MSL: April 10, 2024

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The following program is recorded content created by The Truth Network. It's Matt Slick Live!

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Matt is the founder and president of the Christian Apologetics Research Ministry, found online at karm .org.

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When you have questions about Bible doctrines, turn to Matt Slick Live for answers. Taking your calls and responding to your questions at 877 -207 -2276.

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Here's Matt Slick. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the show. It's me, Matt Slick. You're listening to Matt Slick Live.

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Today's date is April 10th, 2024. And that's for the podcasters. If you want to give me a call, all you have to do is dial 877 -207 -2276.

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You can also, if you are so inclined, send me an email to info at karm .org.

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Info at karm .org. Put the subject line, radio question, radio comment, and we can get to it.

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I put them into a folder and then I get to them a little bit later. So that's it. We don't have anybody waiting right now.

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And there you go. All right. Now, tomorrow night I'm going to be in a debate on does the

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Bible teach Jesus as divine? And it's with a Muslim who says he's a Muslim apologist.

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And he wants to debate this. And he's really pursued it.

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Okay. So that's what it will be. And if you want information on it, either tonight or tomorrow,

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I'm going to release the information on where it's going to be so that you can watch it. And if you're interested, you go to karm .org

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forward slash calendar. And I'll put the information up on there. I just have to create a room, create this, create that.

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It takes about five minutes, five, ten minutes. And I wanted to wait until after the show today because we have to set up a scheduled video event thing.

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And I don't want it to be conflicting with something. I won't get into the details. It'll bore you. And that's why we're holding off a little bit.

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But we'll get that going. And hopefully it should be fine. It should be. And I spent, oh,

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I don't know, two or three hours. Oh, my gosh. Oh, man. Working on an outline for my presentation and converting to a

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PowerPoint. Because what I'm going to do is just present the information.

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And I'll probably put up a little debate page on it with the slide.

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That's a good idea, actually, with the slides on it so I can just say, hey, go here. Take a look at the slides. And it'll be helpful.

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So there you go. Pretty easy. Easy peasy. And if you want to give me a call, we have, let's see, a couple open lines.

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877 -207 -2276.

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And like I said, you can e -mail me. And that is info at CARM .org.

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And just put in the subject line, radio question, radio comment.

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And we can get to them. In fact, let me see if we've got any new ones in. All right. Uh -huh.

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Mm -hmm. Ooh, ooh. Hey, that's interesting.

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I'll have to check it out. Oh, I like that. Someone sent me an e -mail. I was just checking to see if any new e -mails came in for comments or questions.

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And someone said that at the LDS General Conference, they did a hit piece on Calvinism. So I'm like, oh, man, that'll be good.

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So I'm going to go check it out. Not right now at the moment, though, but, you know.

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Oh, man. Oh, man. You know how many e -mails we have? We only have 83, way down low.

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Usually it's hundreds. That's just in that e -mail account. I've got other ones. Here's one. I have 1 ,573 in that one, 889 in that one.

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And in my private one, I have 99. So, yeah.

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Well, hey, you know, it's what it is. I'm super busy. All right. Hey, let's get on with Spencer from North Carolina.

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Spencer, welcome. You're on the air. Hey, how are you today, Matt? Oh, hanging in there, hanging in there.

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What do you got, man? Listen, yesterday I tuned into your broadcast, and I could have swore that one of the people that were calling to ask you a question was asking about salvation and that, for some reason,

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I thought they said that even though they were saved, they didn't think they were saved or wouldn't be saved.

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And I'm not sure what happened with all that, and I was kind of confused what was going on.

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Yeah, I remember it well. It was just a guy who was going through it. It was just a guy going through a dry spell and going through a desert time.

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And it makes you wonder. It makes you think. And that's what it was. We talked about it for a while, and it wasn't any big deal.

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It is, it's not. But, you know, for him it is. But when you're on the outside and you know and you've been through it and you see it, you go, no, don't worry about it, you're good.

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But he's still going to go through it. That's kind of a thing. Okay. Well, my question,

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I guess, is if you've accepted Christ as your Savior and you know that God has raised you from the dead, once you accept that, can you lose that?

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No, you can't lose salvation. You can fall away from God, but you can't lose salvation, correct?

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No, you can't lose salvation. Okay. In one sense, yes, in another sense, no, he doesn't.

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Okay. I know it's a hard thing to hear. Why what?

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Why not? Why doesn't he want everyone to accept him as their

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Savior? Well, there is a sense in which that's the answer, but the answer is yes, another sense where it's not.

