Yusuf Ismail and Deuteronomy, and Further Response to Abu Zakariya

Alpha & Omega Ministries

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00:32

Greetings welcome to the dividing line here. We are live again. I sort of feel like I did this yesterday I was on iron sharpens iron with Chris Arnson yesterday for two hours well

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He has a 12 -minute break at the top of the hour, which is really odd, but so it wasn't really a full mega dividing line, but anyway

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Discussing the I don't know, but what we will call it evidently It's either the useful idiot controversy or the white bot controversy

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Those are some of the terms are being thrown about out there by some folks

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Have a couple things I need to say about that and then transition into today on the program I Was listening to a debate last evening

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Between Yusuf Ismail and And we saw my deck doc from like two months ago really recent

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Stop that I Wouldn't have reacted quite as strongly if it wasn't for someone

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I know this side of the window, but Yeah, it was

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Wow In the olden days we used to term Donnie Brooke But I don't know that anybody uses that anymore and what we even understand what it meant anymore

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But it was Donnie Brooke. It was Somewhat first so he had the opportunity of setting shall we call it the temperature for the the discussion

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And he put it on full blast You know just We're gonna we're gonna have ourselves a knockdown dragout fight here

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And we're just gonna yell at each other and we're just gonna talk past each other and we're just gonna throw out as much

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Arabic as we possibly can from both sides and Call it good, and that's sort of what it ended up being and of course

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Yusuf Yusuf just went toe -to -toe you know he can give as good as it takes and Osama set set the the pattern and and he followed through and it it was it was nasty so I I want to look at some statements that were made in that debate and Actually invite everyone to take your

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Bibles, and we're gonna. We're gonna look at some tough texts, and if you've not had the opportunity to Well most of you have had the opportunity, but whether you've chosen to take that opportunity or not last year approximately a year ago

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I was in the middle of a sermon series at PRBC on Really the toughest

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Old Testament texts there are I mean We didn't skip anything we

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We went for all of them. We we went for we did the Holiness Code we we did if it was a tough

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Difficult what in the world does this mean? text in regards to God's law in in the

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Mosaic Covenant we we attempted to deal with it and this came up in the back and forth between Osama and Yusuf and It was interesting because of the fact that at one point basically

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At least in my experience people involved in Islamic apologetics when Muslims push back with Old Testament texts

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People just go hey, I just follow Jesus and Jesus told us love everybody so I don't I don't even worry about that stuff and I Don't know how anybody can do that, but I certainly can't do that that's

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You know, I've I've heard some pretty well -known Christian apologists say hey, it's good reason why we don't follow

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Moses anymore. And I and I'm just like How can how can you do that?

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Jesus taught people. Yeah, Jesus obviously honored that very law.

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You can't just throw that law under the bus it just Again, you know,

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I I try to take the long view If you if a person if if your witness is used to bring a person into the

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Christian faith What are you gonna want them to do? Are you just gonna put a notch in your gun belt and say?

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Got another one move on from there and just leave them to themselves or is it your desire these individuals who grow in the grace and knowledge the

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Lord Jesus Christ and and They will end up with questions. They will end up reading these texts and they may very well discover that Jesus honored that law and Then what do you do?

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so Excuse me. I can't I just I can't take that that perspective and when it comes to Doing apologetics, but what

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I really want to do is look at What texts two particular texts that Yusuf Ismail brought up and point out that if If we were to attempt to deal with these texts in a meaningful fashion, it could never have been done in the context this debate

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And not only were the time frames just such well I You know

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Yusuf always wants to have really really long opening statements 30 minutes 30 minutes.

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It's that's his standard and Did here as well and maybe you could if that was the focus in 30 minutes do something with particular text, but especially with the heated nature of that stuff

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You just you could never really address these things so we're take a look at that and then we want to get back to the response to Abu Zakaria and look specifically at Trinitarian issues so it's could get sort of deep

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Why is it everyone's saying I need to drink of water. I I I did Interval training this morning really tough intervals stuff not only on the bike but on the rower

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And when you're going all out when you're pushing your heart rate to max doing sprints I Think I think it was a little dry and I sort of irritated

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Something in my lungs and either that or I sucked a bug down there. That's a possibility too

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You never know So I just got his little little thing and it was just due to how hard I was working this morning intervals or Intervals hurt, but they're really really good for you

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And I'm just glad that I can still at least try to to do them. So anyway

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So let's talk a little bit about what happened over the weekend briefly Two major things since the last program one was a broad a webcast from Reformed Baptist in Ireland and I actually

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Put the the audio into audio note -taker. I was gonna I was gonna play some stuff

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I just decided no, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna invest that that level of time

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Fundamentally what what really took me aback by this particular webcast not only was the unfairness of it.

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I mean The expressed intentions that I as a

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Reformed Baptist Have very clearly put out there just well that may be what your intentions were

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But we're gonna judge on a completely different grounds completely different basis pretty strong bias and prejudice

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Expressed in regards to Muslim people as a whole, but it was the it was the biblical

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Interpretation that left me going really For example,

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I was faulted for referring to And this is the one that just left me stuttering.

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I was I was faulted for referring to Yasir Qadhi as a Muslim believer a believing

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Muslim and Because only Christians are believers and I'm like What I?

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Mean so so you can't refer to a believing Jew a

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Believing Buddhist You can't use the term believing of anybody but Christian. I Mean, I don't even know how to interact with with that Everybody knows exactly what

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I was saying. Here is a person who really believes Islam not not a not a ishy -squishy liberal but someone who actually believes that the

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Quran is the Word of God and Muhammad was a prophet and all the rest that stuff and which is

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You know when you get into conversations with most Muslims that you're gonna be trying to witness to if you try to witness to Muslims that's where they're gonna be coming from and so You know that kind of thing

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I don't even I don't know how to Someone who would bring that up is not out there

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Reaching out to Muslims and these other people there That kind of criticism only comes from people that are holding them at arm's length and I just don't you know, and I've seen this attitude sadly in a number of of contexts and that Part of me just doesn't even want to have to waste my time with it.

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And and part of me is just tired of it If you can't tell what I meant by believing Muslim and if you think that's a that's a reason for criticism

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Well, okay fine, whatever. I find it absurd. I'll just tell you that right now that's not the kind of exegesis and hermeneutics that brought us reformed theology or Trinitarian theology or anything else, but There you go.

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The fact matter is we have you know There's there's there's a strain of fundamentalism even within reformed reformed groups there really is and I think that's where some of that comes from But then there was that there was a lot of stuff, you know trying to connect this to The Israelites going down to Egypt and Jeremiah and and stuff like this and I'm just I'm just going

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Wait a minute. We're talking here about Seeking to understand what someone else believes so that we can be more effective in Engaging them for the gospel what on earth does this have to do with any of that?

