So that day Esau started on his way back to Seir. Jacob, however, went to Sukkoth, Genesis 33:16-17a NIV However – Take a moment to read Genesis 33, Jacob’s reunion with Esau. You’ll find something odd about Jacob’s protests. Again and again, Esau shows no animosity, no hidden agenda of revenge, but Jacob turns away…
On the Friday before Easter, the village of Tuscania performs a parade of the suffering of the Messiah. Here’s some of what you would see. Notice, if you will, all the syncretism. Topical Index: Good Friday, Tuscania, syncretism
Now they were expecting that he was going to swell up or suddenly fall down dead. But after they had waited a long time and had seen nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and began to say that he was a god. Acts 28:6 NASB Fall down dead – It’s a famous story. Paul…
When God started creating, He chose to abdicate control. Genesis 1:1 Skip Moen paraphrase When – “Bereshit, ‘in the beginning,’ describes not the clarities of origin and cause, but the potentialities of purpose.”[1] So writes Avivah Zornberg, reflecting on Rashi’s comment on creation. Potentialities demand alternatives. Things might not work out as we expect, and…
Then God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” Genesis 1:6 NASB Separate – “In the act of creation, there is perhaps inevitable sadness, as the work works itself loose from the vision.”[1] The Egyptians believed in unity, that is, the absolute unity…
and when all the people had finished crossing, then the ark of the Lord and the priests crossed in front of the people. Joshua 4:11 NASB Crossed – Yesterday we reflected on the paradigm commitment to miracles, noting that reconciling apparently conflicting texts sometimes leads to some fairly irrational conclusions. Today we’ll focus on a much more pedestrian item. …
“Command the priests who carry the ark of the testimony that they come up from the Jordan.” Joshua 4:16 NASB Come up – God is pretty great, right? How great? Well, greater than we can even imagine. So great, in fact, that He does things we think are beyond doing. We call them “miracles” because they…
Then God said, “Let Us make mankind in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the livestock and over all the earth, and over every crawling thing that crawls on the earth.” So God created man in His own image, in the…
Then Joshua set up twelve stones in the middle of the Jordan at the place where the feet of the priests who carried the ark of the covenant were standing, and they are there to this day. Joshua 4:9 NASB In the middle – The story of Israel crossing the Jordan leaves us with a lot…
