Denying vs. Confessing, Canon Discussion at G3, the Lollards

Greetings and welcome to the dividing line. My name is James white I'm going to keep the microphone a little bit closer than normal and I'm going to do everything my power to keep the the volume down It seems we we got the the airline

Stuff took a little while but Those of you who really don't like me and there are a number of you you might want to be recording this one because at some point

I'm sure I will cough and And if you freeze -frame that it'll it'll be great because All those muscles are already pulled and so every time

I cough it's just wow So much fun. And so those of you who are tuning in just for that kind of thing.

There you go I gave you a little bit of head head start there But we want to try to press through I've been using

Star Trek analogies on Twitter My shields are are failing the dilithium crystals are decrystallizing we may have to eject the warp core at some point and you'll notice

I will at least be able to Look at the camera now because rich is playing with them and now they have tally lights and So I can

I can tell which one is actually on if I'm paying attention to things like that and if he does it too much then we will not pay attention to things like that and Just go from there, so that's what we'll do with that May need to put into a star base repairs and some shore leave as well.

Yeah That's that's that's possibility, but we've got lots of stuff coming up including next month up in Salt Lake City got a lot of stuff happening.

So I continue to pray for that the ministry up there in Salt Lake and especially the

Three -hour program with Sean McCraney on the Trinity live on his program on Tuesday night.

I think it's the 13th or 14th. It's the Tuesday night of after the 11th.

That's what that way And so don't have don't have time to slow down though obviously

Your body has a way of of doing that for you And it's just another reminder of how often we are very very healthy and are not thankful for it

How many times I've traveled and not gotten something So just got to keep that in mind and get some get some more rest to try to get over this

In first John chapter 2 I want to spend a little time not not any particular conflict or Anything else

I'm not I'm not even gonna refer to critics and stuff like that. I Not interested in in all that folder all right now to be honest with you

But I spoke on this last evening at church and even then I I showed up spoke and then left

I couldn't I couldn't stay That was the best I best I could do I hate doing that but that was just the best could do but I think it is

Some of you may remember a Sermon that I delivered

I forget how long ago now Titled the blessing of apostasy and I focused in that on first John 2 18 through 19.

There's a There's a lot in that text it's a very deep text and what's interesting is as I'm looking at it here on the screen

As I've mentioned many times in the past when you're teaching Greek First John is is normally the first book you go to sometimes you go to Philippians, but but first John is considered baby

Greek and That is because it's vocabulary it's syntax

It's it's you know, maybe a two on a scale of ten and so it's

Encouraging To first -year students if you wanted to drive them all out give them no hope for the future whatsoever

Then you'd you'd go to some place like Luke or Acts or Hebrews And they would all run screaming into the night and would never touch a

Greek New Testament again so It is interesting that we can have such deep theological truth

Expressed in rather simple simple language and That's something to keep in mind you you don't necessarily have to utilize the most

Complex language Certainly, there are things that require it. But here you have little children it is the last hour and Just as you heard that Antichrist is coming and now many

Antichrists have arisen or have appeared By this we know that it is the last hour now, please notice something.

They'll keep it keep it up big This is the Nessie Allen 28th edition no says na 28

Greek New Testament sigla and so you have the textual variant signs noted within the text itself and You'll note that When it says children it is last hour and just as you have heard that Antichrist is coming

Comes is coming and notice. There's a little symbol here and when we click on that And then make this big enough for somebody to see you're given the textual data and You'll notice

I just found this an interesting I realize we have an unusual audience and sometimes you like to see these things

The second hand of Sinaiticus and a number of other minuscule texts and all of the pretty much all the

Byzantine Tradition well that well that that that term will always have meaning even after CBGM, but anyway

Has Hathi ha so that the Antichrist and I I noticed last evening when

I was Preaching on this speaking on this that it it does seem and it may be just because of my eschatological background from my youth that it's strange to translate

Not the Antichrist, but Antichrist without the article the majority reading is that the and then

Codex, Alexandrinus in 1881 those are important witnesses

Only have the article so instead of Hathi Antichristos, it's just ha you have heard the

Antichrist is coming not that the Antichrist is coming little unusual after a

Kathos But anyway, and then the text which is just Hathi Without an article is found in the original hand of Sinaiticus Vaticanus And then there's some of the early church fathers that have that reading.

