September 11, 2003

Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona, this is The Dividing Line. The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us, yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence.

Our host is Dr. James White, Director of Alpha Omega Ministries and an Elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church. This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you'd like to talk with Dr. White, call now at 602 -973 -4602, or toll free across the United States, it's 1 -877 -753 -3341.

And now with today's topic, here is James White.

9/11, Religious Rhetoric, and the Lack of Repentance

And good afternoon, welcome to The Dividing Line. My name is indeed James White. We're here an hour early, and there's a reason for that, but I'm not really sure exactly how to explain it. We're not sure exactly what the schedule is going to be in the future.

Back up just a little bit, and I thought maybe we could just switch days, because now there's an issue on Thursday nights, and we haven't figured all that out yet. So just keep an eye on the website, and maybe we'll be able to figure out exactly how this is all going to work sometime in the future as to rescheduling things and making everything function.

Today is September 11, 2003, and just a few minutes ago I was listening to The Dividing Line from September 15, 2001, and that was interesting to listen to. I had forgotten some of the things that I mentioned at that time, for example, the hearing of aircraft going over the first time after a few days of the eerie silence of no aircraft going over.

I had sort of forgotten about that, and I think most Americans have forgotten about a lot of little things like that. We may sit around and talk about it, and those memories come back. But given that we had dedicated an entire program to 9 -11 when it took place, I thought we'd at least begin our time today with somewhat of a, shall we say, a two-year checkup.

Some of you who heard that program will recall that I wasn't overly excited about the religiosity that I saw in our nation in the days after 9 -11. In fact, I pretty well directly identified as hypocrisy.

I saw no attendant evidence that the religiosity that we saw was relevant at all to Christianity. It seems that many in the church today think that if someone says, God bless you, God bless America, let us pray, mentions the man upstairs, I mean, we have so dumbed down the faith that as long as there's something semi-religious about it, we get all excited.

And the problem is, the scriptures give us specific, very clear indications of what real true godliness is all about, and none of that attended the religiosity that sort of popped up for a while. You'll notice the flags are gone.

You know, everybody had a flag on their car, and God bless America, and these colors don't run, and those have been scratched off or faded off, and the flags are gone. And we all knew that was going to happen.

It's not like that really, you know, surprised anybody. But the religiosity that we heard, the prayer meetings, the fact that there were individuals, you know, the ACLU was laying low, even though there are all sorts of religious activities going on, and people in religious office were asking for people to do religious things.

Well, they were laying low for a while. They didn't want to be seen as mean, nasty, terrible, horrible people, so they sort of kept quiet. Well, they're back. They're back with a vengeance. Their minds weren't changed.

When we look at what has happened since 9 -1 -1, it definitely seems to indicate to us that the religiosity that was seen was very similar to the religiosity seen in Israel when there would be judgment that would come upon the nation.

There would be this surface renewal. You know, when you have an enemy frightening you, standing at your doorway, it's easy to call out to God. But then when the enemy's gone, deliverance has been given, or simply time passes, well, then sin is a whole lot more interesting to engage in, it seems.

Think about what has happened. I mean, if there truly was, there was all this increase in church attendance, as far as I understand, it's pretty much back to where it was before now. And there was all this discussion of God, and I kept saying at the time, well, if that does not include repentance from sin, and repentance is not just simply a, well, you know, I'll stop doing this for a while.

We'll sort of back off on promoting our sin agenda for a couple of weeks here, you know, because of the religious folks in our nation. That's not repentance. Repentance involves a change of mind, a turning from something to something, and that to something wasn't there.

There wasn't a turn, it was just instead of the headlong rush, we skipped a few steps. You know, we slowed down just for a couple weeks. That's not repentance, as most of you who are biblically literate are fully aware.

That's not repentance. There wasn't a turning from and a turning to. And at the time, I mentioned the fact that even at that period of time, if you said something about repentance, if you said something about judgment, oh, people threw their hands up and they were just angry that you would actually believe that God would bring judgment upon a nation for their sin.

And has anything changed? Just a few weeks ago, the President of the United States made a statement, said, we're all sinners. That was a mistake, wasn't it? What do you mean we're all sinners? Who are you to say?

Who are you to judge? It was an amazing thing. It truly was. And hi, how are you doing, folks on the intercom there? Nothing's really changed. Let's think about just a few things in this past number of months and weeks.

Did the Supreme Court choose to interpret the Constitution in light of its original intention and in light of their duty as judges to render verdicts that are just in the sight of God? No. No, in fact, they overturned the sodomy laws of Texas and then, not happy to do that, decided to join the culture wars firmly on the side of homosexuality.

As a result, we now have an explosion of homosexuals militantly seeking Uber rights. They don't want equal rights. They want superior rights. They want superior rights to everyone else based upon how they engage in sex and with whom.

Sounds like Sodom and Gomorrah to me. I just saw a video. It was horrible. Just, ah, incredible. Put out by Soulforce, Mel White's organization. And, oh, it was just, it was about an alleged trial. And they put this Presbyterian minister up there and, you know, having written a book on this subject and having debated Barry Lynn on this subject, listening to this guy crowing about how he had never lost a debate on this subject, then listening to the absolutely hilarious argumentation.

I mean, argumentation that would not last three seconds in cross-examination. Ah, it was, it was, it was the arrogance of those promoting this lifestyle, this sin. When we look around at the media, have we seen a change?

What's on TV? Well, let's see. We've got, what is this, the Paradise Hotel thing? I've never seen that one, but can tell from the promos that I'm sure it promotes a very healthy, monogamous, family-valued type of perspective, I'm sure.

We've got Queer Eye for the straight guy. We've got Coupling coming. That looks like it's going to reach new lows. That's what people want to watch. It makes money in our nation. We've got at least one of the two major political parties engaging in every known tactic to allow for the continued murder of unborn children.

One of the two parties has made it very, very clear that you must interpret the Constitution as they interpret the Constitution so as to protect the murder of unborn children, even though that's lousy constitutional law to anyone who would even be honest enough to address the issue, but you're not allowed to honestly address that issue.

That has become an absolute dogma, dogma, of one of the two political parties. You cannot be in that party and expect to get anywhere. You're a heretic, a dogmatic heretic if you do not hold to abortion rights, murder of unborn children.

And then just a few weeks ago I mentioned the irony, and don't get me wrong, the other political parties, not much better. Certainly there's more folks in it that would at least oppose abortion, but still, what's really being said, what's really being done?

And then just a few weeks ago, just so that we can make sure that attorneys do not have to be reminded of the source of all moral law, we had to remove the Ten Commandments from the Alabama state. That's courthouse building there.

Can't be reminding folks about that. Now they can drive by bulletin boards all along the way that are downright pornographic in content, and all sorts of stuff like that, but we cannot be reminded that historically this is the foundation of the law.

We don't want to do that. I was mentioning I saw that Soulforce video today, and it started off with Mel White. It's just, I couldn't help that it was the worst form of grossly inaccurate rhetoric that you hear from politicians.

Exact same thing. And it talked all about how, the real problem in the homosexual, it's the fault of religious conservatives. It's all our fault. All the problems that homosexuals have is actually our fault.

It was incredible. And these folks are supported, and they get money, and they get the opportunity of promoting their agenda from a willing media. You know, if there had been a change, a change in the thinking of this nation, don't you think it would, where would it reflect itself?

If there was a concern about what God says is right and wrong, then wouldn't there somewhere along the line be some evidence, some place, some evidence of godliness? Some evidence that people are taking seriously the commandments of God in regards to holiness of life and thoughts and honoring God?

Wouldn't there be some evidence somewhere? I don't see that anything has gotten better. It seems we're on the exact same path, and that takes us back to what we were saying initially. All the prayer meetings and the ecumenical stuff where you get all the Muslims and the Jews and the Hindus and the Buddhists and the Buddhists and the United Methodists together.

They seem to fit in there well for some reason. And you sit there and you talk to Father God and Mother God and Mother Earth and all the rest of this garbage. It's idolatry. It's not going to result in godliness.

So here we are in the second anniversary of 9 -11, and is it any more popular today to talk about judgment? Is it any more popular today to recognize the holiness of God than it was on 9 -11? No. Maybe even less given the things that have taken place in the Supreme Court, the laws that are being promoted by senators in the Senate and representatives in the House.

No, we just took a little pause, just a little break. Didn't change our thinking. We're just sort of shocked. Amazed that something like that would happen, but you know, we've moved on. If something like that happens again, and all the experts say it probably will, I expect there will be another outpouring of emotion, another outpouring of patriotism, but it probably won't be quite as intense.

It probably won't last quite as long. We're starting to get used to it. Maybe the time after that, maybe not quite as intense, not quite as long. I mean, look at Israel. They face this stuff every day.

It's become second nature to them. I'm not saying that they are used to it, no one can ever get used to it completely, but the point is it doesn't have quite the same impact. The second time, the third time, the tenth time, the hundredth time.

And so what was all that religiosity? Did it really have anything to do with Christianity? No. It doesn't touch the heart, it doesn't change the heart. If it doesn't bring someone shattered to the cross, then it didn't have anything to do with Christianity in the first place.

So we look around and we say, well, we've still got a lot of work to do. We still have to remain faithful despite the fact that what we saw in those first few days, what seemingly encouraged so many folks, and I guess some folks just easily encouraged.

I looked at it and said, this doesn't encourage me. So some folks are using God's name, so what? The Philistines used various names that refer to God. Where does a person who derives their worldview from the Bible come up with the idea that as long as someone uses the name of God, somehow that's a positive thing?

Oh, well, I know the answer to my own question at that point. So I hate to start off on a low note, but let's just be realistic with ourselves. Nothing changed. There was no turning to God. Not seriously.

I would hope Christians certainly think more about their nation now than they did before. I would hope that there is more prayer concerning one's nation, more thinking about the issues of judgment, at least in the part of God's people.

But as things have, quote-unquote, returned to normal, what we really have to conclude is that man may go running after his idol of God when he is faced with adversity and danger, but that's not what changes a heart.

That's not what changes a heart. And that's what we see going on in our land. 877 -753 -3341. And I know we have listeners from outside of the United States. We have listeners from Canada. We have listeners even in that portion of Canada around Nova Scotia.

And those folks are really strange. They truly, truly are very different. And I was in Canada the week before last, and I refer to my takeoff out of Vancouver Airport as my escape. I tell you, it's different.

You know they have no food in the Vancouver Airport. It's the weirdest thing. It's just the weirdest thing. You know, you go to an airport in the United States, and you can eat. There's going to be pizza and cheeseburgers.

Yeah, it's going to cost you an arm and a leg, but it's there. But not in Vancouver. No. No. And then, you know, I got ripped off. And I'm going to lodge a complaint here with our Canadian dude because I got a hot dog and a bag of chips and a Coke at the Vancouver Airport.

He said there wasn't any food there. Yeah, you have to look around for it, and there's not much. And so they said $7. And so I got out my $7 American, and they saw it, and they said, oh, that's five, I think it was 5 .40, 5 .40 American.

Okay. So I gave her six, but she gave me the change in Canadian money. I tried to use it in the car wash yesterday, and I spit it out every time I tried to put the stupid thing in there. It doesn't weigh enough.

It's cheap. Oh, well, anyway. Yes, I know Vancouver is on the other side of the continent. It's still in Canada. That's the point. Anyway, 877 -753 -3341, 877 -753 -3341. You don't have to talk about that.

You can talk about other things if you want to, but why don't you give us a call? I know that a lot of folks who normally would be listening right now will be coming in, you know, as the theme music is ending, going, what happened?

And it's because we're early. Like I said, I don't know how we're going to fix that in the future, but we'll, for now anyways, figure it's going to be 11 a .m. on Tuesday and 4 o 'clock on Thursday. That's about the only thing we can do right now.

We'll see. I'm watching our Canadian participants telling me, of course you got ripped off. You're an American. What do you expect? Really? Okay. Anyhow, at least I live Vancouver, U .S. Oh, Vancouver, U .S .A.

Well, that's a pretty area up there. It was in Seattle. So anyways, 877 -753 -3341 is the phone number. And let's go ahead and let folks get on the line. And while we're doing that, we haven't yet fixed our computer that does those wonderful spots that we normally do.

And so we still have to do them live. And so I'm just going to do a brief one just to remind you in light of the fact that I watched that Soulforce video. The book, The Same Sex Controversy, you really need to get hold of it.

I listened. In fact, you know, I've got it right here. This is the user's guide to the video. And it's called Homosexuality. Homosexuality. The debate is over. The verdict is in. Not a sickness, not a sin.

Hey, you know that rhymes. And Mel White comes up there and he's just listen to this. Listen to how fair this is. Since ancient times, religious leaders have persecuted homosexuals by stoning them to death, burying them at the stake, and hanging them alongside witches and heretics.

The past 35 years or so, Protestant and Catholic churches have continued this history of persecution of sexual and gender minorities. Don't you like that? Sexual and gender minorities. Terms that did not even exist 35 years ago.

By studying and debating our humanity, by calling us sick and sinful, by refusing us the rights to ordination, to marriage, and to unqualified membership in the church. Just think about the entire spectrum of false argumentation that just got snuck in there.

And then later, they bring in this Reverend Dr. Jim Rigby, Senior Pastor, St. Andrews Presbyterian Church, Austin, Texas. And here's what he says. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I am a heterosexual Presbyterian minister.

I have no vested interest in coming here today. I'm here because people I love and respect are being falsely accused. Over the last 10 years I've gone around the country debating this issue. I've never lost a debate, not because I'm so good, but because the fundamentalist argument is so laughably weak.

Now, you ready for a refutation here? Check this out. They appeal the Levitical Code, Leviticus 18 .22 and 20 .13 of the Old Testament, even though the New Testament clearly says that we are free from that code.

In fact, it's a sin to use that code against another person. The Book of Acts says, Call no one unclean, Peter in Acts 10 .28. Yep, that's what Peter meant to say. Peter, having been told that he should eat with Gentiles, do not call what I have called clean, unclean.

That meant that the entire Levitical Code and all of its moral precepts, including prohibitions against incest and bestiality and homosexuality, all that's gone in Acts chapter 10. And now there is the exegesis of a Presbyterian minister from Austin, Texas.

Well, how do you respond to that kind of stuff? Well, that's what Jeff Neal and I addressed in the same-sex controversy, and that very issue is addressed. Leviticus 18, Leviticus 20, fully taken apart, dealt with.

All these arguments, well, it's all gone because, you know, all that stuff. Already taken care of in the book. You need to get it. We have it available. Okay, that's only one very live commercial, but we'll just go on from there.

Eternal Life Now Through Faith in Christ

Now, I believe that this is the first time we've ever had a call like this, and so we'll do the best we can. Let's go up to, I think this is Kansas, and talk with Stephen. Hello, Stephen. Stephen? Hi.

Hi, Stephen, how are you? I'm fine. Stephen, how did you know to call this program? My dad told me.

Your dad? Yeah, he called before.

Oh, Kansas. Hmm, I bet you I have some idea. Maybe his first name starts with an H? Yep. Uh-huh. Tricky fella, that dad of yours, huh? Yeah. Uh-huh.

Well, and what's your question? My question is, can I have eternal life now before I, like, get to heaven?

Well, you know, I've got a real neat answer for you. Jesus said that that's really the only way that you can have eternal life. Jesus said in the Gospel of John, the fifth chapter, the 24th verse, he says, He who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life.

Not will have eternal life someday way down the road, but right now has eternal life and does not come into judgment, but is passed out of death into life. And so a Christian who believes in Jesus and believes that he is our Lord, that he died upon the cross, he rose from the dead, a person who believes in Jesus, right now the kind of life they live is different than the life of the people around us that don't believe that because it's already a different kind of life.

It is eternal life. And so, yes, you can have eternal life now. And, yeah, that does mean it will always last, but it means more than just it will always last. It also means that it's a different kind of life.

You have different, you know, when you're a Christian, you want to do things differently than other people. And you have different things that are important to you than other folks that don't believe in Jesus.

So the answer to your question is, yes, you can definitely have eternal life now and know for certain on the basis of the Lord's own honesty and integrity that you'll have eternal life when you go to be with him as well.

Okay? Okay. All right. Say hi to your dad for me. All right. All right. Thanks for calling. God bless. Bye-bye. All right. 877 -753 -3341. And let's talk with Evans from Cedar Rapids, Iowa. How are you doing, Evans?

I'm fine. Are you there?

Yes, sir. I had a question and I kind of believe that all infants, and John Piper actually taught the same thing.

Well, I have read that Spurgeon did believe pretty much the same as Zwingli did, that all infants who die in infancy and all who are mentally incapable of cognitive thought in essence were numbered among the elect.

I do not know what John Piper's view of that subject is. I believe that would probably be as well the view of John MacArthur, but I really don't go around finding out what folks' view on that is. I would assume that the foundation, certainly at least in the few sermons that I've seen Spurgeon make reference to it, the foundation was based upon his view that the judge of all the earth would do right, these individuals would be joined to Christ and hence would be saved.

I have never spent much time looking into anything beyond that level of it. I know there's folks that take that view. There are folks that take the other side. And then there's those in the middle who say, well, I'm uncomfortable with taking the extreme on either end.

That is, if you say that all infants who die in infancy are thereby lost, then you limit God's ability to express mercy in that situation. On the other hand, if you say that every infant who dies in infancy is automatically saved, then in essence you've just turned abortion into the greatest heaven-filling device ever devised by man.

And you also have problems with the whole issue of original sin and union with the atom and the origins of death and so on and so forth. There are answers that both sides will give on the extremes. I think there's a middle ground which says the judge of all the earth will do right, and you can leave that in his hand, that he is not under compulsion one way or the other, and that he can exercise his freedom in the granting of his grace as well as in the righteous judgment based upon one's union with Adam.

Unfortunately, I don't hear a lot of really good discussion of that particular issue, but there's probably a reason for that. It's not something that you can't go to a particular passage of Scripture and say, ah, there it is.

You can go to David, and David talks about his son, but is that a universal thing? I know where the arguments are, but I tend to fall into that middle group.

Okay. Well, when the conversation came up at work today, I went to the judgment of Canaan.

They're definitive, but... How do you mean definitive?

Well, would be Lot and his family, people in...

Well, I don't think that too many folks are arguing... Well, okay, I'll take that back. Yes, there are people who argue that children are not guilty. I wasn't really even addressing that perspective because I believe that everybody, at least both Spurgeon and Piper, would believe in original sin, and they would be talking about those children being saved through the redemptive work of Christ, not just...

That's exactly what was said at work today. The idea is that every infant...

Right, and the point is you can't... I don't know that you can prove that from, for example, looking at David's son, because David's son could be while others are not. At the same time, I don't know that all the children, Sodom and Gomorrah, necessarily becomes a universal picture for everybody else.

I mean, let's face it. Sodom and Gomorrah had very little light as far as God's truth presented to it. There are worse cities mentioned in Scripture. Chorazin and Bethsaida are considered to be worse as far as that goes because they had more light given to them.

So that's why I sort of stay in the middle. I see arguments on both sides, and I don't see that any of these particular examples presented by the extremes necessarily establish the sort of universal conclusions that are being drawn from them.

So I would definitely agree with you, though, in Sodom and Gomorrah, the only people that were delivered, and they were not delivered on the basis of their own personal righteousness, I can guarantee you that.

Look at Lot's wife and what happens to her as evidence thereof, was Lot and his family, and everyone in those cities was most definitely destroyed, and righteously so.

I have another little question if you've got time. Sure. I have a teacher who is adamantly convinced that Paul is not the author of Hebrews, from the other epistles of Paul, that it can't possibly be the same person.

He's convinced it's Barnabas, that's his theory. I was just curious as to your judgment on that argument.

Well, he is exactly correct that the grammar and syntax of Hebrews is substantially different than Paul's epistles to the church at Ephesus or to the churches in Galatia or something like that. There's no question about that.

The various theories of those who would defend Pauline authorship, and all I can say that I'm certain of is that the author of the book of Hebrews was very well versed in Paul's teaching and theology.

Hence, some people look at Luke, some people look at Apollos. I think Luther even suggested Apollos as a possibility there. There are many places where the argumentation, and even the phraseology at times, is very definitely very close to Paul's at that point.

However, the language is very different. A person who is very comfortable in the Pauline epistles will encounter very different syntax, much more like Luke in Luke and Acts than anything that Paul would write.

Now, one of the theories that has been used by defenders of Pauline authorship of Hebrews was that Paul originally wrote it in Hebrew and that Luke translated it into Greek, and that that was what was distributed was Luke's translation of Paul's original letter to Hebrew Christians.

That's, again, one of the many theories that's thrown out there. That certainly would explain the two issues. That is that the theology has many parallels directly with Paul's teaching on Christ and things like that, and then the Greek is very much like Luke.

That would explain both of them, but again, we'll get to find out. I'm sort of wondering if ten days into eternity the Lord's going to announce that he's going to reveal to us the author of Hebrews and someone's going to walk out from behind a curtain and, hey, it was him, and we're all going to sit around going, ah, we argued about that, and I don't know.

I was being facetious there at the end. Okay, thanks, Evan. Thanks for calling. God bless. 877 -753 -3341 is the phone number. We have open lines right now. You can get in if you have questions today.

We're sort of allowing for whatever you'd like. We just went from eternal life to authorship of Hebrews and infant salvation. There you go. There's a fairly wide view of subjects that we covered all in one particular shot, and we'll take your phone calls at 877 -753 -3341.

Sufficiency of Scripture and the Coming Book on Calvinism

Just received... Oh, yeah, okay, fine. Just received from UPS today a book I ordered quite some time ago now, Richard Muller's second volume, Post-Reformation Reform Dogmatics, The Rise and Development of Reform Orthodoxy, Volume 2, Holy Scripture, The Cognitive Foundation of Theology, and I have had this highly recommended to me, and looking through it already, I see that it's going to be a very good resource, no twist about it, and it was recommended to me by David King, who wrote Volume 1 of Holy Scripture, that being the three-volume set of Holy Scripture, which we have available by Bill Webster and David King, and some of you know that I'm currently working on a book, trying to work on a book, on the subject of scriptural sufficiency, and one of the issues that I'm discussing with the publisher in regards to the format of the book is that I do not want to rewrite what other people have already written.

David King's first volume in the three-volume set on the sufficiency of scripture, biblical argumentation, is simply wonderful. Obviously, the book that I just received today, tremendous information, tremendous documentation.

The problem is, for a lot of folks in the church, you'd have to almost pay them to read those books. There are hundreds of footnotes in each, and the authors of each one would probably not tell you that they were attempting to write a book that would be equally accessible to all folks.

Basically, they were writing it for people who really want an in-depth discussion of that particular subject. What I want to do in the book that I'm writing on the sufficiency of scripture right now is I want to basically do the same type of thing that I did with The Doctrine of the Trinity and that I did with the King James Only controversy, justification.

I want to inflame passion in the part of believers about a foundational and fundamental belief. I just don't believe that people are going to remain faithful to these things if they're not passionate about them.

You will not remain faithful to a particular doctrinal stance and position if you are not passionate about its truthfulness and the impact it has on your life and the fact that we're dealing here with God's truth.

That's what I want to try to do, and the format of the book, as I hope that it'll end up being, as we're in the writing right now, is such to hopefully help with that. By the way, just a quick sort of reminder, or not really a reminder, an update.

I've seen the front, now I've seen the back of Debating Calvinism, the book with Dave Hunt. Sola Scriptura for Dummies, yeah. Okay. That is not the point I was attempting to communicate. Thank you very much.

Some folks. I'll have to kick that person later. Anyway, I've seen the front and the back of the book now. I saw the graphic for the front, I've seen the text for the back. That'll be being sent out to folks for endorsements.

That's going to be really interesting. I'm really going to be very interested in seeing what kind of endorsements. I've decided to put myself in the shoes of, think about some of the folks who endorsed The Potter's Freedom, for example.

Bob Raymond. I think Bob Raymond said that I took Norman Geist for The Theological Woodshed. What's he going to do with a debate book like this? I mean, I know what many of them would like to say, but what's Multnomah going to be willing to actually put in print?

I feel like asking for, I want to hear what every single reviewer actually says. I want to see every letter. I think it's going to be very humorous, actually. Anyway, we'll see what comes. It's still scheduled for February.

The book, the five views, I think it's five views book that I contributed to on church governance, all I've been given is spring 2004. I don't know what that means, but all that work's done. It just hasn't appeared yet.

Please don't be frustrated with me about that. I have no control over that. It's sort of like the situation we have right now with Straightgate. I mean, people are all contacting us and saying, come on, why can't you fix this and all the rest of it.

We have no control over it, and believe me, Stephanos is doing everything he can. Stephanos is doing everything he can to get things fixed. I said to Rich, I think this morning, I said, okay, what we'll do is everyone who calls and complains concerning Straightgate not working right now, just ask them, okay, and how much have you donated to Straightgate of late?

That'll pretty much take care of it, because I think there'd be like two people left who could actually have a basis for complaining about Straightgate. Anyways, let's go back to the phone lines, and let's go ahead and go over to the wacky, wild republic of California with the Min Pin in the background barking.

Talk with Johnny. Hello, Johnny. How are you, James?

Doing all right? I'm trying to get this dog to stop barking, so I'm going to go to the next room. It sounds like a miniature pincher. It's actually a small Pomeranian. Oh, that's even worse. Oh, yeah, they bark at everything.

That's a rat with fur. Yes, a miniature fox. Okay, all right, I got you. My question's about Exodus 6, verse 3. Now, I remember when I was studying Mormonism a few years ago, and I guess I might pick up the subject a little bit more, but anyway, in a book is that there's a... because Joseph Smith spoke, I think it was in the book of Abraham, I'm reading the ESV here, but I did not make myself known.

The basic confusion here is that when I look, I see Abraham calling God Yahweh in Genesis 18.

I don't know if you could clear up that. Yeah, well, there is much discussion. If you check any of the... It got back in. If you check any of the critical commentaries on the subject of Exodus 6, you'll find a number of discussions that will break down basically into two types.

The first type is, well, here is an obvious indication of... The liberal perspective will be... We're going to have to turn you down here for a second. Shoot the dog. I meant that metaphorically. Anyway, the liberal perspective in answering that question will be that the writer of Exodus and the writer of Genesis are two different writers and therefore there is an inconsistency between the two.

The conservative understanding of the text will basically focus upon the idea that making known to them by my name is an issue that is in relationship to the covenant name of Jehovah and that it was a form of revelation.