Do you ever come across a snippet of a verse that so captures your thought and heart that you stop everything to stay with it? Maybe you see how it’s translated across multiple Biblical versions. Maybe you simply sit with it for awhile, listening for further inspiration because you know its coming if you’ll be […]
Archive | Discipleship
How Jesus Used His Location to Teach
One of the more arresting aspects of traveling to Israel, particularly the Galilee area, is how nuances of Jesus’ teachings in the Gospels come to life in wholly unexpected ways. I had such a moment at Caesarea Philippi. It all began with the familiar passage in Mark 8:27-29: 27 Jesus went on with his disciples to […]
Lazarus’ resurrection: Vital to early Christians
You start to notice it from the art of the early centuries of Christianity: in the Roman catacombs alone there are over 55 paintings of Lazarus’s resurrection. Roughly an equal number depict this ministry-changing event (told only in John’s Gospel), on Roman sarcophagi, the marble caskets where nobility were buried. Dozens more depictions of Jesus’ […]
The Psalms: Man Responds to God!
If someone were to think of the Psalms ‘only’ as hymns of praise, often set to music, they’d be missing why they’ve been so central to the worship of God throughout both Jewish and Christian history. In addition to the beauty of their poetry and musicality, the Psalter is the only Biblical book in which […]
Lessons from Emmaus: Coming Home to Christ
April is the month parallel to those ancient, world-changing days when Jesus made resurrection appearances. According to Luke’s Gospel, all three occurred before the anticipated Jewish Pentecost festival – held fifty days following Passover. This month’s blogs will focus on this period of Jesus’ life between the resurrection and ascension, and examine those three appearances in the […]