Bible Study for Dummies

I was raised in the Catholic Church.
Up until my 5th grade year when we moved to Kansas, my sisters and I attended private schools.
Our parents took us to Church every Sunday.

Well let me clarify that.
Our parents “dropped us off” at church every Sunday!
As we prayed, confessed, communed, knelt, stood, and knelt again…
They were enjoying coffee and bagels and reading the Sunday paper.
When we moved to Switzerland there were only minor changes to this routine.
Our mass was in Latin and they munched on croissants!

Ironically, once settled in the Bible belt itself, they stopped sending us to Church all together.
Maybe they thought that the strong Christian values we were surrounded with in this small Midwestern town would be enough to sustain our good morals and virtues.
More likely though, it was the fact that not only was a good bagel nonexistent in this town, but the newspaper got delivered to their door.
There was no longer a compelling reason for them to leave the house on Sunday mornings!

After all… we three kids had all celebrated our First Holy Communions, been Confirmed and had a total of 37 years of catechism classes between us.
We’d indeed been churched!

Now ask me what I know about the Bible.
Stunned, awkward silence.
“Nada” would not be an over-exaggeration.

Oh I’ve tried.
I’ve got the King James Version, the New International Version, the 365 Day bible and the Bible for Women.
I have more books on Spirituality then I do Rachel Ray cookbooks.
Those, I can handle.

But the Bible…
It intimidates me, frustrates me, bores me and gives me an extreme headache from its tiny little font.
That said...it keeps drawing me back to it.
I want to know it, I want to understand it, I want to read it.

But I can’t do it alone.
I’ve failed too many times that way.
So bring in the cavalry...
AKA: Bible Study for Dummies.

This is a small group of friends we’ve put together who feel similar to the way I do.
Suffice it to say, we’re all Biblically challenged.
Our leader, who was not brought up in the church as a youngster is no dummy!
She has studied the Bible for the last 11 years.
She knows it, she understands it, and she lives it.
She too is presented with a big challenge…the rest of us!

Last night, at our first meeting, we learned that both the Old and New Testament were written over a period of 1500 years, with 400 years of silence between them.

Whew!
That alleviates some pressure.
If it took that long to write it, with so many authors…
It’s clearly not an easy read!
But maybe I can get through it with a little help from my friends.

So here I go.
But hey…if you’ve read it…don’t spoil the ending for me!
I want to find it out for myself.

(Come on…that was a joke!!!)