In Matthew 12:31-32, Jesus defines “blasphemy of the Holy Spirit” as the attribution of Beelzebub to the work of the Holy Spirit when He healed a blind and mute demoniac to authenticate His offer of the kingdom to Israel. This passage is often misunderstood through soteriological rather than doxological lenses when teachers downplay or even reject the kingdom significance and instead hold to a soteriological reading of this vital passage. John Piper describes his soteriological view of the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit from a Calvinistic New Covenant Theology perspective:[Read More]
eschatology
The Biblical sustainability of the de jure interpretation of Col 1:13
Across the theological spectrum it is agreed that easy texts are to interpret the difficult texts. The challenge for the interpreter is to discern which passages are easy and which are difficult. Since the only other occurrence of “kingdom” in the book of Colossians occurs in the final greetings in chapter 4,1 the meaning of “kingdom” likely occurs in an easier text somewhere else. The Bible develops the idea of a literal kingdom, the “kingdom of God,” established on land from Genesis all the way through the New Testament, so one would anticipate that this is the same kingdom in Col 1:13. There is an alternative theory, however, that Paul here is speaking of a spiritual facet of the kingdom, rather than the Millennial Kingdom. This theory that there is a spiritual facet of the kingdom is not necessarily in conflict with postponement theology. Much of this dissertation has responded to external threats to dispensational theology, but since a Spiritual Facet of the kingdom can coincide with postponement theology, Col 1:13 will be treated with the spirit of unity as an in-house dispute. Some fine dispensational scholars, propose that this Spiritual Kingdom is God’s rule in the heart of the believer and that it is composed of all believers, and only believers, of all time.[Read More]
Rabbinic insight on Matt 5:17ff
Here is an excerpt from some research on the Sermon on the Mount. Positive feedback may be submitted through email and negative feedback may be submitted by shouting at your nearest wall.
Just kidding. We would love to hear your negative feedback as well 🙂[Read More]
Cuneiform and Midrashic stuff related to Micah 5:2
Today we are going to take a look at some extrabiblical resources that you can use to impress your Sunday School the next time Micah 5:2 comes up in a conversation (Micah 5:2 appears as Micah 5:1 in the Hebrew Bible).[Read More]
The Kingdom, a word study, and a story about King Darius running away from Ukrainians
This post is extracted from some research I’m doing related to the kingdom.
φθάνω (Matt 12:28; Luke 11:20)
A host of clear biblical passages teach that the kingdom is literal and earthly. Two obscure passages that have become key to overthrowing the plain meaning of the text are Matt 12:28 and Luke 11:20, both of which record Jesus telling unbelievers that the kingdom ἔφθασεν ἐφ᾿ ὑμᾶς, which the KJV translates, “is come unto you” in Matthew and “is come upon you” in Luke. To the assertion that Jesus made it plain that the kingdom had already come, Millar Burrows responds:[Read More]
Kingdom Postponement in the Talmud
A Disclaimer
I have recently been doing some research on the topic of how Christ offered to establish the kingdom during His earthly ministry, but postponed the kingdom to a later date upon His rejection. This research took me to an interesting place in the Talmud that I thought would be of interest to our readers, but before any discourse on the Talmud, I feel obligated to begin with a disclaimer.[Read More]