I'm not I'm only using the Nestealin Excuse me didn't get my hand over to the cough button in time.

I apologize I'm only using the Nestealin 28 we could bring up the

UBS and have Much more in the way of citation evidence provided, but we won't do that right now, but I found that to be an somewhat interesting

In light of how we we tend to hear the text in light of our own understanding of background

We think of the Antichrist, but it says right there and now many

Antichrist or a polo a many Antichrists have appeared and the context

And I think it's important to recognize this the context is a narrow context.

I Think down through the history of the church we have At times wanted to expand out certain texts so we can include our pet opponents within texts

That's that's not unfortunately an unusual thing in church history but these

Antichrists By which we know is the last day have gone out from us

That's a verse 19 says and you'll notice a phrase Notice here ex hamon.

I don't think anybody can see it with us. There we go ex hamon Here they went out from us, but they were not

Ex hamon from us For if ex hamon a song for if they had been from us

They would remain with us, but in order that might be manifested that they were not all ex hamon

Then they went out from us the art of the action of exhale fun going out is borrowed by that last phrase

It's assumed as the verbal aspect of that last phrase So you have one two three utilize four one two, three four

Utilizations of ex hamon out from us out from us out from us. This is obviously very important in John's Recommendation or his his teaching.

I'm sorry that these Antichrists have Gone out of the true fellowship.

They are no longer a part of The true fellowship For indeed if they had been of us

They would have remained with us, but it was necessary In order that it might be

Manifest they were not all of us that there is sadly even in the day

Of living Apostles you had individuals who would

Rebel even against their their authority at that time and Would seek to draw people after them and that's that's what was taking place.

And so John says to his audience and you have a charisma an anointing from the

Holy One and You know and I'll just show you that the variant here real quick.

It's demonstrating Panta and Pontus There there is a translational difference between the two depending on how you interpret all these things are all things so on so forth, but What John is saying is

I'm not telling you something new You have you possess the Spirit of God you aware this is going to be happening

I'm just bringing these these things to your remembrance and he says I have not written to you

Because you do not know the truth but because you know it and because Every lie well

Literally, it's every lie is not from the truth. So in English we can play around a little bit with the

Particles of negation because no lie is of the truth You have a very strong Concept of objective truth in In first John and in the

New Testament as a whole you do not have the kind of Gnostic concept that you have in writings that are not first century, but Sadly many of our young people are sitting in university classrooms, even as I'm speaking being told that the

Gospel of Thomas or whatever else Is of equal authority with something like first John as Christian scripture

And yet it's quite obvious that there is a fundamental difference in worldview and So all of that just to get us to verses 22 and 23, which is what

I wanted to focus on. Who is the liar? except Ha our numinous the one denying and I want you to notice how our numinous appears here

Here here and then you have the

What I would call the negation of it not technically a negation but conceptually the negation of it

Ha hamalagon the one confessing So you have the negatives three negatives and then the positive at the end of verse 23

So who is the liar except the one denying that Jesus Now it's literally again the one denying that Jesus is not the

Christ. So it's a Greek obviously handles negation differently than English does just as Greek handles articles very differently than English does so The one who denies

That Jesus is the Messiah the Christos and What strikes me there's a couple things

The Hebrew roots movement is a very dangerous movement in the sense that I have seen many of these individuals use the reality of the

Jewish nature of the early church as A springboard from which to Present all sorts of unorthodox things that the

Apostle Paul especially would have found Particularly reprehensible in that it brings about a division between the

Jewish Christian Church and the Gentile Christian Church. There's only one church But that shouldn't keep us from recognizing the truthfulness of the fact that When we say

Jesus Christ Christ is not Jesus's last name and There is a meaning to Christos the anointed one the

Mashiach the Messiah and I don't have any problem with translating

Christos as Messiah But here part of a denial of Christian truth in fact being a liar is

One who denies that Jesus is the Messiah now when we look at what

John was responding to many scholars over the years have noted that both in Colossians with Paul here in first John with With John we have a

Mixture It's not the pure Gnosticism of the second century. That's that's yet to develop there.

