November 25, 2003

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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.
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Our host is Dr. James White, Director of Alpha Omega Ministries and an Elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church.
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This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you would like to talk with Dr. White, call now at 602 -973 -4602 or toll free across the
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United States. It's 1 -877 -753 -3341. And now with today's topic, here is
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James White. And good afternoon. Good evening.
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Welcome to the Dividing Line, a Tuesday evening edition. Boy, last week we had quite a barn burner this evening.
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We had Jerry Manateeks and Eric Svensson on and we're still feeling the repercussions from that one.
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I tell you, there are some interesting folks out there that, you know, it doesn't matter what facts you present, it's just no way around it.
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But you know, we've had to move on from there because this Saturday I leave for Florida. And over the course of the next week, ministering a number of times,
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Steve Camp's going to be on the cruise with us and he and I are going to be doing some ministry together before them.
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And then, of course, Friday night, December 5th, in the
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Tampa area, the information is on our website. If you are planning on being there, you might want to, you know, take a look at that, get the information regarding the debate that will be taking place between myself and Greg Stafford, the thesis,
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Jesus Christ, God or a God. It's going to be very, very interesting. I'm very excited about it.
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I have not been this prepared for a debate, I would say, probably since January of 1991.
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So we'll be coming up on 13 years ago when I debated Mitchell Pacwa on the subject of the mass and justification,
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I'm not sure which one went first, I think justification came first in that one. Yeah, I'm pretty certain it did.
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And that was in San Diego and, of course, at that time, all
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I knew about Mitchell Pacwa was he had been on the Ankerberg program with Walter Martin and so I watched that and listened very carefully to that and was very, very prepared for that set of debates.
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And I am more prepared, I think, for this particular debate, listened, have listened very, very carefully to the debate between Mr.
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Stafford and Robert Bowman that took place in May of this year and, of course, I've had Mr. Stafford's book for a long time, specifically his
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Jehovah's Witnesses Defended, second edition, and there was a first edition.
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And I read that book in preparation for writing my book on the Trinity and responded to a number of Mr.
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Stafford's points. In fact, I've mentioned a couple times that there are some chapters in the
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Forgotten Trinity that are better, stronger chapters because I had read Greg Stafford's book and had listened to his responses and hence clarified my presentation in light of them.
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And so it's going to be quite the debate and then, of course, the very next day we drive across Florida, basically, which, given the shape of Florida, is not that bad, and we get on a cruise ship and we spend a week in the
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Caribbean on an apologetics tour. And that's going to be very, very interesting, especially given the fact that we're going to be discussing a positive
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Christian defense of those Christian doctrines denied by Islam and the majority of the folks on the boat who are not guests are
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Islamic. So that'll be interesting. Who knows what will come of that.
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And then, don't forget, I just put this on our website. I'm sorry that I have not kept up with my blog since about Friday or so, but I'm not going to obviously be able to do that when
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I'm on the road. So just sort of get used to it, I'm afraid, for the next couple of weeks. But I just, again, made the announcement, put it up there on the very beginning of the webpage,
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December 16th and 17th, and maybe even the 18th, I don't know. All depends.
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My understanding is that the Bible Antiman broadcast is a little more structured than it has been over the years in the sense that there is more scheduling, and there have been many times, most of the times that I've been on, we've gone three hours.
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I know we did the King James Controversy, I think, with James Akin, Jimmy Akin now. Let's see, who else?
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Staples. We've done a lot of three -hour programs that extended over the course of three days, and that's what
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I'm expecting. Obviously there's going to be absolutely positively no shortage of phone calls when we are going to be debating the subject of Calvinism.
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I'll be taking on George Bryson. He has a new book out. I can't find it anywhere. I've looked.
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I looked on Amazon. I looked on CBD, and they've never heard of it, but it's called, let me try to get my voice.
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The Dark Side of Calvinism. Ah, I just love it.
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The Dark Side of Calvinism. And I've not seen it, but I can tell you exactly what that's all about, because I've debated
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George Bryson before, and really, for George Bryson, the primary reason that he believes what he believes about Calvinism, it's not obviously exegetical.
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The primary reason is because if you were to believe Calvinism, then you could not believe his traditions.
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And so his arguments are going to be, well, if you believe Calvinism, then maybe Christ didn't die for your loved ones.
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And of course my response will be, well, if you believe Arminianism, it doesn't matter whether he did or didn't, because it's all up to them, so why are you praying to God about it in the first place?
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But anyway, it'll be interesting, and so I don't think there's going to be any shortage of phone calls in that one, so it could go three days if there is room in the schedule, and I think once before what happened was we did two days, and then we played, they played,
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I shouldn't say we, I don't schedule it, but they played the third day, I don't know, a couple weeks later, you know, fill -in type thing,
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I don't know. So that's what's going to be coming up at least on the 16th, you know, at least get one hour in, scheduled for two, so that would air on the 17th, and then
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I think it'll probably go a little longer than that, because we will be melting the phone lines with that particular topic,
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I really think we will be, so, but there will not be any dividing line this Thursday, of course, for obvious reasons, it's
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Thanksgiving, and nobody would be out there listening, at least I doubt anyone would be, and then
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I leave on Saturday, so as the website announces the next regularly scheduled dividing line, and I'm not sure if this is even going to happen, because I sort of have a mental breakdown scheduled for when
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I get home on the 17th, but we're supposed to do something on the 18th in the morning, and that'll probably just be a real big report on how everything went, and it'll be fun.
