Institute for Biblical Studies

The article library of the Institute for Biblical Studies (onenesspentecostal.com) — 435 works hosted here in full with the authors’ credit, plus the collection’s audio lessons and book files, linked at the original site. Some 1.1 million words of Oneness Pentecostal scholarship: Jason Dulle, William Arnold III, Dave MacPherson, Jason Clark, and others.

Every hosted text is reproduced unchanged under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 license offered on the Institute’s copyright page, with the author credited on each page. Audio lessons and book files remain at onenesspentecostal.com.

Angelology

• A Study of Satan (outline) — William Arnold III
  Presents an outline study of Satan, collecting his biblical names and descriptions, including the evil one, the great dragon, father of lies, and murderer. Drawing on Scripture and the ISBE, it portrays Satan as the enemy of God and man whose power consists principally in his ability to deceive.
• Are There Demons of Sex and Alcohol? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether there are specific demons of sex, alcohol, pornography, anger, and other vices, in light of the list of works of the lower nature in Galatians 5. It raises the possibility that the names demons give when possessing a person are accurate word pictures of human weaknesses and sinfulness, while stressing human personal responsibility.
• Could Aliens Really be Fallen Angels? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of whether supposed aliens could really be fallen angels, weighing the similarities between reported sightings and evil spirits while raising the theological problem that beings on other planets would also need redemption. The author is somewhat persuaded some sightings may be evil spirit sightings but does not rule out life on other planets entirely.
• Do Angels Exist in Space and Time? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether angels exist in space and time, arguing that they do: immateriality does not preclude spatiality or temporality, and finite spiritual substances, being neither nowhere nor everywhere, must be somewhere.
• Even More on the "Sons of God" in Genesis 6 — William Arnold III
  Continues defending the view that the "sons of God" in Genesis 6 are angels, as the reading that does the most justice to the text on exegetical and hermeneutical grounds as opposed to theological reasons. It responds to the usual objection that angels and humans cannot mate, which the author identifies as the theological motivation behind the opposing view.
• If Genesis 6 Refers to Angels, What About Hebrews 1:5? — William Arnold III
  Answers how Hebrews 1:5 fits with identifying the "sons of God" in Genesis 6 as angels, distinguishing sonship by creation, by adoption, and by begetting. It argues that angels are sons of God by creation while Jesus is the unique begotten Son, so the statement of Hebrews 1:5 still stands.
• More on the "Sons of God" in Genesis 6 — William Arnold III
  Responds to an article defending the view that the "sons of God" in Genesis 6 are angels, offering points for consideration drawn from the incarnation as evidence that a spirit being can unite with a human.
• Who is Lucifer in Isaiah 14:12? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether "Lucifer" in Isaiah 14:12 is Satan or actually the king of Babylon. It states there is no doubt Isaiah 14 refers to the king of Babylon: "Lucifer" does not appear in the Hebrew text, where the words mean "Helel son of Shachar" — probably a name for the morning star — and the translation came over from Jerome's Latin Vulgate.
• Who Were the Sons of God in Genesis 6? — William Arnold III
  Examines the disputed identity of the "sons of God" in Genesis 6 who took wives from the daughters of men. It notes that early Jews understood the passage to refer to angels and that this was the favored interpretation for thousands of years until rationalism ruled it out in the last few hundred years.

Bibliology

• A Brief History of the English Bible — Jason Dulle
  Traces the history of the English Bible from the earliest translation efforts of figures such as Caedmon, Bede, and King Alfred, within the longer story of Scripture's translation beginning with the New Testament itself and the ancient versions.
• A Short History of the Textus Receptus — Jason Dulle
  Traces the history of the Textus Receptus from sixteenth-century Europe, beginning with Erasmus's encounter with Lorenzo Valla's annotations on the Latin Vulgate. It corrects the claim that the Textus Receptus printed by the Trinitarian Bible Society was the Greek text used by the KJV translators.
• Bible Translations: Has the Word of God Been Changed? — Jason Dulle
  Critically evaluates the arguments used to prefer the Byzantine Text and Textus Receptus/KJV over the Critical Text and modern translations, demonstrating weaknesses in those arguments.
• Biblical Inerrancy and the Resurrectoin — Jason Dulle
  Considers how to hold the doctrine of biblical inerrancy in light of Gospel difficulties and apparent contradictions, including some for which the author admits he has no good answer. It argues that concluding Christianity is false — or that God does not exist — from irresolvable difficulties wrongly elevates inerrancy to a status it should not have in one's theological taxonomy.
• Biblical Inspiration, Editors, and the Book of Proverbs — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the book of Proverbs was compiled and edited from distinct collections of Solomon's proverbs, as suggested by the repeated heading "The proverbs of Solomon" at Proverbs 10:1. It considers what this editorial process means for understanding the book's composition and the doctrine of inspiration.
• Defending the Inerrancy and Canon of Scripture — Jason Dulle
  Defends the inerrancy and canon of Scripture against attacks from both non-believers and, more recently, some Christians. It argues the Bible openly confesses human authorship while also claiming divine authorship, and that non-Christians err by denying the divine authorship while Christians often err by minimizing the human elements.
• Evangelicals and the Bible: Spiritual or Rational Interpretation? — Jason Dulle
  Answers how Apostolics can learn from non-Apostolic theologians who deny the Oneness of God and the new birth, if the carnal mind is an enemy of God and the unregenerated cannot understand Scripture. It argues the issue has often been misunderstood, pointing out as evidence that the unregenerated Israelites nonetheless understood the Torah.
• How To Self-Study Greek or Hebrew — William Arnold III
  Answers questions about self-studying Greek or Hebrew, arguing that with the wealth of original-language tools available today, neglecting them is a serious loss for preachers and Bible students.
• How We Get Our Bible — Jason Dulle
  Explains how we got our Bible, addressing the KJV Only movement's claim that the King James Version is the only inspired, inerrant English translation. The author states he is not a KJV Only advocate and focuses on the historical transmission of the text, the extant Greek manuscripts, and the problems translators face in determining the Word of God.
• Introduction to Biblical Languages — William Arnold III
  Introduces the biblical languages, describing Hebrew as a Semitic language with simple syntax, a 22-consonant alphabet, and a vivid, pictorial character that can make translation difficult.
• Is A "Literal" Translation Best? — William Arnold III
  Answers whether a "literal" translation is best, explaining that the New Testament was originally written in Greek, so a Hebrew New Testament is itself only a translation and gets the reader no closer to the original.
• Is the NIV a Perversion? — Jason Dulle
  Evaluates assertions made by KJV Only proponents against modern translations, stating that the author is not a KJV Only advocate while not attacking the KJV or defending any particular modern translation.
• Is There a Right and Wrong Translation of the Bible? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question whether some Bible translations must be right and others wrong, affirming that translations cannot all be right but arguing that no translation is perfect. It explains that translations may be flawed first in the underlying Hebrew or Greek wording they adopt, since the original documents no longer exist and no two copies agree exactly.
• Judas' Demise: Not a Contradiction — Jason Dulle
  Examines the apparently conflicting accounts of Judas's death in Matthew and Acts and asks whether the two passages really contradict one another, as skeptics claim.
• Judas' Extreme Makeover: Examining The Lost Gospel of Judas — Jason Dulle
  Traces the discovery and modern history of the lost Gospel of Judas manuscript, found near El Minya, Egypt in the 1970s, stolen, recovered, and kept for sixteen years in a New York safe-deposit box before its purchase in 2000 and public unveiling at the National Geographic Society. The excerpt recounts how the deteriorating codex, broken into nearly 1000 fragments, passed through dealers' hands over three decades.
• Mark's Ending: The Long and Short of It — Jason Dulle
  Summarizes the evidence and arguments for and against the authenticity of Mark 16:9-20, the long ending of Mark, surveying the perspectives of several scholars on the debate.
• Must There Be an Inspired Translation of the Bible? — Jason Dulle
  Responds to a reader who holds that English Bible versions are inspired and that modern translations water down the meaning, in a discussion touching on renderings such as "remission" versus "forgiveness" and "only begotten Son" versus "one and only Son."
• The Nature of Inspiration — Jason Dulle
  Examines the nature of biblical inspiration, addressing the manner in which inspiration took place — what part the divine element played and what part the human element played in the writing of Scripture. It frames the discussion among longstanding questions about whether all or only parts of the Bible are inspired and whether inspiration extends to the very words and grammar.
• The Queen James Bible: A new gay-friendly translation — Jason Dulle
  Examines the Queen James Bible, a gay-friendly edition of the King James Version whose editors altered eight verses traditionally interpreted as speaking negatively against homosexuality. It compares the KJV and QJV renderings of those verses, followed by comments on the editors' changes.
• The Story of Christianity from Beginning to End: Putting the Pieces Together — Jason Dulle
  Condenses the Bible's storyline from Genesis to Revelation into one coherent narrative. It offers a bird's-eye view of the major themes and events, beginning with God alone before creation, desiring to reveal His glory and share His love with humankind.
• Was there a Mrs. Jesus?: Thoughts on the Gospel of Jesus’s Wife — Jason Dulle
  Examines the papyrus fragment publicized by Harvard professor Karen King in which Jesus speaks of his wife, written in Sahidic Coptic with unknown provenance. It notes the fragment's resemblance to known Gnostic texts, the possibility raised by Francis Watson that it is a modern forgery, and that it cannot even be certain the text is of the gospel genre.
• What Books Would You Recommend on Bible Difficulties? — William Arnold III
  Answers a request for recommended books on Bible difficulties, discussing handbooks such as Gleason Archer's encyclopedia of Bible difficulties, Hard Sayings of the Bible, John Haley's Alleged Discrepancies of the Bible, and a popular handbook by Norman Geisler and Thomas Howe.
• What Happened to the Original Books of the Bible? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of what happened to the original manuscripts of the biblical books, explaining that the originals no longer exist, that Scripture survives through hand-copied manuscripts, and that scholars use textual criticism to determine the original wording.

