Pastor Tony Bartolucci

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Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line
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The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us Yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence
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Our host is dr. James white director of Alpha Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix reformed
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Baptist Church This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you'd like to talk with dr.
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White call now 602 nine seven three four six zero two or toll -free across the
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United States. It's one eight seven seven seven five three three three four one And now with today's topic here is
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James white When I was driving out here because I've thought about your comment that I'm not going to be a
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Roman Catholic apologist It occurred to me since your your change to Catholicism is based on the fact that you think
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Roman Catholicism Represents the true church. Why wouldn't you be a Roman Catholic apologist?
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And I think you mentioned before Well, you're kind of mere Christianity. We talked about this in the phone, but wouldn't mere
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Christianity now be Roman Catholicism? No, therefore it'd be appropriate to promote that or I was never really a
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Protestant apologist. I mean if you think about the works that I published in the areas
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Concerning questions like the existence of God the resurrection Right the issues of abortion.
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All those would apply to both sides. All right, and that of course is a familiar the familiar tones of Greg Koukl and Frank Beckwith that I Forgot the date that was spring of 2007
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We went through that. In fact, some of you may recall that we
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Took a lot of heat because we are the first ones to openly announce
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Frank Beckwith's return to Roman Catholicism and to call for his Stepping down as president of the
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Evangelical Theological Society. That was I believe early May of 2007
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I would be yeah, I think that's that's correct and I listened to The interview that took place on Stand to Reason between Greg Koukl and Frank Beckwith while writing
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Yesterday once again and pulled up the old sound file. Thankfully my faithful computer has survived that long and noticed that pretty much everything that I Listened to and said
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I would want to talk about that was already what I had marked and talked about two years ago But had forgotten that I had talked about It's just a sign of age, unfortunately as many of you know,
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I mentioned on my blog back when I was in London back in November that Frank Beckwith's book return to Rome confessions of an evangelical
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Catholic had come out from Brazos press Why the president of the
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Evangelical Theological Society left his post and returned to the Catholic Church I'm not sure that I like that title because he
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Went back to the Catholic Church and had seemed to fully intend to remain as the president of the
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Evangelical Theological Society So it wasn't well, I'm going to leave my position so that I can go back to Rome That's not really what happened.
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But I also understand that subtitles on books are sometimes forced upon you by people in publishing houses that really shouldn't be doing things like that be that as it may
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I Mentioned on the blog a couple days ago the possibility of putting together sort of a group of folks
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I know that with the debates coming up in in May in Milwaukee the trip back to New Jersey in June Australia over the summer the possibility of return trip to London at the end of of the year
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And and everything else in between that I'm once again doing the let's bite off as much as you can possibly do
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So that you're I would say I'd be constantly running around with my hair on fire But I've been doing that for so long that it doesn't really matter anymore
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And so given that dr. Beckwith's book is only 144 pages long and that includes the endnotes and no indices
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It's it struck me that it might be better to have a group of folks and one of the folks that has been not so subtly pushing that there be a response to this book is actually joined me in studio here and not by his own choice
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I'm gonna do the Jackie Gleason. I'm gonna hum and a hum and a hum and a hum and I'm glad I'm glad you you know we talked yesterday, and you said hey
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Why don't you come down to the studio and watch and watch yeah? And so I came prepared to watch and then you sit me down in front of a microphone
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Well, but you're a preacher and so preachers like to sit in front of yes, and do things like that so But but at least
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I got a good night's sleep last night very good And it's and and back in that tell us about your church back back east give us a little information
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Oh, it's a it's a wonderful church. I wish I had a lot of time to talk about it, but Clarkson Community Church it's in a rural suburb outside of Rochester, New York and That's warm there here.
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No no and that's why you know we have family my wife And I have family out here, and so we like to come out here and this time year and hopefully get back to spring
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But Clarkson Church, I've been there six plus years was a church one of the oldest churches in Monroe County where Rochester is and Clarkson Community Church was established in 18 16
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Sanctuary was built in 1825 two subsequent additions but had gone through really a hard time and had declined to about 40 50 people and Some good godly core group of people said hey, you know well, what you know what are we looking for?
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what is this church need and they said you know we really need a historic preacher and expositor and My desire wasn't to go to such a small church, but I told them when they called me up in fact
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I told them what we want we really would like to stay in the Arizona area That's where all our family is and all and last
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I checked Rochester was not very close to Arizona But I said the magic words
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And God just continued to open the doors and the church was not Sovereign grace oriented and just naturally naturally moved in that way
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I'm not a manipulator, but I just came and started preaching the word pretty unusual. It can be very tough.
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I talked with a Fellow who actually you may have run into him in our chat channel
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Just a couple nights ago And he's been trying to bring a church for quite some time that direction and has run into the proverbial brick wall
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And Especially when I speak at founders conference meetings and stuff talk to a lot of guys in that situation so when you find a group of folks that are are willing to Do what needs to be done light of the
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Word of God? It's that's a big blessing. There's a lot of a lot of folks get They good they go through a lot yeah, they get one of my seminary professors said it was sheep shudder
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You know you start teaching the doctrines of grace, and they say that's not fair and Let's get a kick out of that You're pretty good at doing that.
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Yes, that's good now Frank Beckwith book you you would come into chat channel or in swallow and go
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I can't believe what he's saying And I'm taking all these notes Is there something in your background?
