- Written by Steven Amis
The doctrine of eternal security, which teaches that the salvation of believers is forever guaranteed by our Savior and great High Priest Jesus Christ, is a glorious doctrine that gives believers assurance of their faith in Christ and their eternal inheritance. Yet tragically, it is a doctrine that many well-meaning Christians question or deny, and instead teach that people can experience genuine conversion but later fall away from the faith and lose their salvation, a view sometimes referred to as conditional security. Unsurprisingly, both sides of this ongoing debate within the church claim to have their fair share of proof-texts that justify their positions, so we will be taking a closer look at a couple of passages that appear to teach conditional security in order to better understand them and to provide meaningful responses that will hopefully strengthen your faith and assurance. As we will see, some of these passages can be a bit challenging at first glance, thus it becomes important to always remember to interpret unclear texts with clear ones.
- Written by Adam Heltne
Have you ever read the nativity story in Luke chapter two and thought, “How convenient that there was a census at the exactly right time that Mary and Joseph needed to go to Bethlehem, so Jesus could be born there?” As a kid, I can even remember people telling the story as if Mary and Joseph made it just in time to give birth to Jesus! Census, Bethlehem, baby. Was it really that easy? How difficult and trying was this experience for this young couple? How did God work in the lives of Mary and Joseph to get them from Nazareth to Bethlehem? My goal in writing this blog will be to explore the events leading up to the birth of Jesus in an attempt to see how God worked in the lives of Mary and Joseph on the road to Bethlehem. In order to do so, I will try to fill in the Biblical account with some details while also acknowledging that they are by no means conclusively facts.
- Written by Steven Amis
As Christians, one thing all of us are guaranteed to experience in one form or another in this life is adversity. Regardless of what directly causes the various trials to come our way, we know that God is the one who ultimately causes all things to work together according to His eternal decree. Many Christians cite Romans 8:28, which says, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose” as their favorite Bible verse. To avoid any misunderstanding, I think this is a great passage to memorize and Christians most certainly have liberty to make it their “life verse”; however, there is also a lot of misapplication of this verse that needs to be addressed.