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There are clear straightforward biblical texts 1st Peter 3 16 when you give that apologia when you give that reason with hopes within you you do it with gentleness and reverence

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How about talking about that I really don't think what happened in the latter chapters of Jeremiah is overly relevant and if you think it is well

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Okay Blessings to you So anyway

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That came out and and it was like okay, and then on Saturday an

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Article hit American thinker comm by James Simpson called when evangelicals become useful idiots for Islamism Now you need to understand

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How many times you've been sitting around? and some

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Some Kind of thing has happened politically and Normally what

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I hear is People from the left coming out and they're all using the same language the remember the member when

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When Bush chose Cheney for vice presidential nominee, what was the term that the next day?

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gravitas Everybody was using a word that nobody had ever used before It was just I mean the talking points thing was just so obvious and we

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You know, I'm used to seeing people on the right Exposing people on the left who are just don't they've been given their talking points and they're just babbling heads.

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Okay Guess what? Doesn't just happen on the left it happens on the right too and This Useful idiot thing.

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We know exactly where it came from. We know who the first one to use it was this is a talking point and It's this is a organized effort to get this stuff out to try to destroy this ministry

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That's all there is to it. It has been decided that this idea of of Reaching out in love and compassion in an

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Uncompromising way to adorn the gospel of Jesus Christ can't allow that that's against the meme

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It's it's and it's all you know A lot of these people have completely different reasons why they're doing it very different reasons some it's money some it's their own little

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You know some it's personal There's there's there's lots of different reasons But they're using the same they're using the same talking points

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And so as soon as I see this first of all I realize you know American thinker I used to subscribe to that on my

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RSS feeds. I haven't seen it for a while But You know

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I start looking through it, and it it's pretty much copied straight from Brandon House. There's not much It's been added to it at all

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All the the connections stuff connecting Yasir Qadhi to everybody in their second cousin

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Same type of stuff that that Brandon House spent pretty much the first hour of his of his program on So it didn't take much work to do this.

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It was 2 ,500 words and So down at the bottom of course there is

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Twitter Facebook for James Simpson, so I Throw out there to James Simpson is is it your normal practice not to contact?

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The people that you're that you're writing about I may have thought about putting the people you're calling useful idiots, but I didn't

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And I didn't really expect to hear anything back But I did and he said well, maybe we should have done that maybe we should have done that It's not

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It does not take Any journalistic acumen to be able to find the phone number for this office

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Given the phone calls that we get here it takes none whatsoever to find the phone number it's it's on the front page of the website and Google is still working and But no we were never contacted and So I I followed up and I'm gonna need to change the

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Thing here because I have this I have this up Is that the

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I Think that's yeah, I think it's the right one Is that the right one?

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So here's here's the the follow -up tweet that I sent quick follow -up

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One read any of my books to seen any of my nearly 160 public debates three listen to my refutations of Brannan house and in true modern 2017 journalistic fashion

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Jim Simpson author of the American thinker Argus says why should I you are wrong?

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Oh What why why should I do what? research

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Spend time. Do you realize I got a 2 ,500 word article into American thinker for only 12 minutes worth of work

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I've got swimming to do what? What do I care if I throw a

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Christian minister under the bus and call him a useful idiot when He's out there doing debates in mosques and writing a book on Islam and doing all been doing this for years

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What do I care? I don't have time for this stuff so Well, okay

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You know that Doesn't surprise me. We got called by another reporter last week early last week,

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I think and I started talking with him and And You know, he asked me a question why would you sit down and talk with an imam about what he believes and I'm like So I can better understand his position and communicate the gospel to him first words out of his mouth is you're naive.

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Oh Okay, you're I'm sorry, I was laboring under delusion that you're actually a reporter

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Not someone well, yeah, we recognize it vast majority of these folks are not writing as Reporters or journalists they are they have their their memes their themes their positions and they're just out there to promote that and Whether it's truthful accurate fair What does that matter?

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But just to give you an idea, you know, it's been said many times that the that lies

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Fly around the world before the truth gets out of bed and puts its shoes on Just to give you an idea that article

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Was picked up by some Christian Networks and within six hours before they were pulled down Had over 30 ,000 shares 30 ,000 shares people love lies

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People just love to believe the worst about people. They don't it people love lies even sadly

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Christian people love lies and Once it's out there

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My goodness in in our day You know the the the

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Internet is the greatest means of communication ever But because of its nature it is likewise the greatest means of promulgating lies and deception that has ever been designed

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I mean think how many times we have to deal with with Abject foolishness that comes out of the zeitgeist movie just simply because it's out there and it'll remain out there

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It's been refuted over and over and over again. It's been so blown full of holes That that it doesn't even offer wind resistance anymore.

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I mean it is completely Decimated But it just continues on because that's the nature.

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That's the nature of of these things and so There you go.

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It's it's a shame. We'll come back to that subject in a second with Usama dak -dak and that that debate, but I did want to look at one other

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Tweet just briefly I Need to need to make mention of it anyways

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As sad as it is. I haven't listened to it yet I Need to grab it and Go through the torture,

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I guess If I'm gonna do an outside ride later on this week. I'll probably do it then because I'll already be suffering enough as it is but Here is a

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Catholic answers tweet And Never never expected to see this one

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And but there it is the Bible answer man finds the Eucharist listen to this captivating interview by Cy Kellett of Hank Hanegraaff and there's the link to Hank Hanegraaff's appearance on Catholic answers and I mentioned this

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Primarily Due to the fact that when

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Hank announced his conversion to Eastern Orthodoxy He made kept making the statement in his defense of his move

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That My beliefs my beliefs haven't changed I've been promoting

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I've been promoting mere Christianity all along and and I've got 30 years worth of books and I still believe all of that and All the rest that stuff and and we all kept saying

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That's that can't be true That's this is not what you've been been teaching for 30 years.

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There are there is a fundamental paradigm shift here And if you can go on Catholic answers

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To talk about what you as an Orthodox person has in common with Roman Catholicism as the

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Bible answer man I think most folks will go

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I Maybe you're you're not really considering the extremity of the change that you have made because I think

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I think you're missing part of it and Yeah, that would that would be That would be the case

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So it was sad to see that I don't have any comments on what was said because like I said, I haven't listened to it yet And I'm not sure that not sure that I actually actually will so anyways let's get to this video because we're already 23 minutes in and Like I said, this is

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Osama daqqa set the Set the theme very very strongly

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With his opening statement he had queued up Statements from Yusuf Ismail so he had already gone on the attack and the alleged topic

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That's the only way to put it the alleged topic Was is

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Isis Islamic and That seems to be the primary thing that Osama daqqa is focused upon and So once Yusuf got going he was already

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You know pedal the metal full throttle as well. So it was just hand grenade versus hand grenade versus hand grenade back and forth back and forth with a lot of a lot of heat that was that was going on but One of Yusuf Ismail's Approaches and he's found it useful because for the vast majority of Christian apologists they

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You Know as I think of those who who actually deal with Islam Very few

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Have written anything done any presentations on The nature a consistent understanding of the nature of God's law and it it is pretty unusual

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I'm trying to think right now of people that are known You know, I would imagine about the only person

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I can think of off top my head At least here in in in United States, Canada That would you know has obviously done work in that area would be

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Tony Costa Where he's done both Islam and as well as dealing with God's law and things like that because he's a theologian.

