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Bible Study

In Bible Study, Blog, Genesis on
January 17, 2022

Savior of the World

I am very thankful that I had the privilege of attending Bible college. I know it’s not an opportunity that many Christians have, and I’m glad that I was able to spend five years of my life studying theology and the Bible on a more academic level. Those five years made me into the theology nerd, Bible student, and writer I am today. During my bachelor’s and master’s degree programs, I learned about a lot of fun topics, like exegesis and hermeneutics, aseity and theophanies, cessationism and special revelation, double imputation and substitutionary atonement.

One of my favorite theological topics I learned about was typology. Theopedia defines typology as “a method of biblical interpretation whereby an element found in the Old Testament is seen to prefigure one found in the New Testament.”[1] Essentially, a type is someone or something in the Old Testament that foreshadows a greater someone or something in the New Testament, and many of the types found in the Old Testament point forward to Jesus and the salvation He provided for us. One such type was a man named Joseph.

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In Bible Study, Blog, Luke on
January 3, 2022

Jesus Draws Near to the Hurting

By some miracle, I’ve managed to never test positive for COVID-19 over the past two years. I say it’s a miracle because I’ve continued working throughout the entire pandemic, and I come into contact with a lot of different people at my job. I’m convinced that I have had it at some point and was just asymptomatic or had really mild symptoms and didn’t realize it was COVID.

I’m very grateful that I’ve never had COVID (or at least had no COVID symptoms) for many reasons. But one of the main reasons I’m thankful for never having COVID is that I never had to quarantine. At the beginning of the pandemic, it was hard enough to only go from home to work back to home again and never go anywhere else or see anyone else other than my immediate family and co-workers. I can’t imagine what it would have been like to be isolated for days or even weeks on end and never see anyone or even go outside. I can’t imagine what it would’ve felt like for everyone to avoid me at all costs.

Sadly, many people, whether they’ve tested positive for COVID-19 or they’ve been diagnosed with something else, have been avoided, shunned, made to be outcasts because of their illness or disease, both in present times and in ancient times. And we can see this clearly in the story of Jesus cleansing a leper.

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In Bible Study, Blog, Isaiah on
December 20, 2021

A Child is Born

Christmas is a busy time of year. It’s a time of baking cookies, hosting holiday parties, and singing all of your favorite Christmas carols. It’s a time of wrapping presents, drinking hot chocolate, and last-minute shopping for that one family member you didn’t know was coming into town. It’s a time of hanging lights, decorating trees, and watching classic films, like Home Alone, Christmas with the Kranks, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas. For some, Christmastime is filled with joy and cheer. For others, Christmastime is filled with stress and exhaustion.

No matter what life stage or season we’re in, we all have busy schedules at the end of each year, and we all get to a point where it feels like there is so much to do and so little time to do it all in. But as we attempt to fit in all the festivities and events, we miss something. We forget that Christmas is about more than the gifts and the music and the décor. It’s a day when we are to celebrate the birth of a child. And not just any child, but the Son of God.

What is so special about this child? Why does this boy named Jesus deserve our focus, our reverence, our worship? We can discover the answers to these questions by consulting a roughly 2,700-year-old Jewish prophecy written by a man named Isaiah.

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In Bible Study, Blog, Thanksgiving on
November 22, 2021

But God

When the clock struck midnight on January 1, 2021, people were ecstatic to leave the woes and troubles of 2020 behind. However, it appears that 2020’s issues followed us into 2021 and, in some cases, became even worse. People are still contracting and dying from diseases, often without any family or friends beside them as they take their final breaths. Workers are still being let go from their jobs, even though there is an ongoing nationwide worker shortage. Small businesses are still facing product delays, and the threats of inflation keep rising and rising. Corrupt world leaders are still enacting laws and policies that oppress their constituents, getting bolder and more authoritarian by the day. And many churches are still parroting the slogans and jargon of our secular culture and beginning to move away from biblical Christianity.

With all these things happening in our culture, country, and world, it may seem hard to find something to be thankful for this year. But we, as Christians, have a lot to be thankful for regardless of what’s going on around us. Whenever we’re feeling discouraged or disappointed, we just need to remember two little words: “But God.”

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In Bible Study, Blog, Matthew on
October 18, 2021

Judge Not

We live in a society where judgment is not tolerated. When a person makes certain choices or decisions in their life, they expect everyone to accept and affirm them. But if anyone pushes back or questions the decision, they act as if their identity and personhood is being denied, and they label their questioner as a hateful bigot. And this reaction is amplified if the person who pushes back is a Christian.

The Bible calls Christians to be kind and compassionate (Ephesians 4:32), to love their neighbors (Matthew 22:39), even if their neighbor is their enemy (Matthew 5:44). Because of this, many people, including many believers, think that Christians should not disagree with anyone publicly. Somehow, this is seen as being “unloving,” and if you do try to disagree with someone’s choices or actions, someone is sure to throw the common Bible verse at you: “Judge not, that you be not judged.” (Matthew 7:1, ESV) However, this Bible verse is very often misused, especially in the situation described above. To find out the true meaning of this verse, we must look at it in context.

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