As we have seen, our world, though created perfect, had fallen, with devastating results. But God had not abandoned us to what would have been our fate, eternal destruction (the fate that science says awaits us). Instead, even before the world began, the plan of salvation was formulated (see 1 Pet. 1:2) and, at great … Continue reading –>
“My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you” (Gal. 4:19, NKJV). We were originally created as perfect and complete beings in a perfect and complete world. Unfortunately, this pre-Fall paradise was lost through sin, and the world as we know it is filled with death, violence, suffering, … Continue reading –>
Read Genesis 3:14-15. What does God mean when He says to Satan, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers” (Gen. 3:15, NIV)? What hope can we find here for ourselves? The word enmity in Hebrew shares its root with the Hebrew word hate and the word enemy.By … Continue reading –>
The Bible does not say how long a period of time existed between the finished Creation and the Fall. Days, weeks, years, we just don’t know. What we do know, however, was that there was a Fall, and the consequences were immediate and apparent. The first mentioned result of Adam and Eve eating of the … Continue reading –>
The Bible says that humanity was originally created in the “image” (Gen. 1:27) of God. An image may be either two-dimensional, such as a mirror reflection or photograph, or three-dimensional, such as a statue or hologram. An image can also be intangible, such as a mental image, an idea that we have in our heads. … Continue reading –>
Read for This Week’s Study: Gen. 1:26-27; Deut. 6:5; Gen. 3:8-19; James 4:4; Gal. 4:19; Mark 2:1-12; John 10:10. Memory Text: “So God created mankind in his own image, in theimage of God he created them; male and female he created them”(Genesis 1:27, NIV) . All one has to do is look around, at the … Continue reading –>
The Whole Gospel A pastor held up his Bible before the congregation. It was in tatters, full of holes. In seminary he and some classmates had gone through his Bible and underlined every passage that dealt with justice, poverty, wealth, and oppression. Then, with a pair of scissors, they cut out every verse dealing with … Continue reading –>
As did all the other Gospel writers, Matthew wrote about the resurrection of Jesus. Also, as did his fellow writers, he wrote next to nothing about what the meaning of the Resurrection itself was. Though they depicted the story of the Resurrection, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John gave us no real theological explanation of it, … Continue reading –>
For many people, one of the most hard-to-understand things Jesus did was to return to heaven and entrust the gospel ministry to humans. How often we disappoint Him and ourselves, and as the Gospels show, His early followers were no exception. Yet, it’s by entrusting us with ministry that Christ shows His love for us … Continue reading –>
The Christian faith centers not only on the cross but on the empty tomb. The truth is, the majority of people in the world, including non-Christians, believe that a man named Jesus of Nazareth died on a cross. Not long after Jesus lived we find historical references such as this one from Tacitus, a Roman … Continue reading –>
