My hope for you is that these courses will lead you to understand Jesus in a better way, and as a result, these teachings will bring clarity, correction, and confirmation to your walk with Jesus.

First C: Culture

Culture is a strong part of people's lives. It influences their views, values, humor—their loyalties, fears, and hopes.

Words have specific meanings to the language and to the culture in which they are used. That is why it is essential to learn about the Hebrew language and Jewish culture of Jesus. Jesus lived during the 1st century while the Temple was still in full operation with the sacrificial system. However, at that time, the whole region was under oppressive Roman rule.

Jesus was born into a Jewish family in Bethlehem.  He was later raised in Nazareth as a Jewish kid to study the Torah in a synagogue.  Jesus was a Middle Eastern, Galilean, Torah-observant Jew. With His family, He traveled during the three pilgrimage feasts up to the Temple in Jerusalem. He was a Rabbi in Galilee and taught in all of the synagogues. He went back to Jerusalem during the Jewish holy festival of Passover to be sacrificed as the ultimate Lamb of Judah, and He will come back again as the Lion of Judah.

So when you are reading Scripture and building relationships with Jesus, it helps to have some perspective and understanding of His Jewish identity and culture.

These online courses will give you practical information about how to understand Jesus in His 1st century culture. It is different from your own western modern culture. By the way, I have a complete online course about the differences between Eastern and Western cultures.

Second C: Customs

A custom is a pattern of behavior that is followed by members of a particular culture. Most people adhere to customs without any real understanding of why they exist or how they got started. The purpose of customs is to provide a sense of association and belonging to communities, groups, and organizations within a society. Because customs are so important to social harmony, over time, they become the norms of society.

Third C: Context

In general, the meanings of words are found within the context of sentences and in how a sentence finds its context in the other sentences that surround it.

When interpreting Scripture, we must understand what the context of the passage is. Every verse in the Bible has a specific historical context, which has to do with culture, customs, time in history, author, audience, the geographical and political situations, and the occasion and purpose of the writing.

Historical context helps us to see more clearly the circumstances around events in time that we are not familiar with.