The Weakness of the Evangelical Church on the Doctrine of the Trinity

God's word. This is the Dividing Line. The Word of God is living and active, sharper than any double -edged sword.

It penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

This program is designed to equip the Body of Christ with biblical answers to the complex questions that we face in our day and to serve as a witness of the gospel of the grace of God to the unbelieving world around us.

The Dividing Line is a presentation of Alpha and Omega Ministries. Our host is

Dr. James White. This is a live program and we invite your participation.

In the metro Phoenix area you can call now at 602 -274 -1360 and toll free across the

United States. It's 1 -888 -550 -1360. And now with today's topic, here is

James White. And there we go.

I sound much better when I'm on the air. It is symptomatic of exactly what is going on in evangelicalism today.

It is symptomatic of what is wrong with evangelicalism today. What am

I referring to? I'm referring to the conflict that is taking place these days between many people regarding the subject of music.

And specifically, specific music that's supposed to be playing right now underneath me. Listen very carefully.

There it is now! Ah, yes.

You may have heard this music before. This is the music of Phillips, Craig, and Dean.

As you listen to it, you'll notice it's very pretty. And if you listen to the words, you don't really hear anything overly unusual.

In fact,

I listened to this song for a long, long time. And really enjoyed it. So what's wrong?

It's a beautiful song. It's based on Galatians 2 .20, one of my favorite passages. Maybe one of yours as well.

And it's beautifully sung. It's arranged wonderfully. It actually excites the emotions.

And if you listen to someone saying this in your church, you'd probably not for a second think of anything more than Galatians 2 .20

and to be crucified with Christ and everything else. So why in the world do we bring this issue up on the dividing line today?

Now listen to this song just for one more moment. And yet I live not

I but Christ that lives within me His cross will never ask for more than I can give

For it's not my strength but His There's no greater sacrifice

For I am crucified with Christ And yet I live

I am crucified with Christ and yet I live. That's a beautiful message. And that is the music of Phillips, Craig, and Dean.

And you say, well, what could possibly be wrong about that? And why is this emblematic of what's wrong with evangelicalism today?

Well, let me try to tie all of this together. Some of you may be familiar with an article that appeared recently in Christianity Today.

There is a controversy. Marty Minto has mentioned it on Straight Talk Live.

It was a controversy I was aware of quite some time ago as I was writing an article for the

Christian Research Journal entitled Loving the Trinity. And at that time I was aware of the fact that there were concerns about the

Weigh Down workshop and a woman named Gwen Shamblin. And as I read some of the things that Gwen Shamblin had read,

I admit I bent over backwards to try to read them in a positive light. And I came to the conclusion that in reality what we had going on with Gwen Shamblin was simply confusion.

We had a woman untrained in theology, untrained in scripture, who was really just a weight loss expert, who was saying some confused things about theology.

And there are a lot of folks that are confused about theology, so I didn't even mention her particular situation in my article on Loving the

Trinity. Well, lo and behold, I was too nice. And only recently

Gwen Shamblin has come out on her webpage as being specifically and purposefully anti -Trinitarian.

In fact, the church that she and her husband, I guess, are a part of and are sort of in charge of is going off into, well, rank cultism, to be quite honest with you.

And in the Christianity Today article we read the following words.

Quote, a few people have been on a witch hunt in the last month, end quote, Shamblin told CD. She likens the controversy to Christian authors holding different views on once -saved, always -saved teachings.

People don't care about this, Shamblin told CD. They don't care about the

Trinity. This is going to pass. What the women want is weight loss.

They care about their bodies being a temple and their lives turned over to the Lord. That's what my ministry is about, end quote.

Let me repeat that just one more time. People don't care about this, Shamblin told CD. They don't,

CT, they don't care about the Trinity. This is going to pass. What women want is weight loss.

So Gwen Shamblin of the Weigh Down Workshops said, people don't care about the Trinity. They don't care about my views and the doctrine of the

Trinity. They want to lose weight. That's what's important to Christian women. If I were a

Christian woman, I would be exceptionally offended at such a statement.

And yet, though I am thankful to report that there are many churches that are closing their doors to the heresies of Gwen Shamblin, there will be many others who will agree with her assessment and say, hey, look, she talks about Jesus, she talks about the

Spirit, she talks about God the Father. What does it really matter if she's not a Trinitarian? What does it really matter?

Because people get something positive out of what she has to say. And if it can help them meet their felt needs, if it can help them lose some weight and feel better about themselves, isn't that why we're here?

