PreTrib PilgrimSearch the library
Search by subject, then refine by approach. A prophecy study may also be apologetic or discerning because subject tells you what it examines, while approach tells you how it examines it.
47 results for “Christian hope”
Clear searchSeeing God, bodily resurrection, and life in the renewed creation
Is the Beatific Vision the Whole Christian Hope? Seeing God, bodily resurrection, and life in the renewed creation The beatific vision is the Christian teaching that the redeemed will see God and find their perfect happines…
Read article →Not escape from the body, but its redemption
The Hope of the Resurrection Not escape from the body, but its redemption Many people imagine the Christian hope as an endless disembodied existence: the soul released from the body, leaving the…
Read article →Michael J. Vlach · Biblical theology · 2023
…as parts of one coherent purpose. Vlach is especially helpful in resisting the idea that Christian hope means escape from the physical world. He traces God's work from creation to restoration and shows why bodily resurrection, the renewal of the earth, Christ's reign, and life i…
View recommendation →Near-death experiences, neuroscience, and the authority of Christ
…in. Some may combine physiology, memory, medication and expectation. Scripture also gives Christians a category of spiritual deception, though we have no warrant to label every unusual experience demonic. The evidence usually does not permit us to reconstruct the cause of a parti…
Read article →Brian E. Daley · Historical theology · 1991
I recommend The Hope of the Early Church because it showed me how varied early Christian thinking about death and the world to come really was. Daley traces the development of the intermediate state, apokat…
View recommendation →John Bunyan · Christian allegory · 1678
I recommend The Pilgrim's Progress because it gives memorable form to truths Christians often know only as abstractions. Bunyan makes conviction, temptation, discouragement, fellowship, perseverance, and hope into places and people that stay in the mind. It rewards r…
View recommendation →Dave Hunt · Devotional theology and biblical exhortation · 2000
I recommend An Urgent Call to a Serious Faith because it refuses to separate Christian belief from Christian living. Hunt ranges across the gospel, faith, love for God, discipleship, doctrine, the Church, and the believer's heavenly hope, but the recurring appeal is…
View recommendation →Israel's Messiah, Israel's Scriptures, and a gospel for the world
…Israel's Messiah, Israel's Scriptures, and a gospel for the world To many Jewish people, Christianity appears thoroughly foreign. Its historic centres became Rome, Constantinople, Canterbury, Geneva, and countless cities far from Jerusalem. Its Scriptures have been used to justi…
Read article →Two accounts of judgement, mercy, and the sinner's hope before God
The Scales and the Cross Two accounts of judgement, mercy, and the sinner's hope before God How will I stand before God? The question reaches deeper than religious labels. We know that our actions matter, that evil deserves judgement, and that our own record is not…
Read article →Christianity, Islam and the verdict of the evidence
The Sum of These Things Christianity, Islam and the verdict of the evidence “Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Ma…
Read article →History, heresy, and the temptation of private Christianity
Have Evangelicals Become Neo-Gnostics? History, Heresy, and the Temptation of Private Christianity The accusation identifies real evangelical deformations—secret-key religion, escape rhetoric, elite conversion status, and churchless faith—but fails when it becomes a historica…
Read article →Two failures, two responses, and the difference between remorse and repentance
…ed what it wants from us, it leaves us with wounds it cannot heal. Judas: Remorse Without Hope The Sin of Judas Judas went to the chief priests and asked: “What will ye give me, and I will deliver him unto you?” —Matthew 26:15 They agreed to pay him thirty pieces of silver. From…
Read article →An unrequited love for the historic Church
…ry later development apostolic. There is a particular accusation made against evangelical Christianity that I feel more deeply than might be expected. We are told that we are rootless individualists: Christians without a Church, readers without rulers, minds pursuing private illu…
Read article →How the Law reaches its goal and appointed end in Christ
…aw reaches its goal and appointed end in Christ Few sentences have carried more weight in Christian discussions of the Law than Romans 10:4: "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth." —Romans 10:4 Does Paul mean that Christ terminated the La…
Read article →Faith, assurance, and the unseen reality of God
…These questions bring us to a remarkable statement: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” — Hebrews 11:1, KJV There is something profound here. Things still hoped for have a present substance. Things still unseen carry conviction. Fait…
Read article →The peace Christ gives in a troubled world
…n away from Christ. He makes Christ and His words precious to His people. This means that Christian peace is personal before it is emotional. It does not begin with our ability to create a particular state of mind. It begins with the reality that Christ has not left His people as…
