JahBwoy:
Looks like I knew the trouble ahead when I asked this question

https://www.nairaland.com/6521167/christians-celibate-relationships-mirage-possibility

I was celibate for the first six months of the year and I actually grew my spirituality to enviable heights, got blessed with a better job in a top firm and I fell a bit on the first week of July but I kept on with my spiritual life.

Fast forward after giving testimony at a local interdenominational fellowship I attend, the pastor's wife introduced me to a Lady with the sole aim of helping her secure a job in the firm's I worked previously.

Well I helped the lady do her CV and she got a job soon after for a start, and she began visiting frequently.

I liked her mostly because we shared a Common religious background although I noticed she's not so keen on the spiritual.

Well I kept it formal for the first two months and one day we kissed, and since then we've been exploring since, (note that I've not been keen on a relationship for this particular reason, despite being born again , I don't expose my self to ladies cos I know what will be the aftermath, thoughts like this made me out up the thread above)

Now we're officially dating but then.... My spiritual life has completely nosedived , and slowly we re engaging in sex too. I have prayed lots of times for God's guidance but she seems to involved in my life now and we can't seem to stop the romance.

I am notentirely sure about the future of our relationship, I like the fact that she's is a teachable woman , but I'm miles ahead of her in all aspects , I seem to have Mader her life better in three months but I enjoy her company and she's mostly around me when she's off duty cos I workfrom home.

I am completely at a loss now on how to get my spiritual life back, once she's gone , I seem to get some renaissance, but once she's around me we get down most times. Is it too late to enforce God's will into this relationship

Have you ever been in my position, pls advise

As a dear friend and mentor says, if you're doing something wrong, stop it. It really is that simple. Nobody says that it's easy (unless they've never actually tried), but that is what needs to be done.

livingchrist:
I have no intention to take this argument further.

By all means, do as you please.

livingchrist:
I had to reply to clarify somethings, at italicized, thank God you said it your said that [b] gentiles has being replacing israel, but for the rest of the bolded Jesus would not have come before Israel will be restored. Israel will be saved through the tribulation. The seven years was part of the seventy weeks to restore Israel
Daniel 9:24
Seventy weeks are determined upon 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.

Revelation 7:4 And I heard the number of them which were sealed: and there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel.

Revelation 12:6, 17 And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days.

And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.




Revelation 14:3 And they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts, and the elders: and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth.

The woman in revelation chapter 12 is Israel, what will happen after the rapture is that God's attention would be focused on Israel once again as it was in the old testament.
The remaninant of her children that would be persecuted are the 144,000 israelities.
Which only speak of one thing that Israel would be restored again, the would come to know the truth that Jesus was their messiah the one whom they killed and would engage in evangelism all over the world, which would lead to alot of gentiles be restored through them, this is what paul said in Roman's that if the fall away of the jews gave opportunity to the gentiles how much more their restoration, that God is able to restore them if they do not continue in unbelief.
Because Israel would come to accept Jesus as their messiah and reject the antichrist, this would anger the antichrist, the dragon and the false prophet, who will muster the armies of the earth particularly the kings of the east to attack Israel, they would pass through the river Euphrates which would have being dried up due to bowl wrath Judgment, they will pass through and encamp in the armageddon, they will actually attack Israel ransacking it, but their terror will meets its end when Christ israel's messiah would suddenly appear with his saints and angels, he will execute Jugdment upon the enemies of his people, and reward his servants, this will usher in the millennium of peace and righteousness on earth.

Conversation is all about correcting, clarifying and expanding thoughts and expressions, after all.

I NEVER said that the Gentiles are replacing Israel. Those are your words and your thought, not mine. What I did say is that believing Gentiles are replacing unbelieving Israelites in the true Israel. Where else are the Gentiles coming into to take the place of unbelieving Israelites if not Israel?

I don't see any biblical proof for this: "Israel will be saved through the Tribulation." Daniel 9:24 which you quoted says that 490 years were decreed by God upon Israel and Jerusalem to

1. finish the transgression

2. make an end of sins

3. make reconciliation for iniquity

4. bring in everlasting righteousness

5. seal up the vision and prophecy

6. anoint the most Holy.

Nothing there about saving or restoring Israel.

Within this 490-year chunk of time, the Cross of Jesus finished the transgression, made an end of sins, and made reconciliation for iniquity. The Return of the Lord Jesus at the end of the Tribulation will bring in everlasting righteousness (Satan and all rebel angels will be imprisoned in the abyss, the Antichrist and his prophet will be in the Lake of Fire, and the Holy Spirit will restrain human sin nature far more than ever before), seal up the vision and prophecy (all the prophecies of Scripture will be fulfilled by His Return), and anoint the most Holy (Jerusalem will be the city of the Great King until the end of time).

The Tribulation is clearly prophesied to be a time of terrible testing for Israel at the end of which the Lord will return and regather all the Jews scattered across the world.

It is true that when the Lord Jesus returns, one of the things that will happen is the fulfillment of that promise of recall to the homeland and the establishment of Israel as the premier nation in the world, but I'm afraid I don't see how Israel will be saved through the Tribulation. The Second Coming is the deliverance of Israel from the hands of the Antichrist. The Millennium is the time when Jews will be saved disproportionately compared to Gentiles.

You are certainly right that the 144,000 Jewish believers spoken of will be persecuted by the Antichrist. In fact, the passage in Revelation 14 that you quoted was showing us the 144,000 in heaven after they have been killed by the Antichrist. You are also right that these 144,000 will be responsible for global evangelism, but I don't see where the Scriptures say that it is Gentiles that they will be "restoring." Rather, I see that they will be responsible to go only to Jewish communities around the world (cf. Luke 10:1-20; Matthew 10:5-42; Mark 6:7-13). I'm sure that those Gentiles who see their activities and are willing to be saved will be, but their work will be focused on the Jews to prepare them for the return of the Lord (Malachi 3:1; 4:4-6). Obviously, not many Jews will respond appropriately. It will still take until the actual return of the Lord Himself for the Jews to repent in large enough numbers to warrant comment (Zechariah 12:10-14).

What I don't see is any treatment of Israel as an entity separate from Gentile believers. While obviously the majority of ethnic Israelites remain unbelievers to this day, Israel is really all those who believe, not just those who are descendants of Abraham (Romans 9:6-8 ). So, when you say that Israel will repent, you are not making very much biblical sense. If you mean that those unbelieving Israelites will repent, then I can understand you even if I still don't agree with you.

The Antichrist and the world do not need Israelite unbelievers to finally believe in Jesus Christ to hate them. The world hates them even today because they are physically part of the nation that God chose for Himself. That is why it has been trying to destroy them for so long. Hitler certainly didn't hate Jews because they suddenly decided to become Christians. Muslims the world over don't hate the state of Israel because the ethnic Israelites there have become believers. They hate them because they are physical descendants of Abraham the friend of God. This is still why the Antichrist will try to destroy the country with the war of Armageddon. The immediate cause though will be the revolt of Israel against him (Daniel 11:44). Therefore, I don't see how your argument is right. It still does not stand on Scripture.

I also don't see what Revelation 12:6,17 has to do with this. As you said, the woman in Revelation 12 is Israel, but I am yet to see that God is not focused on Israel even now. I don't see that in the Bible. God scattered the Jews all over the world and will recall them at the Second Coming, but what you have in 12:6,17 above is the preservation of Jewish believers from martyrdom by the Antichrist and the persecution of Gentile believers respectively. This latter is already proof of the error of your thinking in this matter.

livingchrist:
It seems you have a problem with words, I used the term ' time ignored' to mean specific times are not mentioned for fulfillment of bible prophecy.

Jesus did mention the duration of his millennium reign, the time of Christ second coming are not revealed to any man.
When Jesus mentioned his second coming he ignored the time duration.
The time duration between the first coming and second coming of Christ was never mentioned,




there are things not revealed to one generation but revealed as time progresses.

all these long epistles actually addresses nothing, honestly you show of pride but knows nothing

Jesus never taught a 1000 years duration between a first and second resurrection,

You don't even understand those verses you quoted.
Did you see that Israel will be saved only after the full number of gentiles has being saved. What does that tell you? That the gentiles church must be complete before Israel salvation commences.


Paul was clearing the air of a false teaching that the day of Christ has come, he simply let the church h know what will happen before the day of Christ comes, ordinarily paul teachings focus on the those things that would have to the gentile church.
Next

If it was important for the gentile church he would have written on it, honestly your rebuttal is shallow.



It is your understanding that is poor
Ask yourself what are we to expect Christ coming or the great tribulation, paul teaches the church to expect Christ coming not the great tribulation.



1 Thessalonians 4:16
For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:


at bold where did I say such? You dont understand nothing



you see why I said your understanding is poor.

Acts 13:46
Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles.

@ bold this is your answer

Note I won't reply any of your quote any more

I have noted that you don't want a conversation. I will make my response anyway just in case it proves useful to you or anyone else considering the matter.

If that was what you meant, I'm sorry I didn't catch it. The idea that I got from what you were saying was that it is to be expected that prophecies about the resurrection and the Tribulation may ignore time gaps. Since I don't see prophecies ignoring time gaps anywhere in the Bible, I didn't think you could be right. I think that the Bible leads us to expect clear teaching concerning any relevant time duration involved in any matter of importance. For example, although the Church Age is important to us, it really was not necessary knowledge for believers of the Old Testament, so the hiding of that part of prophecy was not damaging at all to them, but since it matters to our spiritual wellbeing whether we will go through the Tribulation or not, it only follows that any time information connected with it would not be ignored in prophecy. And it isn't.

I don't understand what you said about the Millennium and the time gap between the first and second Coming. I'm not sure what bearing it has on the discussion.