Well, is that why the church is here, folks? Is that why the church exists? If your church exists to make people feel better about themselves, then you're not going to care at all about Gwen Shamblin's theology.

In fact, you're probably going to say, look, you theological Nazis, run around being concerned about what people believe on these irrelevant issues, whether there's a

Father and a Son and a Spirit, or there's just one person that manifests himself. You know, it's just all a bunch of words anyways.

Doesn't really matter at all today to the modern church. That brings me to an email that was sent to me this week.

It was sent to me from a local listener who had written to K -Love

Radio. And as you know, K -Love is not just one radio. There is a local station,

K -Love, that plays contemporary Christian music. But there is a whole series of radio stations in the

K -Love family. And this particular individual wrote to the folks at K -Love and basically said, why do you always play the music of Phillips, Craig, and Dean?

Because Phillips, Craig, and Dean are not Trinitarians. In point of fact, they are

Oneness Pentecostals. They deny the doctrine of the Trinity. So why do you play their music?

And this was the content of the response. Thank you for your recent email to K -Love

Radio. I'm glad you took the time to write. I appreciate your willingness to come to me with your concern regarding Phillips, Craig, and Dean.

K -Love does seek to be doctrinally accurate and true to the Bible, and I do understand why you were alarmed.

K -Love has long sought to uplift all believers, regardless of their denomination. Our goal is to focus on the 90 %—now listen closely— the 90 % of essential doctrine on which all

Christians can agree, and not to argue about the 10 % of non -essential doctrines, which give room for Christian liberty.

Early last year, the issue of Oneness Pentecostals and Phillips, Craig, and Dean, Dean's involvement in this movement, was brought to our attention.

The K -Love Board of Directors discussed this matter, and I'd like to share our conclusions with you. After much prayer and research, we learned that PC and Dean do believe in the

Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They just don't call them the Trinity.

But then, neither does the Bible. From their testimonies, they seem to be fellow believers and are not living in sin.

The lyrics of their songs are clear and biblically correct. If that should change,

K -Love would immediately stop playing their songs or promoting their concerts. But until then, or until new information comes to light, we decide to continue to play

PC and D. Also, the board decided to leave them on because the doctrine of Oneness Pentecostals would not exclude them from eternal life.

They believe in Jesus, and that faith in Christ is essential. In other words, they believe in the basics of K -Love's statement of faith.

End quote. Well, listen to what this means.

We are told, first of all, that the station is going to focus upon that which uplifts all believers, that is, on the 90 % of essential doctrine in which all

Christians can agree. The only way I can understand that is that means that the doctrine of the

Trinity falls in the 10 % which is non -essential.

The doctrine of the Trinity has become non -essential.

We are told that after much prayer, K -Love learned that PC and D believe in the

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They just don't call them the Trinity, but then neither does the Bible. Now, folks, what does that mean?

What does that mean? As I pointed out in my response to this, Mormons believe in the

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. What they mean when they say they believe in the

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is, of course, completely and totally different than what Christians mean when they say they believe in the

Father. That's Elohim, one God who was once a man on another planet. And Jesus, that's Jehovah, who is the first begotten child of Elohim, who has a body of flesh and bones, and one of his heavenly wives.

And the Spirit, we assume, is another one of the offspring of Elohim, and a third God. But they believe in the

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Then again, so do Jehovah's Witnesses. Jehovah's Witnesses believe in the

Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is God's impersonal act of force. And the Son is Michael the Archangel, and the

Father is Jehovah. But they believe in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And so, it would seem that since the

Trinity is part of the 10 % non -essential doctrine, that Jehovah's Witnesses who produce contemporary

Christian music, there's a bunch of Mormons producing contemporary

Christian music. And if you listened to that contemporary Christian music, in a large portion of it, you would not be able to detect specific

Mormonism. So, should they be played on K -Love as well? Should Christian radio stations say,

Hey, you know, as long as it has a good beat, it sounds good, it's arranged well, it's recorded well, all is well with us.

It is also told that, we are also told that the board of directors of K -Love has decided that Oneness Pentecostalism does not affect the

Gospel. Now, I don't know what basis upon which they're saying this. Oneness Pentecostalism, as it is expressed in the

United Pentecostal Church, and I'm quick to point out that none of the members of PC &D are still members of a

UPC church, but Oneness Pentecostalism, as it is expressed by the

UPC, the largest denomination, not only denies the doctrine of the Trinity, but it goes beyond that to say that speaking in tongues is absolutely necessary for salvation.

And that you must be baptized in the name of Jesus, not in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Not in a

Trinitarian formula, but in the name of Jesus alone for salvation. But we're told that the board has decided that the doctrine of Oneness Pentecostalism does not exclude from eternal life.

