SCOTUS Madness, Then Open Phones

Well greetings and welcome to the dividing line we're gonna be taking phone calls here a little bit You know

I used to go Dial and then we had a number Eight seven seven seven five three three three four one.

I wonder who has that have you We still have it Why do we still have it?

Okay, I thought we had gotten rid of all that stuff. You know and there you go so I Was gonna make some comment of yeah, you know we should call that live see what happens ends up being

Joe's tire shop in Alaska or something, but anyways Just real quick.

I oh We already have some interesting questions lined up on zoom for the program today

But I Started saying last year that 2024 was going to be crazy and I Don't think we have even started crazy yet There's all sorts of theories running around about what's going to be happening as far as elections are concerned and things like that and But one thing

I can I can assure you of the Supreme Court Rendered a decision yesterday and They're pretty late getting to it too, by the way, it's very rare to have stuff coming out in July But they gave the immunity decision and rational historically minded well read individuals who have some concept of law and How the

American government was designed and how it's worked and how it's changed Many ways not for the better but rational people understood that the issue of Presidential immunity is really a common -sense thing

That there are nations in the world Where once your term of office expires unless you do what many people do and You know extend change the

Constitution or kill off your enemies or whatever Once your term in office expires

What happens is if your party loses then they? turn on you and imprison you for having done whatever it was you did when you were in office, so if if as the commander -in -chief

You Sent men to war to defend a border of your country and then you leave office then people could

Legally come after you for people who died and it was stuff that you did in your official capacity as president and if that nation you are the commander -in -chief or whatever and Obviously it would fundamentally impact the ability of anyone to be able to govern and To be able to do what's right if you're always running in the back of your mind

Wow, if I do this, I've only got I've only got you know, three months left in office

You know, I'm gonna end up in the who's cow Not because what you're doing is wrong, but because there are gonna be people who are gonna come after you.

They're just How it works So common -sense had already said and this is how we had functioned since George Washington was president

That once a man leaves office Well, first of all the tradition for a long long time

Was that once a man leaves office He pretty much Shut up He pretty much just he wouldn't comment on The current president

The tradition was you go into private you build your library.

I'm not sure when that started But you you go into private life and you stay out of the limelight

And that was wise There was real wisdom in it. Of course, that's all changed now

Obama primarily is the one who changed all of that Clinton didn't help but So that was the tradition and then our nation up until Trump had just never gotten on the

Banana Republic bandwagon and Started doing well the stuff they did even while Trump was still president.

I mean If somehow Trump avoids being assassinated and I'll be perfectly honest with I have said to many people in my circle that I Cannot think of anyone with a higher risk of being assassinated than Donald Trump.

I really can't and I mean there are people in Washington that very plainly love their positions of power and There's not much they won't do to keep them keep that power

Those positions of power that are theirs So but let's say, you know

You have how many how many impeachments were there two three then they even did one after you left

Two and a half. Yeah, it's something like that. It was just absurd. It was so These people have zero respect for the nation for its offices

They are there to destroy these things. It's it's like well, it's it's like Ilhan Omar and the former prime minister coming over of Somalia and in Somalian Stumping for her reelection

And literally telling the audience She's not promoting

America, she's not promoting American values She's promoting Somalia and She's standing right there.

I don't know if they just figured no one can understand Somalians so they can say whatever they want

But I'm from a you know a time period I'm from the last century I'm a time traveler.

There are many of us, you know, I threw out on Twitter I said I posted a joke from and it was a great joke from from Ronald Reagan about the

Democrat kitties and the Republican kitties and the difference between a Democrat kitten and a Republican kitten is once they open their eyes, they become

Republican kittens and it was very funny and he could tell a joke and After he was shot and I remember

I remember sitting in guitar class in high school The day he was shot and Mr.

Munoz the associate the assistant principal came on the loudspeaker and said that the president had been shot

I remember exactly where I was where I was in the room that day

But I posted something about having voted for Reagan and I was gonna say was after he was shot twice he was he was giving a speech and a balloon pop there's a pop and Both times he is with without even skipping a beat.

He just stopped and said miss me Let's suck.

It was Wow, man That that man. I'm I am so thankful that I got to vote for him.

Um, I Missed the first one by three weeks because you know where my birthday is so you just backtrack

Yeah, but um anyway, I put that out there and so I'm from I'm from the last century and People did not respond to events in government the way they respond today

There was the Democratic House of Representatives person from California, which tells you that right and immediately has to be a communist

I'm serious about that. By the way, it's it's California. Do you know anything about California? You know what's going on their model party, you know, there's no two -party system there anymore

Literally saying that the Supreme Court decision means that that Biden could use

SEAL team six to go kill Trump or to kill the the the Supreme Court justice and Suggesting that wouldn't be a bad idea

Which of course it's absurd you have to have and this is my favorite line right now because it's very very descriptive

You have to have the IQ of a wet shoelace To say this kind of stuff, but people are saying it all over the place and then

Ilhan Omar, you know would have been Driven out of the country

Prior to the turn of the millennium. No question about it And probably up through about 2003 after 9 -11 and then

AOC I Mean I'm really honestly thinking it would be a good idea to have a basic cognitive

IQ test For anyone who is going to serve in the House representatives because it would help a lot but she's going to introduce articles of impeachment

For a simple common -sense Decision and That means these people are just looking for ways to disrupt destroy eviscerate

Make the government unworkable. That's that's all there. That's all they're there for but I'm sorry

Yeah deconstruction. Yeah, that's all it is. And that's what they're doing. They're enemies and They're promoting the destruction of this nation and you might go what

I have to do with theology. Well, they're the very same ones Promoting the entire

LGBTQ array of stuff Isn't it sad that most of us sat around yesterday going well

At 11 months to go, you know, you know just oh, thank goodness

I might be able to log on to a website without getting hit with rainbow flags and everything else

They're the very same people who promote abortion and I retweeted I had not seen this before this incredible animated short this morning

About the various embryonic stem cell lines. I don't know if you saw it, but look at my Twitter feed

I retweeted it this morning and it was really well done Really and just kicks you in the teeth

And I remember my daughter getting in a whole lot of trouble Her sophomore year in high school in a public high school that she wanted to go to For writing on the subject of the embryonic stem cell stuff and So there's a little background there to that.

