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Raised in the Heavenlies!

Easter is upon us once again! Lent is over, Good Friday has passed and now the time for mourning and fasting is complete. It's a time to feast, a time to remember and celebrate the resurrection of Christ as we look forward to our own final resurrection!But what really is the resurrection? How will we be resurrected, and what does it mean for us that Jesus rose again? Let’s explore what this means for us as Christians, and see what the Scriptures say. The resurrection is spiritual! That heading may cause some reading this to question me, but do read on – this is actually what the New Testament teaches us (though not only this type of resurrection). Many ti...

John Chau, missionary to the Sentinelese: martyr or madness?

...root out Christians necessarily, but they did refuse to partake due to their beliefs in worshipping God alone and not committing idolatry by performing an act of worship towards the reigning Caesar. As far as the Romans were concerned, the Christians were traitors and committed a treasonous act. It didn’t really matter why, only that they couldn’t be convinced otherwise and were killed for it to be an example to others. Were these early Christians martyrs or completely mad? How you answer that, I suspect, will inform you of how you view young John Chau’s death. I, for one, am willing to give him the honour of “martyr” as he truly did count the cost...

Creedal Christians: The Nicene Creed

...The Nicene Creed — what is it and why is it called that? This creed gets its name from a time and place: the first ecumenical Church council held at Nicaea, which is now known as İznik in northwestern Turkey, in 325 AD. Now that may raise another question for you: what is an ecumenical council? Well, to explain more about the Nicene Creed, we are going to have to take a look at The First Council of Nicaea in order to better understand why this creed was written. First things first though; an “ecumenical council” is ideally a Church-wide meeting where all the Bishops from all across the Church come together to hold a very large and very important meetin...

New Covenant Israel is no longer physical (nor literal)!

...the early Christians taught that Christ had fulfilled the Old Covenant in himself, and therefore superseded it with the New: Justin Martyr (about 100 to 165): "For the true spiritual Israel ... are we who have been led to God through this crucified Christ." Tertullian (ca.160 – ca.220 AD): “Who else, therefore, are understood but we, who, fully taught by the new law, observe these practices,—the old law being obliterated, the coming of whose abolition the action itself demonstrates. . . . Therefore, as we have shown above that the coming cessation of the old law and of the carnal circumcision was declared, so, too, the observance of the new...

The Coming of Jesus: Our Future Hope - What Now?

...the early Christians had a belief and view of the resurrection of Jesus as being the beginning of the new creation – the eighth day they called it. The epistle of Barnabas conveys it well: The sabbaths, that now are, are not acceptable unto me, but that which I have made is, even that in which, after that I have brought all things to an end, I shall make a beginning of the eighth day, which thing is the beginning of another world. Wherefore we keep the eighth day as a day of gladness, on which also Jesus rose from the dead, and after he had appeared ascended unto heaven. Barnabas 15:8,9   An unexpected twist After an exploration through Revelation,...

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

...brated by Christians as a divine miracle, with the virgin Mary giving birth to him in a humble stable in Bethlehem after being overshadowed by the Spirit of God (Luke 1:34-35), but still being born in the flesh like everyone else from a woman. Nothing like how Mithras supposedly came about. Central Acts and Teachings Mithras is best known for the tauroctony, where he slays a bull to release life-giving forces that ensure the Earth’s fertility. The name comes from the Greek word tauroktonos (ταυροκτόνος) meaning “bull killing”. This act represents Mithras’ divine intervention in the natural world as the blood from the bull was believed to rel...