What can we learn about worship through the book of Revelation?
Question:
What can we learn about worship through the book of Revelation?
Answer:
Before I begin I must humbly submit that I find this book to be most difficult to grasp. I will quote John Calvin who himself did not choose to write a commentary on this book for fear of err. In his commentary on Galatians, Calvin said the following about the interpretation of Scripture: “Let us know then, that the true meaning of Scripture is the natural and obvious meaning, and let us embrace and abide by it resolutely.” He even goes so far as to say “Let us not only neglect as doubtful, but boldly set aside as deadly corruptions, those pretended expositions, which lead us away from the natural meaning.”
I present this merely in humble agreement as to my abilities to understand Revelation in its entirety. That being said we can begin by simply looking at the examples of worship we see through John’s (son of Zebedee (Matthew 10:2)) apocalyptic accounts. Interestingly, if we err and think we may more clearly understand these visions if we witnessed them first hand (as John had) this may not be the case as John’s purpose was indeed to write down what he experienced in order to share it with others (Revelation 1:11) so we should be able to take this account and glean what God had intended for us.
What we see through Revelation (perhaps not coincidentally a vision that occurs on the Lord’s Day) is this constant veneration by all for the …
What is your understanding concerning the Triune God?
Question:
What is your understanding concerning the Triune God?
Answer:
The concept of the Trinity is one that can’t be answered in a few short paragraphs but I will provide a brief initial response and at a later date post more on my web site on this important and oft misunderstood and underappreciated doctrine. Firstly, we must define the term Trinity as it comes from the Latin “Trinitas” which means three in one. The word Trinity was first found in a reference text in the writings of Theopolius of Antioch in AD 180. We see expansion of usage of this term by Tertullian in AD 200 when he accurately refers to “tres personae, una substantia” (three persons, one nature/substance). The value in understanding the textual usage in history is because some have incorrectly claimed the Trinity is a recent invention of Christians.
Additionally, as we look to the Trinity it is important to understand the Trinity as one and not three. Often the term Trinity is mistaken for tritheism where one mistakes it for stating there are three Gods (as the Muslims mistakenly understand Christianity). Another common mistake is that of understanding God playing 3 roles which is referred to as Modalism (or oneness theology) – God does not change roles (Malachi 3:6).
Muslims often vacillate between tritheism and modalism or even Arianism. Arianism is an ancient theological error that appeared around the year 320. It taught that God could not appear on the earth because he was too pure, that Jesus was not eternal and was created out …
Give five reasons to support your view of the divine inspiration of Scripture.
Question:
Give five reasons to support your view of the divine inspiration of Scripture.
Answer:
I am uncompromising in my stance of the Bible, as originally inspired, being the inerrant Word of God. I can base this statement on many facts (for a much more detailed study on this topic please see my post entitled “Validity of the Bible”) but in summary we can rest assured it is divinely inspired because of the following:
1. Jesus Himself spoke of the Scriptures’: Authority – Matthew 22:43, Reliability – Matthew 26:54, Finality – Matthew 4:4, 7, 10, Sufficiency – Luke 16:31, Indestructibility – Matthew 5:17-18, Unity – Luke 24:27, 44, Clarity – Luke 24:27, Historicity – Matthew 12:40, Facticity (scientifically) – Matthew 19:2-5, Inerrancy – Matthew 22:29; John 3:12, 17:17, Infallibility – John 10:35
2. Third-party verification – a plethora of external sources and facts outside the Bible corroborate what is found in the Bible.
3. Historical reliability – The Bible’s message is a sharp contrast to the pagan fertility religions and philosophies of the ancient world as revealed through history. It isn’t shy about mentioning dates and places that have never been proven false (or if they seemingly had later evidence has uncovered these claims to be false themselves thus proving the Bible true). Additionally, the multitude of manuscripts and breadth of textual criticism has brought us much closer over time to understanding the truly amazing accuracy of the Scriptures.
4. Fulfilled prophecy – Events demonstrate that the Biblical prophets accurately predicted events hundreds of years before they occurred.
5. Archaeological evidence – Physical evidence demonstrates the historical and cultural accuracy of the Bible.
6. Life …
Please give the basic tenets of Gnosticism and how 1 John answered this system of thought.
Question:
The Epistle of 1 John was written (among other things) to combat the heresy of Gnosticism. Please give the basic tenets of Gnosticism and how I John answered this system of thought.
Answer:
Firstly, the term Gnosticism is derived from the Greek word “gnosis” translated “knowledge”. It is this term that helps us begin our understanding of the positioning of the value found in its beliefs – that is in salvation gained through “special knowledge” (gnosis). So what is this “special knowledge” that supposedly helps us gain salvation?
We must begin with exploring the worldview of the Gnostics which removes the element of a personal God and makes Him unknowable. This is concluded from a simple and flawed logic based on the fact that God is by nature too perfect and pure for us. The origins of our being are also very different than the Christian worldview as Gnostics believe that God created lesser gods called emanations and in turn one of these tried to know the unknowable God via Wisdom. This mistake that seems to mark a loose parallel to Satan wanting to have God’s nature and humanity’s original sin of wanting to seek knowledge from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (God’s domain) seems eerily familiar. Out of this faulty goal came an evil god (demiurge) who created the universe and beings known as the archons who subdued us “mortals” to prevent our souls from returning to our intended state with God. Indeed, this is all extremely fascinating mythology …
Define the nature of sin and discuss its consequences both temporally and eternally.
Question:
Define the nature of sin and discuss its consequences both temporally and eternally.
Answer:
When evaluating sin we must understand it in the context of our humanity. John 8:44 says “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”
We can understand that by nature we are objects of God’s wrath (Ephesians 2:3) and this is so because our father is the devil until God adopts us into His family (Ephesians 1:5). We also understand that since the origin of sin is the devil and our identity is initially found in him we must strive to examine the characteristics of Satan. In the above passage (John 8:44), we can clearly see that the natural implications of our hereditary makeup in the devil is to carry out his desire and inherit his other traits (sin). With this understanding of the origins of sin we can then posit the contrary premise that if our God is our Father than we must “carry out [His] desire” and this would be the opposite of sin. Thus, sin is doing something that is contrary to God our Father’s will – in effect aligned to Satan’s desire/will.
Additionally, as we would inherit the traits of the devil (once our father) we would then inherit …