Critical Thinking / Apologetics

• "I Don't Want to Disagree With You" — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the conversation-ending reply "I don't want to disagree with you" in religious discussions, treating it as a stock response used when a person cannot answer points or is disinterested in truth. It advises countering with questions and argues that when evidence supports one belief over another, there is a rational obligation to accept it and disagree with the other.
• "I Now Pronounce You Man and Husband?": An Argument Against Same-Sex Marriage — Jason Dulle
  Argues for the definition of marriage as the union between a man and a woman only. It grounds marriage in family formation and procreation, explaining that governments promote marriage because of the family's foundational function in society.
• "Well We All Have Faith, Right?" — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the claim that having faith in God is all that matters by focusing on what faith is and what makes faith valid, arguing that beliefs can be irrational and destructive in both the physical and spiritual realms.
• "You Always Think You are Right" — Jason Dulle
  Explains why everyone thinks they are right: to believe something is to hold it to be true, so no one knowingly prefers a belief they take to be false. It argues that this is a matter of common sense rather than arrogance, as shown by the fact that people argue over what is true.
• A Balanced Perspective on Reason and Faith — Jason Dulle
  Seeks a balanced perspective on the relationship between reason and faith, including the role each plays in conversion and in Christian witness. It argues that reason is inescapable in evaluating religious truth-claims but that reason alone cannot prove Christianity's truthfulness or convert a sinner.
• Abortion and Capital Punishment: The Seamless Garment Argument — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the "seamless garment" argument that pro-life opposition to abortion is inconsistent or hypocritical if it is not also opposed to capital punishment. It argues first that even if a pro-lifer applied the pro-life ethic inconsistently, that inconsistency would not undermine the truth of the ethic or show that abortion is right.
• Abortion: Genocide in the Womb — Jason Dulle
  Presents statistics on the scale of abortion worldwide and in the United States, and examines who obtains abortions and the reasons given, framing abortion as genocide in the womb.
• Abortion: The One Exception — Jason Dulle
  Argues that objective moral rules are applied according to circumstances, and that this principle justifies one exception on abortion: when the mother's life is likely to be lost through the pregnancy or delivery. It distinguishes that case from elective abortion, where the mother's life is not in danger.
• All Roads Don't Lead to Rome — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the religious-pluralist claim that "all roads lead to Rome," meaning all religions lead to God. It proposes questions that expose problems with the claim, whether it means God is pleased with all religions or that all religions teach basically the same thing.
• An Apologetic for Apologetics — Jason Dulle
  Makes the case for apologetics in the face of intellectual attacks on Christianity, noting the role of intellectual skepticism among young people who abandon the faith and asking how Christians should speak to a society that no longer views the Bible as a reliable authority.
• An Appeal for Preparation — Jason Dulle
  Appeals to the church to prepare to answer unbelievers, citing Paul's charge in Colossians 4:3-6 to know how to answer everyone, and lamenting that so few Christians can adequately defend their faith, partly because of a faulty view of faith.
• Aren't Christians Arrogant? — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the charge that Christians are arrogant for holding Christianity to be the only true religion, arguing that everyone who believes anything takes their own view to be true and contrary views false, which is the nature of belief and truth rather than arrogance.
• Arguing Against Homosexuality: A Response to Challenges From a University of California Professor — Jason Dulle
  Presents Jason Dulle's email response to a University of California Santa Cruz professor who had written to his class on the Gospel of Mark about the Bible's treatment of homosexuality. It answers the professor's claim that Scripture is not the ally Christians who oppose homosexual practice think it is.
• Assertion or Argument? — Jason Dulle
  Distinguishes an assertion — an opinion held on feeling with no rational supporting evidence — from an argument, an opinion supported by reasonable evidence, and discusses how to answer someone who retreats to "I just know in my heart" when shown to lack Biblical or rational grounds.
• Biblical Examples of Apologetics — Jason Dulle
  Collects biblical passages demonstrating the role of evidence, reason, and persuasion in Scripture, including texts about the defense and confirmation of the gospel and Paul's practice of reasoning from the Scriptures.
• Big Bang Cosmology and Atheism Go Together Like Peas in a Blender — Jason Dulle
  Argues that Big Bang cosmology, by establishing that the universe had an absolute beginning in the finite past, carries theistic implications — a beginning requires a supernatural cause outside the natural world — which explains the fierce opposition and alternative models it has provoked among atheists.
• Capital Punishment and the Christian Worldview — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the biblical position in both the Old and New Testaments favors capital punishment, and sets out extra-biblical arguments in its favor together with responses to opposing arguments.
• Charles Krauthammer's Embryonic Nonsense — Jason Dulle
  Criticizes Charles Krauthammer's position that destructive embryo research on excess embryos from IVF treatments is morally acceptable, while creating embryos specifically for research and destruction is not. It presses the reasoning that existing embryos may be killed for their parts while new ones must not be manufactured solely to be killed.
• Clones Have Souls — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether human clones are human and have souls, arguing that they are human — as their human genetic makeup and the natural analogy of identical twins show — and addressing the moral status of clones.
• Dialogue With a Homosexual — Jason Dulle
  Presents an email dialogue between Jason Dulle and Michael, a homosexual student at the University of California Santa Cruz, following Dulle's response to the student's professor on homosexuality and the Bible. The student engages Dulle's analysis and offers his own thoughts in an extended exchange on the subject.
• Dialogue With an Atheist — Jason Dulle
  Presents an edited 2005 email dialogue between the author and an atheist university professor, organized by topic and offered to show the intellectual strength of Christian theism. It opens with the dispute over burden of proof, where the atheist claims theists must defend God's existence while atheism, making no claim, is the default position.
• Do You Support a Woman's Right to Choose? — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the loaded question "Do you support a woman's right to choose?" by distinguishing affirmation of free choice in general from affirmation of the particular choice to terminate an unborn baby's life. It argues that each choice must be evaluated on its own merits and that this choice unjustly terminates an innocent human life.
• Eternity is Not Forever: An Argument for Theism — Jason Dulle
  Draws on Aquinas's categorical distinction between eternity as timelessness and forever as endless time to develop an argument for theism. It applies the distinction to humanity's post-resurrection existence and to the origin of the universe, beginning the analysis with the potential infinity of numbers.
• Existence and Necessity — Jason Dulle
  Distinguishes two questions - whether existence itself is necessary, and whether some specific thing exists necessarily - arguing that historically something must exist eternally, since nothing could never become something. It concludes that from a metaphysical perspective existence is not necessary but contingent, and that contingent things require an explanation for their existence.
• Faith Has Its Reasons — Jason Dulle
  Explains the role of apologetics in removing intellectual obstacles for non-believers who have closed themselves off to the working of the Spirit because they do not believe Christianity is rationally credible. It presents placing faith in Christ as a reasoned judgment in reality rather than a blind leap of unreasonable faith, while stressing that apologetics does not take the place of the working of the Spirit.
• Faith is Not a Private Matter — Jason Dulle
  Argues against the claim that faith is a private matter to be kept to oneself. It contends that if faith were kept private, believers could not identify one another, religious movements could never form or grow, and faith would die with the individual holding it.
• God is an Apologist — Jason Dulle
  Argues that biblical faith is not antithetical to evidence and reason but involves trusting what we have reason to believe is true. It shows that Scripture commands believers to give a defense of their faith, that Paul regularly engaged in apologetics, and that God Himself has acted as an apologist, as in giving Moses signs so Israel would believe.
• Homosexuality and the Bible — Jason Dulle
  Surveys what the Bible teaches about homosexuality amid public confusion and increasing challenges to the traditional understanding from within professing Christianity. It frames the issue against events of 2003–2005, including denominational disputes over openly homosexual clergy and bishops.
• How to be a Good Agnostic — Jason Dulle
  Explains the basic forms of agnosticism and three common mistakes made in confessing or practicing it, including the false supposition of neutrality. It presents agnosticism, properly understood, as an active methodological pursuit of positive knowledge rather than a lack of bias.
• Investigating Faith: Placing Religious Truth Back Into the Arena of Knowledge — Jason Dulle
  Argues that religious truth-claims belong back in the arena of knowledge, contrary to the modern view of faith as a blind leap into the non-real that cannot be tested against reality. It critiques scientism, noting that science works by induction rather than deduction and so yields only probabilistic truth, not indubitable knowledge.
• Is an Unembodied Mind too Abstract a Notion to be the Cause of the Universe? — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the cause of the universe must be timeless, non-spatial, immaterial, intelligent, and powerful. Since abstract objects are causally impotent, it concludes the cause is an unembodied mind, and it answers the objection that a disembodied mind is too abstract a notion to be the universe's cause.
• Is Philosophy Religion Gone Bad? — Jason Dulle
  Argues that religion cannot be reduced to a philosophy gone bad, since religion and philosophy are conceptually and functionally distinct, and that it is unreasonable to treat Jesus as merely one of the greatest philosophers.
• Knowledge Requires a Soul, and a Soul Requires God: An Argument for Theism — Jason Dulle
  Reproduces Greg Koukl's article arguing that true knowledge is only possible if human beings possess a rational soul, and builds on it to offer an argument for theism.
• Marriage by Any Other Name is Still Marriage — Jason Dulle
  Argues that civil unions granting same-sex couples the same package of rights under a different name concede the substance of the marriage debate, criticizing President Bush's endorsement of civil unions as surrendering the fight over marriage itself rather than merely over a word.
• Moral Relativism Undermines the Ability to Condemn Anything — Jason Dulle
  Argues that moral relativism undermines the ability to condemn anything, since those who adopt it to justify their own choices still hold moral views they expect everyone to share.
• No one is born an atheist — Jason Dulle
  Argues that no one is born an atheist, since infants hold no beliefs about God at all, and criticizes defining atheism as a mere lack of belief in God, which it distinguishes from agnosticism and from atheism as an actual claim about reality.
• Not So Fast: There is no Presumption of Atheism — Jason Dulle
  Argues that there is no presumption of atheism, because the belief that no god exists is a positive knowledge claim that requires rational justification. It contends that atheists typically offer only negative arguments against theist proofs rather than positive evidence for God's nonexistence.
• Pacifism: Well Intentioned, but Ultimately Immoral — Jason Dulle
  Argues that although pacifism is a well-intentioned ideal, it is ultimately immoral, contending that God has commanded war and that the use of force can be justified to secure justice in the face of gross evil.
• Pentecostals and Anti-Intellectualism — William Arnold III
  Critiques anti-intellectualism among Pentecostals, which it finds puzzling because it contradicts the foundation of Christianity. It observes that emphasis on the spiritual is often taken to exclude in-depth study of Scripture and doctrine, and that belittling of Bible college and of Greek and Hebrew study usually comes from those who have never pursued such education.
• Prayer Under the Microscope — Jason Dulle
  Critiques scientific studies that attempt to measure the efficacy of prayer for the sick, arguing that such studies are misguided in principle and reveal little about God and prayer. It distinguishes between impersonal event causes and personal agent causes in explaining why prayer cannot be evaluated like a physical mechanism.
• Pro-Choice With a Footnote — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the view that abortion is morally wrong except in cases of rape or incest, held by a large share of the American population according to Barna Research Group figures. It presents a conversational tactic for exposing the muddled moral thinking in that position by asking whether abortion does anything different to children conceived by rape or incest.
• Religious Truth Can Be Known — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the claim that religious claims cannot be proven and are therefore irrelevant. It argues that such responses are mere assertions offered without justification, and that atheists should be held to the same standard of justification they require of Christians for belief in God.
• Responding to the Charge of Closed-Mindedness — Jason Dulle
  Advises how to respond when Christians are accused of being closed-minded, beginning by asking the accuser what the term means, since such charges are often used unthinkingly as a conversation-stopping trump card.
• Responding to the Jesus' Words Only View of the New Testament — Jason Dulle
  Examines the "Jesus' words only" view, held by some liberal Christians, that Christ's words are authoritative but the apostles' words — usually Paul's — are heretical deviations. It argues this position lacks support from both Scripture and reason, noting that Jesus Himself declared those who believed on Him would listen to His apostles' words.
• Responding to the “change and diversity” argument against moral objectivism — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the "change and diversity" argument against moral objectivism, arguing that disagreement about morality does not imply the absence of moral truth and that relativists confuse moral epistemology with moral ontology.
• Scaling the Gulf Between Scientific and Religious Knowledge — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the perceived gulf between scientific knowledge and religious knowledge in an increasingly secular society. It argues that science is not the enemy of religion, since the book of Scripture and the book of nature have the same author and cannot ultimately contradict one another.
• Senate Leader Bill Frist's Pro-Life Confusion — Jason Dulle
  Criticizes Senate Leader Bill Frist for announcing support for a bill expanding federal funding for destructive embryo research while claiming to be pro-life. It argues his opposition to abortion is not principled, because the same principles of logic and moral reasoning that make abortion morally unacceptable apply to embryonic stem-cell research.
• Skepticism Is Not Worthy of Belief — Jason Dulle
  Argues that radical skepticism is not worthy of belief because it is self-refuting: the skeptic claims to know that nothing can be known, yet fails to doubt his own doubt. It also argues that doubting all things is epistemically impossible, since doubt rests on prior beliefs that are not themselves doubted.
• Space is Not Eternal — Jason Dulle
  Argues that space, like matter, had a beginning, since finite space cannot be eternal. It supports the point with Big Bang cosmology's point of singularity and develops a philosophical case for the temporality of space.
• The "Jesus Never Existed" Fable — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the claim that Jesus never existed because no historian mentioned Him until 60 years after His crucifixion. It argues from a historian's perspective that such a gap is not significant, noting for comparison that the two earliest biographies of Alexander the Great were written by Arrian and Plutarch more than 400 years after his death, yet no historian doubts his existence.
• The (In)adequacy of Darwinian Evolution — Jason Dulle
  Argues that many people accept Darwin's theory of evolution mainly because it is the scientific consensus, without sufficient understanding of the theory or its evidence. It contends that scientists, like everyone else, bring philosophical assumptions and biases to the evidence they interpret.
• The Eulogy of Meaning — Jason Dulle
  Reflects on why human beings are compelled to seek purpose and ultimate fulfillment rather than being satisfied with bare existence, lamenting how little thought most people give to eternal things amid daily entertainment and busyness. It asks why we are here, what we are supposed to do with our lives, and what will bring us ultimate fulfillment.
• The Evidentiary Basis for Affirming the Resurrection of Jesus Christ — Jason Dulle
  Argues that Christianity rests on God's activity in history and sets out to demonstrate the historical reliability of the Biblical accounts. It presents the resurrection of Jesus as the capstone of that activity, whose credibility supports the theological claims tied to it.
• The God-Gene: Is Religious Faith and Experience a Biological Misunderstanding? — Jason Dulle
  Examines molecular biologist Dean Hamer's thesis, reported by Time magazine, that spirituality is a biological trait hardwired into our genes. It poses the question of whether religious faith and experience are genuine perceptions of a divine reality or merely a biological misunderstanding caused by ignorance of our own physiology.
• The Hiddenness of God Objection to Theism — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the atheistic "hiddenness of God" objection, which argues that God's existence is not as obvious as it should be if He existed, so rational persons should conclude He probably does not exist. It offers responses including denying that the conclusion follows from the observation, since absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
• The Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus: A Short Case — Jason Dulle
  Presents a short historical case for the resurrection of Jesus, arguing that there are good, objective, historical reasons to believe Jesus rose from the dead. It identifies the New Testament Gospels and Paul's writings as the primary source material, while acknowledging and addressing the objection that they were written by Jesus' disciples.
• The Marriage Amendment: No Rights Are Being Taken Away — Jason Dulle
  Argues against the claim that a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman would take rights away, asking where rights come from and whether homosexuals currently have a right to marry.
• The Myth of the Divine Matchmaker — Jason Dulle
  Argues against the idea of soulmates - one person personally created by God for each individual to marry - calling the notion unreasonable, unbiblical, and impractical. It also critiques the method of finding "the one" through prayer, feelings, or signs, and promises a brief exposition of the biblical teaching.
• The Question of Truth and Apologetics in a Modern/Postmodern World — Jason Dulle
  Examines the question of truth in a modern and postmodern, pluralistic world, contrasting the Christian claim that objective reality exists independently of human knowing with views that treat truth as personally or communally constructed and relative.
• The Same-Sex Marriage Debate: Who Has the Burden of Proof? — Jason Dulle
  Argues that in the same-sex marriage debate the burden of proof lies not with defenders of traditional marriage but with those who wish to change 5,000 years of human civilization. It examines the typical arguments from love, equality, and freedom, contending that marriage is about families and children rather than love.
• Theistic Evolution: The Illegitimate Marriage of Theism and Evolution — Jason Dulle
  Argues against theistic evolution as an illegitimate attempt to wed theism to evolutionary theory. It contends that evolutionary theory by nature excludes God as creator, so the claim that God used evolution to create cannot reconcile the two views.
• Thinking About a Whole 'Lotta Nothing — Jason Dulle
  Reflects on the concept of nothing, asking what nothing is, whether there could have been nothing rather than something, and why there is something rather than nothing.
• Truth, Experience, and Meaning — Jason Dulle
  Presents an exchange with a fellow believer about the nature and knowability of truth, particularly the tendency to base truth-claims on personal experience. It argues that competing experiences cannot adjudicate between opposing truth-claims, which must instead be settled by use of the rational faculties.
• Two Kinds of Narrow-Mindedness — Jason Dulle
  Distinguishes two kinds of narrow-mindedness: believing in the existence and knowability of truth, and holding one's views dogmatically without justification, and suggests how to respond when accused of being narrow-minded.
• Was Bodily Resurrection a Later Christian Invention? — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the claim that overtly physical resurrection appearances were later inventions of Luke and John to counter non-physical views, arguing that references to the physical nature of Christ's resurrection are by no means absent from Matthew and Mark.
• What exactly does it mean to be an “atheist”? — Jason Dulle
  Examines the debate over defining "atheist," contrasting the traditional definition - the belief that God does not exist - with Antony Flew's redefinition of atheism as simply lacking belief in God. It argues the definition matters because it determines who bears the burden of justification for a claim.
• What is the Definition of the "Definition" of Marriage? — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the same-sex marriage debate should not begin with marriage's form (one man and one woman) but with its purpose, since the traditional form is only necessary once the purpose of civil marriage is understood. It begins that case by citing Justice Cordy's dissenting comments on the important functions of the institution of marriage.
• What Makes Morality Moral? — Jason Dulle
  Examines divine command theory by asking what makes morality moral and what gives God's commands their morally binding force. It distinguishes God's commands as a source of our knowledge of morality from the deeper ontological grounding of goodness, noting that on the popular view goodness is reduced to God's power to command.
• What Single-Parenting Can Tell Us About Same-Sex Parenting — Jason Dulle
  Argues from the documented emotional and social difficulties of children reared in single-parent homes that same-sex parenting cannot supply what children need merely by having two adults present. It contends that what children need is not simply the number of parents or love alone, but a mother and a father.
• What's the Big Deal About Those Tiny Little Embryos? — Jason Dulle
  Critiques embryonic stem-cell research, arguing that amid media hype, junk science, empty promises, misinformation, and political campaigning, very little attention has been given to a scientific and moral analysis of the research. It examines prominent pro-research voices, such as John Kerry and Ron Reagan Jr., in that light.
• When Did God Create the Cosmos? — Jason Dulle
  Reflects on the question "What was God doing before He created the cosmos?" It argues that there could be no "before" creation because time itself began with creation, while noting how difficult this is for time-bound creatures to express in language.
• Why is there Something Rather than Nothing? — Jason Dulle
  Poses the question of why there is something rather than nothing, noting that nonexistence is logically coherent. It considers scientific evidence pointing to an absolute origin of matter, space, and time, and the materialist claim that the universe popped into being from literally nothing.
• Why the Same-Sex Marriage Debate Matters — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the irrelevancy objection that legally recognizing same-sex relationships as marriage would not affect other marriages or society at large. It argues the debate matters because, among other effects, it would sever the connection between marriage and procreation and child-rearing.
• You Can't Know Atheism is True Unless God Exists — Jason Dulle
  Argues that atheism cannot be known to be true unless God exists, contending that if God does not exist, human beliefs are wholly determined by materialistic processes and cannot amount to genuine knowledge.
• You're Only a Christian Because You Were Born in America — Jason Dulle
  Refutes the argument that one's religion is merely a geographic accident of birthplace, showing that the argument cuts against the religious pluralist as well and that it commits the genetic fallacy, since the truth of a belief is independent of how one came to hold it.

Ecclesiology

• A Pastoral Theology from 1 & 2 Timothy & Titus — Jason Clark
  Develops a theology of pastoral ministry from 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, urging readers to set aside modern assumptions about offices such as pastor, elder, and bishop and to recover Paul's teaching on the pastoral ministry.
• Female Deacons? — Jason Dulle
  Examines the question of female deacons, presenting the deacon qualifications passage from 1 Timothy 3 in multiple translations. The passage requires deacons to be dignified, not double-tongued, not given to excessive drinking or greedy gain, tested first, and husbands of one wife who manage their children and households well.
• Ministerial Authority — Jason Dulle
  Examines the scope and limits of ministerial authority, asking where a minister's God-given authority begins and ends and at what point legitimate leadership becomes ungodly control, with elders called to be examples to the flock rather than lords over God's heritage.
• peitho (obey) in Hebrews 13:17 — Jason Dulle
  An exegetical study of the Greek word translated 'obey' in Hebrews 13:17, arguing that misunderstanding the word's meaning has led to blind obedience to ministers and to ministerial abuse of authority.
• The Church and the Sabbath — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether the Sabbath is for the Christian church today and whether Sunday is the Christian Sabbath. It frames the Sabbath question as intrinsically connected to the church's relationship to the Law of Moses, while focusing on the role and meaning of the Sabbath itself.
• You Don’t Need to Call Me Brother … Brother — Jason Dulle
  Explains why the author has come to prefer calling fellow believers by their first names rather than "Brother" or "Sister," observing that these titles are often treated as honorary marks of superiority for those in authority and tend to be used where no close relationship exists.

