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Man-made religion often thrives where we have learned religious vocabulary but forgotten the heart of God. Religion tells us repentance means, “Try harder to stop sinning,” so we become preoccupied with our failures. Religion tells us confession means, “Continually rehearse everything wrong with you,” so we spend our lives reviewing what Christ has already forgiven. Religion tells us holiness means, “Stay away from sinners and protect yourself from the world,” so we withdraw

The doctrine commonly called “once saved, always saved”—more formally known as the perseverance of the saints—teaches that those who are genuinely regenerated by God will be preserved by divine grace and will not ultimately lose their salvation. This paper argues that the security of believers rests on the sovereign initiative of God in salvation, the completed work of Christ, and the sealing work of the Holy Spirit. Through exegetical analysis of key biblical passages, inclu

Why the Earliest Christians Wrestled With Violence — and Why We Still Do Every time violence erupts somewhere in the world, Christians inevitably begin asking the same question again. What does it mean to follow Jesus in a violent world? Recently I came across a collection of quotes from Christian thinkers spanning nearly two thousand years. What struck me was not simply their beauty, but their remarkable consistency. Justin Martyr wrote in the second century: “We who formerl

When people ask me about heaven, the questions are usually detailed: What will it look like?How long will we be there?Will we recognize one another?Is eternity simply a disembodied spiritual existence? But when I turn to Scripture — and read it carefully, contextually, historically — I’m struck by something surprising: The Bible speaks far less about “going to heaven” than most of us assume. And few scholars have pressed this point more clearly than N. T. Wright. In fact, muc