Lee Harmon's Blog, page 70

Malachi 3:6, God Changes Not

For I am the LORD, I change not;

//I’ve heard this verse a lot, often spoken out of context. God doesn’t change? Really? What aboutJonah 3.10:And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.

Evidently God does change his mind at least, so what are we to make of today’s verse in Malachi?

Let’s put it back in context. God bemoans the status of his people and how they have strayed away from h...

Book review: God and Evil

by Chad Meister and James K. Dew Jr.

★★★★

Wherever you turn, evil rears its ugly head. This book is the case for God in a world filled with pain, and it makes for a sober read.

Meister and Dew have collated a series of essays about the problem of evil, with noted theologians—twenty one in all—examining the issues through several different lenses. It’s an interesting collection, with a myriad of different tones … some aggressive (the New Atheists get put in their place), some philosophical, one...

John 1:32, The Logos (Part V of V)

And John bore witness, saying, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and He remained upon Him”.

//Over the last few days, we’ve discussed two major religious themes: One, the Hellenistic idea of a Logos someday being sent from God to mankind, who would “reveal mysteries and make everything plain.” And two, a dream held by the Jews of a day when God Himself would step down from heaven and take an active part in governing the world, inaugurating the messianic age.

What we haven’t...

1 Corinthians 1:30, The Logos (Part IV of V)

But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God

//Before wrapping up this discussion tomorrow, a little more information about the Logos is in order. What is this mysterious, cosmic Reason that coexisted with God since the creation?

John’s Logos Christology poetically parallels the structure of Wisdom texts throughout Jewish tradition. It is not a new idea. These texts, both inside and outside the Bible, personify Wisdom’s relation to God, her preexistence and role in crea...

Ezekiel 37:27, the Logos (Part III of V)

My dwelling place will be with them: I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

//We continue our theme about the Logos, as described in the prologue to John’s Gospel. John has just made a profound claim, that the Logos has finally arrived as promised, and that it came in the form of a flesh-and-blood person! The wording of John’s Gospel is not coincidental; it refers back to the book of Ezekiel—a favorite of the Johannine writings, in particular Revelation—including today’s verse.

Devou...

John 1:14, the Logos (Part II of V)

And the Logos became flesh,

and dwelt among us,

and we saw his glory

//Yesterday, I repeated a statement attributed to the philosopher Plato, long before Jesus lived, suggesting that one day God might send forth a Logos, who would reveal all mysteries and make everything plain.

Hundreds of years later, John wrote about this Logos in his Gospel. But before John wrote, Philo of Alexandria (a Hellenized Jew) also used the term Logos to reconcile Stoicism and Judaism. Philo spoke of the knowledge of...

John 1:1, the Logos (Part I of V)

In the beginning was the Logos.

//John’s Gospel is a fascinating and complex theological work, painting Christianity (which was itself an offshoot of Judaism) with a Hellenistic brush. I thought it might be enlightening to discuss the Logos, John’s word for the pre-existing Christ. In most all Bible versions, the Greek word Logos has been translated to Word.

But what is a Logos? Why does John use this word to describe Christ?

Logos is the mind of God controlling this world, the force changing it...

Book review: The Psalter

by Galen Watson

★★★★★

Hey, this is a fun one!

Let’s start with the basics. A psalter doesn’t psing psongs door-to-door, nor does it dispense psalt and pepper. A psalter is a devotional book of psalms.

This particular psalter is over 1,000 years old. Nay, nearly 2,000 years old, for in the ninth century, it was written over the words of a first-century heretical gospel … a copy of the Book of Thomas the Contender from the Ebionites … as a means of secretly preserving the words of an original apo...

Matthew 5:38-39, Jesus Rewrites Scripture

You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.

//Five times in this chapter, the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus begins a topic with the words “You have heard.” Curious that Jesus would use these words, because the punch line resides in where they heard the words. They heard them in the synagogue, for each one is a quote from scripture.

I...

Job 38:7, Martin Luther King: A New Day

When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy

//On March 31, 1968, a week before his assassination, Reverend Martin Luther King quoted the book of Revelation to conclude a sermon at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.:

Thank God for John, who centuries ago out on a lonely, obscure island called Patmos caught vision of a new Jerusalem descending out of heaven from God, who heard a voice saying, “Behold, I make all things new; former things are passed away.”...