F4F | Will the Real Pharisee Please Stand Up?

Fighting for the Faith

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Welcome to another installment of Fighting for the Faith. My name is Chris Roseborough. I am your servant in Jesus Christ.

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This is the channel that compares what people are saying in the name of God to the Word of God. So let me tell you about comments.

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Let me tell you about a common comment that I get. In fact, Kozar commonly gets this comment as well.

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And, you know, so we do the research, we show from the objective evidence, from the soundbites, in context, that so -and -so is teaching false doctrine or making false claims or performing false miracles.

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And the comment comes in, you're a Pharisee! And apparently that's, you know, that's supposed to be the divinitive thing.

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And so I've invited Kozar on to Fighting for the Faith and fighting him back. Stephen Kozar, thank you for coming back on Fighting for the

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Faith. You're a Pharisee, aren't you? You know, the thing is, if we don't define it, a lot of people think that's true.

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Yeah. So, yeah, I was thinking if we could do a show where we just go into some detail about what were the

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Pharisees actually saying, what were they guilty of, what would it look like to still be doing things like a

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Pharisee today. Yep. And I think the most amazing thing is our theology is really specific about saying that we are sinners, we continue to struggle with sin, we don't ever attain total holiness, not even by a long shot, we are guilty before God, we continually confess our sins, and we live in that forgiveness.

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And then they turn around and say, you guys think you're better than everybody else, don't you? It's amazing. Right. So in the evangelical world and in the charismatic world, you know,

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Pharisee, they really believe that the problem with the Pharisees is that they were obsessed with the

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Bible, and that they were all about sound doctrine. And the reality is, it's like, nothing could be further from the truth.

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Nothing could be further from the truth. So what I thought we would do today, we'll have a discussion along these lines.

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You've provided us with a couple of screen grabs from salient examples in your comments, and if I wanted to sift through my comments,

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I can find the same thing. Well, this one is from yours. Oh, this is from my channel? This is awesome.

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I got one from you, one from me, and one from Justin Peters. All right, so this is one from the comments of the

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Fighting for the Faith YouTube channel. And so here we go.

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Let's see, so is it Kyle Koenig at the bottom that we're looking at here? I need to scroll up here.

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The Holy Spirit, Kyle says, is not involved with any of the words I just read, friends.

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It is the spirit of the Pharisee that occupies your hearts and your minds.

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Selah. So I think that's an accurate reading,

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I think. So apparently the spirit of the Pharisee is what occupies our hearts and our minds.

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Yeah, even look at the comment right above it. Religious leaders. Remember, Jesus scolded the religious leaders in his day, and I'll give him the benefit here, the religions leaders in his days.

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Are you one of them? Do you believe God is limited in what He wants to do?

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Wake up! Is He real or not? All right, so by the way, it's like, this is so weird on so many levels, so this strange idea that the

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Pharisees and the religious leaders were obsessed with sound biblical doctrine. We're gonna debunk that completely today.

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I've done some teaching on this in the past, but it's nice that we're gonna have this kind of held out as its own topic.

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Yeah. And here's the other thing. I absolutely cannot put any limits on God.

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By the way, neither can you, Kozar. God's gonna do what God's gonna do, but we know that God does what

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He says He's going to do, and He does it where He says He's gonna do it and how He says He's gonna do it.

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And it is a sin on our part to presume that we know the mind of what

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God is doing, or that we think that it's okay when somebody acts contrary to clear

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Scripture and say, well, you're limiting God by saying that God's not involved in what this guy is doing, even though it totally contradicts the

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Bible. You know, we're not putting limits on God, we're actually paying attention to what God has revealed in His Word, who to look out for, and what their major error is.

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Let's take a look at another one of these examples here. This is, I think, from your channel, this is the

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Kozar quote, and who am I specifically looking at here? Is it Hudson Slack, or am

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I looking a little farther? Yeah, he's got a long eye. Yeah, here it is right there at the top of Hudson.

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I'm so sad. Be careful, y 'all. The persecutors were primarily religious leaders trying to find everything they could wrong with what

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Jesus was saying. Please don't sit in there, don't sit there in your chairs and judge.

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Is that better, if I go like that? I'm not sitting in my chair anymore? No, it just makes a bad camera angle.

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Yeah, that's another, the Pharisee thing is often combined with your being judgmental.

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Who are you to judge? How dare you judge these people? We're gonna talk about that, too. Yeah, they're very closely tied together, and the other thing that we should probably address is the blasphemy of the

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Holy Spirit. Why not? I mean, while we're on this, we might as well take a look at that.

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By the way, I just have to give a disclaimer right now. This is driving me nuts, but I want to look at you, because I'm talking to you, but my screen, you're off to the side.

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I feel like the shiftiest guy right now, because my camera's here, and you're over there. So if anybody sees me looking to the side, it's because I'm looking at Chris, and I can't stare at the green dot, anyway.

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My apologies, but... You know what, I'm thinking of buying one of those cheap little, you know, those laptop cameras, so I can put it wherever I want it to be, even though I already have one built in.

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Yeah, that would probably do it. Yeah, I got my DSLR and a tripod here.

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That would be nice, but I don't have one that's compatible right now. Yeah, that's kind of the thing. I had to cheat.

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I got this thing, so I got an HDMI cable coming out of my camera, which

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I think is pretty standard, it has been for a while. So I got this connector that connects to the

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HDMI, and the other end of it is a USB connector. So I'm able to pop it in, and then it sees it as a video feed.

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And it goes right into the computer? Right into the USB connector. Huh. Yeah, so we'll talk tech some other time.

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But that's what makes it possible for me to use DSLR. Well, I'm doing the job of portraying the blogger in his basement.

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I literally am in my basement with a cheap camera on my computer. Do you have a beanbag and some

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Cheetos? I don't have the Cheetos or the beanbag. Darn it! You need to fill out the rest of the requirements.

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Alright, so this guy was saying, by the way, Dan Mohler doesn't even post his own material.

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Y 'all sit and study everything he does, don't even give a moment of intercession towards him.

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Why? Because you're sitting angry at a man that you can't pray over him, because faith works through love, and these videos sure aren't believing the best about him.

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So apparently you weren't thinking the best about Dan Mohler when you showed in context that he was teaching false doctrine.

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Okay, next one. This is from Justin Peters, from his comment section.

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I'll move this over here. Let's see here. I'll put it up higher.

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So is this Paul or Shahid? Paul. Okay, why do you continue to attack those that God has called and anointed?

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Touch not God's anointed, Stephen. Yeah. And in ministry, God has not called or anointed you to anything, yet you seem to think you're self -appointed.

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Judgment office is godly. It's not. It's neo -phariseeism and that self -satisfying and self -aggrandizing that you're addicted to it.

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So apparently you're addicted to self -aggrandizing, and so is Justin Peters, man. Yeah, and then look at the very last line he says there.

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This is very typical. Why are so many of your attacks just like the recorded attacks in the

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Bible? So we will make a note here, and that is that out of all the human beings on planet

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Earth who have ever lived and will ever live on planet Earth, from the first man

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Adam to the last man who dies on the last day when Jesus returns, that everyone with the exception of one is a sinner.

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Okay? And so we're just gonna say that. And Scripture commands us to test people's messages, and Scripture commands us to silence those who are teaching doctrines that are contrary to sound doctrine.

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This command is found very clearly in Titus chapter 1, but I digress.

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So those are the charges, so we've established the charges. But what I thought would be helpful in this regard,

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Steve, is to talk a little bit about the history of the Pharisees. They're not

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Orthodox. They are rank heretics. And they added to the Scriptures, they did not follow the

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Bible, they didn't even properly believe in the God of the Bible, as a result of it, when the God they claimed they believed in was standing right in front of them, they hated him and wanted him dead.

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So I'm gonna show you a video that I have found helpful.

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If you want to begin the process of doing research on where did the Pharisees come from, there is a video by a fellow by the name of Nehemia Gordon, and you can find this on YouTube, it came out in 2011, so it doesn't have the best production value, video quality has gone up substantially in the past nine years.

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But it's a great lecture, and this is a fellow who is a former Orthodox Jew, and Orthodox Judaism, theologically, is in the same stream, comes from the same flow as the

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Pharisees stream. And so he becomes, later in life, what's called a

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Karaite Jew. Rough, and I mean really rough, kind of paraphrased translation of Karaite Jew would be the idea of a

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Sola Scriptura Jew, alright? And Nehemia, in this lecture, if you're looking for something brief, and I apologize, two hours is brief, this gives you a flight over the battlefield, okay?

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Because you're going to note, when you read the Old Testament, you know, scribes are mentioned for sure in like Nehemiah and Ezra, but nowhere in the

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Old Testament are Pharisees ever mentioned. They're not, and there's a reason for that, and that is that the

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Pharisees arose during the intertestamental period, and Jesus describes them as those who've jumped the fence, came into the sheep pen without, you know, without permission and stuff like that.

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We'll talk about that as well in John 9 and 10. The famous passage, you know, the wolf comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy, and everyone says that that's the devil.

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Right. It's not. It's talking about these false teachers, the

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Pharisees. I just did a Cindy Jacobs video with that very same thing, she just said that, how Satan is the one that's trying to steal everything, you gotta yell at Satan and tell him you're the boss, says the woman who couldn't even bring

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COVID -19 to heal. Anyway, so Nehemiah points out that they don't exist in the

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Old Testament, they arise during the intertestamental period, and there was pushback against them when they arose, but these are people who claimed, and their major claim was that when

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Moses ascended Mount Sinai, that God gave not only the written

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Torah, which we know as the first five books of the Bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, but that God also gave a second body of work called the

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Oral Torah, which then this oral tradition, this

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Oral Torah was called by several different names, including the tradition of the elders, it eventually gets recorded in the

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Talmuds, in the Mishnah, and these rabbinic writings, but he does just a far better job of giving you a flight over the battlefield that shows that these guys, they do not represent in any meaningful way

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Orthodox, biblical, Old Testament Judaism at all.

