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Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line
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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
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Our host is dr. James White director of Alpha Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix reformed
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Baptist Church This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you'd like to talk with dr.
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White call now. It's 602 973 4602 or toll -free across the
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United States. It's 1 877 7 5 3 3 3 4 1 And now with today's topic here is
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James White And good afternoon. Welcome to the dividing line Well, I've got a lot of stuff to talk about today.
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First of all, I'm very excited about the fact that over in my office right now the EEPC is charging up It was less than a week ago.
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It was A week ago tomorrow. I think yes, we go to go tomorrow.
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I was at the airport in Indianapolis sitting at the gate and I blogged an article
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Blogged a blog article. Is that how you do it? You blog it. Well, anyway, I put something on the blog about Finding this little teeny tiny
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PC that we would be able to use to stream Debates and presentations things like that while I'm on the road and I Told the story later on the blog that I posted that I walked off Walk down the down the way got something to take on the flight back came back got my
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BlackBerry out surfed over to the Amazon wish list and it was already purchased and it arrived today and it is tiny
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Oh it is it I remember Have you ever seen the video of when
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I was I was debating Hamza Abdul Malik and I had this teeny tiny little
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Thing was called an LG phenom and I'm so bummed that LG stopped making that because it was it was pretty cool
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This is this is just a little bit bigger than LG phenom. Obviously considerably more powerful But it is a tiny little thing and it's charging up the other room
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I haven't even turned it on yet because you know, it's always good to charge the battery first So it's in the other room charging now What I'd like to do today, first of all very again
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When when folks do stuff off that that wish list it is a resource list. It is so encouraging and this morning
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Someone was doing something that I've really needed for a long time. I put it on the wish list and They were talking about doing that and that's that's always encouraging to us.
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That's great But what I'd like to do today is I'd like to get your feedback on a possibility of Doing something.
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I had this really cool idea and I need to find out whether we should invest in this or not, basically
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And maybe get some ideas of how to do it Maybe if we did like a pre sale thing on it or something to raise the funds to do it.
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I don't know But here's the idea You're you're at the airport.
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You're on a bus in New York a train in New York or London for that matter You're having a conversation with somebody and you really actually start to get into Giving your your
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Presentation of the gospel you're dealing with a Mormon up in Salt Lake. You're dealing with Roman Catholic, whatever it might be I had a conversation
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Monday with a guy about the meaning of life and death. I mean, he's back from Iraq he saw lots of things there and and it opened up an opportunity to talk about those things and You don't have forever and You don't just want to hand him a tract you want to give him something more but you're you know
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You can't have stuff with you all the time unless you're one of those really geeky people who walks on the backpack or something like that and so The thought struck my mind and someone in channel claims that he came up with this first I have no recollection of that ever.
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But anyway, I'm a jump drive type guy I love jump drives, you know like churches that have me in you know
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Sometimes in the hotel room they have a little bag of goodies. Oh, yeah, throw a jump drive in there. I love Just I'd love them in all sorts of different colors and sizes and stuff like I have a 32 gigabyte jump drive
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It's ridiculous. Anyway, I love these little jump drives. They're very easy to carry around And I was looking at one of them
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I use this one source where you can get if you buy you get free laser engraving on it and stuff like that They've got all like 16 different colors and all that kind of stuff
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And all of a sudden it crossed my mind What would what would we do?
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Well, how cool would it be if I would have been able to hand this fellow a jump drive?
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That had on it Let's say we have a jump drive My first thought was just this one and then
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I started realizing we could do this for a bunch of different groups but had on it the John Dominic cross and debate on the reliability of the
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Gospels the cross and Borg debate, which is that available yet? Cross and Borg resurrection.
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Well, we need to get the cross and Borg resurrection one up because we've got the recording done So it should just be a matter of Spitting it out.
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I think But the cross and Borg debate on the resurrection The Bart Ehrman debate on the
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Bible and the Dan Barker to ban the existence of God along with a little 29 -minute Why I'm a
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Christian a thing that I did a number of years ago back in New Jersey In fact of the same church, I'll be speaking at New Jersey in actually a matter of weeks
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There you've got four debates good debates very useful debates plus a gospel presentation plus a we maybe we can get
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Hasim son of Ramallah king of graphics to do a something when you pop it in this this would come up and and You know would allow you to load it on your machine or play or whatever
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I don't want to get too complicated with it. Most people today know how to handle an mp3 People who have computers and stuff especially younger people have that kind of stuff and so you we would have something by color or by laser inscription it would be
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Identified as you know a defense the Christian faith or something like that and you could hand this to this person and They could go away with that and you let's say they had had some questions about the resurrection.
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You said, you know There's a debate on here Between James White and Jim Renahan representing the Christian side and John Dominic cross and Marcus Borg on the other side on the subject of of the
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Resurrection and you might find a lot of your questions answered in that and the neat thing is you'll hear both sides and you'll be able
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To see here how both sides handle the same information and I think a lot of folks would then be attracted to listening to the other
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Debates that are available there and then they can follow up with the with the link to the website to get more information
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We could do that For you know general issues Obviously we could do one on Mormonism.
