Upon This Rock

In this episode we continue talking about the word wrath by looking at the three primary metaphors the Bible uses to talk about God's wrath. In doing so I hope we can come to a clearer idea of what God's wrath is.

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This is part one of a longer look at the wrath of God. In this episode we look at how wrath is generally thought about and analyze the first story in the Bible where God is said to get angry and want to pour out His wrath. Part two coming soon. 

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"Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to....go to hell?" Today we are starting a new series called "The Inigo Montoya's": Words you use that don't mean what I think you think they mean. To kick things off I talk with Brad Jersak about hell, what the biblical words are, what they mean, the images associated with them, and how we weaponize our concept of hell. Brad has written a wonderful book on hell as well as a number of articles, the one he mentions in the pod is linked here.

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Why do we care so much about the Bible? And why do we try so hard to understand it? In part, because we believe it is the inspired word of God. But what do we mean by inspiration? How does that actually work? I think if we can see how the Bible works we can better understand what it is actually saying.

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To start reading the OT with new eyes you need to remember one word: repetition. This is how the OT works. The authors of Scripture repeat words, ideas, places, names, stories, images, etc. If you can pick up on those repetitions a whole new world opens up. To start reading the OT with new eyes you need to remember one word: repetition......wait did I already say that?

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How did the early church read their Scriptures, what we call the Old Testament? And how do we see those reading habits built into their writings the New Testament? In this episode we continue our series on learning to read the Scriptures by looking at how the NT authors employ Scriptural echoes, allusions and "hyperlinks". Part of learning to read the Scriptures well is directly tied to recognizing how the authors constructed their stories, poems, and writings. 

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In this special crossover podcast with the Rabbit Trails Podcast I talk with Barrett and Garrick about some of my personal journey, missions, and our call to live as the people of God wherever we are. After you listen make sure you go check out the Rabbit Trails Podcast! 

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In this Deep Dive episode we look at two famous Old Testament stories which portray God as violent that are quoted by multiple authors in the New Testament in order to learn how to read even the most difficult texts in light of Christ. 

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Reading the Bible can be puzzling to say the least, but the metaphor of a puzzle can actually help us tackle the daunting task. In this episode I argue that Jesus, as the image of God, is the picture on the "puzzle box" of Scripture and that He should inform how we read and interpret it. This means that we cannot read the Scriptures and come to see God as something other than the crucified and risen Jesus. 

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One of the greatest tasks given to Christians is learning to read Scripture faithfully. Yet for many this is a point of burdensome frustration. In this series I want to have a series of conversations around becoming faithful readers of Scripture, how we do that, what obstacles do we face, what mistakes are often made, and what strategies we can employ, so that we can read the Bible well.  But first we need to admit two things. First, that the task of reading the Bible faithfully is hard. We've all probably admitted that to ourselves but many haven't ever felt permission to admit that to anyone else. Second, that the Church holds some of, I'd say the majority of, the responsibility in helping people become good readers of Scripture. Sadly, to this end the Church has largely failed. To many people grow up in the Church and are never shown how to read Scripture.  It's my hope through this series we can all grow as readers of God's word. 

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