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Maybe that would cause you to oh, yeah? I'm being my last name is Bartolucci. Yeah with my
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Italian heritage is very much Roman Catholic and God you were born into yes and God in his grace
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I mean you look at my extended family And it's all Roman Catholic God in his grace called my dad to saving faith first when
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I was about a junior in high school and I was very antagonistic against him and had some run -ins with them that God was working in my heart, and I Came to believe in Jesus Christ as my
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Lord and Savior my life was transformed I realized what it you know I never knew what what he meant that Christ died on the cross and And he was still up there yes exactly and and then
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I had the wonderful Just blessing of leading my mom to saving faith in Christ in 1983 and she was delivered from alcoholism
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Through that so I've seen the dramatic change in our family the love that we have for Jesus Christ and understanding of his word
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It's not religion. It's regeneration as I like to say and I've been able to witness the rest of my family who is
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Involved in Roman Catholicism and yet You know the lights just not on James, and I think you know what
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I'm talking about but So when you read something like this, it's
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It's more than just simply an academic Exercise you're you're listening to someone who's basically making excuses for a system that Simply doesn't offer.
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Hope and So it's much more much more personal so That's what's behind that so basically you know you were talking about the fact that you've you've typed up all this information from the book and everything else and Of course
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I'm listening to people utilizing Beckwith name now mainly because of The positions that he held specifically as the president evangelical theological society
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But not because of him ever having produced any type of meaningful
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Protestant theology he was a philosopher as a philosopher He remains it remains being a philosopher and most of the stuff that he did he co -authored books on relativism and the abortion issues and and so on and so forth, but as far as Just today.
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I was I was reading the section where he talks about Starting to attend a
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Protestant Church, and there was nothing at all about being convinced That the gospel of grace is different than what
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Rome had Nothing like that at all. It's just well you know some
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Protestants were nice to me, and they invited me to go to church and They seem to be living out their faith
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He does sort of say and I really had not seen anything like this in the Roman Catholic Church But you know there's there's
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I I don't read in here And did not listen in in the the Coco interview
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I did not hear him saying I was convinced that the gospel of sola fide and sola gratia
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Was absolutely true and that Rome did not possess it. I don't hear him right no no not at all and Much like I see some parallels in his arguments to the new perspective on Paul And I see
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I don't see it a doctrine of regeneration About as close as he comes to it as the
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Roman Catholic doctrine of being born again at baptism Taking John chapter 3 right in that direction, but I don't see a doctrine of regeneration
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And it just obviously what you and I would be looking for because when if if if one of us
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If you or I did what he did you would expect I would expect if I met with you
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Or I called you up, and I heard that you had done. There's something like that I would expect to hear some really strong reasoning that I once Placed my faith here.
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I said I will live and die on on this hill I've now abandoned that hill and here's why mm -hmm
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But that's not what I hear with Frank Beckwith in fact the thing that drove me nuts listening to him and Greg Coakle and Greg Coakle Was a tough tough spot to be in Very tough spot to be in he came out of Roman Catholicism And he does say that he says this is the hill to die on and this is
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I had never heard this And this is not what Rome teaches and all the Roman Catholic priests I've ever talked to have said
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X Y & Z to me, and you're telling me something else And so this is you know how am I supposed to really know I felt for him?
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but still one of the things that drove me nuts listening this interview again was the
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Almost the jocularity in some of the responses that Beckwith offered like ha ha ha
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I expected Trent to be poking you in the eye and and I was like It just grated to hear these vitally important issues, and you could tell when when
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Beckwith got to the point where no more no more of these questions about indulgences and all the rest of stuff
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I just I want a safe place to tell my story and and You know what what was
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Coakle supposed to do at that point? But I just did not get that sense of someone who had been passionate and now
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And you know James to look at that argument backwards You also get the sense as you go through the book that he never really entirely left
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Roman Catholicism Oh exactly exact in fact. That's one of the things that we need to address what
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I'm basically saying here is Thanks to brother Bartolucci is pushing pushing along here
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I think it'd be one of the things that I've already talked to and I and I Need to mention this to you, and you're gonna find out now
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I've already talked about four guys who are very good in this area and They've all said
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I I'd love to do this and so if you can get five six guys Who right in this area have experience in this area?
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To contribute yes Wow all of a sudden many hands make light work and There's the key issues.
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He's gonna be bringing up You know obviously authorities of issue the issue of authority
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The journey of justification the idea that that stuff, which is what I would be addressing There's the church history stuff that needs to be addressed the soul scripture stuff that needs to be addressed and we've got some great guys who are experienced writers that that we can we're gonna be putting all this stuff together and and Writing response to dr.
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Beckwith, but one of the things does need to be addressed is Was well let me let me let me play it again.
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I mean this is this is what he himself says I've been I was thinking when I was driving out here because I've thought about your comment that I'm not going to be a
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Roman Catholic apologist It occurred to me since your your change to Catholicism is based on the fact that you think
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Roman Catholicism represents the true Church Why wouldn't you be a Roman Catholic apologist, and I think you mentioned before well, you're kind of mere
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Christianity We talked about this in the phone, but wouldn't mere Christianity now be Roman Catholicism No therefore it'd be appropriate to promote that or I was never really a
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Protestant apologist I was never really a Protestant apologist and at the beginning of the interview he talks about how
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Even at that Boston College thing where the seeds were planted Why aren't you a Catholic because he had been promoting some stuff the
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John Paul II and said he mentioned just in passing I just you have to actually listen carefully to hear it.