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So I'm afraid we're going to be gone for a little while, but you know, absence makes the heart grow fonder, and all that kind of stuff, and that's just sort of how it works.
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So 877 -753 -3341 is the phone number, if you'd like to make some comments, maybe you did not get an opportunity to get in Thursday morning, you've got some comments you'd still like to make on last
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Tuesday evening's program, and some of the fallout that has come from then, stuff
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I'm not even mentioning, I tell you, some of the stuff I've seen, and some of the folks that, you know,
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I've gotten emails from a certain Roman Catholic apologist, another Roman Catholic apologist has posted things, and it's so tempting to just sit here and demonstrate the utter,
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I don't know, inanity of some of this stuff, but some of these people I'm just starting to realize, you know, you get into a food fight and you're going to end up with, you know, strawberry shortcake on your face, it's just how it is, and if that's all certain people can do, that's all they can do.
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Now I know that's an easy way to get away from real debate challenges, but I'm not talking about people who actually are really worthy of real debate challenges, so it's hard to know exactly what you're going to discuss and what not to discuss, but it's been interesting, maybe you'd like to have some comments on that, 877 -753 -3341, haven't really had an opportunity to comment much on the cultural things that have taken place since last week,
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I believe it was last Tuesday that Massachusetts did what it did, and, you know, four judges who obviously embraced the idea that what the worldview of the people who wrote whatever constitution we're talking about, whether it be a constitution of the state, whether it be the constitution of the federal government, in either case, the worldview of those folks and what they intend and what they meant is irrelevant.
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We can just reconstruct everything in our own modern image, and we have these king priests, the priestly kings called the judiciary, who really, you know, they're not accountable to anyone but themselves anymore, and it's a sad, sad situation, no two ways about it, but that's what's going on in our society, it shouldn't surprise us, this has been developing for a long, long time, but we haven't commented on that, maybe you'd like to comment on that,
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I saw on a Southern Baptist, a Founders Conference Southern Baptist message board this week, it was referred,
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I was referred to it, it's about the only time I can see those things, people send me URLs, I don't sit there and run around and track this stuff down,
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I don't sit there surfing the web for hours a day, but people send me URLs and someone had posted, it really, it almost looked like someone had taken the same sex controversy, had taken every passage that we address, and had written a little thing where, in essence, let's ignore the rebuttal that's offered here, let's just take the questions that are being responded to in this book, and turn it into a positive presentation on homosexuality, it was so much exactly what we had addressed in the same sex controversy, it wasn't even funny, and saw that, and so you're going to be seeing a lot of stuff, if you have not picked up the same sex controversy, there's a lot of folks who haven't,
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I realize that, there's a lot of folks who, eh, homosexuality stuff, it's really distasteful, well it is, there's no question about that, believe me, it'd be a whole lot easier for you to read the book that Jeff Neal and I wrote, than to read the books that we had to read to write the book,
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I assure you, we, if you want to go read all the pro -homosexual books, and then, you know, come up with your own conclusions, that's one way, but if you like to avoid all that, and just read some good stuff, that would be,
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I think, a better way of doing it, so the same sex controversy, the debate with Barry Lynn, people starting to realize, you know what,
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I need to know about this stuff, because I know, I went through seminary, and I couldn't have given you a semi -decent discussion of homosexuality,
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I mean, I knew of passage here or passage there, but I didn't, I really didn't know, until I was forced to really do some studying, if we're going to be able to give an answer in our society, it's something we need to be addressing very much along the ways.
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I did want to play one section, just to sort of help prepare you, for the upcoming
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Bible Answer Man broadcast in December, this is, I just wanted to play a section, and I think we may have some,
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I'm not sure if we have some folks calling in or not, but this is just a section from the cross -examination, one thing,
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I'm going to tell people straight up front, one of the things I'm going to do, is
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I'm really going to emphasize biblical exegesis, as much as I possibly can,
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I cannot control those programs, they, normally the first hour is discussion driven, but still you have all the breaks, there's nothing you can do about that, you can't really build a cadence or a rhythm or anything like that, but the first hour is primarily discussion driven, and so,
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I'm going to do my best to lay the groundwork right at the beginning and say, look, here's the issues we need to address, and if we just sit here and go back and forth, and do things with, you know, philosophy, and things like that, it's not going to work without establishing a biblical foundation, we're just going to continue to increase the amount of confusion on this subject.
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We need to base this discussion in the word of God, not in our traditions.
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Our traditions differ from one another, and if our traditions are our final authority, then we're never getting anywhere.
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Let's concentrate especially upon the word of God.
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And in doing so, I would like you to listen to the cross -examination period, just a section of the cross -examination period between myself and George Bryson, where I asked him about a passage that I'm going to be asking him about when it comes up in December as well.
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So let's listen to this section from the debate, this was from April of last year, on the subject of salvation, who is in control.
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Mr. Bryson, I would like to ask you, in light of what I just said concerning John chapter 6, verse 44, all the
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Father gives me will come to me, and the one who, I'm sorry, no one is able to come to me unless the
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Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day. Is it your position that the one who is raised up at the last day in John 6, verse 44, is different than the one who is drawn?
