Q & A: On a Wide Variety of Topics

Opening Remarks and Tonight’s Surprise Live Stream

Welcome back to another episode of Revealed Apologetics. I'm your host, Eli Ayala, and if you are tuning in, it's not the radio, I guess, but if you're watching and you're wondering, wait, you know, I didn't know there was a live stream today.

Neither did I. I did not know that there was a live stream today. I have a three-day weekend. My wife's not feeling well. My youngest son isn't feeling well. I've been hanging out with my other kids and, you know, everyone's in bed now and I'm like, you know what, why not?

So I have no idea who's gonna watch this. Although, if you do watch it, I think you will find tonight's live stream useful as I have just returned last weekend from upstate New York. I was invited to speak at an event where I was able to give four sermons and there was a one-hour and 45-minute Q &A session.

That's right, one hour and 45 minutes. So there were a lot of questions that I was able to interact with, mostly from young people, people from, students from high school and college. And so we were able to get into a whole bunch of things.

And so what I have tonight is a bunch of questions that I received that I didn't have an opportunity to go into great depth while I was up in New York. And so I figured, why not do a live stream where I cover a bunch of those questions?

And so these questions are gonna be wide ranging. Some of them are practical. Others have to do with things pertaining to apologetics. And so hopefully it will be useful for folks who are listening in tonight.

And so, yeah, there you go. So this is a surprise, surprise live stream. I'm also, I'm super excited. What's today's date?

Today is the 13th.

On January 15th, I will be, we'll be having our first private Zoom class session for those who signed up for PreceptU, the premium version of the course. And so looking forward to meeting folks who signed up for that.

As I've said in the past, one of the great joys is to be able to actually see people and meet the people who are signed up and follow the ministry from all around the world. And so I'm super excited about that.

So that's January 15th. I'll also be flying up to New York again in February, speaking at a Christian school and then a church. So if anyone wants to have me out, you can totally do that. You can go to revealedapologetics .com and you could reach out to me and we can book something.

Real quick, nothing is set in stone in terms of the dates and stuff like that, but Apologia Studios invited me back out to Arizona to do a part two of the presuppositional apologetic series that I recorded with them some months back.

So I was super excited about that. I was like, well, I went there once and had a great time and everything went well. And I was wondering if they'd ever want me back. So they want me back. So I'm super excited to go there whenever we nail down the specific date.

And so when information with respect to that kind of clarifies and we kind of nail some things down, I'll let folks know what's going on with that. And of course, the series that I've recorded with Apologia, and the upcoming series that I will record with them, I assume will be available on apologiastudios .com.

And I think you have to subscribe or something like that to have access to that. But Apologia is a great ministry to support. So I totally encourage you guys to do that. So, all right, well, let's jump right in.

Got some people watching and let's take a look at some of the questions. Again, these are questions that came to me from high school students and college students. And so hopefully this will be useful to you if you are in ministry or you work with young people and these sorts of questions are floating around.

Relationships, Priorities, and Covenant Faithfulness

So first question someone asked is, is it okay to be with someone who knows the Lord and is active in church, but does not make him their number one priority? Okay, and so I would assume that this is in the context of like a relationship, right?

So is it okay to be with someone who knows the Lord and is active in church, but doesn't make the Lord their number one priority? So if the person knows the Lord in this hypothetical, right, then I think he or she should know that the Lord needs to be their number one priority, right?

So this is the teaching of scripture. It made one scripture that kind of popped in my mind is Deuteronomy 6, 5, right? Which gives us the greatest commandment in all of scripture. It says that you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

And of course, when Jesus is asked about the greatest commandment, he kind of adds this here in Matthew 22, 36, he says, love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.

So I wanna, if this is in the context of say, like a relationship, I want people to keep close attention to the phrase in these passages, the Lord your God, okay? That's a very important phrase because this is language of covenant, okay?

A covenant in scripture refers to a pact or an agreement between two or more parties and it comes with certain obligations and various stipulations. So within scripture, the covenant between God and Israel, for example, came with both blessings and curses for either keeping or breaking the covenant.

So all this to say, as believers, we need to be reminded that we are in covenant with our God, right? He is covenantally our God and we are covenantally his people. And so we're to have as our goal to love God and to keep him front and center in our lives.

And so, you know, that's what we should have as our goals as believers, okay? In reality though, we fail to do that, right? We fail to do this consistently. We often need moments in our lives in which we intentionally have to reorient our priorities.

