Orthodoxy, Justification, James 2, Dale Tuggy, and Jordan Hall Rebukes Rodney Howard Brown

And greetings, welcome to The Dividing Line. My name is James White. I'm not sure where I'm supposed to be looking because we don't have any monitors on, but that's okay. There we go. So we're looking over here.

There we go. Got to get that figured out someday. Anyways, thanks for being with us today. Got a lot to get to today. A video was posted that I wanted to get to a little while ago, and it has to do with Hank Hanegraaff and John MacArthur.

And so I would like to start with that. And I'm not sure which to do first. I guess I'll... Basically what happens is Hank plays a segment from... The way it was recorded almost sounded like a Q &A type thing.

It does sound like it was recorded by Grace to You. And it is John MacArthur commenting on Hank's conversion, though I don't think he did so by name, though it was obvious who he was referring to. And then Hank responds with his standard James Chapter 2, we're only talking about living faith stuff, which is, again, Hank Hanegraaff is not an official spokesman for Eastern Orthodoxy, and there are a lot of issues in having him as a representative for Eastern Orthodoxy.

But he just basically quotes by memory the English translation of James Chapter 2. If you really wanted to impress us, you could quote it in Greek, because that's one of the big things of his conversion is, hey, we can do it in Greek, and so on and so forth.

Anyway, we'll actually be looking at it in Greek, and basically uses James 2 as his rebuttal of John. I actually have corrections to make to both Dr. MacArthur and Hank Hanegraaff on this particular issue, but we need to hear what was said first.

So hopefully this will come across audio-wise. Let's listen to what was said. We don't need the... Since it's just the... Well, I don't know if you're getting it. I suppose we could put up, because it's the transcription of what's being said, and the sound quality isn't all that good.

So we'll see how it goes here. Here are John MacArthur's comments. Over the last couple of weeks, you may have read,.

A famous evangelical teacher and radio personality joined the Eastern Orthodox Church, went through a ceremony or ritual called prismation, in which a rag supposedly infused with divine life was placed upon his head and transferred to him.

This is an Eastern Orthodox ritual. What does the Eastern Orthodox Church believe about the gospel? Here is decree 13 from their dogma. We believe a man to be not justified through faith alone, but through faith which works through love.

That is to say, through faith and works. That's what Eastern Orthodoxy teaches. We are not justified by faith alone, but by faith and works. There are about 300 million people worldwide who are in the Eastern Orthodox Church.

The sister church in the West is the Roman Catholic Church, that has the exact same doctrine, and there are 1 .3 billion people in the Roman Catholic Church worldwide. So 1 .6 billion people call themselves Christians and believe in a salvation that is a combination of grace and works.

That is false Christianity within true Christianity. That is false Christianity teaching a false gospel. It is not to be joined, it is to be cursed.

Okay, so, and we don't need to bring that up. There you have the presentation, almost sound like someone in the audience recording chapel service or something, I don't know. A couple of things, I think there is a, I need to be fair, I need to be accurate.

We really err when we identify Eastern Orthodoxy as simply the mirror image in the West of, in the East, of Roman Catholicism. There, as I have tried to explain when this whole thing first started, one of the reasons that I've avoided the Eastern Orthodox subject, rather assiduously over the years, is I had the opportunity, I think back when I was in seminary, to have some fairly lengthy interactions with one particular Eastern Orthodox individual who was extremely well-read and thankfully was able to somewhat bridge the gap that exists.

There is a huge gap that exists. The mindset and the worldview of Eastern Orthodoxy is extremely difficult to communicate to Westerners. For example, you'll notice that the citation that was given was said to be from their dogma.

Well, there are specific books of theology, but anyone who really knows Eastern Orthodoxy knows that not only are there rather obvious differences in emphasis between the various communions within Eastern Orthodoxy, but that the essence of Eastern Orthodoxy is that they're not dogmatic.

Their liturgy determines their beliefs more than a manual of written words. And so, it's really hard to get Westerners who are accustomed to being able to reach over here and grab the Catechism of the Catholic Church, well, at least up until Francis, who has decided to change this too, but grab this and go, okay, well, here's the section on indulgences, and here's what it says about that.