There are foundational issues that are already present But There's a mixture with Judaism, you know the worship of angels and and exactly

Where the line is is it's difficult to say I mean when you think about it one of the real challenges

For Christian scholars and studying church history is when you read Christian writings About others.

I wish I could say that Christians have always had as their greatest desire to accurately represent other people

It's not the case we can look at some of the great works of Antiquity and Now that we've found a lot of Gnostic works

Nag Hammadi Oxyrhynchus places like that We can sort of compare and certainly there has to be a certain level of accuracy or no one's even gonna recognize what you're talking about but And there was a lot of variation

Especially amongst Gnostics because they don't have a belief in like an objective truth So But given all of that We can still demonstrate that there were exaggerations and Misrepresentations.

So how do you filter through all that and still if all you've got's what Christian said, how do you know?

So when we look at this There is something here about denying the

Messiah ship of Jesus that is related to The relationship between father and son

Because what's? What's the next line? This is ha anti Christos.

So now you have the article. There's no question about it the one denying the father and the son now in case some of my

Do I even mention this word because you'll end up having to deal with 47

Voicemails But do I even mention the word modalism to the to the man in the audience and you know who

I'm talking about, please I'm gonna talk about modalism once in a while and I had you on and we talked about it.

We did our thing Please don't take up riches time with Numerous voicemails.

No one's gonna hear him He doesn't listen to them as soon as he hears the voices delete delete that you're wasting your time and our time

Maybe that's what you want to do. I don't know But look if you if you if you want to get your word out start your own program.

I Have I have absolutely no moral Requirements to give you time to present your heresies on hair.

Okay Just don't so I'll mention it anyways

For those of you who have modalistic tendencies, I think I have seen some who have

Utilize this text In such a way is to say well the father and the son are one person who's being denied here

It'd be easier for me to not have to turn my head left all the time. So, thank you So They will say the father and the son the problem is you can't read first John and Not have already recognized if anyone sins we have an advocate with the

Father Jesus Christ the righteous the It's the son who has become in flesh not the father the distinguish distinguishing has been made

So just just because we find in John's writings a number of places where the father and the son are very

Closely related to one another as they are here Does not mean that John has not sufficiently differentiated them

So the point is that if there is something about the truth about who

Jesus is Is that to deny The testimony that the father has given to the

Messiah ship of Jesus is to deny both the father and the son There are there are those who would say well look and Let me just go ahead and add the next line

Everyone denying the son does not have the father the one confessing the son has the father also the this is a package deal in the sense that Because Of how

The incarnation has taken place in history the father has testified to the identity of the son through the resurrection and Through the exaltation of the son to his right hand therefore to For those people who would say

We can have a son who is a mere creature mere moral teacher

Not truly the Messiah and say that this but we still have the father

This is no longer a possibility in light of the incarnation in light of the incarnation

Because of what has happened in history The identity of father son and spirit has been made clear

Now I do want to point out That once again, this is a limited context.

These are individuals who were in the church and they have left the church and Ha our

Newman OS the one denying involves having a knowledge of what is being denied. It's not out of ignorance

It's not I've never even heard of the doctrine of the Trinity. Well, but you're denying and if you don't believe it this is a specific group and we need to be very careful that we do not make application of these texts outside of what the original authors would have intended us to we need to understand what it says in context and then you can make application from there, but you have to start with the original meaning in the context and so You cannot deny what

God has done in revealing the Sun and claim that you still have the father And This is going to be a text it's going to come up In a couple of weeks in Salt Lake City.

