St. Irenaeus Ministries

Isaac prayed that his wife Rebekah have a child, and she had twins, Esau and Jacob. Jacob was born grasping Esau's heel, which is prophetic given how he would later contend with God, and references to this can be seen in Hosea 12 and Micah 1. Jacob convinces Esau to give away his birthright in a moment of hunger. When a famine fell upon the land, Jacob went to Gerar, and Abimelech, the king. God t...

Sarah dies and Abraham makes a contract with the Hittites to purchase  a plot of land to bury Sarah. Nearing the end of his life, Abraham  instructs his servant that Isaac must not take a Canaanite wife, but  rather a wife from Abraham's country. When he has done this, Isaac  must settle in the land of Canaan, which God has promised for him. The servant prays that God might give a sign identifying...

Lot leaves Zoar, and his daughters wanted to have children, so they got Lot drunk so that they might get pregnant by him, and through Lot they bear Moab and Ben-ammi, the origin of the Moabites and Ammonites. Abraham goes to Gerar, where he encounters Abimelech. Abimelech, not knowing that Sarah is married, wants to add her to his harem, but God, wishing to preserve the lineage of Isaac, tells Abi...

God promises Abram that he will be the father of a multitude of nations, and thus names him Abraham, which is a name that bears similarity to other words that mean father of a multitude. The covenant comes with a command to be circumcised. God promises that Abraham will have a child from Sarah, who laughs when she hears it, because she had been infertile and now she was much older. Abraham shows t...

After rescuing Lot, a priest named Melchizedek blesses Abram with a sacrifice of bread and wine, and Abram gives him a tenth of everything. Heb 7:9ff says that Levi, who receives tithes, tithes through Abraham, and that if Christ is a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek (as Ps 110 says), He would have to have an indestructible life. Abram knows that his descendents will be numerous, but...

Abram's family comes from Ur of the Chaldeans. Abram's father, Terah, meant to move to Canaan, but only came as far as Haran. God calls Abram to Canaan. There is some confusion over some of the dating in the text, but we know that from Acts 7, Abram did not move until after his father died. God promises the land to Abram's children, and Abram builds an altar there. This is the first of several tim...

After the flood, God gives Noah and his family the land to populate, but instructs them that they are not to eat animals with their blood, as life is in the blood. This is one of the laws that the Council of Jerusalem stated apply to Gentiles. Noah grows a vineyard, and becomes drunk and naked. His son Ham sees him in his vulnerable state and does nothing to help, though his brothers clothe Noah....

Though there are poetic elements of the creation account in Genesis, there are important things that are related in Genesis. There was a first man and first woman, and they fell from grace due to man's sin, and though they have an adversary in Satan, God does not abandon them, even though the effects of sin are immediately visible in Cain. Genesis states that the sons of God had children with the...

Genesis 2 gives us another perspective on creation with an emphasis on man. Man is given the land to cultivate, and Adam is given Eve to help him. God instructs Adam not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, but he eats deliberately, knowing that this is a sin, and that it is grave matter. This meets the criteria of mortal sin. We can see the effects of Adam's sin immediately...

The first twelve chapters of Genesis concern the origin of Man. The creation is structured into seven days, but appears to be a thematic categorization of creation into ages, as the word for day is used shortly thereafter to also mean an era. The universe was created by God, who existed before everything else and created it out of nothing.

Much of the scholarship of the book of Genesis from the 18th century to the early 20th century was based on Wellhausen's Documentary Hypothesis that the Torah was collated from multiple sources based on various factions. The evidence for this comes from the type of content in portions of the Torah, and in particular the words used for the name of God. The theory proposes that there were four autho...

Genesis is a book of origins, as the name suggests, but it is in many ways more addressed in the New Testament than the Old Testament. Genesis, along with the next four books of the Bible, was substantially written by Moses, though some portions, such as the death of Moses in Deuteronomy, may have been written or edited by others. Genesis' origin differs profoundly from the Semitic origin stories...

In strong terms, Paul commands the people not to associate with those who live in idleness. This is not simply lending a helping hand to those who are down on their luck, but to those who refuse to work and simply live on others and gossip. Paul commands such people to attend to their work quietly. In contrast, 1 Cor 5:9ff describes a situation where those who are wicked must be driven out, but th...

The second coming will be a terrible day for some, but it will be the end of the journey for the faithful. Paul prays that the word of the Lord speed on as the Thessalonians have been doing and are continuing to do. Paul prays that God directs His people to Himself.

The book of Daniel predicts that a desolating sacrilege will appear in the temple. People had thought that the desecration of the temple in the time of the Maccabees was this, but Jesus says that this is yet to come. This is an antichrist who will cause sacrifice to cease. There will be a tribulation and while some will make it to the day of the Lord, some who remain faithful will die before getti...

Paul addresses the likely reason for this second letter, a misapprehension of the second coming. Some had been caught up in the belief that the second coming had happened or was about to happen soon. This idea may have come from a false letter of Paul. The end times will be accompanied by a man who is against God's law but who exalts himself over God, and this was something that the people would h...

When the Lord is revealed on the last day, He will be revealed from Heaven, in power, and in the fire of justice, which may or may not also be a literal fire. God will punish those who do not know God and refuse to obey Him. Yet it is by God's grace that we may know Him.

Thessalonica is growing in faith. Paul's catechesis is an exercise in growing in holiness. The Thessalonians were eager to hear the good news and were preparing for the second coming. Paul sees that they have already grown in love, and Christians must have love to care for their fellow Christians. On the last day, those who persecuted Christians will be judged as well as those who were persecuted,...

Paul instructs Christians to encourage those in our communities who may be struggling in faith, calling on similar statements in Colossians 3 and Romans 12.

Paul tells is that we must be prepared for the end times, and not be in the dark like the rest of mankind. Isaiah 59 may have been in Paul's mind when he wrote this section. Paul uses a metaphor of armor here that is similar to the one in Ephesians but with different metaphors.

Paul instructs Christians not to shun manual labor but to engage others in their lives in Christian love so that we are command the respect of others. We must be blameless and holy on the last day, since it will be on that state that we will be judged. There will not be a period in which some are left behind or a Rapture, and we must celebrate the death of any righteous man as he returns to God.

Paul calls Christians to catechize and root the new disciples in faith and in practice, but he focuses on three issues in chapter 4 under the subject of holiness: sexual issues, love of the brotherhood, and those Christians who have died. For Christians, it is vitally important that they do not give those who would oppose them an excuse that a sexual scandal might afford, and Paul uses language to...

Paul is driven to Athens and preaches there, but is not able to return to Thessalonica to continue preaching there, and sends a letter back to them explaining his great desire to return there with Timothy. Paul also says that we must be vigorous in our faith, even to the point of suffering.

Paul did not preach for prestige or glory, unlike other false teachers. He has worked intensely and personally with the people to make people's lives worthy of God. In Philippians 1:6 and Philippians 2:13, Paul speaks of how God works through us to bring His work to completion. Paul is deeply grieved by his inability to get back to Thessalonica.

When Saul first encountered the Christian faith, he would have been offended that a man who claimed to be the Messiah was hung on a tree, and such men are described as being cursed. Paul visits Cyprus as part of his first missionary journey, and they have a disagreement as to whether the Gentile converts must become Jews first by circumcision, which Paul is opposed to. Paul returns to Antioch, and...