Eschatology

• An Evaluation of the New "Pre-Wrath" Rapture Theory — William Arnold III
  Evaluates the pre-wrath rapture theory devised by Robert Van Kampen and popularized by Marvin Rosenthal, examining the claims made in their books. The excerpt criticizes the theory's scholarship, including its handling of Biblical Greek.
• An Overview of Daniel's First Vision (Daniel 7) — William Arnold III
  Provides an overview of Daniel's first vision in Daniel 7, noting the chapter's place in the book's Aramaic section and its chiastic parallels with chapters 2-6. It introduces Daniel's dream of four beasts as a vision concerning the end times.
• Daniel's Seventy Weeks (Dan. 9:24-27) — William Arnold III
  Presents an exposition of Daniel 9:24-27, quoting the prophecy of the seventy weeks and taking up the interpretation of the sixty-nine sevens in relation to scholarly views of a future literal Tribulation.
• Elijah Will Come Again — Jason Dulle
  Examines what the Bible means by Elijah coming again - whether Malachi's prophecy was literal, fulfilled in spirit by John the Baptist, or has a double fulfillment involving both. It bases the discussion on Malachi 3:1 and 4:5-6 and notes that first-century Jews expected Elijah to return and prepare the people's hearts to receive their Messiah.
• Heaven Is Coming To Earth — Jason Dulle
  Asks what heaven is and where believers will spend eternity, arguing that most people's expectations rest on imagination rather than the biblical text. It teaches from Scripture that following the Millennium God will destroy the present earth and heavens and create a new earth and a new heaven.
• How Long Will the Tribulation Last? — William Arnold III
  Answers where the Bible mentions seven years of Tribulation. It explains that the Bible describes a seven-year period beginning with the antichrist's covenant, but that only the second half of that period is called the Great Tribulation, while the first half is the beginning of labor pains.
• Is the Destruction of the World Trade Center The Fulfillment of Revelation 17 & 18? — William Arnold III
  Answers whether the destruction of the World Trade Center fulfills the prophecy of Babylon's destruction in Revelation 17 and 18. The author answers no, arguing that Babylon's destruction takes place at the very end of the Great Tribulation, after the mark of the beast is in effect, neither of which has occurred.
• Is the Great Tribulation Already Past? — William Arnold III
  Addresses a reader's questions about tapes teaching that Matthew 24 and most of Revelation were fulfilled in AD 70 with Titus's invasion of Jerusalem. The reader asks whether that teaching has merit and how it fits passages describing a tribulation greater than any other.
• Post-Death Existence of Man--Intermediate State — Jason Dulle
  Examines individual eschatology — the state of the dead and the intermediate state between death and resurrection. It details the most significant answers given by Christians and non-Christians alike, critiques each, and seeks to formulate the most consistent model, beginning with the materialist view that death is man's final state.
• Secret Rapture? — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the pre-tribulationist notion of a "secret rapture" of the church rests on a misunderstanding of 1 Corinthians 15:51-52. It examines the teaching's theological connection to pre-tribulationism in light of Scripture's teaching that Christ's next appearance is at the second coming, at the end of Daniel's seventieth week.
• The Abomination of Desolation — William Arnold III
  Answers a question about Daniel 12:11 and whether the abolition of the regular sacrifice and the setting up of the abomination of desolation occur at the same time, 1,290 days before the end. It explains that these events are taken to mark the midpoint of Daniel's seventieth week, after which the Great Tribulation described in Matthew 24 begins.
• The Antichrist (Outline) — William Arnold III
  An outline that collects and organizes by topic the biblical information about the Antichrist — including the little horn, the man of lawlessness, and the beast — in order to answer what the Bible tells us about this person.
• The Beast of Revelation 17: Person or Institution? — Jason Dulle
  Seeks to determine whether the beast of Revelation 17 is a person or an institution, interacting with scholarly viewpoints and with the text of Revelation 13 and 17, and exploring the identity of the woman riding the beast as it bears on that question.
• The Body is More than a Shell — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the body is not a mere shell or prison housing the "real" self, as in Greek dualism, but is part of the person and is destined to be resurrected and transformed into an immortal body.
• The Day of the Lord — William Arnold III
  Examines what "the day of the Lord" refers to, arguing against understanding it as a term that must include the entire Tribulation period and the millennial kingdom. It surveys biblical descriptions of that day as one of destruction, fury and anger, clouds and darkness, retribution, and the wrath of the Lamb.
• The Latter Half of Daniel's 70th Week — William Arnold III
  Answers a question about the latter half of Daniel's 70th week, discussing the 1,260, 1,290, and 1,335 days of Daniel 12 and acknowledging that some details remain enigmatic.
• The Nature of the New Covenant and its Implications for the Church Today — Jason Dulle
  Seeks to understand the new covenant promised in Jeremiah 31 in its literary and historical context, discovering its nature and contents and determining its recipients, centered on the question of the church's relationship to Israel.
• The Order of the Book of Revelation — William Arnold III
  Examines the order of events in the book of Revelation, arguing that a strict chronology is impossible. It cites passages such as Revelation 14:1, 11:15-19, 7:15-17, and 10:7, which appear to depict end-time or eternal conditions before later chapters unfold.
• The Post-Tribulation Rapture (eBook — PDF, EPUB, MOBI, MS Reader) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Download page for the eBook edition of William Arnold III's The Post-Tribulation Rapture in PDF, EPUB, MOBI, and MS Reader (.lit) formats; the same files are also served from the site root.
• The Post-Tribulation Rapture (online book) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  William Arnold III's book The Post-Tribulation Rapture in full online: eight chapters arguing that the church will go through the Great Tribulation, plus an analytical table of contents, a Q&A section, recommended reading, and downloadable eBook formats.
• Themes in Revelation — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the macro-structure of the book of Revelation and the development of its three most prominent themes. It acknowledges the difficulty of interpreting Revelation's symbolism and the ordering of its seals, trumpets, and bowls, while arguing that much of its interpretation can be known.
• What About Soul-Sleep? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question whether the dead sleep until the rapture or go directly into God's presence, addressing the doctrine of soul-sleep. It notes that the Bible's use of "sleep" for death appears to be a euphemism limited to the description of the body, and should not be taken so literally as to exclude a surviving soul or spirit.
• What is meant by the "Lord's Day" in Rev. 1:10? — William Arnold III
  Answers what is meant by the "Lord's Day" in Revelation 1:10, distinguishing it from the "Day of the Lord" by the different Greek terms used and by its use in early Christian literature for the first day of the week.
• Who were the Nicolaitans? — William Arnold III
  Answers who the Nicolaitans of Revelation were, noting that little is known of their teaching beyond Revelation itself and considering whether they were followers of Nicolaus, possibly the deacon of Acts 6.
• Will We Know One Another In Heaven? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether we will recognize and know one another in heaven, drawing on Matthew 8:11 and the Transfiguration account of Moses and Elijah in Mark 9.

Hamartiology

• Are There Scriptures Denouncing Cremation? — William Arnold III
  Answers whether any Scriptures denounce cremation, stating that the author knows of none. It weighs the Bible's high value on the body and the resurrection against the fact that many Christians have died by being burned to death.
• Arguing Against Homosexuality — Jason Dulle
  Answers a request for biblical references beyond Genesis showing that homosexuality is wrong, and for how to demonstrate its moral wrongness to unbelievers who reject Scripture's authority. It argues the Old Testament clearly condemns homosexual practice, citing Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 and the condemnation of male temple prostitutes, and states the New Testament is just as clear.
• Was the Sin of Sodom and Gomorrah Merely Unhospitality? — William Arnold III
  Addresses whether the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah was merely unhospitality, examining the meaning of the Hebrew word translated "to know" in Genesis 19:5. It argues that the word is often used in the Bible as a euphemism for sexual relations, as in Genesis 4:1, and that most translations favor this meaning in Genesis 19:5.
• What is the Nature of Sin? — Jason Dulle
  Presents a dialogue about the nature of sin, debating whether regeneration gives believers a new heart in the sense of a constitutional change of nature or a change of the will effected by God's grace.
• When Does Our Death to Sin Occur? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses when a believer's death to sin occurs, in an exchange debating whether the ruling power of sin is broken at initial faith and justification or at water baptism in Romans 6. The author argues for an actual spiritual change at repentance and faith while questioning whether Paul locates that change at water baptism, which he treats as a symbolic burial.

Hermeneutics

• Bias, Systematic Theology, and Exegesis — Jason Dulle
  Examines how a person's prior understanding filters what can be heard and comprehended. It describes learning as assimilating new information into an existing interpretational grid, sometimes forcing the data into the grid and sometimes altering the grid to fit the data.
• Differing Levels of Relevance to Differing Audiences — Jason Dulle
  Examines Matthew 10 to demonstrate that Scripture has differing levels of relevance to differing audiences. It measures the passage's relevance to three distinct groups: the original hearers of Jesus' words, the original readers of Matthew's gospel, and later readers.
• That's Just Your Interpretation — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the charge "that's just your interpretation" by explaining the process of exegesis and the principle that valid interpretation requires the receiver to accurately understand the author's intent.
• The Difference between Event and Text and the Interpreter’s Task — Jason Clark
  Argues that the biblical text, not the historical event behind it, is the proper object of interpretation, since the text is the vehicle that contains the actual message of God. It defines "event" as the historical circumstance that occurred and "text" as the written record of that event, captured through the personality and literary style of its chronicler.
• The Goal of Interpretation — Jason Clark
  Argues that the goal of interpretation is to reconstruct the original intent of the author, since communication is the transfer of ideas from one party to another. It warns that without the sender's intended meaning as the goal, meaning becomes arbitrary and descends into relativism, confusion, and disagreement.
• The Hermeneutical Spiral — William Arnold III
  Explains interpretation as a communication process in which a reader decodes a text while bringing along presuppositions. It argues that some preunderstanding is inevitable and necessary, since a reader can only make sense of a message by relating it to what is already understood.
• What is the Relationship of Reason to Revelation? — Jason Dulle
  Examines the relationship between reason and revelation, surveying positions ranging from "Revelation Only" and "Reason Only" to views that give one priority over the other or hold both together. It defines reason as the mind's natural ability to discover and process truth and revelation as God's supernatural disclosure of truth, and begins evaluating positions such as Kierkegaard's.
• Who needs Hermeneutics? — William Arnold III
  Introduces hermeneutics as the science of interpretation and argues it is needed because godly, Spirit-filled believers differ over passages not from insincerity but from approaching Scripture with different rules of interpretation. It urges careful, precise handling of Scripture — attention to context, grammar, and sound hermeneutical principles — rather than carelessness.

Miscellaneous

• About the Apostolic Faith — William Arnold III
  Responds to a correspondent's request for a better understanding of the Apostolic faith, taking up questions about Jesus being the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, passages where only the Father knows certain things, Jesus calling Himself the Son of God, and Stephen seeing Jesus standing at the right hand of God.
• An Evaluation of Astrology — Jason Dulle
  Evaluates astrology, explaining its underlying belief that the positions of the stars and planets at the moment of one's birth directly influence the events and destiny of one's life as charted in a horoscope.
• Binding and Loosing — Jason Dulle
  Examines binding and loosing in Matthew 16:19, Matthew 18:18, and John 20:23, asking whether the church initiates decisions that heaven must ratify or carries out decisions God has already made in heaven, and surveys historical views such as church discipline and the administration of the sacraments.
• Can God Transcend Time to Know the Future? — Jason Dulle
  Questions why theology permits qualifications on God's omnipotence, following Aquinas, but not the same qualifications on His omniscience. It presses the problem of how God can immutably foreknow the future free actions of moral agents.
• Divorce & Remarriage: A Biblical Synthesis — Jason Dulle
  Presents a biblical synthesis on divorce and remarriage, in a research paper the author compares in length to reading a 150-page book, with a shorter companion paper offered for a quicker read. It opens with a scenario of a Christian couple, Rick and Sarah, facing divorce despite having long agreed that divorce was not an option for them.
• Does God's Knowledge of the Future Render Free Will and Human Responsibility Meaningless? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether God's knowledge of the future renders free will and human responsibility meaningless, in an exchange over whether God exists outside of time with past, present, and future as one big "now." The author resists the idea that the future already exists in all its detail, arguing that such an idea would destroy human responsibility and any measure of free will.
• Einstein and Time: A Critical Evaluation — Jason Dulle
  Critically evaluates Einstein's special theory of relativity, agreeing with general relativity but questioning whether time itself slows down as matter accelerates toward the speed of light. It argues the issue hinges on whether time is physical, since science can only observe and test the physical world and time lacks physical properties such as weight or chemical composition.
• Evolution - Science or Religion? — Arlo Moehlenpah
  Argues that the theory of evolution is not supported by scientific evidence as the public has been taught, and that it functions as religion rather than science. It frames school board and court battles over creation and evolution as wrongly presenting the issue as religion versus science, and begins by defining what science is.
• Figures of Speech — Jason Dulle
  Answers how a literal interpretation of Scripture accounts for figures of speech such as God hiding his people under his wings. It distinguishes a literal historical-grammatical interpretation from a hyper-literal interpretation, explaining that every language contains figures of speech that are automatically interpreted to uncover their underlying reality.
• Foreknowledge and Free Will — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the relationship between God's foreknowledge and human free will, distinguishing foreknowledge - knowing beforehand what will happen - from predestination, or making it happen. The exchange also fields the challenge of where the Bible speaks of free will, while the author declines to enter the Calvinism/Arminianism debate by email.
• Forgiveness: The Misunderstood Virtue — Jason Dulle
  Argues that many Christians who sincerely want to forgive still struggle with feelings of anger, resentment, and bitterness because of their misunderstanding of biblical forgiveness, not because their forgiveness is insincere. It identifies three pervasive misunderstandings about forgiveness and counters that the Bible teaches the purpose of forgiveness is the reconciliation of personal relationships and that forgiveness requires the participation of both the offender and the offended.
• How Can I Know the Will of God? — Jason Dulle
  Answers how a believer can know when God is speaking and when something is merely self-will. It explains that God reveals His will in varied ways to different believers, and suggests that believers sometimes make finding God's will harder than it really is.
• I.N.R.I.: The Inscription on the Cross — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the apparent contradiction among the four Gospels over the wording of the inscription above Jesus on the cross, as recorded in Matthew 27:37, Mark 15:26, Luke 23:38, and John. It explains the differences as omissions and slight variations in quotation, noting Jesus most likely spoke Aramaic while the New Testament was inspired in Greek.
• IBS and Standards — Jason Dulle
  Presents a young Apostolic minister's questions about why IBS maintains a policy of not discussing standards. The letter asks whether there is a biblical basis for standards, what holiness is, and what role standards and personal holiness should play in a believer's life.
• Is It OK to Pray the Sinner's Prayer? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question whether it is OK to pray the sinner's prayer, noting that the apostles did not lead people in such a prayer in Scripture. It responds that it may be acceptable to give someone a model prayer to confess their sinfulness, as the Lord gave a model prayer, provided it does not become meaningless repetition.
• Legalism — Jason Dulle
  Describes legalism as a contagious and deadly disease that is hard to recognize, arguing that legalist behavior can look identical to true holiness while differing in the motive of the heart.
• Miracles and the Laws of Nature — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the objection that miracles would violate the laws of nature, arguing that natural laws are not physical entities with causal properties and so are misconstrued by that objection.
• Mutual Submission? — Jason Dulle
  Questions the idea of mutual submission, arguing that submission presupposes a hierarchy of authority and that understanding every Christian as yielding to every other would gut submission of its fundamental meaning.
• Not So Fast: Is This the Fast the Lord Has Chosen? — Jason Dulle
  Examines the biblical teaching on fasting, addressing Christian confusion over everything from its frequency to its purpose and evaluating popular theories about the benefits of fasting. It distinguishes Old Testament from New Testament fasting and starts from Jesus' statement that his followers would fast once the bridegroom was taken from them (Matthew 9:15), focusing the discussion on why believers are to fast.
• Oneness Pentecostalism — William Arnold III
  Presents an email exchange in which the author defends the Oneness position and speaking in tongues as the normative experience for believers, replying to a correspondent who warns against 'salvation by works' doctrines.
• Other Human Beings? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether God created other human beings besides Adam and Eve, arguing that Genesis mentions no others and that Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 teach that all humanity sinned in Adam.
• Recommendations for Commentaries — William Arnold III
  Answers a request for commentary recommendations, giving the highest recommendation to the Expositor's Bible Commentary and discussing other commentary sets valued for combining scholarship, value, and accessibility.
• The (Ab)use of Faith — Jason Dulle
  Critiques deficient conceptions of faith, including faith as a mental state for tapping into God's resources, faith as an incorporeal substance "out there," and faith as wishful thinking sealed with the phrase "in Jesus' name." It presents the nature of faith as one of the most misunderstood concepts in Christianity, despite faith being the means by which believers receive all that God has secured for them.
• The Biblical Significance of Names — Jason Dulle
  Explores the biblical significance of names, particularly as it relates to prayer and baptism, contrasting modern Western use of names as mere designators with the greater significance attached to names in the East.
• The Biblical Teaching on Judgmentalism: Setting the Record Straight — Jason Dulle
  Argues that both the church and the wider culture have misunderstood the biblical teaching on judgmentalism, examining passages such as Matthew 7:1 that are commonly cited in support of non-judgmentalism.
• The Compatibility of Divine Foreknowledge and Human Freedom — Jason Dulle
  Examines the compatibility of divine foreknowledge and human freedom, posing the problem that if God infallibly foreknows what we will do, we cannot freely choose otherwise and may be mere actors playing out parts written for us. It engages Darwinist Robert Eberle's version of the objection, which claims that an infallible God who knows what is going to happen conflicts with free choice and responsibility.
• The Cursed Doctrine of "Generational Curses" — Jason Dulle
  Challenges the doctrine of "generational curses," arguing that passages such as Exodus 20:5 about God visiting the fathers' iniquity on the children do not mean God punishes children for their fathers' sins. It examines the context of these passages, including Deuteronomy 5:9-10, to make its case.
• Thoughts on the Lord's Supper — Jason Dulle
  Expresses concerns about how many Protestant churches practice the Lord's Supper and argues from Acts 2:42 and other evidence that the early church celebrated it regularly, if not weekly, as a time of joy and hope.
• Time, Eternity, and Predestination — Jason Dulle
  Examines the nature of time and God's relationship to it, taking the position that it cannot rightly be said that God exists in the past, present, and future simultaneously. It draws out the implications for understanding eternity and for the relationship between God's foreknowledge, predestination, and human free will.
• Turn the Other Cheek — Jason Dulle
  Interprets Jesus's command to turn the other cheek (Matthew 5:39), questioning whether it teaches pacifism or non-defense against attackers. It notes that Jesus Himself did not literally turn His cheek when struck at His trial, and draws attention to His specific mention of the right cheek.
• What Do I Do If My Pastor Will Not Recognize My Calling? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of what to do when one's pastor will not recognize a felt calling to ministry, responding cautiously out of respect for ministerial authority while noting that God can speak through people in positions of authority.
• What Legalism Is and Is Not — Jason Dulle
  Distinguishes what legalism is and is not by outlining its different manifestations, including reliance on one's own performance to merit God's favor and confusing personal convictions with biblical mandates or enforcing extra-biblical standards on others.
• Who Needs Theology — Jason Dulle
  Asks who needs theology, surveying viewpoints that range from theology being only for scholars to every believer needing to study it. It begins by clarifying what theology is not, rejecting misconceptions such as theology being pointless questions or the possession of a select intellectual few.
• Who was Melchizedek? - Two Views — Jason Dulle
  Surveys two views on the identity of Melchizedek, noting the many proposals (theophany, angel, pre-incarnate Christ, Shem) and observing that Scripture focuses more on the nature of his priesthood than on his person.
• Why Do Some Jews Spell God, "G-d?" — William Arnold III
  Answers why some Jews spell God as "G-d," tracing the practice to caution about the third commandment (Exodus 20:7). It explains that this reverence led Jews to stop pronouncing God's name, substitute "Adonai" when reading, and leave the exact vowels of the tetragrammaton (YHWH) uncertain.
• Why Human Freedom Does, and Divine Freedom Does Not Require the Ability to Choose Evil — Jason Dulle
  Answers an objection to the free will defense: if the ability to choose evil is necessary for human free will, why does God, who cannot choose evil, enjoy free will? It restates the question as a formal argument alleging a logical inconsistency within Christian theism before attempting an answer.

