Seminary will challenge you beyond what you might imagine—spiritually, intellectually, and even physically.1 For me, going to seminary was the hardest and most wonderful experience of my life.
Whether you are already going to seminary or plan to start soon, here are three things you can do now to help smooth out potential bumps in the road and make the journey a pleasant one. [Read more…]
Many Bible readers are familiar with the plague in Egypt at the time of the Exodus (Exod 7:14–12:32)—water turning to blood and infestations of frogs, lice, flies, locusts, and the like. With coronavirus on everyone’s mind, questions abound of whether the word “pandemic” appears in the Bible, too. [Read more…]
In Genesis 12, God promised Abram:
I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. (2–3) [Read more…]
When I’m in Jerusalem, I love watching gaggles of Jewish children walking alongside their fathers. And when I hear them call their daddy, my heart melts.
“Abba! Abba!”
At times I’m sure it sounds a lot like when my kids were little and needed my attention, calling out my second name incessantly until I responded: “Mom! Mom! Mom! Mooommm!”
But Abba? It’s different. [Read more…]
What does it take to pray like a Puritan? And why would we want to?
For the Puritans, prayer was neither casual nor dull but a passionate affair.1 A cry for mercy. Unabashed praise for the Creator of all things. Vibrant expressions of deep Christian faith that are a shining example of holy living. [Read more…]
Reading theologians with similar views is like cozying up next to a fireplace on a winter day in a favorite chair. It feels comfortable. Safe. Those like-minded wise ones become leaders of the tribe with which we belong, the theological clique we ascribe to, find affirmation in, and sometimes form pieces of our identity.
If I’m honest, it’s where I tend to camp. [Read more…]
Poems and songs. History and narrative. Wars and celebrations. Romance and grief. The Bible is an eclectic book.
But it’s more than a book. It’s a compilation of sacred writings God gave us to know and love him better—it is the word of God. And within our Bibles, we find what A. W. Tozer calls God’s present speaking voice—that which makes the written word all-powerful and as relevant today as it was to first-century believers. [Read more…]
Understanding the Trinity—one God in three persons (Father, Son, and Spirit)—takes us into deep theological waters, where the simplest math fails us: 1 + 1 + 1 = 1. [Read more…]
We often read our Bibles as if Jesus made his first appearance in this world as a baby in the New Testament. Our story as Christians, we sometimes think, starts with the book of Matthew.
But the Bible’s witness to Jesus did not begin there. A common thread runs throughout the pages of our Bibles from the beginning of Genesis to the last page of Revelation: Christ.
Here are 12 New Testament verses that point to Jesus in the Old Testament. [Read more…]
Scholars Agree: The Paideia Commentaries Stand Out
The series name alone sold me on this commentary set: paideia (παιδεία) in Greek means “education,” or “instruction intended for a person who is in the process of growing up.”1 And that’s that goal of the Paideia commentaries publisher: to come alongside contemporary students in that lifelong journey of “growing up” by giving them a basic grounding in academic New Testament studies and guiding their engagement with New Testament text.2 [Read more…]