In The Book of Exodus: Explorations in Christian Theology, scholar Ed Gallagher examines how the Book of Exodus served as the foundation for several themes and passages within the New Testament. Each chapter charts the movement of a character, theme, or passage from the Book of Exodus through later Jewish and Christian interpretations, with special emphasis on how the New Testament used those people, stories, or texts to explain various aspects of the Gospel. Written for t...

*To understand the Lord better and what he expects of his followers, then we need to understand what Scripture teaches about the church—the community of believers he left behind. The Ekklesia of Christ will bless you as you seek to be salt and light to your community. It will invigorate you with the exhilarating message of the kingdom of God. It will empower you to fulfill the mission that God has entrusted to his people.The Berean Study Series is a practical resource, consisting o...

The declaration that Jesus is "both Christ and Lord" is the culmination of Peter's sermon on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2, but what does such a declaration mean? How would Peter's audience have understood the idea of a "Christ" or "Messiah" or "anointed one"? How did Peter himself understand the term, when he first made the confession "You are the Christ" in response to Jesus's question, "Who do you say that I am?" We know that the phrase "Jesus Christ," ubiquitous in the New Testament, ...

What is the Christian life supposed to look like? What kinds of things ought Christians to be doing? In this book-designed as a simple, biblical study for teachers of Bible classes and small groups-Gallagher focuses on the human response to God's offer of grace. With chapters on the labels applied to Christians in the New Testament (e.g., "brothers and sisters," "disciples," "saints"), basic elements of the Christian religion (e.g., faith, repentance, baptism), along with the importance of...

The issue of what real Christianity looks like presses on believers from multiple sides. If we are going to maintain this historic faith, what does that faith look like in a changing world, and what will it look like a decade from now, or a century? Is the religion that is spreading around the globe now, the same as what Jesus preached? However difficult the parables of Jesus are to understand, they are much more difficult to put into practice. Lessons about mercy and compassion, or respon...

God first reveals his ethical demands to Israel through the Ten Commandments, which serve as the first and foundational summary of God's covenant with his people. These commandments guided the ethical reflections of Jesus (Mark 7:10), Paul (Rom 13:8-10; Eph 6:1-4), and James (2:8-13). Instructions for Living explores how the Ten Commandments continue to teach Christians about their God and how they ought to love God and their neighbors.The Berean Study Series

Perhaps the single most common admonition in Scripture is the call for God's people to express faithfulness in their lives and in their relationship with God. Just as Isaiah encouraged Ahaz to "stand firm in the faith or you will not stand at all" (Isa 7:9), God demands the same from each of us. The Bible is full of examples of faith, but perhaps more than any other chapter, Hebrews 11 exemplifies and extols the life of faith. Cloud of Witnesses: Ancient Stories of Faith examines ...

What is the grace of God? What does that term signify? Unfortunately, the word "grace"-like "church" and "atonement"-might be one of those church-y words that people throw around and don't really understand, a word that does more to obscure than to reveal. In Visions of Grace, thirteen lessons as stories from scripture help illuminate grace, to present a vision of it, or, rather, a series of visions. This study will invite you to live graciously and gratefully in response to God's bounteou...

Designed as a resource for church Bible classes and personal study, The Sermon on the Mount: Explorations in Christian Practice (Cypress Bible Study Series)carefully considers how Jesus' most famous sermon presents the life of a disciple. Scholar Ed Gallagher argues that the Sermon on the Mount is full of difficult sayings from Jesus that make Christians squirmy even to discuss, partly because his sayings are not quite difficult enough. If only they were too difficult to understan...