The Color of Compromise, Steven Anderson Continued, Open Phones

Alpha & Omega Ministries

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

Comments are disabled.

00:37

Please welcome to the dividing line hopefully my voice will survive there for a second and we will keep streaming today that's our goal we will see which is a little bit unhappy he had to step down the and the camera went back zoom back out again to where you don't like it so.

00:56

But he had to step down the bit rate or something so it's not quite as fancy and snazzy as he'd like it to be but hey

01:03

I've never really wondered why by wants to watch me talking anyways so it's only when we show stuff that really matters.

01:10

So you know the background is nice except someone didn't turn the lava lamp on today so it's just sitting back there doing nothing

01:16

I won't mention who is here to be able to do that but it's just gonna sit there and eventually about half of the program will go and it'll freeze and look really weird but.

01:28

It's just sort of how it works anyway on the program today we're gonna take we're gonna open the phone lines here in a while I haven't done that in a long long time and of course we talked a great deal about.

01:41

Well a bunch of things on the last program including jd greer's sermon

01:49

I've gotten some pushback on that from people who struggle with the category issue regarding some sins are worse than others that it's it's worse to murder someone than to steal their coke.

02:05

Just because both come from a crop nature and both result in a punishment from god leads some people think that that means they're they're equal with one other so if still some ice coke you might as well shoot while you're at it.

02:18

It's not really how things work but anyway we had that and there's been a little bit more in the anthony bradley front in in twitter and a few things like like that so lots of stuff that we can talk with you on the phone but first I want to do two things we did not finish the first response to.

02:46

Steven anderson hopefully everybody has picked up on what that kind of discussion is going to actually look like we're looking at basic fundamental things were covering some important.

02:56

Issues in regards to the history of the bible and things like that it's really not about steven anderson it's about the issues are being raised.

03:02

But then I want to in the first few minutes here provide a brief commentary not so much a review but some thoughts on a recently published book that I have a feeling will be on the recommended reading list for every.

03:22

Well every social justice gathering every tgc t4g get together everything the erl see will publish everybody who's woke will be you know divided by faith was there their their favorite book and still is in many ways.

03:45

But now added to the list will be jim artis be's book the color of compromise which came out what about two weeks ago or so I think maybe three anyway.

03:59

And I have read the book and once I read the book then

04:06

I went to the tgc website because I had seen that there had a review had been read will samuel say wrote a review very shortly after it came out and I had seen that one but I hadn't read the tgc one and once I read it for myself

04:24

I wanted to see. Would the reviewer for the gospel coalition note any of the issues that I myself noted.

04:38

And of course they didn't there was one mild almost like I have to include this so it sort of sounds like I actually

04:47

I'm doing a review rather than just promoting this there was one mild interaction at one point but otherwise it was a wide open recommendation commendation of the book and acceptance of his perspective.

05:04

As samuel say noted about the after the first eight chapters it switches over from being a historical work to a a work of political rhetoric political promotion and you can see it if you're if you're listening carefully you can you can very easily see the shift.

05:31

From narrating historical realities to for example the the attempt to turn ronald reagan into a racist was extremely obviously and painfully artificial and having been on the receiving end of well even jamar tisby's attempts to read racism into places where racism doesn't even begin to exist.

06:00

Makes me a little bit more critical because i've you know i've experienced myself i i know how how this works and so.

06:12

It does shift you know the first portion of the book has historical value and the second is a study in the promotion of progressive leftist politics within.

06:27

Ostensibly a christian framework. And as such demonstrates the incredible.

06:35

Incredible bias that is inherent within the progress of this movement i hate that term progressive it's not progress yeah right over a cliff.

06:48

But you know he controls the language controls the debate and so to that's why i don't refer to people as liberals any longer because they don't believe in liberty.

07:01

They're leftists and their totalitarians and their socialists and need to call things where they are anyway.

07:12

What was stunning to me about the book as i as i got to the end of it i was thinking about all the things that were not said.

07:22

Not even mentioned and the tgc reviewer skipped over all this to how can you write.

07:30

I mean there was in the latter chapters the the real attempt to go after the alleged identification of christian evangelicalism with the

07:40

GOP and attach that to. Some form of racism we're gonna see here in a moment the definition of racism given well there was never any there was never even an attempt.

07:50

At meaningful biblical exegesis as far as racism or any of that kind of that did not even that wasn't the purpose of the book and there was no attempt to do it.

08:01

The initial definition given of racism was solely derived from sociology and and secular sources it was you know the power stuff and all that kind of stuff.

08:15

But the definition given for the twenty first century specifically on pages one ninety and one ninety one.

08:22

Of the book if you have it is frightening and it's divisive and wrong and wrong headed and yet explanatory of so much of what we're seeing today but.

08:37

Before I get to that when you're when you're desperately trying to go after the

08:45

GOP reagan obviously trump and you're putting effort into that in the latter portion of the book.

08:54

How in the world can you skip over the senator from west virginia for fifty one years robert bird.

09:08

Who is a member of the KKK fifty one years and i say senate how can you skip over the fact that the democratic party founded the

09:20

KKK. That the democratic party stood against the civil rights movement and and the passage of legislation and.

09:29

And how do you how do you spend pages trying to spin a narrative that reagan was a racist when at the same time you turn a blind eye never say a word about the centrality of the democratic party in the promotion of racism united states it.

09:55

I'm sorry it vitiates any claim that this is any meaningfully historical work at all it shows that you are promoting a perspective and promotion of the democratic party and you're just going to use history to to promote that.

10:10

I was shocked I really expected something different that there would at least be an acknowledgment yeah you know that you've got some real problems here and then in the same way not a whisper about the genocide of black children by Planned Parenthood millions.

10:41

Word if you don't even say a word if you don't even tip the hat it's screaming out loud everybody knows about well okay maybe not maybe people don't know and maybe you're hoping that they don't know

10:57

I don't know but there you go.

11:02

Not a word. What what Planned Parenthood was mentioned only in passing in regards to why many evangelicals struggled in the twenty sixteen election regarding to reference to Hillary Clinton but you have a genocide.

11:24

Taking place by Planned Parenthood can't can't talk about that I looked up Chicago twenty four references to Chicago in the book not a one of them had anything to do with the black on black violence oh there was plenty about a cops killing unarmed black men that that narrative was front and center nothing about the.

11:55

Thousand times more blacks being killed by blacks in places like Chicago Los Angeles.

12:05

Fatherlessness can't can't talk about that despite all that like I said you just watch you just watch gospel coalition

12:19

T4G ERLC Russell Moore the beady and a wheelie.

12:26

What are they gonna be doing I gotta read this book man oh man you just gotta read this book

12:34

I'm not telling you not to if you want a great example of how the left spins everything there you go like I said the historical material worthwhile.

12:50

But are you gonna is it is it in any way shape or form fair or balanced or biblical no no it isn't and who's gonna say that well me and.

13:06

Tom Bach and Sam you'll say and they're open are in Harrison I'll be a few people but the vast majority of us go on this is this is one just like divided by faith you know written by non

13:20

Christians of the non Christian anthropology and all that all that we don't have to let's not worry about that.

13:30

So there you go like I said not an entire review but I was just amazed at how you can pretend to write you can call it a historical review and then just edit out the historical parts that don't fit your narrative that's that's what you had there and that is very problematic all right.

13:57

Let's take a look at the rest of what we needed to cover from Steven Anderson and then we'll go to your phone call so let's go ahead and I guess open the do you have because I have

14:10

I've got the phone the phone's working for me so it says you've connected so that's good so that's 877 -753 -3341 it has been a while I confess.

14:27

But 877 -753 -3341 I've always noticed our phone number and I stare at it because I have this

14:38

I have it you know sitting over here and there are three sevens and then three threes and my mind just can't help but adding the one to the eight and then the five to the four that makes a nine too and so there's something numerical about that.

14:57

There's something numerological about the phone number so it's yeah it's how many years have been staring at me

15:04

I mean when did we print that that that that was printed a long long time ago yes so anyway 877 -753 -3341 is the phone number so let's let's get back to all we get our phone calls together we'll get back to our

15:23

Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our

15:39

Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our

15:46

Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our

15:53

Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to the introduction of the phone number and then we'll get back to our Steven Anderson response this is just to would insist that the above -mentioned textus receptus or received text either has been supernaturally preserved over time or even inspired and hence maintained an inerrant condition.