Thank you for clarifying your meaning with reference to "progressive revelation." I can see how it applied during the period that the Bible was being written, but it obviously doesn't apply now since the Bible has been completed. I expect that you raise the matter with reference to the subject we are discussing, but I don't really understand the connection right now.

Perhaps my long epistles do address nothing, and perhaps I am a very arrogant person, but that is neither here nor there. I think the question that really needs answering for you is whether your teaching is biblical or not. My long epistles need not mean or address anything, and the Lord is my judge and yours too, but you need to both believe and teach the truth of the Bible for your spiritual safety and for the safety of your hearers. Is that what you are doing?

As for your claim that Jesus did not teach a gap of one thousand years between the first and second resurrection, isn't the following in your Bible?

4 I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years. 5 This is the first resurrection. 6 Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years.
Revelation 20:4-6 (NIV)

Whose teaching is the above? When it speaks of a first resurrection, to what does it refer? What is the second one?

As for your interpretation of the passage in Romans 11, I think that it is obvious that you are wrong. The Bible clearly says that the Gentiles are grafted into the tree of Israel:

24 After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!
Romans 11:24 (NIV)

That is to say that rather than truncating anything about Israel, it is simply unbelieving Israelites who have been rejected by God in favor of believing Gentiles who have replaced them in the nation of Israel in a spiritual sense. This is, after all, why Paul makes a point of demonstrating that Israel is not just a matter of physical genetics, but of faith.

6 It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” 8 In other words, it is not the children by physical descent who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring.
Romans 9:6-8 (NIV)

Those who believe are Israel, whether they are Jews or Gentiles. Those who don't believe are not Israel whether they are Jews or Gentiles. So, there is no distinction between a Gentile Church, as you call it, and the nation of Israel. That is far from anything that the Bible itself says.

As it is, because so many Jews rejected and continue to reject Jesus Christ, the Gentiles have continued to come in to take their place for two thousand years (although there have always been Jewish believers regardless). This will continue until all the Gentiles who wish to believe are complete, then the Coming of the Lord Jesus will turn the tide causing Jews to finally realize how wrong they had been and return to the Lord.

10 “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son. 11 On that day the weeping in Jerusalem will be as great as the weeping of Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo. 12 The land will mourn, each clan by itself, with their wives by themselves: the clan of the house of David and their wives, the clan of the house of Nathan and their wives, 13 the clan of the house of Levi and their wives, the clan of Shimei and their wives, 14 and all the rest of the clans and their wives.
​1 “On that day a fountain will be opened to the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and impurity.
2 “On that day, I will banish the names of the idols from the land, and they will be remembered no more,” declares the LORD Almighty. “I will remove both the prophets and the spirit of impurity from the land. 3 And if anyone still prophesies, their father and mother, to whom they were born, will say to them, ‘You must die, because you have told lies in the LORD’s name.’ Then their own parents will stab the one who prophesies.
4 “On that day every prophet will be ashamed of their prophetic vision. They will not put on a prophet’s garment of hair in order to deceive. 5 Each will say, ‘I am not a prophet. I am a farmer; the land has been my livelihood since my youth.’ 6 If someone asks, ‘What are these wounds on your body?’ they will answer, ‘The wounds I was given at the house of my friends.’
Zechariah 12:10 - 13:6 (NIV)

This turning of the tide will then complete the number of "all Israel" including Gentile believers. As I have demonstrated, both Gentile believers and Jewish believers are Israel. So "all Israel" will be saved when all the Gentiles who will be saved have believed the Gospel and all Jews who will be saved have believed the Gospel. This will be fulfilled at the end of the Millennium.

Your response concerning Paul's teaching about the Tribulation is confusing, at least. You just owned that Paul did teach about it to a Gentile church no less, thus owning your error in claiming that he did not speak of the years of the Tribulation, then you turn around to claim that if it was important for the Gentiles to know about the Tribulation, Paul would have written about it?! What were you agreeing that he was clearing the air about then? Was Paul not teaching the Thessalonians specifically what would happen before the return of Jesus Christ and our gathering to Him? Additionally, if it really is not important for Gentiles to know about the years of Tribulation, we shouldn't have the whole Bible including the Daniel that you keep quoting on the matter since it is only relevant to the Jews.

Perhaps it really is my understanding that is poor, but then maybe you could explain yourself better. As for what we are to expect, the Bible seems clear to me that it is the return of the Lord that we are to be yearning for, waiting for, and praying for. But I don't see how that means that we are not expecting the Tribulation to precede that. In fact, from my reading of the Bible, it is our hope in that Return that gives us the strength to face the Tribulation that comes before it.

Regarding your quote of 1 Thessalonians 4:16, isn't this more of what it says?

16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.
1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 (NIV)

Why did you exclude the bit about those who are alive and remain?

As for where you said that Israel and Gentile believers are two different entities, maybe I don't understand what you said, but here are your words. Feel free to explain them better:

"Presently God suspended the Israel programme and only allow the gentile church time is ticking very soon God will conclude the gentile church programme and resume the one for Israel.
You have to understand that in the old testament Israel was the one through which God uses to reach out to the whole world but in the new testament when Israel fell away the gentile church replaced Israel, but the gentile church will be removed via the rapture to enable the restoration of Israel and fulfilling their election."

If these are not two different organisms, how is one able to replace the other? Or how is God stopping one for the other? I really don't understand.

My understanding may be poor, but since you are such a great teacher, doesn't that give you a good opportunity for you to teach the truth and instruct the foolish?

As for the quote from Acts, I'm not sure I see how that means at all that a Gentile church (still not sure what you mean by the term) replaced Israel especially given everything that the Bible teaches.

Cheers.

livingchrist:
You have reinstated what I just said, and besides I said prophecy usually ignores time not everytime.
The over two thousand year church age prophecy was kept from the prophets, you reemphasized what I was saying.

I believe I mentioned that I saw your point. The critical difference here is that I don't believe that prophecy ever ignores time. The very nature of prophecy is all about time. What happens with prophetic foreshortening is not that time is ignored but that information about time is deliberately hidden.

livingchrist:
I said prophecy ignores time that is not prophetically relevant. I have given you an example, the time duration between the first and second coming of Christ was ignored because of the reason you stated another one is the resurrection, there was no mention of the events that would take place between the first and second resurrection hence one might think they take place at the same time.

As I said, time was not ignored in that example. It was hidden. The prophets knew that and sought to understand what they were not being told. The Lord told them that the prophecies were for believers of the future, not for them. So, again that example does not at all prove that time is ignored in prophecy since it isn't.

10 Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, searched intently and with the greatest care, 11 trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of the Messiah and the glories that would follow. 12 It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you, when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even angels long to look into these things.
1 Peter 1:10-12 (NIV)

As for Jesus's words about the resurrection, I have just shown you that He did not ignore time. He spoke of the resurrection as a concept, it is true, but even in practice, what He said was literally applicable since both the righteous and the unrighteous will be resurrected at the same time at the end of time. So, again, this is not at all proof for your position.

livingchrist:
@ bold that is what op said, now christ didnt mention that the resurrection is going to take place in trenches, what does that tell us? That revelation is progressive. The revelations of apostle paul is concerning we the gentiles not the nation of Israel hence paul spoke of the events of the end time that will affects the Gentile churches. The 7 years of tribulation was not mentioned by paul so he spoke as if the rapture only which of cause is also the coming of christ.

What do you mean by "revelation is progressive?"

The Lord did teach that the Resurrection will occur in tranches. You only took one or two instances of that teaching and ignored the rest. These are other things that He said:

26 “So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. 27 For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 28 Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather.
29 “Immediately after the distress of those days
“‘the sun will be darkened,
and the moon will not give its light;
the stars will fall from the sky,
and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.’
30 “Then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven. And then all the peoples of the earth will mourn when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory. 31 And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.
Matthew 24:26-31 (NIV)

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.
Matthew 25:31-32 (NIV)

These are the two tranches of Resurrection left. The first describes the resurrection of Church Age believers at the Lord's Return. The second describes the resurrection of Millennium Age believers and all unbelievers. This is not something that Paul saw and Christ didn't mention. It was taught by the Lord Himself.

Regarding your claim about Paul's work and its focus on Gentiles to the exclusion of Israel, this is what Paul said:

12 For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile —the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him,
Romans 10:12 (NIV)

13 I am talking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles, I take pride in my ministry 14 in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people to envy and save some of them. 15 For if their rejection brought reconciliation to the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead? 16 If the part of the dough offered as firstfruits is holy, then the whole batch is holy; if the root is holy, so are the branches.
17 If some of the branches have been broken off, and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, 18 do not consider yourself to be superior to those other branches. If you do, consider this: You do not support the root, but the root supports you. 19 You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.” 20 Granted. But they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but tremble. 21 For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either.
22 Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. 23 And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. 24 After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!
25 I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers and sisters, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in, 26 and in this way all Israel will be saved. As it is written:
“The deliverer will come from Zion;
he will turn godlessness away from Jacob.
27 And this is my covenant with them
when I take away their sins.”
28 As far as the gospel is concerned, they are enemies for your sake; but as far as election is concerned, they are loved on account of the patriarchs, 29 for God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable.
Romans 11:13-29 (NIV)

There is more, but I can tell you for sure that I have never seen anything to suggest a spiritual distinction between Gentile believers and Israel. In this passage in Romans 11, Paul was unequivocal in his claim that Gentile believers, rather than becoming some distinct olive tree preferred by God to Israel, have actually only been made part of Israel in a spiritual sense so that we are tied to Israel's spiritual fate now as long as we are believers. So, when you make these differences between Israel and Gentile believers, I not only see nothing of the sort in the Bible, but I also can't understand what you think you mean. Paul's "revelations" were for the whole Church including all Jewish believers.

