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Understanding how the Bible is meant to be read
How does your cultural upbringing affect the way you read the Bible? It’s more significant than you may think. Discover how you might be “Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes” when you join the Discover the Word team as they continue their conversation with Randy Richards and Brandon O’Brien on Discover the Word. Learn how to […]
How we mistakenly interpret the Bible through our Western cultural values
The Bible wasn’t originally written to 21st-century Americans. And if we’re not careful we’ll read our own Western cultural values into Scripture! Today on Discover the Word, we continue a conversation with authors Randy Richards and Brandon O’Brien about how to take off our Western cultural glasses and see the Bible with new eyes. Join […]
Exposing our blind spots
When you read your Bible, could you be wearing blinders and not even know it? We’ll get together with the Discover the Word group today as we expose some blind spots we might not even realize we have. Authors Randy Richards and Brandon O’Brien are helping us see how we may be “Misreading Scripture with […]
“Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes”
With so many English translations available today, it’s easy to forget that the Bible wasn’t originally written to us! And when we fail to understand the context in which the Bible was written . . . we will surely misunderstand it! Today, the Discover the Word group welcomes authors Randy Richards and Brandon O’Brien for an […]
Unraveling the Mysteries
I have always enjoyed the wit and insight of Peanuts creator, Charles Schulz. One of my favorite cartoons drawn by him appeared in a book about young people in the church. It shows a young man holding a Bible as he tells a friend on the phone, “I think I’ve made one of the first steps toward unraveling the mysteries of the Old Testament . . . I’m starting to read it!” (Teen-Ager Is Not a Disease).
Psalm 119 overflows with the writer’s hunger to understand and experience the power of God’s Word each day. “Oh, how I love your law!…
5 Tips to Stay Woke as a Christian
“Stay woke? Well, I must be awake, because I am talking with you.” That was my response to a friend when I first heard the term, stay woke*.
Soaking Up God’s Word
When our son Xavier was a toddler, we took a family trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. As we entered the building, I pointed to a large sculpture suspended from the ceiling. “Look. A humpback whale.”
Xavier’s eyes widened. “Enormous,” he said.
My husband turned to me. “How does he know that word?”
“He must have heard us say it.” I shrugged, amazed that our toddler had soaked up vocabulary we’d never intentionally taught him.
In Deuteronomy 6, God encouraged His people to be intentional about teaching younger generations to know and obey the Scriptures. As the Israelites increased their knowledge of God, they…
He Gave Us Scripture: Foundations of Interpretation
Evangelical Christians affirm the Scriptures as God’s inerrant word, but we still disagree sometimes over the meaning of particular verses or passages, and these differences can influence our Christian doctrine and practice. One reason for these disagreements is that there are many different approaches to interpreting the Bible. But how do we know which approach to interpretation is the most responsible? This course will help answer that question. It is based on the lecture series, He Gave Us Scripture: Foundations of Interpretation, produced by Third Millennium Ministries and hosted by Dr. Richard L. Pratt, Jr. with contributions from a variety…
A Journey of Belief
Since its first publication in 1880, Lew Wallace’s novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ has never been out of print. It has been called the most influential Christian book of the 19th century, and it continues to draw readers today as it weaves the true story of Jesus with that of a fictional young Jewish nobleman named Judah Ben-Hur.
Amy Lifson, writing in Humanities magazine, said that the writing of the book transformed the life of the author. “As Ben-Hur guided readers through the scenes of the Passion, so did he lead the way for Lew Wallace to believe in…
His Word the Last Word
Dawson Trotman, a dynamic Christian leader of the mid-twentieth century and founder of The Navigators, emphasized the importance of the Bible in the life of every Christian. Trotman ended each day with a practice he called “His Word the last word.” Before going to sleep he meditated on a memorized Bible verse or passage, then prayed about its place and influence in his life. He wanted the last words he thought about each day to be God’s words.
The psalmist David wrote, “On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. Because you are…
What to Do When the Bible Seems Boring
In November 2015, I decided that it would be a good idea to read through the Bible again. The last time I had done it was a number of years ago, and since then, I mostly hung out in the Gospels and the letters of Paul, venturing forth occasionally to Genesis and Proverbs.
Do You Read Your Bible For Fun?
I spent the whole of November immersed in the countryside of Western Australia with my family. We brought no work along—no revision (for the kids), no prep, teaching or writing (for my husband and me).
Concluding a week long study on “Mysterious Bible Texts”
It’s a question about the Bible that people have asked through the centuries. Who exactly were the sons of God who married the daughters of men back in the Old Testament? Were they angels, demons or demon-possessed men? There are a number of possible explanations. Today on Discover the Word, we will talk about all […]
Context can help us understand mysterious texts
“What’s going on here?” How many times have you asked that while reading your Bible? Well, as we reveal today on Discover the Word it’s so often all about the context! Context can help us understand mysterious texts, like in Jude 9 where it talks about Michael the archangel disputing with the devil about the body […]
Humbly accepting the “tension of mystery”
Being finite beings, we’re limited in how much we can understand. And that’s why some Bible passages really challenge us. Today on Discover the Word, the team will discuss 1 Peter 3:18–20 where Peter talks about Christ’s spirit “preaching to the spirits in prison.” It’s another one of those strange texts that remind us that sometimes […]
