The Bible in a Year from Luther Seminary

26. The Verse on Dr. King's Wall, and the Book Most People Never Read

In this book of Amos overview, hosts Kristofer Phan Coffman and Jennifer Wojciechowski welcome back Cory Driver, Director of Research at the Center for Life at Miami University and author of God, Gender and Family Trauma [https://www.fortresspress.com/store/product/9798889832201/God-Gender-and-Family-Trauma], to explore one of the Old Testament's most pointed minor prophets. Cory explains how Amos draws Israel in with a "tour of sinfulness" against their neighbors, building confidence and comfort, before turning that same judgment back on Israel itself. The conversation digs into prophecy as a window into God's emotional life: God's love, disappointment, and frustration, expressed through a farmer turned reluctant messenger. Cory and the hosts also explore the agricultural language that runs through Amos, Jeroboam II's prosperous but unjust reign, and the famous Amos 5:24, the verse Dr. King made iconic on the walls of his memorial. They draw a surprising connection between Amos and the prophet Jonah, two prophets sent to people who weren't their own, with very different responses.

25. The Day of the Lord: What Joel and Obadiah Teach About Judgment and Hope

The Day of the Lord connects two of the Bible's shortest and least familiar prophetic books. In this episode, Dr. Kathryn Schifferdecker and Katie Langston welcome Dr. Tyler Mayfield to explore Joel and Obadiah. Joel reads a catastrophic locust plague as a sign from God, calling the people to lament and repent before delivering a tender promise of restoration and a vision of a far-off day of divine judgment. It is the same passage about God pouring out the Spirit on all flesh that the book of Acts would later draw upon. Obadiah turns its gaze toward Edom, the sibling nation whose story reaches back to Jacob and Esau and whose betrayal after the fall of Jerusalem turned the people's lament into righteous anger. Dr. Mayfield helps us see how both books wrestle with judgment, hope, and the very human desire for vengeance, and why the Day of the Lord ultimately points toward God's longing to set things right. * Father Abraham’s Many Children [https://www.eerdmans.com/9780802879455/father-abrahams-many-children/]

24. What the Book of Hosea Reveals About the Heart of God

What is the Book of Hosea really about? In this episode, Old Testament scholar Dr. Brad Kelle joins hosts Katie Langston and Dr. Kathryn Schifferdecker to get the book of Hosea explained from the ground up. Dr. Kelle walks listeners through the book's three major sections, the famous and often misread story of Hosea and Gomer, and why the rich web of metaphors at the heart of this prophetic book points to something far bigger than one man's unusual marriage. Set against the backdrop of rising Assyrian imperialism and communal trauma in the eighth-century northern kingdom of Israel, Hosea's message is ultimately about identity, faithfulness, and what it means to be the people of God under pressure. The conversation moves through Hosea's Bible Bingo words, including metaphor, marriage and family, the Exodus tradition, politics, and divine love, before landing on the book's breathtaking arc from human unfaithfulness to the transforming love of God. Dr. Kelle highlights key passages including Hosea 6:6, the stunning parent-child portrait of God in chapter 11, and the promise of healing and new future in chapter 14. Whether you are reading Hosea for the first time or returning to it with fresh eyes, this episode offers three guiding questions that will open the book in a whole new way. * The Bible and Moral Injury: Reading Scripture Alongside War's Unseen Wounds by Brad Kelle [https://www.amazon.com/Bible-Moral-Injury-Scripture-Alongside/dp/1501876287] * Telling the Old Testament Story: God's Mission and God's People by Brad Kelle [https://www.amazon.com/Telling-Old-Testament-Story-Mission/dp/1426793049] * Ezekiel: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition (New Beacon Bible Commentary) by Brad Kelle [https://www.amazon.com/NBBC-Ezekiel-Commentary-Wesleyan-Tradition/dp/0834129450]

23. Monsters, Empires, and Gallows Humor: The Book of Daniel You Never Knew

The Book of Daniel is one of the strangest, funniest, and most hope-filled books in the Old Testament, and in this episode, Dr. Michael Chan helps us see why. Joining hosts Katie Langston and Dr. Kathryn Schifferdecker, Dr. Chan walks us through Daniel's two distinct halves: court tales of Jewish exiles navigating life under foreign kings in Babylon, and apocalyptic visions that pull back the curtain on the cosmic forces shaping human history. Along the way, he unpacks surprising details about Daniel and his friends, including the very real possibility that they were eunuchs, the significance of Daniel's Babylonian name Belteshazzar, and what it meant to live a dual identity under an empire that was not your own. Dr. Chan also explores the Daniel Old Testament themes that make this book so theologically rich: the earliest clear expression of resurrection theology in scripture, the connection between Antiochus Epiphanes' persecution and the Maccabean revolt, and why apocalyptic literature uses monsters and cosmic imagery to critique empire. Most of all, this conversation surfaces the two themes Dr. Chan sees at the heart of Daniel: hope and humor, traveling together as a kind of Trojan horse for people living under cruelty and disempowerment. If Daniel has always seemed like a Sunday school book to you, this episode will change your mind.

22. The Bible Book So Intense, Rabbis Said You Had to Be 40 to Read It

The Old Testament book, Ezekiel, is one of the strangest, most visionary, and most hope-filled books in all of scripture, and in this episode of Bible in a Year, we get a scholar's guide to its depths. Dr. Kathryn Schifferdecker and Jenny Wojciechowski are joined by Professor Stephen Cook, the Katherine N. McBurney Professor of Old Testament Language and Literature at Virginia Theological Seminary, for a rich conversation about wheels within wheels, the glory of the Lord, and what it means that God showed up in Babylon of all places. From the Valley of Dry Bones to the temple's stream of living water, Professor Cook traces the thread of hope running through a book that is often dismissed as dark or difficult. Ezekiel's vision of a new heart, a new spirit, and a God who is mobile enough to meet us anywhere offers a powerful word for anyone who has ever felt like the world is crumbling underfoot. Tune in and discover why holiness is stronger than exile, chaos, and death.