MSL: March 14, 2024

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The following program is recorded content created by The Truth Network. It's Matt Slick Live!

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Matt is the founder and president of the Christian Apologetics Research Ministry, found online at CARM .org.

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When you have questions about Bible doctrines, turn to Matt Slick Live for answers. Taking your calls and responding to your questions at 877 -207 -2276.

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Here's Matt Slick. Everybody, welcome to the show. It's me, Matt Slick, and you're listening to Matt Slick Live.

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I hope you're all having a good day, a good time, and may the Lord bless you in that. And, um, here we go.

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So, hey, oh, I've got a couple things to do here. So today is March 14th, 2024, and that's for the podcasters.

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So if you want to give me a call, all you have to do is dial 877 -207 -2276, and we can talk.

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If you want to email me, all you have to do is send your email to info at CARM .org.

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Info at CARM .org, C -A -R -M dot O -R -G. And then the subject line, just please put radio question or radio comment, and I can get to them.

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We've got a few right now. We've got no callers waiting right now, so what I'll probably end up doing is getting some of these questions.

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So last night, I did something a little I thought was interesting. What I did was I went to the

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CARM forums. Now, we have forums if you're interested in joining in.

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And so there's something I've noticed lately. And so let's see.

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How do I say this? The doctrines of God's grace and how they are coming under attack more and more by people.

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And so there are those who hate the idea that God is sovereign, that God must choose people for salvation.

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As it says in 2 Thessalonians 2 .13. And so I've seen this disdain for this kind of thing increasing.

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So on the forums, what I did was I, a few days ago, yesterday, the day before,

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I don't remember, I put up a request. I said open discussion, you know.

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And I put the link in for last night, hoping that people would come in who would like to discuss these things.

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And just one person did. It was good. And it was really a good conversation. He didn't agree with me on some stuff.

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But it was really a great conversation, you know. And it went really nicely. He was a good guy.

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And then we had some other people come in who, well, they were open theists.

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At least one I know was an open theist. And so I asked a question.

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I asked a question that apparently he, I guess his name was

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Warren McGrew, wasn't able to answer. And so it was a basic question.

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If God doesn't know everybody's free will choices, then how did he know which sins to impute to Christ on the cross?

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And along with that question, I said, what does it mean for Jesus to bear our sins in his body on the cross?

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So that's what I wanted to know. And he couldn't answer it. He said, well, I've already answered it. I said, okay, where?

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You know, just scroll up or something, you know, in the chat. And I said, look, I've been talking to somebody else for 20 minutes, half hour.

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Where is it? Just tell me what's the answer. And he wouldn't answer the question. He refused, apparently refused to answer the question.

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I think it's too difficult for them to answer. And this is what's interesting to me. If someone asks me a question, it's difficult for me to answer from whatever theological perspective

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I might have. I don't just start attacking the person or say, I've already answered it.

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I'm not going to answer it. You know, whatever it is, I will say, that's a good question. And I need to think that through.

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I've said that so many times over the years. You know, people have asked me questions. That's a good question.

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I got to think about that. There's nothing wrong with that if you don't have all the answers, because I certainly don't.

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But what I think is interesting is when people on the other side are so vituperative. They get vociferous.

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And they throw out a lot of inane persiflage. So in other words, they get mean and nasty.

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And they start to accuse. And they deflect. And there's a little bit of mockery.

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I'm not saying he was doing all that last night. I'm just saying, I've noticed this a lot. And it was interesting.

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It is interesting to me. What's the problem with just answering a question?

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I've done this before with so many people. You know, I say, ask, what about this? Oh, I've already answered you. Okay. Sorry, I don't know what that answer is.

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Could you please just tell me what the answer is right now? No, I don't need to. I've already answered you. Oh, well, okay.

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Could you tell me where that answer is? On my website. Okay. Which article? Which whatever.

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And they're always difficult like this. And I've also noticed that, dare

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I say, it seems a little stubborn to me to just not answer a basic question.

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Why wouldn't you just answer the question? Seriously, I don't understand it. Just, well, here you go.

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Can you answer that question? Good question. If someone were to ask me a difficult question, I said, you know, I'm not sure how to answer that.

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And I said, give me some time. I'll come back to you. That's fair. And when someone, and it does happen every now and then, but rare.

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Someone will say to me, you know, I'm not sure how to answer that. Let me think about it and come back to you. Great, no problem. I'm not going to mock that person.

