Peter Krol | Knowable Word

10. Announcing the 2026 Bible Reading Challenge

This year’s Bible reading challenge is underway. Maybe this is your year to read the entire Bible in 90 days. You could win a premier book rebinding as a result. See the announcement for the official rules.

9. Wisdom in Disappointment

This year, I’ve continued revising and editing an old blog series on Proverbs 1-9. This post kicks off the study of Proverbs 3:1-12, which is one of those key texts where it’s crucial to understand how misleading is the conventional wisdom that “proverbs aren’t promises.”

8. Context Matters: The Lord’s Prayer

The rest of this list belongs almost exclusively to Ryan, who provided (and republished) much wonderful content this year. This first piece on the list considers that most famous of prayers in light of the context within which it was given. The Lord’s Prayer is an illustration of what it looks like to pray to a heavenly Father who knows what you need before you ask him. It is an example of how to pray in secret, how not to practice your righteousness before men, and how to seek reward from God. And it is a reminder that our relationship with God cannot be divorced from our relationship with other people.

And if you enjoy Ryan’s writing—as I sure do—you should also check out the Substack newsletter he just launched this year as well.

7. No Good Tree Bears Bad Fruit

You’ve probably heard this; it’s one of Jesus’ most famous metaphors. But can you explain what it means? If your answer is not “do you mean the Matthew 7 version or the Luke 6 version,” then you don’t really understand it! You’re in danger of reading one of those into the other text and missing the point.

6. Three Important Contexts for Bible Study

Your Bible study won’t have much teeth without consideration of the context. But which context? Because there are a few different kinds that all should be considered. This post tackles historical, literary, and personal. That doesn’t even exhaust the categories, but will certainly get you started in the right direction.

5. Reading the Bible for the First Time

In this masterful post, Ryan considers what you might want to say to a friend who wants to start reading the Bible for the first time. In our generation, such people are all around us. Most have no basic understanding of the facts or structure of the Bible. This brief post will help you get them started quickly.

4. Context Matters: Count the Cost

Before diving into this post, perhaps you should count the cost of shaking off dusty old metaphors. In other words, perhaps we shouldn’t just toss our Christianese phrases around so much that they lose their meaning. That way, when we come upon them in the Scripture, we can hear them as the author intended. Have you counted the cost of following Jesus? There is no discount, and the bill is extreme. But Jesus supplies what you lack and gives joy along the path.

3. What We Miss When We Skip the Prophets

Ryan enjoys motivating people to give attention to the obscure parts of the Bible. In this post, he explains how the New Testament makes constant use of the prophets to explain what Jesus has now done for his people. Skip them, and you might not really understand. For insight into other books you wouldn’t want to skip, see: Leviticus, Ezra, Nehemiah, Lamentations, and Numbers.

2. Just Do Nothing, and You’ll Ruin Everything

When people think that “proverbs aren’t promises,” they lose interest in the book of Proverbs. Why study a book that says stuff you can’t really bank on? But come to see the book rightly, and it’s treasures pay quickly and often. Such as a consideration of this rather obscure passage in Proverbs 1:20-21 (the prelude to the section of Prov 1:20-35). The point is simple: Wisdom is available. It is everywhere. We think we can’t change. We believe no one understands us. We assume we’re on our own. However, we’re surrounded by people with decent advice on important topics. We have no excuse for remaining immature.

1. Reading the Bible for the Ten Thousandth Time

Ryan wrote this post as a companion to #5 on this list. This one is not just for your “friend,” but for you who have grown familiar with the Bible. Familiar enough that the glow of it has long since faded. Ryan provides five great ideas to help you stave off your Bible weariness, and he reminds you that you never outgrown your need for the help of God’s Holy Spirit.

Previous years’ top tens: 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017

Identifying Longer Poems in the Body of Proverbs

December 17, 2025 By Peter Krol

Paul Overland has a fascinating piece on how to detect the poetic structure of Proverbs. I’ve written a full study of Proverbs 1-9, but Overland draws lessons from the structural markers in 1-9 and applies them to discern longer poems in chapters 10-29 as well.

