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Church Café
[Christian Life]A church café is a coffee shop that a church operates inside its sanctuary building or an auxiliary building. Its main purposes are to foster fellowship among members and to provide a place of contact with local residents.
John Stott
[People]John R. W. Stott (1921–2011) was an English Anglican priest, preacher, and author. A leading figure in the worldwide evangelical movement of the twentieth century, he led the drafting of the Lausanne Covenant in 1974.
Compassion Korea
[Institutions]Compassion Korea is the Korean branch of Compassion International, an international child development organization. Compassion first worked in Korea to help orphans of the Korean War, and its assistance there ended in 1993. Compassion Korea was established in 2003, when Korea became a sponsor country. It connects children in poor countries one-to-one with Korean sponsors.
CGNTV
[Institutions]CGN (Christian Global Network) is a Protestant mission broadcaster operated by the Onnuri Mission Foundation, an incorporated foundation established chiefly by Onnuri Church in Seoul, South Korea. It began broadcasting in 2005 as CGNTV. Its primary audiences are overseas missionaries and members of the Korean diaspora around the world.
Revelation 7:4
[Bible Verses]Revelation 7:4 states that the number of those sealed from all the tribes of Israel was "an hundred and forty and four thousand." Interpreters disagree over whether the number is a literal count or a symbol, and over whom it designates. Several heretical groups have also associated this number with their own organizations.
Deuteronomy 22:10
[Bible Verses]Deuteronomy 22:10 is a provision of the Mosaic law forbidding the plowing of a field with an ox and a donkey yoked together. It has been read as a law of care for animals and as a holiness law prohibiting mixtures. In Korean Protestant churches, it is frequently cited in discussions of marriage between believers and unbelievers.
2 Thessalonians 2:3–4
[Bible Verses]A passage in which Paul tells the church at Thessalonica that before "the day of the Lord" there will come an apostasy (a falling away from the faith) and that "the man of lawlessness" will be revealed. Because it is a principal text on the Antichrist and the sequence of end-time events, it is interpreted in widely differing ways.
2 Corinthians 12:2–4
[Bible Verses]In this passage Paul recounts, in the third person, an experience from fourteen years earlier in which he was caught up to the "third heaven" and into paradise, where he heard "unspeakable words." It is frequently discussed in connection with Paul's visionary experience, the meaning of heaven and paradise, and whether it can serve as a basis for testimonies of visiting heaven.
2 Corinthians 4:16
[Bible Verses]In this verse Paul, amid the sufferings he endures as an apostle, declares that "though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." The verse is frequently cited when speaking of hope in the midst of aging, illness, and suffering, and discussion centers chiefly on what the "outward man" and the "inward man" denote.
Damascus
[Bible]Damascus, today the capital of Syria, is an ancient city that appears throughout the Bible. In the Old Testament it is the chief city of Aram; in the New Testament it is the city toward which Paul was traveling when he was converted.
Genesis 35:1–7
[Bible Verses]After the events at Shechem, God commands Jacob to go up to Bethel and build an altar there, and Jacob's household puts away its foreign gods before arriving at Bethel. The passage is often preached as an example of fulfilling a vow and of purification before worship.
1 Corinthians 8:4–6
[Bible Verses]In this passage, Paul addresses the question of food sacrificed to idols by affirming that an idol is nothing and that there is one God, and he confesses God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ together. It is frequently cited in discussions of early Christian Christology, the doctrine of the Trinity, and the question of food offered in ancestral rites.
Isaiah 30:15
[Bible Verses]Isaiah 30:15 is addressed to Judah, which was seeking an alliance with Egypt in the face of the Assyrian threat. It declares that salvation and strength lie not in military calculation but in returning to God and trusting Him in quietness. The verse is frequently cited in discussions of trust and waiting amid anxiety.
Parable of the Unjust Judge
[Bible]A parable of Jesus recorded in Luke 18:1–8. Even an unjust judge grants the plea of a persistent widow, and God will all the more avenge his elect. The parable teaches that believers ought always to pray and not lose heart.
Didache
[History]The Didache, meaning "the Teaching (of the Twelve Apostles)," is an early church document generally thought to have been written in the late first or early second century. It contains instructions on baptism, the Eucharist, fasting, prayer, and church offices.
Noah's Ark
[Bible]Noah's ark is the large vessel that God commanded Noah to build in Genesis 6–9. Noah's family of eight and the animals survived the Flood aboard it. The New Testament takes up the ark as an image of faith, salvation, and baptism.
Excommunication
[Organization & Polity]Excommunication is the most severe stage of church discipline, in which the church removes an unrepentant member who has sinned from the church community and revokes that person's membership.
Candace
[People]Candace is the "queen of the Ethiopians" mentioned in Acts 8. An official in charge of her treasury was baptized by Philip. A widely known view holds that the name was a title of the queens of the ancient Nubian kingdom rather than a personal name.
Origen
[People]Origen (c. 185 – c. 253) was an early church theologian and biblical interpreter from Alexandria. He produced the Hexapla, a parallel edition of the Old Testament, and On First Principles, a systematic theological work, but some of his teachings were condemned after his death.
Seer
[Bible]A seer is "one who sees" what God has shown. In the Old Testament it is an older name for a prophet. Samuel, Gad, and Iddo, among others, were called by this title.