Adam Callis's Blog

I love watching kids receive unexpected compliments—especially shy kids. Often, they smile and seem to hold the moment with their surprise, fully absorbing the compliment. It strikes me that many adults are just as shy, and you can often catch an adult off-guard with an unexpected compliment as well. Try it sometime.

I reflected on this topic while writing my book on humility, because receiving compliments is often viewed as a test of our humility. And in some ways, we often treat compliments as a threat to our humility.

An example of this is the common practice of responding to a compliment with a self-deprecating comment, which happens all the time. Here’s an example:

“That supper was fantastic!”

“Oh, I just threw something together.”

Here’s another:

“You did a great job with your speech!”

“Thanks, but I thought I stumbled around the whole time.”

Self-deprecation has the appearance of humility, but it’s actually a false humility that, ironically, draws more attention to ourselves (while simultaneously dismissing the other person and what they said!). It’s also dishonest, not just because the compliments are often true, but because a self-deprecating response subtly turns the other person into a liar.

Thankfully, humility runs much deeper than these things, so true humility isn’t threatened by receiving the praise of others. That’s the trick. A prideful person (who may be seeking to be humble) actually wants the praise, so he finds a way to quietly obtain it, whereas the humble person can do without the praise, so when he receives it, he can simply say, “Thank you.”

The reality is that whether we want it or not, praise sometimes comes, and if another person chooses to give you a compliment, that’s their choice, not yours. It’s their gift. That’s why simply saying, “Thank you,” is the proper thing to do. It doesn’t make you proud to do so. In fact, it makes you humble—because you have to accept the gift. This is the reversal we miss when we respond with self-deprecation.

Recently, I’ve been reading Augustine’s Confessions, and I was struck by a section in Book 10 that dealt with the nature of receiving praise. Augustine took this concept a step further by saying that when someone else compliments us, it gives us a chance to rejoice in seeing something they experienced. Directing his reflections to God, he says this:

“Truth, in you I now see that, if I am praised, I should be touched not on my own account, but for the benefit of my neighbour.”1

The essence of what he is saying is that when someone compliments something we have done, it gives us an opportunity to be touched for the other person’s sake, because we’ve gotten a glimpse of their heart.

In hearing responses to preaching, I love to hear the specifics on what stood out to a person, because it opens up this very experience. I get a glimpse of what’s going on in that person’s heart and what God is revealing to them. It deepens the gift of the moment. Because that’s what a compliment is at the heart—a gift. The proud person doesn’t receive gifts well, because they can’t boast about it. The humble person can receive a gift any time, because they have learned to see that all of life in God’s world is a gift.

And here’s the rub. If we can’t learn to receive gifts, we can’t receive God’s grace. And grace isn’t just for the beginning. Our need for it grows as our understanding of Christ’s glory and our sinfulness grows. This is why Paul Miller argues that strong Christians pray more.2 It’s not because they’re more holy—it’s because they’ve realized that their need for God’s grace is always growing.

That brings me back to children, because I think children have a unique ability to receive compliments well. I remember passing a kid in our homeschool co-op one morning and complimenting his shoes. Upon hearing this, he stopped in his tracks and said, “Wow. Thank you!”

Now that’s how you do it!

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Confessions, Book 10, Chapter 37

From A Praying Life, Chapter 6. Fantastic book!

This past weekend, while visiting my wife’s extended family in Lebanon, Missouri, I had the opportunity to attend a local Catholic mass with her cousins Jeff and Sara, along with their kids. We shared an AirBnB with them, and when Sara mentioned going to a morning mass, I joined them. I’d attended a mass once before as a child, but I had never done so as an adult, and I was curious to experience a mass with a different set of eyes.

We attended a 9am mass at St. Francis de Sales in Lebanon, a brick church building that has been there since 1949. It stands beside another large brick building that was formerly an elementary school. The grounds were charming and picturesque, and we were greeted outside the door by several men and women who stood holding the doors for everyone, and then again by others who stood just inside the foyer. We sat very near the front, and I watched as my companions kneeled once toward a large cross before entering the pew.

Throughout the service, Jeff graciously directed me and made sure I knew what was happening, specifically through pulling out a book from the pew case that had the liturgy for that day, complete with all the readings, prayers, and hymns. I was delighted when the organ opened the service and the music director led the church in “Holy, Holy, Holy.” So far, so good, I thought to myself, and sang right along. I also recognized “Shepherd of Souls, Refresh and Bless,” and I was able to follow the others since the sheet music was printed out.

I was struck by two things about the singing: 1) The music was lovely, the hymns selected were all very singable, and they all had rich, poetic lyrics with heavy Scriptural language; 2) The singing overall, from where we stood at the front, was not very loud.

