John chapter 3 is one of the most beloved portions of the New Testament, and for good reason. It treats matters of life and death. How can I enter the kingdom of God? What does it mean to be born again? What’s that even look like? With such grave questions to be answered, we must … Read more
In John 2:23-25, the beloved Apostle makes an astonishing statement: “Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to … Read more
Dear Church, this morning I’m re-posting an article by Jack Wellman, pastor of the Mulvane Brethren Church in Mulvane, Kansas. Pastor Wellman does a nice job here of succinctly weaving together a number of important details that help explain our Lord’s cleansing of the Temple. His view, which is perhaps the majority view, is that … Read more
It’s the first or the ‘beginning’ of the signs Jesus performed in the Gospel of John. There are seven of them. Frederick Bruner translates the passage this way: “Now on the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Both Jesus and his disciples had been … Read more
They are among the most fascinating and enigmatic of the Bible’s prophecies: A ladder reaching to Heaven and touching the earth with a multitude of ascending and descending angels; Heaven opened so that God might come down to us and that sinners might arise to Him; One like a Son of Man coming with the … Read more
Andrew is a bit of mysterious figure, unfortunately often lost in the shadow of his larger-than-life brother. We know something about him from the New Testament (all of which is true) and something about him from Church tradition (some of which may be true). However, the picture of Andrew that does emerge from Scripture is … Read more
John the Baptist is clearly among the most remarkable people who have ever lived. He was Jesus’ forerunner, preparing the sinners to repent and receive their Messiah. John’s portrait of John the Baptist is quite different from that of the other three gospel writers. We don’t read about how he dressed or what he ate … Read more
John likes symbolism, as even a surface reading of the Book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ will readily show. But John’s Gospel has its allusions and symbols too. One of these we find in the jaw-dropping declaration of John 1:14: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his … Read more
“In the beginning was the Word,” is the sublime opening sentence of John’s Gospel. Like the beautiful, yet anxious, faint opening notes of Beethoven’s Ninth symphony, they can barely hold themselves back from the glorious explosion of sound that looms just ahead! “The Word was with God” and “God was the Word” and the “Word … Read more
Last month (April 27, 2019) my wife Mary and I – along with our grandchildren Jacob and Bella – witnessed the most significant event to occur in Somerset Massachusetts in the last hundred years: the great Brayton Point Cooling Towers implosion. At last, the two uber-ugly cooling towers that had so blighted our skyline came … Read more