Mystics of India Video Review and More

Alpha & Omega Ministries

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

Comments are disabled.

00:31

And greetings and welcome to The Dividing Line. We're back. What's funny, we're back in a spot where I actually have good

00:38

Wi -Fi, which is unusual at an RV park, I can assure you. But I have nothing on my cell phone.

00:46

I've got zero bars, nothing there. So my wife tried to call me today and I said, sorry, best

00:53

I can do is anything over Wi -Fi right now. So it's an unusual situation. But I can see the tower right there.

01:01

So good 5G signal, should be all right. And all the storms that were dancing around us.

01:09

And the lady at the check -in did say, you can have storms all around this place. And it's just sort of like, it just circles around it.

01:17

And that's what I've seen for the past couple of days. There's some big thundergusts out there and you can see the black clouds and you hear the thunder and you can see the lightning and it just, we're not going to rain on that spot.

01:30

So there you go. That all could change in 10 minutes.

01:36

That's what the monsoon in the Southwest is all about. And so anyways, so we are back and not having to do just a audio version, though I'll be perfectly honest with you, for most things, that's plenty.

01:52

I didn't have time to set up the other monitor to do much over there anyways. So I don't think

01:59

I'm going to be showing anything. No, no, I will. I won't. Nevermind that.

02:04

Nevermind that. I will. And in fact, how am I going to do that? We'll find out as we go along.

02:11

That's what we'll do. There are a couple of videos that I'm going to try to show. So and I didn't have them all set up here.

02:20

So anyways, things to get to today. I made a promise. And once again, just a reminder, big weekend next weekend, this weekend coming up at Redemption Hills Church in the

02:39

Denver area, Jason Lyle and I will be dealing with the subject of the emptiness of secularism.

02:48

And that is officially the world view of our government these days, the regime anyway.

02:56

And it should be part of the discussion around the dinner table.

03:06

As rare as dinner tables are any longer, it should be what we're talking with our kids about and our grandkids about.

03:15

So that they have a solid understanding, so they can see as they watch what is happening in the world as we all experience the fact that inflation has stolen a great deal of the profit from our labor.

03:38

And that's purposeful. And as of yesterday, the United States legislature, the

03:44

Senate passed 50 -50 with the ever intelligent

03:51

Kamala Harris casting the tie break vote. Those mules, they did their job.

04:00

A bill that when the spokespeople speak to you, they say, no one making less than $400 ,000 will pay an extra penny in taxes.

04:17

And then the people that aren't paid by the government analyze it and go, actually, if you make more than $30 ,000, which is everybody,

04:27

I mean, if you have almost any full time job at all, or even a couple of part time jobs, your taxes will go up.

04:35

So yeah, when the leftist lips are moving, they're lying, because that's their world view.

04:42

That's just how they operate. And so as they see these things happening, as they get old enough to where they see so much of what they earn from doing labor being stolen by the government, they need to know that they need to be able to see the big picture.

05:02

And this money is being funneled into the coffers of organizations that promote all sorts of opposition to godliness in our society.

05:14

And so they need to understand these things. And so we're going to be talking about those issues next weekend at Redemption Hills Church, specifically

05:23

Christian worldview issues in regards to secularism, in regards to the conflict, in regards to flushing out of our brains the myth of neutrality that has been a part of how

05:40

I was raised. And I'm not ragging on my parents or anything like that.

05:45

It was just fundamentalism. It's interesting, fundamentalism historically had that strong reaction to liberalism, but the result was to become very internalized and to not recognize that the issues with liberalism, the world has the same problems.

06:16

And so we had this, well, you just look at these Southern Baptist churches that are filled with American flags and patriotic music and all the rest of this kind of stuff.

06:27

And it's the same idea that there's this myth of neutrality, that you can have governmental exercise of authority that is completely disconnected from God's will.

06:44

And they're just, that's what I was raised with, and there's a, I've got a lot of friends that still have that idea, really still have that idea.

06:51

And what's coming, whatever that is, will disabuse us,

06:56

I think, very much of a lot of those things. So that's coming up next weekend.

07:02

If you just look up Redemption Hills Church, Denver, it'll come up and there's a whole schedule.

07:09

And like I said, one of the talks, it's not really about secularism specifically, but it's a good connection, is

07:17

Jason's talk on fractals. And I'm going to see if I can't slip him a 20, these days inflation, a 50, and have him sneak one of my fractals in to his presentation.

