Continued Cultural Collapse, Totalitarianism, and a Discussion of the Cost of Human A

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Good citizens of Suffolandria, after having vanquished his foes in the great battle of the bicycle,
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I present to you, the newest knight of Suffolandria, Sir James White.
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I had absolutely positively no idea that was coming. And if you think I have a bad
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English accent. Wow.
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I was, I was all set ready to go, but I'm pretty well shot now. Um, wow.
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Thank you very much. Um, minion rich. Um, I, you know,
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I did include you in my minion list and my, did you, did you read that? Did you read my, my post yesterday?
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I did, even though I got, you know, locked out when I showed up. Well, that was, that was totally unintentional.
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Uh, but it's, it is a good thing to just naturally lock the door, uh, in our, any neighborhood around here.
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There is that. Yeah, very much so. Um, but I did appreciate you coming by, even though you just came by to talk shop anyways.
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It's just, you know, but, but it did help those few minutes you were there to pass by.
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At least you didn't do what Dalby did, uh, you know, sack out on the couch. Uh, so, you know, that's, that's a good thing too.
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So, uh, for everyone who, um, uh, supported us yesterday, supported me,
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I suppose, uh, in yesterday in, uh, my, uh, my fundraising activity, uh, also, uh, known as something else.
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But anyways, thank you very much for the support. Appreciated the, uh, kind, uh, words, many of which
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I saw, which I saw during, but since I was alone up to the sixth video, uh, it's sort of hard to do that and look at your phone and do all the stuff you're supposed to be doing and, and, uh, stretch and things like that.
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But, um, for those of you that have no idea what I'm talking about, I, uh, I took the suffer
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Landry and a challenge yesterday. Uh, if you've never done a sufferfest video, you really won't understand it.
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But if you have or have seen them, um, they are cycling videos that are, um, really, really good.
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They're just, they're, they're just gut ripping, um, workouts. And especially when you use a power trainer where the computer is in control of the trainer.
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You know, if you've ever written one of those trainers before, you're just sitting there spinning and the resistance doesn't change and you have to do it by perceived exertion.
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Uh, when you do it this way, the computer is a charge. It tells the trainer how much resistance and you just got to do it.
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And, um, so it was, uh, it was quite, uh, quite the day, 233 miles, 375 kilometers, uh, 6 ,426 calories.
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Yeah. I'm still able to eat anything I want today. No problem about that at all. And, um, I think it was 11 hours and 34 minutes.
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I think grand total, uh, from the start to the finish. So, uh, nothing too bad today.
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I, I, I figured out about five minutes ago why my right calf gave me the, um, what, what, what the problem was.
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These are intervals. So you have to do interval training means you're jumping, you're accelerating, you're sprinting, and I'm right handed.
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So it also means I'm right leg. Um, whenever I start, like if I'm, uh, at a stop sign or a stoplight,
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I'm starting off, I'll, I'll, my power leg is the right leg. So who knows how many times yesterday
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I did some super acceleration and it's starting with the right leg. And I think that's why it's, uh, bothering me a little bit today, but not too bad.
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Uh, so far, of course, at my age, I actually have to wait until tomorrow to find out what's really going to end up hurting.
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It takes about 48 hours before you go, Oh, Oh yeah, that was a couple of days ago, wasn't it?
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Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But, um, hopefully not. I actually, I actually, um,
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Lord willing, I'm going to get back on that thing this evening. Uh, just, just for a little while, just to spin stuff out, try to stretch stuff out, you know, things like that.
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But thanks very much for the support. Uh, obviously we need to continue raising, uh, support for South Africa.
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So the link is still active. Uh, but for everybody who, uh, who, um, uh, encouraged in that way, very, very much appreciative of that.
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Some of you saw, um, there's been some discussion. Robert Gagnon has written a good article on this, um, a letter from, uh, the elder board to city church in, um, and you can see the
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Fred Harrell senior is the pastor, the elder board in San Francisco.
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Now, of course, being in San Francisco in of itself is obviously, um, a, a challenge, but it is, you all, you all testify if you've been listening to this program for any period of time.
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Um, yeah, I mean, as Aaron says, I looked 10 pounds later, honestly. Um, I did weigh before and this morning, five pounds, five pound difference.
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Um, now that's not real weight loss that will come back up. It'll probably be about a pound and a half by the time it evens, evens out, but yeah, not 10 pounds.
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Um, but I did, I did lose five, five pounds in, in one day there.
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But that, like I said, that's not a permanent type thing anyway. Um, uh, what, what caught my attention about this is
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I've been telling you for a long time, we're going to be seeing a lot of this. And, and even now a story like this is starting not to have as much traction as far as the news cycle, even amongst
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Christians. It's sort of like, oh yeah, another church has collapsed on this issue. And you know, it's almost what you expect, but I warned you the tsunami was coming.
