Nuclear Strength Apologetics

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But we're really blessed he's gotten to be friends with some of our young folks who are on fire for God and and learning how to share the gospel and and Jeff is going to help us out this morning with some instruction on apologetics during Sunday school

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And I don't know what all he's going to do But he said he's gonna jump around on the pews and in that kind of thing and so it'll be real exciting

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So before he comes let's let's start with the word of prayer Father we thank you for this morning

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We thank you for this beautiful day and Lord a time when we can come together in your presence

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And your word says we're two or three are gathered in your name there You are in their midst, and we welcome you here

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Lord, and we pray that you would guide us our minds fill our hearts and Lord when we're through here today.

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Let us be changed by your presence. We pray in Jesus name Amen Let me introduce

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Jeff Durbin Morning guys

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Thank you guys for having me And it's so awesome because yesterday was extremely wet and uncomfortable for me coming from Arizona couldn't breathe

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I walked around my hands were I kept doing this on my hands. I was like well my hands are soaking Why are my hands soaking, but it's cooled down a lot today, so that was a gift from God He did it just for me, so you're welcome for that Well hey,

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I was told this week to also do the Bible study and do something on apologetics, and I thought

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Excellent. I mean the name of the show that I do is apology or radio some of you guys are fans of the show Holla, no, okay, all right

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Apology or radio if you guys have heard it. It's our biggest following for the show is is internationally actually does air all over Arizona But apology or radio .com

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is where you can go. I'm pointing you there That's a shameless plug by the way But I'm pointing you there because there's a lot of episodes that we do on apologetics on the show

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And we've done some really great ones. There's actually even some debate stuff We've done on the show so you can hear a lot of what I'm going to talk to you about today in Practice on the show so I encourage you guys to go there check it out

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And so I want to sort of like help you guys for stuff after this It's difficult to help us as Christians kind of shape our minds and think through things like apologetics and defending the faith

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It's difficult to do in a 45 -minute session. I mean you're going to get a lot I would have said it but it's just hard to just say in 45 minutes you're going to be fully equipped and ready to go and launch because a lot of This has to do with sanctification our own thinking about Christ is

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Lord and and and just what is Jesus Lord over? Spoiler alert everything okay, so But there's a lot that has to take place in our own thinking and it's sort of it

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It's it's a sanctifying process the transition, so I want to point you guys in the right direction there are also I think some good videos that are very helpful on YouTube, so if you go to YouTube just type in Jeff Durbin and Maybe debate or apologetics and a lot of videos that come up and so you get a lot of what

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I'm going to tell you about Today you'll get to hear it in a kind of live practice with some Mormon missionaries out of the average

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Jehovah's Witness Atheists that's all on YouTube so you can listen to it and a lot of the discussions are even like 35 minutes long

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And so you can kind of sit back and just sort of listen listen to it again Let me just start with kind of explaining to you at my personal biography is not altogether important But I just want to sort of explain to you how this was helpful for me when

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I first became a Christian It was I heard the gospel later in life I wasn't raised in a Christian home 17 years old heard the gospel for the first time and it was all new to me

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I mean coming to Christ everything was new and the whole I didn't know what apologetics meant I didn't know any of this

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But one of the first things that happened is I was I became like a fixture in a

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Christian bookstore It was called heaven Christian bookstore and I was there like every day after school and I used to sit on the floor at this bookstore and just open books and Just read all day long and and I was just just chewing everything up I can get my hands on and there was a guy in the bookstore that was that didn't notice that I was a fixture there and he used to just sort of give me free books and He he came to me one day and he said hey take this

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I have a gift for you and it was a cassette box of Tapes from dr. Walter Martin who wrote.

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Yes, what I'm talking about Kingdom of the cults and He's just one of my heroes of the faith.

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He wasn't reformed completely, but we'll forgive him for that but he he wrote a fantastic book the

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Kingdom of the cults and he did a lot of work for the gospel into the area of the cults and the religions and This cassette tape box, which is dating myself some of you kids

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There was this thing and it like this and you push play and it was really amazing You had to wait for it to rewind and it was just an incredible experience so in rotary phones

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But yeah, I'm 35 35 so Yeah, I'm not as old as you

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So Well, anyway, I have the cassette box and in the cassette box there are all these tapes and it's dr

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Walter Martin and he is he's doing what he would typically do and he would go to a city like to go preach at a

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City and he would they would blanket the area before He went out and they would tell all the members of the the cult or the religion.

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He was trying to reach dr. Martin's coming to town come and hear him speak and They would come so like Jehovah's Witnesses would show up Mormons would show up atheists would show up Agnostics would show up whatever he was dealing with they would show up.

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And so this cassette box that I got was all like the recorded stuff from all of these times that he went out and it was just Amazing.

