Dr Paul Allen

And He built His sanctuary like the heights,  Like the earth which He has established forever.“ ( Psalm 78:69 ) There are a number of passages in the Bible that state unequivocally that the earth, in some form, is going to continue eternally. “One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever” ( Ecclesiastes 1:4 ). However, this present earth and its atmospheric heavens must first be purged of all the age-long effects of sin and the curse, which now affect the very elements (or “dust of the earth”). Therefore, “the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up” ( 2 Peter  3:10 ). Evidently, this fiery cataclysm is not an annihilation of the earth and its atmosphere but rather a great exchange of energies . The earth’s very elements will probably be converted into sound and heat energies by mass-energy nuclear-conv...

The so-called hard sayings of Jesus entered Christian vernacular in 1983 with the publication of F.F. Bruce ’s book of the same name. But individuals have been grappling with the teachings of Jesus long before the don of twentieth century British evangelical biblical scholarship wrote his now-famous work. After Jesus’ bread of life discourse in John 6 , several professed followers of Christ abandoned His band of disciples because they were offended by what they dubbed His “hard sayings” (vv. 60–65). Not everyone was as put off by the words of Christ. The Apostle Peter responded to the very same “offensive” words with confidence, exclaiming, “You have the words of eternal life” (v. 68). How shall we respond to the hard sayings of Jesus? Even a cursory reading of John  6:22 –71 will reveal a host of interpretative challenges. Jesus’ sermon touches on doctrines as wide-ranging as the Trinity, election and reprobation, the purpose of His mission, the nature of faith, t...

Two Biblical Promises Concerning Healing     1.      Isaiah 35 It is widely argued that the description in Isa. 35 is of conditions that will prevail in the Messianic age to come. Premillennialists place the fulfillment of this text in the 1,000 year reign of Christ upon the earth following his second coming. Amillennialists believe it will be fulfilled in the New Heaven and New Earth of Rev. 21–22.  What is important to note, however, is that Jesus appealed to this passage as proof that He was the Messiah and that the Kingdom of God had come in his ministry.     In Matthew 11 we read about the doubt that entered the mind of John the Baptist following his arrest and imprisonment. He sent word to Jesus with one question: “Are you the expected one or should we look for someone else?” (v. 3). Jesus answered by appealing to both Isa. 35 and 61. The fact that now, through the ministry of Jesus, the blind receive sight and the lame walk ...

To call the incarnation "relevant" almost sounds patronizing. But we need to recognize the intimate connection between this important doctrine and personal piety. It Opens Up Scripture Until we grasp that Christ is God-in-flesh, the Old Testament will remain a collection of stories about how men and women struggled with the call to faith. The incarnation helps us to see that the Old Testament sets the stage for God to once again live with man as He did in Eden. On every Old Testament page, God promises a human deliverer who is also stronger than Satan (Gen.  3:15 ); both a suffering servant and an anointed king. The reality of God-with-us is explained and applied throughout the rest of Scripture starting with Matthew. The New Testament is not simply a collection of ethical instruction, or even a commentary on the life of a certain Nazarene. It is the real-life story of what happened when God came to men that they might belong to Him. The New Testament is the a...

The Son of Man and the seven lampstands (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Revelation’s picturesque images, mysterious symbols, and apocalyptic language make it one of the most challenging books in Scripture to interpret. There are four main interpretative approaches to the book. The preterist approach views Revelation not as future, predictive prophecy, but as a historical record of events in the first-century Roman Empire . The preterist view thus ignores the book’s own claims to be a prophecy (1:3; 22:7, 10, 18–19). Nor were all the events predicted and depicted in Revelation fulfilled in the first century.  The second coming of Christ described in chapter 19 obviously is yet to occur. But the preterist view requires that one see the words about Christ’s second coming as fulfilled in the destruction of the temple in A.D. 70, even though He did not appear on that occasion. Nor is there any persecution in the first century that fits the description of the horrific events depicted i...

Words (Photo credit: Southernpixel - Alby Headrick ) Think with me for a moment about when you started learning to read . After you had listened to your parents reading to you for several years, you started learning the letter sounds yourself. Then you started to learn to sound out two- and three-letter words. Then you learned to read those words in a short sentence. And then after a time of doing that, you learned to understand what you were reading. Reading really is amazing. What's most amazing about it is that God has  spoken to us  in such a way that we get to  read His words . Step by step, as God's little children, we need to learn how to read the Word, beginning the process from learning letter sounds to understanding what we are reading. In Deuteronomy 4, the Lord exhorts His dear children to hear, to know, and to do His Word. He exhorts them to "listen to [His] statutes and [His] rules" (v. 1) and not to "add to the word . . . that you may kee...