For example, the sage uses an inclusio (repeated bookends) to mark the beginning and end of a poem in Proverbs 4:20-27. The NIV captures the repetition of “turn your ear” (Prov 4:20) and “do not turn” (Prov 4:27). In a similar way, the inclusio of “comes only to poverty” may mark the beginning and end of a larger unit in Prov 21:5-22:16.

Overland provides many specific tools to help you recognize boundary markers of poetic units within the book. And he offers the following benefits to engaging in this work:

Poems reveal richer meaning to their single sayings
We discover messages emerging from entire poems or lectures
Adjacent poems cluster together to deliver a cumulative lesson
A book-wide curriculum of wisdom training comes into view

The book of Proverbs is a tremendous gift from God to help us know him and grow up into maturity in our thinking, our piety, and our social progress. In today’s societies, we can easily witness the fruit of neglecting such wisdom from God. And Overland’s article will provide much stimulating help with considering just how this book can train us further in God’s wisdom.

Check it out!

Wisdom is Infectious, Not Contagious

December 12, 2025 By Peter Krol

There’s hope that anything can change. But first you must get wisdom.

Hear, O sons, a father’s instruction,
And be attentive, that you may gain insight,
For I give you good precepts;
Do not forsake my teaching.
When I was a son with my father,
Tender, the only one in the sight of my mother,
He taught me
And said to me,
“Let your heart hold fast my words;
Keep my commandments, and live” (Prov 4:1-4).

We can tell Solomon wants to get our attention because the first verse says, “be attentive,” and because it begins with “Hear, O sons,” rather than the usual “Hear, my son” (Prov 1:8). Would you like to get unstuck? Pay attention to what comes next.

After Solomon exhorts the reader to hear his instruction, he backs up the exhortation with a bit of autobiography. We’re transported back to the days when little Shlomo sat by the hearth and heard his father David talk about life. The most memorable advice was this: Hold on to my words (Prov 4:4) and get wisdom (Prov 4:5). This little story is noteworthy for at least two reasons.

1. It shows that the reason Solomon asked God for wisdom (1 Kings 3:5-9) was because Papa David told him to.

It’s easy to think Solomon’s request came out of nowhere, as though he had a flash of genius that just happened to coincide with the night when God made him the offer of a lifetime. No, instead, as we learn here, David had trained Solomon to do whatever it might take to get wisdom. Solomon was ready to ask God for it. Like Solomon, we must be taught to love and seek wisdom; it doesn’t happen naturally. Wisdom is an acquired taste, cultivated by people who have good examples to follow.

2. It implies that, if we want to inspire others to love wisdom, we must live it out and pass it on, just as David did for Solomon.

I’m not saying that David was perfect. He influenced his son both for good (loving wisdom) and ill (loving too many women). Solomon’s chief memory, however, was of his father’s quest for wisdom. It inspired him deeply.

To influence others, we, too, must quest for wisdom. Love for wisdom is infectious, not contagious. In other words, it doesn’t catch very easily; it requires close personal contact to be transmitted. For instance, parents ought to practice what they preach; they should be both open to learning and quick to ask forgiveness when they sin against their children. Leaders ought to tell tasteful stories about themselves to illustrate key ideas; people generally won’t get the point until they can see how it has personally affected the teacher. To save us, God didn’t hand over a philosophy or rulebook. He became a man and stood in our place, showing us in the process how to live wisely.

The first step to getting unstuck is to find good models who inspire you with hope and point you to Jesus as your wisdom. If you are a leader of any sort, your words will never be enough; you must visibly demonstrate the wisdom you seek to impart.

This post was first published in 2013 and is part of a series walking through Proverbs 1-9.

The Staying Power of Wisdom

December 10, 2025 By Peter Krol

I’m so grateful for William Osborne’s recent piece “Wisdom Rarely Makes You Famous.” In it, he explains the end of Ecclesiastes 9 and beginning of Ecclesiastes 10 to show why wisdom is far superior a thing to pursue than the acceptance of any inner circle in society.

The temptation to stray from God’s word continues through every generation. Wisdom is not crowd-sourcing. Wisdom is not trying to guess what the next big thing will be before everyone else. Wisdom begins with the fear of the Lord and building our lives upon his words. Wisdom believes that God’s instructions are good and life-giving, even though wisdom rarely gets a trophy.

