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.
94 results for “Sin”
Clear searchJohn Bunyan · Spiritual autobiography · 1666
Bunyan's account of conviction, temptation, fear, doubt, conversion, preaching, imprisonment, and the mercy of God in Christ, opening the personal world from which much of The Pilgrim's Progress later emerged.
View recommendation →A response to Michael Horton on the land promise, Amos 9, and the people of God
No Holy Land? Covenant Discipline, Gentile Blessing, and Israel's Future A response to Michael Horton on the land promise, Amos 9, and the people of God Michael Horton's essay, “No Holy Land: Does Israel Still Have a Biblical Claim on th…
Read article →C. I. Scofield · Pastoral sermons · 1915
…ication deepened my understanding of Christ in us. The final study of defilement and cleansing brings the whole book to a searching and satisfying conclusion. These sermons come from an earlier evangelical setting and some expressions may sound unfamiliar today. Scofield also use…
View recommendation →The man of sin, the last trumpet, the first resurrection, and the last day
Four Difficult Texts for Pretribulationism The man of sin, the last trumpet, the first resurrection, and the last day A cumulative case should be exposed to the passages which appear least friendly to it. Four objections deserve particular atte…
Read article →Signs, expectancy, and the event the Church is told to await
…Second Thessalonians 2 The strongest challenge comes from Paul's discussion of the man of sin: "Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him... Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except…
Read article →Augustine of Hippo · Spiritual autobiography and prayer · c. 397–400
…ns, excuses, habits, relationships, and ideas through which he ran from God, while recognising the patient providence that pursued him. The result is both deeply personal and intellectually rich: a study of sin and desire, but still more a testimony to the God in whom the restles…
View recommendation →Marvin W. Meyer · Historical sourcebook · 1987
A wide-ranging collection of ancient texts which opens a window onto the mystery religions of the Mediterranean world—their gods, initiations, sacrifices, prayers, festivals, secret rites, and hopes for blessing or life beyond death.
View recommendation →How an openly transmitted text survived copying, criticism, and centuries of examination
…text was actually transmitted. The Bible did not pass through one secret chain in which a single guardian could rewrite every copy. Its books were read publicly, copied repeatedly, translated into other languages, quoted by Christian writers, and carried across a wide geographica…
Read article →Spiritual ecstasy, altered states, and discerning what is from God
…explanations include neurological illness, poisoning, and a mass psychogenic response arising from severe social distress and deeply rooted fears surrounding the curse of St Vitus. The outbreak should not be presented as proof of demonic activity. It demonstrates something more…
Read article →Christ the promised Seed, Gentile inheritance, and Paul's final blessing
…el of God the Church? Christ the promised Seed, Gentile inheritance, and Paul's final blessing Galatians contains two of the strongest arguments for identifying the Church as Israel. First, Paul says that the promises were made to Abraham and his singular Seed, Christ. Everyone w…
Read article →The Gospel, Human Perception, and the Illuminating Work of the Holy Spirit
…uminating Work of the Holy Spirit We sometimes describe an evangelistic conversation in a single sentence: “I explained the gospel, and he rejected it.” That may be an accurate description. Scripture certainly speaks of people refusing Christ, resisting the Holy Ghost, and turnin…
Read article →Why the final seven is unfinished, future, and centred upon Israel and Jerusalem
…pon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy." —Daniel 9:24 The expression tr…
Read article →What Christ’s promise establishes—and what claims about infallible teaching still need to prove
…s always right, that bishops never make mistakes, or that church leaders are incapable of sin. Its doctrine of infallibility concerns protection from error in teaching faith and morals under specified conditions. It includes certain definitive teachings of the pope and of the bis…
Read article →Two failures, two responses, and the difference between remorse and repentance
…repentance Few experiences are more painful than awakening to the seriousness of our own sin. The excuses fall away, the damage becomes clear, and conscience begins to speak. We may feel guilt, grief, shame, fear, or even disgust with ourselves. Yet sorrow by itself is not repen…
Read article →Governmental restraint, the final ten kings, and the preparation of the temple