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And eventually I believe it will be the majority report of what was once called evangelicalism because, and we should have known this all along.
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If a church is already based upon, if a church has already defined its worship and its proclamation based upon societal norms, then why should we be surprised that once the society says this is a normal behavior and a normal, um, and good and moral thing, um, we'll go with it.
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Why should we be surprised by that? We shouldn't be surprised by it at all. So that's what's taking place.
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But what really caught my attention and I didn't read enough of Bob Gagnon's article yet, just haven't had time to, um, to see if he addressed this.
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But what struck me was right off the bat. Um, it says, uh, in May of 2014, the board asked me for a book that was clearly grounded scripture that we might study on pastoring our brothers and sisters in Christ who are part of the
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LGBT community. So immediately assumption being, um, that we're not talking here about people who have same sex attraction and are handling it in a fashion seeking to live under the
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Lordship of Christ. That's, that's not what we're talking about. Uh, there's already been a fundamental collapse, uh, on a definitional basis as to biblical theology here.
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Um, and notice the next line, we read Ken Wilson's a letter to my congregation.
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And I have mentioned this book. I read it when it first came out.
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Um, and it was a classic example of how this collapse will take place.
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And I used it, utilized it as an example at that time of how this collapse will take place.
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It was, uh, obviously Wilson has a very odd, uh, mixture of, um, strange spiritualistic practices, uh, that, that clearly indicate a, um, a corruption of his view of biblical authority and sound theology.
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And that, that lays the groundwork for all the rest of it. But, uh, here you have these books, whether it be
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Matthew vines or here, Ken Wilson or whatever, having an impact by providing the pretense.
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I'm sorry. I know these books. I've read these books. They are not compelling to anyone who is seriously asking biblical questions.
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There are just so many holes in, in the argumentation that it's, it's hard to take overly seriously, but what you need when you already have the desire that's been built into your ecclesiology and how you do church in trying to bring people in rather than, rather than having some form of a regulative principle of worship where scripture defines what worship is to be scripture defines what the church is to be.
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You've, you've already become imbalanced in seeking the favor of the culture, uh, and to, to speak with the culture's language.
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So you're looking for a, a pretext, a pretense, a, a basis, and there's plenty of books now, and there'll be more coming out, um, that will, that will provide this kind of, of basis for that kind of action.
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And so you have this, I guess it's been described, I don't know anything about it as a, a megachurch in the
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San Francisco area. Um, and, uh, you have them making, you know, what are we talking?
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Why are we talking about this now? Well, number one, God is bringing LGBT Christians to the doors of city church. So we've already, we've already collapsed on the key issue and that is whether the scriptures use the past tense or the present tense in first Corinthians six 11.
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I mean, that that's really, that's really what the issue is. Uh, such are some of you are such were some of you, this is a now, now an our church rather than a word church.
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Now, of course there are no manuscripts say are so, um, that means it's a rejection of what
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Paul wrote church, but there you go. Um, number two, our pastoral practice of demanding lifelong celibacy by which we meant that for the rest of your life, listen, listen to how, listen to how this is expressed, but the rest of your life, you would not engage your sexual orientation in any way was causing obvious harm and has not led to human flourishing.
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Ooh, first of all, they are going to get sued by, uh, Al Mohler for copyright infringement because the phrase human flourishing is definitely,
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I mean, I tried to get theology matters, but clearly I, I evidently did not get that registered in time because it's all over the place now, but a human flourishing,
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I think is copyrighted by Al Mohler. I, I I'm pretty, pretty sure that is, but again, notice the fundamental issue, um, not engage your sexual orientation.
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The Christian response to this is that Christ defines who you are, not your desires, your lusts.
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Um, and so this is allowing for the idea it's, it's become a given.
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No one, no one will, will defend it. No one will argue the point, but it's there.
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That is that sexual orientation is genetic. It's innate and therefore it's morally good.
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Now, now think about what that means. Our society has become so morally and ethically bankrupt, childish, immature, disconnected from the past, um, arrogant.
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Uh, I think I already said childish, uh, but I need to repeat it. Um, we know more than any generation before us, every generation before us, the generations that, that fought for freedom in the world and self -sacrificed and built all this.
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They, they, they were a bunch of moral Neanderthals in comparison to us. That is, if you're a leftist, progressive, liberal socialist, um, so on and so forth.
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And, uh, so we have now declared that sexual orientation is an innate biological thing.
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We can't show you any evidence of this. We just have people who say it. And as long as they say, this is how
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I am, then that makes it truth. Well, except for the orientations that we haven't gotten around to having
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Hollywood make acceptable yet, which we'll, we'll get to eventually. Um, and so we just accept that.
