The Biblical power of extending forgiveness to others is a profound and life-changing act that reflects the core of indwelling Christian faith. Forgiveness is central to Yeshua’s teachings and is emphasized throughout the Bible. In Matthew 6:14-15 (ESV), Jesus states, "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses." This passage highlights the reciprocal nature of forgiveness and its importance in our relationship with God.
In the heart of every believer in Christ lies a powerful and transformative force: the grace of forgiveness. This chapter explores the importance of extending forgiveness to others, a fundamental aspect of our identity being indwelt by Christ.
Jesus Christ, in His infinite love and mercy, forgave us of our sins and offered us salvation. As His followers, we are called to extend that same forgiveness to others. “Be kind and compassionate to one another,” Ephesians 4:32 tells us, “forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” This is not merely a suggestion but a divine mandate that reflects the very heart of the Gospel.
Forgiveness is not always easy. It requires humility, courage, and a willingness to let go of our hurt and resentment. Yet, through this process, we experience true freedom and peace. Forgiveness liberates us from the chains of bitterness and opens the door to healing and reconciliation.
This chapter will delve into the biblical teachings on forgiveness, exploring its significance in our spiritual journey and its impact on our relationships. We will also provide practical guidance on forgiving, even when it seems impossible and seeking forgiveness when we have wronged others.
As we navigate through this chapter, let us remember the words of our Lord in the Lord’s Prayer: “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors” (Matthew 6:12). This prayer serves as a constant reminder of the reciprocal nature of forgiveness in the life of a believer.
Listen to the full podcast today.
The End Times Chronicles hosts Knowing Identity Matters Podcast, a reader-supported publication & broadcast. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
Thanks for subscribing to The End Times Chronicles. Your paid subscription helps us advance our non-profit’s mission. Dr. Stephen R. Phinney is dedicated to providing quality media and publications that advance the Life of Christ. Paid subscribers receive free eBooks, media content, and other free stuff.
Hey, fellow writers/readers, would you be open to buying me a cup of coffee? Check out this fun way of supporting my writing: https://bmc.link/drphinney
Despite what many Christians believe, there is not one single version of the Bible. Biblical canon has changed repeatedly over the centuries, with books being added or removed from the official scriptures, and that process continues today. The Bibles read by Catholics, Orthodox Christians and members of different denominations of Protestantism may contain very different books. There are more academically inclined Bibles that contain references and extra resources and “more complete” Bibles that contain books that were previously removed from the canon. Which “extra” books are included in these Bibles varies wildly.
The development of the “official” biblical canon was a lengthy process that began shortly before the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. Emperor Constantine commissioned 50 copies of the Bible for the Church at Constantinople, but this was not considered to be an official canon for Christianity. It was not until 367 A.D. that the first version of the Christian canon was officially developed. It was Athanasius, the Bishop of Alexandria, who listed the books of the New Testament and instructed them to be kanonizomena or canonized. The canon of the New Testament, however, was not ratified until the 5th century.
Biblical canon was again questioned following the Protestant Reformation. The Church of England and English Calvinism both adopted slightly altered canons in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, and the Synod of Jerusalem made minor tweaks to the list of Old Testament books accepted by Orthodox Christians. With this turbulent history filled with additions and removals of books, there has been a rise in Christians who prefer Bibles that contain these “extra” books, which are collectively known as the Apocrypha or Apocryphal Books. Here are five books that are not included in the Bible that every Christian should read.
The Gospel of Thomas.
The Gospel of Thomas would look very strange to most Christians as it contains almost none of the narrative details that are common in the canonical New Testament gospels. Instead, the Gospel of Thomas is composed almost entirely of the logia, or sayings, of Jesus. Many of these sayings are repeated verbatim in the other New Testament gospels. When a person accounts for slight variations as a result of translation differences, the text is almost identical to the teachings found in the canonized New Testament. There are, however, a few extra sayings that are not included in the canonical gospels, and the Gospel of Thomas includes no explicit references to Christ’s crucifixion, His resurrection, the final judgment or a messianic understanding of Jesus.
The Gospel of Thomas was not added to the official canon because it is the epitome of a Gnostic text. Gnosticism was an early form of Christianity that was declared heresy by those who would eventually become the Orthodox Church. Gnosticism eventually died out at some point in the second or third century, and many of their writings were lost, making discoveries such as the Gospel of Thomas of great value to the historical record.The Book of Enoch.
