The body of Christ started the same time the Church started, on the cross at Calvary where Jesus made a payment for sin in God’s shed blood.

Nothing like a King James Bible to clear up false teaching, and today we take a look at when the body of Christ, and the Church, actually began. The hyper-dispensationalists will try and tell you that it started in Acts with the commission of Paul, and nothing could be further from the truth. Paul himself tells you in Romans 16:7 that there were many people in the body of Christ before he was. In fact, the body of Christ doesn’t begin anywhere in the book of Acts, it begins on the cross at Calvary.

“And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:” Ephesians 2:16 (KJB)

What was Jesus doing on the cross? Lots of things. First of all, Jesus went to the cross to make a payment for sin, and that payment is the shed blood of God as we see in Acts 20:28. That payment is the thing that makes reconciliation between lost sinners and a holy and righteous God possible. Heretics like John MacArthur and the ‘reformed’ crowd will try and talk you out of it, but don’t you let them.

“In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;” Ephesians 1:7 (KJB)

“But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.” Ephesians 2:13 (KJB)

Secondly, Jesus shed blood on the cross established something on this earth the bible calls the body of Christ. What is the body of Christ? It is Jew and Gentile come together by faith in Jesus Christ and His work on the cross, and it is called the church, the called out assembly. On the day of Pentecost, this assembly, the Church, was placed into the body of Christ where it will remain for all eternity. Everyone who becomes born again by saving faith in what Jesus did on the cross, and receives that payment made in God’s blood, is placed into the body of Christ through the Church.

“And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.” Ephesians 1:22,23 (KJB)

By the time Paul meets Jesus on the road to Damascus, the Church is well established and made up exclusively of Jews and Jewish proselytes. But when the Holy Ghost is offering them the Kingdom of Heaven in Acts 7, all they have to do is believe and repent at the preaching of Stephen, they instead murder him, an act which simultaneously put the Kingdom of Heaven on a 2,000 year pause, and ushered in what we call the dispensation of the Church Age. From this point on, Jews will be side-by-side with Gentiles in a mystery called the body of Christ which Jesus will task Paul with revealing. It didn’t start with Paul, but the knowledge of it comes through Paul by the Spirit. It began on the cross at Calvary.

“For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward: How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words, Whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ) Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel: Whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power.” Ephesians 3:1-7 (KJB)

Paul was given the job of revealing the mystery of the body of Christ, but it did not start with him as you can obviously see. The hyper-dispensationalists get it wrong, as they usually do, because they don’t understand what the ‘rightly dividing’ of 2 Timothy 2:15 actually is. True biblical rightly dividing is not a hammer to smash things with in large pieces, as evidenced in the ‘Romans to Philemon!!’ battle cry of the hypers. No, rightly dividing is done on a verse-by-verse-basis anywhere in the Bible, comparing what you read, in the context that you find it, to what God has written through the apostle Paul.

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

• HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

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But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

Can you perform all 5 of the signs, miracles and wonders Jesus lays out in our NTEB Mark 16 Challenge? We invite you to try it and see how well you do!

Let’s get right into it, shall we? In the beginning of the Church Age, when the last of the apostles died, they were not replaced. The Bible was finished being written around the year 96 AD, and there has been exactly zero new biblical revelations from God since that time. Boatloads of revelation, wisdom and insight on what He spent 1,500 years to write, but no new revelation. There are no prophets, there are no apostles, and signs, miracles and wonders are not for believers in the age of grace.

“(For we walk by faith, not by sight:)” 2 Corinthians 5:7 (KJB)

The main people promoting this false gospel of signs, miracles and wonders are a branch of the Charismatic Movement known as the New Apostolic Reformation, and a more deluded bunch you have never seen. They stand on stage telling people to not pray when they or a loved one are sick, but to ‘claim your healing’ and all will be well. But sadly, real life in the Church Age doesn’t work like that. Bethel shaman Bill Johnson found that out when his ‘co-pastor’ wife Beni got sick with cancer. Despite years of teaching that Christians can just ‘claim their healing’, she was unable to claim hers. Does that make Bill Johnson a false teacher? It sure does, and a dangerous one at that.

Maybe you are one of those people who believe that signs, miracles and wonders are for today, and that reading this article is making you mad. If that’s you, take this little test and see how well you do. Remember that we are scoring on the 5-point must system, and that you must be able to do all 5 things Jesus says the people He is talking to can do. Buckle up and let’s take the test!