…ises a related question of preparation. Antichrist desecrates a sanctuary already in use. Since the final rulers exercise authority for a limited period, I expect that the temple may already be built, or under construction, when the ten kings begin their reign. Preparations for t…
Read article →El, the Exodus, and the God Who Came from Sinai
Did Israel Invent Yahweh? El, the Exodus, and the God Who Came from Sinai Yesterday I found myself discussing claims about the origins of Israel’s God with my son. He seemed to regard the essential theory as accepted among scholars. He had also discussed it…
Read article →Conditional blessing, irrevocable promise, and fulfilment in Christ
Has God Abandoned Israel? What Do the Covenants Say? Conditional blessing, irrevocable promise, and fulfilment in Christ Israel broke God's law, rejected the prophets, and nationally refused its Messiah. Jerusalem was judged, the temple was destroyed, and the…
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 recor…
Read article →The olive tree, the natural branches, and the limits of the metaphor
…ing picture is richer than either separation or replacement. Gentiles really do enter blessings rooted in Israel's covenant history. They do so by grace and faith, alongside the believing remnant of Israel. Yet Paul continues to distinguish wild branches from natural branches and…
Read article →A history of interpretation, polemic, and forgotten tension
…not appear in one moment through one theologian. It developed as the Church became increasingly Gentile, separated socially from Jewish communities, interpreted the destruction of Jerusalem as lasting displacement, and read Israel's Scriptures principally through their fulfilmen…
Read article →Seth D. Postell, Eitan Bar & Erez Soref · Messianic biblical theology · 2017
I recommend Reading Moses, Seeing Jesus because it treats the Torah neither as an embarrassing relic nor as a covenant code which the Church must simply re-enact. The authors read its narratives, patterns, promises, and commandments as a coherent witness whose goal is found in Ye…
View recommendation →An unrequited love for the historic Church
…s without a Church, readers without rulers, minds pursuing private illumination while refusing the visible, historic community Christ founded. Sometimes the accusation is sharpened further. Our distinction between outward rites and inward grace, our insistence upon testing doctri…
Read article →J. C. Ryle · Doctrinal and pastoral essays · 1874
Nineteen clear statements from an evangelical Anglican standpoint addressing salvation, Scripture and private judgment, baptism and regeneration, the Lord's Supper and real presence, the Church and ministry, confession, worship, the Sabbath, doctrinal novelty, ministerial fallibility, and idolatry.
View recommendation →Isaiah, John, and the Divine Identity of Jesus Christ
…man support. Isaiah 43:25 adds the forgiveness of transgressions. YHWH blots out Israel’s sins for His own sake. His saving power includes the restoration of a guilty people, not merely their relocation from one empire to another. The exclusivity requires precision. God can save…
Read article →Simon Greenleaf · Legal examination of testimony · 1846
…t asks readers to take the four Gospel witnesses seriously as testimony rather than dismissing them by prejudice or accepting them without examination. His legal approach draws attention to the difference between contradiction and the ordinary variation found among independent wi…
View recommendation →Unity in Christ and distinction in God's purpose
…nd the glory, and the covenants" (Romans 9:3-5). He can say there is no difference in the sinner's need and the gospel's availability (Romans 10:12), then distinguish Israel from the Gentiles throughout Romans 11. Equality answers the question, "How are people saved and what stan…
Read article →Near-death experiences, neuroscience, and the authority of Christ
…question. A testimony may be moving without being self-interpreting. An experience may be sincere without every conclusion drawn from it being true. In the decades since Brooke wrote, resuscitation medicine has advanced, researchers have interviewed cardiac-arrest survivors syste…
Read article →The incarnation, the limits of created perspective and the love philosophy could not imagine
…us wept.” — John 11:35 Christ’s tears were not a failure of reason. His grief was neither sinful nor disordered. Perfect humanity did not require emotional detachment. At the grave of Lazarus, holiness wept. The world associated greatness with rising above service. Christ washed…
Read article →How the Law reaches its goal and appointed end in Christ