This was a bit sad for me—to hear such rich songs being sung so quietly. As it turns out, this was my feel of the whole service. The readings, hymns, prayers, and creedal recitations (we read the Nicene Creed) were all very filling from a theological standpoint. But the overall engagement with these rich offerings was very formal and restrained.

At one point, the priest encouraged everyone to give a blessing of peace to their neighbor. Beside me, Jeff leaned over and kissed his daughter’s head, then he turned and shook my hand. The three people in front of us (we were three pews from the front) turned and gave a peace sign with smiles. At another point, we said the Lord’s Prayer aloud, and Jeff leaned over, wrapped his arm around my shoulder, and said, “We don’t say the last part until later.” I remembered an inside joke about his and Sara’s Catholic wedding, where all my wife’s Baptist in-laws went on reciting aloud, “For thine is the kingdom, and the power…”

The feast of Scripture was a highlight for me. Our church reads a good deal of Scripture every Sunday, typically in at least 4 places. But this service had a reading from the Old Testament (Jeremiah 38:4-6, 8-10), the Psalms (Psalm 40:2-4, 18), the New Testament (Hebrews 12:1-4), and the Gospels (an Alleluia with John 10:27, then a reading from Luke 12:49-53). That was a delight.

The priest, in his homily, delivered a sermon from his manuscript that took Jesus’ interaction with his disciples in Matthew 16 (where one of them says that some claim Jesus is Jeremiah in 16:14), and through the lens of suffering, he connected this with the reading from Jeremiah 38, along with the reading from Hebrews 12, both of which deal with the topic of suffering in their own way. In 10 minutes or less, he applied this theme to suffering and persecution that Christians have faced in the past and up to the present.

As expected, the Eucharist took center stage at the climax of the service. The priest prayed for the bread, lifted it high with his eyes fixed on it, and someone behind us rang a bell three times. This took place with the cup as well. The three people in front of us (who turned out to be Communion attendants) went forward and received the Eucharist, notably with the priest placing the bread in their mouth.

I watched the people in the pews across from us walk forward to receive the bread and wine, noticing that several had the bread placed in their mouths, while others took it and fed themselves. I wasn’t able to decipher the difference, and very soon it was our turn. I asked Jeff if it was alright for me to join them. He said I could either stay, or I could come and cross my arms (as in prayer) before receiving it. I was determined to watch everything he did.

There was an older man handing out the bread. When I came to him, he said, “The body of Christ,” and I raised my hands toward him, curious to see what would happen next. Nothing happened. He stood, waiting, and finally said, a bit briskly, “Amen?”

Amen, I said, smiling. Then he handed me the bread.

I then came to the woman who was holding the cup. She was a short woman, about a foot shorter than me. She said, “The blood of Christ,” and I said, “Amen,” determined not to have a repeat.

But yet again, nothing happened. She stood, waiting, as did I. I learned later after watching the others that I was supposed to take the cup from her. But I didn’t. Instead, recognizing my inaction, she awkwardly lifted the cup up to my mouth, tipped it forward, and my mouth filled with the taste of cold wine.

And she kept pouring. I took at least two big gulps before she pulled back. I guess she figured I needed extra. Perhaps I did.

I returned to my seat and sat while others around me kneeled on the kneeling benches. About halfway through the Communion, the woman with the cup stepped up onto the stage and watched as people took the bread then passed by her. I thought to myself, Did she run out?

Finally, a woman came by and looked up at her, and she made a motion to show that the cup was indeed empty. I watched curiously, with the lingering taste of wine in my mouth.

Once this was concluded, the priest carefully emptied and wiped clean the cups with the help and watching eyes of a young altar boy (who looked very solemn and perhaps a bit nervous) and an equally young altar girl (who had long curly hair, large front teeth, and a pleasant girlish smile that lingered throughout the entire service).

The service was soon over, and we left the building, shaking the priest’s hand briefly on our way out as he told everyone, “Have a good week.”

There were many aspects of the Catholic mass that were refreshing to me, namely the abundance of Scripture, the call and response readings, and the significant focus given to the Communion. At the same time, there was an undeniable feeling of rigidness and routine. My major reflection afterward was, “I can see how all the motions of that service would be deeply meaningful to a person with a genuine faith and love for the Lord. I can also see how all those same motions could become an adequate outward replacement for that same genuine faith and love.”

I think the same is abundantly true for those of us in Protestant circles. On one hand, I am continually enriched by the spontaneity and personal engagement found in many of our services. Yet the same spirit of routine can plague us just as severely.

