October 7, 2004

desert metropolis of phoenix arizona this is the dividing line the apostle peter commanded christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence our host is doctor james white director of alpha and omega ministries and an elder at the phoenix reformed baptist church this is a live program and we invite your participation if you'd like to talk with doctor white call now at 602 -973 -4602 or toll free across the united states it's 1 -877 -753 -3341 and now with today's topic here is james white well good afternoon and evening welcome to the dividing line we are live this uh...

this evening at 877 -753 -3341 877 -753 -3341 don't have any uh...

debates to be running into at this particular point in time as far as the presidential ones or vice presidential ones i wouldn't want to i really wouldn't want to have to debate uh...

dick cheney that would be a especially when when you're really uh...

fluffy trial lawyer it would be an ugly thing but anyway uh... that one again not really a debate but you know uh...

folks like me sort of go excuse me excuse me sir you didn't answer the question sir did you hear the question sir you did hear the question but you didn't answer the question that was that was just what i kept thinking when i listen to that it was it was amazing and did you see the disadvantage that put uh...

vice president cheney at he actually answered the question and then the other guy just sort of wanders off you know you know i didn't get a chance to say this about this thing about twelve minutes ago and i'd like to uh...

you know i mean like uh... what was that one question that that i recall very clearly uh...

something about you personally you know uh... and so cheney answers and then that other guy with the fake hair uh...

or the you know that well it's not fake or the one where they weren't supposed to mention no no no not the one where he kept saying the other guy's name because he couldn't get through that one but but no it was they asked for you to like give personal what was it you know uh...

personal uh... story about you know why you should be vice president and and didn't even come close like he didn't even remember what the question was well that happened all the time but anyway it was uh...

i'll tell you it was uh... it was ugly but uh... anyhow uh... i did see a excellent uh...

where was uh... this thing i think i put it in politics here uh...

yeah right here uh... uh... here's here's a good here's a good comment watching the presidential debates of october first in the subsequent reactions to them has let me once again has left me once again with a sad realization that there are many millions of people who prefer a man who says the wrong things well over one who says the right things badly and the case of the first debates we're talking about saying very very stupid things well and intelligent things very very badly that's exactly that is exactly right and uh...

the second paragraph is now i don't mean stupid in a bad way i fully credit john kerry with the intelligence needed to analyze dissect and evaluate a position and without mechanical aid quickly and accurately use advanced trigonomic functions to determine the most popular position on a wide range of complex issues a feat that requires a very quick mind indeed uh...

yep yep yep yep yep yep and you know i knew that all along and and uh...

and anybody who has listened to post debate discussions in my own debates knows that as well uh...

because i can tell you it's uh... listening to what people heard and what they didn't hear and how rarely the issue is why that person just couldn't follow an argument and they were not able to substantiate their points that's not what they say they say things like well his tie was incredible you know kind of stuff and it's just like uh...

it's it's really sad anyway uh... i wasn't gonna start there and uh... in fact uh...

only have like twenty six minutes now to uh... respond to stuff because uh... i've got a special guest i hope we have a special guest at half hour because someone decided lay down a few minutes i hope the uh...

the alarm worked anyway uh... last time we were together i did not have the opportunity to do a lot of uh...

uh... discussion of this but i wanted to respond to uh... david hoff i believe that's the name is david hoff but this uh...

i heard this as i was driving to church sunday morning i i happen to uh...

click on family radio to see if there might be some nice uh...

you know music because that's that's sadly only family radio plays the hymns we sing at our church that's a commentary but uh...

instead i got this stuff and i came right in right at this point and as soon as i started hearing this i'm just rolling my eyes and just uh...