And so we don't have God as our number one priority. We place ourselves, when we don't have God as our number one priority, we place ourselves in a position to commit idolatry as we often, you know, place other things on the same level or above God.

This can be done within the context of a relationship or whatever the case may be. So more specifically to answer the point in question, specifically then, I would caution getting into a relationship with someone who has their priorities mixed up, right?

Now, of course, in some sense, we all suffer from the lack of proper prioritization, right? So it's gonna depend on the person. It's gonna depend on the situation, right? But such a person I think needs to proceed with wisdom, okay, when thinking about who is a compatible person to be in these sorts of relationship with, right?

As scripture teaches us that we are not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers as 2 Corinthians 6, verse 14 says, but within the context of this question, I assume this person is a believer. But if you think about it, it is possible to be unequally yoked with another believer, right?

So if the people involved in this scenario genuinely love the Lord and they're seeking to serve Him faithfully and consistently, okay, then perhaps the situation warrants a conversation, an agreement, if you will, right?

To reorient priorities so that the relationship is one in which honors God, it seeks to love Him first and foremost. And I genuinely believe that God will bless a relationship in which the people involved love the Lord more than they love each other, given the fact that in order to love each other, this is important, in the way that God has created us to love one another, that we need to love God first, okay?

So it's very easy to kind of bring other things into focus. And let me adjust my chair real quick. So my chair sinks in while I'm talking. And so it looks like I'm really tall at the beginning of a live stream.

And then I look like, you know, my face is like, you just see my forehead. So there you go. I had to adjust my chair there. So a good scripture to keep in mind with respect to proper priorities, I think is Matthew 6, 33, which says, but seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

The relationships which have God at the center are the best kinds of relationships because they're patterned after God's standards for proper relational priorities, okay? So that's my advice, okay? So if someone's gonna ask the question, if the person knows the Lord, okay?

This is a believer.

So is it okay to be with someone who knows the Lord, is active in church, but it's not making him or her, their number one priority, the Lord, okay? These are things I think you need to consider, okay?

When you say, is it okay, this issue of relationship needs to be looked upon with wisdom, with prayer, because relationships are important. And so you do not wanna act foolishly by being unequally yoked with the person that you are in relationship with, okay?

Hope that makes sense. That's an important question, especially you're in college or high school and you're in that stage where the relationships, right? So I think we need to proceed with wisdom, okay?

Hearing God’s Voice and Testing Inner Thoughts by Scripture

All right, let's see here. Next question. Okay, this is a good question. How do I know God speaks to me? I don't know whether it is God or just the noises in my head, okay? I'm sure, let me adjust my foggy glasses.

So before I went live, I went for a jog and so I'm all like nasty and sweaty, sorry. I think my glasses got fogged up.

Let's see here.

There we go, okay? All right, so how do I know God speaks to me? I don't know whether it is God or just the noises in my head, okay? That's a super important question. It's a good question, okay? We don't wanna confuse the voice of God with our own conscience, right?

Our own inner thoughts, right? Our own minds are unreliable and often deceive us, right? Jeremiah 17, nine says that the heart is desperately wicked who can know it, right? So this is one of the primary reasons why I encourage people to be in the scriptures.

So when we fill our mind with God's truth, we're in a better position to differentiate between what God is saying and what we're saying to ourselves. And we're also able to differentiate between God's voice and the many other voices that influence us like in general, right?

So our thoughts are always going to be placed within the backdrop of scripture that we have hidden in our hearts, so to speak, or our minds, right? So let's be more specific with respect to the question.

I think it's vital to recognize that we're creating God's image, as Genesis 1, 26 says, and God is not created in our image. This is important. There are things we share in common with God, but in very important ways, God is vastly different from us, okay?

So consider the scripture, for example, Isaiah 55, verses eight through nine, which says, "'For my thoughts are not your thoughts, "'neither are your ways my ways,' declares the Lord. "'As the heavens are higher than the earth, "'so are my ways higher than your ways, "'and my thoughts than your thoughts.'".

Now, in light of this fact, okay, it should help answer the initial question with respect to differentiating between God's voice and our own thoughts. So the point is that God does not sound like you or me, okay?

This is important. The voices in your head, your thoughts, sound like the one from which they come. God's voice is, of course, fundamentally different, okay? And of course, when God is speaking to us, okay, again, the word of God hidden in our heart is going to be the standard by which we judge, you know, what's going on in that situation, right?

