WWUTT 795 Q&A Baptism Before Christ, Being Narrow Minded, and Flat Earth Cosmology?

Baptism Before Christ and the Meaning of John’s Baptism

What was the reason for baptism before Christ instituted baptism as a sacrament? Is it offensive to be called narrow-minded? And yeah, we're going to be talking about the shape of the earth again when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible teaching podcast in the Word of God, so that we may rejoice in the things freely given to us by God. Visit our website at www .wutt .com. Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. So, I received an email from somebody that included a new alarm tone. Like I can download it on my phone, and it can be my alarm when I wake up in the morning. Are you ready for this?

I'm not sure. Okay, so this now, when I wake up next to you, is what you're going to be hearing when my alarm goes off. Okay. All right, here we go.

So, thoughts? You better wake up first. Well, yeah, that's the idea. Yeah, I meant before me.

I know, that's what I'm saying. So, my alarm is going to go off before you wake up, so you can wake up to that alarm tone as well. But wait, wait a second. There's more. Oh. I can tell you the first thing I'd be thinking about when I wake up is getting a cough drop.

Never mind.

What were you thinking? What were you going to say? You're going to have to get up in another part of the house? That's not happening.

You know who that was, right? Yes. Yes, I do. I'll tell you, that's all that's good for is an alarm tone, because it's sure not good for a church service. Oh, definitely not. That is craziness. Well, this is when we understand the text.

Yes. And when we understand that text. And yeah, being Friday, we take questions from listeners, so that was a good start right there, because that came from one of the listeners. They sent me that video.

That was very kind of them. So that I could be benefited by that alarm tone. I wonder if they're actually using it. I think my chair's getting creakier.

I know. It's so bad. Creak, creak. Except when you want it to creak, it doesn't creak.

Yeah, now when I was just doing it right there. I think I fixed it. You might have. Yay. I was waiting for something else.

I was waiting for something else for you, too. Oh, boy. You can tell when we're talking. We've been doing this for a while.

Yeah. Very organized. How about that? When we understand the text at gmail .com is the address, and I've got several emails I'm going to be getting to today. If I've got time, when we get to the end of this, I'll read some of the comments that we've been getting because of the flat earth video that I did just a couple of days ago.

If we've got time. I'm not going to respond to any emails. I haven't. I've received emails from folks very angry that I would say what I said about flat earth cosmology, but I don't waste my time. It's casting pearls before swine.

Right. Matthew 7, 6, which Jesus said to avoid. I'm not going to convince you. I've got things to do. And arguing with flat earth cosmology is just simply not going to be one of them. There's a reason why I concluded that video with the two passages out of first Timothy and second Timothy, where Paul said to avoid irreverent, silly myths.

And don't quarrel about these things that are insignificant to the gospel and salvation that we have in Christ. For these kinds of quarrels will only lead to division. It will address some of that a little bit more at the end.

This first email comes from Bill, and he says, Hello, I've recently began a following recently began recently begun. See, I'm confused on that, too. You're the English teacher. What would that be? I'm too tired.

Sorry. Keep going. I recently began following the what work after discovering it through wretched radio. I have a small ministry I'm still establishing, but I would like to ask your permission to share your content on my website, on the Facebook page and on my podcast.

Of course, I do not plan on editing any of it and will be giving you full credit. Any questions about this? Please let me know. So do you have an answer for Bill? Of course. Yes. Take our stuff and use it.

Yes. It is fine. That's what it's out there for. So we appreciate you using it. Yeah. As long as you don't alter it in any way, that's fine. But thank you, Bill. I appreciate that it has been meaningful to you and that you would find it useful through your ministry, your online ministry that you're doing as well.

Next question comes from Jean in Augusta, Georgia. Hello, Gabe and Becky. Hello. And she spelled your name right. First of all, thank you for all the work you do on the podcast. I have learned so much from your teaching and it has played a very positive role in my spiritual health.

I have a question about baptism after listening to Tuesday's podcast. So on Tuesday, I was still in John 1 and was talking about John the Baptist and his witness and testimony of Jesus Christ as being the Son of God, the Lamb of God who came to take away the sin of the world.