Check it out!

Wisdom and Hope

December 5, 2025 By Peter Krol

I’m Stuck

I’ve been stuck for some time. There’s a certain person I’ve known most of my life who is very difficult to get along with. Our personalities clash, and our tastes diverge on just about everything. He doesn’t know Christ yet; thus, he doesn’t understand most of the life choices I’ve made. I’ve often felt personally attacked by his comments and attitudes.

I want this person to meet Christ and find life, but when we converse I end up feeling like I’m about 8 years old again and helpless to change things. After I got married, my wife helped me to see that all hope was not lost; God had provided many opportunities to build a healthier relationship. My self-protective fear had prevented me from seeing these opportunities, and the fear of the Lord would give me the wisdom to make changes. Only after I stopped worrying about protecting myself and started seeking to represent Christ, did I have hope that the relationship could get better. I have a long way to go, but I want to do whatever it takes to travel this path one step at a time.

Proverbs 4 explains the vital connection between wisdom and hope. If we don’t fear the Lord, we won’t be open to change. If we’re not open to change, we won’t change. If we don’t change, we’ll fail as agents of redemption to those around us. We won’t inspire them with hope that they can change. Then—guess what?—nothing ever changes.

Are You Stuck?

Are you stuck? Stuck in a bad habit, a bad relationship, or a bad situation? Has your life failed to meet your expectations? Are you always too busy? Do the years keep flying by, yet without moving beyond the “same old, same old”?

For example, have you committed sexual immorality in the past? Will you ever be able to forget the memories or mental images? Can the damage done to yourself and others ever be undone? The fear of the Lord can give hope.

Are you married to an angry, hurtful person? Is your relationship caught in the endless cycle of attack-remorse-apology without any lasting change? How could you ever forgive? Can you get more help? The fear of the Lord can give hope.

Were your parents critical of your every move? Did they care at all? As you grew up, did they miss all your major milestones? Did they abuse you verbally, physically, emotionally, or sexually? How could you possibly trust another person again? The fear of the Lord can give hope.

Have your grown children rejected the Lord? Have you tried to win them back by every available means? Might you have been part of the problem, pushing them away with ungracious legalism, unrealistic expectations, harsh judgments, or emotional neediness? Can they ever return to the Lord or to a healthy relationship with you? The fear of the Lord can give hope.

There’s Hope

I’m not saying that the answers to these questions are easy. I’m not saying that wisdom will eliminate your pain and disappointment. But what I am saying is that there’s hope. One of our own poets, speaking of that hope which rises from fearing the Lord, said:

Hope springs eternal in the human breast:
Man never Is but always To be blest.[1]

There’s always hope. Real hope that it can change. Do nothing, and it will certainly get worse. But fear the Lord, and it just might get better.

Proverbs 4:1-27 has three distinct units, each beginning with an address to one or more “sons.” The theme of “life” links the sections together. Solomon’s advice goes like this: First, do whatever it takes to get wisdom, and you’ll find life (Prov 4:1-9). Second, contrast the two roads before you to see which one leads to the life (Prov 4:10-19). Third, let the life become a part of who you are, and it will change everything you do (Prov 4:20-27). In other words, because God makes his life available in Jesus Christ, those who turn to him have hope that anything can change.[2]

This post was first published in 2013 and is part of a series walking through Proverbs 1-9.

[1] Alexander Pope, Essay on Man

[2] I’m indebted to Waltke, Proverbs 1-15, pp.274-301 for the structure and main points of Proverbs 4. (Disclosure: This is an affiliate link, so if you click it and buy stuff from Amazon, your purchase will help to support our site at no extra cost to yourself.)

3 Reasons to Teach Your Kids the Bible

December 3, 2025 By Peter Krol

Ken Mbugua offers 3 reasons to teach your kids the Bible:

It is your God-given, joyful privilege.
God still speaks through His Word.
The Bible is a light.

If we don’t teach them the Bible, what will they find instead to guide them through life? How will they hear from God? How will they know him? For those reasons, we’ve sought to provide help with teaching not only the content of the Bible but also the skills for children to read and understand it themselves.

As Mbugua declares, “The call to teach our children about God is not a modern idea but a timeless command rooted in Scripture.”

