Mt 15:21-28 Jesus went to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman from that area came and cried out, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David! My daughter is horribly demon-possessed!” But he did not answer her a word. Then his disciples came and begged him, “Send her away, because she keeps on crying out after us.” So he answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”…
So many voices seem to clamour for our attention these days:
But there are three voices that must not be drowned out by all this noise. These voices are ancient, and yet timeless. They speak to us eloquently, instructively, harmoniously.
Together, they witness to the most important thing in the world: the knowledge of God.
Each of them can be heard in this, perhaps the most wonderful of all the psalms.…
John 7:53-8:11 records the famous and well-loved account of a woman caught in adultery.
This text is ‘troublesome’ because of the high level of doubt about whether it belongs in John’s Gospel, or, indeed, whether it belongs in our Bibles at all.
The earliest manuscripts do not contain this passage, and it is very rarely mentioned by Christian teachers during the 1st millenium AD.
Few scholars would argue that even if it is canonical, it belongs to this particular place in John’s Gospel. …
William Hendriksen writes:
The Evangelical Times, August 2020 reports:
The University of Pennsylvania, also known as Penn, has decided to remove a statue of the 18th century evangelical preacher George Whitefield from its campus.
The university issued a statement saying, ‘The case for removing Whitefield is overwhelmingly strong. He was a well-known evangelical preacher in the mid-eighteenth century, who notably led a successful campaign to allow slavery in Georgia. This is undeniably one of Whitefield’s principal legacies.
…‘Honouring him with a statue on our campus is inconsistent with our University’s core values, which guide us in becoming an ever more welcoming community that celebrates inclusion and diversity.’
“We look for the resurrection of the dead”, says the Nicene Creed.
“I believe in the resurrection of the body”, we declare every time we recite the “Apostles’ Creed”.
These ancient affirmations are well-grounded in Scripture, most obviously in 1 Corinthians 15, but also in Romans 8 and other passages. They are also consistent with the teaching of 2 Peter 3 and Revelation 21 and 22 that confirms that the future hope of God’s people is not for their bodies to remain buried for ever in the ground of this earth and for their “souls” to fly off to “heaven”, but for bodily resurrection and for future life in God’s new heaven and new earth.…
Atheists like to claim that their views, unlike those of believers, are falsifiable.
So, given this openness to a change of mind, what might convince an atheist that God exists after all?
One blogger lists the following as her number one kind of evidence:
‘If I saw an unambiguous message from God, I would be persuaded of his existence. If I saw writing suddenly appear in the sky, in letters a hundred feet high, saying “I Am God, I Exist, Here Is What I Want You To Do” — and if that writing were seen by every human being, written in whatever language they understand, comprehended in the same way by everyone who saw it — I would be persuaded that God existed.’…
Psalm 19 is the go-to passage for the witness of the heavens to the glory of God. But, in fact, it is only one of a number of scriptures that explore what the starry skies reveal about the nature, will and purpose of God.
Power
Gen 1:2 famously says that ‘in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.’ In fact, the first two chapters of Genesis witness of the creative power of God in creating the cosmos and everything in it.…
These three words (writes Jan Johnson) take us to the heart of what contemplative prayer is all about.
Resting in God
‘The shadow of the Almighty is a safe place to rest for a soul that is scattered, parched, guilt-ridden, or uncertain.’
Psa 4:4 – ‘When you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent.’
Psa 37:7 – ‘Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him;.’
Psa 62:5 – ‘ Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him.’…
Or, to put it otherwise: ‘cancel culture makes liars of us all’.
The current fad for toppling statues of the great and the good when their ‘goodness’ is found to have been mixed with ‘badness’ is chilling in its implications. Yesterday, it was Edward Colston. Tomorrow, it may be John Newton, Winston Churchill, or even Mother Theresa herself. And are you quite sure that there is not something lurking in your Twitter account that will not, one day, be held up to your eternal shame?…
