Cultish: Jehovah's Witnesses Pt. 2

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Is Protestantism Heresy? Pt. 3 - The Pope | Collision w/ Jeff Durbin

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Yeah, I'm talking to some Jehovah's Witnesses and I went to the first chapter of John and they said that in the

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Greek, you could translate them to God, a God. And so I looked it up and the

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Greek can be transferred to your God or a God. So I want to know how we know that it's translated. God, John one, the

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Jehovah's Witnesses say you can translate a God. That's one of their favorite arguments. Okay. All right.

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It's incorrect to say it can be translated a God. No translator in the world has ever translated a God who was a scholar.

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Uh, they got it from the book called the emphatic dialogue by Benjamin Wilson, who was a Christadelphian cultist and a

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Geneva, New York newspaper man. They bought the plates from the Fowler Weld company in 1872.

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Charles Russell bought them and they publish it under their own imprimatur. I've been offering rewards for Jehovah's Witnesses translators for years just to get them to come out from the woodwork.

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You know, come out, come out wherever you are. They won't come out any place where we can deal with them. So therefore you can't really pin them down.

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Let me simply point this out to you. I've dealt with this in this pamphlet by showing you why you can't do it in the

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Greek. But let me add this one word. Jehovah's Witnesses have a translation called the kingdom interlinear translation, the kingdom interlinear translation.

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One side of the page is Greek with English underneath it. And the other side of the page is the

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New World translation, which is their own. The fascinating thing is that somebody gooped because on the right side of the page, it says the word was with God.

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The word was a God. The left side of the page says God was the word. Now you can't have your cake and eat it to either.

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He is a God or he is God. Which is it going to be? They've said it both ways. So they're talking out of both sides of their mouths.

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I would simply like them to clarify the issue. They never answer any mail. I send them. I've sent them registered letters.

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I've got a couple of answers that are incoherent. Other scholars have written them. They can't get anything out of them, either.

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They refer you to the appendix of their book, which is an atrocious thing. I have publicly accused the

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Jehovah's Witnesses Watchtower organization, not the average Jehovah's Witness. I believe they're sincere.

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I believe the Watchtower organization itself is not sincere, and I believe they're scholastically dishonest, and I believe they twist the

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Bible into a pretzel like nobody else is able to do it. Man, this is gold.

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Oh my gosh, this is gold. This is gold. This is gold. And anyways, we are back.

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It's definitely gold. Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. The Coldest, part two. I've got something

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I want to say. You do. You do. You do. So as always, my name is Jeremiah Roberts, one of the co -hosts here.

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Super sleuth Andrew is not with me today. He is taking care of his lovely wife, Casey.

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They are expecting their fourth child, by the way, which is super awesome. But Casey's a little under the weather today, so Andrew's having to step up and make sure that he takes care of his lovely wife.

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So I am back here with my man, Veda. Good to have you back, man. Thank you for having me back, man.

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Yeah, I'm loving it. I know. I know. I love how you're talking about how you just feel like super nerdy, like kind of getting into all this apologetics, and I feel like the same way.

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Feeding off each other, for sure. Hey, what's up, everyone? I want to talk to you about our latest sponsor at Cultish.

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Our good friend, Ed Kolsch, has put together a really impressive Bible dramatization that's very well done, very well produced.

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It has a lot of talented voice actors. It's one of his big passion projects. If you want to go to redeempodcast .org,

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he's got some great examples of what he's been able to put together. You can get an idea of what his passion project is all about.

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I've listened to it. I think it's very well done. I was very impressed. Go to his website, redeempodcast .org,

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and if you like what he's putting together, he's currently doing a crowdfunding campaign for his next couple episodes because there's a lot of production that goes into it, and we really believe in what he's doing.

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We're very proud to partner with him. So go to redeempodcast .org and find out what it's all about.

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It's also brought to you by apologiestudios .com. Everything that goes into Cultish would not be possible without apologiestudios .com.

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So if you go there, you can become an All Access member. That will support the studio, which will also help

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Cultish. Also, make sure you go to shopcultish .com. A lot of you have been loving all our designs, especially our

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And as always, a program like Cultish cannot continue without your support. So if you feel led to donate and help this ministry, you can go to thecultishshow .com.

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You can donate one time or monthly. I love it. I love playing the old

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Cliffs from Walter Martin because he did such groundbreaking work in regards to countercult apologetics.

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And here we are, all these decades later, he probably recorded us, who knows, maybe even before we were born.

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In a sense, there's nothing new under the sun with a lot of what he was talking about, a lot of what we're talking about, how to talk to Jehovah's Witnesses using the

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New World Translation. I definitely have some thoughts on what Uncle Wally said here. What was going through your mind?

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Oh my goodness. First of all, thank you for playing that. I'm glad you're on my laptop because this is going to be on my history because I want to listen to all of this.

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Yeah. Man, that was so rich, but I want to highlight something that he said.

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Someone asked him about John chapter one, verse one, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was

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God. And where there's an argument or where the person who had the question heard the argument that the

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Greek can be translated to a God. And when Dr. Martin responded, he referred to their

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Greek interlinear. Now, I actually have something with another text where we can use the

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Greek interlinear to show that the Jehovah's Witness translators aren't being honest, but that's essentially what

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Dr. Walter said. He said, hey, if you go to forget what

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I'm saying as a Greek scholar and exegete in their interlinear, you see that there is a more accurate translation.

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So which one is it? You can't have your cake and eat it too. And man, I'll let you respond, but I want to take you to their

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Greek interlinear and show you something else that Dr. Martin didn't say, but after you.

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Well, I just like, I mean, he goes more, he talked about a little bit here, but he kind of goes on in the lecture, just talking about almost like the malicious intent that the organization made with trying to manipulate

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God's word to make it say things that it wasn't saying, which again, this is understanding, like the basic one -on -one of talking to cults and counter -cult apologetics is understanding, becoming familiar with the original, but also detecting counterfeits.

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That's right. What we're essentially dealing with with a new world translation is a counterfeit $1 bill or $20 bill.

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That's what we're dealing with right here. And so that's basically it.

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But what I find great though, is as malicious as they were, as malicious as Charles Hayes Russell was in the people who formulated this and these

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Greek scholars to be dishonest like this, ultimately, you know, God has a way of using, you know, the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, in a sense to where we're actually using their translation, using their own materials against them.

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In a sense, you think about David, he cut off Goliath's head with his own sword. And what you're allowing to do is you're using their own materials against them.

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And even, you know, whether it's like, you know, there's different aspects of apologetics, but I think it was Greg Bonson who said, you know, you give the unbeliever enough rope, just metaphorically speaking, and eventually they'll hang themselves in the sense that a lot of times all you have to do is let them articulate their position.

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And that ends up being the self -refutation in and of themselves. And that's what I think you saw in many cases with just a couple of demonstrations you gave in part one of using the jab jab hook from Old Testament and New Testament showing how one shows in the

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New World translation, not only is Jesus God, according to you put those two verses together, but also the

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Holy Spirit is God. So I can't wait to unpack and see more examples of this. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

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And can I go into one? Yeah. Because man, Dr. Walter got me so excited.

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So stay right there. Don't go to the Greek interlinear yet. I'm going to ask if you can go to Colossians chapter one, because that's another really popular verse that they, you know, that they butcher both the

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John, both John one, one in the beginning was the word was with God and the word was a God.

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And there's also Colossians chapter one verses 15 through 17. And I want to unpack that a little bit.

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Yeah. So just if anyone's just jumping onto this, this is actually part two of our conversation. So definitely go and check out part one.

