Dr Paul Allen

In the presence of God, everything trembles. The earth trembles, according to Psalm 114:7: “Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob.” The psalmist trembles in Psalm 119:120: “My flesh trembles for fear of you, and I am afraid of your judgments.” Indeed, the one who trembles at God’s word, that person catches God’s attention, according to what he tells us in Isaiah 66:2: “But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.” And in the New Testament, Paul calls us in Philippians 2:12 —Christians — to “work out” our salvation “with fear and trembling.” So why do Christians tremble?  Here’s Revelation 19:15: “From his mouth comes a sharp sword [now, this is describing Jesus at his second coming] with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.” Now, that last sentence is exceedingly terribl

Psalm 18 is a psalm of David, a song celebrating “the day when the LORD rescued him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul.” This psalm, the longest of Book One, praises God for His deliverance. It is also recorded, with slight differences, in 2 Samuel 22. At the centre of this psalm is a strong confession of faith: “With the merciful you show yourself merciful” (v. 25). This psalm begins (vv. 1–6) and ends (vv. 46–50) with praise offered to God. It is praise filled with love and thanksgiving for God’s protection from enemies and from death. The praise rejoices in the victories God has given His king and His people—victories displayed before the world. The central section of the psalm (vv. 20–29) celebrates the faithfulness of David and of God. David served the Lord with integrity (we will look at the difficulties that seem to surround this kind of claim below). The Lord on His part had always been reliable and blessed His king. On each side of this ce

Probably the most difficult Old Testament ethical issue is the divine command to kill the Canaanites. Theologian-turned-atheist Gerd Lüdemann wrote that “the command to exterminate is extremely offensive”—a far cry from the merciful God frequently proclaimed in Scripture.  Consider just one of these passages: Only in the cities of these peoples that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, you shall not leave alive anything that breathes. But you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite and the Amorite, the Canaanite and the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite, as the LORD your God has commanded you, so that they may not teach you to do according to all their detestable things which they have done for their gods, so that you would sin against the LORD your God. (Deut. 20:16–18) Were the Canaanites That Wicked? According to the biblical text, Yahweh was willing to wait about 430 years because “the sin of the Amorite [a Canaanite people group] has not yet reach

May all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you; may those who love your salvation say continually, “Great is the LORD!” (Psalm 40:16) Great is an important word. We use it to talk about something of unusually large size: A great earthquake shook the city. Or a large number: A great crowd filled the stadium. Or unusual power or intensity: She has experienced great pain. Or something that is especially good or wonderful: He is a great player. Or something in an extreme degree: For a long time, we have been great friends. Not only is the word great flexible — used in five different ways above, to talk about size, number, intensity, goodness, and degree — but it’s also a powerful word. Or at least it used to be. It’s become an easy word to overuse. When day after day is great, and meal after meal is great, and game after game is great, we begin to lose the punch of the word to talk about our wedding day, or an unusually lavish feast, or the championship game that went into overtime.