…n usage demonstrates this range. In Romans 6 he asks believers what fruit they had in the sins of which they were now ashamed: "For the end of those things is death." —Romans 6:21 He then contrasts that former life with service to God, whose fruit is holiness and whose "end" is e…
Read article →A quiet invitation to draw near to Christ
…. But the believer comes to God as someone already received in Christ. We can confess our sins honestly because we have a Saviour whose finished work is sufficient. We do not have to hide until we have improved. The beloved knocks In Song of Songs 5, the scene changes. “It is the…
Read article →Responding to five common criticisms without defending what Scripture does not require
…ispensationalism was invented by Darby” John Nelson Darby played a major role in systematising and spreading nineteenth-century dispensational thought. Denying that would be poor history. But the date of a system's formulation does not determine whether its interpretation is true…
Read article →What the historical evidence proves—and what it does not
…uine early evidence for a concept substantially similar to pre-Tribulation removal. Dismissing the passage solely because the name on the sermon is uncertain is a sleight of hand. Morgan Edwards is clear pre-Darby evidence The strongest evidence for a rapture separated from Chris…
Read article →Ezekiel 20, child sacrifice, and the judgement of being given over
…giving people over after they reject the truth about Him. Their resulting conduct remains sinful; being handed over to it does not make it an approved command. Psalm 81:12 and Romans 1:24, 26. Second Thessalonians presents a similar sequence. People refuse the truth, and for that…
Read article →Why the Son assumed a complete human nature, not merely a body
…hat distinction is demanding, but it is necessary. Jesus did not have a human body while using only a divine mind. He also was not a divine person sharing one body with an independently acting human person. He is one Christ, the eternal Son, living in the complete human nature He…
Read article →The crucifixion in history, Scripture and the Qur'an
…stantially intact. It is the historical event through which Scripture says God dealt with sin. The Qur'an appears to deny that event. Surah 4:157 says of Jesus' opponents: "But they neither killed nor crucified him - it was only made to appear so" (Surah 4:157, The Clear Quran, t…
Read article →Eustathius of Antioch, the human soul of Christ and the pictures created by our words
…2:17–18). The same epistle says that He was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15). These are not scenes performed by God behind a human mask. The Son truly lived them as man. At the same time, incarnation did not mean subtraction from deity. The Son did…
Read article →What 'yea and Amen' in Christ means for Israel and the covenants
…. Gentile believers are not spectators looking through the window at another people's blessings. But a vital step remains unproved. Does fulfilment through Christ mean reassignment to the Church alone? Does the certainty of every promise permit its stated recipient and content to…
Read article →Why apantēsis does not settle the timing of the rapture
…of the rapture One of the most sophisticated objections to pretribulationism centres on a single Greek noun. Paul says that living believers will be caught up with the resurrected dead "to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thessalonians 4:17). The word translated "to meet" is apantēsi…
Read article →Origen, Arius and the line between Creator and creation
…In Britain, Easter regularly brings television documentaries and newspaper features promising to uncover the “real Jesus” behind the faith of the Church. The familiar suggestion is that Jesus was originally a Jewish teacher, prophet or failed Messiah and that belief in His deity…
Read article →Abraham, Lot, divine wrath, and a pattern that must be used carefully
…ience disease, war, persecution, natural disaster, and the consequences of other people's sin. Scripture never promises believers immunity from every earthly calamity. Abraham's appeal concerns God's punitive judgement of Sodom as Sodom. God does not condemn the righteous as wick…
Read article →Matthew, the Hebrew word almah, and a sign whose meaning reaches beyond Ahaz
…fic. Isaiah 8 introduces Maher-shalal-hash-baz with a similar timetable, while also addressing the land as belonging to Immanuel (Isaiah 8:8). The relationship is close, though the names and descriptions should not simply be collapsed. Whatever view we take, the near application…
Read article →The gathering of the elect, one taken and one left, and Paul's revealed mystery
…nship, custody, or simple removal. The word does not determine whether the outcome is blessing or judgement. The surrounding scene must do that. Paul uses a different and more forceful verb for the rapture. In 1 Thessalonians 4:17, believers are "caught up"—harpazō, to seize, sna…
