Reading Time: 5 minutesQuestion 60088 The assumption that science and the Bible are locked in fundamental conflict is one of the most widely held in contemporary culture. It surfaces in popular journalism, in university lecture theatres, and in the private doubts of many Christians who feel caught between the faith they hold and the world the sciences appear…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 10028 Most Bible readers have had the experience of a passage opening up with a clarity and personal directness it had never carried before — something has changed, though not in the text itself. And most have had the opposite experience too: reading words that are technically comprehensible but which carry no weight, no…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 10025 The Bible is a large, complex, ancient document. It contains poetry, prophecy, law, history, biography, letters, and apocalyptic vision. It was written across fifteen hundred years in three languages, addressed to people in vastly different cultural and historical situations. Christians claim it is the word of God for all people in all ages….
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 01156 The imprecatory psalms are those passages in the Psalter that call down divine destruction on enemies — “Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow” (Psalm 109:9); “O daughter of Babylon… blessed shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock” (Psalm 137:8-9). The discomfort these…
Reading Time: 6 minutesQuestion 0032 It is one of the great tragedies of the modern church that the study of God—which is what the word “theology” means—has become associated with dusty books, academic jargon, and irrelevant speculation. How did we get to the point where knowing God is considered boring? How did understanding the Creator of the universe…
Reading Time: 5 minutesQuestion 0033 The question itself is encouraging. Anyone asking how to develop an appetite for doctrine already possesses something precious—the recognition that such an appetite is desirable. Not everyone reaches that point. Many Christians coast through their lives on spiritual junk food, never realising they are malnourished. The fact that you want to grow in…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 3045 We use the word ‘Christ’ so frequently that it can almost seem like Jesus’ surname. But ‘Christ’ is not a name – it is a title, and one loaded with meaning. Understanding what ‘Messiah’ and ‘Christ’ actually signify helps us grasp who Jesus claimed to be and what He came to accomplish. The…
Reading Time: 5 minutesQuestion 3047 The book of Hebrews makes an extraordinary claim: Jesus, the Son of God, serves as our High Priest. This would have been a startling assertion to Jewish readers, since Jesus came from the tribe of Judah, not Levi, and the high priesthood was hereditary through Aaron’s line. How can Jesus be a High…
Reading Time: 5 minutesQuestion 3031 Throughout history, various groups have tried to reduce Jesus to the level of an exalted angel. Jehovah’s Witnesses teach that Jesus is Michael the Archangel. Some early heresies considered Jesus the greatest of angelic beings. Even today, people sometimes speak of Jesus as if He were simply a more important messenger from God….
Reading Time: 5 minutesQuestion 3029 Colossians 1:15 describes Jesus as “the firstborn of all creation.” Critics of Christianity, particularly Jehovah’s Witnesses and other groups that deny Jesus’ deity, seize upon this phrase as proof that Jesus was the first thing God created. If He is the “firstborn,” surely He must have been born at some point? This question…