Kingdom

James tells Christians (i.e., the twelve tribes of Israel) to honor the poor (Jas 1:1; 2:1–13). To reinforce his message, he says, “Listen, my beloved brethren: Has God not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those…

This is the third and final post that I am republishing to prepare for a discussion of Paul’s “rapture passage” (1 Thess 4:13–5:11), especially his words, “And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the…

Announcement The Southern Christian Writers Conference has chosen my book, Inmillennialism: Redefining the Last Days, as a finalist for their 2021 Notable Book Award. They will host their Book Expo and live stream the award ceremony on Facebook (here). The Expo starts at 10 am (CST) and the awards at 3…

The major challenge to my prophetic view (inmillennialism) in Paul’s “rapture passage” (1 Thess 4:13–5:11) is in the following statements: The Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.…

Matthew’s gospel emphasizes the kingdom of heaven. “The central emphasis of the book is found in what is designated (uniquely in the Gospels) as … ‘the gospel of the kingdom’ (Matt 4:23; 9:35; 24:14; cf. 26:13).” To understand the gospel, we must understand the kingdom. In Matthew 19, Jesus uses four…

Our last post (here) discussed Jesus’s parables of the “treasure” and the “pearl of great price” (Matt 13:44–46). Our view of them agrees with the majority view on a key point. In these stories, “Jesus is comparing the kingdom of God to the treasure and to the pearl.” We disagree,…

We Christians would do well to remember an important aspect of the gospel. In the New Testament, the kingdom of heaven was at the core of the “good news.” As we have seen, John the Baptist preached this message. He proclaimed, “Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at…

Some prophetic models teach the “thousand years” of Revelation 20 is in our future. They say this “millennium” is the kingdom age. Christ will reign for a literal thousand years. Inmillennialism maintains the “thousand years” of Revelation 20 is figurative. This symbolic number represents the entire Messianic Age. Christ established…

A reader asked a provocative question after reading our last post. There we discussed the timing of the millennium. We compared the two resurrections in 1 Cor. 15 to the two resurrections in Revelation (Rev. 20:5–6). We showed the general nature of the second resurrection by using John 5:29. That…

Let’s set some prophetic dates! This post will consider the timing of the “thousand years,” or millennium, of Rev. 20:2–7. It will discuss the millennium’s place in the sequence of major prophetic events. Also, it will set a calendar date for its occurrence. This will answer the question in our…