Simple Truthfulness & Consistency, Steve Hays Melts Down & Review of Oneness Advocate Steve Ritchie

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00:31

Well, greetings, welcome to The Dividing Line early on a Wednesday, just bouncing around trying to schedule stuff and and get things done and just gonna be that way for a while and so appreciate your bouncing around with us.

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Let's start with what's on everybody's mind and then move on to a number of other things.

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Obviously, as news started coming out, I think Monday evening after we did the program in response to the

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Orlando shootings, a huge factor has arisen that you know, changes the character of everything and once again demonstrates that so often our instant information age, you know, we think that's great, we think that's wonderful, but the problem is that it sometimes leads to all sorts of conclusions that end up having to be modified and and everything else over time.

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So a number of sources are now reporting that Omar Mateen was a homosexual and as soon as that information started circulating,

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I noticed that the few Muslims that are a part of my regular, you know,

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Facebook feed and stuff like that immediately grabbed hold of that and sort of ran with it and of course from my perspective, it should have, you know, all this stuff's tentative.

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You know, we don't like to do it, but what we should be saying is, well, based upon the information we currently possess, it may be possible that, well, people don't like that.

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They don't like the tentative nature of stuff like that. So you just want to go for the conclusion and that's, you know, that's what's going on, you know, in the media, either on the one side

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Fox News, the other side MSNBC, CNN, and of course all their conclusions are completely opposite of the other.

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Because everybody has a agenda, that they're trying to push a particular agenda and, you know, never let a crisis go to waste, as someone was famous for saying.

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And this is all the way to the top, all the way to the president and everything else.

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It's just the way things are today. So anyways, let's say for a second that Omar Mateen was a homosexual.

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Now, he was married, divorced, remarried. That's not unusual, especially for someone in his situation, which for cultural reasons, marriage is the absolute expectation.

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And of course, his first wife accused him of, you know, abuse and things like that.

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People at the club saying he had been there many times before, of course, someone could say, well, he's just scoping the place out.

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Don't know, can't tell. But let's just go with a scenario here for a minute.

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The drama that exists, especially amongst male homosexuals, is epic and legendary.

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It already, there's lots of statistics about divorce amongst allegedly married male homosexuals.

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It's a fact, it's a well -known fact that male homosexuals on average have dozens, often hundreds of partners.

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It is expected that on a sexual level, there is going to be what used to be called unfaithfulness, which

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I don't know what that means anymore, given the degradation, redefinition of actual marriage.

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But anyway, think about what that makes as an obvious possibility.

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What makes it obviously possible is that the whole ISIS thing was a cover, that he wanted to strike out at a community that who knows why, who could ever really know why, maybe some private thing to where he felt rejected.

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And because I saw a number of things about how he was, he didn't really fit in anywhere and that kind of stuff.

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We don't know why people crack the way that they do very often.

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And so what would be the best way if you wanted to strike back at the homosexual community as a homosexual, what would be the best way to cover it?

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And you could even spin it this way. What if he identified his

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Muslim heritage as part of the reason why he had failed to gain entrance into the community he wanted to gain entrance into?

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What would be a greater way to strike it to communities than to make that 911 call?

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Now, do I know that's what happened? No, but I have to admit it's a possibility. And if you won't admit it's a possibility,

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I've just got to ask you why? What's your agenda? I know why the socialist regressive liberals, they don't want to go there.

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But I'm talking to people that really want to seriously think about what the truth is here. Why isn't that a possibility?

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Now, it's also possible that he had a religious experience and recognized the only way he could ever really have forgiveness from Allah given the teachings he was given was to go out as a martyr and that he had so much guilt about his homosexuality and about his drunkenness because some of the reports said he had been kicked out of the club more than once in a drunken state.

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That also has to be a possibility that he embraced that and went for it.

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Will we ever know? I don't know. But those scenarios are possibilities.

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And of course, we're operating on so little information. Like I only found out last night, you know, when

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I first heard about it, it sounds like he had a semi -auto. By the way, please, please, people in the media, take a basic gun course and figure out the difference between an automatic weapon and a semi -auto.

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They're firing an automatic weapon. I know people. I know people in the police.

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And I've got video of me firing a fully auto weapon. And an

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AR -15 is not, there are versions called the M16 that is a fully automatic weapon.

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But the stuff you buy, did you see that New York reporter, writer?