I don't know what Sean McCraney Really believes about the nature of the Sun. There's different kinds of modalism

The ancient civilians had a different perspective Perspective Than modern you

PCI people do you PCI people will say the Sun is created

There are people in the ancient church who believe that there was one person who acted like the father acted like the

Sun acted like The spirit that's not the form that you PCI has because the

Sun only exists in God's thought And is not a divine person

The Sun isn't dwelt by the father, but the Sun is not himself divine or eternal and so Eternal ontologically speaking.

They'll say well, he's eternal in that God always planted that that's not what we're talking about so this is going to come up and I believe that when it says the one confessing the

Sun has the father also That's that that cannot be separated out from the gospel proclamation to confess the

Sun in that way Is to confess who he truly is the word made flesh This is this this takes us back to first John and really in essence to John 20 28 and everything else in the gospel of John as well.

That's what's that's what it means to confess the Sun That is a positive thing That's what we want to lead people to do and so we want to make sure they understand exactly who the

Sun is and So that they can have the father and have eternal life

And It is that message that is to abide in people and when that that truth about who

Jesus is abides That's where the church is. That's where That's where you have true faith in in Jesus Christ, so it's a it's a wonderful text and I I enjoy

Looking at I just happen to notice here Well, that's interesting a

Few manuscripts. Well, actually majority manuscripts do not have the article before Hama Lagoon But none of the none of the earliest manuscripts do it will be very interesting

Well, I have them in the other room, but I don't I don't have it up right now to look at what CBGM says something about that so For another time that there's a there's a day coming.

I I trust and hope When You will have in Whatever Bible program is your preference?

Everybody knows I use Accordance Logos is wonderful Bible works is wonderful.

Olive tree is wonderful I have all of tree on my iPad and my phone and and I have logos on both and and and as I've said a million times before the only reason that I went from Bible works to Accordance was because I went to Mac and they both said

I contacted both companies They both said they were never gonna become cross -platform Bible works was always gonna stay windows and Accordance was always gonna stay

Mac. And so at that point I had a choice to make and I made the choice and then both changed their tune later on so What can

I say and once you are as invested? In Bible software as I am switching them out is

Not an easy thing to do and For example a few weeks ago here on the program

While I was doing something forget what was I tried to to get the Gertenshin LXX the septagen up Out of logos and I just I just could not get to where I needed to go

Logos is not as fast as Accordance And so I want to thank the people who support us all the time, but especially those that in this instance

Give to the ministry resource list because we were able to use the MRL to get me

Those resources to have here on this unit for the use and dividing lines. So in a sense you're sort of Buying them to be used by a number of people because we can utilize that information.

So I thank you for that We finished the program

On Tuesday and I sort of did the facepalm thing and said I Didn't even all

I talked about about g3 was the debate. I Did not discuss the presentations on Friday morning and That was pretty much the only time

I was there. I was supposed to be there through Sunday, but I Don't think rich gave this to me by any stretch of the imagination

But he became ill so he didn't come out so we didn't even set up our our booth and he was gonna be there

I didn't need to stay there. So we changed my flights and got me home earlier So but my

Primary time period was Friday morning the first presentation in the morning involved myself and Dr.

Kruger From Reform Theological Seminary the president of the seminary in Charlotte and We've had dr.

Kruger on The program to talk about canon issues. He is a brilliant and I can say young man he's a few years younger than I am and Every time we've done something together, it's we click really really well

And so I remember I forget when it was that I Was informed by Josh Bice that he had invited

Michael Kruger to speak at g3 now, I I Think people need to understand

Michael Kruger's a Presbyterian So we had an interfaith dialogue

I Do yeah, yeah, I think there were a few there I think that the obviously the

Presbyterian detectors were not working at the doors at all so Unfortunately, we were doing a bunch of IFD there at g3 and So When I was informed that he had been invited

I was asked would you and He be willing to do a kind a chat a conversation about the canon of scripture.

