The Laborers' Podcast- Theology Proper

Thank you for watching tonight. We're going to be talking about Theology proper the doctrine of God.

We hope you will stick around and join us Welcome to the laborers podcast, which is a part of the truth in love

Network Join us as together. We strive to grow up together in all things into Christ subscribe and follow the truth and love

Network on Facebook YouTube rumble Spotify and iTunes now, let's join our laborers for tonight's broadcast

Welcome to the laborers podcast again. We thank you for watching. We can pray for you Let us know if we can answer any questions.

We'd love to try to do that If you have any critique, we'll take that as well But the comment section is open and we would love to hear from you at least tell us.

Hello We'd love to hear from you. I'm with big John Who has who does real talk with big

John podcast Andy Cain by his grace podcast and Tyler better the word

Fuck. Yes. How you guys doing tonight? Well happy to be here It was that the first time we've had that in true

Second time second. I think it was really cool Thank You Tyler and big shout out to my buddy with a golden radio voice in Emporia, Virginia Andy Lucy for providing the voiceover

Absolutely. Thank you to all those guys. I think it looked great too. And tonight's tonight's gonna be the first night for the outro video

Tyler's new outro video. So it will be the first night for that. So Please let us know that you're watching say hello.

We'd love to hear from you Glad you guys are doing well. Thank you for joining us tonight

Let's start out with this before we get into theology proper and talk about the doctrine of God I sent you guys the question that I wanted to ask

Initially start off with and I'll tell you where the question come from So it come from two places

Not too long ago here locally. There was a church who had a church sign and It it took a pretty firm

Stance a stance that I agreed with on this gender issue now

Pictures were taken it blew up the internet. There were strong supporters and then they took flight for it

So it wasn't long after the and and I'm not I'm not making any guesses on motivation

Timing or whatnot. I'm just kind of reporting on what happened. So there was the sign and then

Not long after the the post on Facebook took place They changed their sign and the sign currently says

You are welcome here That's example number one example number two there was

Which is interesting. There's another Facebook group that I'm a part of and People will sometimes ask

I'm new to the area. I'm looking for a church. Can you recommend a church and People will start, you know

Commenting about their church and they said we were looking for a church that is welcoming and somebody made the comment.

Well Shouldn't every church be welcoming? So my question that I want to post to you guys when you're driving down the road and you see a church sign and it says you are welcome or it says

All are welcome here How do you as ministers as as guys who've studied theology study scripture?

How how did you respond it in your mind to a sign like that And I can give you my response kind of at the end whoever wants to start

Take away brother Andy Well, I Think Rob likes to get me in trouble.

I'm just the older I get and a lot of this has to do with The way

I was raised the way I spent a lot of my early adult life so the older I get now,

I'm It's not that I'm special or more solo script or than everybody else, but I find myself becoming increasingly adamant about it so in My understanding or in my view a church sign should probably have something to focus on something.

That's biblical. So I Would put something to the effect on a church sign of we worship

Christ We want to see Christ build his kingdom something that's 100 % biblical accurate because to say all are welcome

You're opening yourself up to a man -centered political understanding of that of that statement and As much as people don't want don't want to hear it

The church isn't for unbelievers. It's not it doesn't mean that Obviously it goes without saying we're commanded to Demonstrate the love of Christ first and foremost

Among the brethren and that's how the world John 13 35 and 37 knows that we're his disciples is by how they see how we love each other but within that we also demonstrate love of Christ first and foremost by calling all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel but we can demonstrate love by You know helping people so on so forth

What really what it really comes down to is are you gonna bow to wokeness or are you gonna bow to scripture and people that Want to slide and see if we were to say

Anyone that is a Christian that professes the name of Christ wants to come to our church in General, they're always welcome, but there's always investigation.

There's if a church is doing things properly They're gonna investigate that person's doctrine before they would add them to the rolls men and membership

You would not have a Trinity denier that is welcome at your church unless they went through a repentance of that denial, so This idea that just in a blanket way all are welcome is not in true in and of itself now

Would I say that an unsaved sinning person is welcome to attend a church service?

unless they're causing disruption or of some kind or Something beyond that.

I See no reason to deny them entry to the building But you would never cater change or alter a worship service to meet their needs because they're coming from an unregenerate state and so That's just kind of where I would start it

The other guys may take it a little further or deeper, but that's just kind of my initial thought there um

I'll I'll build off of that a little bit if I couldn't pull that thread a little bit That just that phrase all are welcome

We are not In opposition to that phrase all are welcome. That's not something that we the four of us are saying.

No, that's wrong Some people aren't welcome, but we are saying that there are Nuances to that phrase there.

There are some context points that we have to identify. What does it mean to be welcome? What do we mean?

What are we welcoming them into? Um because how I'm driving by that sign

I might look at that and think welcoming in one way say they will accept me for who

I am and just Not say anything about it. Da da da and that's maybe not the what's being intended by the sign.

That's maybe not An accurate representation, but that might be something that comes to mind when

I see that word welcome And so sometimes we have to take a step back and think about what what what the sentence truly means

What is the the authorial intent there? Because in a sense, yes cannibals are welcome to attend at your church however, when we say welcome, we don't mean partaking in that and being

Promoted in that sense in the church that this is good behavior Because if you are going to be quote welcomed into the body

As opposed to welcomed into the building That looks very different. I think that To some degree

I See exactly what you fellas are saying and and I don't want to come off as just being an odd dude out

But to some degree I think you have to take More than just the context of the statement so much you have to take the context in what you're living in Ultimately, you're right.

