BAPTISM DEBATE REVIEW | w/ Trey Fisher @theparishreformed PT.2

Well, hello and welcome to everybody out there in YouTube world, in Facebook land. This is the

Apologetic Dog, and my name is Jeremiah Nortier. I'm the Apologetic Dog, but I just serve as a representation for all

Christians guarding the gospel of grace, and Paul tells Timothy in 1 Timothy 6 20,

Timothy, not only guard the deposit entrusted to you, but do this by avoiding irreverent babble.

Do this by avoiding contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge. And so today we are doing a continuation,

Trey Fisher, from last week. How are you, sir? Hey, tell everybody what we're doing here today.

What's the continuation of? The continuation is a debate review over Jeremiah Nortier and Mike O 'Heysel.

I just want to add, too, people are like, Jeremiah, do you have any other shirts than the black one you wear every time? I just want to say,

I have two Apologetic Dog shirts, and yes, there is a day coming where I'm going to be making merch for all you

Apologetic puppies out there, so be looking forward to that. But I do have other shirts, Trey. I do.

Well, just before we get into it, I just want to encourage everybody, if you've benefited at all from the parish reformed and the fish bone, with his ministry continuing for the gospel, or the

Apologetic Dog, or 12 -5 Church, where I serve as pastor and elder within a plurality, please like and subscribe and just share this content.

Trey, we need help, don't we? We need encouragement from the saints. We need them to circulate the content, right?

Speaking of one subscriber, Christ rescued me. So glad that tornado didn't get you,

Trey. Thank you so much. It was so scary. I'm not kidding, like the front door of the church flew open, and it was going nuts, lost electricity.

But anything for the dog, you know what I'm saying? That's what I do. Hey, I appreciate that. Trey, what do you think Leanne thought when we both advertised her book at the same time?

I guarantee you she thought they planned that. That was planned. You know she laid an egg.

She was like, no way. You know what's wild, Trey? You know how our critics will throw fiery darts any way they can.

One person started calling me 10 % because he was convinced that I got 10 % of all the book sales of her book.

And I was like, man, that'd be great. Here's what I get. I get what everybody gets when they leave a cult.

You know what I'm saying? They start trying to discredit you, and so I'm just angry. I mean, it's not that I really care about the people in the

Church of Christ. It's not that I think that they're really wrong and they have a false gospel. It's not that I read the

Bible and I was like, oh my goodness, we're wrong. And I love them, kind of like Paul did with the Jewish people. And he would go to them and try to tell them because he knew what they believed and why they believed it.

That's not the case for me, according to them. I'm just angry. I'm just a mad angry guy. Well, I want to piggyback off that because I got a lot of input last time, good and bad, encouraging and discouraging.

And there is a Jew, I'd call him a friend. Oh, yeah. Vogel is saying the Tennessee electrician.

Everybody that's watching, y 'all need to go over and subscribe to the Tennessee electrician because he knows, Trey, that the precondition for electricity is

God himself. Yes. And I'm sure you get 10 percent of whatever you just promoted there.

Oh, you know, it's all about the money. Follow the money, right? I mean, I'm just a false teacher that cares all about money, apparently.

I was going to tell you something, Trey. You know how you talked about how no one wants to give you the myth of the doubt. You are just a sad, bitter, angry person towards the church of Christ, you know.

I have a friend. I call him a friend. He's a Jew and he's a modern Jew and he is cut from the same cloth as the

Second Temple Pharisees. And he told me, yeah, Jeremiah, you really lost that last debate because the other guy really did a number to show that baptism is not a work.

And of course, I ask him all the same questions I ask Mike. And he just said, well, you know, it doesn't really have to mean that.

What do they say? What do they say? It don't mean that. It don't mean that. And what I tried to explain to this

Jewish fellow, I said, look, modern day Judaism and the church of Christ, they are sister religions.

They are both works righteous religions. And this Jew does not like the parable of the

Pharisee and the tax collector that Jesus gave because it's the same scathing rebuke towards Jews today.

The Second Temple Jews 2000 years ago and those works righteous religions like the church of Christ.

They won't say that they're trying to earn their righteousness, but they give away their position, Trey, when they say that their works are necessary for their justification before God.

Yep, I would I would think that he would agree with Michael Heysel on that.

Let's see. We have. Yeah, well, I'm just I let him know that, of course, you're going to go with your bias of having to do obey with your works to be made right with God.

That's what all religions of the world essentially have in common. It's a man centered. It's a man made and you have to grit your teeth and try to obey the law the best you can.

And the gospel of grace, true religion, Christianity, the one true religion that can actually declare you right before God says, no, don't look inward with your obedience in your works.

Look to Christ and his finished work that is perfect to tell us I paid and for look to his work, not adding your works.

Yep. So with that, before me and you start getting preachy, I believe we made it about halfway through analyzing the clips that I pulled out.

My big takeaways from the debate that I had just a couple of weeks ago, I really appreciated the debate.

Trey, I actually had fun getting to know and interacting with Mike. I saw, I believe he was very cordial, very respectful.

Nothing got too heated or anything like that. I think both sides are passionate. And even some of the comments said, man, it was like a preach off.

We need to do more of those. And I said, I like that a preach off. You know, I mean, some debates are boring, dull.

They're just giving lectures. But I don't think that's what happened with me and Mike. What was your thought there? Yeah, I just,

I think he's, I think he's probably a nice person,

I think. But when it comes to things that matter, like God's word, I think he's just a well -groomed wolf, but a wolf nonetheless, because it's the false gospel.

At the end of the day, it's not just about being nice, right? We must worship

God in spirit, a heart of love, but in truth, right?

And so it's not just enough to be nice and have a joyful, kindred spirit with people of being able to be cordial, but you have to stand on truth.

And so that's your heart at the end of the day is, yeah, maybe he is respectful, but the enemy is at work ever slowly undermining and manipulating the truth, right?

Is it the fishbone? That is said that the greatest lies contain the most amount of truth in it.

The best lie you'll ever hear is the one with the most truth in it. Every time. I was close. You're close.

All right, let me queue up. He's redneck. No, no. I want to real quick say, it don't mean that.

All right, let's queue up the next. You're welcome with my honesty. I love it. The what? Miss Perg said that, she said, gotta love

Trey's honesty. Hey, Fergie, Fergie, Ferg. Hey, Ferg, you know

I'm just bitter, I'm just bitter and mad and angry, you know? Well, I just want to brag on Miss Leanne.

She has been a joy with her labors writing the book, because her testimony is that God saved her out of the so -called church of Christ.

And that's why I just told her, hey, I was planning, remember, man, you had those talks about writing a book where you mainly can author it and I can just draw the pictures, you know?

But she did it for us. And I just, I've told Leanne, I'm taking your book with me. I'm going to plug it everywhere

I go. And I guess get that 10 percent. I'm sure Miss Ferg did it because she was bitter and angry.

That's probably why she wrote it, according to them. All right, let's get on, let's get on clip number nine.

Let's get it. Is your position to say, Abraham was justified before the ceremony, before a ceremony.

But for Christians, even though we're supposed to be justified like Abraham, our point of justification is not until we participate in the ceremony of baptism.

Is that a fair representation of your view? Yes. OK. Do you want to defend that a little bit?

Sure. So there's what you're emphasizing is a radical disharmony and discontinuity.

Abraham not justified by ceremony. Christians supposed to be justified like Abraham.

Later in verse four, it's not just for his sake only, but for ours. We are justified the same way.

I agree. It's an obedient faith. He was not justified by ceremony. All right,

Trey, first thoughts. I just think it's really neat when you ask people, are you justified the same way?

Are we justified the same way as Abraham? And you have to say yes. Right. You have to speak the Christianese language. And then you say, how?

And you realize, oh, so when you say we're justified in the same way as Abraham, what you mean is we're not justified the same way as Abraham, right?

Yes. So the reason why I wanted to set up that question is because you have to agree with Paul, because he is at the end of Romans chapter four.

Maybe we can look at that passage here in a moment. But he says that Abraham's justification was not just for Abraham's sake alone, but for ours,

Christians after the law's fulfillment. His justification is for us. And Paul clearly says in Romans five verse one, therefore, you have been justified by faith.

And then he says that is that is ultimately how you have peace with God. True shalom. And the whole chapter four argument is apart from works, apart from works of law, apart from anything that you can accomplish, because you would then be trying to put

God in debt by your work, something that you accomplished. And then that would provide room for boasting.

And so like like you're saying, the whole dance is the Church of Christ have to figure out how they can say, well, we're justified like Abraham.

But it don't mean that. It don't mean that, actually. It don't mean that. And so I wanted to pull up real quick,

Trey, Romans chapter four, because I remember I remember over a year ago when you were getting ready for your debate with old

T .T. Y 'all's debate thesis was something like the point of justification is that faith or at baptism?

And obviously, y 'all were disagreeing at what was the point a person is justified, you saying by faith, and then he has to take the position by baptism.

And so I remember us getting ready for that debate. We were talking about this passage right here. No unbelief made him,

Abraham, waver concerning the promise of God. But he grew strong in his faith and he gave glory to God.