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I'm not going to condemn that person. The person couldn't answer me and was just retreating. That's a fair response.

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And I respect that. But I noticed that last night the people, a lot of people, the antagonists in the room were just mean.

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Why is that? Maybe it's because Jesus prophesied that in the last days people's love would grow cold.

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And these are people who are supposed to represent Christ. And so many times I've seen people like this.

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And what they do is they become aggressive and insulting and mocking and condemning.

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Wow. And I ask them, what is in your heart that you would behave like that?

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Because Jesus says, out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. And so it must be there's mockery and condemnation in your heart.

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Because that's what I'm seeing. That's what I'm hearing. And, you know, so I've been working on my presentation online.

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I think that there's some areas of improvement when I'm in my debates and interactions. And I recognize, okay,

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I've got to work on this. I've got to work on that. And that's okay. No one's perfect.

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But it was just interesting. If any of you were in that room last night, call in if you want and talk about it just for a conversation.

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But here's what I was thinking about today. So I did this last night on a Wednesday. So I was thinking, maybe what

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I'll do is each Wednesday night open a room up just for conversation.

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Bring it in. Come on in. Let's talk. You have your questions, comments. You want to argue with me about something.

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I think I'm going to do that. Now, I haven't decided for sure. I'm going to pray and just put it before the

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Lord and see if that's a good idea or not. You know, to see. I want to know. But it's an idea.

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I think people might be interested in that. I think they might be interested in just having an opportunity to just come on with voice and or camera.

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They can challenge me or just ask questions. And I really love answering questions.

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I do. I love doing the radio. I love going to Discord. And I go into a room and people just flock.

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They just say, hey, can we ask you a question? Sure. And I enjoy that. And it's great.

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So I don't know. I'm built for it, I guess. That's why I do what I do here. Anyway, we'll see what happens.

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If you think it's a good idea, let me know. You can say, Jimmy Smythe says, great idea,

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Matt. So that's one person. I wonder what anybody else would say. Last night was a great new thing,

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Humble Clay says. Great for who, Humble Clay? Uh -huh. Let's see.

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And someone in Clubhouse says, Warren McGrew and Chris Fisher do nothing but mock their opponents in Calvinist.

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So anyway, that's what he said. And so if you want to watch the show, you want to see me, trust me, you're not missing anything.

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But some people like to do that, like to see what I look like. My voice matches my face, which doesn't.

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People say it doesn't. So you can watch by just going to karm .org

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forward slash radio, and you'll see the links and stuff in there. And also you can get in by Rumble. You can go to Rumble, and you can watch the show and participate in the people who chat.

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It's really nice. So we had a long, good conversation. Yes, we did have that last night.

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So to go to Rumble, use rumble .com forward slash Matt Slick live. And there you go.

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See, easy peasy. Hey, let's get to David from Texas. David, welcome. You're on the air.

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How's it going? Can you hear me? Yes, I can. I can hear you. No problem. Great. Okay.

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So what do you got? Yeah, well, so I've been an atheist for about 20 years.

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I called in a long time ago, and then I stopped calling because I think he went off the air for a while. Anyways, I'm open to any question you have for me.

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But if you don't have a question, my question is, why is it that the Bible, when it was originally formulated, had the apocryphal?

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I mean, this is a question of facts. If I'm wrong, tell me. But then it wasn't removed until around the 1800s, meaning that the

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Bible, I guess from a Protestant perspective, was wrong for 1 ,400 years.

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Well, the apocryphal was never in the Bible. If people tell you that it was and that it was originally inspired scripture, then respectfully,

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I want to say that they are misinformed. So there are, for example,

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I think it's in Luke 11 .43. I'll show you a couple of things here. Because the apocryphal was written between roughly 400

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B .C. and the time of Christ. Okay. So, I'm trying to find this one verse.

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And I always have trouble with it. There we go. I found it. So this is what it says. Jesus says in Luke 11 .51,

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From the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah. That's what he says. From the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the house of God.

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He goes on. Why did he say from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah? Because Abel was in the book of Genesis and Zechariah was in the book of Chronicles.

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But Chronicles was the last book of the arrangement that the Jews had. We have the exact same books.