But these the very same people that are pushing abortion profaning of marriage everything to eviscerate the moral and ethical character of this nation and The fact that they keep getting elected.

I I just Honestly, I feel like I feel like going to some of these districts and just stopping people on the street.

Do you have any idea? What your elected? Representatives are all about what they're doing

It's it's astonishing I Real quick before he goes first go. Yes.

Okay. We're gonna first call. Um, I Mentioned this this morning and a number of people responded to on Twitter It is the anniversary of the

Battle of Gettysburg right now and There was a film produced in the 90s called

Gettysburg It was huge. It was massive. It's also extremely long. I think the directors cuts like over four hours and It together with gods of generals were from the

Shara Michael and I think his son wrote these they write historical fiction, but it's

Just incredibly well done. And for example the cannonade that they reproduced prior to pickets charge was the largest recreation of that had ever been done before and it had to be because the

Artillery Duel that took place that day not only could be heard in Harrisburg where I used to live 30 miles away

But it was the largest artillery Barrage to ever happen on American soil up to that point and maybe for the whole war.

I don't remember But if you've not seen that film Gettysburg, it's generally available

I'd highly recommend it. It was really really well done The stuff with Chamberlain and the main boys on the flank and the relationship between Longstreet and Lee it was

Really really well done. There's a lot. Let me put it this way. There's all most everything else on TV ain't worth watching

This one would be worth worth watching you learn something historical along the process. So Anyways, okay.

I said my my my deal and we will Go on from there.

Oh, man I'm Gotta admit the the topics are making me go.

This could be real short because I may end up going down. I Don't know back down I'm sure why why rich put you through but I don't know.

Well, we'll try So, all right, let's talk with Andre Hello, dr.

White, can you hear me? Yes, sir. Oh Thank you so much for taking my call. Well, maybe my topic may be quick I don't know but it deals with Ignatius.

I am right now taking Going over the church history class that you did a few years ago at Phoenix reform.

Uh -huh And we went through it through the part That talks about Ignatius Ignatius and how the

Catholic Church uses The one of the portions from his epistle to the smear needs where Ignatian says that you know,

They confess not that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ But then

I watched a video From Trent Horne where he said like well, you know, he didn't really believe or wasn't really affirming transubstantiation

But the idea of it was right there So, I guess my question is how did

Ignatius Understand the Eucharist. I know he's saying right there that that the

Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior But I guess my question is how was he?

Understanding what what do you think was in his mind when when he thought about the Eucharist?

That's not my question makes sense Well, yeah Except no one can answer the question.

What was in someone's mind. I'm sorry writing a letter to some better words. Sorry So, you know you can you can try to be fair with With historical writings or you can do what

Rome does with historical writings because look The Roman Catholic religion

Has defined itself as being the apostolic religion and tells everyone that They are the 2 ,000 year old church and so they've they've said this is the constant faith of the church

So when a faithful Roman Catholic looks back at sources such as this they

Literally dogmatically have to put on certain glasses that will see certain things and this is one of the big problems one of the one of the real issues that I have with Protestants who likewise play games with Creeds and confessions in the sense of removing them from their historical

Context and not submitting them to scripture Once you put them in position of having that authority

There's no way to go back and you start building if if if you have one slight error here then you build upon that and now you've got a little bit greater error a little bit greater error a little bit greater error and so many of Rome's fundamental falsehoods started off as small errors and then you just kept building upon them and so I've often said that I'm not sure how an

Orthodox Roman Catholic can do honest church history and That they are very susceptible to doing anachronism to inserting into Ancient documents concepts and beliefs that never would have been present with the individual.

So the the primary Citation is

From Ignatius's epistle to the Philadelphians I'm sorry the Smyrnians and it's section 6

It says let no man be deceived even the heavenly beings and the glory of the angels and the rulers visible and invisible if They believe not in the blood of Christ who is

God judgment awaiteth them also, so immediately What's he talking about?

Even before this but certain persons ignorantly deny him or rather have been denied by him

Being advocates of death rather than of truth. He's he's talking the the greatest threat to the

Christian Church in the first centuries in the first two centuries was Gnosticism in all of its various forms both the

What I would call standard Mainline Gnosticism and Then you had

Valentinian Gnosticism that developed specifically To mimic Christianity But the

Gnostics were the greatest danger and He is warning the

Smyrnians do not be deceived If they believe not in the blood of Christ who is

God The Gnostics did not believe in the blood of Christ because Christ was a spirit and Did not have a body of flesh and blood or depending on again which kind of Version you have you had the docetics

Who believed that Christ only seemed? To have a body of flesh fundamental

Gnosticism was a form of dualism the idea that that physical is evil and less the spirit is good and Therefore if Jesus was an eon if he was a divine being then he could not have

Intrinsically blood and So he says if they believe not in the blood of Christ who is

God that's a technical variant there. So, you know judgment awaited them also He that receiveth let him receive let not office puff up any man

For faith and love are all in all and nothing is preferred before them but mark ye those who hold strange doctrine

Touching the grace of Jesus Christ which came to us How that they are contrary to the mind of God?

They have no care for love none for the widow none for the orphan none for the afflicted none for the prisoner

None for the hungry or thirsty They abstain from Eucharist and prayer

Because they allow not that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ Which flesh suffered for our sins and which the father of his goodness raised up?

Next section they therefore that gains say the good gift of God perish by their questionings

But it were expedient for them to have love that they may also rise again It is therefore meet that you should abstain from such and not speak of them either privately or in public but should give heed of the prophets and especially the gospel wherein the passion is shown unto us and the resurrection is accomplished, so This text is taken

And there there's one other as well as you could look at but this gives you a little bit more of a context This text is taken theological developments that took place 900 years to a thousand years later

Involving Utilization of Aristotelian categories of accidents and substance and so on and so forth are read back into these words and so the modern

Roman Catholic goes see They abstain from the Eucharist Because they allow not that the

Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ. So there's transubstantiation right there and What he's actually

Saying is that these individuals do not believe Jesus had a body of flesh and bone

So they don't in they don't partake of the Eucharist Because that is a fundamental denial

In in any understanding of the Gnostic view of who Jesus was Jesus did not have a body that you can commemorate memorialize or do anything else with So an

Honest person dealing with church history with dealing with these things would have to go look

You have to be able to Demonstrate that the key defining elements of your belief are actually present in what a early church father wrote if You're going to assert that they are making a specific statement or defense

And you can't do that with Ignatius. In fact, I was talking with somebody on Twitter this morning or was it last evening?

