The other day, I was at the checkout in a Louisville bookstore when I spied a display of refrigerator magnets with more or less humorous themes. Most were pretty snarky, some scatological, and a few proudly blasphemous. The first one that caught my eye featured an angler in a beautiful wilderness setting leaning over to …
Does it ever frustrate you that so few things God promises His children come quickly? He promises to make us holy, including love, patience, kindness, faithfulness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). Yet rare is the Christian in whom these characteristics develop overnight. God promises provision and blessing to those who tithe (Malachi 3:10). Yet financial burdens …
How Can We Have Faith When God Seems Slow to Keep His Promises? Read More »
Reza Aslan’s best seller, Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, is a Procrustean Bed. (You remember the Greek mythological figure who sized people to his bed by either stretching them or lopping off limbs.) He’s willing to do a great deal of editorial and rhetorical violence to the Bible and to Jesus …
I’ve been reading the Song of Solomon devotionally, and I can’t help but think it’s meant to picture Jesus and the Church. The woman’s delight in her husband (Song of Solomon 1:16-17) makes me think of Peter’s statement that loving Jesus causes believers to “rejoice with joy that is inexpressible” (1 Peter 1:8). The man’s …
We have a new granddaughter on the way, and our daughter has asked us to help brainstorm Bible names. This new grandbaby will join sisters Ruth and Lois, both from the Bible, plus cousins named Josiah, Asher, Judah, Susannah, Adriel, and Alethia (Greek for “truth”). As for my wife Sharon and I, we’re named, respectively, …
A Name for the New Baby? Have You Checked the Bible? Read More »
It has become fashionable to suggest that the Bible is “missing” certain gospels. As the suggestion goes, dozens of early Christians wrote factual accounts of Jesus’ life, but early Church leaders suppressed certain writings—many of which are known as Gnostic gospels—in order to manipulate the Jesus story in service of their political agenda. Though it …