Stories that do something
The parables, and what they were for
Jesus told stories that were meant to land before they were understood. This path works through about thirty of them, sets each in its setting, and resists the habit of flattening a parable into a single moral.
Jesus spoke all these things in parables to the multitudes; and without a parable, he didn’t speak to them…
What you'll come away with
What this path is for
Not a reading streak. These are the things you should be able to do on your own once you have worked through it.
Read a parable in its scene
Who was listening changes what a story does. You will learn to check the audience before deciding what a parable means.
Know when allegory helps
Some parables have an explained key; most do not. You will learn where detailed allegory is warranted and where it starts inventing meaning.
See the kingdom as the subject
Most of these stories are about God's reign arriving in an unexpected shape. That thread turns a scattered collection into a single theme.
Sit with the uncomfortable ones
The shrewd manager, the workers paid the same, the wedding guest thrown out. You will face them rather than route around them.
How the tutor works
A tutor, not a search box
The same eight habits run through every path. They are what make this study rather than summary.
Questions first
Every lesson asks before it tells. A few quick questions check what you noticed, then Trinity explains the answer.
Greek and Hebrew, one tap away
Tap a word to see the Greek or Hebrew behind it. See what it can mean and where else it shows up.
Follow the thread
Pick one image, promise, or line. Follow it from Genesis through the prophets into the Gospels.
- Map
Galilee
LetterPhilippians
- From
- Paul, in prison
- To
- the church at Philippi
- Why
- thanks, and joy
TimelineWhere it sits
- Abraham
- Moses
- David
- Exile
- Jesus
Context that clicks
Maps, timelines, and who wrote it to whom. Get the background the first readers already knew.
Genesis
Exodus
Psalms
Beatitudes
John
Hebrews
Lord's Prayer
Parables
Acts
Corinthians
Romans
Revelation
Isaiah
I AM Sayings
Proverbs
26 paths and counting
Walk through a whole book, Genesis to Revelation, or take a short theme like the Beatitudes or the Lord's Prayer.
Bring your doubts
Ask the question you'd never ask out loud. Trinity takes it seriously, no judgment.
Feb5Maya's questions
Added 6w agoWants to know why Jesus calls the poor blessed. Reads on the train.
Apr12Next up
Just addedBeatitudes, lesson 3: the gentle. Her Bible says meek, so start there.
Pick up where you left off
Trinity keeps notes on your questions and where you stopped. Next time, it starts right there.
Every side, fairly told
On baptism, the end times, and more, you get the main views and their best arguments. Disputed questions are labelled as disputed.
The path itself
What you'll study, in order
Each unit builds on the one before it. Lessons live inside Trinity; this is the shape of the ground you will cover.
How parables work
Why Jesus taught this way
The sower, and the parable about parables
One point or many? A long-running debate
Allegory: when it clarifies, when it distorts
The kingdom of God as the recurring subject
How the kingdom grows
Mustard seed and leaven
Wheat and weeds together
Seed growing while the farmer sleeps
Hidden treasure and the costly pearl
The net, and the sorting at the end
Mercy and the lost
Lost sheep and lost coin
A father and two sons
The Pharisee and the tax collector
The servant who would not forgive
The good Samaritan, and the question that prompted it
Money and reckoning
The rich fool
The rich man and Lazarus
The shrewd manager, the hardest one
Workers hired at different hours
The talents, and what is being risked
Waiting well
Ten bridesmaids and the oil
The faithful and the careless servant
The great banquet and its excuses
The wicked tenants
Sheep and goats, and how it has been read
I've led a small group for six years, and honestly I was mostly repeating Sunday's sermon. Trinity kept asking what the passage actually said before it would tell me anything. Our Thursday nights are better for it.
I was baptized in March and still couldn't find anything in the Bible. I asked what a psalm even is, which felt embarrassing to type. It showed me Psalm 13, a man complaining to God. I didn't know that was allowed.
I mostly use it for word study. When I'm stuck on a Greek term, it walks me through what it can mean without pretending the question is settled. It's told me "scholars disagree here" more than once, which I respect.
Forty years in church and I'd never finished the Bible. I'm in Numbers now. Not thrilling, but I'm still going. Most days I read it before the kettle's boiled.
I'm not sure I believe any of it yet. I came in wanting to argue, and I still do. It argues back properly. It names the best objection before I can, and it doesn't sulk when I won't concede.
I ask it what a fifteen-year-old would really ask about a chapter. It gives me the awkward questions, not the tidy ones. Twice now it's sent me off to study properly, which I suppose is the point.
I read on my phone during my eleven-minute break, and it never tries to make it an hour. Last week it caught that I'd misread who was speaking in Job. It was one of the friends, not God. Changed the whole chapter for me.
I work in two languages, so I'm fussy about words. I asked why one Hebrew word is lovingkindness in one place and steadfast love in another. I got a real answer about hesed, not a devotional paragraph.
I worried it would hand my people easy answers to hard chapters. It mostly doesn't. Someone asked it about hell, and it laid out what Christians have held and said plainly which parts are disputed. I can work with that.
I sit with dying people, so I don't have much patience for cheerfulness. I'd been avoiding the lament psalms. It walked me through Psalm 88, which ends in the dark and stays there, and it didn't rush to fix it.
I'd abandoned three reading plans before this one. I went quiet for a while, came back, and it just carried on. No lecture. I'm in Isaiah now.
Before you start
Questions people ask about this path
Mark 4:11-12 says something close to that, quoting Isaiah, and it has troubled readers for a long time. Some take it as judgment on settled resistance, some as an invitation that separates the curious from the casual. The path presents the readings and does not smooth the sentence over.
Christians differ. Some read it as literal information about the intermediate state; others read it as a story using familiar imagery to make a point about wealth, warning and hardened hearts. Trinity gives both and shows what each does with the details.
Counts range from around thirty to over sixty, depending on whether short comparisons count. This path works through about thirty of the substantial ones, which covers the material most people meet.
Yes, and plenty of people do. The path gives you the setting, the structure and the main interpretive options for each parable, which is most of the groundwork.
Start this path today
The first unit is free, and you do not need to know anything going in. Trinity will ask what you noticed before it explains a thing.
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