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He does theology The The vast majority have just never really given much thought to it and just dismiss it just simply say hey, you know

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I'm a New Testament Christian. I don't worry about that stuff And so that's why

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Yusuf Ismail is found to be a rather effective way of sort of deflecting things so what he does is he basically

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Excuses the passages that Osama dak -dak is presenting but gives them another interpretation Which you can do simply because as I say,

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I don't believe that the sources are consistent with themselves You can also always come from a different direction and say this that and the other thing

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And so often we don't know enough about the original context to be able to really judge one way or the other But then he turns around and he throws these these texts out in regards to Deuteronomy especially and says see

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If you're gonna fault what your understanding of what you're criticizing Isis for maybe Isis is following the

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Bible and not The Quran, maybe it's your problem not ours And that's sort of what we get in this this section.

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So let's let's play a section of it here and It'll give you give you an idea

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Who does Isis follow do they follow the Hadith or do they follow maybe the Bible? Deuteronomy chapter 13 verse 5

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It says the prophet or that dream of dreams shall be put to death Because he had spoken to turn you away from the Lord your

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God if your brother your son your mother your daughter your wife says Let us go and serve other gods, which have not known nor their fathers

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Then thou shall not consent him thou shall not hearken him thou shall not pity him But thou shall surely kill him

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Deuteronomy chapter 13 verse 8 to 9 you Let me stop right there Let's take a look at it

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We will not join those Who take that that perspective and say well that was just back then

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That's not now. I'm not gonna do that We believe that all scripture is the anus to us.

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It's God -breathed and it's profitable and it's been given to us for a reason and I have a very high view of God's law.

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I believe that we should look at these texts and that we should understand what they're saying understand what their usefulness to us today is and The problem is

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I think What you can immediately see is that to seriously deal with some of these texts in the context of a brief timed and Acerbic encounter is really next to impossible.

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I Think God's law should be honored. I think God's Word should be honored That's why

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I've become less and less of a Fan of the the bomb -throwing type of encounters

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Because I just don't think that they're they're beneficial And if we want to get into the serious discussions, then we have to do so on a level that If everyone is emotionally ready to go to fisticuffs at any moment, then it doesn't really matter so Here in Deuteronomy chapter 13

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I Guess I could well No, I'm probably looking at a particular text as far as you know illustrating something.

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So I'll just I'll just read it here you have in Deuteronomy chapter 13 a section that is talking about the necessity of Pure worship on the part of God's people remember the holiness code

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Given to the people of Israel that's in Leviticus Given to the people of Israel so they might know how to live in light of the fact that God is now dwelling amongst them you have

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The people doing things that brings plagues upon them and brings death upon them because they

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Are now dwelling The Holy One of Israel is dwelling amongst them. And so when sin

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Breaks out there is the resultant wrath and in Deuteronomy You're going past just the mere externals and You're actually going to and this is where Israel always outside of those

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Elect of God who were Changed in their hearts. This is where they always stumble.

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This is where I always failed Now you're addressing hard attitudes and This is a very sobering section because a lot of people are familiar you know sort of sad on the main reasons

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I'm familiar with Deuteronomy 13 5 is because it is Something that comes up frequently in talking about Joseph Smith and the nature of false prophecy and true prophets and so on and so forth

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But that prophet of that dream of dreams shall be put to death because he has counseled rebellion against Yahweh your

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God Who brought you from the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery? this was this was in reference to an individual who may get according to Deuteronomy 13 1 if a prophet or dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder and The sign of the wonder comes true

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So you had two different tests for a false prophet The one test was if someone prophesies about what's gonna happen in the future, they got to get it, right but and The sign of the wonder comes true.

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They get it, right Concerning what you spoke to you saying Let us go after other gods whom you have not known and let us serve them.

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So he gets it, right but then says Let us go after other gods

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The absolute Necessity of pure worship of Yahweh alone is the focus of Deuteronomy chapter 13

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The people of God are told you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams

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For Yahweh your God is testing you to find out if you love Yahweh your God with all your heart with all your soul and So this dreamer of dreams has been allowed

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To come amongst the people and to even get their predictions, right and it's a test and it's a test of the people's love and of course,

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I Think it's very important to point out that You know when we can stand back from an pan biblical perspective

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Recognizing old and new covenants and and everything that God has done what we see is

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That the only ones who could ever really hear these words and live in light of them are people whose hearts have been changed through regeneration and that means the covenant -bearing

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Israelite the covenant sign bearing Israelite who is not themselves regenerate

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Will find these commandments to be burdensome because they speak to a changed nature, which they don't have and What is the primary there's a lot of there's a lot of things that that God brings

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Judgment upon the people of Israel for but what's almost always the first thing Idolatry the giving of worship to something other than the one true

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God that has delivered the the Israelite people, so What you have here is a section about idolatry and about the fact that that God requires of his people specifically of his people and Again, I would

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I would emphasize that when you have these laws that are connected

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To the confession of Yahweh as our God if you're talking to people who are making a profession by their activities by the clothing they wear by not wearing mixed fibers by The festivals they keep by by all these things they are making a testimony to the world that they are followers of Yahweh and so this is specifically for the covenant people and And if you're part of the covenant people then you are to Detest idolatry and detest anyone that would draw you away.

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Even if it's a person that claims to be a prophet Doesn't matter doesn't matter You shall follow

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Yahweh your God and fear him. You should keep his commandments. Listen to his voice serve him and cling To him, but that prophet a dream of dream shall be put to death

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Because he has counseled rebelling against Yahweh your God and brought who brought you from the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house

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Of slavery to seduce you from the way in which Yahweh your God commanded you to walk so you shall purge the evil from among you and so this is a very very

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Straightforward command to the covenant people that there can be no

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Impurity amongst them when it comes to this matter of the worship of only one

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God and yet is that not The first step we see over and over again throughout the prophets that brings judgment from God against the people of Israel is the syncretism the

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Not necessarily just rejecting the worship of Yahweh, but joining that to all these other kinds of worship

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That's exactly what happens which demonstrates that they don't love Yahweh they do not cling to Yahweh.

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They they are not thankful for Yahweh's deliverance so on and so forth and then you get this section and again and That's going into as much depth on this as I did in the sermon

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But go to sermon audio go to go to finish for Baptist Church go down to the sermons link the sermon series you'll find the holiness code and I don't know how many how many sermons there are in there is 30 35 something like that But they're broken down by text and if you want to look up Deuteronomy 13 6 and following Then you can go into a little bit more depth on this but if your brother your mother's son or your son or daughter or the wife you cherish or your friend who is as your own soul

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Entice you secretly saying let us go and serve other gods whom neither You know your fathers have known of the gods the peoples who are around you

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Near you or far from you from one end of the earth to the other end. So in other words any form of Counseled rebellion amongst the people amongst the covenant people to go serve other gods and It can be the

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God from the people across the the river or down in Egypt or anywhere else

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Doesn't matter it is a it is a secret hence rebellious counseling of rebellion

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Against Yahweh amongst the covenant people You should not yield to him or listen to him and Your eye shall not pity him nor shall you spare or conceal him

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But you shall surely kill him Your hand shall be the first against him to put him to death and afterwards the hand of all the people now

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So you shall stone him to death because he has sought to seduce you from the Lord your God Who brought you out from the land of Egypt by the house slavery now one of the objections?