They believe in Jesus and that faith in Christ is essential. Folks, what Jesus?

What Jesus are we supposed to be speaking of here? That is where all of this falls apart.

Back in 1999, I received a copy of an email that was written on September 9th, 1999, by Randy Phillips of Phillips, Craig, and Dean.

Now listen to what's said here. Quote, As far as your question is concerned, we believe in the three dimensions or personas of one

God, 1 John 5, 7, Matthew 28, 19, and 1 Timothy 3, 16. We believe in one

God who is eternal in His existence, triune in His manifestation being both

Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and that He is sovereign and absolute in His authority. Folks, that is classic modalism.

That's Oneness Pentecostalism. It says we believe in the Father who is God Himself, creator of the universe.

We believe that Jesus is the Son of God. He suffered, died, was buried, and rose from the dead for our total salvation.

We believe that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Him. Sounds good until you realize that in Oneness Pentecostalism, that means

Jesus is two persons. He is a human person, that's who the Son is, indwelt by the

Father, that's who God is. And finally, we believe in the Holy Spirit who is God indwelling, empowering, and regenerating the believer.

The Holy Spirit is called the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth. So, in Oneness Pentecostalism, you have one person who is the

Father. When He indwells, He is the Spirit. And He indwelt the human person who is the Son, so that the

Son is two persons, the Father and the Son. The Son is not eternal in Oneness Pentecostalism, folks.

The Son came into existence at His birth in Bethlehem. Now, I have written to Phillips, Craig, and Dean.

I have asked them specific questions about these very issues. And I'm not getting responses anymore.

You can imagine why. The end of Randy Phillips' email said, For centuries, people have debated endlessly theological differences.

We do not want to spend our time in debating differences, but in coming together on our similarities.

This is the call of modern evangelicalism. Let's not worry about our differences, let's focus on our similarities.

Folks, if we don't believe in the doctrine of the Trinity, what are our similarities? We start off playing a song,

I Am Crucified with Christ. It's a beautiful song. But what does it mean?

For the Oneness Pentecostal, that means I have been crucified with He who was the

Father in the flesh. Not with the second person of the Trinity who became enfleshed to die in the place of believers, no.

We're talking now about patrapassionism. We're talking about modalism.

We're talking about a different Jesus Christ. But we're not allowed to talk about that without being divisive.

As long as it excites you, as long as it gives you goosebumps, as long as the music is good, and the lyrics are good, and the harmony is awesome, and they are great performers, then it doesn't matter.

As Gwen Shamblin says, people don't care about the Trinity, they want weight loss. Is she right?

Is that what's going on in evangelicalism today? People don't care about the Trinity, they want pretty music.

They want to be entertained. Is it possible, folks, that the main reason that there has been only a few voices, such as my own, raised in warning about inviting

Oneness Pentecostals into the church to quote -unquote minister, is because the vast majority of evangelicals are closet modalists?

They're modalists out of ignorance. They're modalists because no one will preach on the doctrine of the Trinity. We won't train our children in what the doctrine of the

Trinity is supposed to be. And the main reason we won't do it is because it's too inconvenient to do it, and we really don't care.

It really doesn't matter. Whether we worship God in spirit or in truth, as long as our needs are met, what does it really matter?

We wonder why the church is losing its voice and its clear identification, and yet, on the very basic issue of who

God is, what the doctrine of the Trinity is, well, there's compromise.

There's compromise. Phillips, Craig, and Dean, beautiful music.

It's beautiful music. But in reality, when they say

I'm crucified with Christ, I don't know about you, but if someone's going to lead me in worship, there's one thing that needs to exist.

They have to believe in the same Jesus I do. I can't be led in worship by the

Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They may sing holy, holy, holy, but they don't believe in my

God. And the words ring awful hollow when you know what the meaning is, don't they?

602 -274 -1360. 1 -888 -550 -1360.

Let's go to our phone callers, and let's talk with Johnny in Whittier, California. Hi, Johnny. Hi, how are you?

May I call you James? Sure. Oh, hi, James. I'm calling to ask you about the Protestant, what next

Pentecostal author, David Bernard. He wrote a book called Oneness and the Trinity. And in this book, he makes the claim that early

Christian authors, such as Clement Ignatius, Polycarp, Harness, were all

Oneness Pentecostals, and then he makes reference to the Didache, that it was interpolated, that it didn't originally carry a

Trinitarian background. What I'm hearing is that he, I get the impression that he's taking them out of context.