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We just arrange them differently today. I don't know why it changed. But they had the same book. And where we have

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Malachi as the last book, they had Chronicles as the last book. So what he was saying was from the first to the last book of the

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Old Testament. And that excluded the apocrypha. Furthermore, when you go to Luke 24,

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Let's see, 2444, I believe it is. Jesus says, These are my words which

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I spoke to you while I was still with you, That all things which were written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the

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Psalms will be fulfilled. So the law, the prophets, and the Psalms are the divisions of the

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Old Testament, Which excluded the apocrypha books. Because they were already known as the law, the prophets, and the

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Psalms before the apocrypha was ever written. So what Jesus was doing was saying, What's written about me is in the law, the prophets, and the

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Psalms. And that's excluding the apocryphal books. So if he would have said, All about me in Moses, the prophets, the

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Psalms, and Maccabees, or whatever. But he never did that. Never mentioned it.

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So Jesus himself never recognized those books as being authentic. And nor did the Jews recognize them as being authentic.

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So today, the Roman Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox are highly misinformed

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When they want to say, well, the Protestants took it out of the Bible. It was never in to begin with. Well, I mean, if you were around back then, could you have found a

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Bible that did not have it in there? Oh, no. The original

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King James translated the apocryphal with the New Testament Scripture, with the Bible. But it doesn't mean that it was inspired.

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So it was never considered to be inspired. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Yeah, well,

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I mean, I'm saying that Protestants think that it doesn't belong in there. So I'm already kind of assuming they don't think it was inspired.

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No, hold on. We got a break. Hold on. We'll be right back. Hey, folks. We've got a break here.

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And if you want to give me a call, 877 -207 -2276. We'll be right back.

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It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

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Here's Matt Slick. All right, buddy. Welcome back to the show. Let's get back on with David from Texas.

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Dave, welcome. You're on the air. Thank you. I just wanted to point out something a little bit off topic.

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But right before I got on, you were saying that people say your voice doesn't match your face. I believe

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I met you once when I was a little kid back in California when I still lived there on the street corner and passing up tracks.

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Nothing to do with anything. Just thought I'd mention that. Cool. Where in Cali? I don't know.

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What city? I mean, at that time, I think I lived in Reno Valley. Oh, yeah, yeah.

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Yeah, I was a pastor there. I don't know how far to go to see you.

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Well, I hope you weren't too traumatized. No. No. Okay.

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I was with my mom. I think she just wanted to meet you. I guess she had been talking to you or something, I would assume. Okay. But anyway, so just to clarify what

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I was saying earlier, I'm not suggesting that when I –

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I don't want to say Christian because that could – I want to divide Catholics from Protestants here. So whatever you want to call yourself, if you want to say

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Protestant, I'll say something else. But I'm not saying that Protestants have never viewed the

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Apocrypha as scripture. I'm just saying whatever it was, it was in the Bible. Well, you've got to be careful when you say in the

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Bible. And, for example, there's two ways of saying – of meaning that.

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In the Bible as in it was in the corpus of biblical documents.

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It was included in a big book of them, or it was in because it was inspired.

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So there's at least 21 books mentioned in the Bible that are not scripture, like the

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Book of Wars, Book of Jasher, Chronicles of David, the Words of Kings of Israel, the

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Decree of David and the King of Israel. Not to mention Paul the Apostle quotes three pagan philosophers,

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Epimenides, Menander, and Erastus. So just because they were, so to speak, included in certain quotes doesn't mean they're inspired.

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Furthermore, the Apocrypha is never quoted by the New Testament writers as being authentic.

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But the Old Testament is. And I can give you a bunch of other reasons why the Apocrypha doesn't work.

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If you want, I can list out seven or eight. No one ever quotes the

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Song of Solomon either, but I mean, it's in there. Well, but it's included in the corpus of the

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Law of the Prophets and the Psalms. And so in the categories, it is there.

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And Esther, they say, isn't quoted either directly. But this is why we say, as Jesus said in Luke 24, 44, everything written about him in the

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Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms.

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So that's included. Song of Solomon's included in there. So that's all that's going on. But the

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Jews never accepted the Apocrypha as scripture. And what's interesting is in Romans 3, 2, it says the

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Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God. Now, Paul the Apostle, he was a disciple of Jesus.

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He knew the Apocryphal books. He knew other stuff, too. He was incredibly well -educated, highly intelligent.

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He said the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God, and the Jews rejected the Apocrypha. The Catholic Church did not include the

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Apocrypha until the Universal Council of Trent in 1546.

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And it was in response to the Reformation. It never included it and officiated it until 1546.

