Sometimes God is just off-the-charts good—like in his creation of the world (Genesis 1:31), in blessing the just and unjust (Matthew 5:45), in his plan to save Jew and Gentile (Romans 11:33-36), in supplying all our needs (Philippians 4:19), and in giving us everything that pertains to life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3). No wonder […]
The website for futurologist Leonard Sweet is called “Preach the Story.” The thesis of the website is that in all the little stories of the Bible there is the embedded big story of God’s plan to rescue the world through Jesus. That is very much in evidence in our text today where Judah’s speech to […]
A Sunday school children’s song contains the lyrics, “Every promise in the book is mine, every chapter, every verse, every line.” Cute song. Bad hermeneutics. The fact is that we participate in the promise that God made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and we experience its blessings (Galatians 3:9). But the promise itself was unique […]
Headings matter. The New International Version titles this text, “Hagar and Ishmael Sent Away.” The English Standard Version titles this text, “God Protects Hagar and Ishmael.” The first heading emphasizes Abraham’s duty. The latter heading emphasizes God’s care. In this text we see both severity and grace in God’s choices. God cares for the outcast […]
We sometimes use the expression, “There is light at the end of the tunnel,” when we want to emphasize that good is on the way and that soon our “tunnel experience” will end. But sometimes we add to that secular proverb the phrase, “But the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming […]