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But if you're just jumping on here, we are actually on the official site, JW .org,

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and we are on their study Bibles. This is not an anti JW site.

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This is not an outside source. This is their own materials on JW .org. Demonstrating that Jesus is

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Jehovah God using their Bible, demonstrating that the Holy Spirit is Jehovah God using their

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Bible. Because of course, in their doctrine, they teach that that is not the case. Gotcha.

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So where do we go? Let's go to the New Testament. Let's go to Colossians chapter one. Okay. Colossians chapter one.

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Over your Colossians. We go back. You scroll down here.

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It's always different when you're on someone else's laptop versus your own. Colossians chapter one. And we're going to go in verse, in part one.

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Yeah. We're going to go to verses 15 through 17. Yes. I had a feeling you're going there. It's a couple of things I want to say about this.

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So they're going to say some things about Jesus. And this is a really popular, you know, set of texts just in general, right?

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You know, heretics use it, Orthodox Christian teaching uses it, but let's talk about it a little bit.

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And then, yeah, and I'm going to go to their Greek in a second, but let's read Colossians chapter one verses 15 through 17 and how they translate this about Jesus.

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Okay. So here we go from the New World Translation, Colossians chapter one, 15 through 17. Talking about Jesus. He is the image of the invisible

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God, the firstborn of all creation, because by means of him, all other things were created in the heavens and on the earth, the things visible and the things invisible, whether they are thrones or lordships or governments or authorities, all other things have been created through him.

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And for him also, he is before all other things. And by means of him, all other things were made to exist.

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So mind you, this is, if it's in a, if we were reading a real translation, this would be a powerful set of scriptures about the deity of Jesus Christ.

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But of course they edited this to where it says all other things were created through Jesus.

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You know, similar to the John one, one thing that you played in the clip where they added in the beginning was the word, the word was with God and the word was a

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God, opposed to saying that the word was God. Well, just real quickly, this is a great example to say like with counterfeit currency, it's always, it's usually, it's not all over the place.

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It's usually a slight, slight variation. So in these entire verses, the only thing that comes up is by, it says, because by means of him, all other things were created.

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So it's very, very subtle. And that's something that's always so important. It's easy to miss. It's easy to miss if you're not paying attention, even to all other things, like we got to, you know, that can be easy.

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That can be easy to miss because the actual text says that all things were created through him and for him.

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And he is before all things, but this says all other things indicating that Jesus is one thing that was created, but everything else after that was created.

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I would like for you to click on library yet again, at the very top.

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So you're going to go to library and you're going to go to online Bible yet again. And this time you're going to go down to their

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Greek interlinear. So that should be other Bibles, the kingdom interlinear translation of the

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Greek scripture. So we're going to go there and then we're going to go to Colossians chapter one, because similar to Dr.

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Walter Martin, you know, he brought that up because the reason he brought this Bible up is because, you know, this is when the

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Jehovah's witness translators call themselves, holding themselves accountable saying, Hey, we're true translators.

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People who do stuff like beta saying we're not good translators. You're wrong. So then we go, okay, well, let's go to your Greek translation and see what it says.

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And just to, from the Jehovah's witness perspective, it's a good chance. They may know that, you know, that they use the world, new world translation.

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But I think I'm just thinking from the minds of someone who's a Jehovah's witness. If you just come up to me on the street and all of a sudden, you know, the kingdom interlinear translation of the

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Greek scriptures, from my perspective, I'm thinking of the minds of a JW and say, wait, hold on a second. Who is this guy?

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How does he know this? But it's their material. So it's like, I'm still, I got a little deceased mentality, but I still have an open mind on some level.

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It would seem like, all right, here we go. We open this up. Yeah. Let's go to Colossians chapter one. And when you do this,

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I know that some folks if you're listening, it's to the right side of the screen. If you're listening, hopefully you're doing this on your own phone or computer, because it's quite fascinating.

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But if you're watching, you'll see that there's English and then beneath it is what we're supposed to see in Greek.

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Now, here's what I want us to read, because again, this is them calling themselves, holding themselves more accountable.

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Let's read Colossians chapter one verses 15 through 17 in their Greek. And let's see what it said.

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Can you read the English portions pretty please? Yeah. I don't know if I could, I need to have the English at the top.

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Right. Who is the image of the invisible first? Who is the image? I'll say, who is the image of the

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God, the invisible firstborn of all creation? Because in him, it was created the parentheses, all things.

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In heavens, in the heavens. And you'll keep reading, but notice it doesn't say all other things.

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In their own Greek interlinear, it no longer says all other things.

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It says all things in heavens upon the earth, the things visible and invisible, not all other things visible and invisible, the things visible and invisible where the thrones or lordships or governments or authorities, all the, all things through him, not all other things through him, all things through him.

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So which one is it, Mr. Jehovah's witness translator? Your Bible is saying that all things were created through him.

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Now, why, why do you think that is, is that like, why is it that way in this translation showing the Greek, the interland, the inter -translation versus the new world translation?

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Was that a mistake on their part? Or is that, were they just trying to be, give the appearance that they're accurate to the text or like, why is there, there's this distinction?

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You mean, why is their English different here versus, well, I suspect it's, so notice it's reading funny, right?

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How we're reading it, it almost doesn't make sense, but that's because it's a, you know, anytime we are translating something from another language to, to another language and we're sort of being literal, it's going to sound kind of broken up and choppy.

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So because the, and what I suspect is because this is an attempt to be sort of literal with the

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Greek that's beneath it, although I don't read Greek, so I can't completely testify to that, but because they're, they're trying to be more literal to what that Greek beneath it actually says,

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I think that's why they can't just input the word other because, because, because someone who knows

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Greek, if James White watched this episode, you know, you'd be like, look, tell me where it says other in your Greek right there.

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Yeah. Because in verse 16, when it says, because in him, it was created the all things in the heavens and above the earth, the things visible and the things invisible.

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And all of a sudden you see that distinction, which separates itself from their actual translation, the regular new world translation.

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Correct. But again, this is their official publications telling them what the Greek says, right.

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But it's something that's quintessentially opposite opposed to each other. And this is exactly why I thought about this, because in the clip that you played from, from Dr.

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Martin, he made the same point about John one in whatever he was actually reading at that time.

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Yeah. So I don't know if they tried to change that or fix that since then, but they still ain't fixed this one.

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So yeah. Oh, that's huge. That's huge. And this is just another good example to say that, you know, this is, you got to become familiar with the original and you gotta, you know, you gotta be able to sometimes be able to go a little, a little deeper than a, you know,

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Jesus loves me this. I know for the Bible tells me. So this requires, when you're talking with counterculture apologetics, it takes, it's a job of the, both the spirit, but also like the intellect being able to really understand these aspects and understand the, and, and be able to articulate these in a wet, such a way to get them to ask questions.

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Again, this is about planting seeds of doubt within someone who is a watch, who's in the Watchtower Bible and track society.

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Yeah, absolutely. And you know, because we're here, I wasn't going to say this, but because we're here, I would like to focus on the argument about him being firstborn of all creation.

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You know, so, you know, we see here, I mean, even in, even in a real translation, it'll say that, you know,

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Jesus is the image of God, you know, the invisible firstborn of all creation, because in him, you know, things were created through him, et cetera.

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So it'll say firstborn of all creation. And then we get into, okay, well, firstborn, does that mean that he is the first created?

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And of course we're going to say, no, it means that he is the supreme being. That's what, you know, that's what firstborn is ultimately meaning.