New Testament

• "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believed" — Jason Dulle
  Examines Thomas's demand to see the risen Jesus and Jesus' pronouncement blessing those who have not seen and yet believed, taking up the use of this passage by those who regard apologetics as irrelevant or contrary to Scripture and its apparent anti-evidence reading.
• "Test the spirits" and "he who is in the world": Are these verses about spiritual warfare? — Jason Dulle
  Examines 1 John 4:1-6 in context, asking whether "test the spirits" and "greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world" are really about spiritual warfare. It sets the passages against John's stated concern with false prophets and confessing that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh.
• A Commentary on the Book of Colossians — William Arnold III
  A commentary on the book of Colossians, opening with the case for Pauline authorship, the letter's date and audience at Colosse, its parallels with Ephesians and Philemon, and its comprehensive teaching on Christology.
• A Commentary on the Book of Jude — William Arnold III
  Provides a verse-by-verse commentary on the Book of Jude, discussing matters such as the identity of Jude and James and the meaning of Jude's appeal to contend earnestly for the faith.
• A Comparison of Ephesians and Colossians — Jason Dulle
  Compares the epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians, focusing on their parallels and distinguishing marks on both a macro and a micro level. It notes evidence that the two were written and delivered at the same time to the same general area by Paul, including his imprisonment references and Tychicus as the bearer of both epistles.
• A Technical Commentary on Ephesians 1:3-14 — William Arnold III
  Provides a technical commentary on Ephesians 1:3-14, beginning with a grammatical analysis and the passage's three major textual variants, two in verse 6 and one in verse 14. It weighs the manuscript evidence for each variant, largely agreeing with the textual committee's choices, and works through the text of the passage.
• A Technical Commentary on Ephesians 4:7-16 — Jason Dulle
  Provides a technical grammatical commentary on Ephesians 4:7-16, parsing the passage phrase by phrase, including Christ's ascension and descent and his giving of apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, and teachers. It identifies the purpose of these gifts as equipping the saints for the work of service and edifying the body of Christ until all attain unity and maturity.
• An Examination of the Word pisteuo (believe) in the Gospel of John — William Arnold III
  Examines the use of the word pisteuo ("believe") in the Gospel of John, noting that John overwhelmingly uses the verb rather than the noun "faith," and relating this pattern of believing and not believing to the signs given so readers may have life in Jesus' name.
• An Exegesis of Philippians 2:6-11 — Jason Dulle
  An exegesis of Philippians 2:6-11, examining the passage's pattern of humiliation followed by exaltation and the debate between adoptionistic and incarnational readings of Christ's deity.
• An Exposition of Ephesians 1:17-19 — William Arnold III
  Exposits Ephesians 1:17-19, arguing that Paul's references to "the God of our Lord Jesus Christ" reflect the genuineness of Christ's humanity, while other passages affirm his full deity. It also explains that the "spirit of wisdom and revelation" Paul prays for is not a literal spirit, any more than a "spirit of stupor" or a "spirit of gentleness" is.
• An Outline of the Gospel of John — William Arnold III
  An outline of the Gospel of John. The excerpt consists of a single outline line — covering Jesus going away, sending the comforter, and returning (16:1-33) — so the outline's full scope cannot be detailed from the opening text.
• Are Acts 9:7 and 22:9 A Contradiction? — William Arnold III
  Addresses the apparent contradiction between Acts 9:7 and Acts 22:9 over whether the men traveling with Saul heard the voice that spoke to him.
• Books of the Bible Survey 2: New Testament (audio) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio teaching (mp3) by William Arnold III, listed on the IBS homepage under New Testament: Books of the Bible Survey 2: New Testament (audio).
• First Corinthians 15--Flesh and Blood Not Inheriting the Kingdom — Jason Dulle
  Interprets Paul's statement in 1 Corinthians 15:50 that "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God," asking whether he meant believers will have spirit bodies rather than physical bodies in the afterlife. It argues that, viewed within its resurrection context rather than taken at face value, the phrase cannot be read to deny a physical, bodily resurrection.
• Geographical and Temporal Markers in the Canonical Gospels — Jason Dulle
  Catalogues the geographical and temporal markers in the canonical Gospels — statements answering when and where Jesus said and did things — and compares which evangelists provide the most detail. It contrasts this abundance of detail with Gnostic gospels such as the Gospel of Thomas, which provide few if any such markers.
• Gods Ways/Thoughts are Above Our Ways/Thoughts — Jason Dulle
  Argues that Isaiah 55:8-9 — "my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways" — is commonly taken out of context when quoted to plead ignorance or to escape an opponent's evidence. In context, it says, the Lord's ways and thoughts are contrasted with those of the wicked, so the passage teaches divine superiority rather than divine incomprehensibility.
• Hebrews 7:12--Changed or Abolished? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether Hebrews 7:12 means the law was changed or abolished, arguing from ordinary language use, the underlying Greek, and context that "change" indicates removing one thing and putting another in its place.
• How Was Jesus in the Earth for Three Days and Three Nights? — William Arnold III
  Answers how Jesus could be in the earth "three days and three nights" (Matthew 12:40) when the chronology does not add up to three full 24-hour periods. It argues that the phrase is a figure of speech and that in rabbinic reckoning any part of a day and a night counted as the whole; it also notes that a Wednesday crucifixion is a minority view that does not solve the problem.
• Loving Beyond Differences: An Exposition on Romans 14:1--15:3 — Jason Dulle
  Presents an exposition of Romans 14:1-15:3 as a passage on Christian liberty, described as the Biblical alternative to legalism. It sets the passage against the contention between the Jewish and Gentile factions in the Roman church, who misunderstood the church as a unified body of believers equal before God.
• Major Themes of the Book of Titus — William Arnold III
  Demonstrates that the message of the epistle to Titus is an emphasis on sound doctrine and on good works. It traces the occurrences of the sound-doctrine theme, the doctrine Paul gives and its hindrances, and Paul's stress on good works and the means to achieve them.
• Should Christians Celebrate Easter and Christmas? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether Christians may celebrate Christmas and Easter given their roots in pagan worship, and what to make of Santa Claus. It acknowledges the pagan roots are undisputed but argues that nearly everything in our culture — even the names of months, planets, and days of the week — has pagan origins.
• Synthetic Chart of Matthew (Acrobat Reader required) (at the Institute’s site) — Jason Clark
  Synthetic Chart of Matthew (PDF): Jason Clark's one-chart analytical outline of the Gospel of Matthew, listed in the site's New Testament index (Acrobat Reader required, per the index).
• The Argument of the Book of Romans — Jason Dulle
  Traces the literary argument of Paul's epistle to the Romans, following his line of reasoning from beginning to conclusion to show both the letter's macro- and micro-structure. It proceeds through the text in order, asking why Paul advances each subject and how it advances his argument.
• The Bodily Resurrection of Christ Defended — Jason Dulle
  Defends the bodily, physical resurrection of Christ, arguing that Jesus still possesses His glorified physical body in heaven and that the view that He rose as a spirit only denies the testimony of Scripture and the purpose of the resurrection.
• The Complementary Messages of Luke and Acts — Jason Dulle
  Shows the connection between the Gospel of Luke and Acts as companion works addressed to Theophilus, exploring each book's general message and themes and how Acts builds upon Luke.
• The Gospel According to the Galatians — Jason Dulle
  Explains the occasion and message of Paul's epistle to the Galatians, written after converted Jews taught the churches that keeping the Law of Moses was necessary in addition to being born again. It presents Paul's main thesis that salvation is by faith in Jesus Christ and not by works of the Law.
• The Gospels: Why Did It Take So Long for the Church to Write About Jesus? — Jason Dulle
  Asks why it took roughly 20–25 years after Jesus' ascension for the church to write the Gospels, with Mark as the earliest. It finds the common answer — that no need was felt because Christ's return was expected imminently — inadequate, noting that apocalyptic groups such as the Qumran community were in fact voluminous writers.
• The Inferiority of the Law to the New Covenant in Galatians — Jason Dulle
  Studies Paul's theology of the Law in Galatians, identifying the heresy of reinstating the Law of Moses as a means of justification for Christian believers. It sets out Paul's reasoning for regarding the Law-keeping approach to God as error, dangerous, and anti-Christian, within the occasion, purpose, and theme of the epistle.
• The Meaning of "I.N.R.I." — Jason Dulle
  Answers a question about the meaning of "I.N.R.I." seen in artistic symbolism over the cross and what language it is. It explains the letters stand for "Iesus Nazarenvs Rex Ivdaeorvm" — Latin, in which I and V represent English J and U — meaning "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews," the phrase Pilate displayed over Jesus on the cross.
• The Prayer Closet: Did Jesus teach that corporate, vocalized prayer is wrong? — Jason Dulle
  Examines Jesus' instruction in Matthew 6:5-6 to pray in secret and argues that it does not teach that corporate, vocalized prayer is wrong. It points to Jesus' use of "our" in the model prayer and to biblical examples of corporate prayer.
• The Synoptic Gospels — Jason Dulle
  Explains why Matthew, Mark, and Luke are called the Synoptic Gospels: they present a similar view of Jesus, emphasizing His teachings, miracles, and passion and resurrection. It outlines the four major periods of Jesus' life common to all three accounts and notes Jesus' presentation as Messiah and suffering servant rather than a political ruler.
• The Theme of "Messiah" in the Gospel of John — Jason Dulle
  Traces the theme of "Messiah" in the Gospel of John, examining the different terms used in John's day to designate the Messiah and the meaning John invests in each title.
• Was the Crucifixion Really on Friday and the Resurrection on Sunday? — William Arnold III
  Answers the charge that Christ did not die on Friday or rise on the first day of the week and that Sunday observance rests on a lie of the Roman church. The response argues from the preparation-day and Sabbath references in the Gospels that the preparation day was Friday, the Sabbath was Saturday, and Jesus rose before sunrise on Sunday morning.
• Who is the "Queen of the South?" — William Arnold III
  Answers the question who the "Queen of the South" is, identifying her as the Queen of Sheba who heard of Solomon's great wisdom. It notes that Sheba was a country in southwest Arabia, corresponding to present-day Yemen.

