I just thought I would raise an interesting issue with the book of Job that should help us think a little about how we read the Bible. I'll start by affirming up front that I believe strongly in Biblical Inerrancy. Now the problem with such a term is that it has to be understood and people who like to use Straw Men characterizations of Christianity love to take a book like Job and attempt to make the idea of Inerrancy look stupid. For example, in the book of Job we have speeches and conversation Read More

Turnabout is fair play, or so the saying goes. Irony and turnabout are often elements of the kind of stories we enjoy and serve as some of the most effective techniques of slipping past our defenses and presuppositions to deal a deathblow to our pride. One of my favorite literary features of Job is the use of Irony in the story-line.  Given what was written in yesterdays post maybe you could begin to put together some of the irony in the story.As the reader of the conversation we are in a Read More

I have Dr. Branson Woodard from Liberty University to thank for being the first to introduce me to seeing literary technique and beauty in Scripture. His course The Bible as Literature was so compelling and eye-opening that I have never forgotten the important things I learned. When we read the Bible with literary quality in mind we may ask the question, how did the author write the book to assist the reader in understanding and experiencing the main overall point of the story? In Job this is Read More

I wouldn't pretend to understand it fully, but I decided to read the book of Job last week as I continue my enjoyment of Old Testament wisdom literature. I am starting to think that Wisdom literature is my favorite genre of the Bible. After reading Ecclesiastes I headed for Job with the aid of the new ESV Study Bible, which I received as a gift courtesy of Jeremy Morrisey. Job is a book that is highly regarded as valuable for it's wilingness to honestly address the issue of suffering. If you Read More

If our desires for things present are like signposts pointing us to the Eternal city, then I have found few writers to be as good a navigator for the journey as C.S. Lewis. There is something particularly insightful about his understanding of desire and the inability of lesser goods to ultimately fulfill them that serves to echo the voice of Ecclesiastes better than anyone I have ever read. On of the ways he deals with the tension of there being some good present in things like family, work, Read More

First, a word about reading the Bible. I think that a lot of people who read the Bible can miss two very important things. First that the Bible is made of a diversity of theme and parts the create a greater whole. Each book plays a role in building a clearer picture of God's redemptive work in history. This will help because it can make you thankful for a book like Ecclesiastes which leaves you wishing you could hear a little bit more about what life IS about, and a little less about the Read More

I have had some thoughts from Ecclesiastes stirring in my heart and mind the past two days since Annie and I had the chance to participate in Brett and Jen's small group study on Sunday Night. Every now and then I seem to come back around to this mysterious little book and discover it like new all over again. If you have never read it, I would encourage a full sit-down read sometime. Taking a couple of weeks to go verse-by-verse can be good, but we must not neglect to read the whole or we run Read More