Scott Lindsey of Logos Bible Software Interview

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

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Apostle Paul said, But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

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King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, ministry.

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My name is Mike Abendroth, and we have a theme here at the show, and that show, as you probably know if you listen regularly, always biblical, always controversial, maybe always provocative, let's use that, always in that order.

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Basically what we want to do here in No Compromise Radio ministry is to look at the world through biblical lenses, to take a look at Christianity, other religions, through a biblical perspective.

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And that's pretty much the theme of the show. What does the Bible say about apostles today? What does the

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Bible say about speaking in tongues? What's a good book to help us understand evangelical feminism, etc.?

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So we cover a lot of topics. But implicit in all that study is we want to know what the

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Bible says. What does God's authoritative, inerrant, infallible, sufficient words say?

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And that's really the basis, that's our foundation. So today I have a special guest online, and this special guest is going to help us go back to the

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Bible, but in an interesting fashion, and in a fashion that I'm thoroughly convinced is the right way to go.

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Today we have Scott Lindsey, Director of Ministry Relations from Logos Bible Software Company.

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And Scott, welcome to No Compromise Radio Ministry. Great to be here. Now just a moment ago you were telling me about your background.

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I said it was kind of a raw New England day. You're from New England, aren't you? Hey, I was there during the blizzard of 78.

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I remember all that stuff. Yes, no, but yes, my dad retired at Hanscom Air Force Base. So if you were to ask anybody at Logos, we know

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Scott loves Jesus, but we wonder about his idolatry with the New England Patriots because of my office.

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Yes, I'm a true blue New Englander. What do you think of Belichick this year and all that?

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We'll see. I mean, he's been saving a bunch of first -round draft picks, and the team's getting a little old, so it'll be interesting to see.

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But that's his talent, is finding those no -names and turning them into wonderful players.

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So I'm excited, always excited. Do you have a shrine for the Red Sox or no? Not so much of a baseball fan.

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Obviously, I'll root for them if they make it far in the playoffs. And Celtics, yeah,

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I like to root for them. But if I had to pick one sport and that was it, hands down, I'm a

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Pats fan all the way. Well, I got to go, Scott, this year, well, last season, to the first game, and they had the

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F -4 Phantoms, I believe, flying across at the beginning of the game and seeing the players there.

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And so that was quite an experience, and see, as a pastor, I don't get to go to Sunday games, so it was a Monday night game, so I got to go.

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There you go, it's interesting you said that, because my dad, who retired from the Air Force, he was an F -4 pilot, so I know exactly the aircraft you're talking about.

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Well, if I talk about that, you know, Scott, if I say something, you know, Clinton or something about law and order, you already know the lingo.

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Yes, I do. That's right. All right. Here's what I wanted to do, No Compromise listeners. I wanted today to have

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Scott on the line because I really like this Bible software. As a pastor, I use this

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Bible software every single day, except for my day off, and then once in a while, I might use it there as well.

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I want to—I guess this is my goal. I want to have Scott on so he can teach you and help you understand how valuable it is, not just for pastors, not just for missionaries to use

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Bible software, but also lay people. Lots of folks who listen who are moms and dads and folks that teach the

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Sunday schools and Awana programs and youth group. I really like—and sorry, Scott—I really like Logus Bible software, and so I want you to tell us today about what it is, who your company is, sell us on how good it is, because I'm going to help you do that.

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But I want to hear from an insider at Logus Bible software. First, I guess we have to start with why

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Logos instead of Logos or vice versa. Tell me that Randy Alcorn story. Well, that's the heated debate right now.

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I was recently—I spent the day with Randy. I work with him. He uses the software extensively for his research, for his books and such, but he was trying to correct me in saying, no, no, no,

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Scott, it's Logos because he's seminary trained. And yes, at seminary they teach you what's called the

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Erasmian pronunciation model, and the real goal there is to teach you to read and write New Testament Greek.