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It is my position that there are two things required. You must come to him, that's one, and to come to him, you must be drawn.
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It's my position that scripture clearly, John 6, verse 44, and all of that context, so you're talking a lot about the need to look at things in context, if you take all of that in connection, there are two things that happen.
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One, you have to see, and another, you have to believe, if you go on earlier in that very chapter, but the point here is that you cannot come, you are not able to come unless he draws you, but being able to come and actually coming to him in faith are not exactly the same thing.
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He enables you to come, and if you come to him and are drawn, and you can't come to him unless you're drawn, then he will raise you up, but he doesn't raise people up unless they come to him, but the ability to come, he gives, but making you able to come doesn't make you come.
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Okay, verse 44 says, no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day.
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Are you saying those two hims are different people? No, I'm saying those two people there, that one person does two things.
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One, he comes to him, but he comes to him only because he is able to do so. Where did you get that from, verse 44, though?
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Verse 44, two things. No one can come to me. Come to me. That's the one thing.
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The other thing he says is that that person who comes to him has to be enabled by the Father drawing him.
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No one can unless he's enabled. So he has to come to him, and he has to be drawn, but if he is drawn and doesn't come to him, then in fact he will not be raised up on the last day.
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Just as it earlier says, he must see and believe. So you believe that the him, the two hims here are different because you just said you can be drawn and not raised up.
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No, I'm capable as one person of doing more than one thing, and God is capable of doing something while I'm doing something, and what he does here is enable me to come.
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What I do is come. I come in faith. As a matter of fact, let me just say that even Calvin suggested that coming is a metaphor for believing.
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There's a question about that, but where does the word enable appear in verse 44? Can come. In fact, I remember in your book you point this out.
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No one is able to come. That's right. But it does not say he is enabled. It says, unless the
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Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day. The drawing results in being enabled.
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No, that is not what it says. It says that no one can come to me, and almost all Calvinist commentaries say the can is enabling.
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It is not inevitable that you will come. It's an enabling. Could you name one that confuses ability with enablement?
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Ability and enablement is the same. You mentioned in my own book. I never said anything about enablement. Okay, enablement.
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Only it has the ability. Ability and enablement, unless you have a different definition, when somebody is able to do something, or if somebody has been enabled to do something, they are now able to do it.
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Okay, you said that between these two here, you have to come. Who comes to Christ according to John 6, 37?
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Only those who are enabled come to him, and those that the Father has given to him. Okay, all,
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I didn't understand that. According to verse 37, all the Father gives me will come to me.
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Who is given by the Father to the Son? Those who believe. Not unbelievers, but believers.
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Would you agree with that? So, God gives those that he foresees will believe to the
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Son? Well, of course he foresees everything, but I'm not saying he gives him the Son because he foresees. The fact that God, God enables people to do something, but they still must do it.
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He enables us to believe, but we still must believe. Didn't you just say that coming is a metaphor for believer?
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Exactly. And isn't the giving of the Father here what results in their coming to Christ?
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No, that is not. Coming to Christ is putting your faith in him. I understand that, but just on a simple grammatical level, which action in verse 37 comes first?
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The giving of the Father to the Son, or the coming to Christ? Well, I don't think there is a chronological order. I think there's two things that are true.
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Only those, only those that the Father gives to the Son come to the Father.
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But, only those who believe does the Father give to the Son. Now, the other choice, the other option is to say that he gives unbelievers to the
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Son. And if you want to say that, I'm happy with that. No, I'm just, I'm just, you don't believe that there is any temporal priority here between the
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Father giving and people coming. All the Father gives will come to me. That's right. All that I give $10 to will buy books at Stand to Reason.
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Which action comes first? Well, what I'm saying here, and I think it speaks for itself, that those who he enables to come do come.
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Those who believe in him, he gives to the Son. If you want to say the opposite, that he gives unbelievers to the
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Son, you can say it. But, all the questioning on this isn't going to change that. You had said earlier that the
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Calvinist position is that Christ's blood is worthless to all but the elect. I'm saying that's the
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Calvinist position, yes. Okay, let's, if you could follow that, then you should go...
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You should go on that program, because you'll do really well. There's, I mean, that's eisegesis defined.
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That is, that is so clearly not deriving your position from the text that, but still, there were people that were there who said he won that debate.
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And I look at something like that and I go, isn't it just like crystal clear that he wasn't dealing with the text here?
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It seems that way to me, but I'm sure that the exact same thing is going to come up on the program, and it's going to be very, very interesting.
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We had a caller. We had a caller, Mike, but we lost
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Mike. Mike, if you'd like to call back in, we lost you. You may still think you're waiting online or something, but Mike, call back in.
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We'll put you back on. Anyone else at 877 -753 -3341. 877 -753 -3341.
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I really think that what you see in a situation such as the one
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I faced with George Bryson before, and remember, he wrote this Dark Side of Calvinism book, to my knowledge, after that debate.
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I don't know that there's going to be any evidence in the sense of a greater understanding of the
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Reformed position as a result of that. It actually seems to me that, especially in the case of Dave Hunt, when you face people with biblical evidence, one of two things has to happen.
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Either they have to be willing to examine their traditions and change their traditions and abandon unbiblical traditions, or they're going to be pushed further into inconsistency and, in fact, further into error.
