Answering Questions from Friends

Well, greetings and welcome to the dividing line it is a Thursday last program of the week

It's July Second, isn't it? Yes, July 2nd. So July 4th this weekend.

I Was thinking about maybe making some comments about July 4th this year

I'm just not sure if These days You know last

July 4th how many of us would have even Given a possibility

That we would be seeing a full -blown Marxist movement in our nation where There's almost nobody

That's standing up to this stuff Even the alleged conservatives have been cowered by it and Local mayors and governors just collapsing right and left into the demands of wiping out the history of the

United States just wipe it out just just disconnect everything and Start all over again get rid of Mount Rushmore.

There are people demanding it get rid of Mount Rushmore change the name of Of everything all on the basis of a

Marxist organization That has made its name by being pro transgenderism pro -homosexuality and now

Evidently somehow took over Big tech and everything else. You can't you can't open up a browser without Not only without being assaulted by this movement, but this morning

I saw an article From the Washington Examiner UC Boulder now, okay

Boulder Boulder has had two left wings for decades and See what happened is we got we got used to that We we got used to the fact that Academia was filled with people that we just We realized they were leftists.

We realized they they would have loved Stalin But we we we fooled ourselves into thinking and no big deal

I I think the idea really honestly was once people leave University they get a job

Start living in the real world Start paying taxes That that's somehow going to fix everything and We now see from the mayors and governors

Who think themselves just slightly less than demigods? That that's not the case and So we we've all looked at Boulder Like okay.

Yeah leftist University town Crazy as can be But hey, you know, there's actually a little a little town up right hand

Canyon Road out of Boulder called Ward and Basically Ward is filled with potheads 1960s potheads they hate everybody when you climb the road up there on a bike.

It's great climb But they hate you. They hate all the bicyclists that come through They don't want anybody up there when you when you climb the road, there's a

Semi, it's buried halfway VW bus Along the side of the road at one point.

It's it's buried in the ground I'm done done. I have no idea what it's doing there. But that's that's what Ward is

Most of us are figured Well, let them have Ward, you know, they're there are 10 ,000 feet

You know, they're completely buzzed. They're not gonna bother us, you know, just send lots of potato chips and they'll be they'll be good

We were wrong These these folks now have Demonstrated that they have zero respect for and in fact have deep animosity and hatred toward the

Constitution United States because the Constitution United States embodies Concepts and perspectives that they want to see destroyed and they're doing everything they can to do so and The people on the right are either just too stunned or too cowardly to do anything about it and so the great purge of The memory of America is

Is underway and it's happening even now and so here comes July 4th and why on earth given what we?

What we are seeing why on earth would anyone be celebrating July 4th? Given given what we're hearing

Because if you can get rid of Mount Rushmore if you're if you're if you're gonna be consistent and Purge any honoring of anyone who had any connection

With well right now. It's slavery. So if there is so All the founding fathers.

I mean you can make the obviously logical argument That given that slavery existed and the founding fathers did not banish it.

There was discussion. There was argument There was a recognition of its inconsistency. It was a doomed

Concept there's no question about that whether we needed to sacrifice 750 ,000 lives

To get rid of it is another issue That's a lot of people in case you haven't you know figured that out 750 ,000 dead and that's not including maimed and maimed in inconceivable inconceivable ways

Warfare was brutal. They were seen a 50 -caliber slug lead slug that was used during Anyway The reality is

You look at all the founders and Even if they did not personally personally have servants or slaves they

Ran around people who did they cooperated people who did and There's a long history of that.

I mean every time I see a picture of the Clintons with bird, I just chuckle because Democrats have been around for a long time and you need to understand that those were the

Democrats but you wouldn't know that today and and I I I have a feeling that 95 % of the people who are

Tearing down monuments and burning things and and all that kind of stuff don't have a clue.

They don't know They they don't know what the Democratic Party was about Clueless they have no earthly idea and the 5 % who do just simply don't care because they're they're the hardcore

Marxists and they don't care About black lives or anything like that. They care about one thing power

Obtaining power breaking down the system. So that's that's what they're they're into anyway

So What what what is being celebrated and I mean I I can tell you that I can look back and I can look at the

United States of America and because I'm an adult. I Can be extremely thankful For all the blessings that God has poured out upon this nation and all the ways that God has used this nation

Without going. Oh, we're perfect No, we've never been perfect But You know as I said because I'm an adult it is and it is the way of the infant

To refuse to think in categories to refuse to recognize

Spheres of importance That that's how children are that that's that is supposed to be an ability a part of the brain that develops

At a later point in time and so it's a part of maturity It's part of growing up being able to look at someone and appreciate the good

While recognizing that they like us were imperfect human beings and not only they make mistakes

But they may have lived in a day when there were there were beliefs that were generally held by many people

That we would not hold today And you still are able to go Okay, I appreciate

And in fact, I can look at what this person did and there's there's a there's a person who is deeply brave deeply committed in ways that Almost nobody is today almost nobody is today

You know you look at you look at Some of the some of the men let's get a little bit closer to home some of the men who who saved the world from Nazism Who saved the world from the

Axis powers? it's easy to drag them out of the 1940s and bring them into 2020 and then tear their monuments down and say we should never say their names again and yet not only did they risk their lives, but but they

They they gave their lives To fight a greater evil but when you lose the ability to think in categories, there is no such thing as a greater evil and so Maybe you've seen the movie the the red tails

Is about the Tuskegee Airmen? the black fighter pilots in Europe and The trials of tribulations they went through it was really interesting because you know, that's 1943 -44

And it sounds a lot like 1863 -64 and the 54th,

Massachusetts Very very similar attitudes that had to be dealt with even even though 80 years had passed

Similar attitudes that had to be dealt with and yet The amazing thing is those men were willing to fight and die for this nation

Despite the attitudes and the prejudices In at both times at both times

Because they saw something far greater than what is now seen today and was allowed to be seen today and And so it just seems to me that we live we have we have all of a sudden come to realize that we we live in a society of absolute children just just in the the

Institutionalization and the exaltation of a childish way of thought

That Vilifies, so I'm sorry. I was talking about Boulder neat neat neat.

