Did the Father Forsake the Son, World View and Aristotle

Here we go. Starting. Hello, greetings, and welcome to a road trip edition of the Dividing Line. Here we are again. It looks really dark, actually. It's not dark. It's very windy, but I put the shades down a bit, basically because it was making me look really weird.

Who knows? Every time you set up, it's a little bit different. The sun's coming from a different angle. It's really windy today. I'm in Las Vegas. I'll be heading up to Cedar City, Utah tomorrow morning and tomorrow evening.

I'm not sure where. I think it's on Jason Wallace's Facebook page, but I'm speaking somewhere in Cedar City, Utah, and I'm pretty sure I'm talking about the Trinity. I'm pretty sure. You always have to be prepared to rearrange if you need to.

It's actually a relatively short trip from here to Cedar City, so that's good. But I was here last evening, spoke at Redeemer Community Church, which is where I spoke last time I came through Vegas. And I had a nice little group of folks, really primarily younger folks.

There was one guy over to my right that I figured is probably around my age. Most everybody, they're pregnant young ladies and lots of babies and sort of like apologia, lots of beards. And it was exciting to be with everyone.

It was a tough topic. And in fact, I sort of surprised him because one of the elders had said, well, you know, would love to have you talk about prayer, would love to have talk about abortion. And so I talked about praying for the end of abortion in Las Vegas.

And then I did it out of First Kings 18 and 19. You'll have to track it down and see if you can figure out how in the world I did that. But ended up being sort of a heavy, heavy topic. I'm not sure. I'm not sure how these days you can talk about stuff like that.

I mean, I haven't seen all the video, but Jeff tells me that they were putting out. You saw the images of the aborted babies found in Washington, D .C., late term abortions. But they had the actual they had actual video, not just the images we saw on Twitter.

But Jeff had the actual video and they they played it on. On Apology Radio, I think yesterday. And so, as I said to them, I figured Jeff would do a better job than I would on that particular subject, but I did my best.

And it was really encouraging, like I said, to see young people who are very serious about the fact that they they realize they have been called to a different time than I was called to as a younger man.

I look back at the 1980s. And I wouldn't have said I had it easy. We were poor and all sorts of stuff like that. Then again, I was raised very poor. And honestly, as long as you don't live in a society that promotes being a victim, it's no big deal.

As long as you know, I didn't I didn't have to shiver out in the cold. And and I, I always had enough food. It wasn't always the food I necessarily wanted, but that's the way it was. As long as you don't have people constantly telling you that you need to be really, really angry because you need to be a victim.

It's not that big of a deal. Anyway, they are going to be facing a very different world than that I did at their age. And so it was very, very encouraging to me to be able to be of encouragement to them.

And, you know, one young man said, man, that was real heart check. I really needed that. I really, really needed that. And if if there's just a few people that I can encourage and however many trips like this we have left, who knows?

There are very obviously people in positions of power that want to make this kind of thing impossible to do. You just need to, you know, the the World Economic Forum wants you living in a box, eating bugs and not having children.

That's the that's the World Economic Forum view of the future is the elites live in the mansions and they have whatever they want and the rest of us live in boxes and eat bugs and don't have children and live lonely lives of service to the elites.

That's that's where things are going. We literally have enslavers. The slavers are back. They're back. And the amazing thing is they're being supported by and promoted by all sorts of minorities. Just the world is an amazing place.

Anyway, that's what we were doing last night. And like I said, heading up to Cedar City tomorrow and then straight from Cedar City to Salt Lake City. And you can look at Wade Orsini's Facebook page. It's on our calendar, too, for what's going to be going on up there.

First thing is Friday night and then really busy day on Sunday. And then we've got a bunch of stuff the week after that and then heading up to Moscow. And a lot of what we're doing in Moscow is not public.

There's going to be a lot of recording of video for future dissemination and things like that. But I will be preaching at the downtown location of Christ Church on Sunday. That's my understanding. And so, yeah, it's going to be.