Read article →Creation, judgement, and the coming reign of Christ
The Earth's Great Sabbath Creation, judgement, and the coming reign of Christ The Christian hope for creation rests neither in human effort nor in escape from the material world. The creation groans for the return of its rightful King, the revelation of the sons of God, a…
Read article →Marvin W. Meyer · Historical sourcebook · 1987
…Meyer lets their surviving texts show what their adherents practised, sought, feared, and hoped for. For the Christian reader, that background makes the setting of Acts and Paul's letters more tangible and helps us appreciate the world into which the gospel came. It is a genuinel…
View recommendation →The event is explicit; the real dispute is its timing
Every Christian Should Believe in the Rapture The event is explicit; the real dispute is its timing The rapture is often treated as though it were an eccentric event invented by dispensationalists…
Read article →Michael Brown, 2 Thessalonians 1, and the public vindication of the saints
When Do Persecuted Christians Receive Rest? Michael Brown, 2 Thessalonians 1, and the public vindication of the saints In his presentation Why I Reject a Pre-tribulation Rapture, Michael Brown identifies 2 The…
Read article →Jesus and the fountain of living water
…re is a thirst deeper than the body's need. It is the ache of the soul when the things we hoped would satisfy us have not done so. Success can distract it. Pleasure can briefly numb it. Religion can cover it with activity. None of these can give life. On the last and greatest day…
Read article →The glory philosophy could not contain
…r an objection. It should enlarge our worship. The Incarnation is not merely a difficulty Christianity can survive; it is glory Christianity alone can proclaim. The Maker entered His creation. The eternal Son made our nature His own. The One whom the heaven of heavens cannot cont…
Read article →Trusting God when voices seek to weaken our confidence
…worthy. They answered him not We can feel obliged to produce an immediate answer whenever Christianity is challenged. If we cannot reply quickly and convincingly, we may feel that our faith has somehow failed. Isaiah 36 gives us a different picture. In this instance, the people’s…
Read article →The Gospel, Human Perception, and the Illuminating Work of the Holy Spirit
…nd some of it while misunderstanding the rest? Did our words awaken a familiar picture of Christianity assembled from school lessons, political arguments, religious hypocrisy, painful experiences, and things Christians themselves should never have taught? The question is not whet…
Read article →What God's faithfulness to Israel means for everyone who trusts His promises
…erform, confidence becomes impossible. Faith would rest not upon revelation, but upon our hope that the words will retain their recognisable meaning when fulfilment comes. The future of Israel is therefore not a specialised controversy at the edge of Christian doctrine. It tests…
Read article →A history of interpretation, polemic, and forgotten tension
…Christ and the Church. The resulting history is neither simple nor flattering. Some early Christian writers defended essential truths: Jesus is Israel's Messiah, the law cannot justify, Gentiles are full heirs in Christ, and the Old Testament finds its goal in Him. Yet those trut…
Read article →Divine judgement, the character of God, and the promise of escape
…pe The claim that the Church is not appointed to wrath is sometimes answered too quickly. Christians plainly suffer. Jesus promised tribulation in the world. The apostles endured imprisonment, violence, loss, and martyrdom. Across the world, believers still suffer precisely becau…
Read article →Signs, expectancy, and the event the Church is told to await
…Testament repeatedly directs believers towards Christ Himself: "Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." —Titus 2:13 "For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Chri…
Read article →Testing Islam's evidence for divine revelation
Is the Qur'an a Miracle? Testing Islam's evidence for divine revelation Christians are frequently placed on the defensive. Has the Bible been corrupted? Did Jesus really claim to be God? Was He actually crucified? Has the doctrine of the Trinity compromised mono…
Read article →Four popular claims tested in context
…that the coming of Muhammad was written in the Torah and the Gospel possessed by Jews and Christians: "Those who follow the messenger, the Prophet who can neither read nor write, whom they will find described in the Torah and the Gospel (which are) with them" (Surah 7:157, Pickth…
Read article →E. W. Bullinger · Sermons · 1892
…pectation, careful textual observation, and practical urgency: prophecy is meant to shape hope, watchfulness, and faithful living. Bullinger writes within a distinctive dispensational framework and readers need not accept every sequence, distinction, or prophetic conclusion in or…
View recommendation →Christ the promised Seed, Gentile inheritance, and Paul's final blessing
…believing Jew and a believing Gentile possess the same righteousness, Spirit, access, and hope in Christ. God may still keep particular promises to the nation from which Messiah came without creating a second gospel or a superior way of salvation. What is the rule in Galatians 6?…
