Biblical Thoughts

  One of those days, Jesus was preaching. A great crowd surrounded the house where he preached from. The pharisees and teachers of the law came from far and wide to hear him, even from Jerusalem. The power of the Lord was with him to heal (Luke 5:17). Suddenly four men lowered a paralyzed man through the roof and landed him in front of Jesus. Seeing their faith, Jesus said, "Man, your sins are forgiven." The scribes and the teachers of the law were shocked to the core. According to them, sins could only be forgiven by God and one could obtain it only by sacrificing an animal as a sin offering in the temple. The paralyzed man had not even moved a finger to secure his forgiveness. So they declared this act of Jesus as sheer blasphemy. To them Jesus f orgiving his sins was nothing more than a baseless claim. After all, what was the proof that his sins were really forgiven?  At this instance, Jesus posed them a historical query. "Which is easier, to say your sins are forgive...

  When Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord on the eighth day of his birth, an extra ordinary event happened at the temple premise where God rewarded a man for his unflinching faith in a revelation that he received some time ago. Through the season of Christmas much has been spoken about the revelation that Mary received from Gabriel about the birth of Jesus, or Zechariah the priest received from the angel about the birth of his son John the Baptist.  Little has been spoken about a revelation that an unknown person named Simeon received through Holy Spirit about him seeing Jesus during his life.  Simeon appears briefly over the second chapter of Luke.  Bible says that he was devout and full of Holy Spirit. He was constantly expecting the Messiah to come and he expected the Messiah to come soon (Luke 2:25) unlike many of his generations.  Jews through their long history had suffered many a foreign invasions. At the time of Jesus' birth, R...

  Science is full of theories. Dictionary defines theory as an explanation of how things work. To cite an example, the famous chemist Dalton  said in his theory of atoms that an atom is indivisible. That was Dalton's explanation of an atom.  Today this theory is taken out of the text books. An atom is considered to be having subatomic particles. This theory would hold till it is proven otherwise.  So a theory may or may not be true and is expected to lead us to the truth.   Lets look at some of the famous theories such as   Theory of gravity, Theory of relativity, Theory of evolution...and so forth. We do not call them the truth of gravity, truth of relativity or truth of evolution. N ew observations, findings, discoveries or even new theories could correct them or even prove them wrong.   Because of their immense popularity they are often mistaken for truths. They are still theories and not the truth yet. Science is a progressive subject and has ...

    The whole of humanity fell under the curse the moment Eve bit the apple in the Eden Garden. Between Adam and Eve, the very first curse fell upon Eve. “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you” Genesis 3:16. Through the ages women bore the brunt of this curse. With pain she gave birth to her children. Motherhood, her greatest desire, came at a huge price. Most of her life, most of women lived subservient to men. Some of them even surrendered to the dismal profession of pleasing men through prostitution for a living against her own wishes. A woman chooses prostitution as a profession only when she has no other choice for a living. Will this be the condition of women forever? No not all. So, when did things begin to change? Once Jews brought a woman caught in adultery before Jesus. Prostitution as a profession suffered the worst of human atroc...

    Do not murder – was one of the sacred commandments of the Old Testament. Life is God-breathed. No man has the authority to curtail it. Yet we find a number of murders in the Old Testament either before or after the law was given through Moses. First let’s consider the period prior to the law. Fallen Adam’s first child Cain murdered his brother Abel. Jacob’s sons Simeon and Levi killed Hamor and Shechem (Gen 34:26) to secure their sister Dinah and killed all the males in the city. Moses killed an Egyptian (Ex 3:12) when he saw him beating a fellow Hebrew. After the law was given, we rather see an increase of it. At the fall of Jericho, Joshua and team destroyed the city and put to death its men and women (Josh 6:21). They had to kill many to capture Canaan.  Through the times of Judges, we see more of it. Saul has slain his thousands and David his tens of thousands (1 Sam 18:7) the people sang as they danced. The list of murders goes on and on through the times...

    We have been taught about the survival of the fittest from biology classes. But Bible says differently. The meek shall inherit the earth (Mathew 5:5). Do the scientific and Biblical views are in conflict here? Let’s look at some of the dominant animals from history. Dinosaurs were perhaps the most ferocious and the fearful. Why didn’t they survive and dominate (or inherit) the earth with all their strength?  Where have they gone?   The lions who impressed men for ages and whom they declared them as the king of the jungle is sadly on the list of endangered animals, struggling for survival. The tiger which burns bright in the human mind ranks high in the hierarchy of the jungle. They are on their way to extinction unless protected. The kings of the jungle are unable to defend themselves. So, who is the fittest in the jungle? Surprisingly the humble animals such as the rabbit, cat, dog, deer, sheep and the cows, seem to multiply easily enough though they a...

