Biblical Culture

In this thoughtful and inspiring book, Daniel Kooman, the award-winning director of She Has a Name and Dream: Find Your Significance, shares the creation story in a way you have never experienced it before. Breath of Life examines three breaths from God that shaped humanity: the first breath that brought humanity to life; a second breath that redeemed humanity from sin; and a third breath that continues to shape the course of human history as we know it.

The women of the Bible have a strong, relevant message for women today that has been lost underneath layers of traditional interpretations and the expectation that God does his most important work through men. Crucial dimensions of their lives have been muted, forgotten, or passed over. This book brings the women of the Bible into the 21st century by recovering their powerful message for contemporary women.

Not only will studying Scripture daily enrich and nourish your soul, but it will also provide you with solid answers to many of life's most urgent questions—from the introduction. If you are less than familiar with the Bible, you might be surprised at what you'll find there.

The last thing fourth-grader Jake Henry remembers (before the world as he knew it disappeared) is napping at summer camp. What happens next can't be explained as Jake finds himself surrounded by massive stone walls that rise up all around him - in ancient Jericho.

The Feasts of Israel, set by God, are not only commemorative in a historical context, but are also prophetic. The first three feasts in the first month point to the Messiah's First Coming; the last three feasts in the seventh month to his Second Coming. The middle feast highlights the Church, in more ways than is generally recognized. This briefing reveals the rich background of these feasts with many surprises for the Biblical believer and yet only scratches the surface.

It was an outlawed book, a text so dangerous "it could only be countered by the most vicious burnings, of books and men and women." But what book could incite such violence and bloodshed? The year is 1526. It is the age of Henry VIII and his tragic Anne Boleyn, of Martin Luther and Thomas More. The times are treacherous. The Catholic Church controls almost every aspect of English life, including access to the very Word of God. And the church will do anything to keep it that way.

In this concise, engaging book, noted New Testament scholar Luke Timothy Johnson takes listeners on a journey back to the time of the early Roman Empire, when the New Testament was written in ordinary Greek (koine) by the first Christians. The author explains how the Gospels, Acts of the Apostles, and Revelation evolved into the canon of sacred writings for the Christian religion, and how they reflect a reinterpretation of the symbolic world and societal forces of first-century Greco-Roman and Jewish life.

If Jews and Christians both believe in the same God, why is there such division? Why is history littered with deathly accounts of this division, from the early Jewish persecution of Christians to the Crusades' slaughtering of Jews? The Lion of Judah unpacks the roots of this division, showing how jealousy, theology, the law, and the integration of Gentile believers into what was once a predominantly Jewish early church contributed to the schism. It then goes on to reveal how Jesus magnificently fulfilled every word in the Bible.

The God of the Old Testament commanded and endorsed many practices that we find morally reprehensible today. High on the list was the institution of slavery, which features prominently in several sections of the Hebrew Bible. Fathers could sell their daughters into slavery, masters could beat their slaves, creditors could carry off children for failure to repay a debt, and foreigners could be kept for life, passed down as inherited property. How are we to make sense of all of this from our modern point of view?

While many Christians would readily affirm this truth, the widely held assumption that the Bible depicts a male God persists—as it has for centuries. This misperception of Christianity not only perniciously implies that men deserve an elevated place over women, but also compromises the glory of God by making God appear to be part of creation, subject to it and its categories, rather than in transcendence of it.

The church has too often lost its way in reading the Old Testament for lack of sound principles of interpretation. When careless habits get us off track, we can lose sight of what the Bible is really saying, derailing our own spiritual growth and even risking discredit to God's word. We need a consistent approach to give us confidence as faithful interpreters. In Wisdom for Faithful Reading, trusted Old Testament scholar John Walton lays out his best practices developed over four decades in the classroom.

Leading Bible scholar John Dominic Crossan, the author of the pioneering work The Historical Jesus, provides new insight into the Christian culture wars which began in the New Testament and persist strongly today. For decades, Americans have been divided on how Christians should relate to government and lawmakers, a dispute that has impacted every area of society and grown more rancorous over the past forty years. But as Crossan makes clear, this debate isn’t new; it can be found in the New Testament itself, most notably in the tensions between Luke-Acts and Revelations.

In a fascinating rumination, Edward G. Simmons combines a lifetime’s experiences and biblical research in a voice that is as comfortable and welcoming as if one was seated in an easy chair in his study. With his fierce intellect and honesty, Simmons layers his philosophical lessons with personal insights and the latest discoveries of science.

The Apostolic Church: In the Twenty-First Century is a collection of articles and essays on the nature and mission of the church. Written in an accessible style, this book will help both ministers and laypersons understand how to live out their faith in the community we know as the church.

It’s not often that you come across a document of such religious and historical importance as The Septuagint Genesis – in fact its significance would be hard to overstate. But what is the Septuagint? Well, its name refers to the “seventy’ (actually 72) translators – six from each tribe of Israel – who translated the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, the primary language of Jews in Egypt at the time. This, the oldest and arguably most important translation, was the version of The Bible that Jesus himself would have read – and the one from which almost all the New Testament’s writers were quoting.

Who was Priscilla? Readers of the Bible may know her as the wife of Aquila, Paul's coworker, or someone who explained baptism to Apollos. Biblical references to Priscilla spark questions: Why is she mentioned before her husband? Does the mention of her instruction of Apollos mean that women taught in the church? What is her story?

We are witnessing the end of Western Civilization. The present crisis in our culture is the greatest since the first century. Many commentators on the present scene believe that the entire world is moving into a period of neo-tribalism. In this striking book, theologian James B. Jordan argues that this cultural change is part of God's ongoing plan for humanity, the plan by which the Holy Spirit grows God's daughter, humanity, into a bride for His Son. The present crisis provides a tremendous opportunity for the Christian Church to challenge and transform the world as never before.

This remarkable work paints a comprehensive and colorful picture of the world that Jesus knew. From detailed, convincing portraits of John the Baptist, Pontius Pilate, Herod, Jesus himself, and other key figures, to the Jewish and Hellenistic leaders often ignored in scripture, Who's Who in the Age of Jesus is a critical, in-depth look at one of the most tumultuous eras in human history.

Imagine embarking on a captivating journey through the Bible, not as a religious text, but as a historical chronicle. This is the invitation extended by Werner Keller's renowned book, "The Bible as History." Published in 1955, it delves into the fascinating intersection of archaeological discoveries and biblical narratives, painting a vivid picture of the ancient world inhabited by prophets, kings, and everyday people.

In Corona Crisis, professor Mark Hitchcock shares how the current coronavirus outbreak is related to the vivid, end-time biblical prophecies about plagues, pestilences, and pandemics. Jesus listed "pestilences in various places" as a sign of his coming (Luke 21:11). In the prophecy of the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, the fourth rider kills one-fourth of the earth with pestilence and the "wild beasts of the earth".