07:32

That would be, I would have arrived, I would have preached in Spurgeon's Church in the

07:39

Metropolitan Tabernacle, I will have preached in Luther's pulpit, and I will have gotten Jason Lyle to show one of my fractals.

07:48

My memory has gotten so bad these days, I'll probably forget to even ask him to do it, because he'd do it if I asked him,

07:54

I'm sure that he'd be more than happy to slide, because I've made some really nice fractals,

07:59

I really have, do some pretty stuff. Anyway, so about two weeks ago, a friend reached out to me in my role as official theologian for Skillet, that tells you, that sort of limits things to about four people, and asked me to respond to a video, and it's sort of outside the normal range of our discussions,

08:37

I have honestly admitted, I forget what year it was, I think it was around 2010,

08:46

I taught a class on world religions for a seminary in California, and in preparation for that I spent hours and hours and hours listening to graduate level lectures and discussions on Hinduism and Buddhism.

09:06

Evidently I would have to sit down with practitioners of these faiths for lengthy periods of time.

09:15

The worldview, the methodology of thought, the thought patterns, is just so foreign to me, that it's very difficult for me to hold those things together, and hence to respond meaningfully to the claims that are made.

09:37

And so this is from Mystics of India, M -O -I,

09:45

Mystics of India, I'd not heard of them before, it's eight minutes long, and dear

09:55

YouTube, this is called fair use, this is called reviewing and responding to something, and doing so critically, and the problem is, because of the way the video is formatted, there's lengthy periods of just graphics, there's pretty pictures, and so it's really difficult to shorten it up and just focus in on the statements.

10:28

And sometimes, to be honest with you, the graphics, the video in the background doesn't really have almost anything to do with what's actually being stated, so you've got that issue as well.

10:43

And so the question was, how would you respond to these things?

10:49

So when I play something like this, I sort of would ask you, the viewers, how would you respond, before I respond, how would you respond to these statements, and these assertions?

11:04

And here's where the interest was. The title is,

11:11

Great Religions of the World Can't Withstand Two Logical Questions.

11:19

Oh, two logical questions, so that means there's two logical questions that we're going to be asked to give a response to, and of course,

11:28

I would say, we then would likewise want to assert that those asking the questions should be able to answer them as well, from whatever position it is they are seeking to promote and to get you to accept.

11:52

So I wish there was a way I could play this faster. I remember that there is, but I don't remember, no, there's a key combination that allows me to play this a little bit faster, and I don't remember what it was, sorry.

12:20

So, I need to share the screen, host disabled participant screen sharing, so I can't share the video with you at the moment, oops, so hopefully,

12:43

Rich can get me set up to where I can share the video, try it now, all right, there we go, and let's dive in.

13:15

Human intellect has sparked like never before, more people can think for themselves today than ever before in the history of humanity, whether they're thinking right or not, that's a big question, but at least they're thinking something.

13:33

Okay, I'm not necessarily going to pop back when I make short comments like this, but that does leave you with a blank screen, doesn't it?

13:40

I'm not sure what he means by more people are thinking now than ever before. People didn't think in the past, great philosophers of the past didn't think.

13:51

I would actually argue that we are thinking less deeply now than we ever have, because the distractions of modern stuff.

14:01

So once human intellect fires like this, and it will continue in the coming years, you can't stop it, then solutions for life in another place is not going to work, because I want you to understand, with all due respect, all the great scriptures on the planet, most of the scriptures on the planet cannot withstand two logical questions.

14:40

If you ask two questions, it will collapse. Okay, just real quick, it will collapse.

14:47

Okay, collapse assumes some kind of worldview. It's some kind of logical, rational test that results in collapse.

14:59

And you have to be able to explain where that comes from. Remain sacred and up there only as long as you're prevented from asking these questions.

15:08

These questions are taboo. These questions are sacrilege, you're not supposed to ask them.

15:14

I don't know about you, but I was really, really interested at this point. What are these questions? Are they taboo?

15:22

And the result that I got from watching it was the mystics of India know almost nothing about the religious systems that they are saying are incorrect.

15:34

Only as long as you do not ask these questions, they float in very sacred space.

15:41

If you ask two questions, it'll collapse. And our philosophies, belief systems, religious processes, everything will collapse with two questions, majority of it.

15:55

There are a few things we call standard beliefs. Okay, so there's your first question.

16:25

Is heaven for real? I just immediately go, that's the first question?

16:36

Aren't there much more fundamental, foundational, basic questions that have to be answered before even asking that question?