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We could do one on Roman Catholicism and we could do one on Islam as well we've got plenty of material these days to pull from that's for sure and so we could put those debates on there and Provide these jump drives now
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And I'm I'm already hearing the wheels turning in other people's minds. Well, we could do the same thing. Well, yeah, you could
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I Suppose but obviously what we would try to do is if we're buying a bunch of jump drives in bulk
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You can get a little bit of a price break on them And what we're doing is we're doing this, you know, we technically own those things and so we're doing this and saying give it away go ahead and give it away and Somebody said oh
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I could buy that and get the stuff cheaper and I wouldn't have to buy them one by one and I could get It cheaper.
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Well, if you want to rip us off of four or five bucks, you know, you could do that I suppose but my idea is that most of the people who would be doing this would actually, you know have the proper spirit of things and would be would be doing this as a means of witness and a
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Greater witness, so I'd like to know who would want to do who would want to us to do something like that I need to know what kind of interest there would be out there right now
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I'm looking at if we if we started with 200 jump drives we could get them for seven bucks each with it with the engraving and then
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Of course the you know, putting the mp3s and stuff on that wouldn't take all that much time But somebody'd have to be doing it and so there'd be an initial investment, you know to get started, but I Just have a feeling that knowing the people that I know
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A lot of the the folks that listen to the dividing line would love to have a selection of those with them when they're
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Just going around Because they get into these kind of types conversations and would be able like to be able to hand somebody something like that and say here
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Here's here's the resources you want to look at let's let's get together again and and to talk about this I have you have to have an opportunity.
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I mean can imagine like on Rome Catholicism. We put all the Pacwa debates on there And say here here is here is one of the best scholars you have from the
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Roman Catholic side and Here you have the papacy sola scriptura the priesthood justification the mass
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Have you ever heard the other side you want to hear how this can be done? Respectfully without ad hominem without the way that people like Steve Ray and Art Sippo behave here
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Listen to that so That would I think be a really really neat thing to do especially if we can make it affordable
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And not quite a business in process, so let us know I would like to know Jump on the website and and to drop us an email
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Give us a call today eight seven seven seven five three three three four one. Let us know and channel I've already seen a few people
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In channel some people are asking what is a jump drive rich suggestion we call these jump tracks
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I think that's a very good idea jump tracks But jump drives are universal as far as I can tell if you as long as you've got a
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PC my my Mac uses them just fine and so There's something that that would absolutely be
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Tremendously useful I think in in the witnessing situation I'm trying to focus here, but unfortunately we have some folks out in the studio audience that are really
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Somebody has suggested that this might be our version of the jump the shark We don't want to jump the tracks.
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You know mm -hmm like I said, I really wish that the studio audience was under control and Anyway Let us know if that would be something you would you would be interested in doing because that kind of investment is is
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In this economy is a lot, and I I don't want to do something that would end up sitting there on the on the shelf either
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But I have a feeling we'd probably go through them pretty quickly and be making another order fairly fast to be honest with you
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So let us know about the your interest in the jump tracks I Have some really cool clips to play thanks to James Swan He has been providing us with has been providing me with clips from Steve Ray and Carl Keating and since the call
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One caller we have right now is on Roman Catholicism. I guess it all sort of fits together So let's go ahead and take
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Chris in Indianapolis hi Chris Hello, dr. White. Thanks for taking my call. I'm a new listener and first -time caller actually well excellent.
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Thanks Thanks for being out there It is absolutely ironic that you mentioned about the jump drives because that is something that I had personally thought about doing so With several my friends that I'm currently
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Engaged in Roman Catholic apologetics with and hence the nature of the call and I thought about putting some of your debates
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About Catholicism on the jump drive to give to some of my friends. Oh, there you go Praise the Lord in this
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Providence. So that so that would probably be something you would you're that's is that a yes vote.
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Yes I've two questions really and the first one is relating to this long -running debate
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That's recently been kicked into high gear that I've been having with a friend of mine I'm a Reformed Baptist just to let you know enrolled at Southern Seminary in Louisville actually
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To be a pastor. Mm -hmm, and he is a very intelligent and articulate but amateur
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Roman Catholic apologists trying to woo several of our mutual Lukewarm quote Christian friends of ours to the dark side
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And one of the arguments that he recently put forth is the defense of the institution of the real presence in the
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Passover meal turned Lord Supper you may be familiar with this argument as I've got on right?
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Yeah, the fourth cup stuff Exactly and I was going to ask you what is the most cogent biblical
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Protestant reputation of that? In print,
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I'm you know, I've looked around for anyone who has written anything in response
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To that presentation and I am NOT familiar with anything at all. I really don't know of anyone who has has done that it's one of the
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Six or seven Roman Catholic areas Where you go man, it'd be really worthwhile if someone would take the time
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I don't know if it's because it's politically incorrect to address that kind of stuff or or just just what it is, but It may have to do with the fact that that to meaningfully interact with These things would and and I've even thought about doing it
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But again, there's just so many hours in today it what you have to do to do it And since you're in seminary, you have all the time in the world.
