Various Articles and Open Phones on the Dividing Line

Responding to a Roman Catholic Hit Piece and Claims of Hypocrisy

Well, greetings and welcome to The Dividing Line on a Thursday. I've got a oh, there we we had a pixelated dead screen and there there it is. Good to have with us. We're going to be taking some phone calls later on in the program at 877 -753 -3341.

I was directed to a hit piece this morning that I wanted to respond to very quickly. And then we have some comments to make on certain events since Tuesday, and then we'll get to your phone calls. So one individual on Twitter had said that they needed some help with a challenge that had been given to them by Jehovah's Witnesses.

So I said, well, we'll probably be taking some phone calls. So I invite that person especially to call in. I don't know who Alan Rule is. I did some quick just very quick looking around. There's a Jenny Rule that's written some books in Amazon on low carb diets and nothing at all on YouTube debates, lectures, nothing.

But he has written, James White is extremely dishonest and should not be taken seriously. Alan Rule is a Romanist. And he's a Romanist who engages with Muslims. Ah, start putting that together and you start seeing maybe why this is going on, because I have been very clear in saying to my Muslim friends, Roman Catholicism does not represent biblical Christianity.

It's a completely different message, different gospel. Um, the exaltation of Mary in Roman Catholicism, you know, half half the time. Uh, that I engage with my Muslim friends in regards to texts such as Surah 5, 1, 16.

Um, they end up going back to Roman Catholicism as an illustration of taking Jesus and his mother as gods besides Allah. And interestingly enough, Mr. Rule doesn't mention this, but I have even, even though I clearly view and have proven and defended in debate against people who actually do write books and stuff from the Roman Catholic side, the reality that that view of Mary is idolatrous.

It is not biblical. Even though I do that, I also have to correct my Muslim friends and point out that, uh, even Rome very carefully says Mary is not deity. Now they blur the lines. They're, they're the ones that have done it.

They have no biblical basis for doing it. Uh, but I've tried to be accurate about that as, as well. Well, why am I extremely dishonest and should not be taken seriously? Well, uh, he talks about, uh, to all Muslims who read this blog, please pay attention because we all need to expose the dishonesty of this man.

Christians and Muslims, I don't know why he doesn't capitalize Muslims. Why don't you capitalize Muslims? I wonder if they find that disrespectful. Christians capitalize, but Muslims aren't. Christians and Muslims both value honesty.

So we should make it our goal to show that, that James White embraces the same inconsistency of which he accuses Muslims. First of all, I don't see why Muslims would watch Catholic versus Protestant debate.

So I can understand why they wouldn't have seen this, but they'll be surprised to know that White is a huge hypocrite on the issue of using liberal scholars in debate. In 2008, when James White and Shabir Ali debated on Muhammad in the Bible, Ali quoted many liberals, including Raymond Brown.

White spent almost the whole debate trying to point out it is inconsistent to try to use liberal scholarship to try to make supernatural claims. I agree with this, but the problem with White is that he has no problems when doing this with Catholicism.

In 2001, he debated Father Peter Stravinskis and the Doctrine of Purgatory. In this debate, he employed the tactics he condemns when used by Islamic apologists. The debate can be found here, at least provide a link.

At the 45 minute mark, he says, Hence, as Roman Catholic McBride admits, there is for all practical purposes, no biblical basis for the Doctrine of Purgatory. This is not to say there is no basis for at all for the Doctrine, but only that there is no clear biblical basis for it.

When I first heard this statement, I couldn't believe what I was hearing. James White has the audacity to quote this ultra liberal scholar, Richard McBride, to a Catholic opponent to make a point. But when Shabir Ali quotes E .P. Sanders, Rudolph Bultman, or Raymond Brown, it's a big deal.

That is complete hypocrisy for someone who claims to be a Christian. No, that's a demonstration, sir, that you don't have a clue how to think clearly. You don't know what categories are, and you don't know what context is either.

Might explain why you're a Romanist apologist, but let's put this one to bed and do it quickly. Who was I debating? Father Peter Stravinskis. Huh, Peter Stravinskis. Well, where did Peter Stravinskis get his two earned doctorates?

