Category: Bible

Old Testament Wisdom Books

The Great Courses offers hundreds of on-line courses featuring skilled professors exploring a wide variety of subjects. We recently stumbled on a course entitled Reading Biblical Literature. The skilled professor/lecturor is Dr. Craig Koester. We have been enjoying one of these lectures most evenings during Lent. Below are the apps leading to free access on […]

Dramatizing the Old Testament

The Main Point – House of David Just to get to the point early, the main point of this post is to recommend a new eight-episode series, House of David, available on Amazon Prime. The Free Press describes the series as “a beautiful corrective to a lie that’s seeped into American culture: that Christians see […]

Bible Punch Lines

Bible verses read without pertinent context may be misleading. Sometimes, important verses are at the end of a passage and might be surprising, like a punch to the nose, not making us laugh like a punch line to a joke, but hitting us with simple statements of theological truth! Consider these two verses: Bible Punch […]

Herod, Herod, Herod, Herod, Herod, and Herod

Yes, there are six Herods in the New Testament. I’m not sure that has any theological significance, but does have some historical significance with respect to getting things in the right order and understanding who did what. And it may have some value in trivia game competition and crossword puzzle solving. I started out to […]

John 3:16 – Gospel in a Nutshell…with Context

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. – John 3:16 King James Version (KJV) Importance of Context Richer understanding of these beautiful, encouraging, and famous words from the Gospel of St. John results from consideration of context, an essential […]

Septuagint Poetry

Daniel 3:57-87 is a beautiful and inspirational worship canticle (Biblical song or poem), part of the prayer of Abednego as he and his two friends strolled about in the flames of Nebuchadnezzar’s furnace, and a staple of Morning Prayer in the Liturgy of the Hours. But, it’s not in all Bibles. Here it is from […]

Massacre of the Innocents

Saturday December 28 on the Catholic Liturgical Calendar is a Feast day in memory of The Holy Innocents, those slain by King Herod in fear of a new King having recently been born, eventually to replace him as King. If only Herod had known that he had less than a year to live! Much academic […]

THE Bible Story

Most of us raised in a Christian church know lots of Bible stories. We know about the sins of Adam and Eve, Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac, the leadership of Moses and Joshua, Samuel’s anointing of Saul and David, David’s killing of Goliath, the wisdom of King Solomon, the birth and ministry of Jesus, the […]