I have a question about baptism. What was the purpose and meaning behind baptism before Christianity? So this would basically be John's baptism. Why would people be baptized and what was the sacrament intended to communicate to the recipient?

Well, for the priest who was going into the tabernacle, he was supposed to be cleansed from head to toe. And this was essentially baptism. Now, it wasn't like a baptism of immersion in the sense that he was being dipped backwards into water and then coming back up.

It wasn't that kind of baptism, but he was being washed from head to toe. He would stand in a basin and then somebody would come with other basins and dump water on him so that he would be washed before going into the Holy of Holies, into the presence of God.

Right. Now, on Yom Kippur or the Day of Atonement, he would do this three times. He would be washed, he would go into the Holy of Holies and he would sacrifice for himself. Then he would come out, he would take off all the garments and he would be washed again.

And then he would go in and he would sacrifice for all of the priests. And then he would come out and do that process again with all of his clothes being taken off, being washed, new garments being put on him.

And then he would go in and sacrifice for all of the people. Right. So this is what was done on Yom Kippur. And it was this ceremonial cleansing that he would have to do before going in and sacrificing again.

He's taking the sacrifice and he's sprinkling the blood over the Ark of the Covenant. And on the Day of Atonement, this is done for the entire nation of Israel. And it was a public event. All of Israel showed up for the Day of Atonement.

And in the temple, there was a kind of a veil that you could see through, but it was a veil that separated the holy of holies from everyone else. And it was so the people of Israel could watch this so they would know it was being done right.

And their sins were being atoned for and forgiven by this sacrifice that was being offered up by the high priest on behalf of the people. So when John the Baptist was baptizing the people, this was being done in preparation for Christ who was going to come.

And because the king was coming, they needed to be cleansed and washed and prepared for Jesus who was going to come and deliver the word of God. God had not spoken to the people through a prophet or otherwise in hundreds of years.

And now here Jesus was coming to speak to the people the word of God again, but it was going to be God himself in the flesh. So in order to come into the presence of God, just like the priest had to do before he went into the holy of holies, John the Baptist came with a baptism for the repentance of sins and the people were being baptized so that they would be forgiven their sins and be basically ceremonially washed to be in the presence of Christ who was coming to speak the word of God to the people and was coming to be that sacrifice for the forgiveness of sins.

So not just that he was God in human flesh speaking the word of God to the people again, but that he was even coming to be that sacrifice just as the high priest had to take the sacrifice into the holy of holies.

Now Jesus baptism itself was symbolic in a different sense. And that actually has to do with, oh, I didn't write the question down. Somebody had asked me this question. Here it is. I did get this. No, I didn't.

All right. So I forgot to write it down. Somebody emailed this question to me and I meant to grab it and put it in my list here, but I didn't. So the next question is, why did Jesus get baptized? What was the point of Jesus baptism if the people were being baptized for the forgiveness of sins?

Because that's what it said John's baptism was. It was for the forgiveness of sins. So what reason did Jesus have to be baptized if he wasn't sinful? So let's go to the baptism that we have given to us by Matthew, Matthew chapter three.

And I didn't have my Bible open in advance here. This that I'm opening, I've actually never used this Bible on the podcast. This is the MacArthur study Bible, but I've used the ESV study Bible. I've used the ESV archeology Bible.

Is that what it's called? The one that I have upstairs? Yeah. Something like that. I've used that one. I've used my sermon Bible. I've never used the MacArthur study Bible though. It was the first time I've used it because it was handy.

I reached over and grabbed it. I could be wrong. I probably have used this before. Okay. So, and his name is going to come up again in the podcast, by the way, has to do with one of the questions that I'm responding to.

So then Matthew chapter three, verse 11, this is John the Baptist responding to his critics and he says, I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry.

He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.

And then in verse 13, then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him saying, I need to be baptized by you. And do you come to me? And this was, I think this was Tuesday that I was addressing this on the podcast, but Jesus answered him, let it be so now for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.

What does this mean? What does it mean that Jesus needed to be baptized? And he said, this is to fulfill all, all righteousness. Then John consented as if he understood what it was that Jesus was saying.

And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water and behold, the heavens were open to him. And he saw the spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him. And behold, a voice from heaven said, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased.