Your argument that Paul did not speak of the years of the Tribulation is false. He spoke of that time in 2 Thessalonians 2, a passage that I am aware that you know.

​1 Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers and sisters, 2 not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by the teaching allegedly from us—whether by a prophecy or by word of mouth or by letter —asserting that the day of the Lord has already come. 3 Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. 4 He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God.
5 Don’t you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things? 6 And now you know what is holding him back, so that he may be revealed at the proper time. 7 For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way. 8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming. 9 The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with how Satan works. He will use all sorts of displays of power through signs and wonders that serve the lie, 10 and all the ways that wickedness deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11 For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie 12 and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.
2 Thessalonians 2:1-12 (NIV)

If you expect Paul to have mentioned that what he was writing above was the Tribulation and that it would last for seven years, my answer to you would be, "Why?" Did Paul have to write the whole Bible just to make sure that we know that what he was writing of was the same thing that other writers had spoken of? Do we not have enough information in his words to see that he was referring to something covered far more extensively and in far greater detail elsewhere?

livingchrist:
yes my arguement for pretribulation rapture is very valid, the time gap gives credence to the pretribulation rapture. Look at what I am saying.
1The Lord descend into the cosmos from the heaven [third heaven] ------》2the rapture takes place------》3|7 years of israel's tribulation|-----》4-----the Lord judges the enemies of Israel and comes down to reinstablish the kingdom of Israel.
From here you see that Paul's focus was on the gentile church which is, 1 &2, 3&4 does not concern the gentile church but Israel.

As I have tried again to show, your argument is very poor. Time is never ignored in prophecy since prophecy is all about time anyway. It may be hidden, but even when it is, those who are seriously listening to the Lord know that it is hidden and they may be led to find out why just as the prophets were. So, your argument has no leg to stand on in that regard.

As for the sequence you propose, I see what you are claiming. What I am not seeing is where the Bible says all of that.

livingchrist:
the rapture is only for those believers who died in Christ meaning all those who physically recieve Christ as the Lord and saviour during the earthly life.
You dont understand the 7 year gap because you dont understand that Israel and the gentiles actually have a different prophetic calender.
Presently God suspended the Israel programme and only allow the gentile church time is ticking very soon God will conclude the gentile church programme and resume the one for Israel.
You have to understand that in the old testament Israel was the one through which God uses to reach out to the whole world but in the new testament when Israel fell away the gentile church replaced Israel, but the gentile church will be removed via the rapture to enable the restoration of Israel and fulfilling their election.

The seven year gap is from the book of Daniel, the 70th week will restore Israel once again and will mark the return of their messiah with this God would have fulfilled is promise to the patriachs, and the prophecy of the prophets.

In the bit about rapture being meant for only those who died in Christ, where does the Bible say this? Also, what does it mean to "physically receive Christ as your Lord and Savior"?

I do understand the 7-year gap as the Bible actually teaches it. What I don't see is any biblical proof for your own 7-year gap. Where do you find it in the Bible? Where does the Bible make this claim that Israel and Gentile believers are different organisms?

Where does the Bible say that God suspended the Israel program, as you put it? Where does the Bible say that the Gentile Church (whatever you think that that means) replaced Israel in God's program?

As I said, I know what the 7-year gap is about. The 7-year gap is the seventieth week, just as you said. But much of what you say about it I am yet to see any biblical proof for.

livingchrist:
Yes there will be a resurrection that will occur, the reason why many do not understand the pretribulation rapture is time, they cannot accept that sometimes in prophecies time is ignored. What do I mean? In the old testament the prophecies concerning Christ first and second coming is spoken as if they will happen at the same time, but actually the two events were separated by thousands of years.

Same with the resurrection

Daniel 12:2
And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.

The resurrection is spoken as if the resurrection of the righteous and the unrighteous will take place at the same time but actually the both resurrection has a time gap between them.
Same with the prophecies of Jesus
John 5:28-29 Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice,

And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.

Again Jesus spoke as if the resurrection would take place at the same time but they are separated by atleast 1000 years.

First is the resurrection of the righteous which begins at the rapture, and comes to consummation when Jesus comes down to earth, after then the millennium reign of Christ followed by the second resurrection and then the judgment.

I personally I don not separate the rapture from the second coming of Christ only it takes place in stages, first is the rapture and then Christ comes down to the earth, but there is time between the rapture and christ coming down, this time is about 7 years which is the tribulation period.
In summary, prophecies usually ignore time except such time is of prophetic essence such as the 70 weeks of daniel prophecy, of which that seventy weeks is not even completed, it remains one week which is seven days, this is the seven years gap between the rapture and Christ coming down, so that at the end of the seventy weeks Christ would have come down and fulfill all the prophecies written concerning Israel.

Hello livingchrist.

I think I see what you are saying, but I don't agree with you.

Do prophecies ignore time? I wouldn't say that exactly although I will admit that there is something that does require an explanation in the attention that prophecies paid to time. Your example about the first and second coming of the Christ is one big reason for this. It is true that Old Testament prophecies did not distinguish them all that well. The device is called prophetic foreshortening. In the Bible, the effect it produces is that two events look like they are immediately following each other or might even be the same.

The reason for this is NOT that prophecy ignores time. I can't agree with you on that. Rather, the reason is that God was providing only the information that He wanted believers to have at that time. So, He kept the two-thousand-year Church Age that was going to intervene between the two Advents a secret or, as it is more commonly called, a mystery to believers until Jesus came and died for us.

This prophetic foreshortening was then only used to keep believers of that time focused on what mattered the most to them: the coming of the Savior to die for their sins and the eventual redemption of their bodies and the broken world as a result. The Church Age was not to distract them from that hope.

The question arises for you then: why does prophecy ignore time if it does according to you? Do you have any biblical argument to answer that?

The other example you give of Jesus's prophecies about the resurrection is also unacceptable to me. You say that Jesus spoke of them as though they would be happening at the same time, but that they would actually not be. I don't agree with you. From Matthew 25:31-46, there is no confusion. There is a judgment of the righteous and unrighteous that will happen at exactly the same time. This will be preceded by a resurrection of both obviously. So, you are wrong at least to some extent. Then again, Paul says the following:

21 For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. 22 For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. 23 But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. 24 Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power.
1 Corinthians 15:21-24 (NIV)

That is, the resurrection will occur in tranches, as you rightly suggested, but there is a resurrection of the righteous that will happen at "the end" as v. 24 above shows. That resurrection is the "gathering of the nations" that precedes the judgment in Matthew 25 referenced above. In Revelation 20:12-15, the judgment being described there is the one of the "goats" spoken of in Matthew 25. They are in view because the immediate context is about the war and victory of Christ over Satan at last. Because of what else we know from these other passages mentioned here and from elsewhere, we know that the Millennial believers were judged just before the unbelievers of all ages were judged.

So, while you do have a point about how the resurrection is spaced out, I don't think your example is appropriate for your argument. The Lord Jesus's words could be taken literally and they would still be true. Even if they were not immediately referencing a time-gap, we still know that that is not the right way to judge the matter of the Tribulation and the resurrection of the Church.

Before we discuss what the Bible does, in fact, say about the Tribulation and the Resurrection, I also wonder what biblical evidence you have for your claim that there is a seven-year gap between the rapture and the Second Coming. And I assume that by "rapture" you mean the resurrection of the Church-Age believers, that is, all believers from Adam and Eve until the last one to believe before the return of Jesus Christ. If you mean something else, please explain.

As to what the Bible says, there are so many passages that teach that the resurrection of the Church will occur at the Second Coming that I doubt that presenting them will be an effective argument. So I prefer instead to have you provide what evidence you believe you have and solve the problems associated with your position as you present it.

breathelove:
HI people,
So some preachers came to my shop yesterday and we had a very long discussion.
Then this topic of war came up.
I would love to hear from others. What does the bible say.
Is it wrong for a Christian to join the army and fight.
Please I peer bible teaches than personal views.

Hi there.

I was going to offer a brief, not-particularly detailed response, but then I scanned the thread and saw that you might be willing to deal with a more comprehensive answer and that some of your responders provide a cogent reason to tackle the associated questions in this discussion. So, I'm going to try to give you a more comprehensive--but still brief--answer.

First, wars are often fought by groups of people against other groups of people. That is, wars tend to happen between nations. Therefore, we should ask what nations are and why they sometimes go to war. Nations exist today because, at the tower of Babel, God created languages and scattered the previously ethnically homogeneous human race all over the world.

The reason for this was, as most Bible-readers know, that the human race had agreed to form one solid community opposed to God. Now, because of free will, that opposition was going to result in harm for those members of the human race that did not want to oppose God. As any average observer of human community can easily tell, when a large number of people decide to do something that they feel is good for their welfare, the minority are not often allowed to exist among them. They may be forced to join the majority or else be killed or suffer other serious consequences. This was not going to be different for the very few human beings at the time (as there are always so few believers) who chose to walk with God.

God acted then to preserve those who would stand with Him and to preserve the future of humanity. If faith was stamped out of the earth at that time, obviously, the Lord Jesus would never have been born. The answer then was to allow these unbelievers who hated God to exist but also save believers out of their hands. This God did by creating languages and scattering the people from that one geographic area they had all been concentrated. In other words, the Lord created the conditions for nations to form.

Are nations then bad? Although some people have argued that wars exist because nations exist and there would be no wars if there are no nations, the Bible does not hold this view. In the new universe that God will create for all those who believe to be with Him in for all eternity, there will be nations. In Revelation, we are given a glimpse of eternity to this effect.

