Category Bible Studies
Beloved, doing all diligence to be writing to you concerning the common salvation, I have had necessity to write to you entreating to be contending for the faith once being given to the saints."
Jude was pressed also, that urging them to “contend earnestly” for that faith was imperative.Read More
Why do so many preachers make Jesus’ “sermon on the mount” so difficult when it is so basic and simple. There are no hidden meanings among Christ’s statements of contrast between two aspects of things which characterised the culture and generation in which He spoke, and which continue to characterise our own, if we choose to pay attention.
The very first statement tends to elicit a lengthy, counter-textual explanation of what has no bearing on what Christ said:
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
All manner of linguistic contortions are used to explain what it means to be “poor in spirit”; in fact, some modern Bible renditions, and many modern teachers, rephrase this to read “happy are those who are spiritually poor …” Some take further licens...
Read MoreThe letter written by the apostle Paul to the Romans is a rich treatise on the grace and goodness of God towards men. As the apostle to the Gentiles, Paul had not met those to whom this letter was sent. He begins by identifying himself and his intended audience, and clarifying the nature and purpose of his ministry, that of a servant under His Master, Jesus Christ, sent out as Christ’s ambassador with the proclamation of God’s good news pertaining to Christ.
The primary concerns addressed in Paul’s letter to the Romans were: the fact of salvation being an award of grace rather than the reward of works; the inability of the Law of Moses to justify sinful men to a holy God; the equal condition of both Jews and Gentiles before God, due to the universality of the sin-guiltiness of all men fro...
Read MoreRomans 1:1 “Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God …”
Looking at the vocabulary:
Called – κλητος – kletos: invited, appointed (as opposed to ‘named’) (present participle as adjectival)
Apostle – αποστολος apostolos – a compound of:
i) apo -> preposition: of, from, out of, off, etc
1) of separation (locomotion, location, association, of time or place
2) of origin; ie: where something / one is from; where it is, happens, is taken
2b) origin of cause (conceptual)
ii) Stello -> avoid, withdraw (one’s) self.
1) to set in place, arrange, prepare, equip, make provision for – or
2) to bring together, contract, shorten, reduce, check, cause to cease, remove one’s self, to abstain...
Read More“Paul a servant of Jesus Christ, called an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,
2 which He had promised before by His prophets in the Holy Scriptures,
3 concerning his Son, Who was made (the one becoming out) of the seed of David according to the flesh
4 and declared (the one being designated) the Son of God in power according to the spirit of holiness (holy togetherness), by the resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord,
5 through Whom we have received (obtained) grace and apostleship into obedience of faith among all the nations, for (the sake of) His name
6 among whom are you also called (adj., nom) of Jesus Christ;
7 to all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called (adj; dative) saints (holy o...
Read More8 “First indeed I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, that your faith is proclaimed in the whole world.” (kosmo)
Paul thanks God because the faith of the Romans is talked about throughout the world. When the multitudes living in Rome, the seat of political power and religious paganism, began to hear and receive the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ, and eternal life, it became ‘news’ beyond their own borders. Their conversion was not a secret in the ‘world’, nor was the fact an isolated local reality that failed to affect those outside of their environment.
This knowledge is important because it is popular today to dismiss the accounts coming out of first-century Rome as unreliable because the common people supposedly could not read and were uneducated...
21 Because those knowing God, did not glorify (him) as God nor thank (Him) but they were vain (futile; useless; empty) in their reasoning (thinking) and their foolish (lit: unintelligent) heart was darkened.
Despite knowing God, they made a deliberate choice against God. This was an act of human will, and not a consequence of divine causation. They knew God; consider the implications of Revelation 6:12-17: they knew. They didn’t wonder what was this astonishing crisis that was upon them, but had certain knowledge that God’s wrath was about to be poured out and they were done.
From the beginning, Adam and Eve knew God like no one has known God since. Yet she believed and he obeyed the contradictory words of a created animal slandering God...
Read More2:1 Therefore, you are defenceless, oh person! Everyone who judges, for in that which you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, for you who are judging are committing the same things!
Paul contrasts the judgment by people who hypocritically do the things they judge others for, and God’s judgement based on truth. In both instances, the judging party is judging against the action; in this statement Paul does not refer to the sinner approving when others do like sins to their own, but rather those who condemn another for sins they themselves commit. God judges against those who commit unrighteousness without distinction, whereas ‘o man’ judges others but not himself. God will judge both.
Paul also declares that the ones judging others while committing the same sins h...
Read More3:1 Then what (is) the (excessive) prerogative (perisson – the sense of significant benefit) of the Jew, or what (is) the profit (benefit) of the circumcision?
If the Jew did not enjoy special consideration with God on the basis of his national heritage, if the Jew was to be found just as guilty of his sins as the ‘uncircumcised Gentile’, being just as condemned and just as much bound for hell as the Gentile who had never received God’s Law or His covenants with Abraham, if there was really no difference between a Jew and a Gentile in the eyes of God as pertains righteousness, then what advantage is there to being a Jew? Why bother being circumcised, if it is only a sign of membership in a family with no unique significance in the eternal scheme? What benefit is there in being ...
Read More4:1 What then shall we say Abraham our father according to flesh to have found?
Abraham was the physical, biological ‘father’ of all members of the nation of Israel. When Abraham encountered the Sovereign LORD YHWH, he had not known Him, nor had he lived as a man who did. Abraham had nothing to offer God to compel God’s kindness or to turn aside the outcome of justice; Abraham was not a sinless man.
Abraham’s people lived in Sumer, in Ur of the Chaldees. The area was referred to as Mesopotamia, as well as the ‘fertile crescent’. Historical records show Sumer to have been pantheistic (‘god’ is everywhere) as well as polytheistic (they worshipped several deities).[1] Abraham’s father Terah served idols rather than the living and true God...
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