The Book of Kings #10

I was standing, looking out an open window in my hotel room at Victoria Station in London one night. My wife and I had been to the theater, had just g...

The Book of Kings #9

When you settle in to read the Bible, you run into any number of difficulties—none of them fatal, of course. The sense of the Bible is not that hard,...

Master & Lord

At the Last Supper, after washing his disciples' feet, Jesus said something of singular importance. He said, You call me master and lord, and you say...

Leadership in Crisis

By now, everyone realizes that we have a leadership crisis, not only in our country, but in the world at large. I wonder how we got to this place? Whe...

The Book of Kings #8

Never take counsel of your fears. The saying is often attributed to Andrew Jackson who also, plainly, read his Bible. It is fascinating how often fear...

The Book of Kings #7

When you read those books of the Bible that contain the history of Israel, the lessons come at you one after the other. There is a man in the Book of...

The Book of Kings #6

When you are reading the history in the Bible, you have to resist the temptation to see things in terms familiar to the modern reader. Take the idea o...

The Book of Kings #5

One of the most incredible museums that the world has ever known was also one that hardly anyone ever got to visit; it was the temple that King Solomo...

Courage and the Church

We Christians have an anxiety about us—about who we are, about our failures, about our differences, about our spats—and we let these anxieties prevent...

The Undivided Man

Do you suppose God would ever call a man to be a lawyer or, perhaps, a governor? (And, no, I am not about to tell a lawyer joke.) There is a funny thi...

The Book of Kings #4

Sometimes, in the Bible, you come across descriptions, details, and lists that can be a little hard to follow. One example of this is the description...

The Book of Kings #3

In Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night: and God said, Ask what I shall give you. And Solomon said, You have shown unto your servan...

The Book of Kings #2

Nothing is ever easy in the Middle East, and the transition from the man who was Israel’s greatest fighting king to her greatest peacetime king was st...

The Book of Kings #1

Abraham, the father of the faithful, is obviously the greatest figure in the Old Testament. But the greatest man in the history of Israel has to be Ki...

Halloween, Ghosts, and Spirits

Halloween is an odd event—very odd, in a way, because in its origins it was not evil; it was actually good. A number of you probably know that Hallowe...

Halloween

Excuse me for asking, but what’s wrong with you people? Why on earth would you dress up your children like witches, or hobgoblins, ghosts, demons, dea...

Negotiating with the Devil

When I was growing up, Fascism was a political term in common use. I was seven years old when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and the years ahead saw...

Opposing Evil #2

Christian people have often failed in their responsibilities to their fellow man. This is not terribly surprising. After all, we are human. Jesus, in...

Opposing Evil #1

The German people are, in every sense of the word, a great people—intelligent, innovative, accomplished. But for me, the question about the Germans is...

A Treaty with the Devil

Would you make a treaty with the Devil? It is a silly question, isn’t it? You would never do anything like that. And yet, nations do it all the time.<...

Who Will You Be?

When all is said and done; when the Millennium is passed; when the Great White Throne Judgment is finished, and the last of all the loose ends are tie...

Life After Death

When I lived in England some years ago, it seemed that every spring, one or another bishop of the Church of England would publish some new, outrageous...

Try the Spirits #4

Do you believe there’s a spirit world out there? There is, you know, although it’s not exactly out there—it’s right here. It’s in the same room as you...

Try the Spirits #3

Would it be easier for you to believe in God if he showed you a sign? Maybe if he did some miracle for you? What would you like him to do? Cause you t...

Try the Spirits #2

When people start speaking in unrecognizable languages, how do you know this is the spirit of God and not some other spirit? I don’t mean to put down...

Try the Spirits #1

How would you like to see God—to actually hear his voice? Yeah, I would too. At least, I think I would. Some people got close once. You remember the s...

The Eighth Day

One of the most exciting discoveries in my life was when I learned that the festivals of the Bible actually contained an outline of God’s plan—an outl...

Rapture and Resurrection

An old friend of mine used to say that if the Devil cannot get at you any other way, he will waste your time. I got a letter recently asking me to do...

Deliver Us from Evil

Christian Holidays #19

I had a friend once who allowed that human beings were, to God, like fish eggs. We were sitting in the sun on a bass boat trying unsuccessfully to cat...

Christian Holidays #18

Many years ago, before I learned better about arguing religion, I was engaged in a discussion focused on people who never even heard the name of Jesus...

Keep the Feast

A Man Alone

Not Home Yet

We Didn't Know

Born Under This Moon

Verse one of the Gospel of John is one of the most loaded sentences in the entire Bible. There aren’t many places in the Bible where the various trans...

Thinking About the Psalms #2

The third psalm has a striking subheading: A Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son. No one is certain as to when the subheadings found in...

Thinking About the Psalms #1

I've been doing some writing recently on the Psalms, and there are some profound lessons that just keep growing on me. I can't help thinking that ther...

Cleansing and Covering

A Civilization Dying

What kind of people are we coming to be? And What kind of Christians might we be when we no longer govern our lives by the words of Jesus? The road ah...