​1 And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. 2 In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. 3 And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him.
Revelation 22:1-3 (NKJV) (cf. Revelation 21:24-26; Isaiah 2:4; Micah 4:3).

The words "healing" and "curse" are poor translations the original text of the passage. The leaves of the trees of Life will be for the well-being rather than healing (since in eternity, there will be nothing that needs healing) of the nations. This means that they will provide wholesome, satisfying, and nourishing enjoyment to the population of the new universe. Also, since there will be no curse of any kind in the new universe, the issue there is the removal of division between people, especially between nations. The nations of the new universe will truly be siblings that do not war among themselves or even want to do so.

This is an even better promise than the one of the Millennium in Isaiah 2:4 and Micah 4:3 (referenced above). During the Millennium, because human beings will still have a sin nature, they will want to fight each other sometimes, but the Lord Jesus will not permit it. Through His perfect justice, He will quell all quarrels and solve all disagreements without allowing a breakout of violence in His dominions.

That is to say that wars exist for more reason than just the existence of nations.

Second, why then do wars exist? There are two biblical reasons that I can offer:

5 Surely for your lifeblood I will demand a reckoning; from the hand of every beast I will require it, and from the hand of man. From the hand of every man’s brother I will require the life of man.
6 “Whoever sheds man’s blood,
By man his blood shall be shed;
For in the image of God
He made man.
Genesis 9:5-6 (NKJV)

​1 Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? 2 You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask.
James 4:1-2 (NKJV)

In the first passage, the Lord makes it clear that He expects human beings to enforce justice among themselves. Through that statement, He was essentially creating human government and law and order. Human beings are responsible to prevent the cheapening of human life. If anyone, therefore, treats human life cheaply, then the human community is responsible to remove him from this life. This is the basis for what you might call "just wars." That is, godly wars are fought to preserve human life.

This is the type of wars that God commissioned the nation of Israel to fight to claim the Canaanite territories. As you must know, the Canaanite peoples were barbaric. They killed their own infants as ritual sacrifices to their bloodthirsty idols. That is indicative of their value for human life. Beyond that, they were brutal communities to live in. This is not something they automatically were. They took centuries to systematically grow their wickedness to that point. And God was patient with them, warning them through different events, and demonstrating to them how life ought to be through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the twelve patriarchs that lived among them for quite a while. They didn't listen. They only got worse until their evil seemed to become norm and other communities began to be seduced into the same wickedness by their prosperity. God then commissioned Israel to destroy their nationhood so that there could no longer be a cohesive Canaanite community that would perpetrated such evil.

In time, God had the same thing done to Israel too when Israel became just as wicked. He has continued to do the same thing throughout human history. Many nations have been destroyed through war even if not because the ones who destroyed them were trying to deliver divine justice but certainly because God used other nations to exact justice for the lives that were destroyed by those nations.

In the second passage, we see also that there is a kind of warring that has nothing to do with God's justice. In fact, we can say definitively that it is extremely rare to find any nation going to war because of God's justice. Even though God uses all wars to accomplish His own purposes, the agents He uses do not typically act in conscious agreement with God. They often set out to do something else entirely. That thing is often to try to take something that other people have that they want. In other words, human warring is often motivated by selfish lust.

This type of warring is thoroughly ungodly, and it is what we as believers ought to be avoiding. It is also what we are looking forward to seeing an end to with the return of Jesus Christ. Still, this type of warring can be used by the Lord to accomplish His justice in this world. Consider, for example, the commonly debated invasions of European people in the West and in Africa from about the 1500s until the 1800s. Any average history buff knows that much of this campaigning was for economic reasons. European nations were looking for wealth that they could take and they would take it by war if they could too. But many of the peoples that they destroyed in their bid for wealth were really nations that needed destroying. The wickedness of the indigenous nations of the Americas, for example, are well documented. The evil practices of even our own Nigerian peoples are also quite well documented too, for example, the killing of twins and ritual human sacrifice. Although we might be very wrong to call the European invaders good people, we can certainly say that their wars and domination of the lands that they came to did result in some punishment for the wickedness of the peoples of those lands and a change in some of their barbaric ways.

Third, does this mean that Christians are doing nothing wrong to join the army and go to fight wars? Not necessarily. The answer to whether Christians can rightly join the military and participate in wars is a little complex. On the one hand, Christians have a biblical responsibility to be truly patriotic and to follow the law.

​1 Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. 2 Therefore whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. 3 For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same. 4 For he is God’s minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil. 5 Therefore you must be subject, not only because of wrath but also for conscience’ sake. 6 For because of this you also pay taxes, for they are God’s ministers attending continually to this very thing. 7 Render therefore to all their due: taxes to whom taxes are due, customs to whom customs, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor.
8 Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law.
Romans 13:1-8 (NKJV)

To be clear, biblical patriotism is different than what is popular. It only holds that the believer is responsible to be a good citizen, to pay their taxes, obey good laws, and respect the government. If the government makes a bad law, that is, a law that requires us to disobey God, for example, a command to take the mark of the beast, the believer is not responsible to obey it. If the nation decides to embark on an obviously unjust war, the believer is not responsible to join in fighting it. But the nationhood of a community is something that the believer should respect and protect to the extent that he can do so in good conscience. The simple reason is that God wants nations to exist even if He does allow some nations to be destroyed from time to time.

On the other hand, nations can be wicked. To be clear, all nations are wicked in one way or another. There are no "Christian" nations anywhere. The only nation that can be termed "God's country" is Israel, and that nation does not currently exist. It will come back during the Tribulation when Moses and Elijah are brought back to prepare the Israelites for the return of their King. But nations can exceed what you might call "normal wickedness" and enter into the realm of egregious evil that will only warrant their destruction in some way. A somewhat contemporary example is Germany. Another is Japan. These countries were pretty much destroyed by the Second World War, but because there were enough people in them that did not buy into the status quo of their times, they were not completely erased from history like the Amalekites and the Sodomites and Gomorrites were. Sometimes, God does things like that. Now, what if a believer were a citizen of such a nation? Would they be right to fight in their military pursuing an obviously ungodly objective? I think not. But we must remember that the true objectives of wars are hardly ever communicated to the citizens of the countries that fight them. So, a believer may only be doing his godly duty by joining the military and eventually going to war without ever knowing that there was more to the war than he was told. Would he then be wrong? In that case, we can be quite sure that a Christian who is only doing what God commanded us to do to protect our nations should be accommodated in his ignorance such as it may be. This is why the question is regarded as a matter of application (see Romans 14).

In other words, this is not the kind of question that can be answered simply. We have to accommodate a lot of differences in our individual experiences and circumstances in answering it. Nonetheless, the general principle from the Bible is that there is nothing wrong in itself with joining the military and fighting wars. Whether doing so will be wrong for a specific individual will have to be figured out by that individual taking into account all of their circumstances, experiences, and the knowledge that they have of God and the world in which they live.

There are two caveats that I would make here. One, ignorance never absolves us of responsibility, not according to the Bible.

47 And that servant who knew his master’s will, and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. 48 But he who did not know, yet committed things deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more.
Luke 12:47-48 (NKJV)

We are responsible to learn all that the Bible teaches us about God and do our best to make common sense decisions that are spiritually productive. So, if we fail to learn and expand our common sense knowledge to make better decisions, we cannot plead ignorance as an excuse for failing to make the right decisions. Nonetheless, the Lord does accommodate our ignorance so that the punishment or discipline for failing as a result of ignorance is never as bad as the punishment for failing as a result of wilful disobedience.

Two, there is a time when joining the military and fighting wars might be unequivocally evil. When the Antichrist takes over during the Tribulation, all of the world's armed forces will be repurposed to destroying faith in Jesus Christ. It might be very foolish at that time to be in the military or to join his wars. In fact, every single soldier that joins the invasion of Israel at the end of the Tribulation will be summarily destroyed by the Lord at His return.

9 Proclaim this among the nations:
“Prepare for war!
Wake up the mighty men,
Let all the men of war draw near,
Let them come up.
10 Beat your plowshares into swords
And your pruning hooks into spears;
Let the weak say, ‘I am strong.’ ”
11 Assemble and come, all you nations,
And gather together all around.
Cause Your mighty ones to go down there, O LORD.
12 “Let the nations be wakened, and come up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat;
For there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations.
13 Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe.
Come, go down;
For the winepress is full,
The vats overflow—
For their wickedness is great.”
14 Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision!
For the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision.
15 The sun and moon will grow dark,
And the stars will diminish their brightness.
16 The LORD also will roar from Zion,
And utter His voice from Jerusalem;
The heavens and earth will shake;
But the LORD will be a shelter for His people,
And the strength of the children of Israel.
Joel 3:9-16 (NKJV) (compare Zechariah 14:1-15; 12:1-9; Ezekiel 38-39)

No one who has any sense will join the war of Armageddon on the Antichrist's side. And no one who does join his side at Armageddon will be spared by the Lord. They will all be killed by the Lord. So, wisdom during the Tribulation will probably be to stay away from the armed forces.

Please let me know if I can help you any further.

Cheers.

Daniel058:
Am I the only Christian who's finding it difficult to understand God ,I don't think like this before But of recent am beginning to think wether the bible Is telling us the whole truth about God or was it written out of peoples opinion about who the almighty God is .

1John 4:16
God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.


If he does, why are the Israelites considered as choosen people?

Daniel058:
Malachi 1v2-3

2 “I have loved you,” says the Lord. But you say, “How have you loved us?” “Is not Esau Jacob’s brother?” declares the Lord. “Yet I have loved Jacob 3 but Esau I have hated. I have laid waste his hill country and left his heritage to jackals of the

Daniel058:
People say one of the best thing God did to his Creation is giving dem freedom of choice? Is that true?

