II Timothy 2:15
Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

What's New at the BRJ...

It is now available for BRJ readers to post comments on the Weblog posts for purposes of discussion. We have been searching for a system that would provide that capability for a while, and found it at html comment box. Just click on the "Discuss" link at the bottom of the page, and a text box will appear. Be aware that your comments will post immediately. Sorry, but once they are posted you cannot edit or delete them. The only thing automatically filtered is profanity. I'm going to keep an eye out, of course, and I will delete all inappropriate remarks. So long as everyone remains civil, there should be no problems. I am very much looking forward to the discussions. By the way, you may have noticed that we have also made subscriptions to the BRJ available via RSS.

All God's Best to You and Yours,
Jeff's Signature



Latest Weblog Post ...

Recessions, Depressions, and the Biblical Jubilee, Part Four
"The Math is Never Wrong" -Karl Denninger
-- Jeff, Monday 03-08-2010, 7:42 pm CST

Photo of Karl Denninger Over the course of history, things change. Cultures change, technologies change, the accepted rules of legitimacy in governance change, relative levels of prosperity change, a lot of things change. But in the field of mathematics, nothing ever changes. Whether we are talking about pre-history, ancient times, medieval times or modern times, two times two has always and will always equal four.

Yet at the beginning of this Depression, which we are living through in the United States of America and around the world, with the evidence of history staring us in the face -- from the Great Depression of the 1930s all the way back to Joseph in Egypt -- we continue to believe and act as if, somehow or other, we are "special." As if the vagaries of the past somehow don't apply to us. As if "this time is different" (a subject we will explore in depth in Part Five of this series).

In recent times the economic phenomena -- which God instituted the Jubilee Year to address in ancient Israel -- has come to be called the Long Wave. A cycle which, like the Jubilee, recurs within the mean life span of a human being. It is a cycle that ends in a depression. Always and inevitably. That is, for any economy that does not have a Jubilee in place, patterned after the biblical example in Leviticus 25. (No one outside ancient Israel ever has, BTW.). . . more>>




----- BRJ Weblog: February/March 2009 -----

The Foundation of Biblical Research -Sticky-
-- Jeff, Sunday 04-01-2007, 9:30 pm CDT

God bless you and welcome to the Biblical Research Journal. The idea of Biblical research is at odds with many preconceived notions popular nowadays. To a lot of folks, putting the term "research" in association with the word "Bible" seems like an unlikely combination . . . more>>

Rightly Dividing God's Word: Use a Rapidograph not a Barnbrush
-- Jeff, Sunday 02-21-2010, 1:10 pm CST

Back in the early 1990s I saw a a lecture on the subject of mixed-use city planning by the noted architect Andres Duany. He delivered it to a civic group here in San Antonio, and video of it was broadcast several times on San Antonio's cable TV's "Government Access" channel. The first time I saw Duany's talk it grabbed my attention. I not only watched several repeats, I also recorded it on my VCR. Unfortunately the two copies I made were misplaced over the years. And by now even if they were found, I no longer own a videotape player.

What struck me were the principles that Duany adheres to in both his critique of modern city planning and in the solutions that he offers, not just in theory but in the real world. Principles which translate well into other fields of endeavor, including the one in which workmen of the Word of God work.

At one point in the lecture, Duany reminds his fellow professionals that they are designing places "where people live." In other words, that we should not lose sight of the big picture of what our work is all about, and the results that we are answerable for when we succeed or fail. As workmen of God's Word, one thing that hinges upon our success or failure in rightly-dividing God's Word can also be characterized as, "where people live," spiritually speaking. For God and the things of God can only be known from that Word. If we hash it to pieces, people will never know God.

At another point in the lecture, talking about the tools used to draw lines when designing neighborhoods, Duany challenges professionals to "use a pencil, use a pen," not "a magic marker." Because the lines that are drawn in urban planning must be fine lines. Likewise in studying to show ourselves approved unto God as workmen, not only must the lines we draw be bright, they must also be fine. When too often in my experience -- much too often -- workmen of the Word of God are drawing lines using a barn brush where they ought to be using a rapidograph.

There are other important princples that Duany illustrates in his lecture. So once in a while, remembering it, I had hoped to find one of the videotapes so I take it to a shop and have it transfered it to DVD. Gladly, now I don't have to find it. Because evidently during this Information Revolution that our society appears to be in, not a whole lot information-wise gets lost. I found the video of Duany's lecture, delivered to a small group in San Antonio all those years ago, on NuHerbAndIzm's Channel on YouTube. Cool! I believe that readers of the BRJ will enjoy viewing this lecture (and go ahead, TAKE NOTES!), which is presented in nine parts that last less than ninety minutes all tolled...