And we have that testimony from John also in John chapter one, right? Testifying that according to this witness, Jesus Christ is the promised Messiah, the lamb of God who came to take away the sin of the world.

So if Jesus was without sin and John's baptism was a baptism of repentance, why is it that Jesus needed to be baptized? Well, the reason is twofold. Number one, because he is our great high priest, as it says in the book of Hebrews, the one who enters into God's presence on our behalf as that sacrifice who has cleansed us from all unrighteousness and made us acceptable unto God.

So just as the high priest needed to be washed before he went into God's presence on the day of atonement. So Christ has done that for us. So the baptism was symbolic in that sense to signify that he is our great high priest and he's the final high priest.

That's the first reason. The second reason is because also in Hebrews two 17, it says, therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

We have been commanded to be baptized. And so for Jesus to be like us in every respect so that he might be this merciful and faithful high priest on our behalf, then he also had to obey everything that we have to obey, living his life in that holy way that we are supposed to live and could not live so that he would be made into that acceptable sacrifice unto the Lord.

And so in this way, he had to be baptized just as we have to be baptized and doing this to fulfill all righteousness, to show that he kept the law of God perfectly all the way up to his death so that he was that sinless sacrifice for us in every respect.

So that was the reason for Jesus' baptism. And I did mean to say that, too, when I was reading from John 1 Monday or Tuesday or whenever it was that I was in that particular lesson. But it's just kind of like, you know, there's certain subjects that sometimes take precedence over others.

Yes. But we can always cover it in a Q &A when we get around to Friday, if I can remember to grab your question and then read it. Well, you know. So whoever it was that emailed that question, thank you.

And also to Eugene in Augusta, Georgia, thank you for listening in. This next question comes from Johnny. He says, Hey, Pastor Gabe, first, I want to thank you for your ministry. It has been an encouragement.

And just listening to you break down a text teaches me how to read and dig deeper. So thank you. And I appreciate that, Johnny. I had to be taught that. So there are good men of God who are around me that showed me how to use scripture to interpret scripture.

The first person who showed me that was my dad. Right. So when he taught me how to read the Bible, he showed me how to use this text to apply to this text. And we interpret things according to what the whole Bible says.

Right. Because even though it was written over a span of fifteen hundred years, it's the same author. It is. The Holy Spirit working through men to write down what they wrote down, as Peter talks about in Second Peter, chapter one.

So Johnny goes on to say, I have a question about something that I heard on a podcast the other day. I decided to listen to Apologia's podcast, Apologia Radio, and I select Apologia Radio. I was going to correct you.

Yeah. I know. Difference in understanding of Greek, I suppose. But, you know, James White does it, too. Does he? He calls it Apologia Radio. And him and Jeff Durbin, who's the host of it. Well, people call this, well, what?

That's true. Yeah. That's all good. I was never calling it, well, what? It was Todd Friel that started that. So everybody else does, too. That's just fine. That's good. I think it's great. Probably, probably fits better than just, what?

What? Everybody's like, what? What? What? It's like a, it's like an Abbott and Costello exchange. Who's on first? What's on second? Exactly. I don't know who's on third. What? Anyway. Apologia. So, yeah.

Apologia Radio. And I selected an episode on culture, which was episode number 256, entitled Justice Worldview and More. And I listened to it. I'll share that here in just a moment. The guest that they had on was named Dr. Andrew Sandlin.

And he made a comment about John MacArthur and said he was narrow-minded. This was right after calling him a good man. This question may not be a big deal, but I've always been a man of doubt and double-takes.

I've always found Pastor MacArthur to be faithful and knew that's why many may not like him, because of his faithfulness to scripture. But it did make me stop for a second. My question is, if we truly are faithful to the word, would we be considered narrow-minded and come off as stubborn as Pastor MacArthur does?

Or does Dr. Sandlin have something here? Thank you for your time. And I know my question isn't weighty or even important, but I just wanted to hear your thoughts on this. Well, I went and listened to the episode.

It had been a while since I listened to Apologia. And this particular exchange between the Apologia team and Dr. Sandlin was about the statement on social justice and the gospel, which I'm a signer of that particular statement.