I'm just simply, you know, I said to my wife as I was leaving. Now, every time I head out, I could be doing this 10 years from now or the trips we have for this year could be it. I don't know. And so the best attitude I can have is be really, really thankful for every opportunity, every opportunity to speak in churches and to do this, to do road trip dividing lines.

I think it's awesome that we're able to do this. Believe you me, this would not be working if I was using the campground Wi-Fi. It's just bad, bad. I have discovered it doesn't matter which campground, honestly.

And I know the KOA folks try, but no, no, this would be if there was any video, it would be 640 by 480, 10 frames per second, something like that. It'd be really, really, really bad. But no, since I was here last time, my phone tells me that I now have 5G ultra wide.

So last night, I was actually outside last night and there was a cell tower. I mean, just right there. And I'm sort of like, well, we're going to be well irradiated by the time we get done this evening.

Because I mean, it was right there. Anyhow, so let's get to it. This was not the troublemaker from Texas, who's quite busy with his own stuff. Oh, by the way, this is my, I love this cross that I got at the KOA in Santa Fe.

It's I'm not sure how to describe what it's made of, but it's a I don't even know how to describe it. It's a super lightweight, high temperature fired type thing. I don't know. But anyways, don't worry.

I don't leave it up there while traveling. Wouldn't stay there. And then I have the John Calvin quote up there that just fits there perfectly. I didn't have to put any nails up, glue or anything else.

It ain't moving. So it's like, I'm going to leave it there. And then, of course, there's Ultraman over there. Now, I haven't seen an Ultraman episode since I was probably seven. But Chris Honholtz gave me that Ultraman.

And so given that I have discovered that during the month of December, Chris develops a tick every time Amazon shows up at his door because he's afraid he's going to open the door and find a full size cut out of Buddy the Elf standing on his porch, of which he has like 12 already.

I just sort of felt I have a slight. It's very slight feeling of guilt that I've had a little bit to do with. It's very small. But Chris gave me Ultraman. And so I've kept Ultraman with me. He's now been traveling around the United States.

He's one of the best traveled Ultra men, Ultramans. I don't know. But I just decided to keep him in here. And every once in a while, I'll send a picture of him to Chris and say, I'm stuck in Las Vegas now.

So that's just, you know, Chris came by and his family came by. We had dinner here and stuff like that when it was really nice and clean. It's currently not the moment, but the camera's not facing that way.

So who cares? Right. There you go. All right. So it's not the troublemaker in Texas, but I guess we'll say the troublemaker in Phoenix. Sent me a link. Well, not a link, but just a citation from an article that was posted by Dan Wallace.

Now I had seen, I think I saw something related to this, where Dan was talking about what year he feels Jesus was crucified in, whether it was 30 or 33. And if it was 30, then the crucifixion would have been on such and such a date.

If it was 33, it would be such and such a date, April 3rd, specifically, if it was in AD 33. And I had just read that with interest in passing. Now, you got to understand, I love Dan Wallace. We've known each other for a long, long time.

We had a blast together taking on the King James Only Guys in 1995 on the John Ankerberg show. And you can still go back and catch those episodes. And I thought we did a pretty good job together in dealing with those guys.

In the background, because it was a few years after that, in fact, I watched a discussion that Dan gave about the sickness that he had. And how he's had to relearn Greek three times in his life. And, well, learn Greek three times, not relearn.

Relearn twice, learn once. Anyway, I stayed in contact with Dan. I don't know if he even remembers this because, I mean, he really, he had, even at the time, they didn't really know what it was. They were talking about Lyme's disease and there were all sorts of things.

But we stayed in contact and we talked on the phone. And I don't, like I said, I don't know if he remembers this. But I tried to be a good friend to him during that period of time. And he did write a real nice commendation for the Potter's Freedom.

And we still, you know, we'll exchange pleasantries once in a while. Just chat with each other. And, but we don't agree on everything, obviously. And Dan doesn't require you to agree on everything with him, thankfully.

