Plainfield Ponderings - Scripture Meditations

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about why the miracles in the gospel of John are uniquely designed as evidence for Jesus as the Christ the Son of God. John says they are - John 20:30-31. However, why are they? Many people performed miracles in the Scripture but that did not prove they were the Messiah...so what is so special about these miracles in John's gospel? This is the subject of a n...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me some more about the glory of God! We have been tracing this theme throughout the year of 2026, at the beginning of each month. We start with the glory of God descending on the Temple, but that is now God's church. So, what does the glory of God look like when it rests on His church now? You might be surprised...and yet Peter tells us not to be! Please join m...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about how we let lies slip into our thinking and ultimately how lies end up dethroning Christ. Paul says in I Timothy 4 that people were going to leave the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons. Demonic forces are a part of the religious lies we are surrounded with. Join me in this study and let's take that seriously....

Send Allen a text - Ponder this question with me - is there ever a time when someone should be re-baptized? I realize this term "re-baptism" is somewhat controversial, because if the first baptism was not legit, then some think we should not call it a baptism at all. Regardless of what we call it though - is there ever a time when someone learns something different and then is baptized &...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about how to stay spiritually motivated. If you have been around the church very long, things can feel like they are "same ole, same ole". Worship is the same, life is the same - it can even feel like the movie Groundhog Day. This is a spiritual killer. What is our godliness motivation? Join in and let's think through it. To God be the glory! Pleas...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about how to be spiritually confident. I'm sure you have met people who are oozing with confidence about the Lord and their walk with Him. It makes you want that for yourself! Where does that boldness come from though? We already know the answer - it is both simple and yet extremely profound. Ponder it with me and may we grow in it together. To God be the gl...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me the simplicity of how the church was structured in the New Testament. I Timothy 3 contains the qualifications of elders and deacons. In this lesson, we will not go line by line in studying the qualifications. Instead, I want to challenge whether we have exalted the role of preachers over elders - and what are the ramifications? Also, we'll end by thinking ab...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about how God wants us to be near His glory! We will think about this in terms of God's glory filling the Tabernacle when it was first erected. This is such a heart-touching truth. God wants to be near us, and we need this desperately to provide perspective in our lives. However, because of sin, there are limits and barriers. How are these limits dealt with?...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with the stark contrast between the no-kings protests here in the U.S. vs. Israel's demand for a king in I Samuel 8. The greatest irony is that we all have a king, then and now - King Jesus. Let's think through I Samuel 8 and the lunacy of trusting sin and worldliness. Trusting ourselves never leads to the places we think it will. To God be the glory! Please em...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me what it means when Paul said, "Yet she will be saved through childbearing..." (I Timothy 2:15a). This has historically been hard for believers to unpack. We get into it pretty heavily in the last part of the episode. The first part is a continuation from the last episode about gender roles where we'll see Christ empower women very similarly to Paul...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about Paul's seemingly controversial subject about women teaching or exercising authority over a man from I Timothy 2:12. How are people getting around this statement from Paul when it seems so clear? But more importantly, what is the reason of Paul for giving this instruction? Also, this paragraph was meant to be much more empowering to women than most peop...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me a new sermon series coming to Plainfield, Indiana! The Plainfield church of Christ is having Bryan Schiele come to teach a series called "Unveiled" - it's about removing the veils of distraction, pride, and noise, so we can reflect the glory of Jesus. He and I talk about our past teaching endeavors and this upcoming series. To God be the glory! Pla...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about some of the ICE protesting and how it might relate to the singular path of salvation - Jesus. I know it sounds weird! It's less about ICE and more about how Christians ought to see the government, interact and pray for the government. Strangely, Paul connects these two ideas in I Timothy 2. Let's dive in! To God be the glory! Please email me any c...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me about the providence of God from the book of Esther again. God works through the horrors of life just as much as the things we think are positive. We need that perspective to help reframe our hardships. Also, we'll think about the back-story of Haman and Mordecai and why this extermination threat should have never happened in the first place. Be careful! You...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me how God has exalted humankind and bestowed on us glory. This glory was made to image His glory but unfortunately has been squandered. How can we get back to the glory God wants us to image? Lastly - is seeing God's glory about seeing the cool, visual spectacles or is there something deeper we are made to see? To God be the glory! Please email me any comments...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me a little deeper about handing someone over to Satan and its connection to church discipline. We ended last episode with a question - WHY? Why is handing someone over to Satan a good way to speak about discipline? What does that say about the domain of God's church vs. the domain of the world? And perhaps more importantly...does this mean that those in Christ...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me what it means to hand someone over to Satan. That is not a phrase you'll hear used very often in churches (if ever), but Paul uses that phrase twice in the New Testament. However, before we think through that phrase, we really need to wrap our heads around the possibility of Christians falling away. Is this possible? Many say it is impossible to lose your sa...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me the possibility that God has pre-determined some things in your life. Most that listen to the podcast, me included, believe in human free will and that God has not pre-determined everything. However, it would be a grave mistake to ignore the fact that God is at work in all of us. What happens when we open up to the possibility that we are in this exact moment bec...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me one of the most famous quotes from Paul - that he was the foremost or chief of sinners. Is Paul saying that he was the worst sinner of all time? Is that even a biblically accurate thing to say? That's how most people have interpreted it, but we will think about the original word and the original context a little deeper in this episode to unpack what Paul is...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me the art of double checking everything we hear, even in the church. We are diving deeper and more specifically into the problems of Ephesus, where Paul left Timothy to help the church through problems. The issues arose with people mishandling Scripture...and we can be sure that the greatest problems in the church today will arise in the same way. What can we do ab...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me the beginning of 1 Timothy and start by being amazed at the fact that Paul had Timothy stay in a troubled church. Timothy stayed in Ephesus because of the mess that existed there. After all the years of N.T. study, I'm still stunned by how open and honest the church leaders were about the problems that existed. We can learn from this. However, especially in...

Send Allen a text - Let's ponder about what the word "glory" means. We are going to embark on a series about the glory of God which we will tackle on the first Sunday of each month...this episode being the first. We'll begin by thinking about the original meaning of "glory" in Hebrew and then think through how God first demonstrated His glory - in creation. Are we lis...

Send Allen a text - Ponder what it means to hear with ears like Jesus. In Psalm 40 we have a strange phrase in Hebrew - "ears you have dug for me" (vs. 6). This is quoted about Jesus, which is clear enough. However, it gets stranger when you hear the Greek translation of it, and how the Hebrews writer uses this. We'll dive into the weird world of translation but in the end it's...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me one more time about helping one another thrive in the church. That was the theme of the congregation where I worship (Plainfield church of Christ). We dedicated one episode to that theme every month in 2025. However, in this episode we'll sum up everything we talked about in regard to the theme and then tie it up with a few thoughts on the chain of love, bin...

Send Allen a text - Ponder with me some of the broad themes in 1 Timothy. This book is not given a lot of attention. It certainly isn't given the attention other books are, and I think it's because it is viewed as a "preacher book". Is that the best way to view it though? Also, as we have done several other times on the podcast - we'll read through the letter in its fullne...