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So a lot of my early training as a Christian came not necessarily by way of just listening to sermons

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It was that but it was also by listening to the biblical worldview defended against error and And and falsehoods and so that was one of the the greatest things for me as a

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Christian So when we started Apologia Christian Ministries before it became Apologia Church I really felt like what was one of the best things for me as a believer was listening to the faith the gospel being defended against falsehoods

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And so we immediately started saying let's just get it. Let's just let's get on it Let's we started looking for people to talk to and Mormon missionaries

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Jehovah's Witnesses atheists And we just recorded the conversations and that became it blew up I mean we have we have videos that have had just tens and tens of thousands of views

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We've had people from around the world listen to these videos Christians saying hey, I listened to it I got equipped and now

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I'm sharing my faith with my atheist friend my Mormon friend And so I've always felt it's one of the best ways to be equipped is to just listen and hear the faith being

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Defended and you'll learn about what the Bible says about God and the gospel and everything else So I just really want to encourage you guys to listen to that and it's just really encouraging for me, too

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Because I even heard a week ago Jehovah's Witness an ex Jehovah's Witness contacted us and this happens on a regular basis

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Contacted us from around the world. So hey, I was Jehovah's Witness. I listened to an audio recording of you talking to some

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Jehovah's Witness Teachers and I've come to Christ and now I've abandoned all that and it's amazing

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It's like it's because of a video we recorded, you know five years ago and placed up online And it's just an amazing amazing thing.

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So I just want to commend that to you guys but my Entrance into apologetics really came by way of someone completely ignorant.

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I don't know what it means to defend the faith I don't know what that looks like, but I remember that early on as a Christian I thought to myself like look like Christians like we're supposed to love truth and I don't want to run away from the world that's criticizing my faith or denigrating the gospel or Rejecting the

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Bible and I used to ask questions like well, how come is it that as a Christian? I'm saying that Jesus is the

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Messiah. He's so the heap Yeshua is Mashiach He's the Messiah, but yeah, there's

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Jews today people who say they're Jews who reject him as Messiah and I thought why? Why why is that I wanted to know the answer and so I dove right in like what are the scriptures saying?

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I thought that's sort of like the Christian mo That's at least what I'm getting from the Bible And so I would I would read

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Acts chapter 9 and I'd see the Apostle Paul Going as soon as he comes to Christ going into Damascus and he takes a beeline for Damascus.

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And what does he do? he doesn't Wait five or six years to see if he can create a relationship with somebody to sort of like earn the right to preach

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Jesus to them he goes right to the religious context to the synagogues in Damascus and Immediately he goes preaching

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Christ reasoning from the scriptures proving that Jesus is the Messiah And I noticed that was kind of the mo you look at in Acts where Apollos is he's mighty in the scriptures

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And he's eloquent and I mean the guy's like a rock star Apologist right and he's in public and it says that he he vigorously refuted the

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Jews publicly Proving that Jesus is Messiah and I thought to myself.

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Well, that's that's astonishing I mean Christianity is true objectively true. Jesus says he's the way the truth and the life

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I mean we say that we're following the one who is in fact the embodiment of truth early Christians went out into the

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Marketplaces the toughest levels of philosophical debate and discussion the Areopagus in Athens It was the intellectual capital of the ancient world

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It's the place of Socrates the place of Aristotle and Paul is going into those places preaching

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Christ again the religious context they're going into cities and they would preach the gospel and and and sometimes people came to Christ other times people

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Wanted to kill him and like Paul's being lowered out of windows like a basket and and I thought you know

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This is an amazing thing Christianity comes to the world with a boldness and with a fearlessness in a sense with the truth and that excited me and so But early on in my my learning how to defend the faith a lot of what

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I was learning When I went to Bible college, what is is what is known as evidential apologetics and essentially what that means is this

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I've got an unbeliever in front of me. He says I'm an atheist. I reject God's existence

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Well, my mo as a Christian was like, well, how could you do that? What are you nuts?

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Like what are you not seeing like look at all the evidence here and the fossil record There's no transitionary fossils.

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There's no speciation from one species to the next there's no macro evolution I would say look at the stars and I would read all the stuff on science and everything else and by the way

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It's good stuff. It's amazing Christianity Christians have a basis for looking at science and doing those things

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But I would notice something is that every time I would talk to an atheist or unbeliever And I would give him something would completely refute what they said.

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They were just on to the next thing I just confused me. Amen. Holla. That's me over there. That's it

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That's exactly I give him give him something and they were coming right back again with something else

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And it just seemed like nothing was well, what's going on here? And it seems like how could you not see this? What's going what's going on?

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What why why are you not seeing that you're just you just changed the subject when I refuted you

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How come and and it wasn't until really after? many years really engaged in the in the area of Evangelism and reaching the cults and and atheists and everything else and on the street doing thousands of encounters quite literally thousands

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That I really what I believed about God by way of my belief my belief about his sovereignty and salvation my belief about Anthropology the nature of man.

