The Logos Bible Software Blog
Arguably the most significant new Logos 8 feature is the Notes tool. I certainly have received more questions about it than any other feature. Once you understand how to save and retrieve notes you’ll develop your own organizing scheme.
For now however, allow me to jump start your Notes‘ creativity I’ll show how easy it is to create and search an Illustrations Notebook.
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Several years ago my former employer, Moody Publishers, acquired almost every book A.W. Tozer (1897–1963) ever wrote.
In God’s kindness, I had just started working at Moody—and my job included reading every book we would print.
So I read a lot of Tozer. I found in him a lifelong conversation partner. [Read more…]
Isaiah’s magnificent prophecy spans not only history, going from creation (e.g., 42:5) to eternity (e.g., 9:7), but also geography, with an interest ranging between God’s own people through all of humanity (e.v., 2:2). Containing both words of hope and horror, its key theme is God himself, who is referred to hundreds of times.”
—Zondervan Illustrated Bible Background Commentary on the Old Testament
In the first chapter of Isaiah, God expresses his dissatisfaction with the sacrifices Israel offered (Isaiah 1:11–16).
On the outside, they are doing exactly as God asked: they sacrifice rams and bulls, fat and blood, lambs, goats, and incense. They honor the Sabbath. They have a system for remembering when to feast and celebrate what God has done (Isaiah 1:14).
But God says their sacrifices are meaningless.
“I have had enough . . . I do not delight . . . bring no more.” Quantity is not the issue. Quality is. And it’s not a matter of extravagance. Their elaborate prayers use their lips and their hands (Isaiah 1:15) and look great on the outside (Matthew 6:5), but there is no heart behind them.
Other religions made sacrifices to their gods because they believed they were feeding them. The Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary says, “Popular Israelite religion frequently forgot that God was not actually fed through sacrifice and sought to manipulate him through such offerings.”
They forgot why they were making sacrifices. They thought they had to feed the God who created the world. But God wasn’t dependent on the Israelites and their sacrifices. They were dependent on him. As the Faithlife Study Bible says:
An increase in offerings is meaningless without a change in attitudes. The sacrifice fundamentally represented Israel’s relationship with Yahweh, by which Israelites acknowledge dependence on Him. There was no point in going through the motions if they’d abandoned that dependence—either through idolatry or pride in their self-sufficiency.
The sacrifices were meant to be an external symbol of an internal process: repentance (Isaiah 1:16–20). The FSB says “God calls for inward repentance after condemning the empty efforts of outward observance.” They were cleaning the outside of the cup, while filth festered on the inside (Luke 11:39).
The system God established for dealing with sins had been abused for too long. The death of innocent animals was not enough for guilty humans to see the error of their ways (Hebrews 10:4). The status quo wasn’t working. Isaiah called for change in the present, and pointed to a bigger change in the future (Hebrews 10:10).
Isaiah 9:6 introduces Israel to powerful names for a son who was yet to come. Wonderful Counselor. Mighty God. Everlasting Father. Prince of Peace.
The people of Israel didn’t crack open their New Testaments to John 3:16 and say, “Hey, that’s Jesus!” They looked to the current line of David for an immediate answer—someone who could live up to these prophetic titles.
The Faithlife Study Bible reminds us that “the prediction of a future ideal Davidic ruler point ultimately to the Messiah, but immediate hopes for Judah’s future would have been directed at the Davidic line, continued through Hezekiah.”
But there was a problem. Some of these titles could only be attributed to God. No man could measure up to names like “Mighty God”—that’s blasphemy (John 8:58–59). As he so often does, God had a different plan than man.
People can’t overcome sin by their own power. The sacrifices which were once acceptable to God had become useless buckets on a sinking ship. God needed to intervene, or the world would drown in sin.
No matter how mighty God made a man, man could never escape sin and death (Romans 3:23). Christ overcame both in his death and resurrection, making a way for man to overcome both through him and him alone.
People couldn’t find their own way out of sin, either. They had not the wisdom.
They needed a Wonderful Counselor, someone who could give them the wisdom they needed to truly repent (James 1:5, Hebrews 2:18). Christ not only gives us wisdom by the Spirit through the word, he is our wisdom (1 Corinthians 1:30).
With Abraham, Israel was entitled to an earthly inheritance, but then what? As goes the earth, so goes the inheritance.
But through their Everlasting Father, they had an eternal one to aspire to (Hebrews 9:15, Romans 8:16–17).
And to abolish the old sacrificial system which put a bandage on their sin, Israel needed the Prince of Peace to restore them to God perfectly and once-and-for-all (Ephesians 2:13–18, Philippians 4:6–7; Hebrews 10:1-18).
The Christmas season is a time to celebrate the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy: “For to us, a child is born, to us, a son is given.” Remember where that son came from (Galatians 4:4–5), and glorify God for providing the sacrifice to end all sacrifices.
But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. – Galatians 4:4–5
This is a revised version of a post that originally appeared in 2014.
It’s been 80 years since Clyde Dennis, a young Christian printer with a passion to proclaim the gospel, started producing Bible tracts out of his spare bedroom. In 1979, that ministry expanded into Crossway Books. Today, Crossway continues to publish gospel-centered, Bible-centered content that honors Jesus and serves his Church.
This Christmas season, stock up on Crossway bundles for 40% off.
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The word “covenant” is difficult to understand, yet central to biblical interpretation. But is it really all that important?
The late R.C. Sproul answers assuredly, “Yes!”
In this excerpt from The Promises of God, free this month, Sproul distinguishes biblical covenants from man-made contracts and affirms what makes biblical covenants so unique.
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The Christmas season just got more joyful.
For the month of December, save up to 44% on commentaries, courses, and ministry resources during the Logos Monthly Sale.
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There are at least three things book lovers love doing:
The Lexham Christmas Sale encourages all three.
This Christmas, buy one of these print books from Lexham Press and Kirkdale Press and get the ebook free. So you can keep one copy for yourself, and give the other to someone on your list.
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“[T]here is no one like God, the King who cares,” writes John S. Feinberg in No One Like Him: The Doctrine of God.
And this month, as you prepare to celebrate the birth of “the King who cares,” you can get No One Like Him free.
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The most wonderful time of the year is here!
And some pretty wonderful sales, too.
Here are five ways to save on Bible study resources this Christmas:
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I recall the traumatic experience of seeing the movie A Thief in the Night as a teenager. The film was about how Jesus could return at any moment—like a thief in the night, a description borrowed from 1 Thessalonians 5:2. The message: If we weren’t believers, we could be left behind by the Lord. The movie didn’t lead to my decision to put my faith in Christ, but it did accomplish one desired effect—it scared me. Is the idea of the imminent return of Jesus biblical?
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