The church is the called -out Bride of Christ and the called -out Bride of Christ is Not chosen by men, right?

This is we this is a divinely Orchestrated salvation that we have in such a manner that I can't

I can't just say You're welcome to become part of the Bride of Christ.

This is do you have to take this up with the Lord? This is something I can't do For for anybody and nobody can do that for anybody save Christ alone

The the the thing is that we have built our are the way we do church in America Around the idea that Sunday morning is also evangelism moment so now while I think that it is

Biblically Incorrect for Sunday morning to be a time set aside for evangelism

That's the world we find ourselves in we finders we can't we can't change the times that we live in where everybody that's in Everybody that's in the country is gonna know

Well, you can't go you can't be a part of the church unless you're part of the Bride of Christ So we've confused what church is so bad that people who are members of church still think it's a building at times

Not not an organism, you know divine organism. So I Don't have a problem with a sign that says that Given the context that we're in right now in America that if you're going to if you're going to have a ministry

That has a Sunday morning that is equal parts Dedicated to evangelism to the lost as much as it is to try to disciple the saved

He might as well you might as well and But I'd have one quick follow -up.

I think what you take what Tyler and John said and combine it And that's what I was trying to say you it's pretty much what cuz

John's right What whether we agree or not we live in the times we do church is the way it is.

So in some cases Some people may only hear a gospel presentation at a worship service on a

Sunday morning So we need to make sure we're always balanced and understand that Yes If someone's coming and they're clearly not saved if they start to ask about church membership then you go to Tyler's side and what

I was saying you have to explain what that looks like but sure we all I Don't see now. I am opposed to Make it because of my independent fundamental background.

You should not be making every single Sunday morning I'm not saying John's saying this but you should not make every Sunday morning an evangelistic service

It's not there to have a Billy Graham style evangelistic service the money more the Sunday morning worship service if your church has one should have more than just that but I Don't see anything wrong with I mean you should be calling people to repent and believe you and if you're 100 % sure

That everybody in front of you is saved. There's nothing wrong with that. So I think there's a great balance in there.

Yeah Yeah, I'm like you Andy. I think everything that you guys said is Points that I would make from from my perspective.

I don't think that that I could Put up that sign Just because there's too many qualifications

Involved that you would have to make and you guys hit on just about all of them. There's just Exactly, you don't know the context of the church and why they're writing it or or their motivation behind it what they what they mean behind all are welcome here because you can have this you can have a liberal woke church that Means that all are not just welcome into the building but welcome into the body of Christ But you could have you know a more conservative church

That means you are welcome to visit but then you would have to like you said Andy make those qualifications

Later, but then you got a you would have confusing confusion. It seems like with that Well, I thought

I was welcome here, you know, once you start making those qualifications Well, you are welcome to visit but you're not welcome to join.

Well, that's not what your son said So there's just so many qualifications You just took me back to a dark place to work at a food line how many times have

I heard that's not what your side said So Just for your son.

Yeah just for clarity and confusion purposes

You know, I'm totally I'm totally on board with what Tyler was saying, you know people all people are welcome to to visit and And join and I think it was you

Andy that said as long as they're not being disruptive But to avoid that confusion and and all that other stuff and all the other qualifications

I I personally would would avoid it. It just seems like a We could put more biblical things on us.

Someone's attending your church and they're unregenerate It certainly could not hurt them because they're already ungenerate

So to be there and say Saints Singing and worshiping God and be under the preaching of the Word of God. It might just convict them further

Right. So I ask this question for those who are watching if I'm gonna minimize my screen so I can see any comments that may come across If If you're watching and you were born again in a church service

Comment I Wasn't you know, I went to church for the first time as a Christian When I went to church as a

Christian was the first time I've been a church as Christian I was saved in my living room so The times that I went to church prior to salvation obviously

I wasn't I was welcome to come and sit every Sunday Although that was completely unregenerate

But almost everyone I know Was born again at a church service which begs the question

We Would it make us not wildly hypocritical to say that while I was saved

During a church service. You can only come to this building if you're a Christian. I Mean to some degree

Well, let me add to that that I was saved in a church camp I've been going to church for the better part of a year

And so I went to camp with the youth group and that's when that's when I was saved So again,

I was welcomed into the the the building I was welcomed into the activities Just not the the the role so to speak.

Yeah Into the Bride of Christ as John so eloquently put

Now I went through and and this was I Guess a big

Southern Baptist thing way back when but I went through a salvation class

Signed the back of the book indicating that I prayed the prayer But I don't believe that God saved me and until later and it was in in my bedroom

By my bed. I'll tell you this. I was a I Was raised in a

Methodist Church went to something called catechism at 13 years old or something like that was when we joined the church

They Sprinkled my head with water the following Sunday after alcoholic training never one time was

I asked if I was a believer Never one time. Well, did anybody pray with me?

Anybody set me aside and explained to me. I was lost or who Jesus was I Was brought in sit down fill out this paperwork do what the lady says don't cause no trouble next week

I got sprinkled by a preacher ain't got a clue why I'm sprinkled out now I've given a job with a funky looking candle thing

I'm supposed to light a candle every Sunday and then put that sucker out before we go home. Don't burn the church down These are your jobs.

They give me a lighter. I Was to keep up with it and I was supposed to change the tape deck underneath the pastor's pulpit whenever he put his microphone on That's how you recorded the sermons and give out to the shut -ins who couldn't make it to church on Sunday.

Not one time Was it was the things of God ever expressed to me in such a manner as I might know that I was lost but I was most certainly welcome to be there and Whenever the preacher would preach things that would cause me discomfort.