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Are we dead or are we sick? Spiritually and the Bible says that you're dead in your sins and trespasses

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Jesus says no man can come to me unless the father who sent me draws him He started thinking through the implications of my my belief about the scriptures the world

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What the Bible says about us and our condition before God and then really beginning to unpack the scriptures in areas like first Peter 315 which is by the way the charter verse of Christian apologetics and Christian apologetics

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We get that word Apologia from that word that's there in first Peter 315 for Christians to always be ready to what?

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To give a reason defense to everyone who asked of you a reason for the hope that's within you

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That's a daunting task right everyone everyone right, but do a gentleness and reverence

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But you notice something I left something out didn't I? And I quoted that the way that we all quoted as Christians always be ready to give a

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Reason defense to everyone who asked of you a reason for the hope that's within you to do a gentleness and reverence

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And I noticed something that's relieving something out As I began to study apologetics and began to learn from a man named

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Greg Bonson and his old lectures He's with the Lord now, but I got to get his lectures And those are missing the first part there there really should be the root of everything

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We're doing in apologetics, and it ends up helping us to not separate our apologetics task from our

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Evangelistic call and that is the first part to sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts and Thinking through that in first Peter 315.

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That's the powerful thing see I want you guys to think about this for a second and Peter Who wrote Peter?

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Good job. Okay. I'll be at some churches and takes me like five minutes. They're like he's tricking me.

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He's tricking me Peter wrote it and it's interesting because Peter wrote that somewhere near the end of his life before he was killed by the

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Emperor Nero And it's funny when you think about the charter verse for Christian apologetics to always be ready to give a reason defense

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You got to think about the peculiarity of that because it's the guy who's famous for denying

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Jesus I mean he's famous. He's in in history on record for Denying the

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Lord with an earshot of Jesus denying that he even knows him because he's afraid of a little servant girl not a big

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Dude Okay, do a little servant girl He's afraid so he denies Jesus and how here he is at the end of his life telling you and I To always be ready to give a reason defense

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And it's interesting because we think about the guy you would think well He really learned his lesson there something happened in that man's life after the resurrection of Jesus where he laid everything down for Jesus But the first part of that verse is what

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I'm going to focus on to start with an apologetics You want to know how to defend the faith? It's gonna have to start on a rock

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You see we can do apologetics in the wrong way if we don't start in first Peter 315 with the first part of the verse to always

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First set Christ apart as Lord we can do apologetics in the wrong way We can do apologetics in a way where we forget the person that we're talking to Knows God we forget the context of the situation.

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We forget the atmosphere We are actually breathing in at this moment You see at times we can do apologetics like I was describing with the unbeliever and we're preaching to him

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We're telling him or there's this evidence and then there's this evidence in this evidence We notice they just keep parrying right just keep blocking and they're just dodging and moving like why won't you sit still?

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Right, why are you moving around so much? And the truth is is we're forgetting what we believe about God We're not letting our theology actually meet the earth and roll and actually move in our experience with this

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Discussion with the unbeliever and here's the truth about it. The unbeliever truly does know God and he's not neutral That's what the

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Bible teaches Romans chapter 1 says that he knows God and that he suppresses God Romans chapter 1 verse 18

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How much does he know God? Well, it says that God has sent the message of himself to him That which is known about God is

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Evident within them for God has made it evident to them Romans 1 19 Now the question you have to get to is if God sends the message of himself

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Into a person and he's all -powerful Nothing could stop him.

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He spoke in the universe leapt into existence. He owns all of everything There's no maverick molecule in the entire universe

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If an all -powerful God sends him the message of himself into the heart of a person does it get through answer?

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Yes, so what's wrong? the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and Unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

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This person's suppressing the truth. That's why it's not sticking That's why they keep pairing. That's why they're so squishy So letting your theology meet the ground is first starting apologetics with a commitment to Christ as Lord This person is pretending to be neutral.

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He's not she's not they know God They're suppressing the truth about him and the amazing thing is as Christians We've gone into the area of apologetics and the unbeliever pretends to be neutral toward God and he wants you to go with him pretend neutrality pretend neutrality and the truth is they're not neutral and neither are you and the

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Bible clearly teaches throughout That there is to be no neutrality with us as Christians And I think that one of the reasons we have failed in our apologetics task is

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That we have not approached it in a way that keeps our evangelistic call of a command to repent and believe

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Attached to our apologetic in other words sometimes as Christians we take off The hat of the believer and our call to evangelism and we go over doing

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Apologetics as if we can throw potshot evidences at the unbeliever and hope that something sticks with them maybe if I have enough information about science and astronomy and and and all the the newest discoveries and in the archaeological digs, maybe something will stick in this person's gonna come to Christ and We're forgetting the person does in fact know

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God. How do we know that God has revealed himself? He's told us about this unbeliever and ourselves and what it takes for them to come to Christ And what we end up doing is pretending neutrality along with them

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And we can't figure out why nothing's working and the truth is ultimately nothing is working Because we have forgotten that our evangelistic call is to be connected to our apologetic task