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Many church fathers reject the Apocrypha as scripture. And so, not that I believe in all the church fathers, but many of them said, no, no, no, it's not scripture.

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The Apocrypha contains no predictive prophecy, none. In fact, Maccabees, which is part of the

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Apocrypha, says there were no prophets in Israel. If there were no prophets in Israel at that time, then how could

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Maccabees have been inspired? Because God worked through the prophets to write what he did.

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So he didn't have to be inspired. So it has no predictive prophecy. Furthermore, it teaches giving money for the sins of the dead.

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Money? That's completely unbiblical. It contains a historical error, at least one of them, when it teaches

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Nebuchadnezzar was the king of the Assyrians in Judith 1 .5. But that's not true. So you see, the

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Jews knew about this and the Christians knew about this stuff. They didn't consider it scripture. It's old writings, and it was cool.

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So when King James commissioned the Old and New Testaments to be translated, they included the

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Apocryphal books because there's a lot of historical information in them. They weren't considered inspired, but he just included them in the translation process because they're so valuable.

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But it doesn't mean they're inspired. Okay? Right. Let's put it this way. If I see an index or a table of contents,

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I'm not going to mistake that for being scripture. But if for some reason

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I put the Book of Mormon in the Bible, you probably wouldn't like that because it kind of gives the idea that it's part of the

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Bible when it isn't. So if the Apocrypha is not part of the Bible, why was it in every book that someone would pick up to read?

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It's not. The Bible I have doesn't have it. No Bible that I have has it.

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Until the 1800s when it was moved. No, no, no. Don't make the mistake of thinking.

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Okay? Don't make the mistake of thinking that the Apocrypha was considered scripture.

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I just gave you the reasons why it's not. And I gave you the reason why it was translated in because it has important historical information in it.

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But it has mistakes in it. God's Word doesn't have mistakes. Jesus excluded the

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Apocrypha and the disciples excluded the Apocrypha as scripture. So those are the facts. So if you want to say, well, why is it included?

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Because if it was, I don't know if that's the case or not. It's because it was an important historical document and they were sometimes used for references.

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But they understood it was not scripture. Okay? That's it.

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It's not scripture. Okay? Well, okay. So from here,

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I'm going to go to another caller. If you have a question for me, I'll take any question about atheism you want.

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Or I do have a poll. Well, if you want to call back, we have three callers waiting. And if you call back,

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I can question you about the validity of your atheism and what justifies knowledge and rationality in your worldview.

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You can think about that and then call me back and see if you can come up with an answer. What day do you do?

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Monday through Friday. I can show you. For example, are you a materialist? Do you believe that the universe is all there is?

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That's a positive claim. I wouldn't be able to make that claim. Okay. I'll show you something.

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Do you believe, just find out what you believe. Do you believe that everything operates in the universe, operates under the laws of physics?

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Do you believe that? It seems like, yeah. Yes? Well, that refutes your atheism. And I'll show you how.

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This is the kind of stuff I do with atheists. I say, look, if everything operates under the laws of physics and chemistry and motion and matter and all that kind of stuff, then that means your physical brain is limited to the physical laws of chemistry.

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Okay, then that means one chemical state in your brain that leads to another chemical state is a chemical necessity, which means from the atheistic worldview that you hold, which requires a materialistic worldview that everything operates just under necessary chemical reactions, then your belief in atheism is a necessary chemical reaction doesn't mean it's true.

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Therefore, that position in atheism casts doubt on itself and its own validity.

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Therefore, you can't trust it. So it refutes itself. Okay. Real simple. Call back tomorrow or later if you want me to talk some more about it.

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I'll show you some more stuff. Okay. All right, buddy. We got a break. Okay. Thanks for Dave.

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Call it being polite. Appreciate it. Okay. Hey, folks. Be right back after these messages. Please stay tuned.

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It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

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Here's Matt Slick. Everybody, welcome back to the show. If you want to give me a call, 877 -207 -2276.

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Let's get on with Scott from Spokane. Scott, welcome back, man. Hey, how's it going?

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It's going. It's going. What do you got, buddy? Yeah, so I have a few.

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I'll start with the easy ones. John 125, they say to Jesus, why then are you baptizing if you're not the

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Christ? And when I was reading that, it made me just think, is there anywhere in Scripture that's prophesied that Jesus will be specifically coming to baptize?