I think it was last evening and I Forget I forget. I think it had something to do.

I Think that's something to do with the LGBTQ stuff. I could be wrong I'd have to go back but basically

I was saying this individual Okay, I've talked to Ignatius a number of times

You just brought him up you show me the text That you claim is teaching these things and let's examine it as far as I know.

I've gotten no response I very frequently don't get responses on stuff like that But if you're going to so when

I say Ignatius plainly Taught the deity of Christ identified

Jesus Christ as God. I Can give you multiple clear

References from his writings wherein he says this he says it plainly

He expands upon it. He expects his audience to understand it. It's all there if you want to say that what

Ignatius is doing is utilizing Aristotelian categories so that there is a

Change in the in the substance So that it continues to appear one one way, but it's changed in another way transubstantiation then

Explain that from Ignatius Don't just read it back based upon dogma.

That's going to be defined the fourth ladder and counsel 1 ,100 years in the future But they can't do that.

There's it's not there. And so the only thing it could say is well, you know, we only have seven genuine letters from Ignatius and So we just we just don't have enough to be able to prove that but it's it's just plainly there.

Oh Okay that's not how you do church history and That's why you have to be very careful in in your assertions about it

And I just don't think Rome can be careful any longer because especially over the past three to four hundred years

Rome has dogmatically made statements about the ancient and constant faith of the church

That is not the ancient and constant faith of the church at all. And that's their problem

Yep. Yep. I I'm dealing with that. My mother is a Roman Catholic from Colombia and it's it's been

I've been having to have some conversations over it Columbia what you said you sounded

Irish to me Just kidding You can you can you can tell by the

Colombia you you know where it's coming from Yes watching the tour of the France my friend. I know

I know It's exactly what I was about to say as I was gonna say once they get in the mountains and the Colombians start taking off You get to hear their the interviews and go.

Ah, that's that's how you say it in Colombia Yeah Yeah, but thank you so much.

I think what what was really helpful was to read the letter in context. So What he was really fighting was

Gnosticism And I think that's what the Catholics are The Roman Catholics are ignoring that part of the context

Well, they have and I think they have to and I actually I'll try to remember. Hopefully I will um,

I Looked it up and I don't know what the resolution on this thing was but I Did this was so long ago?

That on YouTube the longest video you could post was 10 minutes remember that and So I did a series of videos on my personal

YouTube page in response to Steve Steve Ray On the subject of Ignatius and the

Eucharist and like I said The camera resolution is like 640 by 480 or something.

It's pretty bad. Oh, yes. I think I've seen that video. No. Yeah Yeah, I'll try to remember the link to it. All right.

I'm sorry. That's probably from a long time ago, right? Yeah, I think it was 14 years ago.

Yeah. Yeah. Yes. I think I watched it. Yeah great well Thank you so much, okay

Thank you, Michael. All right. Thank you very much. And Did you see did you see the stage today?

Oh Man rich cut you off too fast. I'm so sorry See rich isn't a cycling fan.

So he doesn't he doesn't want to hear you and me talking about Tadej Pogacic's incredible performance today and the most amazing stage of the

Tour de France I've ever seen I Was sitting on the edge of my seat the whole time he was descending the

Galibier That was that was that was astonishing. Anyway, all right, we continue on let's talk to Jeremy.

Hi Jeremy Hi, dr. White Thanks for taking my call.

Um, it's not my actual question. But then I hear you saying your introduction used to take a guitar class I'm sorry

Did I hear in your introduction that you used to take guitar class? That's not my actual question, but our class

Guitar class. Oh, yes. I would yeah, I took I Took guitar my senior year in high school.

I really enjoyed it I haven't done anything with it since then so it's all gone. But yeah, I I am

I was in guitar class my senior year in high school when when Reagan was shot and Well, yeah,

I remember it well Okay Well my question It Kind of has a little bit of a build -up to it, but I I called in a few months ago and part of my question back then was

About I mentioned about wanting to maybe reform my church And learn a little bit more so I could be more of a help in teaching and stuff like that.

Well two Sundays ago me and a fellow teacher friend of mine in the church were

Asked to stay and talk to the pastors after the church service and well we were

Asked to step down from teaching unless we stopped teaching Calvinism and not just the terms but just you know stuff like predestination any of that stuff

And they said that that will not be taught in this church. And you know, so obviously, you know

We both would have to leave with that and and you know more power to them for firming up what they believe because before that we

There really was no solid Stance either way, but I guess my question is it's kind of multifaceted.

I guess first of all I'm kind of just Looking for a little bit of wisdom and encouragement on what to do next.

I mean, I want to be in another church, but Yeah, how much stuff do I need to put on hold until that happens because it's not like You know,

I can go find a church tomorrow wait till Sunday for one and Yeah, I got to go to church a few times before I can really know what they believe and if I can plug into it and I'm kind of not just asking for myself, but also my friend who also was asked to step down but and there's just gonna be a lot more damage from this and You know, so I guess in a broader sense.

The question is, you know, what encouragement would you give to people in this kind? Of situation and I guess on a more personal sense like, you know

I I want to teach I want to I have a website in which I want to put out articles and things like that Is that stuff that I need to put on hold until I get firmly planted in a church?

I mean, I don't know this is it's been a pretty weird week Yeah, you know, I'm I'm sorry to hear about that.

It's not doesn't it's not overly surprising Most churches that take that kind of perspective

Consider that to be a Definitional issue even though they may not have any sound understanding of it

And so it's certainly you're certainly not the first person who's encountered that and I think it is good for you to be considering You know, if I'm if I'm producing content for the web, it would be appropriate to be in a sound church

I suppose the The main question

I would have is are you in a location where there are

Sound reformed churches that you can become a part of because a lot of people, you know

They're in places down south, especially where you know, I'll stop at a church and they'll say we are the only reformed church for 30 miles around And I know that's that's a reality that some people have to have to face

But at the same time I would assume that you would probably be aware of Where there are reformed churches nearby just simply from hearing about people who are

You know teaching in a similar fashion to what yeah, I believe there are There there's a handful.

