WEEKLY PRAYER
Thomas à Kempis (1380 - 1471)

I will presume to speak to you, my Lord, though I am mere dust and ashes. If I imagined myself to be anything more, you would confront me with my sins, which bear witness against me. But if I humble myself and acknowledge my nothingness, then your grace will come to me, and your light will enter my heart. So let the last trace of pride be swallowed up in the depths of my own nothingness and perish forever. Let me see myself for what I am and what I have been, as mere nothingness.

Now, Lord, look upon me. Your gaze can turn my nothingness into newness, my darkness into light, my misery into joy, my death into life. When I become nothing, I discover both myself and you. When I admit I deserve nothing, you shower me with blessings. You are my salvation, my power, my strength.

Amen.

The Bible remains the best-selling book of all time. It is at your fingertips, has a ton of resources and great scholarship done about it, but for many people - including many Christians - it remains a mystery as to how to read, understand, interpret and apply its contents.

This series will aim to help you feel confident enough to begin to read and understand it yourself! It will be full of all sorts of things you wanted to ask but were too afraid to!

This is the point in Israel's story where the kingdom under King David has now been split: The Kingdom of Israel in the North, and The Kingdom of Judah (with the city of Jerusalem) in the South.

From this point on in scripture, whenever "Israel" is mentioned, it is referring only to the northern kingdom. Sometimes the name, Ephraim, is used for Israel.

This is the start of the Jews' (those Hebrews from the kingdom of Judah), hatred of what would become the Samaritans in the north.