Jason Boyett - Pocket Guide to the Bible: A Little Book about the Big Book

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Table of Contents

Informative, thoughtful, humorous in all the right places; and best of all, its smartly written!

CHRIS YAMBAR, Bart Simpson Comics, Mr. Beat creator

I usually dont laugh out loud when I read the Bibleor even stuff about the Biblebut Jason Boyett had me laughing all the way through this book. Laughs aside, the Pocket Guide is well researched and documented, instructive and insightful.

DEAN NELSON, co-author of The Power of Serving Others and director of the journalism program at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego

Jason Boyett dips the King James into a cultural vat of theological salsa. One bite and you know this aint your grandpas Bible.

TERRY ESAU, author of Surprise Me

Most books dont move me to read Leviticus. Weirdly, this one does.

MATTHEW PAUL TURNER, speaker and author of The Christian Culture Survival Guide and Mind Games: Advice, Stories, and Truth for Thinking Free

Jasons first Pocket Guide left me shaking my head with a grin and a healthy appetite for more.This new book exceeded my expectations. Reading it is like staying up late with that old friend from seminary. He just wont shut up, and youre not about to ask him to, cause youre loving every second of it.

ANDREW OSENGA, singer/songwriter with Caedmons Call

A true sign of brilliance is the ability to explain the complex and convoluted simply. Jason Boyett has done that in Pocket Guide to the Bible. His clever and conversational style makes it an enjoyable as well as intruging read.

RUSSELL RATHBUN, author of Post-Rapture Radio

INTRODUCTION

In the beginning was the Word. At least, thats what some people call it. Others know it as the Good Book, the Holy Scriptures, or the Law and the Prophets. But to most of us? Its the Bible.

The thing came together a couple millennia ago and covers a few thousand years of human history. Readers of the Bible occasionally dispute its authorship. Some people think the book was written by God himself, whispering in the ears of a few dozen holy scribes way back in the Middle East. Others think those who wrote it were decent guys, perhaps more attuned to God than most, who got the Creators point across despite subjecting the text to their own personal whims and limitations and primitive perspectives. And some people think the authors were all just a bunch of delusional wack-jobs out to justify their own misguided beliefs.

Something like 168,000 new Bibles are sold, given away, or otherwise distributed every day.

But dont let the controversy keep you from enjoying the Bible, because theres good stuff in there. Just about everyone can find something of benefit.

Steadfast believers love the Bible, even though right in the middle of itin Psalms, which a lot of people cite as among their favorite books of the Biblethe authors repeatedly call into question Gods faithfulness. And his presence. Even his existence. Nonbelievers and skeptics enjoy the Bible too because this collection of ancient documents packs a variety of literary styles, influential language, and beloved stories about human naturebeneficial material, whether or not they think any of its true.

I believe the Bible is the best gift God has ever given to man. All the good from the Savior of the world is communicated to us through this book.

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)

Uptight moralists adore the Bible despite its explicit references to sex and immorality. Cautious mommies and daddies read this book to their kids, even though parts of it detail some of the most horrific violence in human history. Politicians and judges swear on it, even though they occasionally object to it being displayed in public.

Its a book that has inspired, at various times, the decisions of great leaders of mankind and the obsessions of serial killers. Abolitionists used it to justify their actions. So did slaveholders. It drove Martin Luther King Jr. to push for civil rights while fueling the lynch mobs who opposed him. It has convinced presidents to go to war. It has convinced presidents to embrace peace.

The Bible has motivated its readers to tend the sick, feed the poor, shelter the homeless, educate the uneducated, and fight for the oppressed. It also motivated the Crusades. And the Inquisition. And apartheid.

It gives us joyful holidays like Christmas and Easter. It gives us doomsday prophets and end-of-the-world predictions.

Its stuffed with passages commanding believers to love one another and live in Spirit-led unity.These passages are read by Roman Catholics, Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Southern Baptists, National Baptists, ELCA Lutherans, Missouri Synod Lutherans, Methodists, Episcopalians, African Methodist Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Charismatics, Pentecostals, Assemblies of God, Nazarenes, Quakers, Churches of Christ, Disciples of Christ, Churches of God in Christ, Bible churches, and a steaming stew of nondenominational congregations.

Jews dig the Bible. At least the first part, which they call the Torah and which Christians call the Old Testament. But Jewish readers arent so interested in the New Testament, on account of all the Jesus stuff.

Christians dig it, too.Theyre all about the New Testament, but tend to forget about most of the Old Testament, except for the first few chapters of Genesis and a handful of childhood Sunday school stories.

Yes, the Bible is an interesting book.Which is why nine out of ten American households own at least one copy, according to a 2005 update from the Barna Research Group. Its why six out of ten Americans confess to reading the Bible every once in a while, according to a 2000 Gallup poll.Yet most of us Bible readers dont know Ezra from Esther or Zephaniah from Zechariah. Few of us can list all four Gospels or recite half of the Ten Commandments. A majority of us cant even identify who delivered the Sermon on the Mount.

Thats why you need this booka handy, easy-to-read, occasionally amusing guide to the Bible and its characters, events, translations, and history. Why? Because the Bible is the all-time best-selling book, one that most people own but apparently dont read, that lots of people read but apparently dont understand, and that people allegedly understand but in a way that makes them jerks.

Lets see what the Pocket Guide can do about that.

The Gideons International distributes more than one million free Bibles every week. Which means people are stealing them from hotel rooms, and the Gideons are cool with that.

BIBLICABULARY (A GLOSSARY OF THE GOOD BOOK)

Sure, a lot of Christians act as if a person can just crack the Bible open and suddenly discover Gods plan for his or her life. But lets be honest, right here at the start: the Bible is not that easy. Its a difficult book. Its stacked with unfamiliar terms, exotic concepts, and complex systems of thought that germinate in the Old Testament and ooze into the New Testament andhey, whats the difference between the two testaments anyway? And while were at it, how can you distinguish an epistle from an apostle? The exile from the exodus? A Pharisee from a Sadducee?

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