I tried one this past Sunday And you know, I figured the next few weeks.

I'm gonna go to around the different ones that are available locally But again,

I you know, I can't join a church after one week I mean, I guess I could but you know what? I mean, it's it's

I want to I Guess feel a church out and make sure it's a good fit for them and and for me

Yeah, yeah So, you know as long as it doesn't become a long -term

No situation if you're if you're looking then I would put together a list of You know if you have

Multiple possibilities I'd put together a a list that you you want to visit maybe find a opportunity to briefly sit down with the

Elders or elder or elders and And you know inquire as to you know

What their thinking is about you joining obviously? Most most of the time

Speaking as someone who's been an elder for you know 20 over a quarter of a century you

You're a little hesitant About people who come through the door saying hi,

I'm here to teach Yes, you you you got to realize that if they don't know who you are that there has to be a time period of Acclamation getting to know somebody getting to observe their life things like that Before you would you would be in that type of situation and and that may require some patience

But you know things like that, but and and you also can't make a decision just based upon a single visit either

Yeah, you know This last Sunday, you know, we're renting a church that just the the air conditioning system just is not up to dealing with as Large a crowd as we have at four o 'clock in the afternoon, which is right around the hottest time of the day.

Yeah, and so You know some people might might, you know judge us simply based upon that Well, they had too many fans going and stuff like that, you know

Whereas, you know in December's could be completely different situations, so so it's it is a it is a process and it's it's worth investing time and effort in and But I know that as a as a head of a non -profit organization having harmony between Myself and the leadership of the church is absolutely vital.

I mean I I could not be running around speaking in other churches if I did not feel like there was a

Consistency between what I was teaching and what would be taught if they came and visited the church that I'm a member of so It's it's definitely worth

The kind of time to find that out Okay Patience, okay

Well, I appreciate that. I mean you're you're affirming what I I guess I've kind of been thinking anyway But it's good to hear that.

I do appreciate appreciate that your answer. I do it's okay. I don't want to give a shout -out to the last time

I called a I mentioned about learning Greek and Some guys that were watching on Twitter, I guess through rich or whatever.

We kind of got a group going We're still still meeting this side. I assume some of them are probably listening right now. So just oh, okay.

All right Well, I appreciate having that opportunity All right. Well I'm glad that I do recall that I'm glad that that worked out

So yeah, patience is a good thing and you just need to find I you do need to get plugged in someplace

So that'd be good. All right. All right. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Bye. Bye whoo

Glad I had the cough button that time. It was a sneeze button Sometimes those things sneak up on you and they're violent, you know, there's a violent thing to do sneeze.

Okay. Anyways, all right I'm gonna go above my pay grade here, but Blake.

Yes, sir You got the way can you hear me? Yes, sir Wonderful.

Yeah, I just wanted to give like really simple down -to -earth sort of question, you know something everybody everybody thinks about this

So There's a lot of answer related concepts here I've seen some of your responses in the past to lap -staring issues and oftentimes

I've Heard you give a response of you know, Robert Raymond has a helpful discussion of this and his systematic theology and I think so, too but something that kind of piqued my interest is the sort of reasoning that people

Give in to when they choose in for lapsarianism over super lapsarianism and so on and so this has to do with the logical order of God's decrees and As an example

Francis Turton he's the only one that have a specific example of but he reasons that the fall has to Logically occur prior to election reprobation because it's only from the fall

That's creatures become reprobable, which is the English translation of it and so what

I'm getting at is that it's interesting because he also has a discussion of the Election and reprobation of the angels and when he talks about the election reprobation of the angels in terms of the lap -staring debate

You would think that you would say I will clearly in the case of the angels there's no fallen mast of angels that God can then elect or reprobate from there because they they were just all standing upright and So because of that there has to be a super lap -staring scheme.

Well, he goes the opposite direction which very much surprised me when

I first Read his Institutes of Olympic theology in that section not the whole thing

And then he ends up saying that essentially Because the fall has to logically occur prior to angels being reprobable basically

Reprobation of the angels did not take place but rather he simply foreknew passively and it seems passively foreknew which angels would fall and Then as a result of that Reprobated the ones that that fell

I'm bringing that up because there are much of interrelated concepts where it seems like in the lap -staring debate there's this tendency to have it so that God at least that on one point at least in the case of the fall or at least

Something in particular God foreknew and then he decrees based on that foreknowledge

Which to my understanding just kind of gives up Calvinism just gives up What makes

God's decree his decree it seems that all things have to be conditioned upon his decree rather than his decree being conditioned upon everything else and so that's kind of what has pushed me into holding to some type of Super lap -staring ism because I don't understand that reasoning and I also

Many topics coming up, but I also see a similar sort of Structure in an intro lap -staring argument to something that freewill theologian would say

I'm not saying it for lapsarian So they're just low Calvinist. What I'm saying is that they seem to make rules that are not necessarily in Scripture and then say that God would be

Unjust or that God can cannot do those things without being unjust and so therefore

The fall needs to be first it's similar structure To a freewill theologian where well,

God can't hold me accountable unless there's a libertarian free will and so therefore We have to conclude certain things.

Yeah, so that's kind of like a jumbled mess I guess I don't know what else to say about it

Besides it seems like there's some type of touchstone or linchpin in the lap -staring debate

That I think is incredibly important even though it's sort of like a heady topic in historical theology

I think something about it is really important because if we don't get that correct

Then I think we would have a tendency to mischaracterize the nature of not just election and reprobation but also the nature of God's decree itself and Then this gets into you know, the nature of God himself or what is

God? Allowed to do, you know, who is God, you know God created all things good but then at the same time we acknowledge that He has forever purpose that certain people are going to remain under his justice for all eternity and so how do we you know, how do we make that conclusion and So I I hope you can comment on that mess of comments in some way.

