John Mark Hicks

That was no place for a child. In the darkest days of Jerusalem’s despair, God told Jeremiah to neither marry nor have children (Jeremiah 16:2). That world—the world of Jerusalem’s destruction—is no place for children. All that would await them was pain, horror, gloom, dislocation, and destruction. Even now it may sometimes seem that the […]

Text: Isaiah 55 Come, listen, look and seek. Those are the main imperatives of Isaiah’s invitation. The message of Isaiah since chapter 40 has been deliverance. Just as God liberated Israel from Egyptian slavery, so now God is acting to deliver Israel from Babylonian exile. God’s chosen servant has suffered the punishment of the exile (Isaiah […]

Now that I have finished reading papers, grading exams and posting grades, I hope to have some leisure time to complete my series on Salvation and begin blogging about other topics that interest me.  However, given that this Christmas week, I want to call attention to a series of sermons that I regard as outstanding […]

When you feel forsaken or rejected,  when you feel like a failure or a piece of dirt, when you feel inadequate or deficient, when you feel unloved or unchosen, hear the word of the Lord through Isaiah the prophet Isaiah 62:2b,4,5b …you will be called by a new name        that the mouth of the LORD […]

As I mentioned in my previous post, I was enriched by attending a session on contemplative spirituality at Lipscomb’s Summer Celebration led by Randy Harris, Rhonda Lowry and Gary Holloway.  In this post I will describe how Gary Holloway reminded me of the ancient practice of Lectio Divina which has been part of my spiritual meditations off […]

I had the joy of sharing one of my favorite texts with the Wisdom class at Woodmont Hills this morning. I love Isaiah 25. It excites me everytime I read it…and for several reasons. While Isaiah 13-24 rehearses God’s “woes” toward all nations due to their arrogance, injustice and evil, Isaiah 25 (actually beginning with […]