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You look at, for example, the apostasy of Clark Pinnock over the past number of decades, starting as a
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Reformed person and now holding to open theism, inclusivism, post -mortem evangelization, denying the existence of an eternal hell, so on and so forth.
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You look at a situation like that and you watch the process, and the bringing to bear of truth just caused constant retreat from it.
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And that seems to be the case when you start, when these folks, maybe initially out of ignorance and out of a misrepresentation of Reformed theology, begin to react against it from their tradition.
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But then when you bring the truth to bear, only one of two things can happen. You cannot be neutral at that particular point in time.
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You have to either respond and deal with the biblical evidence, or you go further and further into error to the point where you look at some people and they start denying eternal security, and eventually what they start doing, because they don't believe that the saints will persevere because of the supernatural work of grace in their hearts, eventually they start believing, in essence, in a works salvation system, in a system where you do these certain things, and if you don't do these certain things, then you might be saved, but then you get lost, and you get saved again, and you get lost, and etc.,
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etc., etc. And it really, you know, you just can't stay at one point unless you just stick your head in the sand and, you know, just not even think about it.
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So that seems to be the case with most of these folks, and those who are writing books, you'd think that these books would get the arguments against the
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Reformed position become sharper and sharper and more pointed, don't you think? And yet that is not the case as we examine them as they come out.
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877 -753 -3341, let's go ahead and head back to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, a place
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I've been to a few times when I was much younger, and talk with Miles. Hi, Miles. Hi.
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How are you doing? I'm doing great. It's a real pleasure to talk to you. I'm looking forward to it in a couple of weeks. I'll be seeing you at the cruise.
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Aha! Well, so how many entrees can you put down in one dinner? Too many.
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Now, I don't want to hear about any competition starting because my son is 17, and I think he'd have a real advantage over all of us who have already gone past that point in our life where our metabolisms slow down.
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It'd be really bad for us to try to keep up with him. Well, I'm from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and we have many fine smorgasbords, all -you -can -eat places, and I've tried them all.
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But I'm doing the Atkins diet right now, so I'm trying to... Oh, good luck.
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Oh, good luck. You do realize they have midnight buffets with these mountains of chocolate and desserts and things like that.
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Maybe I'll have to give myself a break that time. I think you're dead meat, brother. So what's going on?
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Well, I was listening to you speaking. I attend at Calvary Chapel. Please don't hold that against me.
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Hey, we had a bunch of nice folks from Calvary Chapel that came to the Bryson debate, and they were going, you know,
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Preacher, brother, we need to hear this, but, you know, y 'all are in the minority. I know, I know.
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The funny thing is I started attending Calvary Chapel a couple years ago. It was right around the same time I discovered your book,
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The King James, So either God has a sense of humor or, you know, because it was the same time that I really started cracking my thinking on Reformed theology.
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I never really heard it expressed as well. The idea of God choosing somebody to be saved and choosing somebody to go to hell, that's all
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I really heard. I didn't hear that, wait a minute, we're all sinners. We all deserve to go to hell in the first place.
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The idea, you know, we would not, if we had our own free will, we would not respond to God's grace.
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It has to be an act of grace on God's part to get to us. Right. So I thank you for that. I've grown a lot in the last couple of years, and God's used you in that.
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Well, it's great to hear. There's others in the Calvary Chapel who are not thrilled about what's going on as far as like George Bryson's book.
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Well, have you seen this new one advertised anywhere? No, I have not yet. Yeah, because I just got an email from CRI, and they were talking about resources.
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And, you know, I wish Debating Calvinism with Dave Hunt would be available, but it won't be out until February. So we were talking about the
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Potter's Freedom, and they mentioned that they were going to be making available George Bryson's book, The Dark Side of Calvinism.
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And so I went online, and I haven't gone to the Calvary Chapel website yet, but I went to Amazon and CBD.
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I mean, Amazon has Debating Calvinism available for preorder already.
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And so I figured, well, if it's being published by anyone as far as a national publisher, then
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Amazon or CBD would have some notification about it or something, not a whisper.
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And so I just wondered, well, you know, is this just simply sort of a rehashing of the
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Five Points of Calvinism, Wade and Found Wanting, or just a new title? You know, I don't know. I didn't know if it had been in any of the advertisements or any of the
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Calvary Chapel stuff. Yeah, we should be getting the magazine sometime soon. I mean, they had
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Dave Hunt's book in there. Yeah, I did see that. But I haven't seen anything for George Bryson's new book.
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Hmm, interesting, interesting. Well, okay. But, you know, just in my experience the last couple of years,
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I mean, serving, I mean, a fellowship in Calvary Chapel and serving, I serve as an elder there now.
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I don't think Chuck Smith really knows about Reformed theology. I mean, he's very critical of it, but I don't think he really knows it.
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I mean, I've heard him talk about it. In their doctoral statement they say they take a middle -of -the -road approach, but it's more closer to Arminianism than Calvinism.
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They really should steer more towards that than the middle, in my opinion.
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Well, it does seem to me that they try this mediating position, but in reality, if you recall, the advertisement for Hunt's book in the official
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Calvary Chapel magazine specifically talked about if you see it sneaking in, if you see it coming into your church, then you need to get this book.
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And so it's obviously viewed as something that the leadership is opposed to, and that is sort of a sad thing.