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Not that I'm aware of. So they were talking, I believe that's to John. John said that to ask him, why are you baptizing if you're not the

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Christ? But that's a good question. Because Christ's disciples did do baptisms.

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So that's a look at that. That's a good question. Okay, I got another one.

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Or the prophet, and that's prophesied in Deuteronomy 18. So that's a good question.

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Yeah, I saw that already. I was just wondering if I missed anywhere. But yeah, so I got another one.

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I was just wondering if you could show me some of the verses that really, you know, show and reflect inseparable operations.

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Yes. For that, you want to go to, let's see, John 5.

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Let's see if I'm remembering correctly. John 5 .19. Yes.

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Let me explain what it is first, so it's for people to understand. Inseparable operations is the position that all of the

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Godhead are inseparable, and that what is operating in one operates in the other.

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Yet there's distinction is retained. So one of the verses used to support that is John 5 .19.

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The son can do nothing of himself unless it is something he sees present tense.

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He sees the Father doing. So that's one thing. And Jesus says in John 5 .30,

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I can do nothing of my own initiative as I hear, I judge. Well, these are present tense conditions and actions that Christ is relating to God.

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So therefore, these are the things that we would use to support inseparable operations. Okay.

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Okay. Is there any more than John 5 that I haven't seen? Let's see.

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I wrote an article on it. Let's see if I did put more in there on that. Those are the two I just happen to remember.

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And so let's see. I don't remember about that one. Come on, where are you? Oh, interesting.

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So here we go. I've got my article. And come on, open up. So we have

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John 6 .38. I've come down from heaven not to do my own, but the will of him who sent me. So he's doing in present tense the will of the

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Father. The Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name, he'll teach you. That's a future -ish one.

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The helper comes whom I will send to the Father. So the Father and the Son both send the

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Holy Spirit. So there's an inseparability there.

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And John 16 .13, the Spirit will not speak of his own initiative, but whatever he hears, he will speak.

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You've got some noise in the background. And so this is how the Holy Spirit contains or is said to contain the same attributes inseparably of the

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Father and the Son. Okay, you've got time for one last quick one? Yes, go ahead.

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Okay, so the Jews, apparently they're still waiting for a Messiah. And so my question is, you know, at the time of Christ they were hoping for a

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Messiah to take care of the Romans and establish, you know, sort of a just rule for Jews.

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What are they waiting for now? I mean, what does their eschatology look like for a Jew? Well, I think there's divisions within Judaism in answering that question.

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And from what I understand, they are still waiting for the Messiah to come here. And some Jews just look at it as,

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I think what they do is they look at it as just a symbol. It's not really going to happen in the literal sense.

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So I don't have a whole bunch of knowledge on that. I have a friend who knows a lot about that kind of stuff.

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Maybe we could have him on sometime and have him as a guest host and people can fire questions about Judaism on him.

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That might be a good idea. Set it up like two weeks in advance. Yeah, that sounds fun. Yeah.

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Okay, well, yeah, that's all I got. I will go into Costco now and have a good day, my friend. Okay. You too, man.

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God bless, buddy. All right. Now let's get to Elijah from Philly. Elijah, welcome.

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You're on the air. Hey, man, how are you doing today? Doing all right, hanging in there.

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So what do you got, buddy? Yeah, my question is about the statement where Jesus said, unless you believe that I am, you'll die in your sins.

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I'm going to give you my response to how I would answer a Unitarian.

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And I would like to. You're a Unitarian? No, no, I'm Trinitarian. Okay. I'm saying

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I'm going to give you my response to how I would answer them, and I would like to know what you think of my response.

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So if a Unitarian were to tell me that Jesus in that verse is not saying that he's

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God, but he's saying that unless you believe that I'm the Messiah, you will die in your sins,

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I would respond by saying Muslims also believe that Jesus is the

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Messiah, and they're still going to die in their sins as well.

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So that argument doesn't work. So what do you think of my response? That's a good response.

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I'm going to steal it, use it, and claim it for my own. That's pretty good. Oh, did I say that out loud? Oh, man.

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That's pretty good. I like that. Yeah. Good stuff. Yeah, thanks. Yeah, and I also thought about maybe a counterargument that they might throw at me.

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So the counterargument that I imagined in my head is that maybe they would say, yeah,

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Muslims do believe that Jesus is the Messiah, but they don't believe that Jesus died on the cross and rose again on the third day.

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So that's what truly damns them, not them believing that Jesus is God or whatever. So what do you think about their response, and how would you respond to that?