16:47

But that's the first question. Is heaven for real? Heavens will collapse.

17:00

Anyway, let's simply explore the heaven. What's there in heaven? In the

17:07

Hindu heaven, food is very good. Allah himself will cook for you.

17:15

Best food. See, now we look at this and we're immediately like, what?

17:21

Heaven? Food will be good? And I remember listening to Shabbir Ali make a comment about how attractive the hoodies are in heaven and how great sex will be.

17:36

And Christians go, what? That just doesn't even enter our thinking as to the nature of heaven.

17:47

Foodie, that's a place to go. In another heaven, there are white -clad ladies without legs who float in the clouds.

17:56

If you like that kind of ambience, you can go there. In another place, you'll have, you'll encounter working problems.

18:07

If that's what you're seeking, you can go there. But how to get there?

18:17

You've got to die first. If you die, depending upon the culture in which you are, we will either bury you, burn you, throw you to the birds, something.

18:29

One thing is we'll put the body back into the earth. It's a very eco -friendly thing to do. Because this body is just a...

18:36

A very eco -friendly thing to do? Put your body back into the earth.

18:43

Um, okay. All right. You must at least have the sense to put it back, not go away with it.

18:51

So you left your body here and went to heaven. Whichever three you chose. You don't have a body.

18:59

What will you do with good food and virgins, I'm asking? I'm saying, everything that's not logically correct is going to collapse in the next 25 years.

19:11

Now, watch it. 25 years?

19:22

Reminds me of, well, 12 years before the planet's dead and, you know, all the rest.

19:27

25 years? What do you mean collapse? On the basis of what? Okay, so here's your second question.

19:44

Is God really up there? So these are two questions that allegedly all the world's religions collapse.

19:53

All their scriptures collapse. On these two questions, which we would recognize, are not even basic enough to start the conversation.

20:08

I was, um... These are taboo? Taboo where?

20:13

With whom? In what context? I have no idea. Whenever things don't work, there is a habit in lots of people, they will look up.

20:24

Uparwala. The whole world is looking up.

20:32

Looking up. See, you know the planet is round? You know?

20:40

The planet is round. And you're not sitting on top of the North Pole. You're sitting in Chennai, here in the tropical climate.

20:49

And the damn planet is spinning. So if you look up, you're always looking up in the wrong direction.

20:57

Maybe at a certain moment of whatever Greenwich Mean Time, zero hours, when you looked up, maybe you hit the heaven.

21:05

Rest of the time, you're always looking in the wrong direction. It's so hard to follow the logic here.

21:15

As if heaven is a physical place. I suppose if your heaven is filled with a certain kind of food, then yeah, that's how things are.

21:25

But it's, um... Again, for a Christian, it's not a matter of which direction.

21:34

Heaven is where, well, for us, where Christ is. That's the place he's preparing for us.

21:40

It doesn't matter which direction you're looking, or whether you're spinning, or whether you're on the Southern Hemisphere, the

21:46

Northern Hemisphere, or anything else. It just doesn't make any sense. Isn't it so?

21:55

So in this cosmic space, is there somebody who knows which is up and which is down?

22:02

Does somebody know? Huh? Is there somewhere, is it marked this side up?

22:10

Nobody knows which is up, which is down. It's just an assumption, isn't it? Do you know really which is

22:16

North, which is South? In the real sense, do you know what is North and South? It is just for our convenience, we just fixed it, isn't it?

22:25

Yes or no? Do you know what's East and West? No. Do you know what is forward and backward?

22:32

You do not know. None of these things you know. There is only one thing you can be certain of right now.

22:39

This is, you know what is outward, what is inward. Again, assumptions being made on issues that don't seem to be overly relevant.

22:52

But again, if you don't know what's up and down, how would you know inward and outward?

22:58

I can think of all sorts of objections to that too. I'm not sure how this is relevant to, is there a

23:07

God up there except for the word up? And again, you just have to have such an incredibly limited view of deity to even get close to this.

23:32

See, if you believe there is God or if you believe there is no God, you are in the same boat.

23:40

You believe something that you do not know. That would be one of the most important assertions in the whole video.

23:49

Because, you know, the Christian response is, this type of ultimate skepticism is directly contradictory to the

23:57

Christian scriptures, which specifically say that God has revealed himself. And that that knowledge gets through and we suppress that knowledge.

24:03

And that's where I would then find the connection between myself and the individual making these statements.

24:10

Because they're made in the image of God. And as soon as that connection is established, then this entire argument is laid to rest and you can move forward from there.