Check it out!

When Humility is not Easy

November 28, 2025 By Peter Krol

It’s easy to forget humility and act like violent men when facing certain types of people. We’ll find help with three groups of people by considering the three places where New Testament authors quote Proverbs 3:34.

1. Those who have hurt me deeply

James has this first group in mind when he quotes Proverbs 3:34 to instruct the community to stop quarreling (Jas. 4:1-12). James argues that we each tend to love ourselves more than anyone else, so we fight for our rights. In the course of such conflict, we get hurt and want to retaliate. Instead, we must remember that our desires cannot give us what they promise. So we must turn to the Lord, because he always gives more grace than the world does. As we fear the Lord instead of focusing on ourselves, we become more humble people. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (Jas. 4:6).

2. Those who don’t deserve my trust

Peter has this second group in mind when he quotes Proverbs 3:34 to instruct the church to submit to the elders (1 Pet. 5:1-11). Elders are shepherds of the flock of God, but they must never be mistaken for the Chief Shepherd. When we put our leaders in the place of Jesus, they fail to deliver because they are neither divine nor sinless. When they fail, we tend to become disillusioned, anxious for the future of the church, and proud in our own opinions. Instead, we ought to fear the Lord more than we fear failure. This makes us both humble and effective, for “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (1 Pet. 5:5).

3. All the rest

Paul has all of us in mind when he draws us back to Christ’s humility to empower our own (Phil. 2:1-18). Does Christ encourage you? Does his love comfort you? Do you participate in his Spirit? Has God shown any affection or sympathy toward you? Jesus gave up what he deserved (his rights as God) and took on what he did not deserve (the role of a servant, the limitations of a human body, and the utter disgrace of death by crucifixion). He did it to rescue you from what you deserve (God’s judgment) and to give you what you do not deserve (God’s pleasure). Paul was so affected by Jesus’ humility that he was prepared to die himself if it meant his people would hold these truths more dearly.

Loving others wisely and humbly is not optional for followers of Christ. It’s the meat and potatoes of living by faith in community with other sinners. Wisdom must penetrate this crucial area of our lives. The fear of the Lord is the beginning, and when you fear the Lord you can’t help but become like him. That means dying for others, even if they’ve hurt you or if they don’t deserve it. When Jesus’ humility grips you, it changes everything about you. Don’t turn inward and deny yourself the opportunity to fear the Lord and know Jesus in his humility. As Raymond Ortlund writes:

If you would like to experience God with that humility, here is how you can. You look at the cross. You see a wise man hanging there, dying in the place of fools like you, because he loves you. You may despise him, but he does not despise you. You may be above him, but he humbled himself for you. Look there at him. Look away from yourself. Look at him, and keep looking until your pride melts. You will not only worship, you will begin to grow wise.[1]

This post was first published in 2013 and is part of a series walking through Proverbs 1-9.

[1] Proverbs: Wisdom that Works, Kindle location 537-540.

Disclosure: This link is an Amazon affiliate link. If you click it and buy stuff from Amazon, your purchase will help support our site.

Might Your Teaching be Preventing People from Learning?

November 26, 2025 By Peter Krol

Bryan Elliff has a wonderful and provocative piece called “Less Lecture More Learning: Ideas for a Better Sunday School Hour.” In that article, he describes situations where church members faithfully attend Sunday school classes for decades but still don’t know how to read or study their Bibles.

One of the biggest contributors to the problem is lecture-style teaching. That may surprise you, but I think it’s true. Let me paint the picture. One willing and perhaps gifted person spends a lot of time at home preparing during the week. On Sunday, he marches to the front of the classroom to speak at the group for an hour. Maybe a few minutes are given for discussion at the end and the listeners file out to go to the worship meeting where they will listen to a speaker again.

The problem with this is that it doesn’t teach the people how to read the Bible. It just serves up a finished product that they think about for a few minutes. Most likely, unless the teacher is an exceptionally good speaker, they’ll forget it rather quickly. It’s kind of like inviting someone over for a meal once a week and expecting him to learn how to cook.

In other words, there’s too much teaching and not enough learning.