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He had been responding to some Reformed criticisms of natural law and so if you look at the people that he was involved with Coming from the
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Norman Geisler perspective there's a strong element of Roman Catholicism Jesuits in you know
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Fordham University etc etc went to you know He's that he was at Dallas there when he gave that thing and that again
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That's where Mitch Pacquiao was speaking And I I just just in passing hadn't read the stuff about Pacquiao at Martins or nation until I read this book that was like Oh, really fascinating You know,
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I'm wondering maybe we could have a chapter entitled Can you have your cake and eat it to addressing the whole ecumenical issue?
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Because he he really does want to have his cake and eat it, too He wants to affirm his
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Evangelical past and his friends as brothers in the Lord and yet also wants to defend the Roman Catholic Church as the true church
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Them having the correct way to justification but with the idea that well, you're okay, too You're gonna you're gonna enter the kingdom also
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And then what what I've read from Trent and the Unum Sanctum and was a 1302 of the Bulletin Sanctum and Trent Vatican one
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You know, I don't know things have changed. Yes. Yes And that is the big issue.
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I mean does anyone really know what Rome teaches any longer? I mean, let's face it Almost everything that Coco and Beckwith were talking about regards to justification and indulgence and stuff like that How many of the magisterium today?
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I mean, how many of the European bishops are not? I mean, they're clearly inclusivist if not to the point of being mere
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Universalists any longer now obviously for me that deeply impacts Rome's claims to infallible authority over time
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There's got to be consistency over time. You can't you can't be going, you know, I remember asking Robertson genus once I I sent him
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That those quotes like from from the Council of Florence where it was saying the Jews and schismatics and and Heretics cannot have eternal life and so on and then
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I quoted a recent thing from John Paul II one of his more liberal you know universalistic inclusivistic types type statements and His response was well
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James the church Interprets what the church has always meant and so if the church today
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Decides that what it was saying back in the 1400s It was inclusivistic then it's inclusivist
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Yeah Now whether anybody back then would have ever dreamed that that's what was being said is irrelevant
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And I I can't help but think of a book that I'm actually rereading right now on my Kindle called 1984
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Where you just um, you know, you can change the past It's it's you know
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Just by the way, you think But weren't we refreshed when Cardinal Ratzinger our present
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Pope came out and said there's no salvation outside of the Catholic Church I mean the National Council of Churches went ballistic
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But I think the rest of us said yes, you know good But see but he's doing the same let's face it if you're the the pontiff in Rome You have to do the same thing
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JP to was doing and that is it's like it's almost like it's a two -year cycle one year you throw out the conservative bones for the conservative side and the next year you throw out the liberal bones for the liberal side and He's doing the same thing one year.
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It's the there's no salvation outside of the church and then the next year it's some inclusivistic statements or Luther was right if understood correctly blah blah blah blah blah blah and that's the only way to keep this massively diverse group of people together and protect the myth of Well, we are the unified one church, what do you mean you're the unified one church?
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That's what I'm really enjoying I imagine you're probably enjoying to James Swann's articles on on the on the blog where he's pitting all these
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Catholics against each other on their biblical interpretation and It and how they get around even admitting today.
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He put one up. I'm not sure if you've seen it yet where he Demonstrates that Tim Staples and Patrick Madrid read the
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Luke 16 text and the and the and the man in you know Lazarus and Abraham's bosom and the rich man's of Staples says rich man is in hell and that that is the majority view of the church, but he actually admits that Patrick Madrid puts him in purgatory and It's sort of like wow, you know you guys keep talking about how soul scripture is a blueprint for anarchy
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But exactly how does that work on your end of things here? You know? It's it's great to have that, you know people putting that type of stuff out there
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Well, that's the frustrating thing is that then the default position as well. Those weren't infallible statement, right?
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Oh, yeah, and who knows which in which statements were infallible and and of course the what I emphasize with Tim Staples in our debate
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Many many moons ago in was that already nine years ago two thousand and Fullerton man
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That's that's like that seems like it was very very recent But as I pressed on him, how did anybody in the days of honorius know that honorius his letter was just his own personal opinion
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How would anybody know these things you you get to be hundreds of years later and the church is sort of you know
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Swept the stuff on the rug and now they've you know, clean up the mess. How do you know you don't know? How do you know that what's that's a lumen gentium or or a human a vitae or whatever else?
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50 years hundred years from now is just gonna be viewed as some personal opinion of someone and you know
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Schluft off the way that So often unum sanctum is today It just it just doesn't work and yet we hear these people pushing this stuff all the time.
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Well, anyway There are just a couple things. I want to get here Patrick. We've got it. We got a call We'll get to you after the break, but I wanted to play just some of the some of the clips here
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Get your comments on it and It just I don't know.
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There was so many things here I was noticing just a few moments ago in the book a brief discussion of James chapter 2 and I I was looking at the
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The references in the back and of course, I didn't I couldn't be overly
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Impressed with the sources. I just don't see any evidence that Frank Beckwith I mean have you done any work on the timeline because it seemed to me that from his description to Greg Koukl, this was this happened pretty quickly
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Basically, he says he really started diving into reading in January and by April right had converted
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That's I by his own account in the first part of the book, which is Biographical I came up with about three months three months.
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Yeah, and I'm like, all right So I look for a bibliography no bibliography. I look through the end is it no indices so you have to start looking through the notes and I'm Not You know overly impressed with the
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References as far as it doesn't strike me That he looked at a lot of what has been written in response to modern
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Roman Catholic apologetics and theology I just don't see any evidence that that he did and he would be the first one to admit that that really wasn't his field
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That's what led to the big brouhaha where he accused me of dishonesty because I just I just let his own words speak for himself
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This was this was I don't know if you remember this, but this is this is the section that got me in trouble Let's let's listen to it.
