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

Alpha & Omega Ministries

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00:31

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

00:48

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

00:58

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

01:09

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

01:17

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

01:24

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

01:35

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

01:45

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.

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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.

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

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

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

02:33

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

02:42

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

02:52

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

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

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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

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

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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

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Some of you may remember a Sermon that I delivered

03:50

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

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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

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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

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

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

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

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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

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

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

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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

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

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

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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

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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

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

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

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

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

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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

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

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Codex, Alexandrinus in 1881 those are important witnesses

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

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

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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.

08:08

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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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.

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

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

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

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

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Of living Apostles you had individuals who would

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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.

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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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

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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

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

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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

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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

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Here here and then you have the

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

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

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

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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

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

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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

15:03

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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

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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

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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

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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.

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

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

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

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

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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

18:41

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

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

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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.

19:05

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

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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

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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.

19:27

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

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

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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

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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

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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

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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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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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

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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.

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

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The ancient civilians had a different perspective Perspective Than modern you

24:04

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

24:11

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

24:16

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

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

24:27

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

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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

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

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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.

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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

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

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

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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

25:53

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

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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

26:23

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.

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

26:44

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

26:49

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

27:05

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

27:13

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

27:23

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

27:33

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

27:42

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

27:55

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

28:05

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

28:11

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.

28:25

So I thank you for that We finished the program

28:34

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

28:41

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

28:55

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

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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

29:09

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

29:18

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

29:28

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

29:39

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

29:56

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

30:05

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

30:13

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

30:19

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

30:26

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

30:43

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

30:51

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

30:59

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

31:06

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.

31:14

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

31:32

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.

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

31:57

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

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

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

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

32:32

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

32:39

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

32:46

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

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

33:07

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

33:23

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

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

33:37

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

34:04

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

34:15

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

34:26

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.

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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.

34:52

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

35:04

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

35:15

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

35:21

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

35:40

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

35:56

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

36:01

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

36:11

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

36:23

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

36:34

about the apocryphal books Old Testament the

36:40

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

36:50

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

36:58

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

37:06

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

37:11

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

37:24

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

37:30

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

37:45

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

37:55

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

38:02

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

38:10

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

38:33

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

38:43

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

38:49

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

38:55

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

39:03

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

39:12

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?

39:19

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

39:31

That aren't prepared And So that's

39:37

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

39:46

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

39:51

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

40:01

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

40:10

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

40:17

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

40:24

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

40:32

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,

40:49

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

40:59

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

41:06

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

41:13

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

41:30

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

41:40

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

41:55

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

42:16

That really is relevant apologetically Christian worldview wise everything else

42:21

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.

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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

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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.

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It was anything but and so That's how

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

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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.

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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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

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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

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Reformation Wycliffe would have been as An individual the person

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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

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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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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

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

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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

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

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

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

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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.

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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

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

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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

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

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It took time and so You have

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Rome deflected distracted Wickliffe began a translation of the

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

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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

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

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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.

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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

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Holy Ground But 31 years later at the

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

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Jan Hus He was officially condemned 31 years later at the

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

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

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

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

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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

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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.

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

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

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

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

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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.

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

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

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

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

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

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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

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

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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

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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.

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

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

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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.

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

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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

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

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

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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

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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

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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.

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

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

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

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

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Eschatology in that he had both a spiritual and a physical

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Antichrist the Physical Antichrist were the

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

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

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

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

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

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Bishop of Rome is Ha on Tichos toss is obviously exegetically

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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

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

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

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

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

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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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