As I reflect now on the experience, comparing it to my own experiences in various Protestant churches ranging from Churches of Christ, Southern Baptist, Presbyterian, Assemblies of God, and various non-denominational churches, I’m reminded of a line from A.W. Pink in his 1971 book Spiritual Growth:

“As the reception of one part of the Truth prepares us to take in another, so the admittance of error paves the way for the coming in of more. Moreover, the particular denomination to which we belong and the distinctive form of its “line of things” (2 Cor. 10:16), has a powerful effect in determining the type of Christians reared under its influences—just as the nature of the soil affects the plants growing in it. Not only are his theological views cast into a certain mold and his concept of the practical side of Christianity largely determined thereby, but his devotional life and even his personal demeanor are also considerably affected by the same. Consequently there is much similarity in the “experience” of the great majority belonging to that particular party. This is largely the case with all the principal evangelical denominations, as it is also with those who profess to be “outside all systems.”

Regardless of which church we find ourselves in, we will, over time, find ourselves being impacted and influenced by the forms and emphases of our particular stream or local congregational culture. We have all also been far more influenced by 2000 years of Christian history than we might readily admit.

I do not think the answer to this is to start a brand new church, or to visit a different church every Sunday, or else to give up the enterprise entirely. I sometimes imagine what it would’ve been like to have been a believer in the year 400, or 1600, or even today in one of the many countries that face a radically different religious landscape than we do in America. What would I do if all the forms that I have come to be familiar with were to become unknown, along with all the hymns I’ve come to love, and so on? It tells me that in my practice of faith in this particular place where I live, there is a focus that should be continually on my heart and mind: Do I truly know the Lord with an ever-deepening knowledge, and is His Spirit bearing His perfect fruit in my life to daily conform me to the image of Christ?

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If you’ve read my book, I would be honored if you would consider taking a moment to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads. It’s been a true joy for me to hear from so many of you.

Big news! I shared in my last email that my new book on humility, titled Descending to Glory, would be up for sale this Friday, August 1st.

But for everyone on my email list, I wanted to share with you that the book is already live on Amazon!

It’s available in Paperback, Hardback, Kindle, and Audible (I’m a big audiobook user myself). I’m also planning a giveaway on Goodreads for later this week.

As a bonus, I have 20 promo codes for downloading the book on Audible for free. If you’re brave enough to listen to my dry, scratchy voice for 2 1/2 hours, reply to this email and I’ll send you a free promo code.

And to be fair to those who prefer physical books, I have a less convenient but just as effective promo code for you. The next time you see me in person, just use this passphrase—“Where’s my book?”—and I’ll give you a free copy.

Seriously, God has been so gracious in the journey of writing this book, and I’d be totally happy for you enjoy it for free. I’m also thankful to Jonathan Fann, Justin McCoy, Kyle Fleischmann, and Jeff Smith for their contributions in taking time to read and comment on sections of the book. Thanks also to my wife Melody for her constant companionship and encouragement along the way. Thanks also to Ronnie Carter for reading the first official physical copy!

Sincerely, I hope you’ll enjoy the book as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it, and more to the point, I hope that God will use the book to bless you in your journey of surrender to Christ.

Thanks!

Adam

Click here to view the book on Amazon!

Around 2 years ago, I was introduced to the life and writings of Andrew Murray, a 19th century minister in South Africa whose ministry coincided with a South African prayer revival. The story of the revival is incredible, and it actually traces back to two other prayer revivals, one that started with a prayer meeting in New York in 1857 (Laymen’s Prayer Revival), and another that occurred in 1859 in a province of Northern Ireland called Ulster. All three revivals are connected, and all three are incredible stories.

But in researching these revivals, I became fascinated with the life and writings of Andrew Murray. Interestingly, Murray initially rejected the South African revival because he felt it was chaotic and disorderly. But in the months and years that followed, he began to play a primary role in aiding the discipleship of Christians in the surrounding area, notably through his writings. He went on to write over 200 books, booklets, and pamphlets for the Christians in these South African churches, spanning a wide range of topics related to discipleship, such as prayer, raising Christian children, waiting on God, etc.

My fascination with this revival and Murray’s life led me to pick up one of his most highly recognized books Humility: The Journey Toward Holiness (I wrote about it in my 2024 review of books).

I won’t retread what I’ve already written about this book, but suffice it to say I have returned to it countless times over the past year, and I keep a copy of it close at hand. I found the theme of the book so important that it planted a seed for a potential writing project of my own.

Separate from that, I’ve spent the past several years feeding my growing interest in Christian paintings, particularly the works of several 19th century Russian artists. One of these paintings, Christ in the Wilderness by Ivan Kramskoy, brought my mind to the themes in Murray’s book. The painting vividly details the humanity of Christ as he fasted 40 days in the wilderness. The painting and Murray’s book on imitating the humility of Christ seemed made for each other.

One final thread involving Bible memorization. Several years ago, I was led to commit Philippians 2:1-11 to memory, a passage that similarly focuses on imitating the complete humility of Christ. As all these threads began to converge, an idea for a book was formed.