So I appreciate John MacArthur, Votie Bauckham, James White, Tom Askall, Tom Buck, Justin Peters, Phil Johnson, I'm doing this off the top of my head here, Todd Friel, all the guys who were involved in helping to write and put out this statement, the statement on social justice.

Thank you to those men for doing that. And I appreciated the statement and I signed the statement. In an effort to encourage the discussion within the church on social justice, but that we're focusing more on the gospel rather than these issues that are really being named by the culture and the church is starting to adopt and pull them in.

So that our focus remains on the gospel and reaching people for Christ. Are you going to grab something there? Becky was reaching under my arm and I was like, oh, hey. Hands up. Whoa. Is there a bug? No.

See, if there was a bug, you definitely would not be reaching for it. No, I would not be reaching for it. You would have moved your chair over there.

So you better believe it, it'd be in the outtakes.

So anyway, so I did listen to the episode and it really was good. So it's episode 256 of Apologia because the way that Dr. Apology, the way that Dr. Sanlin broke this down was great. The way that he broke down the whole concept of cultural Marxism and what we mean when we use that term was easy to digest.

Anybody of any level of intellect would be able to understand the basic terms that Dr. Sanlin put cultural Marxism in. So helping us understand it, not only from the perspective of what the culture means when they use it, but why the church shouldn't be adopting this terminology and incorporating it into the evangelism that we're supposed to be doing.

And I'm going to play portions of that here in just a moment. So before I listened to the episode, though, I was pretty sure I knew why Dr. Sanlin referred to John MacArthur as narrow minded. And listening to the episode, my suspicions were confirmed.

This was simply a difference of eschatology or a study of the end times. While Dr. Sanlin believes that MacArthur is straight as an arrow on the fundamental aspects of the gospel, and that's what he's going to say here, MacArthur doesn't go far enough in his understanding of the effects of the gospel on the culture.

That's Dr. Sanlin's perspective of this. MacArthur is a dispensationalist while Sanlin and the Apologia Ministries at all, Apologia Ministries all together, they are post-millennial reconstructionists.

The worldview was pervasive throughout the conversation, the entire one hour episode. And I don't wholly disagree with the concept of post-millennial reconstructionists, but there are some viewpoints that I don't share.

While I agree with post-millennial ambition that all spheres of influence in the culture need to come under the authority of Christ and his law, I agree with that aspect of post-millennialism. I disagree with the post mills that it will actually happen in this age.

This is the case also with our own sanctification. Like you apply this to our sanctification, our being made holy or being made more like Christ. That's what we talk about when we're talking about being sanctified.

So when you came to believe in Jesus, you were completely justified, but you were not yet fully sanctified. So we are growing in holiness now and we are being made holy. And it is a work that will not be completed until the day of Christ.

As Paul says in Philippians chapter one, we should want and strive for perfection in the body, even though we will not acquire it on this side of heaven. And Paul said this in Philippians 3 .12, not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own.

So Paul here to the Philippians saying, I'm not perfect, but I desire perfection because Christ who is perfect has made me his own. And what he gave for me that I might become his, he was the perfect sacrifice.

I want to be as my Lord. And so we pursue that, even though we know that on this side of heaven, that living in these bodies that are subject to corruption, not just in the sense that we can be tempted, but also that the body is wasting away, it's falling apart.

So the fact that we are so true, we all feel that. I'm wearing a knee brace right now. I feel like my knees are falling apart. But anyway, so as we feel in our bodies, it's susceptibility to corruption.

We know that we can be tempted and fall into sin. So we're not perfect and we will not reach and attain that perfection until the day of glory. So this also is the case with the culture. We as Christians should desire to make the culture perfect.

We should desire to bring all spheres of influence in the culture under the authority of God's word, his law, Jesus Christ, what Christ has commanded. We should desire that everyone in the culture follow that.

But the reality is that it's not going to happen. This side of heaven, the world will not be perfect. And we've been assured of that. In this world, you will have trouble. But take heart, I have overcome the world.

We've also been told in Matthew chapter seven, that the way to destruction is wide. And many people are going to find that because that's the easy way. But narrow is the way that leads to life. And few are going to find that because that's the difficult way.

