Category: Acts
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As the Waters Cover the Sea
Isaiah 45 is addressed to Cyrus, king of the Persians, whom God calls His anointed — His messiah, His christ — the one who would shepherd His people. God tells him that He will give him the nations so that all will know that Yahweh is God and there is no other, so that all […]
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Babel and Pentecost
Genesis 11:1 says, “Now the whole earth had one lip and the same words.” This “lip” refers to a common confession, a common religious belief. They built a city around their common culture and language, and they built a tower as a shrine with its head in the heavens for their common credo, “I believe […]
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Messianic King
Psalm 110 celebrates God’s gift of a messianic king over the people and the restoration from judgment*. It echoes themes from earlier in the Psalter. This king to whom Yahweh says, “sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool,” is the same one who received the commendation, “You are my Son; […]
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Filled with the Infinite
It is not a rare thing in the Old Testament that the surrounding nations are included as participants in the blessings and worship of Yahweh. Even in the promises to Abraham, God says that in him “all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” This promise is not just for the time after the […]
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Jews and God-fearers
The structure of the people of Israel – the careful arrangement of the camp, the clear delineation of the land among the tribes, the laws of uncleanness, food restrictions, and circumcision – all serve to set Israel apart as a priestly nation. The Jews were not exclusively the people of God; there were still Noahic […]
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Into the Name
Woven throughout the later chapters of Isaiah is the theme of a new Exodus, a return from the exile of Babylon. Yahweh opens the eyes of the blind, He frees the prisoners from the dungeon and leads them out. He causes His light to go before them, just as He did with the pillar of […]
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Wrestling God
The story of Jacob wrestling with God in Genesis 32 is difficult to get a handle on. The narrative is interrupted rather abruptly by Jacob wrestling with this man who just appears from nowhere. It’s the only time that this word for “wrestling” is used and the only place where someone has this kind of […]
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Rejected
Jeremiah 26 falls right in the middle of a series of messages given by God to the southern kingdom of Judah just before they are carried away into exile in Babylon. He gives them the opportunity to repent so that this disaster He has prepared for them might be turned aside. He threatens to make […]
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Servant-kings
Moses didn’t just stand up on the mountain to give the law. He sat with the people and took on the burden of hearing and judging their individual cases. When God was angry with the sin of the people, Moses prayed that God would blot him out of His book rather than destroy the people. The blessing […]
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The end
And I gave them my Sabbaths to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord who sanctify them. Ezekiel 20:12 This Sabbath shall appear still more clearly if we count the ages as days, in accordance with the periods of time defined in Scripture, for that period will be found to be the seventh. The first […]