Keith Giles on God’s Wrath
I was reading up on house churches when I stumbled across this post from Keith Giles (whom I am not familiar with, but who has written about “organic churches”). He argues that wrath is not one of the attributes of God. That’s clearly wrong. Wrath is definitely one of the attributes of God. If God […]
How Do You Know You’re Trusting Jesus to Save You?
By Shawn Lazar Question How do I know that I am trusting in Jesus to save me? I am worried if I was to die, I’d find out that I was believing something else. I guess I get a bit confused because I was raised believing that if someone is truly saved, he will have […]
Fifteen Characteristics of Life in the Millennium According to Isaiah
By Shawn Lazar The Millennial kingdom will begin after the Tribulation. What will life be like? A great deal could be said about it. For starters, here are fifteen characteristics of life in the Millennium, based on three passages from the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah 2:2-4 Now it shall come to pass in the latter days […]
A Free Grace Response to John Owen’s Conundrum
This past spring was one of the wettest on record. That might be why we had tons of flies around the house. As the kids ran in and out of the house, flies would get in, so we set an electric bug zapper on a kitchen counter to deal with the problem. One day, my […]
Watchman Nee on the Eternality of Eternal Life
Charles Ryrie famously said that if eternal life could be lost, it has the wrong name. He wasn’t the first to make that point. Watchman Nee, the well-known Chinese theologian (whom I consider to be an early proponent of Free Grace theology), said the same thing way back in 1937: The Bible shows us that […]
“No Pure Gospel”?
“There’s no pure gospel in the world.” Recently, I took a class at an Evangelical seminary when someone made that statement. He continued: “In fact, I’d be really afraid if someone thought that he had the pure gospel!” It was not clear what he meant by “pure gospel.” Did he mean “no one really knows […]
John 3:16—A Thick Reading
John 3:16 is well–loved for good reason—it’s the gospel in a nutshell. If someone believes it, he has everlasting life. Of course, you don’t have to understand and believe it all to be born again. It’s possible to believe that promise in a basic way without having a very deep understanding of what it means. […]
Given Eternal Conscious Torment, Is God’s Justice Ever Satisfied?
A moral objection to eternal conscious torment (ECT) is that if sinners are tormented in hell for all eternity (or, to be more precise, the lake of fire), then God’s justice is never satisfied. Think of it like a mortgage—at some point, you pay it off and satisfy the debt. Or, with a prison sentence, […]
Arthur Pierson on the Difference between Eternal Life and Eternal Rewards
Arthur T. Pierson (1837-1911) followed Charles Spurgeon as pastor of Metropolitan Tabernacle, was a consulting editor for the original Scofield Study Bible, wrote an excellent biography of George Muller, and co-edited The Fundamentals. Here is his description, published in 1894, of the difference between eternal life and eternal rewards: “With many disciples, the eyes are […]
Can Eternal Rewards Be Eternally Lost?
Question Are rewards eternally lost when they are lost? Or are you eligible to regain those rewards if you repent, return, and persevere correctly for that reward after having fallen away? Answer Thanks for the question. Here are some things to consider. First, once you lay up treasure in heaven (Matt 6:19-21), it seems to […]