Old Testament

• A Survey of 2 Samuel — William Arnold III
  Surveys the narrative of 2 Samuel, tracing David's rise from learning of Saul's death to becoming king over all Israel, conquering Jerusalem, defeating the Philistines, and bringing the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem.
• A Survey of Deuteronomy — William Arnold III
  Surveys the book of Deuteronomy as Moses' summary of the law from Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers for the new generation of Israelites after the wilderness wandering. It outlines the book's four parts - Moses' three sermons reviewing Israel's history and law and warning against disobedience, plus a conclusion.
• About the Book of Enoch — William Arnold III
  Answers a request for information about the book of Enoch, explaining that Jude 14-15 directly quotes Enoch's prophecy and that the book belongs to the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, not the Septuagint or the Apocrypha. It describes the book's account of angels mixing with women and producing giants, as in Genesis 6, and notes the book was not actually written by Enoch.
• Adam Was Not Present During Eve's Temptation — Jason Dulle
  Argues from a close reading of Genesis 3 that the temptation and the Fall were separated in time, and that Adam was not present with Eve during her temptation by the serpent, though he was with her when he ate the fruit.
• An Examination of Psalm 130 — Jason Dulle
  Presents an exegesis of Psalm 130 that explores the psalm's background, type, literary structure, and key words for purposes of exegesis and devotion. It notes that the psalm is an unnamed composition by a penitential Israelite and carries no superscription indicating its historical situation.
• An Examination of Psalm 2 — Jason Dulle
  Presents an exegesis of Psalm 2 that analyzes the psalm's structure, imagery, and central message. It observes that the psalm's structure is indicated within the Hebrew itself, consisting of four stanzas of three verses each.
• Books of the Bible Survey 1: Genesis - Acts (audio) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio teaching (mp3) by William Arnold III, listed on the IBS homepage under Old Testament: Books of the Bible Survey 1: Genesis - Acts (audio).
• Did Moses Write Deuteronomy? — Jason Dulle
  Examines arguments against Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy, such as the narrator's perspective from within Canaan and the book's third-person account of Moses's words and deeds.
• Does the New Testament Interpret the Old? — William Arnold III
  Answers whether the New Testament interprets the Old, grounding the idea in progressive revelation and arguing that the New Testament is the best commentary on the Old Testament.
• Evidence for post-Mosaic additions to Genesis — Jason Dulle
  Presents evidence for post-Mosaic additions to Genesis, such as the reference to Dan in Genesis 14:14, a name the region received only after the conquest of Canaan, and considers possible rebuttals.
• Habakkuk: Journey Toward a Theodicy — Jason Dulle
  Examines the book of Habakkuk as one man's journey toward a theodicy — seeking to understand the existence and continuation of evil in light of God's righteousness. It studies the book within its historical and theological context, including Habakkuk's complaint of oppression and God's answer that He would raise up the Chaldeans to judge the nation, and draws implications for the church today.
• Introduction to the Psalms (audio) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio teaching (mp3) by William Arnold III, listed on the IBS homepage under Old Testament: Introduction to the Psalms (audio).
• Is Heaven in the Old Testament? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of whether the Old Testament promises heaven, noting that it speaks of heaven mainly as God's abode, that the dead went to Sheol, and that a believer could not enter God's presence directly until Jesus paid for the sins of the world.
• Major Themes of Isaiah 40-48 — Jason Clark
  Surveys the major themes of Isaiah 40-48, written against the backdrop of Judah's uncertainty after the Northern Kingdom fell to Assyria in 722 B.C. It identifies the dominant themes as the redemption of Israel from Babylonian captivity through Cyrus, Yahweh's role as suzerain to His servant Israel, and the contrast between Yahweh and idols.
• Psalm 110:1 — A Case Study for the NT use of the OT — Jason Dulle
  Uses Psalm 110:1 as a case study for how the New Testament uses the Old Testament, analyzing the psalm's structure and original context. It argues that in the original setting the prophet addressed David as his lord, with verses 1b and 4 conveying YHWH's message to the king.
• Psalm 11: Confidence in God's Power — Jason Dulle
  Offers an exposition of Psalm 11 as an account of one man's confidence in God's power. It classifies the psalm as a song of trust of the individual and connects its theme to the exhortation in Hebrews 10:35 not to throw away confidence.
• Questions About the Integrity of Genesis — William Arnold III
  Answers questions about the integrity of Genesis, including apparent discrepancies over the numbers of animals taken into the ark and the duration of the flood. It offers possible explanations — such as chapter two being not a second creation account but a focus on mankind — while acknowledging the details are not agreed upon even by conservative scholars.
• Subject/Purpose of the Book of Exodus — Jason Dulle
  Summarizes the subject and purpose of the book of Exodus: Israel's redemption from Egypt by YHWH's great power through Moses, and Israel's beginning as the covenant people of God through the Mosaic Law. It covers the call of Moses, the ten plagues, the Decalogue and covenant laws, Israel's idolatry, and the detailed description of the tabernacle and the ordination of the Levites in the book's latter half.
• Subject/Purpose of the Book of Genesis — Jason Dulle
  Surveys the subject and purpose of the book of Genesis, outlining its structure of 'toledoths' (generations), its opening chapters on creation, the fall, the flood, and Babel, and its accounts of the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. It states Genesis's purpose as showing the superiority of YHWH over the nature deities of Egypt and His desire to bless a cursed world through Abraham and his seed, Israel.
• The Law: The Misunderstood Covenant — Jason Dulle
  Examines the Mosaic Law as a widely misunderstood covenant, posing questions about what the Law is, who it was given to, how long it was intended to remain in effect, and its nature.
• The Shekel and a Half Doctrine: Shortchanging Scripture and the People of God — Jason Dulle
  Examines the "Shekel and a Half" doctrine circulating in the author's fellowship, which claims that believers must pay an additional 5 percent beyond the tithe, often for church upkeep or a building program. It introduces the appeal made to Exodus 30:11-16, where those numbered in the census pay a half shekel as an offering to the Lord.
• When Was Eve Created? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether Eve was created during the creation week or after it, responding to the view that Genesis 2:18-25 places her creation after the seventh day. It argues from Genesis 1:27-28 that male and female were both present on day six, noting the plural pronouns used of them in verse 28.

Pneumatology

• 1 Corinthians 14:22 - How are Tongues and Prophecy Signs to Unbelievers and Believers? — Jason Dulle
  Examines Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 12–14 on tongues and prophecy as signs, arguing that tongues edify the assembly only when interpreted, whereas prophecy edifies believers and unbelievers alike.
• Are There Counterfeit Tongues? — William Arnold III
  Answers whether Satan can counterfeit tongues as he counterfeits other signs and wonders, and how to explain the possibility to a skeptic. It cautions that while counterfeiting seems possible, labeling people counterfeit is dangerous and risks the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit that Jesus warned about.
• Are Tongues the Least of All Gifts? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the charge that Paul called tongues the least of all gifts. It argues that in 1 Corinthians 14 Paul was not downplaying tongues but prioritizing prophecy in corporate worship because it edifies the whole body, and that interpreted tongues stand on the same level as prophecy.
• Are Uninterpreted Tongues Worthless? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether uninterpreted tongues are worthless. It argues from 1 Corinthians 14:2 that one who speaks in a tongue speaks mysteries to God, which is far from worthless, and that Paul's instruction is for the tongues-speaker to keep silent in the church when there is no interpreter while still speaking to himself and to God.
• Can We Lose the Holy Spirit? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether a backslider who leaves the church loses the Holy Spirit, noting that the answer differs among Oneness Pentecostals and hinges on one's understanding of justification by faith.
• Did the 3000 in Acts 2:41 Receive the Spirit? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether the 3,000 who responded to Peter's preaching in Acts 2:41 received the Spirit and were saved on the Day of Pentecost or only later, and who is meant by those being added to the church daily in Acts 2:47. It notes that the text does not state when or if the 3,000 received the Spirit.
• Does Praying in the Spirit Mean Praying in Tongues? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether "praying in the Spirit" (Ephesians 6:18; Jude 1:20) means praying in tongues. It argues that 1 Corinthians 14:14-15 explicitly defines praying with the spirit as praying in a tongue, in contrast to praying with the understanding.
• Does Romans 8:26 Teach a Second Person in the Godhead? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question whether Romans 8:26 teaches a second person in the Godhead, addressing the verse's statement that the Spirit makes intercession with groanings that cannot be uttered. The response agrees that the verse is probably not about tongues, since tongues can be uttered, and begins explaining the verse according to Oneness theology.
• How Do We Distinguish Between Soul and Spirit? — William Arnold III
  Addresses questions about how soul and spirit are to be distinguished, including claims that the soul is the mind, emotions, and intellect while the spirit is the innermost being. The response calls the soul/spirit distinction really difficult, noting that many scholars today believe they are the same.
• How do We Speak in Tongues? — William Arnold III
  Answers a new believer's question about how speaking in tongues works — whether one moves one's own mouth or it moves by itself. It explains, from Acts' statement that the disciples began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave utterance, that the believers do the speaking while the Spirit gives the ability, and that speaking in tongues is not mechanical dictation since speakers can start, stop, and modulate at will.
• Is Ephesains 1:13 a Monkey-Wrench for Tongues? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether Ephesians 1:13 teaches that the Spirit is received at the point of faith, a reading used to challenge the view that receiving the Spirit is distinct from believing. It exegetes the passage, noting that in the Greek both "believed" and "received" are in the aorist tense and that the KJV reading can sound sequential while the NIV sounds contemporaneous.
• Is Interpreting our Own Tongues Biblical? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether a person can interpret his or her own tongues, arguing from 1 Corinthians 14:13 that the one who speaks in tongues is the same person who should pray that he may interpret.
• Is Prophecy Tongues? — Jason Dulle
  Presents a dialogue over whether Peter's quotation of Joel 2:28-32 on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:16-21) identifies Joel's prophesying with speaking in tongues. It argues that since all who received the Spirit that day spoke with tongues and the promise is to all flesh, Joel's "they shall prophecy" was fulfilled by speaking in tongues.
• Is There a Difference Between Receiving the Spirit and Being Baptized in the Spirit? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether there is a difference between receiving the Spirit and being baptized in the Spirit. It argues that the two are the same, that Scripture uses the descriptions interchangeably, and that the distinction comes from Charismatic teaching rather than the biblical data.
• Must We Lay Hands on People For Them to Receive the Holy Spirit? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether laying on of hands is necessary for people to receive the Holy Spirit, considering the pattern of prayer and laying on of hands in accounts such as Acts 8.
• Should Acts 19:2 read "since" or "when you believed?" — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of whether Acts 19:2 should be read as receiving the Spirit "since" or "when" one believed, arguing that on either reading Paul indicates the Ephesian disciples had already believed but had not yet received the Spirit.
• Should We Continue to Speak in Tongues? — William Arnold III
  Addresses the case of a believer who was filled with the Holy Ghost, with the evidence of speaking in tongues, almost twenty years earlier but has not spoken in tongues since. The questioner raises the concern that the person may have been released from the prayer room too quickly and may not have genuinely received the Holy Ghost.
• Tongues are Not Learned or Known Languages — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the tongues spoken of in Acts and 1 Corinthians 12-14 are not languages learned and known by the speakers, but a supernatural gift from God. It answers the argument based on the word "unknown" before "tongues" in the KJV and examines the Greek word glossa.
• What are the Groanings that Cannot be Uttered? — Jason Dulle
  Asks what Paul means in Romans 8:26 by the Spirit interceding for believers "with groanings too deep for words" when they do not know how to pray. It questions the common Pentecostal interpretation that the groanings are praying in tongues, noting that Paul did not use the word for tongues and that tongues are expressed verbally whereas these groanings are too deep for words.
• What is the Nature of "Spirit?" — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the question of what the spirit is, considering a correspondent's understanding of spirit as deriving from root words meaning wind, breeze, and breath, whose workings are unseen like God's.
• When Was the Holy Spirit First Poured Out? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the apparent contradiction between John 20:22, where Jesus breathes on the disciples and tells them to receive the Spirit on the day of His resurrection, and Acts 2, where the disciples receive the Spirit more than 40 days later after His ascension. It examines the suggestion that there are two infillings of the Spirit — one for salvation and one for power — and raises problems with that suggestion.

Post-Tribulation Rapture subsite (post/)

