Category: Genesis to Revelation

  • WHEN THERE IS NO JUSTICE SEEK PEACE

    Reflections on Isaiah It was a normal, hectic New York City commute. I was walking through the Staten Island Ferry terminal to the subway, when I witnessed two young men collide. What was clearly an accident quickly became a showdown. The men began hurling racial epithets at one another and squared off for a fight…

  • MORNING & EVENING

    Do you want a house for your soul? Do you ask, “What is the purchase?” It is something less than proud human nature will like to give. It is without money and without price. Ah! you would like to pay a respectable rent! You would love to do something to win Christ? Then you cannot…

  • BELIEVING IN THE IMPOSSIBLE

    Connect The TestamentsJudges 8:1-9:21; Philippians 2:12-18; Psalm 67:1-7 Too often, we’re cynical about circumstances. When people come to us for advice, we want to list all the reasons why they shouldn’t take a certain course of action. We want to dissuade them. But what if we had a little faith instead? In Judges, we find…

  • FALLING IN LOVE THE BIBLICAL WAY

    Reflections on Song of Songs I’m quick to fall in love; my wife takes her time. Luckily, this boded well for me. I fell in love with Kalene literally at first sight. Since I had planned for Kalene to be my bandmate—we were meeting for a music audition—I later tried to argue myself out of…

  • MORNING & EVENING

    What a sweet title: “My people!” What a cheering revelation: “Their God!” How much of meaning is couched in those two words, “My people!” Here is speciality. The whole world is God’s; the heaven, even the heaven of heavens is the Lord’s, and he reigneth among the children of men; but of those whom he…

  • MORE THAN I CAN HANDLE

    Connect The TestamentsJudges 6:11-7:25; Philippians 2:1-11; Psalm 66:1-20 “God doesn’t give us more than we can handle.” This Christian maxim is a well-meaning attempt at putting our difficult times into perspective. It holds the view that God knows our weaknesses and knows when we can’t measure up to a challenge. But if we’re going through…

  • MAY GOD KEEP US FROM BEING LIKE THINKERS

    Reflections on Ecclesiastes Great minds don’t think alike. Leonardo Da Vinci didn’t paint the “Mona Lisa” by working like his predecessors; he made the uncommon move of focusing on her eyes and hands. Albert Einstein didn’t figure out the speed of light by focusing on the problems his peers were solving. Walt Whitman didn’t come…

  • MORNING & EVENING

    One great besetting sin of ancient Israel was idolatry, and the spiritual Israel are vexed with a tendency to the same folly. Remphan’s star shines no longer, and the women weep no more for Tammuz, but Mammon still intrudes his golden calf, and the shrines of pride are not forsaken. Self in various forms struggles…

  • IF LIFE WERE A MUSICAL

    Connect The TestamentsJudges 4:1-6:10; Philippians 1:19-30; Psalm 65:1-13 Maybe life should be more like a musical or an oratorio—like Les Misérables or Handel’s Messiah. How we feel is often expressed better in song or poetry than anything else. Literary criticism tells us that poets write verse because prose simply can’t capture the emotions they’re feeling.…

  • TO DO: FEAR GOD

    Reflections on Proverbs From the time I was old enough to work an after-school job, I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I had a game plan. Star student and valued employee, I closely identified with the Proverbs 31 woman; she embodies the modern-day linchpin concept: goal-setting, prioritizing and productivity. But it…