Theme- Names
God is our creator and no one else, he wants a close, loving and caring relationship with us. This can be shown by two of his many names in the Bible. One is Yahweh which means a loving relationship and Elohim which means creator. In the Bible, God changed people’s names because of the meaning and personality and character of the person. The visual I picked was a grove of ash trees because my name means lives in a grove of ash trees. I love the meaning of my name because it shows that even though it sounds like an ugly, gross looking tree it’s actually beautiful, and that means to me that I may be an unclean, sinner but I’m beautiful to God. God used names back in the bible to show things to his people, and make a point to them. Learning about names in the bible might help me to know how devoted a person was to God and what their personality was. Nowadays names aren’t so important to us, but your name still defines part of you and is still important.
Theme- Covenant
A covenant is an agreement or promise between two groups about something. An example of a covenant with humans and God is the cultural mandate which is that God commanded us humans to rule and take care of the world for him. If we obey God we will receive blessings and if we disobey God we will receive a consequence. There are two types of covenants, the first one is conditional which means if one person says they’ll do something and the other person says they’ll do something, they both have to keep their part. The second one is an unconditional covenant which is that God will keep his promise no matter what. The symbol I picked was a rainbow which God put in the sky after he flooded the whole world and promised Noah he wouldn’t do that again, that is an example of an unconditional covenant. Covenants come up a lot in the Bible, and they are very important to the people in the Bible because God used them to keep his people under control, and following Him.
Theme- Symbol of a Lamp
God promised a messiah and savior from the line of David. God used a lamp to describe Jesus since that was the only source of light the people used back then, they didn’t have electricity like we did. God called David a man after his own heart even though David made many mistakes in his lifetime. David’s family line leads to Jesus the ultimate light and lamp of the world. For my symbol, I chose the sun because that’s our main source of light along with lights in our house. With Jesus being the son of God when I was younger I imagined him as the sun, that’s in the sky. When I’m walking through a dark part of life Jesus will light my path to get out of the dark part of life and he will lead me to the light while guiding me with His light. Jesus is the ultimate light of the world, especially when it’s dark he shines his light throughout the earth. God didn’t destroy people in David’s line because that’s the family line where Jesus would come from, even though some of David’s descendants were evil and didn’t always follow God and his laws He kept David’s family line alive so that he could bring the ultimate light into the world.
Theme- Conflict/Doubt
Israel means struggles with God. Jacob literally wrestled with God in our story. Sarah and Abraham, Moses, Jonah, Peter, Abraham and Isaac, Joseph and brothers, Thomas, David, Noah, and Saul all struggled and doubted God throughout their lifetime. Even today we ask God questions like; Why not cure everyone? Why me? Why did God create sin in the first place? If he knew we would sin, why didn’t he stop us? For my symbol, I chose tears because it shows that we cry and get frustrated at God for the things he’s putting us through. We don’t understand at the time that God makes all bad things into good. People in the Bible struggled and got frustrated with God, when you hear a Bible story for the first time you really never expect them to get mad at God, you expect them to go along and do whatever God says and not question it, but the fact is they were human and so are we, we sin and get mad at God. It’s just a part of life.
Theme- Call
God called Abraham and Sarah to be the parents of a great nation. Abraham and Sarah didn’t always trust God’s call and tried to control things on their own. In the end, God kept his promises. God still calls us to do things for him today. We have to listen and look closely for his clues. It won’t always be the easiest thing ever. As a symbol, I picked children. I picked that because we are God’s children and called to love God like children, with no doubt. They just know that God loves them and will keep them safe. We still get called to go places and do things in God’s name but not quite as much as people did in the Bible, and it’s harder nowadays because we don’t have prophets that can directly speak to God, we have clues from the bible and prayer.
Theme- Slavery/Salvation
Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers, his brothers hoping to never see him again, but Joseph ended up helping his family survive the famine. Moses was born into slavery yet he leads Israel out of Egypt, the land of slavery. People intended to harm others but God planned it for good. God proclaims “I am who I am.” God is unchanging, faithful, and present today. God is a “verb.” The symbol I chose was a rock in different types of weather, the rock never changing. I chose that because it shows that God, no matter what he stays the same, he never changes, through the slavery and the salvation of our lives. We go through hard times in our life and God lets those things happen because he one, wanted to make you stronger and two, he will make something beautiful out of it. The flowers don’t grow and bloom if there’s no rain, we need the storms in life in order to turn out as God’s beautiful creation.
Theme- A Savior
God’s people couldn’t keep the Sinai covenant so God offered a new covenant, The new covenant would be written on their hearts, not on stone tablets. It did not need animal sacrifices since Jesus is the ultimate sacrifice. Jeremiah gave the people the new covenant, it did not have conditions and was based on grace and forgiveness. Isaiah also gave the people pictures of the new savior that they could relate to and connect with. The visual I picked was a cross because Jesus is my Lord and Savior and the cross represents the new covenant He made with the Israelites, and that Jesus died for all our sins so that we can have eternal life with him. The new covenant God made with the Israelites was that he would send a savior to die for their sins, and Jesus dying would make them be able to have eternal life in Heaven.
Theme- Something is Rotten
Israel had one lousy and evil king after another. God sent a prophet, Elijah to talk to the people for him. Since the Israelites’ king worshipped Baal, the king convinced the Israelites to worship Baal and turn away from God. God stopped the rain from coming for a few years until God told Elijah to say,”How long will you waver between two gods?” The people responded to Elijah with silence. God will put you in a culture that doesn’t believe in God but they may not change after seeing your light. People don’t change overnight, so maybe after seeing your light for a while they might start to change but never overnight. I chose music as my visual because our generation’s culture has made music that has become completely different from what God created the world to be. Music is a big part of our lives and the things people sing about aren’t always the best and towards God. The world has become very sinful and has started to turn away from God, music is also part of the world that has turned away from God.