November 5, 2020 Show with Eric Hovind on “Is Atheism on the Rise in America?”

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Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation, to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions, and now here's your host,

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Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday on this 5th day of November, 2020, and I'm thrilled to have for the very first time ever

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Eric Hovind as my guest today. He is president and founder of Creation Today, and we are going to be addressing the theme is atheism on the rise in America, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Eric Hovind.

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Hey, Chris, I think we both know and everybody listening knows the honor is mine. You have interviewed some amazing individuals, and it really is a privilege to have a little bit of time with you, so thank you so much.

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And somebody that is a mutual friend of both Eric's and mine, that our listeners, well many of our listeners are sure to be familiar with, that is

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Sy Tim Brugengate, one of the No, don't say that, don't say that publicly,

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I don't like to admit that publicly, come on now, Chris. Wow, an amazing guy,

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I love Sy, love his movie How to Answer the Fool, he has spent literally hundreds of hours teaching me, mentoring me, and I've really enjoyed learning the entire pre -suppositional approach,

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I don't know if we'll talk about that later, but boy, that was a phenomenal experience for me, so good to see you. Yes, he is one of the foremost pre -suppositionalist apologists, especially actively involved in debates in the world, really, obviously there have been much more famous folks who have written things like Cornelius Van Til and others, but Sy is certainly the one in the trenches today doing a lot of the debating and engaging unbelievers and even believers alike who disagree with the pre -suppositional approach to apologetics, but he's a dear brother, and a very humble brother, and I'm giving him a shout out now,

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I hope you're listening, Sy. Tell our listeners about Creation today. Wow, I get to be the president, as of right now, until they fire me of this amazing organization called

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Creation Today, really it was birthed out of, I grew up in evangelism, grew up in apologetics, especially creation science, with my dad,

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Dr. Kent Hovind, he ran an organization called Creation Today, and I actually kind of transitioned that organization into Creation Today, what it is now, my dad ended up spending a little bit of time in prison, got out and started a new organization called

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Creation Science Evangelism, same name as his old one, and so I get to be the president of this organization that just loves to tell people who

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God is, and encourage them and be a catalyst in their life to make sure every single second of their life is used for the chief reason they were created, and that is to glorify

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God in everything they do. We do that through articles, videos, blogs, television programs,

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I've got a whole bunch of little hooks out there with bread on them, seeing how many fish will bite, we started this coffee, why

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I bought your coffee ministry, which is incredible, you simply buy somebody a cup of coffee, and you hand them a little card, the card just says why

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I bought your coffee .com, and you walk away and say have a good day, and curiosity is going to kill the cat,

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I guarantee you, they're going to go that way, so we're an organization that just wants to share the gospel of Jesus Christ any way we can, and are excited about all the different ways

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God gives us to do it. Great, well I guess you can't do that with a Mormon though, can you? We have our limits, but I did buy why

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I bought your meal .com, why I bought your drink .com, I've got about 30 different websites like that that I'd love to develop over time.

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Well I'm sure especially our Presbyterian and Lutheran listeners will love the whyIboughtyourdrink .com.

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I did buy whyIboughtyourbeer .com, just to make sure a beer company didn't buy that one and use it against what

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I'm trying to do. Well, if anybody is interested in finding out more about Creation Today, you go to creationtoday .org

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creationtoday .org, and I am going to be repeating that, God willing, throughout the broadcast, so I wanted to make sure that I got that in there right now before I forget.

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As we do, as a tradition here, whenever we have a first -time guest, we have that guest give a summary of their salvation testimony, what kind of religious atmosphere you were raised in, and what kind of providential circumstances our

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Sovereign Lord raised up in your life that drew you to Himself and saved you, and you already hinted at your upbringing, but if you could give us more detail on that.

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Sure, brought up in the church, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, Thursday night was choir practice,

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Tuesday night was some other thing, Saturday was visitation, my dad ran the bus ministry, man, he ran dozens of buses back in the day, some of you will remember the old bus ministry days, some churches still have it, but for the most part, that seems to be gone, man, so I grew up with going to the streets, getting the kids, getting them on the bus, bringing them to church, and all that time, through Christian school, my dad being a pastor, a principal, moved to Pensacola, Florida, went to Pensacola Christian Academy where the

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Abecca book curriculum is created and published, incredible youth pastor,

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Jeff Redlin, who is now the pastor here at Campus Church at Pensacola Christian College, grew up just with an amazing background, where my parents didn't just, you know, say they believed in Christianity, they lived it out, day in and day out, we sacrificed to be able to further the kingdom of Jesus Christ, and like many kids that grew up in the church, rather than having a relationship with God, I learned how to follow rules,

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I learned how to follow regulations, I became a product of the

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Christian environment, rather than having a true relationship with Jesus Christ, and there is a huge, huge difference.

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Once somebody is saved, God gives them a desire for righteousness. If you've ever heard

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Ray Comfort say, you know, that the unsaved have a desire for righteousness about as much as a five -year -old boy has a desire for a bath.

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They just don't want it. And I realized, it was actually through Ray Comfort's message,

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Hell's Best Kept Secret, that I saw my sin for what it really was.

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I was in my 20s, I had already been traveling and preaching, you know, grew up going to camps, going to speak at camps, work at camps, and it was in my 20s, early 20s, that I heard

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Hell's Best Kept Secret. I listened to that message, and I went, oh my goodness, this has some big, giant implications.

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I listened to the message again, and I went, oh my goodness, I called my brother -in -law, I said, you've got to come hear this with me, he came over that same night,

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I watched it again, called the youth pastor at my church, it's now almost midnight, and I said, you've got to come over and watch this with me,

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I watched it again, and then they all went home and I laid down on my living room floor, and I begged

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God to grant me forgiveness, and I wanted to repent. And I really saw that I had become a product of the church environment, and I had a desire for righteousness, but my desire for righteousness was really a desire for popularity, and a desire not to hurt or offend my mom and dad and pastor and brother and sister and friends and youth pastor, and a desire for righteousness so that I didn't get a spanking.

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But it was not a God -given love for holiness, and it was in my 20s that I got that, and I'm so, so grateful that God saw fit to expose me to the truth of the fact that I was dead in my sin and my trespasses, and saw fit to save me.

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So I'm just incredibly grateful. Now I love going to church youth groups and sharing my testimony, sharing science, sharing

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Scripture, and saying, look, just because you're here, that doesn't mean you're a Christian, and really challenging where we're at.

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So yeah, it was through Hell's Best Kept Secret with Ray Comfort. Well, praise God, and Brother Ray has been on this program.

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I just wish that we could get a longer interview out of him. He typically is only on for about 15 minutes when he comes on, which is a record for the shortest interview on Iron Sherpa and Sine Radio.

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That's so funny, because that is him, he is super just ADD, and when

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Amanda said, hey, Chris wants to have you on Iron Sherpa and Sine Radio, I was like, well, that's great, that's really cool.

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How long is the interview? Two hours. I'm going, what? Well, with the commercial breaks, it's really about 95 minutes.

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Okay. Well, I got a confession to make on you, Chris. I downloaded your podcast once we scheduled this, so that I could hear a couple of your shows, and I got a confession.

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I play your podcast on double speed. I was like, man, I got to get, this is good, but man,

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I want this to go, let's go, let's go, let's go. I'm one of those guys, get her done, get her done, get her done, and so that's my little confession to you today.

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All right. Well, if anybody has any questions of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

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C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence, if you live outside the

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USA, and only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

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Let's say you disagree with your pastor over something that we're going to say today, which actually would surprise me, because we're speaking about atheism, but perhaps you have a close family member that's an atheist, perhaps your spouse is an atheist, or whatever the case may be, and you don't want to draw attention to your identity.