• 1. What About the Millennium? — William Arnold III
  Addresses a reader's questions about the thousand-year reign of Christ: whether believers are in the Millennium now, and how the darkening of the sun, moon, and stars immediately after the tribulation relates to the end of time.
• 10. Do Your Homework — William Arnold III
  Answers a critic who claims the timing of the rapture does not matter, arguing that it does matter because Jesus told believers to watch and pray, and that those who expect to be taken beforehand may fail to do so.
• 11. The "First" Resurrection? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of whether the saints raised in Matthew 27:52-53 contradict the claim that there has been no resurrection before the future one, arguing that such raisings were temporary restorations to life while 'resurrection' in Scripture almost always means a permanent change to immortality.
• 12. Are You Fundamentalist and Dispensational? — William Arnold III
  Answers a reader who asks about the author's denominational background and whether he is a dispensationalist; the author identifies himself as a Pentecostal and explains that 'fundamentalist' simply means holding to the fundamentals of the conservative Christian faith, such as the virgin birth, Christ's bodily resurrection, and biblical inerrancy.
• 13. Types, Shadows and Degrees of Authority — William Arnold III
  Addresses a reader's challenge to the statement that theology should not be built on types and shadows, taking up how to interpret the Lamb and the seven-headed beast in Revelation, the parables, and Jesus' saying that He is the vine.
• 14. Why Will God Destroy the Earth? — William Arnold III
  Answers a reader's questions about why God would destroy the earth He created for mankind, why believers would be raptured only to return as the meek inheriting the earth, and where Scripture expressly says the Church will be raptured.
• 15. How Do I Share Post-Trib? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of how to share post-tribulation convictions within a pre-trib church, agreeing the issue is urgent — like the watchman of Ezekiel 33 who must warn of coming danger — while admitting there seems to be no inoffensive way to raise it.
• 16. Is Jesus Still Coming Soon? — William Arnold III
  Addresses a reader's questions about the Pentecostal messages of his childhood that Jesus was 'standing right at the door' — whether such messages were from the Lord — and about the author's present denomination.
• 17. What About Covenant Theology? — William Arnold III
  Answers questions about Covenant Theology and postmillennialism, giving as the author's main problem with Covenant Theology its denial of a future for national Israel, whom God promised to forgive and bless despite their disobedience.
• 2. John 14 vs. Matthew 24 — William Arnold III
  Answers the claim that John 14-16 speaks to the Church while Matthew 24-25 does not, arguing that the two were delivered only days apart and that the word 'church' appears in Matthew 16:18 and 18:17, before chapters 24-25.
• 3. Does it Really Matter? — William Arnold III
  Addresses a reader's question of whether it really makes a difference when the rapture occurs, including whether there is danger in believing in a pre-tribulation rapture and whether such believers may fail to take needed preparations.
• 4. Harvest of the Wicked First? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of why, in the parable of the wheat and the tares, the tares seem to be gathered first, suggesting that the 'gathering' may be the gathering to Armageddon (Revelation 16:16) while the first actual harvest, in Revelation 14, is of the righteous.
• 5. Daniel's Seventy Weeks — William Arnold III
  Explains Daniel 9:24-27, teaching that the sixty-nine 'sevens' were the time leading up to the Messiah, who was then cut off, and that the one remaining seven-year period is the future Great Tribulation, in which the Antichrist confirms and then breaks a covenant with Israel.
• 5. Key Greek Words and Terms — William Arnold III
  Examines key Greek words and terms in the rapture debate, focusing on the word translated 'coming,' which denotes both an arrival and a consequent presence and is used in both the rapture passages and passages about Christ's post-tribulation coming.
• 6. But What About . . . — William Arnold III
  Responds to common objections to post-tribulationism, including the doctrine of imminency, arguing that the passages about not knowing the day or hour and watching for Christ's coming refer to His post-tribulational coming.
• 6. My Church is not Post-Trib — William Arnold III
  Answers a young post-trib believer headed for a Baptist college who asks whether to be bold or quiet about his conviction in a church where everyone disagrees, and who asks when the 'peace and safety' of 1 Thessalonians 5:3 occurs.
• 7. History of Pre- and Post-Tribulationism — William Arnold III
  Traces the history of pre- and post-tribulationism, arguing that pretribulationism is a relatively new doctrine with no record of being taught before the past century, and scrutinizing Grant R. Jeffrey's claim to find it in Pseudo-Ephraem.
• 7. Rapture, or Second Coming? — William Arnold III
  Responds to a pre-trib reading of Matthew 24:31 as Christ returning with an already-raptured church, arguing that the Bible nowhere speaks of two comings, nowhere says the gathering happens before the Tribulation, nowhere uses the word 'rapture,' and nowhere exempts believers from that time.
• 8. Supporting Arguments — William Arnold III
  Offers supplementary supporting arguments for post-tribulationism, such as John linking himself to the churches in tribulation (Revelation 1:9) and Jesus praying that the Father protect His disciples rather than take them out of the world.
• 9. Will the Antichrist be a Jew? — William Arnold III
  Answers a reader's questions about whether we are currently in the 'time of sorrows' and about the Antichrist's origin — whether he will be a Jew or come from Europe.
• An Evaluation of the New "Pre-Wrath" Rapture Theory — William Arnold III
  Evaluates the pre-wrath rapture theory devised by Robert Van Kampen and popularized by Marvin Rosenthal, criticizing its lack of scholarship and familiarity with biblical Greek and its claim that the rapture occurs on the very day the Day of the Lord begins.
• Analytical Table of Contents — William Arnold III
  An analytical table of contents for William Arnold III's The Post-Tribulation Rapture, breaking the book's argument down point by point.
• Boiling it Down — Dave MacPherson
  Summarizes the highlights of the author's book The Rapture Plot in the form of an imaginary phone call with a dispensationalist, boiling down his account of the earliest development of pretribulationism in the early 1800s.
• by William Arnold III — William Arnold III
  The author page of The Post-Tribulation Rapture subsite, giving William Arnold III's background as the book's author.
• DECEIVING, AND BEING DECEIVED — Dave MacPherson
  Argues that promoters of early origins for the pretribulation rapture — through Morgan Edwards (1788) and Pseudo-Ephraem — have covered up and twisted what those sources and their modern interpreters actually wrote.
• Do we hear all of the seven trumpets? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question of whether Christians will hear all of the seven trumpets of Revelation, answering that the Bible does not specifically say, though it seems reasonable that if the last trumpet of the series is heard, the rest would be as well.
• How Can You Teach Post-Trib? — William Arnold III
  Responds to a challenger who asks how post-tribulationism can be taught when believers 'appear with him in glory' (Colossians 3:4), arguing that the Bible says believers appear with Christ, not return with Him, being caught up to welcome Him back.
• Humbug Huebner — Dave MacPherson
  Profiles R. A. Huebner, a retired electrical engineer and prophecy writer with no seminary or Bible school training, and charges him with deliberately distorting pretrib rapture history in ways that influenced Walvoord, Ryrie, and LaHaye.
• Is the Destruction of the World Trade Center The Fulfillment of Revelation 17 & 18? — William Arnold III
  Answers the question whether the destruction of the World Trade Center fulfills the prophecy of Babylon's destruction in Revelation 17 and 18, arguing that it does not and that America is not the Babylon of those chapters. It notes that Babylon's destruction is placed at the end of the Great Tribulation, after the mark of the beast is in effect.
• LaHaye's Temperament — Dave MacPherson
  Recounts Tim LaHaye's hostile private reaction to the author's pretrib-history research, including a 1981 letter calling him a 'turkey,' alongside Brethren testimony that the dispensational position began in 1830 with Darby's acceptance of Margaret Macdonald's revelation.
• Letter From Mrs. Billy Graham — Dave MacPherson
  Reproduces a letter received in March 1975 from Mrs. Billy Graham, recounting a China missionary's regret that she taught Chinese Christians a pre-tribulation rapture rather than preparing them for the tribulation they suffered under Communism.
• More on the Order of Revelation — William Arnold III
  Continues the discussion of the order of Revelation, presenting a reader's argument that Christ comes first to the Mount of Olives and that the vials of wrath fall before Armageddon, together with the author's response that Revelation 19 is definitely the second coming.
• Noteworthy Post-Trib Scholars and Persons — William Arnold III
  Lists noteworthy scholars and other persons who have held the post-tribulation view, with brief notes on their credentials and works. The list responds to Tim LaHaye's characterization of post-tribulationists as "false teachers."
• Open Letter to Todd Strandberg — Dave MacPherson
  An open letter to Todd Strandberg criticizing the quality of the pretribulation material he distributes and disputing standard pretrib accounts of Margaret Macdonald's 1830 vision and Edward Irving's early pretrib teaching.
• Recommended Reading — William Arnold III
  Provides annotated recommendations of books on the rapture and post-tribulationism, ranging from works intended for the average reader to scholarly treatments, and includes Three Views on the Rapture. The annotations summarize each book's approach, evidence, and level of technical difficulty.
• The Antichrist (Outline) — William Arnold III
  An outline study collecting all the information the Bible gives about the Antichrist — also identified as the little horn, the despicable person, and the man of lawlessness — organized by topic from Daniel, the Gospels, Thessalonians, John's epistles, and Revelation.
• The Post-Tribulation Rapture - 1. Introduction — William Arnold III
  Introduces the case for a post-tribulation rapture, questioning the recent teaching that the church will escape the tribulation Jesus warned would precede His return, and urging believers to be prepared to face it.
• The Post-Tribulation Rapture - 2. The Biblical Basis for Post-Tribulationism — William Arnold III
  Lays out the biblical basis for post-tribulationism, arguing that 1 Thessalonians 4:17 is the Bible's only rapture passage and that any other passage must first be shown to describe the same event before it can be called a rapture passage.
• The Post-Tribulation Rapture - 3. Order and Scope of the Book of Revelation — William Arnold III
  Examines the order and scope of the book of Revelation, asking whether the book applies to the church today, how its contents are arranged, and when God's wrath falls.
• The Post-Tribulation Rapture - 4. Various Themes — William Arnold III
  Treats various themes in the post-tribulation debate, arguing that the 'day of the Lord' is simply a reference to Christ's return itself rather than to the entire Tribulation period or the Millennium.
• The Unoriginal John Darby — Dave MacPherson
  Argues that John Darby was not the originator of the key features of dispensational premillennialism, showing that Manuel Lacunza (1812) and Edward Irving (1825-27) taught the same themes before Darby's earliest papers.
• Thieves' Marketing — Dave MacPherson
  Exposes plagiarism by well-known pretribulation rapture authors and major evangelical publishers, beginning with the author's 1997 discovery that a book by C. C. Carlson was a brazen plagiarism of Hal Lindsey's 1973 book.
• Walvoord's Posttrib "Varieties" - Plus ! — Dave MacPherson
  Critiques John Walvoord's division of posttribulationism into four 'distinct' and 'contradictory' schools — classic, semiclassic, futurist, and dispensational — arguing that Walvoord's own descriptions show the groups share the same major tenets.
• What You Should Know About 911 & Deep Politics — William Arnold III
  A curated collection of videos and articles advancing alternative accounts of 9/11 and 'deep politics,' including claims about the controlled demolition of WTC Building 7 and remarks by officials such as Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Norman Mineta.
• What You Should Know About Freedom & Privacy — William Arnold III
  A curated list of videos and resources on freedom and privacy, covering topics such as loss of privacy, Bible prophecy, the Oklahoma bombing, UN takeover of national parks, and thumb scans.
• What You Should Know About Money, Banks & The Federal Reserve — William Arnold III
  A curated list of videos and resources about money, banks, and the Federal Reserve, including material said to expose the truth behind the economic crisis of 2008 and an inside view of international banking.
• What You Should Know About the Food You Eat & the Water You Drink — William Arnold III
  A curated list of videos and articles about hazards in food and water, covering genetically modified foods, fluoridation of drinking water, aspartame, vaccines, and hydraulic fracturing.
• What You Should Know About the New World Order — William Arnold III
  A curated list of videos and resources about the 'new world order,' covering the history of the Masons and Illuminati, the Bilderberg group, globalism, eugenics, and Bohemian Grove.
• Wily Jeffrey — Dave MacPherson
  Critiques Grant R. Jeffrey's inconsistent claims that pretribulationism emerged in 1820, arguing that no writer has offered evidence for its development that early and that 1830 is the earliest defensible date.
• X-RAYING MARGARET — Dave MacPherson
  Examines Margaret Macdonald's statements that the church's trial is from Antichrist, arguing that pretrib leaders such as R. A. Huebner, Charles Ryrie, Thomas Ice, and Frank Marotta deceitfully isolated her words and misrepresented her partial-rapture view as pretribulationism.

Site Documents

• Statement of Faith (at the Institute’s site) — Institute for Biblical Studies
  The Institute for Biblical Studies' statement of faith: the Bible as inspired and inerrant in the original manuscripts, strict monotheism, Jesus Christ as the one God become man, salvation through faith, repentance, baptism in Jesus' name and Holy Spirit baptism with tongues, and a literal post-tribulation return of Christ.

Soteriology

• "Lift up" or "Take Away" in John 15:1-6? — William Arnold III
  Examines John 15:1-6 to determine whether the vinedresser "lifts up" or "takes away" fruitless branches in verse 2 — a point disputed between advocates of unconditional eternal security and those who believe salvation can be lost. It argues for "lift up," supporting this from John's use of the word elsewhere, such as Jesus telling the lame man to lift up his bed and walk.
• A Collection of Evidence Against the Traditional Wording of Matthew 28:19 — Clinton Willis
  Collects evidence from encyclopedias and other sources against the traditional wording of Matthew 28:19, arguing that the New Testament's silence on the triune name and its use of the Jesus-name formula point to the historical origin of Christian baptism.
• A Fundamental Challenge to Calvinistic Theology — Jason Dulle
  Presents a fundamental challenge to Calvinistic theology from an Arminian perspective, turning on Paul's statement that God desires all people to be saved and on the distinction between God's sovereign will and His moral will.
• Acts 2:38 and the Purpose of Baptism — Jason Dulle
  Examines the controversy over Acts 2:38 and the purpose of baptism, contrasting the Oneness Pentecostal reading that repentance and baptism are both for the forgiveness of sins with the traditional Protestant grammatical argument that ties forgiveness to repentance alone.
• Acts 2:38, Baptism and Remission of Sins — William Arnold III
  Presents a reader's challenge to associating water baptism with the remission of sins in Acts 2:38, arguing on grammatical grounds that remission is tied to repentance rather than baptism. The writer appeals to Greek scholarship on the verse and to the Cornelius household in Acts 10, who received the Spirit before water baptism.
• Baptism in Jesus' Name — William Arnold III
  Argues for baptism in Jesus' name by comparing Matthew 28:19 with the other Gospel accounts of the Great Commission and insisting that Scripture must interpret Scripture.
• Baptism: Do It Right — Jason Dulle
  Responds to a correspondent distressed at being told by a Oneness Bible study that he must be baptized again in Jesus' name to be saved, discussing the importance of baptism as something Jesus commanded and the apostles consistently administered to new converts.
• Both Sinners and Saints — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question whether believers are still sinners saved by grace, affirming that they are, since a sinner is one who sins and even sanctified believers still commit sins of attitude such as jealousy, wrath, and pride. It cites Paul's present-tense self-description in 1 Timothy 1:15 as chief of sinners and Romans 3:23's teaching that all fall short of God's glory.
• Can One Lose Justification? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether one who has been justified can lose that justification, considering how a person declared "not guilty" before God could still be lost if they are never born again.
• Can We Have Peace With God Before Regeneration? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether a person can have peace with God through justification before being regenerated, arguing from Romans 5:1 that justification itself ends enmity with God and brings peace even before one is saved by regeneration.
• Did the Apostles Preach Acts 2:38? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether the apostles preached Acts 2:38, given that people in Acts cried out "what must I do to be saved?" in response to the gospel message rather than to a direct preaching of that verse. It affirms the observation: the apostles preached Jesus Christ — His messiahship, signs, death, burial, and resurrection — and baptism and receiving the Holy Ghost followed belief and obedience.
• Heavenly or Earthly Bodies? — Jason Dulle
  Answers questions about whether the glorified Jesus remains fully God and fully man in heaven, how His heavenly body relates to His earthly body, how His role as advocate and mediator applies, and what form the saints will have in eternity.
• Inclusivism is Incompatible with Biblical Teaching — Jason Dulle
  Argues that inclusivism — the doctrine that one can be saved through Christ's atonement without conscious faith in Christ — is incompatible with biblical teaching. It contends from the New Testament, including John 3, that one must exercise conscious faith in Christ to experience salvation.
• Is Baptism Essential for Salvation? — William Arnold III
  Addresses whether baptism in Jesus' name is essential for salvation, discussing the disputed longer ending of Mark and other passages about being born of water and the Spirit and being washed, sanctified, and justified.
• Is it wrong to baptize in the name of the "Lord Jesus Christ?" — William Arnold III
  Addresses the question of whether it is wrong to baptize in the name of the "Lord Jesus Christ" rather than "Jesus Christ," responding to a pastor who taught that using "Lord Jesus Christ" was in error.
• Is the Singular "Name" of Matthew 28:19 Theologically Significant? — Jason Dulle
  Questions the traditional Oneness Pentecostal interpretation of Matthew 28:19, arguing that the singular "name" is not grammatically incorrect and is therefore not theologically significant in the way usually assumed.
• Justification and Sanctification: The Theological and Practical relationship Between the Two Doctrines — Jason Dulle
  Argues that justification and sanctification are not antithetical, and that theologies creating a dichotomy between justification and good works rest on a misguided reading of Scripture.
• Justification by Faith — Jason Dulle
  Argues that holiness and grace are not contradictory but complementary, since holiness must be anchored in the grace of God, and addresses the "good day-bad day" mentality in the believer's walk with God.
• More On Baptism In Jesus' Name — William Arnold III
  Discusses what it means to baptize "in the name" of Jesus, explaining that the phrase is used in the sense of acting by someone's authority, as an ambassador acts in the name of the one who sent him.
• Rebaptism — Jason Dulle
  Considers whether believers who were previously baptized in a legitimate Biblical manner need to be baptized again, an issue the Bible does not directly address. It argues from Colossians 2:11-12 that where genuine faith was exercised, baptism was spiritually efficacious and there is no spiritual need for rebaptism.
• Reckoning and Transformation--What Does This Mean? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses questions arising from a fellow believer's distinction between reckoning at justification, where Christ's righteousness is imputed, and transformation at baptism, where the body of sins is put off. The questioner asks whether Abraham, as the example of justification by faith, experienced only a reckoning of righteousness and not an actual transformation.
• Repentance (audio) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio teaching (mp3) by William Arnold III, listed on the IBS homepage under Soteriology: Repentance (audio).
• Sin (audio) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio teaching (mp3) by William Arnold III, listed on the IBS homepage under Soteriology: Sin (audio).
• The Baptismal Formula Debate: A Biblical and Historical Investigation — Jason Dulle
  Investigates the difference between the baptismal wording of Matthew 28:19 — the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — and the repeated practice in Acts and the epistles of baptizing in the name of Jesus, setting out the viable options for reconciling the biblical and historical data.
• The Believer's Union With Christ — Jason Dulle
  Examines the believer's union with Christ, expressed in phrases such as "in Christ," "in the beloved," and "with Christ," which appear some 164 times in the writings of Paul and John. It notes that Scripture clearly attests the union but says little directly about how it is established, which has produced several interpretations.
• The Oneness of God and Baptism in Jesus’ Name are not Joined at the Hip — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the Oneness of God and baptism in Jesus' name are not joined at the hip, contending that one need not believe in the Oneness of God to see the validity of the Jesus-name baptismal formula.
• The Process of Salvation (Outline) — William Arnold III
  Presents an outline of the process of salvation, beginning with the Old Testament idea of salvation as deliverance by a savior from distress and danger. The outline collects scriptural references on being saved by repentance and by the Holy Ghost, and on continuing in Christ.
• What Is The Meaning of Christ's Death? — Jason Dulle
  Interprets the meaning and significance of Christ's death, asking why the New Testament so strongly emphasizes His crucifixion and blood, and noting that the biblical authors did not provide a full, systematic explanation of the cross.
• Why Jesus is Necessary — Jason Dulle
  Argues that although people are capable of good, every person sins against a morally perfect God whose justice cannot ignore those violations. Even one sin a day over a lifetime amounts to more than 25,000 violations of God's moral law, setting up the case for why Jesus is necessary.
• Will God Forgive Intentional Sin? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether God will forgive intentional sin, particularly premeditated and habitual sins, noting first that God hates all sin because it is contrary to his holy nature and ruptures his relationship with us. It reasons that if God would not forgive intentional sin, no sin would be forgiven, since all sin is a choice to disobey God rather than something that merely happens to us.
• Word Biblical Commentary admits Matt. 28:19 is probably not original. — William Arnold III
  Reports that the Word Biblical Commentary — a respected evangelical commentary series written by Trinitarians — treats the threefold name in Matthew 28:19 as probably not original. It quotes the commentary's judgment that the formula seems to be a liturgical expansion of the evangelist, consonant with the ante-Nicene witness of Eusebius.

Study Tools

• Comparison of Free Bible programs for Apple iPhone, iPod & iPad — William Arnold III
  Compares free Bible programs for Apple iPhone, iPod, and iPad, including Pocket Sword, YouVersion, Logos, Blue Letter Bible, and Olive Tree's Bible Reader. It recommends a combination of Pocket Sword, YouVersion, and Logos to get the most at no cost, noting Pocket Sword's free Hebrew text, Strong's numbers, and Greek morphology, and that the others add little not already available in the first three.
• Greek Word List — William Arnold III
  Presents a study list of every Greek word occurring ten times or more in the New Testament, together with a second list of definitions. It explains how the lists can be copied into a word processor and formatted as flash cards for vocabulary study.
• Hebrew Word List — William Arnold III
  Presents a Hebrew vocabulary study list drawn from Page H. Kelly's "Biblical Hebrew," arranged in the order of the book's chapters and formatted for use with the BibleWorks Hebrew font. It explains how the words can be printed as flash cards for study.
• IBS Recommended Book List — William Arnold III
  Presents the IBS annotated list of recommended books, compiled by William Arnold III with consulting contributors, including works on the authority, inspiration, canon, text, and translation of the Bible and on church history.
• Links (Oneness Pentecostal organizations, Bible colleges, and articles of interest) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  IBS's links page: Oneness Pentecostal organizations, Bible colleges, other sites, and articles of interest, prefaced by the note that IBS does not represent the official position of any particular Oneness organization.
• Online Resources for Biblical Studies (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  The site's Study Tools page: IBS's own resources (recommended books and software, Greek and Hebrew word lists) plus a large curated directory of external biblical-studies resources — archaeology and maps, apocryphal texts, online Bibles, apologetics, and more.