I Would I would get up like I'm going to go to the altar my mom, but what are you doing? I was like, I think I need to be up there where he stays talking about it

He hit me between the eyes with that just sit down. Don't make no stink. Okay Yes, ma 'am.

Yes, ma 'am so, I mean you got to understand that the culture we find ourself in is radically depraved in such a manner that if You take a billboard sign that looks like a drive -in movie theater screen and you put your qualifications for entering in in such a way

That you have to be a theologian to understand them You're you're not you're not going to be serving anyone

Except for a handful of folks who are already say which is fine. I suppose that's fine but if If the impact is to do as much as you can with the time that you have here

I think you need to not be seeker sensitive and not be you know, not be out there trying to get

Souls to the polls or nothing like it, you know, don't make your church about elections. Don't make your church about you know

Barbecue fundraisers and all this other stuff Make your church about worshiping Christ and teaching who

Christ is but also make it up making sure that you don't forget that you're supposed to love and Preach the gospel in love in such a way that those that are lost might be convicted and drawn

It's a delicate thing to feed sheep and to protect sheep at the same time to be a

Minister to those who are not yet sheep in the fold or at least not sheep in your fold, right?

Another thing that I thought about as I was thinking through the the church sign question was Unpacking those qualifications, you know

If you if you do have the sign all are welcome Somebody comes in and you stop you have to start unpacking all those qualifications and you know, a lot of times you get pushed back

You're talking about You use the word hypocrite a lot of times where you people don't go to church because there's too many hypocrites in the church

You know, you always get a lot of pushback And I was thinking about you know One of those qualifications that we have to unpack and explain to folks is when it comes to membership and and joining

Joining the body because you were a believer in Christ, you know, it doesn't mean that we are without sin

We are just people who admit that we're sinners, but we're repenters Sure. Oh, you know, we don't we don't come in and Ask people to accept our sin like Tyler was saying, you know accept us as we are that we may continue in sin

What we mean is we are believers and Jesus has made us repenters we see that it's we see that our sin is wrong and against God and we we were continue to repent and Move away from it

Well, so I mean it's Proverbs 11 1 it says a false balance is an abomination to the Lord and just wait is his delight

I always preach against the extreme. So if your church is one that Would focus extremely hard on we don't want you in the building unless you're already saved an active

Christian well Then you have a church full of pharisaical fundamentalist morons If you take it so far to where every

Sunday morning You wish Billy Graham was there to have an altar call and you it's an evangelistic service Well, then you have a church full of lazy

Christians who think that evangelism only happens inside the building So the balance is in the middle. It's a combination of all of it

It's recognizing that church services can be a tool to reach the loss, but ultimately it's us going in the world

Imaging Christ calling men to repent everywhere in Walmart especially

Walmart Yeah, well, I mean you're 100 % right our the ministry is to be carried out by the church

Church singular made of many members Our job is that we're to be a living epistle of who

Jesus is everywhere We go so that when we're asked why we're this way we have a reason that we can give them and whenever they are

Regenerate whenever they're born again We bring them in to our own congregations or encourage them to go to someone else's whatever the case may be to where they can be

Discipled which is what the church is made to do is to make disciples That they go out and they make more converts and then they bring them back.

That's that's the way this goes Ephesians 411 the the Concept however has been lost for so long

That we find ourselves doing this my sermons that I did

I teach and I teach more than I preach not because Well, it's because it's more comfortable to me for some degree if I'm being honest

But the other end of it is is because there's a lot of people at our church that are Christian or soundly saved But they've there's so much that they've missed out on over the years because folks have been content with them praying

Understanding who Jesus is enough for salvation and being faithful members to show up to all the events

They give money every week and They don't get in any trouble and then a lot a lot of pastors have been okay with that and I'm not okay with that Yeah, I'm not okay with that.

That is not that is not being biblically a good steward of the time Christ has given us on this earth

Our job is to spend all of our days telling everybody we can about Jesus.

That's our job, right? if I could just Before we jump into the the meat of the program here tonight if I could just restate some of what you just said

We don't we don't need a sign that says you are welcome here if we're going out

And behaving as they are welcome true enough and so exactly

I Think I think that should be our behavior And we won't need that sign

So let's let's jump into the meat of the program Talking about theology proper and the doctrine of God and and hopefully we can get through a good portion of this

John you were explaining to me this earlier So I'll give you the first question.

What what is theology proper? What did you find out? So according to Google theology proper is the study

I'm just not getting over my cough The study of God and his attributes now

I was ignorant and thought it just meant a formal study of who God is So as I said before I before I just take that to the to the guys

Let me let me run that through the old Google machine here. And whenever I saw that pop up I said, oh, oh, okay

Well, I see I see what you did there Google the fact is that undoubtedly theology proper is a study of the attributes of God and dives into the

Trinitarian attributes or the Trinitarian aspect of What we refer to as the Godhead Absolutely, I had to look it up to hang a lot

Next let's get into the good stuff then. So Andy, how can we prove

God exists? Man based on whose terms

So that's that's the question. You have to ask if you if the atheist Asked it's gonna be a different answer see cuz this all still when

I was looking these questions. I was like For the vast majority of them. I could probably get the same answer for each one and it's gonna probably bore people

But it really is simple my friends There and this is

I'm sure plenty of other people have said this. I've just personally heard. Dr James White say it the most often so I usually

Refer to her refer to him when I quote this but I've heard him say it Durbin said it Anybody online you've

I heard him say it a lot of people say this There are no neutral worldviews

There's not you this whole especially in politics.

It just drives me up Three walls when you hear these people talking about well,

I'm non part. It's like no you're not come on It's it's not possible.

