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On Our Hearts
After a young boy faced some challenges in school, his dad began to teach him a pledge to recite each morning before school: “I thank God for waking me up today. I am going to school so I can learn . . . and be the leader that God has created me to be.” The pledge is one way the father hopes to help his son apply himself and deal with life’s inevitable challenges.
In a way, by helping his son to commit this pledge to memory, the father is doing something similar to what God commanded the Israelites in the…
Good for You
People the world over spent an estimated $98.2 billion on chocolate in 2016. The number is staggering, yet at the same time not all that surprising. Chocolate, after all, tastes delicious and we enjoy consuming it. And the world rejoiced collectively when the sweet treat was found to have significant health benefits too. Chocolate contains flavonoids that help safeguard the body against aging and heart disease. Never has a prescription for health been so well received or heeded (in moderation, of course!).
Solomon suggested there’s another “sweet” worthy of our investment: wisdom. He recommended his son eat honey “for it is…
Mirrors and Hearers
When I emerged from my hotel in Kampala, Uganda, my hostess, who had come to pick me up for our seminar, looked at me with an amused grin. “What’s so funny?” I inquired. She laughed and asked, “Did you comb your hair?” It was my turn to laugh, for I had indeed forgotten to comb my hair. I had looked at my reflection in the hotel mirror. How come I took no notice of what I saw?
In a practical analogy, James gives us a useful dimension to make our study of God’s Word more beneficial. We look in the mirror…
"Approved to God"
If you cannot express yourself well on each of your beliefs, work and study until you can. If you don’t, other people may miss out on the blessings that come from knowing the truth. Strive to re-express a truth of God to yourself clearly and understandably, and God will use that same explanation when you share it with someone else. But you must be willing to go through God’s winepress where the grapes are crushed. You must struggle, experiment, and rehearse your words to express God’s truth clearly. Then the time will come when that very expression will become God’s wine of strength to someone else. But if you are not diligent and say,
Good for You?
Because I like dark chocolate, I sometimes Google “Is dark chocolate good for you?” I get a variety of results—some good, some bad. You can do the same for almost any food product. Is milk good for you? Is coffee good for you? Is rice good for you? There is a dizzying array of answers to these questions, so you have to be aware that the search itself may not be good for you. It may give you a headache.
But if you are looking for something that is one-hundred-percent good for you all the time, can I recommend the Word…
Keeping Close
My mile-long walk home from dropping off my daughter at her school gives me the opportunity to memorize some verses from the Bible—if I’m intentional about doing so. When I take those minutes to turn over God’s Word in my mind, I often find them coming back to me later in the day, bringing me comfort and wisdom.
When Moses prepared the Israelites to enter the Promised Land, he urged them to hold close to God’s commands and decrees (Deuteronomy 6:1–2). Wanting them to flourish, he said they should turn these instructions over in their minds and discuss them with their…
Letters Home
Far from home and training for World War II, American recruits in basic training turned to humor and correspondence to cope with the challenges they faced. In one letter home a young man described the vaccination process with wonderful exaggeration: “Two medical officers chased us with harpoons. They grabbed us and pinned us to the floor and stuck one in each arm.”
Yet one soldier began to realize that humor could only take him so far. Then he received a Bible. “I enjoy it very much and I read it every night,” he wrote. “I never realized you could learn so…
Biblical Geography Basics
Although the Bible is not a geography book, it is a book filled with geography—geography that shaped the way the writers of the Bible thought and communicated. Therefore, to the degree that we miss or misunderstand the geography in our Bibles, we may miss or misunderstand a part of what the Lord wants to share with us. This course, led by Jack Beck, is designed to explore the absolutely vital relationship between what the Almighty has to say and the place from which He says it.
Clouds and Darkness
A person who has not been born again by the Spirit of God will tell you that the teachings of Jesus are simple. But when he is baptized by the Holy Spirit, he finds that “clouds and darkness surround Him . . . .” When we come into close contact with the teachings of Jesus Christ we have our first realization of this. The only possible way to have full understanding of the teachings of Jesus is through the light of the Spirit of God shining inside us.
Removing cultural blinders
Have you ever tried reading something upside down? Doesn’t usually work too well does it? But, flip it over and that change in perspective is all you need to see clearly! Well, today on Discover the Word, we wrap up a two-week discussion with authors Brandon O’Brien and Randy Richards. They’ve been helping us to […]
How we miss the main point by reading Scripture out of context
We know that reading a verse out of context can lead to some wacky interpretations, but what if we’ve been doing that without even realizing it? Today on Discover the Word, authors Randy Richards and Brandon O’Brien look at a story in the Bible where we likely have missed the main point! Find out how […]
Handling tragedy – a challenging and freeing discussion
We’ve all experienced loss. But have you ever felt like you’re just supposed to soldier on, denying your grief? Today on Discover the Word, we will tackle the subject of handling tragedy. It’s a challenging and freeing discussion—part of a series about “Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes” with special guests Brandon O’Brien and Randy Richards. […]
Understanding context makes for a much clearer story
Today on Discover the Word, Randy Richards and Brandon O’Brien join the team to lead a discussion on the story of David and Bathsheba and Uriah. Discover how understanding their culture makes some confusing things about this story a lot clearer. Join the conversation about “Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes,” today on Discover the Word!
“Love God and love others” – How did this gospel get Jesus crucified?
The gospel is sometimes summarized as “Love God and love others.” So it makes you wonder how that message got Jesus crucified. Today, the Discover the Word team continues their series titled “Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes”—providing cultural perspective for the Bible. We’ll learn why some things we consider orthodox were absolutely revolutionary to first-century […]
How our “cultural blinders”affect how we read the Bible
We all know Jesus wasn’t a 21st-century American, yet we often read the Bible with cultural assumptions we might not even be aware of! Today on Discover the Word, we invite Randy Richards and Brandon O’Brien back to the table for a fascinating discussion about how our “cultural blinders” often affect how we read the […]