16:06

Of course we believe this has been supernaturally preserved and of course it's inerrant, but James White doesn't have an inerrant Bible that he can point to.

16:12

Okay, so once again, here's the

16:19

TR, at least TR as it is published by the Trinitarian Bible Society, and hence

16:28

I would imagine would be the version that Steven Anderson would have.

16:35

This is not anymore what was passed down than Maenetzioland is.

16:47

There is no single manuscript in the world that reads identical to Maenetzioland.

16:53

There is no single manuscript in the world that reads identical to the TR either. What I can tell you is that the sources that lie behind this represent far more of the

17:11

Christian Church than the sources behind this. There's no question of this.

17:16

The number of manuscripts, the range of manuscripts, not just Greek manuscripts but Latin or Sahitic or Coptic or whatever, far, far, far more of the

17:30

Christian Church's experience is represented here than here.

17:36

This represents a narrow spectrum of the

17:43

Byzantine tradition. It does not represent the broad spectrum of the Byzantine tradition.

17:48

It represents a narrow spectrum and a later portion of the narrow spectrum of the

17:54

Byzantine tradition. Now again, despite Steven Anderson and others, they have to do this because if they accepted this, everything would have to change for them.

18:09

But despite what they have to say, if you take these two texts and if you apply the same rules of hermeneutics, now

18:19

Anderson isn't much of a hermeneutics guy. You can tell that, you know, just listen to the the wild -eyed interpretations and stuff that he gives.

18:32

He knows what it is and he knows the necessity of it, but consistency in it? No. You apply the same rules of hermeneutics and interpretation to the entirety of these texts, not to an individual verse.

18:47

You do not determine the teaching of either one of these books by an individual verse. You cannot demonstrate any single

18:56

Christian doctrine by just simply a single verse. God has given us more than one verse, and so you take the entirety of what is said.

19:06

You apply the same rules of interpretation and hermeneutics to these volumes, and you come up with the exact same theology.

19:16

That is a fact. It flies directly in the face of King James only -ism, but it is a fact.

19:26

And their counterexamples collapse upon examination, as we will demonstrate. That's that's one of the things here is, in my first turn about this, like, well, okay, we're gonna be given yet another opportunity of demonstrating the incoherence of the

19:41

King James only position and its inability to provide a consistent argumentation. But what you're hearing here is the circularity of King James only -ism.

19:51

Let's not, let's not ask the questions about where this came from. Let's just assume that it was just passed down.

19:57

Look, the name Textus Receptus, he actually takes it, it's the received text.

20:04

That was a advertising blurb in 1633 by the Elsevier brothers. Who, who decided this is the received text?

20:13

A couple guys in London trying to make a buck? Or back then it would have been a crown, or a pound, or something like that?

20:23

That, that, that's your, your source? What, what church council has met and said the

20:29

Textus Receptus is the received text? Who's, who's done that? Anybody over there in Eastern Orthodox churches?

20:35

Anybody? No, no, no, nobody's done that because it simply isn't true. This isn't the text that was passed down.

20:45

The New Testament manuscript tradition as a whole, gift of God to the Church preserved by His special providence, but the mechanism of that preservation does not fit with King James only -ism.

20:59

It does not fit with King James only -ism, so they will not even allow it to exist. But the actual method of preservation is far more beautiful and far more defensible than anything that the

21:14

King James only -ist can come up with, and that's what we've been talking about for years. In the multifacality of the text and the books of New Testament being written by multiple authors at multiple times in multiple places to multiple audiences, the fact there's never been an opportunity for any one group to control the text and make edits in the text and change the text and corrupt the text and so on and so forth, and the explosion of the text all over the

21:39

Empire, even during the period of persecution up to the Peace of the Church in 8313, all of that is relevant to the mechanism that God has used for the preservation of that text.

21:56

And so, this whole thing doesn't make any sense when you start by going, well,

22:05

I'm just gonna start with this, and then I'm gonna compare everything else to this, but the standards

22:11

I use for this, I won't use for this, because I'm just gonna say, I'm gonna start with this, and everything else is gonna be found wanting because it'll be different from this.

22:21

Well, this came in history. It came from a great producer.

22:29

I left my water out in the kitchen, and I'm gonna need it, so if you could plop some ice in it, if there's any ice left, because someone hasn't been doing that stuff anymore,

22:37

I don't know, so we'll see, but if you could do that, that would help. You know,

22:44

I would like to point out that the most common question that I got at G3 was, why you're not nicer to me?

22:50

Uh -huh, I know, I know, I realize that. There's so many things, so many thoughts crossing my mind right now that I'm, I shouldn't.

23:02

Anyway, this text has a history, and the people involved, sources involved, have to be examined on the exact same level as anything involved with this, and if you say, nope,

23:21

I'm not gonna do that, you have just destroyed the foundations of your position.

23:26

You have just made your position apologetically irrelevant, and that's why

23:31

I have said, one of the reasons I address this, King James Onlyism is absolutely destructive, absolutely destructive to any meaningful apologetics.

23:44

You cannot defend the New Testament as a preserved text based on King James Onlyism, because it's irrational.

23:53

You're simply saying there, well, here's my standard. Why is that your standard? Because it is. And we already saw, trying to steal presuppositional apologetics and transcendental argumentation, even as badly as he did it, is insufficient.

24:07

It is, it remains irrational. You're simply saying, I can't really defend this, I can't, I will not apply the same standards as this, that I apply to anything else,

24:14

I just won't. That's hypocrisy. King James Onlyism is at its base a hypocritical argument, and hence it cannot do apologetics.

24:29

Cannot do apologetics. Just look at Sam Gipp. Just watch Sam Gipp. Put Sam Gipp and Steven Anderson in the same room together, and then call the cops, because you're gonna need to.

24:44

While you're off that one, you can adjust it, maybe. I'm not even sure if you can, but anyways, we press on with Brother Anderson.

24:54

I mean, even just from a human perspective, okay, the King James Bible was translated over the course of seven years by 54 brilliant scholars.

25:05

Yeah, they're brilliant. They were Calvinists, almost all of them. None of them would have believed what

25:10

Steven Anderson believes. None of them would have been a member of his church. None of them would have been anti -lordship.

25:19

None of them would have substantiated so much of his weirdness, but they're brilliant.

25:27

And when you say 54, yeah, divide that between all the different committees between the Old Testament and New Testament, and what you have is a relatively small number of scholars working on any one particular text.

25:37

And so he's gonna wax eloquent about how brilliant these people were, without telling you, yeah, and the vast majority of them were, you know, they were, well, they were all, none of them were

25:49

Baptists. None of them were independent fundamentalist Baptists. Not a one.

25:56

But they were brilliant. And so if you have scholars like that today, that are involved in production of the

26:05

There's a bunch of heretics, and, hey, stupid. Yeah, well, anyway. One of whom spoke 21 languages fluently, okay?

26:12

Many of them spoke multiple languages. They didn't just speak Hebrew. They spoke Hebrew and Aramaic and Arabic, okay?

26:19

So they spoke the related Semitic languages. They didn't just speak Greek, but they also spoke Latin.

26:24

But one of them I read about had literally read every word of ancient

26:30

Greek or biblical Greek that was available at that time. This guy just ate, breathed, and slept the

26:37

Greek language, okay? So, yay! That's great! Then can you explain why you don't believe what they said in their introduction, and violate their canons of interpretation, and why these brilliant, brilliant, brilliant people were so dumb as to believe the

26:54

Greek Septuagint was, in fact, prior to the time of Christ, and represented an earlier text, and all the rest of that stuff?

27:04

I don't know. The inconsistencies are rather glaring, okay?

27:09

Because our Bible is the King James Bible. We don't walk around, door -to -door soul winning, or go to church, or go to a

27:18

Sunday school with a Greek New Testament in our hand, or a Hebrew Old Testament in our hand. We're living in the United States of America, and the vast majority of people,

27:25

English is their language. So, that's our Bible. I mean, that's the only Bible that most people in Faith Forward Baptist Church will ever read.

27:32

The vast majority of them are not going to learn Greek and Hebrew. They don't need to learn Greek and Hebrew. I mean, God gave them the Word of God in their language.