I'm like Well, first of all this the overarching topic is

Discipleship and just a few weeks ago. I had one of my critics Say that at a you know

I spoke on the reliability of the text of scripture at a conference a number of years ago There was on evangelism and he was like just rolled my eyes.

What was that have to do with evangelism? Anyone who's ever evangelized on a university campus knows exactly what it has to do with evangelism, but I Did think to myself

It is a vitally important topic And I think it is central to discipleship, but it's gonna be a little off the beaten path and we had a really good group show up Calvinist Batman was there at one point.

I think actually during my presentation. He clapped once he was the only person that did Which was very

Odd it was a little uneasy, but I didn't know it's him too late or somebody's handled on him.

But anyway, appreciate that We on Thursday I Get a text message sometime in the morning

It says Kruger can't make it he's snowed in and I'm like Okay, and so I'm I'm trying

I had this one presentation I did on Canon issues in London could not find it for love nor money.

I was looking everywhere and So for a while, I'm thinking I've got two presentations to do in the morning and then

I get a text. He's gonna make it. Well What happened was he was stuck in his driveway,

I mean it was just iced up. Yeah, I mean, you know, there's there's something you know providentially hindered is when you just can't get to the airport and So he made it and he did a

Session a breakout session on Thursday night on the self -authenticating nature of the gospel, which

I didn't get a chance to hear But I've heard his presentations on it So we didn't even see each other until Friday morning just a few minutes before we started and we didn't need to One of the things that has been

Very encouraging to me since the publication of Michael's books is

Here's a situation where Some conclusions that that I came to pretty much on my own now

Afterwards I came to recognize it. It's pretty much what Warfield had been saying once you read him carefully and There are there are others but I Had had come to the understanding if you if you read scripture alone, you read the two chapters on Canon When I lay out the concept of Canon one and Canon two, which he identifies as ontological and specific

I used to use little numbers because I'm not as smart as him I had come to the same conclusions that that he had and so to find someone

Saying the same things In that context it's very encouraging It really really is and I'm very thankful that he has

Gone so far beyond anything that I did In laying out the scholarship in reference to that and Associating those concepts to the text of scripture.

He has an incredibly deep scholarly book on the text of the New Testament and I tried to convert it to listen to while writing and Not not possible.

There's none of the programs I have could survive all the foreign language stuff but Very very very encouraging along those lines at the same time

You know, this is the first session in the morning I've seen rich first thing in the morning before the caffeine kicks in from the coffee and it's it's ugly

It's really bad And so I was really concerned that we might end up getting some empty Starbucks cups

Thrown at us like how about I get these bums off the stage Give us something we can understand but One of the one of the nice things about I've certainly learned over the years that when the person interviewing me

Actually either has read my book with understanding With understanding or has background in the subject the interview can flow so much more easily

The questions make more sense The worst interviews are the ones where you know, the guys is why

I didn't have a chance to read this I just tell as well about it, you know That's that's happened many many times

So I took the role of Primary interviewer. He was the interviewee focused on his books and We just You know,

I'm just sitting here thinking okay from my perspective pastorally and apologetically What would this audience at g3 need to know?

about the apocryphal books Old Testament the

New Testament apocryphal books the gospel of Thomas the gospel of Mary gospel of Peter and I I Did truly enjoy

Michael's description of The gospel of Peter I'm looking forward to when that is is posted

Because it was somewhat humorous and I I mentioned him that we've been doing

Story time with uncle Jimmy on the dividing line and I said, you know reading these books.

