The false teachers John is defending his church against made much of their own leadership, creating doubt in the minds of her members by causing them to selfishly look for the locus of their relationship with God inside themselves. But John draws them back by making...
God wants us to stop sinning, but how can we even begin this impossible task? John's answer: look to the cross of the crucified Jesus who died to sin for us, look to the new creation where our destiny as full-formed children of God will become a reality, and look...
John's church was attacked from within by teachers who taught that Jesus was not actually a physical being and that salvation was not about a restored relationship with God but about secret knowledge of God gained privately by the enlightened initiated. John...
The women who go to the empty tomb have a plan to anoint Jesus' body, but they soon realize the main problem with their plan is not merely that the body is missing but that they had planned to anoint his body in the first place. Today, we (and the culture) are...
Pilate and Jesus circle around the question of Pilate's power to condemn him or release him, and Jesus' refusal to play the power game with him. Instead, Jesus holds out the ultimate value of Truth for Pilate's consideration, but Pilate refuses to give up...
The Lord's Supper – the body and blood of Jesus in, with, and under the bread and wine – unites holy God and forgiven humanity through a Jesus-shaped, vertical connection. But the Lord's Supper also creates a Jesus-shaped, horizontal connection...