Biblical Heritage Center Blog

  I am a “ numbers guy ” who “ loves facts .” Amazon delivered “ The World Almanac and Book of Facts 2021 ” to my back porch on Saturday, so you can probably guess how happy that made me. One of the first sections I always visit is the religion section. When I added the new information to what I already knew, this is what I visualized in my mind.   30 CE (Globally) One Jesus with One Group of Followers.   1970 (Globally) 1,130,000,000 Christians & 18,630 denominations/paradenominations.   2000 (Globally) 1,888,000,000 Christians & 33,820 denominations/paradenominations.   2020 (Globally) 2,545,579,000 Christians & 40,000 denominations/paradenominations.   Next, I checked the number of Christians in America as we prepare to enter 2021.   245,264,000 (73.5% of the Total Population)   As I focused on the trends above, a seemingly crazy question popped into my mind:   What would happen if Christians found ways to work togethe...

  Christianity and Judaism are mutually exclusive monotheistic religions , which means a person cannot belong to both religions at the same time. In addition to that, some Christian and Jewish religious institutions do not agree about what important beliefs mean within their own religions . Those “ polarizing beliefs ” are “ the elephants in the room ” – beliefs that most people usually avoid talking about .   However, there is another reason that people ignore these “ elephants .” They are “ Institutional Truths ” ( see my previous email for more info about this ), which means they are backed by the authority of powerful institutions.   Challenges to an Institutional Truth is viewed as a direct challenge to the institution’s claim that it is an authorized representative of God!   For most people, emotions are much more involved in belief discussions than logic or reason. That is another reason people choose to “ ignore the elephants. ” The bottom line...

  Wars have been fought over beliefs about God. People have been tortured in Inquisitions because of beliefs about God. Others have been excommunicated because of beliefs about God. Billions of peoples have beliefs about the afterlife that are based on beliefs about God. So, what is a “ belief ”? According to Merriam-Webster online dictionary:   “ A belief is a state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing .”   Trust is a feeling of confidence . Be sure to note that belief, trust, and confidence are all emotional states. Beliefs are the building blocks of religious belief systems and they are viewed as “ truths ” to believers.   In his book, Letters from an Astrophysicist, Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson discusses the difference between science and religion (p. 99):   “ Science follows evidence. When strong evidence supports an idea, the concept of belief, when invoked the way religious people use it, is u...

  In my last email I introduced the Law of Language and Linguistic Profiles ( click here to read ). Today I am going to introduce you to the Linguistic Profile of “ the Jesus of history ” -- the person who lived in Nazareth and traveled through Galilee and Judea preaching his gospel . We call him “ the Jesus of history ” because as we explore biblical heritages and travel from the 1 st century to the 21 st century , we will make new Linguistic Profiles from documents written between those dates. Those Linguistic Profiles will be about Jesus the Christ, Jesus The Christ of Paul, Jesus the Christ of Athanasius, Jesus the Christ of Arius, Jesus the Christ of Constantine the Great, Jesus the Christ of Augustine, Jesus the Christ of the Trinity, Jesus the Christ of Martin Luther, etc .   The information we acquire from creating or just reading Linguistic Profiles is very useful, but when we compare Linguistic Profiles of Jesus from documents written over a 1,500 year span ,...

You have probably heard this before, but the journey that led to the creation of the Biblical Heritage Center began when I prayed the prayer below in August 1980. I was preparing to begin classes at a Bible College and become an ordained minister.   Dear God, please show me what you want me study in my Bible.   Immediately, these words popped into my mind:   Unless you know how words work you can’t understand the words of the Bible.   If that was the answer, it made absolutely no sense to me -- so I forgot about it! After that I graduated from the Bible College, became an ordained minister and founded a church.   Four years later an advertisement for a new book came in the mail -- “ Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus .” I ordered it and as soon as I finished reading it I remembered the answer to that prayer. That was the moment I decided to find out “ how words work .” I spent an entire month in a university library doing research which led to the crea...

  In my last email I told you the story about the prayer I prayed forty years ago – and the answer that made absolutely no sense to me . My first impression, after thinking about it later, was “obviously I know how words work I used them every day.” But that answer doesn’t hold water because I use a car, computer, smartphone, refrigerator, etc. every day and have no idea of how they actually work!   Nineteen years after praying that prayer, I co-founded the Biblical Heritage Center (BHC) with Dr. Ike Tennison (University of Texas at Arlington professor that taught courses I took in Classical Greek ). This year BHC celebrates its 21 st birthday. Below are the facts that have guided BHC since 1999 .   1. BHC is an educational institution that teaches people How Words Work and How to Work with Words by applying that knowledge to the words of the Bible by Exploring Biblical Heritages.   2. BHC teaches people how to use the BHC Guideline below to Transfor...