Category: Bible

Posts from The Bible Blog, by Peter DeHaan

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Bible

Pray for the Holy Spirit

For much of my life when I would stumble upon a confusing section in the Bible, I would rush through it to reach something else that made more sense.

Lately, I’ve been doing the opposite. When I reach a confusing passage, I linger, seeking to dig deeper, contemplate more fully, and discover hidden truths.

Such is the case with Luke 11:13. Jesus is wrapping up his teaching on prayer, about how to pray, what to pray for, and God’s goodness in answering our requests, when he throws a curve ball. He concludes by saying God will give the Holy Spirit to all who ask.

Wait, where did that come from? Jesus was talking about praying for our daily needs, for food, and for forgiveness and protection from evil and stuff like that, when suddenly he mentions praying for the Holy Spirit. Why?

I’m still contemplating this, but have a few initial ideas:

  • Of all the things we can pray for, asking for the Holy Spirit (his guidance, filling, control, or whatever word you wish to use to understand his functioning in our lives) is perhaps the most important request we can make.
  • We need to first have the Holy Spirit to properly form all our other prayers.
  • We can be assured Father God will give us the Holy Spirit when we ask.
  • Our parents know how to give us what is good, even more so with God, who knows the best gift is the Holy Spirit.

I suppose there’s validity in each of these statement and I suspect there’s even more we can glean from this verse. I will continue to meditate on it and encourage you to so the same.

[Luke 11:1-13]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Ask, Seek, and Knock

Jesus told us to ask in order to receive, to seek in order to find, and to knock in order for the door to be opened.

ask -> receive
seek -> find
knock -> open

This seems straightforward: ask, seek, and knock. But what is the door that will be opened? Is it a door to heaven? Or perhaps a door to eternal life? Can it be more general, suggesting the realization of whatever we prayed for? Whatever the open door means, one thing is clear: God responds.

Later on Jesus turns this thought around, saying he is standing at our door and knocking. If we hear him and let him, he will come in and be with us.

But he won’t force his way in if he’s not invited, but he is there and waiting, ready when we are.

[Luke 11:10, Matthew 7:7-8, and Revelation 3:20]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Be Careful What You Pray

The Lord’s Prayer contains a curious phrase that gives me pause. Frankly it makes me uncomfortable every time I say it.

The passage in question is “forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” We mean the first part, but do we really mean the second part?

When we ask this of God, are we implicitly requesting him to forgive us only to the degree we forgive others?

If so, I want to make sure I’m not holding any grudges or have any unforgiveness in my heart towards others.

The consequences are too great for anything less.

[Matthew 6:12]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Diligence is Rewarded

In my prior post, “Listen to Understand,” I noted that listening to Jesus results in more understanding; not listening produces confusion.

This parallels Jesus’ teaching about the “talents” and the “minas” (both words refer to denominations of money). These parables, though differing in details (likely because they were given to different audiences at different times) have the same conclusion and message.

To those who invest their master’s money wisely, more responsibility (or money) is given; to those who fail to invest, what they have will be taken away.

Just as really listening to God results in more understanding of him, so too being faithful in the jobs he has given us results in greater responsibility and opportunity.

Many followers of Jesus desire to do great things for him, but before he gives us huge opportunities, we must prove themselves diligent in completing lesser tasks first.

When we are diligent in serving God, he rewards us with more.

[Matthew 25:14-30 and Luke 19:11-27]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Listen to Understand

Doctor Luke writes that Jesus tells the people to listen carefully to what he says. When they do, they will understand — and then even greater understanding will follow.

But there’s a warning, too. Those who don’t really listen will lose whatever understanding they currently have.

Listening to Jesus results in more understanding; not listening results in confusion.

If we are to understand, we need to listen to him — really listen.

[Luke 8:18]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Six Woes

One time Jesus skipped the ceremonial hand washing before he ate. The Pharisees took notice of his omission and were about to criticize him when he took preemptive action, giving them a teaching about six woes:

  1. Tithing, but neglecting justice and God’s love (v 42)
  2. Loving others to be noticed and respected (v 43)
  3. Being like unmarked graves — an unseen danger (v 44)
  4. Making unrealistic demands of others (that they don’t do) and not helping out (v 46)
  5. Implicitly honoring the sins of their ancestors (v 47-51)
  6. Hiding the truth from people — and missing it themselves (v 52)

When considering these six woes, ceremonial hand washing isn’t a big deal.

[Luke 11:37-54]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Worthy or Not

There’s a story about a military leader, a centurion, who desires Jesus to heal his dying servant.

The centurion doesn’t approach Jesus himself, but instead he calls in a favor, asking some Jewish leaders to go on his behalf. If these men are like most of the religious leaders we read about in the Bible, they don’t like Jesus and must be humiliated to ask him for help.