Ivy League schools. Huh, you think there's just a small chance that at every school that Stravinskis taught at, and every school where he learned, people like McBride and these others, Raymond Brown, were the biggest names possible?

Let's try something else, Mr. Rule, since you seem to be such a conservative Catholic. How about the fact that your current pope is just as liberal as either one of them? How about the fact that it's your popes that keep putting these people on the Catholic biblical commissions?

Maybe when I'm debating a Roman Catholic who is defending the current papacy, using the current standards of the papacy, might be a good idea. What do you think? And you think that might be just a little bit different than the situation of a Muslim who accepts a supernatural worldview, believes the moon has been split, believes Muhammad flew on a winged beast from Jerusalem up through heaven and back again.

You think maybe the level of inconsistency and the character of the inconsistency and the kind of the inconsistency is completely different because of the context? Yeah, well, so I am quote-unquote dishonest because I actually use the sources that my opponent would be the one who's utilizing.

And that somehow is, he just completely misses the category difference between that and dealing with a, well, with a Shabir Ali who continually says, scholars, scholars, scholars, standard over here, different standard, different scholars over here when I'm defending the Quran or coming to the table.

Coming up with the argument for the number 19 in the Quran or whatever else it might be. Has nothing to do with this dishonesty, has nothing to do with inconsistency. It has to do with the fact that Mr. Rule seemingly cannot follow category errors or just simply commits them very badly.

So I found that fascinating that a Roman Catholic, oh, later on, this makes me sick. Well, the temperature of my response is directly correlated to the temperature of his absurd attack. And I hope if any Muslims had seen that, let me repeat it one more time.

Roman Catholicism is not biblical Christianity. Roman Catholicism has a different gospel. And I think most Muslims can see that. I think, especially if Muslims obtain any level of familiarity with the New Testament, they can see that the simple, pure faith of the New Testament, the worship of the New Testament Church, the organization of the New Testament Church, all they gotta do is compare that with what they see in the Vatican or what they see with the current Pope and his perspectives and his viewpoints and his worldview.

Massive difference, massive difference. No two ways about it. But there are massive distinction between those who hold to sola scriptura and those who do not. It is interesting, leaving that behind now, it is interesting to look at the distinctions amongst Muslims and sort of try to draw parallels.

You know, I was explaining Sufism or at least elements of Sufism to some folks. And when I used the term charismatic, a lady started laughing in the audience. It really struck her as funny. But there are Muslims who have a much higher view of the later tradition and then Muslims that reject that.

Can you really draw a parallel that to the Reformation and things like that? Not really. You've got very, very different situations. You've got pretty much a controlled, a governmental control in Islam at the beginning over against the persecution of the Christians by the Roman Empire for hundreds of years.

Really, I don't see any benefit whatsoever. To trying to make the parallel because there's just too many differences, too many differences. But some people do and it doesn't work out real well. Before I go to phones, some of the stuff, you know, last week started with Donald Trump and his comments about transgender bathrooms and Trump Tower and all that kind of stuff.

Then a few days later, this didn't seem, this just didn't seem to hit big. And I'm not really sure why, but former Senator and let's see, Democrat from Pennsylvania, Senator Harris Wofford. Senator Harris Wofford has announced that he will be marrying a man 50 years, his junior next weekend, which would have been this past weekend, 20 years after his wife's death.

Did you see this? Yeah. Wofford is 90. So he's marrying a 40 year old man. 20 years after his wife passed away and he is a former Democratic Senator from the state of Pennsylvania. When I first saw it, I, you know, the first thing you have to do is check the source.

Is this the onion or, you know, now there's dozens of onion type sites. At least some of them are straight up front and really easy to recognize. And then of course we have the new, already classic Christian satire website, the Babylon Bee, which I've already appeared on a couple of times, the Babylon Bee.

But it comes from Fox News, which sometimes can be a little weird, but you don't even know what to say anymore. When you have article after article after article, that is nothing more than the written evidence of the stench of a dead and decaying society.

That's what it is. It is obviously to me a horrific insult to the memory of this man's wife. But once you have destroyed all meaningful ethical and moral categories, once you have destroyed the very meaning of what marriage is, once everything has become just about me, me, me, my feelings, my emotions, my et cetera.