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And so you have your sexual orientation, you leave all of scripture aside.
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And therefore this call for lifelong celibacy of discipline, we've gone from recognizing that SSA, same sex attraction exists and seeking to help those who experience it, to live purity of life, to seek deliverance from it as many people experience.
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But even those that do not to live in purity of life, uh, to abandoning that.
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And you need to realize taking this position is a utter betrayal of those who seek to live in purity of life with same sex attraction.
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You need to realize that this, this collapse, this moral and ethical collapse is a slap in the face, um, of all those who live, uh, and struggle with this and do so under the
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Lordship of Christ. It's just, but they don't care. These folks, these folks just, again, apostasy abounds.
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Um, we, we feel a growing sense as counsel is not necessarily the way of the gospel.
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There isn't of course, anything in here biblical. And like I said, the book they're reading, uh, is, is simply laughable on a biblical level.
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It really is. I'm sorry. Um, I can say that having read it. So, but the thing is, um, as a church within the reformed tradition,
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I remember folks, some of you have only heard that term in a meaningful context.
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That is churches that are truly reformed, that know what the reformation was about, believe in solo scriptura, believe in all the solos, the reformation, and not just in the sense of, uh, yeah, this is where we come from, but this is where we are.
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This is what defines us. Um, there are a lot of churches that self -identify as being in the reformed tradition that have become quite liberal.
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Um, believe it or not, Robert Schuller's church was a part of a reformed tradition.
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So just being a part of reformed tradition does not mean you actually believe the
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Bible, believe it's divine revelation, seek to live in light of it. Um, there are all sorts of churches.
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Uh, and in fact, the, the current uh, Bible of the gay
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Christian movement, uh, James Brownson's book, uh, Brownson is a professor at a reformed seminary, but obviously that does not mean a reformed seminary in the historical sense.
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Uh, but, uh, more in, well, it came from a tradition that was once associated, but has abandoned many of the fundamental assertions that were central to the definition of reformed theology.
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So as a church in the reformed tradition, we go directly to scripture to find counsel and to re -engage, notice re -engage the verses that talk about same sex activity.
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Um, for so long, this has been a case closed kind of issue for evangelicals, but in recent years, multiple respected evangelical scholars and theologians have begun to wrestle with this and a healthy debate is underway.
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It's not a healthy debate. It's not a healthy debate. Um, it is a revisionist debate.
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And the funny thing is there is no debate. We can't get Brownson to debate. We can't get these guys, we can't get
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Gushie and these guys to come out and defend what they're saying against meaningful opposition, against believing opposition.
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They want to pick and choose. Look at Matthew Vines. Um, so there it's, it's, there, it's not a healthy debate because it's not an open debate.
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It's not a debate at all. There is no debate in Ken Wilson's book. There's, there's no. Asking questions about what the scriptures say on this issue must always be coupled with asking why the scriptures say what they do and what kind of same sex activity is being addressed.
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In other words, they're accepting the revisionist idea, um, that, uh, this is either just excessive kinds of homosexual behavior or homosexual behavior, uh, that was limited to that particular time period, pederasty, um, you know, all the revisionist stuff on Romans one and, um,
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Arson of Coitus and all the rest of that stuff. Scholars and leaders who have previously been united in their interpretations are coming to different conclusions.
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Almost all of them ended up having, for some odd reason, gay family members. And they only changed their views once those family members became open about their homosexuality.
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Might have something to do with it. Maybe, possibly, who knows? You know, it does. It does.
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Um, we engaged Ken Wilson's book to see how this might be understood in a church with a wide range of viewpoints.
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How come you didn't engage anybody else's book? How about, uh, how about Gagnon's book? Or, um, uh, how about Michael Brown's book?
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Hmm. All right. And all of this we're looking to scripture to understand how Jesus would counsel us to care for the
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LGBT members of our community. And again, show me a single positive thing
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Jesus said about homosexuality. If he was God, human flesh, he didn't know about these folks. He didn't know about these folks.
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When he said what he said in Matthew chapter 19, he didn't know about these folks. One of the reasons why debates don't really take place.
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But anyways, just a, a, a note about, uh, the tsunami of apostasy along the same, uh, subject.
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Uh, did you see S. Bear Bergman's article, uh,
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March 13th, I have come to indoctrinate your children into my LGBTQ agenda. And I'm not a bit.
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Sorry. And basically he's admitting that for 25 years, quote,
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I'm here to tell you all that time. I said, I wasn't indoctrinating anyone with my beliefs about gay and lesbian and bi and trans and queer people.