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and there there are a couple of things a couple sections I could have played from Yusuf's comments because At one point he said now if you believe

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Jesus Yahweh Then this is Jesus doing this and and he was doing that because each time he brought these up with Salma Doc Doc's response was

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I'm a New Testament Christian I don't I don't follow any of that Jesus says love one another and that's that's that that that stuff is is not what we need to be concerned about so Yusuf's Rebuttal is but if you believe

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Jesus Yahweh, then this is Jesus. You can't you can't make that kind of of Simple distinction there and at that point he'd be he would be correct

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But what he missed is he just basically said you shall kill him, you know Sort of like you just rise up yourself.

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It's it's obvious That in the context of the Deuteronomistic law in the context of the

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Mosaic law as a whole You didn't just walk up behind this person with a rock and bash him over the head

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When it says your hand shall be first against him That means that there has persons been brought to the elders.

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The testimony has been given to the elders The elders have found this person as a covenant breaker to be guilty of idolatry and seeking to cause others to engage in idolatry and rebellion against Yahweh and the

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Execution takes place under the authority of the elders and the law That means there had to be had you know, there had to be basically the you know due process is what we would call it today

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It wasn't just simply taking personal vengeance or something along those lines But what's being said here is it doesn't matter who it is it's one thing if some guy says

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Hey, buddy. Hey, look at these idols I've got you want to come worship down the dark alley with me these idols and like, you know it'd be pretty easy at that point to you know, point this person out and and and say this person is counseling rebelling against Yahweh, but the point here is that you shall love the

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Lord your God and serve him only and Your love for him should be above everything else.

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It should be in a personal affront to you That anyone would seek to cause you to be disloyal

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To that commitment to the covenant God who has redeemed you gives you all of your blessings gives you life etc, etc and that really when

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Jesus says Hate father hate mother Follow me

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It's the same concept it's the same concept of the absolute primacy of the commitment to one's maker before anything else and you know, what's ironic to me is that I You know part of part of this current attack upon me originates due to the fact that a few years ago

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I Responded to the hit piece on Yasir Qadhi by Robert Spencer theologically and I theologically pointed out that it makes perfect sense given the fundamental beliefs of Islam For Yasir Qadhi to have said that someone who is an idolater is filthy in God's sight that That's Islamic belief

41:14

That it should be accepted as Islamic belief and unless you're gonna pull a Bernie Sanders and say you don't have the right to teach that It's shocking to me how many

41:24

Christians because of their prejudice will look at that and say that's just terrible for that Muslim to think that and you turn around go

41:33

Okay, so wrath of God cross God's wrath is being revealed present tense

41:42

Romans chapter 1 against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth and unrighteousness, so the

41:49

Christian can believe that God's wrath is being poured out against all unrighteousness and That that means idolatry is worthy of death.

41:59

Remember the end of Romans chapter 1 They know that those who practice these things are what? worthy of death

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And they not only practice them but encourage others to do it. Remember that part that that's in our Bible. That's in our scripture, right? How can you on the one hand

42:17

Say I'm just so offended by what this Muslim says when you on the other hand are saying the same thing now

42:22

You're your solutions different I get that but we can't get the talking about what the solutions are if we can't get past This unfairness issue that allows both sides to define themselves first The power of the gospel is the demonstration that once we understand what both sides are saying and we've allowed both sides to have their say

42:43

We have the answer The gospel is the answer I mean, you know, what's what's so sad is that so many this these these

42:56

Christian people In their their zeal to be anti Muslim Missed some of the most important stuff that was in that dialogue

43:08

Did you? could how could you have could anyone have put anyone have provided a

43:17

Stronger contrast Between the two positions and you saw if you just if you would just have listened to the dialogue

43:25

Which thankfully the people in there did And of course I can simply trust the

43:31

Holy Spirit of God to Make these things come alive in the heart of his elect people. That's That's why

43:37

I can You know rejoice even in the midst of all the insults and everything else But did you did you hear what yasser khadi said?

43:47

about their understanding of justice and works and reward

43:54

I Mean he was very straightforward, you know God rewards us for the things that we do and it's it's the scales of justice type thing and it's it's right there

44:04

It's right laid out. What do I do in the mosque? We're dead in sin. We're under God's wrath

44:11

We need someone else's righteousness and that righteousness comes in and through faith in Jesus Christ Um You know, you don't even get you don't even get any mention of that The primary reason being that for many of the people that are attacking the dialogue.

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They don't have a theological Dog in the hunt. They don't care Gospel, what's that matter?

44:41

It's it's all about the politics. So okay, I get that but the people who pretend

44:47

To be theologically concerned, how can you just skip over that? Oh, well, it's it's the rest of stuff, but you didn't hear that Yeah, that's it.

44:57

That's pretty amazing. So Anyway This is this is the text that you know, what's what's it telling us?

45:09

Can let's put this way can you divorce this text can you say I that was that was just then Now we recognize that there are elements that were just then there was a theocratic nation with elders who judged based upon Theocratic law and these were

45:28

People that had taken a covenant at Mount Sinai to be God's people And so there were certain things they had to do and there are certain ways they had to behave and They're You know the whole issue of penology and stoning and execution for idolatry

45:50

Yeah, you've got to recognize the church is not given the context for that in in the modern world

45:57

We're not we're not focused in one little strip of land and we're not worried about you know, who has this parcel land that parcel land and and All the rest that kind of stuff the gospel goes all over the world and therefore it's a different context

46:12

But you see the problem is when people recognize that then is throughout the whole moral content of it and go Ah, I have to worry about it.

46:18

I'm not in a law. I'm not alone. I'm under grace and you just go on from there What is the application today?

46:28

Well, it just seems for a lot of folks that for a lot of Christians they look at this and they go as if Well, this is terrible.

46:35

How much more? Should we as spirit indwelt believers?

46:42

Be absolutely horrified by idolatry in our own lives than these people were then

46:52

Look at how much more light we have. I mean think of These people looked back upon the miraculous deliverance from Egypt we look back upon the cross the death barrel resurrection of the

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Son of God and God has in his grace united us with him and given us all these things

47:18

Who should be more terrified? Who should be more repulsed? by idolatry

47:26

Than ourselves and yet how many Christians give how many Christians get up in the morning and have even the first bit of concern

47:34

About committing idolatry in our own lives so my you know

47:45

Yusuf uses it as a baseball bat and given the ignorance of His own audience who doesn't have a clue about the book of Deuteronomy 99 % of his followers have never read

48:04

Deuteronomy and 80 % of mine haven't read

48:10

Deuteronomy As far as just from a Christian perspective, obviously the people in this audience a little bit different a bunch of weirdos but Sadly You know, there you go because of that You can use a passage like this rather than going into depth on it and understanding what it's really talking about contextualizing it and Recognizing how important it really is.

48:39

But hey folks It's not just it's not just Yusuf Ismail Atheists will throw these things at us and and if you've not read them yourself and struggled through these things

48:49

You are going to be buffaloed. You're gonna be sitting there going And you're are you gonna have to do the the the basic simple?

