Famine appears in both Books of Kings: “For three years no rain fell in Samaria, and there was almost nothing to eat anywhere.” (1 Kings 18:1-2) “The Lord has warned that there will be no food here for seven years.” (2 Kings 8:1) Famines in East Africa in the 1970s revealed the impact of environmental […]
We know that the Old Testament took place in the context of the desert. That’s not precise enough. It actually took place in the context of desertification—the onset or increase of desert. The difference is crucial. The Middle East wasn’t always a desert. The Middle East wasn’t always a desert [1]. Prior to about 4000 BC […]
Forgiveness is a word that gets bandied around a lot. Phrases like “forgive and forget,” or variations, like “I will forgive but I won’t forget,” trip easily from our tongues, often with little thought—let alone genuine—attached to them. Yet Jesus is explicit on the reciprocal nature of forgiveness. “If you forgive others for the wrongs they do […]
We are normally taught that grace is something we only receive through a winning ticket in the lottery of divine dispensation. That it is unrelated to who we are or what we do. If we get lucky, we come up smelling of roses. If we don’t, we prick our thumbs on the thorns of life […]
The Book of Judges is one of the most colourful books in the Bible. And one of its most colourful stories is that of Samson—the long-haired man of superhuman strength who wrestled a lion. It’s a story we’re all familiar with, but is it true? In 2012, archaeologists from the university of Tel Aviv discovered […]
Some tools are more powerful than others. Some tools are easier to use than others. It doesn’t come as any real surprise that the most powerful tools are the hardest to use. Case in point: the tool in this article. Like the self-observation tool discussed in the previous article, this is one of those tools […]
Most of the tools in this series are just like tools in a mechanics’ toolbox. You get them out when you need them to perform a specific task. In the next couple of articles, I’d like to discuss some tools that have a more general use. They’re like some of the things mechanics use in […]
In the last article in this series we looked at courage. In this one we’re examining surrender. While surrender might seem to be the direct opposite of courage, it’s actually a powerful tool in its own right. The very word ‘surrender’ has several negative connotations: losing a fight, lacking the ability to impose ourselves on […]
Previous articles in this series have looked at a variety of tools that are available to you, 24/7 and entirely free, to help you get to the New Earth. The next tool is faith. Jesus tells us just how powerful faith is in Matthew 17:20. “If you had faith no larger than a mustard seed, […]