God's covenant name
One gracEmail subscriber has heard that God's name is "Jehovah" and that we should always use that specific name. Another subscriber asks how "Jehovah" could possibly be the correct name of God, since the Hebrew alphabet contains no letter "j."
the divine name: YHWH
In the days of Adam's grandson Enosh, men "began to call upon the name of the LORD" (Hebrew: YHWH). Yet centuries later, God states to Moses that he was not known by that name to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. A gracEmail subscriber asks an explanation.
the answer is God
A gracEmail subscriber writes, "I am studying philosophy in my university courses and wonder whether it is safe for me to do so as a Christian. Some of my Christian friends in science programs wonder the same thing."
afraid of God?
A brother writes that "the God of the Old Testament does fierce and horrible things to people, and this makes me pretty nervous. I know that perfect love casts out fear. But I understand that I show my love by my obedience and that leaves me scared again."
it's the honest truth
A gracEmail subscriber wrote: "How could God be disappointed in human beings, since he knew everything before the foundations of the earth?"
eternal truths
The ancient Psalms of David still refresh and encourage us after 3,000 years. Here are just three examples.
does God change his mind?
In view of 1 Samuel 15:35 which says that the Lord regretted that He had made Saul king, a Presbyterian brother asks: "Does God change his plans for us, depending on our responses, or does God's sovereignty mean that He 'did unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass' (The Westminster Confession of Faith)?"
look to your God
The midweek ladies Bible class at our church is studying Isaiah this year and they kindly invited me to take three sessions over chapters 34-48. The occasion provided special incentive to read chapter 40 again, a passage that has encouraged and inspired me ....
God loved like this
John 3:16 is perhaps the most memorized verse in the Bible. It begins with the familiar phrase: "For God so loved the world . . . ." The Greek word translated "so" can express both manner ("this is how God loved the world") and degree ("God loved the world this much").
God's love experienced
God loved human beings so much that he gave his one-and-only Son to bring our alienated world back to himself . . . . By his life and death, Jesus brought into being an objective reality that did not exist before -- a state of friendship between God and the estranged world.
rejecting God's love
A gracEmail subscriber, having read in previous gracEmails that Jesus made peace between God and the entire world, asks whether anyone can reject God's love and the reconciliation resulting from it.
God is in control
I was blessed by the worship service this weekend at St. John the Divine Episcopal Church in Houston, where I was completing five Sundays of Bible teaching, and I wanted to share some of that blessing with you. Both Scripture readings reminded us that we are less in control than we like to think . . . .
God, not fatalism
A gracEmail subscriber writes: "Sometimes I feel like God is playing a giant game in which we are just the pieces. He already knows how my life will turn out. Why does it matter if I struggle to be close to him or to serve him? Does prayer really change things, or is everything predetermined?"
God even knows our names
It is Sunday, November 17, 1996, approximately 4:20 in the evening. I have taught and preached this weekend at a little church in the southern Arizona desert, and the Tucson traffic has almost made me miss the plane home. I rush to check in at the American Airline ticket counter, then run -- as fast as my stubby, out-of-shape body can travel -- to the departure gate marked "Dallas."