How many times has Israel needed rescuing? God says it’s times “without number” (Jer 2:32). It’s remarkable how memories can sweep in like waves. Imagine little knots of worshipers in their tent encampments outside the city walls, sharing a meal perhaps. There’s talk of the family, the crops, and the exciting events to take place during Israel’s […]
CHRIST the ONE CALLING YOU: “The Master has come and is calling for you” (Jn 11:28). What a wonder, when having no idea how to extricate yourself from the hopelessness of sin, to hear the Good Shepherd’s voice calling you “out of darkness into His marvelous light” (1 Pet 2:9). And from that very moment, […]
“Remember, I pray, the word that You commanded Your servant Moses, saying…” (Neh 1:8). Nehemiah clearly was “instant in prayer.” His first-person narrative (one of the few in Scripture) is a running conversation with the Lord. Notice 4:1-6. When Sanballat and Tobiah started hurling mockery over the wall at his workers, Nehemiah simply included the […]
“That in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death” (Php 1:20). In the same spirit, Jim Elliot prayed: “Father, make of me a crisis man. Bring those I contact to decision. Let me not be […]
If we’re patient enough, the Lord has a way of bringing things full circle. “For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged;” said the Lord, “and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you” (Matthew 7:2). There’s a boomerang effect in life, as this story illustrates, so watch what […]
See the link between the servant’s eye and the Master’s hand, between the servant’s hand and the Master’s will. It’s one thing to come up to Jerusalem—from whatever altitude or location, one NEVER goes DOWN to Jerusalem—it’s quite another to go up to heaven. The Lord has addresses in both locations. And so the psalmist […]
The INCALCULABLE CHRIST: The gift of Christ to us is indescribable—anekdiegetos, “not able to describe or declare fully” (2 Cor 9:15) and the joy we have as a result of believing is unutterable—aneklaletos, “beyond one’s ability to divulge” (1 Pet 1:8). His ways in our lives are unsearchable—anexereunetos, with still more to know after being […]
“Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly…” (Ps 1:1). In this dramatic way the Book of Psalms opens, an introduction to the whole collection. It has been pointed out that the word “blessed” (Heb, ashrei) is plural and makes an exclamation, “O the blessednesses of that man…!” So the […]
“I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications…be made for all men…For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior; who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:1-4). During the English Keswick Week of 1925, Irish evangelist W.P. Nicholson […]