24:19

I believe this, you believe that. It doesn't make any difference. You can believe whatever you want.

24:28

Everybody can believe whatever they want. It need not have anything to do with reality as such.

24:35

So this is a definition of belief that is pure irrationality. There is no objective truth.

24:42

There is no way to... God has not spoken. God has not acted in history. If you say

24:51

I do not know, the longing to know will arise within you. If the longing arises, the seeking arises.

24:59

If the seeking arises, the possibility of knowing exists. That's actually pretty much it.

25:17

There's some more music after that. And then the advertisement for Mystics of India. You will see. Let me stop the share here.

25:26

You'll see. No answers are given. There is nothing substantive.

25:33

There is no truth being offered. There is no recognition or understanding of...

25:39

You know, you could see, if you watched the graphics a little bit, that they were basically referring to Muslims and to Christians.

25:46

There was one point where the guy with the cross, and there was Muslims praying. And so the scriptures would be the

25:53

Quran, Bible, so on and so forth. And I can assure you, my

26:02

Muslim friends would have answers to those two questions. Any Christian has the answers to those two questions.

26:11

And in fact has much more fundamental questions to ask of them. Why did you ignore these foundational issues?

26:22

And I think a lot of us, we sort of stay away from these kinds of conversations because we recognize that the individual with whom we're speaking is functioning from such a different worldview.

26:39

But you have to remember, if what Romans 1 says is true, then

26:47

God has sufficiently revealed himself so that there is a connection point.

26:58

It's not a point of neutrality. There is no neutral ground.

27:05

It is the fact that they are made in the image of God and they are suppressing the truth of God. There is the connection point.

27:12

And you saw in that video four or five places where the underlying assumption of what was being said assumed facts, not an evidence.

27:31

Assumed a world where a logical conclusion would flow from certain arguments.

27:40

The whole idea that you could have questions that would refute religious systems assumes that there is some type of objective revelation, some type of objective truth that can be known with sufficient clarity to refute something.

28:02

But no grounding was provided for that within the worldview. And so that's where the

28:09

Christian who encounters someone who says these things needs to be prepared to explain to them how they are basically stealing from God's world to hold theirs together.

28:26

And so I think a presuppositional approach is absolutely necessary in this situation.

28:34

You have to be able to challenge where they're coming from and trust the spirit of God and the fact that they're suppressing the knowledge that's already there.

28:46

This is just another way of doing it. Rich mentioned that someone in,

28:53

I guess, the Twitch comments or something said this sounds like Deepak Chopra.

28:59

Yeah, it's all the same type of Eastern mysticism which glories in its not providing answers and in mocking those who do provide answers in essence.

29:14

But again, these individuals are made in the image of God. That's where you go is to the demonstration of that.

29:23

Let me see. Oh, yes, I do have another one here. This I picked up a couple of weeks ago.

29:32

And since we were doing just audio only, it's been a little while.

29:42

At the Christian Booksellers Association meeting. Oh, well, that looks interesting.

29:50

This has popped up on my screen. FBI raids Donald Trump's Mar -a -Lago resort. Just make the comment in passing that once a nation transitions from being a nation of law to a nation of people.

30:14

The institutions of law that we once trusted become reasons for terror for all of us.

30:23

And that's what we're seeing happening here. Institutions that we once had great respect for have been politicized and turned into the private terror forces of those in political power who will use them in that way.

30:45

I don't know the way back. But there's going to have to be reconstruction someday.

30:52

The question is going to be how much? From the foundation up? Or will there still be something left standing after the insanity burns itself out?

31:11

I'm one of those old fogies. Olivia Newton -John, my goodness.

31:20

I guess she was only, what, 14 years older than I am? Yeah, about 14 years older than I am.

31:26

And you pray that toward the end of her life,

31:34

I don't know anything about her personal life, but you pray that she heard and responded to the gospel.

31:43

God gives us a lot of reminders that life is brief, internally and externally.

31:52

The aches and pains. Rich gave me this.

32:01

I think it was my Christmas present. It's one of those muscle bumpers.

32:12

I'm doing a lot of riding right now. Still trying. I'm fighting it. You give up and you never get it back.

32:20

I've done 7 ,000 feet of climbing in the past two days at altitude. You get to my age and stuff hurts.

32:30

That helps. Work on the IT bands. Every man over 50 knows what

32:41

I'm talking about. Things just don't work the way they used to. You get injured. And the funny thing is, you get injured and it takes two days for it to start hurting.