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They are rank heretics, they added to the scriptures, and on top of it, they taught just overt self -righteousness.

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And a lot of people, if the one thing they'll know about the Pharisees is that the

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Pharisees added their own laws to the 600 -something laws of the

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Mosaic Covenant, and the claim was that what they were doing was creating a fence around the the commandments of the

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Bible, and if you kept their commandments, then you wouldn't break God's commandments, and therefore you would be righteous by your commandment -keeping.

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And so you'll note that the Pharisees were constantly accusing Jesus of breaking the

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Sabbath, but he never broke the Sabbath. He was guilty of breaking their rules regarding the

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Sabbath. So for instance, I mean, if you want a little bit of a background on this idea then, so when you, in the tradition of the elders, when you look at how it gets written out, laws regarding the

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Sabbath, they would oftentimes create these scenarios like, what can you do in a situation like this?

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So the Tanakh makes it clear that Sabbath begins at sunset on Friday afternoon and continues until sunset on Saturday, alright?

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So the Shabbat is basically Saturday, and in the Hebrew way of keeping time, everything begins in the dark and then finishes in the light.

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So a new day begins when the sun goes down. So the Pharisees, in their tradition, they'd say, so what if a friend were over at your house, and just seconds before the sun went down, they handed you an apple, and you grabbed the apple from their hand, and as soon as it was firmly in your hand, the sun went down.

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Now what? Alright? You don't want to break the Sabbath, okay? So now consider your options at this point.

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Can you bring your hand, your arm, into your home? Answer, no, because then you'd be delivering groceries, and that's working, and that's a breaking of the

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Sabbath. Oh man. Okay, I'm not making this up. Could I then drop the apple on the ground?

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Answer, no, you cannot drop the apple on the ground because that's planting a tree, and planting a tree is horticulture, and horticulture is work, and work is forbidden on the

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Sabbath. Wow. This is the kind of conundrums that they would come up with, and the nonsense that they would do.

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So over and again, they were constantly accusing Jesus of breaking the laws regarding the

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Sabbath. Now all that being said, so what we're gonna do, we'll put a link down to Nehemia Gordon's lecture, and like I said, this is like just the beginning.

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You're gonna have to actually buy books and read more things if you want to get a fuller understanding, but Nehemia does a really good job of giving a brief overview where they came from, and he represents a

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Jewish tradition that has existed since the intertestamental period who consider the

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Pharisees to be heretics. So he's part of that stream now, the Karaites. So all that being said,

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I'm gonna pull up a biblical text here, and in Mark chapter 7, you can see all of these things kind of in play.

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And so in Mark chapter 7, it's still fairly early on in Jesus's ministry, and so the

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Pharisees and the scribes from Jerusalem, it's like from headquarters, they've got to go check

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Jesus out, right? And so here's what it says, "...the Pharisees gathered to him," that's to Jesus, "...with

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some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem. They saw that some of his disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed.

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For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands properly, holding to," and this is where I'll take an issue with the the

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ESV, "...the tradition of the elders." This should be capitalized. This is a body of work. This is an actual

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Pharisaical body of work. Another name for it would be the Oral Torah. So you're gonna note something, this is a...

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I've lost Stephen, he's disappearing. Oh, there you go! Alright, so the idea then is that if you were to look in the

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Old Testament, can you tell me off the top of your head, Steve, what book of the

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Old Testament, where's the commandment written that when you're out in the marketplace you've got to wash your hands when you come in door?

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The book of Justifications. Second or Third Justifications?

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It's Third Justifications, but there's a parallel passage in Second Hesitations. Right, right, see?

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You know you're Tanakh. So you get the idea.

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So the reality is that Jesus didn't break a single commandment, and here's the thing.

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This is the ground where the Pharisees go to war with Jesus, and there's a reason.

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And because if Jesus doesn't make his disciples observe the commandments of the tradition of the elders, then the entire authority by which they claim that they're able to teach and do the things they're doing is undermined.

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And they claim that God is the one who gave this oral Torah to Moses, and according to the

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Pharisees and their tradition, the reason why God gave the oral Torah was so that Gentiles wouldn't hear the whole truth and couldn't be saved.

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It was a mechanism to ensure a righteous failure of all the

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Gentiles. That's the story behind it. So at this point, the entire beings, all of the authority of the tradition of the elders, is at stake if Jesus doesn't require his disciples to follow those commandments.

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And so this is where they draw the line. This is where they're going to go to war with Jesus. So when they come from the marketplace, they don't eat unless they wash, and many other traditions they observe, such as the washing of cups, pots, copper vessels, and dining couches.

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Interesting that the word here for washing is baptizmos, which means baptism.

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So they baptize cups, pots, copper vessels, and dining couches. Alright, so all that being said, the way the ceremony goes,

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Nehemia Gordon actually explains the ceremony. So there you are, you are a

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Pharisee, you have to go out into the marketplace, into the agora, and that means you're going to mix with the goyim, the

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Gentiles, the unwashed Romans, the pagans, and things like that, and their spiritual ick gets on you.

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And so you've got to get it off you. And so they had these little pitchers of water, and there wasn't soap, or it's not like they had antibacterial soap.

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And the way the tradition worked is that when you come in, you have to take your left hand, palm down, take the pitcher, pour some water on the back of your left hand, switch hands, right hand, palm down, water on top of your right hand, palm down, switch hands again, left hand, palm up, water on top of your left hand, switch again, right hand, palm up, water on top of your hand, palm up, and then you put the pitcher down and you say this prayer.

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I thank you, Lord God, Creator of heaven and earth, that you have given me the commandment to wash my hands.

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That's all you got to do, right? And here's the thing. Jesus forbid

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His disciples from observing that, okay? So there they are, all the

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Pharisees, after spending their time watching Jesus healing people and doing all the things that He was doing, and they're scratching their beards going, hmm, right?

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They go in door for a meal or something like this, and all 12 of Jesus' disciples, they skip the basin, you know, bye, and they're already in the dining room like, hey, could you pass me a chicken wing?

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And stuff like that. They couldn't pass bacon because there wasn't any. But you get the idea, and so there's the

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Pharisees all lined up, you know, it's like, come on, guy, could you hurry up? So the guy's all, da -da -da -da -da -da -da.

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And this takes forever, okay? And funny enough, this tradition still exists today.

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It's still there today. So all of that being said, it's not in the

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Bible. It's in the tradition of the elders. So the Pharisees at this point, they've lost their minds, and no!

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So the Pharisees and the scribes, they asked Jesus, why do your disciples not walk, not walk, halak in Hebrew, this is peripateo in the

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Greek, it means conduct their lives. Why do they not live their life according to, watch this, the tradition of the elders?

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So that's the question, okay? Jesus, why aren't your disciples following the traditions of the elders?

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But they eat with defiled hands! So Jesus said to them, well did Isaiah prophesy of you, you hypocrites, as it is written, and by the way, this is the definitive text that shows they're not

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Orthodox. This people honors me with their lips, their heart is far from me, in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.

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Okay, so, all right, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.

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If you don't wash your hands, you're disobeying God and you can't be saved.

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That's not in the Bible. So you know, they've added to the scriptures.

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This doesn't make them Orthodox, this makes them heretics, all right? It's every but bit the same way as like Patricia King saying, yeah, and the way

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Jesus was able to perform healing miracles is because he had a portal experience, you know?

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It's like, really, portal experience? That's not in the Bible, you know? And so you can have an open heaven over you too, after we activate your portal experience, and you can learn how to operate in portal experiences too.

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You're adding to the scripture. And you're adding to the scripture based on a mystical experience, or it's very much a stream of Gnosticism, then, isn't it?

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Absolutely, absolutely. So then the text continues. You leave the commandment of God and you hold to the tradition of men.

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And by the way, I would argue that people who believe in the nonsense like, you know, that Bill White teaches, that, you know, name like Bill Johnson teaches and all this other stuff, they're leaving the actual

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Word of God in order to chase after these exotic brand -new doctrines and revelations.

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And so that's how it is. I described it one time in a teaching, it's as if faith only has one hand.

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It can either hold on to the Word of God, or it's gonna hold on to something else. And so you leave the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men, and then

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Jesus continues. And He said, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God, which you can say, you could say, you could paraphrase this, you have a fine way of rejecting the

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Word of God. Right. Okay? In order to establish your tradition. For Moses said, and now

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Jesus gives a really poignant example, Moses said, honor your father and your mother.

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Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die, but you say.

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And note here, Moses says, God says, and note, Jesus has a perfect understanding of how

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Scripture works. God uses men and writes and has them write the very words of God.

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Okay? So God says, Moses says, but you say. All right?

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So, in fact, that's part of the secret of behind fighting for the faith, is that, you know,

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I sit there, we open up God's Word, and we say, God's Word says, God says, but this person says.

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All right? And that's how we do the comparative work. So, but you say, if a man tells his mother, father or mother, whatever you would have gained from me as Corban, that is a gift given to God, then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the

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Word of God by your tradition that you have handed down, and many such things you do.

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So if you want an idea, so this Corban doctrine. So let's say that you and your parents didn't exactly have the best relationship, right?

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And so mom's getting old, and dad's getting old, and they don't have assisted health, assisted living facilities in the ancient days, right?

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So who's responsible for taking care of mom and dad when they're old, when their health is deteriorating, and as they're languishing, and you know, it takes months and years for them to skid into the grave?

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Answer, their children, okay? But you don't like mom, you don't like dad, because you know, they disciplined you, they held your feet to the fire, they expected you to actually obey and things like this, and you just wanted to be a goof -off.

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And so now you owe a grudge against your parents, what can you do? I don't want to have to spend my hard -earned money taking care of mom and dad.