Elliff goes on to suggest some practical ways you can turn your lectures into an academy for vibrant learning. His suggestions are quite close to my model for teaching Bible study in church.

Check it out!

Logos Bible Software: The Subscription Model Seems to be Working

November 21, 2025 By Peter Krol

About a year ago, I reviewed some major changes undergone by Logos Bible Software in switching to a subscription model. The biggest complaints against Logos over the years have been 1) affordability and 2) the huge learning curve required. It appears that the subscription model is truly working to address that first issue. And the second issue is largely addressed by the huge library of tutorials and training videos accessible not only on the web but also through the software.

As a reminder: You can select which tier of access you want to the software, including the size of resource library you want access to. And the truth is that only full-time Bible scholars really need the highest tier. A bottom- or middle-tier plan is more than sufficient for the average Bible student.

Why I still love Logos

For years, I have used Logos every day. So it was a no-brainer for me to agree to write an honest review for you in exchange for another year’s complimentary subscription. Now in no particular order, here are the reasons why I love Logos:

Access to the Scriptures on laptop, tablet, and phone.
I can pull up a quick search or library resource on the fly to help during a conversation or discipleship time with someone.
I click on a word to automatically all instances where that word is repeated in the text.
The Sermon Builder is a wonderful word processor designed from the ground up with preaching and preachers in mind.
I preach and teach from the Logos app on my iPad.
I read church history and theology in Logos like an ebook reading app.
I regularly watch videos from courses in Logos mobile ed.
I mark up my text in a certain way, which Logos saves. I can turn those highlights on when I want to revisit my work, and I can turn them off when I want a clean text.
I make use of a lectionary and a prayer book in Logos for personal devotions.
The Sermon Manager enables me to maintain a database of everything I’ve ever taught, when and where I’ve taught it, and how many times (and in what scenarios) I’ve taught the same text.
I can check many English translations of the text I’m studying in a few instants.
I can search my entire digital library and my entire print library for anything. Topic? Text? Quotation? You name it. Logos will find it, and even give me the exact page number for a print resource sitting on my shelf so I can get to the right spot instantly.

What I don’t love about Logos

I’m frankly concerned with the extent to which Logos has incorporated AI into the software, without granting users a setting to opt out of it. As with most other software available today, AI is being pushed on us whether we want it or not.

Some of the AI features are wonderful, such as Smart Search. To perform a robust search in Logos, I used to have to spend lots of time looking up the proper search syntax for what I was seeking. But AI now enables me to search for anything in plain language, and the search results come clearly footnoted with sources in my library, so I can click on any source to verify the AI is not hallucinating on me.

However, the AI incorporation into the Sermon Builder is nothing short of troubling. So far, I have been repulsed by handing my work in teaching and preaching over to AI, but it is only becoming easier for students and teachers of the Bible to do so, with few safeguards. It’s packaged in Logos as mere suggestions for outlines, discussion questions, or illustrations. But with a single click, you can then insert those “suggestions” right into your notes or manuscript, presenting them as your own work.

To get more specific: With a few keystrokes, you can submit a Scripture text, audience demographic, and general theme you want to cover. Logos AI will then spit out a full sermon outline, with summaries of sections, suggested applications, teaching objectives, and a main point. All you’ve got to do is take that with you into a small group or class, and you can lead a discussion or present a lecture that is just as soulless and Spirit-empty as the machine that disgorged it onto your screen.

This is not good for humanity, especially for the church of Jesus Christ, and we need heartier speed bumps for such dangerous tech.

Conclusion

I don’t refuse to ever use AI in my life. It just requires self-discipline and thick boundaries. So if you’ve got the self-discipline and boundaries for it—and you’d better, no matter what software you use these days to do anything—and you want to give Logos a try, feel free to shop plans here and test it free for 60 days. If you buy a subscription after clicking this link, our blog will receive a small commission, which enables us to cover the fees associated with maintaining the blog. Thank you!

How to Ask Excellent Discussion Questions

November 19, 2025 By Peter Krol

The Logos blog recently republished a classic piece by my most excellent colleague Ryan Higginbottom about “How to Ask Excellent Bible Study Discussion Questions.” This article summarizes a lot of important work about launching questions, observation questions, interpretive questions, and application questions.

Check it out!

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