I’m going to begin a series on Puritan books and writers that I hope will be edifying for my readers. I believe the Puritans to be the single greatest group of writers on the Christian Life and the Life of Faith. This is not to say I believe they were always right, or that they should be followed religiously on every sentence they wrote. I differ from them in their adherence to Reformed Covenant Theology, be it paedobaptist or credobaptist. I think they sometimes overplayed what it takes to get saved and have assurance of salvation (e.g., Bunyan’s Grace Abounding). On occasion in…

“And Jehoshaphat was afraid and set his face to seek Yahweh, and called for a fast throughout all Judah.” (2 Chronicles 20:3, LSB)

People react differently when they become afraid. Psychologists have noted that people typically respond with either a “fight or flight” reaction. Being originally from Southern California, I can testify that every time there is a major earthquake, the news reports that someone died from the earthquake. Surprisingly, many of these deaths are not directly related to the earthquake, such as something collapsing on the victim. Instead, some deaths…

Matthew 5:43-48 is one of the hardest passages in the bible. People usually know two things about Jesus—that he said not to judge, and that he loved people! This is the “he loved people” bit.

The passage

First, we have Jesus’ statement about a common idea floating around in culture at the time: “You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy’” (Mt 5:43).

This is kinda right and kinda wrong. Yes, the bible does speak of loving your neighbor (Lev 19:17-18). And yes—if you squint just the right way you can twist it to support…