27:38

So, basically, what James White wants you to believe is that the Bible in your hand is not inspired by God. Now, interestingly enough, the

27:46

King James translators themselves said that even a mean translation—of course, mean back then didn't mean the same thing as it today—mean would be like an average, done in an average fashion, not done beautifully or overly well, but well enough.

28:03

Even a mean translation of the Bible is rightly to be called the Word of God. But obviously, the term inspiration needs to be defined, and though it's used in the

28:17

English King James Version of the Bible, it has a history to it, and it's derived from Latin, and it really—its meaning is not the same thing as the underlying

28:31

Greek. And so, given that Anderson rejects the

28:37

Ruckmanite position, which he calls the Rucktards, the Ruckmanite position, that there's new revelation in the

28:48

King James, then of necessity, the

28:53

English translation of the King James must be held to a standard of accuracy as to the translation of the underlying

29:03

Greek. And a number of times in our responses, we will look at passages where the

29:08

King James translators did not do a perfect job, because they didn't claim that they did, but did not do a perfect job in the rendering of the

29:17

Greek. There are places, for example, in Acts chapter 5, where you can demonstrate that the translation provided was influenced by external factors, normally by the

29:28

Latin, and hence can make a very strong argument that if that was submitted in a

29:34

Greek test today, it'd have to be marked wrong. When the King James says that Jesus was slain and hung on a cross, no, he was slain by being hung on a cross.

29:46

He wasn't killed and then hung on a cross, which is what the King James says. That's an error.

29:54

The underlying Greek's fine. It didn't handle the Greek properly. And if this man's on his third time through of reading the

30:01

Greek New Testament, you never noticed that before? Which is what makes me go, hmm, you know, okay.

30:09

Yeah, okay. If you're walking into church with a King James Bible, he'll point at that and say, that's not inspired by God.

30:16

Now, no translation is inspired by God. That doesn't mean it's not the

30:22

Word of God. There has to be some meaningful level of accuracy in using language here.

30:33

What is inspired is what was written by the Apostles.

30:40

What is preserved is then, even here you have to have categories, because inspiration, theanoustas, doesn't mean to breathe into something, but the divine act of revelation took place in the past and is a completed action.

30:59

Things are not being re -inspired over and over and over again. Greek translators do not pray for new inspiration, for new revelation, or something along those lines.

31:11

And so, you have the initial inspiration, then you have the question of preservation, and even then you have the question of preservation as an entire corpus of text, or looking at individual verses, the existence of textual variation.

31:33

Every person, every one of those brilliant 54 scholars, fully understood and recognized the existence of textual variation.

31:44

You have to deal with it. You can't deal with it if this is all you've got.

31:49

This isn't a critical text. It doesn't have any notes in it. It doesn't tell you about where any of the variants are. You simply have to accept that Scrivener got it right, 1800 years after, well, of course, he's following the

32:02

King James Translator. So, if you want to say that the 54 scholars between 1604 and 1611 got it exactly right, isn't that what the group that he rejects is pretty much saying, is that there was some special supernatural intervention at that particular point in time?

32:20

Because they had to make choices. They had to make choices even between the printed editions of the

32:26

Greek New Testament they had in front of them. Why do you think they were infallible? You don't believe what they believe about the

32:32

Lordship of Christ. I've heard you rail at people, calling them false prophets and false teachers who are going to hell.

32:41

Don't you believe all the King James Translators are going to hell? They were Calvinists and they believe in the Lordship of Christ, they believe in the necessity of repentance and infant baptism.

32:50

So, I thought as I listened to Anderson and these guys, they're going to be consistent, they're going to have to say they went to hell.

33:03

But they're still the best translators around, I guess. I don't know. I enjoy reading the

33:09

Bible in the original languages. I'm on my third time through cover -to -cover reading the New Testament in Greek and I'm also reading an

33:16

Old Testament translation into Greek from Hebrew. And I also enjoy reading the Old Testament in the original

33:21

Hebrew, although my Hebrew is not on the level of my Greek. Wow. Look, smart guy, professionally worked as a

33:32

German translator. It doesn't make a lick of sense to me. It only heightens the multiple personality disorder problem that I see when

33:43

I watch him standing on his pulpit or yelling and screaming at people or firing employees like a complete jerk.

33:51

I don't see the consistency between that kind of behavior and the preaching and the teaching and someone who's read through the

33:58

Greek New Testament three times. That doesn't make any sense. Now, he went on to basically say, but it's more like a hobby.

34:03

It's just not necessary. It's just sort of more like a hobby. Well, if you read the Greek with that level of facility, then you have to have found numerous places where the text could be rendered in a clearer way than it was in the

34:20

King James. That creates such incoherence. I don't even know how to figure it out.

34:27

Okay, and if it says the same thing in English that it says in Greek, if the Greek's inspired, then the English is inspired, folks, because it's

34:33

God's Word. Now, he has a very weird theology of this. Again, these folks don't care about previous generations, the categories of theological language that have been developed, so they get to take words and just let's fill them with new meaning that they've never had before.

34:54

And since they don't really care about church history, and he admits that, he'll admit that in a future video, yeah, we don't really, you know, because it's just a bunch of apostates and blah blah blah.

35:06

So since they don't really care about church history and don't do much reading in church history, the result is that they seemingly feel that they can take established categories of theological language and just use them like Play -Doh, just stretch them and attach them to something new and let's not worry about how this actually developed.

35:28

So the specific utilization of terminology for inspiration now is being watered down and transferred over into, well, if a translation in English can be used by God as the

35:47

Word of God, that means it's inspired. So you're confusing the initial

35:53

Act of Revelation with Apostles with something that happens 1 ,500 years later in a language that did not exist when the

36:05

Apostles lived. Once you are so sloppy in your theology as to use categories in that way, your result in theology is so full of can hold no truth and it all just leaks out, which is what we see.

36:27

What language it's in? I mean, when the Apostles are quoting the Old Testament in the New Testament and they say stuff in Greek, it's still inspired.

36:35

I mean, when Acts chapter 2 took place and the Holy Ghost is causing them to speak with other tongues and they're speaking the

36:41

Word of God in at least 17 different languages? So I wonder when the Apostles quoted from the

36:47

Greek Septuagint, which he says is a 4th century text, was that inspired?

36:55

Because they did, specifically, even when it differed from the Hebrew. So what about that?

37:03

Well then, was that not inspired, what they said? If it was the Word of God, it's inspired, folks. Inspired just means it's what

37:09

God said. It's God breathed. It's what God spoke. So yeah, I believe the King James is the inspired Word of God.

37:14

Why? Because it's a perfect translation from... So if we show one example, and I already did, and we'll go into more detail with that,

37:21

I did in the book. So I'll see if he even attempts to interact with it from Acts chapter 5. But you show one example of an errant translation, and does that mean the

37:34

Bible's no longer inspired? If you've made what he's already admitted he's made, the connection between the

37:41

King James alone as the Word of God alone, yes, it does.

37:47

Which is obviously irrational, which is why this system has really nothing to commend it to.

37:54

Original Greek and Hebrew, the correct, received, traditional, passed down Greek and Hebrew, translated perfectly into English, yeah.

38:01

So a little bit later he says, this group's key affirmation, which gives form and substance to the entire

38:07

KJV -only controversy, is found in the following equation. The King James Bible alone equals the Word of God alone.

38:12

Now, did you catch that? The King James Bible alone, not in the translation, the

38:18

King James Bible alone equals the Word of God alone. He sort of lost the alone part on the

38:25

King James part. We must understand that this is the starting point in the thinking of most

38:35

KJV -only believers. This belief gives rise to so much of the heat that marks this debate, for in the mind of a convinced

38:41

KJV -only believer, any attack upon the KJV is an attack upon God's Word.

38:46

Again, of course we believe the King James Bible is God's Word. If we didn't, then we would be like, oh, we don't have

38:54

God's Word in English. All we have is these translations, 50 of them, and they all say different things, and we don't know what to believe.

39:00

Of course we believe the King James is God's Word. Why? Now remember what I said, King James alone equals

39:07

Word of God alone. He's already skipped over that part. Because it's our Bible. It's the final authority of our faith and practice.

