Walla Walla University Good Word Broadcasts Walla Walla University Good Word

Relevant Bible Verses: Isaiah 7

Leading Question: How does the Lord work with those who are disobedient?

Our lesson this week focuses on Isaiah 7, an event that takes place entirely during the reign of Ahaz, the only truly “bad” king of the four under who Isaiah ministered. According to the narrative in 2 Kings 16, Ahaz was far from the ideal. “He even made his son pass through fire” (16:3). Furthermore he made significant changes in the temple and worship services because of altar he had seen in Damascus when he went there to meet Tiglath-pileser, the Assyrian king.

Would the ...

Relevant Bible Verses: Isaiah 6

Leading Question: To what extent is God prepared to twist our arms – as he did Isaiah’s – in order to persuade us to enter his service?
In this lesson we tussle with three issues:
1. The nature of God’s call: coercive or freely chosen?

2. The relationship between civil leadership and sacred leadership: Does prophetic authority depend on a strong civil leader, i.e. king?

3. What does it mean when God’s preaching and teaching only hardens the human heart?

1. Nature of God’s call. In order to properly evaluate God’s call to Isaiah, we need to compare his call ...

Relevant Bible Verses: Isaiah 1, 5

Leading Question: “Was Israel’s place as God’s chosen people irrevocable?”

The book of Isaiah is a pivotal books in the Old Testament. It contains so many passages that have been applied to Jesus, that is has sometimes been called “the fifth Gospel,” as noted by D. J. Wiseman, General Editor of the Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries, in the “General Preface” to Isaiah in the TOTC series .

I should note here that Motyer’s commentary is a worthy companion for our studies in Isaiah this quarter. Motyer is ...

Leading Question: The hope of restoration is a vibrant one in the New Testament, but what does that hope look like in the Old?

The official studyguide does not address the differences between the Old Testament hope and that of the New Testament. In this lesson, we will look first at the New Testament hope, its points of contact with the Old, and explore ways of bringing the two together:
Key New Testament Passages:
John 3:16 (NRSV): 16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may ...

Leading Question: How does one experience the Sabbath as a gift instead of a test?

I am intrigued by the fact that a lesson on “Sabbath” is included in this series on “Education.” Maybe because university life is so intense that the editor decided that it would be good to focus on the blessing of the sabbath. I recall a story told me by a colleague in the English Department at Walla Walla University.

When she was in graduate school she had been with a group of fellow graduate students on Friday afternoon. As sundown approached, she began to put her ...

Leading Question: What’s the agenda here: a lesson on “work” in a series on education?

Many of my students have told me that their parents have drilled it into them that they should get an education so that they don’t have to dig ditches the rest of their life. If one looks at the spectrum of “jobs” available in our world, one moves from the very concrete world of menial labor to the cerebral world of the PhD. The mental capacities of some limit limits their options. But using formal schooling as a norm can be terribly misleading. The life ...