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31 results for “Christian life”
Clear searchJesus and the fountain of living water
…Pleasure can briefly numb it. Religion can cover it with activity. None of these can give life. On the last and greatest day of the Feast of Tabernacles, Jesus did not whisper to such people. He stood and cried: "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believe…
Read article →Not escape from the body, but its redemption
…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 physical world behind and becoming something more like a ghost than a human being. Christians…
Read article →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 →Seeing 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 →Labour, purpose, and faithfulness in a fallen world
…lace of God. Others speak as though work itself were an indignity—an interruption to real life which should be escaped as quickly as possible. Scripture presents labour differently. Work is not our god, and it is not the curse. It is part of the good order God gave humanity befor…
Read article →Circumcision of the heart and the identity of Paul's inward Jew
Does Romans 2:28-29 Make Christians "Spiritual Jews"? Circumcision of the heart and the identity of Paul's inward Jew Paul's description of the inward Jew is often treated as a decisive redefinition of Israel: "For…
Read article →Why the Trinity is not polytheism—and why Christians confess one God
Not Three Gods Why the Trinity is not polytheism—and why Christians confess one God The Trinity is often rejected before it is accurately defined. “The Father is God, Jesus is God, and the Holy Spirit is God,” the objection runs. “That makes three…
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 →Which Gospel does the Qur'an affirm?
…m it. The People of the Gospel are told to judge by what God revealed within it. Yet when Christians open the Gospel they possessed for centuries before Muhammad, they find the Son who shares the Father's glory, gives His life as a ransom, is crucified under Pontius Pilate and ri…
Read article →Two accounts of judgement, mercy, and the sinner's hope before God
…it against failure. The Bible also teaches a perfectly just judgement according to works. Christianity does not replace moral seriousness with divine indifference. Yet at the centre of the gospel stands an answer that no scale can supply: the Judge has provided a substitute, and…
Read article →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 →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 →What the Father's love for the Son reveals about God
…ion to love and freely express it when He creates. That answer should be taken seriously. Christianity does not need to prove the Trinity by defining love in a way which makes every alternative logically impossible. The biblical case is stronger than that. Jesus does not leave us…
Read article →The divine identity of Jesus across the Gospels
…Prophet The divine identity of Jesus across the Gospels Islam honours Jesus in ways which Christians should acknowledge accurately. The Qur'an calls Him the Messiah, describes Him as a word from God, affirms His virgin birth and attributes extraordinary signs to Him by God's perm…
Read article →What mercy, holiness and the cross reveal about God
…revealed by what it does when the beloved is undeserving and the cost is real. Islam and Christianity both speak of divine mercy, forgiveness and love. A fair comparison cannot begin by pretending that the Qur'an presents Allah as merciless or that Muslims worship a deity who ne…
Read article →Sources behind Qur’anic narratives
…cultural vacuum. It appeared in a world alive with biblical names, Jewish interpretation, Christian preaching, sectarian disagreement, devotional legend and stories carried across languages by travellers, merchants, clergy and ordinary believers. That observation does not disprov…
Read article →The olive tree, the natural branches, and the limits of the metaphor
…he Church participates in that history; it did not create the root from which it receives life. Gentiles are grafted in among believing Jews Paul describes the grafting with carefully chosen relationships: "And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive t…
Read article →The crucifixion in history, Scripture and the Qur'an
Did Jesus Really Die? The crucifixion in history, Scripture and the Qur'an Christianity and Islam cannot both be correct about the death of Jesus. The Gospel declares that Jesus was crucified under Pontius Pilate, died, was buried and rose bodily from the dead. His…
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
…s the revealing of the Son of man with the days of Noah and Lot (Luke 17:26–30). Ordinary life continued until judgement arrived suddenly. In Lot's case, “the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven” (Luke 17:29). The comparison highlights sud…
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 →Conditional blessing, irrevocable promise, and fulfilment in Christ
…nd sacrificial blessings to believers who approach God through Christ. Jewish and Gentile Christians therefore enjoy genuine new-covenant forgiveness, the indwelling Spirit, and direct access to God. These are not borrowed blessings of uncertain ownership. They were secured for u…
Read article →Signs, expectancy, and the event the Church is told to await
…to await Imminency does not mean that Christ was required to return within the apostles' lifetime. It means that no revealed prophetic event must first occur before the Church may be gathered to Him. The distinction matters. An event can be certain and constantly expected withou…
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 →The covenant son and the sacrifice that points to Christ
…xpressly records that God heard Ishmael, protected him and promised to make him fruitful. Christians have no reason to erase what Scripture affirms. But blessing is not the same as covenant election. God named the covenant heir before he was born. He repeated that choice after hi…
Read article →Why a loaded label does not settle the question
…emain with Him for ever. His concern is pastoral. Some Thessalonian believers feared that Christians who had died would miss the Lord's coming. Paul assures them that the dead will be raised and that the whole company will be reunited in Christ's presence. He concludes, “Wherefor…
Read article →Regathering, national rebirth, and the spiritual renewal still to come
…tical strength but upon the Creator's faithfulness. Ezekiel sees a nation brought back to life Ezekiel's vision of dry bones is sometimes applied generally to spiritual revival. The prophet himself identifies the bones: "Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel." —Ez…
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
…is between Romans 8:39 and 12:1. Structurally, Paul pauses before moving to the practical life of the Church. The section is parenthetical in position but not incidental in purpose. It answers the largest possible objection to the assurance he has just given: whether human unbeli…
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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