39:13

Well, that's a circular argument. So what? We got saved because we believed what the King James told us about salvation.

39:20

That's why you got saved? Well, that tells you a lot. Theology does matter.

39:27

That's not why you get saved. I mean, okay, I'm not sure you even understand what the gospel is, but that's not how

39:35

Christians get saved. Christians get saved by the work of the Spirit of God called regeneration, taking out a heart of stone and giving a heart of flesh.

39:44

God uses the means of His Word to communicate the content of the gospel used by the

39:51

Holy Spirit to bring about that change. But God has used tracts and portions and even bad translations.

40:02

There have been people who've been saved from reading the Good News Bible. Wow. Because God can draw a straight line with a crooked stick.

40:12

So that's not how you get saved. The King James preached, faith came by hearing and hearing by the

40:18

Word of God. And the Word of God is not some issue of translation. It's the message of the gospel.

40:25

A perfect English translation of the Greek original is the Word of God.

40:31

Again, perfect. He must not be reading very closely as he does his Greek studies.

40:38

For example, if the King James Bible says, of some have compassion, making a difference, and then the

40:43

NIV says, be merciful to those that doubt, those are two completely different things. Of some have compassion, making a difference.

40:50

Be merciful to those that doubt. Now, I had to look that up, and I forgot to pull it up here.

40:59

I apologize. But it's in Jude, and it's in a really, it's right toward the end of Jude, and it's in a really, really difficult area.

41:17

So it's verse 22,

41:27

Jude 22. And have mercy on some who are doubting, is the New American standard. The King James is really difficult to even understand what it is that it's saying.

41:47

But, and of some have compassion, making a difference.

41:55

Making a difference? What does that even mean?

42:03

Now, the underlying texts do tend to be different. There is a major textual variant here.

42:10

And again, the King James guys just go, well, whatever's in the TR, it's not that we have any idea if Erasmus knew of the variant, or Stephanos, or Beza.

42:27

We don't know. We don't care. It's irrelevant. We're simply going to accept whatever's here.

42:37

And there might be a much better understanding of it in even earlier manuscripts that have been read by Christians for even longer than the manuscripts that we read via translation.

42:52

They don't really seem to care. And of some have compassion, making a difference.

43:01

So which actually makes more sense? And have mercy on some who are doubting. Now, part of the reason for the difference here is that in the

43:17

TR, well, in the manuscripts, there are a couple of different readings in regards to diachronomenos, diachronomenus, diachronomenoi.

43:42

And so you have two different cases for either, how would you render it?

43:54

When you look at the utilization of this term, there are a number of places where it would refer to having doubts.

44:02

And that makes sense here. So have mercy on some who are doubting, save others snatching them out of the fire, and on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted by the flesh.

44:13

And so you're having to make decisions about where people are in their relationship to the message, and so Jude is saying we're not always going to have the same response.

44:26

But making a difference might mean distinguishing between people, but it changes the who's doing it to us from a description of those who are doubting.

44:47

Again, it's a textual issue. I could show you the textual data. There's three different major readings that you can look at here.

44:58

But certainly the earliest manuscripts that we have either don't have the phrase, such as P72, or they have it as it's rendered in the

45:14

American Standard, and have mercy on some who are doubting. That's found in Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, and a few others.

45:23

But let me just back away from that particular variant for a moment and go, what is the specific doctrinal content here?

45:36

Are you saying that how we are to approach unbelievers is determined by this one text, and by the difference between whether you have it as making a difference or who are doubting?

45:51

That that's somehow a completely different thing, and that wow,

45:57

Jude 22, everybody knows Jude 22. Everybody's got Jude 22 memorized, and everybody who's ever thought about how we're supposed to approach people outside of the faith has gone to Jude 22.

46:06

No, they haven't. No, they haven't. So it's easy to go, well, there's a difference here.

46:18

Yeah. And to be honest with you, how many people, educated people, would really have any idea what

46:27

Jude 22 is saying in the King James? I mean, honestly, the only way to really understand that is to go back to the original language to have some idea of what was being said.

46:37

You'd have to read in context, you'd have to read in the original language, and of some have compassion making a difference.

46:47

If you want to say, oh yeah, that's, there you go, there's a great example. Well, it's more of a great example of how obscure the

46:55

King James can be in many of its renderings. And he goes on and on, like, you know, why is it the standard? You know, who says that's the standard?

47:01

He says, it's perfectly logical to ask, this is on page 27, why should I use it as the standard by which

47:06

I am to test all others? You know why the King James is the standard? Because it's the standard. There you go.

47:15

That's the best they have, folks. It's all they've got. It's all they've got. It's a standard because it's a standard.

47:22

And he's already said, well, you know, that you're giving circular arguments about God's existence. Total category error.

47:29

Just total category error. A 17th century English translation is a completely different category than the transcendent, eternal being of God, without which,

47:46

I'm trying God, without which you cannot make sense of human reasoning. You can make sense of human reasoning without a 17th century

47:53

English translation because English didn't exist before about 1000 AD. Okay?

47:59

So that whole thing you tried there, that's already been completely done away with. No logical person is going to defend that.

48:06

So what are you left with? Well, it's standard because it's standard. And yeah, there were translations before, translations after, but we have one set of standards for it and a different set of standards for everything else because it's our standard because it's a standard.

48:21

It's a standard standard. It's just, this system is indefensible.

48:27

That's why you cannot take this system out and do apologetics because you're just babbling at people.

48:34

You don't, you don't have a meaningful, a meaningfully consistent leg to stand on, but he goes on.

48:46

And you say, well, what are you talking about? Look, even the world knows it's the standard. In fact, this week, you ready for this folks?

48:52

How do we know? How do we know that it's the standard?

49:00

What sources can we turn to? Now, if you're expecting an ecumenical council, no, it's not that.

49:09

What would Stephen Anderson go to to demonstrate that the King James version of the Bible is the standard?

49:15

What would he accept to define this deep central theological assertion that he's making?

49:23

There was an article in the New York times about some Jew that just completed his brand new translation of the old

49:28

Testament that he's been working on for decades. Some Christ rejecting Jew put out his translation of the old Testament.

49:34

And the headline says that this guy puts out a old Testament to rival the

49:40

King James. So in 2019, when a brand new translation comes out, the New York times says,

49:46

Oh, this will give the King James a run for its money. Why? Because the New York times knows that the King James is the standard.

49:56

Can't argue with that. That's, I use the New York times to define all my theological categories.

50:09

I'm sorry, it's folks, it's all they've got. But yeah, it's the standard because it's standard. And Hey, the

50:15

New York times refers to King James. And, and we know the New York times knows everything about Bible translation. Right?

50:21

So we look at other things as changes, omissions and deletions. Amen. That's where I was pointing out the charged language.

50:30

You set up the King James as a standard. And if there's any difference, then it's an omission or deletion or something like on the basis of that standard, rather than asking what was originally written?

50:42

What did Paul originally write? What did John originally write? That obviously is the most important thing, but not if you're a

50:48

King James only -ist. If you're a King James only -ist, what they originally wrote doesn't matter. It's what's in the

50:54

King James. And he just said, Amen. How do you, how do you reason with someone like that?

51:01

Because they're not reasoning. They will, if you, if you cannot recognize categories, you're not reasoning.

51:08

And he says that it's, you know, fellowship should never be based upon the

51:14

English translation. One carries in studies. He's saying, you know, you should never separate from people based on what translation they use.

51:21

Hey Rich, what, what translation do you carry? Uh -huh. Digital?

51:29

No, no. What, you know, when you come to church, what? Did you just say you actually have an

51:35

NIV? I'm, I'm afraid

51:52

I can't talk to you anymore. I'm sorry. And it should not be the test of fellowship. We should have the Christian freedom to use whatever the translation.

51:59

Folks, that is ridiculous because if the Bible is the foundation for everything we believe, that's like saying,

52:04

Hey, just use whatever foundation you want. You know, as long as you build the right building, use whatever foundation you want.

52:10

Well, no folks, the foundation is the most important part. So there's no way that you're.

52:15

So you'll notice the equivocation. Okay. We're talking about the Bible, which we know was written before the

52:22

English language came into existence. But once you make that equivocation, that, that equation in the mind where the

52:29

King James becomes the Bible in a completely different language, then you can come up with this kind of stuff.