  When disciples approached Jesus to teach them to pray, he gave them a model prayer, famously known as the Lord’s prayer. While it teaches us how to pray, it provides a deep insight into the mind of Jesus. It uncovers the enduring intimacy between the son and the father. More importantly, it verily defines how the relationship between man and his creator God should be. Jesus begins by calling out to his father “Our Father in Heaven”. This expression is an acknowledgement of the highest order as to who God the Father is, where he dwells and why he is. All living and non-living things have all their origin from heaven. They have their being in him (Rom 17:28).   While on earth, Jesus could not but acknowledge how exalted the heaven is, which is the throne of God, the seat of all creations, the source of all life. Men of earth marvels at the wonders of the earth whereas the Son marvels at the heaven itself. What is earth after all for one who descended from heaven. As the heav...

    Can man earn the favor of God through good works ? If it could, why did God had to send his son on the earth to redeem man? This could be explained using the principles of mathematics. Let us place the finite man at Point 0 and position the infinite God at Point ∞ on a line segment . Let us assign a score 1 for one unit of good work. So, if a person does 10 good works, he or she gets score 10 and moves from Point 0 to Point 10.   However, ∞ - 10 = ∞. So, the distance remains ∞ even after moving by 10 units to the right as per the definition of   ∞.     Another person decides to do 1000 units of good work and moves to point 1000.   However, ∞ - 1000 = ∞. So the distance remains ∞.     This shows that a person must do infinite amounts of good works to get close to God. But a finite man in his finite life can never achieve this. So mathematically a person can never reach God by good works . However, God the Fat...

  Adam was not born of a woman. He was born of God. God formed him out of dust and breathed his breath into him and there he received God’s Spirit because the Spirit in a man is the breath of the Almighty (Job 32:8). So, Adam began in Spirit. He communed with God daily, walked hand in hand with him. God and Adam had an unbroken companionship because Adam remained in Spirit while he was in his body. To be in communion with God, one must remain in Spirit because God himself is a Spirit (John 4:24). When he ate the luscious apple which was a delight to his eyes (Genesis 3:6) from the forbidden tree, by way of obeying satan, he fell from the spiritual realm and fell to his flesh. This was his spiritual death. When Adam and Eve heard the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, they ran for cover and hid themselves among the trees in the garden (Gen 3:8). When God asked him, where are you (Gen 3:9), he was afraid to face him because those who are in the flesh cannot plea...

    As Jesus passed by Jericho, there was a blind man who shouted out Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me (Luke 18:38). A blind man addressing Jesus as son of David is as startling as ever. Neither the learned Pharisees, the Jewish priestly class, the Roman elite, nor those who witnessed his miracles could recognize who Jesus was. Here we have a blind man who had no physical vision possessing unimaginable knowledge of who Jesus was. How could this blind man address Jesus by his Messianic and prophetic title “son of David?” God had spoken to David “When your days are over and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever (2 Samuel 7:12-13). Jesus came from the tribe of Judah same as David, and his kingdom is eternal and timeless. This prophecy is fulfilled through Jesus. ...

  Faith is the assurance of things hoped for (Heb 11:1). So then fear is the assurance of things dreaded for.   Faith is the assured conviction of the unseen we hope for, fear is the assured conviction of the unseen we dread for. Faith is borne out of our dependence in God’s faithfulness. Fear is borne out of our dependence in Satan’s unfaithfulness. Faith takes you beyond the visible, while fear traps you within the visible. Faith propels you into the unknown, while fear fills you with fear for the unknown. Faith pulls you out of the cage of circumstances; fear keeps you bound. Faith emerges from the ashes; fear burns and bleeds in the ashes. Faith builds imagination, fear kills it. Faith is faithful, fear is fearful. Faith drives you into your future, fear holds you in the past. Faith creates the future, fear destroys it. Faith releases, fear restricts. Faith set you free into the freedom in Christ, but fear sets you into slavery to satan. Faith is God-confiden...

    Esau had fallen out of the covenant as he traded his precious covenantal birthright for a bowl of soup. Later he picked his wives from the pagan world (Gen 36:3) much to the disappointment and disagreement of Isaac and Rebekah. He mixed his blood with the pagan’s. He even married his cousin Basemath who was the daughter of Ishmael (Gen 36:3) who himself was driven out of the home of promise by Abraham and Sarah. As we read through Genesis, we chance upon chapter 36 which is exclusively kept for the descendants of Esau. It happens precisely after the burial of Isaac in chapter 35. Why was one chapter of Genesis devoted to Esau by the Providence? Did the author plan to bring a focus on Esau before he loses his presence among the descendants of Jacob, the children of promise? What do we learn from this chapter full of antique names? What is its significance?     When Rebekah found the twins struggling in the womb, she reached out to God and the Lord said to he...