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So let me use the example of my father who was an F -4 pilot. Well, he retired from the Air Force as a colonel, but if you look at that on paper,

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C -O -L -O -N -E -L, that's not how we pronounce it with that R in there. So I guess the

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Erasmian pronunciation of colonel would be colonel to kind of help you phonetically digest that in your mind and do a better job tackling the

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New Testament. So I guess you can say either or. If you went to Greece today, they would say Logos, but all your seminary scholar types are definitely going to arm -wrestle with you and say, no, no, no, it's

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Logos. But we'll take either at the company. Hey, Scott, I like that. It's very interesting.

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Plus, it's a slam for any of us who really want to study under Erasmus. We'd all prefer probably

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Luther or Calvin as Protestants, so it's kind of like a double little jab there. I like that. There you go.

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How would you pronounce the study of God? What's the word that's the study of God? Are you asking where we get the word

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Logos? No, no, I'm saying we have a word called Theosomething, and how do you pronounce that word that's basically a study of God?

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Theology. Theology, there you go. And so then it would be Logi, or would that be Logos, Logos, I'm just trying to give you a hard time.

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Oh, I got you. You're messing with me. I am. So, Scott, tell us basically about your company and the software just generally, then we'll get into some more specifics.

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Well, we're going into our 20th year. Our fearless leader and CEO is a gentleman by the name of Bob Pritchett.

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Bob was one of the youngest program managers at Microsoft at 16 years old. Microsoft actually had to wait until he got his driver's license before they could offer him a full -time position.

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So a very sharp kid, I guess you would say, and used the labs there at Microsoft, met another

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Christian while he was there, and used the labs at Microsoft to create the first Bible software program, and obviously had to have the meeting with the leadership there, are you interested in this, and they said absolutely not.

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And so they signed the rights over to Bob, and he said, you know what, I want to equip the church for better Bible studies.

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So he left Microsoft and started on this journey, and it's just been an exciting one.

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This is my 13th year, we're over 200 employees now, just a hand of blessing, you know,

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God's sovereignty has just been amazing in our growth, and we're really excited about the new version that just released,

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Logos 4, because it's now Mac, PC, and iPhone, so it doesn't really matter what flavor of computer you have, we've got you covered, and can really equip you for amazing exegesis and serious

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Bible study. Well, Scott, one of the things that I love is I have a PC for no -compromise radio ministry,

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I use a MacBook Pro for personal study, and then I have an iPhone. And so now I have all three of those linked, all my books and all my libraries,

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I can access every book in each of those formats, and tell us how it's linked through Logos .com

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or Logos .com. Yeah, we're adopting, if some of your listeners have been hearing in commercials, like from some of the major tech companies, you're hearing about the cloud, the cloud, the cloud, well, the cloud is this new kind of way in which software syncs with each other.

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What's great about the new version of Logos is that if I, you know, start a reading plan on my desktop, or read a book, or add a note, or anything like that, well it'll sync over to my

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Mac, things sync over to the iPhone, so you don't have to worry about, you know, if, let's say

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I'm preparing a Bible study on my laptop, and I'm traveling, as soon as I get home on my desktop, everything

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I did is already there, so it's wonderful in that it always stays in sync with each other, you don't have to worry about backing up things, so that's a tremendous new technology that we've adopted.

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But just having all the pieces there, Mac, you know, the Mac world is definitely growing,

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I have a Mac myself, but I do have, you know, a PC, Windows -based laptop as well, but just being able to have, you know, any flavor, and the iPhone app is wonderful, just being at church, and literally in your hand, having access to hundreds upon hundreds of titles, and, you know, it makes my pastor a little nervous, because he knows

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I'm checking up on him, but, you know, he uses it, too, and loves it. But I love the fact that I have my library wherever I go.

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Well, you can now get a free app, can't you, Scott, from the iPhone? I don't know if it's through iPhone or through its iTunes, but there's a free iPhone app that you can have, what, up to 30

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Bibles and theological resources, free download now, right? Yes, we've been adding,

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I think we're at 31 now, so they can go to iTunes and just search for Logos Bible Software. I think it's one of the most downloaded apps, as far as reference goes now, in all of iTunes.

