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As a thief veils his presence from those he wishes to steal from, so the Lord has veiled the doctrine of the Pre-Tribulation coming for His church. That may be construed by some as a loaded statement, for sure. Of course, those who have put forth great effort in the study of the Pre-Tribulation Rapture doctrine may dispute its veiling. Indeed, for those who search out truth through the effort of study, and humble reliance upon the Holy Spirit, truth is unveiled. It is of no mystery to the children of God that He requires us to study His Word....

"If a teaching isn’t explicit in the Bible, then we don’t accept it as doctrine!" That belief, commonly known as sola scriptura, was a central component of all I believed as a Protestant. This bedrock Protestant teaching claims that Scripture alone is the sole rule of faith and morals for Christians. Diving deeper into its meaning to defend my Protestant faith against Catholicism about twenty years ago, I found that there was no uniform understanding of this teaching among Protestant pastors and no book I could read to get a better understanding of it. What role does tradition play? How...

April 3, AD 33 In our new book, The Final Days of Jesus: The Most Important Week of the Most Important Person Who Ever Lived , we assume but do not argue for a precise date of Jesus’s crucifixion. Virtually all scholars believe, for various reasons, that Jesus was crucified in the spring of either a.d. 30 or a.d. 33, with the majority opting for the former. ( The evidence from astronomy narrows the possibilities to a.d. 27, 30, 33, or 34). However, we want to set forth our case for the date of Friday, April 3, a.d. 33 as...

Was "Babylon The Great" a Symbolic Name for Jerusalem? Recall that Jesus said: "… it cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem" (Luke 13:33.) That is a very important statement to keep in mind when considering the following passages: and later in the same chapter of Luke, Jesus added: "…I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute: That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation; From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias which...

“Now the LORD had said to Abram: ‘Get out of your country, from your family and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you. I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed’” (Gen. 12:1–3, all Scripture quotations are from the New King James Version.). The entire remainder of the Bible after these verses can be...

Does the Earth Abide Forever, Like the Bible Says? Many Christian doctrines take the following passage literally: "And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea." (Rev 21:1 KJV) Some even believe there will literally be no seas/oceans in the "new earth!" But there are many other verses that seem to contradict Rev 21:1, as follows: "One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever." (Eccl 1:4 KJV) "Bless the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my...

While it is true that the millennium (that is, one thousand years) is found only in Revelation 20, the belief in the Messianic Kingdom does not rest on this passage alone. In fact, it hardly rests on it at all. The basis for the belief in the Messianic Kingdom is twofold. First: there are the unfulfilled promises of the Jewish covenants, promises that can only be fulfilled in a Messianic Kingdom. Second: there are the unfulfilled prophecies of the Jewish prophets. There are numerous prophecies of the Old Testament that speak of the coming of the Messiah Who will reign...

The Thousand Year Reign of Christ on Earth: Is it Biblical? This is the passage in question: "And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished....

The following outline shows that Jesus intended to create a holy, visible Church; complete with a prime minister, a hierarchy, binding authority, and perpetuity—the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. It is important for Protestants to understand some basic facts. Contrary to the modern belief that the Bible is a “blueprint” or “textbook” which explains how a church should be structured, it is a product of the Catholic Church—a compilation of writings that reflect a structure that was already present. As such, the “Bible alone” has no reason to provide fine details of proper ecclesiology; however, proper ecclesiology is detectable....

Kenneth L Gentry, Jr., makes evidence derived from exegetical data of the Apocalypse his major focus in building a case for dating Revelation prior to the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70. Even though acknowledging that other advocates of either a Neronic and Domitianic date for Revelation's composition find no direct evidence within the book for assigning a date, he proceeds to find "inherently suggestive and positively compelling historical time-frame indicators in Revelation." He uses the contemporary reign of the sixth king in 17:9-11 and the integrity of the temple and Jerusalem in 11:1-13 to exemplify arguments that are "virtually...

Are the Kingdom of God and Heaven the same? The teaching of the kingdom began in the days of John the Baptist, whose ministry was the fulfillment of Isaiah 40:3 and Malachi 3:1. These are the prophecies and their fulfillment: "The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God." (Isa 40:3 KJV) "Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the...

He who would understand the prophets had better begin with Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians, where he will find that the Church is one in the Old Testament and New, and the New Testament Church is the fulfillment of all prophecy, the very last phase of God’s redemptive work on earth. He will discover in Galatians who the true Israel is, to whom the promises are made and that there is no other Israel, and no further fulfillment of prophecy. The problem of the Galatian believers was the conspiracy to impose upon them Jewish interpretations of prophecy, and to claim...

This is a discussion about the term "elect" or "election" found in the bible. I believe the elect are a combination of the remnant of Israel from the days of Christ and the apostles, and the holy men of old. I base this on several direct scriptural references: This verse implies Christ is the elect: "Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles." (Isa 42:1 KJV) In these verses Israel or Judah is the elect, but could also be interpreted...