The River, Part 3. On the basket she wove. When she could hide him no longer, she took for him a basket made of bulrushes and daubed it with bitumen and pitch. She put the child in it and placed it among the reeds by the river bank. — Exodus 2:3 Into the Word Pharaoh… Continue reading If You Could Give Your Child Only One Thing
Can Fear Save You?
The River, Part 2. On the midwives who feared God. But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live. — Exodus 1:17 Into the Word Pharaoh’s first plan had failed. He worked the Hebrews from morning to night, hoping exhaustion would keep… Continue reading Can Fear Save You?
Egypt Forgot Joseph. Israel Carried His Bones.
Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. — Exodus 1:8 Into the Word Egypt forgot more than a name. It forgot that it had once been starving. Through seven years of famine, the grain Joseph had stored kept the country alive (Genesis 41:53-57), and Pharaoh gave Joseph’s family the… Continue reading Egypt Forgot Joseph. Israel Carried His Bones.
The Hand That Lets Go
Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves. — Romans 1:24 Into the Word Three times in one chapter Paul writes the same verdict. “God gave them up” (Romans 1:24, 26, 28). The verb is paredōken (παρέδωκεν), to hand over, to deliver… Continue reading The Hand That Lets Go
The Bay That Changed Its Name
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations. — Matthew 28:19 Into the Word Not long ago, I listened to a missionary’s report. After seminary, she had left for a small island nation. She is still there. There were no impressive numbers and no dramatic breakthroughs, only someone staying in a difficult place because she… Continue reading The Bay That Changed Its Name
Love Cannot Be Done Alone
As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. — John 15:9 Into the Word Love cannot be done alone. Love with no one to receive it goes nowhere. A heart with no one to hold it stays only a feeling. The very word love points beyond the one… Continue reading Love Cannot Be Done Alone
When the Home Becomes a Church
“These words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.” — Deuteronomy 6:6–7 Into the Word Look at… Continue reading When the Home Becomes a Church
The Father Who Lost a Son
He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? — Romans 8:32 In loving memory of a precious young life, and in prayer for his grieving family. Into the Word Yesterday, a two-year-old boy from a missionary… Continue reading The Father Who Lost a Son
The Land I Will Show You
Now the Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. — Genesis 12:1 Into the Word Look closely at the tense. The land that I will show you. Not a land already surveyed, not a place Abram had visited and… Continue reading The Land I Will Show You
The Sentence Adam Never Said
The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate. —Genesis 3:12 Into the Word Read the sentence slowly and watch where it travels. It starts with the woman. It ends with I ate, which is the only honest clause in it. But the middle is… Continue reading The Sentence Adam Never Said