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But I can still, and we're about to do this, I can go through their Bible and show that firstborn doesn't necessarily mean the first created.

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I can, I can actually show that. And if you don't mind, can we go, it might be best to just hit back a couple of times to take us back to their regular

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Bible. Now, mind you, yeah, it'll be the first one,

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New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures. And go back to Colossians? Yeah, let's go to Colossians just real quick.

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Yeah. And it's good to also note while I'm pulling this up here is that this is the one commonality that every single cult has, is that they all adamantly deny, they'll adhere to certain

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Christian terminology, but when you push them on who Jesus is, they all fundamentally deny that he is

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God come in the flesh. Right. Of course. That's the one thing that they all share in common for sure. Right. All right.

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So here we are, Colossians chapter one. Right. So I'm gonna go back to verse 15. I just want to talk about the firstborn thing because, you know, you know, you may get a response, so you may hear a response, well, it still says that Jesus is the firstborn.

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So verse 15 says, he, referring to Jesus, is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

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And I would like to make the point that firstborn, even using their own

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Bible, doesn't have to mean, quote unquote, oh, you're the first one that was created and whatnot. Because now that we read that again,

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I'm going to ask if you can go to Psalm number 89. Watch this. So Psalm.

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Oh, no, you can just go to click on where it says Colossians and go to Psalm and then go to Psalm number 89.

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Psalm 89 of the Old Testament. Right there. It's P .S.

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89. So going down to verses 19 and 20,

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I'm not going to read the whole thing. I'm not going to read the whole thing, you know, but it says, let's see, at the time you spoke in a vision to your loyal ones and said,

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I have granted strength to a mighty one. I have exalted a chosen one from among the people.

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I have found David, my servant with my holy oil. I have anointed him.

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So we see that David has been found. David, who is going to be a king. That's what's up.

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That's what's up. Well, let's go down to verses 26 and 27 and let's see what God says about David, this king.

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All right. So versus this is the New World Translation. Psalm 89 verses 26 and 27 says, he will call out to me, talking about David, you are my father, my

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God, and the rock of my salvation. And I will place him as first born the kings, the highest of the kings of the earth.

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Thank you. And my point is that this is saying that God is saying that he is going to place

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David as firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth. David wasn't the first king, you know, he wasn't the first born, but he will be the highest.

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He will be the supreme king. So using the same hermeneutic and the same exegetical skill set that we should have, we can see that when

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Jesus is the firstborn, that doesn't mean he was the first created. Yeah. Using their own

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Bible. That's huge, man. That's huge. Yeah. That's so eyeopening because I've always,

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I think for me, like I've always gone to this and I immediately kind of jumped to try and say, explain, no, actually just means this in the

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Greek. And you start arguing semantics about translations, which from a, from their perspective, now, while that's accurate from their perspective, they're thinking through the mindset of Jehovah's witness through the lens of authority.

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They're thinking, no, well, ultimately I still have the high ground because I have the ultimate true translation.

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I have Jehovah's translation, but to be able to explain that firstborn means in that particular way, but through their

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Bible is a way to articulate that very well. Right here. Yep. Right here.

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You know what I'm saying? I mean, cause it's clear what God is communicating about, about David and he uses the word firstborn.

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Yeah. You know, so I didn't plan on going there. The Holy spirit just sort of worked that one out. So yeah. Hallelujah. Good. Awesome, man.

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What else, what else we got? All right, let's go to Isaiah. This is, this is one of my favorites right here. Let's go to Isaiah and we're going to,

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I think it's chapter six. Yeah. Isaiah chapter six, man, this is so much fun.

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All right. So we're going to go to Isaiah chapter six and we are going to read verses eight through 10.

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So let's see what Isaiah says, uh, you know, uh, in this canonized, uh, report of history.

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All right. Isaiah chapter six, verses eight through 10 in the old Testament in the

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Jehovah's witnesses Bible. So we've already established that the firstborn argument, uh, a, that doesn't make sense, but also that their own

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Greek doesn't, uh, doesn't say all other things, but now let's go, uh, and see, um,

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I'm about to point out that the Holy Spirit is Jehovah God, by the way, that's where we're going. So yeah.

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And just so people, everyone knows too, we're talking about Isaiah six. So, I mean, most people listening in, if you're familiar with the old

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Testament, the Bible, I mean, this is probably one of the most well -known areas specifically about, you just an encounter with Isaiah seeing

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God when it says, Holy, Holy, Holy. And he says, well, what was me? I am undone. That's the main context of that.

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I'm thinking of, you know, just listening to those old lectures and R .C. Sproul's holiness of God and stuff like that. So that's, that's the context of what we're looking at.

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So here we are on New World Translation, Isaiah chapter six, starting in verse eight, correct.

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And it says, then I heard the voice of Jehovah saying real quick, because you're about to read quotes, the quotes that you're about to read from are coming from who

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Jehovah, right? Isaiah says that Jehovah said this. All right. So go ahead. And Jehovah says, whom shall

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I send and who will go for us? And I said, here am I send me.

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All right. Isaiah responded to Jehovah saying, here I am send me. And then he replied, and then

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Jehovah replied, go and say to this people, you will hear again and again, but you will not understand, but you will see again and again, but you will not get any knowledge.

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And we keep on reading? Yes. Okay. Make the heart of this people unreceptive, make their ears unresponsive and paste their eyes together so that they may not see with their eyes and hear and hear with their ears so that their heart may not understand and they may not turn back and be healed.

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All right. That sounds like something Jehovah might say, no big deal, but please quickly go to Acts chapter 28,

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Acts chapter 28 in the new Testament. When might

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I add these spirit filled men of God, when they were spreading the gospel did not have the new

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Testament. So mind you, by the way, if the Trinity is true, we should be able to see it in the old Testament in different places because they didn't have the new

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Testament yet. So let's see if some of that comes to fruition in the Jehovah's witnesses, actual

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Bible Acts chapter 28 verses 25 through 27. And I'm just going to highlight some things that Jehovah said in the book of Isaiah, according to the

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Jehovah's witnesses Bible. So again, Isaiah chapter six, verses eight through 10, it says that then I heard the voice of Jehovah saying, and Jehovah said, who shall

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I send? Who will go for me? And Isaiah said to Jehovah, send me, holla at your boy. And then

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Jehovah replied saying, go and say this to this people. You will hear again and again, but you will not understand.

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You will see again and again, but you will not get any knowledge. Make the heart of this people unreceptive, make their ears unresponsive.

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And then he closes by saying so that their heart may not understand and they may not turn back and be healed.

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So now we are in Acts chapter 28 in verses 25 through 27, where Luke is telling a story about a historical event that happens.

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So Luke writes this, can you please read verses 25 to 27? I almost like my eyes just like dropped.

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I just had this mind being blown, like mouth dropped to the floor moments. I feel like I'm seeing, I see where you're going with this. Dude, this is awesome.

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So verse 25, Acts chapter 28, the New World Translation, Luke is giving a historical account under this being inspired by the

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Holy Spirit. And he says this right now, just bear in mind too, for anyone listening Jehovah's witnesses, they do not believe the

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Holy Spirit is God. They believe that the Holy Spirit is an impersonal force. So bear that in mind. This is coming from the

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New World Translation. It says, so because they disagreed with one another, they began to leave and Paul made this one comment.

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So let's pause and make sure we're following. We're about to read a quote that's coming from, not from Luke.

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This quote isn't coming from the Holy Spirit either. This is a quote coming from, it says, and Paul made this one comment.

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So that means that this one comment that we're about to read is coming from Paul. Yeah. So he's talking about that.

