Dr. James White on Dead Men Walking Podcast: Restoring Culture, Having Fun, Newsy News, & Fresh 10

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Exploring theology, doctrine, and all of the fascinating subjects in between, broadcasting from an undisclosed location,

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Dead Men Walking starts now. Oh, well, hello everyone.

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Welcome back to another episode of Dead Men Walking podcast. I'm your host Greg. Jason cannot be with us today, but he's with us in spirit.

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Thank you so much for visiting dmwpodcast .com where you can find out more about the show, visit our snarky merch site, and maybe support the show.

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We thank you for coming along, and the constructive criticism that we get, some of it constructive, some of it just criticism, but either way we absolutely love it.

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So let's get right into it, because usually I'll talk a little bit, say a few things, but I want to get right into it because we have a guest, and I know

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I say this every week, we're excited about our guests, but this one really is because we've talked about him for a long time, two and a half years on the podcast, and he's finally here.

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I don't have a written out bio because I just, I can't, or I don't even have a bio because I can't even remember all the things that this gentleman has done, so he's going to introduce himself.

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How about that? Probably our favorite guest so far on the podcast, and I don't even rightly introduce him, it's

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Dr. James White. How are you, sir? You can't call me your favorite guest when you've had

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Doug Wilson on, first of all, and I haven't said anything yet, so I could fall asleep,

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I could start speaking in tongues and completely destroy your theology, I mean, there's just all sorts of stuff that could happen, you never know.

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Well, I say favorite because you're one of those that have touched and marked my life as well as my co -host who isn't here through your books, through your debates, so it's one of those things to where whether I speak to you or not, know that the

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Lord has used you in my life, and I absolutely love it. I will tell my story to you very quickly after you give us a bio or before you give us a bio here.

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And I was raised in a very fundamentalist church for the first seven or eight years of my life, and then the between seven and 16, very, very

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Bethel Pentecostal, so I got two extremes, ran from the Lord and at 22 years old, the

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Lord absolutely saved me. I said the sinner's prayer at seven, I was saved at 23, started to read and get into the

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Bible and got hooked on this newsletter. It was a physical newsletter coming to my house from a gentleman named

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Dave Hunt of the Berean Call, and I went, oh, this guy really argues logic, and he seems to know what he's talking about, and I'm wrestling with some of the traditions

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I was taught growing up, and it seems like he explained them. Well, about a year into this, in his newsletter, he says, hey, you guys need to go check out this new book that I did with this guy named

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James White. It's called Debating Calvinism, and I said, oh, I don't know who this James White guy is, but Dave is going to wipe the floor with this guy.

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I was so happy to get this book. I go, I'm going to read through this and go, Dave, and about halfway through it, I went, wait a minute, this

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James White fellow is making a biblical argument, the same things I've been wrestling with, and from there

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I tell people I was a closeted Calvinist for about eight years because, yeah, about eight years, well,

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I didn't want to admit it because I grew up saying, you know, those people are kind of strange, they're weird, they have some things about election and the sovereignty of God, and took a long time to unwrap those traditions, but by far,

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Potter's Freedom, Debating Calvinism, I mean, your debates online, I remember my mid -twenties just staying up till two o 'clock in the morning watching those debates, learning, soaking it up.

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Obviously, it was all based on the Word of God and studying that, but you aiding in that was huge, so what an honor it is to have you here, and officially,

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I think, my favorite guest. Well, you know, it's funny, when

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I had Dave on, I actually interviewed him on a local radio station, he calls it a debate, it wasn't a debate,

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I was interviewing him for, I was taking Marty Minto's place, actually, and that's where the

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James I Have No Traditions thing took place and all that kind of stuff, and I had friends tell me, when the book idea came up,

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Debating Calvinism, they said, if you do that, he'll never debate you, because even when the book came out,

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I think that was Multnomah, if I recall correctly, because that was his publisher, they tried to, you know, when you have a book come out, they do publicity and stuff like that, and like when

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Letters to a Mormon Elder came out, Bethany House had me on just all sorts of radio programs and stuff like that. Anyway, Dave would not do any programs with me, and the one exception, however they'd been arranged, they hadn't told him

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I was going to be on, and he was angry that I was on the air with him, so it was,

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I had been told the truth, if I did the book, he would never, ever, ever interact with me, and he never, ever did.

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I could tell you a really fun story about meeting

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Dave at the studios, at the offices of Grace to You, a few years later, but I probably shouldn't go into that right now, it's not really our topic, but anyway,

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I'm glad those books were helpful to you, I'm not sure how you're a closeted Calvinist for eight years, you'd have to be really, really careful about that, but I'm glad.

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Well, I didn't come out and say it openly, but I believe those things, I knew they were biblical, and it was, honestly, studying between you and R .C.

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Sproul, and his writings were probably the two most impactful of unpacking those big weighty subjects in a way that a meathead like I can understand, so I do appreciate that, and I'm sure you've been told that many times, so we won't linger on that too much,

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I will say, in that book though, he didn't, in most debates that you have, and we'll get into this a little bit, they don't really ever refute the exact point you're making, or they gloss over, here,

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I need to ask you this, refute this, or what do you mean by that, and it was a lot of that in that book, which I was very disappointed in, but we're not going to dwell on something that's, you know, whatever, 20 years old now, almost, at the top of the hour, we always do some newsy news, would you like to do a little newsy news with us?

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Up to you. All right, here we go, let's, yeah, let's go, here we go. The newsy, newsy news, the news, the news, the newsy, newsy news, news, we got some news!

