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Ephesians 2:14, Paul says, Jesus himself is our peace, he made the two groups one, in other words, he takes all the different tribes of humanity and the two groups, he reduces it all down to one thing, he destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by setting aside in his flesh the...

Hebrews 9:4, describes the contents of the Ark of the Covenant, inside were three objects, the golden pot of manna, Aaron’s rod that budded and the tablets of the Covenant, most people think of the Ark as a treasure chest, a sacred container holding God’s greatest artifacts, but look more...

Galatians 5:13, if you are free from the law and you are saved only by grace, why not just sin as much as you want, if God’s job is to forgive and my job is to have fun, let us get to it, this is the most common objection to the message of grace. People are terrified that freedom will lead to...

Between the shedding of the old and the putting on of the new, Paul inserts an essential element in Ephesians 4:23, to be renewed in the spirit of your mind. This phrase is the central axis of transformation, the mind is the battlefield where change occurs or fails. The renewed mind suggests a...

Hebrews 9:14, he offered himself without spot to God, it was voluntary, it was an act of love, it was the most generous payment ever made and there is one more detail in that verse, Christ offered himself through the eternal spirit. This is one of the only places in the entire New Testament that...

Genesis 3:7, after Adam and Eve sinned, they tried to cover their shame with fig leaves, it did not work. Genesis 3:21, God himself made garments of skin and clothed them. An animal died, not because Adam and Eve asked for it, because God provided it, an innocent creature gave its life, so that...

Ephesians 4:24, presents the positive side of the command, to put on the new man, to shed the old, is an act of death, to put on the new, is an act of resurrection. Paul is not asking Christians to create a new version of themselves through moral effort, he is saying, that there is already a new...

Titus 1:2, when the new man speaks the truth, the believer is reflecting the nature of the one who created you. Paul is not only prohibiting explicit lies, he is calling for a culture of transparency and integrity in the body of Christ, to speak the truth with one’s neighbor has a deep...

Ephesians 4:15, truth without love becomes a weapon, love without truth becomes sentimentality, the new man balances these two dimensions, believers speak the truth, because they love people enough not to let them live in deception. The new man speaks with compassion, recognizing the believers...

Galatians 5:24, Paul then tells you what has happened to your old nature, it is something that has already happened, when you put your faith in Jesus Christ, your old self died with him on the cross. The power of sin over was broken, crucifixion is a brutal image, it is a slow, painful death...

The order observed in the liturgy of now, finds its ultimate grounding in the physical and metaphysical reality of the resurrection, the event that anchors all Christian hope in the solidity of transformed matter. 1 Corinthians chapter 15 indicates that Christian hope does not reside in a...

Galatians 5:2, today, most of us are not tempted by circumcision, we look at the Galatians and think their problem was silly, but we have our own modern versions of this trap. People fall for the Jesus plus lie all the time, they think it is Jesus plus their financial success, they think it is...

There is an instruction in Ephesians 5:1 that seems impossible at first reading, imitate God, not admire him from a distance, not just obey him out of obligation, but imitate him, reproduce in daily life something of the character of the one who created the universe. This instruction only makes...

Religious practices are meant to align ourselves with the heart of God and in doing so, make all of our relationships better, but Jesus saw that religious practices of his day were sometimes doing the opposite, that people were doing religion in order to promote themselves to seek honor and...

Galatians 5:2, you insist on giving God your pocket change to help pay for it, that might seem like a nice gesture, but it is actually a deep insult. By trying to pay, you are turning a loving gift into a business transaction, you are saying his gift was not sufficient, you are degrading his...

Your existence today isn’t the result of all your planning, because even your planning itself and the ability to plan and to have a stable enough life and environment to make your plans is all a gift that you didn’t create for yourself. Jesus isn’t saying don’t make plans beyond today’s bread...

What will the forgiveness of sins mean, it’s not just an exchange between God and your average Israelite, it will by definition be like a dual relationship, you can’t claim to be forgiven by God and then be holding out forgiveness, not releasing other people of what they’ve done to you, but then...

Luke 4:16-30, this is a Jubilee announcement Jesus is announcing, that it is the arrival of God’s Kingdom, the ultimate release, the great forgiveness and to be a prophet announcing that to Israel as they sit under foreign domination from Rome, he’s announcing that the great restoration is going...

Hebrews 9:15, under the first covenant, that means the people who lived and died under the old system, the believers of the Old Testament who brought their animal sacrifices in faith and never lived to see the Messiah, they were covered, too. Their sacrifices were like a credit forward, against...

My real life source actually doesn’t truly come from my own ingenuity and I cannot create and sustain my own life, I am confronted with my morality in that moment, but Jesus cites the mana, which was a very unique kind of bread, it’s a bread that only comes in certain amounts at the certain...