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Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness. That was, that I couldn't,

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I couldn't believe that article. That was, that was shocking. That was just like, seriously? Yeah.

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The, the latest evaluation that I've seen on that is it's not that he is a gun expert.

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It is that he is a wimp. Oh, yeah. Well, that was, that was my, that was my, that was my first, my first term.

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I'm sorry. If your, if your shoulder gets bruised by firing an AR -15, it's a .223

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for crying out loud. Now, I know if you've never touched a gun, you don't know the difference between a .223 and a .338

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Winchester Magnum. But let me tell you something. I offered, I offered on Twitter, if he'd like to actually bruise his shoulder.

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Yeah, I have a, a Ruger .338 Win Mag. And I know how to use it.

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Ask the black bear hanging in my office. You won't get a reply though.

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I'm sorry. There will be no reply. Well, I sort of figured the term hanging sort of indicated that.

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But one shot, she never moved. Okay. I didn't miss. .338 Win Mag will,

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I mean, I've told the story before, but, but the way the bear approached and where I was sitting, I could not put the stock in my shoulder.

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I had to twist so far behind me that the only place to put the stock was my bicep. And my bicep was bruised for two weeks.

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Okay. One round. Did you cry? I did not cry. I rejoiced. Okay. And so,

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I mean, if you're this, for this reporter, if you're laying prone on the ground, a .338

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Win Mag will slide you backwards when you fire it. Okay. A .223

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Win Mag will not. Oh, please. Unbelievable.

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Learn the difference. Well, he's not writing for anybody who knows these things anyways. He's writing for his fellow

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New Yorkers that would never touch a gun if, if they're, and they're, they're the first ones that go when the zombie apocalypse happens.

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It's illegal pretty much for most of them anyway. Well, this is true. You know, except for this guy in Florida who had licenses.

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Oh, you got to think about it. This guy probably had the, the, the qualifications to be a bodyguard for a

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United States Senator. Yeah, I know. I know. We got to think about the fact that he, he had law enforcement level.

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I know. I know. Credentials. Yeah. Anyway, anyway, we, we, we digress from the theological at that point, though it does speak to the utter lack of integrity and truthfulness in modern media.

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It just, anyhow, these scenarios are possibilities.

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Oh, but I didn't finish the point. No, no. As soon as I heard about the shooting,

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I figured, you know, he had to send me out. He probably had an AR -15. That's what everybody was talking about. He didn't have an AR -15. What was it he had?

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MCX, the Sig Sauer. Sig Sauer MCX. Okay. Looks like an

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AR -15, but it's not an AR -15. But that's what everybody was talking about. But I believe it's .223.

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And a .223 is a very controllable round. Like I said, when

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I, when I fired that semi -auto, or that, the full autos that I had, sorry, they have different settings, single shot, three round burst, and then full auto.

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The reason for that is after the third round on fully automatic, you're just spraying lead anyways.

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You, you can't control it. I know, I know in the movies, Arnold can.

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Yeah, yeah, I know. I get it. Anyways, so it wasn't even an AR -15. So the level of accuracy, nothing there.

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What? Well, really the standard is more that it was a scary looking gun. Yeah, it's scary. Very scary looking.

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It was an SLG. SLG. SLG. And, you know, I can take my kid's .22

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Plinkster and make it look like an SLG. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I've got a little, I've got a little

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Ruger 10 -22, and you put a folding stock on it and a banana clip. And, and I bet you

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I could fool half the liberals on MSNBC that it's actually an AR -15, which it'd only be really relevant for hunting rabbits.

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But hey, you know, what, what can I say? Accuracy. Yes, that's what we were talking about.

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So these scenarios exist. And they have, we, we have to allow for these possibilities.

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Now, why do I raise this issue? Well, there is, you know, what was it, six, nine months ago, maybe at the time of the

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Paris shootings, something like that, I got in all sorts of trouble. Because when something like this happens, the idea now is amongst, even amongst many

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Christians, stop thinking, paint with a broad brush, and deny everything you've been saying up till now.

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That's, that seems to be the idea amongst many Christians. And it was all about my daring to say that there are

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Muslims who sincerely, really, honestly find this type of activity to be horrific, un -Islamic, etc, etc.

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No, no, no, no, no, all Muslim, all Muslim. It's like, okay, let's, let's point something out.

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You read something to me right before I came in here. Do you still have that around? Because evidently, a number of people have commented on the

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Orlando shooting. And we mentioned, we mentioned the

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Westboro Baptist Church. And you know what the Westboro Baptist Church has said.

