Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. Genesis 2:24 Therefore – “Therefore” means that as a result of something previously explained, the following happens. Therefore, “therefore” is a very important word J. Without it we will not know why a man…
for this shall be called woman because out of man this has been taken Genesis 2:23 Woman – There is something crucial happening here, deeper than we can see in the simple translation. It is connected to the formulation of the Hebrew words for man and woman. It tells us something important about roles and…
He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. John 3:36 Obey – Even in translation this verse demands that we see the connection between “believe” and “obey.” But when we realize that John’s thought…
“Are you the teacher of Israel, and you do not understand these things?” John 3:10 Understand – The educational model of this world is not God’s model. This statement has nothing to do with the subject matter. It’s not about “creationism” versus “evolution.” It’s not about how to teach moral concepts (or how not to…
Then Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent, and he took Rebekah, and she became his wife, and he loved her; Genesis 24:67 Took – It’s symptomatic of our Greek cultural ethos that we immediately think of the Hebrew word laqah from the perspective of eros. When the text says that Isaac took Rebekah,…
to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share 1 Timothy 6:18 Good Works – Did you think that doing good (yesterday on agathoergeo) was good enough? Not quite. Paul adds another qualification with the phrase “good works.” The problem is that we don’t see the difference in…
to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share 1 Timothy 6:18 To Do Good – There are only two places where this word is used in the whole Bible (and in between). The only other occurrence of this word is in Acts 14:17* where Paul describes God’s…
Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field Genesis 3:1 Crafty – Adam and his wife thought they would be like God. Instead, they just discovered they were naked. It was the greatest seduction the world has ever known. If we could just peer into the Hebrew in this verse, we…
Therefore I want the men in every place to pray, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and dissension. 1 Timothy 2:8 Wrath and Dissension – We know that prayer is the operating power of God’s redemptive plan. We know that prayer is deeper, more powerful, more courageous and more demanding than any other spiritual discipline. …
All things are lawful to me, but not all things are profitable. 1 Corinthians 6:12 Lawful – How we long for the removal of all requirements over our lives! We want to be free! What we mean, of course, is that we want to do whatever we want to do whenever we feel like doing…
