John chapter 1 is basically a crash course in theology. And there is a detail in John 2:16 that I hadn't noticed before: Jesus drove the sheep and the oxen out of the Temple, but not the doves.
The sheep and the oxen could be and no doubt were re-captured, but the doves could not have been, and they were still needed for sacrifices. Jesus told the owners of the doves to take them out themselves, and why.
Another thing I noticed is that Nathanael was perhaps an autist: truth-oriented; was sitting under the fig tree before--alone?; compared Philip's news about Jesus with his background knowledge; and very quickly made the leap to declaring that Jesus was the Son of God and the King of Israel.
A boomer apologizes, albeit without much clarity.
"It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs," Jesus said; Matthew 15:26.
I recently understood that I am spending my life in rebuilding spiritual and practical foundations that had been foolishly undermined by previous generations.
Several months ago I was reading a nonfiction book by Christian author Paul Tournier, and made it about three-quarters of the way through before being drawn away to other things.
When I picked it up this last week and finished reading it, I found references to about a dozen Bible passages that had come up in my daily Bible readings in the interim, mostly obscure Old Testament personages with a variety of afflictions; Tournier was a Swiss doctor famous for connecting his Christianity with his medical practice.
I also read a Christian fiction book this last week: Deadline, by Randy Alcorn. One day, what I read in the book mirrored my morning Bible reading on that same day.
"A work of creation was three-fold, an earthly trinity to match the heavenly; the Creative Idea, timeless and passionate, which is the image of the Father; the Creative Energy, begotten of the idea and working in time, which is the image of the Word; the Creative Power, the meaning of the work and its response in the individual soul, which is the image of the indwelling Spirit."
-- P. D. James, summarizing Dorothy L. Sayers' description