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Oh, yes, our Tom Askell approved newsy news, you should have seen the face he gave us when we played that for him, but we like to take learned men and bring them down to our level, that's what we like to do, so, right out of the headlines here,

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Governor Abbott dropped off illegal immigrants in front of the VP's house the last couple days, this seems to be something that DeSantis and Governor Abbott are doing, what do you think,

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Dr. White, is this something that we should be doing, should we be taking the illegal immigrants and saying, hey, your policies started this, here, deal with them, is it the

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Christian thing to do? Well, the problem is, constitutionally, the regime has abandoned its responsibilities, you talk about impeachable offenses, refusing to close the border, allowing millions of invaders into the country, that's what it is,

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I'm sorry, this isn't about justice, it's about the definition of a nation, and so, yeah, if they're going to install these policies that are basically going to be flooding my state,

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Texas, New Mexico, California, with people we don't know where they came from, we have no way of tracking them, and yet they're filling our, you know,

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I can't even do my long distance bike rides anymore, from my house, because it's no longer safe,

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I used to be able to ride at the Arizona Canal, for like 70 miles, without any problems, all the underpasses are now filled with homeless people, drug addicts, needles everywhere, my entire city has been completely transformed in five years, and so, that's a clear violation of the law, that they swore to uphold, so, hey, whatever, you know, my understanding is, those people have to agree to go to those places, and they want to go to those places, so, fine, let them go.

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I think the biggest issue here, is you have those, air quotes, compassionate liberals, that are needing to put their money where their mouth is, in those policies, and they don't seem to like it, when they have to follow through, on their utopian plans, that's kind of what

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I get from that, second story, very quickly, Trump's tax returns are going to be released, out of the house,

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I think this week sometime, not just Trump, but any politician, should they be required to show their private tax returns,

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Democrat, Republican, who cares what it is, what's your stance on that, do you think we should have to, should people have to see my tax returns, as a locally elected official?

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I don't know, this only seems to go one direction, I don't expect to see

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Nancy Pelosi's tax returns, or anybody else like that, so, I, it would be nice, if we actually enforced laws, concerning influence peddling, and things like that, but, we're so far past all that anymore, it's so obvious to me, that China owns most of the people in charge of our country anyways, that, you know, this 1 .7

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trillion dollar thing, that got illegally, unconstitutionally passed, without a quorum in the house, just a few days ago, and nobody cares, it's just sort of like, you know, whatever, you and I both know, that's never going to be paid off, and, that means defaults coming, and when default comes, oh my slice of bread is going to cost you 25 bucks, so,

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I don't know, we, we just, you sort of wonder, with the stuff that came out about the

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JFK assassination, and everything else, you just sit back and go, is anything the way

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I actually thought it was, and of course, I'm a bit older than you are, so, I go back to a time when you, you really did trust the

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United States government, and probably didn't have any reason to do so, back then either, so,

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I don't know. Yeah, on a personal note, even me at 41, I feel like I've just seen the same cycle of, even with government, or even in culture, and you just start to see these patterns of, oh, how do

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I say it, of evilness, and then progression, and then, you know, you can almost predict and go, okay,

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I can see what's coming, just because of what I've lived through, and unfortunately, in this country, we're in such a youth culture, we don't honor those who have the, you know, the most valuable thing under their belt, the most of it, which is time, we toss older people and elders to the side, say, your, your ideas aren't important, we're a youth culture, do you see that as well, just, you've lived through a certain amount, you go, geez,

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I can almost predict what's, what's gonna happen, and how this is gonna go. Well, let's be honest, the, the elderly people in politics, they, you know, you look at all the clips of Biden saying the exact opposite of what he says now.

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So it's not that there's, there's wisdom there, it's that these people just, just float with the wind, they do whatever, whatever the culture wants them to do.

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And the problem today is how many older people don't stick with their convictions.

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I mean, look at, look at the polls on gay marriage, for example. It's astonishing, they say 73%, or something like that, of American citizens today, think this is fine and wonderful.

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And when you really start talking with somebody about it, it's all, it's all pure emotion. And it's, it's the same with everybody.

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It's one thing for the kids to be pure emotion. But you would think that people my age would recognize that there are, are, you know, important things that can't, you move, you move that stone, the whole place falls over.

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And no one, again, seems to care too much about that right now. Yeah. All right.

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Last one, as a real estate broker, this interested me, it said record numbers of Christians or, or self -identifying

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Christians moving from liberal states to conservative ones, almost 30 % more in the last five years than year over year before that.

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How do we feel about that? Should we just go whole up in a conservative state and kind of build a little kingdom there?

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Or should we be in the cities and be in the democratic states and, uh, try to change within,

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I know there's a big debate even within, um, Christianity in general. What do you think? Yeah, I, um,

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I don't know. We, uh, I live in one of the most corrupt, uh, counties in America, Maricopa County, where I can guarantee my votes worthless.

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Um, where we, we know, you know, I, I knew in 2020 what had happened here.

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There wasn't any question about what had happened here in, in, uh, 2020. Um, and now it's happened again, right in front of our eyes.

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Everybody was watching it and they still pulled it off. Um, so I don't, part of me goes, you know, this state's going, going blue.

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It's sort of purple right now, but it's going blue. And I, you know,

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I don't even drive and I don't even go to California anymore. So have I thought about where I need to go?

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Yeah, I have. Uh, do I want to do that? Gracious sakes? No. Um, but I don't know.

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Will there, will it get to a point where, um, the, the, the tyranny is just too strong to, to survive.

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And, uh, yeah, it could definitely get to that point. Um, the governor we've got coming in,

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I know she's not a valid, she's not the valid governor. She didn't really win, but she's a vacuous cowardly, whatever

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I'm told to do by the higher powers type of person. And so they're going to be locking us down the next time there's anything that even looks like a, a sniffle out there.

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Like, I don't know what, so I don't know. I don't know. It's, um, these are all questions that we're all struggling with.

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There's no two ways about it. Well, uh, thank God we still have that personal liberty is guaranteed in the constitution to the freedom of travel.

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Uh, we saw that taken away for a little bit in 2020. Uh, but you know, people vote with their feet, uh, here in Michigan where we're from.

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Uh, we lost, uh, two congressional seats. People took off to, uh, Texas and Florida because of what our governor did here.

