Perrydox.com is devoted to the pursuit of truth, whether plain or paradoxical, whether simple or sublime, or simply absurd yet absolute.
PHall | March 23, 2015
Silence. A silent stare. A turned back. Aggression. Resignation. Contempt. Confusion. Disappointment. Restlessness. Disease. Ignored. Cast out. Which of these hurts the most? The answer might depend upon the definition and direction of hurt. Job is praying. Again. “Again” is painful knowing that if he had been answered the first, second, third, fourth, or fifth […]
PHall | February 24, 2015
“Why do bad things happen to good people;” is the inverse of “Why do good things happen to bad people?” Most of the rich are unbelievers. Many shadowed by “bad luck” are believers. How do we reconcile this reality with a good God? Something strange happens in Job’s second response to Zophar. He repeats the […]
PHall | February 14, 2015
Was Satan right about Job? Satan’s challenge is this: Would Job be more adversely affected by the ravaging loss of his health (Job 1.22), than the loss of his children (1.11)? Hearing Job talk, it isn’t until the second round of speeches that this godly man even mentions his children: “Surely He has now exhausted […]
PHall | February 6, 2015
My relative was schizophrenic. Those who suffer, endure mentally twisted hallucinations and delusions forming false realities. Making this practical, pain can make us experience what I’ll call “sane schizophrenia,” producing unearthly realities. Pain can produce an irrationality of hope superseding human experience. This pained induced thinking then enables us to expand beyond man’s reality, to […]
PHall | February 4, 2015
Sitting in a court room, the accused is dressed to look respectable; looking respectable looks innocent. The defendant tries to look calm. Each is faking serenity while someone else is deciding their future. Sitting there, they appear to be in total control, while the reality is control is totally out of the grasp. Job feels […]
PHall | January 27, 2015
Pain brings rash words. That is the explanation – or rationalization – of Job to Eliphaz (Job 6.3). He does what is so easily and commonly done; He blames God: “Surely the arrows of the Almighty have pierced me; my spirit drinks of their poison. God’s terrors are arrayed against me” (Job 6.4). Job’s physical […]
PHall | January 22, 2015
Waking up with something physically wrong with my right eye, I thought it was a stye. Hourly, my face’s right side deteriorated. Only 20 years old, I called home panicking and frightened. The entire right side of my face was becoming paralyzed. While traumatic, it was compounded by the fact I was considering becoming a […]
PHall | January 6, 2015
Shooting basketball, my mother walked onto our deck to tell me “Grandmother” died. She was my great-grandmother. I stopped for a few seconds, and then started shooting again. She was the first person related to me who died. I was young, and only met her a few times. One day at college I got a […]
PHall | December 17, 2014
If you knew death was quickly approaching, how would you spend your last days? Nehemiah has served as governor for 12 years (Nehemiah 1.1; 5.14; 13.6). The last chapter of this topical biography is saying good bye to its readers; and sounds like what a good last few days should be: filled with corrections, reflections […]
PHall | December 15, 2014
Have you prayed the Bible? Have you taken entire books or significant sections as an outline for your prayer? This is amazingly what we see the Levites doing in Nehemiah 9. They had just “read from the book of the law of the LORD their God for a fourth of the day and spent another […]