Kidnapped, enslaved, and forgotten—until God spoke in a dream. The story of Patrick isn’t just history; it’s an invitation. What happens when we say yes to God, even when it leads us back to the places we’d rather avoid?
Today is a day of resurrection! Not a day where Jesus simply came back to life as though resuscitated, but a day in which Jesus was given a new spiritual/physical and immortal body that sometimes wasn’t recognized by his own disciples; could seemingly warp around different areas at will and vanish in and out of…
To the Greeks, Tartarus was a spiritual prison in the underworld where the Titans were locked up. In the Bible it was the place where God locked up the angels that created the giants of the Old Testament (like Goliath). Genesis called these angels the “sons of God” and Jewish literature said that their judgment…
The Last Supper was a Passover meal and in Jesus’ time, the Passover meal had several traditions, including four cups of wine to be drunk throughout the night and certain types of food to be eaten, with everything representing a different theme. Jesus followed these traditions, but gave many of the foods new meaning. The…
The gods of ancient times told humanity that they were, more or less, slaves—created by the gods to do their bidding. They made humanity to bring them food, drink, clothing and housing, and so if humanity was willing to provide for them in such ways, the gods would return the favor by giving them care…
Today I read The Great Sex Rescue and can confirm that this is the “Christian sex” book of “Christian sex” books. Anyone who grew up in the purity culture with me should read this for an essential critique on the teachings we grew up with. There has been a lot of sexual teaching in the…
Throughout the Old Testament, God would enter sacred spaces in a cloud and people would celebrate. On Palm Sunday, God walked into a sacred space and some celebrated while others were enraged. God then walked into the temple and began to flip tables and call attention to the oppression committed by the religious and the…
I’ve felt it especially important over the last year to call attention to some important issues, and that’s hard to do when I know I have a lot of faults myself. When I forget about the tree branch in my own eye, it becomes easy for me to harden my heart against others and not…
Occasionally a Bible passage strikes you a little different than it did before—in my case, Luke 11:5-10, where Jesus instructs his disciples as to how to pray. And he said to them, “Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves, for…
The greatest glimpse we get of utopia in the Bible is in the Garden of Eden. It is the place we long for and would happily return to if we were able. But we, of course, cannot return due to our sin and how it has disrupted the planet. From a Biblical standpoint, everything has…
In Luke 3, John the Baptist finds himself facing a crowd of Israelites who all want to receive his “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” Should any modern day preachers find themselves in such a scenario, they probably wouldn’t respond like John, saying, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath…
Jamin Bradley 