This is part of the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. This one is the first of two letters to Moses.
When the author of Hebrews writes about Moses, there are several “by faith” statements. In this letter, I’m going to focus on the first two: about how he refused to be considered an Egyptian, and how he left Egypt.
Continue reading Passion and justice: a letter to Moses
This is part of the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. This one is to Moses’s mother, Jochebed.
We’ve moved from Genesis to the beginning of the book of Exodus.
Continue reading A mother’s courage: letter to Jochebed
This is part of the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. This one is to Joseph.
Joseph had a very eventful life. It’s the subject of Genesis 41–50. Although his brothers sold him as a slave, he ended up in Egypt and rose to power just in time to manage a famine. He reconciled with his brothers and then his whole family came to live in Egypt. When Jacob/Israel died, Joseph led a large entourage to bury him with his wife, father and grandfather. Curiously, Joseph didn’t ask for the same thing when he died. Well, not in the same way: he asked for his bones to be taken back to Canaan when God came to his people.
And that’s what I focus on in this letter.
Continue reading The witness of the body: a letter to Joseph
This is part of the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. This one is to Jacob.
This letter focusses mainly on the end of Jacob’s life.
Continue reading Our heart’s desire: a letter to Jacob
This is part of the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. This one is to Isaac.
Continue reading Last(ing) words: a letter to Isaac
This is part of the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. Today’s is to Abraham and in particular the part of his story where he very nearly sacrifices Isaac. The story is in Genesis 22, though Genesis 18:1–15 and Genesis 21:1–7 provide context.
Jews refer to the (non-)sacrifice of Isaac as the “Akedah.” Some of what I write in this post draws on a book by scholar Aaron Koller: Unbinding Isaac: The Significance of the Akedah for Modern Jewish Thought (2020: Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press).
Continue reading The truth of worship: a letter to Abraham
This is part of the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. Today’s is to Sarah. Her story is broken up and intersects with those of her husband, Abraham, and her slave Hagar. You can find the relevant passages in Genesis 12:10–20, Genesis 16, Genesis 17:15–22, Genesis 18:1–15, Genesis 20, Genesis 21:1–21.
Sarah’s not exactly a comfortable story—both in terms of how Abraham treated her and how she treated Hagar. Nevertheless, Sarah’s story and her identity as a mother figure was of huge importance in Jewish thought and we can see this in New Testament writings.
Continue reading The story never told: a letter to Sarah
This is the fourth in the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. Today’s is to Abram (later renamed Abraham) looking at the events of Genesis chapters 12–15. I will write another letter to Abraham in a couple of weeks.
I’ll be honest, I have many unanswered questions when it comes to Abraham. And part of me wonders if that’s the point: he wasn’t meant to be perfect. It was just that there were moments in his life when—for whatever reason—he was able to recognise the voice of God for what it was.
Continue reading What do you make of your younger self? A letter to Abram
This is the third in the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. Today’s is to Noah. The story of him and of his ark is in Genesis 5:28–9:17.
By faith Noah, when he was warned about things not yet seen, with reverent regard constructed an ark for the deliverance of his family. Through faith he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
Hebrews 11:7 (NET)
Dear Noah,
Your story certainly captures the imagination. I grew up with sing-along stories and songs about you, the ark, the animals and all that rain. My choir was actually on TV once singing “Captain Noah and His Floating Zoo” by Michael Flanders and Joseph Horowitz. But since then, it seems many of us have grown tired of hearing the flood spoken of like a children’s story.
Continue reading Commission, courage and completion: a letter to Noah
This is the second in the series of letters I’m writing to people listed in Hebrews 11 as the “cloud of witnesses” who went before us. Today’s is to Enoch. His story is in Genesis 5:18-24. Note that this Enoch was descended through Seth and was the seventh generation (Adam being the first) recorded in the book of Genesis. He’s not to be confused with Enoch son of Cain!
