Hi.  I have a few questions that need answering.  Thank you in advance for your answers.

1. Are the souls of the fallen angels on this earth age?  I have heard that all souls that were in the first age, came to the second, but a verse from the Bible reads: Jude 6 "And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, He hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day." ...from what I understand of the passage, the fallen angels do not enter the second earth age.
2. If the souls of the fallen angels are in this earth age with us, can they be saved, or is it too late?
3. Can people who are "Satan’s children" in this earth age, be saved?
4. Is everyone who is on earth now someone who was indecisive in the first age, or did some of us follow God then as well?  I thought we already decided to follow God, and that is why we are in this earth age.

Sincerely,
Time Trials

Dear Time Trials,

All of these questions can be answered by clearing up a misunderstanding about the ages of the earth.  Some people teach that there have been multiple earth ages: the first earth age was a time that existed millions of years before Adam and Eve, the second earth age is when we are currently living, and the third earth age has yet to come to pass.  The Bible doesn’t teach this.

Genesis 1 teaches that God created the whole world in six days, and it was immediately inhabited by Adam and Eve who became the father and mother of all mankind (Gen 3:20).  The Bible never speaks of a world existing before the earth we know today.  At one point, God flooded the earth, but that didn’t destroy all of mankind because Noah’s family survived (1 Pet 3:20).  One day, this earth will be destroyed by fire and replaced with a new, spiritual heaven and earth (2 Pet 3:10-13).

The fallen angels spoken of in Jude 6 are doomed for destruction in that day of fire, and all mankind has an opportunity to repent and come to Christ before that great Day of Judgment (2 Cor 6:2).

Why does the church not teach when Christmas first started?  They only teach that it’s Jesus’ birthday.  But they don’t teach who actually started Christmas.  Everything that I have been studying about Christmas has nothing to do with Jesus; it’s all about money.  When I type ‘what is Christmas’ into a search engine, Santa Claus is the first thing that is shown, not Jesus.  Congress was actually started on December 25^th, 1870, and America decided to make that the Christmas federal holiday.  Jesus was never born around December.  All my life, I have been told lies about Christmas.  Can someone out there tell me the truth about Christmas?

Sincerely,
The Grinch

Dear The Grinch,

Many people believe Christmas to be a spiritual holiday, but the Bible never commands us to celebrate Jesus’ birth on December 25^th (the truth is, no one knows when Jesus was born, but it was most likely in the spring or summer because the shepherds were out – Lk 2:15).  Christians are commanded to remember Jesus’ death every first day of the week (Acts 20:7, 1 Cor 11:24-25)… we are never commanded to remember His birth on an annual basis.  Christmas is not a biblical holiday.  There is nothing wrong with celebrating it as a family holiday, but it is wrong to teach that there is a biblical foundation to it.

Christmas can be traced back to the Roman pagan holiday of Winter Solstice (also known as ‘Saturnalia’ because it was in worship of the god, Saturn).  As Catholicism tried to integrate itself into a pagan Roman world, Christmas was instituted by Pope Julius I on December 25^th as a way to assimilate the pagans into a Catholic worldview.  In short, Christmas has never been a truly biblical holiday; it is a manmade tradition with no bearings upon your salvation.

I am a Jew and was invited to a friend’s church, and I went out of respect.  Wonderful people, but I was blown away with the preacher’s bottom line of "convert or burn in hell".

Jews believe there are righteous gentiles (non-Jews), but it appears from going to this church that there is no such thing as righteous non-christians.

Do all churches teach this?  Is this love and mercy?  It is hard to understand when the priest who read Adolf Lekman his last rites was asked after he purified himself with Jesus for one minute if he was now in heaven, and he replied, “Yes, he is”, and when asked about the 1.5 million Jewish children who were murdered he said, “May God have mercy on their souls”, meaning they are doomed.

Does this not cause division and pit one group of good people against another?

Sincerely,
Of A Friendly Faith

Dear Of A Friendly Faith,

As a Jew, you must appreciate the importance of the Messiah as much as we do.  Every Hebrew has anxiously searched for and waited for the coming of the Savior of Israel for thousands of years.  If that Savior came, and you rejected Him… you would be rejecting your own religion.  The coming of the Messiah is the single most important element of Judaism… even your own rabbis state this.  The only difference between you and us is that we believe that Messiah has already come.

Jesus is the Christ (Jhn 20:31).  Jesus professes that He is the only way to God (Jhn 14:6).  God’s definition of being a ‘good person’ is when we follow and obey His Son (Jhn 12:26).  Jesus is a stumbling block to many Jewish people (1 Cor 1:23), but that has always been the case.  Jesus even said that His coming would bring division (Matt 10:34-36).  If Jesus is a liar, we should desert Him, but if He is the Word of God (Jhn 1:1), any other religion cannot stand beside His (Eph 4:4-6).

I am a committed christian, and I accept Christ as my Savior, but I don't understand some of the things God does to people who do not believe, and I believe this is holding me back from truly feeling Him in my heart.  These are some of the things I do not understand: there are truly great people out there who do not know Christ or do not believe.  Those who are brought up believing something else are innocent, for they have no choice. To them, it is like someone trying to convert you to Buddhism; you would not convert because you were brought up believing something else, and the consequence is to burn in hell for all eternity.  The human mind can’t even conceive of eternity; that’s the most horrifying thing I can imagine. God is like our father, but could you send your son to burn in hell, even if you could do something about it?  Please help me understand this; my faith most likely depends on this.  Thank you.

Sincerely,
Voice For The Lost

Dear Voice For The Lost,

There are several things to consider when wrestling with the issue of the lost going to hell.  The first thing to remember is that God doesn’t send people to hell – we choose to go there.  Sin is a choice made by responsible adults (see the story of the first sin in Gen 3:1-7).  When we sin, we die (Rom 6:23).  God didn’t make us spiritually dead; He created us with spiritual life (Gen 2:7).  God originally wanted all mankind to live eternally with Him in the Garden of Eden (Gen 2:8)… we are the ones who chose to break that perfect pattern.

God says that everyone has the opportunity and freedom to choose Him – regardless of what background we come from.  The very universe screams of the nature of God, so all are without excuse (Rom 1:20).  We all have a responsibility to seek out God, and He promises that all those who seek Him will find Him (Matt 7:7, Matt 5:6).  God never condemned us to hell; we did it to ourselves.  God has offered a payment for our souls through His Son Jesus Christ’s blood (Jhn 3:16).  Jesus is a road back to God (Jhn 14:6), a road we don’t deserve (Rom 5:8).  All of us have rebelled against God (Rom 3:23), and God in His infinite mercy gives us a second chance.

When we start thinking in terms of “God opening the way to heaven through His love” instead of “God condemning almost everyone to hell”, then we begin to get a proper picture of the way God views eternity.

When kids are psychic, and they claim they do not have anything to do with the devil, are they lying?  Or is the devil using them?

Sincerely,
Weirded Out

Dear Weirded Out,

People that claim they are psychic are lying and are meddling in the occult.  Astrologists, those who claim supernatural powers, palm readers, etc. are not from God (Mic 5:12, Isa 2:6, Jer 27:9).  Every lie is from the devil (Jhn 8:44), and the devil uses us when we promote false teaching (Matt 16:23).  The only way to properly serve God is to throw off all pretenses of these dark arts and wholly serve Jesus in truth (Acts 19:18-20).