just wanting to drive uh... down the wrong side of the road uh... let's just listen to a little bit of david hoff give you an idea of what it was i was listening to and then we'll start to providing a response unfortunately we'll read verse sixteen it's a complicated verse knowing that these true believers knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by the faith of jesus christ even we have believed in jesus christ that we might be justified by the faith of christ and not by the works of the law for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified so it's a complicated verse it starts out with the word knowing this is something the true believers know that generally is not known in the christian community and here is a important question whose faith saves us whose faith has saved you if you're a believer now remember we read in ephesians 2 .8

you're saved by grace through faith but god didn't say whose faith there although we kind of did by saying it was not of ourselves but whose faith is that referring to whose faith well galatians 2 .16

and a couple of other verses tell us very specifically a man is not justified by the works of the law but by the faith of jesus christ whose faith faith of jesus christ we understand the believers can understand that we are justified by the of jesus christ we have the answer whose faith saves us the faith of jesus christ not by our faith we're saved by christ's faith by the way this is the correct translation i got into discussion with somebody and and and and you know the new bible is probably if you have a bible other than the king james it probably says the faith in christ and the new bibles have changed it but the greek is very simple and i've studied a little bit of greek and i know it's very simple it's the faith of christ that is the correct translation and i got into a discussion with somebody i showed him that the greek is very simple just like the english is very simple and but it's so hard to accept because the church says it's our faith the church and the bible say it's our faith but the greek is very clear it's god's faith so we're being tested each one of us is being tested do you follow the bible or do you follow the church do you follow the church the bible translators the christian community all the tracts out there say it's our faith put your faith in christ they even change the bible but the bible says the king james bible is correct it says christ's faith has saved us and there's a few you know unfortunately you know we're so blessed in english because we have an old bible the king james bible i have some contact with some of the other languages and many of them haven't had a bible until the last hundred years or a bible that's a full bible and a lot of them almost all of them say faith in christ but there's a few of the like the some of the like i know the old spanish bible says faith of christ and some of the other languages faith of christ i think the chinese bible says that but a lot of the languages they've already gotten to those languages and they all say faith in christ now next we read in verse sixteen even we have believed in jesus christ now god is teaching us the effect of salvation now we can understand the difference between a cause and effect right the cause of salvation is the faith of christ the effect of salvation is we have faith see christ's faith is the one christ is the faithful one that gave us salvation he has faithfully completed our salvation christ has done it the lord jesus came into this world as a man he faithfully obeyed the father even to the end and went to the christ and went to the cross excuse me he went to the cross he faithfully obeyed the father and during hell rose again returned to heaven sent the holy spirit to apply the word of god to the hearts of the elect christ was faithful in all of those things to accomplish our salvation that's why we're saved by christ he's the faithful one that's the cause of our salvation now next part in the verse even we have believed in jesus christ is the result of salvation faith in christ appears faith in christ appears in the life as a result of salvation just move over to Galatians 5 if you would

Galatians 5 .22 Galatians 5 .22 very close by it's not very far away Galatians 5 .22

and of course we know that this is the fruit of the spirit the fruit of the spirit but the fruit of the spirit is love joy peace, long -suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith meekness, temperance against such there is no law so now the question is the fruit of the spirit is that what caused us to be saved or is that the result of our salvation it's a result first god saves us and then he works in our lives and these fruits start showing up he gives us a new heart but that isn't sufficient enough he has to put the holy spirit in us and guide us he has to do it all and then a godly love take the first one shows up in our life we start to love god which means we want to obey him and we love our fellow man which is to bring the gospel and so that's the result of salvation a true godly love shows up as a result of salvation god is working in our life to build that and you notice in the same passage just like love is a result of salvation faith is a result now in the perverseness of modern man this is the churchmen these are the christian community they've changed that to faithfulness or something else the word is faith the word faith appears exact spelling about two hundred times in the new testament it's always translated faith and it's here it's faith too but of course they don't like that if they can't have what they want they just change the bible to say what they want that's why if you don't have a king james bible go out and buy one it's faith okay so if it were our faith that would save us it would be something different than the fruit of the spirit but faith in christ shows up as a result of salvation so our faith in christ begins to develop and that's an evidence of a true believer and evidence that god has saved us is that there is faith in christ but that is the cause we understand excuse me the effect we understand the difference between a cause and effect the cause of our salvation is christ faith the result of salvation is a faith in god like a love for god begins to develop and now having played all of that uh...