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So absolutely. Um, those things have consequences. I would say on a side note, as we round out newsy news, um,

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I do personally appreciate you over the last probably three to four years, seeing you being much more vocal on, um, not only theological issues we, we know in doctrinal issues and debate issues, but even on political and policy issues,

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I think that's, uh, with someone like you who has such a large following and people who respect your opinion to see you, um, talk about those things because unfortunately, uh, policy is intertwined a lot with, uh, uh, not only citizens, but people who are

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Christians here in the country. So appreciate that. Well, I, I certainly we've seen a major change.

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Um, with, you know, the nation has changed so much over just the past 10 years.

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And much of that change has been directly related to the shift in worldview and the abandonment of the impetus, the momentum of a

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Christian consensus into a secular consensus. And so we, we can't avoid those things.

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I was raised certainly in the context where you, you never talked politics in the pulpit.

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You never address that kind of stuff. That was, that was way, way, way, way too controversial to do anything like that.

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But besides back then, the difference between a Republican and Democrat, um, was not well today, it's about back to the same thing.

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I'm not sure as much of a difference either, but, um, but for different reasons. And there was still, um, such a, a consensus in regards to what was foundationally required or a president or something like that.

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But now so much, I mean, look, we're, we're dealing with, and this is sort of what our topic is anyways.

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Um, yeah, let's go into it. We're dealing with the, uh, um,

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Senate, uh, putting into law only a few weeks ago.

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Um, the direct repudiation of the foundational view of man and woman that had given any meaning to our legal system to begin with.

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This was more than a Burgerfell. We all know it's more than a Burgerfell. This is, this is going to be the foundation for, um, silencing

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Christian schools and Christian education and going after churches and, and everything else.

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And anybody who, everybody who doesn't see that just, I don't know what, what they're, what they're doing with their time, but they're, they're not using it to think exactly what it was all about.

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And so the pressures that are coming against, um, my grandchildren.

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Okay. My, uh, my oldest granddaughter is just turned 13. So, um, you know, we've got a teenager now, scary, scary, scary.

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And, uh, she's going to be facing societal educational employment pressures.

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Um, that I certainly didn't have as, as, as a kid, her parents didn't have as a kid, um, to where they're going to have to be making decisions and being willing to sacrifice tremendously as far as ability to earn money, where they can live, what they can do, uh, based upon whether they're going to stand firm on their convictions or whether they're not.

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And so the, the, the time for, uh, calling that kind of stuff too controversial is long, long past.

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It is, it is now staring us in the face and therefore these are theological issues.

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I think certainly over the past couple of years, it is interesting. I, I moved to Apologia church in 2018 and anybody that knows

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Apologia knows that that's the home of end abortion. Now, um, Jeff Durbin has been very, very well known for his bold stands, uh, for quite some time.

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And so there was, that was probably part of my evolution there as well.

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But there's also, uh, in that context, an eschatological, um, foundation for looking to the future, which was not something

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I was raised with. I was, I was raised with a very, very strong, you don't worry about the future.

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There was almost never any discussion of, uh, my having grandchildren or great -grandchildren or anything like that at all.

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That was, that was just not a part of, of what you, what you thought about. And so that has changed a lot of things to be thinking forwardly, to be thinking, um, building now, even in the midst of tremendous opposition and, uh, in essence, communicating forward the faith to future generations and giving them that foundation to stand against the tremendous pressures that they're, they're, they're going to be facing that, that changes everything as well.

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And, um, uh, I wish there's, there's a lot of things I look back on and go, man,

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I, you know, I would have had more kids if I had been at a, at a place like Apologia, um, rather than, rather than raised the way that I was.

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Um, I sit back and somehow my mom, especially communicated to me that once you had a boy and a girl, you were done.

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That was, that was it. I don't know where that came from, but when it's, when you hear it over and over and over again, uh, in your youth, it just becomes a part of, and it, the churches we are in never addressed issues like that at all.

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And so I, you know, that's what we had. And now I, I wish I had done things differently.

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Um, but thankfully, you know, I was just watching a video of one of our church, uh, one of our families in our church and Apologia is known for having lots of kids.

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I don't know what the average number is. It's at least five. We have at least two or three families of 10.

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Um, and I was watching those kids, uh, performing. They, they, they, they did, they did a

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Christmas thing on four different pianos together and they're doing the 12 days of Christmas.

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And I'm just watching these, these kids and they're, they're just, they're just fantastic.

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So at least I can sort of enjoy that, you know, um, in that context.

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Um, and I've got five grandkids, so, you know, we'll, we'll, we'll be able to do something fun with the, with five eventually too.

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So, but yeah, it, it, it does change how you approach everything in, in society.

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And I'm not one of those people. I don't know what the future holds. I don't know if there's going to be a, if there's going to be a great revival.

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I don't know if, if, if it is God's intention to just make

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Western culture a memorial for the rest of time, for what happens when you abandon the gifts of God that he's given to you in the goodness of his law.

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It may be, maybe we're just going to have to be leveled to the ground for the people who come after to go there.

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That's what happens. We'll never do it again. Right. Secularism brings this look at the madness they had.

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Oh my goodness. The video that popped up yesterday on Twitter of some dude pretending to have cramps.

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Yes. Oh my goodness. Yeah. This, this is not even physically possible, but yes.

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Yeah. You don't, I don't even know what to say, but, but I can certainly see how 70 years from now that's in a museum someplace as one of the clearest examples of the utter insanity that infected

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Western culture because Western culture had the light and said, we hate the light.

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And we're going to sit, we're going to, we're going to bury it under the largest amount of, of insanity and rebellion we can possibly come up with.

