I'll Be Honest

What could be more satisfying than having God draw near to you? But If you want God to draw near to you, you first need to believe that God drawing near is an actual reality and not just a theory. Do you really believe that if you draw near to God that He'll draw near to you?

In this live question and answer session, we spent the majority of our time dealing with questions about raising children and parenting.

In this excerpt, Tim Conway shares about his father's death and the things surrounding it, and what he shared while preaching at his father's funeral.

Our greatest need is drawing near to God; but if we're going to draw near to God, we need to have the right attitude. What should be our attitude when we draw near to God?

The Bible calls us to draw near to God but we also need to see the danger of drawing near to God. Have you ever truly considered who the God of the Bible is? The God of the Bible is not a soft pushover that we can manage and boss around; He's a dangerous God, and drawing near to Him is dangerous if we don't come the right way.

What is the answer to all of the unfulfilled desires that eat away at mankind? The supreme need for mankind is to draw near to God and to know Him. What need do you have that does not get answered by knowing Christ and partaking of His unsearchable riches?

Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near of which you will say, “I have no pleasure in them”. – Ecclesiastes 12:1

How should someone in a church react when the elders are disagreeing over matters in the church? Are elders able to have different views on issues in the church? What if the pastors are disagreeing over how sin is being dealt with in the church?

Few things will eat up our spiritual life like bitterness will. Few things will grieve the Holy Spirit within us like unforgivness and grudges towards others. As difficult as it can be, we need to truly forgive others from our hearts. And if we find it hard to forgive others, we need to remember how God forgave us by giving His Son for us.

For us to be transformed into the image of Christ, one essential factor is that we don't conform to this world. We can't let the world define terms and morality for us; we have to renew our minds according to how God defines terms. In the end, the world's dictionary of definitions will be burned up and obliterated, but God's standards will endure forever.

If you are a Christian, your life is one of continual transformation into the image of Christ. But if we are to be transformed, we need to know the foundation of that transformation. If we fail to understand the foundation, then we will fail to have a Christ-like transformation.

In order to go to heaven, you must be as holy as God and have a perfect record in keeping all of God's commandments. Every human being has failed miserably, but praise God that Jesus Christ's righteousness can freely become ours by faith.

What does the Bible mean when it talks about the "old man"? Do we still have the old man? Is the old man completely gone? Is there a tension or balance between the two? Whatever the old man is, one thing we know for sure is that we need to put him off.

One of the results of the fall of Adam and Eve is that now all of us feel ashamed to be naked. No matter where you go in this world, everyone knows the shame of being naked and the need to cover themselves. And in a spiritual sense, we all are trying to cover ourselves before God. But our coverings won't cover us, only what God provides can cover us.

How are we to grow as Christians and as churches? The Bible describes us as a body, and in order for us to grow, we need to hold fast to the Head and also joined to one another. And one of the primary joints that will hold us together is speaking the truth in love to one another.

The Bible declares three distinct persons to be God (Father, Son, Holy Spirit), but we need to remember that the Bible gives primacy to the Father. The Bible most certainly exalts Christ, but we can't forget that God the Father is said to be overall, including Christ.

If there’s ever been a topic in Christianity that has seemed to cause massive disunity, it’s baptism. And yet when Paul is declaring foundational doctrines of our Christian unity, one of the things he includes is “one baptism”. What is baptism? In addition, Scripture talks about multiples forms of baptism (water, fire, etc.), so what is the “one” baptism referring to?

What are Christians to make of the recent controversy regarding the death of John Allen Chau? Should we look down on him as one guilty of foolish presumption, or commend him as one who it appears trusted God and gave his life for the sake of Christ?

How should we respond to movements that teach false doctrine? Should we stay up to date with the latest resources that explain and expose the movement? Or is there a better way to recognize it and keep ourselves from it?

We are called to be eager to maintain unity. But why is unity so important? And how do we become eager to maintain unity with other Christians? And even if we are eager, how do we actually succeed in maintaining unity in the church?

Sexual sin has been a problem in all generations, but there's no question that our current generation faces it and has access to it far more than any other generation in history. This sin is a horrific sin. It grieves the Holy Spirit, it brings unbearable guilt, it defiles peoples' consciences, it hides the glorious face of God, and it damns the souls of those who are enslaved to it.

A proper and Biblical understanding of repentance is essential when it comes to salvation. We don't want to make repentance less sharp than the Bible does, but we should equally not want to make repentance more severe than the Bible does. What does the Bible teach us about the nature of repentance?

Many children find it convenient to use the failures of their Christian parents as an excuse to not come to Christ. Their failures (not referring to a life of hypocrisy) just means that even Christians still need Christ. Don't use the failures of your parents to justify your own rebellion against God and refusing to repent.

Unity is foundational and essential to Christ's people. This was a main theme in Christ's prayer just before He went to the cross. We must not only understand but also define unity the way Jesus and the Bible does. We must not at all seek to be unified with others who don't believe in the Jesus of the Bible.

The Bible urges us to walk worthy of God's calling; one of the characteristics of a walk worthy of our calling is humility. The Bible also calls members of churches to function properly. One of the necessary ways of functioning properly and building up the whole church is walking in humility.