Now muster your troops, O daughter of troops; siege is laid against us; with a rod they strike the judge of Israel on the cheek. But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in…
Category: Exegesis
A Study of the Acts of the Apostles
The book of Acts gives us a picture of the growth of the early church. It also gives us a picture of the work God was doing through the Holy Spirit to establish the Kingdom of His Son. The period covered by Acts is unique in world history. It covers the transition from the old…
Are You Hungry? A Homily on Nehemiah 8:1-12
Are you hungry? Well, in just a little while, when we are finished here, we will all leave to go have a meal to satisfy our hunger. Some of us may eat burgers, some of us fish, others of us even pizzas. Maybe some green beans or broccoli. The meals that some of us eat…
The Kingdom of God and Our Hope
During some recent conversations at my church about abortion, Republicans, the mission of the church, and the fulfillment of the cultural mandate, several questions came up about how the mission of the church relates to the cultural mandate and and also what sources have helped some us hold to a preterist and postmillennial view of…
The Shocking Deaths of Abraham and Sarah: Genesis 23:1-20 & 25:7-11
What is shocking about the deaths of Abraham and Sarah? Well, so much about their lives had been about the reversal of curse of death. Isaac their son was the heir through which their descendants would receive that gift. But yet they died without God’s promise of the end of death fulfilled. Is God then…
Psalm 94: Mischief by a Law
Conservatives are handicapped by human nature when seeking to convince liberals that their understanding of the world is wrong, that more government is not going to make things better. No amount of education or persuasion will get the job done. God is not so handicapped. He created us and made us and sustains us. He…
Kill Sin or Sin Will Kill You
Christians are saved by grace. No action of ours, or even a decision, saves us. We are saved because God gives us a new heart with which we are irresistibly drawn to Him. Yet Scripture also makes it clear that we will never make it to heaven if we don’t kill our sin and walk…
Are You Enslaved to Laziness? Proverbs 26:13-16
Most of us don’t think of laziness as fatal. But John Piper lays out the deathly, eternal ramifications of unrepented laziness in this great discussion of Proverbs 26:13-16. And provides these questions to assist our study of this passage: What is the difference between laziness and rest? How can you tell whether you are doing…
Horsemen of the Apocalypse
Many people understand the book of Revelation as portraying what is going to happen at the end of the world. This comes from what is known as the pre-millennial view, popularized in Tim LaHaye’s and Jerry B. Jenkins’ Left Behind series, which is a recent interpretation pushed by dispensationalists. Rather than see the Bible as a portraying the unfolding of God’s covenant…
Where is Your Hope? The Structure of Isaiah
I love reading learned theologians who mine the depth and richness of Scripture. Two of those show up in the article in this post, David Dorsey and Peter Leithart. Building off of Dorsey’s analysis of the chiastic structure of Isaiah, Leithart points us to the central point of Isaiah: The central narrative section is embedded…