God is often referred to as a "Father" (107 times in the Gospel of John alone). The Scriptures use the term in several ways: God is the Father of all men in the sense that he is the Creator of hum...

Sometime before the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians (586 B.C.), the prophet Habakkuk wonders why God appears to have ignored Judah's sins. The Lord informs the bewildered prophet that he is pl...

The book of Matthew is especially directed to Jews (hence, the heavy appeal to the O.T.). It is designed to demonstrate that Jesus of Nazareth was the fulfillment of the Messianic prophecies of the...

Joel, a prophet of the southern kingdom of Judah, labors to warn the Hebrew people of the coming "day of the Lord," a time of judgment upon a rebellious people. The punishment is described under a ...

"Extreme Unction" is one of the so-called "sacraments" of the Roman Catholic Church. It is the action of a priest in applying oil to someone who is at the point of death. The priest reads prayers a...

Philemon was a Christian who lived in the city of Colossae. Philemon owned a slave whose name was Onesimus. Onesimus fled to Rome where he came in contact with, and was converted by, Paul. The apos...

This word originally meant "hidden things," suggesting a special body of information reserved for a select group. Eventually, it came to signify a collection of fourteen or fifteen books, some of w...

The word "providence," is not used explicitly of divine activity in the Scriptures, though the concept is apparent in both Testaments. The word basically means "foresight." Theologically, it has be...

The word "perfect" is used in different ways in the Bible. (a) Only deity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) is perfect in the absolute, moral sense (Mt. 5:48), though Christians are to strive for this...

Before Jesus was born, the angel informed Mary: "the holy thing which is begotten shall be called the Son of God" (Lk. 1:35). The descriptive reveals something of the unique essence of Christ. The ...

Critics are fond of claiming that the Bible cannot be the word of God because, supposedly, it contains multiple contradictions. Such allegations reveal that these critics are oblivious to the natur...

"God" (theos) is the name of the divine nature. "God" simply signifies the essence of being deity. Important facts regarding the Deity are these: (a) There is one God (Dt. 6:4; Jas. 2:19), i.e., a ...

Dispensationalism is a system that divides history into seven dispensations, each corresponding to one day of creation week. C.I. Scofield popularized the theory in his Reference Bible (1909). Thes...

The term "millennium" signifies a period of 1,000 years. It is a common belief among many who are identified with "Christendom" that Jesus Christ will return to this earth to set up his kingdom in ...

This is Paul's last letter before his execution. It was written during his final Roman imprisonment. The epistle summons Timothy to Paul's side. It is intended to help Timothy understand the events...

Citizenship is the legal relationship that one sustains to a city, state, or country. Paul was a citizen of Tarsus in Cilicia (Acts 21:39), and he enjoyed the privileges of "citizenship" in the Rom...

Peter addressed this letter to "the elect," i.e., Christians, who are dispersed in Asia Minor. The main theme of the epistle is explicitly stated. He urges the brethren to "stand fast" in the "grac...

The term "sovereign" denotes the right that God has to rule the Universe. Note that the word "reign" is contained within "sovereign." Jehovah has this "right" because he is the Creator, and theref...

This is one of the titles of a church official who oversees a local congregation of Christ's church in the company of fellow bishops (always a plurality of men). "Bishop" translates the Greek ter...

The Greeks had several words that reflected various concepts of "love." Forms of three of these are found in the N.T. (a) The noun storge had a variety of uses in the ancient world, but it most com...