Tommy Mann

Is the New Testament part of the inspired Bible? While there is far more that can be said then I have room to share here, I think there is an interesting piece of evidence slipped into 1 Timothy 5:8. After Paul said an elder is deserving of his pay from the church, he went on to say: "For the Scripture says, 'You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain,' and, 'The laborer deserves his wages.'”  Paul is clearly quoting Scripture. The reference to muzzling an ox comes from Deuteronomy 25. That was part of the old law, and verses like 2 Timothy 3:16 tell us "all Scripture" was breathed out by God. The Jews had collected all the books we call the Old Testament, and they viewed them as inspired writings from God through human authors, and thus incapable of containing errors. But Paul didn't just include Deuteronomy when he wrote "For the Scripture says." The second phrase about the laborer deserving his wages was a quote from Jesus re...

King Solomon had a lot to say about ancient landmarks, and how they should not be moved. This might make us think about people who deface or even topple statues, something that we have seen a rise in of late. But that is not what Solomon had in mind. The landmarks referred to boundary markers that separated one person's property line from another. You might know where your land ends and your neighbor's begins because there is a fence separating your lots, but during the days of the Bible people piled up stones for that purpose. If you wanted to expand your territory, all you had to do was move the stones a little farther onto your neighbor's side. If you wanted more land to farm or more room for cattle to graze, you could deceive your neighbor by moving the stones. This was considered one of the most heinous of offenses, but it happened.   So in Proverbs 23:10-11 Solomon wrote, "Do not move an ancient landmark or enter the fields of the fatherless, for their Redeemer i...

Have you ever watched a controlled demolition? I have never seen one in person, but several times the local news has shown an old building come down. Dynamite is strategically placed throughout the building, and when it is detonated, the building will implode and come crumbling down. It is really amazing how quickly a dilapidated structure can be leveled, especially when you think about how long it took to erect it. People spent months planning and drawing, then carefully constructing until the building was finished; sometimes it takes years to move from a concept to completion.  Years to build, and gone in minutes.  There are two types of crews involved in this lifecycle of a building: the construction crew and the demolition crew. One specializes in building up and the other in blowing up.  It seems that people can be divided into those same two groups. Some people love to build others up, and some, it seems, enjoy tearing others down. Our words have the power to do bot...

In school we learned about the process of metamorphosis, where a caterpillar becomes a butterfly. On average, a caterpillar will spend about two weeks in a cocoon before it emerges looking like an entirely different creature. The before and after picture are quite stark.  The word metamorphosis is not just in our textbooks, but in the Bible as well. In Mark 9:2 we read, "And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them." The word translated as transfigured is the Greek word metamorpho.   (Matthew also uses the word metamorpho , and together, these are the only two times that word appears in the Bible) On the mountain Jesus underwent a metamorphosis, completely changing His appearance. It did not happen gradually over two weeks; He did not enter a cocoon in order to change. The Greek text indic...

It is that time of year again where there is plenty of work to be done outside. Just yesterday I was weed eating and got myself into a tangled web of thorny vines, which poked me through my clothes, and stuck into my skin. I am yet to meet a person who likes thorns; instead, I hear people jokingly blame Adam for the very existence of these nuisances.  There is someone in the Bible who notoriously disliked thorns, and that was Paul. In 2 Corinthians 12:7 he wrote, "So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited." What was this thorn in his flesh? There has been much speculation over the centuries, but the truth is we do not know. Using a thorn as a metaphor, Paul complained that something was bothering him. This thorn "was given to" him from God to keep him humble, and yet it was a messenger of Satan. It seems that Go...

We don't use the word naughty very often, but when we do, we are usually thinking of one of the two lists found in the North Pole. "He's making a list, he's checking it twice, he's gonna find out who's naughty and nice." We associate the word with disobedience, or the opposite of being nice. But naughty actually derives from the Old English naught, which means zero, or having no value. The King James uses that word in Proverbs 6:12: "A naughty person, a wicked man, walketh with a froward mouth." The ESV says worthless rather than naughty.  A person who is naught-y is a worthless person, someone who contributes nothing because he is living in sin.   On the other end of the spectrum, just a few verses later, is the haughty person. Verse 16 says there are seven things the Lord hates, and the first one on the list is haughty eyes, which is an old way of referring to pride and arrogance, someone who never drops his gaze, but turns his nose up in the a...