Theology Proper

• "I Will" or "We Will": How Many Wills Does Jesus Have? — Jason Dulle
  Asks how many wills Jesus has, given the Definition of Chalcedon's confession that Christ is one person in two natures, each with its properties preserved. It questions whether confessing two wills in Christ reflects an incarnational theology or makes Christ will in two ways simultaneously.
• A Break Down of the Name "Jesus Christ" (Chart) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  A chart breaking down the name “Jesus Christ” (Greek: Iesous Christos), published by the Institute for Biblical Studies and listed in its Theology Proper index.
• A Oneness View of Jesus' Prayers — Jason Dulle
  Presents a Oneness view of Jesus' prayers, explaining that the uni-personal God became a man while continuing to exist beyond the incarnation as the transcendent Spirit, so the deity of the Son and of the Father is the same person. It argues Oneness and Trinitarian theology differ not over a dual existence for one personal divine Being but over the identity of that one Being.
• A Trinitarian's Struggle With the Oneness Doctrine — Jason Dulle
  Responds to a Trinitarian who is struggling with the Oneness doctrine over Christology, taking up his concern that Oneness works seem Apollinarian or Nestorian and his suspicion that Chalcedonian Christology is necessarily Trinitarian.
• Acts 9:3-5 is Not a Prooftext for the Deity of Christ — Jason Dulle
  Argues that Acts 9:3-5 should not be used as a prooftext for the deity of Christ, since the Greek word kurios simply denotes a master or authority figure and is used of human beings as well as God. On this reading, Paul's address to the heavenly voice as "Lord" does not by itself show he thought he was speaking to the one true God.
• Angels or a Trinity? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether the three visitors in Genesis 18:1-2 represent God in three persons or Jehovah accompanied by two angels. It argues the two men who went toward Sodom are the two angels of Genesis 19:1, so the passage does not depict God as three persons.
• Are We Jesus? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether the language of mutual indwelling — believers in Christ and Christ in them — implies that believers are Jesus, arguing that the meaning of such phrases depends on context rather than a fixed, static sense. It maintains that in John 10 and John 14 the phrase presents Jesus as being in the Father and the Father in Him.
• Are We Little Gods? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether believers are "little gods," judging the slogan a heresy in the making and examining the passages, such as Genesis 1:26-27, commonly used to support it.
• Avoiding the Achilles Heels of Trinitarianism, Modalistic Monarchianism, and Nestorianism: The Acknowledgement and Proper Placement of the Distinction Between Father and Son — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the challenge of reconciling Jewish monotheism with the New Testament's hundreds of distinctions between the Father and the Son. It proposes acknowledging and properly placing the distinction between Father and Son in a way that avoids the pitfalls of Trinitarianism, Modalistic Monarchianism, and Nestorianism.
• Can God be God if the Incarnation is Permanent? — Jason Dulle
  Argues for the permanence of the incarnation against the view that Christ's humanity was temporary and dissolved at His ascension once redemption was secured. It seeks to demonstrate from biblical and theological perspectives that Christ's humanity continued beyond the ascension, addressing objections that His glorification means the cessation of His human body and that a permanent incarnation would limit God.
• Christ's Human Consciousness in Light of the "I am" — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether Jesus was conscious of Himself only as man, in light of statements such as "Before Abraham was, I AM" (John 8:58) and His claim to have come down from heaven. It argues this fits because the one conscious of Himself as man is God Himself, so Jesus, whose personal identity is God's, knew who He was.
• Christology — Jason Dulle
  Introduces Christology as the study of how the deity and humanity of Christ relate in one person, and sets out the task of scrutinizing what Jesus said about His own identity and what the New Testament writers state about His dual nature.
• Christology is Discovered Soteriologically — Jason Dulle
  Explains that the early church's Christological debates were driven by soteriological considerations — what Christ must be in order to save — and that rejected Christologies such as Arianism and Apollinarianism were rejected because they destroyed Christ's ability to save.
• Colwell's Rule and John 1:1 — William Arnold III
  Explains Colwell's rule concerning definite predicate nouns and the Greek article, and examines how the rule applies to John 1:1 — whether "the Word was God" should be taken as definite or as qualitative, emphasizing the nature of the Word — in response to the New World Translation's rendering "the Word was a god."
• Did God Leave Jesus on the Cross Prior to Jesus' Death? — Jason Dulle
  Examines the interpretation of Jesus' cry "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46) as meaning that God withdrew from Jesus' body before His death so that He could die. It presents this view, drawn from a quoted author, that the Father remained in Christ until the moment of death and then withdrew as the sins of humanity were laid on Him.
• Did the Divine Spirit Leave the Body of Jesus? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether the divine Spirit left the body of Jesus when He died, engaging David Bernard's argument from Hebrews 9:14 that Christ offered Himself through the eternal Spirit. It considers what a departure of the Spirit would mean for the hypostatic union and whether Jesus could have died if the divine Spirit had not departed.
• Did the Father Become Sin? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses a Trinitarian objection drawn from 2 Corinthians 5:21 and Mark 15:34: if the Father still indwelt Jesus on the cross, were both Father and Son together made sin for us, and would that not nullify the atonement? The excerpt presents the critic's challenge to the author's argument that Jesus only felt forsaken on the cross rather than actually being deserted by the Father.
• Does God Know When Now Is?: Revisiting God's Relationship to Time — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether God is timeless or temporal - whether he exists in an "eternal now" outside of time or experiences chronology and succession as creatures do. The author argues it is biblically sound and philosophically preferable to understand God as timeless without creation and temporal subsequent to creation.
• Does Numbers 23:19 Mean That God Can Not Be Incarnated as a Man? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether Numbers 23:19 means God cannot be incarnated as a man, arguing from the verse's context in Balaam's speech to Balak that it must be read in light of its setting.
• Does Oneness Theology Deny Jesus' Deity? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the charge that Oneness theology denies the deity of Christ, insisting that Oneness believers affirm Christ's full deity. It frames the real difference as whether Christ's deity is the Father's deity incarnated in flesh or a distinct eternal person in the Godhead.
• Echad, Yachid, and the Oneness of God — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the Trinitarian argument that the Hebrew word echad, used for God's oneness in Deuteronomy 6:4, denotes a composite unity of persons, while yachid denotes strict numerical oneness. It argues this is not a good argument, noting that echad is used nearly a thousand times in the Old Testament and almost always refers to a single numerical entity.
• Eternal Father, Eternal Son? — Jason Dulle
  Argues against the conclusion that the Son is a second, eternal person in the Godhead, contending that God is not eternally "Father" any more than he is eternally "Son." It says "Father" was never God's name - his name is YHWH - and that God came to be known as Father in the incarnation, being likened to a father only about a dozen times in the Old Testament, in the sense of creator.
• Fullness of God — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether Paul means the same thing by "fullness" in Colossians 2:9, where the fullness of the divine nature dwells in Christ bodily, and Ephesians 3:19, where believers are filled with the fullness of God. It argues the difference lies in Jesus being conceived by the Holy Ghost and thus God's Son by birth, whereas believers are God's sons only spiritually, by adoption through being filled with His Spirit.
• God is a Person — Jason Dulle
  Argues that it is appropriate to refer to God as a person, answering common objections raised even by some Oneness Pentecostals. It contends that having a body is not necessary to personhood — a person is essentially incorporeal, constituted by mind — so God's lack of a body is no evidence against His personhood.
• God's Name Was Not Secret — Jason Dulle
  Answers the teaching that the Old Testament patriarchs did not know God's name, arguing that God declared His name YHWH (Yahweh) to Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Moses, and countless others.
• Greek and Hebrew Words for "One" — William Arnold III
  Answers a question about the Greek and Hebrew words for "one," addressing the Trinitarian appeal to "echad" in the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4) as implying a composite deity. It explains that echad is simply the Hebrew number one, which, like English "one," can at times denote union, but that an unqualified statement that "Yahweh is one" should be taken at face value.
• How Can God's Fullness "Fit" in Such a Tiny Place as Christ? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the question how the fullness of the omnipresent God can dwell in Christ bodily, as Colossians 2:9 states, without God ceasing to exist beyond the incarnation. It rejects the view that God vacated heaven to dwell in Jesus, noting that Jesus spoke of the Father being in heaven.
• How Could Jesus Be Anointed by God if He Is God? — Jason Dulle
  Responds to a reader who struggles with how Jesus could be anointed by God if He is God, clarifying the author's earlier claim about Jesus ministering as a man anointed by the Holy Ghost.
• How divine appearances and the angel of YHWH can illuminate the meaning of “the form of God” and shed light on Jesus’ prayers — Jason Dulle
  Explores the Old Testament references to God's visible, often humanoid appearances, including theophanies, and lays out a case for identifying the angel of YHWH as the visible form of YHWH himself. It then shows how these divine appearances illuminate the meaning of "the form of God" and shed light on passages about Jesus' prayers.
• How do we know God is good? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of how we can know God is good rather than evil, and whether this could be discerned from natural theology alone apart from Scripture. It argues that God, as the greatest conceivable being, must be omnibenevolent, since it is greater to be good than evil and greater to be all-good than partially good.
• If Jesus Was the Father, Why Would He Pray to the Father? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of how Jesus could pray to the Father if, as Oneness theology asserts, Jesus is the Father's hypostasis incarnate and shares the Father's hypostasis. It works through the questioner's Chalcedonian framing, in which the distinction between Jesus and the Father lies in the hypostatic union the Father lacks.
• In the Beginning was the Word — William Arnold III
  Examines John 1:1, explaining how the Word can be both with God and be God, and noting that John does not phrase the verse in the Trinitarian terms one might expect.
• In the Incarnation Did God Become a Man, or Indwell a Man? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether, in the incarnation, God became a man or merely indwelt a man, defending the claim that God can become a man and arguing that denying it undermines Jesus' divinity and the incarnation itself, forcing a choice between Jesus as YHWH incarnate or a mere man.
• In What Manner is Jesus Considered "God" in Oneness Theology? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses a critic's charge that Oneness theology, in saying Jesus is God, means only that the Father indwelling the Son is God, relegating the Son to a mere role or manifestation of a uni-personal God. The excerpt presents the objection — that Oneness resembles Adoptionistic Monarchianism — which the article takes up.
• Is "Father" a Name or a Title? — Jason Dulle
  Answers whether "Father" is God's name or a title, arguing that "Father" was not the revealed name for God in the Old Testament but a mere appellation describing the way God related to man. It contrasts YHWH, God's revealed name used over 6,800 times, with the approximately thirteen Old Testament references likening God to a father or calling him "Father."
• Is "Jehovah" the Name of God? — Jason Dulle
  Argues that "Jehovah" is not and never was the name of God in the Old Testament but an accidental, fabricated pronunciation arising from misunderstanding the Hebrew tetragrammaton YHWH. It traces how the spelling and pronunciation arose through the history and phonetics of the divine name, contrasting it with the rendering "Yahweh."
• Is a Chalcedonian Christology Coherent? — Jason Dulle
  Examines the charge, raised by Moulder and earlier by Kierkegaard, that the Chalcedonian formulation of A.D. 451 — Jesus as fully God and fully man simultaneously — is incoherent, like calling a square round.
• Is an Omnipotent and Omnibenevolent God Incoherent? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the argument that an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God is logically incoherent, setting out the objection that omnipotence would include the power to commit evil while omnibenevolence excludes it, and beginning the theist's response.
• Is Genesis 1:26 Translated Properly? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of whether Genesis 1:26 is translated properly — specifically whether the plural pronouns "us" and "our" are present in the Hebrew and whether God might be speaking of creating all mankind. It argues from the Hebrew that both the verb "make" (asah) and the noun "image" (tselem) are in the plural, so the first person plural form cannot be understood any other way than "let us make."
• Is Mary the Mother of God? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether Mary is rightly called the Mother of God, explaining that the early church insisted on the term not for its implications for Mary but to affirm that the baby she bore was not only man but also God.
• Is the Name of the Messiah "Yeshua?" — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the question of whether the Messiah's name is properly "Yeshua." It presents the claim that a name's sound cannot change in translation — citing Acts 4:12, Acts 26:14-15, and Zephaniah 3:9 — for examination.
• Is Trinitarian-Bashing Right? — Jason Dulle
  Answers a new convert who is discomforted by preachers bitterly attacking Trinitarian believers as idolaters damned to hell. The author agrees that such bashing is wrong: Trinitarianism is false doctrine, but most Trinitarians hold it only by name, and bitter attacks accomplish nothing.
• Jesus' Prayers — Jason Dulle
  Addresses why Jesus prayed if He was God, answering that He prayed because He was also flesh. It argues Jesus had a genuine, progressive relationship with God that He grew into — evidenced by His doing always what pleased the Father — because His deity was divinely limited so His human life could be lived in the same manner as ours.
• Jesus' Prayers: It Doesn't Take Two Persons to Tango — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the objection that genuine communication requires at least two persons, which appears to give the Trinitarian explanation of Jesus' prayers — Father and Son as distinct persons — an explanatory advantage over the Oneness view. It concedes the Trinitarian view seems at first blush to have this advantage and takes up the maxim that communication requires two persons.
• Jesus, the Voice, and the Dove — Jason Dulle
  Examines the baptism of Jesus (Matthew 3:16-17 and the parallel accounts) by comparing all four gospels. It contrasts their details — who saw the Spirit descend like a dove, that the Spirit continued to abide on Jesus only in John, and John's stated purpose for the dove's appearance.
• Jesus: The Visible God — Jason Dulle
  Answers a former Trinitarian's question about how the incarnation can be permanent, with Jesus in heaven alongside the Father, without contradicting the Oneness expectation of seeing only one person in heaven. The exchange clarifies that the author does not advocate Sabellianism, since successive modes could not pray to one another.
• John 14:23 et al : Does Jesus’ Use of Plural Personal Pronouns Prove that Jesus and the Father are Different Persons? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether Jesus' use of plural personal pronouns for Himself and the Father (as in John 14:23 and 17:20-22) proves they are different persons, contrasting the Trinitarian personal interpretation with the Oneness incarnational interpretation.
• John 16:12-15 – The Spirit will speak on behalf of the Son? — Jason Dulle
  Examines John 16:12-15, in which the Spirit of truth receives from the Son and tells the disciples what is to come, and addresses its use by Trinitarians as evidence the Spirit is a distinct divine person from the Son. It poses the problem for Oneness theology: if Jesus and the Holy Spirit are the same person, why is revelation portrayed as a two-step process from Jesus through the Spirit to believers?
• Love in the Godhead? — Jason Dulle
  Examines Jesus's statements about the Father's love for the Son and the Son's love for the Father, asking how such an exchange of love can be reconciled with God's uni-personal nature rather than supporting Trinitarianism.
• More on the Oneness of God — William Arnold III
  Responds to a critic's challenges to Oneness exegesis, addressing passages such as Colossians 1 and Hebrews 1:8 and the author's claim that the biblical distinction is always between deity and humanity, never God and God.
• My Father is Greater Than I — Jason Dulle
  Answers the argument from Jesus' statement "My Father is greater than I" that the "I" is the Son, a distinct person from the Father. It counters by asking how, on the Trinitarian view, God the Son can say the Father is greater than himself if the Son and the Father are coequal.
• Non-Biblical Vocabulary: Does it Make the Trinity False? — Jason Dulle
  Evaluates the Oneness argument that the Trinity is false because its key vocabulary is absent from Scripture, arguing that this is not a reasonable principal argument even though there are solid grounds to reject Trinitarianism.
• One With Jesus — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of how Jesus could pray that believers be 'one' as He and the Father are one (John 17:11), arguing that 'one' denotes unity rather than oneness of person or essence.
• Oneness vs. Trinity: A Reason for the Different Theologies — Jason Dulle
  Argues that Oneness and Trinitarian believers read the same Scriptures and differ because of the preunderstandings and emphases they bring to interpretation, not because of the biblical text itself.
• Oneness-Trinity Debate: Areas of Agreement and Disagreement — Jason Dulle
  Examines where Oneness and Trinitarian theology actually agree and disagree, arguing that the debate is partly semantic but that the terminology used shapes one's understanding of God and can lead Trinitarians toward a tritheistic conception of Him.
• Patripassianism and the Death of God — Jason Dulle
  Examines the Trinitarian objection that Oneness theology, which identifies Jesus' deity personally with the Father's, entails Patripassianism — the Father suffering and dying on the cross — and explores why the ancients deemed that idea heretical.
• Plural Pronouns Used for God — Jason Dulle
  Examines the plural pronouns used for God in Genesis 1:26, Genesis 3:22, Genesis 11:7, and Isaiah 6:8, asking whether they imply that God is more than one. It surveys four major theories proposed to explain this plural usage, beginning with the theory that God deliberated within His own will.
• Proverbs 30:4--What is the Name of His Son? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question how Proverbs 30:4's reference to God's son can be explained if the Son is not an eternally distinct person in the Godhead. The response notes that Old Testament passages speak of YHWH or God rather than of a Father-Son relationship before the incarnation, and that such passages are prophetic, pointing to the future Messiah.
• Reifying Natures = Two Persons — Jason Dulle
  Discusses how Oneness Pentecostals explain the distinction of activity and consciousness between the Father and the Son portrayed in Scripture. It introduces the standard appeal to a duality of natures, in which Jesus' human nature does and knows some things while His divine nature does and knows others.
• Revelation 1:4--Greetings from the Trinity? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses a Trinitarian argument from Revelation 1:4, where greetings are sent from the one who was, is, and is to come, from the seven spirits before His throne, and from Jesus Christ. It considers whether each of the three distinctly sending greetings shows that they are distinct persons.
• Revelation 5: Evidence for the Trinity? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses a theology professor's argument that Revelation 5 proves God exists as a tri-unity of persons. The excerpt quotes the chapter's distinctions between the one sitting on the throne, the Lamb who takes the book from His right hand, and the seven Spirits of God.
• Should Isaiah 9:6 read "Everlasting Father" or "Father of Eternity?" — William Arnold III
  Answers whether Isaiah 9:6 should read "Everlasting Father" or "Father of Eternity," and whether "Father" in this verse connects Jesus to being God the Father. It explains that "Father of Eternity" is how Hebrew says "Eternal Father," since a noun in construct form can function adjectivally, as with "everlasting mountains" in Habakkuk 3:6.
• The Development of the Doctrine of the Trinity — Jason Dulle
  Traces how the doctrine of the Trinity developed as the church sought to explain the relationship of YHWH, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit while maintaining monotheism. It asks how the early church understood these questions and where the doctrine of the Trinity came from.
• The Dual Nature of Christ — Jason Dulle
  Examines the identity of Christ and how his divine and human natures function together, asking whether their union is metaphysical (ontological) or one of function only. It introduces three strands of historical understandings of Christ as part of the framework for the paper.
• The Identity of the Son of God in Oneness Theology as Compared/Contrasted to Jehovah's Witnesses and Trinitarianism — Jason Dulle
  Responds to the charge that Oneness theology, like Jehovah's Witnesses, denies that the Son is eternal and thus makes Jesus a mere created being with a false Jesus. The excerpt begins explaining what Oneness theology does and does not mean when it says the Son is not eternal.
• The Preexistence of the Son? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses the question why several New Testament passages, including Colossians 1:15-16, Hebrews 1:1-2, and John 17:5, appear to speak of the Son's existence and activity before the incarnation if, as Oneness theology holds, "Son" applies only to God's existence in the flesh. The questioner suggests that "Son" cannot be limited to the incarnation only.
• The Present Knowledge of Christ — Jason Dulle
  Asks whether Jesus' knowledge remains limited in His present glorified, heavenly state, as it was during His earthly life when He did not know the timing of His second coming. It frames the answer as depending on the nature of glorification, the permanence of the incarnation, and whether the kenosis was temporary or permanent.
• The Question of Titles — Lance Kidwell
  Examines the Oneness-Trinitarian debate over the titles "Father" and "Son," questioning the presupposition that these words describe eternal relationships between persons of the Godhead. It sets that presupposition against scriptural questions such as who was manifest in the flesh and whether passages like Colossians 1:17 and Hebrews 1:10 speak of the Father or the Son.
• Trinitarianism: Modified Tritheism — Jason Dulle
  Argues that a theological system must be judged by whether it faithfully reflects the overall biblical portrait of God rather than merely collecting supporting quotations, applying that test to Trinitarianism, which the title characterizes as modified tritheism.
• Understanding the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — Jason Dulle
  Presents an advanced study of the Godhead seeking to understand the relationship of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost as set forth in Scripture. It commends approaching the subject with humility and openness to revising one's present understanding rather than merely protecting a viewpoint.
• Understanding the Significance of Distinctions — Jason Dulle
  Argues that the mere presence of distinctions between the Father and Son proves very little, since the reason, location, and nature of those distinctions must first be understood. It contends that, viewed against the biblical data as a whole, the distinctions are better understood as incarnational rather than personal in nature.
• Was it Possible for Jesus to Sin? -- Updated! — Jason Dulle
  Addresses whether it was theoretically possible for Jesus to sin, noting that He in fact did not sin. It argues that the question must be settled by larger theological considerations rather than direct scriptural statements, and defends the genuineness of Christ's temptations against the claim that God cannot be tempted.
• We Cannot Avoid "Nature" — Jason Dulle
  Clarifies the Oneness account of the Father-Son distinction, denying that it is merely a distinction between Jesus' divine and human natures and explaining it instead as the one divine person's two modes of existence resulting from the incarnation. It addresses why the language of "nature" cannot simply be avoided in this discussion.
• What Did Stephen See? — Jason Dulle
  Addresses what Stephen saw in Acts 7:55-56 when he saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God. It argues that the "right hand of God" is an anthropomorphic expression of exaltation, power, prestige, honor, and strength, not a physical location or a literal hand.
• What Is the Significance of "Son of God" and "Son of Man?" — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question what the significance of the terms "Son of God" and "Son of Man" is, beyond stressing Jesus' deity and humanity respectively. It explains that "Son of God" signifies Jesus' divine identity as the one conceived by the Holy Spirit, and was also a title for the king, as with David in Psalm 2:7.
• Where is God?: Exploring the Nature of Omnipresence — Jason Dulle
  Explores the nature of God's omnipresence, asking how a being who existed without space before creation can be omnipresent and concluding that omnipresence is not an essential attribute of God's nature but emerged as a relation between God and the spatial world.
• Who Is In the Driver's Seat?: Identifying the Conscious, Active Agent in Christ — Jason Dulle
  Argues that Christ's person is singular — the divine person — and that this one person is the conscious, active subject of all Christ's experiences, acting through His human nature rather than through a separate human person.
• Why be a Trinitarian? — Jason Dulle
  Asks what compelling evidence there is to conclude that God is a Trinity of three eternal persons. It acknowledges the weight of the scriptural distinctions between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for readers who hold God's oneness to be a numerical oneness of person, while holding that such distinctions can be explained in light of the incarnation.
• Why Such an Insistence on a Chalcedonian Christology? — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question of why such a high premium is placed on a Chalcedonian Christology, arguing that only a Chalcedonian understanding of Christ, together with the limitation of the exercise of His deity, explains how Jesus is fully God and genuinely human, subordinate to the Father, while maintaining biblical monotheism.
• Will We See the Father and Jesus in Heaven?: The Meaning of "and" in the Greeting Passages — Jason Dulle
  Answers the question what Paul and Peter meant by using "and" to refer to God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ in their epistle greetings, and whether this means believers will see both the Father and Jesus in heaven. It explains that the discussion centers on the Greek word translated "and," which usually means "in addition to, also."
• Yahweh or Jesus: What is God's Name? — Jason Dulle
  Explains the name of God, YHWH, as a Hebrew sentence derived from the verb "to be" (haya). It argues that God existed long before the Hebrew language, so He revealed Himself to the Hebrew people using existing Hebrew vocabulary rather than a name He had always borne.
• Yahweh, Jehovah, or Jesus? — Jason Dulle
  Answers why the name "Yahweh" does not appear in the King James Version. It explains that the translators used Anglicized pronunciations of the Hebrew and Greek names, and that "Jehovah" is not even an Anglicized form but arose from a medieval misreading of God's Old Testament name.
• Ye Are Gods — Jason Dulle
  Explains the statement "Ye are gods" in Psalm 82 and as quoted by Jesus in John 10. It identifies the "gods" as human judges and magistrates of the land who were perverting judgment, to whom God gave authority but who would die like men.
• You Have Not Seen the Father — Jason Dulle
  Answers the objection from John 5:37 that Jesus cannot be the Father, since He told the Jews standing before Him that they had never seen the Father or heard His voice. The response agrees that the Jews had never seen the Father's form, explaining that the Father is a Spirit who has no form and cannot be seen.