There's no neutrality. It's a myth So once you get past that it's very easy to deal with this

The atheist comes to this with presuppositions. I believe in presuppositional theology.

That means you can't even begin to understand your world Morality creation any of that existence without understanding in the beginning

God The Bible doesn't seek to prove his existence. The Bible assumes it why cuz

God wrote it He isn't seeking to prove existence. He God has no

Requirement to prove his existence anyone and he's even even if you get into scripture where Jesus was telling

I can't remember who was in front of him at the time But I remember he said, you know, you won't even believe Moses and the prophets

I could you know Do this do that? You're not gonna believe why cuz you're unregenerate the unregenerate heart

Will not because it doesn't want to it's a John chapter 5 in it. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. There you go Yeah, I want to look at Psalm chapter 2 well not chapter such

Psalm 2 here um, I was thinking about his Wednesday night at church when our pastors names

Andy to He let me preach this past summer I got there and said, you know The best thing about this is if I completely messes up we can just blame

Andy and nobody don't think it was me And he chuckled at first but he was like, wait a minute

But this song popped in my head where it says, you know why do the nation's rage and the people's meditate on the vain thing the kings of the earth take their stand of the rulers take counsel together against Yahweh and his anointed and The without we're going through reading the whole song for time purposes purposes the bulk of the theme of the psalm is there's no neutral worldviews these people rage the anger you see the

Hatred you see the rebellion you see it's because they know there's a God Ecclesiastes talks about how

God put eternity in man's heart. He has general revelation. He's without excuse Man knows they're there.

So when you get past that when we talk about proving that God exists, I don't believe we should do that through the standpoint of we're actually trying to prove he exists or not because What goes along with that is

I'm gonna prove to you God exists and then you'll believe like no you won't believe even if I Make good arguments, but in you're having the conversation you could point to things like You know revealed scripture general revelation, you know and the sheer complexity of the human cell

Yeah, I mean, I don't understand And I know it's because God's put his spirit in my heart and I know these things but it's like my finite mind

Can't even begin to understand the human cell and that's just one piece of this creation

So I I would kind of gut start and answer it that way, you know We need to be careful what we say when we say proving, you know, something like that well,

I think Bob me personally my favorite proof if I could be very tongue -in -cheek my

One of my favorite extra biblical proofs for the existence of God is jazz music because it's such a tangible application of the beauty of and complexity of what

God's made There there is so much packed in there and so much theory I've been digging into music theory a little bit lately, but at the end of the day, we didn't invent music

We didn't invent these frequencies. These are rules that we've observed. These are patterns

Observed about the world around us because everything has a frequency So we may have given names to these notes, but ultimately

God is the author of the notes Collisions one says that by him and for him all things were made in him all things hold together

And so I I would apply that very much to things like music that there is a complexity there that is beautiful that it brings glory to God and Something like the

Big Bang Theory Cannot explain jazz chords. That's right so I want to build off of both what y 'all said and in Romans we see

That what what brother Andy was talking about general revelation. These are things that exist that anybody with senses can see right when for God For God's wrath is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppressed the truth

This is Romans 1 and 18 going to 19 Since we can know since since what can be known about God is evident among them because God has shown it to them

From the creation of the world his invisible attributes That is his eternal power and divine nature

Have been clearly seen being understood through what he has made as a result people are without excuse

And that's what brother Andy was talking about a while ago when he said people were without excuse because of divine revelation and You know,

I watched a video the other day that said the Big Bang Theory was actually on the ropes because of this new

James Webb Telescope satellite thing that they've put out in space. It's observed things in space so far off that They're not behaving the way that it should behave if the theory surrounding the

Big Bang was correct, so my caveat in that is not to be scared of scientific advancements because the more of them we have the more they highlight who

God is The better the microscope the more the complexity we see in the cell the more God's handiwork is revealed the further we see in the

Space the more we see the majesty and his creative hand at work in in everything, you know

Whenever we understand 440 megahertz above middle C is the perfect pitch for the key of a that's for brother

Tyler Yeah, my god my comment was definitely in the realm of if you're in a confrontation and Someone's saying well,

I won't believe in God unless you can prove he exists. You don't go down that rabbit hole It's that they have no true motive to actually change their mind

In terms of how we approach the world in terms of how I approach Everything I am a to approach it the same way scripture does and that is that God exists

He's the creator of everything and we're to call all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel. There are categories and Contexts where we can have discussions about talking about the evidence of evidences for God and so on so forth

But this is an area that I'm still very much lacking So, I know there's probably a lot of Christians out there that are woefully ignorant when it comes to Knowing what conversation you're having with someone and how to approach it

I still find myself getting drawn in sometimes and before I know it. I'm DD. I'm like, man, I didn't see it cuz it's because I mean it's that's why we have people that engage in apologetics as a life's calling

Because they can provide to us the way to handle these things because it's not something you really teach or train specifically in the church

To the degree that your whole body Would be to a level of someone that is doing apologetics as their life's work.

So I'm with all you guys and and I would consider myself a presupposition us too.

But then you have the verses like John just read us where There are evidences.

Yeah, I've got existence. So evidence is not unvaluable but the reason I would be a priest up in the presupposition list is because God's gonna exist

Whether he has shown us the evidences or not. Yeah, so I think both are valuable

It's it's I'm kind of on the fence myself. I'm I see good points for both sides

And I'm not necessarily committed to One way or the other definitely not dogmatic on it

I Think that you know So I love the way brother Ray comfort shares the gospel.