So another thing to consider, I think, is whether the voice in your head is in agreement with the Bible. That's the key thing, okay? When we know God, when we know the scriptures, we learn that God never contradicts himself.

He's a God of truth, okay? And as the saying goes, "'The hallmark of truth is consistency.'" God is consistent. And so if the thoughts in your head are in conflict with what God has already revealed, right, then you can be sure it's not God speaking to you.

So to give an example, I knew a couple who were professed believers. They were newly married, but shortly after they got married, things got, like, super messy, and the woman in the relationship asserted that she believed, through her prayer and reflection, that it was God's will for them to get a divorce.

And so there was no marital unfaithfulness or anything like that, based upon what I was told, right? There was definitely no biblical warrant based upon what they told me. There was no biblical warrant for the divorce.

And so it's most definitely the case that God would not have condoned the divorce given the circumstances, right? So we need to ask ourselves, would God say this or that, okay? If you know God's word, you'll be in a better position to make the proper differentiations, right?

So super important. So in the final analysis, I think, while I do believe that God can speak to us in any way he pleases, okay? No one's gonna say, hey, God can't talk this way, or God can't do this, that, or the other thing.

The primary way in which he speaks to us is through his word. And God never speaks in a fashion that contradicts that word. So my advice to the person who asked this specific question is to not be primarily driven by what he or she thinks may or may not be God in his or her head, but rather be driven by that which we know is God's voice, and that is the Holy Scriptures, okay?

I'm gonna say that again, okay? We need to not be driven by what we think God might be saying to us, but rather we should be driven by what we know God has said to us, and what we know is what is inscripturated in God's word,.

Okay?

The less you are in God's word, the less discerning you will be to differentiate the voices in your head between your own thoughts and what God may or may not be speaking to you, okay? This is super, super important, because this has great practical import, okay?

A lot of people who emphasize prayer but neglect scripture reading, that can be very dangerous. That's why the Christian life has to be one of balance. We not only are praying and seeking God and speaking with God, but we are also filled with God's truth as it sets a standard in our heart to judge truth from falsity, whether it's the thoughts in our head or the thoughts of someone else's head coming out in the form of teaching or anything along those lines.

So super, super duper important. All right, now I'm just gonna step aside real quick. Now I'm taking questions that were sent to me, but if you have questions in the chat, I will try my best to answer them.

And it is 945, so I don't know how sharp I'll be. So if I don't know the answer to your question, if you have a question, I will just let you know, hey, that's a great question, I don't know the answer to.

So, but I love when people ask me questions that I don't know because it gives me something to study, it gives me something to research. So if you do have a question, shoot away and shoot away or ask away, I don't know if I said that right.

Just preface your question with the word question so that I could differentiate it from comments, okay? All right, but since there are no questions, I'll continue through my list here. And I hope this is helpful.

You can give me a thumbs up or a happy face emoji if what I'm saying is making sense and it's useful to you, that would be very helpful to me. So, all right. So here's another question that was sent to me.

Welcoming Sinners Without Celebrating Sin

Several mainstream churches are very welcoming to the gay community. I see a rainbow flag hanging outside some churches. Is this something that is okay? Okay, so several mainstream churches are very welcoming to the gay community.

I see a rainbow flag hanging outside some churches. Is this something that is okay?

So, all right.

So, to answer this question straightforwardly, no, it's not okay, all right? On the one hand, we want to be welcoming to those within the LGBTQ plus community, right? But being welcoming to such people is not equivalent to celebrating, right?

Their lifestyle choices by placing their representative flag outside of the place of worship, okay? The same goes for like the Satanist, okay? I want to welcome the Satanist, right? If the person's coming in the church, I'm not going to kick him out because he's a Satanist, right?

Such individuals need to be welcomed to a certain extent, but what are they welcome to? They're welcome to come and hear the gospel. You're going to come into the church, you're going to hear the gospel, and you're going to hear a message of repentance.

You're going to hear the things you should hear, and those aren't being unwelcoming. That's welcoming and also standing firm on where we need to be. So, just as I will not put a flag out for anyone within the LGBTQ community because I'm not celebrating that, I like fashion, I'm not going to put a Satanic flag out in my place of worship just to show my support for those people.