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Because he says, for example, in 1 Samuel 3 .14, he says that the iniquities of Eli's house shall not be atoned for by sacrifice or offering forever.

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So that means Jesus didn't atone for their sins. Well, that means then that he didn't want them to be saved. Jesus speaks in parables so people will not be saved.

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He says that in Mark 4 .10 -12 and 2 Thessalonians 2 .11. God sends a deluding influence on people so they'll not be saved.

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They'll believe lies. And yet we have 1 Timothy 2 .4 and 2 Peter 3 .9 that says that God, he desires all people to be saved.

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So who and what's going on? Some people just interpret that all to mean every individual, but they don't know if that's correct.

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See, they interpret it, they read into the text. But if you look at what Jesus said, he said that in Matthew 15 .24,

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he said he was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

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And the phrase house of Israel deals with the nation of Israel. He was only sent to Israel. He was not sent to the world.

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But the covenantal aspect of God's faithfulness where he sent, the father sent the son to covenant

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Israel. The Jews rejected the Messiah, broke their covenant with God.

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So we the Gentiles are then grafted in. So in that we would say that he wants all to be saved, not just the

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Jewish people. And that's how I interpret it. And when I do that, everything makes sense at that point.

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And there's no problems. Okay? Okay. But you're saying that there are some that he's going to say,

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I don't accept you because he makes them blind. You said that in one of your first statements when we first started talking.

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Yeah. I know what I'm saying. Well, the thing, when

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I first started reading this in the Bible, it was disturbing because I'd already had this pretty well entrenched view that Jesus was the blonde haired, blue eyed

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Caucasian surfer dude who was dressed in a woman's nightgown and wanted everybody to be saved, standing at the door of your heart, asking permission for you and your wisdom and your sovereignty and your goodness to let him in.

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And then little by little, that image was chipped away at until it crumbled.

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And I found that in Psalm 5, 5, Psalm 11, 5, God hates all who do iniquity. In Romans 9, 19, 23, it talks about God having mercy on whom he desires.

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And he hardens whom he desires. And it's not dependent upon the man who wills or man who runs, but upon God who has mercy.

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These are hard words, but this is what the scriptures teach. So I was forced to just change my theology to make it fit the scriptures.

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So now that's what I teach. I teach that God even makes the wicked for the day of destruction or the day of evil, that's

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Proverbs 16, 4. What if, I'll just read it.

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I haven't quite got this memorized, but I'm working on it. This is Romans 9, 22, and 23. What if God, although willing to demonstrate his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much patience, vessels of wrath prepared for destruction.

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And it says he did so in order to make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy which he prepared beforehand for glory.

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So when you say prepared beforehand for glory, what does that mean? Well, if you go to Ephesians 1, 4, and 5, it says he, the father, chose us, the elect, in him,

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Jesus, before the foundation of the world. So I'm forced, personally, the way

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I see scripture, I'm forced to say that God elects and predestines people into salvation. And that if you're not in that elect, you can never be saved, and you never will be, because you'll never want to be.

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And Jesus says, no one can come to me unless the father grants it to him. John 6, 65. So this is not the image and the

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Jesus characteristics that's taught from most churches today. And so when I teach this with Christians, two

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Christians, a lot of them are just blown away. And I say, have you ever heard this before? They say, no. Well, it's right there in scripture.

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And I think it's because people are compromising on who the truth is. And they want him to be made in their image.

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They want Jesus to be the nice guy who's begging you and your wisdom to let him in. That's just not how it is.

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Okay? Okay. So, real quick,

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I don't want to keep up all your time. So just to put this in perspective, I have quite a few

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Christian friends that we talk amongst ourselves about the Bible and stuff. And then

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I have a friend that doesn't believe in Christ.

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But we've all spoke to him at different times alone to try and get him to accept

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Christ. But he's not all. He's like, I don't know if I want to believe that or fully believe that.

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So would that be an instance where he might be one of the people that Christ doesn't want?

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Who knows? So we don't know. Oh, no, no, no. It's not up to us to make that assessment.

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Oh, I see. Our job is to preach that gospel. And you know what the funny thing is?

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The weird thing is? The more we preach, apparently the more God has chosen people to be saved from the foundation of the world.

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I just don't get how it works. I know what the Bible says. I can quote those verses, and I have to believe what they say.

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That God chose us from the beginning for salvation, 2 Thessalonians 2 .13. Or Acts 13 .48, which says as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed.

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So, yeah, you know, that's what it says. And so I have a more complete study

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I've done on this. And I can teach. It takes me about 20 minutes to go through everything and put it all together.