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We should just sign it to you but but What would be required would be first of all an in -depth analysis of just how accurate?
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current Seder representations are I've I'm aware of the fact
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Baruch may owes. I'm not sure if you're familiar with him, but he's a Reformed Baptist pastor in Israel he has been longtime pastor of the the only
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Reformed Baptist Church that I know of in Israel and Very large congregation. He's quite elderly now and Baruch however had made a presentation once at our church where he
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Specifically pointed out that a lot of this the the Passover Seder Presentations that Evangelicals like to have at their churches and stuff are really highly suspect as far as their accuracy goes as to what
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The Passover was actually like at the time of Jesus This goes back to another major area that I have done a lot of study on but it was back right when
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I was in Seminary which is a long time ago Which was the the fact that you can't simply assume that's because something is found in the
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Mishnah Which is codified 200 250 years after the time of Christ you can't necessarily assume that that's
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Accurately representing what the situation was to two and a half centuries earlier. And so how much do we really know of the actual form of The Passover meal to be able to make the kinds of connections that that particular argument makes
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That's the first thing and that's that would take a lot of time and effort Maybe that's why it hasn't hasn't been done.
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The second thing that would have to be dealt with of course is the the entire approach of the nature of the
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Atonement and that certainly is is extremely valuable needs to be done, but Unfortunately, it's just here that so many of those who respond to Roman Catholicism And I can say this to you being a fellow
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Reformed Baptist So many of those reformed who respond to Roman Catholicism have a what we would identify as sub biblical view of the
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Atonement the purpose the Atonement the intention the Atonement and the book of Hebrews would have to Be very central to any any presentation on this subject and sadly and in a lot of evangelicals and today
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The book of Hebrews is somewhat of a closed book because of its reliance upon the Old Testament and things like that.
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And so Non reformed apologetical responses would tend to focus on completely different aspects of the issue than what really needs to be focused upon and that is the intention of God in the
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Atonement and the result of the Atonement and the Finished work and so on and so forth. And so, you know, where do you cut that off?
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You have to deal with all of those those issues to deal with that particular argumentation.
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So Obviously, I have thought about what needs to be done to put together a full appropriate response, but it's it's doing it and It's one of those there's
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I can think of a probably five or six topics in almost all of the major areas of studied
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Where there are things I wish I had had time to do when I was especially focused upon that area
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And would like to get back to I want to I want to deal in fact We're gonna be doing dealing a little bit later on the program here with the issue of the priesthood in Roman Catholicism In fact, the whole program is probably
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Roman Catholicism. So you'll find it interesting. I hope Right. I actually had my second question regarding that it was just a a little logical thought that I had and it's in regards to Ultimately the establishment of the priesthood and the real presence and since the
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Roman Catholics dogmatically hold that Jesus Institute of the priesthood there during the Passover meal Eucharist Lord's Supper and that a priest is needed to reoffer represent the sacrifice of Jesus there in the mass and since Judas Iscariot was present at Jesus words of consecration according to Luke 22 19 through 23 and Since Jesus knew long before that that Judas Iscariot was quote the devil the son of perdition and was going to betray him
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Wouldn't it be a serious if not mortal sin for Jesus to knowingly make a priest out of an unbeliever?
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Especially one possessed either at that very moment or shortly thereafter by Satan himself We all know
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Jesus never sinned Wouldn't that logically mean that Jesus didn't actually institute the priesthood at least then and therefore since no priests were present other than Jesus the
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Great High Priest a Sacrifice of the real presence could not have been made and since scripture doesn't even hint at Nor did the
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Roman Catholic dogmas define any other possible time of the institution of the priesthood? Wouldn't a logical conclusion therefore be that the real presence didn't exist at the
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Lord's Supper and therefore doesn't exist today I just thought of that the other day off the top of my head and was curious as to what your thoughts were on that the only
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I'm gonna play Steve Ray giving that presentation about How the priesthood was established in the upper room here just in a moment
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The only thing in that that caught my attention that I would have to look at is
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I think the issue of when Judas leaves is
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One of the synoptic issues that you would probably want to look at a little bit more closely before you press forward with that the encounter that according to the
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MacArthur study Bible, but Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, that's the that's the only thing is
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I was listening to it that immediately popped in my head was well, that's I that's one of the things I have on my list to possibly deal with in the
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Ehrman response, it's one of the synoptic Parallel issues that one has to deal with and so that would be the only thing that would make me go
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You that's really foundational to the art. That is the foundation of that argument. So you'd want to make sure you've got that one
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Nailed down firmly before you before you proceeded with it Okay, and and one final question if I could briefly beg of you
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It's in regards to the propitiatory nature of the mass and the atonement itself Obviously anytime that the mass is taken in it's a finite level of propitiation is applied and whatever is not
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Accomplished there in the life is done Taken over by a finite time spent in purgatory.
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But my thought is that if an infinite number of finite times applied to the mass
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Subtracted from an infinite debt load of sin is still infinite So are there any scripture verses that either directly or indirectly talk about how sin as an infinite?