Well, yes, very much so. Anyone who's read Ignatius knows he was no Oneness Pentecostal. He very clearly differentiates between the

Father, Son, and Spirit while affirming the deity of the Son. So, really, the position that he espouses was one of the earliest heresies the

Church dealt with. And any group, for some reason, feels the need to go into the early

Church and somehow try to prove that their view was, in fact, the majority view, which

I think shows a real ignorance of Church history as a whole, because outside of monotheism, there was almost nothing that all the early

Church authors agreed on. But yet, as it may, there's absolutely no evidence whatsoever that the

Didache, which contains the Trinitarian form of baptism out of Matthew 28, 19 -20, has been, quote -unquote, interpolated.

Dr. Bernard and I have not debated that issue. We did debate on WMCA a couple of years ago the subject, does a person have to speak in tongues to be justified?

And in that particular situation, it took me, I would estimate, about an hour and a half to get

Dr. Bernard to admit on the air that I was not justified because I have not spoken in tongues.

So it took a lot of work on my part, but eventually I did get him to admit that, in point of fact, the doctrine of the

One that's Pentecostal, the United Pentecostal Church, and he is their chief theologian, is that. So there has been a lot of discussion of Dr.

Bernard and I debating in the future on Long Island. I'm sure that eventually that will take place.

I don't know if it will happen the next year or not. But to debate the doctrine of the Trinity, and I'm sure those issues would come up.

Some debates, sometimes you have time to get into the early Church fathers, sometimes you do not. But there were certainly modalists in the early

Christian Church. They were called modalistic heretics, and they were refuted by anyone, such as Irenaeus and others, who recognized the clear teaching of the

Scriptures regarding the fact that the Father and the Son are differentiated from one another. Actually, his book called

The Oneness of God... I have it. Yeah. Interacted with that a fair amount when

I wrote a paper that is on our website called The Trinity, the Definition of Calphan and Oneness Theology.

And I think one of the most glaring things from Dr. Bernard's book is the tremendous difficulty, in fact impossibility, that faces

Oneness Pentecostal writers when they attempt to deal with the subject of the prayer life of the

Lord Jesus Christ. But the problem here, Johnny, is that the vast majority of evangelicals have never even heard a sermon on the doctrine of the

Trinity, and therefore to be able to provide a response to Oneness Pentecostal, who's ready to do it these days?

That is, I think, one of the greatest shames upon the modern

Church, is that we simply do not prepare our people to understand what the issues are and to understand the errors of those around us.

And I think that's why you see not only Phillips, Craig, and Dean, but Gwen Shamblin and other

Oneness Pentecostal individuals. Turn on the channel here in Phoenix.

Well, you're in Whittier, so you've got TBN over there. Turn on between 20 and 22 here in Phoenix, and you'll see

T .D. Jakes constantly. And I have sat there and listened to T .D. Jakes present a modalistic view of God, and yet he's on the

Trinity Broadcasting Network. Hello, is anyone home? I don't get the feeling that too many folks are.

Yes, because I was at the debate that you did against Tim Staples, and really what I'm concerned with is on Church history, because I want to get into the

Church Fathers. And you even said at the debate not to read quote books, to read the actual studies of the debate. Right, right.

Well, you know, it's fascinating, Johnny. You know what's fascinating about why? Because we didn't ask you to call, right?

No. You just called in. The reason is Richard Pierce is sitting across from me in the control room, and I happen to know that during the break coming right up, he's going to be talking about a new item that we're offering on our website.

Mr. Pierce, you want to tell us about it? Because the reason I think you might want to listen to this,

Johnny, is we're offering a new product that contains a number, it has the entire 38 -volume

Erdman set available on the Master Christian Library. I don't know if you have that yet.

But Mr. Pierce is going to be talking to us about that, and you might want to listen in, because you said you wanted to go to the originals.

Well, that's how you get to the originals. It also has a lot of other stuff on it as well. So listen in to see if he describes it here in just a second, okay?

Sure. Okay, well, thanks for calling today, Johnny. Thank you. God bless. 602 -274 -1360.

We're going to take a break and be back with Kevin right after this. I've even got to hold it.

Turn that music down. I can't hear myself. I feel like Rush Limbaugh. Can't hear myself.

Just about deafened me there, actually. I picked up the Ages Library because not only did it have the 38 -volume

Erdman set, which I know I've had that for a long, long, long, long time. I mean, everybody puts a

CD out, throws it in there just for the fun of it. But it had all sorts of other stuff, including now

Kylan Dellich's commentary on the Old Testament, which is a very, very valuable 10 -volume resource, and so it is definitely worth picking up.