The idea was to take these threads and write a book in the style of Henri Nouwen’s The Return of the Prodigal Son, a book which begins with Nouwen’s own journey of discovering Rembrandt’s painting of the father and prodigal son from Jesus’ parable, and then builds into a deep reflection on being the beloved and embracing the love of God the Father. My thought was to do the same with Kramskoy’s painting, Philippians 2, and the theme of humility.

I’m excited to share the result of this, Descending to Glory: The Joy of Humiliation in Christ. The book has been a labor of love, and I’ve been able to share the writing journey with several people who have graciously taken the time to read sections of the book and share feedback along the way.

My goal for the book was to practically describe a Spirit-led journey of embracing humility. One of Murray’s points in his own book is that we often pray for humility, only to recoil from the very things that would humble us. This is why I’ve sought to describe an approach to embracing humility that is fully dependent on the Holy Spirit’s work of sanctification in us. The book spends a great deal of time in Philippians 2, but it also delves into the lives and writings of various individuals like Hudson Taylor, David Brainerd, Benjamin Franklin, and yes, Andrew Murray. My hope in this has been to provide a concise, well-rounded book with Biblical exegesis, Spirit-dependence, historical perspective, and practical application.

The book will be available by August 1st in paperback, hardback, Kindle, and audiobook (I’m a big audiobook user myself!). I hope the book will be a joy for you, and more importantly, I hope it will lead you to see the greatness of Christ in humbling himself completely to raise us to glory. May we joyfully surrender to him as the Spirit does his perfecting work in us!

Stay tuned for updates — I’d love to hear from you in the meantime.

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Every art medium has its limitations, and that is part of what makes each one great in its own way. A film will not convey the same impact as a painting, or a photograph, or a sketch. In the same way, a narrative account will be different from a poem. And within each of these, there are further limitations: a rondeau is a poem, but it is not a haiku, or a limerick, or a villanelle, even though all these are poems as well. In art, everything is a choice, and that choice becomes part of the overall piece itself.

Such is the case with “Isaac and Jacob,” a 17th century painting by the Dutch Golden Age painter Abraham van Djick. Van Djick was one of the many talented painters who lived under the shadow of Rembrandt during a time when religious art was undergoing significant changes. The Protestant Reformation, especially in Calvinist regions, rejected the lavish, iconographic, and often didactic religious art typical of Catholic churches, viewing it as potentially idolatrous and distracting from Scripture and worship. This led to a shift toward simpler, more restrained church interiors and a move away from public religious imagery. Simultaneously, art found new life in secular and private spheres as the market moved from church commissions to private collectors.

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Van Djick’s painting displays this tonal shift well, both in how it emphasizes the humanity of the Biblical account and in its overall moral ambiguity. Van Djick was far from being the only painter of this era to depict this Biblical moment (in fact, Rembrandt himself produced a sketch of it), but van Djick’s painting stands out from the rest with one particular detail: Jacob’s face is hidden.

The Biblical account gives virtually no moral commentary or inner dialogue to unlock Jacob’s perspective in this moment. When we read the account, we only hear his lying responses to his blind but suspicious father’s questions. But when van Djick renders Jacob looking in the direction of his mother, we can understand why. The text indicates that Rebekah instigated the ruse, not Jacob. This doesn’t make Jacob guiltless, but it does reveal that he was listening to the words of his mother and looking to her for guidance. After all, she cooked the meal, she took Esau’s clothes and gave them to Jacob, she put the goatskin on his body, and most notably, she told Jacob when he questioned the idea, “Your curse be on me, my son. Just obey me and go get [the goats] for me (Gen. 27:13).”

All of this comes through in van Djick’s portrayal, which is a textbook display of artistic choice. A painting cannot move, neither in its application nor in its final display. Paintings are not meant to move, at least not in the way a film moves. So when we see Rebekah’s finger pressed over her lips to silence Jacob, hunching over the chair to make herself clear (even though she is literally in the shadows), we don’t have to guess at Jacob’s face or thoughts. It’s a masterful demonstration of visual subtext.

Biblically, we know from Genesis 25:22-23 that Rebekah received a word from the Lord that Esau would serve Jacob. Did she share this with anyone? Surely she shared it with Isaac, right? We can wonder. But we just don’t know. What we do know, however, is that her choice to deceive her husband stood in the family tradition of both deceit and human action in accomplishing divine promises. Both Abraham and Isaac lied about their wives being their sisters, and Sarah (Rebekah’s mother-in-law) told her husband to sleep with her servant girl in order to have the child God promised to give them. It’s a remarkably ugly picture for being the family chosen by God to bring a blessing to the entire world.

But one detail that always stands out to me in this moment—a detail that van Djick’s painting handles very subtly—is the detail of Rebekah putting Esau’s clothes and goatskin on Jacob. It’s clear when you look for it—the quiver of arrows on his back and the furry hand being touched by Isaac. It’s the clearest picture of the deceit—Jacob is literally wearing a disguise to hide the fact that he is a fraud.