That's helpful Yeah You know, it does seem like when

I was in seminary and most of my fellow seminarians actually were not interested in any of this stuff and certainly,

I can't imagine Turretin ever being read by almost anybody at Fuller Theological Seminary, but It does seem that there is a time period in my younger life probably before age 35

Where there was a really strong desire to spend an inordinate amount of mental energy

Trying to figure out things that I Already knew for example that Jonathan Edwards had gotten himself into a whole mess of self -contradiction and problems

By basically trying to figure things out that are not a part of divine revelation and the older I've gotten and the more

I have sought to Defend the faith in a broad range of context the more focused

I've become on recognizing the difference between Speculative historical theology and A historical theology that really has its origin and source in Biblical language and in biblical revelations, so Last year,

I think it was whenever the last g3 national conference was

I Spoke on God's eternity

From Isaiah 41 and The nature of his decree in light of the fact that he challenges the false gods to not only say what happened in the past and what's gotten in the future, of course, but Why things happened in the past and so it seems to me that a lot of historical theology is

Very speculative in its nature and only has a Secondary connection to scripture and Is more the result of theologians going?

all right, well, you know the Greek philosophers said this and this is what the the

Greek God the the great Greek God has to be like and so we we we need to at least live up to that level and so we need to be asking these questions and rather than Going to scripture and deriving these things from scripture and going.

Hey, we have an entire section of scripture here We're God's demonstrating what the true God is over against false gods.

And so we can derive a lot from that So let's focus upon that It just seems like the lapsarian

Debate Should Be primarily conditioned by statements regarding the nature of God's decree the nature of fallen man and It when it comes to trying to figure out logical order in Non -temporal divine activity.

I Just don't know that we can actually go there It seems to me that the reason you can you know, you said well, hey,

I'm turrets and shocked me I thought he'd go this direction. He went that direction. Well that might be indicative of a speculative theology that might be indicative of Well, we're not really we don't have any divine revelation on this subject and we're trying to reason based upon You know one statement over here and another statement way over there and a third say way over there and Maybe we were just never meant to answer certain questions

That seems to be very much in opposition to many Theologically minded individuals that there would be a limitation as to what is appropriate questions and what or not but it certainly seems to me that God has the right to say this far and no farther and when we try to push beyond that We end up asking questions that quite honestly

If we don't have divine revelation that provides enough light you're not going to get any type of consistent answer and We should just be honest enough to say that hey, you know what?

We've we're way out beyond the headlights of Scripture now And so we're speculating and if you start here, then maybe this is the conclusion if you start there, maybe that's the conclusion

But instead we want to pretend that This becomes an area where we can still kick people out of the kingdom for disagreeing with us on this or the other thing and so You know we can we can you know what we were saying before About the the speculation impacting the nature of the decree that's what's important to me is

How does God know what God knows and Do you ever get to the point?

Because you're focusing upon creatures and The impact upon creatures and what creatures can do in and of themselves

Are you ever getting to the point where God's decree becomes dependent upon? Something other than his own goodwill his own intention to accomplish

X Y & Z and Once you get there, then that's when I think things start turning upside down so Personally I you know,

I understand the interest in having you know discussions about it, but From my perspective the the issue

Really in the infralapsarian superlapsarian argument I think historically what ends up happening is those

Conclusions end up driving Theological paradigms and things like that so that certain forms of superlapsarianism led it to dead forms of hyper

Calvinism certain forms of infralapsarianism led to denials of the decree and and a

Weakening of the specificity of Election, you know, you can look back and see how this happened with a lot of folks and I just I just go well

Okay, but if we if we were just honest enough to say we have entered the grounds of speculation now

Maybe we wouldn't end up going those directions. Maybe we'd maintain that appropriate

Humility that says well we can speculate this and we can speculate that but the fact the matter is we really don't know

And if we really don't know it's not because of a lack in Scripture It's because God has the right to say this far and no farther and that's what we really don't like We don't want to have to admit to people.

Yeah, you know God has the right to do this as he as he sees fit. So I don't know if any of that is

Even relevant to what you were saying, but it's about the best I can do Yeah, it's relevant and I don't want to I don't want to end up Like rolling up into a bundle of speculation but the the like like what you said it hitting upon the nature of the decree and The fact that certain people make just you know

One exception exception where God's decree is conditioned upon something else. I find to be very

Scandalous. Well, yeah, you know, I don't know I'd use the term scandalous. I just I would go I don't know how it works because if the decree determines the nature of the creation

Then how could the decree be impacted by? What takes place in the creation itself since the decree formed that very nature?

That's that's where I go I don't see how that would actually work.

But you know, that's that's how I respond yeah, and Part of the reason why

I also think about some of these things sometimes in some of the speculation and description you get really sweet thoughts where I think

Thomas Goodwin I was reading a commentary on something that he wrote and People like him say things along the lines of you know,

God's Top priority is glorifying Christ prior to our salvation and for whatever reason

I think that that's a really sweet thought and I enjoyed reading that chapter and then besides that I Think a lot of the objections that come against Calvinism as a system come against it either from You know like pretty much from the most extreme fringes or edges of it where there's not a lot of discussion

And so you go to those areas that aren't as clear and then people can make just blanket Objections and blanket statements against it.

This is probably another reason why I brought up equal intimacy before because there just seems to be a fertile ground for objections in these areas of theology and also

These areas of theology that have the least amount of readily available answers

And maybe it's good that they're not necessarily readily available answers because people are spending more time doing more important things

But at the same time I have this I have this sense where there needs to be certain, you know basic and consistent answers to Objections leveled against Calvinist system saying, you know,

God can't do this. Otherwise, he's unjust And I Disagree with that form of reasoning.

I only see the answer in Job where he says, you know, where were you? Where were you when I formed the earth? Where were you when

I made Leviathan? You know, can you even poke a hole in his skin and all that? Yeah, and that's where I go.

But then they They continue their objections. Well, there's there's nothing you can do about objections

They're there. They're always going to be there and believe me as you get older it bothers you less and less because you've you've heard it you've seen it and You can just simply go, you know

I can leave it in God's hands and I don't have to worry about answering every single objection. It's out there if it's biblical objections that's one thing it almost never is it's it's either isogetical or Speculative and the most the time the systems they representing have never even thought about this stuff anyways, they like to throw out the objections, but they don't have any answers to themselves because they don't make a sufficiently

Sound theology in their own system to begin with but anyways, hopefully that's helpful. We got to get to a couple of the callers here before we

Run out of time. Well, we've sort we're gonna run out of time. Anyways, we'll go go beyond it I think we can get through we can get through Alex Brenda and Jeremiah.