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But you're not alone, I can guarantee you that. Good to know. Yeah, because I have talked with folks, and I don't want anybody to think that just because I mentioned
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George Bryson or I mentioned something happened, you know, Dave Hunt preaching at a Calvary Chapel, that that means that everybody who goes to Calvary Chapel is in the same boat.
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But it's obvious to me, anyway, that as I look at people who have been, in essence, expelled from the movement for being
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Calvinists, I don't see anybody who's been expelled for being Arminian. So there does seem to be sort of a semi -quasi -official stance that's taken.
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So your name is actually Roberto, right? And you are calling from Michigan, right?
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That's right. Well, thank you, Roberto. We look forward to seeing you on the cruise.
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Do I have time to ask you questions? I'll tell you what, let me hold you over. We'll come right back to you after the break, and we'll go ahead with that question, and that will give other folks a chance to call at 877 -753 -3341.
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We'll be back with Roberto right after this break. Under the guise of tolerance, modern culture grants alternative lifestyle status to homosexuality.
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Even more disturbing, some within the church attempt to revise and distort Christian teaching on this behavior.
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In their book, The Same -Sex Controversy, James White and Jeff Neal write for all who want to better understand the
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Bible's teaching on the subject, explaining and defending the foundational Bible passages that deal with homosexuality, including
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Genesis, Leviticus, and Romans. Expanding on these scriptures, they refute the revisionist arguments, including the claim that Christians today need not adhere to the law.
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In a straightforward and loving manner, they appeal to those caught up in a homosexual lifestyle to repent and to return to God's plan for His people.
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The Same -Sex Controversy, defending and clarifying the Bible's message about homosexuality. Get your copy in the bookstore at almen .org.
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Millions of petitioners from around the world are imploring Pope John Paul II to recognize the Virgin Mary as co -redeemer with Christ, elevating the topic of Roman Catholic views of Mary to national headlines and widespread discussion.
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In his book, Mary, Another Redeemer, James White sidesteps hostile rhetoric and cites directly from Roman Catholic sources to explore this volatile topic.
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He traces how Mary of the Bible, esteemed mother of the Lord, obedient servant and chosen vessel of God, has become the immaculately conceived bodily assumed queen of heaven, viewed as co -mediator with Christ and now recognized as co -redeemer by many in the
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Roman Catholic Church. Mary, Another Redeemer is fresh insight into the woman the
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Bible calls blessed among women and an invitation to single -minded devotion to God's truth.
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You can order your copy of James White's book, Mary, Another Redeemer, at almen .org.
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This portion of the dividing line has been made possible by the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church.
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The Apostle Paul spoke of the importance of solemnly testifying of the gospel of the grace of God. The proclamation of God's truth is the most important element of his worship in his church.
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The elders and people of the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church invite you to worship with them this coming Lord's Day.
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The morning Bible study begins at 9 .30 a .m. and the worship service is at 10 .45.
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Evening services are at 6 .30 p .m. on Sunday and the Wednesday night prayer meeting is at 7 .00.
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The Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church is located at 3805 North 12th Street in Phoenix.
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You can call for further information at 602 -26 -GRACE. If you are unable to attend, you can still participate with your computer and real audio at PRBC .org,
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where the ministry extends around the world through the archives of sermons and Bible study lessons available 24 hours a day.
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And welcome back to the dividing line.
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My name is James White and we are currently talking with an anonymous brother from an anonymous state back east where the battle of Gettysburg took place.
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He is in an anonymous denomination because we don't want to get him in trouble at all. And if you heard anything other than that,
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I'm using my Jedi mind powers to erase that from your memory even now. So you're going to have to...
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Now just be careful when we meet. People try to come up with really funny ways of introducing themselves.
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I have an op in channel. And he walked up to me at John MacArthur's church once to introduce himself for the very first time.
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And he comes up and he says, I'm the guy in channel whose nick is a hot pox legomena.
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Now I'm sitting here trying to get ready to speak. I'm really rushed and there's people all around me. And I just look at this guy like, what in the world are you talking about?
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And I sort of shake his hand and say, thanks. And it's not until hours later, we're on the road back to Phoenix, that I finally figured out that this was one of my ops.
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I would have loved to have said hi to him. I bug him about that to this day. So when you say hi, just don't come up with something like,
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I'm the anonymous guy from the city, the state where the battle... Because I'll look at you in the exact same way.
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Okay. Hello. Yes. Oh, there you are. Okay, good. Did you hear any of that? All of it, yes.
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Okay, good. All right. You had a question. Yes. I heard this, it's
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James 5, 19 and 20. I was going to ask you to interpret that.
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Some of my church said that might be a path, could mean that we could lose our salvation.
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And I just want to get your interpretation.
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Well, actually, if you look back, there's a number of things in that passage that are quite interesting.
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But it always amazes me when folks will go to a passage, instead of passages that specifically talk about whether salvation is eternal and who's in charge of salvation, rather than looking at those passages, we'll go over to another passage where you're talking about exhortations to people.
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And they'll say, see, since you're exhorted to do this, then this must be the result of that.
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You would only be exhorted to do this if these things were true, and therefore these things are true.
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And then when you go to passages like John 6, where Jesus is specifically talking about the will of the Father for him in being a perfect Savior, then all of a sudden that doesn't mean what it means anymore.