well there you go did you notice the uh... all the church and bible translators those evil evil men uh...

who up until just a few years ago we were supporting and we were uh... putting them on the air and and then of course harold figured out that uh...

nineteen ninety four is actually the end of the church age and so and twenty eleven is going to be the end of the end and and all the rest of that fun stuff so now we're doing things differently so you've got uh...

these churchmen and bible translators and since they don't like what we believe then they change the bible now of course the new american standard which likewise uh...

reads at galatians two sixteen in a way that he would find improper uh... was translated long before herald camping had a clue about any of this stuff and so how we could dislike this is difficult really to understand uh...

the new american standards is nevertheless knowing the man is not justified work by works a lot of solutions to sixteen by the way uh...

but through faith in christ jesus even we have believed in christ jesus that we may be justified by faith in christ and not by the works of law since by the works law no flesh will be justified now we have someone here who who indicates that he has studied a little greek well there are a few things in life that i discovered that are more dangerous than that people who have studied a little uh...

that's like a taking your taxes to someone who is studied a little tax law the result can be rather devastating and uh...

embarrassing and that's the case here uh... mister hoff doesn't know what he's talking about uh...

he certainly is not a greek scholar of any uh... rank whatsoever and uh... uh... his comments demonstrate that he only understands enough about greek to be able to identify uh...

the genitive form but not to translate the genitive form i've taught greek a number of times both on the beginning level and then greek exegesis and one of the things i love doing because i like torturing people a little bit uh...

it says as uh... as the the poor students are crunching along in uh...

in first -year greek and they're they're just they're learning the nominative and the genitive and the dative and the accusative and the evocative and they're they're struggling with these forms and they're just starting to get into verbs and and uh...

you know all the rest of that stuff and they're they're starting to feel like they're getting somewhere you know right then i'd like to point out that now you all may be thinking that you are getting along because now you can recognize a a genitive form uh...

the problem is there are many ways of translating the genitive in fact if you use the five k system and i was i've learned on the eight k system and that is you split the ablative off from the genitive and then you add the locative, instrumental, and dative in the greek language you have those five forms but in the eight k system you identify different uses if you put the ablative together with the genitive in the five k system there are at least at least twenty four major translational categories for that particular form and when i'm talking about this i'm talking about you can have a possessive genitive uh...

you can have in this case what we're talking about is the subjective and objective genitive and you have genitives with prepositions and you throw all the ablative stuff in and uh...

now you've got separation and origin and source and all this stuff okay and so i like throwing that out to first year students so they realize you need to do second year as well and unfortunately

Mr. Hoff didn't do second year maybe he didn't finish first year either i don't know because when he sits there and says well uh...

this is very simple it's very easy to see he obviously is clueless as to what he's talking about he has no idea what he's talking about the reason being that if you pick up any meaningful commentary on Galatians chapter two you'll discover that either there or in the same commentary series on romans or wherever it might be this phrase faith of Jesus Christ.

Now Jesus Christ, Yesu Christu, is in the genitive alright and so the the faith, for example in Galatians 2 .16

faith is in the genitive as well uh... but that's primarily because it's being used the preposition use the genitive here, dia so the question is when you look at this phrase faith of Jesus Christ what is that communicating what is that telling us if you would like to have a nice discussion of the differences these things you can pick up the basics of new testament syntax by Dan Wallace in intermediate greek grammar you'll see discussion of this on pages fifty seven and following uh...

and i'm not going to go through all that right now because i already see people in the channel who are saying they're falling asleep and and they're falling off their chairs and uh...