There's just You let them speak for themselves they're just they speak from a completely different language completely different place and So we got a lot of positive

Feedback from folks about that session. I think it was necessary. I think it's a

It's it's a it's a great thing to have that kind of information out there be able to discuss That's definitely something once it's posted if you know anybody that's going to community high school anymore junior high school anymore

Get them to watch that Because one of the primary approaches is to So doubt not only about the text but about what books belong

In in the New Testament can those books get the heresy of orthodoxy? You need to have the heresy of orthodoxy, which

Michael Kruger is one of the editors on I strongly emphasize that during the session and then an hour later

They let me speak again and All I did was go through a few verses in Jude and it was all the background to to talk about sort of just introduced just a little little little bit about CB GM and one of the changes major changes that has taken place because of The ECM and CB GM and textual criticism that is a

Jude 5 the Lord delivered people out of Egypt Jesus delivered people out of Egypt and And So I got to preach a little bit for the first like 20 minutes

Going through the text and then we hit the the tough part and and I know I'm not gonna get a bunch of likes

And ooh, that was great because it's challenging information, but you know,

I just I just remember one of the young men in my church who wrote to me after he Moved away from home went to college a

Christian college and After about a year and a half he wrote to me he said, you know For years you've said in Sunday school

It doesn't matter whether you're a Christian college or non -christian college You're gonna get hit with this and this and this and this you gotta understand this and this and this is it?

I always dismissed it But here I am at a Conservative Christian College and I'm getting hit by it just like you said and I'm prepared but I can see a lot of people around me

That aren't prepared And So that's

That's interesting someone on On Twitter says you and Michael J.

Kruger should do a tag -team debate. Well, that would be very interesting No, no two ways about it.

I'm just not sure if if Michaels really interested in In that kind of that part of the arena

Maybe on Roman Catholicism or something. He might have an interest there. I don't know but I Don't want to speak for people in other in other situations

All right. So that was the rest of g3 that I forgot to tell you about. I apologize for that.

I Did take the time today as best I could while basically laying down and trying to breathe

To find out where we were in Looking at church history and discovered we did one session

It's easy for me to forget because I've been teaching Church history we're getting to the same material now at PR BC right around the same area and In fact,

I think we are at the exact same area which is gonna really confuse me badly But prior to October 31st

We started looking at church history and I made the statement then I said look October 31st rah -rah.

Yay. Yay You get your Luther bobblehead doll, but for people who are serious

About their faith and about church history. This is just the start This is gonna be a wonderful opportunity to have 500th anniversaries of all sorts of really important stuff

Sorry and So, you know not immediately but you know next year there will be some some things and and in 2019 and you know all the way through the

Diet of Worms and all the way through till I'm too old to do anything about and so I've wanted to work through this because Not all of you can listen and all of you will listen to the the

PR BC stuff I know a number of you are getting a lot of people are listening to that and I'm glad that's a that's a resource that people can use but I Wanted to do it on the program because the dividing line has the global audience and When you mix it in with the other stuff then people will actually listen to it and find out oh

That really is relevant apologetically Christian worldview wise everything else

I Think one of the most encouraging things to me when I first started teaching in 1991 right after I graduated from seminary that I taught church history at Grand Canyon University and I Knew that made the students taking the class.

They're only doing it because It's required class. You know, it's just it filled it it filled a need and Many of them said at the end of that semester

That I had instilled in them a love for church history and They would never be the same they had come in expecting to be bored.

It was anything but and so That's how

I was taught church history well Exactly. I don't remember the guy's name.

So I guess okay if I mentioned I dropped church history in college Because I started taking it and the guy with the book was horrible and the guy was horrible and I dropped it after a week and a half.

I was like, I Don't need this. I already knew enough about church history realizes the mess so It was dr.

Nate Feldmuth at Fuller Seminary. Yes Fuller Seminary That I took took church history from that really

Inculcated in me a love for church history. And then when you have a teacher Who models how to make something interesting will be to you if you then turn around make it boring when you are asked to teach it

So this subject thrills me I think it's Extremely important for many many reasons.

