31 March – 6 April 2019. Numbers 35–36 (click to read). A few years ago a big business leader in Taipei angrily told me that churches should stay out of economic discussions and just focus on teaching people about life in heaven. We had been debating economic reforms, the need to care for the poor, […]
24–30 March 2019. Numbers 24–25 (click to read). In Numbers 24–25, the story of Balaam continues. Balak, the king of Moab is afraid of the Israelites and their military power, and so he hires Balaam (a non-Israelite diviner from Syria) to come over and curse the Israelites. In this way King Balak hopes that he […]
17–23 March 2019. Number 15 (click to read). No matter which country or culture we come from, sadly one thing all people are good at is making divisions. We divide up our societies in so many ways. We divide between men and women, young and old, rich and poor, city and country, educated and uneducated, […]
10–16 March 2019. Numbers 4 (click to read). The Bible tells us that in the years when the Israelites wandered through the wilderness, they carried a tabernacle with them. The tabernacle was the place where Israel’s priests and leaders could meet with God and serve him. Because the people were mobile, the tabernacle had to […]
24–30 April 2016. Deuteronomy 19 (click to read). Deuteronomy 19 talks again about cities of refuge, an idea we saw back in Numbers 35. But unlike in Numbers, this chapter is special because it includes the “lex talionis“, the famous Jewish law of revenge. In verse 21 this law demands “life for life, eye for […]
10–16 April 2016. Numbers 35–36 (click to read). Today, when terrible crimes are committed in Taiwan, we see how quickly the newspapers and media are to start shouting for revenge. Instead of trying to find out the truth of what happened and to report that, the media instead do their best to build up hate […]
3–9 April 2016. Numbers 26 (click to read). Numbers 26 begins by mentioning the plague in chapter 25 that killed off the last of the old generation of Israelites. God had threatened them before that none of the generation that left Egypt would enter the promised land. This was their punishment for all the ways […]
Bonus March 2016 Text. Numbers 17–18 (click to read). In Numbers 17 we have a very late story about power – not God’s power but the power and authority claimed by Israel’s priests. At times in Israel’s past, people questioned the authority and even the need for priests. So Bible scholars tell us that in […]
27 March – 2 April 2016. Numbers 9–10 (click to read). Many Christians think the Jews were incredibly strict when it came to following the law, that they carefully obeyed each word as it was written. Sadly, some Christians even want to introduce this type of strict legalism into the church! But the situation was never […]
16–22 August 2015. Ecclesiastes 11:7–10 (click to read). As we come towards the end of Ecclesiastes, the writer begins to sum up his thoughts, and we find here a very bittersweet feeling. He has tested and tried many things, and looked for a stable meaning to life. But everything has failed. Wisdom and learning, joy […]