We like to be able to do that kind of thing, and you can't really do that with Eastern Orthodoxy. At the same time, it is quite clear that Eastern Orthodoxy does not believe in sola fide for numerous reasons, some of which Hank doesn't touch on, because I'm not sure he fully understands that issue.

And what I mean by that is part and parcel of why we believe in sola fide has to do with our biblical anthropology. We can't bring merit into the situation because of what we believe about man's nature in the fallen state.

Eastern Orthodoxy does not share our understanding of the corrupted human nature at all. It really has a very plainly, minimally sub-biblical, and in the vast majority of instances, anti-biblical view of the will of man and the capacity of man in regards to the issue of salvation.

So, immediately, the whole issue of sola fide is almost like asking, what exactly does blue smell like in a red world? Now, that may be an interesting question on Twitter or Facebook these days, but for most of us, it doesn't make much sense because the categories are all wrong, and they don't really intersect.

And that's one of the issues in dealing with Eastern Orthodoxy, is the differences are more fundamental, but they're not as easy to actually enunciate and lay out because of the nature of real Eastern Orthodoxy.

There's sort of the westernized version, which ends up looking more like Roman Catholicism than it does anything else. But it's a version, and it doesn't really represent the heart and soul, the essence of historic Orthodoxy as it exists in those lands where it has sometimes been very much turned into the nominal religion of the masses.

Anyway, so I would disagree with Dr. MacArthur that Rome and Eastern Orthodoxy are pretty much the same thing. And even though both would deny sola fide, I would say that they do so for differing reasons.

And not recognizing what those issues are can be somewhat confusing, but they do deny sola fide. That much is true. And so, obviously, Hank responds to this. He starts off talking about how many times they've played golf together.

I want to announce to everyone right now, I have never played golf with Hank Hanegraaff. And it's not because he wouldn't have invited me to, but I just don't play golf. Okay? And I think that has probably kept me out of a lot of difficult situations.

Don't get me on that. Anyway, Hank's primary response was simply quote James chapter two and give the standard almost Presbyterian answer that faith alone saves, but saying faith is never alone. But that's not a meaningful response within Eastern Orthodoxy in light of its doctrine of the sacraments, its liturgy of the sacraments, the centrality of the sacraments to its liturgy, as well as the whole concept of Energia, energy in Eastern Orthodoxy, which is a very difficult concept.

I mean, it's hard for most of us. I mean, it really, it strikes us as almost new agey, the way that most Orthodox in Orthodox lands. And I'm obviously influenced primarily by my experience within Ukraine at this point view their churches as well.

Remember, remember what year was it? What year was the convergence up in Sedona? Do you remember that? What was that called? The harmonic convergence, the harmonic convergence took place up in Sedona, Arizona, which was a beautiful city.

It's still a beautiful area, but it's just, it's commercialized and creepy now. I mean, that's the best way you can put it. And maybe somebody can Google it or something when the harmonic convergence was, but there was, you know, all these weird people descended on Sedona, Arizona for the harmonic convergence.

Well, to be honest with you, there's, there's a parallel to the magical idea amongst Orthodox of the Energia, the energies that go, you know, they go to church because this is a place of energy, of being able to, you know, obtain this special energy type thing.

And it's what? 87? Wow. Really? 19? 30, 30 years ago? I didn't remember. I didn't remember. If you'd asked me, was that 30 years ago? I would have gone, no, but somebody in channel saying the same thing.

It's just, look, folks, it's when you get to be our age, especially Rich, who is considerably older than I am. But when you get to be our age, you know, 30 years dropping the bucket, no big deal. Pretty soon that'll only be half the time we've been alive.

So, hey, you know, it's, it's, it was like yesterday. Anyway, that's, that's neither here nor there. So while we can honestly recognize the differences between Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy, we likewise, thank you, Tony's, Tony's watching.