As I try not to as well. Obviously, I get along with people that I have disagreements with. Anyway, I'm going to be disagreeing with Dan. But hopefully, it'll be interesting to folks in the process to see this.

But in Facebook on April 3rd, he posted the following. Today is April 3rd, the day I believe Jesus Christ was crucified. Good Friday in AD 33. What did he accomplish on the cross? His death was nothing less than receiving the penalty for sin bodily and spiritually that was due to every man, woman, and child.

So obviously, there's a universalistic perspective there that I would not agree with. And he did say in an email to me that I almost convinced him of particular redemption, but evidently didn't. In his death, he cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

The father did indeed forsake the son. Many today would argue that no, God did not forsake his son. But many passages just say this. They were one in purpose, Jesus obediently went to the cross, and God demonstrated his love for us now in what Jesus did then.

But make no mistake, the entire Trinity suffered at the death of Christ. Now, I didn't see it, but I have been told, again, by the toll maker in Phoenix, that this prompted a fair amount of discussion amongst certain groups of people today.

And I might say, I'm not sure, but I might say, just in passing, that some of these people, whenever you talk about the father, the son, the spirit, they become uncomfortable in the sense that it just seems for some people to be able to be as plain and open about the relationship of the divine persons in light of other commitments that they have.

Whatever we do as a doctrine of the Trinity, we cannot do less than the New Testament does. And there is a danger, obviously, that later developments could be less than biblical, could be less than doing justice to the biblical revelation of what takes place.

One of the articles I wrote years and years ago, Beyond the Veil of Eternity for the CRI Journal on Philippians 2, which, by the way, I've told the story before. Dan and I stood at the NET desk. The one time I went to the ETS meeting, it was in Florida.

It's normally in Florida. Not always, but normally. The one time that I went, we stood there for an hour debating the meaning of the Cardinal and Christy, which we also had disagreements on. But on the basis of the Greek text, but neither one of us had a Greek New Testament with us.

We had both been doing so much work on it that it was just... It was a great conference. There were two highlights of my trip there, and that was one of the two. The rest of them were pretty much lowlights, which is why I've never been back.

But anyway, so it does seem as some people struggle with the fact that there are key texts, Philippians 2, Colossians 1, Hebrews 1, John 1, John 17, John 8, just going through a few lists in your mind, where you have some of the most amazing revelation of the relationship of the Father and Son, and some of which actually gives us a glimpse into eternity.

And if your philosophical pre-commitments require you to water down the depth of that interaction and the reality of that interaction, you need different theological and philosophical pre-commitments, is what I would say.

Anyway, so turning to what Dan said here, most people know, even though... You know, I don't know that I removed it from being a footnote and brought it into the text in the last edition of the Forgotten Trinity or not.

I know I thought about doing it, maybe that's why I'm wondering whether I did or didn't, but minimally in a footnote in the Forgotten Trinity, and if not in the second edition in the main text, I addressed this issue.

And that's what he's talking about when he says, the Father did indeed forsake the Son. Many today would argue that no, God did not forsake His Son. I would be one of those that would say, well, any meaningful exegetical approach to the use of Eloi, Eli, Lama, Savoxani on the cross by Jesus has to begin with the recognition of the citation of Psalm 22 .1.

And so, instead of starting with, well, he says, why have you forsaken me? Therefore, there is a forsaking going on. It's just necessary when an Old Testament text is being cited, that you recognize what the original context was and what the application of it is being, what the application is intended to mean in the context that you're dealing with.

So, I want to look at that. And we're in the quote, unquote, Easter season. I'm going to miss it. I'm really sad that I'm going to be missing the Easter pageant out in Mesa, Arizona. I certainly would have been out there if I were there, but I'm not.

And Apologia is going to be out there doing their thing. And so, it's that time of the year. And if you've watched any of the debates that I've done with Muslims, you know that this text, Matthew 15 and the other citations and the other Synoptic Gospels, where you find this language being used, very favorite texts of our Muslim friends.