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I'd say, well, that he didn't say in John 8, 24 that you have to believe he rose. He just says you have to believe that he is the

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I am. So the resurrection issue isn't what Jesus clarified as being necessary.

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So since the Koran uses the word Christ numerous times, which is the equivalent of Messiah, so then they're believing.

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I'd say the Unitarians apparently they're believing what you believe. See, I like that. That's pretty good.

30:33

Yeah. Good stuff, man. Hey, I got one for the

30:39

Muslims. I ask. I say in the Old Testament, the name of God Yahweh is used like 6000 times or something like that.

30:47

It's just insane. And in fact, let me go check. So I can always remember this. Let's see. First Kings 8, 60.

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And it says Yahweh is Elohim. All right. So what I'm going to do is do a search for that exact.

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And it occurs 6517 times. So I say to the Jews, I say his name.

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I mean, to the Muslims, I say his name is I am. That's what he says. I give him the information.

31:17

I said, how come he's never called that in the Koran? How come he's never said to be the

31:22

I am? It's a good question. Anyway. So good stuff, man.

31:29

All right. Appreciate it. Can I ask you one more question?

31:34

Sure. Go ahead. Okay. I have. I have a

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Bishop Jerry Hayes book called Godhead Theology. And I'm trying to find that page in here.

31:51

But he had a commentary on Mark 12, 29.

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And if I remember correctly, as I try to find it, but if I remember correctly, he said in Mark 12, 29, if you look at the

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Greek there, he said that he said that the word for one there is a numerical one.

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And so his argument was that Jesus was saying that God is one person in Mark 12, 29.

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But it doesn't say that. Yeah. It doesn't say that, though. Yeah.

32:40

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm there. Yeah. It doesn't say God is one person.

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It says he's one Lord. That's what it says. So great.

32:51

It's quoting it. And in Hebrew, Yahid and Echad are different words for the word one.

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Yahid means only one. It cannot mean composite. Where Echad can mean composite as well as being simply a non -composite one.

33:07

But Echad is used in the Shema of Deuteronomy 6 .4. But from what I understand in Greek, there isn't an equivalent of Yahid and Echad distinction.

33:17

So they use the one. So that's what I understand. And so that's why.

33:23

So I know Jerry. I've talked to him many times. And he's wrong in that.

33:29

It's a misapplication. Okay. Yeah. And it's interesting because also in the same book, he admits in I think it's what,

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John 10 .30 where Jesus said, I am my father,

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I am one. He admits that right there. The one is not a numerical one.

33:52

Okay. Well, yeah, he's got issues. I've talked to him many times. We need to have a better debate. There's a break coming up.

33:58

So we got to go, buddy. Okay. God bless, man. Thank you. Thanks for calling. All right. Hey, folks.

34:03

We'll be right back after these messages. Please stay tuned. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

34:15

Here's Matt Slick. Everybody, welcome back to the show. Let's get back on here.

34:21

Let's get to Steve from Las Vegas. Steve, welcome. You're on the air. Hey, how you doing, Matt? God bless you, man.

34:28

Hey, thanks, man. Doing okay? I just want to say I thank the Lord for you and your ministry.

34:34

I think you do a fantastic job. My prayer goes out for you and your wife. I know it's kind of difficult, you know, with the ministry and her being sick and all.

34:41

So I really appreciate it. I got a few questions. One question is,

34:48

I believe in the doctrine of eternity. I may not know it as deep as you do. I know in one of the debates

34:55

I watched you debate, you said you've been studying it since 1980. So glory to God for that.

35:01

My question is, usually when

35:07

I talk with people that deny or reject the deity of Christ, they'll bring up Mark 13, and the objection usually sounds like this.

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They'll say, well, if Jesus is all God, how does he not know the hour of his return?

35:24

What would be your best response back to that question? Well, there's two responses

35:29

I give. One is to go to Revelation 19 .12. And it says there, it's talking about Jesus.

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His eyes are a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems. And he has a name written on him which no one knows except himself.

35:48

Well, wait a minute. Does that mean that Jesus has a name on him which no one knows except himself? Well, that means

35:54

God the Father doesn't know. So therefore, the Father doesn't know everything. So therefore, the Father is not God. You see the problem with that logic that they're using.

36:03

So that's a problem. You with me? You see that? Okay. Okay. Revelation 19 .12.

