Father Mike Schmitz

And I probably came across as kind of being really boring because I didn't make a lot of jokes because we had a different cultural context.

Okay.

How does this apply right now?

It applies right now because we have to discover the sacred author's intention, which means that we have to do some scripture study that are some, you know, study of the culture and study of like, okay, here's what it means to me right now to read these words.

For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand before it?

but what did Matthew actually mean when he wrote these words?

Chapter 7 The 144,000 of Israel Sealed After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth, that no wind might blow on earth or sea or against any tree.

Or this is what it means to me as a 21st century American, but what did this mean to Moses as he wrote the first books of Moses like 4,000 years ago?

So it's important to understand, number one, to try to discover the sacred author's intention.

Then I saw another angel ascend from the rising of the sun with the seal of the living God, and he called with a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm earth and sea, saying, Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, though we have sealed the servants of our God upon their foreheads.

Number two, and when it comes to interpreting scripture, we need to, Goya Catechism says, to be especially attentive to the content and unity of scripture.

What that means is,

there are 73 books.

They're all different.

They're all different genres, but they will not contradict each other, but they rather inform each other.

and i heard the number of the sealed a hundred and forty-four thousand sealed out of every tribe of the sons of israel twelve thousand sealed out of the tribe of judah twelve thousand of the tribe of reuben twelve thousand of the tribe of gad twelve thousand of the tribe of asher

And so if in one portion of the Bible, it seems like, wow, God is really unjust.

For example, one of the first books we're going to look at in this Bible in a year podcast is the book of Job.

And you can look at this and say, wow, did God just like visit all this destruction upon Job for no reason?

12,000 of the tribe of Naphtali, 12,000 of the tribe of Manasseh, 12,000 of the tribe of Simeon, 12,000 of the tribe of Levi, 12,000 of the tribe of Issachar, 12,000 of the tribe of Zebulun, 12,000 of the tribe of Joseph, 12,000 sealed out of the tribe of Benjamin.