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Do you feel this is kind of off subject, but you brought this up and so many questions I could ask here, but I'm just curious, do you feel, because I was brought up this way in the, in the eighties, uh, in church, the overwhelming popularity of this kind of rapture hatch pre -mill eschatology that really invaded in the seventies, eighties, and through the nineties of,

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Hey man, let's just hunker down and he'll take us out of here. Are, is that a little bit to blame of where we are now to look at?

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We know men, man is depraved. We know they seek their own pleasures, but I feel like the church really missed, you know, me growing up, it was more important not to listen to, uh, you know, uh, queen or AC DC than it was to actually go and, uh, preach the gospel to people.

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Um, so it's like this because, Hey, Jesus is coming anytime and we're up and out of here. Leave these fools behind, you know, uh, when in fact,

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I would definitely agree on the AC DC part, but, um, but the, uh, you know, when

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I, when I was a kid, it was, don't listen to John Denver, if you can believe that. Um, uh, but no.

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Eschatology is a part of theology as a whole, and it very often reflects, um, how we view the church's purpose in the world.

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And so I was raised very strongly dispensational pre -millennial. And, um, so my earliest memories are of books, uh, about, um, uh, the fig tree in, in Matthew 24.

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And so that's 1948 and that's the nation of Israel. And so you've, you've only got 40 years from 1948.

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And so, um, I remember we came out of our Southern Baptist church one time and somebody had hit the parking lot and had put these booklets on every windshield, um, 88 reasons why the rapture is going to be in 1988.

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And as a nice ring to it. Well, it was convenient. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and I couldn't argue with it too much because, uh, in,

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I remember in 1980 being at a lock -in, uh, late at night at our church.

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And back then I had a tritium watch. I don't know if you've ever seen a tritium watch, but yes. Yes. And they, they glow all the time.

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And once your eyes are accustomed to dark, they're very bright. And I was literally using it to read the page.

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It was that bright in my little handheld. I couldn't even read it today. Um, new

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Testament. And I was explaining to the guys in my group in this lock -in about the fig tree and 40 years.

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So 1988, I mean, this was like, that was eight years in the future. And so it's like, that's all the time we've got guys, you know, and that's going to impact a lot about how you, how you think and how you act.

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And, and, um, you know, did, did that encourage some people to be zealously evangelical?

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Well, I suppose in a sense, but I'm not sure exactly, you know, the fire fire escape mentality does, does not lend itself to the creation of particularly strong churches.

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And it is interesting that church had 20 ,000 members. Wow. We can never find more than 7 ,000 at a time.

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And when the pastor of that church left, the next guy that came in was brutally honest and said, look, for years, we've had a larger backdoor than a front door.

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We've had more people leaving than we were bringing in, which is why the church was shrinking. Uh, which means there was, there was no discipleship.

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There was no, you know, it was, it was get them in, dunk them. And then, you know, whatever.

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And, you know, those type of people are, are sometimes the hardest type of people to actually win, uh, because they're, they're religiously abused.

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You know, they've, they've already, they already think they're right with God to begin with. So anyway, I, I think it, it had, it was a part of it, but I think that the greater aspect of it was that we didn't really have the idea that God was about his own self -glorification in all of creation, that all of, all of what's taking place in time is going to be seen as a part of that great tapestry of God's self -glorification.

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And we can only see a very dim amount of that.

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Um, so, but it would have been great if somebody back then had done the two things that Doug Wilson did for me recently.

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And, and that is to say, why don't we ever, why doesn't a Christian, why don't Christians ever talk about their great grandchildren?

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And I had to think about that and it's like, yeah, we don't. And then his other question was, how do you know we're not still in the early church?

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Right. Which was interesting because, you know, I've been teaching church history since 1990.

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Um, not continuously, but, um, and I knew intellectually that every, uh, generation viewed itself as, as being the last generation.

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Sure. And I knew where that came from, from the new Testament. I, I, I get an expectancy, a type of an idea.

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Um, some of that was because of, I think, a misunderstanding of Matthew chapter 24, but Hey, you can go too far the other direction too.

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Yep. And so, um, I just wish that there had been more,

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I wish I had read a little bit more broadly, but look, when you're raised in a fundamentalist context, you don't think there's any wisdom to be found outside of the people that look like you and dress like you anyways.

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Yeah, that was, that was how we understood it. No, I was raised the same way. Like I said, for the first 10 years of my life.

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Um, so it sounds like you're saying you would be a proponent of, of, of Christians engaging culture.

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You have yourself obviously, uh, running for local offices, uh, creating art, creating, uh, movies and books and all these things, which

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I feel is lacking a little bit, even within the broader evangelical Christian, uh, church, which what does he even evangelical mean anymore?

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I don't know. Um, uh, Ligonier did a, did a 20 ,000 person poll and 65 % of people who identified as Christians didn't believe that Christ was deity or didn't believe in the

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Trinity. So I don't even know what Christian means anymore in America, but, um, so, so you're okay with, with, uh, with, with building a

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Christ, I don't want to say Christ culture, but building, building the kingdom or, or glorifying

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God in those things, art and public square and, and business and things like that. We're not one of those that should just hunker down inside the church and, and, uh, you know, maybe once in a while go out and help the poor and say some nice things on the corner square if we need to.

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Right. It, it could be, um, very, very frustrating right now to be seeking to do that.

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If in fact, we're on the cusp of a period of deep darkness and judgment that then will be used.

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I mean, this has been my argument. It seems to me secularism is the greatest enemy of the cross of Christ that has ever arisen.

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Even paganism had some type of theistic concept to it, but secularism is the rebellious insanity that not only is there no

31:22

God, um, but there is no purpose. There is no reason man is the ultimate authority.

31:29

Um, but there really isn't any authority other than that, which we create for ourselves because you, once you die, there's no meaning, there's no purpose, there's no judgment, there's no nothing.

31:39

And it is, it's pure futility. And it means that everything that Christ said and did was a lie and is empty and worthless.

31:48

And the tomb is still full. We just haven't found the right one. So, so secularism, uh, is the culture of death in its fullest flourishing and formation.