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But then we had Stephen Anderson. And of course, the media picked up on Stephen Anderson and repeated

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Stephen Anderson's statements. Then, then yesterday, the media picked up on Waleed Shoubat.

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Now, Waleed, I don't know how this is possible. But Waleed Shoubat has become even more aggressively, wildly insane than we've seen before.

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Pretty hard to do. But we're talking gnawing on the leather straps holding you to the gurney crazy.

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And various of his articles, you know, they cherry picked certain statements.

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And there is no context possible that would not, that would in any way ameliorate the insanity of Waleed Shoubat.

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And the extremism and the just, just reprehensible stuff out there.

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But then evidently, he seemed to feel left out. And so right as I was walking into the studio,

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Rich informed me that Pat Robertson has, has decided to give us some of his great wisdom.

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I think, I think Pat is about what about 114? Somewhere around there.

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And you say you shouldn't talk. Yeah, well, I hope once I start saying stuff like this, somebody will shut me up.

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But what what did what did dear brother Pat have to have to help us with here?

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Well, I've lost the story on the Facebook trending because Waleed Shoubat took its place.

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How about that? Well, he was trending yesterday. Yes. So but apparently, um, in response to the

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Democrats and liberals response to the Orlando massacre, his, the quote that's being thrown out is that we should just all stand back and let them kill themselves.

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Thank you, Pat Robertson. So here's, here's the point.

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Michael Brown released a video in response to Steven Anderson repudiating the very essence of the attitude that defines

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Steven Anderson. I mean, he's a cult leader, you know, but the, the point is that we demand the right of self -definition of what we believe.

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Now, Steven Anderson is a Baptist. I am a

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Baptist. So to the world, we're like this, we're just peas in a pot and Pat Roberts is a charismatic,

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Michael Brown's charismatic, peas in a pot. I don't know anybody who's like Waleed Shoubat, but hey, uh, that's something else.

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And Westboro definitely out there, but they're Baptist too. Allegedly. I mean, it's on the name Westboro Baptist church.

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And I demand the right to say these people not only do not represent me, but they are fundamentally in error on so many levels.

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And the media says, we don't care. It doesn't matter. It's irrelevant.

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And what's worse is they're now saying they are the true Christians. You're the compromiser.

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You're the compromiser. Have you seen, did you see what the president of the United States said?

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I posted this on, on Facebook and it was, it was frightening.

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Um, yeah, right here, Marty Minto actually posted it, but the last paragraph in regards to the shootings.

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So yes, I'm sure we'll find that there are connections regardless of the particular motivations of this killer. There are connections between this vicious bankrupt ideology and general, general attitudes towards gays and lesbians.

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And unfortunately that's something that the LGBT community is subject to, not just by ISIL, but by a lot of groups that purport to speak on behalf of God around the world.

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Who do you think he's talking about? The media has decided that though this guy was never any kind of Christian at all, it's actually a conservative

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Christian's fault. It's our fault for believing what the

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Bible says, just simply for believing what's, and there are people calling for the suppression of any kind of Christian belief about homosexuality.

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Combine that with what happened in the state house in California. The bill died this year, but every whacked out, crazy totalitarian communist bill that has become law in the state of California died initially.

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But they, it's, it's like the zombie apocalypse. They just keep coming back, keep coming back, keep coming back.

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Um, so what was that bill about? It was about allowing people to sue climate change deniers.

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So if you disagree with the state approved perspective on a subject of tremendous controversy where there has been documented alteration of data, there has been clear interference from external entities into scientific studies where it's being used as the means of promoting progressive socialist ideas.

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If you dare disagree, you can be sued for saying what you say.

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And if you can't see that that attitude will then be applied almost instantaneously to the expression of a belief in the creation of the world, that mankind is the creature of God or that God gets to define human sexuality and that there's right and wrong in human sexuality, then you are naive and not even looking at what's happening around you.

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You don't understand what motivates totalitarians. You don't understand it. So if we keep this in mind with what's going on along those lines, then our very freedom to be able to differentiate ourselves from these whack jobs like Walid Shoebat and the

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Westboro Baptist Church and Steven Anderson is going to be under attack. The world hates the gospel.