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That was a lie. All 25 years of my career as an LGBTQ activist, since the very first time as a 16 year old,
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I went and stood shaking and breathless in front of 11 people to talk about my story. I've been on a consistent campaign of trying to change people's minds about us.
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I want to make them like us. That is absolutely my goal. I want to make your children like people like me and my family, even if that goes against the way you have interpreted the teachings of your religion.
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I want to be present in their emotional landscapes as a perfectly nice dad and writer who is married to another guy who used to be a girl, kind of who is friendly and cheerful and not scary at all, no matter what anyone says.
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So remember how for decades we've talked about the, the homosexual agenda and the press mocked us and laughed at us.
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And now a number of them that have been there all along going, yeah, of course, of course it was.
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Yeah, that's what we want. And it's, and it's really too late now. They're already there.
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I mean, if your kid goes to public school in California, he gets to be, it's demanded of him to celebrate
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Harvey Milk Day. Um, it's, it's there. Uh, Caesar has spoken and Caesar is a homosexual.
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Um, and you will, you will do what Caesar says, just, just the way it's supposed to be.
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Um, and if, if they're now so open as to admit that, yeah, that's what we've been up to all along, then they must feel like they have passed a point where it matters anymore.
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They can be open about it. They can be open about it. And, um, it shouldn't surprise us.
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It's just, it's just an indication that they recognize how far they've progressed and how absolutely confident they are, that the majority of the
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Western population is now so utterly reprobate morally and ethically that they can now come straight out and say, yeah, we want your kids too.
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And, um, if I had to guess they're right. I would agree.
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They're probably right. Even, uh, Al Moeller noted this next one always beats me to it.
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Cause he has a daily program and well, once in a while I get to beat him to something. If it comes over the weekend or no, not,
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I forget what it was. We, we got to that, uh, uh, Newsweek Newsweek article before.
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Oh, that's cause he was not, he was off for the holidays. That's what it was. That's what it was.
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Um, no, Benjamin Smith.
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I, I I've said that many times, even if there may be a genetic predisposition to homosexual behavior, does that make all the sin, which we do by nature, morally good?
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No, of course not. Of course not. I've mentioned that many times. It wouldn't matter if there was a gay gene that it's actually irrelevant.
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But the point is when you live in a secular society, genetics makes good, which is why they have absolutely no basis for the condemnation of pedophilia, bestiality, incest, polyamory there, there, there cannot be sexual or moral ethics in a secular worldview.
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Once you accept the idea that desire is what defines what is good. So they're, you know, they're, they're left with that.
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Um, yes, I'm, someone must be reading one of my books or something there.
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Anyway, even Al Mohler mentioned this one, furious
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Elton John calls for boycott of Dolce and Gabbana over IVF comments.
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Uh, did you hear a molar on it? He actually took, he actually sided with Elton John on one issue.
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And that was, he said that it was inappropriate for these guys to identify their children as synthetic.
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Well, that was a translation. And I think what they were talking about,
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I think it's down here. Yeah. Here, this translation is children of chemistry.
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That's their synthetic. Yeah. Um, one of the things they talked about were rented wombs.
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You know what they were, even though these guys are homosexuals, they recognize that redefining basic human terminology is self -destructive and foolish.
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Now they engage in self and destructive and foolish behavior, but they recognize that society is fundamentally and adversely impacted when you decide to redefine what the family is.
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And the, the outrage here is so clearly based upon, well, there'll be outraged no matter who says it, but the, the special outrage is due to the fact that these guys are known homosexuals and Elton John and others were wearing their clothing because they were homosexuals.
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And so if you're a homosexual, you cannot possibly hold different views than Elton John.
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Um, you cannot possibly believe that renting wombs, um, is an appropriate thing.
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No, no, no, no. Or is an inappropriate thing. Sorry. Um, and so once again, the, the totality, when you join moral and ethical insanity with totalitarianism, the result is ugly, really ugly.
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I mean, that's what you've got here. That's what we're, that's what we're facing is we are facing people who are so narrow and so, well, let's, the funny thing is we're so tired of the words being used of us.
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We've stopped using them, but these, these people define the term bigotry. They define the term bigotry.
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They are the perfect example of bigots. Um, they, they, they, when they will not even allow for the discussion of the possibility of there being any moral value to any other position than their own, we will debate the issue.
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We will discuss the issue. We will talk about it and we will lay out our cards and we'll say, here's why we say this.
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And here's why we say that they won't. It's just accept what we have to say. That's it.
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Period. End of discussion. That's all there is to it. Um, and so, uh, it, it, it,
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I didn't read in this one, but there were other articles
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I saw where, oh, the nastiness, uh, just pure hatred. Now we saw what happened to Chick -fil -A.