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To put the verses in place and say, look, this relates to this. Here's how you respond to that. I have what

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I think. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think I have a pretty coherent analysis of it all.

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Maybe we should put it on the web or something. But anyway, it's just what it says. And the big thing is like Romans 9.

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And I would recommend that you read Romans 9 .9 -23. But you understand in that that God is a sovereign king.

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But we don't know who God's calling. We don't know who he's drawing. Because you can't come to him unless you're drawn.

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John 6 .44. You can't come to Christ unless it's been granted by the Father. John 6 .65. God grants that we have faith.

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Philippians 1 .29. He grants us repentance. 2 Timothy 2 .25. Okay, Lord, please grant it to more people.

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You know, and election is something that occurs in the inter -Trinitarian communion from before the foundation of the world.

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And a lot of times in my prayers, I'll be praying and I'll say, Lord, if that person's not elected, please elect them.

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And what I'm saying is I don't know how it all works. I just don't. I just trust

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God that he's a sovereign king. And in my foolishness, what I do is

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I stumble through the Scripture seeing things and say that's what it says. I need to incorporate that into what

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I believe. My belief needs to change and be in concert with what the word of God says. And hopefully

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I've done a good job. But we'll find out on the Day of Judgment. Hey, man, we got a break. Can you hold on? Yeah.

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Okay, hold on, buddy. Hey, folks, we'll be right back after these messages. We have one open line if you want to give me a call, 877 -207 -2276.

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We'll be right back. It's Matt Slick Live!

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Taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276. Here's Matt Slick.

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All right, everybody, welcome back to the show. And I'm saying hi to Russ down in Utah.

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We're texting on the phones about the debate set up, but he runs the station down there in the

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Utah area. All right, let's get back on with Spencer. You still there, buddy? Yes, sir.

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Yes, sir. All right. So there's a lot there. So I guess in a nutshell, yes, and I'm trying to wrap my head around it.

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And I'm trying to comprehend everything you said. And the thing that I did come up with is that you're saying that we as Christians go out and just have trust in the

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Lord that we preach to someone and try to bring them to Christ, but only

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Christ is going to let that happen. That's right. As my friend Bill McKeever said, that's right.

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As Bill McKeever, my friend at Mormonism Research Ministry said, he said, we're in sales, not production.

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So just so that I could maybe learn more of this, where should I start?

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Like you said, Romans 9. Do you have anything on your website that was Romans 9?

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Yeah, I have another website that I put this kind of stuff on there and really get into a lot more.

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And it's calvinistcorner .com. Okay, calvinistcorner .com.

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And that's where I put more. But you said I should start Romans 9, correct? Yeah, you should read

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Ephesians 1, Romans 9, if you want to really learn about this stuff. Let me tell you,

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I also recommend this. Go on to Google Docs or whatever it is and do an outline analysis of whatever you find.

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Pick an outline form. I do outlines all the time. I probably have 1 ,000 pages of outline material, and that's not an exaggeration.

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And so what I would do is whatever strikes you. You're reading Romans 9. You put

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Romans 9, and you hit Enter, and you hit Tab, and now you're underneath Romans 9, and point, subpoint 1, whatever it is.

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And you take a note. Look at verse 18. It says this. Verse 16. Wow, that's interesting.

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And you just write down your comments, and then you go research something. You look at cross -references. You look at words.

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You can go to BibleGateway .com and look up Greek words. Well, what does this mean? You just study. Just do stuff like that.

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And what'll happen is you'll just start going in different directions because one thing leads to another because the

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Bible theology is interconnected. It's not just in one thing. And this is what people make a mistake of.

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They say, like, you know, 1 Timothy 2 .40, what's all to be saved? That's it. It's by itself. We're done. We don't have to study anymore.

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Wrong. What does the word all mean? And you look. I've done this.

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I've done an examination of every single instance in the Greek New Testament where the word all occurs, every one of them.

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And then I categorize them, and I have it on the CARM site because I want to say, well, how does God use the word? And so I start realizing, wait a minute.

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He's using it in different senses in different places. And so it teaches me. And when

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I raise these issues up to a lot of Christians, they don't want to hear it. They're not taught to study.

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They're taught to submit Scripture to their presuppositions. They're not taught the reverse. So if you're to do an outline, like on Romans 9 and Ephesians 1, for example, and you were to just start studying, you're going to learn a lot.

