InVerse 154 - IVT Explained, Part 11 (The Verse Essay)

InVerse 156 - You Must Be Born Again

John 2.23-3.21 And many people, when they saw what He had done while He was in Jerusalem for Passover, believed that He must be the Son of God, as He had said to them, and trusted in His Name. But Jesus knew their hearts. He knew the motives of all men and needed no one to advise or to explain to Him the heart of any man. Thus, to commit to them He would not do.

InVerse 155 - IVT Explained, Part 12 (Appreciating Theology, Appreciating Verse)

The primary reason to take up reading and studying both poetry and theology is that these can show us paths for journeying with Jesus through our lives. Poetry and theology can point us to Jesus, inviting us to consider Him in ways that can make His Presence with us more real and continuous.

InVerse 154 - IVT Explained, Part 11 (The Verse Essay)

To many readers, poetry represents a kind of mysticism. We know the poet is trying to say something, but we’re not quite sure what it is. Perhaps he’s just inviting us to have some sort of inward and personal encounter with his words, to lead us in making our own poem out of the lines, images, structure, form, and all the rest he supplies?

InVerse 153 - IVT Explained, Part 10 (Baubles, Bangles, Bright Shiny Beads)

We have seen that among the aspects of a work of literature which identify it as poetry are a certain employment of form, rhythm, rhyme, and image.

InVerse 152 - IVT Explained, Part 9 (Image and Rhyme)

The heavy lifting of poetry is by the images poets choose to convey meaning and experience, together with the rhyme schemes they adopt to add musicality to the verse. Images can be of various kinds, as also can rhymes. Images and rhyme are the muscle and flesh of a poem. Images come into play when poets use one thing to stand for another. Images are primarily of two sorts, metaphors and similes, which are simply metaphors introduced by “like” or “as”. In a metaphor a poet gives us something familiar to help us understand and experience something less familiar. A good image can make a lasting impression and convey a deeply meaningful experience.