Like, I just want to pause. That's where works belong, is a life that is dedicated to glorify

God. We work hard not to earn our salvation or to keep our salvation, but to give

God glory. Abraham, fully convinced that God was able to do what he promised, right?

Firm trust. Faith. That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness.

But the words it was counted to him. Go ahead. Well, I always pause right there in verse 22. Go ahead.

Those first three words of verse 22, that is why. So let's go back and see why again.

Why was his, why was he counted righteousness? So it's not James two. So do we have a apparent contradiction or are we misunderstanding some things here?

Which I would obviously argue that the church of Christ misinterprets James two. Intentionally.

I don't think they're, I think they know what it means. I think they, they understand that they're not, they're not dumb. But to hold on and maintain their positions and where they're at and say faith, they just keep fighting it.

But that is why his faith was counted. So why was his faith counted righteousness? What does it say in verse 21?

Because he offered up his son Isaac. No, nope. Nope. Oh, I don't find it.

Yeah. Because he believed he had strong faith. He trusted God. And that is why.

And I mean, just go back to, you know, verses one through 12. It's just as clear as a bell.

So, I mean, yeah. So another criticism that I got,

Trey, from our last episode is people didn't really like you accusing the church of Christ of re -crucifying

Jesus to contact the blood and water. And you know what someone said to me? We can talk about that again, if you'd like.

Oh, we got to. What'd they say? They said, well, aren't, couldn't the same logic be applied to you at the moment of faith?

And I said, time out, maybe for an Arminian, right? Where they can just kind of conjure up their faith out of thin air to contact the blood.

But I said, from the reform perspective, we died with Christ at Calvary. And so he atoned for all of those who would put their faith in King Jesus.

All of our sins were already accounted for once at the cross. And so my point is, the grounding of our justification is the death of Jesus Christ, his death, burial, resurrection.

That's for us. And so the good news, like you said, is when the elect of God hear the good news preached and the

Holy Spirit illuminates their hearts to these truths that our sins are already paid for. Well, that's good news, right?

It's the analogy you gave. Well, news is always past tense, right? And you can't add yourself to the news.

If you have to add yourself to it, then it wasn't news that you heard. Okay. News is something that happened in the past.

And this is what Paul says over and over again, like in Romans five, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, right?

And so it was while we were enemies that we were reconciled to God. How? By the death of his son, substitutionary atonement.

So then you have this right here in Ephesians two, that we're by nature, children of wrath, like the rest of mankind, but God being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead and our trespasses made us alive together with Christ.

Well, Christ didn't come alive in the watery graves of baptism. Christ came alive three days after he was risen from the dead or after he was put to death on the cross.

And we were made alive with him because he died in our place as if it was us there. And so when we read these things, like we died with Christ, we were buried with Christ, raised with Christ, that is talking about the atonement and what happened there.

And that's the good news that we heard, right? So I see you're reading some good comments over there. Which ones?

Before, before I get into some of the comments, this was the interesting exchange.

You have a wolf, you have a wolf for the apology. I saw that. I thought you'd like it.

Yeah, a dog and a wolf are the same thing, or basically the same thing in the comment. Hey, I can take a joke.

That doesn't look the same thing. So something that Mike brought out in the debate, and to me,

I thought, yes, let's camp on this because, you know, I got him to just openly admit that Abraham justified differently than Rahab, right?

And Christians justified differently than Rahab and Abraham. And then I wanted to shift back to Abraham.

And I liked how Mike just owned the fact that Abraham justified before a ceremony.

And then, but Christians, it's radically different. We are justified during the participation of a ceremony.

Like I was so shocked, Trey, I asked him, do you want to defend that? And I was like, no,

I'm good with it. I had so much time, I was like, go ahead and defend that a little bit before we move on.

And but I actually appreciated the trajectory of the conversation, because when we do look at Hebrews chapter 11, we see in verse eight that by faith,

Abraham obeyed God essentially when he left the land of Ur. But from Mike's position, faith is only real if it takes steps.

You know what I mean? And so I think I have a clip coming up here a little bit. But the fundamental distinction between our positions is they think

God doesn't know if your faith is real until it takes steps. You got to prove it to God.

You remember when I was talking to Aaron Gallagher, that's what I held him on. He says that, you know, you know, you have faith, but you got to show you get baptized to show

God that you truly believe. I'm like, but doesn't God know your heart? Doesn't he know everything?

Doesn't he know my heart? Isn't he the one that gave me faith? Isn't faith a gift from God? But they would argue. But at the end of the day, still, are you saying that God doesn't know our hearts?

So I have to prove to God, hey, I know I really do believe in you. Trust me. Right? So you're saying,

God, trust me. I don't have to trust you, God. You trust me and I'll prove it to you. Right?

So I'm sorry. I think I interrupted you. Very good. Y 'all let us know.

I got some people saying that my mic is super loud and yours is not. So I can maybe turn mine down or you can.

I'll turn mine up. Is that, is that any better for everybody? I can hear you really well. Yeah.

Y 'all let us know. And if I do need to turn my mic down, I will do that as we speak.

So going back to Abraham with the ceremony is it goes back to a few fundamental different things for them.

They're proving their faith is real before God by their works. And we're over here saying, oh,

God sees the heart. That's why I read all those verses in the gospels. The Pharisees justify themselves before man, but God sees your heart.

Jesus sees the heart of man. That's why he doesn't entrust himself to them. But you got to think the way they want to read

James two is not a vindication before man, all that's before God.

And we're saying, well, now you're going to have real problems. Sure. A justified faith that produces fruit.

Well, that's still before God, but that's in terms of our sanctification. Even the

Christophany in Genesis chapter two, the angel of the Lord says, for now

I know, Abraham, you fear God. Now we understand that God didn't learn.

So in what sense is the angel of the Lord declaring this truth? Well, from on high, now he speaks on man's level and bears witness to the fact that the just shall live by faith.

And going back to the initial point of justification, it's the moment your heart is truly trusting in the finished work of Christ apart from your own works.

God knows that. And that's the moment. And then a vindication of that real living trust that's internal will produce itself in works.

Those works are beneficial for mankind, beneficial for the body saying, hey, you can be added to the visible church by your baptism, right?

Universally, we join the universal church, the cosmic called out ones by grace through faith.

That's how everyone has been, quote unquote, added to the universal church. But the local body that I would say is distinct within the

New Testament, that is at Pentecost, is by baptism, by your works before other men, seeing the evidence, the fruit of repentance.

And so I think when you have a distorted view of who God is, and it's basically demoted to where man are at, well, you're going to have all these problems because you are trying to show

God that your faith is real by your works. And so I'm saying you have to have a low view of God. The first problem with the

Church of Christ is that they don't believe that they're truly that sinful, right? When you don't understand original sin, you deny that.

We're already off on a really bad spot. But I want to read something here that I preached on last

Sunday, and it's a quote from Burkhauer. And we're actually in Romans 4, and so we're talking about faith alone.

And it says, faith does not justify as though it were in itself a noble work. It justifies only in that through it the promise of grace is accepted.

Reject sola fide, and you must tear pages from Paul's testimony. We read that we are saved by grace through faith, and that's not of ourselves, for it's a gift of God, not of works, that no man should glory.

Herein is the exclusiveness of grace confessed, right? Here it is. Sola fide is not an exclusive hobby that prohibits recognition of other truths.

It does not exclude evangelism and the sacraments. It excludes only our own merits.

At this point, there is an extensive explanation of why we are saved through faith and not through love or good works.

Love and works are not disqualified. Love must follow faith. However, we are not to build on our confidence on love as though it for its sake and through it we should expect to receive forgiveness of sins and redemption from God.

And so, you know, faith alone does not exclude good works. We're not saying you don't do good works.

All the only thing faith alone does is excludes our works for merit, as if we did something and now we get something.

And that's what you really pinned Michael down on. And he admitted like, yeah, once I do this,

I get that. That's a merit. That's a work. I want to throw this comment in here because this person started commenting on my videos and you could tell a very strong Church of Christ advocate.

And so he kept asking me, do you believe that it's faith only that justifies? And you know what question

I asked him? What do you mean by faith? And he has refused, refused,

Trey, to define faith because either he can't or he knows when he does, then we're going to go to Romans and show how we are justified like Abraham by faith apart from works.

And so when we say we're justified by faith, Trey, we're talking about firm trust from the heart.

And God knows that before it produces any works. And it's beautiful because it's trusting in the finished work of Jesus, recognizing that our works are tainted by sin and God is holy.

So we cannot add our participation, our works of obedience to the already finished work of Christ.

So I want to add one more thing here because we do got to get to some more of the clips. Shane Fisher, I really think y 'all related,

Trey, you and Shane Fisher. But this is this this shows me how there's the blinders on because he says, walking in the steps of the faith of Abraham, I will side with Paul and the inspired apostle.

And so I've pleaded with Shane to understand that Abraham was justified by his faith and then the just shall live by faith.

And then it works out in a believer's sanctification. But he's been a major critic of us.

And so that's where eventually you got to dust off your shoes and say, hey, here's a thing for you.

I'm going to going to plead with you. Abraham was justified by faith. There's no arguing this.

I mean, it's it's so just Romans 4 is as clear as it can be. Abraham was justified before he did anything, before he the law.

