Does anyone really try to mock, ridicule, or sneer at God? It must be a real temptation for some to mock God, for Paul warned us against it in Galatians 6:7: “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.” Enemies of God have sometimes mocked God […]
Which Came First: Mother, or Baby?
May 5, 2015 by · Leave a Comment
Those who believe in the Darwinian theory of evolution believe that mankind is the result of a long chain of random, accidental, natural, mechanistic processes which led from an amoeba eventually to primates and then to human beings. One of the many insurmountable difficulties for the evolutionary hypothesis is that evolution opposes the scientific Law […]
The Apostle John on “Him Who is From the Beginning”
April 30, 2015 by · Leave a Comment
Twice in 1 John 2, the apostle tells his readers that they know “him who is from the beginning” (2:13, 14). What does this phrase mean? Whom did John say that his readers knew? If we looks through John’s writings, including both the Gospel of John, the epistles, and the Revelation, then it is possible […]
Four Generations
March 30, 2015 by · 1 Comment
From time to time we see a photograph that pictures four generations of family members. These photographs are very special, because they show that there are shared values and memories among those who span the decades and yet represent the same family. There is a Bible verse that mentions four generations. It’s 2 Timothy 2:1-2: “Thou […]
MTD: The “Whatever” Religion
February 11, 2015 by · Leave a Comment
You may be asking, “What is MTD?” MTD stands for “moralistic therapeutic deism.” Sociologist Christian Smith of the University of North Carolina coined the phrase in 2005 to describe the basic religion of many teenagers in America in our day. ((“On ‘Moralistic Therapeutic Deism’ as U.S. Teenagers’ Actual, Tacit, De Facto Religious Faith,” Princeton Theological […]
The Kingdom in the Model Prayer
January 29, 2015 by · Leave a Comment
I have paragraph headings in my Bible, and the paragraph heading above Matthew 6:5-15 says, “The Lord’s Prayer.” This is misleading, for the prayer in the passage is a sample or model for prayer given from Jesus to his disciples, and not a prayer that Jesus prayed to the Father. (If you want to read […]
There are No “Church of Christers,” and One Person is Not “a Church of Christ”
January 20, 2015 by · 3 Comments
We must think and speak in biblical ways (Philippians 4:8; 1 Peter 4:11). One important instance of biblical thinking and speaking is this: We must understand what we mean when we speak of the “church of Christ” (Romans 16:16). It may surprise some to learn that the designation “church of Christ” is not is not […]
Do Bible Topics Get Too Old?
January 7, 2015 by · Leave a Comment
Once in 1893, the great preacher and scholar, J.W. McGarvey, was preaching on baptism. ((McGarvey’s Sermons (Delight: Gospel Light, n.d.), 109-121.)) He began by noting that many people in his audience might think it strange for him to focus on a topic that religious teachers have covered so many times without producing a general consensus. If many preachers […]
“There’s a Movement Coming”: A Response to Patrick Mead and Lauren King, Preachers
December 17, 2014 by · 6 Comments
Christians have been warned, and we had better be ready. Recently, the Fourth Avenue Church of Christ, in Franklin, Tennessee hired Lauren King to be their preaching intern. That King, a Bible major at Lipscomb University, is using the preaching internship for university credit, is remarkable in itself given that female biblical studies majors regularly meet […]
Sony’s Leak and God’s Omniscience
December 4, 2014 by · Leave a Comment
In recent days, Sony Pictures’ computer network was hacked, apparently by a group calling itself the “Guardians of Peace.” ((Kim Zetter, “Sony Got Hacked Hard: What We Know and Don’t Know So Far,” Wired, http://www.wired.com/2014/12/sony-hack-what-we-know/ (2014).)) So far, the hackers have leaked about 40 gigabytes of sensitive company data from computers belonging to Sony Pictures, […]