And Jesus himself saying that the way to eternal life through him is always going to be the narrow path. The majority of people are always going to take the broad path. And there's no reason for us to believe that will ever be any different at any stage in the age in which we live.

Right. The effect of the work of the gospel is not up to us. So we should strive to share the gospel in this culture. Jesus told us to, Matthew 28, that we need to go into all nations baptizing in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

We've been commanded by Christ to do this. So we should desire that the whole culture would be changed by the gospel. Right. But the effect of that work is not up to us. It's God's alone. Amen. And the church will always, always be in the minority.

Now we have the That's tough. It is. That's a tough place to be. It's tough to swallow. And I understand why when I read through church history, and I'll read about guys, particularly the Puritans, who were post-millennial, I understand why.

I know why they were that way, and the desire that they had for everything, to just get better. Right. And the gospel would make everything better. I get why people have that viewpoint of the end times, why they're post-millennial.

But it is, it's simply not going to be the reality, this side of glory. We have the advantage in power, but we will never have the majority until we are fully sanctified in Christ's heavenly kingdom. Right.

And then that's all there will be. There will just be fully sanctified people with Christ forever. So I'm not post-millennial. I'm also not dispensationalist, as Pastor MacArthur is. But nevertheless, I appreciate Apologia Radio.

Hey, I got it right that time. Although in my head, the whole time I was approaching the word, I'm going, what is it? What is it? The correct Greek pronunciation is Apologia. Uh-huh, moving on. Apologia Radio and the work that they do for the gospel.

And I praise the Lord for the influence that Pastor MacArthur has had. Oh, yeah. Regarding his submission to the authority of scripture, and that it is sufficient for every need that we have. We find sufficiency in scriptural teaching and MacArthur's scriptural teaching.

He's been that way for 50 years. Can you imagine that? This coming year, 2019, is 50 years that he has been at Grace Community Church. So cool. That's incredible. What a faithful ministry. So I find the question that Johnny had was, if we are truly faithful to the word, would we be considered narrow-minded and come off as stubborn as Pastor MacArthur does?

Or does Dr. Sandlin have something here? No, because again, Dr. Sandlin's perspective on this was simply a difference of opinion regarding eschatology, because he was talking about, he's approaching this from the post-millennial perspective, and that's why he said that.

Let me go ahead and play the clip. Okay. And then I'll answer Johnny's question more directly here. This is a couple of minutes.

Okay. It's going to be about a three-minute clip or so. There was a recent statement put out. It was a statement on social justice and the gospel, and you guys can all read that at statementonsocialjustice .com, statementonsocialjustice .com.

Dr. Sandlin, you signed the statement, and I want to just talk to you in terms of just quickly addressing this. There are sort of two directions people go as they've looked at the statement and they've criticized or made comments on the statement.

On the one hand, you have people ultimately, I think, that are falling into a lot of this cultural Marxism and things like that, and they have sort of a wrong way of looking at justice or social righteousness.

Their complaint, looking at the statement, is you guys don't care about justice at all. You don't care about these issues. You're not willing to address them. You're just trying to tuck them under the rug.

You're not really listening, and so that's the one complaint. On the other hand, this is the interesting thing. There are Christians that hold to a more, I think, biblical, historic view of culture and society and the kingdom of God.

You have people that would call themselves post-millennialists that are actually complaining, saying, well, I don't think that I can't sign this statement because I don't believe it goes far enough. I mean, it minimizes the language that I would want to see take place in saying things like, you know, Christians should have some effect on the culture.

But Dr. Sandlin, you and we here at Apologia Studios believe it's ultimately through the kingdom of God, the preaching of the gospel, regeneration, new hearts, and all that. It's not going to be some effect on the culture.

We believe, 1 Corinthians 15, that Jesus is putting every enemy under his feet, and after every enemy is under his feet, then death will be put under his feet, but that's after everything's put into subjection to him.

So Jesus wins, not just at the end of the world and the resurrection, but in history through his conquering kingdom and gospel. So there are people that hold our perspective that would say, hey, I don't think this statement goes far enough.

What would you say to that?

Yeah, no, good point. In fact, one of our scholars didn't sign it, and Dustin Messer wrote a fine article. I'm particularly sympathetic to that second objection. I don't, in substance, disagree with it.

