Posts from January 2022

  DISCUSSION:                               In Genesis 48-50, Jacob has died and has been carried off to Macpelah to be buried with his ancestors.  Since Jacob has passed, the brothers of Joseph begin to fear that Joseph would now enact his revenge on them for selling him as a slave.  When confronted with their fears, Joseph’s statement must have really surprised them: “you meant evil against me, But God meant it for good ” (Genesis 50.20).  Joseph knew…

  DISCUSSION:                                                      You can almost feel the anxiety in the room as Jacob debates within himself what to do.  If he does nothing, he loses his son Simeon who is being held hostage in Egypt.  He also risks the entire fate of his family due to the famine.  If he says yes, he risks losing the only connection he has left of his beloved Rachel in their son Benjamin.   The famine has been severe, and they…

  DISCUSSION:                                               Isn’t this a sticky situation?  Here we have the ten brothers of Joseph coming to Egypt to buy food for their family due to the famine from none other than their brother Joseph.  The Bible tells us that even though they don’t recognize him, he recognized them.  In the process of meeting with them, he begins to question their intentions and toy with them and make them sweat.  It doesn’t take…

  DISCUSSION:                              ”      The Tribe of Judah is the most significant of all the tribes of Israel, because it is from this tribe that delivers the Messiah.  One would think that if the Bible recorded any story concerning the man from which this tribe originates, it would be one of strength, holiness and godliness.  That could not be further from the truth.  It doesn’t take long for us to see that Judah was a man…

  DISCUSSION:                           Bethel is often mentioned as a place that the Patriarchs would go and build an altar to God to offer sacrifices; it simply means the “House of God”.  Right before God changes Jacob’s name to Israel in Genesis 35, Jacob is instructed by God to rise and go to Bethel and build an altar there to God.  Before Jacob goes, there are a few things that are necessary…

  DISCUSSION:                                We are a funny group of people. We sure are happy. We sue for everything from a hot cup of coffee to hurt feelings. Forgiveness has become a lost art. Now everything is about revenge, getting even, making someone pay. Sadly enough, it’s drifted from the secular world into churches today. When we should love, we are often bitter. As we continue in our journey through the scriptures, I think that we will…

  DISCUSSION:                          Emotions are one of the greatest blessings that God has given us.  However, learning how to control those emotions can be very difficult.  In Genesis 30-31, one can see that Rachel is struggling with some of her emotions.  Rachel is very upset that God has not allowed her to have children and that anger has grown into jealousy and resentment for her sister Leah. Leah is not only…

                                The phrase “like father, like son” has been around for centuries.  I don’t know if it came from some old Chinese proverb or Confucius’ quote, but it could have had its origins here in Genesis 26.  In this story, we have Isaac repeating the same thing that his father Abraham did by withholding the whole truth about their wives.  In the case of Abraham, he lied to Pharaoh (Genesis 12) and Abimelech (Genesis 20) telling them that…

                               A college student had come to take his final exam in his ornithology class (the study of birds). It had been a tough class with a tough professor. The exam consisted of 25 pictures of birds’ feet and he had to identify which birds they were, based solely on their feet. The exasperated student said; “I’m not going to do this. Nobody could pass this test!” The professor replied, “Then I will have to fail…

                              Years ago instead of going “out” to eat, people would invite others over to their home for dinner.  As a child when that would happen I can remember my mother frantically cleaning the house because we had, as she called it, “BIG COMPANY” coming.  She wanted to make sure that she had cleaned the bathroom, dusted the furniture, mopped and vacuumed the floors and prepared the food, so the “BIG COMPANY” would see us at…

                                               As a product of the Eighties, we had our own little language.  The word “bad’ became something that was “good”.  The word “cool” became something that meant “hot” or “trendy” and the word “gay”, which used to mean “happy” became someone who was homosexual.  Every day at school you could hear words like “like”, “gnarly” or “psych”.  Another word that became very popular that you don’t hear much today was the…

                     “God’s Promises are Sure! God’s Promises are Sure! He Speaks, and It Shall Be; God’s Promises are Sure! Those are the words to a song that sister Jewel Kenderick wrote almost fifty years ago that have been sang in elementary chapel for years.  The idea for the song comes from the Promise of Abraham that is mentioned in Genesis 12 and reaffirmed in Genesis 15.  The rest of the Bible…