Showing results by narrator "Dr. Bill Creasy" in All Categories

Study through the entire Bible, Genesis through Revelation, in one year! This "flagship" Logos course grew out of Dr. Creasy's year-long UCLA program, "The English Bible as Literature." One of the most highly rated courses on campus, "The English Bible as Literature" placed Dr. Creasy among the top 2% of UCLA teaching faculty for over 20 years!

Join Logos Bible Study as we continue the story of redemption. As told by Dr. Bill Creasy, Israel falls into the cruel bondage of slavery in Egypt. And it is no accident: God had said to Abraham 500 years earlier that his descendants would be “enslaved and mistreated four hundred years”.

Prophets are emphatically not seers who gaze into the future and predict far-off events; they are God’s spokesmen who always speak into their own historical context. Sometimes what they say may foreshadow messianic or “end time” events, but they always have an immediate historical reference. Understanding a prophet’s historical context is essential to understanding his message. Join Logos Bible Study’s Dr. Bill Creasy in this dazzling exposition of Isaiah, the first of the major prophets.

Jonah is one of the great stories in the Bible. Join Logos Bible Study’s Dr. Bill Creasy as he tells this story as no one else can! When God commands Jonah to go to Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian empire, and preach against it, Jonah heads in the exact opposite direction—to Tarshish, in Spain! Follow the adventure as a huge storm tosses Jonah’s ship, the sailors hurl Jonah overboard and a huge fish swallows him!

Although Matthew may not be the first written Gospel, like Isaiah it is positioned first in its sequence of four Gospels. Opening with a 42-generation genealogy, Matthew reminds us of the linear nature of God’s plan, and Matthew forms a link—a swinging door—between the Old and New Testaments. Matthew is a Jew writing for a Jewish audience, and his Gospel provides our first perspective on the birth and public ministry of Jesus Christ. Join Logos Bible Study’s Dr. Bill Creasy as he leads us through this dazzling work.

In Genesis the curtain rises on our story. Genesis introduces most of the major themes in the Bible. Listen closely as Logos Bible Study’s Dr. Bill Creasy takes you through the story of creation, the fall of man, grace, atonement, faith, justification, redemption and much more in this extraordinary story of beginnings.

Paul sends 1 Corinthians to the church at Corinth, and when they receive the epistle, they are livid! They immediately write back to Paul in very harsh terms (the letter from Corinth has been lost, but Paul alludes to it in 2 Corinthians), prompting Paul to get on board ship in Ephesus, sail to Corinth and address the church in person. It is not a pleasant visit. When Paul gets back to Ephesus he has second thoughts about his “short but painful visit”, and he writes 2 Corinthians to smooth things over.

Although Romans is not the earliest of Paul’s writings, like Isaiah and Matthew, Romans sits at the head of the epistles and letters. Written as a formal argument and structured as a scholastic diatribe, Romans presents Paul’s great thesis that we are saved by grace through faith, not by works of Law. This is revolutionary! Romans, perhaps more than any other book ever written, has fundamentally changed Western civilization, and it is foundational to understanding all of Paul’s other epistles and letters.

Luke is a Gentile writing for a particular person, another Gentile named Theophilus. In his Gospel, Luke provides a detailed and orderly account of the life and ministry of Jesus. Although Matthew, Mark, and Luke draw from many of the same sources for their material, each Gospel writer adapts his material for his particular audience and purpose. Luke presents his material in a brilliant prose style, as he creates a specific voice for his narrator and specific, identifiable voices for his characters.

Some think Leviticus is a “boring” book, yet it springs to life with the masterful storytelling skills of Dr. Bill Creasy. Listen as he weaves the texture, tone, and color of daily Israelite life during this amazing period of biblical history. With its emphasis on personal holiness, atonement, and sacrifice for sins, Leviticus separates the Israelites from their surrounding culture, calling them to be holy, as God is holy.

Joel may be the earliest of the writing prophets; if he is, then he introduces the term “the Day of the Lord” as a reference to a set of final, catastrophic events that will befall Israel—and indeed all humanity in the “end times.” Illustrating his message with reference to a dreadful locust plague that occurred in the past, we shudder as God makes clear that if Israel does not repent something much greater than a locust plague will occur.

The Book of Micah is a complex mixture of judgment and hope. God is a god of justice, as well as a god of love, and genuine peace cannot come until justice prevails on earth. Micah’s message of judgment culminates in the redemption of Israel and of all humanity, but a fearful judgment must come first. Join Logos Bible Study’s Dr. Bill Creasy as he explains how judgment and hope are intimately intertwined in the plan of salvation.

Written considerably later that the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), John takes a very different approach to the Gospel story. Traditionally attributed to the "Beloved Apostle" John, this Gospel doesn’t give us yet another version of the events in Jesus’ public ministry; John illustrates what those events mean in light of 60 years of reflection upon them. The Gospel according to John is a brilliant book, and it offers us a profoundly intimate glimpse into the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Read through a Christian interpretative lens, Daniel foreshadows the coming of the Messiah as well as the “end time” events in the book of Revelation. Daniel is a very important book for Jesus, who draws his self-referential title “Son of Man” from Daniel 7:13-14; who quotes directly from Daniel 12 in the Olivet Discourse; and who seals his “guilty” verdict before Jerusalem’s religious leaders by reference to the book of Daniel.

As Proverbs fits squarely into the genre of “advice to a son” literature, so the Song of Songs fits squarely into the genre of erotic love poetry. Traditionally read as an allegory of God’s love for Israel or of Christ’s love for the Church, Logos Bible Study’s Dr. Bill Creasy explores the Song of Songs as what it is, first and foremost: an erotic love poem written by Solomon in the final years of his life, a poem tinged with deep regret and longing.

With Moses dead, Israel stands on the threshold of the Promised Land, looking to Joshua for leadership. Join Logos Bible Study as Dr. Bill Creasy takes us across the Jordan River and into the land of “milk and honey” in a brutal conquest - a campaign of extermination that raises profound moral and ethical questions in its day, as well as in ours.

Both Isaiah and Hosea are writing at the same time, during the reigns of kings Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, 740-686 B.C. In Isaiah 1-35, Isaiah hauls Israel into court, charging her with unfaithfulness, calling out witnesses and finding her guilty. The theme of these chapters is judgment. In Hosea, God says: “You know what I think; now I want you to know how I feel.”

The curtain goes up on our story as we view creation, both from God’s perspective and from man’s.

Working hand-in-hand with the prophet Haggai, Zechariah also encourages the people to resume work on the temple in 520 B.C.; but unlike Haggai, Zechariah extends his prophecy to foreshadow future messianic and end-time events. Like Ezekiel, Zechariah has several “weird” visions, including that of an ugly woman in a flying bushel basket! Listen as Dr. Bill Creasy of Logos Bible Study explores this fascinating book.

The story of David continues in 2 Samuel. With the death of Saul and his three sons at Mt. Gilboa, the door opens for David to become king. But David has, in fact, no legitimate claim to the kingship; indeed, he has been working for a decade as a mercenary for Israel’s Philistine enemies. Listen as Dr. Bill Creasy follows David from the triumph of his kingship to his colossal fall and ultimate reconciliation with God.