How many fighting men did Joab count in Israel and Judah?
Question: How many fighting men did Joab count in Israel and Judah? II Samuel 24:9 says 800,000 and 500,000; but I Chronicles 21:5 says 1,100,000 and 470,000. Answer: When dealing with numbers, you must ask yourself two questions: Are the same group of people being counted and could one account or the other be rounding…
Read MoreInconvenient Truths
by Steve Klein The United Nations Conference on climate change concluded in December 2009, in Copenhagen, Denmark. Leaders from 193 nations have been attempting to reach an agreement on international policies to combat global warming. Outside the conference center, thousands of protesters braved the frigid temperatures, risking frostbite and hypothermia, to protest global warming. The…
Read MoreThe Trinity: God is Three in One
by Mark E. Larson Many critics of Christianity point to what they believe to be a fundamental flaw – the belief that God is three persons, yet one God (i.e., the doctrine of the Trinity). To the Jews and Muslims, this Christian doctrine appears to be a contradiction and a blasphemy against the one, true…
Read MoreMy wife has been committing adultery with her step-brother. What do I do?
Question: Should I stay married and does my wife need to tell the truth? I have been married for over 15 years. I caught my wife cheating on me 10 years ago with her step-brother. She said all they did was kiss, but I knew it was not true. We reconciled to keep our family…
Read MoreHow can I help my rebellious 15-year-old brother?
Question: Hi, I’m a 20-year-old girl with a 15-year-old younger brother who is going down the wrong path. He drinks, smokes, curses, hangs out with his friends most of the time and doesn’t take his schoolwork seriously. He’s repeating 9th grade because he failed two classes last year, but he’s still slacking off and getting…
Read MoreAn Idea for a Sermon Topic
by Jefferson David Tant Sometimes preachers are hard-pressed to come up with a good sermon topic. In reading some of my father’s old church bulletins from Norman, Oklahoma, (April 1946), he wrote of a famous preacher in London many years ago who announced his sermon for the next Sunday – “A Reaping Hook Well Tempered…
Read MoreWhat does the Bible say about infertility?
Question: I am a Christian and want to know what verse should I read to encourage me about infertility. Answer: The inability to have children has long been a problem for couples. The first mention of barrenness was with Sarah, Abraham’s wife (Genesis 11:30). In their case, it was a situation God left unchanged until…
Read MoreHow do I fix my brother?
Question: I know this sounds like a stupid question, but how do I fix my brother? He keeps getting worse. I thought he was starting to act a little bit better, but I guess I was wrong. I know I messed up in acting the way I did when I was little and ended up…
Read MoreI’m pregnant. The stress is getting to me. I don’t know what to do
Question: I know I’m making a habit out of writing to you when life gets to me, but I know your advice helps so I do. I seem to get myself in situations that are always hurtful to me. I know I told you when I last wrote that I wouldn’t know if I was pregnant until the…
Read MoreHow to Thank God for His Gifts
by Sam Stinson “All the women whose hearts stirred them to use their skill spun the goats’ hair” (Exodus 35:26, ESV). Ethan Bortnick is a piano prodigy. At age seven, he has memorized two hundred melodies and has composed a handful of his own. After hearing him play a piece on TV, I researched his…
Read MoreHow to Teach Your Father or Mother the Truth
Adapted from an article by Edward Good via Gospel Power, Vol. 16, No. 29, July 19, 2009. What a difficult thing it can be to teach your father and mother the truth of the gospel! There are so many Christians whose heart’s desire and prayer to God is for their father and mother. They either…
Read MoreIs marijuana use approved of in the Bible?
Question: On our newsgroup, someone posted up your article on ‘pharmakeia’ and I read it. Then, I went to your site and got your email address for the purpose of writing to you. There was a critic of your work that claimed to leave out the use of drugs by the pharmaceutical industry is deceptive. You…
Read MoreHow Many Roads Lead to Heaven?
by Erin Percell via The Beacon, March 10, 2009 On a map, you can see many roads leading to any major city. You can pick whatever route suits you. Many people think the same thing about variety among churches — “We’re all on different roads to the same place,” they say. Can such a thing…
Read MoreHow Long Did the Judges Rule Israel?
by Jeffrey W. Hamilton A passage that has given scholars difficulty over the years is Acts 13:17-20. The New American Standard renders it thus: “The God of this people Israel chose our fathers and made the people great during their stay in the land of Egypt, and with an uplifted arm He led them out from…
Read MoreIsn’t the only reason God allowed Noah to eat meat was because it was convenient?