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debt load and so how can a finite amount of suffering or purging or Propitiation be applied make it an infinite
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Jump to perfection so that the Catholics can therefore go to heaven well, I I'm listening to that as Trying to think as a
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Catholic would respond to it and I believe that a Catholic would respond to that somewhere along the lines of saying well the the you need to differentiate between the eternal debt of sin and the temporal and The one is is forgiven
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Sacramentally the other is not well it is but but not completely
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So they just since they make that distinction, they would say well the eternal debt the eternal weight of one's sin is dealt with through initially by baptism and justification and the sacramental means of that and then the purgatory issue is is not
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The eternal weight of sin it is the temporal weight of sin And so they wouldn't so you'd have to focus upon the non -existence of that differentiation
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I think to actually make that argument run because they would respond by saying well we differentiate between these these
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Classifications recognizing that the eternal weight has to be dealt with in a different way than the temporal does and I'd be in a perfect Thank you for clarifying that.
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All righty, sir. Thank you very much. Thanks for calling All right. God bless. Bye. Bye. Well, it's nice to have new listeners out there, especially in Indianapolis where we just were
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Speaking of which let's go ahead and get to our clips here. I wanted to listen to a once again,
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I maybe I'm just mean or something, but Roman Catholic apologists have a very difficult job they have a
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Internally inconsistent Massive body of literature that they have to defend, you know, they want to tell us sola scriptura is our
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Achilles heel Well, what do you offer in place of sola scriptura? Well, we have the Magisterium.
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Well, how do we know what the Magisterium did? Well, you've got you know You've got all these dogmatic canons and decrees and all the rest of stuff and then you've got the
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Universal Catechism of the Catholic Church well the Universal Catholic Catechism of the
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Catholic Church has section 841 in it that talks about the subject of the
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Muslims And I have my handy -dandy Catechism right here and it's right next to me and It says this is on page 242 of the paperback edition
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The church's relationship with the Muslims the plan of salvation also includes Those who acknowledge the
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Creator in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims These profess to hold the faith of Abraham and together with us
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They adore the one merciful God mankind's judge in the last day now Some of you may have heard the debate that I had was the last
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Roman Catholic debate we had Was it last Roman Catholic debate we had on Long Island? I think no second to last
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Second last anyways, yes and we talked about this subject ad nauseum and my my opponent really struggled mightily to deal with this particular text because Words have meaning and Here is the real key when the text says and together with us
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They adore the one merciful God and Yesterday in channel.
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I asked a turret and fan to track down for me the Latin version of that Which he did very quickly on the web
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It was Adirond which comes from Adorama Adoramus To adore that is a high word of worship in Roman Catholic theology and this says that they together with us
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Adore the one merciful God now I don't know how you can get around the fact that the
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Universal Catholic Catechism is saying that the Muslims are Truly worshiping God when they worship
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Allah now, of course, they believe that Jesus is but a mighty prophet so I don't know how that works, but that's what the
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Universal Catholic Catechism says and is that not identified was that not identified by the
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Pope when it was released as a as an authoritative compendium of the church's teaching
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Well, of course it is it was So let's listen to a caller because you know
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Catholic struggle with this It doesn't make any sense. It is a self -contradictory perspective. I can guarantee you there was nobody at the
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Council of Florence that ever dreamed That a bishop of Rome would ever sign off on anything like that.
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I assure you of that But be that as it may let's listen to a phone call that Carl Keating took
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I was at an anti -catholic contact me over the internet the other day and I don't have my catechism with me
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But he quoted something out of the catechism with regard to Muslims and salvation and basically stating that Catholics Pray to the same
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God Allah as Muslims and he and he backed up the fact it up a statement out of the catechism
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Yeah, I don't know if you have in front of you, but matter of fact I do Elaborate on that.
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Yeah, let me start backwards. So first of all, the word Allah simply means
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God and And Christians in the Middle East Catholics in particular
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Use the word Allah in the mass. That's in an everyday speech.
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That's simply the word for God So don't consider Allah to be a formal name
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Any different say from the word God for us? Okay the passage in The catechism is
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Paragraph 841 very short. It reads this way the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the
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Creator in the first place Amongst whom are the Muslims these profess to hold the faith of Abraham and together with us.
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They adore the one merciful God mankind's judge on the last day a Couple things can be said here.
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First of all, this doesn't say that their religion is correct It simply says most that they acknowledge that there's one
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God and that's the same God that we acknowledge Because after all there is only one God there is here a slight possibility though of Nuance I Admit I haven't looked that up in the original the way
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I would like yet But it describes the Muslims as these profess to hold the faith of Abraham The word profess could be taken in two ways
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One is to profess something is to acknowledge. This is what I believe another sense of professors to claim to Hold a particular thing.
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Okay, so this might be interpreted as they profess that as they claim to hold the faith of Abraham But maybe they don't quite hold it the way say the
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Jews did or Christians today do all right so I'm not really sure to what extent the original text of The catechism allows that kind of leeway and interpretation but anyways, at least this says that Muslims do claim to be following the faith of Abraham and They adore one merciful
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God Which of course is what we also do now. Did you catch that at the end?