I love it We approach every conversation the exact same way using the law to lead men to the gospel

The Bible says the law of the Lord is perfect you convert the soul So I'm gonna use the law of the Lord when you're trying to see folks converted, right?

And and I absolutely love the way that he approaches people and his heart behind it He's very he's very humble, but I think that if you'll watch some of his clips

The thing that he's not able to teach is the wisdom of the Holy Spirit that it just comes from being being called for this kind of work and being prepared and set apart by God for this work if you listen to him, he'll

He'll converse with people very matter -of -factly But in a way that they don't they're not

Offended to the point where they run off rather they're offended because they've heard the gospel and at the end of his conversations

They he's he's flexible enough in his presupposition That if he sees things need to be addressed in a different way, you'll notice he does that So I think there's nothing wrong with having a framework for presenting your argument, but I think that you do need to be flexible and Use the wisdom that can only come from God to approach every individual encounter

So that you do it with respect People are people are valuable if for no other reason than because they're image bearers of the king of glory.

So take the time and Be careful with them because they're they're they're valuable

Yeah, and yeah, one of the things about presuppositional apologetics. I'm learning as I'm diving into it is

The main reason for starting there and Starting with God is because we've got to get

Christians to understand the world's not starting from a neutral place People that don't believe in God.

They're not neutral So if you come at it strictly from an evidentialist position of well

I've got to be able to prove based no amount of evidence you present to the unregenerate is gonna convince them unless God's working in their heart so I Some of my friends online don't like the fact that I'm not 100 % dogmatic presupp but I see it a lot like Tyler a lot of you are saying

I think there's the balance to be had Presuppositional understands there's no neutrality that this is a person in rebellion against their creator

But as John said in that context of that conversation You may recognize that this person may be more willing to listen to an evidentialist based

Argument, so you got to kind of just feel it out I think apologetics is a lot like how

John described the gospel because you're not going to reason and logic somebody into Responding to the gospel.

It's gonna be the conviction in the word of the Holy Spirit The truth of the gospel that's gonna stop them out

And I think the same way with apologetics We're not going to reason like you said Andy. We're not going to reason and logic people into You know believing our way

But that's right. The truth will stop them out If we can navigate to where we are expressing the undeniable truth

Then it stops them out like this. The sky is blue You can't deny that Yeah, you know and so truth when you get to the point where you're you're just expressing and making truth visible

You can't deny and it stops them out What about the Tyler?

Are you ready for this one a? Little bit a little bit deeper in the existence of God comes the question

Can you prove the self existence of God how is God's self existing and for that I'm going to take a page from the classical theism side of things and I'm gonna

Basically say Logically he would have to be self -existent to do what the

Bible says that he does When you look at the world we occupy the way it operates

You see a lot of cause and effect that these seem to be very much ingrained in the way things happen

Ping -pong gets hit by the paddle it hits the table it bounces up in the air it flies over the net

Gets hit by another paddle and it goes back and does the same thing again, there's There's a series of causes there and you can trace all those causes back to an initial cause and it's the same way with creation with Basically reality with itself where the earth came from where people came from There's all these strings of causes and eventually if we follow that trend that trick back far enough

There's going to be a point where we're gonna have to have a first cause and there's the logical dilemma of what caused the first cause and how some philosophers have attempted to wrestle with that idea is that Whatever the first cause was whatever the initial starting point was it had to be something different Than every other cause that came after it

That it's not something new. It's something that's always In motion something that has everything it needs within itself to sustain that motion

Genesis 1 in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth Nothing there was no creator that created

God because Again, you have that vicious cycle of who created the God that created

God. You have this whole endless cycle of bigger gods, but in the beginning

God and he has Everything within himself to begin causing other things

Without needing a cause himself. So when we say that he is self existent, he is fully within himself

Without need of anything external To do what he did That he is constantly in motion.

He is constantly enacting causes without being caused That's good brother

William William Lane Craig that talks about the cosmological concept of the unmoved mover Have you ever listened to any his philosophy?

I've not heard much from Craig, but I'm I'm familiar with the uncaused cause Somewhat And that that's a good trend that your answer was a good transition to the next question

John. So, how can we know? How can we understand the fact that God is is knowable and yet incomprehensible in other words?

his eminence his closeness versus his Transcendence, so I'm gonna try my best

To take what Tyler said and shift into that but if this fails bail me out, okay

We're thinking deep today Rob is my bailout button.

What I'm gonna do is I'm gonna do like Rob. I'm gonna go And I'm gonna say he lost his internet and just cut me off and then

I'm gonna swim to shore. Yeah It's like what? So in Hebrews chapter 3

Therefore holy brothers and companions as a heavenly calling consider She considered Jesus the

Apostle the high priest of our confession put that in your back pocket He was faithful.

He he was faithful to the one who appointed him now We're talking we're getting into that Trinitarian aspect right here.

You understand? He is faithful to the one who appointed him just as Moses was in all of God's household

For Jesus is considered worthy More than Moses just as the builder has more honor than the house

So now consider the fact that a house is probably one of most invaluable things

You'll ever purchase in your entire life, but one man can build many homes so how much more valuable to him if you owned a

Contractor who built homes how much more valuable than the home is the man who builds them, right? That's how we've said this before.

That's how Jesus is able to save the whole world With his blood is because he's more valuable than the whole world

He's more valuable than all of creation because he is the one who created everything So he is our high priest.

Therefore. He is knowable Right, he intercedes for the church.

Therefore we we have to have a relationship with him Therefore he's knowable but as God as the second person of the

Trinity. He is also the same person I think it's Isaiah 55 8 more.

