There is a balance involved in the Christian life: God’s free grace is an unearned, undeserved gift, but at the same time, following Jesus in true discipleship is often very costly. It is because those who are truly saved always become true disciples that the Bible sometimes makes it sound…

What will the world be like when Christ returns to set all things right and make all things new? John first echoes the imagery of Ezekiel, who described a river flowing from the Temple of God that would heal the waters of the Dead Sea, allowing fish to live in…

Sometimes, when we speak of a city, we are referring to a place – a set of buildings and streets: “I am going to New Orleans.” Other times, we are referring to the people who live there: “New Orleans loves jazz music and good food.” In today’s passage, John seems…

“Trust Jesus so you can go to heaven someday.” Maybe that’s the way you first heard the gospel, and it is a great comfort to know that the spirits of all those who trust Jesus go to be with Him when we die. After all, He told one of the…

So if we’re saved by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8), how can we make sense out of today’s passage? Well, while some well-intentioned folks insist that this “white throne judgment” is not for Christians, we need to consider the whole witness of the Scripture. After all, Paul himself, the apostle…

There has been much ink spilled over “The Millennium” mentioned in Revelation 20: Who is the angel with the key and the chain? When does this 1000-year period take place? How can there be more than one resurrection? Well, remembering how numbers quite often have symbolic meaning throughout this book,…

As we saw in the first part of this chapter, those who trust in Christ will experience His coming with the joy of a bride at the coming of her groom, with the happiness of guests who are invited to a wedding feast. But in today’s passage, we learn that…

There are lots of different wedding traditions. Jewish couples stand beneath a canopy called a chuppah, and everyone dances the hora at their reception. Up north, guests tend to be invited to a sit-down dinner after the wedding, while Southern folks generally prefer a stand-up reception, mingling around tables of…

Some can remember VE Day, the day when Germany surrendered unconditionally to the Allies in May of 1945. Others recall the collapse of Communist rule in East Germany and the fall of the Berlin Wall in November of 1989. We feel such joy and relief when wars end, such satisfaction…

Ancient Babylon was indeed a great city, without rival in learning and sophistication. In fact, its “hanging gardens” were considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and historians still debate where they were and exactly how the Babylonians accomplished such a feat of architecture and engineering. Of…