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It does not say they adore one merciful God, which is what we also do.
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It says they together with us it isn't that what it says and Together with us they adore the one merciful
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God You can't get around the fact that this is saying that the
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Muslims adore they give adoramos to the one merciful
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God, even though They deny the Trinity. How can you adore the triune
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God if you deny the Trinity? it makes no sense and Isn't it weird that?
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Karl Keating has been doing this for like almost 30 years How many times has this one question come up?
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in On Catholic answers live and he's never looked up the Latin on it I mean if I had to defend this thing,
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I'd I mean I'd be in it all the time I'm just totally left befuddled besides.
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This is actually a quotation. It's a quote and he didn't mention this. I don't know why It's a quotation from Lumen Gentium 16
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This is Vatican 2 speaking. You want to tell me that what Vatican 2 was saying in Lumen Gentium?
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Was actually that well they profess But don't really of course not
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Lumen Gentium was meant to be as touchy -feely ecumenical as it could be along those lines
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And so how can you really come up with this idea that well what it was really saying was they they profess to but they don't
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Really on the same level as us blah blah blah blah blah. That's not the context of Lumen Gentium and so here you have this statement from from the
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Catholic Catechism and What it says is what it says and it is a thorn in the side of any
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Roman Catholic apologist who wants to even try to become consistent how many times have we played?
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Tim Staples and other people trying to get around this I think we've played Aiken we've played
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Staples I think we've played Ray and they all tap dance spin around and say oh look at that shiny thing over there and Try to get away from it as fast as possible because they just can't deal with it
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It is a big big problem eight seven seven seven five three three three four one
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Thank you All right,
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I had seen a Notification my RSS feeds that Steve Ray was gonna be on Catholic answers live talking about the priesthood which
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I I was really looking forward to here's here's something that should should get your attention
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Steve. Welcome back Well, thank you Patrick. Good to be here. You get literally welcome back You were literally get back and tell us a little bit about that trip and I had a great time
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My wife and I were invited by the legionaries at the Regina Apostolorum University in Rome to do a very intensive week -long
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Course on apologetics and so we were there each day five days Doing a lot of talks four hours straight talking explaining apologetics an intro to apologetics two classes on Mary a class on two classes on authority one on the
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Bible Scripture and Tradition another one on Peter and the papacy And we had a class called the ten fingers.
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There was a the ten Classic questions that get asked to Catholics over and over again Although we've answered them a million times and then
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Catholic answers I think you've answered them a billion times and they still say the same thing Why did you why do you call priest father?
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Why do you pray repetitive vein repetitive prayers these kind of things? Sure And so I why do you make up the numbers like 33 ,000 and why do you misrepresent
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Athanasius and uh, yeah He does definitely has some zingers. I did a whole course and the
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PhD candidates all got credits for it and catch that PhD credit for listening to former
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Baptist Steve Ray massacre apologetics Wow If that's what's coming out of Roman Catholic higher education apologetically speaking if you're having
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Steve Ray a guy whose materials are Riddled with errors that have been documented and he refuses when when refuted he just goes
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Oh, they're just a bunch of mean right and I Catholics and everything. Oh my Things are
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Well on the far side of the diver They do with the forts are unmanned currently speaking of which let's let's listen to a discussion here
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I want to get to one. Let's let's see which which this one is first Now there are a lot of listeners out there who are not
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Catholic from all walks of life Religion and none and so they're looking in on this this discussion.
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They may be asking why do Catholics have priests at all? For Protestants listening. They may think well, I'm baptized.
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I have the royal priesthood. So why do we need priest Steve Ray? No, I like to say it
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Because that's the way Jesus created this church It's not up to us to say what the church should be or is or the way we like it to be
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We have to go back and say what did Jesus actually begin? What was instituted by him?
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How did he intend this thing to grow? And the fact is that we have priests today in the church because that's the way
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Jesus made his church and if you go Understand that the church today is really Jewish Meaning by that, of course that we didn't just pop out on the day of Pentecost Out of a vacuum and all of a sudden here we are a brand new unique thing that never existed before Now listen to this argument because this this is all they've got folks and they don't have much on this one
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If you haven't listened to the debate Between myself and Mitchell Paco on this subject. I would highly recommend it to you.
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Let's just remind ourselves ourselves of a few things There is no sacramental priesthood in the
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New Testament Richard Hanson the Christian priesthood examined letterworth press 1979 says does the
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New Testament recognize any individual minister as a Christian priest and in virtue of his being a minister the reader will not be surprised to find that this question must receive an answer and as an answer an emphatic negative
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There is no question of Christian officials as priests in a newton. I'll get it right yet There is no mention of Christian officials as priests in a
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New Testament Whatever we have no ground for assuming the large number of priests the Jewish temple who we are told became officials
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Officiated as or regarded as priests in any specifically Christian sense Despairing attempts have been made to read the existence of Christian priests in the various parts of the
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New Testament But of official Christian priest we must honestly admit there is in the New Testament not the faintest whisper and that is
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Absolutely without question the case You have the pastoral epistles
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You have their extensive discussion of the offices of the church nothing about priests
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You have presbyters which the Roman Catholics will tell us is where priests came from but presbyters and bishops are the same thing in the
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New Testament They are not differentiated you have these extensive discussions of the qualifications of the priest
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Of the of the presbyter and the bishop you don't have nothing about a priest at all Can you imagine the presbyter is a lower position in Roman Catholic thinking the priest is and yet?
