1Samuel 15

Does God repent? Yes, but not the way we do.

When we do it, we recognize our sin for what it is and turn from it, intending in God's power to never do it again. None of that sentence applies to God, though. I think the answer is that God loved his children (and still does) but knew they needed enough rope to hang themselves. He hated the pain it caused, but he knew Israel wouldn't any other way.

Review: KING LEAR by William Shakespeare

This is considered one of Shakespeare's greatest works, and one of the greatest plays in the English language, so it doesn't much matter if I liked it or not. I did though.

Lear begins by fishing for compliments from his daughters, dividing his kingdom among them based on the extravagance of their declarations of love for him. He only goes downhill from there. In a few words, the play is about the descent of the King into madness.

It's not always pretty, but it's always interesting. The archaic language is a hurdle, but not as large a hurdle as you might think. I recommend this, for its realism. The situations may be unfamiliar, but they're handled in a very real way.

1Samuel 14

Saul made a couple of rash vows, and was too much a coward to follow through when it was his family at stake.

The amazing thing is that he mentioned his son Jonathan by name. When it came down to it, though, he couldn't keep his vows.

Review: THE PURITAN BIBLE PRIMER by Jon J. Cardwell

Cardwell, if I'm not mistaken, is a pastor in Anniston, Alabama. He has compiled several books, largely from public domain sources. This one is geared toward training children.

Though Cardwell is a Calvinist --as were the Puritans --and the Primer is written that way, it's easily adapted for a non-Calvinist perspective. Even as it stands, though, it's a great book, and I'm thankful that Cardwell has made it available.

I recommend this to anyone who speaks time with children.

1Samuel 13

Saul lost his kingdom because he tried to usurp power that wasn't he.

He was already king, which gave him near-absolute power over the Hebrews, and he was occasionally a prophet, when the power of the Holy Spirit came on him. One type of power he didn't have was the power to offer sacrifices, which belonged to the priesthood alone. Only one person held the officers of prophet, priest, and King, and his name wasn't Saul.

And lead us not into temptation

The book of James tells us that God can't be tempted, and doesn't tempt anyone else. That's good to know, but then what's this line doing in the Lord's Prayer?

The first thing to notice is that we don't ask God not to tempt us, but not to lead us into temptation. Sometimes God will allow us to be tempted, for our good or that of someone watching.

The second thing we should be aware of is that there is a difference between temptation and testing. The Lord will not tempt you, but he will test you, as he does all his children. That sounds like a fine distinction, and it feels that way sometimes. I can only tell you my way of looking at it; if it helps, you're welcome to it and if not, you're welcome to throw it away.

God tests us to see us succeed and grow stronger. Satan tempts us so we'll fail and grow weaker,

Simplistic, maybe, but it's worked for me.

1Samuel 12

Samuel was unusual among the judges. He was the last one, and bridged the gap between rule by God through the judges and rule by kings. He led from the tabernacle rather than leading an army.

And though he was chosen by God, like the other judges, he had to spend half his farewell speech proving his own honestly. How sad.

Review: HOW SHOULD WE THEN LIVE? by Francis Schaeffer

I probably misspelled his name, but I'm not concerned enough to look it up, and that's not the important part anyway.

The important part is that every professing Christian should read this book immediately. Not instead of a Bible, but with a Bible. Check Schaeffer's book against Scripture. Then act like it.

At the surface, it's a book about art, contrasting older works with newer ones. If you never get past that, it's still a very good book, and you'll likely learn to good deal about art and art criticism. It doesn't take a lot of digging to find out it's really a book about worldview.

Worldview is basically the lenses through which we look at the world . An American sees the world very differently than an Australian, though there will be similarities as well. A Han looks at the world differently from a Uyghur, though they both live in China. Men and women have different worldviews. In this book, Schaeffer makes the point that the Christian worldview is different than the non-Christian one, and draws that seemingly simple observation out to its logical conclusion: that Christians should be different from other people.

I can't recommend this book highly enough. I really can't.

1Samuel 11

the people of Israel were ready to kill whoever had put Saul forth as king. 

They were the same ones who demanded a king and loved Saul because he was taller than everyone else. Seems kind of dumb in hindsight, doesn't it?

Please forgive me

I think I've figured out my defining sins: lust and pride.

By defining sins I mean the ones that have always been with me. They're the ones that were there when I thought I'd rooted everything out. They're what I see when I look at myself.

