Bible Commentaries

2 Chronicles 20:1-4 — set himself to seek Jehovah; and he proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. And Judah gathered themselves together, to seek help of Jehovah: even out of all the cities of Judah they came to seek Jehovah." The great significance of this is found in the faith of all the people of Judah who joined their king in the fervent plea for the help of the Lord. "And with some of the Ammonites" This is an accurate rendition of the Hebrew as attested by the marginal reference; but it sounds awkward, so the RSV

Job 10:18-22 — Commentary on the Bible (London: T. C. and E. C. Jack, Ltd., 1924), p. 354. We reject such comments. One may find many other similar comments in the writings of scholars regarding this chapter; but as we have noted above, there are marvelous evidences of faith and submission to God's will throughout the whole passage.

Job 39 overview — mortality, pertains to all mankind. And it is in that sublime fact that the wise man must, at last, find the explanation of all the mysteries of our earthly existence, and, "Trust our Creator in all areas, even those in which we cannot see; for we walk by faith and not by sight." It was the surpassing honor of Job that God enabled him to do that very thing.

Psalms 32:10-11 — between the wicked and the righteous. "The wicked envisioned here are the enemies of God; the righteous are those who live in the Covenant of their God. They are not perfect, but they confess their sins and acknowledge their duties in the household of faith." The Layman's Bible Commentary, Vol. 9, p. 64.

Psalms 77:20 — known persons who in some disaster, such as the sudden death of a beloved child, have turned against God in bitterness and unbelief; but such a reaction is never right. God loves his children no matter what wretched sorrows they suffer; and the heart of faith must always, "take it to the Lord in prayer." There is no consolation, utterly no help, anywhere else.

Daniel 5:30-31 — "In that night Belshazzar the Chaldean king was slain. And Darius the Mede received the kingdom, being about threescore and two years old." THE PROPHECY FULFILLED Darius did not take the Median kingdom; Darius the Mede took the kingdom for the Medo-Persians.

Matthew 4:15-16 — amazing benefit of our Lord's earthly residence in their midst. How marvelous are God's ways! Darkness has ever been a symbol of moral destitution and spiritual blindness. All people must remain in darkness until the Light shines in their hearts through faith. In the shadow of death … is an expression that occurs a number of times in the Old Testament (Job 10:21; Psalms 23:4; Jeremiah 2:6, etc.). In this place it is only a further reference to the moral and spiritual condition of the people of

Matthew 4:6 — haply thou dash thy foot against a stone. Note the same employment of doubt as an instrument in temptation. "IF" is a big word in Satan's weaponry of deceit. A paraphrase of this second temptation is as follows: "Since you have so much faith in God, that is fine; just call all the people together in the temple and perform an outstanding miracle in the sight of all. For example, you could leap from the pinnacle of the temple unhurt, and the people would instantly hail you as the Messiah.

Matthew 9:30 — adhering strictly to Christ's command (which) conduct should be regarded, not as a fault, but a merit."Richard C. Trench, op. cit., p. 215. On the other hand, interpreters of the Reformed Church see in this "a blemish in the perfectness of their faith who thus disobeyed; a fault which remained a fault, even while they recognize it as one which only grateful hearts could have committed."Ibid. This profound difference of the views of expositors is ascribed by Trench to the desire of the reformers

1 Corinthians 10:2 — Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1940), p. 97. Bruce presented the analogy between Israel and Christians thus: Their (the Christians') baptism is the antitype of Israel's passage through the Red Sea; their sacrificial feeding on Christ by faith is the antitype of Israel's nourishment with manna and the water from the rock; Christ the living Rock is their guide through the wilderness; the heavenly rest before them (the Christians) is the counterpart to the earthly Canaan which was the goal

1 Corinthians 13:3 — 338. giving the meaning of giving away all the giver's property a little bit at a time so as to reach the greatest possible number. My body to be burned … Coining as it did before the savage persecutions in which Christians were burned for their faith, this is surprising, being perhaps prophetic. Some have supposed that Paul was here thinking of the Hebrew children (Daniel 3:23), and Barclay thought it possible that Paul "referred to a famous monument in Athens called `The Indian's Tomb.'

Joshua 3:4-6 — going into the mosque to pray."Ibid. Arthur Pink's comment on this is especially good, particularly as it is related to the great bulk of current-day preaching. He said: "The hirelings harp continuously on God's grace, His promises, and naught but faith required by Him; and woefully fail to stress God's holiness, His precepts, obedience being indispensably necessary."Arthur W. Pink, op. cit., p. 72. Yes, God's grace took them over, all right, but note the part that Israel themselves played in this

1 Thessalonians 3:2 — and sent Timothy, our brother, and God's minister in the gospel of Christ, to establish you, and to comfort you concerning your faith; God's minister … Some scholars insist on translating this, "God's co-worker," as some respected manuscripts have this; however, despite the attractiveness of doing so (it would fit in so beautifully with 1 Corinthians 3:9), there

2 Thessalonians 3:5 — but it is a struggle against all the erosive elements of time, against sorrow, and temptation, and at times even against boredom; and patience is the only stabilizer powerful enough to enable an effective completion of the conflict. "Add to your faith virtue, knowledge … PATIENCE" (2 Peter 1:6).

2 Timothy 3:10 — But thou didst follow my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, longsuffering, love, patience, In this and the following verse Paul listed ten aspects of his own life which he was leaving to Timothy as an example of faithful conduct. As Spain said, "They serve as a sort of check list for Timothy to use

Titus 3:6 — New Testament Words (Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1940), p. 97. This is every man's responsibility. Although baptism is exclusively a work of Almighty God, the Lord will not perform it upon any person who does not seek it through faith and repentance. On the other hand, "the renewal of the Holy Spirit," here and in the preceding verse, is the element of the new birth which is performed by God through Christ, it being appropriate to say that the Spirit is sent both by

1 Peter 4:19 — Wherefore let them also that suffer according to the will of God commit their souls in well-doing unto a faithful Creator. Suffer according to the will of God … Throughout this letter, "suffer" is to be understood in the sense of capital punishment, and in a few instances the lesser sufferings that often preceded it. According to the will

1 Peter 5:14 — exclusively for those in Christ, i.e., his baptized followers; (2) perfection and holiness without which no one may see God are achieved by the Christian's identity as Christ; (3) the ultimate grounds of all justification for human beings is the perfect faith and perfect obedience of the Son of God; etc., etc. For full discussion of this principal theme of the New Testament, see in my Commentary on Romans, especially in Romans 3, pp. 94-154. Peter's significant mention of this doctrine in this chapter

1 John 2:19 — that "they never had been of us," but that at an unspecified previous time, they were not. This is even more clear in the last clause where the word is not that they had never been of us, but that they are not of us. Their departure from the faith became final at some point prior to their leaving; but there is no suggestion by the apostle that those who departed had never been truly converted at the beginning of their Christian association. The fallen angels were not wicked from the beginning

Revelation 5:2 — righteousness, holiness, and justice — in a word, worthiness. The great problem to be solved in human redemption was simply this: how could God injustice do it? Paul stated it thus: "That he might be just and the justifier of him that is of the faith of Jesus" (Romans 3:26). Inherent in this interpretation is the fact that the vision at this point is retrospective in time, looking to the period when the salvation of Adam's race appeared to be absolutely impossible. As Caird said, "Some