Hi, Tony. Dr. Tony Acosta, I'm going to be playing a portion from your debate today, Tony, so that'll keep you tuned in. So while we can recognize the necessity to address these issues, I think they need to be, this needs, needs to be very, very carefully handled.

And I, I, I've explained this before, Orthodoxy can be just as formalistic and dead as Romanism, no question about it. But because of its less dogmatic structure, I think there is a little bit better opportunity for someone in that context to have that simple faith than there is within the Roman context.

And it's primarily because of the mindset of East versus West that opens up a wider realm for that. And I know it's harder for Westerners to, to wrap their minds around that kind of stuff, but that's why I've, I've tried to avoid that, that as much as I possibly can.

Anyway, with that in mind, I want to, I'm not going to go into super, super deep depth on this, but I do notice that for most of our audience, when we do exegesis on the text in, in the program, people really respond very, very positively to that.

And so, I, I want to remind us once again, we've done it over the course of the years a number of times, but I, I want to remind you that every word of divine revelation is theanoustos, and that there is a danger for many of us who are involved in apologetics and in interreligious evangelism, that certain texts that are misused and abused can take on a negative hue in our thinking.

Why I don't like that text? I wish it didn't, I wish it didn't say things the way it says things, etc., etc. We have to be very, very careful of that. Every, every word of God is pure, and even when scriptures are misused, we must just all the more seek to handle those texts correctly.

So, let's once again remind ourselves of the truth of James chapter two, and we'll take a look at it, and if we could move over here so I can see my computer. And when dealing with the subject of James chapter two, I meant camera-wise, when dealing with the subject James chapter two, we have to, and this is what makes it difficult, it is a lengthy discussion.

It's not in nice little verse size, you know, just a verse here, a verse there. You have to deal with an entire section, a pericope, a division of the letter, and so it requires reading of the text, it requires time, and so often our conversations with people are far too brief.

You know, it's sort of like we've become accustomed to Twitter level discussions, and there are a lot of really important truths that just simply defy even 280 characters, or even 280 words, or even 280 minutes.

And so, the key to handling James chapter two is not what kind of illustrations you use. The key is to start where James starts the discussion and to remain consistent with his point. And James begins the discussion, verse 14 of chapter two, and that's where he says, what use is it, my brethren, if, and then he uses a certain one, just someone, he doesn't have a specific person in mind.

He's describing a kind of person who says, who should say, that person has faith, that he possesses faith, but does not have erga, works. So, the first thing to note is, this is a nameless person who lege, just says, makes the profession with the mouth, oh, I believe I have faith, but it is descriptive of this individual that they have no corresponding external reality to their statement of faith.

So, what use is it, my brethren, if a certain one says, I have faith, but has no works? Then, and this is, I believe, the determinative issue in this text, because depending on how you come down on here, you will either have John James in contradiction to Paul, which is what, obviously, large majority of modern scholarship wants to do.

Well, okay, I'll take that back, a significant portion of modern scholarship wants to do. Or, you will have Paul and James saying the exact same thing. And, of course, today, you're not allowed to have that.

You're not allowed to have harmony in the text. That's not going to get you anywhere. It's not going to get you published, that's for sure. And that is the last phrase, me dunitai haepistus, so se auton.

When you start with a me, the expected answer to the question is going to be negative. If you're doing it rhetorically and expect a positive answer, then you use oo. So, some would say faith cannot save him, can it?

Answer being no. But the issue is, obviously, the phrase haepistus. Faith has the definite article before it. And the reason that it has a definite article is it is referring back to this use up here.

And that is a faith that has no external evidence of its existence. It is a lege faith. It is a faith that is simply stated without evidence. It's in the subjunctive, it's not in the indicative. And so, it is a said faith.

And so, the question is, that kind of faith, a said faith, is not able to save. A faith that has no evidence of its existence, a faith that exists only in the realm of words and claims. Now, is that what the rest of the passage is going to substantiate?

It is. But we have to keep that in mind. The New American Standard says, can that faith save him? But I believe the New King James simply says, can faith save him? Leaving out the article and weakening the connection between the faith that was specifically referred to in the preceding portion of the verse and what is being referred to here.

