Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 8034 Reports of disturbing physical manifestations attributed to demonic presence have circulated throughout church history and continue into the present, ranging from objects moving to visible apparitions. Understanding what Scripture actually says about demons and physical form requires distinguishing carefully between what angels can do, what demons appear to do, and what the biblical…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 8035 The relationship between demonic activity and physical illness is a question the New Testament addresses with more directness than is sometimes acknowledged, while also providing important guardrails against the kind of sweeping attribution that causes serious pastoral harm. The answer is not a simple yes or no, and the difference matters enormously in…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 8037 The phrase “unclean spirit” appears throughout the Synoptic Gospels and the book of Acts, and understanding it requires attention to more than just the Greek vocabulary. The designation is theologically rich, connecting to deeply embedded categories in Israel’s religious life and revealing something specific about the character of the beings it describes. The…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 8039 The question arises from one specific and remarkable incident in the Gospel accounts, and it is worth examining that incident carefully rather than building sweeping conclusions from it. What the Gadarene account tells us is both more and less than might be expected. The Gadarene Incident The account appears in all three Synoptic…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 10011 This is one of the most asked questions in Christianity, and it has been asked since the earliest days of the Church. The disciples themselves wanted to know. “Tell us, when will these things be?” (Matthew 24:3) The answer Jesus gave them, and the answer Scripture gives us, is both clear and mysterious….
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 10012 The return of Jesus is not a quiet, unnoticed event. It is the most dramatic, world-changing moment in all of history. Everything changes when Jesus comes back. The question is not whether He will return, for Scripture is abundantly clear on that point, but what happens when He does. The answer unfolds in…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 7067 Easy believism describes a presentation of the gospel in which salvation is reduced to intellectual acknowledgment of certain facts about Jesus, with no genuine repentance, no change of direction, and no expectation of transformation. It is not a label its proponents normally accept for themselves, but it describes a real tendency that has…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 7062 Judas Iscariot is one of the most disturbing figures in Scripture. He spent three years in Jesus’ company, witnessed miracles, heard the Sermon on the Mount, was numbered among the Twelve and sent out to preach and heal, and then sold his Master for thirty pieces of silver. The question of whether he…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 07058 The question of deathbed conversions tends to provoke two quite different reactions. For some, the thought that a person can turn to Christ in the final moments of life and receive full forgiveness and eternal life is an expression of the gospel’s astonishing generosity. For others, it raises uncomfortable questions about fairness, about…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 60096 The question of whether Jonah was swallowed by a great fish and survived is one that divides those who approach Scripture assuming miracles cannot occur and those who take the text on its own terms. For the reader who accepts that the God who created the ocean and everything in it is capable…