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We're supposed to be in the business of calling a person to turn to Christ for salvation and forgiveness

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And if we approach apologetics without first a commitment to Christ as Lord over our reasoning over this discussion over the very atmosphere

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We're in at the moment if we forget that we cannot call the person to repentance and faith in Christ We've lost our ability to actually have the gospel call get into this discussion

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When we pretend that we're neutral and Christ maybe isn't Lord. I'll give you an example of what I mean here now

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This isn't meant to be an attack on the man just a discussion about methodology and a correction I think

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William Lane Craig is Is is somebody who who professes faith in Christ believes in Christ he affirms the resurrection calls

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Jesus Lord so amen amen amen Wonderful stuff. He's done some amazing things written books on the resurrection of Jesus that are awesome books for Christians They really are but in his debate with what

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Lawrence Krauss professor of physics at ASU William Lane Craig did a debate in the first five minutes of the debate

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I lost count as to how many times he talked about the probability of God that it's more statistically probable that God exists and He said to the audience basically,

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I'll leave it to you to decide Which in that discussion if you think about it if we talk about the probable existence of God, and it's more statistically probable

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But I'll leave it to you to decide I want to ask the question does that make Sense and does that comport with Jesus's call to repent and believe

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Jesus doesn't come to people and say to them If anyone comes to me

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He needs to decide in himself whether it's worthy to come and follow me with his life and lay everything down No, Jesus doesn't do that.

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Does he? Jesus says if anyone comes to me does not hate father mother sister brother wife even his own life

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He's not worthy to be my disciple Jesus saying he don't come to die don't come Period and it's amazing is that we think oh

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Jesus like you're gonna fail like the seminary course of evangelism You're kind of you're kind of bad at this but the truth is is that When we don't approach apologetics

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With our evangelistic call wrapped up into it in a way where Christ is Lord over our reasoning and over this discussion

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And we lose the opportunity to really have somebody come to Christ because we're not calling them to repentance

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We're not pointing out to them their borrowed capital that they know him and that they're they're resisting him at this very moment

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We're not showing them their feet and we have to do that It's amazing

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Jesus would preach the gospel to crowds of thousands and they would he would say something cutting to them and they would just Walk away from him.

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He's left with these other disciples little handful of music Do you also want to go and they're like, where are we gonna go? You've got the words of eternal life

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You see they knew what they were there for The other ones were just hanging out and Jesus was willing to tell the truth to people

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To whittle down the group to get to the core that knew him and he was willing to say it's better that you go instead of pretend and what we don't need to do is have

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Apologetics be something that placates to the unbeliever in order to get a lot of kind of converts We need to tell the truth in our apologetic and I want to start with the very first Foundation is and you something you should probably know you guys have got an amazing church and amazing pastors

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I'm a pretty astonished actually, by the way Bo is my new hero, by the way first Peter 3 15

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Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts is the foundation Listen, don't do apologetics if it isn't with a commitment to Christ as Lord because it's worthless.

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It is Worthless, it is a fruitless endeavor Completely and it's simply not true.

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We're not being honest if I pretend neutrality, I'm not even being honest Because I'm not neutral and here's the amazing thing.

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Neither are they? They know them the Bible talks to us about them and their condition and if it truly love them

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We're gonna stand on the rock of God's Word and here's the encouraging thing when you do you're standing on a rock They're on sinking sand

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Jesus said in Matthew chapter 12 verse 30 That if anybody builds their life on Anything other than the rock of his

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Word they are building their house on sand sand and the rock there

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Jesus refers to is the things that he says Now there is to be no divided one.

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No, that was Matthew 7 Sorry 24 through 27 Matthew 7 24 to 27 and Jesus says in Matthew 12 30 that if you are not with him

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You are against him Now that needs to be taken in as Christians today if anything else does listen

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We live in a culture today and this is where I'll get a bit preachy on this But we live in a culture today of Christians that will in the area of education or politics or anything else will pretend that there's neutrality and that you can have sort of before Jesus or not for Jesus been a neutral situation

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I'm not gonna say it because this is being recorded and I don't want it to get out because I have a lot of things I'm trying to do here, but there is an organization

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That I sat with this week major political organization major major political organization

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I Sat with the leader of the organization this week private meeting a couple hours long

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Might be given the opportunity to sort of like be able to be used for media to preach the gospel So I'm gonna take it.

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Thank you very much for that But in the discussion the person said to me well on a lot of issues. We really try to not necessarily be like overt

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In like our you know our faith like we do we know so we sort of trying to get to the societal issues You know and and she's like, but I'm but I'm noticing more and more that like as the discussions go on Like we're getting to the point where like we sort of have to like talk about the crazy

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I'm like and I said I said to her I said Yeah, I said, you know, it's interesting because when

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I when a person say for example Says well, I'm gonna sort of play neutral in the discussion with the unbeliever about the issue of homosexual marriage or abortion or whatever

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You know the savvy unbeliever Who is same -sex attracted if you as a

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Christian committed a crisis Lord want to sort of pretend neutrality in the discussion? About say same -sex marriage or abortion or whatever the issue might be

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It doesn't matter what it is if you want to pretend neutrality and that what's not because God says

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But sort of because it's hurtful to the woman or because you know It's destructive society and family and we don't love traditional values traditional values traditional values

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You know the savvy unbelievers gonna come to you and say So you're saying like this is your personal preference.