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There is nothing in inspired scripture about what the qualifications of a priest are nothing there is no
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Christian priesthood whatsoever in the New Testament New Testament and And Notice where she
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Hansen also says no Christian priesthood is found in the New Testament There is in fact no solid evidence that anyone thinks of Christian ministers as priests until about the year 200
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Attempts have been made to find evidence for a Christian priesthood in the second century Likely candidates for the position of priests in the second century should be presbyters or bishops
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But nobody called these priests at that time Joseph Martos in doors the sacred 1991 said the earliest
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Christian community contained a variety of ministries But priesthood was not one of them
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The only priest of the Joseph that Jesus and his immediate followers apparently recognized was the ministry of the Jewish temple priest nevertheless before the end of the first century
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Christian writers likened Jesus death on the cross to a priestly sacrifice and by the middle of the Third century those who presided over Eucharistic worship were beginning to be perceived as priestly ministers so Martos is a
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Catholic and He recognizes this is something that developed over time. This is evolutionary.
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There's no question that it was evolutionary But the problem is the
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Roman Catholic has the Roman Catholic apologist has a real hard time admitting. It was evolutionary why? Because without the priesthood you can't have the things that they claim have been consistent
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Catholic preaching from the start You've got to have that sacerdotal priesthood to have the kind of Eucharistic sacrifice that they insist was actually taught by the apostles themselves and so there's just There's the
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New Testament And this is a great illustration as you listen. I'm gonna continue on here with Ray, but as you listen to him speaking
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I hope what you hear is the vast difference between a theology that is drawn from the
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Bible and a Theology that is forced upon the Bible Rome denies sola scriptura
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Rome has external sources of authority And so Rome can pick and choose what verses they're going to make reference to to try to prop up her case
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But is so plainly obvious on the subject of the priesthood That this is not a doctrine that comes from reading the
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New Testament This is a doctrine you get from someplace else and then you force onto the New Testament If you were actually asking the honest question
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What does the New Testament teach about priesthood you'd be in Hebrews and what he's just about to say is well
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You know It's a Jewish church you see and and so since you have these kinds of priests in the Old Testament Then then you have them in the
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New Testament, too What does the book of Hebrews say about the Old Testament priesthood? it has passed away
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It has been fulfilled Those many priests are contrasted with what the one priest
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Jesus Christ So you would never no one could ever read Hebrews and come to conclusion of their sacerdotal priests
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But do you think that's gonna stop Steve Ray? Of course not we really understand ourselves as the fruit and the leaves and the branches of another of a tree
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Which is the trunk and the roots are Israel The Old Testament is much thicker than the
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New Testament and the New Testament is the fulfillment But the Old Testament is the foundation and we see that the way the
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Old Testament was that God there were three levels of priesthood and nobody I think has explained this better than Jimmy Akin in a set of debate in a debate that he had in the set of tapes that you have for sale there on the priesthood and He explained that in the
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Old Testament you had three levels of priests You had the high priest Aaron who only he could come into the
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Holy of Holies He was the one that made the wonderful the sacrifices before God in his very presence, but then he had
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Underneath him or working with him the ministerial priesthood who were there to serve him They were the
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Levites and then beyond the Levites who were there that they didn't own property
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They didn't own their own part of the real estate of Israel like all the other tribes did their inheritance was the
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Lord They were not property owners and they their property was to serve
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God and now let me just stop Just just for a moment there just point something out Okay, if Jesus is the fulfillment of the high priest.
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It's the high priest who went into the Holy of Holies, right? The Levites didn't go into the Holy of Holies. And yet what is the priest doing?
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Standing before the high altar of the Roman Catholic Church Let me read you just a little something here from O 'Brien's book the faith of millions
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When the priest announces the tremendous words of consecration He reaches up into the heavens brings Christ down from his throne and Places him upon our altar to be offered up again as a victim for the sins of man
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It is a power greater than that of saints and angels greater than that of seraphim and cherubim Indeed it is greater even than the power of the
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Virgin Mary while the Blessed Virgin was the human agency by which Christ became incarnate a Single time the priest brings
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Christ down from heaven and renders him present on our altar is the eternal victim for the sins of man Not once but a thousand times
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The priest speaks and lo Christ the eternal and omnipotent God bows his head in humble obedience to the priests command of What sublime dignity is the office of the
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Christian priest who is thus privileged to act as the ambassador and vice -gerant of Christ on earth He continues the essential ministry of Christ.