48:57

Well, I just follow Jesus and I don't worry about all this Old Testament stuff anymore thing, which hopefully

49:03

Hopefully you're not gonna you're not gonna do but that's not the only that's not the only text Why is everybody talking about me needing to take a drink

49:14

You know Should should should you bring the cough button back? I haven't but I'm just gonna start banning people.

49:21

Okay, so if folks all of a sudden get, you know, 20 -minute Prosper gatory things that they ban them ban them all and them all that's that's what we're gonna do and Chapter 13 verse 15 thou shall murder the inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword

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Murder them commandment by Yahweh, which means father son and Holy Ghost all of them together

49:40

Destroying it utterly and all that is in there in and that cattle with the edge of the sword So did you catch that father son and Holy Ghost?

49:46

So in? Yeah but I guess the reason he's emphasizing that is because he's encountered so many people who have just dodged all these

50:00

Old Testament passages by say look I remember sitting in a

50:08

I remember sitting in a Bible study class at a Southern Baptist Church years and years ago and Talking to this guy and this guy was like what you know,

50:20

I don't know if any of the rest you've noticed this but The God in the New Testament seems to be a whole lot more loving than God the

50:26

Old Testament I like the God of the New Testament. I'm sure I like the God that's in the Old Testament and even back then

50:32

I was like, I Don't think you want to go there the you know Gnosticism But there are a lot of people that have that attitude

50:42

They really have that attitude and if they're gonna express it in Their responses to the

50:49

Muslims. You can't really complain too much if the Muslims then turn around and use that against them in the process

50:58

Severe laws commanded the members of the Hebrew religion to murder even if their own children

51:03

Worship Yahweh now the Bible the biblical words to a fanatical extremist Basically imbibes the killing of family friends because they fail to change their beliefs now, obviously you may argue

51:14

Well, this doesn't bind you this doesn't basically apply to you. I am a Christian. I follow the New Testament Well, it's quite interesting in the context of the

51:21

Old Testament Yahweh did in fact impose these particular laws and even the assumption that you have in the juristic interpretation of the

51:27

Islam and in fiqh Legislation aspects of the death penalty for apostasy. Well, why are you critiquing it?

51:33

Well, I can critique it because I have a particular perspective. Why are you critiquing it when there's more vicious passages in your own book?

51:40

Can you see the double standard there? rape of women Isis engages in rape of women.

51:45

Do we agree about that? Isis engages in rape of women and And and some in his lectures have gone on to say that Islam in fact allows the rape of women

51:53

It promotes the rape of women. Well, you know what the word for rape in Arabic is. I don't know Arabic Do you know what the word for rape is?

51:59

It's as the Saab. Am I correct as the Saab is a word for rape in Arabic? Yet you find in the

52:06

Quran that verse is non -existent in the Hadith literature that verse is non -existent Yet get yourself a copy of the

52:12

Arabic Bible and I will show you where the word as the Saab Appears numerous times numerous times.

52:18

For example, Deuteronomy 22 verse 28 If a man finds a damsel that is a virgin which is not betrothed and lays holds of her and rapes her

52:26

Then the man shall give unto the damsel's father 50 shekels of silver because he has raped her

52:31

He may not put her away as his wife Can you imagine that the penalty for a rapist is that he has to marry his rape victim?

52:39

What kind of a just law is that by Yahweh by God by the Holy Ghost? What about judges chapter 19, but okay, so that was the second one.

52:47

I wanted to get to as you can tell If it was we saw

52:52

Medak docs Intention to Trigger Yusuf Ismael, he succeeded and It was like I like I said it is an amazing encounter on that level but Deuteronomy chapter 22 and Again, atheists will bring this up too.

53:17

So that's why I figured it was a good thing to you know cover all of it Deuteronomy chapter 22 verse 28 if a man finds a girl who is a virgin who is not engaged and seizes her and lies with her

53:28

And they are discovered Then the man who lay with her shall give to the girl's father 50 shekels of silver and she shall become his wife because he has

53:36

Violated her he cannot divorce her all his days And of course what

53:42

Yusuf is saying it is terrible the penalty for rape is

53:50

She can't he can't divorce her the rest of his life. I mean what kind of injustice is this?

53:55

What kind of God is this so on so forth and that's not just Yusuf doing that that is the the atheist and The effectiveness of Doing it this way is again vast majority of folks haven't

54:15

Taken the time to consider what's actually being said and so it can be a very effective kind of argument

54:23

What you must realize of course is this individual and what it says she is not engaged

54:31

So in other words, this is not a violation of a marriage contract this individual

54:37

And it says if a man so the assumption is this is an unmarried woman unmarried man so you have a

54:48

Non -consensual evidently Because elsewhere in the law you have the discussion of crying out whether it's in the city or in the field and there's a bunch of stuff in regards to Determining guiltiness and so on so forth.

55:03

This is only focusing on one aspect of The issue if you really want to deal with this in a meaningful fashion

55:11

Then you would gather together all the texts that speak to this Whether it takes place in the field, but it takes place in the city where there's crying out and and the things that go along with it and So this is talking about one aspect what aspect is it focusing upon if This man has done this and it was not this woman's desire to engage in this activity with him

55:39

He has in essence destroyed her opportunity of being one of the virgins of Israel receiving a dowry

55:47

Being married in such a way that she would have an honorable place. She would be able to have

55:52

Offspring and be able to be cared for later in life be able to have all the benefits that would come with the family situation that is envisioned in the

56:02

Mosaic law and So what is being said is that can't since you can't undo the act

56:10

Then the man who does this is now obligated to provide to her

56:17

Everything that she would have had Had that not taken place which would include all her rights as a wife

56:26

Which would include all that the law says about the treatment of the wife The land the offspring

56:35

The the 50 pieces of silver is the dowry to the woman's father In other words, there is a protection.

56:43

You can't just simply say because this took place out there It wasn't in the city

56:49

So there's there's issues regarding consensuality and all the rest that stuff the woman has to be cared for and in fact

56:58

She is given a stronger familial position than any other woman is given in the sense that she cannot be divorced and So it's it's not like he can marry for a little while and then say well,

57:14

I'm gonna get rid of her later on. No This man's offspring

57:21

This man's land this man's property is now Connected to this woman and she is going to be supported from that And have rights on that when he dies if he dies before her, etc, etc

57:37

This is a protection of the woman and it's a protection of her ability to have proper support and Everything else in that society and you know, we don't think of it that way today because we don't think of those contexts at all

57:53

We don't see the gracious aspect of providing for Someone who has been hurt in this way because we live in a complete we don't live in an agrarian society.

58:05

We don't live in that the where where the land is connected to each family and Completely different context.

58:13

So it's so easy To forget well not even forget all that just not even know all that and hence place it into a completely different Context and turn it into something.

58:21

It sounds absolutely horrific when it's actually a very gracious provision Especially when she cannot be divorced, but you dude if you're gonna do something like that Guess what?

