Kingdom Ready

Here’s the 6th installment in this series:

Biblical Common Sense – Death – An ENEMY!

The Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:26 says: “The last enemy that will be abolished is death.” Now everyone knows what an enemy is. It is someone or something that harms or opposes us.  However the typical sentiment one hears at a mainstream Christian funeral is that death has taken the deceased to a “better place”.  Other variants often expressed can be “God has called so and so home”, or “The Lord needed another member of heaven”.  But does anyone stop and think about what this actually means?  Such ideas mean that death isn’t so bad.  For the saved, death would be taking us to the best possible place we could ever hope to be!

Here’s the 5th installment in this series:

Biblical Common Sense – Death – Usage of the Sleep Metaphor

I’ve been to several funerals the last few years where I have heard the preachers often say that the deceased is now “more alive than ever” up in heaven.  Yet this runs counter to the most consistent description used in The Bible in reference to the dead. A description that isn’t something that means energized and alert, but the exact opposite with the word “sleep”.  Of course this is a metaphor (something used, or regarded as being used, to represent something else) to describe the death.  This metaphor is repeatedly used throughout many of the Old Testament books.

Here’s the 4th installment in this series:

Biblical Common Sense – Death – You shall surely NOT die!

In all of God’s Holy Scripture, there’s not a single verse that tell us that human beings have an immortal soul. In fact the very word “immortal” is used only once in 1 Timothy 1:17 and there it refers once again only to God Himself.

However there is a verse in the Bible that does promote the idea that we don’t really die.  That verse would be none other than Genesis 3:4.

Genesis 3:4 “The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die!”“

Here’s the next installment (Part 3) on death.

Here’s the next section (Part 2) on death.

Biblical Common Sense – Death – Who Possesses Immortality?

One might ask, is anyone naturally in possession of immortality? Yes! Scripture in fact clearly indicates who already has immortality.

1 Timothy 1:17 “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”

1 Timothy 6:15-16  “which He will bring about at the proper time– He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords who alone possesses immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see. To Him be honor and eternal dominion! Amen.”

Finally, after way too long of a delay since posting the first third (about Jesus) of my lengthy paper entitled “A Common Sense Approach to the Biblical Presentation of Jesus, Death, & THE Devil”, here is the 2nd main topic – DEATH.

Like the first section on Jesus (started on KR here: Biblical Common Sense – Intro – What & Why), this has several sub-sections that are best published in smaller, easier to read sections here on KR.  So for my next several posts, I’ll add the sections that follow one another.  I’ll also try to provide all the links at the end of each post to the entire series just for reference.

Well, it’s been quite awhile since I’ve posted an article here.  Far too long in fact.  I apologize for my hiatus. No real good excuses, just the usual things in life that pull us in all directions – job, kids, family commitments, home projects, watching too much football (yes I really do enjoy watching college and professional football – maybe too much), etc..  And probably the worst and certainly dumbest thing is just getting out of the habit.  Of course it seems that may be the case with a lot of my fellow KR contributors.  But let’s see if I can start a trend of coming back to the well here.  Let’s see if I can start off easy and work back into pushing out some fresh content for those have kept coming here and visiting the site.

Installment #8 in my “Common Sense” series.

Biblical Common Sense – Jesus – Not Equal, Not the Same!

The following common sense arguments regarding how The Bible clearly demonstrates that God and Jesus are not the same being are ones that tend to come up quite often among those promoting Jesus as God. Many times I have been told in discussions with those wishing to support a Trinitarian or even a Oneness/Modalist viewpoint that these are simply tired old arguments.  Yes, the arguments are centuries old and people often tire of them. But that doesn’t mean that they still aren’t valid objections. And their validity remains all the more significant due to the fact each of these are easily answerable when one uses common sense as their guide.

Installment #7 in my “Common Sense” series.

Biblical Common Sense – Jesus – Two Adams

The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans and 1st Corinthians detailed comparisons of Jesus and Adam.  Paul even termed Jesus the “Last Adam”.  This is because he recognized critically important parallels between these two individuals.  Adam, the father of the human race brought death upon everyone because his disobedience took away the ability for humans to live eternally. The perfect obedience of the Last Adam, Jesus the Messiah, gave humanity a way to overcome death and live eternally as originally planned.

Installment #6 in my “Common Sense” series.

Biblical Common Sense – Jesus – Jesus was seen!

Throughout the “Original” Testament God goes out of his way to say over and over that He is the one and only God of the universe and that He alone is responsible for all of creation. But God also reveals something else there and then confirms it later in the New Testament. God says that he CAN NOT be seen by man. In Exodus 33:20 God flat out tells Moses that “no man can see me and live”. Then in the Gospel of John we have collaborating texts like “No man hath seen God at any time” (John 1:18) and “You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form” (John 5:37). And in 1st Timothy we have the added facts that God is “invisible” (1 Tim 1:17) and that He “dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see” (1 Tim 6:16).