The detail stands out to me because it makes me think of Galatians 3:27, which says that all who have been baptized into Christ have “put him on,” or to put it another way, they have been “clothed with Christ.” Every Christian has the freedom in Christ to approach the Father’s throne with boldness to receive the inheritance that belongs to Christ, and this is only possible because we have, like Jacob, put on someone else’s clothes. It is no wonder, then, that so many Christian people still feel like unworthy frauds. Satan’s attack is to say, “It’s a disguise. It’s goatskin. It’s stolen clothes.”

The difference, however, is that God had decreed for it to be this way. It is the very reason Christ came to earth—not just to forgive us and pay for our sins, but to become our righteousness (1 Cor. 1:30). Ephesians 1:6 speaks of the grace that has been lavished on us in the Beloved Son.

In his book Knowing God, J.I. Packer describes this Jacob/Christ comparison:

“We have been made ‘accepted in the Beloved.’ As Jacob was clothed in the garments of his elder brother, so we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. As Isaac mistook Jacob for Esau, so God accepts us as sons, because He sees us in His Son.”

I like to imagine that van Djick’s choice to hide Jacob’s face has something to do with this interchange of identity. Jacob was not Esau, but God had already declared that Esau would serve Jacob. Isaac gave the blessing that belonged to Esau, but he gave it to Jacob. In the same way, when we look in the mirror, we likely do not see Christ. But God has declared that anyone who is in Christ is a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17), and the blessing that belongs to Christ now reaches us. It’s not dress-up—it’s a transformation into his likeness, and his Spirit (whom Ephesians 1:14 calls the down-payment of our inheritance) is working to make it so.

It is like Gerard Manley Hopkins said: The just man “acts in God’s eye what in God's eye he is—Christ.”1

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From “As Kingfishers Catch Fire”

I recently joined a friend in reading David Gibson’s 2023 book The Lord of Psalm 23: Jesus Our Shepherd, Companion, and Host. If you’re in-between books or looking for something to read, I highly recommend this one. It’s short, deeply theological, and also nourishing to the soul. It’s rare to find a book that checks all three of those boxes.

If you think you’ve heard everything there is to hear on Psalm 23, I’d challenge you to think again. While reading the book, I was continually struck by the never-ending depth of this Psalm. Gibson notes how Martin Luther called the Psalms “a little Bible,”1 and Gibson presses further to argue that Psalm 23 is a little Bible in itself. He argues that the message of Psalm 23 is really the message that comes through in all of Scripture: “God is with us.”

While reading the book, Gibson’s exposition of the Psalm—and of this major theme—began to take its effect on me. If I belong to Christ, then truly, what more does he need to say to me other than “I am with you,” regardless of the circumstance? Gibson insightfully argues that we often think of the “valley of the shadow of death” as a trial that we are facing, but what if it is simply one avenue along the path of righteousness? Our shepherd is the one who is unafraid to walk through the dark, because as David said elsewhere, “the darkness is not dark to you.”2 So if he leads me there, and if he is with me, I do not need to be afraid, even if he walks in silence when I wish he would speak. If he is with me, that is all I need.

After finishing the book, I came across Robert Alter’s translation of Psalm 23, and I was pleased to find that it matched up exactly with Gibson’s comments. As a primer for what you’ll find in Gibson’s book, I’ll share Alter’s translation here, and I'd encourage you to sit with the implications of what each word and phrase means.

The Lord is my shepherd,

I shall not want.

In grass meadows He makes me lie down,

by quiet waters guides me.

My life He brings back.

He leads me on pathways of justice

for His name’s sake.

Though I walk in the vale of death’s shadow,

I fear no harm,

for You are with me.

Your rod and Your staff—

it is they that console me.

You set out a table before me

in the face of my foes.

You moisten my head with oil,

my cup overflows.

Let but goodness and kindness pursue me

all the days of my life.

And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord

for many long days. 3

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Martin Luther, Preface to the Psalter, in Luther Works, volume 35, p. 254

Psalm 139:12

Robert Alter, The Hebrew Bible: A Translation With Commentary, 2018

In 1856, Russian painter Nikolai Ge submitted an original painting to the Imperial Academy of Arts for exhibition. In March of the following year, the Academy awarded him a gold medal for the painting, granting him the title of Class Artist of the 1st degree and a scholarship for further study abroad. ​That same year, another Russian painter named Dmitry Martynov also submitted a painting to the Academy, for which he received the same honor, as well as the Large Gold medal, the Academy’s highest honor. Two Russian artists, two gold-medal paintings, both occurring in the same year. Yet the most remarkable detail was that both paintings focused on the exact same subject: the strange Biblical story of Saul and the Witch of Endor.

