Content: Planning without God is arrogant boasting, and James calls it evil. Ecclesiastes reminds us that God appoints the times, and James warns that life is a vapor. The faithful alternative is humble submission: “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.” This lesson calls us to repent of self-rule and bring every plan under the Lord’s authority.
Every person who has ever faced his own sin has had to say the same three words: “I have sinned” — but what those three words mean depends entirely on the heart that speaks them. “I have sinned.” The phrase runs through Scripture like a wound….
God’s holiness demands justice just as much as His nature defines love; to deny His judgment is to deny His very nature. The “Yeah, but… God is love” objection fails because it tries to pit God’s love against God’s justice.
The Old Testament is the inspired Word of God — a claim made by the writers themselves, confirmed by Jesus Christ in person, and endorsed by the apostles throughout the New Testament. The church has at various times been tempted to treat the Old Testament as…
The conflicts we see in homes and churches are only the smoke. James reveals that the real war rages within the human heart. Selfish desires, when left unmortified, produce quarrels, corrupt prayer, and spiritual compromise. James 4:1–4 exposes the internal battle between flesh and Spirit and calls believers to reject friendship with the world and return to wholehearted loyalty to Christ.
Revelation and inspiration are distinct acts in a related chain: God reveals truth about himself; inspiration ensures that revelation is accurately recorded and transmitted in human language. Divine revelation comes in two forms — general (through nature) and special (through direct communication, visions, prophets, and ultimately…
The word “Christian liberty” is used in two almost contradictory ways. One use invokes it as a shield against accountability — “I have liberty in Christ; don’t bind your traditions on me.” The other use names the profound freedom Christ actually purchased: freedom from the guilt…
Material and spiritual creation both came from the same source and operate through the same three persons — but with different materials: the Spirit organized and perfected matter in the one; in the other, he organized and perfected the spiritual realm through the incarnation, the apostles…
Psalm 8 is a psalm of wonder: “When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained; what is man that You take thought of him, and the son of man that You care for him?” (Ps….
The millennial theory is built on a single figurative text in the most symbolic book of the New Testament. Every other fundamental doctrine of the New Testament is taught repeatedly in plain language. The Millennium is not. Only speculative teaching can be given for it —…