. . . more>>

Picture of Thomas Jefferson The "Kingdom Theology" Counterfeit, Part Two
And the Biblical Basis for American Liberty
-- Jeff, Thursday 02-18-2010, 5:30 pm CST

Some people may think that I was exaggerating, when I wrote in Part One that, "Kingdom Theology, in practical terms, is nothing less than an attempt by the Adversary to erect a fundamentalist so-called 'Christian' establishment of religion, in violation of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. Akin to what the fundamentalist Muslims are after in the Muslim world."

I have honestly considered it, but no I do not think am guilty of exaggeration. Especially after reading online last weekend in the New York Times Magazine about what some of the Kingdom Theology boosters are up to in the state where I live. The story, titled "How Christian Were the Founders?" and written by Russell Shorto, reports on the machinations of what Mr. Shorto calls "the Christian bloc" that sits on the Texas State Board of Education -- a bloc which actually ought to be called "the Kingdom Theology Bloc."

One of the primary reasons that the United States still enjoys the most spiritual light of any nation on earth, is because for longer than any other, this land has recognized its citizens' LIBERTY to make up their own minds on spiritual matters more than elsewhere. A liberty whose roots are deeply planted in God's rightly-divided Word. But just because we enjoy a lot of spiritual light today in the United States, that does not mean that we will enjoy it tomorrow.

The price of liberty is eternal vigilance. And for a nation whose citizens are falling asleep at the wheel, "today" can quite rapidly become "yesterday."

Traditionally both Protestants and Catholics in the United States -- whether evangelical or mainstream theologically, whether conservative or liberal politically -- have understood the importance to American Liberty of the First Amendment's prohibition against a governmental establishment of religion. Over most of the course the history of the United States, they have understood that the power of governments, and therefore the power of state-sponsored religions, resides solely in their power to coerce compliance. And that genuine Christianity, if it has any power at all, that power resides in the Faith's ability to persuade the human heart to believe.

At best the unwitting boosters of Kingdom Theology dogma are naive johnny-come-latelies. Sheep, shepherded and sheared by media personalities and reprobates of their ilk behind pulpits. Shepherds, who have forsaken God's Word -- along with any minimal standards of human decency -- for a craven pursuit of worldly power and influence. Not to mention the money that goes along with that power and influence, especially if you can drag enough hapless Christians along behind you in your train.. . more>>

bookcover of Learned Optimism "How to Change Your Mind and Your Life"
BOOK REVIEW: Learned Optimism, by Martin E. P. Seligman, Ph.D.
-- Jeff, Tuesday 11-08-2009, 4:15 pm CST

In medical research, there are three kinds of evidence that are considered to determine the effectiveness of a particular treatment. The least valuable is anecdotal evidence. More valuable, is clinical evidence. But only a treatment that has been proven by controlled studies can be said to have been proven scientifically.

Anecdotal evidence would be evidence along the lines of, "My sister-in-law said that her Aunt Gertrude drank Mr. Fletcher's Real Crabgrass Tea for two weeks and the wart fell off her nose." Clinical evidence would be reports by physicians about how often warts fall off the noses of patients who are known to drink Mr. Fletcher's tea, whether on their own initiative or by the doctor's recommendation. But controlled studies must involve double-blind experiments -- which any researcher who cares to can verify independently -- of the effect that crabgrass tea has on making nose warts fall off.

It was eye opening some years ago to discover a book by Martin E. P. Seligman, who is the director of the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania, called Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life. In it I discovered that the Biblical principles of the renewed mind -- which I was introduced to in Dr. Victor Paul Wierwille's "Power for Abundant Living" class and learned more in-depth in Rev. Walter Cummins' "Renewed Mind" class -- have been proven in controlled studies using double-blind experiments involving people suffering from or at risk of psychological depression.

As a matter of fact, in the class I teach on the subject, "The Renewed Mind: Principles, Keys and Skills," next to the Bible, Learned Optimism is the textbook . . . more>>

Washington Praying at Valley Forge The "Kingdom Theology" Counterfeit, Part One
And How the Camel Gets His Nose Under the Tent
-- Jeff, Tuesday 11-03-2009, 3:30 pm CST
UPDATED: Monday 09-03-2010, 9:44 am CST

Sorry, but just because you publish a picture of George Washington praying next to the quote "Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord," like the one that was published in The Way Magazine years ago, that does not make the United States of America God's nation.