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You love traditional values and that's kind of you rah rah That's your that's your team and you say well, yeah traditional values traditional values

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That's why not because God says but because traditional values the savvy unbeliever will come to you and say well

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If you're allowed to have your personal preference So am I if it's not based on objectivity and certainty and it's just your personal preference

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Then you're allowed to have yours and I'm allowed to have mine and so is anybody else so I said this to this leader of this major political organization and I said, are you noticing that unbelievers are catching on?

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And she said yeah And I said you need to stop You need to stand on the rock in God's Word because that's where certainty is found

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And when you do that, then you will be effective. We've lost because we've pretended neutrality Christians pretend neutrality in the area of education

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We pretend neutrality in the area of apologetic to pretend neutrality in the area of politics We pretend neutrality neutrality neutrality and there is no neutrality

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Jesus said if you are not for him with him you are against him. I had a discussion with somebody about It was funny.

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I had a discussion and I I tried it. I tried it can I want to win believers? You know,

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I want to win unbelievers. I want to win believers And so a lot of times I try to use a very sharp tactic and so I ask questions once in a

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Facebook discussion I got lots followers from around the world on Facebook So try to use this to my advantage to make sure I can influence people for Christ around the world

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But I sort of like to ask questions because sometimes you say to Christians you say, um, you know, hey, you know public schools

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Or you know, you know, I've been at homeschool and and they go. Oh, no, you're saying this you're saying

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I'm wicked You're saying I'm wicked and I'm even way way way. So just discussions get bad.

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But um So I I said in this discussion. I said hey

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Jesus says in Matthew 12 30 Whoever's not with me is against me You guys agree.

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There's no neutrality with Jesus. You're either for him or against him. What do you guys think of that? Everyone's like yeah, no neutrality with them against him.

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He's the Lord You're either with them or against him and everyone's like fighting Preaching preach it Jeff preach it preach it preach it preach it.

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I'm like I am Ask a few more questions Neutrality no neutrality.

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No neutrality. And then I asked the final question question number five our public schools for or against Jesus a couple moments of silence and people will go well um

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Kind of not but uh, oh You see the truth is is as Christians we have to finally

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Rest on a rock or we say as Christians and our engagement with the world Has to be with a commitment to Christ as Lord and I promise you this

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You come at the world with a commitment to Christ as Lord standing on the rock of his word Believing what he says first and standing on him as certainty

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And you come to the world with this king over all things who has authority and rule over all things over everything in heaven and earth

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I promise you you will get massive resistance But that is where transformation will occur whether in whatever realm you're in if you stand on the rock of his word

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That's when change occurs when we have a clear proclamation of the good news That's not simply about personal salvation.

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It is that amen. Hallelujah. Give me the bumper sticker and t -shirt because I want to wear it But when we come to the world with the gospel of the kingdom that is about salvation and forgiveness

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But also about the fact that he is king and he rules and he's lord over all and you had to better confess it in a hurry

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Then guess what? Sometimes we go man. There's not a lot of people standing here Which is kind of what it looked like at the ascension 11 very confused disciples

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Didn't look like a big movement Look kind of sad really 11 very uneducated

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Fishermen in palestine mostly illiterate and uneducated place of the world in the in the old times

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So today On the other side of the planet in a room in McAllen, texas

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Believers who love the lord jesus christ because of the work of these believers 2 000 years ago

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So You know if we have to tell the truth That's where transformation comes when we tell people the truth and that's starting with the commitment to christ as lord

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Listen, if you don't start with him, you are on sinking sand period Let me start with with that and I wanted to make it as simple as possible

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Apologetics begins With first beginning with god, if you don't start with god, you have no certainty whatsoever

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You can't know anything apart from god the bible says that the bible says in proverbs chapter 1 verse 7

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The fear of the lord is the beginning of knowledge The fear of the lord is the beginning of knowledge.

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That's a bold claim. You understand how massive that is That's not just something that looks good on a graduation card

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That's an that's a that's a powerful claim That's the word of god saying the fear of the lord is the beginning of knowledge unbelievers want to heap scorn today upon christians

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You're a bunch of idiots. You're religious zealots. You're stupid. You're ignorant. You're not scientific and it's amazing christians today

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Have sort of like had the wind taken out of them to taken out of them and they'd sort of sit back

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Oh like, you know The unbelieving world has all this power and gusto and and zeal and and you know

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Maybe I am kind of stupid and but it's all about faith like just believe kind of a situation um, and it's amazing because They are living on borrowed capital not just from god on their daily bait on a daily basis, but also from us

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It was the christian worldview that gave them science and education and everything else All those things are from the christian worldview.