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Don't expect them to be fair. They're going to be unfair. Just yesterday at the

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Southern Baptist Convention, someone made a motion that Islam should be, my understanding is,

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I didn't take time to go look at the videos, but someone made a motion about making Islam illegal.

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And there was a raucous seconding of the motion. Now eventually someone comes along and says, no, no, no, no, no.

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Because I mean, Baptists? Baptists doing something like that? We were the original ones fighting for religious freedom.

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We were the original radicals. Anyway, there's a lot of forgetting about history going on.

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So the point is Michael Brown wants to differentiate himself from Pat Robertson. I want to differentiate myself from Steven Anderson.

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And yet how many Christians are running around today on the net?

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I am the great compromiser because what do I say? I recognize that Islam is not monolithic.

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Not just the Sunni Shia split, but there are different different understandings of Sharia within Sunni Islam.

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And anybody who studies Islam knows this, but you see, it's that study part.

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And then it's that fairness part. And then it's that thinking part that seems to get lost, especially at times like this, where emotion becomes the way of thought.

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Well, emotion is never the way of thought, but in our land today, that seems to be the case, even amongst

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Christians. So I had some guy on Facebook post this whole thing about how

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I'm just trying to get cozy with the Muslims and all the rest of the stuff. And of course, Steve Hayes over at TriBlog has just completely lost his mind.

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White's problem is he's become a Muslim partisan. I mean, that is, you have to have completely fallen off the cliff to say something like this.

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I mean, just gone. I mean, credibility down to zilch, zero. Mark it off.

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There are still some other good guys there, but Steve Hayes, done. Just gone. All over with.

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Because what kind of abject hypocrisy does it take to say on the one hand,

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I refuse to be held accountable for what this person who calls himself a

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Christian says, and here's my reasons why. And then you turn around and I can point you to the people.

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I know them by name. I've actually met one. That's one of the problems is these people don't know any

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Muslims or the only Muslims they know are street level, cultural

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Muslims who rarely read any of their own history. Just like, Hey, look, folks, cultural

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Islam is just as ugly as cultural Christianity, cultural

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Buddhism, cultural Hinduism. When it's, when any religious faith just becomes a cultural thing, it gets very, very ugly.

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And there is cultural Christianity and it's very, very ugly. And we identify it and we don't want to have anything to do with it.

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Well, if you sit there and say, well, there's really no such thing as cultural Islam. There's just, you know, all

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Muslims are the same. I look at you and say, you are a glowing hypocrite and you have no defense.

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None. I know these people and I know the grounds upon which they say, no, this is wrong.

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Now you may sit there and say, but these people over here, they make their argument. I know that.

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I know that. I've been saying that forever. Okay.

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Not forever. I haven't been around forever, but saying that for years, I know that.

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I know there's an argument, but my argument from the start has been the founding source documents of Islam are not consistent.

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And therefore there are going to be these differences. It's all there is to it.

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And for Steve Hayes, who doesn't know a 10th about Islam, what I know, he doesn't, he doesn't have interaction with these people.

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Show me the evidence that he does. He doesn't to sit there and call me a

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Muslim partisan. What can I say? I mean, we just scheduled a dialogue.

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We scheduled two dialogues. I suppose I should let you know about this. I love the look

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I get from Rich sometimes. By the way, we, I, well, we, but I go up to Colorado in July and what

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I've started doing is, is, you know, like last year we went up through Salt Lake City. Many years have gone up through New Mexico.

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What I've done this year is instead of going up to Colorado twice, like I did last year, is

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I'm doing the triangle of encouragement. I'm going to go up to Evergreen. I'm going to do the big ride

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I do there. It's going to be really tough this year because I'm not getting to do almost any of the training

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I normally do. But, and then I'm going from there down to Santa Fe and want to be an encouragement to the, to the church there, the

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Gospel Church there in Santa Fe. And then I'm driving. So that's, that's this part of the triangle.

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And then I'm going across to Salt Lake City and I'm going to be with Jason Wallace, the

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OPC there. And Jason, Jason's a go -getter when it comes, he does debates.

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He loves setting up debates and stuff like that. Well, one dialogue with Alma Allred on who is

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Jesus, is the Jesus of Mormonism, the Jesus of the Bible. And then that's, that's, that's at the beginning of the weekend.

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On the other side, the last day that I'm there before I drive back to Colorado, he went ahead and Jason's a nice guy, contacted the local

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Imam. And basically, this is what's going to make it really interesting. We're going to do the same topic except with Islam.