Read article →Circumcision of the heart and the identity of Paul's inward Jew
…ew. Anyone whose heart has been circumcised by the Spirit is now a true or spiritual Jew. Since Christians possess that inward work, the Church has become spiritual Israel. That reading takes Paul's contrast seriously. Outward privilege without inward reality cannot please God. C…
Read article →Fulfilment in Christ, the inclusion of the Gentiles, and Israel's future mercy
…future mercy The Old Testament repeatedly promises Israel preservation, regathering, cleansing, the kingdom of David's Son, and a restored relationship with God. A strong supersessionist response does not simply deny those passages. It argues that the New Testament teaches us how…
Read article →What the Father's love for the Son reveals about God
…that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins" (1 John 4:10). The statement "God is love" cannot be separated from the Father sending the Son. God's love is revealed through a relationship already named within the sentence: the Fat…
Read article →The event is explicit; the real dispute is its timing
…estimony proves the narrower point: long before Darby, a Christian writer affirmed the raising of the dead, transformation of the living, their catching up together, and ascent into heaven. The event was not invented in the nineteenth century. The dispute concerns its location in…
Read article →Why Israel's failure cannot make the word of God fail
…ivine promises when their recipients prove unfaithful? Scripture does not answer by minimising Israel's sin. Nor does it conclude that God's purpose must be transferred to a more deserving people. It distinguishes the nation's responsibility from God's reliability. Israel's failu…
Read article →History, heresy, and the temptation of private Christianity
…usation without a stable historical meaning. Christians have been called Gnostic for stressing personal conversion, assurance of salvation, the authority of Scripture, heavenly hope, doctrinal precision, non-sacramental worship, premillennialism, or distrust of corrupt institutio…
Read article →Does John 6 teach the literal eating of Christ's body?
…r eyes, but they had not perceived its significance. They wanted the bread without recognising the One to whom the bread pointed. That failure establishes the problem governing the discourse: the crowd keeps thinking materially about a sign whose reality is Christ Himself. Jesus…
Read article →Jesus and the fountain of living water
…wilderness journey and celebrated God's provision. It also carried the hope of future blessing. Water belonged naturally to that world of remembrance and promise: water from the rock, rain upon the land, cleansing, fruitfulness and the prophetic streams of God's coming kingdom. T…
Read article →The LORD, Zion, and the meaning of Beulah in Isaiah 62:4–5
…med Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate.” The “thou” is feminine singular, addressing Zion as a woman. Yet Isaiah distinguishes Zion from “thy land.” Zion is no longer to be called “Forsaken,” while her land is no longer to be called “Desolate.” The peopl…
Read article →Seeing God, bodily resurrection, and life in the renewed creation
…th. God is not merely the provider of heaven's benefits; He is the blessedness of heaven. Sin alienated humanity from His presence. Redemption brings us home to Him. Thomas Aquinas gave the beatific vision a particularly influential formulation, describing the direct knowledge of…
Read article →Divine judgement, the character of God, and the promise of escape
…hatred of Satan, the world, and wicked rulers. Divine wrath is God's judicial response to sin. A Christian may be exposed to the first while being delivered from the second. Revelation's judgements do include human violence and satanic activity, but they unfold within a heavenly…
Read article →A response to Hank Hanegraaff on resurrection, Daniel’s final week, and the Tribulation
…city, while the prophets repeatedly join Israel’s distress to national deliverance, cleansing and restoration. Once those non-essential claims have been removed, however, Hanegraaff has not answered the central case. He requires pretribulationism to appear complete within one ve…
Read article →Testing Islam's evidence for divine revelation
…een assumed? The strongest Islamic case The most serious Muslim case does not rest upon a single numerical coincidence or disputed scientific translation. It begins with Muhammad's circumstances. He was not formed in the recognised Jewish or Christian schools of scriptural learni…
Read article →The covenant son and the sacrifice that points to Christ