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We understand that, and you can remain anonymous, but if it's not a personal and private question, please give us your first name, city and state and country of residence.

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Now, if you wouldn't mind, and this is up to you, you could say, I'll pass on that, but since you brought it up, you said your dad was in prison for a while, why don't you explain that, if you can, if you desire to, just so our listeners, since you kind of pulled that rabbit out of the hat, if you will, why don't you just explain a little bit about that?

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Boy, so, there's two ways this can be positioned or couched.

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One way is, my dad was a martyr, who they were going after him because of the

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Gospel. I really don't buy that. My dad was pretty outspoken against the

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IRS, put that in several of his videotapes, and they used a couple of laws to come after my dad and say he was structuring transactions the way the ministry was set up.

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My dad was kind of against the whole 501c3, don't get affiliated with the church, should have no affiliation with the government, and really wanted to make a stand on that.

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We watched men rise and fall who had taken that stand, and my dad said,

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I want to take that stand. They ended up getting him on what's called structuring, which is withdrawing, actually, they say they got him on structuring,

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I still question whether that was a legitimate way to charge him, I don't think it was charged correctly, but they were paying people in cash and saying, you've got to take care of taxes yourself, you're responsible for yourself, and this is where I don't know,

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I'm not an attorney, I'm not a tax protester attorney, I'm not a tax protester, I'm not any of that stuff, so I go, well,

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I think they kind of got him on something they should not have gotten him on, laws that were used to catch drug dealers that were going to multiple bank accounts in one day, and doing money laundering, you know, depositing their cash or withdrawing cash in amounts less than $10 ,000, and yet my mom and dad went to one bank, withdrew money to pay people every week, and any time that money was more than $9 ,000 a week, but less than $10 ,000 in payroll, they said, well, you were structuring those transactions, and that's, it's a charge called structuring, so that was kind of the meat of what got them, but they also got charged on failure to withhold and pay over employee -related taxes, because they considered everybody, they didn't say independent contractor, they called them a missionary to say, hey, we don't have to, so I let people out there come to their own conclusions on, should he have done that, should he have died on that hill, should he have been found guilty, you know,

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I think they definitely wanted to make an example of him, but bottom line is, he decided to get into that and stay in that battle, and ended up spending about 10 years in prison, my mom spent one year in prison for that, for being the one actually going and cashing the checks and bringing them back and actually doing the payroll, so yeah, really, really sad, destroyed a family, destroyed a lot of things, and when all that happened, and I kind of took over the ministry,

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I did take it in a different direction when it comes to the IRS, I just, I did an employee leasing service and said, you know what,

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I don't want to have to deal with this, let's make this easy, so decided to try to focus on other battles and not focus on that, but that's what he chose to focus on, so yeah, spent 10 years in prison, for almost 10 years in prison for that.

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Yeah, and I think, if I'm not mistaken, one of the things, as far as what you teach, that you have changed from your dad's legacy, is that he was, and perhaps is, a

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King James onlyist, and you are not. Well, he is a strong King James onlyist, if you talk to him, you would probably come to the conclusion that he is

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King James, I don't know that he would say this, but probably King James re -inspired, in other words, you have to have the

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King James Bible, I remember watching James White and Stephen Anderson's conversation, and Stephen basically said, if you don't have a

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King James Bible, you really can't even get saved, and I was like, wow, man, so sorry for those of you that don't speak

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English, this is really bad for you, so I put that up as an issue that we just don't even,

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I don't even get into it, it's not something I take a stand on, so am I not a King James onlyist?

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It depends on what you mean by King James only, you know, will I read other translations? Yes, I will. When I preach, do

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I use the King James? Yes, I do. It seems to be the easiest one to, I've got a plane going right over our head right now, seems to be the one that will cause the least division, we produced a movie called

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Genesis Paradise Lost, and went ahead and used King James there, and I was like, look, nobody's going to argue with me if I do use it, and if I don't,

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I'll get people pushing back, even though it's a small minority, so yeah, anyway,

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I'm not in the same place as he is on that, that's for sure. Okay, well, is, let me ask you right off the bat, is atheism on the rise in America?

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Well, anybody that pays attention and respects the research that Barna has done over the years would certainly look at that and look at the actual data and say, yes it is, from really millennials, not quite as much, the polls have been about three, up to now five percent, and among Generation Z, it's up to over ten percent, so we're really creeping up there, but what you don't see in culture is a lot of people adopting the name atheism.

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They're not really willing to take a stand and say, I don't believe that God exists, because ultimately that's what atheist means, even though atheists themselves will say, no,

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I think there's lack of evidence. I'm not saying he doesn't, I just don't think there's atheism, I don't think he exists.

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Well, that's agnosticism, but anyway, they try to confuse those terms on a regular basis. Yes, even

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Bill Maher, the very notorious anti -Christian comedian and talk host, he has said,

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I don't know if he's changed his rhetoric, but he has said that he is agnostic, because if you claim to be an atheist, you would have to claim to have all knowledge.

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And logically, he's hitting the nail on the head, he's exactly right. So, a lot of people will say, look,

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I can't claim that. Now you've got the newbies, I'll call them the newbies out there, that are exposed to agnosticism through somebody who claims to be an atheist, and they call themselves atheists even though they wouldn't, if push came to shove, take that actual position with what it really means, because they can't.

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You cannot be that intellectually and logically. You can't be an atheist.

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There's really no such thing. We did a broadcast called, If Atheism is True, Then Atheists Don't Exist, and just logically went through all the problems with atheism.

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And you think about it, why does this next generation, they want to be known as the none? I have no religious affiliation, so when they're doing the surveys, and do you have any religious affiliation, they check the box, none.

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So we call them the nones. Now that's what's really on the rise. Those that say, I'm not picking anything,

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I'm just going to live my life. Am I allowed to let my guard down a little bit here,

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Chris? Yes you can, you can be yourself, as if we're just hanging out in the living room at the coffee table.

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Well then let me take a sip of my coffee and tell you that I look at the church, and I look at the hypocrisy in the church, and part of me, part of me, my heart goes out and says,

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I can't blame them. How can you blame them? When you see such hypocrisy, when you see such division, when you see so much arguing in what looks like hatred and vitriol, who would want to be a part of that, even if it was true?

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So if I'm being honest, I'd say my heart goes out to them. Now, the other side of that coin is, even though my heart goes out to them, it doesn't justify that position.

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It doesn't mean that that's a valid or a tenable position to hold to. I mean, you've got to think about it, and this is what the nones realize, the reason they want to be none and don't want to be called atheists is because if atheism is true, you've got to think about the tenets of atheism.

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Now there's no such thing as a mind. There's really no such thing as a spirit. You're just molecules in motion.

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As Richard Dawkins said, you're just dancing to your own DNA. I mean, it's just chemical reactions taking place.

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Christopher Hitchens, the famous atheist, he was going through cancer, and his doctor was talking about what's going to happen to his body as he goes through the chemo, and Hitchens said,

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I don't have a body, I am a body, being consistent with what he claimed to believe, that I'm just molecules in motion.

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What are you talking about? So the nones are not accepting atheism because, number one, they realize, well, then

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I'm not, I'm just molecules, there's no me inside of this. This is it.

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There's not like a separate me, and that doesn't match reality. That doesn't match what we experience.

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Then they've got to deal with the illusion of choice. Do we have a choice, or are chemical reactions, when you mix vinegar and baking soda, it's going to have a reaction.

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There's nothing you can do to stop it from reacting. And so if we are just molecules in motion, there's really nothing you can do to change the way these molecules are going to interact, the way your brain's chemicals are going to go off when a certain thing happens.

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This is just what you do and how you respond. So you have this illusion of choice. So they're not accepting atheism because of that.

