Patriarch

 
 

  • book coverAbraham was rich, but wealth meant little to him.
  • He loved his wife, but betrayed her twice.
  • He took an army to war, but wasn’t a soldier.
  • He headed up a household, but failed to hold his family together.
  • He was a hero of faith, but all too fallible.

There are many reasons I love the Bible. I love it for its truth but also its honesty. I love it for its timeless relevance, not only for all generations throughout history, but also for my life today. I love it because through it my Father is revealed and my life exposed. I love it for showing me Jesus.

I’m so grateful to those who introduced me to the Bible as God’s Word. They taught me to revere it as holy; but not to leave it on the shelf for use on Sundays and special occasions. For more than forty years my Bible has been to hand all day every day, and I’m more dependent upon it today than ever. Now one of my consuming passions is to pass on what was given to me: a love for scripture.

Patriarch is simply my reflection upon the story of Abraham. My purpose in writing Patriarch is to send you back to the true story in Genesis 11-25, excited and expectant that the Bible has things to say into your life, and God will speak through it.

Of course Patriarch is flawed. I don’t know how many of my reflections are correct. At best they are educated and prayerful guesses. I recognise that I’ve tried to enter the mind of a man from a different culture and different age, and this can be seen at best as naïve and at worst arrogant. But Abraham was a man like us, who thought and felt as we do, and sought and discovered God as we can. I’m not claiming to have got into the mind of the man, but one thing I love about scripture is the humanity of its heroes, and the possibility this offers us to understand them, and through them, understand how God deals with us.

Give a couple of podcasts a try, read a blog or two, and see how you get on. It’s free. You could waste 45 minutes of your life, or….