To start the year, we are studying Peter’s first letter by beginning with I Peter 1:1-2. In each section, we will see how he describes the people of God. In his greeting, Peter calls Christians “elect exiles,” which is a curious expression that mixes something positive (elect, chosen, selected) with something negative (exiles, driven out, rejected). As it turns out, God’s election makes his people exiles in this world, and Peter reminds us that it is our call to live our lives as those who are in the world but not of the world.
In our third look at Matthew 6:1-18, which contains the Lord’s Prayer, or the Our Father, we examine the prayer itself, which serves not...
In a brief burst of practical instructions, we learn how to treat church leaders, other church numbers, and everyone else.
In Jesus’ final public teaching in the Gospel of John (10:22-42), the people of Jerusalem tried to pin him down. They wanted him to...