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I mean, it's been unbelievably popular, it's a great tool, so it gives you the major Bibles and some commentaries and things like that, and that's totally free, but if you do purchase a

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Logos library, that's where you have access to a wealth of information like Greek and Hebrew word study tools, other more scholarly commentaries and things like that, but we definitely do have that free app for your listeners as well.

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And on that free app, you've got Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, you've got Age Strong Systematic Theology, there are topical

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Bibles, Bible dictionaries, folks might know Spurgeon's Morning and Evening, those are all on there and they're free, and I like it because then people,

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Scott, get a taste of what this software can do. Now here's what I'm thinking,

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Scott. At our church, at Bethlehem Bible Church, I try to encourage the folks there, the men in particular in my discipleship classes, but ladies as well, to understand the

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Bible for themselves. And so I love it when I go to someone's house at the church, they're a layperson, they're a brand new

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Christian, and I see Bible commentaries, I see Bible dictionaries,

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Bible encyclopedias, and I tell them, you ought to budget for a theological library because like Timothy, under Paul, you are to be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth.

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And so what I think is so good about Logos is this is not just for pastors. This is for people that want to understand what

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God meant when He wrote Zechariah 14, for instance. And so, have you seen a push,

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Scott, from people who aren't pastors at all, they're laypeople but they need to have the word

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Bible commentary, for instance, available to them? Yeah, like I said, this is my 13th year, and I have to say in the last two, three years,

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I see a real disturbing trend towards eisegesis, and I'll explain that here in a second.

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You know what that is, but I want to make sure our listeners know the difference between eisegesis and exegesis.

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Exegesis is really where you want to be at, and that's from the Greek root meaning to lead out of. So this is the process of interpreting the

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Bible and the text by what it actually says. So this is where your Bible study, where the text leads you in the interpretation.

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The troubling trend is towards eisegesis from the Greek root meaning into, and this is the process of misinterpreting the text by introducing your own ideas, and so you kind of lead the text in your own interpretation, and, you know, pop culture,

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Christianity, what's popular on the Christian bookstore shelf. I don't have cable, but, you know,

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I travel a lot, and I'm flipping through the channels the other day, and I come across a quote -unquote Christian speaker, and he's using

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Luke 638, you know, given it will be given to you, good measure, press down, you know, running over, and he's talking about money, money, money, and sowing seed into the ministry, and give, give, give, give.

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The problem, though, is Luke 638 in the context of the verse is about forgiveness, it's not about money, and so that is so popular today to just take a verse out, again, this is eisegesis, and wrap your ideas around it, and you're not really submitting to the authority of Scripture, and the only way to really understand

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Scripture in context is to study, and the sad fact of the matter is, people are not doing

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Bible study anymore. They might read the Bible, but they're not really exegeting the text, and that's our passion at Logos.

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We want to provide tools to make your listeners exegetes.

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Well, I was reading online one of the interviews, excuse me, one of the reviews by Dr. Scott Olyphant, and he said, tell me if you like this statement or not, regarding Logos Bible software.

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It is misnamed. It would more accurately be called Logos Bible and Theological Study Software.

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The amount of biblical and theological content that one can have access to is unprecedented, as far as I know."

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Do you like that? Dislike it? I absolutely love it, because, you know, one of the things

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I try to do, I'm very extroverted, so I'm on an airplane, or I'm, you know, wherever I'm at, I'm just talking to people, and, you know, if they're not believers,

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I'm going to plant seeds of Christ, and, you know, try to get them thinking about eternity and where they are, but if I meet a believer,

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I'll ask them, hey, are you doing Bible study? And I can see in their eyes whether they are or not, and, you know, if they're honest with me and say, no,

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Scott, you know, I'm not really studying the Bible like I should, I ask them, why not?

