A. Unbelievers who have died are very much awake and alert.  They’re in a place we call Hades or Hell, a temporary place of torment where they await their final judgment at the end of the millennium.  Rev. 20:13-14 says that at the Great White Throne judgment death and Hades will give up the dead that are in them and then they’ll be thrown into the lake of fire along with everyone whose names are not found in the book of life.

A. The support for building another Temple on the current Temple Mount is historical not Biblical.  That’s where the first and second temples were built.  Ezekiel 48 is the only place in the Bible that specifies where the next Temple will be, and that’s several miles north of the current Temple mount.  Part of the problem is that Christian scholars have thrown another Temple into the mix which they call the Tribulation Temple and which is supposed to be built between what Jews call the 2nd and 3rd Temples.  They see this Temple being built on the current Temple Mount, either where the Dome of the Rock stands or just north of it.  Their thinking is that this temple will be built at the beginning of Daniel’s 70th Week, desecrated by the anti-Christ, and later destroyed making way for a 4th one, the one described in Ezekiel.  Since the Bible specifically mentions only 3 Temples, I don’t support the Tribulation Temple hypothesis.  For more detail on my opinion read The Coming Temple

Therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of the lawless and fall from your secure position. —2 Peter 3:17

A. The Bible being the word of God cannot contradict itself.  God doesn’t  say something in one place and then something different in another. Therefore you can’t take one verse whose meaning is not clear to you and use it to negate all the others whose meanings are. There are a dozen or so clear verses on Eternal Security.  Two of the clearest are Ephesians 1:13-14 and 2 Cor. 1:21-22.  I suggest you study them until you understand them fully and can repeat them from memory. Then when someone throws you a curve ball you can compare what they give you with what you know to be true.

Peter was speaking of false teachers who cause people to doubt their faith. They would sew confusion among the people by claiming to know things the people hadn’t heard before.  A couple of verses earlier Peter had said that he and Paul were in agreement on the matter of salvation, and these teachers were distorting what they both taught.  In verse 17 Peter  said in effect, “you already know the truth so don’t let the errors in this false teaching cause you to doubt your security in the Lord.”  In verse 18 he gave us the same advice I just gave you.  “Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”  Knowledge is the best defense against error.

A. The Bible tells us the armies of Heaven and the Church are both with Jesus when He returns.  But Zech. 14:4 mentions only Jesus actually setting foot on the ground .  The others are seen in the air.  And later, the same is true of the New Jerusalem.  It’s described coming down out of Heaven, but never landing (Rev. 21:2).   It’s a good thing, too.  At about 1/6th the size of Earth it’s too big to put anywhere, except in a low Earth orbit.  The Church will dwell in the New Jerusalem, not on Earth (Rev. 21:27).

A. A careful reading of Rev. 20 shows that Verses 7-15 are a parenthetical insert  that John used to carry the dispositions of Satan and the unbelievers to their final conclusion while he was on the subject.  Then in Rev. 21 he returned to the beginning of the Millennium to describe the New Jerusalem, home of the Church.  There are several clues in the text that support this view.  First, Rev. 20:7 begins, “when the thousand years are over” indicating that John has skipped to the end of the  Millennium.  Second, Rev. 21:1 is a direct quote from Isaiah 65:17 where the context is clearly Israel’s Kingdom Age, aka the Millennium, and third the first 5 verses of Rev.22 are a summary of Ezekiel 47, which is also about the Kingdom Age in Israel. And then there’s the mention of the trees growing a different fruit each month in Rev. 22: 2.  This reference to time is also in Ezekiel 47:12 and confirms that John was not talking about eternity, which by definition is the absence of time.

In my opinion the view that Rev. 21-22 are about our eternal state after the Millennium, though popular, is incorrect.

Also, The Bible says that both the Lord and His Church will abide in the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:22-27) and both the Lord and His Church will reign on Earth. (Zech 14:9, Rev. 5:10).  How this will happen in not explained, but that it will happen is clear.

A. When King David committed adultery with Bathsheba and had her husband murdered so he could marry her, God informed David that the baby who resulted from their affair would become sick and would not survive. Seven days later the child died. (2 Samuel 11-12)  This was more likely an application of the “life for a life” principle (Exodus 21:23) than a punishment for adultery .

But why this was being taught to a 5 year old, and why the teacher turned this specific situation into a general principle is beyond me.  He or she could have taught them that even though David committed these terrible sins,  he was forgiven as soon as he asked, the child went to be with God and was spared a life of illegitimacy, and David was reunited with him after he died. (2 Sam 12:23).

A. Although I’m convinced the Bible says we’ll all know each other personally after the Rapture, I haven’t found anything that defines our various relationships in greater detail.  An advantage you have is that the Rapture will likely happen before your children reach the age of accountability.  Tragically, some mothers have to face the possibility that one or more of their children may be left behind.  But one thing is certain.  When we get there we’ll have no regrets about any incomplete or unfulfilled dreams from this world.  Otherwise it wouldn’t be heaven.

A. The purpose of the Lord’s intervention in the Ezekiel 38 battle is to re-awaken Israel and fulfill His promises to them through the final 7 years of their 490 year plan (Daniel 9:24-27).  The purpose of the great delusion in 2 Thes. 2:11 is to assist unbelievers in following their choice to its ultimate conclusion. 2 Thes. 2:10 says the people perish because they refused to believe the truth and be saved.  Having done so, their only other option is to follow the anti-Christ to destruction.

A. Maybe Paul can clear this up for us.

(Jesus) who being in very nature God,  did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death even death on a cross! (Phil 2:6-8)

I’m sorry to have confused you, but I never said that Jesus was not God in the flesh.  As Paul said above, Jesus was God, but when He came to Earth He became a man and purposely limited His abilities to those available to a man.  This is how He could say that we would do even greater things than He did (John 14:12), and this is why He didn’t know the details of His 2nd Coming, which is what prompted this line of questioning in the first place.

A. You’re correct about the 2 Enochs and the 2 Lamechs, but  I believe the real story behind these 2 lines is to demonstrate the difference between the faithful line of Seth and the rebellious line of Cain. In Seth’s line the seventh man from Adam was Enoch, a type of the Church who was “raptured” and walked with God. His name means “teaching”. By tradition Adam, Seth, and Enoch chose 12 constellations and named them in such a way that as they lay under the stars at night fathers could teach their children about God’s plan for redeeming them from the curse. (This was later corrupted into astrology.)

In Cain’s line the 7th from Adam was Lamech, a type of the world, a confessed murderer and the first polygamist. His children introduced an Earth based civilization focused on the exaltation of man, who by their own achievements would try to redeem themselves.  From these children came animal husbandry, manufacturing, the arts and music, and entertainment.  Lamech’s name means “despairing”.

I don’t believe God ever intended for man to build a civilization and get comfortable here.  I believe His desire was that we would be focused on learning the way into His presence and then teaching it to others.