Once there's no longer any objective morality, then this kind of stuff is just gonna become second nature. And I pray that it'll continue to grieve me, but honestly, when it just becomes a daily type thing, eventually numbness sets in.

And what's, you know, our grandchildren are just gonna be so surrounded by this. How can they not be deeply impacted by it to where it becomes the norm, where that's just the way that it is? It amazes me.

It really does. At the same time, we noticed that, well, on a Roman Catholic campus, this is an article dated the 27th. This is yesterday. Jesuit University, Loyola, Marymount University in Los Angeles called the Los Angeles Police Department.

Both the police and the university's bias incident response team. Bias incident response team. It means that's Burt. You know, Burt used to be a character on Sesame Street. Now, Burt is the bias incident response team also known as the thought police.

Both the police and the university's bias incident response team are investigating the stated belief that only two genders exist, male and female as a hate crime. So a conversation took place on campus on a Catholic, a Jesuit campus, and someone who actually still believes in what the Jesuits have always taught said to someone else that you're either a male or a female and they denied transgenderism.

Call the cops. Call the cops. Utter totalitarianism. Utter totalitarianism. You will think like us. You will act like us. Liberty? No. No, only for us. Only if you look like us. Only if you talk like us.

Absolutely amazing. Of course, then we have the story from NC State. Want to talk about Jesus? You'll need a permit for that. Need a permit for that. A permit is required before students can talk about Jesus.

The North Carolina State University, according to a lawsuit filed in federal court, Grace Christian Life, registered student group at NC State, filed a suit over policy requiring a permit for any kind of student speech or communication anywhere on campus, including religious speech.

This is the former United States of America. Can we get around to recognizing that now? This is the former United States of America. It's not the United States of America I grew up in. A revolution has taken place.

Thankfully, it was mainly, well, I was about to say it was a bloodless coup. That's the terminology it's used. And that's true in the sense that there was not warfare in the streets. There were not armed parties.

But we dare not say that it was without bloodshed. Because you need to understand that one of the central platforms of the revolution was erotic freedom. And one of the central pillars in the temple of erotic freedom and human autonomy is abortion.

So it wasn't bloodless. Millions, more than 50 million had to be sacrificed on the altar of Mulloch to bring about the absolute desensitization and the dehumanization of the very nation that had won World War II.

Other nations were just, other nations suffered greatly. Suffered far more than we did. I mean, but it was our military might and our military power that defeated the Germans and the Japanese. Nobody else had the equipment.

Nobody else had that kind of manufacturing capacity. We couldn't do that anymore. There is no way this nation could win a war like that any longer. Couldn't happen. I'm not just talking about militarily.

It's a cultural thing. I've seen these memes. You've seen them too. Comparing the 18 year olds in combat gear getting ready to jump off of landing craft Normandy versus the safe space warriors today. And there is no comparison.

And the safe space warriors are not liberating the world from anything. There's no connection between the two. And there is far more truth to that than we might want to understand. But the campuses, the universities, the totalitarians are really just, they're not even bothering to pretend any longer.

You will think like us. You will talk like us. First of all, the first amendment doesn't hold here. There is no religious freedom. The only freedom you have is erotic freedom. The only freedom you have is to act like us and talk like us and everything else will be silenced.

We are totalitarians. They're not even bothering to hide it anymore. They don't figure anyone cares. They've won the war and there you go. There you go. And so this kind of stuff is absolutely all around us and it is shocking.

877 -753 -3341, 877 -753 -3341. It does seem to me that for all intents and purposes, the election as far as the primaries is over. And now there's still, I still just, I just still wonder. I just still wonder what if maybe possibly the FBI does what the FBI has to do.

Because as far as I can tell, remember General Petraeus? General Petraeus got into a lot of trouble. He will have to be apologized to if there is not an indictment handed down against Hillary Clinton.

And part of me wants to say that will change everything. And then another part of me goes, it'll change nothing. It'll change nothing. I honestly have become so jaded, so skeptical that I honestly think that they would just press on and say, ah, no one cares about emails.