Unfortunately. I learned to lust early. By the time I got to high school, where every girl had something to look at, I was in the habit of checking  them out. And that's how I did it: habitually. Even if I didn't like the girl, my mind was still racing. I owe a much greater apology to the few I physically defiled, but I did more a hundred times a day in my head. I believe God's forgiven me, and I hope you will, too.

As for pride, I've been told for as long as I can remember that I'm smart. Add to that the fact that we have everything when we're young, and I was an arrogant little snot. If I ever made anyone feel stupid or said or did hurtful things, I'm very sorry and can only beg your forgiveness.

It's been a long time, and I should have apologized sooner. Sorry about that.

1Samuel 10

As I said, Israel got the king it deserved. 

Saul's first official act, his own coronation, was something he tried to hide from. Tall as he was, Saul was in over his head trying to rule Israel. He was a man trying to do God's job, and I can almost feel sorry for him. Almost.

Review: ANNA KARENINA by Leo Tolstoy

This is a long book. More correctly, it sprawls. The title character is only one of many foci in the book, and while her adultery is a major plot, the book spends as much time on several members of her extended family.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky noted that Tolstoy concocted long, detailed histories for even minor characters, and that shows in the life that infuses such characters. The downside to this obsessive detail is long books that move very slowly.

I'm glad I made it through this once, but I can't see doing it again. I recommend it if you like the idea of several interconnected romance novels. If that doesn't sound good to you, just be glad I read it so you don't have to.

1Samuel 9

Israel wanted a king with which to impress the other nations. Saul looked like a king; he was tall, handsome, and very impressive.

Israel got exactly the king it deserved.

Review: THE CLOUD OF UNKNOWING by Anonymous

We don't know exactly who wrote this, other than that it was an English monastic who wrote it almost 800 years ago. Now it's considered a classic of Christian mysticism.

The heart of the book is its approach to meditation. In essence, it is this: whatever is good and thus aligned with God, ultimately comes from God. Anything that doesn't is by definition sin. Therefore, thinking about God includes everything good, and thinking about sin includes everything bad. 

As someone deeply interested in these practices, I recommend this book, with one caveat: read it with a Bible in your hand.

1Samuel 8

Just so you know, the people already had a king: God.

God had Samuel tell them the downside of having a human King. They didn't care; they still wanted to go like be the the other nations. So God did the worst possible thing he could do to his people. He gave them what they wanted.

Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us

I can tell you what this doesn't mean. It doesn't mean that you won't be forgiven until you forgive everyone who ever wronged you, as I was first taught. However, it also doesn't mean that it's just filler, to be safely ignored.

In fact, the only way you can ignore it is to be perfect and require no forgiveness. If that's the case, then not only do I have nothing to say to you, but neither does Christianity. Try Hinduism or Buddhism; I hear they're looking for perfect people.

If there are any people left and you want to know what Jesus meant, just look at what he said. The Church has tried to allegorize and spiritualize his words for 2000 years, but precious few have read them and tried to follow them.

To be forgiven requires that you be willing to forgive. In that way it's just another way of saying, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

1Samuel 7

Have you ever heard the song "Come Thou Fount"? There's a line that says, "Here I raise my Ebenezer", which doesn't make sense without some context.

Here's the context.

Review: JULIUS CAESAR by William Shakespeare

Like Shakespeare's other plays, this one has a decent story rendered more difficult than it has to be by the antiquated language.

For the record, this is the only Shakespearean play I've memorized a large chunk of. In my 10th grade English class, Mrs Atchison had us memorize  something like 100 lines of this. Going on 30 years later, I still remember a lot of it.

1Samuel 6

The Philistines got rid of this ark, buy God didn't lower his standards any.

The ark was sacred. It was to be handled, moved, and even looked at in a certain way, and there were consequences for those who didn't follow the law. 

Three verses always misquoted

Everyone gets things wrong every now and then. However, here are three Bible verses I've never seen or heard as they appear in Scriptrure:

Matthew 3.16: this one is interesting because all four Gospels use the exact same words to describe the way they Holy Spirit descended on Jesus at his baptism: "like a dove." Did he come down in the form of a dove? Maybe; the Bible doesn't say. That's never  stopped anyone, though.

Luke 22.44: I couldn't tell you the number of times I've heard about the great drops of blood Jesus sweat the night before his crucifixion. I've even learned about a medical condition in which great stress makes me body sweat blood. The only problem is that the Bible only says that his sweat was like great drops of blood. I'm not saying all those people were wrong. I'm just saying they read more than was there.