New Testament apocryphal books tend to get more focus than Old Testament Apocrypha, but the Book of Enoch is always a popular topic of discussion among those familiar with it. The Book of Enoch, also referred to simply as Enoch, was written sometime during the 2nd century B.C. and is very different from the Old Testament texts that were later canonized. The Book of Enoch was attributed to Enoch, the grandfather of Noah, and contains more traditionally mythological elements than are found in most of the Old Testament. One such example is the Nephilim. The Nephilim are mentioned briefly in the canonical versions of Genesis and Numbers, but Enoch expands greatly on their birth, rise to prominence and destruction. The Book of Enoch also details Enoch’s journey through Earth, Sheol and his interactions with both the angels of heaven and fallen angels. Enoch’s fate is left somewhat ambiguous at the end of the text and open to many different interpretations.
The Infancy Gospel.
Also called the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, the Infancy Gospel is biographical focused on the life of Jesus as a child. This gospel is believed to date back to the second century and to have been written by Gnostic Christians. Interest in the Infancy Gospel has exploded since its translation out of old Coptic because it details Jesus Christ’s childhood, a period of his life that is not described or depicted in the canonical gospels. This gospel was considered heretical in part for its depiction of Jesus as a child. Rather than the wise teacher that the canonical gospels focus on, the young Jesus in the Infancy Gospels has a mischievous streak and takes delight in such simple childhood pleasures as crafting clay birds. The Infancy Gospel of Thomas is not the only apocryphal gospel that depicts portions of Jesus’s life as a child. The Syriac Infancy Gospel and Gospel of Psuedo-Matthew also deal with the life of a young Christ.
The Gospel of Mary.
Scholars do not always consider the Gospel of Mary to be a true “gospel” because the text does not have the same focus on the teachings of the adult Jesus as the canonical gospels. There is also a great deal of debate among scholars as to which Mary is the narrator of the text. Most people argue that the titular narrator is either the Virgin Mary or Mary Magdalene, but neither theory can be confirmed due to the state of the original text. The text is missing a total of 10 pages, six at the beginning and four in the middle of the text.
The sections of the text that are intact depict a scene after the resurrection of Christ when Jesus appears to the disciples. He gives Mary special or secret teachings through a vision. Mary shares these teachings with the other disciples, but the other disciples are skeptical that Christ would trust such important “teachings privately [to] a woman and not openly to [the male apostles].” Peter and Andrew, in particular, question Mary’s truthfulness while Levi defends her. It is likely for the same reason that the text was stricken from the canon.
Thecla joined Paul on his journey to Antioch, where she ran afoul of the magistrate of the city when she refused to sleep with him. The magistrate ordered Thecla to be killed several times, but each time God saved her. In one of her final trials, Thecla threw herself into a body of water filled with sharks. God killed the sharks, and Thecla baptized herself. It is theorized that the Acts of Paul and Thecla was kept out of the official canon because Thecla’s actions were too powerful for a woman. She acted with all the power of a man, something unacceptable at the time.
The Bible would look very different if all the Apocrypha were included in the book. There would also be very different portrayals of Christ found in the Bible’s pages if texts such as the Infancy Gospel of Thomas were included. Though these texts are not found in the biblical canon, Christians can now read many of them due to the tireless work of translators. Ancient texts continue to be translated today, and more hidden gospels continue to be found. The pendulum appears to have swung back the other way. Rather than an ever-shrinking canon, the “complete” list of Bible books is only continuing to grow.
The books of the Bible were written over a period of thousands of years. The Old Testament was written hundreds, if not thousands, of years before Christ was ever born. The New Testament was completed roughly a century after Christ’s death. Between these dates, the dozens of books of the Bible were written, edited and compiled. The order in which those books were placed in the Bible, however, was not always based on their age. Older books are sandwiched between works that were written centuries later, and younger pieces may come before older books. Clearly, the Bible is not arranged in chronological order, but what would the Bible look like if it was? What would be at the end of the Good Book? In that chronological Bible, what would come first? What is the oldest book in the Bible?
What is the Oldest Book in the Bible?
The oldest book in the Bible is, unsurprisingly, found in the Old Testament. Most Christians would likely predict that Genesis was the oldest book in the Bible given that it details the creation of the world. If that was not accurate, then they would probably suggest Exodus or maybe theorize that Psalms or Proverbs were the first to go from an oral tradition to a written one. All of these predictions, however, would be incorrect. The oldest book in the Bible is smack in the middle of the Old Testament. It is the Book of Job.
The Book of Job
The Book of Job is one of the lesser read books of the Bible, despite the fact that it is referenced repeatedly throughout Scripture. Unlike the rest of the Bible, Job is written not as prose or poetry but as a drama. In the book, an angel in God’s court, in some translations it is Satan, challenges God that Job is pious because he has a good, comfortable life. God declares that Job will not give up his faith and curse God despite terrible things befalling him. God accepts the bet, and Job suffers every manner of tragedy but still clings to his faith. God wins the wager, restores what Job lost and further blesses him.
