When told that non-Christians are accepted by God as long as they are good people, many respond: “If a good person can make it to heaven just because he’s good, then Jesus died for nothing!” That reaction doesn’t defend the Cross—it misunderstands it. Jesus was...

There are over 600 scriptures about righteousness. Our job as students of the Bible is to harmonize all of them, including the one in Romans 3:10, which says, “There are none righteous, no, not one.” If we are pitting that scripture against other scriptures, then we...

What if God loves us not just in spite of ourselves, but because we’re worthy of love – and eternal life? This rethink of John 3:16 reframes how we relate to God—and how we share the Gospel with the world.

If you were part of a conversation on the Tri-City Gardeners Facebook Group and you saw that I wrote, "Yeah those crazy Virginia Creepers and Morning Glories. Turn your back on them for 5 minutes and they just take over," you would understand what I was talking about...

Understanding what Self-Righteousness actually is will go a long way in understanding what Paul is getting at in Romans and help to dispel the myths of Original Sin and Imputed Righteousness, as they are commonly understood. Self-righteousness has gotten a bad rap in...

In my hundreds of conversations about Salvation by Being Good there are two objections that are raised almost every time. One objection that I have already addressed in a previous blog post is that no man can by his own merits be...

Christians get into endless debates about free will, predestination, and once-saved-always-saved, get lost in the complexity of it all, and don’t even see the 800 pound gorilla sitting in the room. I feel a need to expose one of the most insidious heresies to ever...

If I led a group of believers and I told you we were practicing ancient Jewish rituals such as lamb sacrifices you might have one or more of the following reactions: "Why on earth would you be doing that?" Or, if you're a student of the Bible: "You know Jesus is the...

Primary Text for the Basis for Judgement: "This is the judgment [that is, the cause for indictment, the test by which people are judged, the basis for the sentence]: the Light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their...

Ed Christian, Professor of English at Kutztown University of Pennsylvania, shows how words about Hell and eternal punishment are misunderstood. This presentation was given at an Evangelical Theological Society annual conference in 2001. The topic for the conference...

I know the topic of salvation raises concern like no other because it hits at something foundational to our Christian faith and what we believe gives us a right to call ourselves Children of God. Recently someone I only slightly knew from my old neighborhood growing...

Utangulizi Salamu! Baada ya kupiga mbizi kwa kina zaidi ya miaka 35 iliyopita katika masomo ya upendo wa kibiblia, haki, na wokovu imekuwa wazi kwangu jinsi ufahamu huu ni muhimu kwa huduma ya Kanisa ambalo Yesu alianzisha. Waebrania 6:1-3 inatuambia ni mafundisho...

If being good can’t save a soul, why does the Bible command it so relentlessly? This post reexamines the disconnect between popular theology and the actual moral expectations of Scripture – as they relate to salvation.