…nswer does not require hostility towards Arabs, contempt for Muslims or denial of the blessings God gave Ishmael. Genesis expressly records that God heard Ishmael, protected him and promised to make him fruitful. Christians have no reason to erase what Scripture affirms. But bles…
Read article →The question reaches beyond prophecy to the faithfulness of God
…f salvation, and Gentile believers are not second-class members of God's household. Every sinner is reconciled to God through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The question is whether this unity in salvation removes the distinctions which Scripture continues to make bet…
Read article →What God's faithfulness to Israel means for everyone who trusts His promises
…the difficult words upon which the debate turns. We have tried to hear the strongest opposing arguments, concede what they genuinely establish, and refuse conclusions which extend beyond the evidence. Now the case reaches its central theological question. What kind of God made t…
Read article →The peace Christ gives in a troubled world
…, believe also in me." —John 14:1 Their hearts were already troubled. Jesus was not addressing people who had mastered their emotions. He was preparing distressed disciples for events they did not yet understand. Yet the One comforting them was not sheltered from suffering. He kn…
Read article →The divine identity of Jesus across the Gospels
…The prophet prepares the way; Jesus comes as the Lord whose way is prepared. He forgives sins in His own authority When a paralysed man is lowered through the roof, Jesus first addresses the man's deepest need: "Son, thy sins be forgiven thee" (Mark 2:5). The scribes immediately…
Read article →Why the Trinity is not polytheism—and why Christians confess one God
…istinct Persons. Christianity begins with one God The Bible's starting point is uncompromising monotheism: "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD." —Deuteronomy 6:4 God says through Isaiah, “I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me” (Isaiah 45:5). J…
Read article →Why the distinction matters when we speak about Jesus
…y obeyed Him. He grew in wisdom, yet He knew what was in man. He was tempted, yet without sin. He said that He did not know the hour of His return, yet His disciples confessed that He knew all things. He suffered, bled and died, although God is immortal. Christians rightly believ…
Read article →Eitan Bar · Biblical and historical polemic · 2019
…ewish setting. His command of Hebrew, familiarity with Israeli life, and experience discussing Yeshua with Jewish people bring valuable context to questions about messianic prophecy, the New Testament, and rabbinic interpretation. The book is most useful when it sends the reader…
View recommendation →Sources behind Qur’anic narratives
…ion” (Surah 5:110, Pickthall). The canonical Gospels record Jesus healing the blind, cleansing lepers, raising the dead and performing many other signs. They do not record Him forming a bird from clay and bringing it to life. That story appears in the work now called the Infancy…
Read article →Why a loaded label does not settle the question
…is in heaven before Christ descends. The pretribulation reading does not rest upon the missing word “church”. It asks which interpretation best accounts for the whole narrative movement. What the historical argument can—and cannot—prove Calling the doctrine “secret” is often pair…
Read article →The Messiah cut off before the Temple fell
…ns can be held together. What Daniel actually says Daniel has been praying about Israel’s sin and Jerusalem’s desolation. He understands from Jeremiah that the Babylonian desolation would last seventy years, confesses the sins of his people and pleads for mercy upon God’s sanctua…
Read article →Creation, judgement, and the coming reign of Christ
…reless dominion. The earth belongs to the Lord. Man governs it under delegated authority. Sin turns dominion into appetite and violence. The land, animals, waters, and whole creation suffer beneath man's rebellion. God judges those who corrupt His world. Yet the final hope of cre…
Read article →How the Lord knows His own—and how their lives bear His name
…to everyone who names Christ. A Christian profession is not permission to make peace with sin. The name we bear calls us away from iniquity. Paul does not say that departing from sin purchases a place among God's people. Nor does he say that belonging to God makes departure from…
Read article →Not escape from the body, but its redemption
…finally escape being human. It is that, in Christ, we shall at last become human without sin, corruption or death. The redemption of our body Paul describes believers as waiting for: "The adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." —Romans 8:23 The body is not an embarrassing…
Read article →Which Gospel does the Qur'an affirm?
