If the death and resurrection of Jesus is the hinge on which the great door of history swung open at last, the conversion of Saul of Tarsus was the moment when all the ancient promises of God gathered themselves up, rolled themselves into a ball and came hurtling through that open door and out
Pentecost is significant in both the Old and New Testaments. “Pentecost” is actually the Greek name for a festival known in the Old Testament as the Feast of Weeks (Leviticus 23:15; Deuteronomy 16:9). The Greek word means “fifty” and refers to the fifty days that have elapsed since the wave
As we turn to this chapter, this is what we find Joshua doing. He is giving his parting words. However, where someone’s final words might be given to his or her immediate family, that is not what Joshua is doing here. Rather, he addresses the people of Israel. Like Moses, Joshua is a national
After success, therefore, comes failure – and sin is at the heart of that failure. Indeed, in this case the importance of sin is highlighted at the very beginning as we are told that the people of Israel broke faith in respect of the things devoted to destruction at Jericho. Although the text
Rahab shows absolute fidelity in how she deals with the spies, so perhaps it is not entirely appropriate to judge her on the basis of the Bible’s wider morality of truth-telling. She operates in a way that she believes enables her to show good faith to the spies and, because that means moving