Vaughan Roberts

“A great Bible overview in and of itself and an excellent foundation for more in-depth study of the Bible’s storyline. Read it and read it again!”

However well we know individual portions of the Bible we are often blind to how it all ties together. Why does Adam and Eve eating some fruit in the Garden of Eden affect us in the 21st century? Was the sending of Jesus a back-up plan because God’s ‘ten commandments idea’ failed? Why is the gospel writer Matthew so keen to tell us who Jesus descended from?

Vaughan Roberts takes his readers on a step-by-step journey through the Bible tracing its storyline from Genesis to Revelation focusing on the developing theme of the kingdom of God. He states that if we possess a good overview of the storyline of the Bible we will be able to get our bearings when we land in any part of it.

God’s Big Picture is readable and clear. It shows that the Bible is Christ-centred throughout and the reader’s attention is constantly driven towards Christ whether discussing Leviticus, Amos or Romans. The text is interspersed with diagrams illustrating various stages in salvation history, which act as extremely helpful memory aids. The Bible studies at the end of each chapter are particularly impressive, they are not simply a review of the chapter but lead the reader to delve deeper into the Bible text for personal application, further study and perhaps reading the book in a group.

This is a book that will be helpful to Christians new and old. If you are daunted by long books then this book is for you – it is easy to read and moves through the Bible at a fast pace without losing you on the way. If on the other hand you think you cannot possibly learn anything from a book with less than 200 pages then think again – God’s Big Picture is extremely insightful in many areas and may give you a better understanding of certain themes than other more complex overviews. I recommend this book unreservedly.