A Compendium to the Bible: A Theological Study

By Michael J. Byrne

Have you ever wondered how humanity has come to its current condition and what lies ahead in the coming years?
This book looks to Scripture as it considers those two big questions, presenting what God intends for the world in the process.
The author observes that since the beginning of time, humanity has attempted to eradicate any knowledge of God and His plans for humanity. People have continued in the pursuits that Eve began in the Garden of Eden – to the point of building their own temples and churches and following the dictates of their own hearts instead of the word of God.
Because of God’s never ending concern for humanity, He inspired a select number of men to document various histories of the Israelites in the Old Testament. God intervened in such a way that when they were recorded, they would paint a mosaic of His intentions toward humanity.
The Bible, in fact, is an encrypted message from God to us. Even if the writers did not fully understand what they were conveying, God’s plan becomes clear in A Compendium to the Bible.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Nov 14, 2023
• ISBN: 9798385005406

Michael J. Byrne

Michael J. Byrne is retired. A Compendium to the Bible is his first book.

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Copyright © 2023 Michael J. Byrne.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

All scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 979-8-3850-0538-3 (sc)

ISBN: 979-8-3850-0539-0 (hc)

ISBN: 979-8-3850-0540-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2023915778

WestBow Press rev. date: 11/13/2023

And He said, "Go, and tell this people:

Keep on hearing, but do not understand;

Keep on seeing, but do not perceive.

Make the heart of this people dull,

And their ears heavy,

And shut their eyes;

Lest they see with their eyes,

And hear with their ears,

And understand with their heart,

And return and be healed."

—Isaiah 6:9–10

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1 All Scripture Has Been Given for Instruction

Chapter 2 The Hidden Mystery of the Gospel

Chapter 3 The Loaves and the Fishes

Chapter 4 The Mystery of the Gospel of God Revealed

Chapter 5 The Marriage Covenant and an Unchangeable Priesthood

Chapter 6 The Carnal Mind

Chapter 7 Food

Chapter 8 Sin

Chapter 9 Repentance

Chapter 10 Calculating the Appearance of the Messiah

Chapter 11 John the Baptist

Chapter 12 Christ is the Only Begotten Son of God

Chapter 13 The Jews’ Reaction to Jesus

Chapter 14 God’s Witness That Jesus is the Christ

Chapter 15 Miracles

Chapter 16 The Spiritual Mind

Chapter 17 The Resurrection

Chapter 18 Promise and Oath

Chapter 19 Physical Representations of the Old Testament Resounding in the New

Chapter 20 Faith versus Works of the Law

Chapter 21 Grace

Chapter 22 The Holy Spirit

Chapter 23 The Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth

Chapter 24 Giving of Thanks

Chapter 25 Suffering

Chapter 26 Forgiveness

Chapter 27 Perfection

Chapter 28 Rejection of the Gospel

Chapter 29 Closing Exhortation

Chapter 30 The Purpose of Life

Prologue

All scriptures given in this book are taken from the New King James Version of the Bible.

I looked when He opened the sixth seal, and behold, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair. And the moon became like blood. And the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree drops its late figs when it is shaken by a mighty wind. Then the sky receded as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved out of its place. And the kings of the earth, the great men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?" (Revelation 6:12–17)

After these things I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, on the sea, or on any tree. Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads. (Revelation 7:1–3)

And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come. (Matthew 24:14)

But when the grain ripens, immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come. (Mark 4:29)

In the writing of this book, certain assertions have been made:

1.The Bible, as translated from the original texts and handed down to us in the form of the New King James Version, is the revealed knowledge of God.

2.The Old Testament is written as an historical record of the world and of a specific nation.

3.God used individuals of that nation and the nation itself to reveal Himself to humanity.

4.The Old Testament reveals God’s nature and the nature of humanity.

5.The Old Testament points to promises made by God—to characters and writers of that book—in regard to that nation and humanity.

6.As was instructed to Moses on Mount Sinai, the tabernacle that he was directed to construct was a copy of the True Tabernacle.

7.The Old Testament—with all of its stories, commands, and regulations—is a physical representation of the spiritual promises that God has made to humanity, it is in its entirety a copy of the True.

8.The terms Christ and Messiah are used interchangeably.

This work will be viewed as controversial and challenging to the existing beliefs of each and every reader. What follows will require more than just the human spirit to understand. It brings to mind the parable of the sower:

Then He spoke many things to them in parables, saying: Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds came and devoured them. (Matthew 13:3–4)

When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside. (Matthew 13:19)

And as was done by those who received the seed by the wayside, the birds will come and pick apart every morsel of truth and be satiated with their lies and contentions.