32:51

By then, you've forgotten what you did to cause the injury. It's frustrating.

32:59

What did I do? Something's hurting. It's too long ago for me to remember what it was

33:04

I did. You get all the internal stuff. I had a heart rhythm today.

33:11

I'm a heart patient and had a heart rhythm today. It was my fault.

33:16

I had gone two hours past when I was supposed to take my meds. When the memory goes, you either laugh at yourself or get really sad and depressed.

33:30

I did it to myself. You get all the internal stuff. You go to your 40th high school reunion.

33:43

There's that display. For us, it was

33:49

Debbie Viles that did it. There's the girls that kept track of everybody and did the work.

33:57

There's the display of all of our teachers that have died. And all of our classmates that have died.

34:07

You're faced with it right there. There's one of the prettiest girls in my class.

34:16

Looking back, the decisions she made in high school shortened her life by 20 -30 years.

34:27

Right there. You turn on the TV. You watch something on the internet.

34:36

Here's the people from your youth. And they're dying. We would have to literally expend energy, effort, to not realize all of this.

34:53

And we do. Because we don't want to believe. When scripture says, it is better to spend a day in the house of mourning than a day in the house of feasting.

35:05

We want to be in the house of feasting all the time. We never want to leave. There are times to be in the house of feasting.

35:13

But the rejoicing in the house of feasting is always very, very surface level.

35:20

Unless you've spent time in the house of mourning. It's a reality. So, God gives us plenty of mourning.

35:31

He really does. And we ignore it. And it's never coming from me.

35:37

No, I'm going to live forever. So, back to the video that I mentioned here.

35:46

I saw this posted online. I just remember the

35:52

Christian Book Sales Association meeting. I think it was 1995. It might have been 1996.

35:58

I went to both of them, I think. I think one was in Denver, and one was in Texas someplace.

36:05

Anyway. And I had lunch with Norm Geisler.

36:11

This was before Potters Freedom. This was when we were buds.

36:22

I remember we were sitting there. The subject of apologetics and presuppositionalism came up.

36:34

The same thing was true with Reformed Theology.

36:42

Dr. Geisler was transparent. When he did not have respect for a position, you could just sort of see this curtain come down.

37:00

And he had a fixed response. And there wasn't going to be any more discussion.

37:07

There just wasn't. And obviously, I would say the biggest influence in Norm's theological construction was

37:22

Thomas Aquinas. And so, a video was posted.

37:28

I need to tighten up this table, don't I? Every time I reach for the mouse, the whole... That's how it works.

37:34

Stuff in an RV has to be sort of flexible. If it's super, super stiff, it can be super, super, super, super broken by the time you get someplace.

37:46

Especially if I don't see a bump coming up, almost always going into or out of a bridge.

37:54

It's just the way it is. But anyway, I'll try not to bounce it around quite as much.

38:02

I apologize. Here is a video that Norm recorded about the importance of Thomas Aquinas.

38:12

That does take us into some other stuff. And it does really,

38:19

I think, give us an idea of where he's coming from. So let's take a look at it here and share and go.

38:35

Yeah, where would evangelicalism be today without Aquinas? Knowingly or unknowingly, it would be in deep, deep trouble without Aquinas because all it is of value, all it is enduring, all it is really preserving orthodoxy is due to classical theology and classical apologetics.

38:59

And to the degree that we've dissipated and gotten away from that, we've gotten away from the things that Aquinas taught.

39:08

Unfortunately... So I would like to know, okay, when you say we've gotten away from the things that Aquinas taught, there was a thread on Twitter yesterday or two days ago from Matthew Barrett.

39:30

And of course, I'm blocked. Anybody who criticizes him gets blocked. I have a long blocked list too, but it's not because of criticism or simply disagreement.

39:41

But he seems to be very, very sensitive. Anyway, the whole thread struck me as spin, salesmanship, desperate salesmanship of how important and how

40:03

Protestant Thomas Aquinas actually is. Because remember, this is the same one saying

40:09

Aquinas wasn't actually a Roman Catholic. Which again, I just go, okay, so how do you define

40:17

Roman Catholicism? It is a valuable and important question to ask what is the

40:27

Genesis development of Roman Catholicism? Because Roman Catholicism is properly an oxymoron.

40:37

Catecholos, according to the whole universal, was used in the early church. And to connect that to a particular geographical location is contradictory.