So, the first example, if a brother or a sister is naked, without clothing and in need of daily food. So, these people are, a sister or brother is destitute. And again, one of you, same, just general idea of not anybody specifically.

And one of you says to them, so it's not the exact same term of saying, but same concept. So, one of you speaks words, go in peace, be warmed, be filled with food, but you do not give to them the necessities of the body.

What good is that? Now, notice the parallel. If you look up above, James 2 .14 starts with Tita Athalos and verse 16 ends with Tita Athalos. And so, he's making the exact same point. What good is it? You have spoken words to them, but you've not done anything.

There is no corresponding reality. The words you said were be warmed, but you didn't warm them. Be filled, but you didn't fill them. So, they are empty words without a corresponding reality, which means that it's not true faith that this person is professing to have, but merely a said faith.

What good is any of that is the point of the apostle James. And hence, his conclusion is in verse 17. Even so, also faith. If it is without works, if it is alone, if it exists only in the speech, if it is only something that is claimed, if it is just saying to someone, be warmed, but I will not warm you.

Be filled, but I will not fill you. It's dead. Being by itself. And there is the issue. It is by itself. So, this is a faith that is unnatural. And if you're going to try to, as many people do, create a schism, and Hank Hanegraaff wasn't doing this, by the way.

I don't want you to be confused. If you try to create a schism between Paul and James, you have to misrepresent both of them. Because when James says, the kind of faith that James is talking about is not the kind of faith that Paul is talking about.

When he talks about faith, for example, as the gift of God. Yes, it's part of the whole aspect of what God does in Ephesians chapter 2, verses 8 and 9. Not just faith. All of salvation, all of grace, faith itself, gifts of God.

When he does that, he then goes on to say that that God that did all these things ordained that we should walk in good works. So, Paul is very plain. And those people who think they are promoting sola fide, when they're actually promoting sola fide, a faith that has no correspondence to the work of the Spirit, holiness, repentance, anything else.

These individuals are grossly misrepresenting both Paul and James. And the liberals who are attempting to say, oh, well, obviously, James is trying to correct Paul. He's contradicting Paul. Likewise, they're misrepresenting and misunderstanding what both James and Paul are saying.

Did Luther understand James? Maybe not. Maybe not. As I said more than once, so much to the infallibility of Luther. But it's a very straightforward statement when you allow it to stand in its context, that the faith that he's deriding, which he says cannot save, is a spoken only faith.

It is not the faith that Paul speaks of as the gift of God, the work of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of his people that we find in Romans 3, 4, 8, so on and so forth. It is dead because it is alone. And this text is also the classic refutation of the quote-unquote free grace, cheap grace, non-lordship salvation material that is out there that is so embarrassing to evangelicalism.

Well, I'm sure that evangelicalism can be embarrassed. But anyway, verse 18. But one of you will say, you have faith and I have works. Show me your faith apart from your works and I will show you my faith by my works.

It's a very, very—will not take the time to even go into the—you can even see—well, you saw when it was all the way up. There's all sorts of textual symbols in the text. You can see here and here and here and here and there.

The difficulty of the expression in the original language has given rise to numerous textual variants to try to smooth things out. But the main point can be understood. If you want further discussion, God Who Justifies, 24 pages, I think, on this text goes into more depth than you may enjoy going into, but does anyways.

The point is this. True saving faith is demonstrated by its consistency with the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the redeemed. The balance—see, the fear that the anti-lordship people have is that if you allow for anything other than a mere head faith, you've opened the door for all the works salvation systems that are out there.

What they don't seem to get is that the balance is struck perfectly by Reformed theology because it recognizes that even saving faith is the work of the Spirit of God in the hearts and minds of God's elect people.

So you don't open the door to any kind of human merit, any kind of synergism, any kind—all that stuff goes out the window when you recognize the centrality of what the Bible says about the doctrine of election.

Verse 19, you believe that either there is one God or God is one. It could be translated either way. You do well, the demons believe and tremble. So he's pointing to that term pisteuo again. You believe and you may have right belief because there is only one God.