He didn't even have the law. The law came. He actually disobeyed. He could just have faith and then disobey.

Exactly. So he had faith. He trusted the word of God. And by faith, he was counted righteous.

And then he was circumcised years and years later. And so it wasn't anything he did is apart from any works, any works.

So you put in there, you name anything he did. And that is excluded. It has nothing to do with your works.

Nothing that you do. Trey, this transitions into our next clip, because I had to get that definition of works, right, because if you just if you just sprinkle in the word works as you're quoting verses without explaining what it means, you're begging the question.

So check this out. What's the definite the principal definition? We don't know we're about to go yet in Romans. Let's take a step back from Rome.

You're you're misusing the lexicon. That's I appreciate your opinion. When we take a step back from the book of Romans and I were to ask you to define works, what would you say?

If you take a step back from Romans, from Romans. And I said, what does the word works mean?

It always has to have a context. So you wouldn't give me a definition. You always have to have a contract. So you wouldn't give me a definition for what works.

I mean, it's something done. Something done. OK, sure. Let's roll with that. OK. So maybe you can help me with this scenario.

A person hears the gospel. They believe it. They repent. They confess. And there's something done that they do.

They obey the command of baptism. Does this person receive anything in exchange for something done like their participation in baptism?

Well, yes, they've met a condition. They haven't merited that. They haven't merited the blessing. But but there is a condition that they've met.

That's the thing in dispute, because you have to say that. Right. Even the Pharisees said we were not trusting in our own righteousness.

But Jesus says, you honor me with your lips. So that's the thing in question. I appreciate you having to say that.

But you agree that you receive something in exchange based on your interpretation of Acts 238, right?

Because your baptism, you would say you get in exchange forgiveness of sin. All right,

Fishbone, what are your first thoughts? Here's my first thoughts, and this is why you asked him that question.

This is why this other cat won't even answer you when you ask him what faith means.

Here is what Paul says in 2 Timothy 2, 14. And this is why, like when I'm discussing these things with people,

I ask them to find these words. If you can define these words for everybody listening, like I know that you've changed the definition of words.

You know, you've changed the definition of words for the people listening. They don't know that. So when they hear you say faith and me say faith, they think that we're talking about faith, which is like the definition of the word, not some made up definition that you've done.

So it reminds me of 2 Timothy 2, 14, remind them of these things and charge them before God not to quarrel about words.

Don't quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers. See, it doesn't ruin me.

It doesn't ruin you. You know that you've changed the definition of words. I know you've changed it. But for everybody out there listening and they hear the word baptism, they know what that means.

They hear the word faith. They know what that means, but they don't know that you've combined these two.

They don't know that you've combined justification and sanctification. And you know what's funny? Check this out,

Jeremiah. You should go back and watch my sermon from last night, from Sunday. And it's on the

Parish of the Redeemer Facebook page. So go to Facebook Parish of the Redeemer, watch the sermon. And I'm talking about when people combine justification, sanctification.

OK, you're going to get a workspace salvation. And at the end of the day, they're all going to sound the same. And I'm reading.

So I said, look, I'm going to read what some people believe, because everybody says, hey, you know, as long as you love Jesus, I'm good with you.

Let me just read some things about what people believe. And these people say they love Jesus and they believe the

Bible. So I read some of their doctrinal statements. And everybody at our church thought

I was talking about the Church of Christ. But guess who I was talking about? Jehovah's Witness, Mormons and Roman Catholics.

They're all the same thing. At the end of the day, they're all going to say the same thing, you know. And so that was a pretty big eye opener for a lot of people.

But look, this is why we don't quarrel about words. And this is why you asked last time, do I get in the Greek and all that?

I only get in the Greek when I'm talking to someone who changes the definition of words. I don't have to use the Greek when

I use the word faith. I mean, when you tell your kid, you know, when a Church of Christ person tells their son, son, just have faith in me.

Does he mean to go get baptized in me? No, no, that'd be crazy.

But, you know, anyway, go ahead. Can I let me piggyback? Because I love how you appeal to verse 14.

I interpret this as saying we're not going to let pagans, people outside the faith, redefine

Christianity, redefine terms that God has inspired and given to us. And so verse 14 must be in balance with 15.

I know you agree with me. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who needs no need to be ashamed.

And this is the key, rightly handling the word of truth. And this goes back to what you said.

When we hear the enemies, mystifying faith to mean baptism, we're going to take them to pistis and say, it don't mean that.

We're going to take them to Hebrews 11 1 and say, this is this is what faith is.

It's assurance of things hoped for. Assurance means firm trust. It's that substance of something you can't see with your physical eye, but with the heart of faith and that conviction, that inward assurance will lead to a life that seeks to glorify

God in good works. So let's let's keep trucking along.

But I love your point is we're not going to quarrel about definitions on their own terms. We're going to go back to the scriptures and we're going to handle it with care.

This is why they hate to even just give you the definition of word, because they know and they know how ridiculous it sounds when you start saying, well, faith actually means baptism.

It's a synecdoche for everything in the Bible, you know. But when you conflate justification, sanctification, when you conflate faith and works and then you have that magical word obedience, then that's that's how they do it.

That's how they're able to say, well, when Paul said faith, he's really meaning be baptized. And so we're saying, nope,

Paul was smart enough to understand the different definitions and meanings of two different words.

They're related because justification and sanctification are related. Faith and works are related. But these words are distinct.

So our next clip is about your favorite verse, Acts 238. Well, Acts 238 clearly says what

I asked you to say. It says what it says and it means what it means. You're still interpreting it. You know how I know you're interpreting it?

Because you don't baptize in the name of Jesus Christ, do you? Well, remember what

I said. What I said, Baptist, Theta, Epi, To, Onomonti, Jesu Christi.

Remember what I said? It means baptized upon the confession of the name of Jesus Christ. It says what it says, right?

Are you interpreting? But I've never baptized anybody that I didn't say in the name of Jesus Christ. No, but I also said father and son.

Do you baptize? This is where Church of Christ would disagree with you and say you're disobeying Acts 238 because they said it clearly says be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.

Do you baptize in the name of Jesus Christ or in the triune name? I baptize in the triune name, which includes the name of Jesus.

Right. Because you have to interpret. I've never baptized anybody that I didn't baptize in the name of Jesus Christ. The triune name explicitly in Acts 238.

The answer is clearly no. No. Right. So you have to interpret that. And I agree with you.

It is talking about in the authority and name of Jesus Christ. But you cannot say it says what it says. It's upon the confession of, is what

I. But that's the point. You have to harmonize that with the Great Commission. It doesn't just merely say what it says.

You have to interpret it. Right. You know, I got to say, it don't mean that.

It don't mean that. You like that one, though, don't you? I mean, I love using that when I tell him like. So here's my thing again.

When you're talking to someone in the church, Christ, you know, who's truly wanting to understand, right, like not just argue or they're literally trying to see where you're coming from,

Jeremiah, or they're coming over here and they're wanting to see where I'm truly coming from. And I tell him, look,

I tell you what, let me make this very clear to you. I'm going to take you. You take me to verses that you believe.

And I'll take you the ones I believe. And they're like, well, I believe the whole Bible. I'm like, well, I do, too. But I don't I don't believe you do.

And you don't think I do. So that's that's fair. So let's just talk about it. They say, well, go to Mark 16, 16.

I'm like, well, you don't believe that verse because it's everyone who believes and is baptized will be saved, not might be saved.

So like this right here, like this 16, 16, he who believes and is baptized will be saved. He was not believed to be condemned.

Well, a church of Christ person doesn't really believe that. What they actually believe is he who believes in his baptized might be saved, could be saved, potentially will be saved if they continue on to the end.

And then Acts 2, 38, well, you don't believe that because you don't do what it says. You don't baptize in the name of Jesus. You baptize in the name of the

Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Go to John 3. Well, you don't believe the reason. The whole book of John was written. It was written so that you may believe.

And by believing you have life in his name. That's what it says at the end of John. So let's not go anywhere in the book of John because you don't even believe the reason the book was written.

Right. So just you just keep taking the Bible away from like, like you said earlier, like this is the

Christian faith. I'm not going to let you take. I wouldn't let you drive my Ferrari. Right. If you didn't know how to drive a car.

So I'm not going to let you take the Bible when you don't even believe so much of it. You don't even believe the Old Testament applies to us.

Has nothing to do. We're not going to we're not going to quabble with their irreverent babble. Right. Not their main scripture.

We're sticking to the grammatical historical. We're going to stick with the consistency of how God revealed himself.

And we're not going to let them define the terms. They're going to get everybody lost over there in tradition land.

Right. The land of the Campbellites. And we're going to take him back to scripture because even Mark 16, 16, if we wanted to grant this verse for the sake of argument.

It doesn't mean that your past sins get washed away in the water where you contact with the blood.

And this is the reason, Trey, I opened up my cross examination with Mark 16, 16 and old dusty roads here.

Probably. I don't. He probably didn't watch the debate. But your old boy, Mike, I saw doesn't believe this verse is inspired.

Now, why would he ever not speak where the Bible speaks? This is where I have respect for Mike.

