When you read the Old Testament prophets, a pattern begins to emerge. And if you know what to look for it begins to clear the air somewhat in trying to understand what they’re about. As …
The Minor Prophets #19 - Joel
Living as we do in an age of plenty, it’s hard for us to understand famine. What we do know about it is a long way off and kind of unreal. We see picture of …
The Minor Prophets #18 - Jonah
Once upon a time there was a man named Jonah. I am sure you heard of him. He was the son of a man named Amittai and we know he was an active prophet during …
The Minor Prophets #17 - Nahum
We don’t know a lot about Nahum. He describes himself as an Elkoshite but no one knows where Elkosh is to date him. The date of his prophecy can be placed between 700 to 600 …
The Book of Deuteronomy #4
All the commandments which I command you this day shall you observe to do, that you may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the LORD swore unto your fathers. And …
Extreme Grace
It had been a hard three days. David and the handful of young men with him had left in hurry and they had taken no food. By the time they got to a place called …
The Minor Prophets #16 - Micah
Reading the biblical prophets—with understanding—is no easy task, at best. But when you try to do it without knowledge of the history behind it becomes hopeless. For one thing, there are parts of prophesies that …
The Minor Prophets #15 - Micah
The words of the prophet Micah could just as easily be said and written today. Micah wrote in Chapter 2: Lately my people have risen up like an enemy. You strip off the rich robe …
The Minor Prophets #14 - Micah
It’s a small wonder that people have a hard time understanding biblical prophets. The truth is, unless you know something about the situation on the ground when they wrote, you’re just left with to come …
The Minor Prophets #13 - Hosea
History really does repeat itself. The reason is simple and obvious: We keep making the same stupid mistakes over and over again—and it produces the same results over and over again. The cycle of history …
The Book of Deuteronomy #3
And Moses called all Israel, and said unto them, Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments which I speak in your ears this day, that ye may learn them, and keep, and do them. The …
Disillusionment and Redemption
Many years ago, in the middle of a theological argument about what is required for the saving of a man’s soul, I formulated another of what I call Dart’s Laws. This one is, simply stated: …
The Minor Prophets #12 - Hosea
At times, when you read the prophets, there’s an almost melancholy sense—a sadness, a blues, as it were—because you realize that God didn’t want things to go the way they were going. The Book of …
The Minor Prophets #11 - Hosea
The whole idea behind sin offerings in the Bible is for a man to acknowledge his sin and to recognize that there is a price to be paid for it. Now, God didn’t make a …
The Minor Prophets #10 - Hosea
It’s painful watching history repeat itself. It’s even more painful to realize you can’t do much to head it off. But there’s nothing new under the sun, and the prophets of old must have felt …
The Minor Prophets #9 - Hosea
I remember a time when I thought all those references in the Bible—and the prophecies in particular—to adultery and harlotry were talking about spiritual adultery. The idea was that Israel was married to God, she …
Judgments
View PostThe Book of Deuteronomy #2
Get up into the top of Pisgah, and lift up your eyes westward, and northward, and southward, and eastward, and behold it with your eyes: for you shall not go over this Jordan. But charge …
The New Calvinism
Let me tell you an obvious fact you may never have thought of: You hold a set of ideas, some of which are contrary to what your church actually believes. And you are probably unaware …
The Minor Prophets #8 - Hosea
Unfortunately, the Biblical prophets don’t write their story like history. I say unfortunately, but that’s strictly from a 20th-century point of view. It’s probably because we aren’t really quite on the right wavelength. Instead, the …