Let's go out to Surprise, Arizona, and talk to Kevin. Hi, Kevin. Hi, hello.

How are you doing, sir? All right. How are you doing, James? I'm doing just fine. It's good to talk to you. I'm calling specifically to ask you a question on how we could, on what approach we could take to help individuals that are dealing with,

I guess, the specific people you had mentioned, Bishop T .D. Jake and Philip Craig -Zendine.

Philip Craig -Zendine. Craig -Zendine, okay. On dealing with truth instead of relying on feeling.

Well, you know, we live in a society that teaches us to rely upon feelings.

It is a part of postmodernism to teach us to think in such a way that truth is what you feel that it is.

Everyone's feelings are to be respected. And what that turns into is everybody's feelings are to be taken as a valid expression of truth, and if you dare hurt someone's feelings by telling them they're wrong, you're a very bad person.

I mean, we can see the absolute foolishness of this in our educational system when, for example, people will say you shouldn't tell a child when they say 2 plus 2 is 5 that they are wrong.

We should instead show them a better way. No, 2 plus 2 is not 5. And it's ridiculous to think that the opinion that 2 plus 2 is 5 is equally valid with the opinion that 2 plus 2 is 4, that that somehow is something we should be promoting.

So we've got to realize most of this thinking comes from the world.

It has come into the Church, and instead of the Church being informed by Scripture and being informed by the way that Christians are to think,

Christians are thinking like the world, and then editing the Christian message from the world.

It has come into the Church, and instead of the Church being informed by Scripture and being informed by the way that Christians are to think.

Christians are thinking like the world and then editing the Christian message to take out those things that are that are contrary to the way the world thinks.

So really it's a it's an entire worldview situation. It involves the necessity of laying down some very basic fundamentals and that is that God is our

Creator and that because God has created all things there is truth and there is error.

There is right and there is wrong. And he has revealed what the truth is regarding the gospel and regarding his existence in Scripture and therefore we must line ourselves up with what is found in that which is theanoustos, that which is

God -breathed. And so many people come into the church because of non -biblical means of evangelism with the idea that they in essence are able to tell

God what opinions he should value and which ones he shouldn't. And it really it really involves starting from the ground up and laying that foundation that the

Scriptures are our sole infallible rule of faith. They're sufficient to function that way and then once you've got that foundation laid then you can say all right here's here are our certain teachings.

Here's what T .D. Jake says. Here's what the Scripture says. This is why it is important. But as I said in the first half of the program, so rarely will you hear preaching and teaching on these particular subjects again because of the deep deep influence of the world upon the church rather than the church upon the world.

You know when you speak that, it's funny you brought up that specific individual on T .D.

Jake's because I had noticed also that in his teaching on the

Trinity that he wasn't talking the same way I guess I would look at it. And in the church that I attended, the pastor and I had agreed to not have me teach there anymore because I didn't believe in the doctrine of losing your salvation.

But instead constantly he is a very, that individual is a very popular figure within our church.

But when I talked to individuals who seem to adore him, they still seem to adore the

Trinity in essence of what we would speak of it. And most people don't, they can't, if they were to go on and see his statement of faith, can't understand manifestation or three -person.

They can't distinguish that, it's too gray for them. So what

I'm asking is how far do you go on that? I mean I have already addressed that, but is it healthy?

Or I am not saying that it's a non -essential, because I believe the nature of God to be a very essential part of our faith.

Otherwise we're talking about a different God. Well, and we don't have anything to say about our God, because when people say, well, who is your

God? We go, well, you know, we all don't really agree on that, so we don't want to discuss that. That exactly doesn't accomplish much.

In reality, the reason that it's absolutely vital is that when we talk about worshiping

God, we're to worship God in spirit and in truth. And seemingly modern evangelicalism has decided that spirit is enough, and even then they've redefined the word spirit to make it emotion.

That we worship God in emotion and truth is irrelevant. So it is vitally important, because it absolutely defines whether we are worshipping

God or whether we're not. And God takes his worship very, very, very seriously. I just remind folks of Aaron's sons and Uzzah.

And if you don't know who they are, look them up in your Bible concordance and you'll discover that both of them died when they did that which was against God's prescription in regards to his worship.

And so, again, I know many a person who regularly attends an evangelical church in the

United States today, who would say, I would never worship a God that would strike someone dead for worshiping him wrong.