You know, just because this exposed our nation to, you know, put lives in danger, maybe even cost lives. Ah, no one really cares. And it all goes back to the public sector unions. And I just, I honestly don't believe my vote counts any longer.

I think the system is broken. Ah, all I know is the news channels would love it. They could go wall to wall and just make all sorts of money in the process. And it does make me wonder. But we'll see what happens.

We'll see what happens. I'm just sort of watching from the outside any longer, to be perfectly honest with you. Um, I'll, I've, I've mentioned this before. Just be very brief as we've got phone lines lined up and I don't see the one caller about Jehovah's Witnesses.

So hopefully we'll be able to get them on if they've tried calling. Um, but, uh, well, let's, well, we'll, we'll go ahead and go to the, go to the, go to the callers here. We won't worry about anything else.

I have to say 877 -753 -3341, 877 -753 -3341 is the phone number. And let's start with, uh, Austin. Hi, Austin. Hello, Austin. Hello, Austin. I can't hear anything. Hello?

Oh, there he is. Hey, sorry. I'm having a hard time hearing. Um, can you hear me? Yes, I can hear you. Okay. How are you doing today? Just fine. Um, so I had a question about the regulative belief in self-reform.

That's it. But I go to school at UNC Chapel Hill. And I'm going to the Presbyterian Church up here.

Do you have a, do you have, do you have a permit? Austin, do you have a permit to be, to be calling me right now?

Well, you know what? Um, my, my friends over at NC State would definitely need a permit if they were calling me on campus. That is amazing.

It is. Does it? I saw the news article yesterday. I couldn't believe it. I, I mean, anyway, uh, okay. So you're going to a reformed, uh, you said reformed Presbyterian Church?

Right. Yeah. I think you're familiar with Dr. Rosario Butterfield. Oh yeah, sure. Yeah, yeah. It's, uh, her, her and her husband at that church was the solemnity, uh, acapella singers. Uh-huh. And so they've been, yeah, they've been kind of talking.

So I, I just wanted to start out just by asking you, I, I think from some of the comments that I've heard you make on the dividing line, you do hold to the regulative principle.

Well, yeah, I, I do, but you need to understand that regulative principle is, is interpreted in a number of ways. Um, the, in general, the, the concept is that, uh, worship is not something that God has left up to us just to do as we, uh, see fit, as we feel is appropriate, uh, et cetera, et cetera, that he has laid out guidelines as to, uh, what his worship is to, uh, consist of.

Now, obviously the great, uh, controversy that has existed really since time of the reformation primarily, um, is, well, but how do you interpret, uh, the scriptures in regards to what has and has not been commanded?

And so some of the areas of differences have to do with, uh, well, what you've, what you've mentioned, you mentioned two areas, the, the utilization of instruments in, uh, Christian worship, uh, and, uh, the singing of something other than the, the Psalter.

And, um, generally, uh, the, the vast majority of those, uh, who came out of the reformation, um, accepted that while God has definitely given guidelines for what he, how he is to be worshiped. And so, in other words, the, the, the fact that the central aspect of worship is the proclamation of his truth, there is, uh, there is singing, there is prayer, um, there isn't liturgical dance, uh, or the utilization of Hollywood rock stars, um, that type of thing.

Uh, the specifics, uh, do tend to, the majority have not taken quite as strict a view as that, um, in regards to exclusive psalmody. There's, you know, lots of, I've got lots of good friends that are exclusive psalmist.

I am not. Um, I don't believe that, uh, that you can, and I've heard all the arguments, but I don't believe you can turn psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs into psalms, psalms, and psalms. And I, the strongest argument I've ever heard, extra biblical argument I've ever heard on the subject is, is quite simply this.

It is difficult to imagine, uh, that it was the intention of the apostles, uh, to teach us that we could never sing a song that would specifically have in it the name of Jesus. Um, and it seems very clear to me that, uh, we do have a fragment of a hymn, uh, in Philippians 2, 5 through 11.

And if we do, uh, then that in and of itself would be scriptural refutation of the idea. Why would you be writing hymns to the church if you weren't going to be singing them in worship? So, my exclusive psalmist friends try to say it's actually not a hymn, and, and since Jesus is Jehovah, and Jehovah's name appears in the psalms, and you can't sing that, but, but obviously it was the manifestation of Jesus in the flesh as Jesus, uh, that I'm talking about when I refer to that.

