Under the Mosaic law, it was permitted for the poor to pick up the gleanings of the harvest. The rule is still observed (at time of writing) in Palestine. I notice that a poor widow has been following the harvesters all day, methodically gleaning straw by straw. By the time the western sun dips down […]
On several trips to the land of Israel over the past few years, I have been privileged to have as my guide a gracious and well-informed Jew, named at birth Philip Halperin. Philip was the name of one of the kings of Romania, and it was not a wise thing to give Hebrew names to […]
“And there were certain Greeks among them that came up to worship at the feast . . . saying, Sir, we would see Jesus” (John 12:20-21). The feast of the Passover was at hand. The City of Jerusalem overflowed with worshipers. There was hardly an available space in home, shop, or byway. The grasping, shouting […]
The use of a name, whether for a person or a thing, is to indicate and identify them. Thus the name, whether in itself expressive and significant, or merely artificial and meaningless, comes inevitably to signify that in which the person or thing named is unique, and by which he or it is to be […]
What the Lord Jesus Christ is at once both God and man is one of the most profound secrets that God has been pleased to reveal to His own. “The mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh,” is one of the two mysteries of the Word of God called great. We cannot understand […]
In Norway, the rivers can be swift and hard to cross by boat. Hans had the feeling that danger was close by. He tells the story in his words: “When I was thirteen, my father and I, a brother, and another man, were nearly drowned hauling hay across the river by boat. One of the […]
Service. In contemporary society, it is a word with scores of connotations, many of them very positive. Yet it was not always so. Being a servant meant hard hours of laboring in obscurity for a master whose expectations were high, and whose commendations may have been few. In our world where you are what you […]
There are in the New Testament four words that describe the gifts God has given to the Church. First of all, they are called “spiritual gifts,” reminding us that they are given by the Spirit of God and can only be used rightly in the spiritual realm. They are called “gifts of grace,” and that […]
It was hotter than I had ever experienced, and the convoy of trucks made dust so thick it seemed we were traveling in a cloud. The 45-mile trip to our Vietnam base camp seemed to take forever. I had my M-16 loaded and in my lap; I was scared, but so glad to be on […]