I saw to some degree because he's not the far right wing church of Christ.

You know, they all sound the same way and it had the same cadence when they say baptized.

And it's because Mike is more right. Moderate leaning. And so he gives honor to scholarship.

He gives honor to context. He's actually going to look at church history and be dag where we have wonderful definitions where I think

Mike really falls short is he wants to trust Lutheran scholarship with their baggage and their worldview that actually would say a

Christian sacrament means baptismal regeneration. Well, Mike, you're going to agree with him there. But what about earlier when we look at baptized when it means to plunge or dip?

Are you going to go with the Lutheran understanding that means to sprinkle? No, you're not going because you're not a Lutheran.

That's the whole point. At the end of the day, we can take these beautiful definitions that have usage, but you still have to build your case within the context of scripture because that's the ultimate rule that's infallible.

And so, yes, we can look to fantastic scholarship, but you've done maybe a third of the heavy lifting.

You still have to build your case by analyzing the whole council of God. So I know we don't, our time is limited today,

Trey, but I wanted to go to the next clip that talks about,

I think, maybe even the core of the debate because, remember, I read the parable of the

Pharisee and the tax collector where the Pharisee is saying, I have done all these things. Ceremony after ceremony.

That's not a fair verse that you bring up to them. This is not fair, but it's necessary because the church of Christ is the church of Christ.

The modern day Pharisee. So the Pharisee said, I am not like other men.

I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get. My question is, can you explain to me how you were saved without using the words

I or obey? Well, you couldn't fully either because you believe you obey the gospel.

I couldn't. As you define that. Actually, you need me to show you how I can. Do you really want to double down on that?

Well, I'm. Do you want, do you want to, is the question. Do you want me to demonstrate how I don't. I'm, I'm responding.

I'm responding to your point. I'm not trying to make a point out of that. Can you explain how you were saved without using the word

I obey? Trust me, I can. I want to see if you can. Uh, no,

I don't believe so. All right, Trey, tell me why he cannot tell us how he was saved without using the words

I or obey. Because he can't, because he believes that he is saved because of him, you know?

And this is why, you know, not just church of Christ, but anyone who doesn't understand, uh, biblical,

I mean, historical Christianity, this is why take Ephesians, right? They were saved by grace and faith.

It's, it's not of our own doing. It's a gift from God so that no one can boast. Right. So when you look at people in the street who are not

Christians and you're going out and evangelizing, you say, Hey, what do you think about Christians? And they're like, well, I think they're, they're snobs.

They look down on me. They act like they're better than me. You know, they come across that way. And my thing is, well, you know, a lot of them actually do, but they don't mean to.

It's just because they don't understand some things, but see, here's, here's the thing, then you, you know, you're going to share in the gospel of grace with them and who

God is. Um, but here's the thing. If we really understood that we're saved by grace through faith, and this is not our own doing, it's a gift from God, then

I wouldn't look at my nose. I wouldn't look down my nose at Johnny down the street. Right. So imagine if, if we came in,

I came into you and I was like, Hey man, Jeremiah, I just saw Johnny, an old friend of ours. And I shared the gospel with him.

And you're like, what'd he say? I'm like, well, you know, he just doesn't want to quit drinking and partying. And we just keep going on about our business because what we're actually saying without saying it, right.

We're saying, you know what? But we did, we stopped. We quit. We submitted. We're a little bit better than him.

Right. But when we understand that we've been saved by grace through faith, and this was not our own doing, it was a gift from God so that nobody can boast.

And if I told you, Hey man, I just shared with Johnny, what'd he say? Well, he didn't want to quit drinking and smoking and partying, you know, whatever the case is.

Then you would say, man, let's pray right now that God opens his heart and eyes like he did ours, because if it wasn't for him, we would be worse than Johnny.

Probably. We'd probably be in a horrible situation. Now we've just leveled the playing field where everybody is wretched sinners saved by grace.

But see, he can't say that because he thinks that, no, he did play a part in this and he won't lose his salvation either.

This is why I always ask him, tell me how you, how you were saved without saying I, and tell me how you know that you won't lose your salvation without saying

I, because you're going to say, well, I'll keep going to church. I'll keep praying. I'll keep blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

So your faith is really in yourself. It's not in Christ. You know, it's a very man centered. We're not, we're not trusting in ourself.

We're just obeying what we were commanded to do. You got to say that, right? The Jews would have said the same thing.

I'm not trusting myself. I mean, nobody's going to say that. You know, that's where I've never met a self -righteous person who said,

Hey, walk in a room and say, Hey, everybody raise your hand if you're self -righteous and just hands go up. Like nobody does that.

This to me was the most pivotal moment in the whole debate. I did not think

Trey, he would say, no, I can't tell you how I was saved. Now I was hoping the fact that, you know, since they are so man centered, that in a moment that it would catch them off guard because you know, what's embedded in their mind is obey, obey, obey, trust and obey.

But what's embedded in that naturally is I obeyed. I was saved in my baptism.

And so it's as though they've never read the promise of the new covenant where Ezekiel 36, God uses the

I. I took out that heart of stone. I will give you a heart of flesh. I will cleanse you with my spirit and I will cause you to walk in my statutes.

So in my closing statement, I may have one of these clips. And be careful to obey my rules is what it says too, right?

Yeah. And God, God does that. God says, I will do that. So did I have an experience that I can tell you about?

Absolutely. But the reality is, is my salvation. I really understand this as in the third person.

This wretched man was saved by sovereign grace who saves to the uttermost.

That is my salvation experience. Not because I obeyed with certain works and a list of commands.

Um, my obedience was from above. My obedience comes from a new changed heart where the

Holy spirit, not because I was more distinguished than the next guy, but because God's grace and his mercy abounds much.

And I pray that that really shined through in the debate train is people. When they hear

Mike, great speaker, I appreciate how respectful he was, but I think when we started talking about the parable of the

Pharisee and the tax collector, I think it's inescapable, even for church or Christ on his side that, that agree with him, walked away thinking, man,

I wish he would not have answered it that way because it's, it's condemning, right? Because the way that Mike interact with my questions, everybody can see is he's the

Pharisee. Yeah. So I want to, I want to bring up this, you know, we're going to do a book review on the turtle book, right?

Right here. Turtle. Turtle book. Church Christ preacher, uh, who, again,

I've reached out to see if I could ask him questions. I didn't even want to, I said, look, I don't even want to refute you.

I just want to ask you simple questions because it's a lot of contradictions in here. Let me show you what he says here.

He says, um, James doesn't contradict Paul, right? And it says,

James provides us with a definition of faith. If we allow the Bible to provide us with a definition, we understand what

Paul says, uh, when we're saved by faith, he and James both know the true definition of faith.

You ready for it, Jeremiah? Here's the true definition of faith. Trust in God that leads us to obey whatever he tells us to do.

Abraham's faith was made complete by what he did, James 2, 22.

So true saving faith is according to this church Christ preacher, trust in God that leads us to obey whatever he tells us to do.

And once we do whatever he tells us to do, then it's complete, right? And so this is the thing.

See, it's not just faith alone. It's not faith. And it's not that we do these things because we have faith.

No, it's faith. We do these things, then we get saved. So obedience produces saving faith.

But the true biblical thing is faith produces obedience. Saving faith produces obedience.

Not obedience does not produce saving faith. And this is the whole Galatian book of Galatians, right?

Yeah. Works flow out of a faith before God. That also means that sanctification flows out of justification.

And so I've had people accuse me with, so you think somebody can have a faith alone justified before God and be disobedient and not live out their faith?

Well, if you have a changed heart, that's necessarily going to happen. And people are like, oh, you disagree with free will.

And then I'm like, oh, that's, that's actually underneath everything is that is the golden calf that natural man will never let go of is their autonomy in the sovereign creator's universe.

Cause you want to be God. And so here's the thing. Here's, you know, I don't like analogies, but you know,

I always get this one right here. If I gave you a check for a million dollars, you know, and that's yours, all you got to do is take it to the bank, right?

And cash it. Would you do it? And I always look at him. I'm like, nope.

They're like, you're crazy. You're crazy. You wouldn't do it. Yeah, you would. And I'm like, no, I wouldn't. You know why

I wouldn't? Cause I don't trust you. I don't have faith that you've got a million dollars. I think that check's going to bounce.

Now, Donald Trump gave me a check for a million dollars. I'm going to the bank. Why am I going to the bank?

Cause I trust he has a million dollars. And if he wrote me a check, I don't think it's going to bounce. Do you see the difference between trust and faith?

Like I'm not going to go to the bank because I don't believe you, but on this guy, I'm going to go to the bank.

Why? Because I believe. So the belief is what propelled my action, my trust and my faith.

And that's what they don't understand. So I know we got limited time. I just want to encourage people that are asking questions in the side chat, telling us we're a bunch of scaredy cats.

I just want to remind you, I'm a dog, not a cat. And Trey may have to hop off here. I'm coming up in about 15 minutes or so, but if you continue to wait around,

I will engage with some of the side chat questions because I love them and there's nothing new under the sun.

And you already know, I'm going to say, I'm going to back it up with not only proof takes, but context.

