Category: Life in the Scriptures

This is the first installment in a five-part blog series on how to think carefully and faithfully about what the Bible teaches about the end of the world. Each of the subsequent parts of this series will be released monthly through the end of the year. For those of us who attend Evangelical churches, especially… Continue reading Talking about the End of the World, Part 1 “I don’t know when Jesus is coming back, but I know it will be soon!”

Last month [here] we took a brief look at the teaching of Jesus at the end of Luke. Jesus taught that the good news of salvation for the whole world is a Jewish story, a story from Moses and the Prophets and the Writings, but Jesus ended this teaching by calling all “Jesus followers” to… Continue reading The Mission of God in the Gospel of Luke: Part 7 – Conclusion

In my previous post [here] we examined the famous condemnations of Jesus. The Gospel of Luke was written to Theophilus and to us to ensure us all that God loves the whole world, but Jesus found in the religious leaders a tremendous obstacle to the world hearing that good news. Jesus condemned them for their self-centered… Continue reading The Mission of God in the Gospel of Luke: Part 6 – The Final Teaching of Jesus

Romans 10 is one of my favorite sections of Scripture.  In fact, I enjoy the entire book of Romans.  I believe that if someone wanted to dive into the theological framework of the Christian faith, then Romans would be the place to begin. Romans 10 begins with a section that provides materials for this framework,… Continue reading Burdens and Beliefs: A Quick Look at Romans 10:1-4

Last month [link here] we took a brief look at the so-called “gentile narratives” in Luke. These are the stories about Jesus and Jesus’ teaching that highlight gentiles, outcasts, women, and anyone who was marginalized in society in Jesus’ day. Luke focuses on these particular people in his “Travelogue” section (Luke 9-19). His purpose in telling… Continue reading The Mission of God in the Gospel of Luke: Part 5 – The Condemnations

Last month [here] we discussed how Luke focuses on the mission of God in Jesus’ parables. The parables in Luke’s “travelogue” in particular (Luke 9-19) show God’s love for all people, even the people that Jewish society had forgotten to love. The trio of parables in Luke 10 teach us that if anyone, even the… Continue reading The Mission of God in the Gospel of Luke: Part 4 – The Story of Zacchaeus

The prosperity gospel is advertised in many churches, broadcasted on your TV screens, and plastered across Christian bookstores. This so-called prosperity gospel is really no gospel at all, but rather just a monstrous combination of Christianity and the American dream. Like Frankenstein’s monster, we’ve assembled a creature out of the rotting corpses of American civil… Continue reading The Monstrous Prosperity Gospel and the Hope of God’s Good Purpose

Last month [here] we began talking about the mission of God in the Gospel of Luke. Luke was written to a man named Theophilus who surely wondered where the Gentiles fit into the plan of God and the story of Jesus the Messiah. Surely Luke, a gentile himself, had these same questions. Throughout his Gospel,… Continue reading The Mission of God in the Gospel of Luke: Part 2 – John the Baptist

In November (here) and December (here) I posted two blogs about Christmas. In both of those we looked at passages from the Gospel of Luke, and I tried to convey just how much of the Christmas story in Luke is about the mission of God in the world. That was not a hard task because much of the Gospel… Continue reading The Mission of God in the Gospel of Luke: Part 1 – Introduction

The other day a Post-it Note fell out of an old school paper file I was searching. It was imprinted with these words: To teach is to learn twice. There was a quick nod of agreement. Then, after a moment of thought, the nod of assent became a shake of the head. My learning as… Continue reading What 94 Students Taught Me This Semester