I'm not gonna go back over today, but I do want to go back we

The last time that we were talking about this We're looking at John Wycliffe, and I don't remember if I told you

I know I mentioned this in the PRBC class, but And if I did Repetitio matera memoria repetition is the mother of memory

In Wycliffe's writings by his own hand We have 12 different ways of spelling his last name formalized spelling had not

Had not developed yet, and so it was a sort of a we Hooked on phonics type thing

I guess so But I said before if and I I'm trying to Draw my voice back down keep it in the in the nice Barry White level

But when I start talking about church history who knows it's going up pace of speaking. It's going up Can't do that If I had chosen someone to start the

Reformation Wycliffe would have been as An individual the person

I would have pointed to brilliant mind a great systematizer but He's a hundred and Thirty forty hundred forty hundred fifty years too early

Well, why is he too early? We've emphasized this in the program before There had to be certain things in place

Especially the printing press Especially the printing press had to be in place

The Reformation could not take place without it. Not the Reformation that we know a religious Reformation rather than merely a governmental or secular type of Reformation So he was too early but he is called one of the morning stars of the

Reformation, you know, like Venus or Mercury will come up very very early and Letting you know the Sun's coming.

Well, that's sort of what what this is about I Think I mentioned

I apologize if I didn't again We're covering all of this on sermon audio

So if you if you're listening via sermon audio, you can just go over the phoenix reform Baptist Church Church history series

I think we're around 52 53 54 lessons in something like that We we talked a little bit about The fact that he used the term

Sola Gratia in defining his doctrine of justification in his trial ogus

Written shortly before his death. He wrote quote therefore if there were a hundred Popes and All the friars were turned into Cardinals Their opinions and matters of faith should be believed only in so far as they are founded in Scripture Now that is

Sola Scriptura That is a meaningful application of Sola Scriptura over against the concept of the elevation of tradition

To the point where it becomes the lens Through which the page the words of Scripture are to be read

He he felt that people should have the Bible in their mother tongue Every Christian is duty -bound to study it.

That's gonna become important here in a moment. He repudiated the veneration of Saints He was summoned to Rome a number of times many papal bulls were hurled at him.

But at this point in time there is a real distance between England and Rome not just There aren't any flights you can get but politically speaking

You must understand if you've had the the great schism you've had the Babylonian captivity the church

The the the papacy is extremely distracted the same thing's gonna happen with Luther People have speculated if Rome had moved more quickly in regards to Luther What would have happened but they couldn't because the death of Maximilian and the need for the election of a new

Holy Roman Emperor in the person of Charles and so You couldn't do those things overnight in those days.

It took time and so You have

Rome deflected distracted Wickliffe began a translation of the

Bible in English that was condemned by the Roman Church and copies were burned all over England I've seen a

Wickliffe translation in the In London at the British Library. It was in the the case on the other side of the aisle from Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Alexandria And His his pamphlets

Made their way all over Europe now. I remember this is before This is before Printing so these are hand written

Pamphlets, but he has a lot of followers. He strikes a nerve so to speak He dies on December 31st 1384 at Letterworth, which is where he was a pastor.

He actually pastored a church He died officially Orthodox He had not been condemned by a council and so he was buried in what's called

Holy Ground But 31 years later at the

Council of Constance very important council, obviously The council that's going to heal the papal schism, but also kill

Jan Hus He was officially condemned 31 years later at the

Council of Constance and so somewhere around 1427 1428 his bones were exhumed from the

Holy Ground burned ashes and scattered in the River Swift and so you may encounter the

Reformation story That because they burned Wickliffe's bones and cast them into the

River Swift That that River Swift goes out in the ocean and therefore carried Wickliffe's teachings all over the world well, you can

Do with that what you will but that's what they are referring to It's amazing how slowly an hour goes when you're trying to talk slowly and keep from coughing

We only have a few minutes left, but I'm gonna make it through we're gonna make it for the full hour You will all wish to listen to this at double speed there's no two ways about it.