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I mean, to this day, to this day, if you are a leftist, commie, pinko, wacko, um, you show your credentials by hating
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Chick -fil -A. I mean, it is the most infantile, absurd, mind numbingly, jarringly, stupid thing to do.
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But that's how you show your credentials is you, you hate Chick -fil -A. And so now it'll be, you hate
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Dolce and Gabbana. Now I could care less. I go to Target, um, which gives money to homosexuals.
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So does everybody else. I mean, it seems to, sadly, it seems to be in our society today. The price of doing business, uh, is to be shaken down literally by these militant homosexual groups.
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And if you don't give us money, we will call you homophobes and we'll stand outside your stores until you give us money. Uh, and that's how they've, that's how they've, that's how
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I've done it. It's, um, it's all around us.
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It's all around us. And it's been all around us for a very long time. And that's what made it interesting that there was a story that at, uh,
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George Washington university, uh, a conservative student group at the
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George Washington university faces punishment, including the loss of its funding, refusing to engage in LGBT sensitivity training on campus.
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The students are now being condemned and attacked on campus by those who claim they're committing an act of violence for standing up for their members, individual rights, and Judeo -Christian values.
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The young America's foundation chapter, the Washington DC based academic Institute has refused to participate in LGBT sensitivity training recently made as a requirement.
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Last month, the GW student association, and you just gotta gotta love student associations passed a bill that would create a sense, create sensitivity training for student leaders regarding LGBT issues trainings, which would be led by the staff of the multicultural student services and LGBT resource centers would teach professors about gender identities and using proper gender pronouns student organization presidents and treasurers would also be required to undergo similar training on believable sensitivity training.
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Well, we've known about it for a long time. And from these folks perspective, again, these people are totalitarians.
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They are, they are the thought police, and they're on the campuses and they think this is okay.
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And they'll be running our government in 20 years. These are the people who will be making the laws in 20 years.
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I, I can't help but think of how horrifying it was to tour the
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Stasi prison in East Germany, the East German Stasi prison, where they kept political prisoners under the communist regime for simply thinking the wrong things.
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And unless God has mercy on this nation, that's where we're headed.
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That's where we're headed. Willingly. And the scary thing is they'll probably find some way of calling it constitutional.
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I mean, look, isn't it obvious if you've got mega churches in San Francisco, redefining the
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Bible so that its original words don't have any meaning anymore. What good is the constitution?
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It's original meanings don't mean anything to at least four and a half of the people on the Supreme court right now, anyways, and probably more like five, maybe even six.
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So if you're one of those folks that are out there, well, they can't do that because the constitution says, well, you and I know what the constitution says, and we know what its authors intended.
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But once you turn it into a living document, add a little postmodern thought in there, who cares what they wrote?
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It's irrelevant. You could, you could put that constitution in, in the old
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Soviet union. And as long as you can just redefine it, you know, words don't have meanings.
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They mean whatever we want them to mean now. Um, I need to, I need to grab my copy of 1984 and just bring it in here, have it on one of my bookshelves.
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You'll remember, remember here, here, new speak, true speak, all that kind of stuff.
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What was it? Ministry of truth. Is that what it was? You know, redefining things, changing words.
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Yep. There you go. There you go. And these people will be in charge and they, they are already so bigoted and so indoctrinated that they, they can't even realize, um, that they are acting more like the
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KGB on the campus of GW than, uh, than anything else. There you go.
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There you go. Wow. Uh, sorry to depress you. Let's change subjects, shall we?
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Might be, might be a good idea. Um, I want to in, uh, our final amount of time here, by the way, you notice that I'm able to look back and forth.
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I'm only using one mouse. Yes. Yes. I came in today, fired up the computers and one of mine said,
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Hey, there's a new version of transport or whatever it's called. What's it called? Um, what is this thing called?
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Teleport, teleport, new version of teleport. And, uh, as soon as I looked at it says supports
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Yosemite. Like, yes, it only took what? Four months, something like that. Uh, and, uh, so my, my
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Macs are now happy with each other and working again, uh, until the next update when everything is broken again.
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But at least it doesn't happen as often as it does on windows. So anyway, um, that's nice.
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And the last amount of time that we have here, I wanted to talk to you about a, an article that I just started looking at last time.
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And, um, uh, I, I made brief reference to this, but I want to really emphasize something.
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Um, latent flowers who will be doing the debate with me on Romans nine in, uh, may down in Dallas linked to this in his, the
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John six passage. And I, I mentioned what he said there, what he said in this article in regards to John chapter 17 and the split that he makes and this, this radical, um, hermeneutic that he is promoting that basically says, well,
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God was hardening all the Jews and that's, that's the immediate context. And so all these promises that Christians down through the millennia have taken as containing promises for all of us aren't for us.