28:16

Right. So Paul, who knows the Old Testament better than all of us combined. He probably knew it by heart, basically.

28:24

All right. Paul made this one comment. So what did Paul say according to the

28:32

Jehovah's Witnesses Bible? Paul, according to Jehovah's Witnesses Bible said, the Holy Spirit aptly spoke through Isaiah the prophet to your forefathers saying.

28:42

Okay, wait. So now we're about to read another quote. So Luke has given us a quote from Paul. He's quoting

28:47

Paul, quoting Isaiah. He's quoting Paul, quoting the Holy Spirit. Right. Right.

28:53

He's quoting Paul. You're right though. He is quoting Isaiah, but we're about to get there. So Luke is quoting

28:59

Paul who is quoting the Holy Spirit. And we know that because verse 25 says that Paul said the

29:06

Holy Spirit aptly spoke through Isaiah the prophet to your forefathers. So now we're about to read a quote from the

29:14

Holy Spirit. So Paul thinks that the Holy Spirit said this in verse 26.

29:20

So according to Paul, what does the Holy Spirit say in verse number 26 and 27? Verse 26, the

29:26

Holy Spirit said, according to Paul in the New World Translation saying, go to this people and say, you will indeed hear, but by no means understand.

29:35

You will indeed look, but by no means see. For the heart of this people has grown unreceptive and with their ears, they have heard without response and they have shut their eyes so that they might never see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn back and I heal them.

29:57

Okay. And I'm going to read Isaiah 6, 8 and 10 once again, where Jehovah was speaking and it says, and Jehovah replied, go and say this to the people.

30:06

You will hear again and again, but you will not understand. You will see again and again, make their heart of this people unreceptive, make their ears unresponsive, et cetera.

30:15

Then it says so that their heart may not understand and they may not turn back and be healed.

30:23

And when Isaiah says that this was said, he says that Jehovah says it. When Paul says that this was said, he says that the

30:32

Holy Spirit said it and it's nearly verbatim because it's interchangeable.

30:37

You can say Holy Spirit, you can say Jehovah and you're talking about the same person because the Holy Spirit is

30:42

Jehovah God, even according to the Jehovah's witnesses Bible. Come on, man, stop playing, man.

30:50

Yeah. And this is just such a great example too, why becoming familiar with your

30:55

Bible, both becoming familiar with the authentic and becoming familiar with the counterfeit and essentially being able to, this is almost the aspect of apologetics where it talks about answer a fool, not according to his folly lest you would like him, but then answer a fool according to his folly lest he be wise in his own eyes.

31:13

Because there is a level two where somebody walks in and there is this superiority complex.

31:19

I have the truth. I have Jehovah's translation. I have that. But all of a sudden when it's some, it's almost like using like Aikido, like this is like linguistic, like using almost like Aikido, like with etymology, using their own distortion of etymology against them.

31:36

And then all of a sudden, then it's, then it's during the headlights. But again, they emphasize, this is not about saying, ha ha,

31:43

I got you. I now have the high ground. We're not, we're not just playing some sort of hermeneutical king of the mountain. This is about showing them that something is off there and hopefully get them to think, as you said.

31:54

And again, hopefully that the Holy Spirit would allow some doubts to be planted in order that they might be born again.

32:00

Yeah. And also, you know, for those of us who also hold to the truth that God has revealed again,

32:07

I mean, just think about just from a, just, just from a general Bible study perspective, like, wow,

32:15

Paul is clearly saying that the Holy Spirit is God. Just from a, I want to learn more about the Trinity perspective.

32:21

This is deep, man. Like this is amazing stuff. And then he gets really specific.

32:28

He doesn't just say that he doesn't just say, hey, the Holy Spirit said this, which would have been great enough.

32:34

That would have been like, wow. But he says that the Holy Spirit said this through Isaiah. Like if they had, if they had verses and chapters the way that we do,

32:44

Paul probably would have said in Isaiah chapter six, verses eight through 10, he said this, like he basically said that.

32:51

He got really specific and said the quotes that we see in Isaiah that's nearly verbatim and says that it's the

32:58

Holy Spirit talking. Dude. Come on, man. This is an example too.

33:05

Even when you look at, for example, like presuppositional apologetics, if you look at the apologetic methodology, for example, of Greg Bonson, you think of like the

33:11

Bonson debate with Gordon Stein, like the great debate does God exist? If you want to check out an amazing debate, check that out.

33:18

But you would see just some examples where, you know, the atheist, for example, they'll image God by appealing to things they can't give an ultimate accounting for.

33:27

He would talk about the, you know, the preconditions of intelligibility, like being able to give an accounting for laws of logic or for morality or just for all these different aspects.

33:37

But when you actually, but no matter how much the atheist tries, they can't help but image God about how much they're suppressing the truth and unrighteousness.

33:43

And I think even with the Watchtower Bible and track society, as much as they're trying to suppress the truth and unrighteousness through this mistranslation, it can't, their own mistranslation still can't help but surface and bubble up and show emphatically what the

34:01

Bible unequivocally declares that the one, the God of the Bible is triune, but Jesus is

34:07

God, the God of the Father is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. And no matter how much you try and change the basic proof text, you can't ultimately get around this.

34:16

Right. Right. You said it perfectly. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I mean, God is that sovereign. He is that wise that even in a corrupted

34:24

Bible, we can see, we can see him. Hallelujah.

34:31

Yeah. Come on. So when they go, no, we got the right translation, even though it was, the actual

34:36

Bible was corrupted for centuries until we, the Jehovah's Witnesses fixed it. And it's like, hmm, that's interesting because the people who say that Jehovah's Witnesses translation is messed up.

34:45

They say that God is triune and that y 'all tried to change it and y 'all

34:51

Bible still has, has these sprinkles that are saying that God is triune.

34:57

This is clearly saying that the Holy Spirit, now who, now who know the Bible better, a

35:02

Jehovah's Witness translator or Paul? Cause Paul, according to their Bible says that that was the Holy Spirit speaking.

35:08

Yeah. I'm gonna trust Paul. Exactly. Exactly. Uh, what else, what else, what's another, what else do you got?

35:13

Now we can go to one more or we can just talk Trinity in general. Let's, let's just do one more. Cause I think people are really into this.

35:19

We'll done them more, but we definitely need to unpack that. Let's, let's just jump on that real quickly. Okay. So, so just real quick,

35:25

I'm gonna ask you to, uh, uh, jump, jump to a few, uh, New Testament scriptures and I'll show you how they connect.

35:31

Here we go. First one being, uh, Matthew chapter 16. Okay. Matthew chapter 16. Yeah. On the official

35:37

JW website. All right. And we're going to talk about Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.

35:43

Who is Alpha and the Omega? Who is the beginning? And who is the end? According to the Jehovah's witnesses website.

35:49

So in Matthew chapter 16, verse 27, what does this say? Matthew chapter 16, verse 27 says, for the son of man, that's

35:59

Jesus, is to come in the glory of his father and with his angels, and he will repay each one according to his behavior.

36:06

Now, man, if I really had time, I could unpack this and connect this to some stuff that we did on part one, but I won't right now.

36:13

But right now I'll just highlight that clearly this is saying that for the son of man, Jesus, okay, will repay each one according to his behavior.

36:22

So Jesus is going to repay each one according to his behavior. I just want us to know that, that their Bible says that Jesus is going to repay each one according to his behavior.

36:31

Let's go to John chapter 5. Okay. Gospel of John chapter 5.