So, I think it's important to know what's going on here. And if you've already heard my responses, well, maybe you can fast forward past this, though I'm going to be looking at some textual issues as well.

So, you might find that to be of some interest to you. So, looking at Matthew 15, I'm sorry, Mark 15, beginning at verse 27. And I'm going to go ahead and try to do the screen sharing thing and hope this works for...

Oh, I can't do it because the host disabled participant screen sharing. So, I cannot share my screen with you. So, maybe that will get fixed. Should have tested this beforehand, I suppose. Um, that was a change.

Now there is something right in front of my face. That looks interesting.

Hi, there we go. Okay, now, okay. I don't know what's going on now. Let's do this for a second while I try to fix this. And you just keep talking because they can hear you. Uh-huh.

I gotcha. All right. Well, so, I don't have anything to talk about because I need to screen share. So, I don't know what I can tell you about the people walking by outside. I can complain about the fact that the gravel that I use here at the KOA is way too small.

It's too fine. And it ends up getting stuck in the bottom of your shoe and you end up dragging it in, no matter what you try to do. And then it pops off your shoe and you step on it with bare feet. And it's really not a whole lot of fun.

So, just first world problems that we have there. And so, that's about all I've got there. And I still don't have screen sharing here yet. So, I can start singing. I'll start singing John Denver. Some of you don't remember that that was a big threat back in our radio days.

When Brother Warren was helping us with the radio program, I would tell people that Brother Warren was gonna start singing John Denver songs if we didn't have callers. Okay. Try it now. There you go. Thank you.

Gotta make sure that the default on that needs to be changed or something. I don't know. So, that's just automatic. Okay. So, here is our text. Hopefully, you're seeing the text. And 1 Corinthians 15, 27.

And they crucified two robbers with him. One is right and one on his left. And then there is an interesting text. We'll bury it. You'll notice verse 28. And I am, by the way. You will notice that the text on the left side of the screen is the LSB.

I have mentioned that I'm using the Legacy Standard Bible now. And so, that's what's displayed there on the left-hand side of the screen. And the scripture was fulfilled, which says, and he was numbered with transgressors.

But notice there is a single bracket around the verse. And over here in the Greek, it's not there. Well, it's not in the main text of the Nestle Ellen 28th edition. But it is. That's the indication right there of its insertion in other manuscripts.

And you can see that right here. Verse 28. And it was fulfilled. And so, right here are the texts that contain verse 28. You will notice it is the majority text reading right here. That's always what that majority text sign indicates.

But you'll notice K, L, P, gamma, delta, theta, families 1 and 13, so on and so forth, lectionaries, Latin, Vulgate, versions of the Syriac, but not all. That's very clearly a Byzantine reading. Now, I mentioned that because I might, if I have time, do a little talking about a King James only video that was sent to me yesterday.

I haven't really had time to go through all of it. But I might respond to its assertion that there are two lines of manuscripts. This shows you that's not the case. Why? Well, you would think, well, you know, this is a good line.

This is a bad line. You got Sinaiticus, you got Alexandrinus. But Alexandrinus is actually very often with the Byzantine in the Gospels. Psi can be as well. And notice the parts of the Syriac do not contain this verse.

And part of the Boheric and the Sahitic does not. And that means those translations were done for manuscripts didn't have it. So the point is the idea that there is this split, this division between the two.

Just simply doesn't make any sense. And it does not hold up to any type of meaningful examination of example after example. The point being that Luke 22, 37 is cited. It's, of course, quotations of Isaiah 53, 12.

But Luke 22, 37 is cited as a possible source or origin of this particular reading coming into Mark between Mark 15, 27 and 29. Because certainly these are the earliest manuscripts we have and it does not contain it.

Though these manuscripts would have it at Luke 22, 37. So again, the people that say, well, heretics are trying to get rid of a certain doctrinal belief. It's not consistent. If they're trying to get rid of it, they wouldn't have it at Luke 22, 37 either.