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We really, really, really, really, really need to establish rules for hermeneutics.
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We need to teach people how to interpret the Scriptures. When you go to James 5, when you're talking about a book that's written to Christians, it's written about how they are to behave in the church, and the exhortations to individuals not to claim to have faith, but not live in light of that faith, and things like that, then we need to be very careful not to derive overarching theological conclusions about subjects that the book isn't about in the first place.
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So, in other words, don't make satirological conclusions based on non -satirological passages. So, when it says, let him know, well, go back to verse 19, sorry,
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My brother, and if any among you strays from the truth, and one turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death, and will cover a multitude of sins.
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Now, the question, obviously, is people ask the question, all right, are we talking about believers here?
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Are we talking about, in this text, are we talking about a recognition of the difference between the wheat and the tares, the believers in the church and unbelievers in the church, or are we in the same situation like we're in the book of Hebrews, where you have an overall exhortation of, for example,
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Hebrews chapter 6, a very similar passage, where you have the exhortation given to the entire church, and yet then the recognition that, in reality, in Hebrews chapter 6, verses 8 and 9, but we are convinced of better things, of you things which accompany salvation, the recognition that when you preach to the church, you preach warnings, and people will say, you can't preach warnings if you're a
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Calvinist. Yes, you can. If God tells you to do it, you do it. And there's a reason why you do it.
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You don't sit there and go, well, you know, I can't really say this, because maybe this will be interpreted this way.
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No, you obey what the word of God says. So, we in the church, I'll give you an example right now, obviously not any specifics, but I know of a situation where there's someone in a fellowship, and they're starting to get into an area that's dangerous.
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They're getting into a teacher who is a dangerous teacher. And I'm praying about that situation.
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I want to have an opportunity to talk to this person and try to warn them, and I need to have wisdom on how to do it.
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And this is a very similar situation. Now, do I know that person's heart? No, I don't have that ability in that person's heart.
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Do I know whether that person is truly a regenerative believer? Well, he claims to be, so I'm going to have to treat him that way.
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But you know what? I've treated a number of people that way, and it turned out that they weren't. And that hurt, and that was difficult, but that's nothing new.
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John said, they went out from us. They used to be here. They used to sit next to us in the service. They're not there anymore.
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Apostasy is a real thing. But, as John himself said, they went out from us, so it might be known that they were not really of us.
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And the same thing would be the case here. I mean, if the sinner turns from his way, it's not because of me.
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I'm just an instrument in God's hands. I just feel terrible for people who think that, oh boy, you know, if I don't just use the right words, and if I don't know enough, then this person might end up in hell.
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It's all up to me. Man, what a pressure to put on somebody. I mean, I want to be used of God.
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I want to have the opportunity of being used in this way and to turn a sinner from the error of his way.
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I really do. I want to be used that way, but I'm just an instrument. God's the one who's using me.
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It's not up to me. I want to be the best instrument in his hand, but that's to glorify God, not because there's some big guilt trip on me.
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And so, if I'm successful in helping this brother, for example, then I've been used, and that's wonderful.
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If I'm not, again, it's not an issue of, well, if you had just studied a little bit more, if you had just done this.
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This passage isn't talking about any of that. It's simply exhorting us to do our duties within the church.
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If we love the truth, and we see someone getting involved in error, then we don't just sit back and close our mouths and do nothing and fear the face of men.
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We have to stand for the truth. And I don't know personally what the multitude of sins stuff is necessarily talking about as far as covering a multitude of sins, but James is just simply exhorting us, don't sit back.
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You need, if you see people just like Jude, snatch them out of the fire. Now, you might get the hair on your hands singed a little bit in the process, and sometimes it's a little bit of a dirty job.
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There's no two ways about it, but that is our duty. And we are to do our duties and avoid misinterpreting the
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Scriptures by looking at the duties and going, okay, I'm going to ignore the clear teachings of Scripture about the purpose of the atonement.
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I'm going to ignore Ephesians 1. I'm going to ignore all that stuff. I'm going to go over here. I'm going to look at my duties and say, well, the only way
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I can see why I would do this duty is if this is true, build my theology from that, and then read it back and do other stuff.
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That's doing exegesis backwards. And I'll be perfectly honest with you, if you're in a situation, if you're in a church, and I don't know, you know,
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I've heard some very good teaching from Calvary Chapel folks. I've heard some very fluffy teaching from Calvary Chapel folks.
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It's not like you can say, all Baptist preaching is this way, or all Presbyterian preaching is this way.
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There's obviously differences between various and sundry local churches, even within the same denomination or movement, or non -denomination denomination, or something like that.
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But if you're in a church where people are accustomed to not really good exegetical preaching, it's hard to get them to think in an exegetically sound way, because that's not being reinforced by what they hear from the pulpit.
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And so when the fluffy stuff, the fluffy exegesis, is what's normally heard from the pulpit, it's going to be really difficult when you get out in a counseling situation.
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And this might be a passage that comes up in counseling. I've had people who were very introspective, very afraid, very fearful.
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They couldn't really accept the forgiveness of Christ, and they couldn't really accept that Christ could save them. This is the kind of passage they turn to and go, man,
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I don't think I'm really a Christian, or I think I'm lost, or something along those lines. And it's very difficult in a counseling situation if you haven't modeled sound exegesis from the pulpit, and you haven't taught people, look at the backgrounds, look at what the purpose of a certain book is.
