his older brother for the inheritance and flees. Jacob meets God in the wilderness while hiding from his brother, and God renames him Israel. Israel has twelve sons and shows favoritism to his son Joseph by giving him a coat composed of many different colors. Joseph’s brothers become jealous of their father’s attention, and they sell Joseph into slavery to Egyptians. God meets with Joseph in prison and grants him gifts of interpretation that Joseph uses to befriend Pharaoh. Joseph interprets a dream foretelling famine, and Pharaoh appoints Joseph to oversee all grain storage. When the famine arrives, Joseph’s brothers travel to Egypt to buy some food. Joseph forgives his brothers, and the sons of Israel settle in Egypt. 

The fledgling nation of Israel grows so large that a new Pharaoh deems them a threat to his sovereignty. This Pharaoh forces the Israelites into hard labor. In the mountains, God appoints an exiled Israelite named Moses to free the Israelites from Pharaoh. When Pharaoh resists, God plaguesEgypt until Pharoah concedes. In a final act, God destroys the pursuing Egyptian army in the Red Sea. On their way to the land promised to Abraham, the Israel people rebel many times against God and Moses. While in the desert, God refuses to let this generation of Israelites enter the promised lands.. Moses dies and leaves leadership to a man named Joshua who leads the Israelites into the land of Canaan, the lands belonging to Abraham. A series of religious and political leaders called judges rule and correct the Israelites when they oppose God. The last of these judges, a prophet named Samuel, anoints Saul as the first king of Israel. The crown corrupts Saul, and God instructs Samuel to select David, a young shepherd-boy as the next king. Saul opposes this anointing but leaves the throne open for David when he dies in battle. God promises David that his lineage will lead the people of God forever. 

David and his sons are rife in corruption. During the reigns of these kings, many prophets roam throughout Israel and begin to prophesy about a coming leader called the Messiah—the contemporary and modern Jews believe that to be a great political leader would reestablish the Davidic kingdom—for Israel [5]. After many tumultuous generations, the Assyrians conquer the northern kingdom of Israel. Though the southern kingdom of Judah barely survives the Assyrians, the Davidic line falls to King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon roughly 150 years later. The Bablyonians destroy the Temple and take many of the prominent Israelites from Jerusalem as plunder. When Cyrus of Persia conquers the Babylonian empire and allows the Israelites to return to the region, they rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem and reestablish Jewish religious practice. More prophets emerge and continue to foretell the coming Messiah. With renewal of Israel, the narrative pauses for several hundred years.  

The story resumes with the birth of John the Baptist. John lives a hermit’s life in the wilderness and foretells the coming of the Jewish Messiah. This Messiah, whom Christians believe to be a descendant of David named Jesus, is born to the virgin Mary in the town of Bethlehem during the reign of the Roman emperor Augustus. Jesus grew up working as a carpenter in Nazareth until about 30 years of age. At this time, Jesus begins to travel, preach, and perform miracles. He gathers many disciples of whom he chooses twelve to be his inner circle (this group he calls apostles). Crowds become amazed at Jesus’ teaching in the form of parables (short, fictional, often confusing stories). After three years, he arrives in Jerusalem where the Jewish religious leaders arrest him on charges of blasphemy because Jesus has claimed on many occasions to be God. The Jewish high court, the Sanhedrin, brings the matter before the governor of the province of Judaea under the emperor Tiberius, Pontius Pilate, and demands that Jesus be executed. Fearing a Jewish revolt, Pilate orders Jesus to be crucified. After Jesus dies on a cross, a man named Simon takes Jesus’s body and places it into a tomb. The Jewish leaders, to prevent someone’s stealing Jesus’s body, seal the tomb with a large stone and place Roman guards at its entrance. Three days after Jesus’ being buried, some women find his tomb empty. They immediately report to Jesus’s apostles, and Jesus himself appears to them all. After remaining on Earth for a little while and appearing to several hundred of his followers, He leaves them with the final command to “go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” [6]. Then, Jesus ascends to Heaven.

The Holy Spirit descends upon the apostles during the Jewish feast of Pentecost. He gives them many spiritual gifts and prompts them to spread the news of Jesus across the world. These apostles begin to preach all over the region and disperse as far as India by tradition. During this rapid expansion, a Jewish scribe named Saul begins killing Christians. On the road to the city of Damascus, the image of Jesus confronts Saul and converts him. Formerly Saul, the convert Paul joins the rest of the apostles in developing churches across the Mediterranean. By the end of the first century AD, many well-established Christian churches exist around the Roman world and into Africa. All the apostles have died at the hands of some political or religious authority save for the apostle John who died naturally, exiled to the island of Patmos. While in exile, John has a symbolic vision and writes Revelation. With the final words of the last apostle, the written Biblical narrative ends. 

The story of the Bible is a new covenant between God and His creation. Through the history of the Jewish people and the life of Jesus of Nazareth, God establishes with us the promise of reconciliation. As Dr. Hicks describes the construction, “The Hebrew Scriptures give us the lens to read the story of God in Jesus as part of the plot of God’s scheme of redemption from the beginning and see the depth of Jesus’s life and teaching in relation to the story of God” [7]. The Old Testament serves to give reason and context for the new promise that Jesus gives to his followers. The promise of reunification with God and of conquest over death (like Christ rose from the grave) through the gift of the Holy Spirit empowers Christians to build personal relationships with God. Therefore, Jesus is the defining miracle of the Christian faith—not the book or the story. Christians revere the Bible because it is both Christ’s example for living (thus, is helpful for instructing how the Church body functions) and, more importantly, the assurance of salvation from sin. Keeping these ideas at the center of the Christian faith helps to unify the churches across denominations and to keep them from dividing over squabble.

1. Hicks, John Mark. Searching for the Pattern: My Journey in Interpreting the Bible. 2019. Page 186.
2. Ibid. 58-59.
3. Ibid. 105.
4. Genesis 17:4-5 ESV
5. Several of these prophecies can be found in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Amos, Zechariah, and Malachi.
6. Matthew 28:19 ESV
7. Hicks, John Mark. Searching for the Pattern: My Journey in Interpreting the Bible. 2019. Page 183.