Tag Archives: Bible study

Jesus, Satan, and the Last Supper | Daily Bread

There is a moment in John 13 that most people read right past.

After Satan entered Judas, Jesus looked at him and said, “What you are about to do, do quickly.”

Jesus wasn’t speaking to Judas. Judas had already betrayed Him. Judas’ deal was already done. In that moment, Jesus was speaking directly to Satan, giving him permission to proceed. Satan was the one waiting for the word.

The enemy thought he was winning, but he was only ever doing what he was told. That understanding changes everything about how you read the cross… and if this hits you the way it hits me, it morphs your love, your respect, and the whole depth of your devotion to Him to levels you never imagined existed, and changes everything about how you praise Him.

Three Habits That Block God’s Voice | Daily Bread

There’s a particular kind of ache that comes when you feel like your prayers are hitting the ceiling. You’re not walking away from God. You’re calling out, but you can’t seem to hear Him.

The Bible doesn’t leave us without an answer to this experience. It tells us how to position ourselves to hear God, and if the problem is positioning, then the positioning can change.

The Double Portion: What Shame Is Really Pointing You Toward | Daily Bread

This morning someone very close to me said something that stopped me mid-morning and opened a conversation about one of the most misunderstood experiences in both human psychology and the Christian faith: shame. I considered what shame actually is, what it’s actually for, and why God never intended for us to make it our home.

If you are dealing with shame over your past behavior or choices, make no mistake. Shame is not meant to be wallowed in. It is meant to point us toward conviction and guide us forward into righteousness. It is a signal, not a sentence. A starting line, not a finish line.

God wants to restore you, just as He promises to do for Israel. The question is not whether He is willing. The question is whether you will allow Him to work in your life, or whether you will let shame block the blessing He is already holding out to you.

The Image of the Cross: Curse or Blessing, and What Are You Living? | Daily Bread

Someone told me recently that wearing a cross is a sin. “It’s a graven image, a violation of God’s law.” But a careful study of Scripture tells a very different story.

The second commandment was never a prohibition against every image or symbol. It was a command against worshiping created things as gods. God himself commanded images to be made, each one pointing toward His glory, His presence, and His provision… and ultimately toward the cross.

Christ broke every curse the law carried through His sacrifice, fulfilling what none of us ever could. The cross around the neck of a humble, spirit-filled believer is not an idol. It is a symbol of redemption, freedom, and the good news of salvation. There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, and we are commanded to carry that truth into the world.

Sunday Sessions: One Gospel, Two Roads (Or, The Argument I Once Used Against My Own Faith)

Many years ago, I tried to use this exact argument to prove my father’s faith was built on sand. I was wrong. Thirty years later someone posted it online and asked anyone to disprove it with scripture. I hope this answers their invitation well, and helps whoever reads it.

Patterns, Cycles, and Ancient Warnings: Exploring the Work of Jonathan Cahn

There was a sycamore tree at the corner of Ground Zero. On September 11, 2001, it was struck by debris from the falling towers and destroyed. The stump was kept. You can look it up, see the photographs, and visit the location. It happened whether anyone was looking for it or not. That is one of nine documented harbingers Jonathan Cahn traces between a single verse from the eighth century BC and the events of that morning. This post is my full engagement with his work — because the material deserves more than a summary.

Why I Believe We Are Living in the End Times — and Why I’m Unbothered by Those Who Think I’ve Lost My Marbles

I’m aware of how this title lands. I’ve seen the eye-rolls, and honestly, I get it — the end times space has more than its share of sensationalism, date-setting, and people who seem to be enjoying the chaos a little too much. I’m not that. What I am is someone who has spent a lot of time looking carefully at Scripture, at history, and at current events — and who finds the convergence of all three genuinely difficult to dismiss. This is not a panic post. It’s a reference post. Take what’s useful, push back on what you disagree with, and at minimum, consider the possibility that the patterns are worth a serious look.

What the Desert Kept: The Unbound Word | What the Scrolls Complicate

The Dead Sea Scrolls don’t undermine the faith. They complicate the comfortable version of it — and that’s not the same thing. Canon fluidity, textual variants, messianic plurality: none of these are hidden, none are invented, and none of them get to stay safely unexamined. Part 3 of What the Desert Kept: The Unbound Word.

What the Desert Kept: The Unbound Word | My Father’s Questions

Part 2 of What the Desert Kept: The Unbound Word traces the questions my father couldn’t put down — about canon, suppression, and the distance between institutional Christianity and the faith Scripture actually describes. It also traces what those questions cost him, what they planted in me without my knowing, and what it took for me to finally understand the inheritance he left behind. This one got personal. I think it needed to.

What the Desert Kept: The Unbound Word | The Discovery

In 1947, a young Bedouin shepherd threw a rock into a cave near the Dead Sea and heard something break. What was inside those clay jars would become the most significant manuscript discovery in modern history — and would take decades of scholarly struggle, controversy, and one very persistent librarian to finally reach the rest of the world. This is Part One of What the Desert Kept: The Unbound Word, a five-part deep dive into the Dead Sea Scrolls — their discovery, their contents, the community that preserved them, and the Scriptural threads that held across nearly two thousand years of silence.