That wouldn't make any sense, okay? So, the church, biblically speaking, should welcome sinners, right? For such were some of us, as 1 Corinthians 6, verse 11 says, right? But we will welcome them, and I think as we welcome all people biblically, we're going to welcome them in a biblically consistent way in which is going to include a biblical presentation of the gospel, a biblical call to repentance, and a turning away from that which is not pleasing to God, right?

Jesus loves sinners, right? Jesus says, I came for the sick, not for the healthy, Mark 2, 17. But I don't think Jesus would have been waving, you know, the gay flag around to demonstrate his love for sinners, right?

And I don't think we should either. So, yeah, I think that's important. All right, let's see here. All right, here's another question, and then I got a question in the chat. So, I see your question, Jen.

I will get to that in just a moment. So, next question here. So, did God just decide one day to make everything? Could there have been a creation before us, and will there be another after? Okay, so did God just create one day?

Did God just decide one day to make everything? Could there have been a creation before us? Okay, so no, God didn't just create, okay? So, that language there smells of arbitrariness, right? So, God didn't just create one day to make everything as though his decision to do this was arbitrary and just decided upon on a whim, right?

God never acts in an arbitrary fashion, okay? God is never arbitrary. If you look at Ephesians 1, verse 11, it says that God works all things after the counsel of his will. The all things would, by extension, include the creation of everything, and the creation of everything was done after the counsel of his will.

God has a counsel and he has a will, and because all things falls under that umbrella, it stands to reason that creation itself was done for a specific purpose, okay? So, with respect to the second part of the question, could there be a creation before or after if God so desired, right?

He could, right? God can do whatever he pleases. Whether he was pleased or not to create prior to creating us or not, we're not told, right? So, and I don't, if people are thinking, you know, the different theories in Genesis, right?

I don't see anything textually to suggest that there was some sort of creation prior to God creating the heavens and the earth or prior to, you know, all the things scripture says he created. So, I'm not sure if the questioner has in mind like some sort of like gap theory, which, you know, in some views, constitute a rebellion and a creation after that rebellion with respect to all these sorts of things, you know, Genesis versus one and two and stuff like that.

So, with respect to a future creation, the Bible does make reference to a new heaven and a new earth. Is that referring to a renewal of what was before or is this an entirely new creation personally? Me personally, I'm not sure.

Okay.

I hope that's helpful.

Yeah.

All right. So, we got a couple of questions here. And again, I'll try my best to answer them. Jen Nesset, our church is doing one year Bible challenge and we are going through Genesis 41 at this point.

Did people eat meat before Noah left the ark? Did people eat meat before Noah left the ark? I would assume so. I mean, yeah, I think they would have. I mean, again, you have different views as to when people ate meat.

Some people think that animal death is the result of the fall. And then you have people who believe that human death was the only kind of death that resulted from the fall. So, you're gonna have different specific, you know, angles that someone might come at that question.

Okay.

All right.

Thanks for that question. Emilio Beltran, what is your take when someone says Jesus died for all and he paid for the sins of all? Are they saying that everyone's sins have been taken away or removed? If so, how does atonement apply?

Yeah.

So, someone says Jesus died for all and he paid for the sins of all. We need to make a distinction, right? We have to ask the question, what does this person mean by all? As it is popularly brought up, all doesn't always mean all in the sense that many people think.

You could have all without exception or you could have all without distinction. Okay. Those are two senses in which one can understand all. So, for example, when the Bible says that all Jerusalem went out to the Jordan, right?

To see John the Baptist. That doesn't mean that all of Jerusalem was like literally empty, right? You could have all without exception, all without distinction. The Bible also makes differentiation between Jew and Gentile.

So, it makes this idea of all without distinction. There is no distinction between Jew or Gentile. It doesn't necessarily refer to all without exception. Now, I do think that it is problematic to suggest that Jesus' death on the cross paid literally for everyone's sin.

That wouldn't make sense to me. I don't think that's biblically consistent. I think the person who says this, Jesus died for all and he paid for the sins of all, depending, when you say, are they saying, well, it depends who's saying this, right?

But if you think that atonement is universal, that Jesus died for the sins of every single person who'd ever live, they would probably say that what is the qualifier for them to enjoy the benefits of the death of Christ is faith.

They'd have to place faith in Christ. And then, of course, these benefits apply, okay? Now, I do not take the all when I say Christ died for all. I don't take it necessarily as all without exception. I would make the distinction between all without distinction, Jew and Gentile.