In presenting their case, the Jewish leaders claim the centurion is worthy to receive Jesus’ assistance. This perspective is consistent with the people’s understanding of the Old Testament, which they see as focusing on right behavior.

Despite the admirable qualities of the centurion, the reality is no one deserves God’s favor. But while we can’t earn God’s attention, he gives it anyway.

Jesus agrees to help, but the centurion deems himself unworthy to meet Jesus or for Jesus to come to his house. In and of ourselves, we are not worthy either; it’s only through Jesus that we become worthy.

Jesus is amazed at the centurion’s faith; the servant is made well in absentia.

[Luke 7:1-10]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Do You Need a Doctor?

Jesus said, “It is not healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Jesus came for the sick. (Since he came to heal and to save, we may be able to comprehend this both literally and figuratively, that is, the physically sick and the spiritually sick.)  Jesus came for sinners — those who miss the mark.

Conversely, Jesus did not come for the healthy, the righteous. What exactly does that mean? Perhaps:

  • People who are righteous (good and law-abiding) don’t need Jesus. (Is Jesus implying their path is through the Old Testament covenant and following the Law of Moses?)
  • People who think they are on the right track will never know they need Jesus, so he is dismissing them.
  • Everyone needs Jesus, but some people delude themselves, thinking they are the exception.

None of these ideas is an adequate explanation for me of what this text means. Although the first one seems heretical, it is also the most direct understanding of Jesus’ actual words. The other two responses require an interjection of ideas, some assumptions to be made — of basically reading the text through our own theological glasses.

Fortunately, I don’t need to understand this text completely. What I do know is I need a doctor — and his name is Jesus.

[Mark 2:17, Matthew 9:12-13, and Luke 5:31-32]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

May I Have Your Attention Please?

There’s a story in the Bible of Jesus instructing some fishermen to try fishing from the other side of the boat. Imagine that, a carpenter giving fishing lessons to commercial fishermen.

The amazing thing is once they moved to the other side, they caught a boatload of fish. It was as if Jesus was trying to get their attention — and it worked.

In fact, it worked so well, he did it twice!

The first time was early in his ministry, when he was looking for disciples. He definitely got their attention, because they immediately left everything to follow him.

The second time was at the end of Jesus’ ministry, after he rose from the dead, but before he returned to heaven. The fishermen-turned-disciples didn’t know what to do after they saw Jesus die, so they resorted to fishing, but caught nothing.

Jesus hollers for them to try fishing from the other side of the boat. They did and another miraculous catch occurred. Again, he got their attention — and they believed he was alive.

Twice Jesus got their attention. The first time they followed him and the second time they believed in him.

[Luke 5:4-11 and John 21:4:14]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Jesus’ Party

Tuesday’s post was about Jesus’ invitation to side with his life-party. This is not a raise-your-hand, say-a-prayer, or sign-a-card decision made without careful consideration, but a total, lifelong commitment regardless of the consequences. To grasp the enormity of this, contemplate the verses where this phrases appears in the Amplified version of the Bible:

  • …became His disciples [sided with His party and followed Him] (Matthew 4:20).
  • …joined Jesus as disciples [sided with His party and followed Him] (Matthew 4:22).
  • “Be My disciple [side with My party and follow Me],” (Matthew 9:9).
  • “…be My disciple [side with My party and follow Me]” (Matthew 19:21).
  • …become Your disciples [sided with Your party and followed You] (Matthew 19:27).
  • “…you who have [become My disciples, sided with My party and] followed Me,” (Matthew 19:28).
  • …followed [with] Him [joining Him as disciples and siding with His party] (Mark 1:18).
  • …went off after Him [to be His disciples, side with His party, and follow Him] (Mark 1:20).
  • Follow Me! [Be joined to Me as a disciple, side with My party!] (Mark 2:14).
  • …take up his cross, and [joining Me as a disciple and siding with My party] follow with Me (Mark 8:34).
  • “…we have yielded up and abandoned everything [once and for all and joined You as Your disciples, siding with Your party],” (Mark 10:28).
  • …they left everything and joined Him as His disciples and sided with His party and accompanied Him (Luke 5:11).
  • “Join Me as a disciple and side with My party and accompany Me” (Luke 5:27).
  • And he forsook everything and got up and followed Him [becoming His disciple and siding with His party] (Luke 5:28).
  • “Become My disciple, side with My party, and accompany Me!” (Luke 9:59).
  • “I will follow You, Lord, and become Your disciple and side with Your party,” (Luke 9:61).
  • “…follow Me [become My disciple, join My party, and accompany Me],” (Luke 18:22).
  • …many believed in His name [identified themselves with His party] (John 2:23).

This is what it means to follow Jesus.

[See biblical references to Jesus’ party and a few others too.]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.