What About Santa?

On Saturday we had sirens blaring as fire truck and police trundled down our street. No, not a disaster, it was Santa in the fire truck waving and throwing out sweets to the neighborhood children that flocked out to greet him. It happens every year in our neighborhood. What place does Santa have in the Christian’s Christmas? Does he have a place at all? In a recent newsletter about writing for children I saw an article about Britain and the new range of comics called Christmas Crackers. These comics feature Santa and snowmen integrated into the Nativity story. These were … Continue reading

Starting Your Own Personal Bible Study: Part 4

Read Part 1 Read Part 2 Read Part 3 So you have figured out what type of Bible study you want to do, where to start, and even how to study, but how much should you study? The amount of time I spend on my personal Bible study varies from day to day. If I am doing a type of study where I have determined that I am reading a certain number of chapters, then my study lasts as long as it takes to get through the material, usually no more than fifteen minutes. If I want to do a … Continue reading

Starting Your Own Personal Bible Study: Part 3

Read Part 1 Read Part 2 In my two previous blogs on personal Bible study I wrote about different types of study as well as where to begin your study. This blog will focus on how to study. This is a fairly broad topic because there are many different approaches that you might take to studying the Bible. Ways to Study the Bible Simply read the text. This is the most straightforward method of study, but in the same sense it is not necessarily a deep study. In this type of study I would recommend that you read through a … Continue reading

Starting Your Own Personal Bible Study: Part 2

Read Part 1 Previously I explained two different types of personal Bible study: sequential and topical. In this blog I’m going to write about where you might want to start your personal Bible study. If you are doing a topical study I recommend starting with a study about God’s Word. Start by searching for scriptures about what God’s Word is and does. A study of the Word of God will be a great foundation for any further study you may do of the Bible. I strongly suggest using a concordance to help you find verses. This shortcut will save you … Continue reading