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So I think that's really neat to be able to do the two topics. And maybe for folks like Steve Hayes, the fact that we're going, that we can do this respectfully, respectfully, kindly, that we don't have to, you know, start a war.

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Alma Allred and I, you know, it's going to be sharp disagreement, but Alma and I have known each other.

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Oh, good grief. When did, when did that man walk up to me? I can, I can remember this day.

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Oh, earlier than that. No, it was earlier than that. Because I remember he came to D .L.

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Culliver's house when I spoke on grieving. And that, but that was, now that was, yeah, that was early 90s.

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I, well, somewhere in the late 80s then.

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Alma Allred came walking up to me at the South Gate. It was to the west of the

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South Gate and at Temple Square. And that started a lengthy correspondence.

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He was the most challenging Mormon I had ever corresponded with. Why? Because he knew his faith.

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He did reading outside of the normal stuff. He had lots of contact with the leadership of the

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Mormon Church. I mean, I've been listening to some of the dialogues he's had with, with Jason up there.

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And it's, it's been fascinating. I did tell Jason, this is gonna be a little bit creepy because I don't know if you have seen

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Alma over the past number of decades. But he now looks like one of the three Nephites. Do you remember the three

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Nephites? And they showed up in their, their robes. He looks like one of the three Nephites. Without the costume. Exactly.

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So it sort of freaks me out a little bit that, that I'm going to be having a dialogue with one of the three

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Nephites. But anyway, we're setting these up.

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I guess there are some people that don't think that the discussion we had at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando, ironically, with Muhammad Musri, that, that we should do that.

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Because I showed the man the respect that is due to him.

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And in fact, let me, let me read something. It happens to fit in here real well. Oh, and I went and skipped that other one.

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Let me, let me read you something I posted, because Monergism Books put up a meme this morning.

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And I looked up the reference. I wish the reference had been in the meme. But anyway, I looked up the reference.

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Check this out. Moreover, that we may not weary in well -doing, as would otherwise forthwith and infallibly be the case, we must add the other quality in the

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Apostles' enumeration, charity suffers long and is kind is not easily provoked. The Lord enjoins us to do good to all without exception, though the greater part, if estimated by their own merit, are most unworthy of it.

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But Scripture subjoins the most excellent reason when it tells us that we are not to look to what men in themselves deserve, but to attend to the image of God, which exists in all, and to which we owe all honor and love.

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But in those who are of the household of faith, the same rule is to be more carefully observed, inasmuch as that image is renewed and restored in them by the

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Spirit of Christ. Therefore, whoever be the man that has presented you as needing your assistance, you have no ground for decline to give it to him.

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Say he is a stranger, the Lord has given him a mark which ought to be familiar to you, for which reason he forbids you to despise your own flesh.

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Say he is mean and of no consideration, the Lord points him out as one whom he has distinguished by the luster of his own image.

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Say that you are bound to him by no ties of duty, the Lord has substituted him, as it were, into his own place, that in him you may recognize the many great obligations under which the

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Lord has laid you to himself. Say that he is unworthy of your least exertion on his account, but the image of God by which he is recommended to you is worthy of yourself and all your exertions.

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But if he not only merits no good, but has provoked you by injury and mischief, still this is no good reason why you should not embrace him in love and visit him with offices of love.

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He has deserved very differently from me, you will say, but what has the

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Lord deserved? Whatever injury he has done you, when he enjoins you to forgive him, he certainly means it should be imputed to himself.

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In this way only we attain to what is not to say difficult, but altogether against nature, to love those that hate us, render good for evil and blessing for cursing, remembering that we are not to reflect on the wickedness of men, but look to the image of God in them, an image which, covering and obliterating their faults, should by its beauty and dignity allure us to love and embrace them."

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John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 3, Chapter 7, Section 6.

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I've read the Institutes, but it was a number of years ago. I had forgotten that. I mean, when

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I read it, it was like the first time I was reading it. It wasn't, but it seemed that way. When you get old, you get to read books you read before and it's new to you.

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It's great. Incredible stuff. That's challenging to me. And he says it's impossible.

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It's against nature. That is against nature. There's no question about it, but it seems extremely appropriate here.

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That Muslim has made the image of God and it is not natural for me to honor that image.

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It is much easier to give into the baser things that I am seeing

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Christians give into this very day. It's much easier. I understand that.