I think God, that the atonement of Christ paid for the sins of God's elect, right? From both Jew and Gentile. And as the book of Colossians says, he nailed the certificate of debt on the cross, canceling out, right?

He canceled out the debt. So yeah, so again, it's a nuanced question. It really depends when you say, are they saying? It really depends who's saying. Is this person Arminian in their theology? Are they Calvinistic in their theology?

Your theology is going to matter with respect to how you answer that question, okay? Hope that's helpful, Emilio. Thanks for the question, man. I'm gonna adjust my chair one more time. I'm getting short again.

There we go.

Now I'm tall again.

There we go.

Polygamy, Evolution, and Theistic Orthodoxy

All right.

Good questions. I feel like the Bible answer man before he went orthodox. Okay, I'm answering all these questions. These are great questions. Let me see. Hopefully I can answer them.

Let's see here. Do, do, do, do, do.

Jen again. And many in the Old Testament had multiple wives and slept with their wives. Slaves, was God displeased with them? Where do we get single now? It's a big question. I haven't, you know what, Jen?

I have an article on the issue of polygamy. Maybe I will put a link to that article. I'll find it and try to put a link in the comments. You could check that out, okay? That's a question that I'd have to sit down and unpack some things.

I don't think I'm prepared to do off the top of my head right now.

So let's see here. Do, do, do, do, do.

Brenda, Brenda. Hello, Brenda.

Brenda says, William Lane Craig accepts evolution in some sense. Do you accept or reject evolution? And if you disagree with William Lane Craig, in what way and why? Yeah, so I do not accept evolution.

We'd have to be more specific what we mean by evolution. So you have macroevolution, microevolution, Darwinian evolution, neo-Darwinian evolution, punctuated equilibrium, all these sorts of things. But with respect to William Lane Craig's view, as put forth in his book, as put forth in his book, the, in the quest of the historical Adam, I do not affirm Dr. Craig's reading of Genesis, where he speaks of like this idea of mytho-history.

I actually had Dr. Jason Lyle come onto the show. I think it's called The Historical Adam. If you look on my page, where we talk specifically about Dr. Craig's position, I do not accept Dr. Craig's reading of Genesis and his analysis of the scientific data and things like that is very important.

The issue of the science with respect to evolution, I don't think is as straightforward as many people think, because when you're dealing with science and scientific questions, those questions are going to, by necessity, be paradigmatic, right?

We're dealing with people's paradigms and presuppositions, and that impacts the way you interpret the data. So when someone says, clearly the science says A, B, or C, well, no, what we see in science are interpretations based on presuppositions and interpretations of various observations and things like that.

So this whole debate over evolution really is a worldview issue. It's not simply a look at the facts issue, as I don't think that's ever the case with anything. You don't just look and see. You know, as we're told, the evidence speaks for itself.

I do not believe evidence speaks for itself because evidence doesn't speak, right? As Cornelius Mantill, I think, rightly said, brute facts, which many people take to be like these self-evident facts, brute facts are mute facts.

Facts don't speak, right? We have presuppositions, we have worldviews, and those impact how we interpret the data of human experience, okay? So I do not accept Dr. Craig's position. I do not take his reading of Genesis.

All right, thank you for the question, Brenda. I appreciate it.

Let's see here.

Emilio says, yes, with respect, every single person that ever lived, including everyone who will never come to faith. Yeah, I don't believe that Christ died for the sins of someone who will never come to faith.

So I'm a Calvinist, right? I'm reformed in my theology and I hold to the doctrine of definite atonement. Christ's death and atonement paid specifically for those that it was intended, people from every tribe, tongue, and nation, Jew of Jew and Gentile.

So yeah, I would challenge the universal atonement position. And of course, that'll just be the classic debate between like Calvinist Armenians or people who might not identify as Armenians, but hold to a universal perspective with respect to the atonement of Christ.

So, so yeah.

Reformed Baptist Identity, Catechisms, and Eschatology

Let's see here.

Yeah.

So the Rev says, what makes a reformed Baptist and kindly explain the catechism and brief love and prayers for you from India? Well, thank you, Rev. I appreciate your question. What makes for a reformed Baptist?

Well, reformed Baptist, there's, it depends. I mean, if you're like a 1689, 1689 Baptist, the London Baptist confession, what makes a reformed Baptist? The answer to that question will be answered nicely if you read the confession, okay?

