Bible Answers Archive

In October 2004 the Food and Drug Administration approved the marketing of a microchip implantable under the skin of humans for medical identification. Paranoid prophecy pundits immediately began touting Verichip technology as the mark of the Beast spoken of in Revelation 13. Contrary to such newspaper eschatology, there is no biblical basis for believing that [...]

Multitudes today assume that 666 is a number representing a modern-day beast about to be revealed. Placing the beast in the twenty-first century, however, may well pose insurmountable difficulties. First, John, the author of Revelation, told a first-century audience that with “wisdom” and “insight” they would be able to “calculate the number of the beast, [...]

For centuries Christians have speculated about the identity of Antichrist. Likely candidates have included princes and popes of the past as well as potentates and presidents in the present. Rather than joining the sensationalistic game of pin–the–tail–on–the–Antichrist, Christians need only go to Scripture to find the answer. First, the apostle John exposed the identity of [...]

Revelation is an apocalypse. Not just in the sense of recording an unveiling but also in terms of its composition in what might best be described as a language system or matrix deeply embedded in the Old Testament. As such, to rightly identify the two witnesses of Revelation 11, it is crucial to have the [...]

Jehovah’s Witnesses believe there is a “little flock” of 144,000 (Revelation 7:4) who get to go to heaven and a “great crowd’ (Revelation 7:9) of others who are relegated to earth. What does Revelation really reveal? First, the 144,000 and the great multitude are not two different peoples but two different ways of describing the [...]

In the Olivet Discourse, Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened” (Matthew 24:34). Which generation did Jesus have in mind? First, when Jesus says, “this generation,” this means this. This does not mean that. The phrase “this generation” appears multiple times in [...]

Many modern skeptics, following scholars such as Bertrand Russell and Albert Schweitzer, have believed Jesus to be a false prophet because he predicted his “coming on clouds” within the lifetime of his disciples. Did Jesus have the Second Coming in mind or does “coming on clouds” have a different meaning? First, when Jesus told Caiaphas [...]

At the heart of a currently popular end–times theology is the belief that God has two distinct people—one of whom must be raptured before God can continue his plan with the other. Rather than teaching that God has two categories of people, Scripture reveals only one chosen people who form one covenant community, beautifully symbolized [...]