Bible stories

Indexes, The bad book

Have you ever noticed how the serpent in the garden of Eden didn’t actually tell any lies? Have you ever thought about the implications of God’s statement that Job had told the truth about him and that his friends had not? Did you spot the huge flaw in Joseph’s plan to save Egypt from the famine?

Have you noticed that despite how much the Bible tries to make him look bad, the guy with the talking donkey was a consistently obedient servant of God? Did you catch the fact that the story of Jonah is about God forcing someone to tell a lie? Or that when Daniel’s friends are disobeying the king so they won’t have to disobey God, the Bible suspiciously fails to mention what Daniel was doing at the time, and vice versa?

Probably not. Maybe you’ve never read the Bible. Maybe you’ve only read “sanitized” versions of the Bible that left out all the awkward parts. Maybe you’ve read the Bible, but you had preconceived ideas of how the stories were supposed to go and what the characters were supposed to be like, which got in the way of seeing what the Bible actually says.

Maybe you’re so familiar with certain passages that when you see them, you just recognize-and-ignore them, instead of thinking about what they’re saying. Maybe the relevant passages were just so far apart in the Bible that you forgot about one by the time you got to another, so you never realized what they imply if you put them together.

It’s easy to miss a lot of surprising things like these in the Bible, for one reason or another. In this monthly series of summarized Bible stories, I’m going to be making those things a lot harder to miss.

I will include a moral at the end of each story. Not all of them are good morals, and not all of them are ideas that Christians are likely to agree with, but they are all lessons that can be learned from the Bible’s stories. For the Parables, I will also include an interpretation at the end, so you can easily see what everything in the story represents.

Below is a list of the Bible stories I’ve published on this blog so far, as well as the rest of the stories I’ll be posting in the future. If you like these stories, you can subscribe to my blog to make sure you’ll get to read more stories as they come out each month. There are several ways you can stay updated, so find something that works for you:

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Or if you don’t want to wait a month for each new story, you can read more of my Bible stories right now on Patreon.

Contents

“History” Stories

These are the stories that the Bible presents as if they were true stories, as opposed to the Parables.

Pre-Settlement:

Stories from before the settlement of the ancient kingdom of Israel.

The Beginning

The Patriarchs

Children of Israel

Journey to the Promised Land

Wandering in the Wilderness

The Conquest Begins

Joshua Takes Over

United Kingdom of Israel:

Stories from when Israel and Judah were supposedly a single nation.

Days of the Judges

Samson and the Philistines

Transition to Monarchy

Reign of Saul

Saul vs David

Rise of David

Wives of David

Descendants of Kings

Fall of David

Divided Kingdoms of Israel and Judah:

Stories from when Israel and Judah were two separate kingdoms.

Kings of Israel

Adventures of the Prophets

Kings of Judah

Post-Exile:

Stories about the Jews after their kingdoms ended.

Pre-Roman Judea

  • Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, and Daniel (Daniel in the Lion’s Den)
  • Queen Esther

Life of Jesus

  • The Birth of Jesus (The Massacre of the Innocents)
  • John the Baptist
  • The Temptation of Jesus
  • The Calling of the Disciples (Fishing for People)
  • The Resurrection of Lazarus
  • The Crucifixion of Jesus

Early Christianity

  • Ananias and Sapphira
  • The Martyrdom of Stephen
  • The Circum-Schism (Paul Hijacks Christianity)

Parables

These are stories that are told by characters in the Bible to make a point using an analogy, and are not claimed to be true stories.

Old Testament Allegories:

These metaphorical stories from the Old Testament are told either by one man to another, or by God to his people through the prophets.

Man-to-Man Metaphors

  • The Trees
  • The Rich Thief
  • The Thistle of Lebanon

The Father’s Fables of Flora and Food

  • The Failed Vineyard
  • The Gardening Eagles
  • The Dirty Pot
  • The Big Tree

The Lord’s Lewd Likenings

  • The Nymphomaniac
  • The Two Sisters

New Testament Narratives:

The remaining stories are all told by Jesus.

The Savior’s Stories of Sinners

  • The Two Builders
  • The Fishermen
  • The Single-Minded Shepherd
  • The Uninformed Servant
  • The Lost Son
  • The Rich Man and Lazarus
  • The Pharisee and the Tax Collector

Emmanuel’s Agricultural Anecdotes

  • The Sloppy Farmer
  • The Weeds
  • The Two Sons
  • The Violent Tenants
  • The Ignorant Farmer
  • The Fig Tree

Christ’s Kingdom Comparisons

  • The Mustard Seed
  • The Yeast
  • The Buried Treasure
  • The Pearl
  • The Impulsive King
  • The Tardy Bridegroom

The Messiah’s Money Myths

  • The Unmerciful Servant
  • The Selectively Generous Employer
  • The Greedy Master
  • The Cancelled Debts
  • The Abundant Harvest
  • The Lost Coin

The Lamb’s Lawless Legends

  • The Burglar
  • The Violent Servant and his Violent Master
  • The Fraudulent Manager
  • The Scary Widow
  • The Good Samaritan
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