What Has God Actually Promised? 20 Truths from the Psalms
“Over and over again, the psalmists reveal that their hope and faith in God rests not in prophetic promises of how God will remove the current struggle, but in the promise of who he is. Even in moments where the writer uses words like ‘deliverance’ and ‘salvation’, we have no idea of the timeframe, severity, or nature of the promised divine action. Like the writers of old, we too rarely receive specific promises stating that the cancer will go into remission, the work conflict will subside, or the support money will come in on time. In these trying moments of waiting and wanting, it is our knowledge of the character of our Heavenly Father that shapes our hope in the promises of who God is for his people.” What Has God Actually Promised? 20 Truths from the Psalms by William R. Osborne
Do Our Prayers Change God’s Mind?
“What good is praying to a God whose will is sovereign? Does prayer change God’s mind? Most answers on offer seem to result either in a diminishment of God’s sovereignty, or a gutting of the power and relational meaning of prayer. We need not rest satisfied with such answers. Indeed, we need not accept without critique the questions in the first place, for they reflect a few common and critical missteps in approaching the relation between God’s sovereignty and our prayer.” Do Our Prayers Change God’s Mind? by Daniel J. Brendsel
When Justice Feels Far
“I bet you’ve breathed long enough to see injustice. Our chests tighten as the question of justice sticks in our minds like a bee stinger hard to remove. So, we who follow a just God turn to him and ask “How is this just?” We know he rules. We know he is good and righteous. We see the discrepancy between God’s character and this world, and we want to know if he is doing anything. We’re not alone in these questions. They are the questions God’s people have been asking for millennia. We stand in their legacy as we ask, and we can read what the Lord spoke to them in the Scriptures to know what he would say to us as well.” - When Justice Feels Far, by Taylor Turkington