1 Samuel 28 records this abnormal moment. The Mosaic Law forbade people to practice sorcery or to seek out the aid of mediums and necromancers.1 1 Samuel 28 notes early on that King Saul had previously “put the mediums and the necromancers out of the land."2 But Saul was a very desperate man by this point. He had been rejected by the Lord, tormented by a spirit, afflicted by foreign adversaries, and most of all, he had been consumed with jealousy and hatred toward David, pursuing him to the death.

But now, the Philistine units had assembled into one army and marched out against Israel. And when Saul saw their troops, his heart “trembled greatly.”3 This was the man who from the beginning had measured strength off what the eye could see, and this was not the first time he had felt fear at the sight of a large Philistine army. In a similar situation recorded in 1 Samuel 13, he had rejected Samuel’s advice to wait and had instead taken matters into his own hands. But now, Samuel was dead, and the Lord who had once anointed him had gone silent. So Saul turned to desperate measures. He disguised himself and sought out a medium.

The Biblical account of what comes next is fascinating for many reasons. Saul visits the medium and requests the audience of Samuel, and incredibly, the medium brings him back. But when Saul requests the prophet’s counsel, Samuel declares that Saul himself will be in the land of the dead by the next day. The text ends with the medium forcing Saul to eat, and she serves him meat from a fattened calf and unleavened bread.

The two Russian depictions of this moment share many qualities, though they are not without their differences. Both paintings utilize a play of light and shadow to heighten the tension between the divine and the profane, with contrasting illumination on the figures of Samuel and the witch. Both artists portray Samuel in white, the witch in black, and Saul in red. But where Ge’s depiction feels a bit more human, showing a side-profile of Samuel’s face, Martynov’s is more supernatural, revealing a light from the witch’s hand and showing Samuel less like a man and more like a ghost. Ge emphasizes the shock of bringing back an actual man from the dead, whereas Martynov emphasizes the unnatural nature of this act. Both paintings render Saul in shock, yet both neglect a curious detail in the text: the shock of the witch.

Verse 13 tells us that when the woman actually saw Samuel appear, she “cried out with a loud voice.” More precisely, she shrieked. The immediate implication is that she did not expect for this to actually happen, which begs the question, “How did this actually happen?” Samuel’s pronouncement of the Lord’s condemnation of Saul suggests that God was involved in allowing this moment to happen, in order to pronounce one final judgment on Saul, but the text remains silent. The woman’s realization that her mysterious client was actually Saul in disguise suggests that her shock stemmed from fear of punishment for aiding the king of Israel in sorcery. The passage reveals, among many things, the troubling weight of transgressing God’s created order by playing around with supernatural forces. The fact that two Russian artists chose to highlight this strange moment during the same year is intriguing, as is the fact that both received gold medal awards for their paintings.

The Russian art tradition was undergoing a radical change in its depictions of Biblical images, and the 26-year-old Nikolai Ge would become one of the major figures in highlighting a less transcendent and more humanistic approach to religious icons, particularly the image of Christ. For many Russian traditionalists, the future paintings of men like Nikolai Ge, Ivan Kramskoy, Vasily Perov, Ilya Repin and others would push the divine too deep into the human realm. But for others, these works highlighted the darker yet undeniable realities of just how much our sinfulness has affected our holy God, and how the stories of the divine and the human have been forever intertwined. The recognition of these two paintings amid the context of this existential debate suggests a battle between those who would seek to warn others of the dangers of seeking forbidden knowledge, and others who found themselves unable to look away.

It is indeed interesting that neither painting renders the shock of the witch, choosing instead to make Saul’s shock the focal point. Perhaps this is as it should be. Because in the end, while the witch’s actual reaction is surprising, Saul’s reaction is the real focus. This passage may be the first time Saul realized that nothing—not even supernatural forces—could alter God’s will. That truth still haunts both of these historic canvases.

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Leviticus 19:31, 20:6, 20:27; Deuteronomy 18:10-12

1 Samuel 28:3

1 Samuel 28:5

I would venture to guess that Biblical genealogies are one of the most commonly skipped over portions of Scripture for the average reader. When I was first starting to read the Bible for myself as a child, my main interest in reading the genealogy of Adam in Genesis was to see how old each person lived to be. I can remember counting up all the years to see just how much time had passed between Adam and Noah.

The primary function of these geological sections is to show a historical progression of time, tracing a person’s lineage. But there are certainly studies that can be done into these people’s lives, particularly with the genealogy of Jesus, since the Old Testament gives us pictures of many of these people’s lives.

The genealogy of Adam, however, is different, since we know basically nothing about most of these characters. We know that Methuselah was the oldest (969 years), and we know that Enoch walked with God and was taken by God (and Hebrews 11 gives us a bit more commentary). We know that Lamech spoke a prophetic word over Noah (5:29). But aside from these details, the Biblical account gives us nothing else to go on for these people. All we know is how long they lived and that they all fathered children.

