Category: John

  • Show us the Father

    Moses fills the offices of priest, judge, and prophet. As priest, he receives the law and teaches the people to obey. He sits as supreme judge over the people. And as prophet, he stands in the counsel of God, calls the people to repentance and warns them of the future consequences of sin. In Exodus […]

  • Ark of the new covenant

    Peter Leithart, in his The Four, posed the question, “What is Jeremiah’s point about the ark in Jeremiah 3:16? How does that fit with what we have learned about the ‘last days’?” And when you have multiplied and been fruitful in the land, in those days, declares the Lord, they shall no more say, “The […]

  • Creation and redemption

    Ben Merkle points out that in Psalm 33, “David looks at God’s power in creation and concludes that ‘all his work is done in truth’ and that ‘the earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.’ The triune God is our maker, creating and upholding all things by the power of his Word and […]

  • Out of Egypt

    Matthew draws heavily on the Exodus story when he recounts the events of the birth of Christ.  Mathew quotes from Hosea 11:1, “Out of Egypt I have called my son.” This passage from Hosea is not overtly Messianic like Daniel’s vision of the Son of Man ruling on His throne forever or Isaiah’s prophecies of […]

  • 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 […]

  • Trinity at creation

    In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. The Father and the Holy Spirit are clearly present at creation in Genesis 1. The Son […]

  • Only be strong

    The LORD your God himself will go over before you. He will destroy these nations before you, so that you shall dispossess them, and Joshua will go over at your head, as the LORD has spoken. Deuteronomy 31:3 Joshua very much foreshadows the work of Christ and the spread of the gospel into the world. God […]

  • Law of love

    Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. Deuteronomy 6 contains the heart of the covenant between God and his people. The Lord our God, the Lord is one. He is not one god among many gods. […]

  • God is Salvation

    And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14) In telling the story of Jesus’ birth, Matthew makes a big point of what his name should be. The angel tells Joseph to name […]

  • Besieged trees

    In Deuteronomy 20, there is a somewhat odd prohibition against cutting down trees in time of war. When you besiege a city for a long time, making war against it in order to take it, you shall not destroy its trees by wielding an axe against them. You may eat from them, but you shall […]