"Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God" (Ruth 1:16). Like Ruth in the Old Testament, every Gentile believer has come out of the land of famine and into the spiritual realm of abundance in the name of Jesus. But unlike Ruth, we have turned our backs on the Jewish people, the relatives of the Messiah. We need to confess personally and corporately on behalf of the Church for centuries of persecution of the Jewish people, looking in these days for every opportunity to bless and not curse them. Once again, Israel and her people are center stage at a crucial moment in world history, and this book shows why the Church must effect reconciliation and why our prayers are vital in this hour. If we will make the same covenent pledge to Israel that Ruth made to Naomi, the Church will never be the same!

After a survey of recent approaches to the study of Paul's use of Scripture, the four main chapters explore the use of Isa. 54:1 in Gal. 4:27, the catena of scriptural texts in 2 Cor. 6:16-18, Hos. 1:10 and 2:23 in Rom. 9:25-26 and Isa. 57:19 in Eph. 2:17. In each case, the ancienwriter seeks to place the letter in its historical context and rhetorical situation, identify the significance of any conflations or modifications that have taken place in the citation process, analyse the citation's function within its immediate context, compare its use by Paul with the various ways in which the text is interpreted and appropriated by other Second Temple writers, and evaluate the main proposals offered as explanations for the riddle posed by the citation. That done, he offers his own account of the hermeneutic at work, based on an analysis of the explicit and implicit hermeneutical pointers through which the letter guides its readers in their appropriation of Scripture. This book compares the hermeneutical approaches of the four letters and draws conclusionsconcerning the interplay of continuity and discontinuity between Scripture and gospel in Paul's letters and the relationship between grace and Gentile inclusion in his theology.

The NIV Application Commentary helps you communicate and apply biblical text effectively in today's context. To bring the ancient messages of the Bible into today's world, each passage is treated in three sections: Original Meaning. Concise exegesis to help readers understand the original meaning of the biblical text in its historical, literary, and cultural context. Bridging Contexts. A bridge between the world of the Bible and the world of today, built by discerning what is timeless in the timely pages of the Bible. Contemporary Significance. This section identifies comparable situations to those faced in the Bible and explores relevant application of the biblical messages. The author alerts the readers of problems they may encounter when seeking to apply the passage and helps them think through the issues involved. This unique, award-winning commentary is the ideal resource for today's preachers, teachers, and serious students of the Bible, giving them the tools, ideas, and insights they need to communicate God's Word with the same powerful impact it had when it was first written.

God has more for us than what we are experiencing. We have all limited God in our lives at some point in one way or another. Fear of success, fear of persecution and imaginations are all ways that we limit God. We often see ourselves in a certain way but we have to change that image if we want to experience the abundant life that God has for...

Building on recent developments in biblical studies, this book introduces the prophetic literature of the Old Testament against the background of today's postmodern context and crisis of meaning. Pulsating with anxiety over the empire--Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian--the prophet corpus is a disturbing cultural expression of lament and chaos. Danger, disjunction, and disaster bubble beneath the surface of virtually every prophetic text. Sometimes in denial, sometimes in despair, and sometimes in defiance, the readers of this literature find themselves living at the edge of time, immediately before, during, or after the collapse of longstanding symbolic, cultural, and geo-political structures. These written prophecies not only reflect the social location of trauma, but are also a complex response. More specifically, prophetic texts are thick meaning-making maps, tapestries of hope that help at-risk communities survive.

No other reference gets to the heart of the Old Testament as efficiently as The Holman Old Testament Commentary. When you've got the time, this series offers a detailed interpretation based on the popular NIV text. When time is short, this series delivers an essential understanding of the Old Testament with unsurpassed clarity and convenience. Pastors, lay Bible teachers and others who find their subject material rich and challenging - but their preparation time running out - will be informed and inspired by this approach to Old Testament scholarship which includes: The main idea - a brief yet accurate statement about the purpose, meaning, and importance of the Bible book under discussion, Quick quotes - comments from noted writers and theologians suitable for citing in your own presentation, Succinct summaries - each main theme or lesson summarized clearly and accurately, Details - illustrations, historical facts, grammatical notations, discussion points, teaching plans, and more. Make every minute of prep time more meaningful with The Holman Old Testament Commentary. Book jacket.

The final book of the Bible, Revelation prophesies the ultimate judgement of mankind in a series of allegorical visions, grisly images and numerological predictions. According to these, empires will fall, the "Beast" will be destroyed and Christ will rule a new Jerusalem. With an introduction by Will Self.