By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.” For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
Hebrews 11:5 (NIV)
Dear Enoch,
Sorry, but we didn’t talk about you in Sunday School. Or church. Or our Bible study group. In fact, most of what I know about you, I learned from Wikipedia.
Or rather, I learned about the idea of you and the ideas people have attributed to you over the ages.
Continue reading The hidden life: a letter to Enoch
So then, with endurance, let’s also run the race that is laid out in front of us, since we have such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us.
Hebrews 12:1 (NET)
Over the next few weeks I’ll be exploring the “cloud of witnesses” listed in Hebrews 11. The author of the book of Hebrews was looking to encourage Christians in the early church not to lose faith or hope. The author looks back to the Old Testament scriptures and starts naming a number of people who walked by faith, but did not receive the fullness of what they hoped for. I say “starts naming” because we only get half-way through the judges before the author writes about all the names they don’t have time to write about!
Continue reading Faith, offering and voice: a letter to Abel
Today is the last in my series on the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22. It’s on love.
As a neurodiverse person, I’ve had a somewhat reluctant relationship with the word “love.” Growing up, people usually described it in terms of emotions that I either didn’t experience, or didn’t experience in the ways that everyone else did.
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: love (a poem)
Honestly, I didn’t know where I was going to begin with today’s poem.
I’d been told plenty of times before that joy is not the same as happiness and that you can have joy even when you’re not happy. As I wrestled to make sense of this, I concluded that joy must be like a sense of inner security that one carries in all circumstances. But isn’t that what peace is about?
I think joy is much more about delight and appreciation.
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: joy (a poem)
Today’s word is peace.
I’m almost embarrassed to write about peace, given that I can be anxious so often. I don’t want to write something that feels disconnected from our present reality, and yet I believe most surely that God’s peace has a completeness and depth that will surpasses everything we could hope for.
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: peace (a poem)
Once again, I’ve taken out my concordance and found out some surprising facts about the New Testament Greek.
I like to think of patience as “love waiting”, as something that exists in its own right separate from any sense of sin or fallenness. But it’s still true that most of the uses of “patience” in the Bible are linked to the world not (yet) being as it should be.
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: patience (a poem)
There is nothing like kindness to cement a friendship.
It’s that feeling of “you didn’t have to do this” that makes it so memorable. The kindness might be a gift in a moment of need, a gentle steer away from a pitfall you didn’t know was there, or someone accommodating you when you make a mistake.
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: kindness (a poem)
Once again, I’m struck by how much I discover when I get out my concordance and start looking at the Greek words.
Take, for example, Jesus’s words in Matthew 7:17 where he says that every “good” tree bears “good” fruit. These are two different words in the Greek, but many English translations render both words as “good”.
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: goodness (a poem)
Faithfulness is such a big word. I think if there’s one thing, just one thing that God wants us to know about him, it’s that he is someone who fulfils his good promises. And of course, faithfulness is a huge part of that.
As I sat and considered the word in more detail, five words came to me:
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: faithfulness (a poem)
For the next few weeks, I’m running a series on the virtues described as the fruit the spirit in Galatians 5:22-23. I started with self-control last week, and this week is gentleness.
I found out some interesting things about the Greek word translated as “gentleness”. The word is πραύτης meaning “meekness”, “gentleness” or “humility” and it’s the same word used in the beatitudes in Matthew 5:5 (“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth”).
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: gentleness (a poem)
For the next few weeks, I want to run a series on the virtues described as the fruit the spirit in Galatians 5:22-23. I’m starting with self-control.
So often, I hear self-control described in terms of hemming ourselves in, or resisting ungodly tendencies. Yet these descriptions feel lacking to me, as they can only have meaning in the context of sin. The other eight virtues all stand in their own right as expressions that will have a place in God’s kingdom when all sin is done away with.
I did, however, find one notable exception to the rule.
Continue reading Songs of the Spirit: self-control (a poem)