you can tell the folks who you know uh... want to get deep and and the folks that just want to be entertained and uh...

that's the sort of how that works but uh... easiest way to remember the the distinction is uh...

is when you encounter hi, how you doing coughing a lot, huh, poor thing i'm sorry it's okay you'll well we'll uh...

we'll uh... get you a glass of water or something like that and uh...

when you hear the phrase the love of christ compels us when you hear uh...

someone talking along those lines what is that the love of christ is that the love that we have for christ or is that a love that comes from christ is he the object of the love or the subject of the love those are two kinds of genitives and they're called the objective or subjective genitive and as a result of that you will see differences in translations there are translations that render

Galatians 2 in such a way as to as to communicate the idea that it is the and these people would not see it as the faith of christ but as the faithfulness of christ and so there are those who would argue that you should take this and you should translate it so that that christ is the subject, the subjective genitive this is his faith or faithfulness now by the way this doesn't completely address the fact uh...

that there are still passages where it is clearly faith that has christ as its object we are to believe in christ there's no question about that and so it really doesn't substantiate the point that the campingites are making anyways but be it as it may in regards to what

Mr. Hoff said it is not true that just looking at this genitive you see genitive and go of a the question is is this subjective or objective genitive and i took the time and the god who justifies to go through and uh...

and quote different sides on this this is i think primarily in the exegesis of romans but it comes over to galatians and you can present uh...

this this entire thing i've just watched a channel here and there's this web user and you can always tell when web user comes in during the dividing line it's somebody who wants to throw something out of the program uh...

i guess uh... armstrong's written open letters and like that no i don't read dave's dave's site uh... last i just noticed he's got pictures on it that's all i see uh...

i just it's just there's no reason to do so uh... anyway uh... so i go back to this i've addressed this and the whole reason i wanted to bring this up is what we're seeing in the development of family radio is the beginning of a cult it's the beginning of a cult now i don't know if this hoff guy or any of these other people are going to have the the ability to hold this cult together when camping dies you always have to have a charismatic second generation leader and i don't see one on the horizon and so i would imagine it's going to fracture and and and go lots of you know different ways but you this is the beginning of a cult and if you want to see cultic thinking here it is uh...

here's here's he's willing to come on to the deal yet right uh... now is your uh...

here is the beginning of a cultic of cultic thinking it is the certainty of ignorance the certainty of ignorance what i mean by that here's a guy who claims he knows of stuff plainly doesn't but he claims he knows of stuff and what he does is he offers to his followers certainty but it's a certainty based upon ignorance it's a certainty based upon ignorance and so what he offers is well the greek is plain and that the church wants to hide this and the church wants you to not know this and we're the only ones are going to tell you this and that makes us special and therefore you should trust us with all the other things that well you really can't verify and that's how they get their foot in the door that's one of the you know one of jehovah's witnesses come knocking on your door they need to get a foot in the door how they do that they do that by raising issues or they can give you the certain the certainty based upon ignorance if they see a cross around your house then they'll start talking about how they know that jesus was not crucified on a cross he was uh...

impaled on a stake or if they come by during the holiday season and they will they will give you their their nice simple straightforward stuff about how all holidays are pagan and and uh...

you're worshiping a tree and and all the rest of stuff and and so they'll give you that that certainty of ignorance and here we see it in the same thing uh...

in regards to uh... herald camping and and the camping nights in his whole movement and his the second generation coming up these people that uh...

certainly to be able to be given the opportunity to teach within the camping movement right now you need to have campings approval small enough anyway and uh...

so you've got this this incipient king james only ism uh...

if you don't have the king james it go out and buy a king james all these modern bibles have changed at these people's want to change the bible uh...

you know we're used to hearing that from king james only folks and honestly after a while you you watch all this uh...

king james only stuff you read their stuff you listen to him in any venture just become so old it's repeated so often and and it never has a foundation to it you stop really paying it a lot of attention to it but now i hear you do you see it in amongst the camping nights and the need to have the king james bible because the king james bible will give you this uh...

