Dr Paul Allen

Zechariah's vision of the four horsemen (Zechariah 6:1-8), engraving by Gustave Doré. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “I saw by night, and behold a man riding upon a red horse, and he stood among the myrtle trees that were in the bottom; and behind him were there red horses, speckled, and white.” ( Zechariah 1:8 ) The Lord divulges ten visions to Zechariah in one night. All of them are among myrtle trees in the “bottom” of a dark, mysterious, and somewhat eerie ravine near Jerusalem . The first vision reveals a man on a red horse responding to questions from the “ angel of the LORD ” and “the LORD of hosts ” ( Zechariah 1:8-17 ). It is likely that the angel of the Lord is a pre-incarnate form of Christ speaking to the First Person of the Godhead. Two other horsemen are cited, which ties these heavenly envoys to the four horsemen of Revelation and to the horsemen driving the four chariots revealed in Zechariah 6 . When Zechariah asks, “ What are these? ” (8:9), he is told ...

Antichrist with the devil, from the Deeds of the Antichrist (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Apostasy will reach its peak in the end times: But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; avoid such men as these …. But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived .  (2 Tim. 3:1–5, 13; cf. 1 Tim. 4:1; 2 Peter 3:3–4; Jude 17–18) But the heightened apostasy of the end times, like the apostasy that has plagued the church throughout its history, is not the specific event Paul has in mind. Nor does Paul have in mind the apostasy during the Tribulation, of which Jesus w...

St. Peter Denying Christ, by Gustave Doré (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.” ( 2 Peter 3:13 ) The cosmos consists of “all things”—every system, every structure, every organism, every process, everything—in heaven and in Earth . Cosmology is the system and study of the whole cosmos. In his final epistle, the apostle Peter outlines four different cosmologies. One is false; the other three are each true but at different times in history. The false cosmology is that of evolutionary uniformitarianism, the doctrine taught by latter-day intellectuals who will scoff: “Where is the promise of his coming? . . . all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation” ( 2 Peter 3:4 ). But this is altogether wrong! The first cosmos—the heavens and the earth which were “of old . . . the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished” ( 2 Peter 3:5-6 ). The prime...

Christ and The Pharisees (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad." ( John 8:56 ) Jesus spoke to the Pharisees about "my day"--a day which Abraham had "seen" 2,000 years before. This evidently referred to the time when Christ would be on earth, which God had enabled Abraham to see in prophecy. But of all the days when He was on the earth, the most glorious was the great day when He rose from the dead. "He hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee" ( Acts 13:33 ). As a result of His death and resurrection, "behold, now is the day of salvation" ( 2 Corinthians 6:2 ). The day of salvation is any day in this age of grace when a person believes on Christ for salvation. He then receives "the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption" ( Ephesians 4:30 ). This gre...

Image via Wikipedia "The beasts of the field cry also unto thee: for the rivers of waters are dried up, and the fire hath devoured the pastures of the wilderness." ( Joel 1:20 )   After the Flood of Noah , God set a boundary for the waters, "that they turn not again to cover the earth" ( Psalm 104:9 ).  There is a time coming , however, when even such a mighty river as "the great river Euphrates " will run dry, and "the water thereof |will be| dried up" ( Revelation 16:12 ).  Instead of covering the earth, the life-giving waters will be withheld as one of God's coming judgments on the rebellious world of the last days. His prophetic witnesses will be given power to "shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy" ( 11:6 ).  Furthermore, the atmosphere will be so restrained that "the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree" ( 7:1 ), yet the sun will burn so intensely that ...