God tells us that He will bless us when we obey Him and curse us when we disobey Him (compare Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28). He explains to us that He curses those who sin against Him. Are we therefore to curse those who sin against us—who have become our enemies?

In Matthew 5:43-44, we read: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you…”

Christ loved us and died for us when we were sinners and His enemies, hoping that we would become His friends. Once that relationship of friendship with Him and His Church (His Body) has been established, He tells us to love one another with the same godly love with which He loved and loves us. This love (to love others AS He has loved us) He does not require of us in regard to our enemies in the world. But He does tell us that we are to love them which is really only possible if we have God’s love (agape) in us. How are we to love them?

Continue reading "Are we to curse or to bless others, including our enemies? What exactly does the Bible teach?"

Does the Bible talk about guardian angels? Does every child and even every adult have a guardian angel? If guardian angels exist, when does God assign those to particular individuals? Does the blessing of little children have anything to do with God’s assignments of guardian angels to them? What about those who were never blessed as little children, but come to the faith later in life—do they not have guardian angels?

We say the following about guardian angels in our free booklet, “Angels, Demons and the Spirit World”: 

“Many have speculated over the years whether or not the Bible teaches the existence of ‘guardian angels,’ that is to say, a specific angel that God has assigned to a particular person. The Bible leaves no room for doubt that guardian angels do exist. [In] Genesis 48:15–16…, Jacob acknowledged the presence of his guardian angel throughout his life. We read in the Revised English Bible, ‘The God in whose presence my forefathers lived, my forefathers Abraham and Isaac, the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day, the angel who rescued me from all misfortune, may he bless these boys.’ Jacob was convinced that God had been with him all of his life, and He was specifically present through a particular angel whom He had assigned to watch over Jacob.

Continue reading "What do we know about guardian angels?"

To think about death is not something we like to do. Even though we know that we will die eventually, we love to concentrate on other and seemingly more important and pressing matters. It is indeed not pleasant to think about the inevitability of our death. Still, the Bible is filled with admonitions in this regard, and it gives us advice as to how to deal with this subject matter in a balanced and right way.

Death is unavoidable. Psalm 89:47-48 tells us: “Remember how short my time is… What man can live and not see death? Can he deliver his life from the power of the grave? Selah.” Ecclesiastes 3:1-2 states as a matter of fact: “To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven: A time to be born, And a time to die…”

Continue reading "How to prepare for death?"

In previous Q&As, we have pointed out THAT God has given His end-time Church—the Body of Christ, consisting of all Christians in whom God’s Spirit dwells—the commission to preach the gospel of the Kingdom of God as a witness unto all nations, which includes the proclamation of a warning message of impending disaster and the possibility of worldwide destruction in a prophesied nuclear war.

Before answering HOW the Church can fulfill that commission, let us quote some excerpts to show THAT it will be accomplished.

We say the following in our Q&A, “What is the Work of God? (Part 3)”:

“But after the death of Paul and the other early apostles, the preaching of the gospel to the world would gradually stop, and so, as we have said many times, for over 1900 years, the gospel was NOT preached to the world, until God began to motivate His church and giving it the strength and opportunities to begin so again. This way, that worldwide proclamation would become the sign of the end—of the return of Jesus Christ. This proclamation would continue during the Great Tribulation as well—including through the preaching of the Two Witnesses. As God’s prophets (Revelation 11:3, 6, 10), they will of course warn the nations and proclaim what will happen—including, what has been written down in the Bible…”

Continue reading "How can the Church of God fulfill its commission to preach the gospel in all the world as a witness and to warn the nations, including their leaders?"

Inasmuch as none of the political and religious leaders of our nations will repent of their sins and stand in the gap to tell the people to repent of their sins and turn to the true God, calamity will follow. What a contrast to the king of Nineveh who, responding to Jonah’s warning, repented of his evil deeds and told the people to do likewise.

Notice God’s pronouncement in Isaiah 63:4-5:

“For the day of vengeance is in My heart, And the year of My redeemed has come. I looked, but there was no one to help, And I wondered That there was no one to uphold; Therefore My own arm brought salvation for Me; And My own fury, it sustained Me.”