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So the Pharisees said, you know what? You know, in the tradition of the elders, in that oral Torah, there's this doctrine called

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Corban. And the way Corban works is you can tally up, you can estimate, all right, mom has ten years to live, dad has five years to live, and you can estimate how much it would cost to support them during that time, and what you can do is you can pay a lump sum to the temple, you can give it as a gift to God, and then you're no longer required to care for your mom or dad.

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And so, and the priests were all, yeah, we'd be happy to take that Corban from you. And so some guy goes, yeah, that is a great idea.

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So he tallies up the amount of money, and then he writes one big check, he donates it to the temple, and then he goes and tells mom and dad, he goes, mom, dad,

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I've really, really grown in my walk with the Lord lately, and you wouldn't want me to use filthy lucre for you when

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I can use it to advance the kingdom and support the priests in Jerusalem at the temple.

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And the money can be used to help beautify the temple in Jerusalem.

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So I've estimated how much I would have spent caring for you, and I've donated all of that money to the temple.

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Praise be to God. Praise be to God. And so when it comes time for me to care for you,

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I can't. You're gonna have to ask another one of your children to do it. Meanwhile, I'm gonna go hang out at the beach with my friends.

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Exactly. Yeah. All right. So you'll note that the doctrine of Corban is nowhere found in Scripture either, and Jesus says that you make void the

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Word of God by your traditions, and Jesus says many, many, many such things you do.

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So what the Pharisees' religion was was not biblical, Old Testament Judaism.

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Think of it this way. David was far from a Pharisee, all right? Isaiah was not a

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Pharisee. Neither was Jeremiah, neither was Amos, neither was Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph.

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Name them, okay? Moses. Even after the Mosaic Covenant got up and running, Joshua was not a

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Pharisee. Nothing even remotely approaching it. In fact, all of the Old Testament saints are saved by grace through faith.

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Trust in the Messiah who's to come, the promises of God regarding God, you know, sending the one who would bleed and die for our sins.

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The Pharisees? Flat -out heretics. Flat -out. In fact, they have more in common with Bill Johnson, Todd White, Rick Warren, name the heretic, okay?

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They have far more in common with them than they do with anything to do with biblical Christianity.

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Well, think about how the word tradition in these verses that we just looked at is referring to a specific deviation from doctrine.

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Exactly. So, here's the problem that I think happens with a lot of people in their minds when they hear about a, oh,

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I don't know, let's say a Lutheran Church that has tradition. The Book of Concord is just a bunch of traditions, or the liturgy is just a bunch of traditions.

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They associate tradition with an old thing that by default is a orthodoxy, when in fact tradition can mean that, but can also mean tradition can be a very good thing.

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We have these traditions, like the liturgy, to keep us tightly held within the boundaries of Scripture.

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Yeah, and that's kind of the point, is that those old things, and those old things predate

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Lutheranism, you know, and predate Lutheranism, and were used by Christians for millennia, all right?

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And for the purpose of putting a fence around the Church and its doctrines and its practices so that there would be no deviations in doctrine, which is the tradition that Jesus is condemning here.

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Jesus is condemning a tradition that is a deviation from and undermining and making void of the actual

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Word of God. And that has to be clarified, otherwise anybody hears the word tradition, and they might say, oh, well it's automatically bad because it's a tradition.

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Right. It's a word that means many things, depending on how you're using it. And the reality is, every

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Church, regardless of how contemporary they are, has traditions.

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Yep. Every Church has traditions, and when we use tradition in that sense, we're not talking about deviations from Scripture, or making void, or doctrines that make void the

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Word of God. That's how Jesus is using the word tradition here. We're talking about, you know, certain rhythm in which they do their

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Church services, you know, maybe something that the pastor says, or things like that, or even the way they do things at particular times of the year.

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Those are traditions, and that's not what Jesus is talking about. The Apostle Paul makes it clear that he delivered a set of traditions that were good, that he wanted the

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Church to emulate, and he wasn't talking about deviations from Scripture that make void the Word of God.

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So Jesus is using tradition in a narrow sense here, specifically talking about the additions to Scripture that make it void.

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So another text here, which I think is going to be helpful along these lines, in fact let me do this one here in this regard.

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In John chapter 9, which sets the context for John 10, remember the three rules for sound biblical exegesis are context, context, context.

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So I want you to consider this in light of the issue with the

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Pharisees. John 9, 1 says, as Jesus passed by, he saw a man blind from birth.

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Now the Pharisees, by the way, they explicitly taught that if you were born blind or had a physical impairment or a handicap or something like that, it was because you sinned or your parents sinned, and God was basically letting you have it because you're wicked.

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And so aware of how that doctrine is woven its way into the fabric of first -century

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Judaism at the time of Christ, this is a fascinating story. So the disciples asked

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Jesus, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? In this particular case, the answer is neither.

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So it was not that this man sinned, Jesus says, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.

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So we must work the works of him who sent me while it is day. Night is coming when no one can work. As long as I am in the world,

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I am the light of the world. So having said these things, Jesus spit on the ground, made the mud with saliva, he anointed the man's eyes with the mud, and said to him, go wash in the pool of Siloam, which means sent.

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So he went and washed and came back seeing. Now, important thing, this guy hasn't seen Jesus yet. Hasn't seen him.

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And here's the thing, is that the Pharisees are already really super hostile to Christ.

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If anybody confesses that Jesus is the Messiah in the synagogue, it is an excommunicatable offense, all right?

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You will be excommunicated and forbidden from the worship of Israel. So the neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying, is not this the man who used to sit and beg?

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And some said, it's he. Others said, no, it just looks like him. So he kept saying, I'm the man!

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I'm that guy! So they said to him, well, then how were your eyes open? And he answered, the man called

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Jesus made mud, anointed my eyes, and said to me, go to Siloam and wash. I went and I washed, and I received my sight.

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They said to him, well, where is he? He said, I don't know. All right? So this guy hasn't even seen

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Jesus at this point. Yes, this is the context of John 10. So they brought to the

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Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. And see, and now the soundtrack goes, dun -dun -dun.

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Okay, so now it was the Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes.

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And here's the conundrum. Jesus has just broken one of the commandments of the tradition of the elders, hasn't broken any biblical command, okay?

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He hasn't done anything wrong. So now it's the Sabbath day, and so the Pharisees asked him again how he had received his sight.

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He said to them, he put mud on my eyes, I washed, I see. Some of the Pharisees said, this man is not from God, for he does not keep the

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Sabbath, okay? Now, Jesus does perfectly keep the Sabbath. Scripture's clear.

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He was tempted in every way that we were, and yet was without sin. Did Jesus ever break the commandment regarding the

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Sabbath? No. Okay, did he break the tradition of the elders and the rules of the Pharisees?

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Fifty ways from Friday, he did it all, like, week in and week out, and it's driving these guys crazy, because Jesus refuses to obey their man -made rules, all right?

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So others said, well how can a man who's a sinner do such signs?

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So, and there was division among them. So they said, again said to the blind man, what do you say about him, since he opened your eyes?

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He said, he's a prophet. Good answer, good answer.

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Not totally right, but it's a great answer. So at this point they're like, get out, get out! So the Jews did not believe that he had been blind, so they're thinking, this is some trick.

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This is like Todd White, he's pulling our leg, okay? That's what they're accusing of, you know, this whole, this is some flim -flam -jam.

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So they denied, they didn't believe that he received his sight until they called his parents, and the man who had received his sight, and they asked them, is this your son, who you say was born blind?

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What a dangerous question. I mean, they are on trial, okay?

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Because their son who was blind can see now, right? You can see they're going like, please tell us he's not, please, please, please.

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Right, and they're going, oh boy, this is a dangerous question, man. Is this your son, who you say was born blind?

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How then does he now see? His parents answered, we know that this is our son, yes, okay, and that he was born blind, but how he now sees, we don't know.

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Nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him, he's of age, he'll speak for himself. Mom and Dad totally checking out here, okay?

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Thanks, Mom! Thanks, Dad! So, but listen to what the text says. His parents said these things because they feared the

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Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Jesus to be the

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Messiah, and that's what Christos means, the Anointed One, the Messiah, he was to be put out of the synagogue, full -on excommunication.

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No soup for you! Okay, you got the idea. So therefore, his parents said, he's of age, you ask him.

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All right, second time now, okay, we're gonna try this again. So the second time, they called the man who had been blind, and they said to him, give glory to God, we know this man's a sinner.

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He answered, whether he's a sinner, I don't know. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now

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I see. Good theme, by the way. That could be a song! Yeah, Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.

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I once was lost, you know, but now I'm found, but was blind, but now

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I see. And that's the point. And Jesus healing this guy is to show that the Pharisees, that they are spiritually blind, and he's not.

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The man born blind is the one who sees clearly who Jesus is. The ones who have eyesight and have since birth, they're totally blind.

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And that's kind of the point of this passage. So they said to him, well what did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?

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He answered them, I told you already, and you wouldn't listen to me. Why do you want to hear it again?

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Do you also want to become his disciples? Oh, this guy's brilliant. So they reviled him, saying, you are his disciples!

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We are disciples of Moses! We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we don't know where he comes from!

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Okay, now note, when they say God's spoken to Moses, they're not merely talking about the Torah.

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They're talking about the tradition of the elders as well. They're claiming that their tradition of the elders is the

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Word of God, and that God gave it to Moses on Mount Sinai. But as for this man, we don't know where he comes from.

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So the man answered, why, this is an amazing thing. Amazing! You don't know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes.

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We know that God doesn't listen to sinners. Now he's taking their theology and throwing it right back in their face.

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We know that God doesn't listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will,

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God listens to him. That's straight -up Pharisee theology right there, okay? And then, this is brilliant, never since the world began has it ever been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind.

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And this is true. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. And here it comes, now they're just gonna just totally vomit out their false theology.

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They answered him, you were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?

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And they cast him out. He's an angry elf. Yeah, so he just got excommunicated, okay?