Virtual Classroom

• 1 Corinthians (New Testament Survey 08B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 1 Corinthians (New Testament Survey 08B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• 1 Peter (New Testament Survey 14B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 1 Peter (New Testament Survey 14B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• 1 Thessalonians (New Testament Survey 11A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 1 Thessalonians (New Testament Survey 11A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• 1, 2 & 3 John (New Testament Survey 16B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 1, 2 & 3 John (New Testament Survey 16B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• 2 Corinthians (New Testament Survey 09A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 2 Corinthians (New Testament Survey 09A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• 2 Peter, Jude (New Testament Survey 15A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 2 Peter, Jude (New Testament Survey 15A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• 2 Peter, Jude (New Testament Survey 15B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 2 Peter, Jude (New Testament Survey 15B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• 2 Thessalonians, Introduction to the Pastorals (New Testament Survey 11B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: 2 Thessalonians, Introduction to the Pastorals (New Testament Survey 11B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Acts (New Testament Survey 06A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Acts (New Testament Survey 06A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Acts Chapter Themes — William Arnold III
  A study aid for the New Testament Survey course listing the themes of each chapter of the book of Acts.
• Galatians, Introduction to the Prison Epistles (New Testament Survey 09B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Galatians, Introduction to the Prison Epistles (New Testament Survey 09B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Hebrews 1-5 (New Testament Survey 13A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Hebrews 1-5 (New Testament Survey 13A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Hebrews 6-13 (New Testament Survey 13B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Hebrews 6-13 (New Testament Survey 13B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Instructions for Taking New Testament Survey (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  How to take the New Testament Survey course online, with background on the IBS Classroom On A Disk courses (New Testament Survey, Eschatology, Hermeneutics) taught at New Life Tabernacle, Key West, in the fall of 2000.
• Introduction to John (New Testament Survey 04B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Introduction to John (New Testament Survey 04B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Introduction to John's Epistles, 1 John (New Testament Survey 16A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Introduction to John's Epistles, 1 John (New Testament Survey 16A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Introduction to Revelation (from Eschatology class) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (RealAudio) from the IBS Classroom On A Disk Eschatology course, taught by William Arnold III: Introduction to Revelation (from Eschatology class). Linked from the Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey index; the same lesson topics are served in mp3 as the survey's Revelation sessions (NT17–NT18).
• Introduction to Revelation (New Testament Survey 17A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Introduction to Revelation (New Testament Survey 17A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Introduction to Romans (New Testament Survey 06B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Introduction to Romans (New Testament Survey 06B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Introduction to the Corinthian Epistles (New Testament Survey 08A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Introduction to the Corinthian Epistles (New Testament Survey 08A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Introduction to the Gospels, Matthew (New Testament Survey 02A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Introduction to the Gospels, Matthew (New Testament Survey 02A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• James (New Testament Survey 14A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: James (New Testament Survey 14A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• John 1-3 (New Testament Survey 05A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: John 1-3 (New Testament Survey 05A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• John 3-21, Introduction to Acts (New Testament Survey 05B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: John 3-21, Introduction to Acts (New Testament Survey 05B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Mark & Luke (New Testament Survey 04A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Mark & Luke (New Testament Survey 04A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Matthew (New Testament Survey 03A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Matthew (New Testament Survey 03A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Matthew (New Testament Survey 03B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Matthew (New Testament Survey 03B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• New Testament Survey (IBS Virtual Classroom course) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  The course index for the Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey: 34 class sessions (mp3 and RealAudio) taught by William Arnold III, with quizzes, a syllabus, and related-reading links. The course was taught in the fall of 2000 at New Life Tabernacle (UPC), Key West, Florida.
• New Testament Survey Quiz — William Arnold III
  Quiz 2 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• New Testament Survey Quiz — William Arnold III
  Quiz 3 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• New Testament Survey Quiz — William Arnold III
  Quiz 4 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• New Testament Survey Quiz — William Arnold III
  Quiz 5 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• New Testament Survey Quiz — William Arnold III
  Quiz 6 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• New Testament Survey Quiz — William Arnold III
  Quiz 7 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• Pastoral Epistles - 1 Timothy (New Testament Survey 12A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Pastoral Epistles - 1 Timothy (New Testament Survey 12A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Pastoral Epistles - 1 Timothy, Titus, 2 Timothy (New Testament Survey 12B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Pastoral Epistles - 1 Timothy, Titus, 2 Timothy (New Testament Survey 12B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Prison Epistles - Ephesians (New Testament Survey 10A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Prison Epistles - Ephesians (New Testament Survey 10A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Prison Epistles - Philippians, Colossians, Philemon (New Testament Survey 10B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Prison Epistles - Philippians, Colossians, Philemon (New Testament Survey 10B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Quiz 10 — William Arnold III
  Quiz 10 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• Quiz 8 — William Arnold III
  Quiz 8 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• Quiz 9 — William Arnold III
  Quiz 9 for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III), covering the course material in sequence.
• Revelation 1-12 (from Eschatology class) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (RealAudio) from the IBS Classroom On A Disk Eschatology course, taught by William Arnold III: Revelation 1-12 (from Eschatology class). Linked from the Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey index; the same lesson topics are served in mp3 as the survey's Revelation sessions (NT17–NT18).
• Revelation 1-12 (New Testament Survey 17B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Revelation 1-12 (New Testament Survey 17B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Revelation 13-16 (from Eschatology class) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (RealAudio) from the IBS Classroom On A Disk Eschatology course, taught by William Arnold III: Revelation 13-16 (from Eschatology class). Linked from the Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey index; the same lesson topics are served in mp3 as the survey's Revelation sessions (NT17–NT18).
• Revelation 13-16 (New Testament Survey 18A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Revelation 13-16 (New Testament Survey 18A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Revelation 17-22 (from Eschatology class) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (RealAudio) from the IBS Classroom On A Disk Eschatology course, taught by William Arnold III: Revelation 17-22 (from Eschatology class). Linked from the Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey index; the same lesson topics are served in mp3 as the survey's Revelation sessions (NT17–NT18).
• Revelation 17-22 (New Testament Survey 18B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Revelation 17-22 (New Testament Survey 18B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Romans 1-6 (New Testament Survey 07A) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Romans 1-6 (New Testament Survey 07A). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Romans 7-16 (New Testament Survey 07B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Romans 7-16 (New Testament Survey 07B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5-7) (New Testament Survey 02B) (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  Audio lesson (mp3) from the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course, taught by William Arnold III: Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5-7) (New Testament Survey 02B). Also served in RealAudio format.
• Syllabus — William Arnold III
  The syllabus for the IBS Virtual Classroom's New Testament Survey course (William Arnold III): course books, session order, and how the course is taken.
• The IBS Virtual Classroom (at the Institute’s site) — William Arnold III
  The Virtual Classroom home page: free online Bible courses (no credit or certificate) for those unable to attend Bible college, offering the New Testament Survey course in RealAudio and mp3, individual-topic audio, and The Post-Tribulation Rapture eBook.