The verse, from which the quote was pulled, says in its entirety:

Psalm 33:12
Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance.

There has been and will only ever be one, and only one, nation whose God is the Lord. There has been and will only ever be one, and only one, people that the Lord chose for His own inheritance as a people. And it is not -- I repeat -- IT IS NOT THE U.S.A. OR THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. Never has been. Never will be. . . . more>>

photo of Gizmo "The Root of All Evil" or "A Root of All Evil"?
The Definite vs. Indefinite Article in I Timothy 6:10
-- Jeff, Tuesday 10-27-2009, 6:30 am CDT

In the English language there is a vast difference in meaning between the definite and indefinite article. For instance if I say, "This photo is the illustration (definite article) of the gizmo," I may well mean that that the photo I am referring to represents the one-and-only illustration of it that exists. But if I say, "This photo is an illustration (indefinite article) of the gizmo," I am implying that this may be only one illustration among some number of others.

When using the English definite and indefinite articles to translate the Greek New Testament, the workman of the Word of God immediately encounters a puzzle common to all translation work. And that is the fact that different languages have varying levels of available specificity among their possible usages . . . more>>

Audio Teaching by Victor Paul Wierwille
"Riches For Power" Sunday Night Service Teaching STS 641, November 11, 1973
-- posted by Jeff, Friday 04-02-2009, 3:35 pm CDT

Dr. Wierwille explains what's behind the "love of money," a most timely subject from the Word of God, given the events that are unfolding in our world today. Formatted in mp3 . . .

"Riches for Power": Part One · Part Two · Part Three · Part Four

By the way, all of Dr. Wierwille's Sunday Night Service teachings are available at the website That Ye May Know.

Threshing_Grain_with_Oxen Recessions, Depressions, and the Biblical Jubilee, Part Three
The Business Cycle Then and Now
-- Jeff, Tuesday 02-17-2009, 6:30 pm CST

It is impossible to rightly-divide the twenty-fifth chapter of Leviticus -- or any of the rest of Bible from Genesis 1:1 to Revelation 22:21 -- without keeping straight "to whom" it is addressed. God is not addressing the Christian church, much less present-day governments or central banks, in Leviticus 25. Rather, via Moses, God gave these commands to Israel as it existed 3,500 years ago as an agrarian and pastoral society.

So Leviticus 25 doesn't offer prescriptions that can be adapted wholesale by, say, the United States Federal Reserve, the Bank of England or The People's Bank of China as a cure-all for what ails today's industrial and information-age economies. What we can learn from this chapter in God's Word, rather, are the principles upon which the specifics in Leviticus 25 are based . . . more>>

Photo of earth from space Recessions, Depressions, and the Biblical Jubilee, Part Two
God Made the Earth to be Inhabited
-- Jeff, Sunday 11-02-2008, 10:30 am CST

Hey now, hold on one doggon minute there, Professor. I thought Jesus Christ declared in John 10:10 that he came so we might 'have life' and 'have it more abundantly'. So what is this in Part One about 'scarcity' as a 'basic premise'? Sounds off the Word to me. ON GUARD!"

Oh, definitely. Time to be on guard. Scarcity may be the basic premise of economics, but economics is a senses-based social science. In fact, all of science is senses-based, which makes for a wide margin of error to say the least. Furthermore, because human nature is an inescapable factor in the science of economics -- unlike in the hard science of physics, for instance -- the margin for error increases so much the more.

Take gravity, as observed by a physicist. Human nature has no bearing whatsoever on how fast a falling object accelerates. But when it comes to supply and demand, as observed by an economist, human nature has tremendous bearing . . . more>>

Chart of Supply and Demand Curves Recessions, Depressions, and the Biblical Jubilee, Part One
Part One: Scarcity
-- Jeff, Friday 10-24-2008, 5:30 pm CDT

By now, it's no secret that the American and world economies have, all of a sudden, begun to experience widespread turmoil. Talk of a global recession, and even the possibility of a depression -- as bad or worse than the Great Depression of the 1930s -- is being heard from the highest governmental authorities in the country.

God declares in II Peter 1:3 that He, "...hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue." And in Psalm 119:130 that, "The entrance of thy [God's] words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple."

Clearly, God and His Son Jesus Christ do not want us left in the dark -- without an understanding of the situations that we face in this life. It is the Word of God alone -- on this subject as all others -- which stands as a beacon of light that can pierce through the darkness of this world, and deliver us from all our fears.

So does the Bible actually have something to say about recessions and depressions? . . . more>>

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