The majority of this work is supporting texts from the Bible. Although it is not exhaustive, it is hoped that enough texts have been included to validate the claims that are being made. The narrative has been limited as much as possible to avoid misrepresenting the scriptures. The subjects have been arranged so that each subject builds on the preceding subjects. There is much overlap between subjects.

Certain claims may be difficult to grasp because of current and historical beliefs. A certain familiarity with scripture will aid in the understanding of this work, but it is not necessary. A complete reading of the work should be made before making any final judgments.

The Bible, of course, should be referenced in its entirety. It is not intended that anyone should blindly believe anything; severe criticism is both expected and accepted.

Be assured that the following is not some idle tale.

Chapter 1

ALL SCRIPTURE HAS BEEN GIVEN FOR INSTRUCTION

Whom will he teach knowledge? And whom will He make to understand the message? Those just weaned from milk? Those just drawn from the breasts? For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, Line upon line, line upon line, Here a little, there a little. For with stammering lips and another tongue He will speak to this people, To whom He said, This is the rest with which You may cause the weary to rest, And, This is the refreshing; Yet they would not hear. But the word of the LORD was to them, Precept upon precept, precept upon precept, Line upon line, line upon line, Here a little, there a little, That they might go and fall backward, and be broken And snared and caught. (Isaiah 28:9–13)

Therefore thus says the LORD God: Behold, I lay in Zion a stone for a foundation, A tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation: Whoever believes will not act hastily. (Isaiah 28:16)

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:16–17; emphasis added)

And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your heart; knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, "but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:19–21; emphasis added)

But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. (2 Peter 2:1–2)

For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account. (Hebrews 4:12–13)

Chapter 2

THE HIDDEN MYSTERY OF THE GOSPEL

Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord God, That I will send a famine on the land, Not a famine of bread, Nor a thirst for water, But of hearing the words of the Lord. They shall wander from sea to sea, And from north to east; They shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord, But shall not find it. (Amos 8:11–12)

Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery kept secret since the world began but now made manifest, and by the prophetic Scriptures made known to all nations, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, for obedience to the faith. (Romans 16:25–26; emphasis added)

However, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, which none of the rulers of this age knew; for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory, But as it is written: "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him." But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. (1 Corinthians 2:6–12; emphasis added)

But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. (1 Corinthians 2:14; emphasis added)

But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord. (2 Corinthians 4:3–5; emphasis added)

And consider that the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation—as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these very things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures. (2 Peter 3:15–16; emphasis added)

The Gospel has been hidden from time immemorial. It was first revealed to us some two thousand years ago by a young Jewish man named John, who went about baptizing people, and it was later expounded upon by Jesus of Nazareth. In the first century AD, after the death of Jesus, the Gospel was preached throughout the civilized world. The Gospel received much opposition, as is revealed to in the book of the Acts of the Apostles.

Most people are aware of the early church martyrs, executions in the Colosseum, and Christians being fed to the lions. We have works of art showing Christians being impaled and burned to death. The founding fathers of Christianity were jailed and executed for their beliefs. Christians were hunted down and murdered. All of the writers of the letters to the Christian communities warned of the false doctrines that were permeating throughout the world and to be on their guard against them.

When Christianity first came on the scene, it created such an upheaval of current beliefs that there was widespread retaliation against it. The facts state that by AD 70, the leaders and vocal members of the Christian community had all but been executed, incarcerated, or forced into hiding.

Christianity was more than a thorn in the side of the Roman Empire. As political entities go, Rome was no different than the times we live in today. After doing everything they could to destroy and eradicate Christianity, they ended up creating their own homogenous Christian faith. They transposed everything pagan onto Christianity and eliminated everything that was Christian from it. It may have been one of the greatest fetes of diplomacy in political history. They smoothed the conflict between the existing religions and created a new state religion.

The major point of contention between Jews and Christians was that the Christians professed that Jesus was the only begotten Son of God, the Firstborn of creation. Jews, as do Muslims today, believe that there is only One God, and He did not beget a Son.

Believing that Jesus is God’s only begotten Son is the key to the faith that empowers us to overcome temptation and sin. Not believing that Jesus is the only begotten Son of the Father will leave a person in the same situation that the seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, found themselves in when they tried to exorcise a demon. Acts 19:14–16 describes how the seven sons called on the name of Jesus, trying to imitate Christians doing the same thing. Having no faith in who Jesus was, the demon-possessed man arose and beat the seven sons senseless.