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He teaches the faithful with the authority of Christ He pardons the penitent sinner with the power of Christ He offers up again the same sacrifice of adoration atonement, which
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Christ offered on Calvary No wonder that the name which spiritual writers are especially fond of applying to the
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Christ is that of altar? Christus for the priest is and should be another
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Another Christ and Quote O 'Brien the faith of millions pages 255 through 256 pure blasphemy.
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I realize it's it is sickening to me to read those words If you haven't gotten the point that is not
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Christianity and never will be Okay, I I think that needs to be said very strongly
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But that is That is Rome exalting its own priesthood I'm sorry, but but trying to draw a parallel between the
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Levites who don't even go into the Holy of Holies and that stuff is absurd on its face
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But that's what Rome is reduced to They have to try to come up with these plausible parallels and then build into these flimsy little parallels massive structures of theology
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Look what they do with Luke 1 28 hail highly favored one Wow Look at all the dogmas in the words hailed highly favored one
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It is it is truly incredible incredible example of how grossly unbiblical
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Romanism really is they were the ministerial priesthood under Aaron and then there was a third level
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Which was the general priesthood of all the believers and then and I'm gonna know Exodus 18
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It talks about who you will be a nation of priests the nation that will serve me as priests offering up spiritual sacrifices
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Praise and worship this kind of thing and fathers were going to be the priest of their homes.
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Just like even today I'm and you asked me when I when you call me. Are you a priest? I said no, I'm not a priest and you said are you sure as you a priest of all beliefs?
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But I'm also a priest of my domestic church here in my family So you had the high priest the ministerial priest
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Levite and the general priesthood of all believers now when you move into the New Testament The very first Christians were
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Jews and they would expect the pattern to be very similar They wouldn't expect it to make radical changes
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You would still have a high priest But now we know that the high priest is Jesus and he is always in the temple in heaven
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He is always there as the sacrifice and as the priest and he's functioning in the place of Aaron the high priest
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Now let me just something that they would not expect any radical change. You mean the Messiah coming wasn't radical enough
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The fact that the gospel is now going to all people not just that's not radical enough What an amazing statement, but then there's another level just like in the
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Old Testament of Ministerial priests who implement what he needs done. They're there to serve him
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They're there to make it real in the real world Covering all the face of the globe and they are the Levites and even interestingly some of the church fathers
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Referred to the priest as the Levites. Now, let me just ask a simple question Did any inspired writer make the connection between the
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Levites and Christian priests? the answer is No Obviously not.
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In fact, what did they say about the Levitical priesthood? It has passed Away if Steve Ray is going to give any kind of meaningful presentation isn't you have to talk about that?
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Well, maybe not. Well, we had the question from Chris earlier about the institution
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Here's the the segment where he gets to the institution. Listen, listen to how this this works Steve Could you say that that Jesus Christ is sort of the the the hinge?
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Between the Old Testament priesthood and the new though because we forget that Jesus was a priest He was the supreme high priest what
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I'm getting at is how are priests of the old? Dispensation different from and same from Catholic priests today in the nuke and under the
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New Covenant The the priests of the Old Testament did not have the Holy Spirit and dwelling them
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That wasn't the Holy Spirit would come upon people but not the same as that's not the right one
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I guess it's number three. I'm gonna try this one Let's I got to get to this one because we're running out of time. Where did Christ Institute the priesthood
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Steve? Where did that happen? Oh, this is this is such an exciting place It happened at the upper room at the institution of the
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Eucharist He was preparing his priests all the way along up to that point to to become priest but there's a room in Jerusalem on Mount Zion and it was it's in the hands of the of Israel right now and you can't celebrate mass there and it's
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And it looks like a mosque when you go in you Think you're walking into a an Islamic mosque and yet This is the upper room the very place on Mount Zion 2 ,000 years ago where Jesus went with his disciples for the
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Passover meal and he's sitting there at this Passover meal and he takes the bread and the wine which are normally part of the
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Passover meal and he Transforms that into the Eucharist into the sacrifice the new sacrifice of the church of the new
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Israel and There are 12 men with him there one gets up to leave and he becomes an outcast another replaces him later, but here he is at a
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Sacrificial meal and he changes what was from the Old Testament into the new it's a transformation
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It's the same and yet it's new and there he when he says do this in memory of me
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These are all sacrificial terms. They are just replete. They're pregnant with sacrificial meaning from the
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Old Testament and for say for example a Jew who understood the Old Testament and just had it memorized and Understood all the feasts and the sacrifices when he read what would happen with Jesus's words there do this in memory of me do
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Whenever you do this do it in memory of me. This is my body. They would see in that very rich Sacrificial terminology they would know that this is a sacrificial meal.
