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jesus, Yahweh, And The Power Over The Storm

Critics of Christianity will often make the claim that jesus never said he was God or divine in the Gospels. The problem comes when they set unrealistic demands and expectations, like wanting a chapter and verse where jesus says, “I am God, worship me”. But this isn’t how the Bible works and definitely not how jesus went about his ministry. Throughout the Gospels, there are clear connections that reveal the true nature of jesus in ways that would have been obvious to the Jewish people and leaders of his day who were very familiar with the Torah and other Scriptures we now call the Old Testament. One of the most striking examples is His demonstration of po...

Is fasting an expectation for Christians?

The season of Lent is here once again which of course brings up the topic of fasting, since the tradition of Lent comes from following jesus’ example of his time in the wilderness (Luke 4:1–2). I wasn’t planning on writing anything specific this year like I have previous in previous years, but I felt inspired today at church from one of Gospel readings: Matthew 9:14–15 Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast?” And jesus said to them, “The wedding guests cannot mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them, can they? The days will come when the bridegroom is t...

The Deity of Christ in the Gospel of Matthew - Part 1

The titles “Jehovah” and “God” given to jesus in Matthew 1 This is a guest post by “KingsServant”, see Part 2 here. In this series of articles, I want to present the case that Matthew teaches jesus is God, from the arguments I made in 2 moderated debates with a Muslim apologist, Mohammed Abd al Razack, commonly known as Al Yemeni. Although I will be going into far more detail, not having to deal with the tight time controls of a debate format. The moderated debate on YouTube with me (KingsServant)   Matthew’s teaching of the Trinity and in particular that jesus is God is by no means limited to the baptismal formula given by Christ after h...

David, Saul, And How We Respond To Broken Leadership

When we think about David and Saul, we often focus on David’s rise to kingship or his battle with Goliath. But hidden within that story is a deep lesson for today’s generation about leadership, resistance, and the power of revolutionary love. At a recent youth training event (thanks to South West Youth Ministries), I was asked how I would present the story of David and Saul to a Christian teenage youth group. My mind turned to the politics of their relationship, and how David accepted Saul’s leadership, even when Saul had gone badly astray. David recognised that Saul was still God’s anointed king — placed there by God Himself — and that it w...

jesus, Mithras and Ancient Roman Cults: Separating Fact from Fiction

Welcome to the next instalment of my series looking at the ancient mythological gods and how they compare to the life, death and resurrection of jesus. Mithras is yet another popular ancient god that people like to compare with jesus and make wild claims about, proposing that they are the same deities with different names. But is this even remotely true? This article has ended up being a bit longer than anticipated as it’s one of the few ancient religions that was contemporary to the birth of Christianity which was seen as somewhat of a rival belief system, so there’s a lot of interesting things to cover! The Origins Mithras has his roots in ancient Persi...

The Coming of jesus: The Olivet Discourse – Part 2

Welcome to Part Two of the Olivet Discourse! It’s been a while, so we’ll pick up right where we left off with Matthew 24 verse 15 onwards, after a small recap of the chapter so far. The Olivet Discourse begins with the disciples admiring the architecture of the temple in Jerusalem. jesus responds to this by telling them that it will all be thrown down and destroyed, to the point that not one stone will be left on another. Later on, when they are sat on the Mount of Olives, jesus’ disciples come to him and ask “when will this happen?” and “what will be the sign” that all of this is about to commence? If we look at the accou...