Three of the Wisdom books — Ecclesiastes, Job, and Psalms — share a common theme: It’s permissible, even expected, that we should kvetch to God about the hardships we face, but this complaining and questioning should be accompanied by faith and trust and a recognition that God knows what He is doing, so that the … [Read more…]
Happy Easter! He is risen! Since I’m writing something about every other book of the New Testament, it would be odd to skip the Gospels. On the other hand, one always worries that it is presumptuous at best to try to boil down God’s word, and that is especially so with the Gospels. What’s more, … [Read more…]
Except for the Creation narrative in Genesis and the End Times discussion in Revelation, no book of the Bible can match the historical and geographical sweep of Acts. It stretches from Spain to Arabia over a period of thirty to forty years, telling the story of the early days of the spread of Christianity. And … [Read more…]
Here’s what we’re saying when we pray the Lord’s Prayer: Our Father — We acknowledge God: His existence, power, benevolence and love (and our love for Him), and universality. On the last point, note that throughout this prayer the first person plural is used — our, we, us — underscoring not only the universality of God … [Read more…]
That is, lessons from the book of Revelation. The book is divided into two parts: The first and shorter is the text of letters that John sends to seven churches in Asia Minor, and the second and longer is John’s apocalyptic vision of the end times. The church letters are report cards, telling each church … [Read more…]
While the authorship of some other books in the New Testament is sometimes disputed, the book of Hebrews is unique in that there is today apparently no traditionalist view on who wrote it, and as best I can tell no majority view either. The original King James Version, and I believe older Catholic Bibles, labeled … [Read more…]
Romans and Hebrews are the two most theological epistles. One reason this is not surprising is that Romans is the only letter of Paul’s that is not tied in with running a church and/or dealing with particular congregants. What follows is definitely not an in-depth discussion of Paul’s theology, but an outline with discussion that … [Read more…]
This is a long letter. Romans is a bit longer, but this comes in a close second, substantially ahead of the all Paul’s other letters, and longer than any of the other epistles, including Hebrews. And it covers a lot of territory and a variety of topics. The first six chapters address directly the dysfunctions … [Read more…]
This is a very personal letter, and one that is tied closely to specific problems and issues with the church in Corinth. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t a lot here of broader applicability, but some parts have more of that than others. In that regard, I’ll note that my NIV study Bible provides a … [Read more…]
I Timothy: Chapter 1: Christ is “our hope.” Don’t worry about “endless genealogies.” The goal of instruction is “love,” “good conscience,” and a “sincere faith.” Paul condemns, inter alia, homosexuals. He acknowledges his own past sinfulness. Chapter 2: This chapter must give the Left fits. In verses 2:1-2, Paul says that we should pray for … [Read more…]