40:50

It doesn't make any sense. So you have to ask the question, when does

40:56

Roman Catholicism start? And you'll get every possible answer to that from the

41:03

Council of Nicaea all the way past the Council of Trent. Because you have to ask the question, what's definitional?

41:14

What is definitional of Roman Catholicism? And most of you know what my answer to that is.

41:27

But I'm willing to hear someone else and go, okay, if that's what you make definitional, then

41:34

I could see how you would start this at a different point in time. But Thomas is a doctor of the

41:41

Roman Catholic Church. And Thomas's theology has been presented by certain popes as the necessary precondition of really understanding

41:55

Roman Catholic dogma. And for me, the central act of worship of the

42:05

Roman Catholic Church is the Mass. And it's a particular understanding of the

42:10

Eucharistic sacrifice that is dependent upon the doctrine of transubstantiation.

42:17

And all of that becomes dogmatized in the 13th century, along with around the same time as Thomas's life.

42:30

And he is the one that provides in his theology and his teaching the foundations for the whole understanding of the

42:40

Mass as a perpetuatory sacrifice. And he's the one who mediates the

42:46

Aristotelian categories of accidents and presence and gives us the dogmatic understanding that Rome has today of the sacrifice of the

42:55

Mass. If that is the central worship aspect of the

43:02

Roman Catholic Church, then it would seem 1215 would be a good place. Now, have there been developments since then?

43:08

There certainly have been. Have there been developments in understanding the papacy? Most definitely. Have key

43:14

Marian dogmas been brought forth and dogmatized since then?

43:21

Yes. Did Aquinas not believe in some of those dogmas?

43:29

Yes. Very importantly. But are those definitional?

43:38

And if you want to make your argument for it, make your argument for it. But you have to be serious about it. And that whole discussion, let's be honest, is a rarity amongst evangelicals.

43:58

It's a rarity. I'm not going to get to it today.

44:04

I was thinking about getting to it, but I should have known I wouldn't. I want to, during the course of this trip, obviously we're in the

44:16

Mobile Command Center here. I want to, in the course of this trip, spend a little more time talking about, for example, the

44:26

Council of Chalcedon, which was really important to me in my seminary training.

44:35

One of the most important papers I wrote in seminary was the Trinity Definition of Chalcedon and Oneness Theology. It was two and a half times longer than it was supposed to be, but I got permission to do it.

44:48

Portions of it are actually in the Forgotten Trinity, or at least elements of it. As I'm preparing and reading for the

44:59

Early Church History class that's next month, late next month, early next month after that,

45:05

I guess. Anyway, I was struck once again by the historical reality of how these councils did not command the kind of authority when they took place that they've been granted over time since then.

45:29

And that Chalcedon especially created divisions that continue to exist to this day.

45:35

And the reason we don't know anything about that, the reason that 99 .5 % of Protestant Christians in the

45:43

United States have no earthly idea the divisions that were created by Chalcedons because we don't know anything about the

45:51

Eastern Church. And we don't care, to be honest with you. We don't care.

45:59

And so we just flippantly, I think very flippantly, grab hold of things in church history and we haven't done our homework.

46:10

We haven't done our homework. In fact, I was going to get back to the Van Droenen article.

46:18

I've got it queued up right here. I'm not sure I'm gonna get to it now. But that was part of the whole thing was one of the things it was saying was, oh, well, these people who criticize

46:26

Thomas, they don't read Thomas. Well, there's nobody that I know that could possibly have read with understanding the corpus of church history because everybody has their areas of expertise.

46:48

And we do have to depend upon one another. And that means there's going to be disagreements.

46:55

And one of the things the article talks about is, you know, there's just a reliance upon secondary sources and a lot of secondary sources are post -Kantian and Kantian can't produce anti -Thomistic ideas.

47:09

And of course, they go after Schaeffer, not that article, but Schaeffer and Van Til and stuff like that. But the reality is there are all sorts of different opinions about what

47:19

Thomas Aquinas believed, where he was going, what his agenda was, things like that. And part of that's because any type of church history requires interpretation on our part.

47:33

There's all sorts of hagiolatry in the materials on Thomas. And the question is, did this even happen?

47:42

Did this conversation ever take place? How are we to prioritize things?

47:48

There's all sorts of issues that come up in those contexts that I think are very, very important.

47:59

But back to what Norm said, I've asked this question.

48:05

I'm going to keep asking this question. I'm going to ask it so many times that eventually somebody is going to try to answer it.