But they do. So, well, they're trying to get fewer references because it's absurd. It doesn't work that way. So anyway, here's Mark 15, 27. Those passing by were blaspheming him, shaking their heads and saying, ha, you who are going to destroy the sanctuary and rebuild it in three days, save yourself by coming down from the cross.

Isn't it interesting that that particular quotation is primarily given to us in its fullness in John, not in the Synoptic Gospels. That's one of those interesting historical crossovers between the Synoptics and John.

The same way, mocking him to another chief priest, also along with the scribes are saying, he saved others, he cannot save himself. Let this Christ, the King of Israel, now come down from the cross that we may see and believe.

Those who are crucified with him were also insulting him. Obviously, we could have lots of commentary on the fact that, of course, they're saying they would have believed, but of course, they would not have.

The sixth hour came, darkness filled the whole land until the ninth hour. This is Roman timing they're using here. In the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice. And here it is, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani, which is translated, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

And the response is, when some of the bystanders heard it, they began saying, look, he is calling for Elijah. Now, it's interesting to think about why would bystanders have not recognized this is from Psalm 22.

But, I mean, you see, Eloi, Eloi, it's quite possible it would have been very difficult for people to understand what Jesus was saying. When you're gasping for breath, your enunciation is not overly clear, they're a good distance away from, there's various reasons.

Could have simply been eschatological thinking about Elijah, things like that. But we know, because both the Legacy Standard Bible puts it all in caps, the Nesoddam 28th edition has it in italics. This is your way of indicating a citation from the Greek Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament.

And it is the fact that it is the opening phraseology, it's not found buried in a psalm someplace. It is the beginning of arguably, but not overly arguably, the most messianic psalm in the entirety of the Psalter.

The specificity of the language in Psalm 22, the fulfillment of elements of Psalm 22 that are found in all of the Gospels. But Matthew, especially, focuses in upon this as well. But Psalm 22 is about the crucifixion.

But it's also about the vindication of this suffering servant as well. Psalm 22 ends with the vindication of this servant. And so here we are at the point in this. This is when Jesus prayed in the garden and sweat, as it were, drops of blood.

That does not mean the atonement started in the garden, unless you're a follower of Joseph Smith, who was a very confused man. The depth of agony of soul that is represented in Jesus's repeated prayers is not a fear of the pain of crucifixion, the pain of the whipping, the pain of the beating.

The depth of the passion has to do with the giving of his perfect life being made sins so we might be made the righteousness of God in him. The sinless one bearing the just wrath of his own law so that those who are joined to him would have justification in eternal life.

So when we talk about this and someone says, yeah, that right there, that's when the father forsakes the son. Well, this is the son's point of ultimate obedience. No matter how you and remember that the seven words from the cross, you've probably heard that terminology.

That's artificial in the sense that what it's doing is it's collecting the gospels together and putting them all together and then figuring out what order they may have been spoken in. But no one gospel gives all seven.

Um, you have very shortly after this, with seemingly within minutes, if you compare the gospels, Jesus says, Father, in your hands, I commit my spirit. So if there was a forsaking, it didn't last very long.

And it does not leave any evidence in the words of Jesus other than a citation of Psalm 22. It seems much more likely in light of the fact that this is the point of the son's greatest obedience to the father.

This is what the father sent the son to do. This is what the son is lovingly doing. And it's just makes so much more sense, especially since this idea of forsaking is not picked up anywhere else. I realize someone might try to maybe glom on to a textual variant in Hebrews 2 to try to say otherwise, but that's an extremely weak variant.

And and even if it was, it's not it's not developed. Where else in the New Testament do we get this idea that the father forsook the son? This is the only place. This is the only place. So, if especially in those texts that are discussing what happens to the cross, if it's not picked up, it's mighty strange that there isn't any discussion of these things.

Instead, it was a normative process or a normative practice. I'm sorry to quote the beginning of a song. Jesus is hanging on a cross. He can't quote the whole thing. But as I've said many times, all I have to say, all I have to do is go, amazing grace, how sweet the sound.