2Corinthians 5.8: This is the verse that started me thinking this way. Someone said "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord",  and I looked it up. Paul actually wrote, "I am willing to be absent from the body and present with the Lord." So am I. It's hard to imagine a Christian who isn't.

Let's be more careful with Scriptrure. We don't need to make it more interesting than it already is.

1Samuel 5

In this last chapter the worst happened.

The ark of the covenant, used as a good-luck charm, was lost to the Philistines. In this one, they are taught to be careful what they wish for. Really, does anyone still need proof that the Hebrews needed God, and not the other way around?

Review: FAMILY-DRIVEN FAITH by Voddie Baucham, Jr.

If Part Washed were to get trampled by marmosets on one of his South American missionary trips, Voddie Baucham would be my favorite preacher. Since that's unlikely to happen, though, he's going to have the settle for this number two spot. I think he'll survive.

That said, I really liked this book. Throwing aside all the marketing jargon, this is a book on how to do married and raise children according to this Bible. Baucham builds a solid case, basing everything on the two pillars of Scriptures and his own experience.

The first makes it right. The Bible is at this point nearly 2000 years old, and people still have it for  guidelines in raising concerns. The reason is simple: its truths are timeless. They've been proven, the newest of them for almost two millennia.

Baucham's book is based on his experience in that in many places he simplly tells what he and his wife did. Since everything has been tested and is based on Scripture anyway, the reader can have a sense of confidence he doesn't always get from books like this.

I highly recommend it to married people and pretty much everybody else. I really liked this book.

1Samuel 4

The solution, if you think you're angered God, is not to ignore him again.

The Hebrews were never told to carry the ark into battle. In fact, the instructions for it were very specific. There was a web of rules around it, most of which were broken by the priests Hophni and Phinehas, who should've known better.

Review: DEEP DOCTRINES -- BRIEFLY EXPLAINED by Brian Coltharp

This is a collection of quotation. I'm left critiquing not so much Coltharp's ability as his library. 

It's apparently very Calvinist. Coltharp has used exclusively Calvinist authors to briefly explain his deep doctrines. If you hold to that particular theological position, you'll no doubt find this book helpful.

I don't and didn't. I can't recommend it, for that reason.

1Samuel 3

The Lord called to Samuel when he was a little boy. Obviously. It's what I've heard my whole life. It's weird that picture in my Children's Bible had shown.

They only problem is this chapter says nothing about him being a child. In fact, it refers to him as a young man.

Give us today our daily bread

Give us what we need for each day what we need, in other words.

Someone once said that it's hard to depend on God for each day's food when we have a month's worth in our cabinets. That's true; we've done such a good job of insulating ourselves from adversity that we don't realize that we've insulated ourselves from God as well.

The only solution is to treat everything as a blessing. It is anyway. Every piece of food you eat, every sip you drink, every molecule you breathe in ... even life itself comes ultimately from God.

It's when we don't acknowledge that that we have problems.

1Samuel 2

Like Mary, Hannah celebrated her miraculous child with a song. Like Mary's, Hannah's song was in praise of God and went far afield from her son.

Unlike Mary's, Hannah's has never been given a name, so far as I know.

Review: THE CHAPLAIN's ROLE by Tery Morgan

This is a little different. I'm going to try and review a book I haven't actually read,

I actually read this first few chapters. The book was written to describe  what chaplains do and to help them do it. Suffice in to say that the author and I have very different ideas on certain subjects.

What I can't abide is willful twisting of Scripture. If I never see anyone use Romans 13 to justify a Christian's use of deadly force, it will still be too soon.

I can't recommend  this book because of this twisting. I doubt it got any better in the last 80%. 

1Samuel 1

Hey, we're in 1Samuel!

This chapter tells about the birth of Samuel and the faithfulness of his mother. As with many Scriptural characters, Samuel's birth was a miraculous answer to prayer. And Hannah kept up her end.

Once saved, always saved? Not the way you think

As a Bapist, I've heard that phrase a lot. I know what people think they mean by it. Unfortunately, I also know what they really mean 

It's said that Baptists have always believed that way, and in a series that's true. Baptists were strongly influenced by two very different streams in their early years: Anabaptism and Calvinism. From the Calvinists they took the idea that a believer will never fall away from the faith. In modern Calvinism, this is known as the perseverance of this same. It's also called eternal security, and it's a fundamental Bapist doctrine.

Something like that is what people think they make when they say "once saved, always saved". What they really mean is something like this:

My son/daughter came forward or said the Sinner's Prayer or asked Jesus into their heart when they were little. They might have lived like heathens for the last 40 years, but they're going to Heaven because they got their fire insurance when they were six.