No question about it. But that's not enough because of the fact the demons likewise believe that theological truth. But that doesn't change them. They know that simply means someday they are going to be judged in an awful way.

But will you know? Are you willing literally to know? Oh, foolish fellow, empty man, that faith, chorus, tone, ergon, and then there's a textual variant here, and I popped it over there. Are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?

So that would be kene. But many other manuscripts, including the Byzantine manuscript tradition, have nekrah is dead, going back to the preceding utilization. And I haven't looked at the ECM on this. I should.

Well, this says this is a Nestle 28, so it did not change it. So is this Nestle? Yeah, this is Nestle 28. So they did not change it. They stayed with Arge, which would... Let's see, where's... Okay, text is right here.

So evidently, even though kene has papyrus support, nekrah is Sinaiticus, Alexandrinus, a number of others, as well as Byzantine reading. Evidently, CBGM, the coherence-based genealogical method, which I'm trying to wrap my head around these days, did not either change or continue to support the reading of Arge at James 2 .20.

I'll be looking at the ECM on that when I get an opportunity to do so. ECM is the new, the Editio Critica Mayor, so it's the new massive critical edition of the Greek New Testament. I'm not sure how many volumes it will end up being, but it'll probably be around 20.

And James has done, the general epistles were done a couple of years ago, and Acts came out a couple of months ago. And I'm hoping Mark is next, but it probably won't be Mark, it'll probably be John. The reason being my studies on p45.

But anyway, that's neither here nor there. So, faith that works is useless, dead, empty. The point that James is making is that a faith that exists only in the spoken realm, you can't let verse 15, 14 and 15, just slip away here.

A faith that exists only in the spoken realm of words only, that's what chorus, tone, ergo means. If you confuse the context that James himself offers with Paul's discussion of law obedience, good works or works of law, you're going to create absolute havoc.

And there's no reason to do it. A contextual reading of Paul, he says, faith alone saves, but a saving faith is never alone. Contextual reading of James says, faith alone saves, but a saving faith is never alone.

They're both saying the same thing. They have different emphases and they make those emphases clear in their contexts. So, are you willing to know, oh foolish man, the one making the statement, be warmed, be filled.

I have faith. I believe there's one God, but I don't care about the Lordship of Christ. I don't care about repentance. And I don't care about holiness. And I don't care about that Jesus said, he who loves me will keep my commandments.

I don't care about any of that stuff. Well, will you know, the faith that works is useless, empty, dead, whatever reading you want to have there. Was not Abraham, our father justified by works in the offering of Isaac, his son upon the altar?

Well, once again, we have an opportunity here because the apostle Paul addressed the same issue. He addressed the justification of Abraham, but Paul did so specifically in regards to his justification before God and said that it took place, Romans chapter four, very plainly in Genesis chapter 15, not Genesis chapter 12, not Genesis chapter 22.

His whole argument, when did this take place? When he was circumcised or uncircumcised. He gives it a specific place because the first use of faith in a narrative of Genesis is Genesis 15. And so he says, this is when Abraham's justified.

Well, is James saying something else? Not if you allow what has already come in the text to speak, because what has he said? He has spoken of saying to someone else external to a, to the watching world, be warm to be filled.

He has said, show me. He's used the Missouri state thing. Show me. So he's talking about demonstration of the claimed faith. And so Abraham's faith was justified in his obedience to God in the offering of Isaac.

And I say, well, nobody saw that. Oh, really? God did. The angel did. And who is that other guy? Oh, Isaac. Yeah. Not Ishmael. Sorry. Sorry. Muslim friends. Isaac. Likewise. You think Isaac wasn't changed by that?

You better believe he was. You better believe he was. Talk about changing his life forever and his understanding of faith and everything else that goes along with it. So you see that faith and y 'all, now, if y 'all are Calvinists, I want to make sure you're not riding your bike or something or running or driving a car or like one of our good friends that listens drives a truck.