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They're not accepting atheism because there's this illusion that people have value, that we, for some reason, have a special place and should govern and should rule over creation.

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And that's not consistent with atheism. So there's really no value that way.

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It also takes away justice. Now, there's really no right from wrong. There's no reason to say this is right, this is wrong in an atheist worldview.

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I know that gets down to presuppositions. All of these do. So you also have to believe something came from nothing. You have to believe that life emerged from non -life.

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And you look at the science and you go, there's just no way. There's no way this could happen.

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And you've got to say that natural selection is responsible for all life after the first life.

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And again, you look at that and you go, there's just no way. It doesn't work. The science is pointing against that.

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So I think what people are really doing, and the reason people call themselves atheists, is because they're really rebelling against a

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God or an idea of God that they were taught as a kid.

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And they never got to have a real relationship with the real creator of the universe and get introduced to him.

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So I don't know what you think about that, but I feel like that's what they're really rejecting, is a God that they were brought up with.

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The God that wants to guilt you into doing things. The God that's against science.

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People are brought up believing you can't believe in God and science at the same time. Or there's that famous meme, you know, what happened here?

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The science guy's writing on a science chalkboard. And they say, well, we don't know. God must have done it. So it's just kind of a

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God of the gaps type thing. Or the one that says, well, God's here to protect you.

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Therefore, if anything bad happens, then, you know, obviously your little guardian angel

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God didn't work. It didn't hold up for you. I got hurt, or suffering happened, or I got emotional trauma, and therefore

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God doesn't. So I think what they're really rejecting are the gods that don't exist. They're really rejecting that, and we need to introduce them to the one true

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God of the Bible. I don't know. What do you think about that? Yeah, I see a lot of validity in that. And also,

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I would throw in there that people, if they are not regenerate, if they are devoid of the

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Holy Spirit, they don't have a conscience that oppresses them with guilt, they are going to follow what the world thinks about that.

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And the world, not all of the world, but a very significant segment of the world, and perhaps even especially with the youth, there is a craving, there is an idolatry of being hip, being sophisticated, being cool.

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There is a disdain for the idea that you're being tricked.

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And I know that a lot of young people view any kind of religion as something that is a trick.

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They don't want to have the wool pulled over their eyes. But of course, going back to the original concept about atheism, doesn't

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Romans 1 teach us that there really are no atheists? Yeah, the idea that, you know, you mentioned conscience there, the con of science with knowledge.

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Science is knowledge, con is with. And the conscience, the fact that God is revealed to everyone.

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I mean, nobody gets an excuse on Judgment Day. And I often think about that and teach that.

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I go, you know, at the end of the day, if you legitimately did not know that God exists, that's a pretty good excuse on Judgment Day.

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I mean, you've got to give it to somebody if they truly didn't know. How could

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God hold them accountable, you know? And I think that's why God says pretty clearly, hey, you know what, you guys really do know that I exist.

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You know that I am here. I put my conscience on your spirit.

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You know me. You have eyes to see, ears to hear, and even without those, you know that I exist.

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So I think Romans 1 does lay that out very, very clearly. I've heard people argue the other way and say that Romans 1 is not saying that everybody knows that God exists.

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But I think it's pretty clear, and I think it tells us why. I mean, it tells us in Romans 1 that they are suppressing the truth and unrighteousness.

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And I've often said, you know, in order to suppress the truth, what do you have to have?

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And the crowd is like, what are you saying, Eric? And I'm like, listen, I'm not trying to make this complicated. In order to suppress the truth, what do you have to have?

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If I was going to suppress a ball in a swimming pool and I was going to suppress it under the water, I have to have the ball in order to suppress the ball.

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In order to suppress the truth in unrighteousness, I have to have the truth.

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I have to have it first. And that's what Romans 1 tells us. The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of the men who suppress the truth.

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And why do they suppress it? What's the reason? What are they putting it under? They're putting it under unrighteousness.

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They want to do what they want to do. And the next verse tells us, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, God has shown it to them.

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God already showed them the truth. When it goes on, for the creation of the world, His invisible attributes are clearly seen.

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And by the way, when I was exposed to kind of that presuppositional approach, I thought, oh, invisible attributes. And I think that can apply to everything.

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The laws of science, the laws of logic, the laws of, you know, all these invisible attributes are clearly seen.

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They understand about the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they're without excuse. Nobody gets to use that excuse.

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And then it says, because when they knew God, they didn't know

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Him. It says it right there. They glorified Him not as God, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened, professing themselves to be wise.

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They became fools. Why are they suppressing the truth? Because they don't want to be accountable for knowing that truth.

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It's like a kid who pretends that he didn't know what he was doing was wrong to try to get away with it in his parents' eyes.

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And while your parents might fall for it, the creator of the universe, the judge of all the earth who does right, isn't going to fall for this idea that, you know, you didn't know, and you're hiding it, you're suppressing that truth.

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Well, we have to get to our very first break. And as I said before, if anybody would like to join us with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail dot com.

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chrisarnson at gmail dot com. As always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

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Don't go away. We're going to be right back with Eric Hovind and more of our discussion of Is Atheism on the

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Rise in America Today? Here's what

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Gary DeMar, president of American Vision, had to say about Iron Trump and Zion Radio recently.

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Good to be back. Chris, I always enjoy our time here. I have to tell you, you're one of the better interviewers out there, and I've been doing this for 30, more than 30 years.

30:54

Wow, that's some compliment. How much do I owe you for that? You don't have to owe me anything.

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We're in good shape. I'll be glad you said it on the air, so I don't have to brag about myself.

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Tell your friends and loved ones about Iron Trump and Zion Radio, airing live Monday through Friday, 4 to 6 p .m.

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It's such a joy to witness and experience fellowship with people of God like the dear saints at Hope Reform Baptist Church in Coram who have an intensely passionate desire to continue digging deeper and deeper into the unfathomable riches of Christ in His Holy Word and to enthusiastically proclaim

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Tell the folks at Hope Reform Baptist Church of Coram, Long Island, New York that you heard about them from Tony Costa on Iron Sharpens Iron.

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Welcome back, this is Chris Arms and if you just tuned us in, our guest today is Eric Hovind and by the way

40:17

Eric, am I pronouncing your last name correctly? You got it actually, you're in about the 22 % club of those that actually get it right.

40:27

Well it is phonetically spelled so but one of the things that this may sound really strange but when

40:37

I hear somebody say that people who openly admit to being atheists are on the rise in America there is something actually refreshing about that because when

40:53

I hear statistical information about the majority of people in the United States being Christian and things like that even when

41:00

I hear about the statistics of those who profess to be born again that makes me more depressed because I know that multitudes if not the majority of those people are deceived or lying because there's no way that our country could possibly be dominated by regenerate people do you understand where I'm coming from?