32:02

And so if every enemy needs to be put under Christ's feet, the only way for this enemy to be put under Christ's feet is in a pretty spectacular fashion.

32:12

And I can't see that happening with a whimper. Um, and I, I can't see that happening in, in, in slow motion.

32:21

Um, because as I look at the type of tyrannical, uh, secularism, the totalitarianism that is clearly all around us.

32:32

I mean, yeah, you're, you're, you're not very far from Canada. And, um, uh, shockingly, uh, having hockey is your favorite sport and, and eating a lot of syrup does not keep you from falling into really radical political, uh, orientations.

32:51

And I think those are the two main causes liking hacking, eating copious amounts of sugar.

32:58

It could be, it could be. Um, but yeah, you're right there. And, and so you, you see that, that kind of insanity and now the,

33:07

Oh, you, you can't get your lift chair fast enough. How about just committing suicide? Okay. Uh, you know, when you, when you see all this happening around us, that's not something that just slowly fades away.

33:20

Uh, these people are tyrants. They are totalitarians. They, they hate the idea of anybody having any kind of perspective other than their own.

33:30

And look, Christians need to be upfront. We believe that every, that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess.

33:36

Amen. But that is totally different than human beings. Um, enforcing their destructive poison, uh, upon the minds of everybody around them.

33:48

And if you, if you will not believe like me, uh, we'll, we'll either silence you, we'll put you in jail or we'll shoot you or we'll do it where else we need to do to you.

33:58

It seems to me like there has been a withdrawing of the hand of restraint on God's part.

34:05

And if that's the case, going back to the point, um, I, I encourage my grandchildren to seek to do beautiful things, but also to recognize that there may be a period of time where the only way, the only thing that's going to be beautiful, we're going to be, be able to do is survive together and love together and, and encourage one or another in standing against horrific persecution, because it wouldn't be the first time in history.

34:36

Um, there have been some super, super, super, super dark times in history. Um, I I've often said that, uh,

34:44

Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye missed their best time in history because if they had been alive in 1347, um, they would have sold a whole lot more books than they did because that's when the black plague started and it would be really easy to convince everybody.

35:00

This is it. Um, right. It's all over with right now. Um, but there was still a lot of stuff to come after that.

35:08

So, uh, we've been through darkness before. It may be a really, really deep darkness again.

35:15

Um, but we have to keep our eyes on, you know, what glorifies God and how do we do that in the context and the time in which we live right now?

35:24

Yeah. So we have the, the secularism that, uh, like you just said, uh, probably the greatest threat.

35:31

Uh, so where, where do we stand as Christians when we're partnering, um, with someone in a cause that might align biblically, but they don't have a biblical worldview.

35:41

I've really been thinking about this a lot lately. Um, the Ben Shapiro's, the Dennis Prager's Jewish, they have some type of theistic view, but then, you know, you do see them celebrating

35:51

Dave Rubin's, uh, marriage with his son and you go, well, they don't, I mean, they still have a pagan worldview when it comes down to it.

35:59

Do I still stand shoulder to shoulder with them on abortion or limited government or, you know, bringing back authoritarianism or reigning it in?

36:07

I mean, and, and things like that, what should we, how do we discern that as believers with a biblical worldview?

36:14

What do you think? Well, yeah, that's really hard because, um, the stuff with Dave Rubin certainly did give us the opportunity and the fellow up in Moscow that did the, um, did the review of Peterson's interview of Rubin that the name escapes me.

36:32

Unfortunately, I listened to it twice. It was very, very good. Uh, I think he's one of the elders up in Moscow, uh, just did a wonderful, wonderful job in taking apart, uh, that interview.

36:45

And so what you have to do is when we are standing shoulder to shoulder, we are still talking to even those people about their need for repentance.

36:58

And now they will say, okay, that means we're not going to be able to stand shoulder to shoulder. Well, if, if that's what they say, fine.

37:04

But the reason I protect unborn life is the same reason that I cannot possibly call

37:14

Dave Rubin a married man. Um, you can't have two husbands. You can't have two wives. That that's a fundamental abandonment of what these things mean.

37:23

And so you, you have to call out the, the contradiction and the inconsistency. And, uh, right now there is a lot of pressure on a lot of people to go.

37:32

No, no, no, no. We just need the biggest group we can. Well, the only way we're going to get a big enough group that's going to be consistent on these issues is if there is a major, major, major work of the spirit of God that converts a majority of the people in our culture.

37:49

And I can see that happening, but it would seem much more likely to me.

37:55

Um, that there's going to be a major transformation of this culture on a cataclysmic scale, scale, uh, before there's going to be a rebuilding and a reestablishment of any kind of, uh, foundation that would reflect

38:11

God's purposes in, in this world. Cause we are very, very obviously intent upon being embarrassed about all the evidence of a

38:23

Christian consensus in this nation's history. Yeah. We're embarrassed by it. That's called racism now and white fragility and whatever other insanity people come up with.

38:35

And, um, I think as long as we continue to have all sorts of cool, neat, fun stuff to distract ourselves, that's not going to happen.

38:46

Um, now the other side wants to make sure we don't get all that stuff. The other side wants us literally living in boxes, eating bugs, about only half of us that that's, that's there.

38:57

It's a little bit, I sometimes wondered honestly about film and movies because sometimes you see things and go, wait a minute, that's what's happening.

39:13

And that was 30 years ago. And how did they know this was going to happen? It's, um, you know, it's, we've all, we've all talked about 1984, but that was general trends.

39:22

Yeah. A lot, a lot of, a lot of specific stuff in 84, though, that you look back on and you go, how did he, well,

39:28

I mean, he was in, I think he was a partner with the CIA and stuff too. So he might've had some insight there, but you're absolutely right.