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Well, go ahead Frank. Yeah, now, you know that There's a number of things that that you know
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I've I've had to work through intellectually and spiritually through this entire process and one of the things that You know some of the passages you mentioned
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Especially when the term law is used I mean It's clear to me from reading a number of these passages that when
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Paul talks about especially in in certain sections of Romans but not the entirety of Romans, but he's talking about the
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Mosaic Law and he's actually addressing the question of those Jewish Christians that were requiring
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Other Christians to have to go to the Mosaic Law in order to be joined the church That's the sort of thing that I think he's dealing with in those cases.
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You don't think there's any in a sense Parallel to that even if it's not precisely the
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Mosaic Law that's in view, but any other system of human works that is placed I think that let me stop it just for a moment make comment on it
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It's it's amazing to me to listen to either newly minted reverts or What's even worse is to listen to evangelicals who start dialoguing with Roman Catholics?
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And all of a sudden they come up with the Wow Roman Catholics talk about grace and in fact
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The Council of Trent and athematizes anyone who says you can be saved apart from grace Wow, the
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Catholics believe in grace and I just want to hit myself with something very hard and heavy because clearly that Protestant or that revert or whatever has never done any reading in in Reformation polemics or anything like that whatsoever
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It clearly had never read the Council of Trent as I think dr. Beck was gonna admit here in a moment, but That argument is so old that a lot of people don't know this, but I have a book from Jonathan Edwards on Justification by faith he actually wrote most most people are not aware of that They've read his stuff on free will so yeah
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He writes a book on justification by faith and one of the main arguments that he takes up is responding to Rome Saying that the law that Paul is talking about is the law of Moses.
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It's only the ceremonies that was in the 1700s There's nothing new here People just keep retreading it because evangelicals today don't know anything about church history and There there is
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I think a major difference between a former Roman Catholic who is convicted that I needed to be a former
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Roman Catholic because Rome does not possess the gospel and Someone who's a former Roman Catholic on the basis of taste
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It's easier for me to do what I want to do as a Protestant than as a Catholic But hey, you know, it's no big deal.
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It's okay. I Can I can you know just sort of get along? One way or the other and it strikes me that what he's just about to say about the
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Council Trent Nah, I'm maybe poisoning the well here But for those of you who maybe are new to the program and didn't go back and listen to everything that we've done in the past Because not everybody can be algo but It seems to me the way he's about to say is he had never seriously looked at the
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Council of Trent before this period of time He's gonna say he had been misled earlier
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He had talked about studying under Montgomery and stuff like that and Lutherans and stuff like that And he says he was misled.
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Well when someone says I was misled I don't know how you mislead somebody about a book. You've actually read.
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How can the book mislead? You know, you're you're a misled on Secondhand I was they misreported to me
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What was actually in the Council of Trent and says I didn't check for myself Whatever that seems to be what he says. He denies that now says all the know
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I read the Council of Trent blah blah blah Well, you listen and see if that makes any sense to you We write it also you can also apply to any human works that are done without the grace of God in other words
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One is saved initially that is today one is regenerated initially holy by the work of God in his grace
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That is pretty clear. Mm -hmm, and that's the view that's been held From Augustin believe it or not to the
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Council of Trent. Mm -hmm If you read the Council of Trent, which by the way really shocked me I was
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I Expected to read the this sort of horrible Document, you know requiring people to stick pins in their eyes and you know and flagellate themselves
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Oh, and it turns out that there are things in there that that are quite amazing That that that that the initial grace is given to us by God In fact, there's a condemnation in there for anyone who says that our works depart from grace
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Okay. Well, here's again. And this is so I mean I thought to myself I had not been told I had been Misinformed right?
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I had been misinformed. Well your own eyes cannot misinform you if you had been reading the words on the page
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You would not be misinformed clearly. What he's saying was I had not read the Council of Trent I had just taken what
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I had been told by Montgomery and by other Lutherans and so on so forth and Now as I dove into this period of reading early church writings and so on so forth and it seems to me
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It wasn't so much early church writings as compilations of early church writings by Catholic apologists And then
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I read the Council Trent and I was shocked. I was amazed. Well, I could not be amazed By reading a book that I had already read so it just strikes me that one of the issues that we're going to need to address is
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And in fact, it might come out like in in the in the title, you know swimming the Tiber is the big is the big
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Way of describing going in Roman Catholicism, but here you have a revert going back across the
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Tiber Well, how far across had he come in the first place? Had he not been in essence waiting in the shallow waters on the
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Protestant side all along I mean his view of man his view of grace his view of natural law were all
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Much more Roman than then certainly Calvinistic and I think it does say something about The the
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Geisler's the world and the people like them Where they've made these compromises and stepped away from a fully biblical position the results
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We might be seeing right here in someone like Frank Beckwith Yeah, and James you may you may know that I I started a sermon series in our church and I entitled it drowning in the
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Tiber And I don't think that would be a good yeah, I was I think waiting in the
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Tiber You know paddling around the Tiber something along those lines because it just seems to me that very clearly there are a lot of folks who if we use the
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Tiber as a simile as a as an example of the divide between a
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Biblical gospel and the Roman Catholic perversion thereof. There's a lot of people who think that they are
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Protestants, but they are Floating down the Tiber River in a rubber tube drinking a beer because they they just They they have not gotten out on the other side and turn around and shaken off the the dust they are
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Protestants of convenience not Protestants of conviction and Personally, you know people like well, you're really upset about Beckwith not really because that doesn't surprise me
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It does not surprise me when I see people Going more deeply into false religion
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Because I do believe that so many evangelical churches are filled with driftwood with people who are there for all sorts of reasons other than the conviction of the gospel and And I think that we
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I think that we see that taking place I tell you what, do we really need to take a break or can we we're just gonna fly right through the break here and Invite your phone calls at eight seven seven seven five three three three four one eight seven seven seven five three
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Three three four one is the phone number Go ahead and stay there with me brother while we take a phone call here.
