{"id":1613,"date":"2009-09-08T00:00:11","date_gmt":"2009-09-08T00:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/new.brethren.org\/news\/?p=1613"},"modified":"2018-09-03T03:54:07","modified_gmt":"2018-09-03T03:54:07","slug":"noac-bible-study-highlights-the-legacy-of-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/2009\/noac-bible-study-highlights-the-legacy-of-family\/","title":{"rendered":"NOAC Bible Study Highlights the Legacy of Family"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"NOACNOAC 2009
\nNational Older Adult Conference of the Church of the Brethren<\/h3>\n

Lake Junaluska, N.C. — Sept. 7-11, 2009<\/h3>\n

<\/h1>\n

Tuesday, Sept. 8, 2009<\/strong><\/h6>\n
Bible study leader: Bob Neff
\nText: 1 Corinthians 1:9<\/em><\/h6>\n
\"\"
Bob Neff leads the morning Bible studies for the 2009 National Older Adult Conference. Click here for a photo album <\/a>of keynote speakers, preachers, and other leadership for the event. Photo by Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford<\/em><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Having been introduced as a former professor of Old Testament at Bethany Theological Seminary, former General Secretary of the Church of the Brethren,\u00a0and former President of Juniata College,\u00a0Bible study leader\u00a0Bob Neff joked, \u201cAll it shows is that I wasn\u2019t able to hold a job.\u201d<\/h6>\n

Neff read aloud from\u00a01 Corinthians 1:9, \u201c\u2026For God\u2019s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom.\u201d In this first Bible study\u00a0of a three-day series,\u00a0he dissected the genealogy of Jesus as it appears in Matthew, giving a practical demonstration of how the wisdom of the Old Testament legacy is interwoven in the New Testament story of Jesus’ family legacy.<\/p>\n

Discussing the importance of family, Neff\u00a0told a story about how\u00a0difficult it is for everyone at his family reunions to discuss religion. But at a recent reunion, all that was pushed aside as the family discovered that eight generations back\u00a0their ancestors–whom they had thought were exclusively Anabaptist–had actually\u00a0included a Hessian soldier who had been a prisoner of war after the Battle of Trenton in 1776.<\/p>\n

In the same way, Neff said,\u00a0it is surprising to find four women mentioned in the genealogy of Jesus–all with interesting pasts. The women include\u00a0Tamar, who seduced her father-in-law; Rahab, the famed harlot of Jericho; and Ruth, who took extraordinary steps to snare Boaz. \u201cAll of these women are Gentiles. Why are they there?\u201d Neff asked.<\/p>\n

Focusing on the story of\u00a0Ruth, Neff emphasized “the devotion, chesed, <\/em>of this woman to her mother-in-law.”\u00a0She both embodies the steadfast love displayed by God toward the people, and the foolishness of God, he added. “Here\u2019s someone who doesn\u2019t know Hebrew law, comes from a completely different culture, who acts to protect someone in danger. It\u2019s incredible! A Moabite, the people who refused bread to the Israelites, brings bread to an Israelite widow. The foolishness of God\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the Jewish festival of Pentecost,\u00a0Neff said, Ruth is the book that is\u00a0read\u00a0because it embodies the way the law is fulfilled in righteous lives, and tells the story of a righteous life lived by one who was not raised in the tradition.<\/p>\n

Ruth also is\u00a0placed in the Old Testament as\u00a0an alternative story to the\u00a0violent chaos of the time of the judges, and\u00a0the story of the monarchy,\u00a0in which power is sought and usurped.\u00a0“The foolishness of God!\u201d Neff repeated. \u201cThe story of Ruth shows it\u2019s possible to have a community in which everyone is cared for without the overlording power of a king…an alternative story that shows the weakness of God is more powerful than anything you can imagine, and the foolishness of God, expressed in a Moabite woman, is the measure of life in the faith.<\/p>\n

“This is why these women appear before the birth of Jesus,” Neff said. “The gospel writer wants to say through genealogy that something different in the way of power and family is going to happen, and that the foolishness of God is inclusive of the frailest member who can redeem the whole community through their chesed.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

—\u00a0Frank Ramirez is pastor of Everett (Pa.) Church of the Brethren\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

——————————————————————————
\nThe News Team for the 2009 National Older Adult Conference is coordinated by Eddie Edmonds, and includes Alice Edmonds, Frank Ramirez, Perry McCabe, and staff Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford, who serves as director of News Services for the Church of the Brethren. Contact <\/em>cobnews@brethren.org<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NOAC 2009 National Older Adult Conference of the Church of the Brethren Lake Junaluska, N.C. — Sept. 7-11, 2009 Tuesday, Sept. 8, 2009 Bible study leader: Bob Neff Text: 1 Corinthians 1:9 Having been introduced as a former professor of Old Testament at Bethany Theological Seminary, former General Secretary of the Church of the Brethren,\u00a0and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[27,3,214,85,300],"wf_post_folders":[],"class_list":["post-1613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bethany-theological-seminary","tag-church-of-the-brethren","tag-everett-church-of-the-brethren","tag-juniata-college","tag-national-older-adult-conference"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1613"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1615,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1613\/revisions\/1615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1613"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=1613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}