Please. Let me be right Don't don't cut the internet yet Yes Thank you

Jesus for my thoughts are not your thoughts and my ways are not your ways

This is the Lord's declaration for heaven is higher than the earth So my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts just for just as the rain and the snow fall from heaven do not return without Saturating the earth and making it germinate and sprout and providing seed to sow food deep my word

That comes from my mouth will not return to me empty It will accomplish what

I please and up and will prosper and what I seem to do in every area in Every area

Jesus is God Therefore he is infinitely more valuable than anything that has been made whether it be animal vegetable mineral man at the same hand he desires to have a relationship with us in a manner that is symbolic of a bride and a groom

So he has to be knowable and the third person of the Trinity the Holy Spirit equally

God in all areas lives in us in A way that makes this more personal than it could be with just the high priest in action

To answer the question Absolutely, and and just to work with your analogy of the house

God is we're saying that God is the builder and yes God is going to be incomprehensible before and after the house exactly

It's the reason that he is knowable at all is because The house exists he built exactly and so therefore

There are certain things that we can know about God We can know about the builder because of the style of the house

Thing it's also noteworthy that the only things we can know about God are the things that he reveals to us

That's yeah, that's my point He revealed the house and he revealed certain things within the house about who he is and his characteristics

You could not possibly fit everything there is to know about God in this book. This is just what he wants us to know

That's right, right. I've often thought about it. Like can I nerd out for a minute? Oh, yeah

So I can't understand more than three dimensions. I just can't right Ben's Built stuff in my entire life and work with things.

I understand height. I understand width and I understand depth Now I don't understand fourth dimensional phrases, right?

Tetrahedrons mean nothing to me. I can't understand how you didn't begin to make one. So I Thought about it though and in the opposite of ways.

I can't understand completely two -dimensional linear thinking where there's absolutely no depth and If you can go with me on this if you had

I think I've heard somebody say this before So if I'm stealing this from somebody, I don't know who it is, and I hope I give you credit for it

But if you had an infinitely flat plane that sit on the horizon and You introduced to that infinitely flat plane a sphere.

What would it see it would only be able to perceive an infinitesimally small dot

But it would have no understanding of the vastness of what a sphere is It wouldn't even have the tools in the box to understand

What a sphere is having no way to relate to it Except for the way that the sphere would allow itself to relate to that infinitely flat plane

This is the way I understand that God deals with us We're only allowed to understand him in the way that he communicates with us in a manner that he's limited himself to let us

Understand we're so finite that he has to come in ways that are that are limited looking to him

So we can even understand him if I took if I told you of earthly things and you don't understand them How would you understand heavenly things?

Right. He tells this to the to the to those of scholars of the day Yeah, I'm 100 % with big

John on this I like the way he put it because that's bait. I wasn't you the same words, obviously But basically my answer was gonna be the same way we can

God is incomprehensible and it is just a very quick point of order. I'm with Tyler on the last question, too

I think I've heard it put that God is the The uncaused first cause in the sense that you know

There has to be something outside of existence to create existence. Otherwise, you just have the infinite loop, but the

God that's incomprehensible We have we approach this same theme when we talk about the

Trinity There is a point where you have to stop and let scripture be true and stop trying to figure it out

We have obviously have been given finite Meaning we are created inside time and space

So our knowledge and our capabilities are going to be finite limited gods are

Infinite in a way that our language can't even describe We can only describe

God to the extent that our language can describe him So John's hitting on it perfectly in that we are able to know

God But we can't know him infinitely We can only know him in the way.

He's created us to know him So in the sense that we are created in the image of God, we are given, you know, rational thought emotion all these things

Which we'll get into as we move along these questions the attributes of God that we can demonstrate

Which make us? created in the image of God Allow us and in every individual is different.

Some people will never spend any time growing in their knowledge of Christ Why why do you think there's so much

New Testament instruction to believers? to study the scriptures and grow in the knowledge and in the depth of the knowledge of Christ It's because you could search the riches of scripture your entire life and you'll hear old preachers say it

I feel like the more I learn the more I don't know It's that vast. So the question is great, you know

How is God noble but incomprehensible at the same time? Well because scripture says he is I am the Lord I change not

I'm the one I You know, we can't do it. But for fun sometimes I like try to think about how it would be possible

To have an existence outside of time and space and then I have to stop and remind myself.

I can't even think Experientially of that existence because I am time -bound creature

Whereas God is not so we've got to let the scripture say what it does Let the general revelation around us speak for what it does and kind of leave it at that.

Yeah Profoundly philosophical very quickly. Yeah Well Philosophy is not necessarily or inherently anti scripture.

It's just that's right. Well, I'm saying that is a philosophy major So I think it's funny that I'm taking a hiatus from class and we're discussing philosophy

Well the passage that comes to my mind Listen to John's answer is is the passage that says the heavens declare the glory of God So the the sermon that creation speaks to us

God's creatures who he's given the ability to reason and logic like you were talking about Andy the sermon that it speaks to us is preaching

There is a creator he is self -existing and it should bring me to my knees

Think about it in these terms the creation that we have the existence that we have is what

God chose to do to Demonstrate his power for his glory. That's right. That's not all he could have done right?

Right, right. That's like What about the next question

Andy, um The names of God, how should we refer to God? I mean, I think about I think about the

Jewish tradition that I've heard that There they weren't allowed to even speak the name of God And then you have folks today

That They won't use the name Jesus only Yeshua You have different names

God gives himself in Scripture Jehovah Jireh Etc, etc

So, how do we refer to God? How do we Why are there so many different names in Scripture Just some general thoughts on that question

Yeah, well first I would say anyone anyone that would question and say well, why does

God have so many names? Who what you know, that doesn't make sense. Why well, I would just say Do you have more than one name?