36:41

Let's go to verse 22. Remember, Matthew 16, 27 says that Jesus will repay each one according to his behavior.

36:50

And then in John chapter 5, verse 22, it says what? For the father judges no one at all, but he has entrusted all the judging to the son.

36:59

All right. Well, that sounds mighty similar to Matthew chapter 16, that Jesus is going to be repaying each one according to his behavior, that Jesus is going to be doing the judging.

37:08

The father judges no one. The son, Jesus Christ, will be doing the judging. Now, let's stay in the

37:14

New Testament and let's go to Revelation chapter 22. Now, bear in mind at this point, this would be in a conversation. It's like you're putting verses together, so this is going to a setup.

37:23

But at this point in the conversation, though, from someone from a Jehovah's Witnesses perspective, they're still going to be looking at a distinction between the father and the son.

37:31

And that's totally fine. Okay. We're going to go to Revelation chapter 22. So, it's totally fine.

37:43

There's a distinction between Jesus and the father. It's just clear so far that Jesus will be repaying each one according to what they do and that Jesus will be doing the judging.

37:56

The father will not be doing the judging. So, in Revelation chapter 22, and we go to verse 12, I would like to take a read there and see what we have.

38:05

Verses 12 and 13. Okay. So, here we go. Revelation chapter 22 and the

38:10

New World Translation on JW .org. Verses 12 and 13. Look, I am coming quickly and the reward

38:18

I give is with me to repay each one according to his deed, to his work.

38:24

Now, mind you, that's Jesus. We know that's Jesus already because we just read that the father will not be doing this.

38:32

Jesus will be doing this. According to their Bible, the father won't be doing it. The father said, son, you got it.

38:39

So, therefore, according to their Bible, Jesus is the one who's going to be doing this. Right? Look, I am coming quickly and the reward

38:47

I give is with me to repay each one according to his work. Jesus will be doing this. So, that means that Jesus is talking.

38:53

So, what does Jesus say in verse number 13? Number 13 says, I am the alpha and the omega.

39:00

The first and the last. The beginning and the end. Hold up. Time out. I know this ain't saying that Jesus is the alpha, which is the beginning, and the omega, which is the end, because that's something only

39:14

Jehovah would be able to say. Come on now. Now, maybe we'll go, wait a minute, Veda. You pieced together a couple of verses.

39:21

That's not Jesus talking. Okay. Well, let's go down to verse number 20 and see what we say there.

39:27

See what we have there, because clearly, according to the Jehovah's Witnesses Bible, the father will not be doing the judging.

39:35

The father will not be repaying each one according to what they do. It will be Jesus doing that. And we just saw that the alpha and the omega said that he's going to be repaying each one according to what they do.

39:45

And then verse 20 says what? Verse 20. The one who bears witness of these things says, yes,

39:52

I am coming quickly. I am coming quickly. Amen. Come Lord Jesus. Amen.

39:58

Come Lord Jesus. So clearly the revelator knows who's speaking. So we've already established who's speaking because the

40:07

Bible is consistent, although we're in a corrupted Bible, but the Bible is consistent when it comes from the

40:13

Gospel of Matthew, the Gospel of John, and what Jesus is ultimately going to do in the role that he ultimately has.

40:20

And when we see Revelation 22, we already know that Jesus is alpha and the omega because alpha and the omega said that he was going to be doing something that only

40:29

Jesus will do because the father said that he ain't going to do it. He going to let Jesus do it. And then we have further specificity in verse 20, because after he's done talking, after the alpha and the omega is done talking, there's a response that says, amen.

40:45

I agree. It is so. Come Lord Jesus. Jesus, you are alpha and the omega.

40:53

Jesus, you are Jehovah God, even in the Jehovah's Witnesses Bible. Wow. Yeah. I mean,

40:58

I love that because, I mean, I was trying to read through this as you were articulating that, and I was trying to do it through the mindset of someone who's a

41:07

Jehovah's Witness. And just, I feel like as you were explaining that, I can almost sort of have that like deer in the headlights moment.

41:14

What am I saying? You know, exactly. What are you going to say? All of a sudden, this, the very high ground that you're standing on ends up being, you know, the house that you built upon the sand.

41:25

My gosh. Hallelujah. Yeah. And that's a huge way. And so this is really awesome, man. And these are, so again, these are just some amazing examples, and this is why apologetics is so awesome just because, you know,

41:35

I think I met a lot of great folks at Doctrine on the Block and just, you know, just, and I've always talked with different people, a lot of great tactics out there as far as using apologetics.

41:45

And I always love these types of aspects. So I appreciate you doing this. Real quickly for anyone, you know, a lot of people listening in, you know, the one commonality that all cults have is one, distorting the biblical trinity and also distorting that Jesus is

42:01

God. So we gave some examples of using the New World Translation and using that again, sort of using that against them to show that.

42:09

But let's just do a quick, fun little primer. Like what was, let's just give, how do we, what's the best case you can make off the get -go showing that Jesus unequivocally is

42:19

God? Because that's, that's the authentic. We have to study the authentic in order to know counterfeits. So let's just tell

42:25

Pete, let's just dive under that real quickly. Honestly, I mean, if about how we know

42:31

Jesus is God, honestly, it could be this verse that we just went through, to be honest with you. Just, you could even do it in the

42:38

New World Translation because this is saying that Jesus is God, but even in a real

42:44

Bible. But I'll just sort of go to one of the ones that we covered in part one of this, you know, in Psalm number 102, where the psalmist starts off saying,

42:55

Jehovah, I'm talking to you. And then he says, Jehovah, in the beginning, you laid the foundations of the earth and the heavens are the work of your hands, et cetera, et cetera.

43:03

And then in Hebrews chapter one and verses eight through 12, we see that God, the Father says those same exact things about Jesus Christ.

43:13

Oftentimes we think that the humiliation of Christ happens when he was beaten beyond recognition and died on a hill called

43:21

Calvary. How about the humiliation of Christ starting when he became flesh?

43:26

You got to think before Jesus is even born as a human, he laid the foundations of the earth, the heavens, where all these people are worshiping

43:35

God and Jesus created the heavens? What? And then this person enters into the earth that he created?

43:45

Before he even goes to Calvary, before he even gets betrayed, lied to, spit on, the

43:52

CEO of Pepsi, I doubt he has time to go to whoever's getting minimum wage and go, hey, what y 'all doing?

44:00

He has bigger things to handle. Unless he goes undercover boss. Undercover boss.

44:06

He goes, wow, I can't believe what y 'all are doing.

44:12

You know what I'm saying? But Jesus was that humble where he is more than just a

44:18

CEO and he became, I don't want to say he became creation, but he became flesh.

44:26

Like he entered into that creation. This is important because it helps us understand how much our

44:35

God really loves us. It's not just, oh yeah, he became flesh. You know, he died.

44:40

And that's amazing in of itself. That's beyond anything that we can fathom in of itself. But when we really have in context that God is, that Jesus is the

44:52

God who created the mountains that are too heavy to be weighed and still became human for me and my flawed self, you and your flawed self.

45:02

And he doesn't just love us. He likes us. I know you asked me what's a scripture that can sort of get us there, but I really think the scriptures that we covered get us there.

45:14

But I think that when we unpack why it really deepens our faith, you know, when we understand who

45:21

God is and what God did, it's fascinating because I wish

45:26

I could stay here and talk about how we can know that Jesus is the one who was talking to Jeremiah before I knew you in the womb.

45:32

That was Jesus. You know, or when in Genesis 15, when Abram accepted that promise, that that was

45:39

Jesus talking to him. So it was like, Jesus, you really that big a deal? And then you became flesh for me?