Do I have to quote all the verses of the rest of that hymn for you to call it to mind? No. And remembering that the Psalms are, of course, the hymn book of the church, then that's all Jesus has to do is quote from Psalm 22 and say, there is, because what came right before this?

The mockery of even the high priests. I'm sorry, the priests. Let him come down to the cross and we'll believe in him. And so when Jesus quotes from Psalm 22 that they claim to know so well, how does it end with the vindication of the one who has suffered?

Which they should be able to see is the Messiah right in front of them. But they don't see it. And that not only is a vindication of him, it's a condemnation of them. And so, again, I appreciate, I can understand many who take this perspective and who insist that what's going on here, there's some type of, not so much an ontological separation, but some type of a soteriological application of separation between the father and the son.

I just don't believe that the text substantiates that. They were one in purpose. Jesus would be on the cross and God demonstrated his love for us now in what Jesus Christ did then. But make no mistake, the entire Trinity suffered at the death of Christ.

That that's sort of dangerous language to use if you don't clearly explicate and explain what it is, what you suffered in what way. Because, again, we have to come up with a term for this. There are some who are struggling to even confess the biblical teaching that the son does things the father does not, or the father does things the son does not, the spirit does things the father and son do not.

So that all they can say is, well, one, the language doesn't even work. And maybe they would say, well, that's because our language is just too limited. But the fact that father, son, spirit take different roles, I didn't know anybody was uncomfortable with that until, well, I knew the one that Pentecostals were, but Orthodox Trinitarians didn't know anyone would be uncomfortable with that.

It's certainly historically Orthodox, but more importantly, it is plainly biblical. And obviously, the role of the son as the suffering servant is very, very different than the role of the father as righteous judge.

And so was the crucifixion Trinitarian? Yes. But what does it mean to say the entire Trinity suffered the death of Christ? If all you're saying is the father and the spirit are not somehow completely separated and distant from the suffering of the son, okay, but there's still a difference.

There needs to be, I think, an acknowledgement of a fundamental difference in how each of the divine persons would be experiencing this. And of course, we're talking about something in time. That's one of the main problems right there, is we're talking about a temporal action.

And again, certain philosophical systems don't want to allow God to have any actions in time. So they struggle along those lines. So with all brotherly love and respect for Dan Wallace, I disagree. And I think I can make a pretty strong case from really how we handle almost any Old Testament citation, but especially in this narrative utilization, how it would have been understood and what it would have meant in that particular context.

So there you go. Okay, so after our last program, man, the ice just disappears in these things. I have them in my cold bottle thermoses. They just disappear, which results in it being all watered down.

I'm the one that grabbed the standard red plastic cup rather than taking the time to get my nice cold thingamabobbies going on. My fault. Okay, after last program, an incident took place that had some repercussions over the weekend.

I didn't want to spend much time in it, didn't want to see any of that happen. But for many months now, when I would address particular topics on this program, especially when I would address issues relating to natural theology, natural revelation, the role of philosophy in the construction of confessions, the relationship of Sola Scriptura and the ultimate authority of Scripture and the nature of Scripture as Theanistos versus historical manifestations of inferior views of this subject.

And especially as I have addressed the issue of divine simplicity, the extended assertion of the ad intra ad extra distinctions regarding the attributes of God and Aristotle and Aquinas and all the rest of that kind of stuff.

What would happen is sometimes within just a matter of hours, you'd start getting sub-tweeting from a particular group of people, Reformed Baptists primarily, some Southern Baptists. And it would rarely quote me, but would be making reference to me.

And sometimes it would happen if, especially if Jeffrey Johnson would post something, others who would post things, you'd get this sub-tweeting going on where instead of quoting someone or saying such and such a person said this, and I disagree, and here's why, you get these arguments that allow you to say, who me?