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But here's the thing, the man born blind is the only guy who can see in this group, okay? The Pharisees, totally blind.

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So Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and I consider this to be one of the most beautiful things that Jesus has did.

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It is so touching when you think about it. This guy, he woke up that day blind, just like he woke up every other day of his life blind.

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And that day, Christ had mercy on him and not only forgave him, but gave him faith in him, in Jesus.

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And this guy, for believing in Jesus and being healed for Jesus, was being persecuted, reviled, and was told that he was born in utter sin, totally dismissed, and just marginalized and then excommunicated.

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And all he did was receive his sight, right? So Jesus, hearing that they had cast him out,

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Jesus seeks him out. And this is one of the most amazing exchanges in all the Scriptures.

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So Jesus finds him and says, do you believe in the Son of Man? And so the guy answered, well, who is he, sir, so that I might believe in him?

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And Jesus said to him, you've seen him. It's he who's speaking to you. And the play on words with him being able to see

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Jesus is so beautiful. So he said, Lord, I believed. And listen to this, he worshipped

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Jesus. This guy can see.

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He can really see. So Jesus said, it's for judgment that I came into the world, so that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may become blind.

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And some of the Pharisees near him heard these things and said to him, are we also blind? Notice they're like, it's like Twitter, man.

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Okay. So Jesus said to them, if you were blind you would have no guilt.

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Takes their theology and just upends it. But now that you say we see, your guilt remains.

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Now note, the break between 9 and 10 is right here, and Jesus continues in this context.

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There's no break in the context. And so Jesus is talking to the Pharisees at this point, and he is confronting them hard on their false theology and the fact that they're heretics.

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And he's taken some of their pet doctrines and just smashing them to pieces.

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So truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and he's a robber.

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Who is he talking about? The Pharisees. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.

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To him the gate keeper opens. The sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.

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When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.

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A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers. Who is the voice of the shepherd?

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Christ. Who's the strangers who jumped the fence? The Pharisees.

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This figure of speech used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. So Jesus again said to them, who?

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The Pharisees. Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep do not listen to them.

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Talking about the Pharisees. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.

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The thief comes only to steal, to kill, and to destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

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Who's the thief? The Pharisee. So the idea then here is that, like I said,

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Pharisees do not represent sound biblical doctrine, correct theology.

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They are rank heretics, they are thieves, they make void the real Word of God with their false words and their traditions, which are deviations from and contradictions to the

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Word of God. You want to know who the real Pharisees are today? Chris Falliton, Todd White, Bill Johnson, and others,

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Katie Sousa, the whole cadre of people that we are covering on Fighting for the

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Faith, they are the Pharisees. Now, a little bit more along these lines, we're gonna note here, you know, this is the

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Gospel reading from yesterday, so I did a sermon on this text yesterday. The Pharisees went and they plotted how to entangle

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Jesus in his words. Now you're gonna note, there's an important word that comes up a little bit later, and that is the word malice.

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We know that they're acting in malice, so the malice here is like hatred on steroids. So in the name of God, the

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Pharisees are already plotting to destroy Jesus, to murder him. In the name...

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they're gonna, we're gonna murder you, Jesus, in the name of Yahweh! Okay, which makes no sense.

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So they plotted how to entangle Jesus in his words, and they sent their disciples with them, along with the

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Herodians. Herodians were the guys who were like, yay, Rome! Way to go, Caesar! And you know, these are

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Jews wearing togas and had no problems, like, using the money of the time. And whereas the

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Pharisees, they claimed that even using a denarius was idolatry, because Caesar claimed to be a god on earth, and he did, and his likeness was on the coins, so that's the reason why there were money changers in the

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Temple, because people, you know, the Mosaic Covenant allows, if people are traveling from a long distance, they can take their tithe, turn it into money, bring it with them, and then purchase what they need for the tithe when they arrive in the

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Temple. But with the Pharisees, they said that you can't use the denarius, man. That's got

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Caesar's image on it, and that's idolatrous money. And so they made it a requirement that you had to exchange a denarii for shekels.

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Sounds like the Christmas tree issue that's gonna be coming up again soon, like it does every year. Yeah, yeah.

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But you get the idea. So that's what's going on. So here they're plotting with the Herodians, who are like their mortal enemies. And I pointed this out in the sermon yesterday, that the

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Pharisees didn't even go themselves, they sent their disciples. They couldn't even be seen in public with the Herodians. So they sent their disciples.

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And so here they're gonna butter up Jesus. Teacher, we know that you are true and you teach the way of God truthfully, and you don't care about anyone's opinion, and for you're not swayed by appearances.

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Now, oddly enough, they're just trying to butter Jesus up here, but what they said about Jesus is true. So tell us, hang on a second here,

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I just opened up my Greek cross -references by accident. So tell us what you think.

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Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not? You can see like, they have plotted this in some smoke -filled room the night before.

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We're finally gonna get Jesus! You know, because if he says no, the

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Herodians are gonna have him arrested on the spot. If he says yes, the Pharisees are gonna say, see, he's an idolater, he's an idolater.

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And so they're gonna get him on one thing or another, right? So Jesus, aware of their malice, this whole thing is, they're not acting in love at all.

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They're acting in pure malice and hatred. He said, why do you put me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin for the tax.

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You can see, you know, the disciples of the Pharisees going, we don't got one of those, we're not allowed to have one of those. And so one of the

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Herodians reaches into with a pocket in his toga, pulls out a shiny new denarii and goes, ting! You know, and hands it off to Jesus.

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So whose likeness inscription is this? They said Caesar's. He said, therefore render to Caesar the things that are

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Caesar's, to God the things that are God's. Right? And the important bit right here is, render to God the things that are

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God's. Remember that we were made in the image and the likeness of God. Jesus doesn't want your money, he wants you.

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He wants your heart, he wants your mind, your soul, your strength. So that's kind of the point there. But again, you note that the

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Pharisees claim to worship God, but the God they claim to worship is standing right in front of them, and they hate him.

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And Jesus pointed out in John 8, if you loved the Father, you'd love me. If you were anything like Abraham, you'd love me the way he did.

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You have nothing to do with it. They're heretics, they're not Orthodox, they're heretics. All right, next text along these lines, talking about judging.

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The Apostle Paul, in 1st Corinthians chapter 5, 12, says these words, For what have

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I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?

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God judges those outside. Purge the evil person from among you. All right, now a little bit of a note here.

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Ten Commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. Teaching false doctrine, teaching for shameful gain things you ought not to teach, performing false signs, false wonders, speaking false prophecies, this is all a breaking of the commandment that says you shall not take the name of the

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Lord your God in vain. It's blasphemy. And Scripture commands us to judge those in the church, and blasphemers are to be purged out of the church, not tolerated.

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Well, yeah, but I don't know how people get out of this. I've sent that verse right there to I don't know how many people over the years when they make a comment about, you're being judgmental.

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I'm like, well, this guy claims to be a teacher in the Christian Church, he claims to be following Scripture, but he's not.

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He's actually doing what you just said, he's actually guilty of blasphemy by pretending to speak for God when he's teaching the opposite of what

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God teaches. Right. Don't make me get in my portal and jump over there, you know, on a quantum leap and have to get up on your business.

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I'm joking. Yeah, the Scripture's clear. We are to judge those in the church. I've made reference to it,

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Titus chapter 1, talking about the requirements of a pastor.

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Everybody knows that if you've got a pastor who's womanizing, okay, or who's a booze hound, he's not fit for the office, okay?

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But there's more to it than that. Have you ever stopped to think that a guy who teaches false doctrine is as bad and unqualified to be a teacher in Christ's Church as a booze hound or a womanizer?

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It all fits. So Paul says this to Titus, this is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remain in order, appoint elders in every town as I directed you, if anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife, his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination, an overseer as God's steward must be above reproach, he must not be arrogant, quick -tempered, a drunkard, or violent, or greedy for gain, or greedy for gain.

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Hello, thousand -dollar seed offerings, ringing the bells, ding ding ding ding ding! By the way, I saw your video where you showed that Benny Hinn's still teaching that, so yeah, and that's recent.

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So, but he must be hospitable, a lover of good, self -controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined.

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He must hold firm, listen to this, he must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught.

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I have these verses in an article that's on Pirate Christian, it's been seen for, it's got hundreds of thousands of views now,

53:34

I'm really happy about that, it's called Shocking Stuff You're Not Supposed to Know. Yeah. And I gave it that name because originally it was something like Bible verses that your pastor doesn't tell you about, and nobody read it, because the name of the blog post wasn't shocking enough, so I called it

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Shocking Stuff You're Not Supposed to Know. It's just a whole list of these Bible verses that instruct us to call out false teaching.

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Yeah, that's what we're supposed to do. I mean, it's right here, you must give, hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, and it goes on, so that he may be able to give instruction in what?

54:08

Sound doctrine. By the way, in the Great Commission, Jesus says, all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.

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Go therefore, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them all

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I have commanded you. One of the, I mean, as far as I'm concerned, that is the quintessential text regarding Sola Scriptura, because when it comes down to it, it's like, uh, all right,

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I'm only, as a pastor, okay, I am only authorized, I have been given permission to only teach what

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Christ has commanded. Well, where am I going to find that? Well, for sure in the

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New Testament, and also in the Old Testament by virtue of the fact that Jesus is God in human flesh. Old Testament, New Testament, that's the only place

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I can go. Everything else, I can't, I mean, what process am I going to go through to verify that Kay Nash has actually heard from God that we're supposed to have suddenlies this week, you know?

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It's interesting, too, that one of the comments you read in the beginning, it was against Justin, but there are very similar comments against you, and that is, you're not anointed like these men are.

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How dare you? What position do you hold that makes you think that you can speak against them? I'm a rightly called and ordained servant of the

55:27

Word. And so is Justin, actually. You've studied, you've been ordained, you've been called, you're actually held accountable.

