Chapter 8
Custodians of God’s Word

1.	What important double role did God have in mind for Abraham’s descendants?
a.	As the cradle of the world’s Savior
b.	As custodians of God’s sacred truth

2.	How can you be sure that God is never interested in playing hide-and-seek with people?
-	We know first and foremost because he came to us and gave us his Word.  If he wanted to be coy and play hide-and-seek, he would never have done this.  Therefore he gives us a place to find him every day.
-	We also know this because he reveals himself to us by means of nature and conscience as well

3.	What will God answer to unbelievers who try to defend themselves on judgment day by saying, “How was I supposed to know?”
I gave you every opportunity to know me as I spoke to you your whole life.

4.	List several different ways in which God speaks to people.
-	Nature and Conscience (neither of these are able to tell us who the true God is or who our Savior from sin is, but they give a natural knowledge of God)
-	His Word

5.	How do you try to listen to God’s voice on a regular basis?
By devotional books; worship; books like this one (Connecting Sinai to Calvary)

6.	Newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, and the Internet all scream for our attention. How do you solve the problem of making sure you listen to the Savior’s voice?
a.	Build it into your schedule  - you make time for that which is important
b.	Get rid of those things if they are hindering you from hearing God’s voice
c.	Make use of technology (thinking of internet) to hear God’s voice by having devotions emailed to you, by watching solid, Biblical devotions online like Time of Grace ministries.

God’s written Word
1.	Why did God decide to put his Word in writing?
Because in his mercy and love he wanted us to know him and know what he did for our salvation.

2.	To whom alone did he entrust his written Word at first (Psalm 147:19,20)?
The people of Israel 

3.	What is the miracle of inspiration? 
The miracle of inspiration is that the Holy Spirit guided the writers in choosing the very words they were to use, keeping the Bible free from error.
The author used the neat terminology – “The Holy Spirit supervised the sacred writers”

4.	How does that miracle influence our attitude toward the Bible?
It makes all the difference in the world…
-	Now we don’t have to read the Bible with any doubt, because we know it is God’s word.
-	It gives us confidence that what it says is true – every part
-	Even though there might be difficult section that are hard to comprehend, we know that we are not blind or foolish to believe it

5.	Who is the heart of the Old Testament? Explain your answer.
Jesus Christ – for he is the fulfillment of all the Old Testament promises

The Old Testament
1.	What do we know about how the Old Testament books were preserved after God’s servants wrote them down?
We don’t know a lot, but consider the next question…

2.	How did Moses instruct the Israelites to preserve the original copies of the Bible books according to Deuteronomy 31:24-26? Deuteronomy 31:11-13? Deuteronomy 17:18-20?
What we do know is…
-	The original books of Moses were to be kept next to the ark of the covenant in the Most Holy Place
-	We also know that the priests and scribes played a big role in making copies and passing the written word down through the generations
-	We also know the kings were to play a role as well

3.	What important role did the scribes have in preserving the Word of God?
Very big!  They were the ones who made copies of the books of the Old Testament – and they took this responsibility very seriously.

4.	What is a scroll?
The rolled up and treated skins of sheep or goat that were then formed into a smooth writing surface

Different kinds of writings
1.	Into which three categories did the Jewish community divide the Old Testament?
a.	The Law of Moses (Torah)
b.	The Prophets (21 books containing history and prophecy)
c.	The Writings (Miscellaneous collection of 13 books of poetry and wisdom literature)

2.	What evidence do we have from the Old Testament that God’s believing children took their assignment to be custodians of God’s Word seriously?
We see the Word, and mentions of copies of this Word, pop-up throughout the course of their history

3.	Which was the second section of the Old Testament that was added to the growing collection of sacred books?
The Prophets

4.	What evidence do we have from the Old Testament that the later prophets knew what the earlier prophets had written?
They quote them

5.	Characterize the third category of the Old Testament books.
Miscellaneous collection of 13 books of poetry and wisdom literature

6.	What role did good King Hezekiah play in preserving the books of the Old Testament?
-	Rededicated the true worship of the Lord
-	Added proverbs to inspired Scripture

7.	The Old Testament is a collection of several dozen books containing different kinds of literature. Describe some of the different kinds.
Here are some of the different kinds, but not an exhaustive list:  history; poetry; sermons; short stories; wisdom literature.

8.	What unifies this miscellaneous collection into a single document?
The fact that it tells a single story of a God who was determined to gather a group of people whom he could love forever.

Custodians of God’s Word
1.	Did the Jewish people accomplish the purpose of God’s plan to have them be the recipients and then the custodians of his Word? Explain your answer.
-	Yes – in the sense that we have God’s Word preserved for us to this day.
-	No – in the sense that had it not been for God, the Word would have been lost.  Therefore we could rightfully say God accomplished his purpose.

2.	Agree or disagree: If there’s anybody who has no business being anti-Semitic, it’s a Christian. Explain your answer.
Agree – We have much to thank them for

3.	What does it mean to be a custodian of God’s Word today?
A number of things can be said:
-	To listen and learn when God speaks to us
-	To put into practice what God has told us
-	To pass it on to friends, relative, acquaintances, and neighbors.