When Was the Book of Job Written?
The Book of Job is estimated to have been written in the time of the Patriarchs, between 1900 and 1700 B.C. The book deals with similar themes as the Babylonian work “Ludlul-Bel-Nimeqi” and is sometimes considered to have been based on the Babylonian work, but similar themes are not enough to state that one work is a derivative of the other. People have been questioning why suffering occurs for almost as long as humanity has existed. As it is, Job and “Ludlul-Bel-Nimeqi” have very different endings to the stories of their protagonists and are written in different styles. Job is a drama while “Ludlul-Bel-Nimeqi” is a monologue. Truthfully, the theme found in the two works is common enough that “Ludlul-Bel-Nimeqi” could be compared almost as closely to Ecclesiastes or Lamentations as Job.
While the themes found in Job are common across the ancient world, the language is not. Job is written in a form of Hebrew that is even older than the ancient Hebrew that makes up most of the Old Testament. In fact, the language used in Job is not even usually referred to as ancient Hebrew. Instead, it is called “Paleo-Hebrew.” The book also contains Syriac and Arabic expressions which point to a period of time between 1900 and 1700 B.C. when the Shemitic tribes had not yet separated into speaking separate Syriac, Hebrew and Arabic dialects. Instead, they still shared a common language.
The language in which Job was written is not the only clue to its age. In addition to using a language that differs from the Hebrew used in other Old Testament manuscripts, Job also mentions several creatures and conditions that are unknown today. The phrases may refer to animals that have gone extinct or, more likely, were called by a different name in later books of the Bible. It is these currently unidentifiable and untranslatable names that have led some translators of Job to translate the animals as more traditionally mythical creatures such as unicorns.
The age of the book of Job can also be found in what is noticeably missing from the book. There are no mentions of the covenant, the Law of Moses or the priesthood. There are not even any mentions of the Israelite people or the Promised Land. Instead, Job offers sacrifices himself for his sons without the use of a priesthood, temple or consecrated altar. His wealth is measured by the size of his herds and the amount of “qesiytah,” unique silver coins, he possesses. Both herds and silver were used as ancient systems of money between 1900 and 1700 B.C. The names of Job’s sons were also uncommon in later time periods but were common before and during the time of the patriarchs.
Exactly when the book of Job was written remains something of a mystery, but there is no doubt it is the oldest book in the Bible. While the early chapters of Genesis cover events that happened before Job, the actual written accounts of those events were not recorded until after the book of Job had already been composed. In fact, Job is over 400 years older than Genesis. This means Job is not only the sole drama in the Bible but also the oldest book by far and all the more fascinating for it.
President Donald Trump has given Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser an ultimatum: clean up the “unsightly homeless encampments” or his administration would step in and take over.
Trump issued the ultimatum in a post on Truth Social on the evening of March 5, telling her that she needs to especially focus on cleaning up the homeless camps around the White House and the State Department. He argued in the post that the nation’s capital needs to become a place that Americans can be proud of again.
“We have notified the Mayor of Washington, D.C., that she must clean up all of the unsightly homeless encampments in the City, specifically including the ones outside of the State Department, and near the White House,” Trump wrote. “If she is not capable of doing so, we will be forced to do it for her! Washington, D.C. must become CLEAN and SAFE!”
“We want to be proud of our Great Capital again,” the president added. “Thank you Mayor Bowser for your efforts on behalf of the Citizens of our Country. Hopefully you will be successful!”
Trump’s post comes after he recently told reportersthat he is contemplating the possibility of his administration taking control over Washington, D.C., because of how terrible the city has been run under Democrat leadership — arguing that the action might be necessary to help crack down on rampant homelessness and skyrocketing crime.
“I think that we should govern the District of Columbia,” Trump said at the time. “I think that we should run it strong, run it with law and order, make it absolutely flawless.”
“And I think we should take over Washington, D.C. We could save people from getting killed,” he added. “The federal government should take over the governance of D.C. and run it really, really properly.”
Meanwhile, as she continues to face criticism from Republicans in the White House, House, and Senate, Bowser recently surprisingly admitted that the homeless encampments are “not technically permitted in the District” and suggested that she may consider working with the White House to deal with the crime problem.
In February, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) worked together to introduce a bill in their respective chambers that would end “home rule,” which was established several decades ago to allow Washington, D.C., residents to control their own local affairs. Instead, Lee and Ogles want to return the district to being under the control of Congress, citing violent crime and the Democrats’ push to allow illegal aliens to vote in D.C.
Posts