But, and then as far as musical, I'm sorry, go ahead.

Uh, I'm, I'm looking a little bit more at this point at the, the instrument side of things. Right, I was, I was about to get to that. They would classify that as, like, you would be violating the elements of worship if you use instruments.

I went on, like, some of the Founders Church's website, and they classify those as, like, a circumstance of worship. Do you have an opinion on that?

Well, it, you know, that one's strange when, if, if you have exclusive psalmody, the psalms themselves refer to using instruments. So, uh, you have to really start, uh, bending stuff to, to try to fit all of this together, because very clearly, even, it's interesting.

My fellow elder, uh, when we first went to Phoenix Foreign Baptist Church, I remember the first time I heard him read a psalm that contained the term Selah, and he would read it. And I had never heard anyone read Selah before.

Yeah. Um, I found that, and he still does, uh, and I guess sometimes when I read the psalms, I, I do too, but sometimes I don't, because most of us believe that Selah was a, a metric or song indicator, a change of tune or key or, or something, it had something to do with the fact that these were actually songs.

And the psalms themselves contain references to the instruments that are to be used with it. And so if that was acceptable, then what, on what principle do you then say, no, it's, uh, you know, for example, I, I, uh, I do personally miss when I'm in a church where the hymnals have been replaced with a projection system, I miss the ability to sing parts in harmony in the songs because I can't, I, if I don't have, if I don't have the music, I can't, I can guess at the bass part, but, and, and some songs, I already know the bass part so I can do it then.

But, but most of the time I just sort of have to sing along with everybody else. And I can't really, uh, you know, participate on, on, on that particular level. So there are, there are instances where, uh, having a, a piano, for example, absolutely necessary for keeping everybody together and keeping going the right direction and getting us all started in the right key.

And, and there are times when we don't have our piano player at PRBC, and I hate when that happens when I'm the one preaching and I don't have my fellow elder to help because there have been a couple of times getting that hymn started was an absolute disaster.

It was, and it almost, it was almost distracting to be perfectly honest with you because, you know, I, I just remember this one where, you know, I'm looking at the notes and for some reason the last hymn just blew the next tune out of my mind.

I, I just, and we got about half a thing into it and we all stopped and, and finally, eventually one guy down front got to start in the right tune, but he's, he's this big, huge dude. And so he was about 14 octaves below any of the rest of us, what any of the rest of us could do.

Uh, so it, uh, it was, it was funny anyways, a little personal story there, but, um, you know, I, I understand, uh, you know, I would rather have people concerned about these issues than apathetic, uh, about these issues.

Um, that was, you know, so I suppose if it's got to be one way or the other, I, I'd rather have the concern at the same time. Unfortunately, I, I have encountered some folks who could get a little bit, um, aggressive about it and, uh, you know, and so there's, there's a, there's a balance in there someplace,.

But, um, you would view that maybe as something that's at the discretion of the elders of the local congregation.

Oh yeah. Yeah, I, I, yeah, most definitely. I think the elders of the congregation should be convinced about it, should be able to give a response for it and say, here's where we stand on this. And obviously we have good relationships with churches that would differ with us on that because we're not exclusive psalm.

We do sing a lot of psalms. Uh, we probably sing more psalms than a lot of people would, would at all be comfortable with. Um, but we're not exclusive psalmists. So, and we do have a piano. We have an organ too, but it's, it's, it's, it's, it's been dead longer than I've been at the church and it's, and it's slowly disappearing because the kids are slowly cannibalizing little pieces off of it.

So it's really sort of humorous that we're all watching this happen over time. But we also have an overhead projector over in the corner of the Bible study room that has not moved literally for about 30 years.

So, uh, that's just Reformed Baptists are just that way. Just real quick.

You're talking about the use of it. I've had an estate to me that system when they were in worship, what they do, what they.

Do, whack the lamb over the head with the heart. I'm sorry. They blow the trumpet. No, I know. I, I'm sorry. I don't, uh, there is, there is a tremendous, for example, I think there's a pretty fatal argument against that.

