Knowing Christianity

     We are clearly instructed in Scripture not to set end times dates since we cannot know the day and hour of specific events. The Lord tells us, Now concerning that day and hour no one knows—neither the angels of heaven nor the Son —except the Father alone (Matthew 24:36). It is not for you to know times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority (Acts 1:7).      So, while we should not be setting dates, the Lord Jesus did point out that we can glean or discern that His coming is not far off, Learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its branch becomes tender and sprouts leaves, you know that summer is near. In the same way, when you see all these things, recognize that he is near—at the door (Matthew 24:32-33).      When I speak of the “signs of the times,” I am speaking of signs that will be evident to those living during the tribulation regarding Christ’s second coming and not to ...

Missing the Fundamental Obstacle in the Palestinian/Muslim and Israeli Conflict      It appears that world leaders are willfully choosing to listen to and accept the lie Muslim leaders are saying the regarding the cause of the conflict. Both politicians and the media fail to understand the fundamental obstacle that prevents peace between the Palestinians and Muslims, and the Jews. Many seem to think that if the Jews would simply give up more land to the Palestinians and allow for a Palestinian state to be formed, there would be peace in the Middle East. The truth is it is not as simple as that. As many Muslims have made clear over the years, they are not only interested in getting all the land back; they also desire to see the extermination of every single Jew on the face of the earth. Many Muslim politicians in the present time have stated that their goal is to see the Jews pushed off the land into the Mediterranean Sea and drowned.      Sa...

  The Conflict Begins      Genesis 21:9 tells us, But Sarah saw the son mocking—the one Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham , showing that the conflict between Ishmael and Isaac began soon after Isaac was weaned. The teenager Ishmael was mocking the infant Isaac.      In Galatians 4:23, Paul tells us that Ishmael had been born “as a result of the flesh . ” while Isaac “was born through promise . ” We need to pay close attention to what the Bible teaches us because if we do not, we will fail to understand the reason for the conflict that has spanned thousands of years. Even though Ishmael had been born first, he was not the child of promise and therefore Ishmael, though the firstborn, was replaced by his younger half-brother Isaac as the heir. Things in the home and the relations between the two children escalated to the point that Sarah demanded that both Hagar and Ishmael be expelled permanently from Abraham's family. So she sai...

       Many people, including Arabs, would have us believe that before the establishment of the nation of Israel in 1948, there were no tensions or anything to harm the good relations between the Arabs and the Jews. Even many historians point to the 1948 establishment of Israel as that which led to the current escalation in the Middle East. The implication is that the only reason there is a crisis in the Middle East today is because of the establishment of the nation of Israel in Palestine; that is the origin of the conflict between these two peoples, who supposedly got along previously. Having been repeated so many times, it has become the accepted conventional wisdom. You have an entire generation of young people around the world, both Muslim and non-Muslim who have believed that “conventional wisdom.”      The study of prophecy will reveal that the enmity between Arabs and Jews goes back thousands of years and that the conflict would be ongoi...