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All those parameters are in place. There's a church body over me, okay? And if I were truly teaching false doctrine, believe me, the higher -ups that I'm accountable to, they would be getting phone calls.

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Now, I will make a note here, funny one, okay? I don't know if you've noticed this about me, Stephen, but I'm prone to be a little satirical at times, and sometimes can be sarcastic.

56:01

You are? I know, I know, it's true. I'm going to have to go back into the archives and see if I can find that. It's true, it's true.

56:07

So this is hilarious, okay? So I don't know if you heard, I don't know if you heard, but during the whole

56:13

Prash incident, okay, I pointed out that James Aloysius Prash Jr.,

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who is as Jewish as a leprechaun, that he had...

56:29

He claims that John MacArthur is the fulfillment of Matthew 24 -24, and that he's a tool of the

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Antichrist for the purpose of deceiving the elect. That's a non -negotiable component of their eschatology, which we call

56:47

Prashcatology. Well, after our exchanges that we had, we had a few exchanges, what ended up happening is that I got promoted, okay?

56:58

I am now one -third of what James Prash calls the

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Devil's Triangle. So I have been promoted, and I'm on an equal level now with John MacArthur, and the

57:09

Devil's Triangle consists of myself, Doreen Virtue, and John MacArthur.

57:16

Well, that's not fair. I mean, Doreen Virtue hasn't been around long enough. I mean, I love her and everything, but I feel a little left out in this whole picture.

57:23

You gotta try harder, okay? But so anyway, so I kind of thought, you know what?

57:28

If I've been promoted, I mean, in the Prashcatological system...

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This is terrible. If I've been promoted, I mean, I might as well flex my demonic power, right?

57:44

Okay, so... I gotta tell you the rest of the story, hang on. I keep thinking of Lucky Charms, by the way, ever since you said he's

57:53

Jewish. Leprechaun. He is, man. Always after me, Lucky Charms. I've done his...

58:00

I went through his family tree on Ancestry .com. But anyway, so now, a little bit of a side note.

58:10

For years, Doreen Virtue, she was really confused because she had this really vivid dream, this vision that she thought was

58:17

Jesus, and it took her a long time to kind of sort it out and to actually say, whoa, that actually wasn't

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Jesus, that was actually a demonic apparition sent to deceive. And so myself and Justin Peters and a few others were working behind the scenes with her and opening up the scriptures to show her that was not

58:35

Christ, that wasn't Jesus. And then at the time she had it, she had some painter put the thing together.

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It is the ugliest looking thing I've ever seen. I call it Care Bear Jesus, okay? And so the

58:50

Prashians think that she's still somehow hanging onto this thing and promoting it or whatever.

58:56

She's not, okay? So after I got promoted to be one third of the

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Devil's Triangle, I decided I was gonna flex my demonic power. And so I was getting kind of tired because on my social media, the

59:11

Prashians, oh man, they were like trolling me and they were like flies.

59:16

And so I put out a Facebook post as well as a Twitter tweet, which

59:22

I still hate that word, tweet. I put something up on Twitter and I basically said, all you Prashians out there who are still trolling me, you better be careful because John MacArthur's people are watching and they're making a list, and once they send me the list,

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I'm going to send Care Bear Jesus to tattoo your forehead with the mark of the beast, okay?

59:43

I'm not joking. So I mean, clearly I'm speaking tongue in cheek, right? So service

59:49

Prashy, Joshua Chavez, he lost his mind. On his social media, he said, see?

59:57

Roseboro's like lost it. He's threatening us with Care Bear Jesus. And so he put the phone number to the presiding pastor and the guy in charge of US missions for the

01:00:09

AALC and they started getting phone calls from the Prashians going, Chris Roseboro's threatening us with Care Bear Jesus.

01:00:17

So when I found out that they had done that,

01:00:24

I called them and I said, I understand that you've been getting phone calls.

01:00:30

And they said, their response to me was, have you picked a fight with a crazy man? Yes, exactly.

01:00:40

Care Bear Jesus is going to get you. That's very threatening. They wanted to have me defrocked because I was threatening them with Care Bear Jesus.

01:00:57

So we got a leprechaun, we got Care Bear Jesus. It is one of the funniest things I've ever seen in my life.

01:01:03

All of that being said, I have accountability. And just so you know, the leadership of the

01:01:09

AALC decided that they would not bring me up on charges of threatening the

01:01:16

Prashians with Care Bear Jesus. So if I taught false theology, believe me, people would be all up in my business and calling the

01:01:29

AALC, and if I were legitimately teaching false doctrine, I would be defrocked!

01:01:35

And rightly so! It's like, pastors are not islands to themselves.

01:01:41

They are accountable to their congregations. They should be accountable to a church body who oversees their doctrine and their theology and verifies that they've studied, showed themselves approved.

01:01:55

Who's doing that with Bill Johnson? Bill Johnson has no theological training. Nobody! None! Nobody's doing it with Bill Johnson.

01:02:02

No one's doing it. Or Benny Hinn, Todd, they're all completely unaccountable.

01:02:09

Absolutely unaccountable. So we come in and we say, look at it, this is what Scripture says, this is what they say, it's a total contradiction.

01:02:16

But by the way, there's a little bit more to Titus, by the way, here. So not only are pastors to give instruction in sound doctrine, they're also to rebuke those who contradict it and goes on.

01:02:26

For there are many who are insubordinate and empty talkers and deceivers. Even in the time of Paul, there were already a lot of them.

01:02:34

And he says, especially those of the circumcision party. Now that party isn't as well represented today as it was back in the day.

01:02:41

That group does still exist in the Hebrew Roots movement today. But listen to what Paul says, they must be silenced.

01:02:53

God wills that false teachers are silenced. That means you're going to have to judge.

01:03:00

That means you're going to have to go, is this person telling me what the Bible says or are they not? And if they're not,

01:03:06

God wills that they are silenced. I left you speechless.

01:03:15

This is a very difficult concept for people nowadays. I know. Evangelicals have been trained in a million different ways to believe that all denominational differences are just there as a matter of preference.

01:03:28

All different theological differences are really, yeah, it's just like going to 31 flavors, you know, get the flavor that you like the best.

01:03:35

It doesn't make any difference. And whether or not somebody agrees with Scripture or not, yeah, who knows for sure.

01:03:40

It's kind of hard to say. I mean, really, evangelicals have become functional as what we call postmodernists, even though they would never say so.

01:03:53

That they would say Scripture is functionally postmodern. It means whatever you want it to mean.

01:03:58

As long as you have a warm, fuzzy feeling in your heart, that's about it. As long as you're on fire for the

01:04:04

Lord, man, that's all that really matters. Which is a completely subjective thing. Yeah. I remember when I was a teenager, so attending the

01:04:11

Nazarene church, had finished my membership classes at Pasadena Nazarene and was plugged into a small group

01:04:18

Bible study. And so there we are, small group Bible study. And so after the mandatory tortilla chips and bean dip, and whatever, socializing, and maybe we sing a little praise song together, we pray.

01:04:34

And the facilitator of the small group study, she would open up her Bible, she would read a verse out of context, and then she would kind of, in this really pious -sounding voice, she would say, let's go around the room and let's talk, discuss together, what does this verse mean to you?

01:04:54

Yeah, I don't care what it means to you. I wanna know what it means. The question is, what does it mean? Right.

01:05:00

And so the thing is, we're trained. We're trained. So many people are trained to ignore the fact that God has communicated to us in His Word, and His Word actually means things.

01:05:12

Instead, everything gets subjectivized, and what does mean to you? And as soon as you go down that path, then the

01:05:20

Bible doesn't mean anything. And that's when there's the wide opening for some form of Gnosticism to enter into the equation, because the guy who comes in and says, well,

01:05:32

I heard from God, and He told me X, Y, and Z, that now becomes the top of the level of importance, and the

01:05:39

Scripture has to go beneath that guy. Because we've already agreed that we don't know for sure what Scripture means in many cases, so the guy who comes in, like a

01:05:46

Bill Johnson or Todd White, and confidently claims, oh, I heard from God. I don't claim to hear from God all the time, but I'm telling you, last

01:05:55

Thursday, that was the real thing. Yeah, it's subjectivism and emotionalism all kind of smooshed into one.

01:06:02

So many Charismatics and Evangelicals are functionally Mormons. And let me explain what

01:06:08

I mean by that. So, years ago, I actually learned Mormonism from the Mormons.

01:06:14

And so, they showed up at my door, and Barb and I, we'd only been married a short amount of time, and I really didn't want to spend time studying with them, really didn't want to.

01:06:35

But what ended up happening, they came to the door, and we let them in, we were being polite. At the time,

01:06:40

I still was doing countercult apologetics, but my focus was really on the Jehovah's Witnesses, I hadn't really had a lot of crossover into Mormonism.

01:06:48

And so, struck up a conversation with them, and I kind of hit them hard, thinking that this would just send them away.

01:06:55

And what ended up happening is that they convinced me to read the

01:07:01

Book of Mormon. All right, so I said, all right, I'll read the Book of Mormon. Because they told you, you were going to get the warm feeling, right?

01:07:09

That's exactly it, I was going to get a burning in my bosom. And I said, well, listen, all right, I work for a living, and I'm doing school and things like this, so it's going to take me about four or five weeks before I can finish reading this thing.

01:07:23

And they said, no problem. So, I read it. It took me a little bit longer than five weeks, more like six.

01:07:30

And when I contacted them, they were jotting on the spots, and they came the next week. And no joke, first question out of their mouths.

01:07:41

So, when you read the Book of Mormon, how did it make you feel? And I said to them, funny that you'd ask that, because every time

01:07:48

I opened up the Book of Mormon, it felt like there was a chill in the room, and I could feel the presence of evil.

