The interpretation of Scripture is called hermeneutics. Our approach to hermeneutics will always be influenced by our worldview, our own culture, and the presuppositions we bring to the task.

This month we celebrate Easter. Whoops! Why do we label our most holy holiday with its pagan obfuscation? It is at this time that we celebrate the very Gospel itself: "...how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; that He was buried; and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures."

Have you ever wished you could win a lottery? Or inherit a great fortune? We all have indulged in fantasies of one kind or another. And yet, we have already won an inheritance that is beyond our comprehension! An inheritance that transcends any quantitative measurement.

In the late 19th century, Charles B. Huleatt, an Egyptologist, acquired three small fragments of papyrus that were unearthed in Upper Egypt and subsequently bequeathed them to his Alma Mater, Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1901.

The Second Epistle of John is among the most neglected books of the New Testament. It, like his third epistle, is simply a short personal letter from the Apostle. There is little doubt that the Apostle John was the author, but there are a number of conjectures as to whom it was written: someone called "the Elect Lady."

In our series of articles on the current Biotech Revolution, certainly the most controversial area is that of "cloning," the common vernacular for nuclear transplant techniques. The British Parliament has recently approved laws to allow research using stem cells from human embryos to develop new medical treatments, overruling opposition from those who said it was a step toward human cloning.

Job was a wealthy person, and an inventory of his holdings is provided at the beginning of the book:

The famed foiling of the wicked plot of Haman to blot out the Jews is, of course, one of the more dramatic narratives in the Bible. In addition to the many twists in the plot, there are also some surprises hidden behind the text itself. It is significant that the name of the book itself, Esther, means "something hidden"!

This tiny four-chapter romance has been venerated in college classes for its elegance as literature, but it also reveals a craftsmanship of prophetic anticipation unrivaled anywhere in Scripture.

While there continue to be many serious hurdles yet to be overcome, after over 60 years of research on animals such as sea urchins, frogs and mice, the cloning of commercially relevant mammals finally seems feasible.

Have you ever been puzzled by the inscriptions that are attached to some of the Psalms? This has puzzled scholars for centuries, and yet the key may have been in the Biblical text all along.

The Book of Joshua is a book of adventure and conquest - even the days were not long enough for his battles! His name is the same as Jesus, but in Hebrew rather than Greek: Yeho-Shua, or Joshua.

Selah does connect the end of one strophe with the beginning of the next; and, in four cases it connects the end of one Psalm with the beginning of the next, thus uniting the two Psalms (Ps 3 with 4; 9 with 10; 24 with 25; and 46 with 47).

Here is a book of the Bible which is among the least studied and the most emotionally controversial. It's a book with only 117 verses and 470 Hebrew words, yet it is among the most difficult and mysterious books in the entire Bible. It's a book about lovemaking from an author who had 700 wives and 300 concubines (women who took his heart away from the Lord).

The twentieth century has been marked by a rapid growth in knowledge, and the twenty-first will be stranger than we can possibly imagine.  The explosive advances in science and technology have already gone far beyond what even science fiction writers once thought possible.

The avalanche of advances in the current biotech revolution is both exciting and frightening. The promise of new remedies and cures in many diverse fields of medicine has given new hope to many sufferers, but is also increasingly being accompanied with forebodings by some observers. Many fear that the biotechnologists may prove to be the "Sorcerer's Apprentices" of the 21st century.

The Epistle to the Hebrews is one of the two greatest theological treatises of the New Testament.1 This letter is, in a real sense, the "Leviticus" of the New Testament, detailing how the Lord Jesus Christ is both the fulfillment and the successor to all that had gone on before.

There have been some fascinating developments in the fight against disease that also portend some astonishing prophetic perspectives.

In view of the continuing tensions on the world scene, it is interesting to reflect on other November dates in history:

Here is one of the bravest and most tender, yet most pathetic figures in all history: a patriot as well as a prophet.

A recent article in the Los Angeles Times highlighted that U.S. archaeologists have found the remains of a 7,500-year-old building more than 300 feet below the surface of the Black Sea. This is being heralded by some as the strongest evidence yet of a catastrophic flood similar to the one portrayed in the Biblical account of Noah's ark.

Every seventh year, Israeli farmers are faced with a sabbatical year for the land (called Shmitta in Hebrew):

One of the strangest episodes recorded in the Word of God is King Saul's consulting a witch (after having ostensibly cleansed the land of Israel from this occultic practice). The Halloween holiday seems like an appropriate time to review the implications of this puzzling tale.

Often I will ask an audience, "How many of you are saved?" And, of course, most of the hands will go up. (It is, in that setting, the politically correct response!)

With an election coming next month - and one that may prove to be a "watershed" for the future of the Republic - it is an appropriate time to review the realities we are facing.

Many of us fail to really appreciate the remarkable - yet often misunderstood - epistle written by Jacob to the descendants of Israel. (Jacob means the supplanter; heel-catcher; tripper-up. It is Ya'kov in Hebrew, translated Jacobos in Greek, Jacques in French, Iago in Italian, Diego in Spanish, and James in English.)

As this issue goes to press, the entire world is wondering what is going to happen to Jerusalem. About 2,500 years ago, the prophet Zechariah recorded God's predictions regarding this troubled city:

It has been popular to presume that the "fig tree" is a reference to Israel. That view was further popularized by Hal Lindsey's best seller, The Late Great Planet Earth, and Ed Weisenant's 88 Reasons that Jesus would return in 1988. The idea was that since Israel was restored to statehood on May 14, 1948, and that a generation can be defended as 40 years, that 1988 was the year to watch.

The Prophet Ezekiel was called upon to undertake a number of strange performances, one of which was to lie on his side for a total of 430 days. Each day was expressly to represent a year of judgment against the nation.

Since the ten Hebrew names are proper names, they are not translated but only transliterated to approximate the way they were pronounced. The meaning of proper names can be a difficult pursuit since direct translations are not readily available. Many study aids, such as conventional lexicons, can prove superficial when dealing with proper names