The Four Moses Books

Moses is the central figure — besides God, of course — in the the four books of the Pentateuch following Genesis.  And those four books have two strands:  the historical narrative of Moses leading the Jews out of Egypt and to the Promised Land, and the laws given to Moses by God during that time … [Read more…]

Scripture and Theology from “First Things”

I really liked this passage from Kevin J. Vanhoozer’s article, “Letter to an Aspiring Theologian:  How To Speak of God Truly,” in the August/September 2018 issue of First Things: … [T]he best way to stay focused on the subject matter of theology is to stay focused on Scripture. John Calvin viewed his Institutes as help … [Read more…]

Jesus’ First Two Converts

In one of our church’s weekly “small group” meetings, we recently discussed Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well, John 4:1-42.  It occurred to me that this might be the first non-Jewish convert.  My NIV study Bible has a table that puts all four Gospels in single chronological order, and that seems to … [Read more…]