Actually, we have a number of truckers that listen, but Razor's Kiss drives a truck. We don't want any accidents out there or anything else. But the term that is found there, faith was working with his works, is sunergai.

Yeah. Synergism. Oh, no. Yeah, but it doesn't really have anything to do with that conversation. The point being that there is a necessary recognition that saving faith in Reformed Theology, gift of God, given the elect of God as a part of their regeneration.

And since it is God's intention to conform them to the image of Christ, then that conformance flowing from the work of the Spirit of God is not a meritorious addition. It is a natural reaction to being a new creature in Christ.

It does not change a human faith into a saving faith. It is the natural and inevitable result of the work of the Spirit in granting supernatural faith. And so, his faith was working together with his works, verse 22.

And ectone ergone, and from the works, the faith was completed or perfected. So, saving faith is demonstrated and perfected when there is corresponding reality to what that faith claims. It is a dead and useless faith when that corresponding reality does not exist.

If you don't have a divine decree, if you don't have sovereign grace, this will inevitably lead you to a work salvation system. That's why you got to believe everything the Word says. And when you start picking apart the teachings about God's sovereignty and grace, you end up with work salvation systems, even amongst non-Roman Catholics.

It's inevitable. You've got to have that balance. And the scripture was fulfilled, which said, And Abraham believed God and was reckoned to him as righteousness, and he was called the friend of God, Genesis 15, 6.

Notice this is hearkening back to the previous text, Genesis 15, 6, even though the offering of Isaac is a number of years later. And then finally, only after all of this, do you get the text that is normally cited.

You see, and it's funny how many people jump in here, you see, you see what? I mean, the very fact that you jump in at 224 means you've skipped, the very words itself show you, you skipped something. You see that a man is justified, ex-erogon, kai, uk, ek, pistos, manon.

Pistos, manon, faith only. See, there's faith alone. No, manon would be alone, apart from works, alone, as in empty, useless. So when someone cites this against the Reformed understanding of sola fide, they're tilting at windmills, because that's not what we're talking about.

And that's not what James was talking about either. Because when he uses manon, what he's meaning is a pistos that has no erogon, a faith that has no works. It has no external demonstration of its reality, which is the inevitable result of its being a divine faith, a saving faith.

That doesn't mean that my erogon add to the pistos, the faith, the merit that is necessary to get me right standing before God. Once you start down that line, no matter where you add that in, you're not going to be able to have an understanding of Romans chapter eight or any of those things.

And again, that's why people try to say James is contradicting Paul. There's no reason, there's nothing contextually that drives us to have that understanding of what Paul is saying, or what James is saying.

We could go on from there, but that's normally how far most of it goes. There are other examples that are given after this. For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is again, talking about the kind of faith by which we are justified.

We are justified. Now see what Rome does is Rome says we're justified by a living faith. What do they mean by that? We are justified by a faith that has added to it the entire sacramental system. And so people trying to avoid that will, well, if you can get imbalanced about that, then I'm going to get imbalanced on this side.

It's the old tug of war thing. You've got 1 .6 billion people on that side, pulling one direction. So we better pull this direction and become imbalanced. And I look, I understand the motivation and the pressure to do that to become imbalanced.

But we can't because when you do that, there's always another heresy waiting right over here. And once you get imbalanced over on this side, now they've got you. The only safe place for lovers of truth is standing firmly right in the center of God's revelation.

Once you get imbalanced one way or the other, somebody's going to get you. There's always somebody waiting. So just a quick, just a quick reference there to James 2, Hank Canegraaff, John MacArthur issue that came up there.

Wanted to, wanted to address that. Next real quick. I have over the past year or so gotten numerous tweets and Facebook, well, not Facebook messages because my Facebook, you can't do it to me on Facebook.

You can do it on the AO page, but I don't see a lot of that stuff. So, and you don't see a lot of stuff on my page. I'm not sure why, how that's not working right. Anyway, I've gotten a lot of stuff about Dr. Dale Tuggy.