45:44

Are you kidding me? That is insane that you love me that much. No, that's so good, man.

45:52

And that's one of the things too I love about Philippians chapter two, because not only in Philippians do you have, you know,

45:57

Paul giving out his resume, as you mentioned a while back, I mean, Paul, he's the one who's the Pharisee of the Pharisees. He knew the

46:03

Old Testament. And unequivocally, if you quoted to Jehovah's Witnesses, Paul's resume, they would agree.

46:10

And so then how can they go back when Paul's actually quoting the Holy Spirit, quoting Isaiah? Come on, you can do that.

46:15

But specifically, when you understand, you know, and this is for anyone new, like sometimes you use a, the theological term is called the hypostatic union.

46:23

And I think the late R .C. Sproul gave a great definition where he talked about it's basically subtraction by addition.

46:31

So Christ's humiliation wasn't about somehow getting rid of his deity. There's a lot of it.

46:36

Sometimes people get that confused, or sometimes there's dangerous false teachers out there who will conflate that. But there is a humility in Christ having the full glory and having that hidden in a sense where he took on flesh.

46:49

And then you saw moments where that was unveiled, you know, during the transfiguration. And so again, it's good to become familiar with the original and understand the nature of Christ, how he's fully a

47:01

God and he's fully a man. That's what the scriptures fully indicate, because every single cult and every single form of counterfeit spirituality, whether it's

47:10

New Age spirituality, where they believe that somehow Christ is some sort of ascended master, and they'll take scriptures out of context and they'll mold

47:17

Jesus into their own image. Or if you have a Mormonism, or if you have the Watchtower Bible and Track Society, or if you have

47:24

Scientology, there's always a distortion of that. And specifically, the denial of Jesus being

47:31

God, it comes from verses that are taken out of context that don't take into account the fact that the account that we actually have of Jesus being on this earth, it's

47:43

God in a humble state, taking on flesh. There's a classic,

47:48

I remember, you know, I'm an 80s kid, but I remember specifically, I think it was in the late 90s,

47:54

I think it was the late 90s, there's an artist named John Osborne. They had that one song, like, what if God was one of us, just a stranger on the bus.

48:01

And it was an interesting song, but I was kind of, even as a kid, I was like, I kind of know this. Have you read the

48:06

Bible? It's like, but that's, that's the point. Yeah. Like that's, yeah, like that's the reality of what the good, like the gospel is.

48:15

And so I just want to emphasize too, like Walter Martin talked about, don't become an expert on the cults.

48:22

You don't have to do that. I mean, we're showing a good methodology here, and that's good.

48:28

But ultimately one of the number one catalysts you can do to be able to witness to a cultist and to know, and to be able to witness a truth is become familiar with the original.

48:37

There's plenty of times where I've read, I've talked to someone about this. I said, how many verses can you tell me? Can you name me five verses that unequivocally shows that Jesus is

48:45

God? And a lot of them are just like, um, uh, you know, and it's not to say,

48:51

Hey, you know, you're a dumb person or anything. It's just to say that, no, a lot, that's just an area that the good majority of Christians are very ill -equipped and need to get better at.

49:01

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Which is also why I love coming from the

49:06

Old Testament, because that's demonstrating, you know, that before the

49:13

New Testament writers were even born, you know, that Jesus is God.

49:18

I mean, even, I mean, if we, we could probably do an episode on the Trinity in the Old Testament and not touch the New Testament.

49:23

We could do that one day. I would love to do that one day, you know, where Psalm 45, we see it, you know, or Isaiah 48, you know what

49:31

I'm saying? Where we see, I'm actually, can we, can we do that real quick or no, it's okay.

49:40

I was going to show the Trinity and Isaiah 48. Um, no, hold on.

49:45

Let's, let's go there. Okay. Okay. Yeah. One. Did you want to pause it and just kind of go back and they'll clip it in?

49:50

No, I was just hesitant. No, let's go to Bible gateway, go to Bible gateway, go Bible gateway. Okay. Uh, regular.

49:56

So the regular Bible, real Bible. Okay. You know, I thought, I thought you may have for a second.

50:01

I thought sometimes for anyone listening in, sometimes there'll be like a mishap and we'll clap. We'll have to reedit it. I thought that's what you're asking for.

50:07

So it's all good. So now, all right, so here we go. Bible gateway, go to Bible gateway,

50:19

ESV, go to Isaiah, go to Isaiah chapter 48. And mind you, the context of this is because, uh, uh,

50:28

Jeremiah, you asked me, uh, we're going to go to chapter 48 because you asked me what's a, you know, a strong verse that just shows that Jesus is

50:39

God. And my response is, well, the verses that we discussed using the Jehovah's witness

50:44

Bible. Uh, but I sort of talked myself into, uh, the

50:49

Trinity in the old Testament because I love to start there. So in Isaiah chapter 48, we're in a real

50:54

Bible. I'm going to ask you if you can go down to verses, to verse number 12. Okay.

51:02

So Isaiah chapter 48, verse number 12, uh, can you read, uh, verses 12 through 17?

51:09

You got it. Okay. Says, listen to me, O Jacob and Israel, whom

51:15

I called, I am he, I am the last and I am the first. My hand laid the foundation.

51:20

Mind you, by the way, keep in mind the stuff that we talked about in this series, part one and part two, we already see that this is

51:26

Jesus because we see in other places like the Psalms and in Hebrews that these words are specifically said about Jesus.

51:33

And now we see that Isaiah 48, this has, it hasn't revealed that it's Jesus yet, but we see that the same thing is being said.

51:41

This is God talking by the way, my hand laid the foundation of the earth. That's what said in Psalm number 102 and in Hebrews chapter one about Jesus, but let's keep reading.

51:51

So, so God is talking, uh, I am he, I am the first and I am the last. We just talked about that with the alpha and the omega.

51:58

Yeah. Right. And then he says, my hand laid the foundation of the earth. We talked about that, but let's keep reading. Yep. So then, uh, in verse 14, it says, assemble all of you and listen, who among you has declared these things?

52:09

The Lord loves him and he shall perform his purpose on Babylon and his arm against the

52:14

Chaldeans. I, even I have spoken, called him, I have brought him and he will prosper in his way.

52:21

Draw near to me, hear this from the beginning. I have not spoken in secret.

52:27

So Jehovah is clearly speaking this, this is all Jehovah stuff. This is all God, almighty stuff.

52:32

All right. Keep reading. All right. And so it says, uh, draw, yeah, draw near to me, hear this from the beginning.

52:40

I have not spoken in secret from the time it came to be,

52:47

I have been there and now the Lord has sent me and his spirit. Hold up. What did it say?

52:53

Read verse 17 again because Jehovah God is already talking. We're in the old Testament.

52:58

Ain't no new testament written yet. Yeah. Jehovah God is already talking. So verse 17 says, that says the

53:05

Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy one of Israel, the Holy one of Israel says that, okay. Keep reading.

53:11

I am the Lord, your God. Okay. So God is saying that I am the Lord, your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you in the way you should go.

53:20

Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I apologize. It's 16. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It's right. It's 16.

53:26

Okay. Draw near to me and hear this from the beginning. I have not spoken in secret from the beginning.

53:33

Jehovah is saying he has not spoken in secret from the time it came to be. I have been there from the time it came to be.

53:39

Jehovah has been there. And then verse 16 says, and now the Lord God has sent me. Jehovah is already talking.

