A Recompense from the Lord

April 16, 2025Posted inSuffering
Merriam Webster defines recompense as an equivalent or a return for something done, suffered, or given. The verb means to give something to by way of compensation (as for a service rendered or damage incurred), to pay for, to return in kind. The basic idea is that there is a correspondence between what is received…

Unconditional Reprobation

April 11, 2025Posted inReprobation
In the early seventeenth century the first Arminians taught that God's election is conditional. They said that God knew from eternity who would believe and chose them to be his people. His election was based on foreseen faith. This, along with other aspects of Arminian teaching, turns faith into a work and makes salvation dependent…

Hatred in the Bible

April 4, 2025Posted inHatred
Perhaps you have heard, as I have more than once, that there are times when the word "hate" in the Bible means "love less." Three passages come to mind. Genesis 29:31-33 tells us that Leah was hated. The NKJV, NIV and NASB all translate the word as unloved, but the KJV, ESV and RSV are…

The Jealousy of God

March 20, 2025Posted inExodus
The Hebrew word for jealousy also encompasses the ideas of envy (Prov. 14:30) and zeal (Isa. 9:7). Envy is a vice because it wants what God has given to the neighbor and is sometimes willing to harm the neighbor to obtain it. Zeal can be either a virtue or a vice depending on its focus.…

Hebrews 13:7-17: A Chiasm of Exhortations

March 10, 2025Posted inHebrews
The book of Hebrews addresses Jewish believers who, under the pressure of persecution, were returning to their old faith. The argument of the book against such apostasy is that they will be abandoning the much better things accomplished by Christ and will be attaching themselves to things that have become obsolete and will vanish away…

How to Get Everything You Want by Praying

February 26, 2025Posted inPrayer
That may sound like a very unChristian thing, even a sinful thing, to suggest. If you want to get rich, to be free from all trouble, or to have whatever it is you your heart desires at the moment, then you will not find the answer here. Isn't it impossible then to get what we…

Distinctive Features of Psalm 80

February 17, 2025Posted inPsalms Commentary
Psalm 80 is a psalm of three movements or stanzas of unequal length. The first stanza (vv. 1–3) is introductory and calls on God to hear, stir up his strength and come to save Ephraim, Benjamin and Manasseh. The second stanza (vv. 4–7) asks God how long he will be angry with his people. The…

The Importance of Brotherly Admonition

February 14, 2025Posted inPsalms Commentary
One of the means our Lord has provided both to keep us from sin and to bring us back from it is brotherly admonition. The health of the church and its members demands it, but we seldom use it when we should. Probably there are many reasons for it, but I suspect that the main…

The Message of Leviticus

January 27, 2025Posted inLeviticus
If forced to decide, many Christians today would probably say that the book of Leviticus is the least important of all the books of the Bible. It is full of laws, and these laws are mostly ceremonial, about sacrifices, consecration of priests, clean and unclean animals, leprosy and so on. When I was a child…