52:36

Obviously that's not what we're saying. We do believe the Bible is the foundation. And if you're using something that isn't the

52:43

Bible, that is a problem. And they're saying, they're saying, well, if it differs whatsoever from our standard, then it's not the

52:49

Bible. And therefore they will divide over. Almost done with this. Sorry, phone callers. I didn't think it would take this long.

52:55

People like Dr. White are constantly trying to say that, you know, these changes don't affect doctrine and there's no meaningful doctrinal difference between versions.

53:02

That's funny because there are a whole bunch of doctrines that King James only believers believe that when you go down to the churches that use liberal versions, they don't believe those things.

53:13

Okay. I mean, we could go on and on about changes that affect doctrine. Has nothing to do with the

53:19

King James. It has to do with the fact that you can't see that the traditions that you hold to, you have elevated the status of scripture.

53:28

You don't believe in sola scriptura. You don't practice sola scriptura. You have turned an English translation into an idol.

53:35

And then you've added to that a whole bunch of absurd, and in the case of your denial of repentance and the

53:43

Lordship of Christ, heretical traditions to your theology and call it the word of God.

53:49

Has nothing to do with the Bible that you're using. There are plenty of people who have used the King James version of the

53:54

Bible to identify you as a glowing heretic, because they actually do real exegesis.

54:01

Has nothing to do whatsoever with the fact that they're carrying something. What translation they're reading.

54:08

But you know, there's so many meaningful differences. Like, for example, in the King James, it says that straight is the gate and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life and few there be that find it.

54:18

Straight is the gate. Straight means narrow. Narrow is the way that leads to life.

54:23

What does that mean? Few there be that find it. It's in response to his apostles having had asked him, you know, are there few that be saved?

54:31

And of course the answer is that the majority is going to hell and that few are saved. Okay. Whereas in the modern versions, even the new

54:37

King James will say, oh, difficult is the way which leadeth unto life and few there be to find it.

54:42

Look, salvation is not difficult. Okay. Jesus did the hard part when he died on the cross. Salvation is easy.

54:49

Matthew 7, New American Standard, enter through the narrow gate, for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction and there are many who enter through it.

55:06

How is straight is the gate? See, he had to, did you hear what he had to do? He says straight means narrow.

55:11

Well, then why don't you just translate it that way? New American Standard did. It's not even, it's not,

55:19

Stenace, Stenace Puleis is not a textual variant. So it's totally translational.

55:28

And so how could the New American Standard have a better translation? Why did you have to give a translation of the

55:35

King James to say that straight means narrow? Because straight doesn't mean narrow anymore.

55:40

That's why, which is one of the issues. All right. One last quote. Sorry, phone callers, just a second.

55:46

The number one, if somebody is using a perverted Bible version, whether it be the ESV, the NIV, or the

55:52

New American Standard, I can have no fellowship with that person because there's no way we're going to be able to believe the same things or even have fellowship or communion around God's word when we have these totally different Bibles.

56:02

I have the right Bible. They have a corrupt Bible. Can two walk together except they be agreed? Absolutely not.

56:08

And so King James -only -ism is the most important test of fellowship in 2019.

56:14

Catch that? King James -only -ism is the most important test of fellowship in 2019.

56:26

Well, we all know that people use Anderson and his ilk to attack us and say, that's what you people are like.

56:34

You people deny the Holocaust and you people are hateful and you people are circular in your reasoning and all the rest of that kind of stuff.

56:40

That is problematic. But one thing we can be certain of is that this movement will have very little meaningful impact upon the true church of Jesus Christ because they don't, they think they're the only ones up there.

56:52

It's sort of like, it's a little bit like the Farside commercial or Farside cartoon.

56:57

It maybe wasn't Farside, but you know, getting the tour of heaven and you finally come to this closed door and the person being given the tour says, what's that?

57:07

He says, oh, shh, please be quiet. Those are the independent Feminists Baptist. They think they're the only ones here.

57:13

It's a little bit along those lines. So there you go. But there's the first of 10.

57:24

But as I said, we're covering important foundational issues regarding inspiration and textual criticism, and that's why it's worthwhile.

57:34

And we'll put all this together and make it available to folks. And I guarantee you within five years,

57:42

I will speak to someone at a conference that will say it was your material response to Steven Anderson that got me out of the

57:48

IFB. I guarantee it. It's going to happen. So thank you,

57:54

Steven, for the opportunity of doing those things. 877 -753 -3341 is a phone number that was called a long, long time ago by Joshua.

58:08

Hi, Joshua. Hey, Dr. Wyatt. I wanted to ask you about, you mentioned

58:15

Fulgentius in your debate with Trent Horn as somewhat like an early testimony to the doctrine of the

58:22

Perseverance of the Saints or something to that effect. And I was just wondering because I've been looking for where Fulgentius might teach that or where you're getting that idea from.

58:30

Well, that'd be something you need to write in on because obviously I don't carry that kind of information around the top of my head. So if I had known about that ahead of time,

58:38

I could have gone into Dropbox and pulled up my notes and stuff like that.

58:43

But I don't carry that kind of reference around just on top of my head. So that might be something you might want to write in about, and we can track that down from there.

58:54

All right. Thank you. All right. Thank you very much. All right. God bless. Bye -bye. 877 -753 -3341.

59:02

Jonathan. Hi, Jonathan. Hi, Dr. Wyatt. Howdy. I'm from Missouri.

59:11

I'm from close to St. Louis, Missouri. I was at the Textual Criticism, KJV -only discussions and lectures the first week of December, and those were great.

59:25

And I think I had asked you about the textual variant in Matthew 522, the without a cause variant there.

59:36

I didn't find it in the index to your book, so I was just wondering what your thoughts were to that particular exception clause there in Matthew's Gospel.

59:55

Well, again, there doesn't seem to be any reason to question the...

01:00:18

Let's see. That's a group calling me that I support, but they keep calling me.

01:00:34

And it's like, would you please not do that? I need to find the place where it says, I'm going to send you your monthly donation, but that's it.

01:00:40

Don't call me all day long. And I can tell you who it is, but I won't. Okay.

01:00:52

Actually, did you say 522? Yes. Matthew 522. Yeah. Okay.

01:01:05

Then I thought you were talking about... The only exception clause I know is in regards to divorce, which is in Matthew 19.

01:01:12

So you lost me. What's... Well, David Alan Black wrote an article,

01:01:18

I think back in the late 1980s, saying that the reading there for the without a cause one that is in the

01:01:27

KJV and the New King James Version has a wide distribution, or it has an

01:01:35

Alexandrian, albeit late, but also a Western and Byzantine backing to it.

01:01:45

But Bill Comfort and Metzger don't think, in their commentaries, don't think that they're...

01:01:52

I think Metzger puts the reading to the 2nd century, and I think Comfort puts it to the 3rd century.

01:01:59

I guess scholars prefer a shorter reading, right? And so David Alan Black was arguing the other way, saying that Matthew liked to put in exception clauses, for example, what you just mentioned about divorce, about adultery.

01:02:15

So he was arguing that based on internal and external evidence, that there can be a good case that it wasn't just a blanket statement against all anger, because even

01:02:30

Jesus exhibited anger at times, although carefully. But yeah, so that's what

01:02:36

I was just asking you about. Yeah, okay. Well, you've already read

01:02:44

Metzger and Comfort, so you've already pretty much seen what the arguments are.

01:02:54

Obviously, there's a much wider attestation as far as numerically for IK than for its deletion.

01:03:05

It is not found in P64, the original hand of Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, and generally, at least through the 27th edition of the

01:03:20

Nasiallan text, if you have a papyrus together with Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, that will be sufficient as considered to be the earliest text.

01:03:33

Unfortunately, we don't have P75 at this point in Matthew, because that would have really helped out a lot.

01:03:43

As far as wide distribution for IK, I'm not so sure about that, because that's going back into the days of using the

01:03:54

Western text as a standard, and there's really good reason to question the existence of the

01:04:00

Western text today. That's what you've got in D there. So you've got pretty much a –

01:04:06

I mean, you do have the second hand of Sinaiticus, but when that second hand is,

01:04:12

I'd have to look in Matthew to see what the date on that is. It's probably quite late. So you're looking at pretty much a

01:04:19

Byzantine versus Alexandrian split there, and probably within seven years maybe, let's hope we might have the

01:04:33

ECM on this out, and it would be very interesting to see what

01:04:39

CBGM is going to do with this. I'm not going to guess, but it strikes me that there would be at least a possibility, as I'm just looking at the manuscripts here, at least a possibility that CBGM would prefer the insertion of IK rather than the excision of it, just simply by looking at the manuscripts.