you know this certainty in this viewpoint and all the rest of stuff and so there you uh... there you have taking something that anyone who reads the language knows there is an issue regarding the translation of the objective and subjective gender than what does that mean and their people on both sides of that you know dan wallace argues for one thing uh...

murray argues for another thing and and i like i said i address those in in the god of justifies you take a look at that uh...

it does get a little bit beyond what you can do real well on uh... on a broadcast like this uh...

but it you can look at it you can examine it and you can make your decisions this is the misuse of the original language that you see in cults it's like it reminds me very much of joseph smith in fact harold camping reminds me of joseph smith only in the sense that i'm sure joseph smith was a significantly significantly more uh...

interesting speaker to listen to than harold camping uh... but as far as the as the uh...

mannerisms of of of creating this this group every first -generation leader has to claim for himself some sort of authority now the camping is very careful i haven't had any visions i haven't had any dreams so what he does is he creates the the impression of biblical knowledge and he certainly knows uh...

you know the the bible is certainly read the bible many times over but he does not know the original language of the bible does not seem to to be concerned about anything like that at all and what he does is he he crushes dissent uh...

through the use of that little little button that he's got because when you try to call in when you if you try to debate with him at all he's just simply going to let you go to a certain point and then you're gone no more does anybody hear you and he can just rattle on for the next fifteen minutes and by the time if you are even put back on and remember that sort of mini debate that chris arnzen did with him where he just kept putting chris back on over and over and over again and chris got to say a lot of important things uh...

that was extremely unusual that generally does not happen at all but still you only get it's not much of a debate when you get ten seconds and the other person gets ten minutes you know that's not real fair and so that's how he creates the the persona of a bible teacher who cannot be challenged and so then he can say we're just we're just talking about what the bible says and we'd simply are willing to be corrected by the bible and we draw everything that we believe from the bible and if i were to say that i was uh...

receiving dreams and visions then you would realize that i am a false teacher but i am not i am just looking at what the bible says and so that's uh...

that's what they want uh... summer they're they're saying we want summer in the channel so they they don't they're not i guess they don't want me anymore and so if you'd like to just take over here in a second after the break that would that'd be fine trying to help people how do i get treated that's what he's doing and that's that's how it's functioning in and uh...

that's how he's creating the persona that he's creating and all all the rest that need fun wonderful stuff and i've seen all sorts of stuff going by uh...

on the on the thing here my proposal you asked how you want to be on divine line webcast of your talk i heard a great example of that last night i think it's possible to do this even in our case so i'm proposing this how about if i come on we talk for the whole hour in a similar manner to your almost half hour long discussion yesterday with jonathan oh they've heard our nice little discussion with jonathan and uh...

yeah okay uh... anyway uh... well i guess we have to go read that and just go uh...

we're gonna take our break and then i'm going to be uh... joined uh... the average age of the program is going to decrease by fifty percent or more actually it's more than fifty percent because i was that's uh...

my math isn't so good but then again i'm not gonna have summer figured out either so we're gonna take our break and then uh...

