I’m excited to announce that we’re forming the launch team for Discovering Good News in John (releasing July 5)! If you want to learn more about the book, check out the endorsements, and view the table of contents, click here. So what is a launch team? A launch team is a group of people who are excited about the release of a new book and are willing to help the author spread the word leading up to and after the release. If you’re excited about Discovering Good News in John and its message of Jesus’s mission, ministry, and resurrection, we’d love to have you join the team. What You Get

Who doesn't love feasts? God gave the people feasts they could enjoy before him. Indeed, God commanded the Israelites to gather together at seven sacred assemblies every year involving feasts. Leviticus 23 describes them: 1. Passover (verse 5) 2. Feast of Unleavened Bread (6-8) 3. Feast of First Fruits (9-14) 4. Feast of Weeks (15-22) 5. Feast of Trumpets (23-25) 6. Day of Atonement (26-32) 7. Feast of Booths (33-43) The people gathered at the tabernacle (later, the temple). Not only did these festivals ensure that people remembered God’s mighty works, but they pointed to something significant about Jesus. In fact, Jesus fulfilled the first four on holy days! What do I mean by “fulfilled”? The apostle Paul wrote that the festivals “are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ” (Colossians 2:16-17). In other words, the feasts and what they commemorated foreshadowed some reality about Jesus. Thus, Jesus fulfilled the feasts when he completed that which they foreshadowed.

For years, Hebrew poetry mystified me. When I was about to read the Book of Psalms for the first time at age 17, I was excited. So many people had told me that Psalms was their favorite book of the Bible, and I couldn’t wait to experience what they had experienced. But I was disappointed. I thought they were repetitive, and none followed the standard flow of an essay: Introduction, three to five points, conclusion. Instead, the middles and ends often repeated the beginning. I could not make sense of many of them. That is, until years later when I finally learned how to interpret Hebrew poetry. Then the structure—which relied on repetition—made sense. Not only could I now interpret the psalms, but I also could finally pray them the way they were meant to be prayed. Here’s what I needed to know.