I was really convicted of the life that Abraham lived. What a relationship Abraham must’ve had in order to negotiate for Sodom and Gomorrah. What’s even more interesting, is God blessing Ishmael on behalf of Abraham. I must’ve skipped over this part when I read it in the past, because I always assumed that Issac is the only blessed son because he was promised to Abraham, and the line in which Christ will arise. Yet in Genesis 17:20, God also promises to bless Ishmael and make him fruitful and multiply greatly. While the covenant is established with Issac, Ishmael who essentially fathered the Muslim world is also blessed by God. It really puts things into perspective in knowing that God is sovereign above the conflicts that are taking place in the Middle East, and that He has a plan to ultimately bring the Muslim world to HIM as well.

Genesis 4:7 – “If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.”

NLT says “But you must subdue it and be its master.”

KJV says “And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.”   (Interesting sidenote, KJV Genesis 3:16 says “and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.”  NIV Genesis 3:16 says “Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.”  Both NIV and KJV use Strongs # 04910 for rule in Genesis 3:16, but NIV uses a different word for Genesis 4:7.)

Anyway, it’s interesting because I normally think of being weaker than sin, and getting run over by it, giving into it (and granted, without Jesus’ help, I am).  However, this is a reminder that sin can be mastered.  In light of this, when Paul speaks of being a slave to righteousness rather than a slave to sin, one can see that this carries on to not only be a slave to righteousness, but a master to sin as well.

A pattern that best encapsulates how sin arises: (Based on Gen. 3:6, 6:2)

- See (Eve “saw the fruit”, the sons of God “saw the daughters of man”)
- Attractive/Good (“tree was good for food…delight to the eyes”, “daughters of man were attractive”)
- Take (“she took of its fruit and ate”, “took as their wives any they chose”)

So yeah…this is just an observation as to how all sin usually tends to fall into this cycle, where the sin occurs when the third step of “taking” is actually committed. And yet, it is so easy to succumb into the temptation of attractiveness. I know for me personally, all three can take place at an instance (I’m talking to someone, find (SEE) that I may make myself look more impressive (ATTRACTIVE) by telling a lie, and immediately allow my pride to TAKE over by telling the false statement) or it can be drawn out over a long time with manipulative actions. These first two readings were a good reminder for me to prepare for my SATs.

Just setting up a place for discussion on Genesis. I know we’ve only read chapters 1-3 so far, so you might not have much to talk about yet, but feel free to drop a comment, introduce yourself in the author’s section, etc.

Question: What are we doing again?
Answer: We are reading the Bible, specifically the NIV translation over a period of 2 years. We took a standard 1 year bible reading plan and assigned each reading amount to two days instead of one. A few of us tried to read the MSG translation last year and discuss it via gmail conversation threads, but it proved too fast paced. This is our second attempt at having a community discussion through the Bible.

Question: Why are we blogging and posting and commenting? Isn’t quite times all about alone 1-1 time with God?
Answer: Great question. These readings are not intended to replace your current style of “quite times”, “personal devotions”, or what ever you call it. One of the hopes of this project is to study the Bible communally, which is somewhat lacking in our culture because we emphasize individuality, where as it was very much an aspect of Jewish culture and the early church. We chose this medium of blogging because it allows us to converse without the limits of space and time, meaning that we don’t have to read the Bible all in one place at one time.

Question: How do I know what we are reading and when?
Answer: The reading will be posted and categorized under the category “Reading Plans” to your right for easy access.

Question: What are my responsibilities as an author?
Answer:
1. Try your best to keep up with the reading. If you choose to post, try your best to post about a particular reading within a few days of the actual day that everyone else read it (ideally the same day).
2. Please be polite when posting and commenting. We encourage you to challenge ideas and to stand firm in what you believe, but this community is not a council to decide what is right and wrong beliefs. Instead this is an open forum to bounce ideas between each other in hopes of catching glimpses of how big God really is.
3. Try your best to contribute, whether it be a post or a comment. Sharing your ideas and your thoughts on paper for others to read and respond to helps us learn from each other(’s successes and mistakes).

Question: What if I fall really far behind in the reading?
Answer: That is okay! As we discovered last year, it happens to all of us (except Joe). If you do fall really far behind, we ask that you jump ahead to the current reading so you can participate in the current discussions (even if your context is not as developed).

Question: I don’t want to be apart of the regular authors anymore.
Answer: That is okay too, though we would be very sorry to see you leave, we aren’t going to hold you to any contract. Our hope is that this site is not a burden to you, but a catalyst in your relationship with God.

Question: How often should I post?
Answer: It is completely up to you. Post as much or as little as you would like or feel you have something to contribute.

Question: What should I write in a post?
Answer: For starters, we suggest that you list the text you are commenting on and then the comment itself appended by any pertinent websites that you feel readers might be interested in for more information or that you yourself gleaned information from. Also, please use the category tags when posting so that readers can easily find posts by topic. If you are posting about a chapter in Genesis, at the very minimum your post should be in the “Genesis” and the “NIV in 2 Years” category.

Question: I signed up via your email invite, but I am not familiar with wordpress. How do I post? help!?!?
Answer: We will do our best to guide you through the interface, just ask. Click the “Log in” button under the Meta category at the bottom of the right sidebar. After logging in, click “Write” and select the categories on the right side bar that you want to label your post with.

Question: Should I correct other people’s posts?
Answer: If it’s a typo, please do. Otherwise, editing and stealing (for which I am already guilty) of other people’s posts is frowned upon.

Question: How do I sign up?
Answer: Invitation only, just contact me and I will send you an invite to set up a wordpress account which you will use to log in and post to this site (the log in link is at the bottom right of this page, under the Meta subtitle on the sidebar). Make sure to add your author profiler by: logging in, clicking site admin (also under meta), clicking manage, clicking pages, clicking edit for the authors page.

Please Comment any other questions you have, and I will update this post with answers.

The following reading plan is for the book of Genesis. There are links to biblegateway.com for your convenience.

[] Nov 1-2 Genesis 1-3
[] Nov 3-4 Genesis 4-6
[] Nov 5-6 Genesis 7-9
[] Nov 6-7 Genesis 10-12
[] Nov 8-9 Genesis 13-15
[] Nov 10-11 Genesis 16-18
[] Nov 12-13 Genesis 19-21
[] Nov 14-15 Genesis 22-24
[] Nov 16-17 Genesis 25-27
[] Nov 18-19 Genesis 28-30
[] Nov 20-21 Genesis 31-33
[] Nov 22-23 Genesis 34-36
[] Nov 24-25 Genesis 37-39
[] Nov 26-27 Genesis 40-42
[] Nov 28-29 Genesis 43-46
[] Nov 30 – Dec 1 Genesis 47-50

So just testing it out to see if it works

thanks for setting up the site Daniel!

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