Oh, no, I don't well, let's take me for example You could call me Anthony you call me

Andy call me. Mr Cain call me pastor Andy call me pastor Cain you can call me father not in the religious sense

But I'm a person's father. My daughter calls me daddy. My wife Calls me

Andy, you know Hey you If I'm really in trouble, she probably just stares at me but you know, we have a

Great number of names that we go by or are called so the understate the idea that somehow because God has

Been called many different things is not really even worth messing with but in terms of why?

well, obviously a lot of the names in Scripture and this will really Perk Tyler's interest because I know he's really been in Deuteronomy for about 10 years now

When you look at all the different Jehovah names, you know, Jehovah Jireh and all these different things each one

The meaning of it describes a different either attribute of God or something He does so you get a depth of meaning it which relates back to our last question

It's a better way for us to understand and know God and who he is, but also that looking at the New Testament Obviously our

Translations there's there's an understanding of why you see Lord Jesus Christ or these, you know over time piety of copyists, they would it may say

Jesus and then he goes well, I want to touch that up a little bit. Let's put Lord Jesus Christ So in terms of the text of Scripture itself, we understand why that happened, but Paul obviously

Didn't seek to answer this question in the sense of saying you should call him this or should call him that or this is why

He just simply says Jesus Lord Jesus Christ Because remember Jesus is his name

Christ. I may get this wrong. So somebody may need to correct me I believe Christ is the title the

Messiah and you know, Lord is an attribute of who he is. He's the Lord He's the master. So that's kind of how

I would open up the floor on that one If I could get into some of the specifics on the names of God, I would love to come on my brother

I love this I Will first of all,

I would say that Jehovah Jireh is not a name of God That is the name of a mountain and even so Abraham in the the text where we see that that idea of the

Lord will provide he did not know God as Jehovah or as it's otherwise rendered

Yahweh that is not a name that God revealed himself to Abraham as Abraham knew him as Elohim or L which is a little more generic just God or he knew him as Adonai Which means basically master

Lord something along those lines He did not God did not reveal himself to his people as Yahweh until Mount Sinai until Moses And he actually says that Abraham did not know me by then by this name, but I reveal it to you

And the word Yahweh literally means on the best way we can plug that in linguistically is

I am Coming back to that Self -existence that we were talking about a little bit ago that I am who

I am I am the God who is who needs not explain himself to you. I just I Is as we say in the

South I is and then you also had like I mentioned

El Shaddai Which means the overpower, but all these names all these these titles that we see

They describe who he is not necessarily what he does They are different aspects of who

God is that in a sense. These are some of the attributes of God These are some of the some of the ways that God has revealed himself.

He's presented himself to his people throughout the time and then

Andy touched on that. Jesus said he was called himself Lord and When we look at the the

Greek that word Kurios in Greek means Lord that is how the

Greek scholars that produced the Greek copies of the Old Testament in about the 300s.

That is how they translated Yahweh So when there is a lot of meanings names

In that ancient Jew Context names were very important names had a lot of meaning which is why as Robert brought up sometimes

They wouldn't even write Yahweh. That was such a holy name. They would not say it. They wouldn't write it

They would leave it blank. I have one of those Jewish Bibles and every occurrence of Yahweh They actually render it as Adonai because there is such a deep reverence for that name

Yahweh That name Let let me branch off what you're saying to ask you a question.

That's somewhat related but I think it's um, I think it would be an interest to some people and I hope it would be helpful for everybody so I think that this importance of names that you're talking about and I think it's you're

Absolutely, right that names were important and names are helpful to help us understand the characteristics of God But there's such an importance on names that those folks

Today and in the past that they don't want to use that the English terminology English form of Jesus they want to or they want to say, you know, yeah for God or Yahshua for Jesus and that may be the reasoning is because they understand the

Names have such importance and They they try to get back and want to stay with the original

So the question is is it okay to use? The English our English term or translation for Jesus or God Or should we stick with the more original languages

Well, I think part of that comes down to just the way words move through languages with translation and transliteration

You know our our New Testament's in English just say that Mary was gonna have a son and she was to name him

Jesus for he will save his people Now that word Jesus as best as we can figure is a translation in Greek In Greek it was yeses, but we would put it as Jesus but in Greek the equivalent of that would have been something more like Joshua Because Joshua meant deliverer

And so there's there's some some some wordplay there But I don't think there's anything wrong with using the

Hebrew names With using the Hebrew names for God or saying Yeshua because at the end of the day

We're talking about the same guy we're talking about the only God that is we may be using different languages different linguistic flares

But at the end of the day, um, you might say God I might say El Shaddai, but it's in the same token

We are we're not talking about two different gods. We just have different Descriptions, I guess you could say

And that's the point there if you're using a different name for the purposes of talking about a different God that's a different subject

Well, my simplistic answer would be We know that the Bible Scripture God allowed the use of three different languages

Hebrew Aramaic and Greek and so therefore God himself had no problem

Using different languages to communicate his word Absolutely, and so well roll it back a little bit.

Yeah. So what if we didn't have the benefit of Greek and Jewish scholars, what if The Internet what what if I was born in the same part of America that I live at right now 75 years ago and the only

Bible I had access to Was a King James Bible and I didn't know that Jesus went by any other name

Than Jesus because all I've read is English, right, right. That's God So, I think that if we're going to say that we can only know

God to the realm that God allows himself to be known That's also true with our language Yeah So I think

I think that speaks to the the question that we're talking about earlier Why why does he use so many different names for himself to describe his characteristics characteristics?