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Jesus is starting something Here's a sacrifice with flesh and blood and when he does is he's instituting
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The priesthood and these men are being made priests They're joining with him in the priesthood and the other thing is that that's the institution of the
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Eucharist as well In that same room and then later when Jesus rises from the dead and comes back
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He institutes the sacrament of reconciliation there. So you have these three marvelous
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Sacraments and I know when I bring priests into this room many times that they just get choked up because what three
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I? Would not have time to get into that that was relevant. So there you have The common presentation and that is believe it or not
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The establishment of the priesthood is do this in remembrance of me And so here's the reasoning now the first day that it's pregnant with sacrificial meanings
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Well, okay Jesus is talking about his upcoming sacrifice They have to say that somehow
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Jesus is actually Transubstantiating the the bread and the wine even before the sacrifice they go.
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Well, you know, he's an eternal person So we can do things like this and and we're supposed to actually believe that that's what the text is communicating
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Stuff that won't end up actually being specifically said for you know, a thousand years, but that's supposed to be in the text, but This whole idea that reasoning is well if this is the
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Eucharistic sacrifice and you need to have Eucharistic ministers for this then by saying do this and the this was the the
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Eucharistic sacrifice then that means they had to been made priests there the fact that there's nothing
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Anywhere The talks about priests is irrelevant. This is the magic of Romanist is a
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Jesus. You don't have to have priests there. It doesn't have to say by this
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He made them priests. You don't have to have the word there You don't have to have the concept there because what the text actually meant to the original writer doesn't matter
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You see that's just your Protestantism getting in the way You shouldn't worry about what the original writer said
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Or what he meant to communicate or what he was thinking it's okay to read into those ancient writers
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The later definitions that come a thousand years and 1 ,200 years after the time of the original writing
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It's okay to do that because we say so we are wrong Now that works a whole lot better during the
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Inquisition than it does today Yes, you know, I I mean remember when
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I when I had that debate in those debates in Austin, Texas with fastigi
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And we were talking It wasn't during one of the debates was between the debates We were talking about I had quoted some
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Roman Catholic scholars and and he didn't like what they were saying And he made the comment in passing. I said
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Bart. It seems to be a lot of you know, different opinions here He says yeah ever since the Inquisition ended.
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That's been I Don't think he realized what he was talking about But yeah
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That that was the whole idea was that you know The Inquisition did tend to unify things just a little bit as far as perspectives went but look the fact the matter is that's not what the text is talking about and if the and where else do can you possibly put the the
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Establishment of the Apostles as priests so here's what we have to believe that that do this and remember to me was actually making these men priests and As they went out
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All through the book of Acts as they preached they never mentioned that they were priests All through the pastoral epistles when
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Paul is so concerned about establishing the churches and the offices of churches For some reason he didn't think that talking about the priests was was relevant
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Amazing I'd say more about that. We got to get Fred on here real quick because we're about out of time Fred in California real quick I wish
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I had something to say about the priesthood now, but I'm calling about the Trinity. Okay? Anyway, I was curious if you think
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I told rich the wrong reference. It's Matthew 28 19. Okay the
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Formula there where it says in the name of the Father Son and the Holy Spirit Have you run across any?
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Anti -trinitarians who try to make the argument that that passage is a later addition to Matthew's gospel
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Yeah, the United Pentecostal Church International That's a standard part of the Jesus only one this
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Pentecostal Argumentation is that? Matthew 20 19 is not original. They don't have any
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Way of establishing that you have to in essence overthrow the entire testimony of the textual tradition
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At the library yesterday, and I was trying to find every hardcore crackpot liberal commentator
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Written some common picture, you know people from the anchor Bible right none of them even mentioned it
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No, they have no reason to There isn't any question about it You would have to overthrow the entirety of the text of the
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New Testament to get rid of Matthew 28 19 now certainly you know The crackpot liberal who is willing to assume that the
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New Testament manuscript tradition is not sufficient to establish What the New Testament text is might go there? But they don't have any reason to do it this particular group because they have so much you know, they have a theological paradigm that they need to insert into the text and so they are willing to question the originality of that particular text
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Some some don't like to go there because a lot of those are King James only folks, too So you put the two of them together and it's and it doesn't work real well, but oh, yeah, that's that's standard argumentation
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I'm trying to remember right now. I'll go would remember because I'll go remembers everything I've ever said, but I had a debate with an iratio debate with the head theologian of the
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UPCI who I have offered to go to st.
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Louis and debate In front of his own students, but I'm trying to remember if he raised that question.
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My memory is that he did Actually raise a question about Matthew 28 19, but they just don't have any means of establishing it
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Well, let's say what this guy kind of does I kind of encountered this person on an email discussion group and this is the first time
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I've really sort of Encountered anyone who tries to take a swipe it Claiming that's an additional to the text, but he tends to quote a whole bunch of church fathers and and You obscure people that I've never heard of you have to go digging around and yeah
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My recollection is yeah my recollection is they try to go to some patristic sources and say that if there since there are
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Variations and citations of it that it might not have been original etc, etc But again, if they applied those same standards, they'd have to overthrow the entirety of the
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New Testament including their favorite texts Which they really shouldn't be doing. But hey Fred, thank you for your call. I have to run.
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We're out of time Thanks for listening to the buying line today. We will be back Lord willing next Tuesday here on the program.
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See you then. God bless The dividing line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega ministries
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