So Trey, I want to move on to the next one because when I started talking about the, the, the tax collector, when he cried out,

God be merciful to me, a sinner, Mike said, well, you notice that his faith took steps.

He had to go up to the temple. Guess what? Knew he was going to say that, right? So then

I wanted to bring up somebody else earlier in the gospel of Luke. Turn with me to Luke chapter five, because my question, because what we see in Luke chapter five is a paralytic man whose sins were forgiven.

And my question is, was the paralytic sins forgiven before he arose and picked up his bed?

Yes, because Jesus is seeing their faith. Right. So what obedient, check this out, what obedient works did the paralytic do?

Not as friends, it's collective, but what works did the paralytic do? Well, he wasn't mute.

He was paralyzed, but he wasn't mute. Is this one of those necessary inferences? And so he submitted, he submitted, he submitted to lying on the mat and being lowered.

He wasn't screaming and saying, no, no, no, I don't trust Jesus. I don't want to have anything to do with Jesus. Pause that.

I don't think he submitted to laying on the mat. Like he was paralyzed.

Trey, this is necessary inference time. He didn't, he didn't crawl, he didn't crawl on the mat. Yeah, he didn't crawl up on the mat and say, hey, guys, will y 'all take me over there?

Because I'm paralyzed. Like, no, he was paralyzed. But Trey, he wasn't mute. Obviously, he was crying out, yes, take me to Jesus.

I mean, Jeremiah, he had ten fingers and ten toes. I mean, give me a break. I mean,

OK, so he wasn't mute. This is this is why this this account is in the gospels to show us someone who physically can't do works was saved before he got up and took his mat.

Because Jesus saw their not their works, but their faith, their firm trust.

And yes, the group collectively was expressing their faith with lowering him, but not the paralyzed man.

How do we know? Because he was paralyzed, quadriplegic. He couldn't do these things.

And yet his sins were forgiven. I'm sure the group collectively had faith that Jesus was the miracle worker.

But it's so important. Even Matthew's parallel account says that it's the paralytic. Just in case anyone's confused when he says, man, your sins are forgiven.

He's talking to the paralytic. Right. So you may go ahead and finish playing the clip because Jesus says

Jesus perceived their thoughts right after this. Right. Yep. So see, he does know your heart. He knows your heart. He knows your thoughts.

You don't have to prove it to him. Right. He looks past all the works and he can see the heart.

And like you were saying, he even perceived the thoughts of the Pharisees that doubted in their hearts.

So to me, this was a moment where I really wanted to illustrate to everyone, including Mike, the fundamental difference between us is you have to read your entire theology into an account.

Does not tell us if he's mute or not. Guess what? If he was mute, my position still stands.

If this man was mute, Mike has no more rescuing device. No, Jesus saw not just the friend's faith who was lowering him, but also the paralytic's faith.

So can a paralytic get up and do works? Nobody can work by moving his vocal cords and scream out and say,

I don't want Jesus to save me. Can you show me where that's in the text, please? That's clearly a necessary inference, right?

That's clearly implied in the text. It's necessary. Would Jesus have said, you know, son, be of good cheer.

Your sins are forgiven you. If the man was crying out and saying, no, no, I don't want this. Oh, see, this is the difference between our positions.

The man doesn't have to do works to know that God sees the heart and he trusts in the Savior to forgive him.

You believe a faith in order to be real has to work a particular action to a command that's adding your works.

You even conceded that definition and you don't like actually applying it into the context. Right. And here's what

I want to say, too, is it can be we can be so legalistic. Like he's like, oh, well,

I mean, his vocal cords were working. His lungs were working because he's breathing and they're going in and out.

You know, like, I mean, it's just so legalistic. And he knows it like he's not a dumb guy.

He's a smart guy, but he doesn't want to let go. It's John chapter 12. They know the truth, right?

They know that Jesus, he's the one. But for fear of the Pharisees, they did not want to get kicked out of the synagogue because they love the praise and the attaboys for man more than the glory of God.

And so this is the position they find themselves in. Like when they get in this like and here's I think a lot of times what

I've noticed is a lot of these people, they're like, yeah, I want to talk to you and blah, blah, blah, whatever.

And they think that because really, honestly, the easiest person when I was in the church, Christ, I literally baptized the

Baptist preacher once. Because when you take the Arminian view. Yeah, but when you take the

Arminian view, all you got to do is just add one more thing to it. Baptism. Right. Oh, so you're saying you have to do this, this and this.

OK, well, look here. And they're like, oh, my gosh. And they think that's who they're talking to here. And I'm like, dude, we're

OG Baptist. You see that back behind me? 1689 London Baptist, baby. We're the

OGs. Like we believe, you know, faith alone in Christ alone, grace alone. Like we are not.

That's not us. We're not saying you do nothing. You don't know what the CLC believe, man. Yeah, I've never. I'm just angry and mad.

Bitter. All right. So since time is winding down, we got about 10 more minutes here. I wanted to bring up this clip from the closing statement.

Notice he said, I was saved in baptism. So I do want to pause in his closing statement.

He said two things that really just struck my heart, Trey. He says God will not save rebel sinners.

And I'm like, well, didn't we just read Romans four verse five that God justifies the ungodly?

Like that's the whole point of the gospel, that God shows his love and his grace by saving sinners.

Right. When we were rebels, sinners, Christ died for us. But you got to think in their minds is you have to be willing to do this five step formula, no longer being a callous rebel.

And so he can tell me all day long that he's not saying we're just a bunch of good little boys and good little girls pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps, meriting salvation.

You are, if you really think that rebel sinners that have a little bit of goodness inside to totally change the whole trajectory of their life and be made right with God.

And you say, well, yeah, your works are necessary. Your obedient works are necessary to a list of commands. That's the whole thing.

Of course, you have to reinterpret how God justifies the ungodly. So before you chime in there, that that's kind of the backdrop that I was addressing here.

Well, Jake's saying now that you're taking his dad out of context. He says that at least be honest.

They're played the clip where my dad defines what he means by rebel. Can you put that his little quote up there so everybody can see it?

I want to be fair to Jake the snake. You know what I would tell everybody? Go watch the debate. I'm allowed to take out the parts that really showed me what represents his entire position.

Go listen to Mike's closing statement. How else do you define a rebel? It's not going to change. The thing is, when you listen to his whole spiel, it's not going to change the fact that he says that God does not save rebel sinners.

You have to hold your own heart. He said that. And I'm over here saying no. He doesn't save rebel sinners.

And so, wow, that's a major contradiction through all of scripture. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

Luke 5, 32. I love 1 Timothy 1, 15. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance.

And this is why I had this in my sermon Sunday. I said, and so I just had that part up there. I said, so whatever

I'm about to whatever comes next after this verse right here, you got to ask yourself, do you believe it?

Whatever comes next, do you truly believe that it is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance?

Here it is. That Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, not to try to save sinners, not to offer salvation, not to try to beg them and plead them.

No, he came to save them. And that is what he has done. That's what he's doing. And that's what he'll continue to do. It's trustworthy and it deserves full acceptance.

And he saves sinners, not the righteous. He came for the ungodly. He justifies the ungodly.

And I don't know yet a rebel. And so when Jake says that, like, well, listen to the context. How else do you describe a rebel?

An angel rebel? Or a really bad rebel? Tray, you have to humble yourself. God's not gonna do it for you.

That's what's underneath. God is not going to save rebels. So the two comments in our closing time here,

Tray, before you got to roll, is Hysahl said, God does not save rebels. And then he had, in my mind, the audacity to confirm my case the whole time.

He says, I was saved in baptism. And so I made note of that and I thought, okay,

I'm gonna quote him in my closing here. Notice he said, I was saved in baptism.

I give tithes of all that I get. I have obeyed the law. I have done ceremony after ceremony after ceremony.

What did Jesus say? This is a people that trust in their own righteousness. Now you heard what he says.

It's not a work of merit. It's not by the things that I do. You have to say that. But you know what gives away his position?

He believes that his participation in a ceremony is necessary for his right standing before God.

That's what the Pharisees of old did. They were trusting in their own works. They didn't say they were meriting it, but Jesus exposed their heart.

He said something else that struck me. He said, God does not save rebels.

Going back to one of the verses that we disputed and talked about is Romans 4, verse 5.

And to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.

God does save rebel sinners. How does he do it? Through the new covenant promise, where God says, now this is where the

I is proper. God says, I will take out that heart of stone. I will give you a heart of flesh.

God says, I will cause you to walk in my statutes. He asked me, how would

I answer the question? How was I saved? Without using the word I obey, I would say, this wretched man was saved by God's amazing sovereign grace to saves to the uttermost.

I would say, it's not because I obeyed in my works. Did I obey the gospel?

In faith, not by my works. You know what faith is called in the New Testament? A gracious gift from above.

Check this out. I've got to go here in just a second, but I want to put, I want to say something here to all my church of Christ people who are in here, all my ex church of Christ people.

And I just want to make a shout out to over 300 and something of those church of Christ exiles on the church of Christ exile page.

They're all bitter and angry. That's what they're accused of. Yeah, every one of them. Look, in the church of Christ, they sing this song.

And you know what I say, Jeremiah, what do I say about songs and prayers? Don't sing them if you don't believe them.