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I mean, when you're reading entire chapters in Hebrews on the purpose and intention of the atonement, then that's where you want to go when you talk about the purpose and intention of the atonement.
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You're not going to go over here and grab something out of some book that's talking about Christian behavior and draw some major conclusion out of it first.
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That's doing exegesis backwards. If they don't see that regularly, then it's going to be very difficult in the counseling situation or in the theological situation to get them to start thinking in a different fashion.
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It's going to be very, very difficult. And so that really comes up. A lot of folks will say, well, you know, I said all that to them, but they just didn't accept what
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I had to say. Well, why is that? If you were talking about the deity of Christ, if one of these folks was getting involved with Jehovah's Witnesses, for example, would we not have to use the same kind of careful exegesis in that situation?
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Well, we would, but again, if they're not hearing it from the pulpit, it's really hard to get them to grasp that and to hear what you're saying when you say, well, you recognize this passage isn't really discussing what you're trying to make it discuss.
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Let's hear what it's saying in its own context and then consider other passages as well. Does that make any sense?
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It's helped, yeah. Because you're right, James is a book of Christian behavior and how we do things.
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Yeah, and when it talks about straying from the truth. Now, is that...
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Everybody's wondering what happened. Have you ever jammed your finger into your wedding ring and just about cut the other finger off?
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That was really stupid. Oh, I can't say that. Sorry about that. Everybody's asking, why'd you go, ouch?
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It's like, well, I just about cut myself to death here. When it talks about straying from the truth, are we talking about a person who is merely in the congregation and they are now, after a period of time in the congregation, being drawn away toward false teachings?
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Are we talking about someone who's truly in Christ? The passage, again, James is talking about exhortations to the entire congregation, just like Hebrews is in the warning passages.
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And so we have to be very careful. People will say, well, if you warn people, then that means that this is for true
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Christians. That means you can be in Christ, and even though this makes the Bible contradictory, Christ can't necessarily save you unless you do
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X, Y, and Z. It really depends on whether you focus upon a theocentric perspective or an anthropocentric perspective.
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And when you start with a theocentric perspective, then it's easy to understand these.
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But if you start with an anthropocentric, I don't know how anybody makes heads or tails out of the Bible at all.
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Thank you very much, and I hope I get a chance to bend your urine about a little more. Well, I'm certain that I'm going to do everything that I can.
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There's like 170 -some -odd people, I think, in our group, and so I don't know how all that's going to work out.
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I know that at dinner I'm going to try to sort of wander around and say hi to folks. But it's going to be a very enjoyable time, and it's a beautiful ship.
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I've not been on this particular ship, but I was on her sister's ship just a few months ago up in Alaska.
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And if you walk around the promenade deck three -and -a -half times, it's exactly one mile. So just keep that in mind after about the 14th dessert.
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You need to get out on the promenade deck and do some laps. Yeah, I'm going to need to walk it off. That's good to know that people walk up miles.
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There you go. And there's a gym on the eighth floor, and it's a nice gym. It's got free weights and Cybex machines and the whole nine yards.
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So we'll have to get up there and pump some iron. Sounds great. Okay, man. Thanks a lot.
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God bless. It was great talking to you. All right. God bless. Bye. Ah, 877 -753 -3341.
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Man, that hurt. How in the world do you do something like that? You're waving your hands around.
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I guess it's because normally when you're at a pulpit, you don't have to keep your mouth in one spot.
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But when you've got a microphone, see, if I do what you normally do, you end up going, and you go over there, and people, it goes back and forth, and it's very strange that way.
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But I guess that's why lavalier mics were invented. Though I'm old enough these days to remember the old lavalier mics.
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And I don't know if any of the rest of you remember these things, but I remember at the Southern Baptist Church that I ran sound at, that there were these, this hardwired lavalier mic.
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And man, I'm going to tell you something. It was so fun to watch the pastor of that church going back and forth, back and forth on the podium of that church.
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And what would happen is he'd almost get tied up in that string that was attached to it.
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Now they had wireless ones back then, but you'd pick up the CB channels on it.
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So, you know, you'd be going along and all of a sudden, hey, rubber ducky, you know, and that really wasn't a good thing.
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So we skipped that part, and we just went with the wired one. But still, I think he just about fell over himself a few times.
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We don't have any callers right now, and that means I get to, I get to go up here, and right as we started the program,
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I shut down Music Match Jukebox, which I was playing the Handel Messiah music on. Oh, thank you.
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And it crashed. My entire Explorer. It was terrible. And so since we don't have callers, you all remember what that means.
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I have a library full of beautiful Christmas music, and I do have under the
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Christmas music, I have this fellow from... I'm watching everybody chill.
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Somebody call for all that is good and just. Somebody call. Because I have...
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Yes. John Denver. He did sing
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Christmas music. John Key?
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He just said Bible. Isn't that good enough? It's good enough for Phillips, Craig, and Dean. Okay, I know he was into Est and all that stuff, but he just said good stuff, right?
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Making a little theological point there in passing, I guess. I don't know. Oh, he is, huh?
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Just watching everybody in channel going absolutely positively nuts. It's more than worth it.
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I should play the Hallelujah Chorus and make everybody stand up and channel. That would be something they couldn't type anymore. Okay, I guess we can go ahead and talk with him.
