Reading our NT incorrectly! (w/o the Divine Council worldview)
Once one begins to read their Bible with a "Divine Council Worldview", interestingly the way Second Temple Judaism and the Early Christians read their Bibles, you begin 'to see' things you missed. According to Dr. Michael Heiser, "The term divine council is used by Hebrew and Semitics scholars to refer to the heavenly host, the pantheon of divine beings who administer the affairs of the cosmos. All ancient Mediterranean cultures had some conception of a divine council. The divine council of Israelite religion, known primarily through the psalms, was distinct in important ways." And once we have this 'worldview' as our background, NT verses that seemed nonsensical at worst and redundant at best, now become clear. Let¹s look at Colossians 1 where this becomes apparent. I had ALWAYS assumed that 'the saints' that Paul addresses in verses 2, 4 and 12 and 26 were a reference to Christian believers in the Church. BUT we need to take another lo...