So you guys hold on here and Let's go ahead and talk with Alex. Hi Alex Hey, Dr.

White. How do you how you doing? Good. I Was falling asleep there.

I got a newborn at the house. No, I thought you were commenting upon Blake's question

No That was also make me a little tired to it. I think I think I think Blake may be

Tracking your address down right now. So just just be be aware. Oh Boy, I'm in the abortion protesters.

They come after me. Okay. All right So my question is

I've been wanting to ask you this question for a while Let me give you some context so it's about intinction in the

Roman Catholic Church so there was a church in the area where I just moved from in Florida and They were practicing

Intinction and they were claiming to be a reformed Baptist Church. Oh, I thought you said

Catholic when I confronted the pastor about it I Thought you said

Catholic Yeah, no, no, so I wanted to know a little bit about the practice of intention but the reason

I'm asking about it is because there was a reformed Baptist Church in the area where I moved that was practicing it and When I confronted the pastor about it

He gave me you told me about Judas dipping the bread in the wine He brought up cultural stuff in the

Middle East and how they still dip there, you know food and liquids and things like that The answer is really didn't suffice.

So I was wondering what you knew about it regarding Roman Catholicism And what do you think about a reformed

Baptist Church? practicing intention well two things for people who don't know intinction involves the dipping of the bread in the wine and so you're you're bringing both of them together and Instead of Drinking the wine separately from eating the bread though to be honest with you.

Once you eat it, it's really a mute point at that point but I Can't answer anything about Roman Catholicism because in in my understanding

At least in the vast majority of practice Rome has always distinct. Well, well, for example start and went once transubstantiation became

Standardized in the second millennium you Couldn't have it. They withdrew the cup from the laity

Because it's too easy to spill and now that's the blood of God and so we can't have that and so the the priest would

Would partake in in part of the people and then they were only given the bread so you couldn't have had an issue with that so I I Don't I don't know

I've never Read anything or heard anything about intinction being practiced within Roman Catholicism I only encountered intinction myself the first time when

I went to Apologia Because Apologia was started out of a drug rehab center and they could not have alcohol in a

Container for people to drink what they weren't allowed to the only way that they could have the supper in that context was to use intinction and so they did up until the point where Just a few years ago

We decided to not do that any longer because it wasn't necessary It was sort of a tradition that had developed out of the drug rehab

Context and what you could and couldn't do within the hospital where it started and all the rest that kind of fun stuff but it wasn't any kind of a

I've never heard a theological argument for the supremacy of Intinction those were interesting things that you said

I could understand how someone would argue that There might have been a dipping of morsels in in the liquid or something like that Maybe but I'll just be perfectly honest with you.

I don't think it matters a hill of beans. I Really don't I like I said

Once you once you drink the wine and eat the bread all going to the same place the same way.

I do not see any relevance to Whether you dip the bread in the wine cuz see and and then that brings up another thing where I've I've had

Friends who've been in churches where it became a big stinking honking deal about whether you use leavened bread or unleavened bread and so church splits and Anathemas and everything else and I'm just like oh good grief people look

Let a local church be convinced in and of itself as to how it does what it does and then

Let it let it be don't it just I've been in churches that use leavened bread because it was breaking of the loaf

And so if you you know You've got to have leavened bread to break the loaf Then in other churches that use unleavened bread because well it was the

Passover and that would have been the bread that was there And there's you know, you can make arguments on both sides all you want and I'm just sort of like, you know

People wait We've got cultists coming to our doors every day and our people aren't ready to deal with them

And yet we're we're ready to to go to fisticuffs over something like this Let's let's get our priorities straightened out here and if you know if if you're you have some

Massive conviction about it Then you need to make sure to go to a place that shares your conviction about it where you got that conviction is up to you fine, whatever but I'm just sort of like There there there are

Adi Afra and then there are definitional things and and that's not a definitional thing for me well, so in first Corinthians, obviously we see a distinction between the

Bread and wine, you know during the Lord's Supper But am I maybe making this a big deal than it should be like you said, maybe it's not

Well, I'll be honest. I'll be honest when it comes to stuff like this This is my experience.

Okay When when people because I've like I said,

I I spoke I was I would speak regularly at a church to still speak there that had a big division over this and Normally The people that make the biggest stink about it

It's because it's their tradition. It's not because it's actually a definitional thing sure, they they didn't make a distinction between the bread and wine, but You've once you put the bread in the wine

That doesn't mean that you've done away with the distinctions So yeah, I would say I cannot possibly see how it's some big thing unless The church that's using intinction makes it a big thing and says the other ways of doing it are wrong

If if a church is saying this is how we do it. This is why we do it We don't we're not condemning anybody else for doing it differently and I think sometimes

Protestants we get into this because We know We disagree with what the

Roman Catholics are doing, but we're not exactly hundred percent certain why? We don't know our history.

We don't know the theology. We don't know understand how Transplantation developed over time.

We don't know about how You know, I that's why I preached through the

London Baptist Confession of Faith on the Lord's Supper to make sure that our people understood

Just how vitally important the Reformation was in providing the language that We use in our confessions to understand why we emphasize the things we do in the supper so But you know at Apologia well at Phoenix Reformed where I was for 29 and a half years you sit in the pews and the deacons or others

Pass the elements, you know, and so you you do the bread first and So you pass the bread around everybody and everybody takes from a loaf and breaks a piece off the loaf and then we all eat together and then you do the same thing with the cup and Oh, let's not even get into grape juice versus wine.

Oh good grief You know, I mean Wow You know at Apologia we use wine wine only

Other churches have a mixture other churches have only grape juice. Oh my goodness but when when

I came to Apologia you get up and you form line a line and we come forward and we partake we take of the bread and we take of the wine and It you know, am

I gonna sit here and say one is The way to do it and the other way is not the way to do it. No, I Like the way we do it at Apologia because it is, you know

First Corinthians says you are proclaiming the Lord's death until he comes. Well, okay, you can proclaim the

Lord's death sitting down But when I walk forward and partake it's in front of everybody.

I'm saying That this is the body. This is the blood. This is my only hope this is my faith.

I like that Activity in being active in making that proclamation

Is that something to you know, divide over or to you know, condemn people over no and for me

I Can I've partaken of the supper in churches that use intinction don't use intinction grape juice wine

Leaven bread unleavened bread and it was all perfectly fine And I just feel sorry for people who just get so Hung up on stuff that well, we've always done it this way.