Don't sing it and don't pray it if you don't believe it, right? They sing this song. I guarantee you

Michael Hysall sings it. Hey, Jake, you're still here. Will you answer me if you sing this song in your church? Create in me a clean heart, oh

God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, oh

Lord, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of my salvation and renew a right spirit within me.

But here's the thing. For one, what do you mean, create in me a clean heart, oh God? For what?

I've got a clean heart. I made this choice, right? But would you put Psalm 51, because I just said this song.

I said the words of the song, but I want to show you that they've changed. The church of Christ changed the words to this song.

Could you put Psalm 51, verses 10 through 12? There's something very significant here that I noticed once I left the church of Christ.

Create in me a clean heart. This is a word for word song, except this one part. And renew a right spirit within me.

Cast me not away from your presence, oh Lord, in the song, and take not your Holy Spirit from me.

Restore unto me the joy of, ooh, whose salvation? Your salvation, not my salvation, not me.

See, salvation belongs to the Lord, and he gives it. We don't earn it, it's his.

And so, back to his whole rebel thing. He doesn't say rebels. Well, then why are we singing songs to say create in me a clean heart?

I've got a good heart. What are you talking about? You know? And so, it's just another contradiction of just little things, just those little drips.

It's a little drip, drip, drip. I mean, it's things that people don't say. They don't come out and say these things. It's a drip over time, drip, drip, drip, drip.

And it starts making sense to you because you're using your fallen logic that's been messed up by sin, and instead of God's word.

And that's the problem. That's the major problem. They're never gonna see it until they see how sinful they are, you know?

And so, until they see that, they're not gonna see the goodness of God. And so, you can talk about baptism all you want, but you gotta start with the original sin and your depravity.

Because if you don't have that, you're good. Thanks for coming on, man. Love you guys.

Bitter, angry, Fishbone is signing out. Hi, next time, we'll talk about some turtles.

Turtle book coming up. All right, bro. Bye, everybody. All right, so,

I got three more clips I'd like to play with y 'all, play for y 'all. And I noticed there was a lot of questions in the chat.

Go ahead and, if you don't mind, if Shane Fisher, Jake's still out there, or what was the

Rusty Rhodes guy, if y 'all have some questions, put a

Q and then ask your question. So, here a minute, when I get done with the clips and reviewing some of those, I definitely don't mind to go back to your questions.

That's actually my favorite part of a debate, I was telling Mike Hysall, is I actually liked being asked questions on the spot, because I know

I don't know everything, but there's some excitement there if I've not considered something from a particular angle.

And if I don't know, you watch, I will own it. That's a good point. I'll have to think about that. What does that verse mean in context?

But I guess I'm encouraged by how clear the word of God is, and he's not left us to try to figure out the simplicity of the gospel.

It's by faith, receiving King Jesus, the second person, the triune God who took on flesh, in faith apart from your works.

And so, I got a few more clips, and I believe this is an audience Q and A question that I'm gonna play next, because I really think this question that was asked gets to the heart of the disagreement from my position that sees

God as absolutely sovereign over all things. And yet, Mike in the Church of Christ position says, well,

God can be 99 % sovereign, but there is one element in this created universe that is totally up to you.

You have to be the one to ultimately make the decision to obey in baptism or not.

God's not gonna do that for you. So, this is the difference between monergism and synergism.

I had a question over your concluding statement. You mentioned that you're only saved because God came down, died for your sins, and then operates as a high priest, but shouldn't you also put an and in there?

That God, through his love, sent Jesus to die for your sins, and because you responded in repentance and baptism?

So, shouldn't you say it's an act of both you and God, not just God? I would say, yes, you do play a part.

So, I mean, honestly, he has to say that, and I wanna show a verse that I think fundamentally contradicts that idea.

In Ephesians chapter one, this is a beautiful chapter about how the gospel is a

Trinitarian work of God. You got God from before the foundation of the world. He has predestined and elect people who the

Son will perfectly die for, pay for all of their sins, not just your past sins.

I always tell the Church of Christ, God sees the entirety of your life from beginning to end, because Psalm 139 says he's the one that wrote all of your days in a book before you lived any one of them.

And so when the Son sets you free, you are free indeed. It's not contingent on the possibility of you walking away someone who is truly justified and regenerate.

No, if you've tasted and seen that the Lord is gracious, your heart is changed. And so verse 11 here says, in him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of God who works all things after the counsel of his will.

And so this is where I would just say that the Church of Christ are not going to be able to consistently exegete this verse, because they're gonna really say that God's working out some of all things here, truly not all things, because it's after the counsel of his will that everything is being worked out in a very particular way.

And so I think that's the core of the COC, is they have a man -centered salvation.

It is up to you to obey, to do the necessary works, to have your past sins.

Even though God is omniscient, I've actually talked to Church of Christ that say that God is so sovereign that he can choose no longer to remember your sins.

And so they're just abusing the verses that says he remembers our sins no more. It means that you've been justified. It doesn't mean that God is omniscient and then makes an exception and doesn't actually know certain things.

But when you have a man -centered salvation, you have to be able to lower God in some degree in order to elevate man.

So like I said, I'm just gonna kinda go through these last few clips. And the next one is from Jake Hysall.

So I really appreciated this question. And so if you have another question about this, feel free to fire away in the side chat.

This is for Jeremiah, clearly. What would it take... End question. I need you to help me out with this.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. What would it take, what would Scripture need to say for you to affirm the proposition?

Yes, great question. Thought about this, and it's not what Scripture would have to say, it's you would have to take out what

Scripture has already declared. You would have to take out the promises of the Old Testament, the old covenant that promised the new covenant, that how

Abraham was justified before his ceremony, before his faith worked a particular action.

You'd have to take that out. You would have to take out Habakkuk 2 .4 that says, the just shall live by faith.

That tells us about sanctification. You would have to take out holistically Romans, Galatians, and the whole apologetic of the book of Hebrews.

So I've thought about this, of what standard of evidence. And you would have to take away the clear evidences already established that tell us that our justification before God is where he can see, not man, which is at the heart.

That's by faith. And like I said, those passages would have to be taken out.

I don't have the presuppositions that my interlocutor has that has to reinterpret what faith into really being faithfulness.

Well, what do I say in light of, I don't mean that. Well, if you are somebody that is just not tuning in or just recently subscribed to the

Apologetic Dog, I just wanna encourage you that if you've benefited this content, from this content in any way, please like and share this content.

This really helps my ministry. And if you haven't already subscribed, even if you disagree with me, maybe you find some of this content provoking, like really challenging what you've been raised,

I wanna encourage you to follow along the ministry because I don't wanna pretend like I know it all, but I know the one who does know all things.

And so we can at least sharpen one another. I know me and Jake in the side chat, we very much disagree, but hopefully at the end of it,

Jake was able to see that we do have a love and compassion for people that we disagree with.

Yes, we will debate over gospel issues, and I will turn around and say I appreciate Jake, you and your dad coming to Jonesboro, Arkansas at 12 -5 to stand firmly on your convictions.

And you remember even in our conversations, you know, we were laughing jokes over certain things, but even in those cordial conversations, we made it known like this is still gospel -like.

We didn't want y 'all to walk away thinking, well, they'll talk nice to us, to our face, but then they'll bad mouth us when they leave.

Our prayer is that God would change the heart of stone, the one that is trusting in your own righteous works of obedience, and give you a heart of faith, grant you repentance, grant you faith to see that Jesus Christ, His work alone is the only thing that can justify you before God.

And so when Jake asked me this question, I think I was asked this question in one of my last debates with Baptismal Regeneration, and the gentleman asked me, what standard of evidence?

And I'm like, well, you show me where your faith plus your works, and I gave this big laundry list of reasons of baptism would have to say that.

And he goes, well, not even faith says that in the scripture. And I'm like, oh, actually it does. And the more

I thought about it, I was just like, you know, what I love is scripture is super clear. We are justified by faith apart from our works, our accomplishments, you can't add the works of the

Old Testament law, and when you add your working participation in a ceremony and think that that justifies you, in principle, you are going back to the old covenant that could never save.

And I want to gently remind my Presbyterians that it's the new covenant, that is the covenant of grace that saves to the uttermost, that is why.

In the old covenant, it's the ministry of death. The law given at Sinai was not a different administration of the covenant of grace, this was a covenant of works that crushes and kills and only shows the

Old Testament saints, the Old Testament people that they need a perfect savior to fulfill the law in its entirety.

So last question comes from the audience Q &A at the debate, check it out.

On the surface, it just seems like the viewpoint that you're coming from eliminates a lot of the possibility to come to Christ in your dying moments.

The reason why I wanted to bring this out before I get to some audience questions is because this is one of those practical things that people just learning about the

Church of Christ kind of see straight through what's being said is if your justification, your right standing before God, if that is contingent on you being baptized by another person, well think about the countless people that never get that opportunity.

Now I've had hard right wing Church of Christ saying, well that's on them, they shouldn't have disobeyed the gospel their whole life until a moment where there's no water to remit and wash away their past sins.

And you know that should break people's hearts, realizing that God isn't going to withhold an opportunity to be saved for someone who is repentant and wants to be obedient to all that God has commanded.