God’s Church must be different. A warning must be given, and God expects and requires of His Church to do so. And so, God demands of His Church to plead the cause of the needy and to show the leaders of our nations and the people following our leaders their sins with the hope that they will repent and turn. Isaiah 58:1 says:

Continue reading "Who is to warn the leaders of the world? (Part 2)"

Paul says that the rulers of this world did not understand the Truth about Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 2:6-8). That is still true today, as this world is still cut off from God and godly understanding. Satan, the god and ruler of this world, has deceived the whole world, so that good is believed to be evil and light is vilified as darkness (Isaiah 5:20). 

Christ says that the Gentile rulers of this world exercise lordship over the people, even being (falsely) called “benefactors,” but that this is wrong and should not be done (Luke 22:25-26). But as we will see, that does not only apply to Gentile kings and nations. Christ even calls our political and religious leaders “blind guides” (Matthew 23:16).

God calls the leaders of the USA, the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand,and other English-speaking nations leaders of Sodom. Note Isaiah 1:10:  “Hear the word of the LORD, You rulers of Sodom; Give ear to the law of our God, You people of Gomorrah…” God is charging the leaders and the people with the same types of sins Sodom and Gomorrah were famous for, leading to their utter destruction. They are supposed to hear and to heed, but they don’t. 

Continue reading "Who is to warn the leaders of the world? (Part 1)"

In part one of this two-part series, we looked at the assertion by some, maybe many in mainstream Christianity, who believe that Jesus’ resurrected body was physical and that this same, physical Jesus ascended to Heaven, from where He will one day return to Earth.

Let us continue to look at evidence that proves otherwise.

We read Christ’s words and action in Luke 24:39:

“‘Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.’”

As we said in the previous instalment, the Roman Catholic Church “explains”: “Christ makes it plain to His disciples that He does have a physical body; He is not a disembodied spirit.” 

Again, as pointed out before, this “explanation” overlooks that Spirit beings do have form and shape—they are not “disembodied” spirits, but their bodies are composed of Spirit.

Continue reading "Is Jesus Christ a Spirit Being Today? (Part 2)"

At first glance, it might seem a ridiculous question to ask but there are those who think that when Jesus went back to Heaven, He did so as a physical being.

In our Q&A entitled “How Important is the Correct Understanding About the Immortal Soul? (Part 2),” we quoted a Christian author who wrote:

“A fundamental article of the Christian faith is that the resurrected Christ now dwells in Heaven. We are told that His resurrected body on Earth was physical and that this same, physical Jesus ascended to Heaven, from where He will one day return to Earth. It seems indisputable, then, to say that there is at least one physical body in the present Heaven.”

On the website catholic.com, we read: “In Luke 24:39, the risen Jesus says to the disciples, ‘See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me, and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have’ (emphasis added). This verse is sufficient to debunk the idea that Jesus did not rise bodily, but John 2:19-22 provides another nail in the coffin. Here Jesus claims, ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ Two verses later, it is made clear what Jesus has in mind; ‘he spoke of the temple of his body.’ Thus, Jesus prophesied that his body would rise.”

Continue reading "Is Jesus Christ a Spirit Being Today? (Part 1)"

In previous Q&As, we’ve already looked at false assertions by some Christian writers that “human beings have an immortal soul, that the present Heaven is a temporary lodging place even though the present Heaven is not our final destination place and that that between our earthly lives and our bodily resurrection God may grant us some temporary physical form that will allow us to function as human beings while in that unnatural state ‘between bodies’ awaiting our bodily resurrection.”  We have also reviewed the spirit in man which is not the same as the soul as the Bible shows, in simple terms, that man is a soul, not has a soul.   We showed that each human being has a non-physical component in his brain, called “the spirit in man.”

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“Pornography” may be difficult to define, and many may not agree on a common definition. When Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart was asked to describe his test for obscenity in 1964, he responded: “I know it when I see it.” In applying this quasi-definition to a motion picture at issue, he concluded that it was not pornographic. This was in 1964. Surely, today’s standards and definitions are even much more liberal.

We will not try to define pornography in this article. Rather, we set forth guidelines which the reader may use to come to conclusions applicable to oneself, based on his or her understanding and conscience.  We use the word pornography (another word might be obscenity) with this introductory precaution in mind.

Continue reading "What are the dangers of pornography?"