John Goldingay
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Choice
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Choice
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The Choice RUTH 1:10-19a When my wife’s multiple sclerosis was first diagnosed, I wrote to tell her pastor, who had also been a mentor of mine. I remember reading his reply. He told us how that morning he happened to have been studying the story of Jesus’ making the water into wi…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - How Naomi's Life Falls Apart
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - How Naomi's Life Falls Apart
by SPCK - John Goldingay
How Naomi’s Life Falls Apart RUTH 1:1-9 One Sunday in the church to which we belonged in England that story was the set Old Testament passage on a day when I was due to preach. My default instinct is to look to the Old Testament passage as the one on which to preach (someone has …
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - How Not to Save the Situation
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - How Not to Save the Situation
by SPCK - John Goldingay
How Not to Save the Situation JUDGES 21:1-25 The story goes that in 1941, on the eve of the U.S. entry into the 1939–1945 war, two teenage ham radio operators who had joined the U.S. National Guard were enrolled into the army and were trained in “scrambling” messages to try to av…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Story Reaches Its Lowest Point (II)
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Story Reaches Its Lowest Point (II)
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The Story Reaches Its Lowest Point (II) JUDGES 20:1-48 For some years now there has been ongoing tension between Russia and Georgia. Sometimes it seems open to being characterized as a little comical; Russia banned the import of Georgian wine on the grounds that it did not meet p…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Story Reaches Its Lowest Point (I)
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Story Reaches Its Lowest Point (I)
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The Story Reaches Its Lowest Point (I) JUDGES 19:1-30 One of the Oscar contenders at the time I write is the movie Precious, the story of a teenager whose life is characterized by systematic abuse in the context of her family, including rape and incest on the part of her father a…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Desperate Dan
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Desperate Dan
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Desperate Dan JUDGES 18:1-31 When we were in the midst of agreeing to come to California for me to teach here, one of our students at my seminary in England sensed God saying to her one day in chapel, “Tell John, ‘Judges 18:6.’” “I don’t know what it says,” she replied. “Never mi…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - But Samson's Hair Began to Grow Again
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - But Samson's Hair Began to Grow Again
by SPCK - John Goldingay
But Samson’s Hair Began to Grow Again JUDGES 16:22-31 The first time I went to Israel, I took part in an exciting archaeological dig. Just next to a tennis club in the big modern city of Tel Aviv on the Mediterranean, where people started playing at 6:00 a.m. because it would be …
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Love Actually
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Love Actually
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Love Actually JUDGES 16:1-21 After the incident a few weeks ago when a man on a plane bound for Detroit tried to blow up himself and the plane as an act of terrorism against the United States and the Western world in general, an extraordinary piece of background to the event emer…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Honey, We Solved the Riddle
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Honey, We Solved the Riddle
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Honey, We Solved the Riddle JUDGES 14:1- 15:20 Only trivial things went wrong at our wedding. Admittedly, for Ann and me it was a narrow escape. At one stage her father said he would not come; that was the degree to which he disapproved of me. I had long hair, like Samson (being …
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - When God Finds It Hard to Be Tough
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - When God Finds It Hard to Be Tough
by SPCK - John Goldingay
When God Finds It Hard to Be Tough JUDGES 10:1- 11:29 In my prayers each day (well, most days, to be honest), I pray either for the nation or for the church in our nation. I do so against the background of the fact that nations grow and triumph and then decline and fall, and that…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Entertaining Angels Unawares
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Entertaining Angels Unawares
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Entertaining Angels Unawares JUDGES 13:1- 25 Some friends of mine have just become pregnant. I am not accustomed to using that verb in the first-person plural; when I was young, it was only women who got pregnant, but now it is a joint operation. There is a certain appropriatenes…
Joshua, judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Man Whose Promise Makes the Blood Run Cold
Joshua, judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Man Whose Promise Makes the Blood Run Cold
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The man Whose Promise Makes the Blood Run Cold JUDGES 11:30- 12:15 There was a story in the news recently about a man who was reversing his car in his drive and accidentally ran over his child who was playing there. Another story related how a mother who had apparently been drink…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - It's Over Even When It's Not Over
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - It's Over Even When It's Not Over
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The Importance of a Game Plan JOSHUA 8: 1-21 Three weeks ago I went to my first American football game. It was also my first experience of tailgating in the warm sunshine and of eating breakfast burritos, which (accompanied by mimosas) were perhaps the highlight of the day. I was…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Importance of a Game Plan
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - The Importance of a Game Plan
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The Importance of a Game Plan JOSHUA 8: 1-21 Three weeks ago I went to my first American football game. It was also my first experience of tailgating in the warm sunshine and of eating breakfast burritos, which (accompanied by mimosas) were perhaps the highlight of the day. I was…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Coveting Can Kill
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Coveting Can Kill
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Coveting Can Kill JOSHUA 7: 16-26 Today (as I am writing this) is Black Friday, when the stores hope to get their books into the black as the year draws toward an end. People will have been lining up all night or will have got up at crazily early hours to get a plasma TV for a hu…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Who Are the Real Canaanites?
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Who Are the Real Canaanites?
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Who Are the Real Canaanites JOSHUA 6: 22- 7: 15 I have tried being confrontational with God, but it doesn’t work very well because God is capable of being confrontational back (as Job found). Once when I was fretting over my wife’s illness, I said to God, “I don’t really trust yo…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Come Blow Your Horn
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Come Blow Your Horn
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Come Blow Your Horn JOSHUA 6: 1-21 In New Orleans over the weekend for a meeting (I have such a hard job) I talked with Tom Wright, author of The New Testament for Everyone series, and with staff from the publishers. I remarked that the most demanding aspect of this project is ha…
Joshua, Judges and Ruth for Everyone - Which Side Are You On? Neither