58:34

She's got she's got she's she's got your property and and the law says you better treat her, right and So think before you act stupid

58:46

Might be a way to to go so Let me see here

58:52

There there are people, you know, I'm sitting here talking about, you know Important stuff on the program and there are people in channel that are just simply

59:02

Doing stuff that's just you know, utterly inappropriate. So I'm gonna start bouncing a few people into There we go, so that'll that'll that'll help folks to start focusing upon what

59:14

I'm actually saying rather than upon The the fact that my my watch band happens to be the same color as stripes in my shirt, so well

59:24

What can I say Anyway, that's why people wander into channel. What is this channel thing?

59:30

Well, it's so there's some weird weird people in there anyway, so and again

59:37

The only way to handle these texts is in a thoughtful fashion They're there they're gonna be people that you cannot reason with on these things

59:49

That they have no interest in reasoning with you that they the only reason they've brought them up is to make a particular form of argument and You know

01:00:01

You just wish them well and go on from there You cannot force them to treat the text fairly you cannot force them to engage in it in a in a meaningful fashion

01:00:11

You just can't You give the proper responses and Trust the rest of the

01:00:16

Lord. That's one of the nice things about being reformed is you don't have to You know

01:00:25

Put all upon yourself you can trust the Lord with those things. So there was some of that stuff I I didn't play

01:00:31

Osama's going. I don't have to worry about that. I've you know We'll get into we'll get into other things at another time on on that Okay Somehow there we go

01:00:46

Let's go back in the last period of time we have here together and continue our response to Abu Zakariya, his book

01:00:58

Jesus Man Messenger and Messiah and once again many of the objections that Abu Zakariya raises are

01:01:09

Common objections against the doctrine of the Trinity. So this isn't just related to Islam Obviously there are times when you do have particular objections that are rooted within only in Islamic context

01:01:22

But many of these are not many of the of the objections that later Islamic apologists have developed they've borrowed from other people.

01:01:32

They've borrowed from Jews. They borrow from Unitarians Akhmed did I would borrow from anybody?

01:01:37

It didn't matter how how consistent or reasonable those particular things were and so We are on page eight and we were looking at The statement had been made it is something that is fully acknowledged by Christian theologians who freely admit the

01:02:01

Trinity cannot be explained And at the right the end of the program I was saying well, yes, it can be explained There is a difference between understanding

01:02:12

The statement for example one that that Muslims and Christians would share

01:02:19

God is eternal and timeless I Can understand what that means

01:02:24

I can understand what the negation of that would mean for example To say that God is under the rule of time

01:02:31

But I cannot comprehend timelessness as A time -bound creature is a creature that My language is to is dependent upon past present future.

01:02:44

I Can't even start to comprehend the idea of timeless existence What is what is a thought my thoughts run in a line?

01:02:52

Well, they're supposed to once in a while they get all jumbled up anymore But they they go from this point to this point this point.

01:02:58

How does that work when you're timeless? So I can understand Statements without company being able to comprehend

01:03:07

Everything that they mean I can fully understand that there is one

01:03:13

True and eternal being of God that is shared fully by three co -equal and co -eternal

01:03:18

Persons the Father Son the Holy Spirit I can understand the statement The Father is not the Son the Son is not

01:03:23

Spirit the Spirit is not is not the Father I can understand that person and being are not the same thing

01:03:30

But can I comprehend something that's absolutely unique and Absolutely eternal

01:03:37

Well, no, I can't so understanding and Comprehending are not the same thing

01:03:46

So we need to keep that keep that in mind so he goes on to say Reconciling the plurality of the

01:03:55

Godhead a threeness within a monotheistic framework Continues to be one of the greatest challenges faced by Trinitarians Well, I can certainly see how from a

01:04:08

Unitarian monotheistic perspective as you have in modern -day Islam that you would think that that's the case

01:04:16

To be honest with you the the greatest challenge I think for most

01:04:22

Christians in struggling and dealing with The doctrine of the

01:04:28

Trinity is the relationship between the divine persons

01:04:33

Not the distinction between personhood and being you all struggle with that So I think we have an indication here of your own

01:04:42

You know, it's it's your background that's giving you this this problem, but When you recognize and there was not a sufficient recognition

01:04:55

I mean, like I said, this is one of the better Descriptions of the doctrine of the

01:05:01

Trinity there is accuracy to it, etc, etc But there was not a sufficient emphasis upon the distinction between being in person

01:05:09

And people say well, those are not biblical terms There are certain people who like to argue against the doctrine of the

01:05:16

Trinity solely on philosophical grounds. I Don't have a lot of interest in engaging those types of folks for one simple reason

01:05:25

What is what what have I said? As far back as the archives go and and Our archives only guess go back to 98, but we were doing these programs in the 1980s.

01:05:38

I started doing the dividing line in the 1980s and All the way through that time period whenever this subject has come up I have said the doctrine of the

01:05:52

Trinity is Is Revelational in its source. It is something

01:05:57

God has revealed about himself we don't sit around and and look at the stars and and We don't look at ourselves and go.

01:06:06

Oh, I I see the doctrine of the Trinity. I can reason from these things No, no, it is

01:06:12

It is forced upon us by biblical categories of revelation

01:06:19

It's forced upon us by the fact that the only consistent way To read the text of Scripture is to recognize that there is only one true

01:06:28

God So you have absolute positively positively no question about monotheism.

01:06:35

There is only one true God. There's only one God Yahweh but then you have this revelation that takes place between Malachi and Matthew and You have three divine persons

01:06:54

That And and this and that's why I point out and I said

01:06:59

I'm saying this for Abba Zachariah's benefit But I it needs to be Pharaoh's benefit the

01:07:05

The revelation of the doctrine of Trinity takes place between Malachi and Matthew It does not take place in Matthew Mark Luke John Acts Romans first and Corinthians so on so forth or we can throw

01:07:15

Hebrews in there if you want to use the order of p45 not p40 p46

01:07:23

It does it's not it's it's not a revelation it takes place in those

01:07:28

New Testament books as if It was unknown before those books were written.

01:07:36

I believe firmly that the revelation of the doctrine of Trinity takes place primarily in the

01:07:43

Incarnation of the Son his death, burial and resurrection and then the outpouring of the Holy Spirit of God all of which took place

01:07:50

After the last word of Malachi was written and before the first word of Matthew or Mark or whichever book you want to make the first book of the

01:07:56

New Testament is written and If that is the case and I firmly believe that it is then it's a revelational

01:08:08

Doctrine it's something that God has revealed that God has Given to us in a

01:08:16

Supernatural fashion that we could not have come How how could we know these things if God had not revealed these things to us and The greatest way he did that was in history itself in the the ministry of Jesus Christ the outpouring of the

01:08:33

Holy Spirit and so when we talk about Being in person we may be using

01:08:41

Philosophical categories, but we are simply explaining biblical revelation

01:08:48

It's the Bible that forces us to differentiate between the Father Son spirit I don't know if any of you have seen it, but have you have you all noticed the

01:08:56

King James only guy that's gone after me a bunch of times I don't I don't pay his ilk a whole lot of attention to be honest with you

01:09:05

You know, he stands there in front of a bookshelf full of Peter Ruckman books And and you know

01:09:12

Peter Ruckman was Peter Ruckman I mean once once you stand in front of a pile of Peter Ruckman books and are proud of it as As well as Gail Riplinger books

01:09:22

Okay, you've you've proven to me that Reason is not one of your big things.