That's why the thief on the cross is a wonderful example of someone who is saved.

Because he looked at Jesus Christ, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords and said, remember me in paradise.

He can save them because that is an expression of a heart of faith. And Jesus can say, you'll be with me in paradise.

You'll be there. Not because of anything that you did, because hypothetically he was baptized by John the

Baptist. There are even some wacky Roman Catholics that say, well maybe there was a pool of water before going through the gates into heaven where he could be baptized.

Like to me that's the same level of absurdity of trying to say the paralytic wasn't mute and so he would have been saying, yes take me.

Don't bring me somewhere where I don't want to go. It's like look, you have to totally abuse the context and read your own theology into something that is clearly not being taught there.

And so I believe Mike and Jake's position is saying, well if somebody wanted to be baptized and they couldn't,

God understands. Well for me that's the biggest cop out of all time. That's not an exception that proves the rule.

That's an exception because you know that this real life practical case undoes your entire theology.

Now I will say, Mike Hysall did educate me on something. A couple of things and I'm really appreciative of that.

Number one, I did not realize that the writers that contributed to BDAG were

Lutheran. And to me when I heard him say that I'm like, oh well you just outed yourself. You actually handed me the rope to your position to say all right, good luck accounting for that because you're gonna disagree with Lutheran theology at some point.

And so to me that was very insightful. I'm gonna go look more into that because so many people will appeal to BDAG as though they are infallible men.

They won't say they are. And so you gotta be able to back it up with something that you actually will disagree with BDAG's functional usage of definitions in a particular context.

You know with the Church of Christ that's easy to do because obviously when they define the word baptize as plunge or dip, the

Lutheran thinks that that means sprinkle. And I will say to infants, they are not contributing their works in baptism.

An infant is truly passive. They're just wrong because the new covenant sign in baptism is meant to be applied to believers, not infants that cannot repent or confess

Jesus as Lord. And so the other thing that Mike encouraged me to think about, and I actually thanked him on the phone for this because I really appreciate it.

He said the Church of Christ kind of have four major sects. Okay, so forgive me if this isn't left or right where y 'all can see it, but the hard right wing are those

Church of Christ that deny the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. It's as you read the words of scripture that's inspired by the

Holy Spirit. You're only filled with the Spirit as you have the words of scripture in your mind, but they will deny an ontological and literal indwelling of the

Holy Spirit. I'm like, great, you have anathematized yourself because you have to actually have the indwelling of the

Holy Spirit to be a child of God. And so Mike is not a hard right leaning

Church of Christ that denies that Jesus will return and restore heaven on earth. He just says,

Jeremiah, I am right leaning moderate. So I'm not a hard right view, but I'm right leaning.

And all I gather from that is they would say, well, if you're a Baptist, then you're not really saved.

You have to believe that God saves in some way in the actual water itself.

And so as much as I respect Mike Hysall being distinguished from Travis Thomas who is a hard right wing

COC proponent that's gonna dogmatically quote Mark 16, 16 as being inspired, even though it's not in our early manuscript traditions, or the gentleman that I debated two years ago at ASU brought

Ken to a hard right leaning right wing Church of Christ.

If you don't go into the water, then you can't have your sins forgiven. I would actually say the hard right wing, they are being more consistent with their baptismal formula of salvation because at least they're willing to own the hard, incredibly hard truth that those people on their deathbed, if they can't get fully immersed, then they disobeyed the gospel.

Now to me, that's a complete distortion of the gospel, but at least they're being consistent. As where Mike and Jake are just gonna say, oh, it doesn't matter there.

That's an exception. And if you're gonna allow exceptions to salvation like that, then I can play that game too.

If you were to ask me a hard question, I'm saying, oh, it's just an exception. Acts 2 .38, that's an exception because it's in the book of Acts with Jews.

It's not talking directly to Gentiles, so exception. So you can't have an exception when it comes to salvation.

You gotta look for the position that is consistent. All right, I would like to address some of y 'all's statements.

Ah, okay. Orange Okie, can you please tell me what statement did

I make that was untrue? So I'll give you a second to tell me.

Let me see if I can go back up in here. Like I said, if you have any questions, I do not mind to answer those.

We're at an hour and 20 minutes, so I might wanna do this for another 10 minutes or so, but if you wanna ask sincere questions, don't add snark in there because I'm probably not gonna put it up there.

If you wanna genuinely know my perspective on something that was brought up in the debate or wasn't brought up in the debate, but you're just curious more of the

Reformed perspective, I definitely do not mind to do that. So, all right,

Jake, I don't know if there's any snark in here, but I'm gonna go ahead and just read it as is. Jake Hustle says, do you plan on familiarizing yourself with mainline

Church of Christ scholarship? Also, Trey's point in the last video, Dr. Jake wrote a systematic theology.

You have some of my contact info, if you don't mind, Jake. Send me that systematic theology. I'm actually really curious.

And to your question, yes. Now, this is where I'm a little confused on what the mainline

Church of Christ scholarship is because as your dad informed me, and I appreciate this, is there's four sects to the

Church of Christ, and so I don't know what is more mainline, if it's the hard right wing or if it's the right -leaning moderate position that your dad told me that his was.

Now, maybe it's hard to know exactly what's the most popular position between those two, but I am totally willing to change a little bit how

I talk about the Church of Christ if the moderate right -leaning position is the majority. I still think at the end of the day, it's outside of orthodoxy because in my opinion, the

Church of Christ, no matter what four groups you have, they all believe that it's necessary to be baptized in water to have your past sins forgiven.

So I just want everybody to know that's the core of what I believe misses the gospel altogether, but if there are legitimate disagreements within the

Church of Christ world, like one cup versus many cups during the Lord's Supper, if the difference is if the

Holy Spirit indwells believers only as you read the words of Scripture or, Jake, to your position and your dad's position, y 'all would affirm that the

Holy Spirit has to actually indwell believers. I'm over here saying, okay, those are legitimate disagreements that I wanna be charitable on not just overgeneralizing that all the

COC believe the same thing because to your dad's credit, appreciate him appealing to church history and scholarship like BDAG, as where I've interacted here in Jonesboro, Arkansas with the

Church of Christ that just says, the Bible speaks where the Bible, we speak where the Bible speaks, the

Bible means what it means and it says what it says, and basically no creed but Christ.

And so I wanna honor the right moderate leaning view that says, no, this does come out of a restoration movement in the early 1800s, we're not gonna shy away from church history and we're gonna own the things that have influenced our theology over time and then maybe build your case from there.

So I'm definitely wanna be charitable in learning those things. And so I do wanna thank you, Jake, and your dad from pointing out, hey, we're not like the

Travis Thomases of the world. I appreciate your dad saying, hey, I actually don't think

Mark 16, 16 is inspired, even though it says whoever believes and is baptized will be saved.

Your dad says, nope, it's not an early manuscript, it is not a verse that I would hold to as being inspired.

Hope that helps. Thank you, Jake. You said, no snark, truly interested. And the same with me is, send me that systematic theology book on Facebook Messenger.

I'd like to look into that. Like I said, I'm very interested in those things too. So in the last few minutes here,

I'm answering questions for people in the side chat. So if you have any, please let me know. I was trying to find

Dusty Rhodes. I love your name, by the way. Fun fact, I used to play a video game where you could name your own character and I named my character

Rusty Bags. And so your name reminds me of that. Okay, question.

How do Calvinists view miracles in the modern age? Never heard much on the

Reformed mind on it. Great question. This just kind of steps into the world of cessationism versus continuationism.

I would say Calvinist, Reformed. Historically, the Reformed have understood sola scriptura to such an extent of saying

God's written word is the sole infallible rule of faith. And so the

Reformed historically have said, we're not really looking to the ongoing sign gifts of the

Holy Spirit that we read about in the Charismata of 1 Corinthians chapter 12. And that's where I'm at.

I would be cessationist leaning. I think a radical cessationist view would actually deny that the

Holy Spirit ontologically indwells believers. And so now, instead of saying all of the church of Christ deny the actual indwelling of the

Holy Spirit to Mike and Jake's delight, I'm gonna say the radical right -wing church of Christ are the radical cessationists that would not only deny the miraculous gifts of the

Spirit, but the miraculous indwelling of the Holy Spirit also. But I will say, to me, this is not a salvation issue.

I know many Reformed people, even Gavin Ortland on YouTube, Truth Unites, I think he is a continuationist.

And Sam Storms is a continuationist that is Reformed. And John Piper, they see the ongoing gifts of the

Spirit for today. I do not, but that is not a heel to die on. I do encourage people to study that issue because there's something at stake for where you land on that position.

If you're holding to the right gospel, which is by grace alone through faith alone, meaning apart from works, if the gifts of the

Holy Spirit are for today, then think about it. If you're a cessationist, then you're missing out on some level of intimacy with God, by definition.

But if the cessationists are right, and people are trying to interact with a spirit,

I would argue that you are in danger of interacting not with the Holy Spirit in that way, but demonic spirits.

And so there is something to be gained or lost by your view of the signed gifts, if it's for today or not.

Like I said, I don't see that as being a salvation issue, but it is a very important issue, because that also affects your church polity.

