Bible Verses and Your Income

"Gospel of Wealth or Poverty?" connects your financial status and your biblical beliefs. The question mark in the title challenges an either/or choice between wealth or poverty based on Bible verses.

Wealth and poverty are significant themes in the Bible. If you focus on isolated Bible verses, you can claim that God wants you to be poor. You can also claim that God wants you to rich. But neither argument can be justified if you go beyond the verses and read whole stories set in their original social, economic, political, and religious contexts.

A Hero and Income Inequality

The inequality scales on the book cover represent the unjust imbalance between wealth and poverty. Significant portions of the Bible focus on economic injustices inflicted by the rich rulers against the poor. This is particularly evident in the New Testament Gospel stories of Jesus about the salvation of oppressed people from the economic injustices of the ruling class.

"Gospel of Wealth or Poverty?" goes beyond an either/or approach to eight specific statements about wealth and poverty in the New Testament gospels to see Jesus as a hero on a hero's journey about economic injustice.

Eight Misunderstood Bible Verses

What did Jesus really say in the New Testament Gospel stories about:

1. "God and Mammon" in the Beatitudes, the Gospel of Matthew
2. "Bread and debts" in the Lord's Prayer, the Beatitudes, the Gospels of Matthew and Luke
3. "Blessed are the poor" in the Beatitudes, the Gospels of Matthew and Luke
4. "Taxes to Caesar," the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke
5. "The money changers in the temple," the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
6. "Honoring your father and your mother," in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark
7. "The poor widow," in the Gospels of Mark and Luke
8. "The rich young man," in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke

How to Become a Money Hero

Heroism responds to a threat. The New Testament gospels are whole stories about a hero who confronted income inequality at its source of power. They are not constraining rulebooks but liberating stories. Don't let misunderstood Bible verses about "what Jesus said about money" keep you struggling with guilt and fear about money. Get your copy of "Gospel of Wealth or Poverty?" now to find out how you can become your own money hero.

How Familiar Bible Translations Hide Your True Identity From You

What is "Your True Self Identity?"

Let's start with what it isn't.

• It isn't a faith-based Bible study.
• It isn't a faith-denying attack on the Bible.
• It isn't about trying to prove that any part of the Bible is true or false.
• It isn't about trying to persuade you that the Bible is eternal truth or made-up stories.
• It isn't a book about "what the Bible says" about your true self identity.

What is it?

"Your True Self Identity" is about "what Bible translations say that the Bible says about your true self identity."

Whether you're a believer or a non-believer, whether you're a Bible reader or have never read a word in the Bible, claims about "what the Bible says" about your identity are pervasive in our Western culture.

Does the Bible Really Say That?Series books focus on the blind spot in claims about "what the Bible says." Unless you are able to read the Bible in its original languages, you are reading translations of ancient documents. The result is that original meanings get lost in translation.

What "the Bible says" in its original languages is not always what translations claim that "the Bible says" on any particular topic.

The most important fact you can know about the Bible is that it was not written in English or French or Spanish or any other contemporary language spoken in any part of the world today.

Every Bible you read is a translation of manuscripts originally written in the ancient languages of Greek and Hebrew with a very few words written in Aramaic. So, no one alive today speaks any of these ancient languages. Even Modern Hebrew currently spoken in Israel isn't the same as the Hebrew in the Bible. This means that every Bible is a translation of ancient languages into contemporary languages by people far removed from what the words meant in their original languages.

If you have ever learned to speak another language other than your native language, you know how difficult it can be to convey exactly what you mean into that language. If you have this difficulty in contemporary languages, imagine how difficult it is to convey meanings from ancient languages into contemporary languages.

Why Do Bible Translations Matter to Your Identity?

Translators choose the words you read on the pages of your Bible. These translation choices define who you think you are. Even if you're not a Bible reader, these translations can still affect who you think you are.

Since Bible translators control the flow of data between ancient Bible manuscripts and the words you read on the pages of your translated Bibles, Bible translators have the capacity to distort original meanings of these Bible verses. These distortions can affect your identity. Even with the best intentions, translators are affected by unconscious assumptions, unquestioned beliefs, cultural blind spots, theological intentions, and particular purposes.

"Your True Self Identity" focuses is on specific misleading translation choices in Chapter 18 of the Gospel of Matthew. Whether or not these misleading translation choices are intentional or unintentional, Bible translation choices can hide your true self identity from you.

If you're ready to delve in and learn how you're being misled by these translations, then get your own copy of "Your True Self Identity: How Familiar Translations of Bible Verses in the Gospel of Matthew Hide Your True Identity from You" and get started right now.

How to Make Good Writing Great

Are you overlooking the essential writing skill that turns good writing into great writing? Do you want to know the real secret of great writers? It's a secret hidden in plain sight. Great writers know that great writing depends on choosing the right words.

Choosing the Right Words

Why does choosing the right words matter so much? Writing is nothing more than choosing words and arranging them into a readable form. Great writing happens when your word choices communicate in a compelling way exactly what you mean to say to your readers and your readers understand exactly what you mean.

Choosing the right words sounds simple enough. But choosing the right words is not always easy.

Do you ever feel frustrated that you can't find exactly the right word to say exactly what you mean?

Do you feel upset when readers misunderstand what you are intend to say?

Do you feel that you need to expand your vocabulary to impress readers with your knowledge of impressive words?

Do you read the words of great writers and feel jealous that you can't write as well? Do you wonder what they know that you don't know?

Your Writing Can't Be Better Than Your Word Choices

The secret hidden in plain sight is that your skill as a writer depends on the quality of your relations with the words you use. The simple fact is that your writing can't be any better than your word choices.

The better you know your words and the better care you take of them, the better writer you will become.

Topics in "On Writing Words"

"On Writing Words" is not about writing technique. Rather it is about the essential relations between you and the words you use.

Topics include:

• Learning to Write
• Making Language Visible
• Relations with Words
• Relations or Relationship?
• Word by Word
• Using Words
• Words as Teachers
• Words Separate
• The Right Words
• Making Words Invisible
• Private Words and Public Words

What Your Words Can Do for You

When you pay close attention to your relations with words, words become more than tools. Words are the medium, the tools, and the product of your writing. Words can also be your teachers if you allow them to teach you. When you write, everything you do is about you and your relationship with language, one word at a time.

Find out how to expand your relations with words now.