I had a question on prayer. Does prayer change God’s mind? Or is God changed by prayer? According to Hosea 11:8b it says, “My heart is changed within me. All my compassion is aroused.” Indicating that God changed his mind. Or King Hezekiah when the LORD extended his life 15 years in 2 Kings 20. Also, in James 5:16b it says, “the prayer of a righteous man availeth much…”

On the contrary, in 1 Samuel 15:29 it says “Also the Glory of Israel will not lie or change His mind; He is not a man that He should change His mind.” Also in Malachi 3:6 says “I the LORD do not change.” And somewhere, I couldn’t find where, it says that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

So I was just wondering if you could help me seek truth with respect to God changing His mind through prayer.

Just reading about Mary and Joseph who both have genealogies that take them back through the Kingly line to David. However, Luke describes Elizabeth as cousin to Mary and her descent was from the daughters of Aaron. Zachariah was a descendant of Abijah the priest. Were Mary and Elizabeth cousins as we would understand cousins (i.e. their parents were siblings)?

Thanks so much for all of the great articles, they are very much appreciated. Your articles on Job, however, had a disturbing misunderstanding of scripture which could lead to undue pain to a new Christian (or an old one for that matter). There is nothing in the book of Job which states or leads one to believe Job was out of fellowship or being pained due to sin, or that Job had the sin of self-righteousness to deal with at all. The self-righteousness did not come out until Job was well into the trials, and explaining himself to his “friends”. God does not hold us accountable to confess sins we have not yet committed and would not commit if we were never given a specific trial in order to bring them out of us.

Please reconsider and study Job from the perspective of God’s sovereignty, His plan for us, and the process of sanctification. Sanctification is often why God allows us to suffer trials, to bring things out of us, to make us more holy. The gold goes into the fire appearing perfect, and only when the fire is lit do the impurities show up and flow out. That is the perspective we should approach the book of Job with. It was sanctification, not sin or lack of fellowship. To have a clear understanding of the book of Job is to have a clear understanding of God Himself. It’s a very important book. I humbly ask you to reconsider this. And again, thanks for all you do for the Church.

I’ve been married to the same man for 21 years, and we have two sons. During all this time, for the most part, I have been the main bread winner. For long stretches of time, the longest being 4 years, my husband has not worked.

It’s not that he won’t work per se, but he’s not the type to go out and search consistently until he finds a job, he always waits for work to come to him, via family members etc. We are both believers, and have been since we were kids. There fore I just don’t understand how a man can sit at home day after day after day, while his wife gets up everyday and goes off to work, so that the family can eat and have a roof over their heads. I will never understand how he can watch me struggle so hard to keep us afloat financially, while he sits and does nothing.

I’m tired of getting very little in return in the way of a loving gentle caring husband. He basically treats me like a room mate, except he doesn’t help with the rent and groceries. I understand what Christ said about the biblical reasons for divorce, but would He expect me to keep up this charade, and keep caring for someone financially who clearly has the ability to get up off the sofa and get a job and help me?

In Ezekiel 47:3-5 are the water depths symbolic/prophetic or were listing the ankles, knees, loins, and unfordable simply a standard of measure? I don’t know why but somehow as I read it I got an image of the statue of Nebuchadnezzar. Any help is always appreciated. God bless.

I read your article “What Is Sin.” You did a good job in explaining what sin is in the life of a believer in the fact that it means “to miss the mark.” You also did very well in showing that all of us sin and miss the mark, pointing out that one sin, no matter how small, is just as bad as what others call larger sins such as murder and adultery. You spoke of repentance being a change of mind. True, we change our mind regarding living a perverse lifestyle, acknowledge that we need a Savior, and accept that Savior (Jesus Christ) as our Savior.

All in all you did a marvelous job in showing people we should not be pointing the finger in judgment toward others who “fall into” sin just like we do when we “miss the mark.” Very good!

Unfortunately, you did NOT address the real issue. What you avoided speaking of was the believer who doesn’t strive. You avoided speaking of the person who declares they are saved and always will be saved because they have had a change of mind, have accepted Christ, but are NOT striving to be holy. Falling short (as we all do) or “missing the mark” in our attempt to achieve living a sinless life is far different from those who, at some point in their “walk” have decided that it’s “okay” to willfully live in perversion.

Biblical warnings against apostasy are real and believers maintain the freedom to potentially reject the salvation they once accepted. They weren’t forced to accept and are not forced to stay.

What was rent from top to bottom at Christ’s death? I cannot find the reference to this for our Bible Study.

I just love your ask a Bible teacher feature. Here’s my question: in Isaiah 14:13 which lists Lucifer’s ” I wills”, what does the third one mean? It sounds pretty specific.

What can you tell me about the Allos Parakleto?

Though the bible tells us to rightly divide the word of truth (that is itself), why don’t it teach even one method of doing so? Or does it?