41:21

Oh boy do I, you cannot look at this world I did a prayer call for Trump this morning for a project that we've been working on for months a movie project called

41:31

Trump 2024 and the first thing I did is I wrote down I held it up for everybody and said listen America is not a moral nation we are a nation that has lots of problems even those that claim

41:43

Christianity have no problem with lying Barnum points out no problem with lying cheating, all kinds of stuff and you go we're not a moral nation so I think you're hitting the nail on the head when

41:53

I heard, tell me what you think about this when I heard these major writers Josh Harris and you know the

42:00

Hillsong singer that came out I don't believe anymore I'm an atheist I'm going well good now you know where you really stand before God because without that you are a false convert you're somebody who thinks you're okay and you're not so I'd rather this happen you know

42:23

Barnum says Generation Z is twice as likely to be atheist than the millennials and older generations three times than the boomers and I go well good maybe this is what needs to lead up to another great awakening where people will realize their sin before God they first have to know they're lost in order to know they need to be found so maybe

42:46

I take that too far but that's kind of what goes through my mind we do have an anonymous listener who says my heart breaks that all of my children are not believers although a couple of them out of six appear to be getting drawn by God to him one of the things that I feel so helpless and inadequate about when

43:13

I'm having conversations with my unbelieving children is that they will bring up subjects outside of the

43:19

Bible that I have no knowledge of and no ability to counteract they will bring up things regarding science or technology they will bring up all sorts of subjects obviously to derail the subject away from hell and their spiritual need but their attempts to get me tongue tied to prove that I don't know what

43:42

I am talking about can be very frustrating and quite frankly can be infuriating do you have any advice about how to keep your children or anyone to whom you are having a conversation who is in opposition to the

43:58

Christian faith to keep them on the track rather than chasing all these different conversations that they want to bring up boy, good question

44:10

I got a lot of different things I want to say there first of all my heart breaks for you as well

44:16

I have not had to experience that I know at 18 years old I kind of questioned everything that I had been taught and wondered if Christianity was real wondered if creation was true could evolution be true but it never got to an extreme before I went let me study this out there is no way so first of all my heart breaks for anybody that has to deal with that second

44:39

I just want to say the direction that I am trying to take creation today is in a direction specifically to reach those young people

44:49

Jesus gave the analogy the parable of leaving the 99 and going after the one well statistically here is what is happening today we are not leaving 99 to go after 1 we are leaving 3 to go after 7 we are leaving 30 to go after 70

45:06

I thought of this I am going to be filming a small group curriculum I hear this next week called Lost and as I think of the different visual images to help me represent what is going on imagine a mom going grocery shopping she comes back ready to carry the groceries in she grabs the bag of oranges that she bought and as she swings it around to take it inside from out of the car you see a ton of oranges fall out on the ground and she looks in the bag there is only 3 oranges left in the bag and there are 7 of them on the ground and she just shrugs her shoulders like oh well and walks away and it is like you wouldn't do that with an orange you wouldn't you wouldn't leave your orange on the ground let alone

45:53

I feel like the church is totally leaving the 7 or the 70 if you want to go at 100 and the numbers are huge they are way more than 70 they are way more than 700

46:06

I mean when you look across the United States it is massive I keep this in mind for you as a listener

46:14

I will tell you this there are great parents that have had terrible children there are terrible parents that have had great children there are great parents that have had great children and there are terrible parents that have had terrible children how your children turn out is by God's grace and God's grace alone and so while you can say

46:32

I wish I would have instead of saying I wish I would have be that now be the parent that says man

46:38

I love you no matter what I have got a Christ like love for you and man I love these conversations

46:44

I am not going to get mad at you for thinking I am not going to get mad at you for having an opinion or having done some research that disagrees with me

46:53

I want the truth and you will hear a lot of stuff on this program that will help teach you how to approach them

47:00

I think the Socratic method asking questions is a great way we we developed a website called search creation dot org

47:09

I learned very quickly in ministry I was not going to be able to publish enough articles to answer everybody's questions so I said forget it

47:17

I am partnering with everybody else whether they like it or not so we built search creation dot org and all it is is a database it searches for you the top 47 websites on creation evolution science and the bible so apologetic websites so if you have a question about the bible or a question your kid brings up about science or what about carbon dating or what about dinosaurs or what about the

47:41

LGBT movement you know isn't it unloving to to say that my my two friends that are gay can't get married and we we developed this search engine specifically to give you access to great resources

47:54

I call it google without the junk so you go there and type in your question or type in a keyword and see what kind of results come up because you're only going to get results from one of 47 well from 47 different websites that that I've already looked at and proofed and gone through and they're good and they got great answers so engage them and sometimes a great way to do that is when they bring something up maybe not right away in a debate format but they bring up you know carbon dating or LGBT or transgender and and go on there find an article and text them that say hey

48:25

I read this I thought the point about X was pretty interesting what do you think or how does this factor into what you you know what you've heard and then listen and then after you listen ask another question because the questions ultimately will lead us to the truth we just gotta keep asking the questions but questions will go to the truth we gotta ask good questions and and it's exactly what

48:50

Jesus did and we call it the Socratic method we should call it the Jesus method he asked great questions so love your children

48:59

I would also encourage you apologize to them about what you've done wrong in the past go to them and say you know what

49:05

I just want you to know I did my best but I think I was too harsh here or I think

49:12

I was a little bit too lenient here or and I know I take my faith so seriously that sometimes

49:19

I can come across rude and I just I just want you to know I'm sorry I just want you to know it's not what

49:25

I what I mean to do and I'm gonna I'm gonna try to do better I I've tried all my life my children are 13 16 and 18 and like listen when

49:34

I mess up I want them to know I'm a human don't put me on a pedestal with God I am imperfect and I'm gonna prove that by apologizing when

49:44

I mess up and just going to them and saying I'm sorry and I think we I don't know we have this uh there's a parent mentality out there that's like I'm the parent you're the kid and well that that's great when they're you know two and three years old but man as your kids get to to middle school and high school we really gotta turn it into conversations where we're finding out what they think and why they think it and that's even before middle school you know at the end of upper grade school they gotta start understanding well why do you think that well what objections are there to that you know you think about pastors uh typically get ready for sermons and they ask the who what where when why questions and try to figure out okay how am

50:23

I gonna answer this for the audience how am I gonna help my audience my congregation understand these things and there's there's a question that we have to ask now as we're preparing for sermons or we're preparing for conversation and that's the question what about what about because anything you say there's gonna be an objection out there online you know

50:43

God is a good God oh yeah well what about all the evil and suffering which is one of the number one reasons people walk away from the church today that was asked to me the other day at youth group

50:54

I'm just sitting in the back I'm just going there just to just to watch these young people just to get an idea that's a huge youth group it's got about three hundred kids and I'm going

51:02

God I wanna reach these young people I know 70 % of these are gonna walk away from this church in just a couple years how do we reach them how do

51:10

I give me insight give me wisdom to reach these young people and the pastor was talking about how you need to be ready to answer and he said for example somebody give me a question about creation and evolution and a couple kids threw out some questions and he said

51:22

Eric what do you think about that and man I just boom boom boom one of the questions out of three was how can

51:27

God exist if there's so much evil and suffering in the world and why doesn't God judge all the evil and suffering if God is good and so I just very quickly said nobody questions the existence of a judge when he judges evil and sends people to prison nobody questions his existence when he does that nobody questions that the judge can also be good and says the judge cannot exist if he both punishes evil and is a loving judge but yet we try to do that with God and so there's simple answers out there and kids have been duped into hearing and believing the little one liners the one line atheistic theologies out there and it's sad so my heart goes out to you my encouragement would be let them know they're loved no matter what let them know that you're sorry for how you've messed up and ask great questions that encourage them to keep digging

52:29

Romans 1 is still true why do they suppress the truth unrighteousness they want to do what they want

52:35

I mean at the end of the day that's why they want whatever it is they want they want their sin so that can be masked as a lot of different things and a good loving person can try to take time to do that and unmask that for them through questions so we have to get to our middle break

52:53

Eric and you can pick up where you left off if you'd like when we return this is the normal the longer than normal break in the show because Grace Life Radio in Lake City, Florida requires of us a break a longer break in the middle of the show because they have to localize

53:11

Iron Trump and Zion Radio to Lake City, Florida as a requirement of the FCC so that they have to air their own public service announcements and other things that localize this program to their area so while they do that we air our globally heard commercials and I would ask you please to make wise use of this time by writing down as much of the information as you can for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully patronize our advertisers because in doing so you're going to keep them happy and they're going to want to most likely remain our advertisers which means subsequently we,