I don't really understand; the same freedom of choice Satan used against Eve/ Adam

The Same freedom of choice that kidnappers/Thieves uses against Their victims


Same freedom of Choice Adolf Hitler used Against the Jews .

Same freedom of choice Politicians uses against the people that vote for them.



I don't understand.

Daniel058:
Am beginning to think wether people that wrote the bible truely know God.

People call him Omnipresence / Omniscience God , what if he's not.

I don't understand,



Rev 12 vs 7-9


7 And war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, 8but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. 9The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

. If the above incidents happened before the creation of Man why would the [b]OMNISCIENCE God create man knowing already how he would be deceived. [/b]


I need help here.

Hi there.

Before I start, I must warn you that faith is a free will choice. That is, no one can make you believe anything that you don't want to believe or doubt or disbelieve anything that you don't want to doubt or disbelieve. I recognize that free will is one of the things you have issues with in your challenges above, but this is still a necessary warning. I will give you the best answers that I have and discuss them with you to any extent that you are willing to go within reason, but I cannot guarantee to you that you will believe me. That is your own choice to make.

To begin, there is really no way to help anyone who won't believe the Bible. Please, understand that that does not mean that you should not ask questions. It only means that since every truly Christian answer about God comes from the Bible, a rejection of the reliability and authority of the Bible will only lead to a rejection of all answers that are based on that authority.

If the question, however, is why we Christians do (or why anyone else should) trust the Bible, the answer is that it is the only literature on earth that perfectly accommodates the witness of creation about God and goes beyond that witness to give us a perfectly reasonable introduction to this same God. That is, when anyone reasonably considers the world around him or her, their common sense deductions will ultimately lead them to the Bible, and when they come to the Bible, what they learn there will make perfect sense about not only the world around them but also the God that creation seems to be pointing to. This is all on the intellectual level. But beyond that, any honest reading of the Bible will tell the reader that they are reading at least an unusual book and potentially the very word of the true God. This is a test that anyone can use for themselves without having to rely on anybody else's opinion.

Did men write the Bible? Yes indeed. Were they writing their opinions? No, they were not. How can we be sure? By reading the book itself. Although there are many things that one can present as proof that the writers were not presenting their own opinions including the Bible's own claim to that effect (2 Peter 1:20-21)--and we can get into these proofs at another time--the very "taste" of the book when you read it would tell you that it is not a human production even if human beings were used to produce it.

Did these men know the God that they were writing about? I think that the Bible itself is perfect proof that they did. If they didn't, they would have been unable to write as they did. Additionally, the Bible itself attests to the close relationship that some of them had with God (Numbers 12:8; Daniel 10:11). But you asked what if they were wrong about God since He may not be omniscient given that God created man knowing that he would be deceived by the devil.

The answer to that question lies in the power of God. In fact, the creation of man was specifically in order to show Satan how wrong he was about God. God created a creature that was considerably weaker than Satan and gave that creature the same free will and the same responsibility that Satan and the other angels had. That creature made the same mistake of rebelling against God that Satan and a third of the angels made before man was created. The point was not whether God knew that man was going to rebel. The point was that many of the race of mankind would repent of their rebellion and (here's the clincher!) God would forgive them! That was what Satan told his fellow rebels could not happen: God could not forgive sin and remain just nor could He punish sinners and remain a loving God. God did both in Jesus Christ and proved Satan a liar by doing so. So, God absolutely knew that man would be deceived and sin against Him, but He had already planned for man's redemption before the fact. Therefore, this is not proof that the writers of the Bible did not know what they were talking about. They obviously did.

Why are the Israelites a chosen people? Because their ancestors--Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--loved God in a way that very few others in their generation did. They loved Him enough to make His promises the exclusive point of their lives. How many people would be willing to leave the comfort of home and kindred to wander among lawless nations following a promise that would not be realized in their lifetime especially in a world overflowing with haters of God? But that was what Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob did. They gave up their own native home and the security of their native community to live as strangers among people that could kill you just because they wanted your wife or a well that you dug for yourself.

Because they chose to be so different, God chose to uniquely preserve their lineage so that the Messiah could be born into a community that would be His means of redeeming the whole world. Without this unique country, there would have been no Messiah. In other words, God chose Israel because He loved the whole world to want to save it.

You also provide Malachi 1:2-3 as a challenge. Maybe this is because of your question about God loving everyone but choosing only one nation. If I'm wrong, please don't hesitate to correct me.

Does that passage in Malachi (repeated also in Romans 9:13) mean that God loves some people and hates others? No, it does not. To be clear, God does hate the wicked (Psalm 11:5), but that does not mean that He wants any of them to perish (Ezekiel 18:23). If you stop to think about it, wickedness is repulsive and wicked people are impossible to love. That is the plain truth. But even though we are wicked, God still sent Jesus Christ to die on the Cross so that all of us can be saved. If that is not love, I have no idea what is. The sense in which God hates the wicked is the exact same sense in which we hate them too. Nobody would be happy to have a wicked person living with them forever. That is why God gave Jesus Christ for us. That way, we can be changed from wicked people into righteous people that He can spend eternity with.

But what about Esau specifically? What the Bible teaches there is that Esau was given the natural right to inherit God's amazing promises and he unilaterally rejected them as being worthless preferring instead the lifestyle of the wicked Canaanites among whom he and his parents lived. What is there to love about someone like that? His descendants were not different. They hated their brother Israel so much that when Israel was invaded and deported by Assyria, they were more than happy to join in the slaughter of those Israelites that might have escaped. What is there to love about people like that? God loves Israel because of their fathers and because even when the nation became so wicked, there were still Israelites who chose to love God no matter what.

About free will, it is certainly tragic that the majority of us prefer to use it to do wickedness, but that is kind of the point, isn't it? If we don't have a choice, how can we love God? We would just robotically do whatever He wants. Because we have a choice, we can freely choose to love God if we want. We can do what He wants because that is what we want not just what He wants. We can also freely choose to ignore Him and do whatever we want. There will be rewards and consequences for either choice, but we get to choose. That is amazing.

It is important to keep in mind that we are not robots. We obviously are self-aware. We have experiences that we contemplate and can enjoy or hate. This is the gift of God. It is our responsibility to use this gift the right way and submit to God's will, but by virtue of this gift, not even God will force us to do the right thing. Whatever we do is strictly what we want to do and that is what God will judge: our choices.

What is our hope if so many use their God-given free will to do so much wickedness? That God will judge everyone and reward each one according to their deeds. This world is only a testing ground. Granted that our experiences can hurt real bad in this world, they too will come to an end. But eternity will not. If we use our opportunity to make the right choices with respect to God in this world poorly, then we will have an infinitely unpleasant eternity left for us. If we use the same opportunity right, then we have an infinitely pleasant one to look forward to. There will be justice for all that we go through in this life. That is the Christian hope.

Taking away free will will not change the nature of this world, if even that were possible, and it is not possible at all to do so. We have a responsibility from God to make choices and we cannot get away from that.

Finally, the passage from Revelation 12 was not describing something that has already happened. That is a common misconception. It is yet to happen in the middle of the coming Tribulation that all the world will experience very soon. We Christians look forward to that time because shortly after then, the Lord Jesus will return to destroy Satan's rule over this world and establish His kingdom in its place. That will be an extremely delightful time, the very thing that we have been hoping for: a perfectly just world. And after His thousand-year rule, we are promised a perfect universe where we will be forever with the Trinity and the elect angels and all Millennial believers forever. This world will not even require justice because there will be no wickedness in it at all. This is our ultimate hope, a confident hope that cannot be shaken.

You are not the only Christian who has had trouble understanding God. I was one too. I know very many personally who still don't understand God. In fact, right on this platform, quite a few atheists were once Christians who didn't understand God and got tired of trying to. This very generation of Christians in fact (beginning from the 1880s) are a generation of Christians who could even be argued to not even know God at all. The Bible calls this generation the Laodicean church. It is a spiritually lazy generation so that it is extremely difficult to find believers who either know the truth or are willing to work at finding it and growing in it.

It is a situation that is both heartbreaking and annoying. Many of us pastor-teachers go to quite a bit of trouble to learn the truth and prepare ourselves to teach the truth fully and correctly to our fellow believers out of a strong desire to help one another grow spiritually and become truly fruitful believers in Jesus Christ, but when we come out and start to help, many of those we meet slap our hands away preferring the obvious lies of those who want their money and control of their lives. This is so common that you will find that such pastor-teachers are not at all particularly visible unless something causes them to come out of "hiding." And, no, we are not hiding. We just don't waste a great deal of effort on anyone who is really not interested in the truth. We don't do what we do for money of for power over you. We do it because if we do our jobs right, the Lord Himself will give us the three eternal crowns that all believers are called to win.

If my answers have been helpful to you, I would be more than happy to help you even further. If not, it is just as well. Let me know if there is any other way I can be of help.

Cheers.

Legendguy:
I have heard lots of people saying that restitution doesn't matter as far as you have giving your life to Christ. I have seen people that restituted tye wrong things they did in the past, like some christians that took their WAEC results back to WAEC because they engaged in exam malpractice.
Is it guaranteed for a person, for instance that involves in stealing and looking government or company money to buy properties and build houses and still claiming born again, even though has has genuinely repented and when such person dies can he still go to heaven without restituting his stolen wealth?

Hi there.

Only those who believe in Jesus Christ will be with God in eternity. Only those who don't believe in Him will be in the Lake of Fire. All sins have been accounted for in the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. See John 3:16,18.

Omicron007:
This has always got me thinking.
Often times I ponder about the concept of Hell.

