Dr Paul Allen

Jonathon cruse In Romans 4, Paul tells us that if we want to know how salvation works, we only need to look to Abraham. His story was recorded for our sake (vv. 23–24). How God worked with Abraham is how God works, period. And how did God work salvation for Abraham? Through faith. We cannot overstate the importance of faith. As Paul wrote in verse 16, “it [the promise] depends on faith.” The ESV supplies that word “depends,” but it certainly underscores the sense Paul is after—literally, the promise “comes through faith.” Why? Why is faith so important? Why does it matter so much in God’s plan of redemption? Here are three reasons. 1. Faith keeps the promise gracious. That’s what the text says: “It is through faith so it can be according to grace” (v. 16). Substitute any other word for “faith”, and the sentence becomes absurd. If salvation is through works, charity, service, church attendance, activism, intuition, or intellect, it cannot be “according to grace.” Faith—which itself is a...

Trevin Wax Most of us know the feeling at some point. We reach a level of familiarity with the Bible, or we grow so accustomed to our church routine or sing the same song so many times that we get bored. We lose our interest in the things of God. We go to church, open the Bible, and send a few words to God in the morning, but we no longer feel any real passion or excitement at contemplating the realities of the Christian faith. Our senses grow dull. Our vision is dim. Our tastebuds don’t work anymore. In a fallen world, we can count on feeling bored at some point, even in our walk with God. Ironically, the solutions to boredom provided by our phones and technology (where, at any moment, we can find a morsel of entertainment) can be the source of spiritual boredom, keeping us perpetually distracted from truth and substance. Boredom often coincides with feeling jaded. Sometimes, that jadedness arises from being disappointed in others. The more experience you have in church, the more like...

 It was snuff that made Walter Garret a rich man. He owned a snuff shop, which he inherited from his father, who inherited it from his father.  When Garret died in 1895, he left an inheritance, consisting of the snuff shop and 6 million dollars, to his wife Henrietta. But Garret had a bugbear about his slacker relatives and in his will stipulated clearly that none of his relatives were ever to receive a cent of his money. Henrietta Garret proved to be a very capable steward of the inheritance and by the time she died at age 81 in 1930, her estate was worth $17 million. Mrs Garrett had no children, siblings or cousins. In fact, she had no surviving relatives at all. She wrote her will on a scrap of paper, disposing of some of her fortunes, leaving chunks of money to her various friends. The total amount she allotted to friends amounted to only $62,500. She neglected to add the all-important clause, “All the rest I leave to…” So, over $16 million was left unallocated. According ...

The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. (Numbers 6:24–26) Tucked away in an otherwise inconspicuous place, in Numbers chapter 6, we find one of the great poems in all the Bible. There God instructs Moses to speak to Aaron (his brother and Israel’s high priest) and his sons, saying, “Thus you shall bless the people of Israel: you shall say to them . . .” (verse 23). Then follows what we now know as the great “Aaronic blessing,” not only one of Scripture’s best-known verses but also one of its oldest. Many Christians today are familiar with it from songs and benedictions in corporate worship that echo it still. In fact, some of us are so familiar with the blessing that it’s easy to take its content for granted and miss what it really means. Whether it’s new or old to you, consider what makes this blessing so great and why it assumed such a place in Israel — at the close...

English: Icon of Jesus Christ (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) "Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine ; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing." ( John 15:4-5 ) As recorded in John 14 -16, many of Christ 's last words to His disciples as He was about to leave them regarded abiding. The word meno occurs 18 times in this discourse and is translated not only "abide," but also "remain," "dwell," "continue," and "be present." Let us look at what He told them about abiding while He was "yet present" ( 14:25 ) with them. First, "the Father . . . dwelleth in me" ( 14:10 ), "I am in the Father, and the Father in me" ( v. 11 ). That is, they are one and the same, inseparably abiding together, giving gre...