There are five books in the Bible that have only one chapter. In the New Testament, there is Jude, Paul’s letter to Philemon, and John’s second and third epistles. In the Old Testament, there is the book by minor prophet Obadiah. It’s interesting that the four authors are at the extremes with regard to the … [Read more…]
In the current (August/September 2020) issue of First Things, George Weigel has an article about John Paul II that discusses, in particular, St. Paul’s speech on the Areopagus to the Athenians, which “held a special place in [the pontiff’s] religious imagination.” And, when you think about it, this was indeed an important encounter, almost literally … [Read more…]
At our church, last Sunday’s sermon — which was on a few verses in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians (4:17-24) — made the point that we should not think ourselves unworthy of salvation because of shame for our past sinful behavior. It was noted in this context that it is unlikely that many of us … [Read more…]
Why would our God choose to inspire humans to write the texts that make up the Bible? The short answer has to be, So that other humans will read these texts and be encouraged to behave in a particular way (in this post, behaving includes not only one’s external actions but also one’s internal motives … [Read more…]
I. A Good Order for Reading the Bible The One-Year Bible that my wife and I are reading doesn’t just divide Scripture into 365 (or 366) equal parts and then plow through them, one per day. Rather, it more or less divides the Old Testament (minus the Psalms and Proverbs) into 365 equal parts; divides … [Read more…]
In my earlier post on this blogsite about the minor prophets, I summarize the lessons from Jonah this way: “Don’t disobey God or be parochial. God wants all peoples to follow him; He answers prayers; He’s against violence and idols and is pro-sacrifice.” True enough, but since this is one of my favorite Bible books … [Read more…]
The main point of this post is that the order in which the Ten Commandments are listed makes perfect sense. The Ten Commandments are listed in this order (I paraphrase and shorten them, found at Exodus 20:1-17 and Deuteronomy 5:4-21): Thou shalt have no other gods besides God. No idols. No misusing God’s name. Keep … [Read more…]
In my post on this blogsite about the book of Joshua, I have a section called, “It’s the Land, Stupid,” and I note that in this book “the importance of the land is manifest, and big chunks of the book are detailed, survey-like description of boundaries.” I continue with this paragraph: This reflects an important … [Read more…]
What does God want our attitude toward money to be? Well, in Scripture the apostle Paul teaches that “the love of money is the root of all evil” (I Timothy 6:10). That’s important, but it must always be stressed that it is the love of money, not money itself, that is condemned. So there are … [Read more…]
I’ve divided this post into two parts: a list of ten general rules, and then some specific applications. Ten Rules Here are ten rules for interpreting Biblical texts, especially difficult ones: There’s a strong presumption in favor of all Scripture being true (if we can freely ignore any passage in Scripture that we find difficult, … [Read more…]