Truth Be Told: A Blog by Pastor Bill Alderson

One of the most important principles derived from the Protestant Reformation is the priesthood of the believer. Martin Luther wanted Christians to understand that, in God’s eyes, the people were not second-class citizens as compared to the clergy or the nobility. Instead, new covenant believers are all saints, kings, and priests. There are three fundamental principles of the Protestant Reformation: the supremacy of the Scriptures over tradition, the supremacy of faith over works, and the supremacy of the Christian people over an exclusive priesthood . The first may be called the objective, the second the subjective, the third the social or ecclesiastical principle.   While Martin Luther did not use the exact phrase "priesthood of all believers," he infers a general priesthood in Christendom in his 1520 “ To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation ” . He said that all Christians “are truly of the spiritual estate, and there is no difference among them, save of office al...

  Jesus said He came to fulfill, not abolish the Law at the Sermon on the Mount so that a new relationship with God could be born. He was asked the question by the Pharisees trying to tempt Him in Matthew 22:36, “ Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law ?"   Jesus went on to quote Deuteronomy 6:5 (love the Lord with all your heart) and Leviticus 19:18 (love your neighbor as yourself) and then made the following statement in verse 40, “ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets ." The Old Testament revelation of God points directly to and is fulfilled in these two principles. God’s Presence   When Moses came down off the mountain with the two tablets in Exodus 32, he observed the people, led by his brother Aaron, worshipping a golden calf. Although every one of the 2,000,000 or 3,000,000 people were eyewitnesses of God’s miraculous deliverance from Egypt through the Red Sea, they were not willing to wait the 40 days while Moses was on t...

The doctrine of the deity (divinity) of Jesus Christ is a central and necessary belief of Christianity since it qualifies the true nature of Jesus as both man and God. As a result, it can also be used as a measuring stick against false religions and religious systems that pervert the Word of God and the true nature of Christ. Each believer should have an understanding of and a conviction for this doctrine. Following are fifteen important proofs about the Biblical claims that Jesus Christ is fully God. In John 1:1, “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” In verse 14, we see that this “Word” became flesh and dwelt among us, a direct reference to Jesus Christ. Some non-Christian groups have attacked this translation of the italicized portion of this verse from the Greek, “kai theos een ho logos”, as referring to “a god” rather than “God” because of a lack of a definite article with “theos” (God). This claim i...

  Old Testament prophecy speaks extensively about the coming kingdom age, the time when Messiah will reign for 1,000 years, but there are no direct references to the church. When I was growing up in the Boston area, my family and I did a lot of hiking in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. From the top of one mountain, you can look out at other mountains with mountain peaks beyond, but you cannot judge between the peaks, neither the distance nor what exists there. This is the principle in play with the Old Testament prophecies dealing with long distance, future events. Prophesy looks to the future, but only sees the mountain peaks. When the Old Testament prophesied about the coming Messiah (some like Isaiah 61:1-2 refers to both comings), it did not clearly discern the two comings and the distance in time between. Since the church age does not deal with Israel, the Old Testament is silent about it. In Ephesians 3:9-10, Paul refers to the church as a mystery, hidden in Old Testame...

  C. S. Lewis once said, “To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.”  To fully appreciate the quality of the Christian life, the believer must appreciate the quality of forgiveness and be willing to pass it on. Making this connection real begins with an acceptance that the new covenant offers the believer total forgiveness for all sins, past, present and future. In Hebrews 8:12, “ FOR I WILL BE MERCIFUL TO THEIR INIQUITIES, AND I WILL REMEMBER THEIR SINS NO MORE ." Like many Biblical realities, the Scriptures contains illustrations that make the principle more acceptable. In John 8:1-11, Jesus purposely demonstrates the principle to His disciples and others.   The scene takes place in the temple, where Jesus is teaching the people. The scribes and Pharisees bring a woman to Him, caught in the act of adultery to test Jesus regarding the Law of Moses. He is asked what should be done to the woman. In Leviticus 20:10...

Accepting the Word of God as absolute truth is critical for a strong relationship with God. Without that conviction, any Biblical account that man does not accept as true can be negotiated away as a difference of interpretation or opinion. This begins with an acceptance of the literal Biblical account of creation in six solar days in Genesis 1 and its place in human history. Although the secular world and even many Christians cannot accept creationism over evolutionism, the evidences for a young earth are overwhelming and become the strongest support of a literal interpretation of the creation story and therefore, the entire Bible. If we trace our ancestry back to Adam through Biblical genealogies, we come to the conclusion that man was created approximately 6,000 years ago. Since evolution teaches that the universe is 4.5 billion years old, we have a major difference of opinion. If the Bible is accurate, there should be real evidence. And there is. Geological time clocks   T...

The Old Testament is filled with many blessings of God for His people. One of the most important of these is found in Genesis 12:1-3 where God blesses Abraham if he leaves his country of origin for an unknown land. It is there that God would make him a great nation, bless him, make his name great so that Abraham would be a blessing. Through Abraham’s willingness to leave his home for one not known to him, God would bless the nations, a new concept since God had just scattered the people from Babel in Genesis 11. The avenue to God’s blessing follows this same pathway for all who choose to believe God’s promises.   Paul teaches us in Ephesians 1:3, that the Father “ has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ [new covenant]”. The Greek word for blessing is eulogia and it basically means a benefit bestowed on another. God has bestowed (aorist tense meaning something completed in the past having future results) divine benefits on believers who are ...