Scripture is silent on the awareness of the Christian upon death. Second Corinthians 5:1-3 tells us about being clothed with our heavenly habitation, which will release us from the burdens of mortality. Verse 8 provides us with a particularly heavenly perspective: "To be absent from the body [is] to be present with the Lord."

Luke 16 speaks of the rich man asking someone to go to his family to...

It isn't your task as an evangelist to give immediate assurance to people you lead to Christ. The Holy Spirit will do that work: "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God" (Romans 8:16).

There are, however, many promises in Scripture you can share that the Holy Spirit will use to help your newly converted friends gain assurance of their eternal destiny (e.g. John 3:16; 1 John 5:1)...

A very real danger facing Christians is the temptation to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches. To base their hope on the uncertainty of riches, instead of God, is foolish. Proverbs 11:28 warns that “he who trusts in his riches will fall.” Proverbs 23:4–5 adds, “Do not weary yourself to gain wealth, cease from your consideration of it. When you set your eyes on it, it is gone. For wealth certainly makes itself wings, like an eagle that flies toward the heavens.”

Rather than trusting in riches, believers are to fix their hope on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy...

Those who are familiar with my ministry know that I am committed to expository preaching. It is my unshakable conviction that the proclamation of God’s Word should always be the heart and the focus of the church’s ministry (2 Tim. 4:2). And proper biblical preaching should be systematic, expositional, theological, and God-centered.

Such preaching is in short supply these days. There are plenty of gifted communicators in the modern evangelical movement, but today’s sermons tend to be short, shallow, topical homilies that massage people’s egos and...

Biblically, the focal point of all church leadership is the elder. An elder is one of a plurality of biblically qualified men who jointly shepherd and oversee a local body of believers. The word translated “elder” is used nearly twenty times in Acts and the epistles in reference to this unique group of leaders who have responsibility for overseeing the people of God.

The Office of Elder As numerous passages in the New Testament indicate, the words “elder” (presbuteros), “overseer” (episkopos), and “pastor” (poimen) all refer to the same office. In other words...

What will heaven be like?

Heaven is a place more wonderful than we can ever begin to imagine. It is a place of joy and beauty, of peace and happiness that will never end.

Why? Because heaven is also a place where there will be no sin or suffering, no sorrow or pain. It's a place where there will be no quarrels or disagreements, no disappointments or weeping--because there will be nothing there to make us sad. And in heaven we will never do anything to displease God.

That's a fashionable concern, judging from the trends in devotional booklets, home Bible study discussions, Sunday-school literature, and most popular preaching.

The question of what Scripture means has taken a back seat to the issue of what it means "to me."

The difference may seem insignificant at first. Nevertheless, our obsession with the Scripture's applicability reflects a fundamental weakness. We have adopted practicality as the ultimate judge of the worth of God's Word. We bury ourselves in passages that overtly relate to daily living, and ignore those that don't.