The, uh, the, the, the ascent Psalms, uh, were sung on the way to Jerusalem for worship, but there are instruments used with them. They weren't even in the temple yet. So I, I just don't see any connection, uh, any meaningful connection between those instruments and the sacrificial system at all.

Okay. I just don't see it. All righty. Well, thanks very much, Dr. White. Hey, thanks, Austin. I appreciate it. God bless, bye-bye. 877 -753 -3341, uh, let's talk with Jeremy. Hi, Jeremy. Hey, Dr. White, how you doing?

Doing good. So I have a question in regard to the Church of Christ. My co-worker recently left the Catholic church with his wife, and I got to, um, get him to go to a solid Baptist church for a while.

And recently, uh, his wife forced him. Oh. And, and when he told me, I tried, um, orchestrating a meeting with the two of them to talk to them over this issue, told the elders of the church, and they basically told him to shun me.

Is this, let me ask you a question, Jeremy. Is this, would this happen to be the International Churches of Christ? Uh, yeah, the ISTC. Ah, okay, okay. Yeah, need to, need to include that in there because, um, the, the old line Church of Christ groups, some, some down south could be that, um, aggressive.

Uh, but as soon as you said that, it, it sounded to me like an ICC issue because they tend to be quite cultic.

Yeah, no, I'm, I'm scared for him because, I mean, he recently left the Roman Catholic church and, yeah, I've been trying to torment him with the reform faith. Yeah. And, you know, his wife totally rejects original sin and they're basically, you know, wanting to shun me.

And I'm scared for my friend because, I mean, he really respects my decision. I told him, like, bro, like, within your, you know, church's theology, I'm not saved. And he was really, like, flustered at that.

And I'm just wanting to come to you to give, you know, wisdom as to what I should do.

Yeah, well, unfortunately, it's been a long time since I've done, uh, almost anything, uh, in, in reading up on any new developments on the ICC. It was, if I recall correctly, I could be wrong about this, but I, I think Eric Nielsen wrote a couple of articles for us a number of years ago on our blog, which I think everything which was once on the blog has now been posted in the archives of the blog.

But, um, there might be something, I think Rich may be looking right now. Is that what you're doing out there? He's, he's checking, but there, there might be something on the International Churches of Christ on, on the blog.

If not, I'm sure there probably is at, at, at, uh, some of the organizations like Personal Freedom Outreach. It's not one of the areas that we, we focus upon or have done any debates on or anything like that.

Um, other than the, to recognize that, uh, the guy that started it was named Kip something as I recall.

Yeah, Kip, written, uh, his last name, but yeah, he was weird. I, I can't hear you, Rich. I'm sorry.

Kip Kinkle. Kinkle? That doesn't sound right. That doesn't sound right to me, but anyway, um, was there something up there? Was there something on our website from Eric Nielsen or anything? Not, not there.

Okay. Anyway, um, Personal Freedom Outreach, um, maybe CARM, some of those groups might have some specifics on the ICC, the people who keep an eye on, on their recent developments, but they, they really should be distinguished from the mainline Churches of Christ, which, which do have some, obviously there's some serious problems.

The old line Church of Christ, as far as, uh, almost getting to the point of Pelagianism and Baptismal Regeneration, all that kind of stuff. But a lot of Churches of Christ that aren't ICC have somewhat liberalized and somewhat backed off from some of those things.

So, uh, there is, there is a distinction that needs to be brought there, but yeah, they will utilize that kind of pressure to, uh, keep conversation from happening. And it's, it does sound like your friends are in a situation about out of the frying pan into the fire.

And the problem is that the same kind of works orientation, uh, that was very much a part of, uh, Roman Catholicism. They just went right back to it in a, in a bare bones version and the ICC version of it.

So what can you do about that? Well, it sounds from the way you described it, it almost sounds like your friend, uh, the husband isn't really in charge as far as spiritually goes in.

Yeah, he's not, he's, he's very, uh, um, quiet. He's very, uh, passive. Okay. So his wife is the opposite. She's very aggressive and, uh, I don't know.