So in other words, I don't know what God they're worshiping, but they're not worshiping the God of the Bible. And it is that, it is that issue that I think is, this whole way in which people are treating the

Trinity is only a symptom of the fact that the church has so watered down the gospel that we have filled the pews with people who are not willing to submit to the

Word of God. And I think someday, when it is no longer popular to be a

Christian and it costs you something to be a Christian, you will see a huge crash in the number of people who darken the door of a

Christian church on a Sunday morning. When it costs you something to walk through there, when you have to live in light of it the rest of your week, you can't get the position at your job because you go there, etc.,

etc. It's going to change things tremendously. So how far do you go? I think when it comes to the central, defining doctrines of the

Christian faith, you go all the way. And that means you might become unpopular, you might be considered unloving, you're not going to get the support of a lot of folks, but that's what you've got to do because it's vitally important.

Okay, Kevin? One more comment, if you have time. Real quick, yeah. Okay, I don't believe within what

I see in our area that there are churches willing to hear that message. You wouldn't even have the door, the open door, to tell that doctrine.

You mean the doctrine of the Trinity? In dealing with issues, as you're saying, dealing with popular figureheads, and then coming back to the truth.

Well, I can assure you there are. They aren't the biggest and most popular ones. I'm an elder in a church that obviously names names.

I recently preached a sermon on the new gods of evangelicalism, where I named names in regards to Gregory Boyd and other people who are presenting,

I believe, false doctrine within the quote -unquote pale of orthodoxy, etc, etc.

So there are such churches scattered around the valley, but I will admit they are not generally the biggest and most successful churches, because generally the preaching is very applicatory, it's very direct, and it is the central aspect of the worship service.

And people are looking for something else. They're looking for something that is commensurate with the way in which they think, and they think in light of the way the world thinks.

So that is most definitely an issue. But they are out there, and we can be very thankful for that.

Thank you, Kevin, for your call today, 602 -274 -1360. Real quickly, let's talk with Sid and Tullis.

And hi, Sid. Hey, what's up, James? Well, I was wondering exactly what would be essential for salvation, as far as doctrine is concerned?

Because I know believing in Jesus Christ is what the Bible says, but do you think that a person who didn't believe in the

Trinity, because of that, would that default their salvation, or what? Well, the quick answer to that question is that we are not saying that a person, the very first day in which they confess faith in Christ, needs to have a

Doctor of Theology's degree and be able to give you a word -by -word, in -depth discussion of the triune nature of God, the relationship with the divine persons.

What we are saying is that an unwillingness to accept what the Scriptures teach in this subject would be indicative of an unregenerate heart, and that a person who is willing to continue to embrace a falsehood when, in point of fact, they have been given the truth, or when they are presented a false gospel within the context of Oneness Pentecostalism, that that gospel does not save.

I know many an evangelical who has misconceptions and confusions on the doctrine of the

Trinity, but the call to the elders in the church, to those given responsibility of teaching, is to continue to teach that truth and to call people to understand that they are to worship

God in spirit and in truth. And it should be the desire of the Christian to be growing in that knowledge, to be growing in that grace.

It should be a consuming desire to know the Word, and to continue to grow in an understanding of who our

God is, because we want to know the one that we love and worship. Anyone who gets to the point where they don't care at all about the identity or the concerns of their husband or their wife in a marriage is in big trouble.

Well, in the same way, we should be very concerned about the identity, the concerns, the desires of the one that we say we love, who is our

Heavenly Father, who is Jesus Christ, who is the Holy Spirit, our triune God. And that is a lifelong pursuit that we should be taken up with, and I would suggest that it should be far more important to us than anything else in life, and yet I think many of us will confess that the world frequently gets in the way of our pursuit.

And so it is my hope that the discussion of this will cause people to again consider what is really, really important and what is not.

You have to cut me off because I just wanted to make one more comment. Okay, go ahead, real quick. Well, I was thinking because something like, let's say a parallel,

I don't know if this is a good parallel, but something like Martin Luther, who was well -known and very strong evangelical

Protestant, but he rejected the book of James, he accepted the book to the

Laodiceans as scripture, and then he also hated the Jews, and there were certain things about him.

Well, Sid, let's back up there. Luther did not reject the book of James.

In fact, if you read his writings, he very frequently cites from James. What he said was that in comparison to Paul's writings in regards their testimony to Christ, James was a right strawy epistle.

And he did not like what James had to say in James chapter 2, because quite simply he did not understand what

James said in James chapter 2. I don't know what you mean about, James, Luther did not change the canon in any way, shape, or form.

Okay, because I have read stuff like that. I might have read some bad things about that. If it's on the Internet, you might want to take it with a little bit of a grain of salt.