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And when I've had my people, I've taught many Bible studies, and I've taught them how to study. I remember I've told them before,

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I've done this more than once, I said, okay, look, what I'm going to do is teach you how to study, teach you some tricks, teach you some things, really simple stuff to do, and do that, then

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I want to give you each a section of Scripture to examine for one week and come back and teach me.

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And they get intimidated. I said, no, no, no, don't worry about it. Just tell me what you find. And I said, what's going to happen is you're going to teach me something

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I didn't know. You're going to find stuff I just didn't know was there. Because that's what

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God does. He teaches people. We don't all have all the answers.

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And you'll find stuff in there, in Ephesians 1, like 1 through 11, and Romans 9, 9 through 23.

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Read the context of everything, but you'll experience a growth in your understanding as well as a confusion in your understanding.

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The confusion is good. It means Scripture doesn't agree with what you think, which means you've got to change what you think, which means you've got to study

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Scripture. Okay? Right. Yes, sir. This has been very enlightening.

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Yeah. Thank you. It's easy to do. See, I don't think that pastors in churches really are teaching people how to study, how to really study, and just do it.

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Just go study. Pastors aren't supposed to make people dependent on them. We're supposed to make them able and be disciple makers who handle accurately the

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Word of Truth, who are equipped for the work of ministry. We're supposed to make them able to do that.

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And that's what we're supposed to do. Okay? You can do it. Thank you,

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Matt. Take care. Have a good evening. You too, man. God bless, buddy. God bless. Let me know how it goes, okay?

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God bless you. Bye. All right. Oh, I cut him off there. Sorry about that. Okay, let's get to Sheila from North Carolina.

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Sheila, welcome. You're on the air. Hi, Matt. Hi. Can you hear me?

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Yes, I can hear you. Okay. In Joshua 4 -9,

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Joshua set up the 12 stones that had been in the middle of the

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Jordan as the spot where the priest who carried the Ark of the Covenant had stood, and they are there to this day.

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Does that mean today, or does it mean at the point where this book was written?

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To this day can be when it was written. Yep. Okay. Because that's what it says.

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Okay, so it's not by 2024. No. All right. Thank you. Hold on, hold on. It's possible they're still there, but we just don't know.

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If you go to the Jordan River, and I've been there. It's a big river, and it's miles and miles and miles long.

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Well, what part exactly where it is? And what if you go out into the Jordan scuba diving, and you see a few stones scattered around in a kind of a pile area?

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Why? Is that that? Or is it that the river gradually knocked them down, erosion knocked them down?

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Whatever. So you see, it'd be tough. You see what I'm saying? All right. Thank you very much,

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Matt. You're welcome. Bye -bye. God bless. Goodbye. All right, let's get to Bob from Nebraska.

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Hey, Bob, welcome. You're on the air. Hey, thanks, Matt. Good to be back. You and I talked,

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I think, about a week ago about John 20, 21 through 23 and the

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Catholic understanding that that's where you find the Sacrament of Reconciliation in Scripture.

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Which, let me interject. I went and wrote an article on the Catholic Sacrament of Reconciliation.

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Did research and wrote on it. Okay, good. So then maybe you'll be able to keep up with me here. That's good.

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So in any event, in that discussion, you said, well, in order for us to argue that that Sacrament of Reconciliation is still with us today, we have to show apostolic succession and the continuation of that.

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And so I did a little bit more looking into that, too. So in that conversation,

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I said, well, we see that in a lot of the New Testament books, the Pauline letters, the

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Acts of the Apostles and such. But I didn't give you any specific things to look at. So, you know, we do see that.

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So when they go to replace Judas. Hold on. We've got a break. Okay. I want to hear what you're saying.

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Okay. But we've got a break. All right. Interesting. All right. So, hey, folks, if you want to give me a call, we have three open lines, 877 -207 -2276.

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We'll be right back with Bob, the Roman Catholic, right after these messages. Please stay tuned. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

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Here's Matt Slick. All right, everybody. Welcome back to the show. Let's get back on with Bob. There we go.

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Hey, Bob, you're on the air. You still there? Hey, yeah, I am. I am, Matt. Yeah, so we're talking a little bit about apostolic succession here and just giving you the

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Catholic perspective on that. So we looked at things like Acts 1, 20 through 26, where the apostles have to select or decide to select the replacement of Judas.

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And so there is a sense of it there, but there's a lot more than that.

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I mean, you go to Acts 9 as well. And let me just pull that up here real quick.

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I mean, there's a whole bunch of verses that we can look at and kind of paint the picture for you.

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So Acts 9, yeah, so that's Saul's conversion, of course. And so he was added to the episcopate.

