Once a lady came by my study to ask me about heaven. She wanted to know if there would be degrees of rewards there. I told her that the scriptures teach us that there will be (1 Corinthians 3:11-15).
The Bible teaches that our destiny depends on faith (Ephesians 2:8-9), but our rewards depend on works (Revelation 22:12). It is by the grace of God that we are saved<...
During the last few decades, a small number of “radical” theologians have received worldwide publicity from their announcement that “God is dead.” Some members of the secular press, hungering for headlines, raised these men to a level seldom afforded a philosopher or theologian.
While there is nothing new about such claims, we who are Christians must know how to answer them. We must be...
Our greatest fear is the fear of death. Some have even proposed that the fear of death is present in our mental functioning at all times. Melanie Klein, the British psychologist, adds that the fear of death is at the root of all human anxiety.
Another famous physician once said that the fear of death is rooted in three things: fear of pain, fear of separation, and fear of the unknown. S...
Once we buried a young lady who was only 21 years old. She was killed in a head-on collision while on her way to church. The night before the funeral, my daughter asked why God allows things like this to happen.
I wish I knew. Things like this have puzzled saints, wise men, and philosophers since the world began.
There is simply no one easy answer as to why tragedies like this h...
I have two friends who recently became Christians. Before their conversion they both had serious drinking problems. One said to the other, “Before I was saved I drank a fifth of whiskey a day.” The other one said to me, “I hated to tell him, but I spilled that much every day.”
My friend has now been dry for several months. He says, “The real miracle is that for the last two months I hav...
Traditionally we think of death as a hostile grim reaper, stalking humanity with a scythe. In the minds of most people, pain and suffering are associated with death. We think of death as a dreadful experience and often wonder, “Does it hurt to die?”
The best available evidence is that the actual act of dying is not difficult or painful at all. To the contrary, it is peaceful and pleasan...
Everyone needs to know how to deal with other people’s sins. Daily we are affected by them and they cause us many a crisis and much misery. We are never free from the wrongs caused by others, and they are never free from the wrongs caused by us.
Sometimes the sins of others touch us directly. A business partner turns out to be dishonest; your husband is unfaithful; a member of your fami...
“What is heaven like?” No words are adequate to describe it. The apostle Paul once had an experience where he was lifted into what the Bible calls the "third heaven." He was taken into the very presence of God... an experience so wonderful that he said he could not talk about it. Weak language could not bear the weight of what he had seen.
Though we can never fully explain what heaven i...
“If Christianity today is losing its influence, the reason may be that the church consists of soft pews, soft music, and soft soap.” So said Pastor John C. Jeske one time in the Presbyterian Journal.
We must never so water down our message as Christians that it loses its cleansing power. We must fight the temptation to be apologetic and even ashamed of the old-fashioned messag...