Well, what I'm trying to say is, if, you know, Luther could, you know, like for instance, he did not like the

Jews much. I mean, he had some negative writing on the Jews. He certainly did toward the end of his life, especially most people in that day.

Yeah, well, what I'm trying to say is, if they could make that fault but still be very strong and saved, could a oneness

Pentecostal, somewhat just because of his misunderstanding of the Trinity, could he still be a strong leader in the

Church or something, or preach a very strong gospel and get people saved, but at the same time still keep his oneness?

That's what I'm wondering. No, I do not believe so, because we're talking about the very object of our worship.

We're not talking about the cultural fact that Luther was caught up in the very same type of horrible anti -Semitism that had been fostered by the

Roman Catholic Church for centuries and had come out of the Crusades and all those horrible things that happened there.

That's not the issue. The issue is, what God are we proclaiming? And oneness Pentecostalism does not have the true gospel.

Oneness Pentecostalism has a very works -oriented gospel, secondly. So, no, I do not think that there is salvation in denying that the

Son has eternally been God, in believing the Son is merely a human being who came into existence at his birth in Bethlehem.

I think that's a real vital issue. Okay, Sid? Yeah. Okay, thanks a lot for calling today. God bless. 602 -274 -1360, and after we come back from this break, we're not gonna take a break?

We don't want to? Oh, goody. Okay, all right. I've been wanting to do this for a long time, folks, and I don't want you to think that, you know, we've been talking about some pretty heavy stuff today on the program, and it started off with Rich's Prozac introduction to the dividing line.

This is the dividing line. I couldn't even do that. We'll be changing that next week.

We'll be changing that next week, but now Colin Smith has asked that we stay with Phil Keggy, and I like Phil Keggy.

In fact, the middle of that particular song is really, really powerful.

It really is, so we need to try to figure out some way of using that, okay? Well, the problem is that's the emotional effect that the song has on me.

Well, I'll tell you what. I'll have you drink three glasses of Mountain Dew before you record the next one, and it'll just go great, but I just want to shift gears here just for a few minutes, because I want to tell you a quick story, and then

I want to play a song for you, and I need to leave enough time here, so I need to hurry up. Five or six years ago,

I got a phone call from a man by the name of Chris Arnzen, and I didn't know who

Chris Arnzen was, but I know who Chris Arnzen is today. Some of you who have watched the debates that I've done on Long Island also know who

Chris Arnzen is. Chris Arnzen is probably the funniest man on the face of God's green earth, to borrow from Michael Medved, and I have probably laughed more with Chris Arnzen than anyone else in my entire life.

Back in January of this year, Chris Arnzen and I together went to a youth retreat in Tuscarora someplace.

It was in Pennsylvania. I don't know. I'm going back there again next year, so I need to figure out exactly where it is, but anyways, he and I performed a song together, and it was a spoof, and I thought it was all he was doing that night, but it wasn't, because after I sat down,

Chris Arnzen stood in front of all of us, and there's a videotape of this that I think we should market someday if they ever send it to me.

He stood in front of all of us, and he sang two songs that he had written. He had been attending. I had been speaking on the solos of the

Reformation, and one Wednesday night he couldn't make it because it was snowing too much for him to get to where I was on Long Island, so instead he wrote the words to two songs, and he performed them that night, and I am one of the few people in the world that can say that I was in the original audience when

Chris Arnzen first performed these songs, and they went over so well that when he got back, he went to the radio station he works for, and he recorded sort of semi -professionally these two songs.

I only want to play one of them for you, but please try to remember the background of these songs.

Chris has arranged all the great debates between myself and and Jerry Madetix, Mitchell Pacwa, Robert St.

Genes were working on the next year's debate on Purgatory, and he's a Protestant. He's in fact a

Reformed Baptist, though there are many Reformed Baptists that are somewhat concerned about that fact, but he is a

Reformed Baptist, and I can say that Chris Arnzen is one of my closest friends in all the world, and so I'm very proud to to bring you this special song by my friend

Chris Arnzen. During the 16th century, the Church of Rome reached its height of power as well as its depths of debauchery, greed, and corruption.

One of the most vile and greedy puppets of the papal throne was a member of the

Dominican Holy Order named Johann Tetzel. Tetzel sold indulgences to the spiritually ignorant and enslaved laity, warning them that this was a necessary means to purchase the souls of their deceased loved ones out from the torments of Purgatory.

A limerick became popular in that day's advent when a coin in Tetzel's kaffa rings, a soul from Purgatory springs.