39:34

You look at it and you go, who tipped them off? Is this a, is this a broader agenda? You know,

39:40

I never watched the X -Files, but it hit the, it hit the social media a couple of weeks ago, this whole segment from an

39:48

X -Files thing. Talking about genetic manipulation and vaccines and stuff like that.

39:55

And you're going, this aired when? What? It's almost disorienting to think about.

40:00

And then there was the movie with Matt Damon where all the rich people, all the powerful people lived up on a space station, basically, it was really.

40:09

Yeah. Remember that? Yeah. And everybody else left on earth is just, you know, eating bugs and living in, living in boxes.

40:16

And it's like, huh, that seems to be exactly what they want to do. I said, yeah, but I think,

40:22

I think, I think we kind of understand, and we might know that men's hearts are depraved, they're sinful, they want power.

40:28

They want to, they want self -interest. And that, that always comes to a tip, you know, of the same thing of I want,

40:35

I need, I get, you don't, it's just pride and everything else. Um, yeah, that's what we're facing.

40:41

That's what we're facing. So unless, unless something major happens, um, the, the, the culture of death will consume itself.

40:50

That's one of my hopes, by the way, is these, these people will turn on each other right now.

40:56

Yeah, they're seeing power, they're grasping power, they're getting power. And so they're cooperating together.

41:01

But the fact of the matter is they will turn on each other. And, uh, we, I mean, your ideology, they have to intersectionality.

41:09

They have to turn on each other. They're always one -upping, but, but you know, that's why I don't, I don't, do not want to be the supervillain right now.

41:17

We all know who the supervillain is. He even dresses as a supervillain. He has the accent of a supervillain.

41:24

It is just a staunch, it's just like, what is this?

41:30

Um, but I wouldn't want to be him because he's, he's got a huge target on his back from his own friends.

41:37

Um, I said two years ago on this podcast that, uh, Elon must time.

41:43

I'm assuming that's who you're talking about that. No, no, no, no, no, no. I'm talking about Klaus Schwab. Oh, him too.

41:50

Oh, Klaus, Klaus Schwab is the one that dresses like a dress is like, I mean, how can you not have the accent of the supervillain and you wear the very clothes of the supervillain?

42:02

I am the supervillain. I am training all my little minions to take over all of the countries of the world.

42:09

And he comes out publicly. It's amazing. Well, that's what I mean. He's so forthright with it and never, no one cares.

42:15

Yeah. It was what we want to do. We want to starve this part of the world. He's got a target on his back. He's his, his people will turn on him eventually.

42:23

They, they will, they will. Yeah. You know, Xi Jinping, same thing.

42:28

Look out, buddy. You may have all the power right now, but, um, most dictators don't, don't live to really old ages.

42:36

I thought you were talking about Elon Musk and how they've turned on him because two years ago, he was the darling of the left.

42:42

And now, uh, he can't do anything right either because he says a few things that don't exactly line up.

42:47

So that's another example of them eating their own as well. All right. Let's, uh, let's finish this segment out with one last question here.

42:54

Um, what do you see currently as the biggest threat?

42:59

And we, we kind of covered it a little bit, but, but the, the biggest threat to, to the

43:05

American church right now, uh, is it social? Is it legislative? Is it ideological?

43:13

Well, what you're using the term American church. Evidently as, as the true

43:19

American church. Um, so much of the, the struggle that we have is how much false

43:27

Christianity there is, how much fake Christianity there is. The world knows fake Christianity, but they, they utilize it.

43:33

I mean, in the, um, passing of the Senate, the, the profaning of marriage act, um, the, the other side used a lot of references to how many churches and how many denominations were in support of this profaning of, of, of marriage.

43:50

And so that's been a reality for a long time, but it, it, it's, it's only growing in its, the, the tsunami of apostasy that I've been talking about for years is really a tsunami.

44:04

And there, there is a lot of it. And I think we're going to see a lot of people that we, we thought were conservative, we thought were solid, uh, moving that, that direction.

44:12

So you have the internal issues there. Um, externally, uh, there is zero question that all financial, um, advantages that have accrued to the church by being in a quote unquote

44:30

Christian nation, uh, those are, those are going to be done with. Um, I think that mega churches, mega seminaries, they're all in deep trouble.

44:40

If you have lots of money, lots of property, you're just a huge target.

44:48

These hate crimes laws will be used to absolutely force, um, compliance on issues relating to the gay agenda and everything else.

45:00

Um, and so you're going to, you're going to see, um, almost all churches above a certain small number of people having to split up into smaller units.

45:13

Cause that's what you see in China. Yeah. Um, the only mega churches in China are state controlled and they're not really churches.

45:21

Uh, true churches are small. There may be many of them, but they have to meet, you know, in secret.

45:27

And even that's next to impossible to do. Yeah. You have to have your phone with you at all times. You're always being tracked.

45:33

I've said many times, the government already knows everybody that attends my church without having to have access to any membership role, uh, used to do it with, uh, if you saw 2000 mules, then, then, you know how they can do this.

45:49

They just, they track your phone. And when you go to the same building on Sunday, every week, they can put all that together and figure out everybody that does it.

45:59

It's, it's simple to do. You don't even have to have satellites and drones and stuff like that. We carry our own little, you know, here, here's my, my tag.

46:06

This is how I I'm, I'm being listened to right now, probably. Um, so, um, that's going to be a huge, huge challenge because we can't just look back at what people did under the

46:20

Soviet union and stuff like that. The technology has changed too much. Um, so there's going to be a tremendous amount of external pressure.

46:28

That's, uh, that's put upon us, um, again, up to a certain point.

46:33

And the law only, only the Lord knows what that is. Will we see a solid sound

46:41

Christianity, uh, just exploding in other places as a result, you know,

46:47

I've been to Zambia and Zambia is, uh, is a, is a constitutionally Christian nation.

46:53

Hmm. And, uh, will we see, um, a purification of churches in places like that?

47:01

Cause there's a lot of really bad theology in South America and Africa.