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You're welcome And christians today want to sort of like backpedal and pretend sort of let's you know

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Maybe they do know and like no they can't do science apart from god. They can't do logic apart from god

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They can't do math apart from god. They can't talk about ethics apart from god. And this is why the unbelieving worldview

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Is in collapse mode right now Give them a moment and they'll destroy everything in front of them without god their house sinks

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Science sinks without god Logic math sinks without god ethics sinks without god politics political situations sink without god right amen

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Goodness gracious. Look at our political situation today. Don't start with god as the rock of your word. You are in trouble

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Because you have no standard No objectivity. It's this guy's personal preference and pontification versus this guy's

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So we'll shut down the ocean Right, we end up in very very peculiar ways because of where we're at not starting with god

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So you want to start with god as the rock of your life stand on the rock of his word? There is no neutrality.

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Jesus says the very clearly if you're not for him, you are against him The bible teaches you start with christ as lord

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First to set him apart as lord before you defend the faith So, how does that look?

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number one Romans chapter one tells us the nature of the person we're talking to by the way so as to not be arrogant

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It's the same nature of you before jesus So calm down The first thing don't lop somebody's head off and go romans chapter one says that you are suppressing the truth and unrighteousness so repent

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It's it's take a look back for a second You are under the grace of god, which is why you believe and they need to hear this message

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Because they are in the same shoes that you should be in So there's no arrogance

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No pride Necessary. So when I say start with christ as lord of your reasoning

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I start with god and the rock of his word I'm, not saying to be a jerk Or pompous or arrogant as a matter of fact starting with god and the rock of his word should remind you very much but the fact that jesus says in john chapter 8 whoever commits sin is a slave of sin

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Which is all of us before him And then he says if the son sets you free you should be free indeed

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That's the truth of the scriptures. So no arrogance, but knowing romans chapter 1 says in verse 18 onward through 20 and 23

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He says very clearly that the wrath of god is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their

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Unrighteousness suppress the truth this person's suppressing the truth. They know god how much so it says that god has made himself evident

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To them and then it says in romans chapter 1 verse 20 that the creation is preaching at them

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It's screaming at them. That's the atmosphere that they live in Constantly You don't need to be afraid.

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You don't need to to sort of pull back And and and worry so much about necessarily what's coming out of their mouth.

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You need to remember what god says about them. They know him They know him clearly and it says in romans chapter 1 verse 20

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That they know him so clearly and he's so clearly perceived and known by every person in the world

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And the problem is suppression not a lack of knowledge or light but suppression

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That on the last day they are left in the greek unapologetus Without an apologetic

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Without a reason defense Isn't it amazing you're told as a christian to give an apologetic a reason defense to everyone who asks of you?

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And god says of the unbeliever. They don't have one and won't Have one before him.

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There is no excuse. How powerful is the christian apologetic against an unbelieving worldview?

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So powerful it has every unbeliever in their spiritual underpants with their mouth shut at the last day

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That's what it says So number one Realizing the context of the scripture says that the this person in front of me is an image bearer of god

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It is unavoidable undeniable and impossible to retreat from Romans 1 says that the creation is screaming to them

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So much they they are without excuse and I need to keep pointing them to that knowledge

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If the bible says the creation is shouting to them about god. I just need I need to keep pointing it out

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If the bible says they are suppressing the truth about god. I need to keep pointing it out And not let them get away from it constantly

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Second point After realizing what the bible says about the person and their nature and condition before god

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Second point is romans chapter 5 is something we should all know we talk about it as christians all the time But we don't always make the attachment to how to defend the faith against the unbeliever

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Very important romans chapter 5 says something very important very important about two people

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Romans chapter 5 tells us one what? First person is adam Adam is the head of the human race

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All who are in adam are fallen in him. He was the first created by god

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He is the federal head of humanity bible teaches romans chapter 5 that all who were in adam

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Die, that is that spiritual death alienation from god. They are separated from god They are condemned and they are lost all who are in adam

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That's where they're at So essentially you can see that there is a union a covenant union

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In humanity about everybody who's born into this world romans chapter 5 says it very clearly all who are in adam

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Die, they are covenantally linked to adam and they display it daily.

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Amen What was the big problem in the fall? God really say

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Half god said what's the question being asked constantly in the world and god really say

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Did he really say nah, i'll be a law to myself We'll make it up as we go We show that we're their kids constantly but everybody is covenantally bound to either adam or Christ he is the perfect representative of Redeemed humanity fallen humanity covenantally linked to adam

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Redeemed humanity covenantally linked to jesus essentially for all the young kids in the room.