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And the, you know, if I was to create a spreadsheet of how many times I've asked that question, and the number one answer, hands down, from everybody, for their excuse, is

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I don't have enough time. And the beauty of Logos is this. If you can just pick a verse or a topic, so let's say you want more information on Tabernacle, Holy Spirit, David, or a verse,

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Psalms 23, Romans chapter 8, Galatians 2 .20, if you can just type a verse or a topic and click one button, that's how easy the software is, click one button, it'll literally do 50 to 60 hours worth of Biblical research in about five seconds.

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So there is no excuse anymore for us not to be rightly dividing the

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Word of Truth, not to be doing Bible study, because we annihilate that time excuse.

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I think that is wonderful. You know what I found out, Scott, is people, according to Sinclair Ferguson, he said they have a where's

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Waldo approach to Scripture. Where can I find Waldo on this page? And now where can

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I find myself in the passage? Now certainly there are some passages that speak directly to us as a

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Christian church, but at other times, these texts are not really about us. They may be about the glory of God and who

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God is. And then Sinclair Ferguson said, how about the temptation? Matthew chapter 4,

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Luke 4, Jesus is going to be tempted by Satan in the wilderness. And the first thing we do if we're not careful, if we don't have good commentaries and tools, we're so selfish, we live through our own eyes so much, we try to figure out principles for dealing with temptation, when everything would be opposite.

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Jesus was impelled by the Spirit to go get tempted, and we want to run away from temptation. Scott, I like it that this product will help us with commentators that will teach us.

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Let's look at God's original intention before we get to some three practical ways of dealing with temptation, like Jesus.

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You think that's fair? Absolutely. I mean, if you can go to Bible college, if you can become seminary trained, wow, what a blessing that would be.

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But for most of us, we have full -time jobs, we're dads, we're moms, and we're busy. We can't take, you know, four, five, six years and go to the school of our choice and get properly trained to rightly divide the word of truth, but that's the beauty of Logos.

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I mean, it literally is like having a bunch of scholars that live at your house, historians that live at your house, archaeologists that live at your house.

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I mean, we really, we show you the world of the Bible, we show you a culture and context and archaeological evidences, and, you know, the one excuse from people that I hear occasionally that probably bugs me the most is when

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I hear people say, I think Bible study is boring. Now, I appreciate their honesty, but the

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Bible is not boring. I mean, it is a lifelong, exciting, wonderful journey, but it has to be presented that way.

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And so one of the things I love about, you know, I teach at about 20 conferences a year, and it's funny because let's say

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I'm with Dr. Norm Geisler or somebody that's very well -renowned and then all of a sudden there's this

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Scott Lindsey guy, like, who's this guy? You know, somebody must have called in sick, right? And so, and they say he's with a software company.

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I can see their faces as I'm standing there being introduced, like, oh, Lord, have mercy on us, you know, technology.

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But about five minutes into my presentation, when they actually see what the software does, mouths are on the floor.

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This weekend I taught in Dayton, Ohio, and awesome story, the whole time

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I'm presenting to a crowd of about four or five hundred, there's this teenager nudging his mom every time

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I show something. They come up, the teenager would not let the family go home until they bought this.

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And the mom's looking at me like, I thought I would never hear those words from my teenager.

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I want to study the Bible using logos. And it's because we're introducing technology into the

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Bible study mix. And for a large part, that's how you get guys, and that's how you get young people interested in studying the

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Bible, is when you put the computer in the middle of it. Well, when I think of the amount of information,

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Scott, that is on this, you know, computer hardware through logos, think about what missionaries used to do.

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And now when I travel overseas, wherever I might travel with my laptop, I can just pull that information up.

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I mean, it sounds like I'm trying to sell it, and I am, because I think it really can help the layperson.

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They say, oh, I'd like to get the MacArthur Collection. I'd like to get James Montgomery Boyce's commentaries.

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And they're just with you. I still read books. I still have a large library.

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But now I've got this huge library within my computer that I use on a regular basis.

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And so that's why I like it, because it helps my people understand the text. I don't really want them to say,

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Abendroth said it from the pulpit, it must be true. I want them to trust me to some degree. I am their pastor. But I want them to know themselves.