48:13

Right now, I think it is purposely being avoided. But I keep asking, what doctrine, teaching, insight that can be demonstrated to be apostolic in origin?

48:32

It comes from Jesus' apostles. Are we dependent upon Thomas Aquinas for our best understanding of or statement of apostolic truth?

48:49

Is he the final link in this chain of development of, say, the doctrine of the

48:57

Trinity? Is everyone before Thomas sub -orthodox today because of Thomas?

49:08

That seems to be the logical conclusion. But the things that Thomas taught, the only thing that could make any application here that I can see whatsoever, are issues related to his metaphysics,

49:30

Aristotle, the Five Ways, quote -unquote classical apologetics.

49:38

Certainly has nothing to do with the gospel, does it? What gospel issue are we dependent upon Thomas Aquinas for?

49:48

What gospel issue? And if gospel issues are not definitional of the faith, then let's just come straight out and say that, because that's what the mere

49:58

Christianity movement is all about. The gospel is not definitional of the Christian faith.

50:06

Neither is ecclesiology, sacramentology, eschatology. The only thing that is actually definitional of the

50:13

Christian faith is theology proper and the subcategories of Christology, pneumatology, the whole field of the creeds of Calzone, so on and so forth.

50:30

But everything else outside of that just doesn't matter. Just doesn't matter. Is that where we're really going to go?

50:40

That's the question. Let's go back here and listen to a little more. Most of Evangelicalism has gotten away from us, but what is good and what is enduring is due to Aquinas, whether they know it or not, whether they even heard his name or not, whether they are seeing...

50:59

What is this that is so good and enduring that is dependent fully upon Aquinas? That a hundred years before Aquinas, nobody knew?

51:10

Or is it that after Aquinas, it had been stated better than it could ever been stated before?

51:18

Which is it? I'd like to know. Should all Aquinas be forgotten, never brought to mind or not because what are the things that are hindering us?

51:30

Denial of classical attributes of God, denial of classical theology... Are we talking about...

51:37

I would imagine at this point, Norm was very much involved in the open theism debates with ETS and of course on his side on that issue.

51:55

But I've debated open theists numerous times, more than almost anybody else

52:01

I know. I've never had to cite Aquinas once. Open theism is fundamentally opposed to basic apostolic biblical teaching.

52:10

I don't need Aquinas and in fact, I'd be honest with you, Aquinas would complicate and confuse, not clarify the issues related to this subject.

52:23

And it's interesting, it was open theists that actually, in my understanding anyways, I haven't triple checked this, but my understanding is the whole phraseology of classical theism was initially a negative description from open theists.

52:40

Well, in classical theism, where God doesn't change, in classical theism, where God is eternal, etc.

52:47

etc. Go listen to the debates I've done with open theists. Did I have to depend upon Thomistic metaphysics?

52:56

Or did I point out that, for example, in almost every debate, that you end up falsifying

53:06

Jesus' own prophetic testimony to his own deity when you assert that the future would be unknown to Jesus, when he says that Judas is going to do what

53:17

Judas is going to do. That's a biblical argument. I didn't get that from Thomas, and I'm not dependent upon Thomas for it.

53:26

So, is not the deity of Christ revealed in John chapter 13 enduring?

53:33

I'm going to have to, if I can remember to do it, actually look up I have

53:42

Aquinas' commentary on John with me. I'm going to look up what he did with that section and see what he did.

53:50

But I didn't need him to exegete that text and to demonstrate the problems.

53:59

I didn't need Aquinas to go to Isaiah 40 -48. So, those things aren't enduring.

54:07

Those things aren't important. I just find this language simply irresponsible.

54:14

Simply irresponsible. I really do. But, there you go.

54:25

We return. Behind most of the main intellectual drifts from true evangelicalism today.

54:35

Whether it's on hermeneutics, those things I listed at the beginning, is hermeneutical view, is view of analogy, is view of scripture, is view of inerrancy, is view of God, attributes of God.

54:45

It's forsaking those things that have gotten us in trouble. Again, we can selectively quote portions of Thomas Aquinas.

54:59

And, it really seems to me that the current

55:05

Thomists do that to an extreme level. But I have,

55:13

I have not seen any of the Thomists deal with Aquinas' statement, for example, regarding oral tradition from the apostles.

55:27

A responsible analysis of that one text could open the door for, yes, like maybe

55:40

Basil did, there was the idea that there were certain traditions that the church possesses from the apostles that are not in scripture, but we only apply those to forms of worship, not to dogmas or doctrines.