53:45

And then Jehovah says, now the Lord God has sent me. Jehovah God is talking in the old

53:51

Testament and then says the Lord God sent me. And then the Lord God didn't just send me Jehovah God, who's speaking, but he also sent his spirit.

54:01

Hallelujah. With none of the 27 books in the new Testament. It's right here.

54:07

Yeah. And even like for someone who's trying to read this as Jehovah's witness, there's a lot of conflicting.

54:14

How is Jehovah keeps on like resetting himself over and over and over again, along with this impersonal force.

54:19

How is he involved? This debunks Unitarianism, oneness, Jehovah's witness, Hebrewism.

54:26

This right? Like what are we talking about? Jehovah God is clearly talking. And then Jehovah God says, the

54:31

Lord God has sent me. He didn't say I sent myself in, you know, at a different time period.

54:40

He said the Lord God sent me. So he ain't talking about Jesus being born in Bethlehem. He's talking about me right now.

54:47

I'm talking, I'm Jehovah God. And guess what? The Lord God sent me. The one that's talking to Isaiah.

54:52

And he didn't only send me, he sent his spirit. Oh, dude. So good, man. You're just on fire here.

54:59

I love it. I love it. And so here's like one of the things too, is that when you're actually looking at countercult apologetics and we're dealing with this, this is not about, so I think so many times we get caught up in the wrongdoing and even like the false doctrine of a cult and how they're distorting their theology.

55:17

Like we even have our own t -shirt, bad theology hurts people. And that's very, very true because any of the sociological and psychological manipulation from the cults always delves from the theological manipulation.

55:27

So when you look at the doctrine of blood transfusion, which has actually killed countless, countless people, including young children, or if you look at the doctrine of disfellowship, where they're essentially treated, members of their own family are treated really as almost as if they're dead.

55:44

They're told not even to look into their own eyes, which is just awful and an abusive image bearer of God. And so those doctrines and those practices by which people have experienced all this abuse, there's plenty of documentaries that come up addressing it.

55:59

It all comes by way of revelation from their God, a false God, like there the

56:04

Jehovah's Witnesses watchtower, which is a counterfeit. It's a counterfeit Jehovah. It's not the real

56:09

Jehovah. It's not the real triune God of the Bible. And so what is important though, is that it's not just about counteracting their doctrine, but showing them the beauty and the glory of the triune

56:25

God. And it's one of those things that Christ talked about in John 17, which is when you, again, when you understand the

56:31

Trinity, the whole high priesthood prayer makes so much sense and it's just so beautiful.

56:37

And I love the one fact where he says, where Jesus says in John 17, he says in starting verse 20, he says,

56:46

I do not ask for these only, and also for those who would believe in me through their word, that they may be also maybe one, just as you

56:55

Father are in me and I in you, that they may also be in us so that the world may believe that you sent me.

57:01

The glory which you have given me, I have given to them that they may be one, even as we are one.

57:07

I in them and you in me, that they may be perfectly one so that the world may know that you sent me and loved, even as you loved me.

57:20

And this is where I think this is the home run here of the very note of the prayer. It says, Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am to see my glory that you have given me because you love me both for the foundation of the world.

57:37

And so you see that this perfect triune relationship, the relationship between the

57:43

Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, the gospel is not just about having your sins forgiven, which there's no assurance within the

57:49

Watchtower world that they can ever truly have peace. They have no idea whether or not they're one of the 144 ,000.

57:56

This is an aspect where it's like, the gospel is that you get God. Christ died for our sins, as it says,

58:02

I believe in Peter, that he might bring us to God. And that's what you see, the beauty of the gospel.

58:08

And that's ultimately what we're pushing them towards. We're not just trying to refute their false doctrines and leave them there.

58:14

We want to bring them to a true understanding of the triune God, understanding that we want to have the overflow, like the cup over runneth.

58:22

They want to have the overflow of the joy of the glory that the Father shares with the Son that they shared together before the foundation of the world.

58:30

And that's just, that's really our hope and desire of doing this whole podcast here.

58:36

Yeah. And you know, that's really great. I love that you went to John 17 and it reminds me of how theology can actually help us when we use it correctly.

58:48

Yes, theology can hurt people. I love that you mentioned that. And it can also help people. We're thinking about the triune

58:54

God, right? God in his nature is relationship. First of all, Jesus, who was our Lord and who was our

59:00

Savior, is so humble that he became, he entered into his creation.

59:07

Those, if someone is a CEO, they might find it hard to be a janitor. They're above that and whatnot. As followers of Jesus Christ, we should be like Jesus, not just his earthly example, but the fact that he was humble enough to do that.

59:22

But also when it comes to loving our neighbor, God in his nature is community.

59:29

And God, the Father, God, the Son, God, the Spirit. So he made human beings in his image.

59:35

Yeah. Me and you, yeah, man, we should love each other. We should be in community. We should encourage each other, hold each other accountable, care for one another.

59:45

That is living in the image of God. I mean, that's one of the things he wants us to do.

59:55

And which is why we feel lonely if we're all by ourselves and we're in isolation.

01:00:01

He wants us in community. God in his nature is community. Hallelujah. Awesome. Awesome.

01:00:07

Right there, dude, I feel like we've covered so much here and I feel, and this is just an act where they're just, this is the beauty of apologetics that there's just, there's just so many aspects you can always explore.

01:00:19

And this is why I think when Coles first started, we always wonder, are we going to run out of ideas to talk about? And no, not only are we, we've only scratched the surface, not in regards to cults that need to be exposed, but as far as how to even approach and address every single cult.

01:00:34

And I think the great thing here too is the applicability, how you can take the wisdom from and the, what you've done here, and you could apply it in so many other areas with so many other forms of cults and counterfeit

01:00:46

Christianity. But I want to, the end of like part one, I play,

01:00:52

I told you about this conversation that Walter Martin had, and I could tell that you were just getting moved. You're like, hallelujah.

01:00:58

And you didn't even hear it, but I actually dug up the clip because I feel like I wanted just to play it and then just kind of give me your thoughts on it.

01:01:06

And maybe you could explain just, you know, the heart and the driving force behind like what you resonate with, uh, with this clip as you, uh, go up here and just so you know too, the, for anyone, if you haven't listened to part one, this is a clip where Walter Martin, uh, talks,

01:01:20

Walter Martin was doing this lecture. It's called Walter Martin under fire, where he was answering questions. Uh, you know, after he'd do any lecture, he allowed anyone to come up to say anything they wanted to, whether they could challenge him, they could ask us a specific question.

01:01:33

So Walter Martin had finished this lecture and someone came up to him and this is what transpired.

01:01:38

Here we go. Brother Martin, I met you 20 years ago when I was at the headquarters of the watchtower

01:01:44

Bible and track society, Jehovah's witnesses. The first time we had a very interesting discussion. The second time

01:01:50

I wouldn't let you even come in the building. I remember it was at 116 Adams street,

01:01:55

Adam street. You were the man behind the desk. That's right. And you wouldn't let me in the second time.

01:02:02

And you said you're going to write about me in your book. I don't know. Yeah. I probably cooled off from that.

01:02:13

Yes. I remember you. I want to tell you that 10 years ago, I left Jehovah's witnesses after giving a talk at Yankee stadium for Jehovah's witnesses.

01:02:23

My wife and I have now become Christians born again. Praise God. And I want to tell everyone here that this is a very, very important ministry that brother

01:02:41

Martin is doing Jehovah's witnesses as an organization. I mean,

01:02:47

I'm talking about the leaders. It's a very, hold the microphone up in front of your mouth. Very vicious organization.