Question: I came across your article when doing research in the bible and trying to find an answer in why is the world so evil. Interestingly man is of course evil as it is evil to animals. No other animal on the planet will use another in the same way. So why can man? I saw…
Read MoreAre people who rejected the ministry of the Holy Spirit not Christians in actual fact?
Question: The article on the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit as a sin that cannot be forgiven did not really explain why those people accused Jesus of casting the demons by the power of Beelzebub. In reality, there are people who professed to be Christians but reject the ministry of the Holy Spirit (speaking in tongues,…
Read MoreIf God wanted us to eat meat, why did He give animals defenses?
Question: If God wanted us really to eat meat, then why did He make animals with senses? Why give animals some kind of self-defense? If really Noah’s word is true, why don’t you eat the flesh of a tiger every day? Why don’t you yourself go and kill a python or a shark and eat…
Read MoreMy boyfriend broke up with me and I don’t know what to do
Question: Writing because I seem to be fighting feelings right now, and I don’t know where to turn. My boyfriend of almost a year broke up with me last week. This time I didn’t even see it coming because we got along so well. His reason was he can’t stand not being with me every…
Read MoreCould you explain Matthew 21:44?
Question: In Matthew 21:44, I know that Jesus is talking to the chief priests and the Pharisees, but I am having trouble understanding this verse. “And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken, but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.” Is Jesus saying that whoever goes against him, since…
Read MoreHow can I know the God of the Bible isn’t a myth?
Question: How do I know that believing in God is the right thing to do? How do I know that the Bible isn’t something that is made for mankind to get by through life without worrying as much as non-believers do? I don’t know what to think about God and life and death. Just the…
Read MoreIsn’t sin the tendency of human beings to do evil?
Question: I am particularly disturbed by the concept of Original Sin. The article mentioned that there is no original sin and every baby is born sinless. This is an Islamic concept. All along, I had been taught that sin entered into the world through Adam. The sin here is normally referred to as the tendency…
Read MoreMy thirteen-year-old daughter isn’t listening to me like she used to do. What should be my next step?
Question: Hello. I am a single mother (I divorced 3 years ago, unfortunately). I have a daughter who is 13. I had a question regarding parenting: In the past, my ex-husband and I had a more lenient parenting style. We taught our daughter all the values of the Bible and we had rules and everything,…
Read MoreDo you think there is anything to this New World Order idea?
Question: What’s all this talk about a one-world government called the New World Order that has supposedly been taking place and that has been in the works for years? I don’t know if you’ve heard of this. I was watching a video on the Internet the other day that talked about a North American union…
Read MoreWhat should a husband do when his wife refuses to have sex with him?
Question: What does a Christian husband do if his wife refuses to have sex with him for 8 months to a year or more at a time for the last 18 years — even though the husband has done his best to plead and remedy the situation on his part but to no avail? Escort…
Read MoreI’m in love with a man who lives in another country and I don’t know what to do
Question: Hello, my problem is not as serious as other askers’ problems. I don’t live in this country, I’m not even religious, but it’s been eating me alive little by little and I don’t know where to turn to. I can’t write them on blogs since friends would know. I can’t write it down otherwise…
Read MoreHow did Israel get across land they were forbidden to travel if they came from the Sinai Peninsula?
Question: I have read in several places in the Bible where the southern border of the Promised Land is from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea (Exodus 23:31) If you look at a map you will see the Promised Land seals the Northern Sinai Peninsula from end to end. So, during the Exodus, how…
Read MoreEarly Christians and Abortion
by William J. Stewart Several years ago, with an election approaching, a candidate canvassing in our area stopped by my home seeking my support in his pursuit of public office. I politely, but firmly informed him that he would not receive my vote, as we had fundamental disagreements on important moral issues. We briefly discussed…
Read MoreHow could dinosaurs have evolved into hundreds of species and then go extinct in the few thousand years since the flood?