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It's not quite the same subject But who knows maybe it'll be somewhat relevant let's head over to An interesting interesting place on the surface of the earth called,
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California and talk with Patrick. Hi Patrick. How you doing? Dr.
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White, it's a great in -studio discussion today. I feel bad asking an off -topic question.
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Well, we'll find some truly imaginative way to get But go ahead you call right at the beginning of the program so you've been very very impatient
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Well, thank you very much for taking my call I want to get your opinion on something that I heard in the
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George Bryson debate if you could comment very briefly It's the idea
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That basically You're a Calvinist But he won't take responsibility
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For being an Arminian. He's just a Christian right? And so then he starts to attack you about Calvin's comments
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Calvinist from history But he can't be held to that same standard Because he's just a
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Christian. Mm -hmm. He doesn't have any sort of worldview and and and I've ran into our minions that are like that Yeah All the time they want to attack you about history they bring up Cervetus And all sorts of things and what's what's a good way to deal with that sort of argumentation?
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Well you have identified something that we've all experienced and that is especially people who have come from a
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Background where they are exposed to a very narrow spectrum. Let's face it. That's pretty much all of us
32:23
I mean, we're we're primarily comfortable with what we hear within our own church
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And if you're fortunate enough blessed enough to be raised within the church, it's pretty natural for a young person for example
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To find somebody else's views to be really weird or strange or something like that Because you've not heard that in your upbringing or something like that set that's understandable.
32:45
Hopefully there is a process of maturing over time whereby that changes in the sense that you
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Recognize you start prioritizing your beliefs and seeing what's core and what's secondary and things like that And one of the problems a lot of evangelicals have is coming up with that priority and sometimes putting the weight in the wrong place
33:04
Rather than the gospel and who Christ is and authority of scriptures It ends up out on some eschatological limb someplace and and they're willing to divide over stuff like that So it's not uncommon to encounter people who upon hearing about quote -unquote
33:19
Calvinism Assume that their position is the default position And this is what everyone's always believed because well that's what everybody at my church believes and they don't realize that they've come to their position or the people who taught them their
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Theology came to their position through a historical process themselves. And so it is necessary often to You know sort of challenge the well,
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I'm not anything I'm just a biblical Christian idea and you go. Well, you know, that's exactly what
33:52
I want to be as well but many people who claim to be biblical Christians will grab hold of all sorts of External things and read them into the text of Scripture so it's very important that we do identify where we come down so that we can examine our own position to see whether we're
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Following a particular tradition. We're bringing a particular traditional Understanding to the text and it can be very uncomfortable for someone to be challenged on that level and have someone saying, you know
34:21
You're understanding. There isn't the Word of God. It's your understanding of what you think the
34:26
Word of God is saying and I've said many times that I think the most glowing example of How far this can take you into into an area of trouble was
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Dave Hunt when he and I had that discussion back in 2000 and he he gave this completely isogetical interpretation of John chapter 6 and I simply said to him
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Dave that those are your traditions speaking and his honest and I believe
34:55
Dave Hunt Means what he said He said to me James I have no traditions and I really think that that's exactly what he thinks the problem though then is his
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Tradition becomes the Word of God you question his tradition and you're questioning the Word of God and that's why so many of Dave Hunt's followers can call me a
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God hater and a Bible hater and a false teacher and blah blah blah blah because they really see that as an attack upon the
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Word of God itself and so it does take a conversation with a person and one that And my suggestion to you would be something along these lines
35:37
Sometimes the way to get a person to see this kind of thing is to raise a separate issue that they don't have as much emotional investment in and Demonstrate how there can be traditional understandings in that area and then
35:54
Transition back into what we're talking about to say now You know your position actually has a historical name
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And it's developed over time and are you aware that you know, you're taking this position this position you're making this assertion
36:10
Sadly, the vast majority of evangelicals have are not challenged in their churches any longer to test their own beliefs and to recognize that they have not just a worldview but a an entire theological paradigm and People can get very very uncomfortable when you start causing them to bring together
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But right next to each other their beliefs about God and the Bible God and Christ God and salvation the the
36:38
American evangelical tendency is to have all those doctrines pigeonholed and separate from one another and I warn my classes at At Golden Gate when
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I when I teach on various subjects where these things are gonna come up I say I'm gonna make you uncomfortable I'm gonna step on your theological toes because I'm going to force you to bring these ideas out of their pigeonholes and put them next to each other to see if you're being consistent and that can be a
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Painful thing and the other thing where it's against modern evangelicalism is that it's frequently a time -consuming thing
37:12
In other words, you actually have to have an attention span more than a little bit longer than the wingspan of a gnat To be able to do this kind of thing and let's face it
37:21
When you live in a in a in a microwave society You want things to be done just boom boom boom boom boom boom boom and and just this last
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Sunday in Sunday school I played a clip from Dan Barker. It's the only believe in one
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God less thing and I actually broke the group up into into four four different groups and had them discuss how they would respond to Dan Barker's claims on this particular issue and Just because of the you know
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The time frame only have about 45 minutes for the Sunday school and stuff like that and and you have to listen to it And then there's you know, the groups have to form and so on so we didn't
37:58
I did not have time to do a Complete refutation by the end and that bothers some people they want everything tied up in a nice neat little package with a bow on top in a brief period of time and Sometimes there's just stuff that doesn't work that way and so what
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I'm saying is with some folks the only way you're really gonna get anywhere is if you have a
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Relationship with them if you're within the fellowship of the church or something like that Bus conversation, you know
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Ten minutes just might not give you enough time to really do it And in that case, you just want to try to plant a seed and maybe hope for an opportunity of talking with them
38:36
You know more at a later time or something along those lines, but but yeah, you're exactly right. You've identified something
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It's very important they do tend to take an Armenian viewpoint as the default and say you're trying to push something on us and that just Demonstrates an ignorance of history and of how they came to their own conclusions
38:54
Yeah, thank you very much. That was a extremely helpful response
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It was a little disheartening hearing some of your interaction in your debate That at the highest levels of Arminianism, it doesn't get any better As someone
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There are all sorts of different kinds of Armenians and here's my experience the passionate ones
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Don't tend to be deep thinkers They are very they're the reason their passion is because they're passionate about their traditions
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But not because they have been challenged on this and they've done a bunch of in -depth study I mean the the Dave hunts and the
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George Bryson's You know, they're the they're the passionate ones They're gonna be going out and doing talks on this and they're gonna bring up themselves and write books about it and stuff like that the more
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Intellectual well -trained ones. Well listen to the debate with Blanket Sanders, dr.