CLICK TO VIEW AND PURCHASE KING JAMES BIBLE COMMENTARIES THAT WILL HELP YOU TO RIGHTLY DIVIDE THE SCRIPURES AS THE APOSTLE PAUL COMMANDS US TO DO!!

Take The Mark 16 Challenge:

Doctrinally speaking, Jesus is addressing His disciples who are awaiting the installation of the literal, physical and visible Kingdom of Heaven on the earth. Prophetically, Jesus is speaking about the 144,000 witnesses that show up during the time of Jacob’s trouble. The people He is not speaking to is me and you living here in the Church Age, hence the whole point of taking this test in the first place.

“And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.” Mark 16:15-18 (KJB)

1. CASTING OUT DEVILS: “And these signs shall follow them that believe; in my name shall they cast out devils” Start with that, can you cast out devils from the body of the afflicted person? To the people Jesus is speaking to, they absolutely can. First you have to be able to discern between demon possession and mental illness, can you do that, doctor? You might want to tread lightly with this one. But please feel free to take a shot, this is a favorite of Charismatics and Roman Catholics. In fact, back in 2019, the Vatican started giving courses in exorcisms to Christian pastors, what an amazing coincidence! (insert eye-roll here)
2. NEW TONGUES: “they shall speak with new tongues;” When was the last time that you, in the Spirit, were able to speak in a foreign language you did not know? I am not talking about the made-up nonsense of Kenneth Copeland and Rodney Howard Browne, I am talking about the biblical gift on tongues which, as Acts 2:5-12 shows us, is the ability to speak a known foreign language not previously known to the speaker. Comment below with story of when you did this, and what was said by you after the biblically-appointed interpreter – 1 Corinthians 14:26-30 – has translated what you said.
3. SNAKE HANDLING: “They shall take up serpents;” Can you handle venomous snakes, get bit and shake it off like Paul does in Acts 28:5? Why not? This is one of the signs, why can’t you do it? Pastor Jamie Coots of the Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus Name church died after handling a snake because, well, snake handling is not for the Church Age. But please, feel free to prove me wrong. (seriously, don’t do it).
4. DRINKING POISON: “and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them;” The snake handling and the poison drinking are both under the banner of “it shall not hurt them”. That said, how well would you fare with cyanide in your Diet Coke? Come on, man! So far, if you’re honest, you are 0-for-4. But the passage is talking about Revelation 8:11.
5. HEALING THE SICK: “they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.” I am still waiting for anyone to be able to do this, and if you can please email me, I have a few sick friends who could really use your gift. Of course, Jesus is referring to James 5:13-15, passages fulfilled during the time of Jacob’s trouble.

Who could do these things when Jesus said them? Why, the apostles of course, and Paul did them as did Peter and all the rest. We call this the ‘apostolic signs’, and to have them you have to be an apostle. No exceptions. These signs were used to bring in the Kingdom Age which did not happen after the murder of Stephen in Acts 7. These signs were also used to show the people that the apostles were who they said they were as the New Testament was being written. During the time of Jacob’s trouble, the 144,000 witnesses from Revelation 7:1-8 will have all of these signs, and will ‘finish the job’. You will notice that our modern-day false prophets of the New Apostolic Reformation healed exactly no one during the COVID pandemic, and the few that attempted to prophesy failed miserably. So the next time you are introduced to ‘Apostle So-and-So’, and ‘Prophet Fair-thee-well’, send them this link and ask them to take the test. Please be sure to post your score in the comments section so we can all see how much of an apostle you are. I’ve always wanted to meet one!

Meet some of the ‘apostles and prophets’ of the Charismatic Movement

These are the people who tell you that ‘signs, miracles and wonders’ are for today, watch them in action and tell me if you believe them. 

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

• HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

CLICK NOW TO HELP US SEND THOUSANDS OF KING JAMES BIBLES INTO JAIL, PRISONS AND DETENTION CENTERS ALL ACROSS AMERICA!!

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

In Acts 13:48, the Bible shows us how God ordained and appointed the gospel to go to the Gentiles as prophesied in the Old Testament that they might believe, this is not a proof text for Calvinism.