01:09:28

So I Generally ignore it and and he jumped in on the you know, he Dogpiled on everything else recently as well

01:09:37

But what's come out recently is the guy's a modalist He's a modalist he he believes

01:09:44

Jesus is the Father Almighty because he doesn't understand John chapter 14 he has zero exegetical skills and People are now jumping up and down as I Could have told you that a long time ago, but but There there has to be a balance in looking at biblical material

01:10:04

And when someone's is obviously imbalanced this guy is It's not overly shocking that they'll jump off into some type of heresy like modalism or something like that it takes balance to Harmonize all of the statements of scripture, which oh by the way,

01:10:27

I can't believe I did that You can't can't believe it either either. I guess

01:10:32

I'll have to save it. I even I even put the file together Wow, what was I thinking? I don't know too many things going on I'll get to it.

01:10:40

I was even gonna start with this Wow that talk about getting distracted Sorry, but I did listen to the

01:10:50

Unbelievable broadcast yesterday morning on a hot early morning ride The heat's finally starting to break here.

01:10:57

Well, it's supposed to get below 110 tomorrow Which for us is the heat's breaking Well, the average is 106.

01:11:04

So if it's gonna be 107, that's like yeah, cool That's get my jacket

01:11:09

Yeah, we have to break the jackets out in the morning because it might might get down to lower 80s and you don't want to catch a chill but I Listened to the unbelievable broadcast with Michael Icona and the other

01:11:24

New Testament scholar on Why do the Gospels differ people kept telling me

01:11:29

I need to listen because they mentioned me briefly and stuff and and so I Already put some of that stuff together marked it was gonna do it today.

01:11:39

I'm totally spaced it. Sorry We've got another program coming up later this week and we'll we'll we'll get to it then

01:11:47

But one of the things that concerned me in that discussion with Michael Icona was the

01:12:00

Dismissive way in which harmonization was treated as If it's an artificial thing to try to harmonize

01:12:08

Matthew Mark Luke and John and sometimes it can be there's no question about that You know when when people say there were two healings of Jairus's daughters.

01:12:16

Okay, then it can get quite silly. I get that but the whole idea of harmonizing

01:12:22

God's truth is fundamental to Trinitarian theology The only reason anyone believes in the doctrine

01:12:30

II historically anyways was Looking at all of what the

01:12:35

New Testament said and seeking to make sense of it to harmonize it.

01:12:42

And so That's why I'm not overly excited about just the philosophical guys

01:12:50

Because if they don't believe that this the whole issue here is revelational in the first place Well, we're not even we don't even we're not even operating on the same grounds.

01:12:58

We're we're miles away from one another all right, I go back to I've got one sentence done.

01:13:05

You can tell I'm a Reformed Baptist. Well, anyway If Trinitarians embraced the polytheism that is inherent in the doctrine most foundational element of the doctrine is absolute monotheism and Explained it for what it really is three gods and not one.

01:13:25

So there there you have the the Muslim presupposition. I will not enter into understanding

01:13:32

Where you're going from it because you really do believe in three gods. No, we don't there's only one

01:13:38

Yahweh Then there would be no confusion well, the confusion is the unwillingness to recognize the distinction between being in person and to allow that to alleviate your confusion

01:13:53

The doctrine is inexplicable inexplicable because Trinitarians try to reconcile a concept of threeness into a monotheistic context

01:14:01

Which does not and cannot fit but so you see right here the fundamental unwillingness to allow for distinction between being in person you're demanding that the threeness has to be of being and the oneness has to be of being and so you get one plus one plus one equals

01:14:19

One and all the absurdities that flow from that How can anyone or anything be three things and one thing all at the same time?

01:14:29

This is disappointing because You just slipped into the misrepresentation of the doctrine of the

01:14:36

Trinity We say that God is three persons one being they're not the same thing and for you to say

01:14:42

Three things and one thing you are making the two things equivalent and so I don't think this is purposeful, but it is what you're doing

01:14:55

When the Jehovah's Witnesses do it When it's the Watchtower doing it I know it's purposeful because the leadership had at least in the past has known when the poor average

01:15:05

Jehovah's Witness I'm talking to does it? They're wrong But they probably don't know any better The fact is that the

01:15:14

Trinity is something that believers must accept on blind faith It cannot be rationalized well to have that right after a misrepresentation of what it is well

01:15:23

Immediately we've got this Major problem. It's not a matter of being accepted on blind faith. It's a matter of accepting it based upon biblical revelation and It's no more blind faith than for you to say well,

01:15:36

I must believe that Allah is Eternal and timeless and unchanging and I have to accept that as blind faith

01:15:47

To say it cannot be rationalized what do you mean by rationalized there? There's a lot of room for discussion with Muslims about rationalism in religion and Exactly the role that what's the role of reason and divine revelation and because there's

01:16:07

Every religious faith has a discussion of this every religious faith it is one of the primary elements for example of Blaise Pascal's Pensee Really deep stuff, but every religion has that that element to it.

01:16:28

So what do you mean by it cannot be rationalized? You you've already quoted a book where I think

01:16:34

I gave a pretty consistent defense of these things and Is that what rationalized would mean?

01:16:42

It's hard to say The Doctrine the

01:16:48

Trinity is also problematic when we consider the purpose of revelation which boils down to guidance The books of God revealed in order to guide mankind.

01:16:55

Well, that's you know, that's sort of like saying and that's why we need it's not chains You're anachronistically reading your

01:17:04

Islamic presuppositions into a Christian context there is a reason

01:17:14

For God's giving a scripture that That involves guidance that that's a part of the reason

01:17:22

We are told in Scripture that these things were written for us that we that we might have encouraged and we might have hope they're written for our example, there's all sorts of things like that, but Christianity is extremely theocentric and Christocentric and so it's really for the glory of God first and foremost and Only secondarily

01:17:45

For a man, of course that doesn't mean that the secondary Purposes are not extremely important purposes.

01:17:51

God's big enough to have multiple purposes in the same thing that he does Goes on to say if guidance results in confusion or misguidance that defeats the purpose of revelation

01:18:04

Well, okay but I've met many a

01:18:10

Muslim That was extremely confused about things within the

01:18:15

Quran does that mean that somehow I mean the

01:18:21

Quran can be interpreted in many different ways and so I Would say the

01:18:26

New Testament is significantly More Mubinun than the Quran is there's there's so much more background information.

01:18:34

The language is much more clear Than what you have in the Quran. There's no question about it. So If if you can get confusion from the

01:18:44

Quran does that mean that it defeats the purpose of revelation Again got to have the equal scales got to have the equal scales.