The efforts of politicians and religious leaders to bring about peace between the current religions involved efforts of reconciliation. That reconciliation has given us today what has become known as Christianity, a pale ghost of the Way that was preached in the beginning. It pacified everyone; Christianity became ritual and celebratory. If you try to be a nice person, go to church on Sunday, attend Easter and Christmas services, say your prayers, give to the local charity, and acknowledge you’re a sinner, God will forgive you. These are all pagan beliefs. Worshipping national and community deities was encouraged—just as various Christian sects today are encouraged to worship the likes of the queen of heaven and her entourage.

Included in Jesus’s preaching was His recollections of how all of the prophets who had been sent to Israel before Him were rejected and many of them were tortured and executed.

Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still others had trial of mockings and scourings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented—of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth. (Hebrews 11:35–38)

Since the beginning of time, humanity has attempted to eradicate any knowledge of God and His plans for humanity. People have continued in the pursuits that Eve began in the Garden of Eden. Since Eve, mankind has chosen to build their own temples and churches, and to follow the dictates of their own hearts.

Because of humanity’s obstinacy, God surreptitiously inspired a select number of men to document various histories and writings of the Israelites in the Old and New Testaments. Throughout these histories and writings, God intervened in such a way that when they were recorded, they would actually paint a mosaic of God’s intentions and purposes towards humanity.

Even theologians have theorized that two of the Gospels in the New Testament alluded to a preceding document, which is commonly referred to as the Q Source. They assume that this document was either destroyed or shared orally. Theories of written and oral traditions and beliefs of the Bible abound.

The Bible, in its entirety, is the source of an encrypted message from God to humanity. As has been documented in the Bible, the writers of the books of the Old Testament did not fully understand what they were writing. Various writers revealed various aspects of God’s final plan for humanity.

The encrypted message that is contained in the Bible could better be identified as the Gospel. Paul, as did the other Apostles and writers of the New Testament, used the Old Testament to preach the Gospel.

Then Paul, as his custom was, went in to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and demonstrating that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and saying, This Jesus whom I preach to you is the Christ. (Acts 17:2–3)

Paul did not use cleverly devised cliches to convince his audience. He used painstaking arguments that could not be refuted. Arguments that took days and weeks to fully develop in order to convince the few. These were tough crowds, but with the aid of God’s Holy Spirit the Gospel was preached orally. The letters written by Paul and the other writers of the New Testament, were letters of exhortation, building on doctrine that had already been preached and believed. Trying to understand the Gospel from the hodgepodge of minuscule fragments of God’s design found throughout the New Testament can be an extremely difficult enterprise and one that has never yet been fully realized.

The current understanding of the Gospel is left to the recitation of a few Bible verses, but a full understanding and explanation of that Gospel is a challenge that has yet to be met.

What has been hidden for almost two thousand years is now revealed.

Chapter 3

THE LOAVES AND THE FISHES

A Prophecy of End-Time Events

And when Jesus went out He saw a great multitude; and He was moved with compassion for them, and healed their sick.

When it was evening, His disciples came to Him, saying, This is a deserted place, and the hour is already late. Send the multitudes away, that they may go into the villages and buy themselves food.

But Jesus said to them, They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.

And they said to Him, We have only five loaves and two fishes.

He said, Bring them here to Me.

Then He commanded the multitudes to sit down on the grass. And He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, He blessed and broke and gave the loaves to the disciples; and the disciples gave to the multitudes.

So they all ate and were filled, and they took up twelve baskets of the fragments that remained.

Now those who had eaten were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

Immediately Jesus made His disciples get into the boat and go before Him to the other side, while He sent the multitudes away.

And when He had sent the multitudes away, He went up on the mountain to pray. Now when evening came, He was alone there. (Matthew 14:14–23; emphasis added)

However, many of those who heard the word believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand. (Acts 4:4; emphasis added)

The feeding of the five thousand was prophetic. Jesus blessed the loaves and the fishes and had the disciples distribute them. After everyone had eaten, twelve baskets of leftovers were collected by the disciples.

This prophecy was fulfilled in Acts 4:4. The five thousand men who ate of the loaves and fishes represented the five thousand men who were first converted. The twelve baskets of leftovers represented the twelve apostles whose mission was to first proselytize the world. They, together with the first-century church, represent the firstfruits of the body of Christ. That Jesus immediately had the disciples get into the boat once the feeding of the multitude was finished portends to the duration in which the Gospel was first made available to the early church.

