First video in a new series I plan to prepare for a series of sessions I am doing at church on the boring sounding (but actually enthralling and exciting) topic of the geography of the land where the Bible stories happened. The goal of the series is to bring Scripture to life through pictures and [&hellip...
Since Google suggests the first chapter of 2 Kings is humorous I’ll measure it against the criteria. It meets most (but not all) which i think makes it clear this passage is not merely funny but was intended to be funny. Though again it is a “black” humour. As a bonus I’ll offer a reading [&hellip...
Jeremiah’s third confession is a monologue, mainly (or all, depending where we think it starts) addressed to God. Complaint is the dominant tone, and Jeremiah asks for vengeance on his opponents. So this text raises interesting questions about the nature of Scripture, and how God might read (some parts of) the Bible… ...
Idols, “gods” that people make! The very idea of making a god is one of those notions that almost have to reduce you to tears (whether of laughter or sadness and desperation depends on the circumstances), and the Bible has plenty of fun at the expense (in both senses) of idols. In this episode, therefore, [&hellip...
Continuing a series on The Confessions of Jeremiah, we’ll explore the second of these rich and complex texts Jer 15:10-21. Although I only have 5 minutes I hope I’ll give you material to spark several times that of study of the biblical text 😉 for it is out of such personal wrestling (sometimes like Jeremiah’s [&hellip...
In the previous two podcasts in this series I’ve introduced “the Confessions of Jeremiah” and the first confession (11:18-12:6). Here we’ll look at this text from the point of view of how it portrays the characters of Jeremiah (in the book the speaker of the passage) and his God (whom he often addresses and on [&hellip...
Before thinking about this “confession” we’ll first look at lament psalms briefly. Lament psalms often contain: – an address (maybe simply “O God” or “O Lord”) – a/some complaint(s) – a request for help addressed to God – the affirmation of trust in God, as thanks for past action or simply as praise and conviction [&hellip...
A series of passages in Jeremiah stand out because of their contents which presents itself as powerful debates about Jeremiah, his call, his enemies and his God. In some of them Jeremiah seems to be speaking alone, in otgher God responds. These “Confessions of Jeremiah are: Jer 11:18-20; 12:1-6; 15:10-21, 17:14-18; 18:18-23; 20:7-13 (the exact [&hellip...
There is a lot of discussion (at least there is in the online circles I move in) about claims to a doctrine of “headship” that is biblical and that means husbands should take a leadership role with respect to their their wives. Or possibly that men should over women more generally. In a recent discussion [&hellip...
Go’el is another thoroughly cultural word, that is highly theological. Again it is prominent in Ruth. This time there is one English word that is often a decent translation, redeemer, the problem is redeem carries a different weight of overtones from ga’al. There is a good short post about ga’al here with reference to Jesus [&hellip...