I read an article earlier today called The Bible Verse That Made Me a Calvinist and it’s sad little story about a man who reads one verse in the book of the Acts of the Apostles and has the stunning revelation that yes, John Calvin was right about everything. So right, in fact, that the author decides, as John MacArthur teaches, that it’s John Calvin and not Paul who is actually the apostle to the Church Age, and it’s Calvin’s doctrine we are to follow. This type of result is typical of shallow study and sloppy exegesis, the antithesis of 2 Timothy 2:15.

“And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.” Acts 13:48 (KJB)

Someone once remarked that ‘a text without a context is a pretext for a proof text’, and that’s pretty much ‘right on the money’ as the Bible is filled with verses that, removed from the safe mooring of their context, yield wildly differing results. In Acts 13:44-52, the context is the hardness of the Jews hearts, and their refusal to believe the gospel. The Bible doesn’t say they can’t believe, it says they refused to believe, and because of their refusal, God turns to a group of people who will believe, the Gentiles. That the Gentiles would one day hear and believe the gospel is an Old Testament prophecy found in places like Isaiah 49:6 and Isaiah 60:3 in your King James Bible.

“Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles.” Acts 13:46 (KJB)

Calvinism may teach, and it does, that no one gets saved until God ‘regenerates you’ in order for you to be able to believe, and then you become born again after God ‘flips your switch’. But this is not what your Bible teaches, it says the opposite of that. In Matthew 23:37, Jesus calls out the Jews for refusing to believe Him and His teachings, clearly showing they could believe if they had wanted to. In Acts 28:23-27, our apostle Paul speaks something very similar to what Jesus said in Matthew, again placing all the responsibility for the disbelief of the Jews on themselves, and not on God for not ‘regenerating’ them. Then in verse 28, Paul gives us a key to unlock Acts 13:48 as we see here:

“Be it known therefore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it.” Acts 28:28 (KJB)

What did God do? He ordained the gospel to go to the Gentiles, just like it did to Cornelius in Acts 10:1-44, He appointed them the opportunity to have the gospel preached to them that some might believe. The Bible is not saying that God ordained and appointed individuals to salvation before they believed the gospel, rather that He was no longer dealing just with Israel. Romans 10:9-17 is quite clear that a person becomes saved when they call upon the name of the Lord and confess Him as Saviour after they’ve had the gospel preached to them. Paul repeats this theme again in Ephesians 1:10-14 where he shows us that a person gets saved after they hear the gospel preached, they believe it, receive it, and then are “sealed unto the day of redemption“ by the Holy Spirit.

THIS EXCELLENT BOOK ‘THE OTHER SIDE OF CALVINISM’ IS JUST ONE OF DOZENS OF BOOKS AND ACCESSORIES ON-SALE NOW AT THE BOOKSTORE TILL THE END OF THE YEAR!!

Remember Cornelius? The Bible says that he was a ‘just man’ and one that ‘feareth God’, who had a ‘good report’ among all who knew him. But there was something pretty huge that Cornelius did not have, he wasn’t saved. So, God appeared to Peter and ordained him to go and give Cornelius the gospel on an appointed day, and that’s exactly what happened. Peter preached the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ to Cornelius, and the man got saved after he believed what Peter preached. What does Calvinism have to say about any of this? Nothing, because there is not one iota of Calvinism anywhere needed to bring this about. Now let’s wrap this whole thing up, shall we?

“Who shall tell thee words, whereby thou and all thy house shall be saved.” Acts 11:14 (KJB)

The Greek word used for ‘ordained’ is tetagmenoi which means ‘to put in order, to station, to place in a certain order, to arrange, to assign a place, to appoint’. This is just what God did when He turned to the Gentiles, as Paul says, and ordains or appoints them the opportunity to hear and believe the gospel. To come to any other conclusion is simply bowing to the filter of Calvinism, and being ‘willing ignorant’ of the abundance of scripture, rightly divided and in context, showing Calvin to be in grievous error. Don’t you make the same mistake.

John MacArthur Led 3,500 Pastors To Believe On John Calvin

This is typical MacArthur garbage. You will notice that Mac doesn’t defend Calvinism from the Bible, which you can’t do, but instead appeals to the “suffering and study” of Calvin as the reason why we should accept the private interpretation of Calvinism.

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

• HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

CLICK NOW TO HELP US SEND THOUSANDS OF KING JAMES BIBLES INTO JAIL, PRISONS AND DETENTION CENTER ALL ACROSS AMERICA!!

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB