Brandan Robertson RESPONDED To Our Video?!

Fight For Truth

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Hey guys, Colin here, and welcome back to Fight For Truth, the channel where we bring you Christian commentary about the things that matter.

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In today's video, we're going to be talking about progressive Christian Brandon Robertson. Now, you may recall that recently

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Brandon made a video saying that sexual relations outside of marriage are not necessarily sinful as long as they are consensual.

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This is something that we disagreed with heavily. And in fact, we disagreed enough with it to make a video refuting

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Brandon's claims. That video will be linked in the description, and if you watch it, you'll get a more thorough and detailed response.

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But in any case, Brandon disagreed with our video. And in the comments section of his TikTok, he went so far as to tell someone that our channel quote, spends thousands of dollars to make ill -informed videos.

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Now, some might be tempted to respond angrily here, but I assure you that's not necessary.

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The headline we should take from this is that, well, we think it's a huge compliment for Brandon to suggest that we spend thousands of dollars running this channel.

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But in the interest of accuracy, we have to correct this idea. While we do try our best to make quality content here, we have not spent thousands of dollars on our equipment or anything else, nor would we be capable of doing that.

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But with regard to Brandon suggesting that this channel specializes in making quote unquote ill -informed videos, that's something we hope to clear up in our response.

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So without further ado, let's get into Brandon's response video. First off, before we play the clip, let's recognize that Brandon played and reacted to a very specific portion of our video.

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Specifically, he played a 14 -second segment of the video, starting at about minute 6, second 20, in case you'd like to go back and watch that again.

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And I have no problem playing short clips, so long as it's done in a way that is followed by strong and biblical argumentation.

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Unfortunately, one cannot define Brandon's reaction as either strong or biblical. Here's why.

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Long story short, that 14 -second clip comes toward the end of our video. And I acknowledged in the video itself that this segment contained my least compelling argument.

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I specifically said quote, the entirety of the video thus far has been dedicated to meeting my burden of proof, end quote.

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In other words, that clip he played was part of the video that supplemented the main content, but it was never meant to be taken as even a small part of my central or overall argument.

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Hopefully that adds a bit of important context as you watch his reaction. Additionally, as you're about to see,

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Brandon does not directly refute any point I made in the clip or in the video itself. So without any further ado, let's dive right into it and watch the first clip.

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Watch this. And even less compelling, and that's really saying something. Here's a few points I want to throw out for you to consider that this content creator never acknowledges and that most

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Christians don't realize. First, marriage is not an ideal in the New Testament. In fact,

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Paul says that celibacy is the ideal. Celibacy should be what all Christians are aiming for, and marriage is reserved for those who could not control their sexual passions.

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So first, Brandon says that I am at least in part wrong because I never acknowledged what Paul says about celibacy, namely that marriage is not the ideal.

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Celibacy for the sake of working for the Lord and building the kingdom is the ideal. And this statement is true enough as far as it goes.

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In 1 Corinthians 7, Paul does write, "...it is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman."

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That is said because married men have to split their immediate attention between their family and potential ministry opportunities, as Paul writes later in the chapter.

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And Paul later clarifies in verse 6, "...now as a concession, not a command,

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I say this, I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another."

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In other words, Paul is saying that marriage is one kind of gift, and celibacy is another kind of gift.

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Paul also says that this is a concession and is in no way to be interpreted as a command to all the people of Corinth or otherwise.

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So what's going on here? Well, Paul is saying that his most ideal situation would be one in which everyone is single and working almost exclusively to build the kingdom of God in whatever way

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God gives them according to their gifts and their opportunities. He then acknowledges plainly that this ideal is not the norm and that marriage is a different kind of gift from God.

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In other words, celibacy is an ideal in Paul's mind in a sense, but it is not an ideal in the sense that every

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Christian is called to it, not even close. By contrast, avoiding sexual immorality is something that all

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Christians are called to. 1 Thessalonians 4, 3 says, "...for this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality."

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But more than this, Brandon never actually demonstrated how celibacy as Paul's ideal would have any bearing on any major argument

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I made in the video. I noted that in 1 Corinthians 7, 2, Paul does say, "...but

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because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband."

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You see, Paul prescribed marriage as the lawful and biblical alternative to having any sexual activity coming outside of marriage.

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This at the very least implies that fornication is sinful, as it is by definition outside of biblical marriage.

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Again, none of that has been disproven by anything Brandon said here. And with that, let's move on to the next argument that he offers.

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Watch this. Second, the Bible takes place in various cultures.

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And so when Paul is writing these various letters, the important question we must ask is who is the audience and what was going on in their world?

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One of the passages that this content creator references is from 1 Corinthians. In Corinth, this was a hub of sexual deviancy, so to speak.

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Corinth was known throughout the ancient world as this big cosmopolitan city that had temples to Aphrodite, the goddess of sex, that would participate in festivals called

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Bacchanalia, which were drunken orgies in the streets. Prostitution was big business in Corinth.

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And so that's the culture Paul is writing to. And he's telling Christians to turn away from all of the things that are distracting them and to focus on Christ, on building the kingdom.

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So now the implication from Brandon is that our first video was incorrect because we did not adequately acknowledge the cultural context of the city of Corinth, to whom

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Paul wrote the passage that we just quoted. About this, Brandon is absolutely correct. We did not have any in -depth conversation about the context of Corinth, a city that did indeed have tremendously high levels of sexual immorality.

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But this again has no bearing on our argument at all. Our argument was that Paul prescribed marriage as the lawful alternative to sexual immorality.

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In other words, the sexual immorality being practiced in Corinth, however severe it was, was happening outside of marriage, and marriage was what they ought to have done instead.

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This does not refute our point at all, but rather, it supports it all the more. It is precisely what we argued from start to finish in the first place.

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And in any case, at no point did Brandon even get close to offering an actual refutation of that argument, and that can be seen even more clearly in the next clip.

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Watch this. And if they can't completely turn away from sexual desire, to do it in the context of marriage and not to give in to the excesses of the

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Corinthian culture. The key here is that Paul is not giving moral commands for all times and all people.

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He's writing to a specific context. Notice here that there is a new level, a slight change in his position.

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We need to notice this. It went from, their video didn't acknowledge the full cultural context to which

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Paul is writing, to now, Paul's standard in that passage therefore does not apply to all people in all places, but only specifically to the people of Corinth.

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This is an absolutely essential piece of the puzzle. In fact, without this assertion,

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Brandon doesn't have an argument at all, at least not one that's even remotely compelling. But unfortunately, it is just that, an assertion.

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Brandon adequately demonstrates that Corinth had a particular cultural context, but he failed to demonstrate how that cultural context removes the possibility of broadly applying

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Paul's writing here to all cultures. That absolutely essential piece of the argument is completely unsupported.

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Why is it that Paul's standard here would only apply to Corinth? And is there something so specifically grievous about Corinthian sexual immorality that only the inhabitants of Corinth alone are required to have sex within marriage, and everyone else in every other culture,

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I suppose, is allowed to fornicate? What exactly would be the purpose of giving such an inconsistent sexual ethic?

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Why would it even be there? And if this is the argument being made, where exactly is the evidence for it?

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These are important questions. Unfortunately, none of them are answered in Brandon's response. And all of this brings us to another problem.

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All of Scripture is written in a particular cultural context. That is, by a specific person, in a specific place, at a specific time.

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There is no getting around this. It's undeniably true. So here's a question. How does one go about deciding which commands are reserved for particular cultures, and which commands are for all cultures?

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Merely stating the fact that Paul is writing to a specific culture, Corinth, does nothing to accomplish this goal.

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And more than this, if this command is only given to the Corinthian church, then why do we also see it given elsewhere, to some degree, in the book of Hebrews, for example?

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Hebrews 13 .4 says, Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and the adulterous.

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Notice this. Here we have a different book, written to entirely different people, saying that instead of being adulterous or sexually immoral, the solution is to uphold the honor of the marriage bed.

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So apparently this advice is not exclusive to the Corinthian church. So what can we say at this point?

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Was the advice exclusive only to the early church and not to the modern church? Was the early church supposed to get married and the modern church can fornicate?

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This seems to be a slippery slope, one that could be used for literally any biblical command. When the apostles wrote about believing the gospel, for example, they were writing to specific people, in specific cultures.

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That's not something all of us should do. You have to remember the cultural context they were writing in. Nobody needs to believe the gospel now, that was just then.

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You see, this vague standard allows you to adjust and critique the Bible wherever you want, without actually having to prove anything.

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To be clear, I wholeheartedly agree that some commands in the Bible were given only to specific people, specific places, and specific cultures.

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But the point is, we need to come to these conclusions based on an exegesis of the text and a valid understanding of all the scriptures in tandem with the specific one we're talking about.

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We can't simply declare cultural context as a general concept and think that that qualifies as a refutation.

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It simply doesn't. And with that, let's go ahead and watch the last clip. Watch this. The big question

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I ask when people debate me on whether premarital sex is sinful or not is, what is the ethical harm of sex outside of marriage?

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I don't believe God gives any commands that are arbitrary. I believe if there is truly a command from God, it is because something is ethically egregious.

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What is the ethical harm of two consensual adults engaging in sexual relationships with one another?

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I've never heard a compelling answer to that question. So now Brandon says that if God truly prohibited fornication, then you must demonstrate what practical harm fornication causes to individuals or to society.

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This is half wrong and half right. Let me explain. It is indeed true that God does not arbitrarily offer commands for absolutely no reason at all.

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In Deuteronomy 10 .13, God himself charges Israel through Moses, to keep the commandments and statutes of the

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Lord, which I am commanding you today for your good. You see, the statement that God's commands are given for the good of His people is an accurate one.

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It's true. Yet, Brandon takes this to mean that if someone cannot adequately explain to him how fornication causes harm rather than good, that implies that fornication isn't a sin.

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This is a bridge too far. The primary reason to obey a command of God is that it is, in fact, a command of God.

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Whether or not you fully understand the benefit of following the command, or the consequences of not following it, is inconsequential to the ultimate standard at play.

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Romans 8 .28 says, We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to His purpose.

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Now, we do not know precisely and exactly, in all ways, in all situations, how things will work together for good.

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Only God knows this exhaustively. Still, we ought to trust that it's true, that all things do, in fact, work together for the good of those who love

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God. You see, my understanding of God's commandments do not determine whether or not they are

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God's commandments. And of course, at the same time, we can also be fully confident that God's commands are indeed given for our good.

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But with that being established at the more theoretical level, let's get practical. The fact is, we actually can provide

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Brandon with practical, concrete examples of why fornication is damaging to people and society.

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First, if two people faithfully wait until marriage to have sex, it pretty much entirely removes the possibility of contracting an

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STD. By contrast, according to a paper from the National Library of Medicine, quote,

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Women with five or more sexual partners were eight times more likely to report having an

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STD than those with only one partner. End quote. And keep in mind, even if a woman only has one sexual partner, this does not mean that that partner also only had one.

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So when it says one partner, that does not imply abstinence and marriage for both parties.

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Yet still, there is clearly an astronomically higher risk for STDs when fornication is being practiced regularly, especially with multiple partners.

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Additionally, if a man and a woman wait until marriage, it is impossible for them to have a child out of wedlock.

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This means that it's much more likely their children will grow up in a stable two -parent home. According to one study, quote,

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Children living with both biological parents are 20 -35 % more physically healthy than children from broken homes.

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End quote. They are also more likely to graduate high school and college. And one staggering statistic declared that being raised in a family of married parents, quote, reduced a child's probability of living in poverty by about 82%.

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The fact is that fornication has far -reaching personal and societal consequences.

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Of course, Brandon says that no one has ever demonstrated this to him in any conclusive way, but we hope we've done that today in this video.

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One thing that is very important to remember, though, is that there is freedom from all sin in Jesus Christ.

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With the Gospel, we can be fully and completely forgiven of any sin that we commit. This needs to be recognized and understood as the backdrop in front of which all of this conversation is taking place.

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Please know that sin doesn't make this a hopeless situation, but rather, despite our sin, Jesus provides us with more hope than anyone could ever give.

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In any case, that is our refutation of Brandon Robertson's statements regarding our channel and the video we made here at Fight for Truth.

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I pray that this has been a blessing to you, and please know that this video is not meant as a sinful attack, but rather as a

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Biblical critique. And let's pray for Brandon, that he would stop this false teaching by God's grace and turn to the truth of God's Word.

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Thank you so much for watching that video. Please give us a like and subscribe so that you don't miss any content.

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Truth Army today, and until next time, fight for truth, never surrender, and keep your eyes open.