Please know that I'm speaking with all the love I can muster when I say no he's not, and he didn't. Unfortunately, not only is nothing like that last paragraph in the Bible, nothing in it is remotely biblical. 

Open your Bible and read the New Testament. See what it says about salvation. It's too important to let a six-year-old take care of it.

Review: THE ARTHUR MACHEN MEGAPACK

The other Megapack I've read was mostly short stories. This one was almost all novels.it took a while to read.

It's a good thing Machen was such a good writer. How good? I've been reading compulsively for well over 30 years, and I can 

say confidentiality that he's the best writer I've ever read. An example: The Hill of Dreams is almost entirely description, with very little plot. Normally I'd prefer it the other way around, but I couldn't stop thinking about this book. It didn't leave me until I started the next Arthur Machen book.

Like the man said, your mileage may vary. I still highly recommend it.

Ruth 4

It's a sad commentary on our age that the actions of Boaz are surprisingly. He not only didn't take advantage of Ruth on the threshing floor, but he kept his promise he made there. Not only did he keep it, but he did so as soon as possible.

But Boaz was an honorable man.

Review: HAMLET by William Shakespeare

this is considered one of the high points of English literature, and I just don't get why. The story is okay, but the language is very stilted and old-fashioned.

Incidentally, I put all the blame on myself. Not caring for Shakespeare is probably my own character flaw.

Ruth 3

If the book of Ruth is a short story,as I've been told many times, this chapter is the climax.

Don't misunderstand me, I don't think anything untoward happened between them. However, a made-up woman doesn't lay down with a drunk man without some idea what she's doing. Boaz wanted a wife, and Ruth wanted a husband, and both of them ended up happy, and that's all we need to know.

Ruth 2

it's significant that Boaz already knew what Ruth was. Not because she was a foreigner or especially beautiful, both of those would have gotten her noticed.

Boaz had heard of her because she took care of Naomi.

Your kingdom come, your will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven

First off, kingdom come isn't it place. It's used that way a lot, but that isn't correct.

Secondly, think about what it says for a minute. This prayer is asking that God's will be done here just like it is in the very kingdom of God. In Heaven his will is done immediately, perfectly, and unquestioningly, if you're not willing to do that, it's a dangerous thing its pray.

It will happen one day. Of that I have absolutely no doubt. Will you be ready?

Ruth 1

A lot happens in this chapter,

You can't blame Orpah for staying. Naomi had nothing to offer her. When you get down to it, Ruth was the crazy one for going with her. It only made sense in light of Ruth's faithfulness.

Review: AS YOU LIKE IT by William Shakespeare

I have a confession to make: I've never much liked Shakespeare.

This play didn't change things. Actually, it's not so much that I don't like Shakespeare as that I didn't understand why he's considered the greatest author in the English language.

All that to say the: this is one of Shakespeare's mistaken-identity comedies. It's amusing, but I suspect that it would be a good deal funnier if I understood it better.

My recommendation doesn't really matter anyway, if I'm not smart enough to give it.

Judges 21

The cure for genocide a kidnapping. Obviously.

One reason I don't like Judges is that it is a book of failure. There are great heroes in it, but they  were always raised up by God in response to the people's failure to obey. We should always remember, though. That whenever they feel, Get well there to pick them up.

I have a small f

I've seen  the past that I could be considered a fundamentalist,because  believing that Bible is fundamental to the Christian faiith. Still, people seem to misunderstand that, some willfully.

Here's an analogy that might help. I'm a libertarian, but not a member of the Liberation Party. I believe in a very limited government, but there are a number of things in the Party's official platform with which I don't agree. I'm a small-l libertarian.

In the same way, I hold to the fundamentals of Christianity without being a Fundamentalist. I'm a small-f fundamentalist.

I hope that made sense.

Judges 20

At lest they asked the win of God before the bat.

The sight of eleven tribes of God's people trying to destroy another was bad enough. Forgetting to seek after God's wisdom would be en worse.

Review: ANNA AND THE KING OF SIAM by Margaret Landon

This book is typical of many 1940s biographies: it's fairly short, somewhat fictionalized, and highly episodic. Though billed as a Christiam boy, Christianity in the book is much less real than the Buddhism. This makes sense, given the setting, but it's sttill disappointing, especially when the reader is told the main character has kept two Muslim servants for years s without shariing tha Gospel with them.

