struggling with all His energy
I think there is a bit of mystique that shrouds a pastor's study: What exactly is taking place in there? How does he emerge with a sermon to preach every Sunday? And does he have a mini-fridge in there? Recently, someone asked about my sermon preparation, and I thought I would swing wide the door to …
Continue reading "Preparing a Sermon from the Original Languages"
I'm working on a project involving Proverbs 31, and I've really fallen in love with the poetry of it's twenty-two lines. The famous work is an acrostic, each line beginning with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Hopefully there will be much more to come on the poem from me, but for now I …
I am eternally grateful for our English translations. On the 500th anniversary of the 95 Theses, we remember how the Reformational belief in the priesthood of all believers drove men like John Wycliffe, William Tyndale, and Martin Luther to translate the Bible into the language of common Christians. That being said, I am still occasionally …
The Bible is so meta--interconnected, self-referential, delicately woven together like the most beautiful spiderweb you've ever seen glistening in the early light of dawn. I came across one of those places in the Bible that connects all the dots in a single sentence yesterday in 2 Chronicles: "Then Solomon began to build the house of the …
Continue reading "Mt. Moriah: The Firm Foundation of Solomon’s Temple"
Two Sundays ago, I preached Nehemiah 3. It's a chapter that lists the various men and women who rebuilt the wall of Jerusalem. Here's a taste: "...Next to them Jedaiah the son of Harumaph repaired opposite his house. And next to him Hattush the son of Hashabneiah repaired. Malchijah the son of Harim and Hasshub …
Continue reading "Can’t I Just Skip the Boring Parts of the Bible?"
First off, the book of Ruth presents itself as the solution to Judges's problem. The book of Judges sums itself up in its final sentence: "In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes" (Judges 21:25). Turn the page, and Ruth 1:1, we find ourselves in same world: "In the days when the judges ruled there was a famine in the land." However, in verse 2 we are introduced to a man named "Elimelech", which translates "God is King."
