I am writing concerning an issue I am facing. I am not sure that I am in the Lord’s will or if I am being deceived. I was recently accepted to graduate school and am receiving lots of resistance from family and friends who don’t think I should be leaving my job and going back to school. At the same time I’m getting encouragement and help from others. So I’m getting confused. Is the resistance a sign that I shouldn’t go or is the help I’m getting a sign that I should. How can a Christian tell what is the Lord’s will ?

What is the difference between seeking the kingdom (Matt. 6.33) , and seeking God (Psalm 34.10) and how do we know when we have achieved these things to God’s satisfaction? In other words we have fulfilled the conditions so that God can begin to bless.

I heard a sermon on this passage which I completely disagreed with. If I understood correctly, it seemed the pastor said that believers who do not bear fruit, or refuse to allow the Holy Spirit to work through them to bear fruits of love would be taken away and “purged or cleansed” in the fire to help them grow…something to that effect. As I understand it, believers can suffer loss but I’ve never read or been taught they will have to go through some type of purgatory. This teaching sounds like more “overcomers” theory.

I read the article “Why Do You Do What Is Unlawful On The Sabbath?” My question is then do we have to keep the sabbath day which is Saturday as our day of worship?

In John 3:10, when Jesus asked Nicodemus, “Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?” What things is Jesus referring to? If He is referring to being born again, how could Nicodemus have known? Isn’t this the first time the phrase “born again” was used in history?

Can you please explain about eating fish? As in Deuteronomy, we may eat all water animals that has both fins and scales on it. But current studies talk about the danger of eating fish which has medium to high mercury content. So, It contradicts the word of GOD. Also, can we eat prawns & lobsters, because they don’t have scales & fins. Are they detestable? Kindly explain. It bothers me a lot.

But every Church I go to has a different teaching about the Sabbath. One says we don’t need to keep it. Another says Jesus is our Sabbath so we keep it whether we rest on a day or not. Even another says that we can keep it if we want to, and disregard it if we would rather do that. Imagine the confusion we laypeople go through. We don’t have time to become famous Bible expositors. Who is correct about the Sabbath?

What do you think of this saying:

“the atonement is at-one-ment. It makes us one with God.”

Atonement is the sacrifice that paid the sin debt. But does it alone, really make us one with God? Isn’t justification the point in time in which we become one with God?

How should Matt. 6:25-26 be correctly interpreted?

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”

Massive numbers of wild birds starve to death all over the world, especially during the winter, as well as other undernourished wild animals. Jesus would have known this, of course, and so would his hearers. I would just like your perspective, because I do not like having cognitive dissonance where Christ (and our Father’s provision) is concerned, and I hope you can help me be more comfortable with this saying.

The word Church (ekklesia) is only used in the New Testament. In the Old Testament, the word congregation (adar) is used. If the same thing is being referred to in the Old as well as the New, then why only use Church in the New and congregation in the Old when translating to English?

One possible answer: The English translators (under the influence of gentile ‘church’ fathers) deliberately used the word in the New but used a different word in the Old to make a separation between Israel and the new covenant brethren that was never there.