01:05:07

But again, until that's actually run, I don't know, and that's going to be what's going to make the decision.

01:05:18

Everything, to be honest with you, for now is on hold until the ECM is done, and at least

01:05:26

I now, having just been at Munster, at least I now have an idea of pretty much when that needs to – that's probably going to take place.

01:05:35

I hadn't heard anybody mentioning this before, but the goal is to have the

01:05:42

Editio Critico Mayor done by 2030. So we're looking at another 11 years.

01:05:49

That sounds like a long time to most folks, but for the amount of work that goes into it, it's certainly understandable it would take that long.

01:05:58

Does that mean we could have Matthew before then? I would think so. My gut feeling is the last books we're going to get out of ECM are probably going to be

01:06:07

Revelation and the Pauline Corpus. So I would expect Matthew within the next five years,

01:06:15

I would hope. And so it'll be interesting to see what they say in regards to IK at that point.

01:06:23

Will they overthrow the combination of P64, the original hand of Sinaiticus, and Vaticanus together?

01:06:31

Will they – because you really only have those three manuscripts with a few patristic citations and a few early translations.

01:06:42

And so will it be made the main reading in the text?

01:06:49

Good question. Until then, if you're preaching the text, it's good to make reference to the variant and to explain it to folks, especially because you've got folks in the audience, they're going to have

01:06:58

New King Jameses and things like that. And it's always important not to lose folks when ministering from the pulpit in that way.

01:07:10

Hello? Yeah, great. I really appreciate that. Okay, thanks a lot. God bless. Have a good day.

01:07:16

Bye -bye. All right. Let's talk to Peter.

01:07:22

Hi, Peter. Hey, Dr. White. Thanks for taking my call. You didn't fall asleep during the discussion of CBGM there?

01:07:31

No, I enjoy that kind of – listening to that kind of stuff, too. I think my IQ dropped a little bit listening to so much

01:07:38

Steven Anderson now. But my question is – You're going to end up on one of his videos now.

01:07:44

So just so you know, that's how it's going to happen. Can you hear me still?

01:07:50

Yes, I can. Okay. I've heard you caution against putting too much stock in our religious experiences.

01:08:00

And my question is, I guess, what is the role in experiencing

01:08:05

God? Is experience something that we should seek to have at all?

01:08:13

I'm part of the Church of the Nazarene, and one of the founders, Phineas F. Brzee, would always say, you got to get the glory down, you know, talking about the

01:08:21

Shekinah glory. And I know there's a lot of people that put a lot of focus on that being a big deal in services.

01:08:30

And so I guess just maybe from a biblical perspective, should we be seeking to experience

01:08:36

God's presence, or should we just not seek it, and if that kind of thing happens, it happens?

01:08:42

Or I guess, what maybe, biblically, do you think we should stay with that?

01:08:48

Well, so it depends on what you mean by experience of God. I mean, when you look at the

01:08:53

New Testament, you look at the worship of the Church, it's focused upon the communication of the deposit of faith, the message of the gospel, the apostolic teaching about who

01:09:05

Jesus was and what he accomplished. And so the idea of the focus in worship being upon us and our experience, or even our emotions, our emotions are impacted, should be impacted, first and foremost, by a recognition of what

01:09:27

God has done, his grandeur, his glory, and that requires the explanation of, explication of, explanation of what

01:09:43

God has done in Scripture. And so the focus needs to be upon bringing

01:09:49

God's voice to God's people. And certainly there is the singing of Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, the corporate worship, and the entering into the common confession of the saints, and that should be a deeply moving experience.

01:10:18

I think in today's situation, one of my criticisms of my charismatic friends is that in watching what they call worship, you could take everybody else away and it wouldn't change anything.

01:10:35

It's not corporate. It's an individual spinning in circles or falling upon the ground, wherever else it might be, but it's not corporate.

01:10:44

You're not joining in with others in a common confession, in a common experience.

01:10:53

You're having your own personal little thing over there by the side, and I find that to be problematic.

01:10:59

It's one thing in your study, in your bedroom, whatever else it might be, to have your personal experience of God, but we're talking about the worship of the church here, and when

01:11:12

I say, be careful of your seeking experiences, things like that, normally

01:11:18

I'm saying that within the context of the necessity of the communication of gospel truth over time.

01:11:25

I'm talking about theology, I'm talking about what the faith is, how the faith applies to the culture that we're living in, so on and so forth.

01:11:31

And when people bring their experience, so for example, the experience that people have in regards to sexuality, gender, whatever else it might be, the

01:11:44

Revoice Conference, I just happened to, my eyes just happened to look over at a book that was just sent to me that I'm probably going to give to my daughter to look at.

01:11:53

But the issue of a person's experience has to be subjugated to the categories of God's revelation, and what we see in our society right now is your experience and the fear of offending someone is considered significantly more important than whatever

01:12:12

God's word has to say about something. So, that's extremely problematic and leads inevitably to fundamental deviation from the apostolic message.

01:12:23

And so, I'm not a person who's saying that there is not an experience of great wonder and awe at the work of God in the worship service or in the contemplation of God's truth or any of those things.

01:12:39

What I'm saying is my personal experience, God may use that to form me into the form

01:12:44

He wants me to be and to prepare me for future ministry or whatever else it might be, but my personal experience cannot be the container of divine truth for somebody else.

01:12:59

And so, I have to remain focused upon what I and the rest of my brothers and sisters can have in common, which is the word of God made alive by the

01:13:09

Spirit of God. So, when I'm talking about experience in that way,

01:13:14

I'm not saying that there is not a spiritual element or an experiential element of the

01:13:20

Christian faith. What I'm saying is that none of that can be elevated to the position—all of that has to be constantly evaluated within the unchanging standard of scripture, and none of that can be elevated to the position where it ends up eclipsing scripture or becomes a source of doctrinal direction or anything else, and that's happening all around us.

01:13:41

And that's why there has to be the constant concern about it today. Oh, okay.

01:13:49

So, I've always felt like when I see other people having experiences and they tell other

01:13:56

Christians, hey, you need to seek after the same experience that I've had, I've always had a problem with that, because I don't see the

01:14:03

Bible instructing us to tell other people to have our experience. Exactly. No, no, that doesn't make any sense.

01:14:10

That may be very, very special to them, but the reality is what we need to be exhorting one another to is fidelity to the single message of the gospel, and then as God applies those truths to our lives, we may have different experiences, but that doesn't mean

01:14:25

I have to go, hey, if you have the experience I had, this is what's going to happen to you. That's up to God.

01:14:31

That's not up to me. I can't tell somebody to go seeking after something like that. That's pretty dangerous.

01:14:39

Okay. Well, thank you very much. That definitely helped a lot. I appreciate it. Thanks, Peter. All right.

01:14:45

God bless. Bye -bye. Bye. All right. Let's see here.

01:14:50

Well, 40 minutes. How'd that happen? Let's talk with Eric in Alabama. Hi, Eric. Hey, Dr.

01:14:57

White. Is it Alabama or Alaska? It's always a pleasure. Yes, sir, Alabama. Okay. Yes, sir.

01:15:03

Yes, sir. It's always a pleasure to hear you, and don't ever apologize for doing the

01:15:08

King James only stuff, because I live with King James only people and they're all around where I live at, so it's always nice to have an answer and have a fresh look at it.

01:15:16

So I appreciate that. Right. Okay. And I appreciate the... Now, what

01:15:21

I thought about is you talked about the color compromise, and I read the article you put out, and I read your response. It was really good, and I actually reposted it, every bit of it, the two times you put out.

01:15:32

But my example was actually last night. We had Miles McPherson come speak, and he talked about his book,

01:15:41

The Third Way. Okay. And I haven't read the book, unfortunately.

01:15:46

I haven't either. But he basically parroted everything you just talked about last night at church.