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No, no, no. It, it, and it, it, I saw, it was interesting. I saw on Twitter, remember that guy years and years ago, the hyper, the super hyper dispensationalist that came up with a wacky interpretation of John six, a pure truth foundation or something like that.
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Um, by saying, well, John six is just about that time. And, uh, the hyper dispensationalist basically has, you know, all of that was anything before the cross is pretty much irrelevant.
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It has to be Paul's all the rest of the stuff. So it was a weird dispensationalist thing. Well, he was giving kudos to flowers on Twitter.
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Um, you know, uh, makes strange bedfellows, uh, this, this, uh, promoting the autonomous will of man over the autonomous will of God.
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But remember if, if what, if your ultimate goal is to have
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God's autonomy limited to one act, one thing,
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God autonomously chose to create autonomous creatures. And then after that, his hands are tied up.
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I did the one thing I there's my freedom. I did the one thing so that you can have autonomous creatures so that you can have synergism so that you can have corporate election.
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So that election is not of individuals from eternity past, but of a group that is filled by the autonomous creatures themselves.
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If that's what you want. And that seems to be what a lot of Southern Baptist want. You need to understand what the cost is.
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You don't understand what the cost is. This article, um, says, have you been given to Christ by the father?
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Now let me just stop and ask you, have you, have you, um, one of the greatest foundations for believing in one's security in Christ.
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One of the greatest reasons why anyone can, can stand against the greatest trials and tribulations that come into our lives is to recognize and believe that we, that God, the father as a sovereign and loving
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King has given his people into the hand of his son and has entrusted us to his care.
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The son has come down out of heaven, not to do his own will, but the will of him who sent me, sent him.
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And what is that will that of all that he's given him, he lose nothing but raised up on the last day. Our confidence is found in Christ, but not if you're a synergist and not if you're a corporate election.
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Give that up. You weren't given by the father to the son. You weren't back.
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You're arrogant to think that you were, he says, have you been given to Christ by the father?
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Have you individually been given to Christ by the father? Or are you one who believed in Christ through the message of those who were given to Christ by the father?
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So already, already you can see what it is. The only ones given by the father to Christ were the apostles.
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Only ones. If you thought you were, if that has given you solace and support and comfort in the darkest times,
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I'm sorry, you were deceived. You were misled. Yep. That's what
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Layton Flower says. The Calvinist interprets John 17 to mean that all of us have individually been given to Christ by the father in the same manner that his elect apostles were while Christ was on earth.
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Actually, of course, again, this is backwards. You trace the themes through John and John six comes before John 17.
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So the John six passage that in no way limits this to just the apostles.
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Oh, they're the only ones left at the end. Again, massive assumptions. This was, you know, this horrific terminology of the cannibalistic sermon where Jesus is seeking to offend these people.
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He's not seeking to offend them. He's seeking to speak truth, knowing that a person who is not being drawn by the father to the son will reject that truth.
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But this is going backwards. The theme comes from six into 17.
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The writer assumed that you would have read six and 10 and 12 and all of 14 through 16 before you get to 17.
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So you have all the parts put together. This is backwards. But again, the hermeneutical issues will come out in May.
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They will have to, but you have the quotation and then you have flowers saying clearly
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Jesus is praying for those he was with while on earth, those given the words and the authority to take those inspired words.
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The rest of the world, these are individual Israelites selected to fulfill the noble purpose for which the nation of Israel was elected.
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Now that's a, a lot of folks are going to go, well, what's he talking about there? Read N .T.
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Wright. He's been influenced by Wright at this point. That, that Israel was elected to do these things and now specific
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Israelites are being drawn out and the rest are being hardened to accomplish this taking of the gospel to the nations as if, almost as if that wasn't, hadn't always been
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God's purpose. Obviously it was, but anyways. They have been given the inspired words of God. This is what has set them apart as being authoritative in their teachings.
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Shall we presume that we have been set apart in the same manner as these divinely elected messengers of God?
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Is it not a bit presumptuous and maybe prideful of us to assume that we are set apart and given to Christ in the same manner that describes his chosen apostles from the elect nation of Israel?
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Let's continue to read the text. Then 13 through 19. Clearly his prayer is temporal, not universal, and that he is praying while he is still in the world for those at that crucial point in human history who have been entrusted with the foundation of his bride, the church.
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However, he does not stop there. He goes on to pray for those who will come to believe through their message. This makes the distinction very clear between the authoritative messengers and those who believe their message.
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Verse 20, my prayer is not for them alone. I also pray for those who believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one
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Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me. Notice he does not describe these who believe in this message of the appointed messengers as being given to Christ by the
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Father. Should we assume from silence that we deserve that kind of authoritative recognition?
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Could we be undermining the unique authority of the apostles' appointment as inspired deliverers of truth?
