PerryDox – BeJustAChristian

Biblical truth standing on its spiritual head to get our eternal attention.

Matthew 4:1-12; Luke 4:1-13 – Order of Christ’s Temptations

| January 18, 2012

Each both Luke and Matthew, the temptation involving bread and stones is listed first. However, the second temptation in Matthew is the third in Luke. In Luke’s record, Satan’s temptation to throw Himself down to prove trust in God is listed third. Matthew is better known for grouping biographical points topically, while Luke’s record is […]

Matthew 5-7 – Living the Sermon on the Mount

| January 13, 2012

“I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand” (Chinese Proverb) – Christianity is not just hearing sermons and seeing the good examples of others. It is practicing it ourselves. Only then does the humanly insane, counter-culture, Sermon on the Mount enlighten us with true, divine understanding.

Matthew 4:8-9 – The Third Temptation

| December 15, 2011

The third temptation here is not worshiping Satan, which is repulsive. The temptation is as subtle as it is blatant – What is Jesus willing to put up with to get what He wants? He did come for a kingdom, right? Applied personally, what are we willing to put up with to get what we […]

Matthew 4:1-11 – The Silence Between Temptations

| December 10, 2011

There is a silence within the details that sounds an alarm. One temptation ends, and another begins, but what about in between? The silence is the amount of time between each encounter in the battle between Jesus and Satan in the wilderness. Unlike the revealing text declaring that afterwards the angels “immediately” came and began […]

Matthew 3; 14 – Jesus and Water

| December 8, 2011

Jesus sank below the water as man and walked on the water as God. In baptism He was overcome; and in the storm He overcame. In the Jordan He submitted; and on Galilee He commanded. The force was never the water; the power was the God-Man’s will. The water always served its Maker, its Master, […]

1 Corinthians 8:2 – Challenging the Conscience

| November 11, 2011

Jesus makes people uncomfortable. Ironically, this is especially true for the religious because Jesus challenges the normal, the expected, and the religious traditions of both the sanctimonious and soft-hearted. Jesus confronts the conscience of others and we must be brave enough to question our own. Learning from Him, who always knew right and wrong regardless […]

1 Corinthians 1:18-23 – Barriers and Balance

| June 25, 2011

Think about the following observation: A barrier to true biblical interpretation is blindness to influences by our social, political, spiritual and personal environment. Before seeing God’s truth, we have to see ourselves truly. To shed biases is a lifelong process. Yet to deny truth is obtainable is to deny reality. True reality is that truth […]

Matthew 1:23 – The Incarnation and Ethics

| April 22, 2011

How do we decide right and wrong? There are precepts and principles, but sometimes a picture is worth a thousand laws. I would like to suggest to you an image, a picture, but one set in time and reality, that can be used to help us see the meaning of ethics and morality – the […]

Mt.8:23-27 (cf., Mk.4:35-41; Lk.8:22-25) Failures of Fear

| February 13, 2011

Fear forgets the promises of God – “let us go to the other side” Fear foisters upon God an unsavory character – “don’t you care?” Fear finds what is not there and overlooks what is there – “what kind of man is this?”

Exodus and Matthew

| February 5, 2011

The story begins with a child being born, by grace escaping the wrath of a king, raised and adopted by one that he was not biologically related to, and then the story continues by skipping to his adulthood. Who is the story about? It is about both Jesus and Moses. Matthew records the story of […]