By Steven Mock

The first church in Jerusalem was formed in Acts 2 when Peter preached a powerful, Spirit-filled, convicting message. God used Peter’s words to convert 3,000 people who were baptized and started meeting together. Verse 42 tells us they had four priorities as a local church: the apostles’ teaching, fellowship, the Lord’s Supper, and praying.

All four of these priorities are important but the apostles’ teaching is probably mentioned first because it was the greatest of priorities. In other words, the local church must be a learning church. The Scriptures must be foundational in your church because according to 1 Timothy 3:15, truth must be pillared and protected by the church.

This leads me to discuss a problem that seems to be a modern day phenomenon in the church at large: distance preaching. I’m not talking about sitting in the back of your church building versus sitting towards the front—not that kind of distance. I am talking about the fact that we live in a day where you can listen to a variety of sermons from all around the world in a variety of media: tapes, CD’s, radio, TV, and internet—that is Read the rest of this entry »

By Dr. Dan Olinger

“I besieged and conquered Samaria and led away as booty 27,290 inhabitants of it.” These are the words of the Assyrian emperor Sargon II, the man who sent his general, Sennacherib, to bring God’s judgment on the backslidden Northern Kingdom of Israel in 722 BC. But these words are not from the Bible; they emerged from the Near Eastern sands centuries later as a silent but eloquent witness to the truth of the Biblical account. Read the rest of this entry »

By Charles A. Hauser, Jr.

Throughout history man has tried to minimize the importance and influence of the Bible. At times, the Bible was kept from people; programs were designed to destroy it. Some wished to negate the influence of a particular book, as did Dionysius in the early church. He tried to cast doubt regarding the apostolic authorship of Revelation, because it teaches Christ’s literal reign on earth. The last two centuries reflect scholars’ focus on negating the supernatural inspiration of Scripture, trying to reduce it to a man-made book tracing man’s search for God. Read the rest of this entry »