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Sanders. Dr. Sanders is a brilliant guy He's a self -professed Arminian But most of the
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Dave hunt George Bryson type folks if they listen to my inclusivism debate with with dr.
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Sanders We're sitting there pulling their hair out because a a lack of passion and Be the the fact that that consistent
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Arminian ism almost always leads to a form of liberalism and so the the
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Intellectual Armenians tend to be intellectual Armenians because they're philosophical. They're philosophically oriented.
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They're not biblically oriented And so I'll never ever forget If you haven't seen the video of this when
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I debated dr. Sanders we did two debates over two nights one was on inclusivism and the second one was on open theism and The first one was at this place called.
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Oh, what was it called the grind? That's right. I was gonna say the grunge and that's It's called called the grind it was this youth
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Thingy thingy thingy in Tampa and we even had to I mean I wore Youthy clothes
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I had these cool Oakley boots and and all the rest of stuff anyways, and dr.
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Sanders just wore khaki slacks Open shirts are like what I'm wearing right now. That's the best you could do on that one.
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But anyway, we were at this youthy place and During the cross -examination
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This again is on inclusivism. I was trying to get him to get into the text Let's let's bring this idea.
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Let's go to the text to see what it's like And so I I asked you about John chapter 6 and He doesn't well, you know, you've got the
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Armenian interpretation the Calvinist interpretation. We're not gonna solve that tonight Yeah, but could we could we look at what it's actually says and I'll never forget this you can watch it on tape
41:47
He sits there and he opens his Bible now This is a cross -examination in a debate across examination is normally a fairly
41:54
Pat a fast -paced thing You know dead air is not a good thing during cross -ex You know and it gets quiet and he's turning the pages of his
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Bible and he goes well, it's been a number of years since I looked at the text and There's silence as he's turning to the text and it's you could hear
42:13
Crickets chirping in the background and it was just like I mean that spoke such huge volumes
42:21
About the vast difference of approach that the two of us would take and why we believe what we believe and So that's what you that's what you discover is that the ones that are going to make a biblical argument
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And and really are going to be passionate about it The the Dave Hunts and the George Bryson's they're over on one side and then the scholars are almost always
42:47
Coming from well, you know I think on a philosophical level that we have to affirm the autonomy of the will of man for these reasons over here and Therefore, you know,
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I see this reflected in the Bible, but you know, I know there are some difficult texts It's not derived from an exegetical perspective.
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It is philosophical in its in its orientation I think that it came out as well in the debate between Shriner and where versus the two
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Arminians at Southern Seminary. Well someplace around Southern Seminary a number of years ago
43:20
Again, it was philosophy Versus Bible and I think most people would say that when
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George Bryson and I were on the Bible answer man that's what it was to was I was bringing up the text and the other side was just doing the the philosophical things so That's been my experience
43:39
Take take it leave it, you know, and if I just add something there especially for those that teach and preach
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I have found that if you're a faithful exegete and an expositor working through the text that Very very few times if I had somebody object
43:53
All right, when I'm teaching the doctrines of grace if I'm teaching the text showing them the connections This is what the words mean.
43:58
This is the context. This is what I've been four years in first Peter We're in the middle of chapter four.
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I've got some people think we're gonna they're gonna die before I finish But in chapter 1 verse 1 going through the whole issue of foreknowledge and what that really means and going through that I you know people that Maybe would question ahead of time did not have any objections.
44:19
They said Yeah, that makes sense. That's well again you're blessed in that situation because the other situation know that some people do have in churches is while they do that and They may even be at the church for years and figure well, this must have gone real well because everybody accepted that They hear that but they are interpreting what you're saying within their own there within their own traditions
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And so it's not until you actually Use the terms of the whoa. Wait a minute Calvinism I know what are you talking about?
44:47
You know and and I've had I've talked to pastors that I thought they had gotten it and then all of a sudden
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These elders came down on top of me like a ton of bricks because I actually used terminology that I thought by now was purely
44:57
Safe because I've been preaching this for so long, but they didn't realize I was preaching it all the time So anyways, Patrick, hopefully that's useful to you.
