'July 2024' Tagged Posts

And they’re off! The Bible program trains men and women to work in the Kingdom; we equip them to be effective preachers, teachers, missionaries, and servants. The course takes nearly two full years, but SWSBS graduates have a solid foundation after they finish. SWSBS has been training Christians “to know Jesus and make Him known” since 1978. This year marked our 46th commencement exercise. Among the nine graduates, three of our ladies will marry SWSBS alumni and help with their…

God told Elijah to anoint Elisha “as prophet in your place” (1 Kings 19:16). He was a prophet of war who would “sweep up” after Jehu by killing those who opposed God (1 Kings 19:17; 2 Kings 13:3; 2 Kings 9:22). When Elijah called Elisha, he slaughtered his own oxen, burned the yokes to cook the meat, and fed the people (1 Kings 19:21). He would not return to the farm. Elisha’s persistence resulted in his being given a double…

Elijah enters the stage of history mysteriously, with little introduction and no fanfare. Immediately, the text presents him as a man of prayer. James, the half-brother of the Lord, explains that Elijah, despite being a man like the rest of us, was able to use his powerful prayers to start and end a drought (1 Kings 171; Jas. 5:17-18). In the same chapter, he fervently petitioned the Lord to resurrect a widow’s son from the dead, and God granted his…

The Lord will de-mask the disguised, so we learn in Ahab’s attempted conquest for Ramoth-Gilead. In 1 Kings 22, Ahab, King of Israel, had orchestrated an attempt to regain the land he deemed as his own. With the aid of Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, and about 400 prophets, Ahab became emboldened. While the voice of Jehoshaphat declared that they inquire from the Lord (v. 5), Ahab’s preference remained upon his men. In fact, unsatisfied with the prophecy of the near…

“Moral courage is higher and a rarer virtue than physical courage” (William Joseph Slim). The Bible contains many examples of people who acted courageously. I think of examples such as Noah, Abraham, Moses, Joshua, Daniel and his three friends in Babylon, and many others, including the prophets of the Lord. One of the prophets that exuded courage was Nathan. This prophet may not have written a book of the Bible, but we might say he “wrote the book on courage,”…

One of the most well-known among the non-writing prophets, Samuel was a judge over God’s people, the last leader of this sort for Israel. His mother, Hannah, prayed earnestly for a child and she dedicated him to the service of God at a very young age. Samuel trained under the high priest, and eventually grew to serve and to lead God’s people through pivotal times of conflict and transition. He consistently showed a dedication to the Lord and His truth.…

When we think of the prophets we tend to think of men like Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Elijah, and for good reason. Their work in the service of God is renown to us, as it was during the time of the first century (cf. Matt. 16:14). But Scripture describes the work of many prophets of old. Some worked in palaces and some among the people. Some wrote, some did not. Some worked for many years, some for just a short time.…