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And like you said, the joy of personal Bible study is wonderful. There's a thrill to that.

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And so that's why I think God has been using Logos. My name is Mike Abendroth. We're talking to Scott Lindsey from Logos Bible.

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And the website is www .logos .com, logos .com.

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Is there some other kind of website that they should go to for anything, Scott? Any other way that they could access this?

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Yeah, actually, the better web address, because anytime we do a radio broadcast, we like to give a special discount.

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And so we've actually set up a special website for this broadcast. And it's just www .logos .com

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and then forward slash radio. So logos .com forward slash radio.

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And again, there we've got a demo. So you can actually see about a three, four minute demo of the software and what it does.

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And again, there's a great discount at the website. At the bottom of the page is information on the iPhone app as well.

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But some people are more comfortable with calling. They might have questions like, does it have this translation?

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And I'm looking for this commentary. Or I do like MacArthur or whoever. They can go ahead and call 800 -875 -6467.

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Again, that's 800 -875 -6467. And if it might be easier to remember, that's simply 800 -87 -LOGOS.

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So 1 -800 -87 -L -O -G -O -S. All right, Scott. Thank you.

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Give me a little more information about pricing. These Bible commentaries cost a lot of money when you buy them hardbound.

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I have many sets here. And so tell me a little bit about the pricing in the regard. You don't have to tell me exact prices.

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But if someone said, you know, it's too expensive for me. I don't know if I can make that kind of investment.

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You probably hear that once in a while. I think it's valuable for a family to make the investment. What do you tell people?

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Yeah, I mean, the number one advantage to Logos is the time -saving aspect. But number two actually is the cost savings.

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I love working with people that have been doing Bible study for a few years, and I walk into their home office or kitchen or wherever they have their bookshelves, and there's just shelves upon shelves upon shelves of books.

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And I love to ask the question, how much money did you spend on those books? And, you know, they're looking at me like, oh, let's not even go there.

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I mean, that's a huge investment. But then the other question I ask is this. Do you read all those books every time you do

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Bible study? And the obvious answer is there's no way. I might do four or five or six of the books, but not all three, four hundred.

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With Logos, when you type the verse or topic, click go. It reads all the books.

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So you're not wasting time. You're not, you know, just using four or five.

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You're using hundreds at a time. And if you do the math, the recommended library for everybody to start with, we really want people to jump into Scholar's Library because it has the essential

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Greek and Hebrew tools. I mean, you can actually do amazing word studies with this library called

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Scholar's. But if you were to do the math, you're paying about a tenth of what it would cost you to buy the books and papers.

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So somebody, you know, we've got math geeks at Logos, a bunch of programmers, but somebody did some calculations.

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And in Scholar's, you're literally paying about $2 for an 18 -volume commentary set, $2 for the

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Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, which is one of the greatest Greek lexicon dictionaries you can own, in papers like $350.

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So we put so much into each library at a fraction of what it would cost you in paper.

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And then the last thing that we're offering for the listeners is a great payment option to where, you know, maybe for budgeting issues,

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I'd rather, you know, throw this over 12 months. We'll allow you to do that. So you can order the software, get it immediately, and have a small monthly payment, but literally have thousands upon thousands of dollars worth of books immediately for your

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Bible study. Well, we've been talking to Scott Lindsey, Director of Ministry Relations at Logos Bible Software.

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You can access this information at logos .com forward slash radio, if you'd like the radio discount.

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Scott, we've got about 30 seconds left. I like, additionally, that you are an evangelical, and you want

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Christ exalted. In 20 seconds, tell me how that plays in the business. Well, my prayer for anybody that purchases

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Logos is, I want them to see Christ. You know, sadly, some people do Bible study to beat up other Christians and to defend their positions.

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And no, we need to dive into Scripture to see His glory, His majesty. And that really comes from studying, from digging deep and into the wondrous riches of His Word.

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Scott, that's a great way to end the show. I have a hard break. Logos .com forward slash radio. Scott, thanks for being here today.

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Thank you very much. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's Word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.