45:04
It absolutely is. Thank you gentlemen for your time It's been a great show. It's been a pleasure Listening to your interaction.
45:11
All right. Thanks a lot Patrick. Okay, God bless Bye -bye, eight seven seven seven five three three three four one is the phone number
45:19
Let's listen to another section here. This was a fairly long one. So we'll probably break it up Only got only got 13 minutes left in the program
45:26
Anyways goes goes by pretty quickly when you're sitting in here as long as you have something interesting to talk about Here was well, actually,
45:34
I'm gonna skip down to something else here and they'll come back to this. We have time this really Most people know that there's there's one particular topic that really gets me going when
45:50
Catholic apologists do this and that's when they attempt to attack they attempt to parallel something like a
45:56
Marian dogma with the Trinity and And But I just don't think there's any way around it for them as offensive as that is and how as blasphemous that is
46:06
Here's where it came out in from from Frank Beckwith. Oh and Claims made by the magisterium or let's say there are claims in Scripture limits
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The things that the church can do if anything what it does is it restrains the Catholic Church from going into the directions that?
46:25
We find for example in the Anglican Church In among evangelicals,
46:31
I mean The openness view all these things. Yeah, but that doesn't go to the question of the authority that does limit
46:38
I mean I agree with you But I don't even see the creeds as being authoritative in the same sense that the Bible is the the creeds are authoritative in the sense that they are derivative from what the
46:46
Scriptures says but they're not they're not obvious. I mean there look the Aryans were dominant, right?
46:51
Okay, but church and so it's it's it took but that is not but that that problem isn't solved by making an authority claim about An inspired interpreter it's solved by battling it out on the words themselves.
47:02
That's the point you're appealing to The authority of a text and you think your interpretation is correct now
47:10
It seems to me that you know that if we're going to start You know saying things that Jehovah's Witnesses for example are going to hell because they deny the
47:19
Trinity I mean, that's a pretty strong thing to say if it's something that comes that you have to be a kind of quasi
47:25
Greek scholar Who can who can evaluate the text and come up with the Trinity?
47:30
I mean who the heck is gonna just by picking up the Bible gonna come up with the nice read I Am so thankful that in 1999 in San Diego at the end of that debate with Mitch Pacquiao.
47:43
I Have in the other room I have this big silver bookcase book bag and I brought it out and I started stacking up all these
47:51
Roman Catholic works Code of Canon Law and the documents of Vatican 2 and the
47:56
Substantiating documents of Vatican 2 and and the Council of Trinity this big old stack and I said what you're being told today is that this clarifies the meaning of Romans 5 1 and I say to you it does the exact opposite and So if he's good if Beckwith's go sit there and say we have to be a quasi
48:16
Greek scholar to respond to Jehovah's Witnesses Well, then what are you offering in its place?
48:22
Are you not is it not due to the fact that clearly Beckwith has differences with so many
48:28
Roman Catholics Is that not a demonstrative of the fact that you have to be a scholar of the
48:33
Canon Law? you have to be a scholar of Literature that's ten times that size and you're telling us that somehow increases your your specificity your clarity your understanding
48:44
It does just the opposite. It seems seems to me. But anyways, there's a phone call.
48:50
We need to get to Let's talk with Lyndon. Hi Lyndon Hello Lyndon, hi, dr.
48:57
White. Yes, sir. Hi. I was listening to you for the last several months though I'm just really thankful for what you've been doing with all all the work with airmen and whatnot and I was listening as you were talking about the tenacity of the text and the establishment of the original text through historical and textual criticism
49:15
And I was wondering if you would say then if we actually then somehow in utero in all the
49:21
Various manuscript traditions if we actually possess the originals of Scripture somehow Yes, actually that is in fact
49:30
I'm certainly hoping given the word we got last week that we might be seeing some DVDs of Of the debates
49:36
Lord willing this week Haven't heard anything, but if they were the copiers last week I don't see a reason why we shouldn't be able to get them
49:43
Lord willing this week But anyway, that was the point that I was making in responding to Bart Ehrman is that if you believe in the tenacity of the text as Kurt Ahlund and Daniel Wallace and others have emphasized and and dr.
49:58
Ehrman dismissed but did not argue against he just simply dismissed With a wave of the hand.
50:05
Well, that was just Kurt Kurt Ahlund, you know, he's just as if that was somehow an unusual view and it's not this was the view of the vast majority of people there has been a major paradigm shift in The Academy not
50:21
I think due to anything other than post -modernism not due to to some Manuscript find that has demonstrated otherwise, but just simply to a a general degradation in epistemology in Western society
50:33
But the idea being that given the tenacity of the text that in the manuscript tradition as a whole
50:39
We do have all of the original Inspired words and in a small percentage that that would be found in a variant and that we have
50:48
Reason to believe that one of those variants represents the original is the original But yeah, that's why
50:54
I asked him our you know Could you give us some examples of where you believe that we do not have?
51:01
in the manuscript tradition the original and Ironically, the only one that he gave Is a text where there is no textual variation the manuscripts in other words
51:11
What he's saying is the original has completely disappeared and there's absolutely no evidence whatsoever in the manuscripts for the the reading that that might possibly be the original and even then it was a
51:25
Reading that did not impact the meaning of the text at all. But ironically he chose one whether it was not a variant
51:32
Evidently where there wherever there is a variant. He wasn't willing to say well None of these could possibly be the original
51:39
So yeah, the the tenacity of the text is an important thing. I think if you pick up the the lectures that I think you can get them off Bible org or the
51:50
Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts That said Dan Wallace did one at a church and one at ETS He discusses those as well, but most definitely.
