Dr Paul Allen

And behold, the word of the LORD came to him: “This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir.” And he brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you can number them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” And he believed the LORD and counted it to him as righteousness. (Gen. 15:4–6) Even though Abram and Sarai cannot have children, God assures Abram that his “very own son” will be his heir. Taking him outside to look at the stars, God promises Abram that his offspring will be equal to their number. The New Testament quotes Abram’s reply four times: “And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness” (Gen. 15:6).  This verse reveals a key scriptural pattern. God regards Abram as righteous in grace and accepts him because of his faith. Paul agrees: “For by grace you have been saved through faith” (Eph. 2:8). In the following two verses of Ephesians, Paul says God did not save us because of our wor...

Stephen Wellum Any sane person knows that there is something wrong with us. No one can honestly examine history, let alone their own lives, without being struck by the extent to which we as a human race have “missed the mark” and not lived up to our ideals. Reinhold Niebuhr keenly observed that “the doctrine of original sin is the only empirically verifiable doctrine of the Christian faith.”[1]  The “human condition” has been the subject of countless books, films, and plays as people have wrestled with the reality of good and evil. One of my favourites is The Lord of the Rings, in which Tolkien explores the insidious power of the ring and the evil that lurks in every heart. 1. Reinhold Niebuhr, Man’s Nature and His Communities: Essays on the Dynamics and Enigmas of Man’s Personal and Social Existence (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1965; repr., Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2012), 24. However, although everyone admits that something is wrong with us, we do not explain the “huma...

Thus the LORD used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses returned to the camp, his assistant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent. (Ex. 33:11) Moses is unique in the history of redemption. God spoke directly and intimately with him. He was a prophet and an intercessor, speaking God’s words to the nation and speaking to God on behalf of the nation. Moses was the covenant mediator. He also played a special role in pointing to the coming One, who would be a prophet like himself (Deut. 18:15–19). In Exodus 33, Moses continues to intercede for the wayward Israelites. His intercession had spared them previously, and now Moses intercedes once more. Although stubborn, this people belongs to the Lord. They need more than deliverance from judgment. Moses knows that God himself must accompany the people. God’s covenant presence must be what distinguishes them from all other people on the face of the earth. Moses appeals to the favo...

“Psst! Did God   really say ?” The very first words of the serpent slyly whispered to Eve in the Garden of Eden haunted me as I wrestled with the Bible’s prohibition of homoerotic sex. I was teaching a module on Biblical Sexuality at the  London School of Theology  in 2009. I was overwhelmed by the volume of new scholarly arguments challenging me to rethink my conservative position on same-sex relationships. Of course, I believed the Bible was inspired, inerrant, and infallible — but in the light of new exegetical evidence, was I correct in holding to a traditional interpretation of the texts prohibiting homogenital relations? Moreover, several of my students who claimed to be “evangelical” had adopted rather worrisome postmodern and permissive perspectives on sexuality. It wouldn’t be easy to persuade them to accept an orthodox interpretation of the biblical texts. Gagnon’s Bombshell Robert Gagnon’s 2002  opus magnum   The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts a...

In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem and besieged it. And the Lord gave Jehoiakim, king of Judah, into his hand, with some of the vessels of the house of God. And he brought them to the land of Shinar, to the home of his god, and placed the vessels in the treasury of his god. . . . But Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself with the king's food or the wine he drank. Therefore, he asked the chief of the eunuchs to allow him not to defile himself. And God gave Daniel favour and compassion in the sight of the chief of the eunuchs, and the chief of the eunuchs said to Daniel, “I fear my lord the king, who assigned your food and your drink; for why should he see that you were in worse condition than the youths who are of your own age? So you would endanger my head with the king.” Then Daniel said to the steward whom the chief of the eunuchs had assigned over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, “Test ...

I am increasingly persuaded that “hearing back” from God in the life of prayer involves an analogous process. It involves a practised prayer life that matures our perceptions to hear him right. For it’s not as though God was ever truly silent. And it’s not that we are at too great a distance from the one in whom we live and move and have our being to hear his voice. On the contrary, as G. K. Chesterton suggests with characteristic paradoxy, it may be that “the laughter of the heavens is too loud for us to hear.”1 If such things are so, then Silence “Be still and know that I am God” (Ps. 46:10) . Being still, or practising silence, is my first suggestion in a course for retraining perceptions. My primary focus isn’t so much on literal silence (though it can’t hurt); it’s on quieting our voices and hearts enough to listen. Those who would truly hear any other, and indeed the ultimate Other, must relinquish control over what’s said. They must render themselves vulnerable to hearing someth...

Luke 2:  “Glory to God in the highest,  and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” (Luke 2:14–15) “And [Simeon] came in the Spirit into the temple, and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the Law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said, “Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace,  according to your word;  for my eyes have seen your salvation  that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples,  a light for revelation to the Gentiles,  and for glory to your people Israel.” (Luke 2:27–32) Rather than bringing fear, which is the appropriate response to seeing the glory and greatness of God, the gospel (the “good news”) is described by the angels as “great joy that will be for al...

  Who is Luke and why is he important? Luke was acquainted with and traveled with the apostle  Paul . Not only did Luke travel with Paul outside the land of Israel, he also visited Israel and may have become personally acquainted with members of Jesus’s family, including his mother Mary and his brother James. Between them, Luke and Paul wrote more than half of the New Testament. This makes Luke hugely important for Christianity. Where does the Bible refer to Luke? Luke’s name appears three times in the Bible. All three occur in the New Testament, and all three are found in letters written by Paul ( Col 4:14 ;  2 Tim 4:11 ; Phil 24). In  Colossians 4:14 , Paul refers to Luke as “the beloved physician.” In  Philemon 24 , Luke is listed along with Mark, Aristarchus, and Demas among the apostle’s “fellow workers.” Both of these references occur in what we know as Paul’s Prison Letters, for they were written while the apostle was detained either in Caesarea Maritima,...