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But I'm so thankful that I've gotten to know some of these people. And when you get to know them, oh, some of them can be pretty mean and nasty.

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And you know what? I know a bunch of Baptists that can be pretty mean and nasty too. But some of these people, my heart breaks for them.

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I pray for them. And if you don't know one, well, go meet one for crying out loud.

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But I'm just trying to do what Calvin said to do because I think what he said there has good, solid biblical basis in this world would be a much nicer place if more people listened to that and believed that and did that.

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It's a lot easier to give in to the anger and the hatred. But for Christians, that's not an option for us.

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That is not an option for us. Good stuff from Calvin.

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I appreciate exactly what it is he said. So anyway, obviously, there's much more to come out in this situation.

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I am very concerned that there is going to be, there was already this horrific act of violence in France.

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What a horrible situation that was. France, look to France.

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Something's going to happen there. Something's going to happen there because they've got the soccer thing going on right now.

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And guess what starts in early July? And this has concerned me for a long time because this is my sport.

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A tour de France starts and you cannot secure the tour de

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France. It's not possible. By the very nature of the competition itself, it's over 2 ,000 miles of wide open territory.

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It cannot be secured. It's not possible. And I am just, to be honest with you,

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I'm just shocked that there hasn't been violence before this.

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Now, there are, again, all sorts of issues to be addressed within the

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Muslim community concerning the nature of jihad, when it can be engaged in, all these things.

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But we do not promote that necessary internal debate when we help

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ISIS and Al Qaeda by saying the other side does not exist.

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That that is the only understanding. That great

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Muslim civilization that flourished for a while and that eventually succumbed to a form of Islam that is very similar to ISIS and Al Qaeda, but that did exist and had this legal system, are you going to deny that it existed?

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What made it able to flourish for the time that it did? And why did it collapse in light of this form of Islam that is so degrading to the very essence of created humanity?

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Because ISIS is. And when there are connected beliefs between the two groups, we are the ones so often going at what those central issues are.

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We're the ones, you know, that's what really, it's one thing when a

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Muslim attacks me, that's a given. I accept that. That's it. But when someone like Steve Hayes, who should know better,

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I can't even begin to conceive it. Think about the things we have emphasized to the

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Muslim people for so long, the things we've been focused upon. They are the central issues.

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The issue of, you know, we've done entire programs. We've talked about how in many forms of Islam, Muhammad ends up taking the role of a mediator and intercessor.

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Why? Because Muhammad didn't understand who Jesus was. He did not understand

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Christ's role as mediator. So, the fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of the

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New Testament revelation is central to the reason why Islam is what

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Islam is and why it has produced the things that we're seeing in the world today.

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We're going right at those things, but we get to do it in contexts that the rest of you people don't get to do it in because we try to be fair.

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It's all there is to it. It's all there is to it. Amazing. Amazing.

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Anyway, some other things to get to today, but there'll be more. There'll be more coming.

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I can guarantee it. There will be more coming. There's going to be more coming out. And like I said, pray for France because I am concerned, very, very concerned about the next few weeks because I don't care how many security people they've got.

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I don't care how many security people they've got. You can't control this.

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Oh, this is nice. Very good. This just popped up. Wait a minute. That's 17 hours. How come it's the first time

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I've seen it? Well, it's Facebook. Who knows why stuff pops up on Facebook? Judge drops charges against man who exposed

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Planned Parenthood. Good. I mean, it was absurdity on his face, but we live in a day where absurdity is the law.

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Was that a signal I saw? Well, I was going to tell you that Facebook has a tendency in the newsfeed setting up there that it keeps taking it over and trying to run to top stories is what it calls it.

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And to make it stay at most recent, you have to continually check that because it keeps running home to mama.

43:34

Okay. Thank you very much for that information. I just hadn't seen it. That's good news, but given time, they'll find a way around it.

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Do you have the video feed? I do. Okay, good. Good. I just wanted to make sure that was coming through.

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I want to, I guess we're having ins and outs with the feed today.

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Yeah, I'll probably wind up having to upload the recording. It's doing the roller coaster thing on us.

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I don't know why it does look. Yeah, it's not YouTube this time. It's our local connection because the audio feeds diving too.

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And that means that we're losing connection to the internet here on and off.

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I don't know why. Who knows? Sunspots? Yeah, there you go. Yeah. We'll blame it.

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Well, we could. Who can we blame? Conservatives? Christians? Guns?

