Recommended reading
Asimov's Guide to the Bible.
Picked this up in college (in an older edition), and have yet to find a better overall layman's reference on the subject. Written by an atheist, too!
The end of the 1200-page book:
Revelation 22:7, Behold, I come quickly...
And with that assurance--still unfulfilled nearly two thousand years later--the New Testament ends.