I'm not saying she should have converted all Indochim. I personally don't like that kind of boring. Her religion should have been more more than just a character trait.

She seems to be Christian im the same way shhe' British, and for the smee treason. She was born amd raised in Britain, so therefore she was Britisd. She was born and rraaised in Britain, so therefore she was a Cristian . Her Christinity appears to have been strictly culturall.

Maybe I'm reading the much into a book that really can't take it. But that's one reason I don't recommend it.

Judges 19

This is the beginning of the worst part of the Bible, period.

It's important to remember that just because something's in the Bible it doesn't mean that God approves of it. Sometimes, like this chapter, it just records what happened.

Review : KJV APOCRYPHA by KJV Translators

Let's get this thing cleared up right up front. Regardless of your feelings about the King James Version (or Authorized Version if you're British), it's not as easy to use as it used to be. There's no point putting another barrier between people and the Gospel, especially when there are several good options available.

As for the content, I thought it was good, unobjectionable reading, but nothing that jumped out as something that belonged in the Bible. To be fair, though, I don't always get impression from the canonical books either.

One thing that struck me as very strange: though they are said to be part of the Old Testament, the KJV Apocrypha follow the New Testament example of putting proper names in their Latin forms. I never understood it in the NT, and I don't get it here.

As far as I can tell, the Apocrypha isn't necessary, but not something to be afraid of, either. I'd recommend it as good reading, but get it in a version that's easier to understand.

Judges 18

This chapter explains why Dan ended up in the far north of Canaan, instead of in the land they were given. It's also a follow-up to the previous chapter.

By the way, Dan had an inheritance. They were just too afraid to take it.

Hallowed be your name

"Hallowed" just means holy or sacred. It's telling God that we value his name, and asking him to make sure everybody else does too.

Unfortunately, this world loves to blaspheme. Blasphemy is just taking his name in vain. It's taking the name of the God who gave you the gift of life and using it as a cuss word.

Most of us wouldn't put up with hearing our moms' names used that way. Why do we let God's name get dragged down like that?

God's name is holy. It's sacred. It should be hallowed.

Judges 17

From here to the end of this book is the worst part of Scripture. Verse 6 tells us why.

Here's something that you can think about instead: in the last chapter Phinehas gave Delilah 1100 pieces of silver to betray Samson, in this one, Micah's mother had exactly that much . Coincidentally?

Review: WHEN HELPING HURTS by Steve Corbett said Brian Fikkert

The premise of this book is that the Church in America too often hears of a need and writes in check to fill it. This office leads to two tragic results: burned on the giving end and a culture of dependency on the receiving end. In the final analysis, they gift hurts more than it helps.

The message resonates with me; I've long believed that you can't solve a problem by throwing money at it. At the same time, we're responsible for what has been entrusted to us. We're to use our relationship wisely, using them for solve problems, not make them worse.

I'd recommend this book even if all it did was cause me to think about where my money goes. Like the man said, if you give a man a fish, you'll feed him for a day, and if you teach a man to fish, you'll  feed him for life.

Judges 16

Samson had a thing for Philistine girls, apparently. He also liked breaking the law and lying at least when the Spirit of God wasn't on him, he was dumb as a bag of hammers.

It took prison to cure him of that.

More about a competing religion

the U. S. doesn't have an official religion,

That's by design. The Founding Fathers knew the dangers of a state church and took great pains to leave any reference to a national faith out of the new nation's founding documents. Personally, I've seen how well government does everything else and am glad it didn't try to handle God, too.

Despite all this, we do have a national religion. It's naturalistic evolution. Its proponents would argue that it's science, rather than religion, but it's an unprovable assumption about God, which sounds like a religion to me.

That's right, it's unproven and unprovable. You can't recreate naturalistic evolution under laboratory conditions, and you can't observe it in nature, so you can't prove it by scientific means. That's the reason scientists give for discounting God, so it is only fair to use the same criticism.

The problem isn't that it's all unproven hypothesis, but that it's treated as a fact. It's been said to be sure by the late paleontologist Steven Jay Gould, possibly the greatest popularizer of science since Isaac Asimov 

Whenever a quote is needed from a "scientist", an evolutionist is chosen, usually because they're irreligious and thus unbiased. The only thing wrong with that is that no one is unbiased. Scientists are people, not robots, and they have bones to pick like everyone else.

Naturalistic evolution is an untested, untestable hypothesis. It is, in fact, a religion,one whose chief virtue is that it protects its adherents from having to believe in any God at all. Until they die.