Galatians 1:1-10 Heresy begins not in the head but in the heart. Show me a heretic, and most likely I’ll show you someone in rebellion against God. Naturally, there are some who through ignorance follow false teachers. But usually a turn from correct doctrine is a direct turn from God. This seems to be Paul’s major point in his letter to the Galatians. Unlike the modern church, St. Paul takes doctrine, or the gospel in the Church, seriously. He takes... Read more
Galatians 1:1-10 Heresy begins not in the head but in the heart. Show me a heretic, and most likely I’ll show you someone in rebellion against God. Naturally, there are some who through ignorance follow false teachers. But usually a turn from correct doctrine is a direct turn from God. This seems to be Paul’s major point in his letter to the Galatians. Unlike the modern church, St. Paul takes doctrine, or the gospel in the Church, seriously. He takes... Read more
John 7:25-36 “We know where this man is from; but when the Christ comes, no one knows where He is from” (verse 27). How often we mistake God when He comes to us! The Gospels contain a litany of mistaken attitudes towards Jesus Christ. Some who followed Jesus turn back. I guess you could say they repented from following Him. Things get too tough or too confusing (such as Jesus’ teaching about the Bread of... Read more
John 7:14-24 “Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment” (verse 24). This is the summary of Jesus’ teaching in John 7:14-24, which is illustrated in 2 different ways. First, the Jews judge according to appearance because they judge Jesus by His formal training: “How does this man know letters, not having studied?” (verse 15). The second example is in verse 23 when the Jews accuse Jesus of violating the Sabbath by healing on the Sabbath. I... Read more
John 7:1-13 “For no one does anything in secret while he himself seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world” (verse 4). I’m with Jesus’ brothers on this one, although not for the same reasons. God wants people to come to know Him, and yet He seems to operate so silently. God is glorious and bigger than the world, and yet He makes Himself invisible. I wrote on... Read more
John 6:60-71 All of this talk about eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Jesus is making my head hurt and my heart ache! “This is a hard saying; who can understand it!” John 6 gets to the heart of the Gospel because it gets to the heart of Jesus Christ. In this last part of John 6 the mystery is more about the Spirit and the Word, while previously it was about flesh and bread. “The words that... Read more
John 6:41-59 Have you ever made fresh bread or been in a house where someone has? I’ll bet I can make you hungry merely by suggesting such wonderful food. Can you smell it? It smells so moist that it seems to emanate a bread cloud over your head, ready to rain down a gustatory experience of biblical proportions. The air is so thick with flavor that you believe you can reach up to it, grab some, and stuff it in... Read more
Introduction to Give Us This Day Welcome to Give Us This Day, the daily Bible devotional I’ve written for every passage in the New Testament. I began to write Give Us This Day in the summer of 2006, in response to the promptings of the Holy Spirit for me to write a daily Bible devotional based on the ancient way of reading the Scriptures known as the lectio divina. Originally called Daily Bread for the first four years of its... Read more
John 6:15-40 We constantly confuse earth with heaven, even though heaven indeed comes to us through the things of the earth. Every one of us his hungry every day and all throughout the day. We fill our lives with hunger, the hunger for bread and the hunger for water; the hunger for silence and the hunger for peace; the hunger for companionship and the hunger for love; the hunger for health and the hunger for rest. How is it, then,... Read more
Give Us This Day
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Saturday of the 4th Sunday after the Epiphany – John 7:37-52
John 7:37-52 “If anyone thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in Me, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” This image of rivers of living water is scattered all throughout the Holy Scriptures. Jesus may be referring to passages such as Isaiah 12:3 (“Therefore with joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation”); Isaiah 43:20 (“Because I give waters in the wilderness and rivers in... Read more