What Your Preacher Or Bible Teacher Never Told You

By Tony Duncan and Clara Shannon

Jesus the Master Teacher asked questions. Why? What? How? Tony Duncan asks "Where" and thus challenges Bible Students to find the facts in their Bibles. Yes, these little known facts are not generally explored by teachers and preachers! When students report the answer Tony then informs them of the context an other important matters tha

• Language: English
• Publisher: James A. Duncan
• Release date: Oct 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9780692620595

Tony Duncan

Tony Duncan was born in 1935. After school, National Service and university, he worked on various farms in England and New Zealand. Then in 1961, he bought a farm on Dartmoor. Tony married in 1963. Together, they have two sons. After a spell as a teacher from 1976 to 1985, he and his wife ran a market garden beside the River Dart. They retired to Totnes in 2000.

Book preview

WHAT YOUR PREACHER OR BIBLE TEACHER

NEVER

TOLD YOU

TONY DUNCAN

© 2015 Tony Duncan

All rights reserved. No part of the publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the author. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

ISBN: 978-0-692-41190-2

CONTENTS

Dedication

How To Use This Book

Foreword

Introduction

Where in the Pentateuch...?

Where in the Books of History...?

Where in the Books of Poetry...?

Where in the Books of Prophecy...?

Where in the Books of the New Testament...?

Works Cited

DEDICATION

My co-author Clara Shannon and I would like to dedicate this book in memory of our parents and in honor of our spouses. Our parents, Sid and Arlis Armstrong and Gray and Lorraine Duncan worked side by side for many years and were dedicated to making our local congregation a sound and productive part of the kingdom of Christ. Their teaching and instruction have laid a strong foundation from which we have benefited and are still benefiting from today. We especially dedicate this work in honor of our spouses Roy Hanes Shannon and Cathy Demonbreun Duncan. Their example and love of the Lord, along with their support of our efforts over the years, have made whatever accomplishments we have had possible. To you both, thank you.

Our love always,

Tony and Clara

HOW TO USE THIS BOOK

This book is intended primarily for those teaching adult Bible classes. It can, however, be used in some way for most ages, in particular teenage classes. Parents and grandparents can use it as a tool for instilling God’s Word (and intrigue and love for it!) at home or when traveling (Deuteronomy 6:6-7). This material can be considered in the trivia genre, but hopefully you will find it to extend well beyond those bounds.

Through the years as I looked for questions and have been given questions, I would find another question while researching the one I had in hand. I hope you will benefit in some way from these questions and answers. Whether you are a student or teacher, look at this material with a critical eye and let each question lead you to some other part of God’s manifold wisdom. Hopefully, as you research these questions for yourself, you will discover things that you did not know or things you had not considered. You may not agree with every answer, but I hope you will be encouraged to research, without prejudice, God’s Word.

For ease in researching, especially when using a concordance, the King James Version is used in every question unless otherwise noted.

My prayer for you is that you will increase your knowledge and understanding of His inspired Word from Genesis to Revelation (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

FOREWORD

Jesus the Master Teacher asked questions––lots and lots of questions! Why? What? How? Which? Where? By some counts Jesus asked more than 300 questions in His ministry while on this earth. He wanted the people He questioned to think, study, reason, and learn. Questions such as What is written in the law? How readest thou? (Luke 10:26) caused the lawyer trying to test Him to think and answer based on his own study. Other questions like What man shall there be among you that shall have one sheep, and if it fall into a pit on the Sabbath day, will he not lay hold on it, and lift it out? forced the Pharisees to reason and apply the logic found in Jesus’ question. Jesus used questions to make lessons interesting and help people think!

In this book, Tony Duncan asks, Where? and thus challenges Bible students to find the answers in their Bibles. Yet, these little-known facts are not generally explored by teachers and preachers! The questions in this book are borne out of years of questions that Tony asked his Bible class. When students report the answer, Tony then informs them of the context and other important matters that can be learned from that text, information that enriches their Bible study by broadening their understanding. What a wonderful teaching tool Tony has honed over 30-plus years while teaching the Sunday morning adult Bible class at the Brushy church of Christ! Like the Master Teacher, Tony Duncan challenges Christians and Christian teachers everywhere with the question Where?

Larry P. Murdock, M.A.R.

Minister, church of Christ

Lawrenceburg, TN

INTRODUCTION

Tony: Upon the completion of my Master's Degree in 1977, my wife Cathy Demonbreun Duncan and I moved to the community where I was reared. We began to worship at the church that I had attended since my birth in 1954. Shortly after our move I began teaching adult Bible classes and have been doing so most every Sunday for the last thirty-five years. During this time, I am not sure when or exactly why, I started beginning my classes with a research question. The members of the class responded well to these questions, seemed to enjoy them, and looked forward to more. I found these questions to be a good way to initiate class participation and to set a positive tone for the remainder of the class. Over the years I have collected hundreds of questions. Upon my retirement I decided to put these research questions into book form. I hope as you pick up this book, you will do so with Bible and reference material in hand, and do as the Bereans did in Acts 17:11. The King James Version is used in the wording of the questions for ease in researching unless otherwise noted.

I want to thank Larry Murdock for his ability and his willingness to take on the task of editing this material. His counsel and friendship have been invaluable to me. I am very grateful to those who have been in my classes over the years and who have suggested questions and caused me to dig deeper. I am thankful that they also corrected me when I was wrong.

To Leon Barnes, Jerry and Fern Hill, and David Shannon who read the manuscript and gave valuable feedback, I express my sincere thanks and appreciation.

How blessed and thankful I am for Tonja McRady for her professional proofreading services and patience with us as novices.

Much appreciation and thanks to Scott Utter, the artist who designed the book jacket and art throughout the book, as well as the layout and formatting.

I am especially thankful to my co-author Clara Shannon. Without Clara's help I could not have completed this work. Her dedication to detail, her encouragement, and her desire to get it right have been priceless.

To my wife Cathy (when counting my many blessings, I rank alphabetical seating at the top of the list), thank you for your love and support and for your tolerance of my imperfections for the last thirty-eight years.

Clara: For decades I have greatly desired to sit at the feet of Tony Duncan in his adult Bible class. This never happened since I taught at the same time, either children’s or ladies’ Bible classes. When Tony asked me if I would help him compile a book of his research questions from his Bible class for publication, it took me only the blink of an eye to answer yes. I had given up on ever being a regular Bible student of Tony’s, but the Lord has given me this desire of my heart (Psalm 37:4) in this most unexpected way. Now for almost two years I have sat at his feet spiritually, while sitting across our study table physically, for countless hours. I feel I have gained the equivalent of a bachelor's degree, or even a master’s degree, in Bible!

I also give grateful thanks and appreciation to the individuals Tony mentioned above––Larry Murdock, Leon Barnes, Jerry and Fern Hill, David Shannon, Tonja McRady, and Scott Utter––whose participation in the making of