This abuse of papal power through pilfering the poor, pious, and peasant people did not go unnoticed by a young German Augustinian monk who was once one of Rome's most faithful and loyal subjects.

Outraged by the level of greed and wickedness that the Church sank to, this monk nailed his protest to the practice of indulgence selling to the door of the castle church in Wittenberg, hoping to spark a debate with the intelligentsia of Rome.

The hammer blows as these 95 feces were nailed to the church door were like cannon fire heard around the world and ignited the blaze of a holy inferno that is still burning brightly today.

This holy inferno is the Protestant Reformation. That Augustinian monk who ignited it was me.

Hello, I'm Martin Luther, and this is my story. Oh yeah,

I'm the great reformer, reforming the churches that I'm known for.

I made my protest before Zwingli and all of the rest, nailed it up to the

Wittenberg door. Oh yeah,

I'm the great reformer, reforming the church was my goal.

But the Pope threw me out like some bad sauerkraut, flushed me right down his

Vatican bowl. I would not indulge that dirtbag

Johann Tetzel, so they threatened to twist my spine up just like a pretzel.

Yeah, I'm the great reformer. The Pope put the price on my head.

But while out on the run, I married a nun.

Sure beats living with guys who bake bread. That's very bold guys wearing robes baking bread.

My lady sweet Katie gave up her old habit.

She once dressed like a penguin, now multiplies like a rabbit.

Yeah, I'm the great reformer. I turned

Tetzel's church upside down. Tell those greaseballs that Trent, centuries after they came and went,

I'll be dead, but that won't keep me down. They wanted to slice me and dice me and feed me to the papal palace puppy dogs, but I'll bet you that in the 21st century that I'm...

Well, let me tell you something. When he did that, you can hear on the original tape anyways, and you can't understand it nearly as well on the original videotape, but it looks a whole lot better.

I think somewhere in the middle of that I fell off my chair, as everyone else did as well.

And what's worse is he went on with a second one after that. And, uh, I'm, I, I think that I may have developed some sort of a hernia or something as a result.

I'm considering legal action, but I'm not really certain whether I'll, I'll do that or not.

But that's Chris Arnzen and the great reformer. And now I wasn't big in 1950s music.

Okay. So I probably didn't get quite as much out of both of his songs as I would have if I had known something about 1950s music, but that's the great pretender, right?

Is that, that's what that, okay. I'm getting nods from the other room that that's the great pretender. So here's, here's poor

Chris. He can't make it to my presentation on one of the solos of the reformation. I forget which one it was, but because it was snowing.

I mean, we're talking, there were cars that got, there was one car that got stuck in the driveway of the church while I was there because they, it was so thick.

They didn't know that there was a curb underneath the snow and they got hung up on it and they had, you know, it was,

Oh, it was unbelievable. I had not seen that white fluffy cold stuff that falls out of the sky living here in Phoenix, Arizona, uh, for a very, very, very long time.

But, uh, because it was snowing so much that he couldn't make it. So what does he do? He goes out to the local karaoke store and buys those two soundtracks and writes, uh, the great reformer and, uh, the other one in case you're wondering, and we really don't have time to play it today because I've yapped too much, but the other one is called, you don't own me.

And, uh, that one is, uh, very, very good. And maybe we'll have to leave it for a, uh, a future time here on the dividing line.

Next week, I will continue and conclude, uh, mercifully for some of you, uh, conclude my response to the

Southwest Radio Church programs with a, a program on the subject, uh, of the assertion, uh, that, uh, certain books went unanswered in my book and that therefore

I am basically an idiot. That is the level of argumentation that we've been dealing with, but we will deal with that next week.

During the month of October. After that, uh, we will be welcoming a number of guests, uh, hosts to the program because generally

I'm not going to be here. I'm going to be far, far away. And, uh, on October 13th,

I'll be debating Roberts and Janice on papal infallibility in Clearwater, Florida. And please put this one here locally,

December 4th. It's a Monday night, San Diego, debating

Father Mitchell Pacwa on the subject of sola scriptura. Put that on your calendar.

I'd like to see some folks from the Phoenix area going over there with us. So, uh, hope to see you then.

Thanks for being with us today here on the dividing line. We'll talk with you next week. God bless. The dividing line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega Ministries.

If you'd like to contact us, call us at 602 -973 -0318 or write us at P .O.

Box 37106, Phoenix, Arizona, 85069. You can also find us on the worldwide web at aomin .org.

That's A -O -M -I -N dot O -R -G, where you'll find a complete listing of James White's books, tapes, debates, and tracks.