The Second Feeding of the Multitude

Then great multitudes came to Him, having with them the lame, blind, mute, maimed, and many others; and they laid them down at Jesus’s feet, and He healed them. So the multitude marvelled when they saw the mute speaking, the maimed made whole, the lame walking, and the blind seeing; and they glorified the God of Israel. Now Jesus called His disciples to Himself and said, I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now continued with Me three days and have nothing to eat. And I do not want to send them away hungry, lest they faint on the way. Then His disciples said to Him, Where could we get enough bread in the wilderness to fill such a great multitude? Jesus said to them, How many loaves do you have? And they said, Seven, and a few little fish. So He commanded the multitude to sit down on the ground. And He took the seven loaves and the fish and gave thanks, broke them and gave them to His disciples; and the disciples gave to the multitude. So they all ate and were filled, and they took up seven large baskets full of the fragments that were left. Now those who ate were four thousand men, besides women and children. (Matthew 15:30–38)

Assuredly, I say to you this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place. (Matthew 24:34)

The second feeding of the multitude is prophetic of the Gospel, which is to be preached, and the resulting conversion that will take place at the end of this age. The original time frame for the Gospel that was preached after Christ’s resurrection lasted one generation. John the Baptist began his preaching in approximately AD 29, and Jesus began His ministry in approximately AD 36. The destruction of the second temple was in AD 70.

At the time of the destruction of the second temple or shortly thereafter, Christianity as preached by the apostles had all but ceased to exist. We are now entering into the end of the ages. This period of time will only last one generation. Remembering Moses—a physical representation of the True and how his ministry lasted forty years—we should expect this end-time period to last forty years. If it continues longer, it will be for the sake of those being saved.

"For He will finish the work and

Cut it short in righteousness,

Because the LORD will make a

Short work upon the earth."

(Romans 9:28)

Chapter 4

THE MYSTERY OF THE GOSPEL OF GOD REVEALED

The Charge

It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, But the glory of kings is to search out a matter. (Proverbs 25:2)

In the beginning, before anything was created that was created, God the Father of us all, begot a Son. His Son was, in essence, identical to Him. Nature teaches us that like begets like. Through God’s Son, He created everything that is seen and that is unseen. The Father commanded, and His Son complied, so much so that He is identified as the Word, the personification of God’s command. All things were created through Him, and for Him, and nothing was created apart from Him. He is the sum total of all of creation.

What set John the Baptist apart from all of the other prophets who came before him was that he recognized that the coming Messiah had to be the Son of God. John witnessed that Jesus was before John, but in physical terms, John was six months older than Jesus.

Through signs and miracles, God witnessed to John the Baptist—and to the disciples and apostles of Jesus—that Jesus of Nazareth is God’s only begotten Son, the Christ. Salvation, as follows, can only happen if Jesus is the Christ, the only begotten Son of God. John the Baptist understood it cannot happen any other way, which will be shown in the entirety of this book.

One of the most important qualities of God is that He is just. He tempers justice with mercy, but He is—without parallel—just. The Old Testament writings introduce us to God’s opinion of lawlessness. It also points out to humanity’s inherent lawlessness. God cannot condone lawlessness. It would be diametrically opposed to His nature to do so.

Man was created in God’s image with an ability to form a bond with God that transcends our current (after the fall of humanity) human limitations. This bond was through God’s Son, through whom He created the worlds and everything in them. The essence of the bond became incorporated into a binding contract or covenant, between Christ and mankind, comparable to an earthly marriage contract. The contract was perpetual, and it could only end by the death of one or both of the parties.

So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no man separate. (Matthew 19:6)

Lucifer and his legions were created to be ministering spirits to mankind, helps in their husbandry of the world.

Lucifer rebelled and incited humans to rebel with him. As the result of the rebellion, Lucifer—whose name was changed to Satan because of his rebellion—usurped God’s authority and became the god of this world.

The penalty for rebellion is death.

God is just, merciful, and impartial.

God cannot condone rebellion.

Humanity was cursed with Lucifer.

Humanity immediately became alienated from God and would become subjected to a curse. In the first aspect of the curse, humanity was cursed, along with the world. The ground would no longer bear its fruit as designed, and humanity would be subjected to death. From the point of view of any legalistic claims, this curse was a permanent arrangement; in human terms, we became divorced from God.

In the second aspect of the curse, at the time of the deluge, at which time both the first and second aspects of the curse came into play, Satan and his legions were cast into hell, bound in eternal chains of darkness, and reserved for punishment until the coming Day of Judgment.

The third aspect of this curse is the coming Day of Judgment, in which the physical world and universe will be totally and completely annihilated, and the consequences of this curse are death and destruction upon humanity and this universe in various stages. Nothing can change this curse. It has been given to us