So you have to do it the same way We've always done it and it's like mm -hmm. Okay, whatever And I I just I think sometimes we we really divide over stuff that we shouldn't be dividing over That that's helpful

Going back to what you said about Roman Catholicism doesn't practice it anymore Well, I didn't say

I didn't say I didn't say it did from my knowledge they've never did Though yeah,

I don't I don't think they ever did. So what I did say was that once transubstantiation became

The popular belief then they withdrew the cup from the laity so when you went to mass all you partook of was the bread and The priest drank the wine in the place of the people because you can't spill

God And they literally had rules that the priests have to get down and lick it up So you don't want to do that on most of the floors in medieval

Europe So so they just withdrew that so the point was they've always made a strong distinction between the the cup between the the bread and wine even though Dogmatically The whole

Christ body soul blood and divinity is present in both and that that developed because they had to say that because once you withdrew the cup were you only getting half of Jesus and So they developed the theology.

No, you're getting all of Christ. Even if all you gets the bread Because he's present body soul blood and divinity in both

So to my knowledge, they've never dated to my knowledge never using tincture. I could be wrong. I've never studied it

It's never come up. I See that that's helpful. Have you heard of Eastern Orthodoxy using it?

Good question. I can't answer that don't know Okay. All right. Well really quick.

I just want to say I really hope you get the debate going against Warren McGrew I don't know.

No, I'm telling you right now. No not gonna happen I have standards and there are certain people well below those standards in behavior much and maturity

That's that's all there is to that. So I Hope sorry about that Thanks, Alex the call.

We got to get to the last ones real quick here Brenda. Hi, Brenda. Hi, Brenda Brenda Brenda Brenda, we put

Brenda to sleep obviously with the superlapsarian question. What happened?

Brenda oh There she is. I hear something And there she is there she is rich rich just had rich just had to hit the right button

He's actually believe it or not rich is actually Blaming on zoom.

He said zoom fell asleep. Oh and I you know, I'm Anyway Yeah, I believe that too

Yes, go ahead. Okay. Yeah this issue that I have a question on comes up When I'm discussing with non

Calvinists The thing about how God has to do a work in us regenerate us

Raise us to spiritual life and one of the gold go to Old Testament passages about the the

New Covenant is in Jeremiah and in that it says that One of the things that he will do is circumcise our heart and put the law into our heart

Well, I've had non Calvinists say well but Paul wrote in Romans 2 15

The Gentiles and of course they translated that to everybody Has already had the law put in their heart, right so I need help

Explaining because I know there's a difference but I need help explaining why that's different right, um and The the answer is going to be found there in and you already know that it's a it's a completely different category because when in the

New Covenant text of Jeremiah 31 I will put my law within them and on their heart

I will write it. So the law becomes something that is internal to them It's written on their heart and I will be their

God and they shall be my people. So there is a love for God's law because it represents who he is in his character and how he deals with mankind and so it's not just an external thing that Limits my freedom

Instead it's a guide. It's a light It's Psalm 119 it's you know, anyone who reads

Psalm 119 They need to be reminded that what the psalmist was talking about.

There was pretty much Just the Mosaic Law. I mean the the the writer wouldn't have had much more than that to have access to as far as scripture at that point in time and Yet you see the the the love that the psalmist has for his commandments for his law

Light to my path light to my eyes Sweeter than honey. There is clearly a a love

For the self -revelation of God in his moral and ethical character. That is not what

Paul's talking about when he says in Romans chapter 2

For it is not the hearers of the law who are just before God but the doers of law will be justified

When Gentiles who do not have the law naturally do the things of the law these

Not having the law are a lot of themselves in that they demonstrate the work of the law written in their hearts

Notice, it's the work of the law written in their hearts their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them so this is a reference to the fact that Mankind Jew and Gentile are made in the image of God and That Gentiles very often demonstrate because of the conscience

The what people call the natural law That is the reflection of the fact that we are made in the image of God This is not even talking not even getting to the point and Paul in fact won't get to the point until Romans 6 of the changed nature and its desire to be

Subservient to God and to honor God and glorify God by doing what God would have us do This is simply saying that God has made us in such a way that we have a conscience and that conscience testifies to us of God's law

But not in the sense of you know being written in the stars and that kind of stuff. It's it's It's simply the the existence of the conscience within man.

So those are two different things. It's it's one thing for the criminal to feel the sting of guilt

For what they've done It's another thing for that criminal to repent and to love the

God that revealed the right and wrong of that issue Yeah, yeah. Okay. All right.

Very good. Okay. Thanks Brenda. All right All right, one last one. We've got them all in today if we get to this one, let's talk to Jeremiah.

Hi, Jeremiah I can Take my call.

I had a quick question and that was the best way I could figure out how to summarize it but I am seeing a lot of people who you know, similar to like Abner Chow or the people at Masters Seminary who come from a

Dispensational perspective, but they aren't that the typical dispensational pre -millennial

Perspective if that makes sense, they they take more of an intellectual approach They focus more on the hermeneutics

Regarding dispensationalism than the eschatology. Do you have any thoughts on on how?

Their approach is different to people like David Jeremiah who's just very end times oriented

It's very difficult for me to wrap my head around a lot of what Abner Chow and people at Masters are coming up with a lot of time and I just wanted to see if you had any insight on how to Approach their their perspectives on eschatology

Jeremiah you're trying to get me in trouble. I'm just sort of wondering, you know, is somebody

Somebody, you know giving you a little bit of money to you know Just get get me in a whole lot of trouble here or just just what

I'm not sure. Um, did you shut him off there rich? Oh, okay. You Jeremiah you're not responding to me.

He muted himself. Oh The mute

That's fine No, I just just wondering if you know, how much how much you getting paid for this phone call.

That's what I want to know And who's who's who's behind this

I want to know who's My brother is actually a student Him and I get in frequent

I won't say debate because we're a little bit more cordial than that Discussions on it. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, you know, I'll be honest with you. I I don't keep up with Dispensational Writings these days

And haven't for a long long time. It's not just because of my adopting post -millennial ism.

