“The Desired of All Nations” “Despise not the day of small things” is the underlying logic of all three of these short books. The temple looked small. The community looked small. The future looked small. And God’s response was: you have no idea what I am preparing. The thing being built in front of you […]
“Though the Fig Tree” Habakkuk does not pretend the loss away. The list is brutal — no figs, no grapes, no olives, no grain, no flocks, no herds. In an agricultural economy, that is not a hard year. That is total ruin. And in the next breath, before the rubble has even settled, Habakkuk says
“One Who Will Be Peace” The promise in Micah 5:2 is not just about a place; it is about a pattern. God is not impressed by the size of the platform. He has been working through small things and overlooked people from the very beginning. Abraham was a wandering nomad. Moses was a fugitive shepherd.
“The Day of the LORD” Jonah’s confession in chapter 4 is one of the most quietly devastating sentences in the Old Testament. He runs from God’s call to Nineveh because he knows what will happen if he obeys. The Ninevites will repent. God will relent. And God will be exposed, in front of his prophet,
“Seek Me and Live” The seeking Amos called for is not casual. The Hebrew verb is dārash — to consult, to inquire, to make one’s way toward. It is the language of a person who has lost something valuable enough to upend their whole day looking for it. Amos was telling a religious nation that
“I Will Pour Out My Spirit” What Joel saw, and what Pentecost confirmed, is that the Christian life is not a life of self-sufficiency trying to reach God. It is a life of God’s Spirit-sufficiency working through you. The promise is not that you will figure out what to do. The promise is that the
“I Will Heal Their Waywardness” The Hebrew word that runs through this book is ḥesed — steadfast love, covenant loyalty, the love that does not let go when the other person does. It is what God is when his people are not. And the staggering claim of this book is that God’s ḥesed is not
“An Everlasting Kingdom” Most of us build our lives around small kingdoms. The kingdom of our career. The kingdom of our household. The kingdom of our reputation. These kingdoms are not evil, but they are temporary, and the mistake is to treat any of them as ultimate. When the ancient near east fell — Babylon
“A New Heart” Look at what the whole canon has been building toward. In Eden, a promise: the seed of the woman will crush the serpent. On Sinai, a covenant: I will be your God. In the prophets, a vow: I will send my Servant. And here in Ezekiel, the landing: I will put my
“New Every Morning” Notice what the writer does not say. He does not say the pain is not real. He does not say God was absent. He does not say it was a blessing in disguise. He says: I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and