In 1988 Margaret Becker wrote a song titled Pico Boulevard. In it she expressed her failure to find the balance between need and desire, and thus fell right into line, this line: “Let me be...
The Last Five Kings of Judah
October 10, 2015
Several books on my bookshelves wrestle with the idea of “a hidden God.” My Amazon wish list contains a few as well. So here we will put the big question earlier than normal: Question How...
The Bible tells us that our world is infected with evil. Where did evil come from? Why did sin arise in the first place, and why has it continued to exist for so long? Matt....
Lesson Guide, Introduction: “Shechem was the place where Abraham had built an altar upon his arrival in the land, and where God first gave him the promise of the land (Gen. 12:7). Now, when the...
Text: Joshua chapter 13: 1 When Joshua was an old man, the Lord said to him, you are growing old, and much land remains to be conquered.
2 This is the territory that remains: all...
Texts: Psalms 37:3–6, 34, 37. 3Trust in the Lord and do good. Then you will live safely in the land and prosper.4Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you your heart’s desires.
5Commit...
“But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”—2 Corinthians...
Deuteronomy 20: 10 As you approach a town to attack it, you must first offer its people terms for peace. 11 If they accept your terms and open the gates to you, then all the...
Giants of Faith: Joshua and Caleb Moses sent 12 men, one from each tribe, to act as intelligence agents or spies, regarding the land that God had promised to Israel. Text: Numbers 13:17-20.
17 Moses...
Introduction: As with the fictional milkman Tevye, from the village of Anatevka*, God chose to bless Zelophehad not with sons— but instead, with daughters—five of them!
Unlike Caleb and Joshua, but like all other men...
Lesson Guide: Of the Israelites: “Their most dangerous enemy was not outside their camp but within their own rank and file.” [But we do not live in a camp, and we are not organized by...
Lesson Guide: “The book of Joshua contains some disturbing scenes. Serious questions are raised by the concept of a divine or holy war portraying a group of people with a God-given mandate to destroy another...
Israel’s crossing of the Jordan in Lesson 3 was a miraculous success: We have tried to imagine the logistics of getting thousands of people of all ages, across a swollen river, together with their animals...
Question: Nowadays the Jordan River has almost ceased to exist. What was so special about crossing this river in the time of Joshua?
It was spring, when seasonal rains, plus melting snow from Mt. Hermon,...
Pride Versus Humility
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That We May Know Him
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What Inspiration Is
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