Blogs by Phil Ryken

Fire and water.  That's what my friend went through when her Philadelphia apartment building was devastated by fire.  First came the fire and the smoke.  Fortunately, even though it happened in the middle of the night, there was enough time... continue

Revelation 12 contains mysterious symbols with seemingly unfathomable meanings.  One is reminded of Ambrose Bierce's famous definition of Revelation as "a famous book in which St John the Divine concealed all that he knew. The revealing is done by the... continue

The apostle Paul is well known for writing letters with an indicative/imperative structure--his New Testament epistles.  The indicative comes first, as Paul tells us what God has done for us in Christ.  The imperative comes next.  In this section of... continue

I saw them over the forest: two golden eagles, cavorting in the wind.  When I first spied them they were still low enough to identify, and they flapped from time to time in order to stay aloft.But the eagles were... continue

So far, so good.  At a time of personal desperation, when his life was hanging in the balance, Hezekiah threw himself on the mercy of God and prayed that he would not die, but live.  God heard the king's prayer... continue

When Paul wrote about love in 1 Corinthians 13, he was not trying to give people something nice to read at weddings (although it is nice to read at weddings). Instead, he was trying desperately to show a church full of... continue

The plagues that God brought upon Egypt were designed to defeat the gods and goddesses of the Egyptian pantheon. For example, by turning the dust into bugs (Exod. 8:16-19), God was claiming his authority over the very soil of Egypt, and... continue

The plenty of the harvest is inversely proportional to the number of harvesters. "The laborers are few," Jesus said (Luke 10:2). Not many people are willing to do the hard labor of the gospel: sowing seeds of salvation by sharing the... continue

What is the meaning of the miracle in Luke 9:10-17, when Jesus fed more than five thousand people? The most obvious meaning of this miracle is that God will provide. As he provided for his people in the wilderness, so he... continue

Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh with a simple demand: "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: 'Let my people go, so that they may hold a festival to me in the desert' " (Exod. 5:1).  These... continue