36:10

That's right. Revelation 19 .12 has a name written on him which no one knows except himself. So the point in that text is it can mean no one because that would exclude the

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Father there. Right. Right? Right? And it's just as simple. See, they would often exaggerate.

36:29

I'm going to give you another answer to this thing about Jesus. But this is a quick and slick answer. If their logic is

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Jesus isn't God because he didn't know something, then the Father's not God because only Jesus knows his own name.

36:43

Also the same logic. So it's a problem. So that's another issue.

36:48

Okay, that's one. Here's another issue. In the Carmen Christi, which is Philippians 2 .5 -11, it says,

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Have this attitude in yourselves, which also is in Christ Jesus, who, although he existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but he emptied himself.

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Taking the form of a bondservant, he humbled himself to the point of death, even death on a cross. Okay, so one of the questions is what does it mean to say he emptied himself?

37:14

So what I say is that he cooperated with the limitations of being a man. He cooperated with them.

37:21

Now we could discuss what that means in different nuances. So could it be that he cooperated with the limitations of being a man while he was under the law?

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Because he's under the law in Galatians 4 .4. And so in Luke 12 .52, Jesus grew in wisdom and stature.

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But this is in reference to his humanity under the law in reference to his childhood in relation to Mary and Joseph.

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So we see something going on here. And so there's something else that's going on there.

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So there could be something that's going on that we're not familiar with that's related to the incarnation and his humility in the incarnation as it relates to being a man.

38:05

That's a second answer. Here's a third. This one's a little bit more complicated. In the ancient

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Near East, particularly in Israel, when a person got married, they were usually engaged for a year.

38:20

And if that engagement was broken off, they had to go through a divorce -type agreement. So in that year period, they would plan a party.

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And the party would have, depending on the level of guests and the level of money that they had, it could include a lamb, a fatted calf, a wine, and all kinds of stuff.

38:46

As you go to John 2, you'll see Jesus at the wedding of Cana. And there's, you know, barrels and barrels of wine because they would have these parties.

38:55

It was a big deal for someone to get married. It was carrying out the requirements of God. It was a great commission.

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That's going to be in the Dominion Mandate when God said multiply, fill the earth.

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So this is a serious thing to the Jews. So they would send out word to the relatives in different parts of Israel.

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And, you know, at the month of Tishri, on the 15th day, we're going to have the wedding. And so please let us know if you can make it because they needed a head count in order to do things.

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And plus, the people would have to make arrangements to where they're going to sleep, where they're going to stay, how much food, how much wine.

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This was a big deal, and it took a while to prep. They had to know what day it was in order to do this.

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But because of the nature of the culture, it might be a day in advance. It might be a day later even because maybe something didn't quite work out.

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And that was okay in that culture because you had a lot of family and a lot of fellowship and party time and just enjoying each other.

39:57

We're going to put the wedding off one more day. Well, okay, just more time together. This kind of a thing was common back then.

40:05

Furthermore, in that context, the groom had to build a room onto the father's house given that there was room to do that.

40:16

In a city, they really couldn't do that. But this was part of the custom. You'd build a room on or modify something inside the house so that the groom would then go with the trumpeters through the city streets to go get the bride.

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And the trumpeters would play music. There would be celebration, dancing. And when

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I was in Jerusalem once, I saw it. We were not too far from the

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Wailing Wall. And there was this party coming through, a big crowd of people. And it was the bride and the groom.

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And it was awesome. They were just, you know, tambourine, I think it was, and music, and people were cheering.

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And we got to see it. And I felt myself privileged to see that because there it was. All right, so we're building the room onto the father's house.

41:08

Now, in the Jewish culture, the father is the patriarch. The father is the final authority, except for, you know,

41:14

God, of course. But you don't mess with the father. So having all this set up, so the wedding is there.

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The bride is getting ready. The trumpeters are there. Everything's been there. It's been planned for a year. Here it is.

41:29

The room addition is fixed. What Jesus says, he says, you know, in my father's house are many mansions.

41:36

I go to prepare a place for you. This is him alluding to the wedding feast ideology and practices.

41:45

Okay, having said all of that, even, the groom's friends would say to the groom, when will the father let you go get the bride?

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And he would say, no man knows a day nor the hour but the father alone. It was an idiomatic expression.

42:01

Just like this guy beat, you know, Bob beat Frank until he's black and blue. Well, it's an idiom.

42:07

It was raining cats and dogs. And so that's the kind of expression.