53:51

God willing will remain on the air for a longer future because we absolutely depend on the finances provided by our advertisers to exist as a program so please try to respond to our advertisers as much as you can and to further ensure you do that write down the information that they provide also write down information for Eric Hovind on how to approach atheists on how to use creation and the fact of an intelligent designer being

54:20

God himself when you're having these conversations with those who reject the Christian faith well write down those questions and send them to chrisarnson at gmail .com

54:29

chrisarnson at gmail .com we'll be right back after these messages so don't go away We are excited to announce another new member of the

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Lord Jesus Christ my name is Bhanu Gadi I'm a pharmacist in New York which is the epicenter of the latest crisis the world is going through in Psalm 139 verse 14 the psalmist offers praise to the

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Lord like this I praise you because I'm fearfully and wonderfully made and wondrous are your works that my soul knows very well he saw

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God's goodness and mercy, kindness and the beauty in what God has designed and he has erupted into praise in any crisis or problem brothers and sisters our only fallback position is to trust

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God's design and once we do there is nothing for us to do but to erupt in praise to him when the whole world is searching for a solution

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God in his infinite mercy has given us what we need to address this illness which can be very serious such is the beauty of his design knowing that design how can we not erupt in praise to our great

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God like the psalmist did may God bless you and give all of us wisdom to see greater things in his design thank you

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John Sampson Hi, this is John Sampson pastor of King's Church in Peoria, Arizona taking a moment of your day to talk about Chris Arnson and the

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Iron Sharpens Iron podcast I consider Chris a true friend and a man of high integrity he's a skilled interviewer who's not afraid to ask the big penetrating questions while always defending the key doctrines of the

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Christian faith I've always been happy to point people to this podcast knowing it's one of the very few safe places on the internet where folk won't be led astray

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I believe this podcast needs to be heard far and wide this is a day of great spiritual compromise and yet God has raised

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Chris up for just such a time and knowing this it's up to us as members of the body of Christ to stand with such a ministry in prayer and in finances

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I'm pleased to do so and would like to ask you to prayerfully consider joining me in supporting

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Iron Sharpens Iron financially would you consider sending either a one time gift or even becoming a regular monthly partner with this ministry

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I know it would be a huge encouragement to Chris if you would all the details can be found at ironsharpensironradio .com

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where you can click support that's ironsharpensironradio .com Chris Arnson host of Iron Sharpens Iron radio announcing a new website with an exciting offer from World Magazine my trusted source for news from a

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James White of Alpha Omega Ministries and the Dividing Line Webcast here although God has brought me all over the globe for many years to teach, preach, and debate at numerous venues some of my very fondest memories are from those precious times of fellowship with Pastor Rich Jensen and the brethren at Hope Reform Baptist Church now located at their new beautiful facilities in Coram, Long Island, New York I've had the privilege of opening

59:58

God's word from their pulpit on many occasions have led youth retreats for them and have always been thrilled to see their members filling many seats at my

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New York debates I do not hesitate to highly recommend Hope Reform Baptist Church of Coram, Long Island to anyone who wants to be accurately taught discipled and edified by the

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Holy Scriptures and to be surrounded by truly loving and caring brothers and sisters in Christ I also want to congratulate

01:00:22

Hope Reform Baptist Church of Coram for their recent appointment of Pastor Rich Jensen's co -elder Pastor Christopher McDowell for more information on Hope Reform Baptist Church go to hopereformedli .net

01:00:34

that's hopereformedli .net or call 631 -696 -5711 that's 631 -696 -5711 tell the folks at Hope Reform Baptist Church of Coram, Long Island that you heard about them from James White on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Iron Sharpens Iron Radio depends upon the financial support of fine

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Christian organizations to remain on the air like the Historical Bible Society The Historical Bible Society maintains a collection of Christian books manuscripts and Bibles of historical significance spanning nearly a thousand years

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today Thank you Daniel P. Buttafuoco attorney at law for your faithful support of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Lindbrook Baptist Church on 225

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Earl Avenue in Lindbrook, Long Island is teaching God's timeless truths in the 21st century

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We're a diverse family of all ages Enthusiastically serving our Lord Jesus Christ in fellowship play and together

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Hi, I'm Pastor Bob Walderman and I invite you to come and join us here at Lindbrook Baptist Church and see all that a church can be

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remember the lost folks in your life they perhaps need Christian books more than anybody because God may use a book that you give a lost friend or loved one to draw that person to Christ and save them so go as frequently as you can and purchase as generously as you can to Solid -Ground -Books .com

01:10:28

and always mention that you heard about them from Chris Aronson on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio before we return to our discussion with Eric Hoven on is there a rise of atheism in America today

01:10:42

I just want to make some very important announcements first of all on November 7th the

01:10:49

Creation Basic Training Conference is going to be held at the Masters Church of Bucks County, Pennsylvania and this

01:10:59

Creation Seminar features Mike Riddle and Dr. Anthony Silvestro and the fine folks at Striving for Eternity Ministries are the ones that actually have orchestrated this event if you have listened to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio long enough you know that my dear friend

01:11:21

Andrew Rappaport has been on this program and he is the founder of Striving for Eternity Ministries and is running this conference

01:11:32

Creation Basic Training Conference that's November 7th from 8 .30am to 5 .30pm

01:11:38

if you want more information on this conference go to themasterschurch .org forward slash creation training that's themasterschurch .org

01:11:50

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01:12:03

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01:17:01

.com There was shame involved in this sin. There was something to be embarrassed about.

01:17:09

There was a reason why people were in the closet. It's because they knew that there was something wrong with it, that it's not something that you would brag about, that you would flaunt, that you would parade in public.

01:17:21

Now, you are a hero if you're involved in this behavior. You may even be considered a celebrity amongst the other young people in the neighborhood or at the school.

01:17:35

I can even remember in college, there were a lot of my female friends who loved to hang out with the gay guys because they thought they were so funny and they were so flamboyantly over the top effeminate and they just got a kick out of that.

01:17:50

But don't you think that things have changed in some ways for the better?

01:17:55

You don't want a person who is involved in that activity being tormented or beat up or something, but at the same time, the whole concept of shame has gone.

01:18:10

You are hitting the nail on the head. What is evil is being called good.

01:18:18

What is bad is being called righteous. And so, we have certainly done exactly what

01:18:25

God said would happen. And we are watching history and scripture unfold right before our eyes.

01:18:35

The culture today has certainly, can I say it like this, I don't know if it's ever said like this, but adopting the religion of sexianity, where everything is sexual, where the prize,

01:18:50

I mean, the extreme is no longer some religious experience. Your religious experience is the, if I can be so open on your program, is the orgasm.

01:19:00

That is it. It's a whatever that takes. So, with homosexuality, we know that's coming about because, wait,

01:19:05

I don't want to do the work of a real relationship with a woman. I just want to get off and call that good.

01:19:13

And man, let me just, let me do my thing and call it good. And so, there's an incredible perversion because we've left the very idea of what real relationships look like, what real relationships are.

01:19:27

We've watched abortion numbers go down, but that's because we've watched teens that are being promiscuous.

01:19:33

The levels go down as social media has risen where they're less interested.

01:19:39

They're like, hey, I'll just pleasure myself, call that good. Now, I'm less interested in having to interact with somebody else in order to make that happen, in order to meet that need.

01:19:49

So, culture has done a great job with the religion of sexianity and making people join that religion, thinking that that is the absolute.

01:20:02

And just like everything else that has been thrown at young people, where it was, you want this big house, and now people are like, young people are going,

01:20:11

I don't know if I'm interested, that just seems like a lot of work, and I want a bunch of money, and it just seems like you can get sued a lot easier.

01:20:17

Maybe I don't want all that money. They just, they want enough to get by without having all that. So, what's the next thing on the plate?