Otherwise, you will fall asleep The Lollards L -O -L -L -A -R -D -S the

Lollards were an English movement of men and women that arose out of Wickliffe's teachings and The term

Lollard literally means a babbler One who babbles you can sort of hear la la la la la la la la

Lollard babbler. The reason they were called Lollards is they made crude

Literal translations of the Latin into English. They were not themselves in general Highly educated individuals, but they had been taught by Wickliffe of The need to know the scriptures memorize the scriptures interact with the scriptures make the scriptures theirs.

And so the term Lollard was a Depth, you know, it's in depreciation deprecatory of the

Lollards that their English translation would be as bad as it was

And so in 1414 right around time the Council of Constance The church moved to suppress

Lollardry and burned Lollard books all over England And so when that happened, this is this is to me.

This is one of the more beautiful stories of Church history they began an oral tradition

By memorizing sections of the Bible in English and even taking on the name of the books they had memorized and so you would have these secret meetings of the

Lollards out in the woods and Jeremiah would get up and would give you a

Recitation from Jeremiah and then John would get up and You had to distinguish between him and first John John's a little smarter than first John And this is how they kept alive their love of the scriptures

I've often Somewhat humorously pointed out that I would have to be like third John or something like that but This is how much they cared about scripture.

And of course eventually they are suppressed themselves and many of them are Are burned many of them are lose their lives their freedoms

But what you see even at this time is this this undercurrent there are people who truly want to love the

Word of God and when they're given access to it and You know, it makes you think Wow The Reformation is still let's say 1415.

You're still talking a hundred years Yeah, God has his timing and we will see

Someday exactly what that timing involved. But here you have the Lollards and They're ruthlessly pursued and yet they love the scriptures and they memorize the scriptures and they take on those names and What's interesting is they were also strongly anti -papal

They were anti -papal not anti -people anti -papal is it With my nose, maybe you can't tell the difference.

They were strongly anti -papal and they identified The Pope as the

Antichrist of the Book of Revelation Now who else is gonna do that pretty much every reformer down the road at some point in time

I I Mentioned the last time we did this because I listened to the dividing line. I rarely do that That Well, I just lost

I'm sorry lost the point I was gonna mention had something to do with the Pope and Revelation, but It's gone that happens.

I made it through 55 minutes without having a complete meltdown. So that's good They They're teaching.

Oh, yes. Okay. I remember just it's just I feel like I'm running a 386 with With 640k of RAM right now

Only a few of you understand what that means But you get the idea it's we ain't running fast and see

I just distracted myself again, so I've already forgotten what it was I was gonna know Luther had a very interesting

Eschatology in that he had both a spiritual and a physical

Antichrist the Physical Antichrist were the

Turks the Muslims who the were Knocking on the gates of Vienna and So he saw them as the

Antichrist But the spiritual Antichrist was the Pope So that was an interesting bifurcation of the concept and Those of you who are reformed

Baptist know that the original 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith has a whole section in it about the the

Pope as Antichrist and Most of us take the perspective today that Papal teachings are

Antichrist because they do not contain the gospel whether the individual known as the

Bishop of Rome is Ha on Tichos toss is obviously exegetically

Much more of a challenge try to prove one way or the other so But that is a very much a part of Reformation history and It goes back to the

Lollards might have gone back to Wycliffe himself and You probably could make an argument that you'll find similar concepts

Amongst Albigensians and and people like that in centuries before that But the difficulty there is making the connection between them and Wycliffe himself

Because it's Wycliffe's writings hand copied Wycliffe's writings That end up having such a wide distribution

Even at that time Can you imagine what his impact might have been? had

The printing press existed at that time But it didn't and as I said, it just wasn't yet time

And so I'm gonna try to remember maybe you can write down out there or something That for this in this context, we're looking at Jan Hus next

Because I'm at the very same spot in the Sunday school class, so I'm never gonna remember But I should make a note to myself

Start with Jan Hus and we'll go go from there So my apologies once again for the slow speaking and the not -so -good voice

But hopefully something from 1st John the discussion of g3 Canon and then this little jaunt into a portion of church history has been useful to you

Now just pray that I get home in one piece and I'm going to go back to bed Thank you,