…r'an does not say that Allah gave Jesus the New Testament. It speaks of the Injeel in the singular as a revelation bestowed upon Jesus, just as the Torah was given to Moses and the Qur'an to Muhammad. The four canonical Gospels, by contrast, are narratives about Jesus written by…
Read article →The near was real. The far is still coming.
…saiah does not always speak that way. He addresses actual kings, actual invasions, actual sins and actual deliverances. Yet, within those same prophetic settings, his language can open onto a horizon that the immediate circumstances do not exhaust. A faithful reading must therefo…
Read article →The brothers of Jesus, the sons of Mary, and an argument of strong plausibility
…0–36. Within the first two movements, the material proceeds in parallel: Waters, mire and sinking in verses 1–3 correspond to the prayer for deliverance from waters, mire and sinking in verses 14–15. Enemies who hate without cause in verse 4 correspond to the plea for deliverance…
Read article →Israel's Messiah, Israel's Scriptures, and a gospel for the world
…d to the nations. Gentiles do not enter by replacing that story. We are welcomed into blessings which came through it. Recovering this setting does more than add cultural colour. It changes how we understand Jesus, the apostles, the gospel, and the relationship between Israel and…
Read article →Regathering, national rebirth, and the spiritual renewal still to come
…6 The sun, moon, stars, sea, and heavens serve as witnesses to God's commitment. Israel's sin is not ignored; the same chapter speaks of uprooting and affliction. Yet the nation will not cease to exist before God. Jeremiah 33 repeats the appeal to day and night while joining the…
Read article →Christianity, Islam and the verdict of the evidence
…justice, forgiveness and assurance. We have tested the transmission of the Bible, the missing Islamic Injeel, the Qur’an’s miracle claim, alleged prophecies of Muhammad, the covenant line through Isaac, Daniel’s cut-off Messiah and the Qur’an’s relationship to the religious stor…
Read article →One Messiah, one gospel, and God's continuing purpose for Israel
…ged Israel severely. The nation remains largely in unbelief and cannot inherit saving blessing apart from Jesus Christ. Yet God has not revoked His oath to Abraham, abandoned His covenant with David, emptied the new covenant of its named recipients, or converted Israel into a tit…
Read article →The glory philosophy could not contain
…s dissolution, was restored to deity. (See Note 2.) At first glance, this can sound surprisingly Christian. Nearly every landmark is present. There is the Word. There is creation. There is descent. There is flesh. There is a return to divine glory. But the road runs in the opposi…
Read article →Irenaeus of Lyons · Early Christian theology and polemic · c. 180–190
…When he speaks of the catholic Church, the word means the universal or whole Church confessing the apostolic faith; it must not be treated as proof that he would endorse every doctrine or institution of the later Church which now bears that name. Test his arguments and his use of…
View recommendation →Tertullian · Apologetic, doctrinal, and practical treatises · c. 197–220
…ou encounter apologetics, prophecy, doctrine, courage under persecution, and an uncompromising emphasis on holy living. Tertullian is an early witness, not a final authority. His later association with the New Prophecy, his growing severity, and some extreme practical conclusions…
View recommendation →What mercy, holiness and the cross reveal about God
…ove: Christ died not for those who had first made themselves worthy, but for the ungodly, sinners and enemies. This difference reaches beyond vocabulary. It concerns what God is like. The Qur'an genuinely speaks of mercy and love The Islamic case should be allowed to speak in its…
Read article →Born, begotten and firstborn in the eternal identity and saving work of the Son
…trying to discover whether Scripture was describing one event in three different ways or using related language for distinct truths. In particular, I wanted to know whether resurrection was the begetting of Christ—and, if so, in what sense. The notes were elementary, but the meth…
Read article →Four popular claims tested in context
…arison to overrule the text's own identification. "From the midst of thee" Moses is addressing the covenant nation of Israel. He does not merely say that the prophet will come from a distantly related people. He says, "from the midst of thee, of thy brethren". The language is cla…