i'm going to be joined by my daughter summer and we're going to chat and uh... who knows maybe even take a phone call or something we're gonna take our break 877 -753 -3341 we'll be right back convictions once held and died for among bible -believing protestants are now being reconsidered with the advent of the recent auburn avenue movement is there currently a common basis for dialogue between roman catholics and protestants were the signers of ECT correct in their ecumenical efforts and all of the reformed scholars who oppose them in error does trinitarian baptism make one a member of the new covenant are roman catholics our brothers and sisters in christ join us in los angeles california on november fifth two thousand four for a full three hours of moderated debate between doctor james white of alpha and omega ministries and douglas wilson of the auburn avenue movement and new saint andrews college as these topics are debated between two of the most respected representatives of the opposing viewpoints additional information and tickets can be ordered at a old men dot org that's w w w dot a o m i n dot o r g this portion of the dividing line has been made possible by the phoenix reformed baptist church the apostle paul spoke of the importance of solemnly testifying of the gospel of the grace of god the proclamation of god's truth is the most important element of his worship in his church the elders and people of the phoenix reformed baptist church invite you to worship with them this coming lord's day the morning bible study begins at nine thirty a m and the worship service is at ten forty five evening services are at six thirty p m on sunday and the wednesday night prayer meeting is at seven the phoenix reformed baptist church is located at thirty eight oh five north twelve street in phoenix you can call for further information at six oh two two six grace if you're unable to attend you can still participate with your computer and real audio at p r b c dot org where the ministry extends around the world through the archives of sermons and bible study lessons available twenty four hours a day at the heart of the controversy between roman catholic and reformation theology is the nature of justification itself it is a debate not merely about how or when or by what means a person is justified but about the very meaning of justification and the gospel of jesus christ what's a debate reserved for roman catholics and the reformers the doctrine of justification is now being challenged from within the walls of reformed evangelicalism itself join alpha and omega ministries as we embark on our first national conference and confront this very issue justification the heart of the gospel with pastor and co -author of holy scripture the ground and pillar of our faith david king the president of the southern baptist conventions founders conference tom askew new testament research ministries founder and author of evangelical answers eric fenton the founder of the spurgeon archive and executive director of grace to you philip johnson nationally renowned reformed christian artist steve camp and the founder of alpha and omega ministries and author doctor james white join us at the los angeles california lex chariton ballroom on november sixth two thousand four beginning at eight forty five a m cd is limited so order your tickets now at the old men dot org that's w w w dot a l m i n dot o r g both summer and i were uh...

what do you call that is that karaoke when you're well no karaoke is when you actually saying we're laying what was it lip -syncing that didn't sound good try again let's think let's thinking okay well all right that's what it was hey uh...

this is really weird as i went into the break i noticed a little mail thing you know how the thing shows up in your system trade you've got and uh...

somebody asked church last night so how is it summer's going to be interviewed on k f a acts in san francisco and i hadn't asked them i hadn't actually take the time to say by the way how did you know that uh...

about what happened my daughter and so i get this email and uh... the email is uh...

from uh... re and uh... now we know why we're gonna be on k f acts in a while for those of you who haven't read the blog summers with me now we're gonna make sure that the phones are working in the the microphones working in the headphones are working and we're gonna chat for a while but uh...

also at six thirty this evening so two hours from right now we're going to be on k f a acts for about half an hour uh...

to also talk with same situation and we're going to uh... webcast that so when you're done listening now we're gonna go by by for about an hour and twenty minutes and then will uh...

pipette pre -feed music on or something like that and uh... then you can listen to the interview if you would like uh...

you know at uh... six thirty pacific time which be nine thirty eastern time if you listen anyway we get a uh...

email right during the program says a high doctor what i was glad to read your blog today that your daughter will be interviewed on k facts earlier in the week i saw her reflections and her original failed assignment on the blog and i was amazed by her courage maturity as well as the other foolishness of her teacher in the administrators who apparently support the teacher i print both out and showed them to my own fifteen -year -old public school student daughter as an example of both the absurdity of post -modernism and as someone her age taking such a firm stand against the subversion of truth incidentally my daughter i met your daughter a couple of years ago when she and i were in phoenix for gymnastics meet you're traveling to time but i was the case of me as a uh...

but we met your wife and kids at the sunday morning service at uh... p r bc and so this is anyway i email k facts the link to your blog and suggestion of the discussed this incident on their lifeline broadcast i got a quick response that they've the producer pj all over uh...

that she was trying to contact you and that was last i heard of it until i read your update today i definitely plan to be listening so there's there's the connection that's how it happened is uh...

that blog it's a that blog it's gets us into so much trouble at that and that's a uh...