52:00
Yeah Okay, thank you I thought
52:05
Beckwith would be more interesting today Well, you know what the problem is We actually have had more calls
52:13
For a morning program than we normally have there's there's two there's two issues morning programs. We don't get a lot of calls
52:18
I mean sometimes it's weird and we'll just get flooded But generally the evening afternoon evening program gets more gets more college because most of folks do actually have to work and But the other thing is this is only the second week after the time change
52:35
Where all the rest of you folks dishonored time and and and played around with it
52:40
And so there were still people coming into channel. Hey, where's the dividing line, you know an hour an hour beforehand going?
52:46
Well, it's right where it always is But remember you fiddled with your clock and so that robbed you of an hour
52:52
So I think between the two of them that's that's the case I do find that this subject rings a lot of bells of people because Not just of people who have a vowel at the end of their name
53:04
Well, I have a valid in the mind but not quite the same way you don't print if you don't pronounce it. It doesn't count basically but there are a lot of folks who are very passionate about this particular issue and They do appreciate
53:20
The blog articles that James Swan and turrets and fan have been posting and they do follow this very closely because it does impact their families in fact if you remember the the caller on the cocoa program the the lady who called in she's
53:37
Protestant her husband is Roman Catholic and she said we have a great marriage, but we have absolutely no spiritual connection whatsoever and You know,
53:46
I wish that come out a little bit more clearly that this divides homes We're not talking about We we just it really bothers me that there are so many
53:58
Protestants today that just they're not really Protestants. Let's face it. They they are splashing around in in the shallow water of the
54:06
Tiber and they just don't know it and They don't realize this is an issue of the gospel They don't realize this is an issue where the the gospel of Rome simply does not bring peace
54:18
There's no foundation in it for having peace and yeah that the Frank Beckwith's the world want to have their cake and eat it, too
54:25
They want to spin it the way that they they do And the Jimmy Akin's the world to come along to help them do things like that, but you know
54:35
You just you can't keep it up forever Eventually, you know
54:40
Jimmy Akin right now has had a lot of questions about him praying to his wife And you you start seeing the ramifications, you know, my favorite statement theology matters and You can spin your theology all you want, but it's going to come out in practical application practical life eventually and the
54:59
Roman Catholic Gospel Simply does not have within it a finished atonement and hence a a perfect mediator.
55:06
That's why you have all the Saints That's why you have Mary. That's where you have all that stuff and Eventually that that becomes clear really and he makes
55:14
Beckwith makes a very telling statement about the midpoint of the book He talks about the doctrines
55:20
That most Protestants stub their toes on like the Marian dogmas indulgences
55:26
You know all that and he says he came to the conclusion that if the Roman Catholic Church is the true church
55:31
He would buy all the rest of those. That's how it works Yeah, that's how it works how many times I've heard people who you know, once they collapsed on sola scriptura
55:39
They didn't like all those other things and Beckwith, I mean, I don't know where he is now But did you hear his
55:45
Catholic answers interview? I did not know you can't find it right now I went back and out now
55:51
James Swan said it may be because of some copyright issues on the music They were using they were using
55:56
Yanni and maybe Yanni doesn't like Catholic it's just like I don't know but they would use
56:03
Yanni stuff And so I've been told that it has to do with copyright issues Maybe maybe not.
56:09
I don't know. It was embarrassing Because and I played it and so I'm gonna have to go back and find in our own archives so I can pull the audio out of it but at one point this little
56:20
Catholic woman calls and She says she and I can't quote it directly, but I think this is fairly accurate.
56:27
She says have you prayed to Mary yet and there's silence and Then he says no
56:37
Now I can hear the gasps Not not on the recording, but you can can you imagine the people who listen to Catholic answers live?
56:49
hearing this this famous revert the head of the evangelical theological society and he's not praying to Mary and You can just hear the gasps.
57:02
You can hear the gasps of disappointment In that audience and you can hear I live blogged it so I that's that's why
57:10
I knew what the date was because I live blogged his appearance and I said
57:16
I looked it up on my blog. Oh He sounds so uncomfortable right now He wanted to get away from that as fast as he could and yet upon what?
57:27
consistent epistemological grounds would he have to be Uncomfortable anyways, right?
57:32
I mean have not the bishops of Rome given plenty of example that he should be doing that And yet he's he remains uncomfortable and and you know,
57:43
I have no doubt that he's a very nice man I was surprised at how young yeah, he's only three years older than I am.
57:49
He's accomplished much the same 63 yeah, okay,
57:55
December 62. Okay. Well close but And and I I pray for him
58:00
I'm not, you know to throw stones at him. I pray for him. Well, I we had met we had talked we ran into each other at the
58:07
LA Airport shortly before all this took place actually and it would be an odd and unfortunately awkward encounter now
58:16
Unlike it was at that time. So anyways, well brother Bartolucci. Thank you for being with with me today
58:21
Hey, it's been a blast. We're going for a motorcycle ride now That would be a sight They call me the round mound of expound for a reason
58:30
I'm as wide as I am tall so Well, I think we'll use I think you have a vehicle out there.
58:36
Yes Is that but hey, thanks for being with a bit better divine line We'll see the rest of you on Thursday Lord. We are willing.
58:41
See you then. God bless The dividing line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega ministries
59:34
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