John Mark Hicks

Texts: Proverbs 9:9-10; Ecclesiastes 1:2-3 Days 25-26 in Around the Bible in Eighty Days. Every people group carries a shared wisdom within their history. This wisdom provides boundaries and paths for successful living. It also offers a way for people to endure the chaos that regularly invades life. Wisdom envisions the good life but recognizes […]

The first line of the Bible is a bold confession, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” The earth began, however, as an uninhabitable mess. The earth was a chaotic void, and darkness covered the face of the deep, as the Spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters. At […]

The earth was a chaotic void, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while the Spirit of God hovered over the face the waters. Then God saw everything made, and, Wow!, it was really good. Genesis 1:2, 31a (my translation) The title is a rather controversial one in the history of Christian theology. Many […]

Psalm 104 is one of the great creation praise hymns of Israel. As worship, it blesses God as both creator and provider. As theology, it identifies creation in theocentric rather than anthropocentric ways. God is not only sovereign over the creation but is immanent within it. The creation is more about God than it is […]

The “day of Yahweh,” or the “day of the Lord,” reverses creation. Through creation God subdued the chaos and gave it boundaries, but divine judgment releases chaos. The “day of Yahweh” uncreates. Eden is despoiled. Or, more specifically in the context of Joel, Israel is threatened with the prospect that the land flowing with milk […]

Revelation 4-16 gives us eyes to see the conflict between the kingdom of God and world powers with the eyes of God. We see the conflict between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this earth from a heavenly perspective; we see it from the throne room of God. John, “in the Spirit,” is […]

The Galilean hills were evangelized through heralding and enacting the kingdom. 5,000 males were fed with five loaves and two fish actualizing table fellowship within the kingdom. And now, apparently, the healded and fed expected something more. Perhaps they intended to crown Jesus king (cf. John 6:14-15) and inaugurate a rebellion against Roman authority. “Immediately,” signaling the critical nature […]

Mark’s action-oriented story paused for a few kingdom parables. Those parables painted a dramatic picture of the kingdom of God. They offer some perspective on the ministry of Jesus. The kingdom ministry of Jesus is sowing seed of the kingdom for an assured future harvest. As Mark returns to the dramatic acts of Jesus and […]

This week I am participating in a wonderful conference on preaching the paradigmatic texts of Scripture. The focus of this particular conference is creation.  Walter Brueggemann is the featured speaker and his presentation last night on Psalm 104 was excellent. Other speakers include Ken Durham, John York, David Fleer and Rhonda Lowry. Everyone has done […]

Why a second speech? One might think that one speech from Yahweh would be enough. Perhaps it is a literary device.  The two speeches may reflect the two council scenes in the Prologue–a “prologue” (1:1-5) heads the two council scenes and an “epilogue” (42:7ff)  follows the two Yahweh speeches. That may be true, but it […]