01:07:53

And as soon as I would shut the book, it would go away. No joke. And so, the one elder, he looks at me and goes, you're not reading it right.

01:08:06

And he said, you're supposed to ask Heavenly Father to give you a testimony of the truthfulness of the

01:08:11

Book of Mormon, and he'll give you a burning in your bosom. I said, well, I was Frosty the Snowman for me. So, I said, so we have canceling out subjective experiences.

01:08:22

I guess we'll just have to look at real evidence. You know what that reminds me of? There's a great episode in the

01:08:29

Andy Griffith Show where Barney's supposed to be learning how to do judo. He's reading his little book. He tells

01:08:34

Andy, hey, I'm learning how to do judo. Let me show you my move. And so, he says, now, pretend to come after me with your arm like you're carrying a knife.

01:08:43

I'll show you what I can do. And Andy's like, oh, I don't want to hurt you. And he goes, no, no, I got this figured out. So, Andy does what he's supposed to, and Barney tries to do the move.

01:08:51

And of course, Andy's twice as big as Barney. Everybody's twice as big as Barney. And he just pins him down to the ground.

01:08:58

And then Andy lets him up, and Barney goes, oh, you're doing it wrong, Andy. You're doing it wrong. Let's try it again.

01:09:05

You're doing it wrong. Same thing. So, here's the thing is that you have all these people who they're not opening their

01:09:13

Bibles. You're a Pharisee, because you're taking their favorite subjective, fluff, charismatic, who's deceiving them, and you're showing that what they're saying isn't from the

01:09:26

Word of God. Actually, the Word of God contradicts what they're saying and doing. And you're the problem, not that guy.

01:09:32

And this shows a complete lack of understanding of what the Bible says.

01:09:38

It reminds me, there's a joke that kind of makes the rounds in the pastor circles. There was a pastor who was invited to a dinner at the house of one of his parishioners, and so he was there, and the husband and wife were really kind, and they were a little bit higher up in the social status, and they had nice china, so they served the pastor dinner with a nice china and the silverware and all that kind of stuff.

01:10:01

And afterwards, after the pastor had left, they did the dishes, and one of their silver spoons was missing.

01:10:09

And so they searched everywhere, they could not find it, and they're thinking, oh my goodness, the pastor stole the silver spoon.

01:10:16

And they couldn't bring themselves to actually charge him with that or to actually mention it, but it took about a year.

01:10:23

And finally, the wife, after one of the services, after the sermon, and the service, how they go through and they shake the pastor's hand, she went through the line and was shaking the pastor's hand, and she held onto his hand and looked him dead in the eye, and she goes,

01:10:36

I just need to know, it's driving me nuts. Did you steal one of our silver spoons? And he goes, no,

01:10:41

I put it in your Bible. That's good.

01:10:48

See, the thing is, you got all these people going to church, they're not reading their Bibles, you know? They do not know the

01:10:55

Word of God, and as a result of it, they are easy pickings for these deceivers.

01:11:01

They really are. Well, and they flip this thing around, and the part that they equate to guys like you and me is

01:11:10

Jesus does some miraculous, supernatural thing, and the Pharisees don't accept that as they should and realize that he's the

01:11:18

Messiah. What they then do is when Todd White does a leg lengthening trick, and we don't accept it, now we're in the position of the

01:11:27

Pharisee because we refuse. Now, if there was a legitimate healing, I'm okay with that.

01:11:33

I would say, praise God, a legitimate healing took place. We just want it to be an actual healing. Right.

01:11:39

And to show some skepticism is actually a pretty healthy thing in the world we live in today, but it doesn't mean that we never believe any healing could ever take place.

01:11:49

I'm a pastor. I pray for people all the time, and I pray for their healing, and I would note

01:11:57

I have seen some notable, really ridiculously incredible answers to prayer.

01:12:06

You know, one lady that I pastor, a year ago, she was told by her physician that she had a very terrible lung disease, and the disease that she has would result in her death within a couple of years, and pretty much giving her a death sentence, and we prayed for her.

01:12:27

I didn't lay hands on her. I didn't anoint her with oil. All we did was add her to the prayer list, and a year later, she doesn't have the problem anymore.

01:12:37

She's fine. It's like, how'd that happen? I'm a cessationist.

01:12:43

You don't believe in healing, Roseboro. Yeah, I do. Thank you for pointing that out, because I just did that Mike Bickle video, and he said that in this video.

01:12:51

He said, when he was trying to come up with excuses as to why they haven't solved the COVID -19 crisis, he said, you know, there's a whole group of people that doesn't even believe in healing anymore.

01:13:00

That's nonsense. Every cessationist I know believes in healing, and here's the thing. Scripture's clear.

01:13:06

We are to make our supplications, our requests made known to God. Not demand that God heal.

01:13:13

So I'll tell you one thing I didn't do. I didn't sit there and go, I decree and declare, and I rebuke the spirit of lung disease.

01:13:22

I didn't do any of that nonsense. I simply prayed prayers like this, Lord, please have mercy on her, and grant to her, according to your will, healing.

01:13:33

I mean, that's kind of as simple as my prayers get, and God heard the prayer, and he healed her, you know, and I'm a cessationist.

01:13:41

It's like, you know, this is, you get the point. I want to get to that one. Hang on,

01:13:47

I'm looking at my own website here. Okay. The Pharisees were lovers of money. Oh, yeah, yeah.

01:13:53

Hang on a second here. You want the text on that? Yeah. Okay, hang on a second here. I'm going to do an accordance search with a modifier.

01:14:01

I'm so jealous of you with your fancy software. I still got these old things called books made out of paper. Yeah, I've heard of those.

01:14:07

They take up shelf space. I used to have to use an exhaustive concordance to find things, and I just do this.

01:14:14

Pharisee and money. Hang on a second here. The Pharisees who were lovers of money, Luke 16, 14.

01:14:21

They ridiculed Jesus. This is what we don't do.

01:14:27

Right. You know, and now the heretics that we deal with, they don't mock

01:14:35

Jesus in the way that you would think. They don't say Jesus wasn't God. They actually mock him in a way that's a lot more subtle and a lot more difficult to detect, but they still are.

01:14:46

It's a form of mocking, especially when they speak on behalf of God, and they say things that aren't true, and they say it in the name of Jesus.

01:14:54

That's blasphemy. Now, a little bit of a note here. You wanted to talk about the blasphemy of the

01:15:00

Holy Spirit. Oh, that's right. Let's not leave it off the table. Let's put it in the mix here. Matthew 12, 22.

01:15:06

If you ever wonder, what is the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit? And by the way, there is a tradition within the charismatic movement.

01:15:13

You sit there and you go, Benny Hinn is not engaged, he's not actually performing healing miracles, this is all flim -flam and a scam.

01:15:20

And they go, oh, be careful. You don't want to blaspheme the Holy Spirit. And I've been accused of blaspheming the

01:15:28

Holy Spirit so many times, it's ridiculous. And by the way, this goes all the way back to William Branham.

01:15:34

Branham was the guy who kind of made that very popular. He would spiritually threaten people with hell if they denied that he wasn't operating by the power of the

01:15:43

Holy Spirit. This is a brand new book. Jim Jones, The Malachi 4

01:15:48

Elijah Prophecy. Is he related theologically to Branham? Yes. Okay, same screen.

01:15:54

They actually work together. Wow. Branham was a very evil man. Yo, I agree.

01:16:00

I've reviewed a few of his sermons on the podcast, and oh my goodness, the man is wicked.

01:16:05

And he's the guy that is the role model for Todd White, and for Chris Vallotton, and for Bill Johnson.

01:16:11

In their own words, they believe that they want his anointing. They want to do everything he did. Yeah. And by the way, regarding my sarcasm and snark at times,

01:16:26

I've discovered that I have the Mount Carmel anointing. That's right. You know what,

01:16:31

Chris? It's from the Elijah mantle. I want to point something out, because I don't want to forget this.

01:16:38

When you make a YouTube video, or when I make a YouTube video, you're not giving a sermon.

01:16:44

When you give a sermon at church, it's different than making a YouTube video. Oh, yes, of course.

01:16:50

The reason that a YouTube video is made the way it is, as far as you and I are concerned, at least, is that we're trying to grab people's attention by using humor, by using satire, by using sarcasm, because people are so stuck in a way of thinking that somebody has to kind of grab them and shake them and say, would you look at this?

01:17:10

YouTube is the marketplace of ideas. It's not the church. Now, but in terms of what's appropriate or not, we're kind of pushing the edge.

01:17:19

And I realize that. I do push the edge. And there are times when I'm working on a video and I say, I don't know, should I do that?

01:17:24

And sometimes I say, no, that's probably a little too much. And I pull back a bit. And we're trying to figure out what's the best way to grab people's attention.

01:17:31

But if you came to my church, where I'm a head elder, you would hear none of that. And the same with your church.

01:17:38

You're a pastor of a church. So when you're doing that, your focus is completely different. Your tone is completely different.

01:17:45

And that's what needs to be explained. What I do hear is it has a different purpose than delivering a sermon or discipling somebody.

01:17:53

Now, there's some crossover because I do spend a lot of time in these videos opening up the Word of God.

01:17:59

Yes, which is great. And I cannot do that dispassionately. And if you haven't figured it out, oftentimes what

01:18:04

I do is just an excuse to open up the Word of God so you could actually see what it says. I love that. I mean, that's what we're doing right now.

01:18:10

This is a Bible study. Right. But it's done in a conversation, and it's done in a particular context.

01:18:17

And I recognize that we use satire, we use snark, and the reality is that so do men of God in the

01:18:24

Scriptures. Have you considered that fact? The Apostle Paul says, regarding the

01:18:31

Judaizers in Galatians, he says, those who would trouble you, I wish they would go all the way and emasculate themselves.