But there’s a fascinating description that comes at the beginning of this genealogy.

Chapter 5:1-2 gives us a review of 1:27, reminding us that Adam was made “in the likeness of God.” But 5:3 reveals something interesting: “When Adam had lived 130 years, he fathered a son in his own likeness, after his own image…” In other words, this is the genealogy of Adam reproducing the image of man.

What does this mean? That Adam’s descendants (and even Adam himself) were no longer made in the image of God? Genesis 9:6 rejects that conclusion. There, God gives Noah a command against shedding blood, basing the reasoning on the fact that each person is made in the image of God: “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.”

Instead, the focus on Adam multiplying the likeness of man is similar to what is described of Jesus in Philippians 2. There, Paul bases his appeal for humility among Christians on the example of Jesus, showing that even though Jesus was “in the form of God,” he humbled himself by “taking the form of a slave, being born in the likeness of men” (2:7). He maintained the form of God, but he was now literally “found in human form” (2:8). In the same way, Adam’s descendants continued to be God’s image bearers. But while they were originally created to multiply the image of God and spread it throughout the earth, they were now blurring his image with the image of man—sinful man. Augustine described this poetically: “The image of God persists, yet it is marred, like a face in a broken mirror.”1

In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul anticipates a day when the broken (or dim) mirror will be exchanged for the real thing: “Now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face” (13:12). When he speaks directly to the resurrection later in this same letter, he expands this, anticipating the redemption of our distorted image through the work of Christ: “Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven” (15:49).

The wonder in all of this is that God’s image persists in mankind, even in the midst of our sin-stained distortion of his image. Underneath every marred sinner lies a being created in the image of God. We are all prodigal children, whose scars and tattoos can’t hide the innate mannerisms that reveal our true parentage. Every time we show love to our fellow man, we are like rebellious children who can’t help but speak and act just like their Father. We can’t escape our ancestry, and the Bible is one massive genealogy, reminding us that we were all created in the image of one Father. Christ has come in the likeness of fallen mankind to clear the stain and bring us face to face with our familiar Father—who has never been far from any one of us.2

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City of God, XIII.23

Acts 17:27

After Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, John records him responding to a group of curious Greeks with words about his coming glorification: “The hour has come,” he says, “for the Son of man to be glorified.”1

But then he began to speak of death—of seeds dying in the soil before they can rise, and of the fate of those seeking to hold on to their lives. And imagine the Greeks’ response to this, much less the response of the Jews. Who speaks of glory and death in the same breath?

Then John records a statement from Jesus that reveals his intent—the intent to see his earthly purpose through to the end. Yet his words reveal his humanity: “Now my soul is troubled.” Why Jesus? Why are you troubled? If you are truly who you say you are, why would anything trouble you into distress?

The way Jesus speaks to these listeners is haunting. How could they know what lay ahead of him? How could they know the true source of his distress? Did he not just ride into the holy city on a colt, receiving loud cries of “Hosanna!” and looking like King David of old? Yet, he has a rhetorical dialogue with them. “What should I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour?’ No, it is for this purpose that I have come to this hour.”

Then the Father and Son share a moment, here in front of these captivated listeners, both Jew and Greek. It was just before that the Jewish leaders said, “Look! The whole world has gone after him!” But Jesus, who has come to give his life for the life of the world, for the lives of all these people—his heart is lifted Heavenward. It must be, for the hour he is facing is too heavy to face without looking to glory. So he says aloud, “Father, glorify your name!”

What the crowd hears next is thunder, though some are a bit bolder, saying that an angel spoke to him. But the sound that followed was the voice of the Father, and somehow John knew. Did he hear it? Was it revealed to him later? We do not know. But the Father confirms his Son’s prayer and gives a promise: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.”

No one fully understood the earthly purpose of Jesus. Not the Jews, not the Greeks—not even the apostles, though they searched for the answer, and though Jesus himself spoke it to them. “Lord, where are you going?” asked Peter in response to such words. “Why can’t I follow you? I will lay down my life for you!”2 But Peter did not understand, and if we had been there, we would not have understood. When the time came, we all would’ve fallen asleep in the garden, though our Lord pleaded with us to pray with him, to not leave him alone with his distress. And when the full realization of his purpose came, as it did for everyone, we would’ve denied him, or pulled out our swords, or fled naked into the darkness like the unnamed disciple in Mark’s account.3

For in spite of his rhetorical question to the crowds, and of his determination to see his purpose through, Jesus did pray to be saved from the hour. “Abba, Father,” he prayed, intimately, “all things are possible for you. Take this cup from me.”4 He offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears, says the Hebrews writer, praying to the One who could save him from death—the only One who could save him.5

And that is where all our prayer would have stopped. If we had been the world’s hope, if we had been in the role of Savior, there would have been no Amen to our prayer. It would’ve have been a continual, “Save me, save me. Father! Take this away.”