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And then we get to Timothy in verses like 1

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Timothy 4. You move on to Titus.

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You see where he's kind of added. You know, Timothy is kind of an interesting figure in the

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Bible because that's, I think, the first time that they they talk about laying hands on one of the successors.

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So Timothy is added to the episcopate. And then 1 Timothy 4, 14. You have to look at things in context.

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And, you know, for example, I agree. You know, Acts chapter one, right? And what were the requirements that they had to have in order for someone to fill that that apostolic office?

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What were the requirements they set out? Yeah, that at that time, they said the requirements has to be somebody that's been with them from the beginning and such, you know, somebody that, you know, that that knew them, that knew

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Christ. So that doesn't apply. Of course, kind of breaks that. Well, hold on, hold on, hold on.

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Hold on. So that that can't be used for your apostolic succession because it doesn't support it because you have the core criteria.

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There is they had to be there. See it. If if the only if the only verse in Scripture or if the only practice in Christian history was that, then you would be correct.

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But well, no, I didn't say it was. No, no, no. You made a mistake. Didn't say it was the only.

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I didn't say that. I said this right here tells us what is necessary. This right here can't be used.

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If you say there's other stuff, we have to go to other stuff. But this doesn't fit. So you read.

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You read. Yeah. You read all of the Scripture. Yes, I do.

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You know, you don't just take out individual sentences to say, you know, this is where it's at. I mean, once is enough on many things.

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I mean, if Christ said, you know, obey the commandments, you'll be the commandments. But look,

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I'm just saying is that the criteria of what you just said in Acts one there, it excludes apostolic succession from that because it says he had to be there with us and see from the beginning.

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It doesn't fit now. So it just can't be used. Well, that's all. It doesn't want to go to acts.

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It doesn't exclude it. Yeah. Yes, it doesn't exclude it because it's part of the whole picture.

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So you do. Yeah. If you want to go to Acts nine, you see that Paul was chosen by Christ and he certainly didn't fit the criteria.

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Yes, he did. And he did. And because you can understand he wasn't with them from the beginning, though.

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Let me explain what they said to replace Judas of the twelve was restricted.

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That's what that is, too. It doesn't apply to laying on of hands and succession going down from them.

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It doesn't work in Acts chapter nine. Paul was called specifically by Jesus.

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And Paul says, am I not an apostle? Have I not seen the risen Lord? First Corinthians nine one.

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So he claims his apostolic authority by having been called by Jesus personally and having seen the risen

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Lord. So does that fit your your criteria today? The well, but we got to go on.

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So there's a lot more. First, does that fit your criteria?

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The answer is no, it doesn't. So if those were the only two.

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No, there wouldn't be anything. So we go to First Timothy four. So we look at that.

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OK, it's yeah. First Timothy four with what the laying on of hands. Mm hmm.

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Yes, that's part of it. Yeah. So, you know, when Paul's talking with when yeah, when

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Paul's talking with talking to Timothy and Titus and Silvanus and others, you know, it's it's all about, you know, we're handing this down where the church is going to continue through these forms of leadership.

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And certainly the apostles are a separate, you know, in those certain criteria applied to them.

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But they knew that they were not going to be around forever. And so they knew they needed to pass this down.

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So they did that with with that. What did they pass down? Well, here, if you read this, it says to teach command to teach these things.

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All right. So that's up in First Timothy four eleven. So he's talking with Timothy, Timothy, and he's telling him, here's what makes, you know, a sound leader of the church.

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He spends a lot of Timothy and Titus kind of giving advice on, you know, who can be let's take a look at a leader in the church.

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Actually, let's actually take a look. Prescribe and teach these things. What things is he prescribing and teaching?

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Well, the stuff before we can get into that. But let no one look down on your youthfulness. But rather in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity.

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Show yourself an example of those who believe. Until I come, give attention to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and teaching.

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Now, just so you know, the public reading of Scripture, the Roman Catholic Church forbade that for hundreds of years.

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But they had the authority. Yes, it is true. At every mass, they read

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Scripture out loud to people because a lot of people were illiterate and couldn't read themselves. No, the

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Roman Catholic Church forbade people from having Bibles. And if they were to study on their own, they were killed.

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You could have studied your history. So where do you see that? Where do you get that in history? That's another topic.

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I can find some documents for that, some sources for that. But notice what he says in verse 14, the verse that you went to.

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Do not neglect the spiritual gift. And it's charismatic in the

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Greek, the charismatic gift within you, which was bestowed on you through the prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands by the presbytery.

