You, Me and the Bible

You, Me and the Bible is a resource to help two or three friends to sit down together and discover the central message of the Bible. Each of the six sessions contains:

• two short Bible passages to read and talk about
• questions and ideas to stimulate discussion
• a linked summary video to draw the ideas together
• concluding questions to discuss the implications.

You can download for free the background notes for the leader. If you are a GoThereFor subscriber and you are logged in, you can also access the video downloads and subtitle files.

What are the six central ideas?

The passages in You, Me and the Bible are taken from all over the Bible, and introduce readers to six key ideas in the Bible’s message:

• God as our creator and ruler
• Humanity as rebels against God
• God’s judgement on our rebellion
• Jesus’ death for our sins
• Jesus’ resurrection as Lord of all
• The twofold response that all this requires of us.

(You may recognize this as following the well-known Two Ways to Live outline of the biblical gospel.)

What are the components?

You, Me and the Bible has four components:

• the reading guide itself (the workbook), containing all the Bible passages and discussion questions
• six summary videos (one for each session) as well as a general intro video
• a set of lighthearted invitation videos to help with inviting your friends
• some background notes and ideas for the person co-ordinating the Bible reading.

Introduction

It’s strange how we often form strong opinions about things we actually don’t know very much about—whether about politics or sport, or about whether that famous person on trial at the moment is really guilty or not.

The teaching of the Bible falls into this category for many people. We know it as a big black book that Christians look to as the source of their beliefs. But it’s amazing how many of us have never actually read it for ourselves.

That’s the aim of You, Me and the Bible. It provides an opportunity for friends to sit down together and see what the Bible really says about God, and the world, and life and death, and what our lives are about.

Over the next six sessions, you’ll do this by reading a number of key passages from the Bible and discussing them together. The passages we’ve selected cover six of the most foundational ideas and events of the Bible, and provide a good overview of its central message.

Each session contains two short Bible passages in a modern English translation, along with some discussion questions to kick off the conversation. Please use these questions as a guide and help to talk about what the passage means, not as a rigid set of tasks you must complete.

After reading the two passages in each session, there is also a summary of the main ideas for you to discuss.

Some basic Bible facts to get you started

• The Bible presents itself as the record of God’s personal revelation to the world—starting with his creation of the world and finishing with a vision of how God’s plans for the world and humanity will finally be fulfilled at the end of time.
• The Bible is one long story, but is composed of 66 separate books written between approximately 1300BC and 80AD.
• These books are divided into the ‘Old Testament’ and the ‘New Testament’.

• The Old Testament is made up of 39 books written between approximately 1300BC and 450BC, and largely focuses on God’s dealings with the nation of Israel and his promises for the future of the world.
• The New Testament comprises 27 books written between approximately 50AD and 80AD, and is mainly about Jesus Christ and his fulfilment of God’s promises in the Old Testament.
• There are many different kinds of writing in the collection of books that makes up the Bible: history, poetry, biography, letters, prophecy, and so on.
• In You, Me and the Bible, you will be looking at a number of these different types of writing, ranging from Genesis (the first book of the Bible) all the way through to Revelation (the last book).
• For the convenience of being able to refer easily to particular sections, the individual books of the Bible are divided into chapters and verses. So ‘Genesis 12:14-16’ means the book of Genesis, chapter 12, verses 14 to 16.