Someone steals a piece of meat and another person commits murder. We are made to believe that both people will find themselves in one hell.

Is there something I don't understand?

Hi there.

No one will go to hell for pilfering or for murder. Anyone who ends up in the Lake of Fire will do so because they rejected the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ in this world. Jesus has already paid for all sins that everybody has committed or will ever commit.

16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. . . 18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
John 3:16,18 (NKJV)

Shyluck:
Well,for me I still go Church to but that's because I have a problem I have been praying about. The only way I will go to Church again when my prayers are answered is by starting my own Church which will be different from what we have today. Sometimes I wonder who propagates churches,is it God or satan,witches or christians. I am tired of Church but not tired of God. God is good. Praise God.
So,tell us why you stopped going to Church.

Hi there.

I stopped going because it was very toxic for me. I have always gone to church in search of clear explanations of the Bible I read, but again and again, I just found people who wanted to make all the money they could by controlling people in any way that they could. So, I quit.

Thankfully, that wasn't the end of the road for me. I stayed away from church from mid-late 2015 until mid-late 2017 when I finally found a ministry online that turned my whole life around. I was finally able to understand what the Bible teaches and see how I could model my life after it. It's been bliss since then although, of course, Satan did not take it lying down.

You could try it out for yourself if you like: https://ichthys.com.

I only go to church now if social obligations demand it. My church is the ministry that I shared with you. It is where I found spiritual refuge from the madness out there.

dsfaster:

Thank you bro for the link

You're very welcome, bro. I will also mention that that ministry is the one under which I grew up spiritually and which has been aiding my development as a pastor-teacher. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to learn everything that the Bible has to teach so that they can grow spiritually and bear fruit for the Lord.

Cheers.

SouthSouth1914:
Is This True since the days of Malcom X?

From Godfather Of Harlem: S2 Episode 4!

Hi there.

I think that any honest person knows that the opposite is true. It's not for nothing that Islam is so often in the news for terrorism-related reasons. Christianity, on the other hand, is hardly ever in the news for that.

dsfaster:
Hello, Christians in the house! This theory of rapture before tribulation has been troubling my mind for some time now and I decided to check it out from the Bible. I grew up in deeper life and I believe 80% of Christians support the theory of rapture before great tribulation

I believe the two will happen though, but I decided to hear what Jesus said with his own mouth concerning the rapture and great tribulation. I discover many of our pastors don't always read Matthew 24 from beginning to the end, they will just pick a section of it and read to support their message.

After reading Matthew 24 over and over again, I feel my eyes have been opened and the answer to that question of rapture and tribulation has been solved. Please bear with me and read althrough this text. I will add some comments in order to bring out my point.

Matthew 24:1-51

1 And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple.

2 And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

3 And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?

4 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.

5 For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.

6 And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.

7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.

8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.

9 Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake.

Comment: verse 9 says Christians will be delivered to be afflicted, maimed and killed - meaning worldwide persecution of Christians.

10 And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.

Comment: Many people who are not prepared for the persecution coming upon Christians will be annoyed and quickly change in their behavior towards their fellow Christian.

11 And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.

12 And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.

Comment: during those days, sin will get to its highest peak and as a result many will lose their love/focus from God

13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

Comment: Endurance, discipline, and deeper love for God will be the only thing that will save the elect (Christians) on that day.

14 And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.

Comment: God will start using serious minded believers to preach the gospel so that everybody in the world will har it.

15 When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand

16 Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains:

Comment: Many Christians will be on the run for fear of being captured by the evil ones.

17 Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house:

Comment: when that time comes, many people will flee from their homes having no food, supply or anything with them other than to keep themselves alive.

18 Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes.

Comment: People will abandon their houses and other possession they have as their safety (lives) will be the only priority

19 And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!

20 But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day:

21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.

Comment: in Jesus words, he said the great tribulation will happen at that time, something that has never been recorded in the history of mankind - and note that he did not talk about rapture first, but great tribulation.

22 And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened.

Comment: The people of God will be considered and as a result the days will be shortened.

23 Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not.

24 For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

25 Behold, I have told you before.

Comment: Now hear, Jesus already gave us some details on how it's going to be. By that time blaming someone else for your unpreparedness will not matter anymore. So he already tell us what to expect.

26 Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not.

27 For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.

Comment: Jesus second coming will not be in secrecy, everybody will see him come.

28 For wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together.

29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:

Comment: More terrible things will happen during those days and note, Christians will still be around.

30 And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

Comment: Now Jesus will come and those who rejected him will cry bitterly that they refused him in their lives.

31 And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

Comment: And here comes the rapture we. The faithful Christians will be raptured and go to heaven. Let me just drop a Bible passage here. Paul was privileged to see this particular event and he says in

1st Thessalonians 4: 15-18

15.For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.

16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words.

That's what apostle Paul said, he only mentioned the rapture but did not see this great tribulation revelation. And now we believe that Jesus is greater than Paul and he gave us a list of what will happen that day. Many congregations are afraid of telling their members the full truth stated by Jesus.


Now back to Matthew 24

32 Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh:

33 So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors.

Comment: Now, with the look of the events happening in our world lately we should be able to decipher that all of this Prophecies will or may happen in this generation.

34 Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.

35 Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.

36 But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.

37 But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.

38 For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,

39 And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.

40 Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left.

41 Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left.

42 Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth cometh

43 But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up.

44 Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.

45 Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season?

46 Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing.

47 Verily I say unto you, That he shall make him ruler over all his goods.

48 But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming;

49 And shall begin to smite his fellowservants, and to eat and drink with the drunken;

50 The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of,

51 And shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.


Now, what do you think of this, I will like to hear your opinion on this matter. I'll appreciate your contributions

Hello.

I think that your experience is typical. Anyone who actually bothers to read what the Bible says on the matter and forgets what the traditional doctrine on it is will come to the same conclusion. I have never found anything in the Bible to support the idea that Christians will suddenly vanish from the earth before the Tribulation begins. But I have found multitude Scriptures that in fact teach the opposite, not least the one you posted above.

If you wish to learn more about this, I recommend the series at https://ichthys.com/Coming-Tribulation-Home-Page.htm or the summary at https://ichthys.com/2B-Eschato.htm. I found them extremely helpful in my own search for the truth.

Cheers.

Model404:
for instance, assuming you are a christain for many years and the moment you just mistakely sinned u die or the rapture took place, will u go to heaven

We neither go to heaven nor go to hell because we sinned. If it were our sins that God judged like that, then nobody would be in Heaven with God at all. We all sin all the time in all kinds of ways (James 3:2).

It is only faith in Jesus Christ or the lack thereof that decides where we end up. If we continue to believe until we die or to believe until the Lord Jesus returns, we will be with God in eternity. Otherwise, we will not be. See John 3:16,18.

Model404:
so what about others, what about those who haven't heard about jesus before, those humans of old who died without the salvation.... seriously christainity is messed up

Hi there.

I'm just being a bit opportunistic here, so feel free to ignore me if you prefer.

The question regarding those who never heard of Jesus has never, to my knowledge, ever taken into account what the Bible says about God's plan for the human beings that He created.

God made human beings with a special quality that only angels among all His many creations possess: free will. Why is this the case? In short, it is to give these two classes of creatures--humans and angels--an opportunity to decide what their relationship to God will be. No other creature has that choice. It is specifically the possession of this quality that makes us unique among everything that exists in the physical universe.

Now, because God wants everyone to choose, He provides us with opportunities to do so that do not deny us the chance to say no to Him. For example, we know that God gave Jesus Christ to die for the sins of every human being that has ever existed or will ever exist, but we also know that only those who care about such things bother to ask about them. Most people would rather not be confronted with the gospel. It annoys them to be told about it. Consider for an example the many atheists that show up on this platform to quarrel about Christians who start preaching to them out of nowhere and warning them about hellfire.

Is God supposed then to breach these people's free will choice to be left alone? Of course, He has no such responsibility. In spite of the fact that He doesn't, He has always given each person enough to awaken a hunger for the gospel in them.

Every human being wakes up to a universe filled with inexhaustible experiences that continue to declare the existence of a God to them to whom we must all answer. When we look up at the sky, there is a response in our own hearts that says that something made that vast stretch of endless blue or gray or black. When we run into trees or rivers or happen on the vast ocean, something tells us that there is something behind them. The question is are we interested in finding out why that thing behind them made them?

For the vast majority of people, the answer is no. They don't care what is behind creation. They only care about what they can get for themselves, so they make all sorts of excuses and buy into all kinds of lies that allow them to do whatever they prefer to do without answering to anyone but their own selves. One might argue that believing in another god other than Jesus does not mean that we are choosing to answer to ourselves only, but when anyone chooses to believe a demonstrable lie, then they are rejecting the authority of an objective power that they did not create. They choose to believe something that lines up with their own way of seeing life.

The world you see around you is our first introduction to God. If we accept it as such, we will be naturally led to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Those who don't come to the gospel are those who rejected that introduction in the first place. If they did, then they would not accept the gospel either. Therefore, they are not saved. Is this "messed up"? I, for one, don't see how it is. I believe that everyone should make their choice and take what comes with it.

On the other hand, before 2/1 BC, the man Jesus Christ did not exist. What then was the lot of the people who did not know Him? Well, before Jesus Christ of Nazareth was born, God Himself had prophesied to the parents of all humanity that He would be born to save the world from the tyranny of Satan and even showed them how He would do it with the bloody sacrifice of the first animal in the Garden of Eden. This was handed down from parent to child throughout the generations of humanity until God even created a whole nation to preserve that knowledge in humanity until this Savior was born.