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Let me just tell you right now You're either dead or alive Spiritually alienated from god or not redeemed in christ and to remember the context the person you're talking to knows

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God suppresses god and they cannot escape god screaming at them He's shouting at them every moment of their life

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And they're covenantally linked to god. Listen, they're an image bearer of god fallen in adam They know god and so apologetics needs to be aimed at covenantally confronting the person

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You can't escape this knowledge You know this god and let me just give you a way to do it

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One of the things I like to do is irritate the unbeliever And it's okay to irritate people for a godly reason, is that good?

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Okay. All right It's a good thing to irritate somebody for the glory of god, can we say that that's an awesome thing to do amen

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Okay I got one follower But here's what

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I mean by irritate them I like to keep pointing them back to their feet what they're standing on So what i'll often do if i'm talking to a crowd full of people i've done a lot of lectures

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Um for about four years I was preaching about eight times a week lectures publicly and everything else And I would have room full of mostly unbelievers and maybe one or two believers in the room

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And what I would often do is try to point them to their feet So what I would say to them is something to the effect of um

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When you all got out of bed today You pulled your covers aside you put your feet on the floor

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And you stood up And you did that and let me ask you a question

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Did you this morning think when you did that that you might float away to the ceiling? No And what did you do afterwards?

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You probably went and you went took a bathroom break. Amen Because based on past experience what you know, there'll be problems right later if you don't

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Right, and you all went and you brushed your teeth today And you amazingly amazingly today you turn the faucet and water poured out like you did yesterday

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Gravity's still working the same And you grabbed your toothbrush and you grabbed the toothpaste tube and you squeezed the toothpaste tube and toothpaste spurred out

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Just like you did yesterday. It's a miracle Right, or did you think about it in that way?

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No, you just walked around and did your business How about this today anybody drink water today? Yes, why'd you drink water?

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You're thirsty so what don't drink don't drink water what happens if you don't drink water

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You dry out then what so what so what stop who cares about drying out you die Everybody it's amazing today.

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You drank water because based on past experience, you know, what if you don't drink water you're dead

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And amazingly you guys all drove here or walked here this morning and it's it's a strange thing

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Today when you drove here in an amazing gravity held you down today, just like it did yesterday

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That's an amazing thing or how about this anybody have to get gas today? Not did anybody have did anybody go to get gas today?

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Everyone got really quiet. Maybe I said that too fast Okay, correct when you went to put gasoline in your vehicle today

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Why did you do it you looked at your car you looked at the the dials and everything else you said oh i'm low

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I need to put gas in my car because based on past experience I know this car functions in a certain way in this world with gasoline and I gotta get some gas

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How come you didn't stop to get milk to put in your car Because based on past experience, you know

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The gasoline works in my vehicle and you base all of your life based on past experience into the future

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You know how this works and right now amazingly You right now are depending upon the uniformity of nature this very second

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Right now as you sit there and guess what you're doing it right now And you did it again and you're doing it again and you just did it again.

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It's inescapable You just did it again. No one's holding on to their chairs right now Like going any moment

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Not very moments You know the god that i'm talking about and the reason you're complaining right now is not that you don't have

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Enough light or evidence is that very clearly you're at war with him You need to come to him for life and for forgiveness and peace.

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I was just like you before christ At war with him a sinner fallen and a rebel and you're displaying your rebellion at every second right now

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Oh, no, i'm not you can't have so really can I choke you to win the debate right now? Can I what if I just get really irritated right now with you in this discussion and to win

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I kill you Sound good. You okay with that? No, you couldn't do that. That would be what what would that be?

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What would it be wrong? Oh, so there are odds for ex -shellfish

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The point is, is to point to them to their covenant status before God. They know Him. They're an image bearer of God, and you have to keep pointing at their feet.

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I'm going over here, but, oh well, okay, so here we go. I'll give you one more thing. I have lots more to say, but maybe

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I'll do it in the next part of the sermon. So let me point them to their feet. Point them to their borrowed capital. But one thing

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I have to say is this, this is very important, is the Christian apologetic is rigorous. It is devastating.

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It is absolutely devastating. You stand on the rock of God's Word, it is unbelievably devastating, and it leaves the unbeliever without a way to speak.

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They can't even talk without Him. They can't even talk without Him. They have no basis for talking, speaking, conversing.

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That's how devastating this apologetic is. But can I leave you with something? Very important. There's another part of the verse that we forget as Christians.

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We get the middle part. Reason defense to everyone who asks of you. Reason defense. We've forgotten the first part,

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Christ is Lord first. And we often forget the last part, gentleness and respect.

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It's an amazing thing, because as a Christian, you need to always be committed to something, and that is that you die for Christ, always.

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And you don't ever compromise as a Christian. We need to say goodbye to the day of Christians who are not willing to die for their faith.

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That's actually what's probably mostly wrong in America today, is that we are too afraid to die. And when you came to Christ, that death is supposed to have already occurred.

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So what's wrong with us today is so many Christians that want to placate and be neutral with society, I question whether they've actually died in Christ.

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Because when you come to Him, you're supposed to have died and risen again. Christians early on, and even overseas today that are being slaughtered for their faith, they're dying and they're being led as lambs to the slaughter, and they're happy to do it.