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And what it meant was that we're right there. We don't know the exact moment because it resides in the heart and the mind of the father.

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Now go get your bride. So the idea here is not being that Christ doesn't know things exhaustively because he's

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God in flesh, but that in the wedding feast and the culture of the time, that privilege was resting with the father who would then make the declaration to go, go get your bride.

42:38

And this is what he was alluding to. Okay. Amazing. Thank you so much, man.

42:44

You're welcome. I appreciate it. Yeah. So I've actually told this at different conferences when people have asked me this, and I've had two

42:53

Jews come up to me who were Christians, raised in Judaism. I remember one guy very specifically.

43:00

He sat down next to me at a table afterwards. Everything was over. We're just kind of fellowshipping and having something to eat.

43:07

He sits down. He says, where'd you get that information? I said, I don't remember. He said, I'm very impressed.

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He said, Gentiles don't know that. How did you find that out? Because he said, because you're right.

43:18

It's true. I said, I don't know where I picked it up. He said, I'm impressed. No one knows this. So two

43:25

Jews have told me that. You also said, according to Galatians 4 and Philippians 2, he was cooperating with the limitations of being a man.

43:38

Correct? Yes. Now, when I say that, I can't really exegete totally what that means.

43:45

But he was walking on the ground. He made footprints. He had to eat.

43:51

He had to go to the bathroom. So there's a cooperation with humanity in the divine essence that is in union with the human nature and the one person of Christ.

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So we see the divinity operate through the humanity. So we see Jesus walk on water as a man.

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We don't see divinity. We see humanity. But the divinity is there within him. So there's a cooperation there.

44:14

So what I'm asking is, because I know a little bit about the hypostatic union, one person, two natures.

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Would this text prove his humanity? In other words, as a man, he would be perfectly well off saying, he does not know.

44:29

But as God, he does. That would work. And then we could then work in the issues of what's called the communication of the properties.

44:38

That's a little bit more complicated. And see how it relates in that teaching, too. But you're on the right track.

44:44

Yep. Okay? Okay. Thank you so much. You're welcome so much, buddy.

44:49

God bless. God bless you. Bye. All right. All right.

44:55

All right. Now let's get to Alberto from Georgia. Alberto, welcome. We've got about three minutes. What do you got, buddy?

45:01

Okay. Okay. Can God speak into existence or word of his power? Can the

45:06

Father speak himself out of existence and still remain? No. And the Holy Spirit still remain?

45:13

No. The Father cannot speak himself out of existence.

45:20

Okay. I'll explain why. Okay. So the nature of God is that he is triune.

45:29

That's the nature of God. If God is triune, then it cannot be divided and the essence of the

45:39

Father cannot cease because it would mean the triune nature ceased to exist.

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But if this triune nature ceased to exist, then God himself, period, in his totality, would cease to exist.

45:54

So we cannot have it be the case that either the Father, the Son, or the

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Holy Spirit could speak themselves out of existence so that there's only a binatarian view of God.

46:08

So it's just not logically possible and it's not ontologically possible. It's not logically possible because it's not possible for God to contradict himself.

46:21

And since he says in Malachi 3 .6 that he is unchangeable, therefore, he cannot change and his nature, which is triune, cannot also not be triune, which would be a self -refutation, a logical impossibility.

46:37

And I've already quoted the scriptures. For example, in Malachi 3 .6, it says that God is unchanging.

46:45

He cannot change. It is his nature to be eternal. And Psalm 90, verse 2, from everlasting to everlasting, you are

46:52

God and God is by definition triune. So it's impossible for God not to be triune or to alter his triune nature in any way.

47:02

Okay? Mm -hmm. So, I mean, in other words, you cannot completely see

47:08

Jesus as God or neither as an individual person of the Trinity, correct? Right.

47:15

God is not a single person in one sense, but he,

47:21

God does speak as a single person, but he also speaks as a plurality.

47:27

So we see in the nature of the Trinity singularity and plurality.

47:33

And the nature of the triune being is plurality. That's his nature, so it cannot change. So either member of the

47:39

Godhead cannot speak themselves out of existence. It's impossible. Okay. Okay.

47:45

All right. Thank you. Thank you for coming to the show. All right, man. God bless, buddy. All right. Hey, folks, hope you enjoyed the show.

47:51

If you want to give me a call tomorrow, that's your opportunity. I hope you have a great evening. God bless. Bye. Another program powered by the