Everyone who believed that Promise was marked by God as His Own until the Savior would come. When they died, they did not go to the same place that those who did not believe it went although they did not go to Heaven either. They were kept in a place called "Paradise" until Jesus came and took them to Heaven after His death on the Cross.

So, the same principle applied then. If anyone wanted to be saved, they would follow from the clear witness of creation that there is a God to come to the promise of the Savior that would make them acceptable to God again in order to be saved. This is why God called Abraham and created Israel. If people don't want to be saved, they will not listen to creation around them and they will not seek the Gospel, and when the Gospel is given to them, they will still reject it. That is not God's fault. It is people's own choice that they have been given the right to make by God Himself.

Again, I don't see how that is messed up. I think that it is extremely gracious of God to do that for us.

Cheers.

CharisEleos:
Can a born-again sister who wishes to have a baby of her own but does not desire marriage go for IVF?

Is it a sin?

Please only Mature Christians with sound spiritual life should advise.

Hi there.

15 But did He not make them one,
Having a remnant of the Spirit?
And why one?
He seeks godly offspring.
Therefore take heed to your spirit,
And let none deal treacherously with the wife of his youth.
Malachi 2:15 (NKJV)

In other words, God invented marriage for both companionship (Genesis 2:18, 21-24) and the production of godly children.

This does not mean that single parents are somehow sinners, but it does mean that this is not God's "first best" for us. Some people get divorced or widowed or bereaved of a wife through no fault of their own. Some women become single parents too through no wish of their own (i.e. rape). These people have a really difficult circumstance thrust upon them, but God is gracious and will supply the help that they need if they lean on Him to raise their children to be godly. But does this mean that we should take on such a burden willingly?

Considering how much of a difficulty it actually is to raise godly children even in a two-parent home, I would think that no one would take on that trouble willingly if they are single. Children are a handful even under the best circumstances. It seems very daring to me to choose to bring them up under less-than-ideal circumstances if we have a choice in the matter.

To be clear, I'm not offering an opinion on the morality of the question. I think that the Bible is clear that God wants us to raise children in the context of a two-parent heterosexual marriage, but I don't see anything in the Bible addressing IVF, so I cannot say that a single woman who chooses to go that route is doing something wrong. I am only saying that given what the Bible does say and what is actually evident from observation, it is somewhat puzzling that anyone would want to go that route at all.

If, maybe, it is loneliness or just the pleasure of having your own child that drives this desire, it seems to me that the consideration of the responsibility of parenting should cool such concerns significantly. It is very little pleasure to have children that are poorly raised just to have a companion or to have a child of your own to claim. Can a single parent raise a well-adjusted, even a godly, child? I believe so, but it is hard enough for two godly parents, so I wouldn't burden a single parent, however godly, with that responsibility.

In addition to all this, it is wise to consider our witness as Christians. Since we are supposed to be communicating the goodness and holiness of God to the world through our choices, what would it say to the world when we go down this path? Even they acknowledge how hard it is to raise decent children under "ideal" circumstances; what would our actions say to them then? Also, anyone who sees a pregnant woman or a mother with her child with no husband in the vicinity is going to wonder and probably ask questions. What will the answer they get tell them about the Gospel that we believe?

These are considerations that I would place before a sister of mine in Christ who is thinking about this.

Cheers.

Janosky:

@ Daniel 10:13, Your Trinity mentors confirmed that Jesus Christ is Archangel Michael in the Geneva Bible since 1599.
That was before your first King James Bible of 1611 came off the press.
What's amusing is the FACT that the Geneva Bible as well as king James Bible were products from the same 16th century Textus Receptus manuscript.
Translators of KJV knew about Daniel 10:13 in the Geneva Bible.


@ Hebrews 13: 8 "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever"- Yes.
Jesus is the son of God,his Father forever.
Revelation 3:21, Jesus said so in the spiritual realm.
Your twist of John 8:58 na GIBBERISH.
Isaiah, Matthew and Peter confirmed it..

Hello.

Who are "my Trinity mentors"?

I believe that you have every right to believe whatever you want. I feel sure that I have said this to you several times. If you wish to buy into the interpretations of the translators of the Geneva Bible (if those footnotes were their own production), you are free to do so, but I have trouble seeing why any of that has to be my business.

My faith is a free will choice I made. My beliefs about the Bible's teachings are my own free will choice too. I am not beholden to anyone for them. If I accept a teaching, I do so because it seems right to me depending on its consonance with the Bible. I don't accept a teaching just because I am tied to a tradition. In other words, I don't hold a Trinity position because the Geneva translators or even the KJV translators did. I have never claimed that I do. And I don't claim it now.

As for your own opinions of my teaching, you are certainly free to believe whatever you want . . . as I already said.

blackmanblack:
That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.
Isaiah 45:6‭-‬7 KJV

Yes! God is the creator of heaven and earth, He is the Alpha and Omega, First and the Last. Glory to His name and his throne.

But my question lies on verse 7 of the chapter were it is said the He created evil. Bible scholars, kindly help me with more of your wisdom, knowledge and understanding in making the verse more explicit.

Thank you.

Hi there.

I've written about this verse a few times on this forum. Granted that the KJV is not wrong here, it uses "evil" in a way that we rarely use it in the 21st century.

It bears repeating that the KJV translation is not wrong here. It is only archaic in usage. We don't often use the word "evil" in the way that 17th century English speakers used it. That was the time when the KJV was produced.

The following are other translations:

7 I form the light and create darkness,
I make peace and create calamity;
I, the LORD, do all these things.’
Isaiah 45:7 (NKJV)

7 I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things.
Isaiah 45:7 (NIV)

7 The One forming light and creating darkness,
Causing well-being and creating calamity;
I am the LORD who does all these.
Isaiah 45:7 (NASB)

7 I form light and create darkness;
I make well-being and create calamity;
I am the LORD, who does all these things.
Isaiah 45:7 (ESV)

The ASV and other translations produced around the same era as the KJV say "evil" because the word was not necessarily limited to moral usage. Something was evil if it was morally bad or if it was just unpleasant. An unpleasant tasting fruit, for example, would be called evil-tasting by English speakers of that time.

Consider the Merriam Webster dictionary's definitions of the word at https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/evil, for example:

2 a archaic : INFERIOR
b: causing discomfort or repulsion : OFFENSIVE
an evil odor
c: DISAGREEABLE
woke late and in an evil temper

Cheers.

Hanibbal:
I am a Christian and when ever I think about the plan of God for man from the beginning, the garden of eden, Adam and Eve. We were made to understand that the plan of God was to make man in his own image and make him eternal like him but the disobedience of Adam and Eve destroyed that plan and brought death.

Now my question is if Adam and eve did not disobey death won't have entered from the beginning. That means if people don't die the population of this world would keep increasing. Is overcrowding not the effect of this? What about earth's resources can it cater for like hundreds of billions of people living on earth?

Only God knows how old this earth is let's say people who have lived on this earth at a time are still here plus our present generation what would have happened. I can't imagine the overcrowding.

At times I would start doubting that God wanted us to live forever from the beginning. Nairalander's please what's your take on this.
Mods please help me push this to FP I need answers. Help a curious soul.

Cc: lalasticlala OAM4J

Hi there.

First of all, I know no part of the bible that says that Adam and Eve were created to be eternal like God. In fact, there is this passage:

22 Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”— 23 therefore the LORD God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken.
Genesis 3:22-23 (NKJV)

That seems to me to make clear that God did not make the couple with an innate "immortality." It was the fruit of the tree of life that would have sustained their life indefinitely if they were not driven out of the Garden of Eden.

But maybe that is what you mean. Maybe you mean that God's plan was for them to stay in the Garden of Eden with unfettered access to the Tree of Life, thus sustaining their earthly existence indefinitely. Or maybe you mean that they were intended to eventually become immortal if they never disobeyed God. Either of these is plausible, but we can only say what the Bible actually affirms to be true: namely, that God made Adam and Eve with a mortality that was sustained by the tree of life until they sinned and He drove them out of the Garden of Eden.

Second, nothing about God's Plan can be destroyed (Isaiah 55:11; Matthew 24:35; Numbers 23:19). Everything that happens in this creation is part of God's Plan. He may only have accommodated certain things so that His creatures can exercise their free will (which is what God's image is), but there is nothing that happens that surprises Him or makes Him change His mind. His plan is the same since before He created the world.

To your question, however, I believe that you are right that there would have been no death if Adam and Eve and their children never sinned against God. Death is a result of sin (Romans 5:12-14). I should point out still that while it is true that it was Adam's sin that brought death on us all, if Adam had not sinned and any of his children then did in their own turn, they would have experienced death. Because of God's Plan, however, Adam sinned so that it would be a 'once for all' thing for all humanity (Romans 11:32, for illustration).

As for overcrowding, obviously, there is nothing that God cannot do. Jesus Christ fed five thousand men and an undisclosed number of women and children with five loaves and two fishes on one occasion, after all. On another, He fed four thousand men and an undisclosed number of women and children with seven loaves of bread and a few fishes too.

What is more, the Glorious Millennium is going to have the largest population of human beings ever to live here on earth. Death will be so uncommon then that anyone who dies at 100 years old at that time will be a sinner under a curse (Isaiah 65:20). Many of those who make it into the Millennium unresurrected will live through the whole thousand years then with their children, grandchildren, even great-grandchildren, and on and on down the line. This will particularly be the case with believers, the majority of whom at that time will be ethnic Jews.