So could we is it okay to say that it's more important that we get his characteristics, right?

Then yes, it's name. I think so, I mean there's Some of the

Old Testament writers called Theophanies of Christ in the Old Testament the angel an angel from heaven or an angel or something like that That's who talked to Hagar and Ishmael, right

He said an angel spoke to her Which is clearly an angel has no authority to make the proclamation over Hagar and Ishmael that was made over them, right?

This has to be a command from heaven. So even in that writing you need to understand

That we must be talking about Jesus here, right? That's right and the context surrounding that leads you to believe that even if you don't have

You know linguistics experts that you can call up and I'm not I'm not at all

I'm not at all talking negatively, but I think it's great That we have that knowledge.

I think it's always better to To gain capacity when it comes to the language because just as technology has gotten better It only points to a more majestic a more holy a more almighty

God and when we all get to heaven, I Think we will find there are other names of God that are not in this book because there will basically be languages

We've never seen there would be a greater beauty to the way we know God there

Then how we could possibly comprehend here. So Yahweh might be the easy one when we get up there

There might be a whole nother string of names and ways to praise God We've never even imagined there might be five dimensions up there

Let's have an election real quick how many of you are okay with a part two

Good well, are we doing paper voucher using ballot counting machine? I want you.

I want it right here right now. Where do you stand? Be a man Well, I think it's okay if we if we do a part two, it'll be perfectly fine.

And with that With that final vote being cast Andy, would you mind to share the gospel of our

Lord Jesus the Christ the Messiah and And John we pray when he finishes

Absolutely Absolutely unfortunately, despite what Many college professors and many secular leftists and What is the dominant?

philosophy and in many respects religion of our world today says There are no neutral worldviews.

You are not neutral the scripture says That you are in rebellion to your

Creator that all of us come from one man and one woman Adam and Eve and We are all in descendants of them and because of Adam's sin

God Holds him accountable for the human race in the sense that every person that is born after Adam is considered to be what we

Refer to in Christianity as being in Adam Meaning that we are born spiritually dead

You say well, I'm alive. Well, yes, our bodies are alive. Our soul is certainly alive.

We obviously exist So we have a soul we means we have being we have exist we have existence we obviously have physical bodies but the scripture talks about our spirit and our spirit is dead in Ephesians 2 says that our spirits are dead because they're dead in sin and in trespasses and We are in rebellion against our

Creator that in fact John read it earlier in Romans chapter 1 Those that are not in Christ have not been saved

Actively Suppress the truth in their unrighteousness. So there were there were not a neutral agent that can go either way

We are not victims we actively disobey

The creator of the universe we are in rebellion against him In fact, one of the things I was reading this week in a rereading rather and in Micah Micah chapter 5 talks about the one that will come

And it says it very plainly and I believe it's Micah 5 chapter. I mean Micah 5.

I believe it's verse 6 somewhere there says that this one referring to Christ will be our peace and Many people will talk about Wanting to have the peace that surpasses all understanding and and you know that we want to have peace in our world and so on So forth the greatest peace that can come to your life is to have peace with your creator to have peace with God you say well 80 if I'm in such rebellion if I'm actively disobeying

God and I'm an enemy of God because of my rebellion in my sin in Suppressing the truth of my unrighteousness.

How could I ever be at peace with God? Well, that's the good news of the gospel The good news gospel is that you can be made right with God You can be made to be at peace with God, but it won't come from you

It won't come from you won't come from me. We cannot manifest or Conjure up this peace on our own.

It has to be given to us and The Bible tells us that it was given to us as a free gift of grace by God himself in Sending himself and sending his son

Into the very created order that he created to die on the cross to suffer the penalty for sin

And all you have to do is repent of your sin Recognize that you're a sinner

Repent and turn from it Recognize that it is not just a mistake. It's not just well, you know,

I goofed today No, I sinned against my creator. I repent I am sorry for my sin and Simply put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ as the only

Savior for your sin Here's the good news about that Not only is the only

Savior. He's a perfect Savior because you may be thinking, you know, Andy come on I know what

I've done, right? Well, let me tell you something. I know what I've done and I wouldn't have saved me

But thankfully I'm not God God is and God is graceful and loving even when

I'm not God is graceful and loving even when I deserve to not be saved and he's a perfect Savior That means

I don't care how bad your sin is Quantity or quality. I don't care what part of the world you're in.

I Don't care what you think Other people think of you. I'm here to tell you that the same

God that saved me the same God It saves Robert the same God that saved big

John The same God that saved Tyler and every single other Christian in the world today is the same

God that can save you So I urge you as big John's gonna take us out with a prayer here to repent of your sin

Don't die in your sinful pride Humble yourself repent and believe the gospel that Jesus Christ died for sinners

Father we come to you in Jesus name Lord very I'm very humbled for the fact that you've given your life for me

For so many what you've gone through and the lengths that you've gone to save man

Still takes my breath away God it's my prayer that all those who are listening

Come to know you as their Savior they come to know you as their Lord's or master that they find their peace in you

Lord that they find their come that they become complete in you Lord, I pray for my brothers that are here

I pray that you bless them if I pray for the brothers that are usually on here that aren't there are in the text read through that We read all week

So much so much is done To see the gospel put out and it is nowhere near enough

You're holy. You're worthy and we love you Lord. It's in Jesus name. I pray Amen Amen, man.

Thank you everybody for watching We hope to see you real soon, and we hope you enjoy this new outro video from Tyler himself