Dr Paul Allen

 At the end of Genesis, Joseph dies. His last request is a testament to his unwavering faith and his awareness of a storyline that is larger than one lifetime: “I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” Then Joseph makes the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here” (Gen. 50:24–25).  Like Joseph, we can consider our death and go to our graves in the certainty that God will do exactly as he has promised. The worker of God goes into the dust, and the work of God continues without faltering.1 Knowing this with perfect clarity, our Saviour laid down his life willingly. Will we do the same? When we know our days are short, will we be grateful for what we’ve been given or greedy for what we have not?  Yes, you may say, but Jesus knew he would be raised. He knew he could go into the grave and come back out again. Friend, so d...

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...