01:18:38

That's the polite translation. I sit there and say, Paul's basically saying, those who think they're holy because they snipped off part of it,

01:18:47

I wish they would go all the way and show how holy they are by getting the lapidophomy procedure. That's pretty much what

01:18:52

Paul is saying in Galatians 5. You know, Jesus says, oh, you brood of vipers, you hypocrites, you whitewashed tombs.

01:19:00

Jesus called people names, man. And Elisha on Mount Carmel, you know, so there's the prophets of Baal.

01:19:07

Oh, Baal! Listen to us! Oh, Baal! You'll notice that the signs and wonders that the prophets of Baal were able to call down, it's the same amount of power that the people of Bethel have today.

01:19:20

So what does Elijah do? They're religious people. They're calling out to their deity.

01:19:26

And Elijah says, why don't you cry louder? Maybe he can't hear you. Maybe he's on a journey, or maybe he's asleep.

01:19:34

Or maybe he's in the bathroom taking a dump. Which I think is a more faithful translation to what he says, because ESV politely says, maybe he's relieving himself.

01:19:44

I don't think my videos are as sarcastic as some of the passages in Scripture. I really don't.

01:19:49

You know what it is? You use memes, okay? You make your own memes and you kind of throw them in there.

01:19:56

You use meme culture rhetoric in some of the stuff you do, and as a result of it, the thing is that when you do that, you committed the cardinal sin.

01:20:07

So here's the thing. The way it works with the false teacher is that they will be able to continue to deceive people as long as people take them seriously.

01:20:19

Because here's the thing. And this is where I take real big issue with people in evangelicalism who go, you know, we need to be careful.

01:20:28

We don't wanna name names. And we don't want to judge a person's heart.

01:20:34

I can't look into Todd White's heart. I can tell you what he says. I can tell you what he does.

01:20:39

And I can tell you, that ain't what Scripture says, and that ain't a real miracle. Okay? Which basically casts all kinds of doubt on what's going on inside of him, but you get the idea.

01:20:49

But the point is that as long as you give them professional courtesy, and we're not called to give heretics professional courtesy, we're called to rebuke them sharply and to silence them.

01:21:01

And Scripture uses humor and sarcasm in that endeavor regarding certain false teachers and idolaters, and Christians through the centuries have always used humor and sarcasm to sit there and say, wake up, it's stupid that you think that leg lengthening is an actual miracle.

01:21:17

It's absolutely insane. It is dumber than rocks to sit there and say that Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry is teaching and equipping people to perform signs and wonders when they're all suffering from COVID right now by the hundreds.

01:21:33

It's so dumb. You know, and to point it out, and see, the thing is, as soon as you do that, and as soon as you mock it, oh man, people get mad because, no, you've got to show love.

01:21:43

You've got to show professional courtesy. Don't show it to be stupid because then people won't listen to these people anymore.

01:21:49

Right? The thing that I'm really clear about in my head is that people who are madly in love with Bethel, and they're totally tapped into it, and they're just on board 100%,

01:22:00

I don't make videos for them because nothing we say matters. I make videos, and I think you make videos for all those people who are confused, and they know there's something kind of not right, but they can't put their finger on it.

01:22:13

And when everybody is so polite and says, you know, I think maybe he's a little off here, but he means well, blah, blah, blah.

01:22:19

Pretty soon it sounds like everything's sort of right. And if everything is sort of right, then nothing's right or nothing's wrong.

01:22:27

Yeah, nothing's wrong, and nothing's totally right either. It's very confusing. When I found you six, seven, eight years ago,

01:22:34

I was so glad to find somebody who would just call it like it is because I thought that was the case, but I just needed somebody to back up what was going on in the back of my mind.

01:22:44

I refuse to give professional courtesy to a heretic. They're heretics.

01:22:49

Along those same lines, there are people that we do disagree with, but it's not the same thing.

01:22:55

They're not heretics. They just have a different way of viewing some secondary issues. And so we have just kind of drawn the line in certain places, and we're not going to go there.

01:23:04

And I'm okay with that. So for instance, I'm very good friends with Phil Johnson, who works for John MacArthur, and I have serious disagreements with him theologically, yet I give him professional courtesy, and he's a brother in Christ.

01:23:17

And here's the thing. We are able as mature men to sit down at the table together and have spirited conversations regarding our differences in theology, and at the end of it still look each other in the eye and say,

01:23:35

I'm so thankful for you, brother. And that's the difference. So you get the idea.

01:23:41

Same with Justin Peters, same with Todd Friel, and these guys are all

01:23:46

Reformed. I'm not. And so the thing is that you make a distinction between primary, secondary, and tertiary doctrines, and you never negotiate or give any ground on the primaries.

01:24:00

And when somebody's teaching a different Jesus, a different spirit, or a different gospel, they've lost the right to be called brother.

01:24:06

And if they're trafficking in false signs and false wonders, according to 2 Thessalonians 2, these are people who are the harbingers of the coming

01:24:13

Antichrist, and they are to be treated accordingly. Do I sound passionate today? I sound a little passionate today.

01:24:19

It's hard to talk about this stuff without sounding like you're upset. But I am.

01:24:25

I get upset. I'm a lot better now than I was five years ago. I was really hard. I think

01:24:30

I kind of killed some of my friendships because I was just discovering this stuff, and I was so passionate.

01:24:37

Yeah, and that's the thing. That's the thing. As soon as the light goes on and you see what Scripture says and you sit there and go, uh -oh, you want to tell people, that guy's a bad guy.

01:24:45

He's a bad guy. He's not telling the truth. And what happens is all of a sudden your friend count on Facebook drops by half.

01:24:52

And they take you aside and they say, you know, brother, I'm really concerned for your heart because it really just seems like you've really become a little harsh lately.

01:25:04

And you're very judgmental, and that's not what the Spirit of Jesus would have you do.

01:25:11

I've been scolded like that many times. By the way, let's kind of wrap up on this blasphemy of the

01:25:22

Holy Spirit, all right? So in Matthew 12, okay, a little bit of a note here. We're getting close to like the halfway point of the

01:25:29

Gospel of Matthew. And in the early part of Jesus's ministry, Jesus did not preach in parables.

01:25:36

He healed people. He performed miracles like you couldn't believe. And there was no doubt that the signs that He was operating in showed that He was the

01:25:46

Messiah. No doubt, okay? And that was the general reaction of the general Israelite at the time.

01:25:52

Is this the Messiah? That's what's going on. So the Pharisees, they came up with a really clever false narrative to explain how

01:26:01

Jesus was performing all these miracles, okay? They never denied that He performed them, okay?

01:26:07

And it was obvious that He did, all right? So when a demon -oppressed man who was blind and mute was brought to Jesus.

01:26:15

So note here, we got three presenting issues. First, he's demonized. Second, he's blind.

01:26:21

Third, he's mute, okay? That's quite the trio, okay? Now, unlike leg lengthening, okay, if somebody is blind and then can see, there's no way to get around that, okay?

01:26:38

Because you can objectively test it. How many fingers am I holding up, you know? Things like this, okay?

01:26:44

And if he's mute, that's also objectively verifiable because now the guy can speak in coherent sentences, right?

01:26:54

And people can hear him. He can communicate. So Jesus healed him so that the man spoke and he saw.

01:27:03

Undeniable miracle, okay? Whereas, let's do a little bit of comparative work here.

01:27:10

So there's somebody who comes up in the conga line at a Benny Hinn healing revival, right?

01:27:15

And they handed the microphone and they say, so what happened? Well, when I heard you call out blood diseases,

01:27:22

I just felt something shift inside of me and I knew that I had received my breakthrough. Are blood diseases visible?

01:27:31

No, not at all, okay? And I used to have metal in my arm, but I don't feel the screws anymore.

01:27:38

Have they conducted an x -ray? No, okay? None of these are real miracles.

01:27:44

These are all just flim flams. But Jesus performed a non... How do

01:27:53

I want to say this? I can't grab the word in my head. You can't deny that this happened. It's undeniable, all right?

01:28:00

So all the people were amazed. And watch, can this be the son of David? They're going, ah, this is the one!

01:28:07

This is the Messiah! And the Pharisees, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You can't believe in Jesus, man.

01:28:13

So the Pharisees heard it. Again, they're heretics. And they said, well, it's only by Beelzebul, the prince of the demons, that this man casts out demons.

01:28:23

Really? Really. That was a weak, a very weak argument.

01:28:28

Yeah, and so what they're basically saying, yep, you can't deny that this miracle took place, but here's the real reason as it happened.

01:28:36

Well, everyone's praising God for it. Yeah, well. All right. So knowing their thoughts,

01:28:42

Jesus says, Every kingdom that is divided against itself is laid waste. No city or house divided against itself will stand.

01:28:48

If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand? And if I cast out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your sons cast them out?

01:28:59

Ooh, that's a little salty right there. So therefore, they will be your judges. But if it is by the

01:29:04

Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Or how can someone enter a strongman's house and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strongman?

01:29:13

Then indeed, he may plunder his house. Whoever is not with me is against me. Whoever does not gather scatters.

01:29:18

Therefore, I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven.

01:29:25

And what is it? It is when an unmistakable, undeniable, in the name of God, by the power of God, by the power of the

01:29:32

Holy Spirit, miracle has taken place. And rather than repent and rejoice on your knees in tears and thank

01:29:38

God that you have been privileged to see such a thing, you sit there and say, that was the hand of the devil that did that.

01:29:44

Okay? In other words, it's practically impossible to blaspheme the Holy Spirit today. Okay? It really is.

01:29:51

So whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven. Whoever speaks a word against the Spirit will neither be forgiven in this age or the age to come.

01:29:58

But see, this is by invoking this out of context and saying, if you're denying that Benny Hinn and Todd White are actually performing real miracles, oh, you're guilty of committing the blasphemy of the

01:30:09

Holy Spirit, they're basically saying you're damned. And yet, I have never seen one shred of evidence that would support even one miracle, for real, being performed by Benny Hinn or Todd White.

