What I learned at Church today

Do you know what this is? For those, like me, with a background in the Church of England it has meaning and symbolism, and it evokes memories and understanding. But for anyone else, it looks like an orange with things stuck into it. (It's a Christingle.) Revelation is a bit like the Christingle. To those it was addressed to it may well have meant something very significant and important, but to us, now, it's confusing and we don't understand the allegories. Why is it so symbolic? When I became a Christina at the age of 14 in 1982 my first Bible study class was on Revelation, and they said the symbolism was because Christians were persecuted so the author had to write in a way no one intercepting the letters would understand – that the lurid imagery would be understood by those the message was intended for, but not by anyone else. Apparently this is no longer believed to be the case because theologians and historians have established that there is little evidence that ...

James There are six Jameses in the New Testament, but the James who wrote this book was James the brother of Jesus. Imagine growing up with Jesus as your big brother! Did they squabble? I suspect not. We can read more about James's transformation in John 7:2-7 in which Jesus's brothers tease him about his ministry, Galatians 1:19 in which James is now and apostle, and Galatians 2:9 where he's described as a pillar of the church.. The epistle was written to Jewish Christians who were dispersed outside Palestine. It was accepted late into the canon of the New Testament, and there is no real agreement about when it was written but probably after Paul’s epistles. It is unusual in that it only mentions Jesus twice, almost in passing, and doesn’t talk about his nature as the son of God, his death, or his resurrection.  James is a BIG DEAL for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for several reasons:  James 1:5 is the verse that started it all. Jos...