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Why? Because they already died. They already died. So don't ever compromise.

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You need to be bold always. The New Testament gives us that bold proclamation. But I want to say something very important to us as believers, and this is a necessary corrective, especially to Reformed Christians.

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It's a necessary corrective. Reformed Christians are known for our rigorous commitment to the

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Scriptures and to what does it say, but we oftentimes as Christians, particularly Reformed Christians, forget there's a whole other element we are missing, and that is that we will often take what we know about God and what's true in Scripture, and we will cut you to pieces with it.

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And we forget the fact that we weren't always there. We didn't always believe these things and know these things, and we were redeemed by God by His grace.

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I am not saying placate and don't be bold. There is a time for fire, and it's often.

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But there is also a time to be a priest, and there is a time to be a person that remembers to minister to the person.

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And let me just give it to you by way of a story. There's an old story of a Methodist congregation. Now, don't turn off, okay?

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It's a Methodist congregation, and this Methodist congregation had lost their pastor and their preacher, and they called up to the district, and they said, hey, send us a guy who preaches fire and brimstone.

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We want... Where's the good spot? Okay, so usually pulpits have like the banging spot.

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Where's it at, Pastor Ron? Okay. We want a fire and brimstone preacher. Where's he at? We want the fire and brimstone.

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Send us the fire and brimstone. So the guy says, well, there's not many of those around in the Methodist, okay,

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I got one. Okay. He sends the fire and brimstone preacher. He gets to him, and then fire and brimstone.

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Two weeks later, they fire the guy. They call back to the district. They said, send us a fire and brimstone preacher.

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He's like, well, he was fire and brimstone. All right, I got another one. He sends another fire and brimstone preacher to the congregation.

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The congregation, two weeks later, sends him back, fires him, says, send us another one.

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And this guy's like, what's wrong with these people? Okay, I'll send you another one. They send a fire and brimstone preacher.

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He gets there, and then it's all good. Thirty years goes by.

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Thirty years goes by in this congregation. This guy's there preaching. There's fruit and ministry. People are coming to Christ.

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Church is growing and flourishing. It's amazing. Thirty years later, amazing. And then finally, the guy, the head of the district, is kind of irritated as he thinks about it.

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Thirty years later, he says, wait, wait a minute. I sent fire and brimstone, fire and brimstone, fire and brimstone. What was with the third guy?

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So he calls the guy that had been there for a long time and says, hey, like, I'm kind of curious, like, as to know, like,

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I sent fire and brimstone preachers, like, you know, those times, and how come you kept the third one? And wasn't, wasn't the first one and second one?

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They go, oh, yeah, the first and second one were fire and brimstone preachers. And they go, what was the third one? He goes, well, yeah, he was a fire and brimstone preacher, but when he preached about hell, he sounded like he didn't want us to go there.

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Do you get the point? As Christians, we need to recognize that we have to have truth always and die for it, period.

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But you can't forget the fact that when Jesus preached the truth to people, for some odd reason he would confront people on their sin and call them to repentance, and for some reason there were a lot of sinners that loved to hang out with him.

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It's because they understood that he said he came to lay his life down for the lost, to seek and save that which is lost.

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They understood that Jesus told them the truth about their condition in hell, but he clearly taught them that he was there for their salvation.

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And if the unbeliever I'm talking to only hears from me the truth without my earnest desire that they know

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God, then I've lost. Let not any unbeliever say of you that you, you personally are nasty.

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Let them hate the gospel. Let them be offended by the gospel. Let it be the stench of death.

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But if they say of you that you stink, personally you're a jerk.

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That's a problem. I'll leave you with this. I know I'm going way over, but I want to say one more thing. Tons of examples

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I can give to you guys, but I want to share with you, a couple weeks ago I was in an abortion mill, and this is different than a story

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I told last night. This guy was there and he was on fire against me. He's like, he's like, and you religious right wing,

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I was like, who's talking about right wing? I'm here with the gospel. What are you talking about? So we're going and I'm talking, and he is just mad and ferocious, and he goes, you know what

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I'm going to do? I'm going to stand right here the whole time to stop you from talking to these ladies. I'm going to stop you from talking to these ladies going to the clinic.

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I'm going to stop you. I hate you guys. And then I'm just talking, I'm talking, I find out he's an atheist, and now I'm just going at him, going at him.

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Two hours, I'm sweating, I'm tired. I'm tired. It's so ferocious, this conversation on his side, that it's wearing me out.

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Other people walked away from the conversation because this guy was so ferocious, but I'm taking him down, taking him down, taking his legs up, taking his legs up.

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Finally, by the end of the conversation, he's just quiet. He's like, I don't have anything else to say.

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I was like, I know you don't. And he goes, you know, I'm going to say something to you.

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I didn't think I would say to you at the beginning of the conversation. He goes, I don't like that you're here, and I don't agree with what you're doing, but I have to admit something.