And when I first heard that name, it rang a bell. And my recollection was that I had seen a fair amount of information on that individual over on Triablog. And I remembered reading some articles on Triablog that were dealing with alleged incoherencies in the doctrine of the Trinity from some guy named Dale Tuggy.

And having looked at them, I had gotten the impression that Dale Tuggy's thing is that he's a philosopher. He's not basing anything on being driven by revelation. He's driven by philosophical categories.

And so he's just saying, well, it can't be this because of this philosophical conundrum here, that philosophical conundrum there. Or if I don't accept your utilization of language here, then this doesn't work over there and stuff like that.

And the guys at Triablog, even though a couple of them don't like me very much, that's okay. We've all got our place in the kingdom and they may not like me, but I say, God bless them anyways. It seemed to me that the guys at Triablog had done more than a sufficient job in taking apart these arguments.

And so I didn't give it much thought because I've got a book here called The Forgotten Trinity. And what does it say right at the beginning? I'm a biblical Trinitarian. I'm not a Trinitarian because I studied philosophy and went, oh, this is compelling to me.

I find this reasoning compelling and so on. No, I'm a Trinitarian because I believe the Bible is the word of God. And it reveals to us that there is one God. It reveals to us that there are three divine persons who are not confused with one another.

And it reveals the full equality in that one divine nature, that one God who is Yahweh of the Father, the Son, the Spirit. And so all of the discussion that has taken place since then to explain that and as the gospel has gone out into the world to interact with different perspectives of the world has to go back to those foundational realities.

And philosophers just don't have those foundational realities to go back to. And that's not my interest. I'm not interested in debating with people who are basically philosophically oriented rather than biblically oriented or revelationally oriented.

I mean, because I deal with a lot of Muslims, but they believe in revelation. I mean, once you become a liberal Muslim, I don't have much to say to you either. Then again, I'm not really sure you're a Muslim at that point, but that's another issue.

Well, I made some comment either on Facebook or Twitter, maybe on the program, I don't remember, basically saying what I just said and oh, the universe became unglued. Oh, no, no, no, no, you don't understand.

He's, he's, no, no, you don't understand where he's coming from. And so I looked it up. I looked up in my downloads. I think it was July. I downloaded a 50 minute, something like that, presentation by Dale Tuggy.

Oh, it was based on that hymn title. That beautiful hymn, And Can It Be? One of the lines in And Can It Be? Oh, wait a minute. Nevermind. Oh, well, I did have it queued up. It went bye bye. I was going to even play a section from that.

Wonder where that went. Anyways, I had it and won't be able to live look for it. I was going to play just a section of his comments. So I listened to it while doing, I think it was a 12k row or something like that.

I just happened to remember it wasn't a ride. It wasn't a run. It was, I was rowing. And much to my non-shock, it was exactly what I predicted it to be. It was exactly what I predicted to be. It was not biblically based.

There's no exegesis. There wasn't anything like that at all. It was purely, well, you know, some philosophers understand it this way. And then some people ask this question and some people ask that question.

And it was, it was, it was a philosophically based, not revelationally based presentation, which is exactly what I had said. And so I was like, okay, that's, that's what I expected. Well, now I'm guessing he's challenged me to debate and stuff like that.

Well, that's nice. Actually, I'm not trying to be dismissive. But I do have the right to prioritize my time. And what I think is most important. And we are looking at, you know, these, these issues and may even produce some materials in response to some of it.

But for those of you saying, ah, well, I had some guy on Twitter about the Brandon Howe stuff, you know, or back in May, they were saying, hey, come to Memphis and debate Osama Daktak on my program and all the rest of stuff.

And I even said back then, excuse me, but I'm like out of the country till like mid-November. And guess what? It's mid-November. And I say, okay, I'm pretty much done traveling except for one trip this year.

How about I come to Memphis and take on the lot of you in a fair, moderated, even time debate specifically on biblical texts? And of course, they're all out flossing their cat's teeth at this point in time, which I like.

The hashtag in Twitter is true. I do love cats. I have two cats. They were born on my back porch. They're feral back then. They're not feral anymore. They do still drag dead. Well, sometimes not even dead birds into the house.