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Conservative Christians. We'll blame the guns. Guns. I talked about guns. Yeah. That must be it.

44:36

Okay. All right. I do want to, we do need to get done at a particular time today due to various reasons.

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So I wanted to get to this real quick. Stephen Ritchie, a oneness Pentecostal, did a debate,

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I think down in New Zealand or Australia. It was down south, way down south. And I don't know,

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I end up in debates all over the world. I end up being quoted and referred to in debates all over the world.

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I want to just briefly play two little clips here. And I've got just enough time to do this.

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But let's listen to something that Stephen Ritchie said. This is something other people have done.

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And I want to correct the a -contextual use of something that I do say all the time.

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And here's where it comes from. Dr. James White once said on his radio,

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I believe, program, as I mentioned to Michael Brown on The Dividing Line last week,

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I think that the majority of people attending evangelical churches in the United States would test as modalists on any meaningful test of their knowledge of the

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Trinity. I believe that there's a lot of people that believe a lot like us.

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Because when you read the Bible, and when you look at creation, we're made after the image of God, and God has to be one because we're one.

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John said. Okay. Now, I have said that many, many times.

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I have said that I have a feeling that if you put together a quiz on the

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Trinity, and well, and this would depend on the church, obviously.

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I said evangelicals in general. Did y 'all see the Babylon Bee thing about Joel Osteen Googling what is a

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Trinity? And he was left mumbling, didn't understand what this is all about. I can guarantee you that if you did that at Joel Osteen's church, the failure rate would be epic, to utilize that term.

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And it is quite true that most would fall into a modalistic understanding.

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Not because they've examined different views and said, oh, this fits best with what

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I think the Bible says, but out of ignorance. That's been my whole point.

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That was my point to Michael Brown. That's been the whole point that I've, it's not because they are functioning on sola scriptura and tota scriptura, but because they are functioning out of ignorance.

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They've never been challenged. They do not have many of their pastors are themselves functionally modalistic.

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I sometimes hear prayers, even from ordained ministers that show a fundamental level of confusion as to their own understanding of the doctrine of the

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Trinity. When you look at much of the training, the theological training, the doctrine of the

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Trinity is very often just off the side, especially in many seminaries today, where it's all about leadership and church growth and programs and Sunday schools, and where you're actually being taught not to be a theologian, not to be the one who protects the flock in that way, but the chief executive officer and financial officer and stuff like that.

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When seminary turns into that, that Trinity thing takes a lot of time and it's just too obtuse for most folks.

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So what I'm decrying is the ignorance within the broad level of evangelicalism.

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I'm not for a moment saying that a fair reading of scripture leads to modalism because it does not.

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Any fair reading of scripture has Jesus differentiating himself consistently from the

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Father and yet praying to the Father as a self -consciously eternal divine person.

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And so it's the penchant amongst evangelicals to do the chicken coop type of theology where you have your doctrine of God up here and your doctrine of salvation, the

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Bible, and then last things, and they're always separated from another and you recognize that it's sometimes painful for people or uncomfortable for people to be challenged to bring those doctrines and beliefs close enough to go, am

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I being consistent? Does my doctrine of God and my doctrine of salvation and my doctrine of the church, do they actually fit together in a coherent whole?

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If most of your belief is just tradition that you have imbibed, not by going to tradition class on a

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Wednesday night, but I grew up in the church, I've attended pretty regularly,

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I don't always fall asleep, and so this is what has been communicated to me by the repetitive nature of its appearance in the teaching and preaching in the church that I'm a part of.

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That's how most people get their theology. When you challenge folks like that on a theological basis, it can become extremely uncomfortable because very quickly the inconsistencies, the cracks develop and are plainly seen and the general reaction is to be angry with you.

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Not with them for having been lazy basically their entire life when it came to their theology, but you.

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You shouldn't be raising these issues or you're being divisive or whatever. Been there, done that.

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Have a closet full of t -shirts on that particular subject. And so, you know, he accurately quoted me, but not to the purpose of what

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I was saying. I think that's a little bit of a misuse of it. I would appreciate at least if Mr.

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Ritchie wants to use that quote that he would say, now Dr. White was not saying that the

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Bible teaches our position, but that people in ignorance default to that position simply because they've never been challenged on the subject.

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And that wouldn't really be a positive thing for your position, so I'm not sure why you would actually be using that.

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But anyway, that was the first thing. And did you notice I used the space bar to stop it?