01:02:55

They are killing their children and they think they're doing God a favor. And don't be afraid to talk to him.

01:03:03

And brother Martin first talked to me. He planted some seeds of doubt. He talked to the editor, to the awake, who is not the editor of the awake today.

01:03:14

You get, uh, you get more and more food from the scriptures and this builds up in your mind.

01:03:21

And finally you begin to see I was born or raised as a

01:03:26

Jehovah's witness. And it was very, very difficult to say that my parents were wrong. You're taught so many things that this is

01:03:34

God's organization and it's not. So I want to thank you brother

01:03:39

Martin for everything you did for me and for the thousands of other people whom I hear. And I get talked to churches about children.

01:03:45

This is the only people I know about. Uh, and there's a witness

01:03:51

Jehovah, the person becoming a Jehovah's witness. Every four minutes, they baptize one somewhere in the world.

01:03:58

Every four minutes, most of them have come since 1967.

01:04:05

And that's because they announced the end of the world for 1975.

01:04:12

Thank you very much, brother. Praise the Lord. I didn't know when I ran into you that day that, uh,

01:04:20

I was going to have a chance to plant all those seeds, but I always believed when I needed Jehovah's witness or a cultist, as you know, that you should plant the seeds and, uh, head right on into the gospel and let the

01:04:33

Holy spirit take over from there. And I'm delighted to see a number of years later that he took over and God blessed you and led you out of the organization into the glorious light of the gospel.

01:04:43

Praise the Lord. I like to see afterwards. So don't go away. God bless you. That's a wonderful thing. That really makes me feel good because I meet people like this, uh, in my ministry.

01:04:53

It's so nice to be met by people that have come out of these things to Christ and to know of the power of God's word, how he uses the word of God and it's planted.

01:05:02

My word never returns to me void. It prospers in the thing whereunto I sent it. It is his purpose that's fulfilled.

01:05:09

And the Lord summoned that brother right out of the watchtower organizations headquarters in Brooklyn at 117

01:05:16

Adam street called him right out of there to return the life. And the man who wouldn't let me in the building is going to walk into the kingdom of God with me one day.

01:05:26

Amen. Be the guy. Yeah. Wow. What are your thoughts, man? Man, man,

01:05:31

I'm getting teary eyed and I'm getting chills. It's just, it's encouraging for one, you know, even with the stuff that we do with podcasting, doing

01:05:40

YouTube videos and, uh, evangelizing. And, you know, sometimes we can really wonder if we're doing anything.

01:05:49

It's like, man, I could spend more time with my wife. If I'm married, I can spend more time with my children. If I have kids, I could be getting some sleep, you know, there's a bunch of stuff

01:05:57

I could be doing. This is not working out. And, and man, eternity is a long time, you know?

01:06:04

So for, for, for the God of the universe to allow us to play a part in someone turning away from darkness to the light is gigantic, you know?

01:06:19

So I'm, you know, prayerfully, you know, us doing these two episodes might bless somebody.

01:06:24

Some of the episodes that I've done on my own YouTube channel, it may bless somebody. Maybe they'll tell me, maybe they won't.

01:06:30

But, but that right there is encouraging because that's why we do this. Exactly. Even if it's not apologetic and it's just preaching, which

01:06:36

I'm just preaching the gospel. I'm speaking on Sunday or whenever I'm speaking. That's why we do it.

01:06:41

We won't, we want, we want, uh, that rock in their shoe. You know,

01:06:46

I love how Greg Coco put it. He's explaining the same thing that Dr. Martin just said there though, where it's just like this, you know,

01:06:53

I love the rocking your shoe analogy. Cause it's like, man, what is this in my, man, let me shake it.

01:06:58

And so it could come out and see what the heck this actually is. Whoa. It's the God of the universe being triune and loving me.

01:07:05

Yeah. I mean, it starts off as like, wait, even like, you know, planning a C it's like, why is this, why is Jehovah's translation teaching these apostate doctrines?

01:07:13

Wait a second. Now they have to cross examine that. And all of a sudden it becomes a catalyst, not just all of a sudden find

01:07:18

Noah's wrong. It's a catalyst for this to actually know the true, the true God, God of the Bible. So awesome, man.

01:07:24

Well, I feel like that's a perfect way to wrap up here. I appreciate you coming in here and you've got, you've been in here from LA last couple of days, unfortunately.

01:07:32

I mean, I wish it could be cooler, but this is Arizona summertime, so got to roll with it. So it's all good, man. Yep. Awesome, man.

01:07:38

Well, this is a huge blessing just real quickly. Where can people find you at? If they want to find more, more about you, you said he got a podcast, he got some

01:07:45

YouTube. What do you, what do you do there? Yeah, sure. Do, uh, whether if it's YouTube, iTunes, Spotify, just type in, is he a real one radio?

01:07:53

You know, I'm a former agnostic that was leaning towards atheism. So I'm asking the question, is he a real one?

01:07:58

It's like that slang is Jesus a real one. The answer is yes, he is. You know, it's one word. Is he a real one radio?

01:08:05

It'll come right up, you know, and I'm doing presentations like this. I'm doing more presentations that are just like this.

01:08:11

Um, sometimes I'm interviewing scholars, you know, uh, I've had, you know, I want to say almost everyone on, on, on my channel, but I've had a lot of folks, you know, from Michael Heiser, Paul Copan, vocab

01:08:23

Malone, I've had a bunch of folks, you know, and I don't only talk about, uh, apologetics and theology.

01:08:29

I also talk about lifestyle things like struggling with lust. You know, I did an episode with Alan Parr that specifically about lunch, um, lust in church leadership, you know, to, you know, because oftentimes if you're a pastor or you're a deacon or you are a, uh, man or woman in any level of ministry, we sort of feel like,

01:08:49

Hey, I can't be that human, but it's like, Hey, we're still flawed too. So I have episodes. That's about that. That's about dealing with porn, dealing with depression and things like that.

01:08:57

So, you know, make sure you check it out. I pray that the information on there blesses you is here. Rowan radio, uh, the, uh, at the time we're recording this, the last videos that I uploaded is, uh,

01:09:08

I did a, I did a series on women in pastoral seats where I interviewed, uh, egalitarian scholars and complimentarian scholars.

01:09:17

And I asked each of them, uh, the hardest questions that I could think of. And because they're scholars and they have their position, you know, they were able to respond to it.

01:09:25

So Thomas Schreiner who holds to a complimentarian view, I had him on, I had Craig Keener who holds to the, uh, egalitarian view and, uh,

01:09:33

Dr. Sandra Richter, um, who also holds to a view, uh, that's egalitarian, but I had a really good time, uh, feeling comfortable grilling them, you know, because, you know, sometimes we have these topics that, that, that brings out emotion on who we're talking to.

01:09:47

So I had a really good time being able to ask them really, really hard questions and them being able to give why they have their position.

01:09:55

So I encourage you to check that out. Awesome. Awesome. Well, appreciate you coming on. If you guys enjoyed this episode, definitely, uh, let us know what you thought.

01:10:02

You can comment on our social media and you can definitely make sure also give us a rating on iTunes, whether it's one star or five stars, we always appreciate your honest feedback.

01:10:10

And as always a program like this cannot continue without your support. So if you feel led to support cultist and allow this ministry to continue, you can go to the cultistshow .com.

01:10:18

There's a donate tab. You can donate one time or monthly. All that being said, thank you all for listening.

01:10:23

And we'll talk to you next week on cultists. We're entering to the kingdom of the cults. Talk to you guys soon. All right, y 'all peace.