01:30:22

There's no objective verification. It's just a thought -stopping device. It's a threat. Yeah, it is.

01:30:28

People having to take that voice in the back of their head that says, I don't know if this is true or not.

01:30:34

I don't know if this is real. You are pushing that idea further and further back because you've been told, oh, you don't want to blaspheme the

01:30:41

Holy Spirit. This makes God out to be not a very nice God.

01:30:46

He's going to send prophets who do very difficult -to -believe miracles, pseudo -miracles, pretend parlor trick miracles.

01:30:53

And then he says, you better believe that. And if you don't believe it, you're going to go to hell. Right. That's not the

01:30:59

God of the Bible. Nope, not at all. These were unmistakable, undeniable. And watch where Christ goes with this next.

01:31:07

See, either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad, for the tree is known by its fruit.

01:31:15

You brood of vipers. Yeah, you want a good paraphrase of what Jesus just said to the

01:31:20

Pharisees? Your moms are snakes. Okay, yeah, he did name -calling. How can you speak good when you are evil?

01:31:28

For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. The good person out of the good treasure brings forth good. The evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil.

01:31:38

And Jesus is saying that what they were saying, what they were doing, the reason they were saying and doing what they were doing is because they are evil.

01:31:44

I tell you, on the Day of Judgment, people will give an account for every careless word they speak. Talking about the

01:31:50

Pharisees here, who carelessly ascribe to Jesus the miracle -working power of Beelzebul, for by your words you'll be justified, by your words you'll be condemned.

01:32:03

You get the idea. Yeah, and this next verse is the one that Bill Johnson does that horrible speech about. Oh, I know!

01:32:09

I saw what you did on that! It's like, I almost feel like I've got to cover that too, because I've never seen anybody take this text and flip it like that.

01:32:16

But while we're in the context, take a look. So some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him saying, Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.

01:32:23

And to which he said there and go, you morons, you just saw Jesus heal a blind man, give him, he was blind and mute and demonized, cast the demon out of him, gave him a sight, made him so he can talk, and you want to see a sign?

01:32:36

Okay, right? So he answered them, and even the adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given except for the sign of Jonah.

01:32:43

Oh, they were given a sign, all right. Christ's resurrection. Okay? For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the

01:32:50

Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise at the judgment of this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah.

01:32:58

Behold, something greater than Jonah is here. The queen of the south will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon.

01:33:08

Behold, something greater than Solomon is here. And then, is this where he goes on and says, whoa? Or is that in the next chapter?

01:33:15

Because the whoa part is kind of the kicker, but it's not in this context. Hold on a second here. Whoa. I'm going to go, whoa.

01:33:22

All right. It's in chapter 11. Listen to this. All right. Woe to you, Chorazin. Woe to you,

01:33:28

Bethsaida. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

01:33:36

Signs and wonders performed to Chorazin and Bethsaida. Do signs and wonders create repentance and faith?

01:33:43

This is the amazing thing. Jesus himself, God in human flesh, does all these miracles, and they still don't repent and believe.

01:33:51

And Bill Johnson says that's the evidence that we need to go out and do signs and wonders so that people will repent and believe.

01:33:57

It's just— It's nuts. It's nuts. And that to me is—that's blasphemy. Yeah, it is.

01:34:03

You take the very word of God, and you take its actual meaning, and you reverse it to mean the opposite.

01:34:08

It's not a little bit different. It's the opposite. Lying and deceiving in the name of God, that is the epitome of the definition of blasphemy.

01:34:17

So when Bill Johnson sits there and says, we need to perform signs and wonders, and by doing so, people will be brought to Christ.

01:34:27

Well, Christ's point here in chapter 11 is that he performed signs and wonders in Chorazin and Bethsaida, Capernaum, and they didn't repent.

01:34:36

And he goes on to say that despite the fact he performed those signs and wonders, that they didn't repent, that the

01:34:42

Day of Judgment's going to be better for Sodom and Gomorrah than for those cities who saw these signs.

01:34:49

He uses Jonah as an example of a great revivalist. When Jonah didn't do signs and wonders, he just showed up and said, you guys are all going to die.

01:34:57

God's about to kill you. And they all got—they all repented for some reason. It was the Spirit of God that caused the repentance in their hearts.

01:35:04

That's right. That's right. Jonah was the worst preacher ever. Oh, he didn't want to go because he didn't want him to repent and be forgiven.

01:35:11

He went because he knew God would forgive him. And again, it's an amazing passage, but for Bill Johnson to use that passage to say, we need to go and be great revivalists who perform signs and wonders, it's just stunning.

01:35:24

Yeah, here's the thing. If God wanted me to perform signs and wonders, God would give me the ability to perform signs and wonders.

01:35:31

He would do it in spite of yourself. He would do it whether he wanted to or not. Exactly. It's like, hello?

01:35:38

Why are you putting this heavy burden on people to go out and perform signs and wonders? It reminds me of—I think

01:35:43

I mentioned this once before. One of my favorite Calvin and Hobbes cartoons is there's—Calvin is outside with Hobbes, and he's seeing fireflies, okay?

01:35:53

And he's looking at him like, this is the most amazing thing ever. And in the next frame, you see Calvin shaking his behind, you know, like this, and looking behind him.

01:36:01

And Hobbes goes, what are you doing? He says, I'm trying to figure out what muscle to flex in my butt so that I can make it light up.

01:36:12

It's like one of my favorite things. So, I mean, telling me I've got to perform signs and wonders is like telling

01:36:18

Calvin he needs to make his butt light up, you know? There's no muscle to flex.

01:36:24

If God wanted me to perform miracles, I'd perform them, you know?

01:36:29

And the reality is that every time somebody hears the gospel from my mouth,

01:36:36

I'm partnering with God. And every time somebody is brought to penitent faith in Christ because they hear the preaching of the gospel,

01:36:43

God is working a miracle in giving them repentance and giving them faith and regenerating them.

01:36:49

And so, over and again, the great miracle that takes place that I get to see is people have their eyes open, the shackles fall off, and they understand the

01:36:59

Scriptures, and they are trusting in Jesus. I see that miracle happening all the time, you know?

01:37:04

And as for actual healing miracles, I've seen it with my own eyes, but not in the leg -lengthening, fancy showy kind of thing, where I've been on my knees and on my face interceding and praying on behalf of somebody, and humbly bringing my request before God for that person, and God answered, you know?

01:37:24

So you get the idea. Yeah, and the whole idea that Jesus does not give us a burden is a really big key to everything we've talked about.

01:37:33

And He was taking the Pharisees to task because that's what they did.

01:37:38

In a nutshell, they were giving people a burden, and Jesus said, come, my burden is light.

01:37:44

Right, come to you if you are heavy -laden, and I will give you rest, heavy -laden by their— and that's the thing.

01:37:51

Telling people that they have to perform signs and wonders, telling them that they have to somehow glow in the dark and be sinless and powerful overcomers, these are super heavy burdens.

01:38:02

And the reality is that Christ takes all of that, because we are not saved by our efforts, and nor does

01:38:10

Christ demand that you perform signs and wonders. Be like demanding,

01:38:16

Kozar, I want you to swim from Wisconsin to Hawaii, get going right now. That's a heavy burden, and you can't.

01:38:24

But biblical Christianity brings peace and rest, a clean conscience, confidence in the mercy, the love, and the grace of Christ, whereas all this other stuff, it creates doubt, it creates suspicion, it creates guilt, and it creates constant confusion and a heavy burden.

01:38:45

How come that person understands it, but I don't get it? I don't understand. How come everyone's clapping and thinking that's real, and I don't even—that didn't look real to me, it looked like a sleight of hand trick.

01:38:57

You get the idea. Well, Steve, we just meandered all over the place.

01:39:04

What is this, like nine hours? Fourteen. I think we're up to 14 hours now.

01:39:12

In dog years, it's 14 hours. This has been great, though. Yeah. So hopefully this will be helpful for other people.

01:39:20

For sure. But thank you again for willing to take some time away from painting and come and be on fighting for the faith.

01:39:30

It's always fun to have you. Enjoy your company. This has been really good.

01:39:35

You know what I just looked at before we started? No. It was just about five years ago when

01:39:42

I first started working with you doing the new Pirate Christian site. Oh, was it really? Yeah. Okay, wow.

01:39:48

It was in the fall. And now you're doing that messed up church. Your YouTube channel is The Messed Up Church. Yeah.

01:39:53

And you have a whole website. I have a whole website. It was originally part of Pirate Christian Media, and it's all still there.

01:39:59

I just took it and made it its own separate website. Yep, yep. And I love doing what

01:40:04

I'm doing, and I'm just kind of following in your coattail. So I appreciate all the stuff that you've done to kind of lay the groundwork.

01:40:12

I'm just a servant. The best thing I love is that the more people doing this, the better, because it's like, what does

01:40:19

Christ say? Pray to the Lord of the harvest. The harvest is plentiful. The workers are few. And so I always love it when you do a bang -up job on a topic.

01:40:29

It's like, all I got to do is share your video. I don't have to make one. And of course, you've learned that all the big bucks is in discernment, man, right?

01:40:37

Oh yeah, big bucks. All right, well, Steve, thank you for your time. It was great to have you.

01:40:43

I'm going to sign off here, and then we'll talk in just a minute, but give me a second here.

01:40:50

Okay. So let me thank you all for watching. If you found this conversation to be helpful and useful regarding the

01:40:57

Pharisees' blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, the fact that we as Christians are to judge those who are in the

01:41:03

Church, and that God, in His Word, makes it clear that those who are teaching false doctrine, God wills for them to be silenced.

01:41:09

Go ahead and share the video, show the people, and all the information on how to share the video is down below.

01:41:16

Let me thank you for watching, and may God richly bless you in the grace and mercy won by Jesus Christ, His vicarious death on the cross for all of your sins.