Should this worry us? As we have just said, no, it should not. Where sin is restrained and God is ruling over the world as He was doing through Adam before he sinned and as He will be doing in Jesus Christ in the Millennium, the world explodes with blessing and productivity. Consider this promise below, which is one of a staggering number:

7 When I returned, there, along the bank of the river, were very many trees on one side and the other. 8 Then he said to me: “This water flows toward the eastern region, goes down into the valley, and enters the sea. When it reaches the sea, its waters are healed. 9 And it shall be that every living thing that moves, wherever the rivers go, will live. There will be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters go there; for they will be healed, and everything will live wherever the river goes. 10 It shall be that fishermen will stand by it from En Gedi to En Eglaim; they will be places for spreading their nets. Their fish will be of the same kinds as the fish of the Great Sea, exceedingly many. 11 But its swamps and marshes will not be healed; they will be given over to salt. 12 Along the bank of the river, on this side and that, will grow all kinds of trees used for food; their leaves will not wither, and their fruit will not fail. They will bear fruit every month, because their water flows from the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for medicine.”
Ezekiel 47:7-12 (NKJV)

Understand that this promise above is concerning this very planet that we live on, not about Heaven or about the New Earth that God will make after the Judgment of the Great White Throne (Revelation 20:11-15) in Revelation 21:1.

It is good to remember that death is not what God wants for us. It is in His plan only because our free will was always going to lead us to sin in very many cases. A third of the angels sinned too just because they had free will, how much more human beings in our weakness. Death was invented by God to control sin and give us an incentive to repent and lay hold of His mercy. Eternal fellowship with God is actually what He wants for us. But He was never going to force it on anybody. Each of us must choose it freely if we will have it.

Cheers.

Chastitivity:
I need more of Christian friends

Hi.

We do. That is why God gave us each other:

4 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, 25 not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another —and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
Hebrews 10:24-25 (NIV)

16 Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.
Colossians 3:16 (NIV)

Still, it is God who puts each of us in the specific Christian family in which we will thrive spiritually.

6 God sets the solitary in families;
He brings out those who are bound into prosperity;
But the rebellious dwell in a dry land.
Psalms 68:6 (NKJV)

Therefore, we may need to be patient as we seek Christian fellowship especially in these days when such a thing is really hard to find. As you may know, most churches that you walk into are Christian in name only with very little otherwise resembling the life that the Bible calls us to.

I, for one, spent a great portion of my life up to now just looking for a place where I could settle down and grow as a Christian and be accepted among people who actually love the teachings of the Bible. So, I spent a lot of time checking out different churches and ministries and trying to cultivate all manner of relationships that I hoped would help me. Much of that effort came to very little of value. But in the end, the Lord did bring me to a place where I was well fed spiritually and where I found true friends whose concern for my spiritual welfare was real and reliable.

I found that place at https://ichthys.com, and I highly recommend it. But you may find it elsewhere. Wherever you do, be diligent both in seeking and in waiting on the Lord. When we take matters into our own hands, we tend to cause a lot of trouble as a result.

Cheers.

Mike2021forGod:
I just recently gave my life to Christ before I was into fraud and redeeming of gift card by Yahoo boiz... I was planning to establish on intimacy gadget business what should be done i have quit fraud but is redeeming of gift card a sin and can a Christian sell intimacy gadgets and all this enlargement cream

Hi there.

Congratulations on your choice to accept the Gospel. What a wonderful decision you have made for yourself. Will say a prayer for you to keep hold of your faith until the end. For now, I encourage you to go on and grow spiritually so that you can bear fruit for the Lord. There is great eternal reward in doing so.

I'm not sure what "redeeming of gift card" is, but if it is against the law, then you should not do it since Christians are called to obey the law of the land as long as it does not require us to disobey God.

As for intimacy gadgets, I'm not sure I know anything in the Bible that would lead me to proscribe it. So I would say that you should pray about it and continue growing spiritually (see the link) and the Lord will lead you to the right decision. That is how we all ought to deal with issues like this where the Scriptures are silent.

Cheers.

Sniper4real:
Morning my people.

Religion and economy works hand in hand.
Max Weber said any carrier you find yourself in is God's calling. So do it genuinely.


We know most of this churches with their busy church activities or everyday programs had affected its members economy when the church expects its members to attend all the church programs and neglect his/her business.

That's Endangering its members on one part



And on the other hand, churches are playing positive impact on the members economy maybe by providing jobs for its members or opening business centers.

That's Engendering its members on another parts

So guys, how has your church or religion centers endanger and engender it's members economy.

Hi there.

You may be right. In fact, we know that religion is really a ruse for power over people. Religion plays on people's natural fears and lusts. So, of course, it could form an alliance with economics for its own ends.

Christianity, however, isn't religion. It does not form alliances with anything in this world. It may accommodate or use them, but it is not allied with them.

What I mean is this: Life in this world is life in this world--it is not Christianity. Everyone has to work for a living whether they are Christians or not. Being a Christian neither excuses a person from this reality nor makes it his or her unique experience. When any church that claims to be Christian interferes with this natural part of human life, they cause serious disruptions in the lives of those who participate in them.

On the other hand, a Christian church is not a business place.

12 Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. 13 “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’”
Matthew 21:12-13 (NIV) (cf. Mk 11:15-18; Lk 19:45-47)

A Christian church is the pillar and foundation of God's truth.

15 if I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.
1 Timothy 3:15 (NIV)

The church is where those who believe the Gospel come to learn and encourage each other in the truth of the Bible. It is not concerned with making money. Believers certainly ought to make a duty of helping one another in their needs both spiritual and material.

2 Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.
Galatians 6:2 (NIV)

10 Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.
Galatians 6:10 (NKJV)

As long as we are growing spiritually (see the link), we will also be finding more and more spiritually productive ways to help each other including, but not limited to, starting businesses with each other or employing each other or just giving gifts where those make a meaningful spiritual difference. But this is on an individual basis, not on a corporate basis. When we gather together, it ought to be just to learn Scriptural truth or encourage each other in learning or continuing together.

This is what it means to use this world without making full use of it (1 Corinthians 7:31).

This world lies in the wicked one (1 John 5:19). The economics and politics of this world has nothing to do with Jesus Christ. We who love this Jesus Christ and have chosen to follow Him must therefore be careful to only use these things to the degree that they serve our mission as Christians in this world. We must work for a living so that we will not steal and dishonor the Lord. Likewise, we must obey good laws, pay our taxes, and respect the government, but we are not to get mired in political issues and agitations since they belong to this world and add no value to our spiritual goals in this world.

14 I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
John 17:14 (NKJV)

Cheers.

greencard:
We do ask for forgiveness after we felt we might have sin and God might not be happy with us .

But how are we so sure that sin has been forgiven by God ?

Hi there.

This is what the Bible says:

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
1 John 1:9 NIV

This is an assurance from the Scriptures of God's mercy to those believers who confess their sins. We can trust that God will keep His Word.

We may not feel forgiven, but the Bible does not say that our feelings have anything to do with it. It is God, not our feelings, who forgives us. If He promises that He will forgive us when we confess our sins, then we can be confident that He will.

FatherOfJesus:
Good riddance, your ridiculous stories won’t sell here. Go talk to some deranged people in your church.

I'm leaving because I'm talking to a deranged person here. You see, I say that because I already said that I don't go to church and because I haven't told a single story here. But somehow you know that I have deranged people in the church I don't go to and I have ridiculous stories to sell here that will sell better there.

How do we define insane? Is it not when people start acting like things aren't what they are or things are what they're not? That is, a deranged person is someone who is no longer reacting to reality as it is.

2dominate:
According to the aforementioned verse I believe that the punishment was not just, extremely severe, because the progeny of Adam and Eve up till date are still suffering the consequences of Adam and Eve's sin.

I don't think I understand. Are your standards for justice perfect? Do you think perhaps that if we all listened to you, the world would be a perfectly just and peaceful place? Is this what you believe?

1Sharon:


What was the sin of the babies that he ordered to be killed?

I don't believe that I have claimed anywhere that I know the sins of all those who are punished by God. Am I some sort of cosmic policeman?

I don't know everybody's sin. I do know that everybody, including babies, sins. But I also know that sometimes the sufferings we experience are not because of our own sins.

In the Bible, David's infant son died not long after birth because David murdered Uriah after committing adultery with Bathsheba in order to hide his sin. We know that this was the punishment that God levied on David. We aren't told anything about the baby dying because of its own sin.

The Bible in this way teaches us that others we love can suffer when we sin, not because the Lord is punishing them for our sin but because their suffering causes pain to us. This is part of the punishment for sin: cursing by association.

As for the babies who die because they are connected to people who sin terribly against God, they are automatically saved. So, while death is painful and a real loss in many ways, having eternity with God is an incomparable compensation for that loss. They may have missed out on life on earth, but that is nothing at all if they will spend eternity in bliss with God.

FatherOfJesus:
The Bible has more errors than the vowels and punctuations in it. An ancient story book written by cavemen for some idiots in 2021 to still take seriously. Science because that story don’t solve problems.

You should be ashamed of your belief and reasoning

Well, I'm not. I see no reason why I should be ashamed of it. And I certainly see no reason why I should care about the opinions of a shameless liar such as yourself.

You must carry on without me from this point on.

FatherOfJesus:
It can’t be as gibberish as the whole bible pages

From one what gibberish chapter to another

Not sure why it can't be. From where I stand, if the Bible lost all its vowels and punctuation, it would still make infinitely more sense than the word salad you wrote there.

2dominate:

To the best of my knowledge the word eternal can also be used for something that covers a lengthy period of time

Is that so? Do you mean in a metaphorical sense?

Is that then what you meant? That God punished Adam and Eve with working for a living until the end of their physical lives and that He limited the length of their physical lives is the eternal punishment you were referring to?

What exactly would you prefer? That God would not have punished them for rebelling against Him or that He should have let them live forever in their fallen state? Is that what you think would have been right and good?