47:07

You know, you see these Nigerian prophets, uh, running around making lots of money off, off of the people there.

47:15

Will we, will we see a strengthening of those churches and a shifting of the focus so that missionaries are now being sent into the devastated.

47:26

Western nations that, um, are recovering from the last revolution.

47:33

I, I don't know. I don't know, but the Lord always has a remnant.

47:39

Uh, and I've, if we were taught anything recently through, even through COVID, what a way to separate, uh, those who play

47:49

Christian and those who love Christ and want to glorify God. It really was a good separation of that.

47:54

All right. As we end this out and we put bookends on this episode, let's stick around with Dr.

48:00

James White. He's going to play fresh tenants where we ask 10 fresh questions. He doesn't know what they are.

48:06

There might be a little personal. We're going to try to get to know him a little bit more. So this will be a little more lighthearted.

48:12

Are you ready for fresh 10? Probably not. Well, here, here it comes anyway.

48:28

All right, here we go. Fresh 10 with Dr. James. Look at the time. Wow. I gotta go.

48:36

Uh, number one, and this is only because what, what, what, what's that? Oh, we need the studio.

48:42

Oh, I lost you. Your camera went out. Uh, uh, this is mostly because we have a warp core behind you.

48:49

Favorite Star Trek character. If you have one and why. That would depend on the series, honestly.

48:57

Um, because I watched the original when, uh, when it was airing for the first time. Um, so yeah,

49:03

I'm that old. Um, so it really depends on the, uh, on that. And, um, yeah, that's really hard to say.

49:12

I, I, I, I would have to say I, I still have a real thing for Spock. Um, yeah, yeah.

49:18

I, I, you know, when, when he, when he, he did, he did a little too much LDS, you know, uh, that was, that was pretty cool.

49:26

All right. Number two. And I'm glad you touched on this earlier in the episode. Would you rather go back in time and visit your great, great, great grandfather, or go ahead in the future and visit your great, great, great grandkids?

49:38

Which one are we doing? We're in the flux capacitor. The flux capacitor is fluxing. We get up to 80 miles an hour.

49:44

We go on the time machine. What are we doing? Back or forward? Um, yeah, see,

49:51

I don't ponder things like this very much. So I, um, I guess I'd want to go.

49:56

I know a fair amount about those in the past and where I'd end up having to go.

50:02

And I know we were always dirt poor, so I know a fair amount about them. So I guess I'd go see the great grandkids and, uh, see if, see how the, um, the period of darkness went.

50:13

Maybe very post mill of you. I like it. What, what, okay, here we go.

50:19

What property do you go for in Monopoly? When you're playing Monopoly, what, what are we going for? The cheap stuff, the expensive stuff.

50:25

I haven't played Monopoly in 30 years. I don't remember any of them, so I couldn't tell you. All right. Question four.

50:31

Uh, where do you most want to take your camper? Or RV, excuse me.

50:37

Oh, well, it's the number one place that you haven't taken it yet that you want to take it. Oh, I, I don't have any place that right now.

50:47

I mean, um, I, the camper is so that I can go and speak places and do debates.

50:53

So I was up late last night, booking reservations for February where I'm going to be doing two debates on a trip.

51:00

Uh, Houston, I'm gonna be debating, uh, a fellow, a fully, uh, deconstructed progressivist on marriage.

51:09

Uh, and then I'm gonna be debating King James only guy. I've got to go into Salt Lake city to debate. Jeff and I are debating two agnostics on, can you have morality without God April 1st.

51:20

And then I've got a debate. Um, I've got another bait somewhere along, uh, along the way in the spring as well.

51:27

So I've got a bunch of debates coming up. So the RV is, is my home away from home to let me do ministry.

51:34

So, so you want to go wherever the debate is, wherever the debate is awesome. Well, look at this question, five providence of the

51:40

Lord. What's the closest debate you've ever had? Now we know you're 255 and oh, or whatever that number is.

51:46

No, I've, uh, I'm at 170. I'm at 178. Okay. 178. No. All right.

51:52

Uh, so what's that one that was close though, that you went, Hmm. I've maybe, maybe I should have been more prepared or wow.

51:59

He was really prepared and made you think and went, that was pretty close. Um, um, there was an attorney.

52:08

I debated on, um, Arminianism that what I had never heard before.

52:14

Okay. And I didn't like doing debates with people. I'd never heard where they'd be coming from. So I really wasn't able to, um, make my presentation specific to his position.

52:25

Cause I didn't know where he was. So I don't like, I don't ever like doing debates with people that I've never, they've never recorded something or they've never written something.

52:35

Um, because then it's always going to, they know where I'm coming from, but I don't know where they're coming from. So you've got that most, most of, of the debates where there was any kind of ambiguity, it was because of misbehavior on the other side, to be honest with you.

52:50

Right. Um, but yeah. All right. Question number six, moving right along quickly, dead or alive theologian or scholar you'd most like to have coffee with not debate.

53:02

We just want to have coffee. You're friends. Well, I don't like coffee, but, um, wow.

53:10

Um, well, I know a bunch of people who knew Vantel, um, but I, of course I never,

53:15

I never had the opportunity of meeting him. So I probably Vantel. Oh, good answer. Question number seven, a book outside of the

53:22

Bible that everyone should at least pick up peruse through read at least once in their life, it can be one of your own if you want.

53:30

No, um, I don't know the, um, holiness of God by Sproul is, is

53:39

I think really classic, um, obviously the institutes to me is one of the best summaries of Christian theology ever written.

53:48

So that's a, that's one that's high on the list. All right. Question number eight, something most people assume about you that is not true.

53:58

Oh, most people are stunned that I have a regular life and that, um, when they asked, when they asked, when they asked summer, um, they say, what was it like growing up with, as the daughter of James White, uh, she stuns them by going hilarious and they're like, hilarious.