But Jesus prayed what we could not pray, and what we still struggle to pray, in spite of our living hope, and in spite of the assurance of the Father’s good purpose: Not my will, but yours be done.

Jesus knew the words of Isaiah. He knew the Father’s will—to crush him.6 And so, in his public speech to the crowds just days prior, he prayed, “Father, glorify your name.” And the Father’s answer of promise came not for the Son’s benefit, but for ours.7

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John 12:23-28

John 13:36-37

Mark 14:52

Mark 14:36

Hebrews 5:7

Isaiah 53:10

John 12:30

This post is part of a series of reflections on the book of Hebrews. These have been sparked by a journey I took in 2024 to memorize the book of Hebrews.

Hebrews 9-10 is a feast of imagery. Ultimately, it connects the physical elements of the priestly sacrificial system with the spiritual cleansing that Christ brings (which the old system never brought!). All these things that occupied the Levites for centuries were merely a “shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form” (10:1).

The writer shows the inability of all these elements to achieve what they were intended to achieve, setting up the perfection of Christ to achieve all this. Think of all the gallons of blood spilled from bulls and goats over the centuries. Yet, the people were never clean, and death persisted. Therefore, Christ offered his own blood as a single sacrifice for all time.

Blood is all over this section, and in spite of the images of being immersed into the blood of Christ that persist in Christian hymns like “There is a Fountain,” the Hebrews writer makes intriguing connections to the sprinkling of blood. My purpose in mentioning that isn’t to make this into a study of immersion vs. sprinkling. Rather, this is just one of the many observations that emerged as I spent extensive time considering every word in Hebrews.

Hebrews 9 paints the dramatic Old Testament scene of Moses slaughtering beasts to fill a vessel with blood. Then, he took a hyssop plant, dipped it in the blood, and sprinkled it on everything—the tent, the elements, the book, and most dramatically, the people themselves. Imagine being there in this moment, making a covenant with the Lord to be faithful to him. And here stands Moses, this dramatic figure who stood up to Pharaoh, who stood in front of the Red Sea, and who alone went up on the thunderous mountain on behalf of the people. He dips the hyssop in blood, comes in front of you, perhaps eye to eye, sprinkles the blood on your face and says, “This is the blood of the covenant that God commanded for you” (9:20).

In the Levitical system, everything was sprinkled with blood, and the priests were required to perform ritual washings amidst all of it. Why were they commanded to wash? Not just to be cleaned, but specifically, “so that they may not die” (Ex. 30:20-21). They had to be clean, yet they also had to be blood-stained, because blood was the sign for life. As said in Leviticus 17:11, “it is the blood that makes atonement by the life.” It’s a compelling contrast.

The Hebrews writer picks up on this imagery. After declaring that we have a newfound confidence that comes from the perpetual sanctification of the blood of Jesus, the writer says, “let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.”

It’s a remarkable connection not only to the imperfect blood-sprinkling of Moses and the imperfect washings of the Levites, but also of the future moment once prophesied by Ezekiel 36:25-27:

“I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules."

Further connections abound, particularly when the Hebrews writer cites Jeremiah 31 (once in Chapter 8, then again in Chapter 10 for finality), to show that God was preparing his people for the day when he would move them beyond the imperfect compliance to written sacrificial obligations, and where he would instead “put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds” (10:16). (Just a side note: in the ESV, 8:10 renders the reverse, with the laws being put in their minds and written on their hearts. This posed quite the challenge for memorization!)

Many commentaries note a connection to baptism with all the language of the blood of Christ and of washing, and perhaps it’s there. To me, however, the emphasis here (as seems to be the case throughout most of Hebrews) is on the images of the past and how God has brought an inner perfection to them all. Paul uses similar language when he tells Titus how God saved us “through the washing of regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit,” by pouring out “his Spirit on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior.”

Reflecting on these passages gave me a deeper appreciation for the rich imagery found in both sprinkling and pouring. Sprinkling, so central to the priestly rites, reminds us of the cleansing blood of Christ that consecrates us for God. Pouring points to the abundant and transformative outpouring of the Holy Spirit, renewing our hearts and binding us to Christ. Whether or not these modes are acceptable forms of baptism alongside immersion is ultimately not the focus of this text. The focus is on how Christ brought the perfected reality of all these imperfect symbols.

Ultimately, Hebrews teaches us that no earthly ritual and no amount of human effort can achieve what Christ has done. The imagery of blood and water, so prominent in the sacrificial system, finds its fulfillment in His once-for-all sacrifice, where we are made clean—not outwardly, but inwardly, in the very core of our being. The symbols of sprinkling and pouring remind us of this: that by His blood and through His Spirit, God has accomplished what the old covenant could only point toward—a people purified, a new heart within, and a covenant that will never fade. In Christ, we are forever clean.

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