55:59

Make the argument, but no one's even tried. No one's even tried, because you're going to have to be really, really careful at that point, if you're actually saying that the apostles taught certain things that are passed down through the church.

56:15

Because Rome's like, oh, yeah, yeah, that's, you got it there.

56:23

So, it's back to Aquinas, whether you want his name Sproul used to tell me this, R .C.

56:28

Sproul and I spent 10 years together working on the Inerrancy Conference, and so we became rather close, even though I'm not a five -point

56:37

Calvinist, I'm a moderate Calvinist, and he is, we hold the same classical theology, and Sproul said, you know, wherever I go,

56:46

I give them what Aquinas said in his Reformed circles. He said, I just don't tell them

56:51

I got it from Aquinas. Because that would put an unnecessary wall there.

56:59

So I do that too. If I can find a quote from Augustine saying the same thing, issues

57:04

Augustine, because they don't have that visceral reaction to Augustine that they have to Aquinas.

57:11

But we're overcoming that to some degree. Okay, so again, what would those issues be?

57:25

What did Aquinas say that is apostolically true, biblically mandated that we must believe today that had not been said by people before him and said better by people after him?

57:42

What? Give me an example. Give me something where Aquinas said it and Calvin didn't.

57:49

Because in my humble opinion, Calvin expresses divine truths with a thousand percent greater clarity and force than Thomas Aquinas ever does.

58:06

So I'm going to keep asking the question and I encourage those of you who are hearing this and you're going,

58:16

I don't know where all this is coming from. Ask the same question. Ask the same question.

58:22

Because I think it's extremely important. This is weird.

58:30

Stuff pops up on your screen. Former US President Donald Trump's Florida Mar -a -Lago home is under siege.

58:38

Under siege? What is going on? I have no earthly idea.

58:49

Is under siege and occupied by a group of FBI agents, the former president said in a statement late

58:54

Monday. Here I'm talking about Thomas Aquinas and the rest of you have tuned out and are watching the news to find out what's going on.

59:11

Oh, by the way, as we wrap up, let me extend my sincere personal thanks to Kuiper Belt Productions and the video that they put out.

59:28

We've all enjoyed the funny reformed videos that they put out but they do such a great job in putting graphics in and stuff

59:38

I could never do. They did one just all about me today and put it out.

59:45

I've tweeted it out. Here's the best of James White and a lot of them are when I'm picking on Chocolate Knox and Rich is in there singing the

59:58

Won't You Be My Neighbor song. Congratulations on that, Rich. My understanding. Oh, that's

01:00:03

Rich there. Yes, he even said, I even got a cameo. You did? And it was a singing cameo.

01:00:09

I think that's very impressive. I'm not sure if you've gotten any calls from Simon Cowell or anyone like that to sign you up.

01:00:23

There was the other shot with my hat. Well, yeah, you did go in. Yes, the hat was in the background.

01:00:29

You did get both of those. That's true. But Cooper was in there as well and his little song.

01:00:44

There was a little bit of everything in that particular one but then I was always going after Chocolate Knox.

01:00:49

There was a lot with the guys up in Moscow and stuff like that.

01:00:56

Yes, thank you very, very much that they would still consider me to even be in the reformed realm.

01:01:02

There are many people who would like me cancelled right after that even for some of the things

01:01:08

I said today, probably. But it was very, very well done and congratulations to those guys.

01:01:14

I hope you get lots and lots of hits and I'm glad we can still do stuff like that. I don't know how much longer.

01:01:19

We will be able to do stuff like that especially with the FBI going after former presidents and things like that.

01:01:26

It's not that that kind of thing never happens. It just normally happens in banana republics in Central America and in South America and we've really become a banana republic.

01:01:36

There's no question about it. But no mean tweets. No mean tweets. There you go.

01:01:43

I am stunned I did not get to the article I had queued up but I touched on it.

01:01:49

I did touch on some. But we have more programs coming up. Tomorrow is a big travel day for me.

01:01:57

When I'm on the road, watch the app. We just have to sort of go you're going to be able to do it, not going to be able to do it.

01:02:06

What's the internet look like? Are you meeting with folks, traveling along, stuff like that?

01:02:14

You never know. We will see but I certainly want to have the opportunity to continue to address these issues and hopefully do so in a way that is respectful to the truth and to the faith and to the church and yet also requires people to come up with meaningful answers and not just spin.

01:02:40

Spin ain't good enough. Spin ain't good enough. Thanks for watching the program today. We'll see you next time.