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Whoa. So now it looks like what he's talking about here is receiving a charismatic gift by the laying on of hands.

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I don't think you can single that out and say that's the only thing he's talking about there. Certainly a priest, a bishop, a deacon can have a charismatic gift, and many have over the centuries.

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What are the charismatic gifts? Timothy certainly. Well, it'd be the gifts of the Holy Spirit. No.

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Well, yes. Okay. But what are the gifts? List me out what the charismatic gifts are.

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Do you know? Well, it'd be teaching and preaching and prophecy and healing.

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You know, those are some of them just off the top of my head. Teaching is not one, but prophecy is.

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There are pneumatic and charismatic. So there are spiritual gifts and there are charismatic gifts and there are 10 charismatic gifts.

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But teaching is not one of them. Prophecy, interpretation of tongues, word of wisdom, word of knowledge.

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These are the kinds of things that he's talking about. Okay, so I know because I did a specific study on this.

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And we are to have them. This is a big topic for me because when I was a pastor, this very topic is what cost me my pastorate.

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I believed in all the charismatic gifts, and the presbytery didn't. That's another topic. It's just, you know, what's right or wrong.

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But this is what's going on, so I'm familiar with it. So it says that the spiritual gift, the charismatic gift, charismatos, within you, which was bestowed on you through the prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands.

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So in the laying on of hands by the presbytery, the group of elders, okay, presbyteroi, he received a charismatic gift.

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Well, it's one of those 10, and the 10th one actually is eternal life, Romans 6 .23.

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So there you go. So are your priests, are they exercising any of their charismatic gifts?

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Yeah, I think many of them do, you know, at different times. Lay people can as well, and many do.

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But yeah, I mean, these are wisdom. Word of knowledge. These are all puzzle pieces. Speaking in tongues. Does this happen in the priest in their churches?

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Does it ever happen? I don't know of any that have or do, but I know that the church does believe in certain circumstances that that is a gift that people can receive.

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But here's the thing, you're saying that it's by authority. Well, hold on. He says by the authority, the presbytery hand, pass it down, the authority is passed down.

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And you went to 1 Timothy 4 .14. We look at the context, and it talks about receiving charismatic gift. Okay, that's what the context is.

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So do they have the charismatic gifts? No, they don't.

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I haven't heard of any. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but I haven't heard of a single Catholic in over 20 years of me debating them saying, yeah, the priests do these things.

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And if they have that same authority as you say, why don't they do it? It doesn't seem to support your position.

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Well, I can certainly research that and probably find you some instances that are confirmed that that has occurred.

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Okay. But I want to continue on with the... Hold on.

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We'll get to another verse, okay? Okay. Which next verse in 1 Timothy 4? I don't know what it was.

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We'll get it. We can look at 1 Timothy 5 .22. Okay, I'll look. Hey, folks, we'll be right back, okay?

34:05

Stay tuned. It's Matt Slick Live! Taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

34:15

Here's Matt Slick. All right, everybody. Welcome back to the show. Let's get back on with Bob.

34:22

All right. Thanks for waiting. Okay. 1 Timothy 5 .22. Go ahead. Yeah.

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So 1 Timothy 5 .22, there's just more kind of another, you know, piece to the puzzle of, you know, who's laying on hands.

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And before that, in verse 17, it says, refers to the elders who direct the affairs of the church.

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So we have now another group of people within the church leadership called elders.

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And what does elder mean in Greek? It means elder. It's a word. Presbyteros.

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It just means elder. Yeah. And presbyterate, you know, means the church leaders.

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It might mean priest or a member of the leadership, an elder of a

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Christian assembly. Right? Yeah. But nothing in the verse that you're saying there says that apostolic authority is passed on.

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Here's the thing I've noticed with a lot of Catholics and Eastern Orthodox, they'll go to the verses like this. I'm familiar with them.

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And they don't say what they are told they mean. You're doing what's called eisegesis.

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You're reading into the text. I -E -I -S. I'm using eisegesis because I'm walking you through just some

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New Testament, you know, scriptures. So you can kind of see, gosh, you know, maybe this is where some people can kind of get the idea that leadership within the church was not ended with the death of St.

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John. It continued on because they appointed people. They appointed people after them to take over the leadership of the church.

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And so that's why we have. You know, I agree. That's where we get it is is from these.

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Yeah. And then you can look into the Old Testament and you can see how the priesthood in in the

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Old Testament is somewhat similar. I mean, you could see probably why they based. You're jumping around too fast, too much, too quickly.