Read article →The wicked husbandmen, the fruit-bearing nation, and what Jesus said afterwards
…merely observe the kingdom from a distance. Believers presently possess its spiritual blessings, submit to its King, proclaim its gospel, and bear responsibility as His people. Nothing in a future restoration of Israel diminishes the Church's present inheritance. Yet stewardship…
Read article →Election within Abraham's family, the believing remnant, and the future of the nation
…therefore, brethren." The question which drives Romans 9-11, however, arises from the closing movement of Romans 8. Paul has declared that those whom God foreknew He also predestinated, called, justified, and glorified (Romans 8:28-30). He then celebrates the security of God's p…
Read article →Defining the position before testing it
…latians 3:16; Luke 1:32-33; Hebrews 9:15; 2 Corinthians 1:20). The Church also shares blessings once associated with Israel's covenants and hope. Gentile believers who were "aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise" have been "made nigh…
Read article →Constantine, Arius, the Trinity, the biblical canon—and the myths that refuse to die
…not three separate gods. He is trying to confess both the three and the one without collapsing either truth. His wording would continue to be refined, but the problem and the essential shape of the answer were already present long before Constantine. Tertullian even reports an ob…
Read article →Michael Brown, 2 Thessalonians 1, and the public vindication of the saints
…s. It does not, however, say that the Church is gathered at that revelation. Paul is promising the final resolution of persecution’s injustice. God will reverse the present order: those who trouble His people will receive righteous recompense, while those who have suffered for Hi…
Read article →Trusting God when voices seek to weaken our confidence
…son does not depend upon settling that question. What the passage clearly shows is a man using familiarity with the people’s faith to undermine their confidence in God. There is a warning here for the church. Religious language, learning, and public standing do not make every voi…
Read article →Earth-dwellers, heaven-dwellers, and the literary structure of the Apocalypse
…, "Come up hither" (Revelation 4:1). John's summons is not the rapture of the Church. The singular command addresses the seer and moves him into the heavenly vision. Treating it as a direct fulfilment of 1 Thessalonians 4 would weaken the case. Its literary placement still matter…
Read article →A forensic reading of Christ's Olivet Discourse
…romised gathering tell us? This article treats the passage as a textual investigation. No single clue carries the whole case. The question is whether the clues converge. The minimum claim defended here is this: within Matthew 24, "the elect" most naturally identifies the faithful…
Read article →A sign of Israel's renewal, not Israel's disappearance
…of those who rejected Him. The existence of judgement does not make the original appeal insincere or the promised restoration meaningless. The Twelve embody a faithful remnant The apostles were Israelites. They did not stand outside the nation as a Gentile body arriving to replac…
Read article →The positive argument of the whole series, brought together
…c programme. Pretribulationism gains its strength from several strands which converge. No single strand carries the whole doctrine. Together they form a coherent movement: Christ completes and gathers His Church, resumes Daniel's unfinished programme concerning Israel and Jerusal…
Read article →Labour, purpose, and faithfulness in a fallen world
…t our god, and it is not the curse. It is part of the good order God gave humanity before sin entered the world. The curse brought pain, frustration, sweat and futility into our labour, but it did not turn meaningful activity into an evil. That distinction has become increasingly…
Read article →How Christians can think politically without surrendering conscience to a package deal
…ing conscience to a package deal Political parties do not merely ask for our votes. Increasingly, they offer an entire identity. Each side supplies its own account of the world: the dangers which matter, the injustices which deserve attention, the experts who may be trusted, the…
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