01:20:24

They, you know, Satan has got people to fall for those things, and you listen to their testimonies, it destroyed their life.

01:20:30

It made them chase after things that didn't matter. It made them go after things that were irrelevant, and we're going to hear the same testimonies just a few years from now of people that have chased and bought after the religion of sexianity, and they find that it's empty at the end of the day.

01:20:47

At the end of the day, what they need is a real relationship with their loving

01:20:52

Creator, the one who loved them so much that He gave His very life for them.

01:20:58

He died on the cross for them. I mean, that's a lot of love.

01:21:03

It really is. So, yeah, I think with the movement of people being open, they would say we're just being honest.

01:21:15

I'm going to be doing a webinar here in a few days, a few weeks, on homosexuality in the Bible with a friend of mine who runs the

01:21:21

Love & Truth Network, who is a former homosexual who married a former lesbian, and now they have two children, and they have a ministry that is teaching the

01:21:29

Church. How do we deal with this? How do you talk to somebody like this? What do you do?

01:21:36

What's the name of that ministry? That's Love & Truth. Love & Truth. They're out of Arizona, I believe.

01:21:43

Gary Ingram is his name. But just really teaching the Church, how do we respond?

01:21:53

What are we supposed to be doing here? I mean, how do we stand on the truths of the Word of God without being mean and getting them to realize there's a reason

01:22:07

God does this? Of course we know that people have been fooled and duped, and they're thinking that the moment is more important than the long term, and you see that in every area—in finances, in relationships, in jobs, in careers, and so in every area of life you see people chasing after the fleeting moment rather than really thinking about long term, because if you start thinking the longer term you think, the closer you're going to get to thinking about the long term of eternity.

01:22:40

And so Satan's done a great job of getting people to think less and less long term, because if you start planning for your entire life, then you're wondering, well, what happens after I die?

01:22:51

But if you're only planning next week, next month, next year, and that's it, and it doesn't go a lot farther than that, and you can keep people in chaos and keep the world in enough chaos where it's hard to plan for your long term future, well, then you're certainly not going to be thinking much about your eternal future.

01:23:08

So Satan's—kudos to him for doing a great job of deceiving the world. He's, according to—what is it—John 8, he's the father of lies, and he does a great job of lying.

01:23:19

Okay, we have RJ in White Plains, New York, who asks, in your experience as an apologist and interacting with the public, what do you find more challenging and difficult, interacting with an atheist or agnostic, or somebody who is really deeply rooted in a false religion?

01:23:40

Wow, I would—personally, I love talking to atheists. I mean, it's like one—

01:23:46

Of course, that is a false religion, no matter what anybody says. Atheism. It is. It is.

01:23:52

And you're exactly right. They'll say it's the lack of a religion, but it is definitely a religious religion, and the dictionary is a set of rules, you know, trying to answer the basic questions of life, and that's exactly what atheism does.

01:24:04

And they say they don't have their places of worship. Absolutely they do. That's what the schools and universities are.

01:24:11

They are all about the religion of atheism. So, I personally prefer that. I guess it's a toss -up for me between that and not those that are of other religions, but those that are atheists and those that have walked away from Christianity, because I just want them to know,

01:24:29

I think you actually walked away from a God that doesn't exist, and I think if you could hear these basic truths, and you could see these basic facts, and you could understand these basic things—I know

01:24:41

I'm getting a little bit evidential in the way I'm describing this, but I do it in a pre -compositional way—that, man, you really can have a knowledge of the truth.

01:24:51

You really can know these truths. I mean, whether I'm talking about dinosaur bones or homosexuality and the reality that those that have—or transgender—those that have experienced that, at the end of the day, they're not as happy.

01:25:04

They're way more likely to commit suicide, and they're discovering it's not because they're picked on, not because it's not culturally acceptable.

01:25:10

It's because it's a problem. It's a brain problem. It's literally a mind problem. It's not satisfying.

01:25:17

It's not doing what they thought. They thought, if I could just get all the pleasure I could out of life, I'd be happy, and they're discovering just pleasuring yourself doesn't bring happiness.

01:25:28

It leaves you empty. So, looking at the science and the facts about that, and the data, the research that's gone into what's happened to Ryan Anderson's book,

01:25:38

When Harry Met Sally, talking about the transgender movement, talking about the homosexual movement, and exposing the science behind all of this, saying, look, it doesn't bring about true joy and happiness that you're searching for.

01:25:50

It's a fleeting thing. Those in other countries that have nothing, yet have

01:25:57

Christ and find themselves happy, we have a lot to learn from them. That's for sure. We have an anonymous listener who says,

01:26:06

I have just received the heartbreaking news very recently that one of my children is a practicing homosexual, and this person also claims to be someone who loves

01:26:19

Jesus. And I was wondering, how do you confront or contradict the charges that we are actually disobeying

01:26:31

Jesus by being unloving toward homosexuals, because Jesus never said a word about the subject?

01:26:41

Well, Jesus spoke very, very highly of Scripture. Jesus referred to Scripture over and over and over and over.

01:26:51

So I think it's easy to look at Jesus' life and encourage people to love one another, but hold to the truth, and do both.

01:27:04

That's why Gary Ingram's ministry is called Love and Truth, because that's exactly what he's about.

01:27:10

He's going, how do we lovingly share the truth? What you're going to run into is what we see in the world today, is people saying, if you disagree with me, you do not love me.

01:27:19

Well, that's not reality, and that needs to be communicated. That needs to be said, is, you know, well, if we disagree, does that mean

01:27:27

I don't love you? No, that doesn't mean that at all. Now, what would it look like to love you right now in these circumstances?

01:27:36

So, if you're an autonomous listener, just like those that said, hey, I have a child who, or my children have walked away from Christianity, walked away from God even, to your child who says, well,

01:27:48

I love God, but I'm gay, what does it look like to love them?

01:27:53

There's a new movie out right now, American Family Association, just put it out, and all you have to do is put up your email address in order to watch the movie at American Family Association, and it's all on this subject of how do we love these individuals, and yet speak the truth of the reality.

01:28:16

Look, sin brings death. This is one of the things I've taught my kids all the way, is there's a reason why

01:28:21

God has the rules that He has. Sin brings death. And when you live in sin, it brings death, death of relationships, physical death, physical suffering, and the science continues to back that up, whether that's emotional, psychological problems that you're going to experience, or it's the physical problems that get associated with homosexuality, and there are numerous, and most people know them, and yet they continue practicing.

01:28:47

Why? Because they love sin. What they have is not a homosexual problem, they have a sin problem just like everybody else.

01:28:58

So the question is, when are we going to submit to God? When are we going to say,

01:29:03

God, I want Your will to be done more than I want my will to be done? And this is kind of one of the focuses of creation today, not specifically homosexuality, but specifically on humanism versus Christianity.

01:29:17

Humanism teaches the end of all being is the happiness of man. Christianity says, no, no, no, no, no, the end of all being is the glory of God.

01:29:24

The reason we exist is to glorify Him. It's humanism, it's man -centeredness that says, it's all about me being happy.

01:29:33

That's not what Christianity teaches. Christianity doesn't say, do whatever you want to do to be happy.

01:29:40

It says, please, God, what does it look like to really love? And so, as with any sexual sin, since we're on the topic, it's clear from Scripture, you're sinning against yourself.

01:29:52

And that's a heterosexual sexual sin, or a homosexual sexual sin, or a transgender sexual sin, any way it goes, you're sinning against yourself.

01:30:04

So I guess my encouragement would be, number one, love. Number two, teach through questions.

01:30:12

Hey, can I love you and not agree with you? Is that possible? Do you love me, even though you disagree with me?

01:30:20

It seems to me like you're trying to say that you do, that you love me, but you disagree with me. I love you, even though I disagree with you.