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I used the space bar. You know what? I generally don't do that because if I do anything else, if I then click over to Accordance or anything else, that's not gonna work anymore.

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No, you have to be careful there. I have to then click back on it. Once I've clicked back on the video, I might as well just mouse it on down and hit play.

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So when people in the channel mock me for not doing that, I'm just like, hey, you don't have to deal with what

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I'm dealing with, man. It certainly answers the question of old dogs and new tricks. It really does. Yeah, thank you very much.

52:56

Okay, you ready to bring this back up? Here we go. John 17, 24, that they may see my glory which you have given me before the foundation of the world.

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So a divine God, the Son, could not be given divine glory, nor any glory at all, because a co -equal

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God person should have all glory to begin with. In context, John 17, 22 says, the glory which you have given me,

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I have given them. Now, we didn't receive divine glory. What glory was

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Jesus talking about that was given to his disciples? Well, look at John 7, 39.

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The Spirit had not yet been given because Jesus was not yet glorified. Jesus had to be glorified by his resurrection before the

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Spirit could be given. He was praying for his predestined glory to be resurrected.

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God as God cannot be given glory. It's ridiculous, the Trinitarian. I would love to debate

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James White on this. I really would. I've seen some of these debates, and I'm like, I really want to debate with somebody like that because it's just ridiculous, the

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Trinitarian eisegesis of these passages of Scripture. So, the Trinitarian eisegesis of John 17, he wants to debate me on something like that.

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Well, did you understand what was just being said? Somehow, what

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Jesus is talking about ends up being something about some resurrection glory.

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So, the Son in the glorified,

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I just like, he sort of left John 17, 5 real quick.

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I wonder why. Well, because John 17, 5 cannot be coherently interpreted by a oneness advocate.

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Just can't. Not possible. Can't be done. Notice what the argument was.

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Well, if he's a divine God, the Son, that he can't receive glory. Did you catch that?

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So, that's why cross -examination is so important because that sounded real good.

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He said it with a lot of authority and good Pentecostal preaching power. But think about for just a second, what does the entire heavenly host say in their worship of God upon his throne?

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Don't they say something along the lines of glory be to him who made us, him who sits upon the throne, glory and power and honor and blessing?

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And, but I thought he just said a divine being can't be glorified.

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So, why do we worship? That makes no sense. Now, when you look at what the

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New Testament is actually teaching and you recognize that the Son has become incarnate, when you tie together

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John 17 with Philippians chapter 2, then the

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Son makes himself of no reputation. He does this voluntarily.

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And so, there is a laying aside of that glory, which was the

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Son's in the presence of the Father. So, then it makes sense.

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And now, glorify me, Father, together with yourself, with the glory, which

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I had, para se auto, at your side, in your presence, before the world was.

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Para soy and para se auto, the two phrases here, together with yourself and then with you, the two different phrases, can not be interpreted any other way than one person referring to a relationship with another person.

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But, from the oneness perspective, there is no divine second person that's eternally existed.

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So, this is where, with cross -examination in a debate, when someone just throws out these authoritative sounding assertions, once you get to the cross -examination, you can get down into the level of the text and say, okay, together with yourself, para se auto, this is the

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Son speaking to whom? So, you identify the Son as a created nature?

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And yet, then it says, para soy, that I had with you before the world was.

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So, you think this is in the divine knowledge? How does this work? You can get down and actually deal with the actual issue.

58:24

So, I had never heard of Stephen Ritchie before, but hey, let's put his name on the list.

58:30

There are times I go to conferences and people go, I'd love to arrange a debate and stuff like that. Well, if it's on the trend or something like that, who knows?

58:39

Maybe it'll work out. I mean, last time I went to Australia, I ended up debating, obviously, with a oneness individual.

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Both of us were from the United States, which is really weird why we ended up debating in Australia. But anyway, so I'd seen that, wanted to throw it out there, say, yeah,

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I've seen it, and no, that was not a meaningful response to John 17 5 either.

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So, don't know when the next dividing line might be.

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I'm waiting for some phone calls and stuff. The possibility exists. We might be able to do another one this week, maybe on Friday, maybe.

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But then again, maybe not. Don't know. It's all up in the air, and we'll just let you know on Facebook and Twitter and on the blog of how we're putting stuff together.

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But I appreciate your patience during this time. We'll see you whenever the next time is. God bless.