01:15:53

It was really disappointing, because he talked about... He tried to give an example of how the world's geared toward right -handed people, and he called it right privilege.

01:16:05

But you know what he was talking about? Yeah. And he hinted toward an unconscious bias in racism, how you may be racist, but you don't...

01:16:14

Not all racism is outright racism or overt racism. And it was just a lot of that all the way through.

01:16:21

And the six examples he gave to deal with it were a little bit insane, because he talked about how...

01:16:27

He used an example of sociologists dealing with groups, and how we naturally are tribal, and how we should see people in their groups, and how you can't not see color.

01:16:37

And I thought to myself, yeah, that may be true, but that's not what somebody means by saying, I don't see color. Right. What it means is that I don't look at you as an individual based on the color of your skin,

01:16:47

I look at you as an individual based on your characteristics, based on who you are as a person. Right. And...

01:16:52

But he didn't address that. He just used that as an example to talk about somebody who made that statement.

01:16:58

And it was just really a disappointing message altogether, and... Yeah, that's a book. And I'll probably say something to people at somebody at the church

01:17:06

I work at, but... Yeah, that's a book I'm not really familiar with, but certainly the descriptions that you're giving the idea of right -hand privilege is just simply what's called majority privilege.

01:17:21

That is, in any society, in any context, when you're in the majority, then the majority of the societal constructs are going to be created by the majority for the majority's primary use.

01:17:40

And so it would be silly in the United States for us to change which side of the road we drive on just because we don't want to offend the

01:17:49

Brits, because they drive on the wrong side of the road. That does create a right -hand side of the road privilege.

01:18:00

And the fact of the matter is, the people in the world who have to drive on the left -hand side of the road have to spend more money for their cars.

01:18:09

Exactly. That more people in the world drive on the right -hand side than left -hand side, so if you're in the minority in that issue, other people have a privilege.

01:18:17

Your cars are more expensive, and your repair stuff is more expensive. Are we somehow supposed to be mourning about this?

01:18:26

Is this somehow a terrible, horrible thing? I mean, there is majority privilege in Asia for Asians.

01:18:36

That makes sense. There's majority privilege in certain countries in Africa for Black Africans, and that makes sense.

01:18:47

It's just the reality. So how you somehow say, well, if you aren't working against these systemic errors, these systemic inequality, then you are an internalized racist, and so on and so forth.

01:19:04

And actually, it's just simply, no, actually, if you're making guns, the vast majority of guns you're going to make are going to be for right -handed people.

01:19:16

And it's stupid to tell a gun manufacturer, you need to make the exact same number of left -handed guns as you do right -handed guns, because they're just going to sit there on the shelf.

01:19:30

It's not going to accomplish anything. And yet, that's what we have going on in so many of these situations.

01:19:36

So, yeah. Well, I can tell you this. It's been a blessing hearing you talk about it, because, like, last night,

01:19:42

I was frustrated about the message, because I enjoy our first week, what we do. Our worship is always fantastic.

01:19:48

It's always God -centered and focuses everybody back on Jesus Christ and brings us to a point of repentance.

01:19:53

But then we get up there and have that message, and I'm like, man, that was like a shot in the gut. But then I happened to get on your website and read what you wrote.

01:20:03

And so, it was kind of an encouragement, and it kind of reaffirmed what I already kind of felt as he was speaking, and the points that you just made are exactly the thoughts

01:20:10

I had as he was speaking the sermon. And so, I appreciate it.

01:20:16

All right. Well, I appreciate the phone call, and I'm glad that even today's Facebook articles were useful to you.

01:20:23

So, keep listening, Eric. Thank you. All right. God bless.

01:20:29

All right. We'll probably get these last two in,

01:20:36

I would assume. So, let's do it that way. All right. Let's talk with Julio.

01:20:42

Hello, Julio. Hey, Dr. Ward. How are you? Doing good. Yeah. So, one quick comment before my question.

01:20:50

You know, as an Spanish nativist speaker, this King James only issue, it just escapes my capacity to understand it.

01:20:59

It's so bizarre. Well… I think I can make a pretty good case for the

01:21:04

Biblia de los Ojos instead of the King James. Well, what about the Riana Valera? Yeah, yeah.

01:21:11

That's where it comes. You know, the Biblia de los Ojos even precedes Riana Valera, right? Yeah. Well, we all have our traditions, so that's sort of how that works.

01:21:21

So, yeah, yeah. Just my question is about 1 Corinthians 13, verse 10, when the perfect comes, you know, for this debate about the cessation of some of the gifts of the

01:21:36

Spirit, and, or the continuation thereof. So, both of the positions use this verse or invoke this verse for their case.

01:21:47

So, I just wanted to know your take on it. How's your interpretation and what's your position on it? Okay. Yeah, I don't think that this is a text that really should be put in the center of the continuation, non -continuation, or cessation perspective.

01:22:09

It's difficult to know exactly what Ta Teleon refers to.

01:22:15

I would have a hard time in a debate defending the idea that Ta Teleon means the completed canon.

01:22:24

Most of the time that Teleon is used by Paul, it's referring to the completion of the work of redemption, the wrapping up of all things, and the final judgment.

01:22:38

So, if that's the case, and I think that would be the strongest exegetical case, then

01:22:45

I don't think that it would be relevant at that point, and truly, the weight that's put upon Ta Teleon is normally based upon the distinguishing of the...

01:23:05

In verse 8, when it talks about prophecies, tongues, and knowledge, there are two different verbs used.

01:23:15

When speaking of prophecies, it's ka -tar -ge -the -san -tai. When it's knowledge, it's ka -tar -ge -the -se -tai.

01:23:26

And then for glossi, tongues, it's pau -san -tai. And the argument generally is that if you take

01:23:38

Paulo in verse 8 in a middle, they will cease of themselves when that which is perfect comes, the perfect is a completed canon, therefore they will cease of themselves at that time.

01:23:50

I couldn't defend that. I can't defeat it.

01:23:56

I can't say it's impossible. It is possible, but I could not make it a dogmatic assertion.

01:24:04

I think the best argument in regards to the issue of tongues is based upon the purpose of tongues, which is laid out in this same section of 1

01:24:17

Corinthians specifically as a sign to the

01:24:22

Jews that the message has gone to the Gentiles. And therefore, the use of that language is a testimony to the

01:24:34

Jews of what has taken place in the

01:24:39

Christ event, and therefore, especially after the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, would not continue to have the purpose that it had at this point in time in Corinth.

01:24:51

So for me, that's central. And I think a much stronger case can be built there than to try to say, well, it could be because it could be.

01:25:03

Talion could be the completion of the canon, though that's,

01:25:09

I think, a minority possibility. And it could be that Paul's middle voice has something to tie into that.

01:25:20

But I can't take a position on something like this that I couldn't defend in a debate.

01:25:29

And so I don't, I can see, if I in my own mind can see how someone could destroy my position in a debate, then

01:25:44

I don't generally take it. It's not that I'm saying it's impossible. It's just I would have a really hard time defending it.

01:25:53

Okay, okay. Okay, yeah, that was my question. So thank you very much for taking it. All right. Okay, thank you.

01:25:59

When you're going to come to Costa Rica, how is that? Is that possible? I don't know.

01:26:05

I've never been invited, actually. But I don't know, man. We'll see.

01:26:13

There's lots of weird stuff going on down there. You would enjoy your bike ride here.

01:26:21

Huh? I'm not sure. It's possible. I've got some good mountains. Maybe we could do it sometime.

01:26:26

But anyway, we'll see what happens. Thank you. Thank you, sir. All right, one more.

01:26:33

And it's, hmm. We'll see how this goes. We only have a few minutes anyway. So let's talk to John in California.

01:26:41

Heading to California, what, first weekend in April? Yeah. Yeah, I'm hoping to come see you then.

01:26:47

Oh, good. What can I do for you? Yeah, so I'm trying to exegete

01:26:54

Acts 238 to argue against baptismal regeneration, which I don't hold to.

01:27:00

I'm trying to explain it to, because I came out of the non -denominational Church of Christ movement, trying to see how

01:27:07

I can explain it, because I feel like Acts 238, don't you—isn't regeneration synonymous with receiving the

01:27:16

Holy Spirit? Wouldn't they have been regenerated first, Monday, the 10th? Baptism doesn't get them the

01:27:23

Holy Spirit, but then it says later in the second half of Acts 238, and you will receive the Holy Spirit.