01:30:27

And I want you to experience it through them. And I am going to just, I'll pray for you that if you're not open to having the conversations,

01:30:32

I can't force that. I mean, I don't know how old your child is, but it's not something I can force.

01:30:38

But boy, I just want you to know I'm open to these conversations. I don't want to be like a lot of people have in the past, and how the

01:30:44

Church has messed up in the past, by saying, you're messed up, you're out, we're done with you, you know, get out of here.

01:30:51

It's like, no, that's not a loving thing either. So what does it look like to be able to speak the truth and love at the same time?

01:30:58

And Chris, maybe you've got better advice than I have there, but I would start right there. Well, the only thing that jumps out at me is the common fallacy that people make that the words of Jesus Christ are more

01:31:15

God -breathed, or the only God -breathed words in the

01:31:21

Scriptures, and everything else was just the personal opinion of the author of whatever book of the

01:31:27

Bible that happens to be, which is absurd, because the only reason we believe that Jesus is who he said he was is because the other

01:31:37

Scriptures point to him, and the Old Covenant Scriptures prophesied him, and he is the fulfillment of the

01:31:46

Messianic prophecies, etc. So you can't just pick the words of Jesus alone, as if the other words of Christ's disciples who authored parts of the canon, and also the

01:32:03

Old Testament saints, you can't view those other writings as less binding, as less authoritative, as less...

01:32:11

I know the word inspired is used a lot, even though it's really expired, it's

01:32:17

God -breathed, but I think people have to be corrected in the way that they even view the

01:32:26

Bible, and how they view the words of Christ. That's why many have objected to the red -letter editions of the

01:32:34

Bible, because they may give some, they may give many, a false understanding that these words are somehow more important.

01:32:44

Am I making sense? I think that is... I was going to say, I kind of meant to say that, but at the end of the day, who do you trust, and what do you trust?

01:32:53

Because at the end of the day, this is why creation today is at its root a biblical authority ministry, saying, look, if we're not going to trust the words of God, whose words are we going to trust?

01:33:07

Because now we're just up for anything goes. I mean, now, why stop at homosexuality?

01:33:14

What's wrong with bestiality? What's wrong with, you know, throuples? And what's wrong with, you know,

01:33:20

I mean, why is there a consenting age? Why did we say 18?

01:33:27

I mean, come on, this is the 21st century, why not 12? Why not... I mean, if an 8 -year -old can transgender without their parents' permission, why can't an 8 -year -old, you know, go have sex with a 50 -year -old without their parents' permission?

01:33:42

And I think that's exactly where that is all heading. Right now it seems, at least in public, the majority of liberal pro -homosexual people are abhorred by the concept of pedophilia.

01:33:59

But I think that that is going to quickly evaporate from their rules of things that are taboo, because if they are pushing this horrendous and satanic idea that an 8 -year -old child should be able to have surgery and hormones to change their gender, then if they can make a decision like that, just like you said, they should be able to have sexual relations with whomever they want.

01:34:28

Yeah, if they're going to let a doctor cut something off, why can't they let somebody that same exact age just simply touch it without cutting it off?

01:34:38

It's so hypocritical. And you're right, we're on this slope. And listeners out there,

01:34:45

I don't know if you guys realize, what we are watching happening is evil expose itself.

01:34:53

We are not wrestling against flesh and blood. We wrestle against spiritual wickedness in high places.

01:35:00

What we are watching happening, step by step by step, is evil prevail.

01:35:07

I thought years ago, when I was younger, I thought, you know, all you have to do to make a lot of money in this world is just figure out where the line of evil is at, and cross it just a little bit and set a new line of evil.

01:35:21

And boom, you're the big hit. And then, hey, when that's a normality, all you have to do now is cross that line a little bit to create a new line, and it'll be rejected at first, but man, now you're the popular one.

01:35:32

Like, all you have to do is sit back and be the evil one. Be the one who takes it one step farther, and you're going to make lots of money, and you're always going to be in the news, and you're going to be the trendsetter.

01:35:42

You're going to be the popular one because you are pushing an evil agenda. And what does it take to stand against that?

01:35:48

Well, it takes somebody standing on the truth of the Word of God with love and saying, no, this is wrong.

01:35:53

This is, here is right, here is wrong, and here is how I know what is right and what is wrong.

01:35:59

And I think that I try to approach it from a twofold approach, not only because that's what God says, but this is also what experientially is true.

01:36:08

I mean, God doesn't write truth that's not both true and not experientially true. It's, you know,

01:36:14

He wrote, He wrote Christ rose from the dead, and experientially

01:36:19

Christ rose from the dead. So it's both and. And, of course,

01:36:24

Jesus defined marriage, and He defined it as being between one man and one woman.

01:36:33

Indeed. So I think people know that they're really playing games with others when they try to act as if Jesus never said anything about this or Jesus was a

01:36:46

Jew, He was an obedient Jew. He obeyed even the ceremonial laws, which

01:36:55

He, after His death, were abrogated. But while He was living on this earth as a human,

01:37:04

He was a faithful adherent to the Hebrew Scriptures.

01:37:10

And they clearly taught, I mean, even homosexual apologists very often will claim that they can't get around that the

01:37:18

Old Testament was clear in its condemnation of homosexuality, although some of them will say that that was just in reference to prostitution and so on.

01:37:32

When you think of Sodom and Gomorrah, you know, and the angels there, I don't know what you think about this, but the theophany is the idea that many times throughout the

01:37:43

Old Testament when an angel of the Lord is mentioned, there's many times where I believe it was

01:37:49

Jesus. And sometimes I wonder, I mean, they were clearly against the sins in Sodom and Gomorrah, and God, for sure, against that.

01:37:58

And Jesus is God, so that's where I go. It's kind of hard to have the prophets and those who say things against it and then say, well,

01:38:08

Jesus never said anything about it, if you put it all together. We have

01:38:15

CJ in Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, who says, do you think, and from your experience with your conversations with atheists and agnostics, that there is some sort of safety they think they have in not committing to belief in God or Christianity specifically, because if they keep asking questions and trying to tie their opponents in knots, they think that if that's the best

01:38:47

God can send me, then he shouldn't be able to pour his wrath on me later, because I couldn't be convinced by the inept people that serve him.

01:38:58

I think that listener has something quite on the money there, myself.

01:39:03

What do you think? Yeah, so CJ, to follow up RJ, that's kind of funny.

01:39:10

So RJ's question, now CJ's question. There's no doubt exactly what

01:39:18

Satan tempted Eve with, ye shall be as gods, is the exact same temptation going on now.

01:39:25

I will decide what's right and wrong. I will determine good from evil. I am intelligent. I am the most high.

01:39:32

And again, this comes down to Christianity versus humanism. Humanism, the end of all being is happiness, and man, you are your own

01:39:39

God. And yeah, that's exactly what we see happening, where these atheists want to consider themselves intellectually superior.

01:39:48

They want to consider themselves intellectually amazing. And I've studied more, and I research more, really what it comes down to is,

01:39:54

I read these articles on the internet, you know, and so, yeah, they come off as though they are intellectually superior.

01:40:02

And I don't know if I'm missing the question. Well, it seems, and I've thought this myself, as I have interacted with even family members who are not

01:40:15

Christian, or who are, they may claim to be a

01:40:22

Christian, but they don't believe in clear teachings of the Bible, like Jesus is the only way to salvation, and so on.

01:40:32

There is, I think, a false security and safety that people have, that if you are bringing them the

01:40:43

Gospel, and you're bringing them the teachings of the Bible, if you can't convince them with a whole slew of questions that they throw at you, and you can't answer them adequately in their minds, that God, they feel a safety because they don't think, as we all go back to Romans 1, that they really do believe

01:41:07

God exists, but they suppress that truth. They don't think God's going to hold it against them, just like the man in Romans 9 who was totally baffled by Paul thinking that God could hold a person responsible for rejecting him, because as Paul says, that the opponent will say, how can you find fault for who will resist his will?