01:18:53

I go on This particular quotation

01:18:59

I've seen a number of times it's sort of passed around I think amongst Muslim apologists it's from Harold Linzel and Charles Woodbridge and Here's the quote the mind of man cannot fully understand the mystery of the

01:19:14

Trinity He who has tried to understand the mystery fully will lose his mind, but he would deny the

01:19:19

Trinity will lose his soul Now I understand why that Might sound strange to a

01:19:32

Muslim who has encountered so many Christians that are not even functionally

01:19:40

Trinitarian and And don't understand the doctrine anyways and that part of the problem there is you think that People are

01:19:51

Christians if they're just born a particular country. I've met many a Muslim. I remember, I remember driving in a vehicle with a couple of Muslims to a debate in California years ago and we were talking and one of the

01:20:05

Muslims made some statement about this being a Christian nation and Made an argument against Christianity based upon that and I and I said what what are you talking about?

01:20:14

I said what what percentage of people driving by us right now is in Southern, California on a freeway. There's lots of people I said what what percentage of People driving by us right now.

01:20:26

Do you think are truly Christians? I Said just think about what what percentage people driving right now has given any thought to Jesus as their

01:20:36

Lord and Savior this day what his will for their life is what what his law Is revealed for them as how they're to live and treat their wife day.

01:20:45

What percentage? Do you really think? And I said if it was 5 %

01:20:52

I'd be shocked That would be high And he's like you're kidding me.

01:20:57

I said no Because many Muslims have the idea that you know, you're born if you're born in Pakistan, you're a

01:21:04

Muslim If you're born in Afghanistan, you're a Muslim, you know being born

01:21:11

Automatically gives you entrance into this community. Well, that's that's not that's not how Christianity works. That's not how

01:21:17

Christianity works So you read this it's like well if I encounter all these people don't even understand the doctrine of Trinity How can how can you lose your soul?

01:21:28

And the comments made this reveals a fundamental paradox of the doctrine Why would God reveal something that cannot be fully comprehended and tie our salvation to it?

01:21:37

well I'm not really sure y 'all have thought through your objection here Because laying aside the confusion of the untaught the unstable

01:21:46

There are Christians who fully understand the doctrine of the Trinity live in light of it

01:21:52

Etc, etc Do you really want to go here? Because there are things that you believe about Allah That are very difficult to understand

01:22:06

Especially this thing about the eternal nature of the Quran and how the Quran is a is not created

01:22:15

And yet it certainly seems to be to most of us but How the

01:22:21

Quran is not created and yet it's not a god. It's not a deity Seems to be a lot of confusion about all this type of stuff.

01:22:30

And so can you fully comprehend that and Again, this idea of comprehension versus understanding needs to be brought up again, too but Yet tie our salvation to it.

01:22:47

What do you what do you think that means? Generally most

01:22:55

Muslims that I encounter Understand that to mean that I have to believe in the deity of Christ to be saved and What's interesting is if you did not have a pre -existing faith structure if you are just plain old secularist walking down the street and A Christian were to talk to you about the gospel

01:23:28

The focus would be upon who Christ was but not so much stuff like hypostatic union or things like that Because the individual may not have a pre -existing

01:23:44

Predisposition to reject those things, but we're talking about Islam here and you've already been taught that Jesus is merely a man you've already read surah 5 and So What I'm saying is there

01:24:02

Because of pre -existing faith structures, there can be a level of what we might call imbalance in the conversations that we have and what

01:24:10

I mean by that is We will be more likely to be focusing upon particular subjects in talking to a

01:24:17

Muslim That would be different than my talking to a Roman Catholic or talking to a

01:24:22

Mormon atheist Buddhist Hindu, obviously, there's all sorts of different things we would focus upon.

01:24:30

And so when we talk about Tying salvation to the

01:24:36

Trinity what we're talking about is Well in the sense that if you wish to have peace with one true

01:24:43

God then there's only one God we can proclaim to you because we are monotheists and That one

01:24:49

God has revealed himself as Father Son and Holy Spirit And so to reject that revelation and to replace that with Jesus as a mere prophet

01:25:05

Whatever it might be Fundamentally means that you're not accepting the authority of Scripture to define who the

01:25:14

God is that you're worshiping let alone the means by which that God has brought about the means of salvation

01:25:21

And so I can't on the one hand say turn to Jesus and you'll find him to be a perfect and powerful

01:25:27

Savior and talk about his atoning sacrifice Without the same time talking about something of saying something positively about who he is that makes him

01:25:38

Capable of doing these things. He's the God man. That's why he can truly give himself substitution substitutionarily if he wasn't truly a man, then the sacrifice he gives is not really substitutionary, it's not really an atonement and So there is the connection, but it's not

01:25:57

I have encountered some Muslims to sort of have the idea. That's almost like a dry

01:26:07

Theological nugget you've got to just sort of check the box next to you. Okay, I'll accept that The gospel is

01:26:14

Trinitarian it finds its origin the Father its accomplishment in the Son its its application the

01:26:20

Spirit it's It's part of the entire message and I'm sorry if a lot of you have talked with with Christians that have only given you a partial message or sort of giving you a

01:26:34

Discombobulated non -unified gospel message or energy the four spiritual laws or something

01:26:39

Which was never meant to communicate with a Muslim in the first place The Trinity is tied to all of it every bit so I I Reject the idea that Trinity can't be understood.

01:26:56

I don't think you have a ground for complaining that it's beyond our comprehension in the sense of it's unique and beyond our time -bound minds

01:27:06

But if you're gonna say you need to bow the knee to Jesus Christ The Revelation is saying who

01:27:12

Jesus Christ is is clear enough, isn't it? Well, obviously that's one of our our major differences and and distinctions

01:27:21

From that point He goes on to have a sub Section the different views of Jesus in the early church.

01:27:32

Now, one of the things we'll be getting into eventually is Abba Zachary is very interesting views of church history and When we talk about the early church, we're talking about a period of time

01:27:47

You know the early church period and that can be defined in different ways, of course But it is obviously helpful for him

01:28:02

To adopt the Bart Ehrman. There were all these different views in the early church There was no orthodoxy and a type type perspective and that's sort of what's gonna end up End up happening here.

01:28:12

And what he does is he? runs through Different views of Jesus Jesus was purely human and Gives the standard

01:28:24

Ebionite You know, what what did the Ebionites believe? well, we don't have almost any idea what the

01:28:29

Ebionites believe but they were described by others and and the Ebionites are our big favorites of our

01:28:35

Muslim friends I Almost feel like having a t -shirt made up go

01:28:42

Ebionites to To give I mean that would be a sort of cool thing in it in a next debate go it go

01:28:51

Ebionites or remember the Ebionites Might get a chuckle and then again most are able to be seen the audience going

01:29:02

But inside joke, don't worry about it. Well, we'll explain it. We'll explain it later Yeah, so I'm just gonna put my little red

01:29:11

I'm doing this little red mark type thing Telling me where I am right there because we have come to the end of our time together

01:29:20

Lord willing we will be back on what Oh Lord willing we will be back on Thursday as he says he turns from camera to camera back on Thursday and Might continue some of this but I'll try to remember

01:29:38

We want to talk about what happened on unbelievable and talk about the Gospels and harmonization and Plutarch and a few other cool things like that and who knows what will happen between now and then