I didn't say anything about that. It's, it can be funny at first, but after a few weeks of it, it's not funny anymore, even though those doing it seem to think that it's continues to be very, very funny.

And so whenever I talk about any of these things, you'd get this stuff and it's been going on for months and people would contact me and they'd send me stuff and they'd go, what's going on? I thought y 'all were buds.

And I'm like, yeah, I thought so too. But evidently not. And my response over and over again has been, this wouldn't have happened in the nineties when I preached for that guy. This wouldn't have happened in the 2000s when I taught at that guy's school.

But now here we are in 2022 and everything's changed. And it's just all because of COVID, I guess. Anyway, so this has been going on for a very, very long time. So you'll recall the last program, I read from Dr. Waldron's article and I focused on one of the five areas that he expressed concerns about.

And I had focused on Sola Scriptura and confessions and really asking questions. If you can't even raise the question as to whether the writers of a confession were even focused upon a particular area.

Because see, I recognize, I've recognized for a long time, when you look at any ancient confession, any ancient creed, when you look at Nicaea, when you look at Chalcedon, there are certain things they were focused upon.

And I've known, I do teach church history and have since 1990. So 32 years, which is, I've taught church history longer than some of my critics have been alive. And I know that, and I learned at Fuller Theological Seminary, that I can have deep appreciation for the Chalcedonian definition and the hypostatic union and reject Eutychianism and Nestorianism and Polynarianism and Neo-Polynarianism and all that neat, fine, wonderful, fun stuff.

But I know that I don't accept what Chalcedon said about a bunch of other things, because they didn't just do that creedal statement. They also had canons and decrees. The Council of Nicaea had canons and decrees, which are very interesting.

The sixth canon demonstrates that there was no concept of papal supremacy at the time of the Council of Nicaea. The Council of Nicaea demonstrates there was no concept of papal supremacy at that point in history.

So I'm well aware of these things. And so I'm perfectly comfortable with interpreting church history and saying, this council got this right, but it didn't get this, this, and this right, because that wasn't its focus.

These sub-articles, these canons and other things weren't what people were talking about at that point in time, that they weren't what the focus of the council was. And so I can look at the big thing and go, yeah, that's right.

And then look at these other things and go, that's right, that's wrong, that's right, man, I don't know. Because those sub-things, that's not what they were focused upon. If that's the case with ancient church history, it's the case with modern or more modern church history.

And so I can look at any confession of faith, Westminster, London, I can look at the three forms of unity, I can look at Savoy, I can look at all this stuff and realize there were historical contexts that decided this was the central focus of what they were dealing with.

And that means stuff over here wasn't really the focus of everything. And so can we look later on at this stuff over here and go, okay, since that's really not what their attention was, it sort of looks like they have imbibed tradition at this point.

Shouldn't we, if we're consistent, be able to analyze that tradition? And doesn't that mean there needs to be a meaningful understanding of Semper Reformanda? Isn't it fair to say that the framers of Lombard's confession of faith were primarily focused upon the issues of their day, which was a continuing counter-reformation, counter-reformation wasn't done.

So Rome remains, by explicit statement, one of the key issues in the confession that defines some of the terminologies being used, especially in the section on the Lord's Supper, you have specific denunciation of the mass, the idea of a perpetuatory sacraments is specifically said, no, this is not what we're saying.

We are reacting against them. But let's be honest, what's the primary thing? The primary thing for the framers of the Lend-A-Mass Confession is we have in recent memory been martyrs, martyrs as Baptists.

And it's only been 150 years since Munster. And people still think that we really think Jan Wyden was a cool dude. And we don't. And that's not where we came from. And we are Orthodox in our understanding of election and predestination and the atonement and the inspiration of scripture and all these things.

But we're focused on ecclesiology and baptism, the ordinances of the church, sacraments of the church. That means there's a lot of Christian theology that was not the burning issue of their day. It was not that which they were specifically seeking to say, we're not that, we're not this, we're putting a special effort into making sure that all the language we're using here is exactly this and exactly that.