36:20

OK, sorry. So this issue of the the New Testament presbytery, the eldership and the

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Episcopal, the bishopric. OK, that's fine. But none of those say they have apostolic authority that represents the apostolic succession.

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That's an invention of the Catholic Church. It's not there in the text.

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They just say, well, that's what it means. So how do you know what it means? So when do you think the Catholic Church invented that?

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When? I don't know when, but it did in its days with Roman Catholic Churches. You know, you know, my opinion is it's apostate.

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It's a false church. That's what I believe. But if you go to Romans chapter with your with your belief.

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Yeah. And it's what I am absolutely convinced. I mean, I'm not trying to be insulting. I'm not trying to be rude, but it's my position.

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I know you aren't. You tell me. What's that? What's that? You weren't insulting me.

37:17

I'm not sure about that. You know, you believe what you believe. Yeah, that's all it is. It's not an attack on you or anything like that.

37:24

So look, this what Roman. My question to you, though, Matt, is is if you're going to claim that the church invented apostolic succession, then you should know somewhere in Christian history where that came to be the first time it was referred to.

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You know, what do you know? I have to know. I don't have to know the first date, the exact date and the first guy to say it.

37:50

It's not necessary. But since the Bible doesn't teach what you guys say, then obviously after that sometime in your history, you did this.

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I've got some more work to do on Catholicism and it's hair. It's a introduction to hearing doctrines that are not in Scripture.

38:05

Oh, yeah. I'm always studying. But look, Matthew ten. Jesus summoned verse one.

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He summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits and cast them out to heal every kind of disease and every kind of sickness.

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And then he names the twelve to whom he gave that authority. He doesn't say he gave it to their successors.

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It doesn't say that because he gave it to the apostles. But the Catholic Church says, oh, I gave it to the to the successors to where does it say that?

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Because he names them the names of the twelve. It was Simon, Peter, Andrew, James goes on.

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But he says he gives and he tells them, as you go, preach, saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

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That's what he told them to do. They're supposed to do that. And your priests aren't doing that.

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Also, heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers. No, no, no, no, no.

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Go around. They don't go preaching. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. They say, come home to the church. They say, come home to the

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Catholic Church and be saved in the Catholic Church. I listen. I have actually heard priests on a number of occasions say the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

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They preach the kingdom, you know. So, I mean, I'm sure this is where they don't.

39:23

But yeah. So let me go on with what Jesus said to this. Back to the. But let me go back to the historical perspective, because I think where you look at what

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Jesus said, what Jesus said, it doesn't fit what you guys want.

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He said, heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons, freely you received, freely give.

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So are your priests like the apostles? Because the apostolic authority, if you're going to have apostolic authority, then it has to be apostolic, as is exemplified and revealed right there in Scripture.

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That's the apostolic authority. That's what it is. If your church has it, I want to see this in it. It doesn't do it.

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So it doesn't. Well, the there's there's more than that, because Christ also commands to go out and baptize all nations.

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And that's what the apostles did. That's what today's bishops and priests do. Too many non -christians or too many non -Catholic

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Christian people don't do that. And so they're not following what Christ taught on.

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Well, we're not talking about the baptism. Yeah, well, I guess, but I'm just saying that's what you get when you follow your type of your type of theology and approach to, you know, apostolic succession.

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So apostolic succession isn't limited to just Matthew 10. There's more to it.

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And it and the priests and the bishops today in the church do exercise some of those gifts as they receive them.

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I suggest you go actually study God's word, actually study it in light of what it says, not what the

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Roman Catholic Church tells you it says. It tells you what it means. Well, and I, I really strongly suggest you look at Christian history.

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I have a history. You're simply. Yeah. But you don't know it because you can't tell me when the church first supposedly invented apostolic succession.

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And I can I can give you quotes from back in the first century from people like Pope St.

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Clement, the first when he said, since very ancient times, the church has appointed, you know, bishops and deacons.

41:38

True. I have no problem with that. That was in 80. You don't. The year 80. Bob, you're not saying you want to.

41:44

Bob, I got to interrupt you and tell you, you're not thinking. You're not thinking. You're not thinking just because they say that there's been laid on.

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It does not mean they have apostolic authority. I'm not saying that people don't lay hands on them.

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I'm not saying that they don't have authority of some sort. I'm not saying that. I'm saying the

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Catholic Church says it has apostolic authority. When we go look at what the apostles authority was, we see it is not manifested in the

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Catholic Church. That's what I'm saying. Well, what is what is apostolic succession if there's no authority that passes down with it?