The reason I signed that statement is because it was a powerful declaration against, quote, modern social justice, modern egalitarian social justice, and cultural Marxism. I think the statement is much stronger in its denials than in its affirmation.

So I agree entirely, it did not go far enough. It doesn't have a full-orbed understanding of the gospel. It was put out by John MacArthur, who I think in many ways is a good man, but I think he himself has a rather narrow, and has had, his dad was a fundamentalist, good, faithful on the fundamentals of the faith, Australia's narrow.

But on some of these other issues that are close to the fundamentals, like the fullness of the gospel, I think there's something wanting. So I think that statement is wanting.

So that's the context of his comment. And he's, Dr. Sanlin's not the only one on Apology Radio who has said that. I've heard the guys say that before about Todd Friel and about John MacArthur, that their views were narrow.

I don't think they use that term. Dr. Sanlin used that term there, but just that they disagreed with their views on eschatology, because the Apologia guys hold a post-millennial view of eschatology, whereas John MacArthur and his ministry, Grace to You, have a dispensational view of the end times, which is that God has arranged things in different dispensations or different periods of time.

The post-millennial, like I said, is a reconstructionist view that everything is going to get progressively better. And Jeff Durbin said it right there. God is gradually bringing all of his enemies under the feet of Christ.

And the last enemy to be put to death is going to be death. So the last enemy to be destroyed will be death, because it's ironic to say, death is going to be dead. Kind of weird. But so he's putting all of his enemies under his feet.

It's like everything's getting better until Jesus returns and finally destroys death. And that's just not what we see in scripture. There's nothing in scripture that is preparing us for that, building up to this ultimate moment.

Rather, what Jesus is constantly preparing his disciples for is, in this world, you'll have tribulation. It's going to be hard. It's going to be difficult. You're always going to be on the narrow path.

So yes, God is bringing all of the enemies of Christ into subjection, but that doesn't reach its ultimate fulfillment until Christ returns. Christ is the one who destroys those enemies, not us. Like I said, we have the advantage in power, but we're always going to be in the minority.

The world cannot take from us what we have. And the church will never be overcome. Jesus said that in Matthew chapter 16, the gates of hell will not prevail against it. And in Matthew chapter 8, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

So rejoice. Amen. Praise God. There is nothing in life that can happen to you so bad that you would be separated from God's love. The world can't take it from you. We are sealed in Christ. Praise God.

Glory. So we've got power. The world doesn't. We've got the power in the Holy Spirit, sealed by his grace. So that's in anyway, the statement that Dr. Sanlin said there toward the end was how John MacArthur was very straight as an arrow on the fundamentals, but he was narrow minded.

And again, they want a more robust gospel from the post-millennial perspective rather than MacArthur's dispensational perspective. But one of the ways in which apologia and grace to you, I think, would talk past one another is they're actually doing the same things.

It's just that they have different words by which they explain or understand or believe the end times. But as far as the exercise of the gospel is concerned, they're doing the same things. The team at Apologia, they go out, they share the gospel, they've got videos of it online and all this kind of thing.

Grace to you and Grace Community Church, they're doing the exact same thing. So while Jeff Durbin and the Apologia guys would say, we don't really like John MacArthur's view of the end times because it's not robust enough.

He needs to be out there actually doing exercise of the gospel to bring all of the culture under the authority of Christ and things like that. Like what we're doing. Well, that is what they're doing. They just don't describe it the same way that you do because you're describing it from a post-millennial perspective and they just have a different view of the end times.

So again, when you break it down, all of us in Christ, we're doing the same things. We might have different beliefs in how Christ is going to bring about the end of all of these things. Most definitely.

But I mean, keep your focus on Christ and be out there sharing his gospel. End times perspectives are non-essentials. Unless you say Jesus has already returned or you say something to that effect. Because Paul actually put people out of the church for saying those kinds of things.

That the resurrection of the dead had already happened. So that's heresy. If you say that either Jesus is not going to return or he's already returned, that's a heretical viewpoint of the end times. But as far as all of us believing Jesus is going to return, we just disagree on the order in which all of that's going to take place.