9 INNINGS OF BIBLE BASEBALL (OR, LEARN THE BIBLE IN 5 SHORT CHAPTERS)

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfbSDoXxcsI

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Recently, I discovered at Christianity.com a trivia game called Bible Baseball. (Click HERE to play.) The Bible questions come in four levels of difficulty -- Single, Double, Triple, Home Run. When you're doing the pitching against the computer, the questions are randomly chosen and seem to come from all four of those different categories.
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Bible Baseball is EXACTLY like real baseball... but without the hot dogs. ...And without the peanuts and Cracker Jacks. Uhm... and without the smell of fresh cut grass, the warmth of Summer, girls in the stands wearing halter tops and short shorts. Without the voice of Vin Scully coming through a transistor radio while Steve Sax steals second. Without "Leather-Lungs Louise" shouting near your ear and that drunken boob spilling his beer on you. ...Other than that, it's exactly like real baseball.
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After experimenting with Bible Baseball a little bit, I decided to play a full 9-inning game to see how I'd do. So, I put on my Dodgers T-shirt and I got settled in front of my computer monitor:
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Naturally, I was representing the Dodgers. And I decided that the computer would represent the Giants. Lemme tell ya, I hate the Giants so much that I'm actually rooting for the earthquake -- The Big One. Ha!
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In Bible Baseball, when you are on offense (i.e., at the plate, hitting), the screen looks like this:
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And when you are on the mound, pitching to the computer, the screen looks like this:
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And when the cover of your Bible is worn like this...
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and when the margins of your Bible pages are covered in notes like this...
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...then after nine full innings of Bible Baseball, your scoreboard will look something like this...
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Yeah, yeah, I know that looks pretty impressive. But in truth, I fell short of my first and primary goal. I really wanted to shut out the Giants (computer). And, actually, I DID have a shutout going after 7 full innings!
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But in the bottom of the 8th inning, a combination of a couple tough questions, a bit of complacency which had seeped into my mindset, and a bit of clock-watching (I needed to make an important phone call to my Brother soon) caused me to give up back-to-back home runs. At the end of 8 innings, the score was 99-2.
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At that point, I necessarily shifted to Plan B Goal 2: To score at least 100 runs more than the computer does. In my half of the 9th, I added 4 more runs to my total. But in the bottom of the 9th, the Giants hit another home run off me, and followed that up with a double.
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I was in trouble. With two outs, the Giants had a runner in scoring position. Any kind of hit at all, even just a single, was going to get the Giants another run and they'd pull within 99 runs of me.
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I felt a bit nervous when I clicked the "Throw Your Pitch" button. But as soon as the following question popped up, I knew the game was over and I had my 100-Run Victory:

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Ain't no way I could miss a question that comes from my all-time favorite "book" of The Bible -- 1st John 1-5.
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Below is another question that came up during my 9-inning game. It's one that I know my good friend Trainyard Julio would get right. Do you also know the answer?...
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Many times I have said, "Show me a person who doesn't believe The Holy Bible is the inspired Word of God, and I will show you someone who has not studied it, or who has not studied it enough."
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I've also been known to say this: "The essential message of The Holy Bible is encapsulated in the five short chapters of 1st John. The rest is details."
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That's right! If you simply read 1 John 1-5 over and over until you fully understood it, and then applied it in your life, you would be following the entire Divine program with a clear understanding of its foundation.
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Of course, I really recommend that everyone read the entire Bible from cover-to-cover every year. (You can't score 100 runs in Bible Baseball by reading only 1 John!) And there ARE various types of Daily Bible Reading Schedules online which, in a single year, will take you through the entire Book in small, bite-sized segments. But if you really just want a "Bible Made EZ" Bible reading program that you can go through in way less than an hour, then 1 John 1-5 is for you. You can read it by clicking HERE. That's the core message of the entire Bible right there. 
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The Holy Bible is indeed God's message to mankind. It's The Truth. And don't you think you ought to know it? ('The Dictionary Of Cultural Literacy' states: "No one in the English-speaking world can be considered literate without a basic knowledge of the Bible.")
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Why not start with 1 John? And before you begin reading, say an honest, humble little prayer to Jesus asking Him to open your heart and mind to Scripture, if in fact it really does come from The Creator. You may be quite surprised by what happens.
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How do I KNOW that The Bible is the inspired Word of God? How do I know it isn't just a Book of myths, like so many atheists try to tell you it is? Well, for one thing, as my buddy, Bryan, wrote with a patina of humorous sarcasm:
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"You know, back in a time when people didn't even understand the concept of basic geometry and thought that mice spontaneously generated from rags, a small group of scam artists banded together and wrote a fake storybook that takes a genius level IQ and years of reading to fully comprehend."
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Yep, I'd say that pretty well sums it up. If you can believe THAT, I suppose you could be convinced of just about anything.
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Test your Bible knowledge by playing Bible Baseball HERE.
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Bless And Be Blessed,
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~ Stephen T. McCarthy
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