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Now, one of the things I really don't like about this is instead of saying it, he's asking questions.
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If this is what you believe, say it. Don't go, well, what do you think? Maybe we might be doing this.
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Might be a mystery. What do you think? No, say it out. Say it out.
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Say that what Christians have believed down through the centuries about how all of God's elect people are given to by the
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Father, to the Son. No matter how you become one of those elect, that's still what they believed. Say it straight out.
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No, only ones given by the Father, the Son, and the apostles. Nobody else. Nobody else. Quit with all the question marks and just say it straight out.
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Is it possible the phrase given to Christ is reflecting God's election of messengers who are set apart to ensure the purpose of Israel's election and given to Christ by the
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Father while Christ was on the earth? So when Jesus says, I've come down from heaven to do the will of the
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Father, and the will of the Father is I save 11 people, that's what it is.
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There you go. Yeah. Yeah, that's why God preserved that for us down through all these years.
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So we, like Jehovah's Witnesses, can read this and go, wow, it must have been special to be those people. Not us.
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Not us. It must have been special to be those people. There's a problem here.
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Let's look back at John 17 for a second because Professor Flowers missed something.
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Oh, yeah. I didn't fire it up, but I can do it real quick. And get that out of the way so that's not in the way.
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Let's go back to John 17 for a second. I do not ask for these only, but also those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you,
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Father, and me, and I, and you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me,
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I have given to them, that they may be one, even as we are one, I in them, and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and love them, even as you love me.
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Now, hold on just a second. Now we're talking about everybody, aren't we? We're talking about this.
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The transition's been made, and yet we're talking about unity here, and what's the rest of it that it says here?
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So that the world may know that you sent me and love them as you love me. Well, that's absolutely vital to the acceptance of the apostle's message.
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That can't be separated out from it. Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me.
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So I guess what Professor Flowers has to say is, well, yeah, it transitioned from 20 to 23, but now they're left out again.
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Now they're left out again. Even though it's been said that they may be one, even as we are one,
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I in them, and you in me, and this has to be all of the elect, unless you want to take 17 and cut it apart from 14 through 16.
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Oh, but wait a minute. He didn't apply this to 14 through 16. So I guess if we're going to be consistent, only the apostles had the
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Holy Spirit, right? All the apostles had the Holy Spirit. I mean, if we're going to create this context to say, this is what we have to apply to the gospel of John, we can't pick and choose what we apply it to.
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So John 14 through 16, after John 13, that's the end of the public ministry. He's no longer talking to the judicially hardened
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Jews. So I will send you the Holy Spirit, the place in heaven, only the apostles.
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Comforter, only apostles, right? How do you make a differentiation? And so let's come here.
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Father, I desire they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am to see my glory that you have given me because you love me before the foundation of the world.
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That obviously takes us back to the beginning, but now the transition's been made.
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Now we're talking about all who will be united in one and their testimony of unity will prove that the
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Father has sent the Son. Oh, righteous Father, even though the world does not know you,
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I know you, and these know that you have sent me. So these must just be the apostles. The fact that he's going back and forth between these two, well, we just,
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I guess that means, well, I don't know what it means for Professor Flowers, but he'll come up with something,
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I'm sure. Historically, Christians have understood this to recognize that while the apostles did indeed hold a very special and important position, the promises of salvation and relationship to the
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Father and the Son inherent in the words spoken to them are true for all
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Christians. I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known that the love with which you love me may be in them and I in them.
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So notice, I made known to them, that's the apostles, but I will continue to make known, well, how's he going to do that?
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The next 30 minutes? The next day? Or is this the ministry of the
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Holy Spirit? And hence, those who will believe through their testimony.
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You see, you turn the whole text into a mishmash of gobbledygook as soon as you pull out the thread of God's freedom and sovereignty.
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The rest of it becomes an incoherent mess. There won't even be enough time in May to point out the number of abject problems and contradictions that this will cost.
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But what I need you to hear right now is what the cost here is. Corporate election, we've already demonstrated many times in the past, as popular as it is, is indefensible, exegetical.
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You can't walk through Ephesians 1 and survive it. You can't. The grammar won't allow it.
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Would love to see Professor Flowers try it, but at some point, you're going to have to grab some external context and drag it in as a filter to get rid of what's actually there in the text, just like you have to do in John 6,
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John 17, so on and so forth. Corporate election robs you as a believer of the personal nature of what election and salvation is all about.
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Robs you of it. When Christ dies, he dies for a nameless, faceless group. Don't talk to me about he knew, because you have no meaningful way of explaining how he knew.
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I mean, if he knew, then it was personal and it was a part of his choice.