If the gifts are for today, then 1 Corinthians 14 would tell us exactly how tongues are supposed to be met in the church service.

Well, for a cessationist, the way that you interpret 1 Corinthians 14 and applied those principles for today would look different than the cessationist.

Hope that helps. Good question. Appreciate the question. Without the snark, even though I get a little snarky from time to time,

I want to answer sincere questions. I really thought that Shane Fisher had a question.

And so I don't know if he's still in the chat, but let me look from earlier. Let's see here.

I think I may have to frame this in terms of question. Shane Fisher says, I'm still surprised that you won't answer

Acts chapter 10, Peter's sermon above, because it destroys your false system.

Well, I appreciate the zeal there, my guy. So I'm gonna try to guess what he was trying to say that comes out of Acts 10.

I've read Acts 10 many times. I'm not sure how this contradicts my system. But you gotta think, for the church of Christ, you have to try to find something that mentions obey, but that really means your works of obedience.

That's not a human work, that's somehow a work of God. So like I said, I'm not sure exactly what he was talking about here in the sermon that Peter gave at Cornelius' household, but I'm gonna try to guess.

Let's see here. Okay, so this is where the good news of the gospel is preached to the

Gentiles. If I had to guess, it's gonna be, truly, I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation, anyone who fears

God and does, Jeremiah, circle that in all caps, and does what is right is acceptable to him.

And so, Shane, if you're out there, tell me if there's a different part that you were addressing here. But this changes nothing.

So what is acceptable in the eyes of God that you must do? This is one of those,

I would say, the just shall live by faith. Abraham believed God and it was accounted as righteousness.

So what can you, quote unquote, do that's acceptable to God? Trust in his promises.

And if you say, well, you must do that, I get how that is a command that you must respond to, but man is dead in his sins and trespasses.

And so in order to positively respond to that command, not by your works, but internally, must be a work of the

Holy Spirit. And so I do not think that this means that you must do your works in order to be made right with God.

But for anyone who fears God, reveres him from the heart, and does by faith what is right to him.

So even Abraham, what believed God was justified. Habakkuk 2 .4

says, the justified by faith then live out their faith in their works.

They live out their faith in sanctification. That has never changed from Old Testament to New Testament.

The thing that I would go deeper on in my explanation is that the new covenant has always been the covenant of grace that is saved to the uttermost.

The new covenant is what saved Old Testament saints. It wasn't the old covenant.

It was the promise of the new covenant. So like I said, Shane, don't know if that was the exact verse, but it was enough sauce to get me going a little bit.

Let's see here. I will begin to wrap this up if, okay, so Shane did,

Shane did talk. Oh no, Jake, don't do the hashtag bell geek, man.

Don't get me started on that. So Shane, tell me real fast.

Okay, you included verse 43. Let me see that. Oh, well, verse 43 is us proving our case.

To him, all the prophets bear witness that everyone who is baptized, oh, sorry,

I misread that, who believes in Christ, the promised Savior, receives forgiveness of sins through his name.

Yep, not gonna give you that one, Shane. So yeah,

I think I did read the verses that you wanted me to touch on. It's not by your works. The gospel of grace is so beautiful because it's not adding your own works, which definitionally mean your merit and trying to put

God in debt. Not just the old covenant paradigm. I mean, those were the best works possible because the works of the law are holy, righteous, and good, but you fall short of that standard.

And so there is a law of Christ and it's love, and we cannot love like Christ loved.

Now, if you've been regenerated and you've been justified, then you can, by the

Spirit's work in you, love like Christ loved. And that's still not with a perfect love because we still have our fallen flesh.

So that's maybe a different sermon. I was going to, what's up, brother? Federal theology in the house.

Shane, if you wanna ask another question about 1 Corinthians 6 .11, remind me,

I didn't avoid it last time, but just re -ask that question before I wrap up here, and if you do that here soon,

I will try to address it. So going once, going twice, if there's anybody else that has any last questions in the chat.

Just wanna thank you all for your support with the Apologetic Dog ministry. And I have to remind you throughout the episode, if you've liked this content in any way, please like, please subscribe, and please share this content because it really does help the ministry.

I would love one day to be able to do apologetics full -time. Now my heart first is a pastor, a 12 -5 church, so I'd love to spend my days and efforts discipling and attending to the flock with 12 -5, but they just turn around and say,

Jeremiah, but we want you to do apologetics and benefit the other saints. And so I did not get a question in the side chat.

Oh, oh, oh, I got it. Thank you, Shane. Okay, so this'll probably be my last question unless I see a juicy one in the side chat.

This is a question. Can you give a brief exegesis to 1 Corinthians 6 .11?

How does this prove or disprove a high solace position? Really good question, Shane. Appreciate the sincerity and not the snark.

But I'm not scared of a little snark. Let me pull this up real fast. 1 Corinthians chapter six.

And Shane, I will say, I believe you've asked me this before. My answer's not different. That's okay.

Okay, so this verse, just on its own, says, and such were some of you, but you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the

Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. So I've been asked, Jeremiah, if this is talking about baptism, a ceremonial rite in water, does this undermine your position?

And I would say no. If you remember in my opening statement with Mike Hysol, I think

I could hypothetically grant all the baptismal verses that have the word lutron or the core of that word, whether it be in Titus 3 .5.

Obviously, I believe Acts 22 .16 is talking about baptism in water and it does mention the word washed there.

And so even if I granted washed means the ceremony of baptism, do y 'all remember my fundamental point is baptism signifies these eternal realities.

It signifies the relationship with God. It signifies the forgiveness of sins. And so if I were to grant that this was baptism,

I would say, great, we cannot confuse the map for the place. I've talked with Gavin James a number of times and we're familiar with the word metonymy.

This just means that you can substitute the sign for the actual thing. And no one is confused about that.

I usually have a picture of my family and I brought this up in my opening statement. If I hold up a picture, how about this?

If I hold a picture up of the apologetic puppy, no one is confused with what

I mean when I say this is my son, right? This is my son that the

Lord has blessed me with and we adopted baby JJ the day he was born. Incredible. But the point is, is my phone is not actually my son.

And so anytime you wanna read a verse that just says you're to be baptized or washed and you think it absolutely must mean the baptismal ceremony, great.

Don't confuse the map for the place. Don't confuse the representation for the reality.

And so that's number one. This does nothing to my theology if I believe this is talking about the washing ceremony that Jeremiah B.

Dagg says that even in the book of Sirach, this means a ceremonial washing. I've never denied that.

I know Jake a few times said, Jeremiah, you just missed my dad's argument. I understood his argument. I get that B.

Dagg with the Lutheran bias is saying Titus 3 .5 is talking about a ceremonial bath.

I'm allowed to challenge that based on the context of Titus chapter three. The definition that I think

B. Dagg does a great job with Lutheran is saying it's a kind of bath.

But when you're talking about a bath in the Holy Spirit, I'm saying ding, ding, ding, this is the new covenant. This is a ceremony done without hands.

And obviously, probably don't have time to go to Colossians 2, but you know I'd love to. Colossians 2 talks about how there is a circumcision of Christ that brings about the powerful working of God.

Now I believe the ceremonial washings these Jewish converts would be understanding, oh man, he's speaking our language.

We have been washed in a ceremony already, but there is a powerful working of God that does not involve a ceremony done with hands.

Not like the Old Testament, and not like the sign in the new covenant. The seal of the new covenant is the baptism of the

Holy Spirit, namely, a believer's regeneration. And that's why you can't lose your salvation.

That's why we're gonna always continue to have these debates is because when you have a man -centered salvation,

I'm sorry if that's offensive, but you're gonna look at it as, well, I chose to obey and believe, therefore,

I can choose to walk away and disobey if I really want to. From the reform perspective, we're saying, well, that fundamental understanding of man is necessarily going to contradict

God in his necessary attributes. And so God is sovereign. God has purpose in everything that comes about in his world.

And so that's why the golden chain of redemption talks about those whom he predestined are those whom he called, those whom he called he justified, and those whom he justified he glorified.

They're all in the past tense because the work that God begins, he sees it to completion at the day of Christ Jesus.

So I got another like out there. Appreciate you. We gotta counteract all those thumb down that we get, but it's all good.

What's the saying? There's no such thing as bad publicity because bad publicity is still good, right?

It's still working, the algorithm, and I appreciate that. I appreciate everybody tuning in. I don't see any more questions in the side chat.

Well, I plan on doing more episodes in the future. And so you'll have to just tune in.

I don't get to always advertise them like I would like to, but thank you all for tuning in.

And once again, one last time, if you've benefited from this ministry in any way, please like, subscribe, and share this content.

Until next time, here's some Grandma's Church. So again, one body, which is the body, his body, which is his church, the

Church of Christ. I mean, man, if you just had some little bit of common sense, you think he drove by these denominations where it says

Grandma's Church, Baptist Church, Methodist Church, Life Church. I mean, he drove an hour and 20 minutes here, and they act like they give

God the glory in Jesus. I mean, Grandma's Church, Baptist Church, Presbyterian Church, Church of Christ.

Same thing again, they deny redemption. Man, if you just had some little bit of common sense.