My question concerns the word “heart” that is used several times in the New Testament. We can take Romans 10: 9 where the Bible says “…and believe in your heart..”. I’m always tempted to think that the Bible doesn’t refer to the heart that pumps blood in our body but our spiritual heart. Can you please explain further what the Bible is referring to? Your opinion will help me make sense when I’m responding to questions my Sunday school kids ask.

Having researched the “emerging church” movement, I am left confused regarding the teaching of a ‘man friendly Gospel’ that these churches have adopted. Some theologians believe this is wrong; that God is a Holy God and man in his sinful state is God’s enemy. Also, Psalm 5 says God hates his enemies, but Jesus tells us to love our enemies. Why does He tell us to do this if he doesn’t love them himself? Finally, I have always believed that we mustn’t judge or condemn, yet this seems to suggest a ‘man centered approach’. These same theologians believe that the real Gospel preaches repentance and a making aware of sin; that the only way to God is through the ‘narrow gate’ by living a sacrificial life. I’m not sure what all this means anymore. Is God a loving father, or a strict judge?

Gen. 3:8 says, “Then the man and his wife heard the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden.” As I was studying angels with my small group of high school boys, we came across this verse and I was intrigued by the fact that it implies God taking some physical form and interacting with the earth as humans would. Is this simply the Angel of the Lord? Or perhaps this Gabriel or Michael?

Can you please teach me on the understanding of Ephesians chapter 4 vs. 17-20. What is said there is very disturbing. Am i taking this out of context?

I remember being told that in Jerusalem there was a passage between two walls of the city that was referred to as the eye of the needle. It was very difficult for a camel to go thru and hence the words from Christ that it was easier for a camel to go thru the eye of a needle then for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. This was a reference to that area in between the walls and the people understood that it would be difficult but certainly not impossible. Have you heard of this?

You have said that “do not judge” is a blanket statement and therefore does not pertain to hypocritical judgment only. I recently read an article about members of a “prayer group” who sexually assaulted and then murdered the wife of the group’s leader with his permission. I cannot believe that Jesus would have us not render any judgment about the people who did these things. I cannot see how you would need to pluck something out of your own eye first before rebuking them.

Re: The Eye Of The Needle There was and still exists today in Jerusalem a narrow passage between two walls of the city that is referred to as the eye of the needle. This was an emergency exit/entrance that was the only access at night. On my visit to Jerusalem (I traveled by bus and not by camel) I personally went through it and understood the picture Jesus was portraying clearly. It is a single narrow doorway allowing access to one person at a time and therefore very secure and defensible. A person arriving at the city after dark would do so with his earthly possessions loaded onto the back of a camel. The choice was clear: unload the camel or leave both it and your possessions behind if you want to enter the city. Camels are obstinate beasts and it took a lot of coaxing and pulling and even beating to get them through the narrow passage into the ante-chamber inside the wall.

I was recently reading about the Providence of God, and wondered what your view on it is ?

Can you explain in further detail 2 Timothy 2:15? What’s the context in which Paul wrote it?

We currently are studying Revelation in our small group and we were in chapters 2-3. A couple of ex-Catholics talked about still holding Mary in high esteem, not praying to her, but praying to God through Mary. One of them used the miracle written by John about turning water into wine as Jesus doing what his Mother asked him to do, to justify this. Could you comment on this event in regards to this miracle?