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You can play all the games of Boethius and philosophy you want. You either have to believe that he learned based upon choosing, or you can run off into middle knowledge and Molinism or open theism or something.
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But the reality is, if there is no personal choice on God's part, the atonement becomes for an impersonal group.
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And I don't know how you explain substitution there. How do you explain substitution?
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That God, based upon his foreknowledge, united a certain people to Christ in his death?
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Obviously, once you say that, then those actions are absolutely fixed in time, are they not?
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There's no way around that, is there? And so, beyond the impersonal nature of corporate election, where you die for a class, rather than a specific individual people, which is, when
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Paul says, I have been crucified with Christ, Paul does not say, I have joined a group that has been crucified with Christ.
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I have been crucified with Christ. It's personal. He gave himself for me. Those are not the words of a rebel sinner in hell.
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Though, from Flowers' perspective, that's exactly what a rebel sinner in hell could say, is
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Christ died to save me and I destroyed his work. That's what he could say.
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But now, in light of this, if you were so presumptuous, so prideful, so arrogant, do you see what's behind that terminology?
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Never crossed my mind to think of pride or arrogance or presumption to say that God's elect were given by the father to the son.
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Because, from our perspective, that's God's free, kingly choice.
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But you see, you got to understand, this is a fundamental difference of viewpoint. We look at this from a
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Godward perspective. The sinner just cannot. This is man -centered through and through.
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Once God exercised his one shot at freedom and bound himself through the creation of autonomous creatures, so that he's no longer autonomous, but he was, but he's not anymore because he made that one choice.
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Once you do that, there's no other way to look at any of these things but a very man -centered perspective.
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And when you look at these texts from a man -centered perspective, the result is that you could actually think that there's arrogance and presumption for the believer to say, the father, in his mercy and his grace, undeservedly gave me into the hands of his son and charged his son to raise me up on the last day.
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I have a perfect savior. This means that Christ is capable, just as Hebrew says, he is able to save to the uttermost.
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It never crosses our mind to think of that as pride and presumption, but it crosses
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Leighton Flower's mind that that is prideful presumption on our part.
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And the only way to explain that is if you think man is an autonomous creature and that it was my choice and the exercise of my will that brought me into this situation, that brought me into this relationship.
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Yeah, I'm thinking the prideful presumption charge is a little backwards there. Because again, we're man -centered puffing our chest out going, hey, hey,
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God can't do this without me. Yeah, there's your pride and presumption. Well, I obviously would agree.
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But I think it takes people aback to read articles like this and to realize that what is being said, despite attempting to make it seem, and a lot of people have said, you know what,
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Professor Flower is a lot nicer than you are. Maybe, could be possible. But you see,
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I think it's really nice to speak directly and to tell people exactly what you mean.
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I think that's something that's important. And if you're going to tell people that they're being prideful and presumptuous to think they've been given by the
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Father to the Son and that they're undercutting apostolic authority, I don't think it's really nice to do that with question marks.
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To just suggest it and maybe let them be led to that as their conclusion. Be straightforward.
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You don't have to use nasty language, but be straightforward. Tell them this is what the scriptures are saying.
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Because I think the only other worst thing that could come out of all of this is people going, well, you know, you've got this perspective over here and that perspective, and there's this other perspective over here.
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And I don't know that we really know. I don't know that we can even figure it out. And that's where a lot of people are today, sadly.
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They don't even think the Bible is clear enough on these issues to make it a matter of conviction.
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And as a result, they don't have a conviction on the subject any longer. It does seem to be in our politically correct society, the case that the plain spoken man is every day becoming more and more ostracized.
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Oh, vilified. And that is a serious problem for Christians. Because if we are not plain spoken people, then how is our message conveyed?
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How is there any clarity? We are all subjectivists at that point just deciding, well,
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I don't feel good about the way you spoke that way. I don't feel good about the way you spoke this way.
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And on and on and on. I think that camera is plugged in. No, actually, it's not. Really? Yeah, it's if you want to see.
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That's OK. Because we're actually out of time anyways. I'll be plain spoken and show you. That's what it looks like right now.
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That's good. Well, cool. All right. Well, we covered a wide variety of things today on The Dividing Line.
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But I thank you for coming along. I thank those of you who tuned in just to see if I would be able to string two sentences together.
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And I'm sorry to disappoint you that I was able to string two sentences together.
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But once again, my thanks to those who supported yesterday. And Lord willing, we will be back at some point on Thursday.
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Then I fly out on Friday, heading your direction, Florida. It's going to be a tough nine days or so.
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Going to be a lot of traveling, a lot of driving. I'm going to be logging the miles big time.
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But we're heading your direction and looking forward to the debates coming up this weekend as well.
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The dialogues, the discussions, everything going on. But we'll see in Florida this weekend.