When Peter denied the Lord and cursed, was he saved? He had already declared Jesus the Messiah so I would assume he was. Did he have the Holy Ghost? After the resurrection, he was strong in his faith even unto death. What made him stronger than before?

My bible of choice is now a parallel bible containing both KJV and NIV. I made this choice largely because of you – because you use the NIV and I’m an ardent student of your material. In using my new bible I was surprised to find out that some verses in the KJV are intentionally absent in the NIV. I’m sure your aware of this and so I was wondering about your position on using the NIV. Just to be clear – I think using both is valuable and I can’t imagine not using both in my own study.

What is ‘The Anointing’? And to further quantify what is ‘The Anointing that breaks the yoke’? A pastor recently rebuked a teacher in his church for studying the history and events of The Bible so as to be able to teach / preach with clarity and accuracy. The pastor’s view is that there is no need to understand any of those factors. He said we should just minister out of our heart under ‘The Anointing’ and that our words will be right for the moment. The pastor’s view is that when you see people shouting and crying it is evidence of ‘The Anointing’ but if one teaches / preaches truth and what is factually correct but the people are not moved, it is evidence of the lack of ‘The Anointing’. Can you clarify this?

Would you please speak on the communion. Which bread is to be used?

I have been attending a great bible teaching church and in the last few month have come to realize that the pastor believes that we don’t receive the Holy Spirit until we are baptized. We have spoken at length and agree that when you believe on Jesus as your Savior you are saved and will spend eternity with him and the father. He says that Ephesians 1:13-14 is saying we are sealed (as in marked) for our future inheritance, but the spirit doesn’t dwell and live within us until we get baptized and that is when we receive the promise of the Father. He says the Lord’s own baptism is our example of this and in Acts 2:38 Peter placed baptism before receiving the Holy Spirit.

I think that baptism is very important and we should do it because it is commanded and it is a public display of our choice to be a follower of Christ, but I disagree with my pastor on this issue. I have studied at length and hoped you might help?

I was going through the Parable of the Yeast from Matthew 13 and I have a question. Normally in Bible, Man is the term used to represent humans (both men and women). Here in this parable “Women” is used. Does she represent EVE? Through Eve, sin has been spread and mixed all over the world till now.(“until it was all leavened” means “to the end of the world”) What do you think?

Man is in a depraved state and sin was passed down thru Adam to us. Because of our sinful nature, how are we able to make the decision to be saved without God helping us? Are we that able to have something to do with our salvation? Wouldn’t that mean salvation isn’t just up to God and that it’s our work and His grace combined?

In response to your post entitled, “To Hell And Back”. I was wondering if you would please elaborate more on why you do not believe in NDE’s, and what other support there is in the Bible for this view. I’ve read some of the reports from both surgeons and patients on the topic of near-death experiences. People have been clinically dead and have been successfully resuscitated only to tell amazing stories of heaven or horrible stories of hell. Couldn’t it be possible that the experiences people witnessed in these events are another way for God to spread his message to the world? The technological age brought methods to resuscitate people effectively even after they’re clinically dead. These could fall in the category of greater knowledge during the end times as our Lord foretold.

Thank you for your incredible website! I read it daily and enjoy it tremendously. My question concerns healing. I cannot recall or find a single instance in the Bible where a woman healed someone. Is this a gift that is reserved only for men? The only mention of spiritual gifts pertaining to women that I recall are the ability to prophesy. Can you shed some light on this for me? Considering how women were to conduct themselves during services by remaining silent, are the abilities bestowed by the Holy Spirit (with the exception of prophesy) only available to men?

I have recently read the book about a man who claims he went to hell for a brief time and it has disturbed me immensely. I find myself trying to find ways to bring hell into conversations with people so I can tell them about the perils that await them if they don’t choose Jesus as their Savior. Is there any way to truly know what happens to people who die without knowing Jesus? Could there be one moment in time between their last breath and stepping into eternity where they have one last chance to make a choice? If I am praying and praying for someone’s salvation, would God truly allow them to go to hell?