01:41:37

You have these people who think that if God's messengers, meaning us, are so inept and unable to convince them, they think that somehow

01:41:49

God is not going to hold them accountable on Judgment Day. They are safe from hell, because in their wisdom, all these questions that they've thrown at Christians were unanswered.

01:42:04

I don't know if that makes any sense, but I think that's where the listeners come in from. Yeah, it certainly helps. Basically, they've deceived themselves.

01:42:11

And so I guess the way I would approach that, if somebody was talking to me or I was talking to an atheist about that,

01:42:16

I would start listing off stories of people that thought they got away with something.

01:42:23

They thought this, but the reality was that. I mean, how many times has that happened throughout history? They thought one thing.

01:42:29

I mean, you can go from examples of business to financial investments to wars to anything you want.

01:42:36

They thought this, but what they thought wasn't reality. And so you're right. Yeah, they have this sense of security, and I think

01:42:42

I'd approach them with stories like that saying, hey, did you hear about so -and -so who thought, and you can look these up online, did you hear about so -and -so who thought this, and so he made this investment here, when in reality this, and he lost everything.

01:42:57

I know you've got a lot of security, and you really think that, you know, God's not going to judge you because nobody smart enough has come along to, but yet we've barely scratched the surface of what's in this world.

01:43:12

We're making brand -new discoveries every day of species of insects and animals around the planet, and you want to believe that all of that came about without a designer?

01:43:25

Are you sure with our tiny bit of knowledge that we can make this bold, bold claim?

01:43:34

I think, do you have one more break or no? Is there another break coming up? Yeah, we actually have to go to our final break right now, so hold your thought.

01:43:42

I've got one story I want to share. Yeah, you can tell it when we get back, and this is a much more brief break, folks, so if you have any questions, send them in now to chrisarnson at gmail .com.

01:43:53

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the

01:43:59

USA, and only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

01:44:05

Don't go away. We'll be right back with Eric Holden right after these messages. Was your business shut down during the

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Trust the law firm where the attorneys of one of the largest business firms on Long Island, New York are sending their own clients for representation during this lawsuit.

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Our congregation is one of a growing number of churches who love and support Iron Sharpens Iron Radio financially.

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Grace Church at Franklin is an independent, autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in Scripture through the person and work of our

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Lord Jesus Christ. And of course, the end for which we strive is the glory of God.

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If you live near Franklin, Tennessee, and Franklin is just south of Nashville, maybe 10 minutes, or you are visiting this area, or you have friends and loved ones nearby, we hope you will join us some

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Our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org. That's gracechurchatfranklin .org.

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This is Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our

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Sovereign Lord, God, Savior, and King, Jesus Christ, today and always.

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When Iron Sharpens Iron Radio first launched in 2005, the publishers of the

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01:54:35

Welcome back. And Eric, if you could, you had a story that you wanted to tell. Before we run out of time, please let's hear that story.

01:54:44

Well, it's a little analogy, and hopefully we've got enough time. The concept is, if you're doing something else, pause for just a minute.

01:54:54

Take three minutes and understand this. And maybe you won't get this. When I talk to atheists sometimes I'll give this analogy.

01:55:00

Out of all the knowledge in the universe, I'll draw a circle on a piece of paper and say, out of all the knowledge in the universe, and don't come to conclusions because you're going to think

01:55:07

I'm going to say one thing, I'm going to say something different. Out of all the knowledge in the universe, draw a circle on a piece of paper.

01:55:14

Say, how much knowledge do you think that you have? And this is not the argument that says, well,

01:55:20

God might exist in the other half. This is not that. So don't think that. So how much knowledge do you have?

01:55:27

Thomas Edison, the great inventor, said we don't know one millionth of one percent of anything at all. I just say, hey, just for the sake of illustration, let's assume that we have one percent of all the knowledge in the universe.

01:55:38

We think we've got one percent. Here's my question. Is it possible that something in the 99 % of knowledge that we do not have, is it possible that in that 99 % that we don't have, that something out there could actually contradict or prove wrong this little bitty one percent that we do have, that we think we've got?

01:56:00

So I draw that on a piece of paper, draw my circle, draw my little bitty one percent. Okay, if we think we've got this much, is it possible that out of all this darkness out there, all the unknown, that something out there could contradict this little one percent that we think we've got?

01:56:14

And they'll say, yeah. And I'll say, okay, so you're telling me we could be wrong about this one percent that we think we have?

01:56:20

And they'll say, yeah. I'll say, so what you're telling me is, if you could be wrong about this one percent, then we don't really know anything, do we?

01:56:33

We don't really absolutely know anything at all. And they'll go, yeah.

01:56:40

And I'll say, see, that's the problem. That's relativism. There is no truth. We can't know the truth. And logically speaking, it's actually true that if you could be wrong, that you don't really know that you cannot have knowledge.

01:56:54

And so I say it like this. I say, see, you would have to have all knowledge. You would have to know everything in that circle in order to claim even one percent of knowledge.

01:57:05

Or you just have to know someone with all knowledge. And the one that has all knowledge can reveal truth to you.

01:57:15

So either you have to know everything in order to claim you know anything, or you just have to know the one who does know everything in order to claim that you know something.

01:57:26

So atheists will get themselves in this bind, in this contradictory circle of saying, we don't know anything.

01:57:31

And then you ask them, do you know that? And they say, yes. And it's a contradiction. It's a statement that doesn't make any sense to say that we don't know everything, or we don't know anything, or that everything is relative.

01:57:43

The statement that everything is relative is not a relative statement. The statement we don't know anything is not a statement.

01:57:50

It does not match the very statement that is given. So anyway, I was debating a guy until 2 o 'clock in the morning, and he kept saying, we don't know anything.

01:57:59

We don't know anything. And we could be wrong about everything. And I just got so frustrated. Finally, I ended the conversation.

01:58:05

The next morning, I got my daughter ready for school. She was 7 years old at the time. Out of frustration, after I got her cereal ready for her to eat in the morning,

01:58:12

I said, Stephanie, did you know there are some people out there that say we don't know anything at all? And my 7 -year -old said, well, how do they know that?

01:58:21

And I thought, wow, classic. The very statement, we don't know anything, is a statement of something that they know.

01:58:28

So it's easy to point these things out. Make sure you do it in love and do it in a way that honors God. And that's what

01:58:34

Creation Today is there for. We're there to teach you, train you, and equip you, not just from our website, but from a ton of different websites.

01:58:41

That's why Iron Serpents Iron is here. And as Chris was saying, would you guys please donate? Man, I know the feeling of having hundreds of thousands of people visit a website and nobody helping.

01:58:51

We've got 70 monthly supporters. So I know that feeling. Guys, why don't you today, today say,

01:58:58

I'm going to write a $5 check, and if you can do more, do more. If you had 10 ,000 people do that, Chris, you could do this radio program all of next year.

01:59:05

So guys, why don't you do that and support what Chris is doing? That's awesome. Seriously, today, stop what you're doing, get out your credit card, go to Iron Serpents Iron, and just punch in the numbers real quick.

01:59:16

It's not that hard. Punch in the numbers, support what he's doing, and set him up for 2021 to keep having amazing guests on and bringing you guys great content that you guys can use.

01:59:26

I really appreciate that. And if folks want to find out more about Creation Today, go to that website.

01:59:34

That's creationtoday .org, creationtoday .org. I want to thank you so much,

01:59:40

Eric, for being such a great guest. I want to thank everybody who listened. And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater