SNAPSHOT 1

A Very Fine Place to Start


Intro to Genesis:


Starting the Bible is always scary and exciting.  Most people go right to Jesus, which is good destination.  But you learn so much about Jesus going back to the beginning.   I like to think about the fact that Jesus sat down and read all of these things, too.  He quoted people and talked about OT verses fluently in his ministry.  I do not think most people had scrolls of their own, and I wonder if he haunted the Temple as a child and teen.   Maybe the word was just already with him, he was the word after all.  Either way, I want to know what Jesus knew as part of my goal of discovering the “Who” of God.


Genesis is not named after a guy, so it is hard to tell who wrote it.  I looked to see what the Bibleheads (my pet name for theologians and apologists) had to say about it.  They say it was written by Moses.  Other books of the Bible (2 Kings, 1 Chron, Matt, Luke and John) also say it is part of Mosaic law.  Mosaic is a weird sort of possessive form of the name Moses.  He is treated like a period in history (Jurassic).  Can you imagine if we used that form in normal life?  That is a Stevaic jacket.  We sort of give Moses his own possessive form.  I am pretty sure nobody else in the Bible gets that.  Not even Jesusaic things.  Weird.  Sorry, rabbit hole.  


Moses did not see these events described in Genesis, so I like to imagine Moses sitting on a rock on Mt. Sinai while God tells him this story about the beginning.  Genesis gives us an origin story for everything except God.  We will learn about the origin of the world, humans, the first relationships with God, of families, and many other things.  So much in here.  So, let's start at the beginning, it is a very fine place to start.