Read article →The olive tree, the natural branches, and the limits of the metaphor
…n precisely the direction of the attitude Paul forbids. The passage does not accuse every Christian who interprets the Church as Israel of personal arrogance. It does establish that the metaphor was designed to prevent Gentile believers from treating Jewish exclusion as proof of…
Read article →Responding to five common criticisms without defending what Scripture does not require
…the date of a system's formulation does not determine whether its interpretation is true. Christian theology repeatedly developed more precise vocabulary when questions forced believers to bring biblical truths into a coherent account. Later systematisation can clarify Scripture…
Read article →El, the Exodus, and the God Who Came from Sinai
…guity is real, but it cannot decide the identity of the one being named. English-speaking Christians, Muslims and Hindus may all use the word God while intending radically different conceptions of the divine. Arabic-speaking Christians and Muslims both use Allah. A common noun do…
Read article →What 'yea and Amen' in Christ means for Israel and the covenants
…ise is certain in the divine purpose fulfilled through Christ, but it does not make every Christian Noah or give every believer the sign and historical commission given to him. God promised that Sarah would bear Isaac, that David would have an enduring royal house, that Mary woul…
Read article →Why apantēsis does not settle the timing of the rapture
…onclusion is overstated. What Paul actually says Paul's immediate concern is the grief of Christians whose fellow believers have died. He assures them that the departed will not miss the Lord's coming: "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice o…
Read article →Abraham, Lot, divine wrath, and a pattern that must be used carefully
…a complete proof. It is one strand in a larger biblical cord. The Judge will do right The hope of deliverance finally rests not in our ability to map every detail but in the character of God. He knows how to distinguish persecution from His wrath, His children from the objects of…
Read article →The gathering of the elect, one taken and one left, and Paul's revealed mystery
…an answer from the context, not the slogan that Matthew concerns Jews while Paul concerns Christians. The contextual differences must be demonstrated, and the similarities must not be denied. The Olivet Discourse is anchored in Daniel and Jerusalem Jesus' teaching begins with the…
Read article →Fulfilment in Christ, the inclusion of the Gentiles, and Israel's future mercy
…, establishes the permanent exclusion of Israel. The Gospels begin with Israel's covenant hope The announcement of Jesus' birth is unmistakably messianic and national: "He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne…
Read article →Why Israel's failure cannot make the word of God fail
…ted day and night has spoken it. Christ confirms rather than dissolves the promises Every Christian interpretation must be centred upon Jesus Christ. He is Abraham's Seed, David's Son, the mediator of the new covenant, and the only Saviour of Israel and the nations. No promise re…
Read article →The question reaches beyond prophecy to the faithfulness of God
…ecy to the faithfulness of God Has the Church replaced Israel in the purpose of God? Some Christians answer yes, although they may prefer words such as fulfilled, transformed, or expanded. They believe that Israel's promises have reached their true meaning in Christ and now belon…
Read article →Regathering, national rebirth, and the spiritual renewal still to come
…sappear into the nations among which they lived. Their Scriptures, worship, identity, and hope of return endured. On 14 May 1948, Jewish sovereignty was re-established in the ancestral land through the declaration of the State of Israel. That event does not by itself settle every…
Read article →One Messiah, one gospel, and God's continuing purpose for Israel
…the prophets, the teaching of Jesus, Acts, Romans, Galatians, Hebrews, and the history of Christian interpretation, the cumulative answer is no. God has judged Israel severely. The nation remains largely in unbelief and cannot inherit saving blessing apart from Jesus Christ. Yet…
Read article →Election within Abraham's family, the believing remnant, and the future of the nation
…pares the reader morally to receive Paul's conclusion. Gentiles must hear Israel's future hope without pride, appropriation, or contempt. The complete movement can therefore be followed like this: | Passage | Function in the argument | |---|---| | Romans 8:28-39 | God's purpose,…
Read article →Defining the position before testing it
…theology" is a useful popular label, but it can also conceal important differences. Many Christians accused of teaching that the Church replaced Israel would reject that wording. They believe that the Church is the fulfilment, continuation, or expansion of Israel rather than its…
Read article →The positive argument of the whole series, brought together
…in the air (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; 1 Corinthians 15:50-54). The question is not whether Christians should believe in that gathering. The question is where it belongs within the wider prophetic programme. Pretribulationism gains its strength from several strands which converge.…
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