Beginning with Advent, a new Scriptorium series will draw out the Bible's teaching about Jesus from every book and section. This is an important series, both for understanding the Scripture and for growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Subscribe to receive Scriptorium in your email inbox every day (along with any of our other newsletters).

Paul was not merely an evangelist and church planter. He was that, of course, but he was more.

He was a true shepherd of the churches God used him to start, and he watched over and continued to minister them all, as he was able. His epistles show us Paul’s pastoral heart. They also reveal him to be ready apologist for the truth of God and a skilled polemicist against all the lies of Satan.

Galatians is in many ways typical of Paul’s pastoral letters to churches. Problems are addressed. The Gospel and the Christian life are reviewed. Evidence of God’s grace is cited with thanksgiving. And all are called to renewed vigilance and dedication to the Lord.

But although Paul loved those to whom he wrote, he could be stern and even unsparing. Unless you think “foolish” is an epithet to wear proudly.

We hope you find this study of the book of Galatians to provide abundant stimulation for your walk with and work for the Lord.

“O Lord, you awaken us to delight in your praise, for you made us for yourself, and our heart is restless, until it rests in you.”

That’s a quote from Augustine, Bishop of Hippo (A. D. 401) in his book, Confessions. He hits on something basic to being a human being. It involves a relationship with God and a restlessness without him.

That relationship is what the Bible talks about. It’s a subject that reaches to the very core of life. This little booklet traces the broad strokes of the Bible’s message. It addresses the issue of the restlessness, discontentment, loneliness, out-of-whackness, ill-at-easeness, wondering-what-it’s-all-aboutness we all face in life.

Please find a quiet spot and spend some time reading what follows. You might even offer a prayer, asking God to help you think through these things. The Bible passages from which these thoughts are drawn are listed toward the end of the booklet.

You can download the book at the link below, and you can find out more about God's kingdom and the good news by reading T. M.'s book The Gospel of the Kingdom.

We live in changing times. The secular worldview, which has held sway in our society for more than a hundred years, is failing to deliver on its promises. Many people are beginning to look elsewhere for meaning and truth, and some are even beginning to “look up.”

As followers of Christ, we need to be ready with a lively faith and a living hope. As we take up anew our calling to be witnesses for Christ, we can expect to be peppered with questions about what it means to be a Christian.

This Guidebook is designed to help us be ready to give a reason for the hope that is within us by reviewing essential Christian doctrines and shoring-up the Biblical foundations of each. Our goal is to lead you into the Word of God so that you can gain a clearer and more lively understanding of what we as Christian believe.

Due to the Pharaoh’s paranoid delusions, the descendants of Israel are enslaved. Then it gets worse. Pharaoh starts a crazy genocidal campaign against them. An Israeli child named Moses is miraculously delivered and, as an adult, finds himself standing before God Himself.

The plot moves fast in this book.

Culture is essential for human flourishing. Which is a good thing, because culture is also unavoidable. We can get away from it and we can’t do without it.

But what is it? Defining culture would seem to be the logical place to begin in articulating a Christian approach to culture. If we don’t know what it is, we won’t recognize when we see it, and we will be less likely to use it as God intends.

Paul spent a little more than 18 months in Corinth, doing the work which resulted in “many of the Corinthians, hearing, believed and were baptized” (v. 8). A church took root; rather (as we shall see), a series of house churches, probably spread around the city, began to meet, worship, and learn what it means to be the Body of Christ. The several house churches were one church in Corinth, and for the time Paul was with them, everything seemed to go well.

But when Paul went to Ephesus, troubles began. He wrote 1 Corinthians to address certain issues, difficulties, and questions that were brought to him by visitors from Corinth. The tone of 1 Corinthians, with its focus on division, immaturity, immorality, neglect, and other matters, is stern and demanding. Paul expected better from these people he had served for a year and a half, and he let them know he was disappointed. But like a loving shepherd, he also walked them through their difficulties, reminded them of the grace of God, pointed them toward the Lord’s return, and urged them to stand firm in the faith.

What does the Bible teach about our role in helping government be a servant of God for good? This series explores that question from the perspective of God's Law.

Genesis is the foundation of the Bible. Understand what God is trying to teach us in this opening work and the rest of scripture becomes clear. Misunderstand it, and you’ll misunderstand everything else.

James begins with a blunt description of life in Christ and the challenges Christians face. Our trials are actually opportunities to do great things for the Lord, but are also opportunities for failure.

No excuses.

When the captivity of God’s people is truly restored, when God “brings back the captivity of His people” (Ps. 53.6), then joy and rejoicing will characterize His people, and the salvation of God will come roaring out from their midst to turn the world right-side up for Jesus.

Neither of these outcomes was much in evidence during the period following the return from Babylon—at least, not consistently or for very long. It would not be until the book of Acts that we see the outcomes David envisioned in Psalm 53. Neither of these outcomes is particularly evident in our day, either. Like the people returning from Babylon, we deceive ourselves if we think our true captivity is at an end. That will only be so when we are wholly, entirely, jubilantly, and obediently captive to Jesus in all our ways. How we can get from where we are to being restored from our present captivity is the theme of this series, “Return from Exile.”