Yeah. That's going to make, that's going to even make it harder. You can, you can try to keep this, by the way, it's Kip McKean. Thank you to Abu Kamal, uh, on, uh, on Twitter. Um, uh, you can try to keep avenues open with him, uh, apart from her, uh, but you know, and, and not so much, I wouldn't so much focus on original sin as I would upon, uh, the, the positive, uh, element, which is the power of grace, um, you know, issues related to man's deadness and sin, uh, things like that.

Um, but you know, if she just slams the door, all you can pray is that that door will eventually come open simply because it's, there's, there's a real weariness with having gone from work salvation system to another work salvation system, but yeah, it's a tough situation they're in no two ways about it.

Yeah. Well, thank you for your help, Dr. White. Okay. Thanks, Jeremy. Thanks for your call. Take care. All right, God bless. 877 -753 -3341. Let's talk with, uh, Danny. Hi, Danny.

Hey, good afternoon, Dr. White. I have a very short question. It's on the, uh, fig tree, but don't worry. It's from a Christian perspective. I just wanted to ask, uh, how you understand Mark 1113, uh, without disputing that, you know, without while still agreeing that it's a physically acted out, uh, metaphor of sorts being that it, the text seems to say that he wanted to see if there was any food on the tree.

The prophesied framework is as like, uh, is still referring to his delimitations on his human nature. That's just the question.

No, I, I think that, uh, the, the whole issue of the fig tree says he went to see if perhaps he would find anything on it. Um, Jesus obviously knew what the season for figs was. This was a fig tree that had given indication by being in leaf.

Um, and the, the whole point, we have to understand that both Matthew and Mark place this in the same, in the same context, and they're communicating the same thing. Everyone understood that the fig tree had relationship to the people of Israel.

Um, if you, if you read the parables, remember in Matthew, you're going to have Matthew 23. Uh, you're going to have everything that happens as far as in the temple precincts. Um, it, it seems very, very clear, uh, that what is being communicated is this is a symbol for the people of Israel and it looks like something that it is not.

And so I, I think trying to read anything more into it and going, oh, Jesus really wanted to eat figs and, uh, he didn't get any. And, and that was just a limitation of his knowledge or, or anything like that.

I, I think both Matthew and Mark would sort of look at you and go, ah, you're over reading me a bit, brother. Just, just, just look at the whole message and you'll, you'll get it type of a thing. I think is what both of them would, would say at that point.

So I just don't, I just don't see any reason to go, go beyond that because of the application it's made. Okay.

May I ask one really other really quick question? Sure. Uh, it's a, a question about the Trinity being that, uh, William Lane Craig is writing, he's adamant about how the three persons within the Trinity, uh, are, none of them are individually identical to God.

I was just curious what your position on that is. Would you say that each person is identical to the one God, or would you take a position like his?

And that's all. Well, I'm not even sure what, I'm not even sure what that's supposed to mean. Identical to the one, to the one God. You mean the being of God? I mean that I see a fundamental, uh, misapprehension of the distinction between being in person in the question.

Well, Dr. Craig's position would be that, uh, so you have one God that comprises three persons, and I guess he would take the position, it comes up in his philosophical foundations for a Christian world where no single person is tripersonal.

So then there's an attribute that God has that no individual person has, and therefore he's adamant that no individual person is, like, identical, logically identical to the one God that comprises the three persons.

Would you stand on that? I don't understand the statement, so I can't really comment on it. I really don't. I mean, uh, the, the being of God and the persons of God, look, I, uh, have criticized, um, uh, the good Dr. Craig when he used the example of Kerberos, uh, for the Trinity in a debate with a Muslim.

Um, I'm just like, excuse me? Um, that, that is, that is just a wildly inaccurate, uh, analogy. And so I've, I've voiced some concerns, and I've forgotten the specifics of it right now, uh, because I, I, I've not spent much time with it.

But I, I also think that there are, he has a rather unique Christological issue, uh, that I've forgotten what it, what it is, but, uh, that he's, he takes a rather unusual Christological stance on certain, on certain things.

So, um, maybe that has something to do with what he's insisting on there. I really, I really don't know. Okay. All right. All right. Thank you. Thank you, sir. I got this better. 877 -753 -3341. I bet you're not writing any of these down, so I'm not even going to bother to try to remember them, but that's okay.