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Is this Micah? Yeah. Hey, is this the Micah? Yes, it is.
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Is this the Dr. White? I think so. Now, I just want to mention something before whatever your deep...
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And now the sound of John Denver being... Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Somebody turn that down.
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Oh, I'm sitting here going, stop, stop, stop. Just turn the computer down for the moment.
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I was actually going to play something from last week. In fact, we had this massive dividing line going on.
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We had more people listening than ever listened before. We had more people in channel.
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Then right as we got started, I was just getting into the introduction, all of a sudden there was this sound that came across the airwaves.
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Do you know anything about how that happened, Micah? Yeah, I do.
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How did that happen? Well, I have a little alias. It's slash SS space. Then I type in slug .wave
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and the sound appears. The slug .wave, huh? That's the sound.
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That one right there. Now, that has been permanently etched into that important dividing line because as I recall, it was you that played that, huh?
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Yes, sir. I sincerely apologize for that before I do again. I think that's been permanently etched in Jerry.
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I think that was an illustrative of his experience here. Actually, there are some people thinking that Micah was actually being prophetic by the sounds that he played that night.
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Anyway, yes, sir. Are you only calling to stop John Denver or do you actually have something that you'd like to ask me?
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I want to ask you some more questions about charismaticism. No, I'm just kidding. Actually, I was talking with another in -channel individual today about Hebrews 11 .13
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that all these died in faith without receiving the promise but having seen them and having welcomed them from a distance and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth.
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Where it says, without having received the promises, we were just wondering whether or not that was talking temporarily or whether it was talking eternally.
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Well, as I recall, and I don't, I can just bring it up here fairly quickly, there was the discussion of, let me see here, seeking a country their own, verse 14, for those who say such things, make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own and if indeed they had been thinking of that country from which they went out, they would have had opportunity to return.
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As they desire a better country that is a heavenly one, therefore God is not ashamed to be called their
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God for He prepared a city for them. And so it's really talking about the promises that they themselves had not received the final fulfillment of those things.
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They only had a taste of those things. And in many ways, especially under the Old Covenant, all they had really were signs and symbols of the greater fulfillment that we have in the reality of the
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New Covenant. But then again, even for us, there is the now and the not yet. We are adopted, but will be adopted.
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We have received the adoption, but will receive the adoption, so on and so forth. Just off the top of my head,
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I would assume that this is the referent that is being discussed in verse 13, is the fact that these individuals had acted in faith.
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And Sarah, by faith, even Sarah herself received the ability to conceive, even beyond the proper time of life, since she considered him faithful who had promised.
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Therefore there was born even of one man, and him as good as dead as that, as many descendants as the stars of heaven in number, and innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore.
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However, especially those individuals died without seeing the obtaining of the land, the growth of the nation of Israel into the nation that would take over the land of Canaan, and so on and so forth.
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Just off the top of my head, just looking at it, that is what I would assume is the referent to the statement that is being made.
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Right. That's what I was thinking too. I guess the question then which always comes up is the
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Old Testament saints as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, the rest, who believed when they died, were they, as the
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New Testament believer is, were they transported to the heavenlies in spirit, or did something else happen then?
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That's a good question. Enoch, right, was with God, but he was no more,
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I guess it says. Right. There are different views about that.
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The view that I would lean toward is that there is in Sheol or Hades, what's called
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Abraham's bosom is the place of rest, not punishment, but it is a place where the righteous go, and there is a view that after the resurrection of Christ, that this is the reference to leading captivity captive, and it's certainly clear that New Testament believers are in the presence of the
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Lord immediately. Some would say that this has to do with the fact that the crucifixion was yet to take place, and that once crucifixion and resurrection took place, then you have this sort of change in the arrangement as far as the location, but there's certainly no question about the fact that there are those who say that the
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Old Testament saints I'm sorry, the Old Testament saints I'm sorry, that the Old Testament does not really say much about existence after death and things like that.
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I don't really agree with that. It's certainly not as clear as the New Testament revelation is, and so maybe some of our confusion is just due to the fact that there was this less than clear revelation on all the details, but there are passages that make it clear that those who are in Sheol are still active, and then in Luke 16 you have the story of Abraham's bosom and the divide that separates the two, and things like that that would indicate that wherever you want to spatially locate if you even want to spatially locate it, the point is that there is a place of refreshment, there is a place of if we don't use the term glory, at least it's not punishment that is reserved for the righteous, whereas those who die in an unrighteous state, as Peter puts it, are kept under punishment awaiting the day of judgment in the final day, so I don't know if that's really directly related to the passage in Hebrews chapter 11, but that's some of the understanding of how that works.
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Alrighty? Okay, well, you know, people in channel were saying I should kick you and ban you and do things, but I didn't do that, did
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I? No, thank you. I was a nice guy. Just don't let it happen again. You did give me the channel talk for a long time.
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That's true, I did. Alright, thanks, Micah. God bless. Folks, have a great
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Thanksgiving. Make it a Christian holiday, and what I mean by that is hopefully you'll give more than just thanks for the turkey or whatever it is your family eats.
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Make it a good remembrance of all the Lord has done for you, and don't forget, we won't be back for about three weeks.
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18th of December is when we'll be back here on The Dividing Line. Hope to see you then. God bless.