Question: So you believe that two “dinosaurs” were on Noah’s ark for over a year, left the ark (where there must have been little to no vegetation), multiplied, evolved into hundreds of different kinds of “dinosaurs,” lived for thousands of years, side by side with man, went extinct and became fossilized all in a few…
Read MoreIs “be fruitful and multiply” a part of the Old Covenant and thus no longer applicable?
Question: I have a question about God saying be fruitful and multiply: Is it a command or a genetic code or a part of us that is put into us that is not a choice? Or is it both? The reason I ask is that all the old covenants are gone. Paul says it’s ok…
Read MoreDoesn’t a publicly known sin need to be confessed?
Question: Hello! I have a question about an article that I have recently found. I am a Christian and grew up in the church always believing you “need to let the congregation know you have repented of your public sins” by going forward. In the article “Does sin require a public confession before a congregation?”…
Read MoreI’ve read that Joshua’s conquest of Jericho and Ai could not have happened.
Question: I’ve been reading about archaeology and the city of Ai and that Joshua’s conquest could not have happened there as the Bible claims. I really could use some help with that. Answer: You need to remember that archeologists’ “datings” are based on modern-day chronologies, which have a likelihood of errors. Interestingly, there is no dispute that…
Read MoreMy daughter said she would marry when she moved back in with us, but she and her boyfriend are still unmarried. What do we do?
Question: My daughter and her fiancé moved in with us over two months ago because he lost his job. Part of their plan was to move a great distance to where his dad lives. I told my daughter that they had to get married immediately upon their arrival and she agreed. I told her that…
Read MoreThe Gospel Songs of Philip Paul Bliss
by Wayne S. Walker Philip Paul Bliss was born in a log cabin near Rome in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, on July 9, 1838. Always interested in music, he was carrying items from his family’s home into town to sell and heard a lady playing the piano in a house along the way. Walking into the…
Read MoreThe Gospel Songs of Charles H. Gabriel
by Wayne S. Walker One of the most prolific composers of gospel songs in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was Charles Hutchinson Gabriel, who was born on Aug. 18, 1856, in a prairie shanty at Wilton, Iowa, and spent the first seventeen years of his life on an Iowa farm. Expressing a keen…
Read MoreWhat would you use for handouts in a community?
Question: Thank you so much for your willingness to answer questions!! We have a congregation (about 40 – 50) and we are wanting to conduct a campaign of the local area. We counted about 830 houses within a three-mile radius of the building (it’s a rural area). In our packet that we want to hand…
Read MoreWill faith and hope still exist in heaven?
Question: I have a question from I Corinthians 13 about faith, hope, and love with the greatest of these being love. I have led public prayers in which I prayed something like this “to bless us with faith, hope, and love. For one day we will close our eyes in this world and sleep, but…
Read MoreCould you explain why Leviticus 27:29 says a person set apart had to be put to death?
Question: I am doing a Bible study about Jephthah, and I really liked your article. I did have one question about the verses in Leviticus which spoke about redeeming or ransoming something devoted to destruction. In Leviticus 27:29, it says, “No one who may have been set apart among men shall be ransomed; he shall surely…
Read MoreGo Often Askew?
by Jim Ward via The Lost River Bulletin, Vol. 59, No. 1, Jan. 2009. Robert Burns, the Bard of Scotland, was also known as the “Ploughman Bard,” because he earned his sparse living as a farmer. One day while plowing, Mr. Burns destroyed a nest of a mouse. He marked the event in a poem…
Read MoreThank you for enlightening me about why sex before marriage is wrong
Question: Your sermon on sex before marriage really enlightened me regarding today’s relationship failures. I have been divorced for several years and been with the same guy off and on who will not commit to me. I have been through a lot in these past years and had a ground-breaking moment just over a month ago. I…
Read MoreGod’s Line of Measurement
by Shane Williams via The Lilbourn Light, Vol. 10, No. 6, Oct. 2009. It is true that you cannot define a word by using the same word to describe it. It just doesn’t work. You can’t explain a term by comparing it with itself. It would do little good to describe “repentance” as what happens when…
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