They're reformed in their soteriology and there's specific views of covenant. And again, it's a difficult question because it depends what kind of reformed Baptist is in question. I tend to lean towards the reformed Baptist position and I would hold to the 1689 London Baptist confession.

So if you really want kind of a rundown on what reformed Baptist believe, I think walking through that confession is gonna be very useful to you. I can't explain the catechism in brief. Depends what you mean, which catechism do you have in mind?

And if so, catechisms cover a wide range of stuff. So unfortunately, I could answer maybe a more specific question. That'd be much too broad for me to deal with here. So I do apologize, okay? Thank you for your question.

Jen Nesset attacks again. No, she doesn't attack. It is a good question. She strikes again with another question. What is your view of eschatology? Yeah, so I am a partial preterist. I take Matthew 24, Luke 21, Mark 13 to be referring to the events leading up to and including the destruction of Jerusalem.

I take the early dating, for example, of the book of Revelation. I think the book of Revelation was written pre AD 70. And I think it is depicting in apocalyptic literary form events that were experienced in the near and soon future of those who originally received the letter.

With respect to my millennial position, I am flexible, but I lean post-millennial, but I am open to be convinced otherwise, right? And so those are my positions with respect to general. I'm a partial preterist.

I believe the great tribulation, my trib view is that it passed. It was in reference to events back in the day. And I do believe in the bodily coming of Christ. I do believe in a future resurrection, new heavens, new earth, those sorts of things.

So that would be my, and I'm post-millennial with respect to my millennial position, okay? Although I do have some pretty smart people that are looking, staring me down and saying, you should really consider amillennialism.

So I'm down. It's just, it's been a while since I've covered those specific topics.

So, so yeah.

Teshuva says, do you know who Sam Shamoon is? I know Sam, I've spoken with him on the phone a long time ago. He probably won't remember me. So if I called him now, I think I still have his number. If I call him now, he probably won't remember who I am, but I do know who Sam is and I've watched a lot of his content.

Yeah.

All right, well, thank you for those questions. I'm gonna return to my main questions unless you have more questions and I will flip back and forth between the questions that I was gonna cover and the questions that you may have.

So thank you so much for those questions. I appreciate it. And I hope I answered to your satisfaction somewhat.

Okay.

Okay, let's see here. All right.

Hell, Divine Justice, and the Character of God

Okay, let's see here. So here's my next question. I was asked, how would you explain to an unbeliever that a just and loving God can send people to hell? Okay, that's a very popular question. A lot of people ask this question.

It's a good question. First, I would like to point out that we shouldn't be apologetic about this. I do believe that God is just and he's loving and he sends people to hell. Those aren't logically incompatible, right?

So if we were to provide a simple and straightforward answer to the question, I would say that it's because God is just, he is righteous, he's holy, he's loving and so forth, right? And that his character demands the punishment of sin.

So if God didn't punish sin, he wouldn't be just. So this question only becomes difficult if we start with an imbalanced view of God, right? And we typically overemphasize his love in church and preaching and these sorts of things.

How can I say this? So I think this question becomes difficult if we have this kind of imbalance, right? And I think the problem is we overemphasize God's love in various discussions in Christian discourse, or we have an incomplete view or an inaccurate view of the nature of God's love, right?

This is when we run into problems when explaining the fact that God sends people to hell,.

Right?

So now it should be noted, I think, that the issue of hell is an important issue and it is often an issue that has great emotional import, okay? So we shouldn't deal with this question in a cavalier way.

It is a serious topic, right? Even believers have difficulty with this concept, okay? But we're gonna wanna make a distinction between emotional difficulty versus the logical difficulty, okay? So for instance, one can struggle emotionally with this idea, but the emotional struggle has no bearing as to whether it's true or not.

I think that's an important distinction to make. So as believers, we're gonna wanna conform our emotions to the truth of God, right? As revealed in his word. So sometimes those truths aren't comfortable, but the fact, that fact doesn't change anything, right?

If we are uncomfortable about something, that doesn't mean that it isn't true or whatever, okay? So I would explain this concept by laying out a general, in a general sense, a balanced and biblical picture of the character and the nature of God and the character and nature of man and his sin and how all this relates to God and our standing before him.

And then I would, from within that balanced and biblical conception of God, I'd answer the specific point in question. So I think what makes it possible for us to answer this question adequately is to have a balanced conception of who God is, all right?