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The it's that's the wrong question. The wrong question. I mean, the right question should be, does our church teach what

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Jesus said? That's what you should be asking. You don't. You go to these verses which we take in context and I show you it doesn't support your position by reading them in context, each one of them.

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And then when I say, now let's go look and see what apostolic authority is. That's what Jesus says in Matthew 10.

42:51

You guys aren't doing it. But what you say is that the church invented this at some point after the

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Bible. And to be honest with you, the Bible hadn't even been compiled and finished by 80

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A .D. And here we already have the pope of the Catholic Church saying, since very ancient times, we have had bishops and deacons appointed.

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That's Pope St. Clement in 80 A .D. And then a century later in 189

43:19

A .D., St. Irenaeus talks extensively in his letter to the Smyrnians about, you know, apostolic succession.

43:28

Yeah. And so what you're doing is you're going to church fathers and I have a saying, my church father can beat up your church father just because a church.

43:35

Well, you know, we've got the same church. There's Matt. Hold on. Just because a church father says something doesn't mean it's true.

43:44

OK, absolutely correct. Absolutely. So I have when a church father says something.

43:50

Hold on, Bob, Bob, Bob. I have quotes from church fathers that differ on the apocrypha, the necessity of baptism, the extent what the canon of Scripture is, what the

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Eucharist is, faith alone, purgatory. I even have church fathers teaching reformed theology,

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Calvinism. There's salvation by faith. I mean, Scripture, final authority to miscellaneous quotes.

44:12

I have a whole bunch of them. You have any church fathers that say that? Do you have any church fathers that say there's no such thing as apostolic succession, that there's no bishops or deacons with authority?

44:23

No, no, no, no, no. You don't understand. You're not understand what I'm saying. Just because a church father and someone in the

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Bible lays hands on them doesn't mean it's apostolic authority succession.

44:39

See, when you guys say this, what you mean is you have the same authority as the apostles themselves.

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Then if you do, then all we have to do is go to the Bible and see where Jesus gave those very apostles the very authority.

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And we find out that you don't have that very authority. Therefore, it's not apostolic. It's simple.

45:03

The authority is the authority to bind and loose the authority to participate in the sacrament of reconciliation in the forgiveness of sins, which is what brought all this up because you said, gosh, if you can't show apostolic succession, then you're wrong on John 20, 21 through 23.

45:25

So I said, well, I'll show him some apostolic succession. So now I've given you some scriptural verses. I've got a long list of church fathers.

45:33

We've got Old Testament verses that also. Look, all you're doing is you're trying to carpet bomb.

45:39

You're trying to carpet bomb by not looking at each verse in context. I've done this so many times with people. They'll say, here's the eight verses.

45:46

He approved it. Well, let's look at each one. And then we find out that each one doesn't support it. In other words, you're not doing my homework.

45:54

I'm doing a comprehensive look at not only Scripture, but church history and pre -Christian history.

46:03

And in the Old Testament, show you that the concept has always been there. That's not let me ask you, let me ask you if and I don't want any harm to come to you.

46:14

OK, so if you're to die right now and go to have face Jesus, where would you go? We'd be heaven or hell.

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Well, let me ask you this. What does that have to do with the main question here, which is apostolic succession?

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I'm trying to show everybody that your teaching leads you astray. You're what you can.

46:35

I've already shown you your verses don't show. Don't support what you're saying. I've already shown you from Matthew 10. So now just because we only have a minute left or less than a minute.

46:43

Where would you go if you're to die right now? Where would you go? Where? Well, what you're trying to do is distract from the main issue of the discussion.

46:51

And and if I've got more Bible verses, I've got more church fathers. I got more things to read in context.

46:59

And well, let's see what you've recently written all about it. You call back.

47:04

I can't I can't call back tomorrow. Yeah, whenever you don't call back and give me some more verses next week.

47:11

Unfortunately, that's fine. That's fine. Or you can even email me your verses. OK, which is fine.

47:16

Info at Karm .org. But I had to tell you, you're a member of a false church.

47:22

And that if you believe in official Roman Catholic theology, when you die, you're going to go to hell. I don't want that.

47:28

I would say that you are you are taking a very dangerous path contrary to Christ in, you know, in your approach to your faith as well.

47:39

You can say it. But I go to Scripture, not the church. OK, hey, we've got to go. OK, Bob, enjoy the church.

47:46

All right. All right. See you, Matt. OK, we'll talk to you later. OK, I enjoyed the conversation. Polite, informative.