01:27:28

I'm trying to figure out the order here. Well, you know, the

01:27:36

Church of Christ folks can debate this single verse for an entire week every night, and have a long history of doing that, which is sort of an oddity.

01:27:50

And I know that if you go to Acts chapter 10, they receive the Holy Spirit first, obviously, and then they get baptized, but still—

01:27:58

Yeah, well, I think you need to recognize Acts 238 is in a very unique situation. It's very, very early on.

01:28:04

It's in a primarily Jewish -only situation, and it needs to be connected to verse 39, and needs to be seen in that light for the promises for you and your children and for all who are far off, as may the

01:28:21

Lord our God will call to Himself. So whatever you do with 38, and whatever you do with Epi, as far as in the name of Jesus Christ, being baptized and repentance and relationship of all these things, it has to be kept within a recognition not only of a biblical doctrine of man's death in sin—in fact, that's how

01:28:52

I addressed this in an article I wrote years ago—on our website, if you look up Acts 238,

01:28:58

I think it'll probably pop up somewhere along the lines. But likewise, it has to be seen in the context of the statement that Peter makes here, and that is, you know, these people are asking—these are

01:29:16

Jews who have been struck with the reality of who Jesus really is, and they're asking, can we be forgiven?

01:29:25

What can we do? And Peter's response is repent, and each of you be baptized into the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins, of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the

01:29:41

Holy Spirit, and this promise is for you and your children, the

01:29:46

Jews, and for all who are far off, the Gentiles, as many as the

01:29:51

Lord our God will call to himself. There's election. So, you have in Peter, in these very balanced words given to us by the

01:30:02

Holy Spirit, the assertion that there's nobody bad enough, even the

01:30:07

Jews of the days that had betrayed Jesus and crucified the Messiah, the promise is for them and their children, and it's also for all who are far off.

01:30:19

It's for all the Gentiles as well, as many as the Lord our God will call to himself.

01:30:24

There you have the election, which then plays out in Romans 9 in regards to the

01:30:30

Jews who have rejected and God's election down through the years. So, I—even in the

01:30:36

Jewish experience. So, I think personally that the best way to deal with Acts 2 .38

01:30:44

in the Church of Christ context and things like that is to approach it first and foremost with a proper biblical anthropology in regards to the deadness of man and sin,

01:30:55

Romans 8, verses 4 -7 and 4 -8, things like that, before you even get to any of the rest of the discussion, and then allow 2 .38

01:31:06

to stand with 39 and see the much broader scope of what

01:31:12

Peter was actually proclaiming to the individuals. I think sometimes when we get so—you know, there's plenty of times to get deep and narrow in looking at ice for the forgiveness of sins and a pea into the name of Jesus Christ, and yes, there's times to talk about prepositions and cases and all the rest of that stuff, but any time that that ends up eclipsing the broader context and the broader themes that clearly the author himself was initially intending to communicate to his audience, that's where we get lost.

01:31:52

And so, I would make sure before going to any of the internal questions that we deal with it in its context and make sure that we see what's being said in verse 39 as well.

01:32:06

Okay. All right. I think I needed to dwell on that. I think my pastor might be listening right now, so I'm going to try to talk with him over it tonight.

01:32:14

So yeah, that's actually a much different take. I actually called in to Greg Koekel's show and asked him that the other day and got kind of a different answer, but interesting.

01:32:26

No, I'm not going to ask what the question was, since we're out of time, or that the answer was, but hopefully that will be useful to you.

01:32:36

All right. Yeah. Looking forward to seeing you in April. Okay. Thanks a lot. All right.

01:32:42

We got to bust. Bye -bye. All right. There we go. We got our first, that's first open phone segment of 2019 in.

01:32:53

No problem streaming. So does that mean that the modem fixed it? Don't mean nothing.

01:33:00

Yeah. That's what Rich said. Don't mean nothing. It means we got through the day and that's, we're just happy about that.

01:33:07

Well, I've been sitting here talking and you've been sitting here arguing with Jasper Abbott on Twitter.

01:33:13

I mean, my entire feed is filled with you and Jasper Abbott going back and forth.

01:33:18

I don't even know what y 'all are talking about and I'm not sure that I'm going to. Yeah, I know. I saw it from this morning.

01:33:24

I know, I know. There is no end to these things. So I didn't, and let me just mention this real fast.

01:33:30

I was going to read and I didn't, I did quote it anyways, but I was going to read, well, very quickly, add this to what the comments, and I just skipped it.

01:33:44

I apologize. I quoted this paragraph in my comments on the color of compromise. Let me read it again.

01:33:51

Christian complicity is page 190. Christian complicity with racism in the 21st century looks different than complicity with racism in the past.

01:33:58

So he spent a lot of time documenting the complicity of certain

01:34:03

Christians, which becomes a wide condemnation of all white Christians, with racism in the past, refusal to speak out against Jim Crow or things along these lines.

01:34:16

But what does it look like in the 21st century? One of the primary theses of the book is that racism will never end.

01:34:23

And if racism is a sin, then that's right. As long as sin exists, then that's true. But if racism is a sin, then how are you trying to get the government involved in dealing with it?

01:34:33

Because you can't deal with a sin by government legislation. But anyway, especially if it's found in the recesses of the heart.

01:34:41

Anyway, but the idea is that racism just adapts. And so the idea that Jamar Tisby has is let's redefine racism with the 21st century, and let's paint everyone who would oppose progressivism and our understanding as racist.

01:34:58

And this is how you do it. Christian complicity with racism in the 21st century looks different than complicity with racism in the past.

01:35:06

It looks like Christians responding to the Black Lives Matter movement, to Black Lives Matter, with the phrase

01:35:14

All Lives Matter. So if you responded to Black Lives Matter with All Lives Matter, that's racism in the 21st century.

01:35:27

Christian complicity with racism. You are complicit with racism, unless you buy the

01:35:32

Black Lives Matter narrative. It looks like Christians consistently supporting a president whose racism has been on display for decades.

01:35:42

So if you support President Trump, and I will confess that the arguments he presented to try to paint the president as a racist were extremely weak.

01:35:57

But you just simply have to accept that narrative. So you have to accept that narrative. If you don't, then you're probably racist anyways.

01:36:05

But then if you support him, and exactly in what way?

01:36:11

I greatly support what the president said in the State of the

01:36:16

Union address in regards to the horrific murder of unborn children.

01:36:24

And I fully support his statement that America can never be a socialist country, because we couldn't be.

01:36:32

It would require a fundamental redefinition of, well, the Constitution would have to be in a way with.

01:36:38

You can't turn that into a socialist document. It's just not possible. Is my being supportive of not having progressive

01:36:50

Supreme Court nominees and opposing late -term abortion?

01:36:57

I guess that makes me racist. That's complicity with racism. It looks like Christians telling black people and their allies that their attempts to bring up racial concerns are divisive.

01:37:15

Wow. So when Anthony Bradley goes on Twitter and says the black church, by God's grace, has survived white people, if you go, that seems divisive.

01:37:27

Racist? You're racist. That's racism in the 21st century.

01:37:34

So what he's done is he has created a definition that anyone who opposes his leftist, progressivist suggestions and perspectives, by so doing, are the face of complicity with racism in the 21st century.

01:37:54

There you go. By definition. This is how the left works. This isn't rational. This could not be debated.

01:38:02

That's why Jamar says we won't debate these things. You couldn't defend it in a meaningful interaction on a scholarly basis.

01:38:11

It can't be done because you're just defining things so that your enemy is guilty, whether they're guilty or not.

01:38:21

There certainly isn't anything biblical about it, but that's what's going on. I realized,

01:38:28

I don't know, a couple calls in, weird how the mind works, that I had not finished my comments there and read that paragraph, though I did quote it in the

01:38:39

Facebook article. So I wanted to get to that and take a couple other minutes to do that.

01:38:45

So I'll have to try to make note of that so that people will listen to the end and catch the rest of the comments.

01:38:51

So anyways, all right, folks, thank you very, very much for listening to the program today.

01:38:56

Lord willing, we'll be back next week and streaming without interruption.