New Year's Bible Reading Goal and Strange Reading along the Way

Every year at the end of December, starting back quite a few years ago, my hubby and I sit down and make goals for the new year and review how we've done with accomplishing the goals for last year.  Inevitably there are goals that are never reached, but at the same token many of them are also accomplished.  I prefer to refer to them as "goals" because in my mind this is something I can work towards instead of a "resolution" that I have to work hard not to break.  One of my goals a couple of years ago was to read through the Bible in a year - which I'm sorry to say did not happen.  So, this year, I decided to renew this goal and use an online tool to try and be more consistent with my reading - especially because I look at my e-mail several times a day and will see the new reading in my inbox.  I'm sure there are several sights like this, but I signed up for daily e-mails with  http://www.bibleinayear.org/

I'm reading through the Bible chronologically and so right now I am in Genesis.  As I read the beginning of Genesis 6, I saw something that I have seen before, but stood out to me once again as being so strange.  Here is the passage:

Genesis Chapter 6
1 When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the LORD said, "My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days will be a hundred and twenty years." 4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days-- and also afterward-- when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.

I don't really know the theological explanation for this passage in which it seems to imply that angels and humans were married and having children, or something of the sort, or who the Nephilim are, but the last sentence is so reminiscent of Lord of the Rings that I'm sure it is a passage from which Tolkein took some inspiration ("They were the heroes of old, men of renown.")  Years ago now, I read many of Madeleine L'Engle's novels and one of them was Many Waters about children from our era being transported back to Noah's time before the Flood.  In this story, L'Engle has the Nephilim as fallen angels and then there are also angels present, as well.  Despite theological disagreements that many have with L'Engle and her Christian views, I personally find her fiction and her treatment of this topic fascinating.  She not only deals with and fully imagines how this passage in the Bible would be practically played out in the lives of her characters, but also shows the beauty of a God-given imagination and challenges us to think a bit outside the box.  This isn't a exactly a book review or a exposition on the imagination and Christianity or a my personal enjoyment of fantasy fiction, but these are all topics I will continue to touch on as time goes by.  For now, I'm inspired to go back and read commentary on the beginning of Genesis 6 and see what is said about it.  I'll be sure to check back in with y'all about it in the near future.