It's just you know, I was raised in it and I know that the that dispensational ism has fractured into a

Thousand different variations. And so if you read anybody you're just getting You know a different take in fact,

I would say probably the one group that is most united in Its eschatological views would be the amillennial is because there's so little to it.

I mean you can't get overly Complicated because it's the simplest Formulation of things and the post -millennial ists have a wider variety because there's different ways of taking things

But so I don't I I can't I Can't give you any kind of insight because I just don't really get into that stuff.

There are certain foundational Beginning presuppositions that I just no longer share with dispensational ism and haven't since Bible college basically and My years of defending the faith have not in any way caused me to rethink that And so I'm I'm thankful for the fact that there are men who feel like they do need to Go deeper than what

Passed for dispensational ism, for example in my father's day You know the

Schofield reference Bible type stuff and and things like that So I am I'm thankful that there have been you know, there is a recognition that there needs to be something more than that But as to any type of specifics or anything

Not something that I that I delve into at all. So I can't be of much more assistance to you there.

Okay All right. Thanks Jeremiah. Appreciate that So, you know hour and 20, that's not too bad.

I got some good Good questions there and I I don't

I don't want Blake to feel like he's actually completely responsible for Causing a comatose state across the entire breadth of the dividing line audience, but he is

And Well, let's keep that in mind the next Yeah, yeah, that's that.

Yeah, that's the even rich fell asleep so when you're screening calls in the future rich, you might want to You might want to you know, keep that in mind for the future.

Oh You love it. Okay. All right. Good. Great. All right, super Okay That should do it

Thanks for listening to the buying lines today Lord willin what oh Yeah, we didn't you need to talk to people we need to we need to address a couple of issues for this week as well

As next week Oh because Thursday's show. Yeah. Well, you know, I'm not gonna be here

I don't know if you're gonna be here. I don't think you're gonna be here so Why not

Friday? Well, here's the problem I am

There are now two holidays that I detest and by the way, we have a thousand thirty six viewers, right?

I'm aware of that. I see that. Um, there are two holidays now that I detest sadly and that is

July 4th and New Year's Eve and the reason I detest them is That I love my animals your kitties.

Yeah, and I live in Arizona and Arizona has legal fireworks.

There are as you've seen them the Fireworks superstores are in every abandoned parking lot

My my my neighbors get out on the street and it goes crazy and and in my neighbor in my neighborhood

You've got m60s going out off in the street in the alleyway behind us along the along the canal.

I I'm stunned that my windows have not shattered with some of them. They were so incredibly loud and close

Yeah, and the point is my my cats are you know? Could end up ten miles away in that type of thing so I don't get to go see

Fireworks displays or anything like that anymore not like I ever did for New Year's Eve anyways, but and so I I Don't care as long as I'm home before the before sunset and can get the cats in and lock the doors and Give them

Prozac or something like that. Um, so I I could do Thursday. I don't care But other people be going places.

So if we want to try to do something on Friday or something I do have plans on Friday on Thursday, but we can do something on Friday if you're up for that.

All right, and then so the Sunday night midnight

Eastern Time this last Sunday night, right the raffle ended right and so we are

Our vice president and I are working on making sure that we

Dot our eyes cross our T's and make sure that we enumerate every single entry properly

Double -checking ourselves each other and then we're gonna run the Ramden randomizer on next

Tuesday's dividing line and we will announce the winner, you know, a lot of people would be Shocked if we even announced who the vice president is.

Oh Yeah Let's just say people on Twitter would go.

Oh That guy that guy now we know it makes a lot of sense

Yep, but yeah, he he and I are working on that and then we want to make sure that every

Every detail is cross -checked and done properly And so we're gonna have and you have to do it all over again once we get the blade from from Derek Yes, okay, so we will do another month on that one as well.

Okay, so this has been now Is this for you get both of them? No, there are two different winners one wins the cross the other wins

Okay, the the Bible. Okay, and so That's gonna happen on next week's dividing line.

But so some people were just buying a ticket for both of them They're buying a ticket each.

Oh, so they so they can make a choice. Yes Okay, so we we have some folks who bought one of each okay,

I didn't know because I certainly can't do it Yes, so and that's that's the other thing

I mean, I'll tell you a quick story what was funny this I was talking looking for different ways of doing this that people do and One of the elders here a local church nearby

Named Vic very nearby very nearby and told me about how he had I guess there was a grocery store raffle or whatever and when they did the drawing one of the folks decided to grab a kid from the audience of all the people standing there and the little boy they turned him upside down shoved him into a big bucket and Fished him out and he had his mommy and daddy's raffle ticket in his hand

I Mean if a mic told me that questionable Yes Questionable anyway, so that's that's what

I had to say. Okay, so and that will be when again Next Tuesday next Tuesday. We will have the drawing.

Oh, well, there are gonna be some people and I'm gonna be able to sleep between Now yeah, that's right. The excitement is going to be palpable.

I has CNN gotten hold of you They're gonna send a crew out to cover the raffle maybe ZNN but not

Okay All right, well there you go there's that information so we'll be looking at Friday and and then next week the raffle oh

Oh, oh, oh We have for the upcoming trip we have

The open theism debates pretty much locked down we've got that and That'll be in Denver and then we are

Pretty close to Doing locking down our first ever

Formal debate from the Mobile Command Center on The last

Wednesday night that I'm in Denver on this trip And it'll be a debate between me and Jared Longshore on The issues that you all listened to us talking about back and forth last year

After his Article appeared on October 31st So it was late last fall where we went in -depth into Hebrews and stuff like that.

We're gonna do a debate there and Just pray For a

Roman Catholic debate to go ahead and happen They had said we'll do this subject and we said could we expand that and they came back and said, okay

We'll do it at all. I'm like, okay. Okay fine. I'll do that subject. I'll tell you what it is

And we if it happens There's no reason to just decide not to do anything. We just wanted to know if you'd have some flexibility

To maybe you know do something else So we'll we'll see well that but that could end up with three debates to live moderated debates

You know in person and one online in this next this next

And so that I have witnesses now You're going to get me the dates and the times and the location so I can actually put it on your calendar before it happens within a few hours

Yeah Yeah See what I put up with folks. I'm gonna tell you what

I put up with. Yeah, we all people just do not understand that the the years of People say why are you so patient?

practice Anyway, all right, we will see you next time on the divine line.