Eternal life resides in Jesus and in Him alone. No one else! This is true now and will also be the case after Jesus removes His true church from the earth.
In John 14:6, Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
What do people need the most? The answer remains the same as it’s always been: A clear understanding of the Gospel. By this I mean that people need Jesus, not the one that so many today create in their mind but but the One revealed on the pages of Scripture.
All the biblical depictions of this other-world domain, whether it be the glories of Heaven, the earth during Jesus’ thousand-year reign, or the eternal state, far surpass the mythical Narnia in their captivating beauty and splendor. It’s this kingdom that should fill our hearts with wonder and joyous anticipation. Yet so many believers live as though the reality behind the mythical Narnia doesn’t exist.
The good news is that Paul doesn’t limit participation in the Rapture to those who are watching for it. The opposite of looking for Jesus’ appearing is not that of physical death, but rather that of being asleep in the sense of not paying attention to the sings of the times, a common malady among the saints today.
Just this past July 28-29, the nations met at the UN to agree upon a resolution aimed at bringing peace to the Middle East. The US and Israel didn’t send representatives to the meetings, but almost every other country attended. The result of this assembly was a document entitled, “New York Declaration on the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State solution." The formal UN vote on the document is set for this September at its annual gathering.
Five hundred years have passed since the Reformation began and yet the influence of the Roman Catholic Church remains strong. I’m not referring to the mammoth oligarchy that seeks to dictate the lives of an estimated one billion people, but rather its continuing influence upon churches outside its realm, including many that adhere to the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture.
Bible prophecy matters; it’s the key to understanding the day in which we live. We need a true Scripture-based perspective of what lies beyond this life in order to make sense of our journey through it.
Without it, we would struggle to understand how a sound biblical worldview intersects with the tragedies, senseless violence, corruption, and lawlessness that are so rampant in our day.
The path to unbiblical teaching always begins with those who illuminate their paths with their own wisdom rather than the light that comes from the words of Scripture. How many times have we heard people say that Jesus is not the only way to eternal life despite what the clarity of what He said in John 14:6?
Do you know there’s credible evidence regarding the discovery of Noah’s ark? In 1959, a Turkish army captain and pilot, Ihan Durupinar, noticed what appeared to be the outline of a large ship near Mount Ararat on the eastern edge of modern-day Turkey. His pictures of what appeared to be the shape of a large seagoing vessel, encased in mud, attracted worldwide attention, led to the investigation of the site by experts, and attracted thousands of visitors to the site.
The Lord’s command for us to “watch” is perhaps the most ignored of all His direct instructions to His followers. I can’t remember hearing a pastor of a local church preach on it although many of them repeatedly stress the necessity of the Great Commission because the Lord Himself commanded us to spread the Gospel to the world.
Since it’s rebirth as a nation in 1948, Israel has been a key to understanding Bible prophecy. The growing determination of many nations to recognize a Palestinian state along with dividing the land of Israel and Jerusalem via a two-state solution yet again confirms the central role of the Jewish state in what Scripture says about the last days.
The dearth of sound biblical teaching on Bible prophecy has created a void that false teachers have filled with a wide assortment of wayward beliefs regarding the church, Jesus’ appearing, the Second Coming, and Israel. As a result, most believers cannot discern the season in which we live and place their future expectations on temporal outcomes rather than eternal realities.
In Invitation to a Lavish Feast, I seek to provide the saints with a firm foundation for their hope in Jesus’ imminent appearing.
Although we see the manifestation of all these things today, it’s but a foretaste of what lies ahead for the world after the Lord removes His Church from the world and with it, the restraining force of the Holy Spirit. Given what I see today, I shudder to think how exponentially worse life will become.