54:17

It says, oh yeah, we had a lot of fun. We used to play laser wars and we'd be crawling around in the dark, shooting lasers at each other and, and, um, you know, all sorts of stories about going on, uh, uh, missions trips with me in various places and getting into all sorts of trouble.

54:34

And so, yeah. Um, people think I just debate all the time and stuff like that.

54:40

And unlike Jerry Madatics, who does debate all the time, uh, when I'm out of the debate,

54:45

I'm not debating anymore. So, right. All right. So, um, what's your go -to meal?

54:52

What's your favorite meal? You just one that you go to and you always like can't get enough of it. Oh, chicken, uh, chicken quesadilla and, uh, chips and salsa cafe

55:01

Rio. Oh, that, that was, that was the easiest one on the whole list so far. Oh yeah. Yeah.

55:06

Yeah. I mean, that's, uh, I, well, you know, I've got a little, I've got a little Italian place up the road that I eat at probably three, four times a week.

55:13

And I get a kid's spaghetti and meat sauce, two meatballs and, and a piece of, um, garlic bread, you know?

55:20

Um, I'm, I'm not a wide, I do not have a wide, uh, variety of, of foods.

55:26

So once I find stuff, I like, I stick with it and then they stop making it. Right. All right.

55:32

Last one. Uh, so we had so many people on here, uh, excited that you were coming on.

55:38

They couldn't wait for the conversation. We obviously revere you. We, we love your body of work. Um, the man of God that you are, but they said

55:44

I had someone reach out and say, have him tell at least one embarrassing thing that's happened to him.

55:51

So we know that he is actually human. Let's say that anybody who listens to me on the dividing line knows that I'm really, really human.

56:01

Uh, and that's, uh, that, that's just not even a, not even an issue. Um, oh man,

56:07

I, I, I don't know how to answer that one. I mean, when I, when I think back on, um, well, the, the only, the only thing

56:17

I've ever given is an answer to that was when I was a senior in high school. I, I went to interview a guy at the

56:24

Arizona fish and game department. I was doing a, you know, I was, I was a biology guy, both in high school and, and I majored in biology in college as well as department fellow anatomy and physiology.

56:36

And, um, so, uh, I, I was going to interview this guy. About deer populations in Arizona and how they managed the deer population from the game and fish department.

56:48

I go into his, I go into his office and he comes in and I remember he looked a little strange when he first came in, but you know,

56:56

I had to take, I had a tape recorder, had a cassette tape, everybody knows that is anymore. And we had a good interview.

57:03

I, I, I was prepared. I knew what I was doing. And then when it was over, I, I, I started putting my stuff together and realized

57:12

I was sitting behind his desk. Um, that it was so messy that, that I assumed that that was the guest chair.

57:22

Right. And the reason he was looking at me strangely as I was sitting behind his desk and I was mortified. I was absolutely mortified.

57:29

That's pretty good though. But he sort of said, well, probably means I need to clean my desk.

57:35

You need to clean my desk up. All right. There we go. That was 10 fresh questions. This is what

57:51

I'm lacking on the dividing line. I have no, I have no musical segues. Um, I don't have, you know, any, and I could,

58:00

I am very good friends with John Cooper. Can you imagine that what you guys could do together?

58:06

What? Come on. I can totally imagine what you guys could put together for with John Cooper. Yeah. Well, and, and the guitarist

58:13

Seth, you know, he, have you ever seen him play? I mean, he could put some cool stuff, but instead

58:19

I focus on content. So what can I say? That's how

58:24

I, I won't say what that might mean about anyone else, but that's how I distract people from my lack of knowledge is, uh, you know, songs and intros that way they don't focus on, but that's why we have guys like you on.

58:35

So let's give us the final word as we wrap this up. Um, tell us what you're working on, where people can find you.

58:41

Uh, we'll link it all up, obviously, uh, when it goes to YouTube and a live stream and, uh, the podcast, but let the people know what you're working on and how they can get ahold of you.

58:50

Well, AOMN .org, uh, the dividing line, um, is, you know, that's how we communicate with folks.

58:57

And, um, uh, like I said, I've got a major, uh, trip coming up. Could be gone pretty much all of February.

59:04

I'm going to be out with, uh, Jeffrey Rice in Tullahoma, uh, Tennessee at his conference out there that he's doing on street preaching and could be doing a debate while they're, uh, like I said, debating in Houston on February eight on the subject of marriage, which

59:21

I think people find really interesting. I'll be speaking down in Louisiana the next weekend. Um, uh, on the subject of Roman Catholicism.

59:29

So lots and lots of, lots of stuff there. And then more trips. Uh, there's the big, uh, theonomy and post -millennialism conference in, um,

59:39

Texas in May. Uh, so that's with Joel, correct? Yes.

59:44

Uh -huh. And then you actually have one coming up in February, uh, with a, with a good friend of mine,

59:49

Claude Ramsey is speaking with you, I believe it's in Tennessee in February, and I'm gonna try to make it right to that one.

59:56

That Tullahoma, Tennessee, right? Is that the, Oh, Tennessee. Yeah. The one you just said. Okay. So I'll be watching out for that.

01:00:01

He's a here. I stand theology. Good friend of ours and absolutely love him as a brother in the Lord too. Uh, there we go.

01:00:07

There we have it. Um, Dr. James White, thank you so much for coming on, being gracious with your time, letting us, uh, bring you down to our level here on the dead man walking podcast.

01:00:18

Uh, we do like that. We have to keep it real here. Um, guys, thanks so much for listening to another episode. We appreciate you, uh, uh, checking out dmwpodcast .com.

01:00:27

And of course, look for those links when they come out to everything. Dr. James White. So you can click on that and take part in it.

01:00:33

Dr. James. Thank you. Thank you for having me. God bless as always, as always guys. God bless.

01:00:39

Be sure to follow us on Facebook and Instagram at dead men walking podcast for full video podcast episodes and clips, or email us at dead men walking podcast at gmail .com.