Sorry me back to the School officials at University of Colorado Boulder Sent a memo to faculty and staff outlining

That holding the values of the Black Lives Matter movement is a quote

Non -negotiable condition of enrollment end quote Campus reform report that a handful of school officials signed off on the memo sent on June 5th

Despite the school previously saying a fundamental role of the university is to encourage free speech. Well, we know we've been watching

How this has worked on university campuses for a long time now the screeching the the air horns the again infantile children

Of standing in front of classrooms chanting mindless

Meaningless tropes Rather than allow for debate or discussion or dialogue anything like that So you've seen this has been going on for years

The memo was signed by the vice -chancellor chancellor for diversity equity and community engagement

In other words one of the one of the communists And others

And described supporting the Black Lives Matter movement as a quote Non -negotiable condition of enrollment and employment end quote according to the news outlet

We value and support the principle of academic freedom and free expression which are central to our academic mission

Upholding these principles is not mutually exclusive from the idea that we have a responsibility

As an academic community to embrace acknowledge and promote equal access and inclusion To all who come to our campus to pursue their academic research and career goals

Spokeswoman Debra Mendez Wilson told campus reform response to the memo at the same time to be in alignment with our

Values as a university and to comply with federal and state laws and university policies We will not condone discriminatory or harassing behavior toward individuals and welcome people who don't agree with those values

To reconsider where they want to be a part of our community You must understand the language of totalitarianism.

You must understand that totalitarians When it is useful for them

Will utilize language like that But the message is clear

There is no free speech there is no foundation at At University of Colorado Boulder To say hey, you know,

I've noticed that Black Lives Matter as an organization is like really Marxist and You know,

I I'm not sure if that's really good idea because I don't think UC Boulder would exist

Actually as it exists today if this had been a Marxist Country and you're out of here.

Boom. You're gone You know, I'd say that I love to say that you need to reconsider your association with our community which means you're gone

This is this is where we are on July 4th

That's July 2nd, but coming up on July 4th of 2020. So I Remember back in Minnesota.

This is back before we burned it down This was over 50 years ago when

We would go out and and I thought it was really cool we would go out and we'd sit on the hood of our old used car and We'd watch the fireworks

For July 4th, and that was pretty special. I bet you they had fireworks in downtown Prescott, didn't they? No Outskirts, okay.

Yeah. Yeah Parades. Ah, yeah Well, I just remember, you know leaning back on the on the windshield at three four years of age and just Watching those those fireworks and it was it was awesome

And so I you know, I was raised as your standard fundamentalist you know you almost every church you went to had an

American flag and a Christian flag up there on the on the Thing and and it was just sort of connected in your mind

Never dreaming that in my lifetime, I mean I was born right after the McCarthy era and So You know

That had its impact Never dreaming that someday we'd be sitting here dealing with the reality that many of the leaders in government are just Straight up.

They don't be honest about it But they are straight -up Marxists and they are supporting a Marxist movement within our society.

That's that's where we are Makes you wonder what July 4th really is going to mean in the future or if there is even going to be any type because You know what happens when communism takes over a nation is they will they will

Either co -opt the holidays and change their meaning or they'll replace them

With you know, let's let's say next year

There is a Governmental action that basically suspends the

Constitution United States and provide something better ie communism and that happens on the 15th of July Then that becomes that that takes the place of July 4th.

You got you still gotta let people have their fireworks But you want to connect them to something else now

You've you've destroyed the memories of the old you want to give them but you still you have to have some cohesion

That's why you get rid of Black Lives Matter. That's why you get rid of these people Once the useful idiots have been used there they disappear.

They they you don't even know where they went And then you start building quote -unquote new memories to try to unify the society and hold it together.

That's What China has done. That's what Russia did South North Korea, etc, etc.

And that's that's just that's it's the same playbook. They don't have anything new That's what was so fascinating about that 1969 clip it reads like reading the

MSNBC ticker because they have the same playbook and they're just doing it the same way and And There you go, that's that's how it works.

So what anyways, so that's 20 minutes gone. Sorry about that. Um What I want to do on the program today is

I have some questions for some friends and I think you will find them questions from not for questions from some friends that I think you will find to be

Challenging and useful as well. That's what I want to address them. And So I have some questions here from Matt so to start with Matt and then we're gonna

Look at some questions from John. So Matt and John today on the program First of all,

I was asked for book recommendations on either the history of communism or the ideology of Marx He says

I can't say for sure But I would guess that I'm one of many in the church today That has little to no understanding of the thinking of Marx or the history of communism

Well, you know I had to ask some folks because to be honest with you Even though I've done a lot of reading in history

That's where That's where I got my knowledge of these things is

You read about Post World War two Europe and you can't help but be dealing with the rise of the

Soviet Union and the establishment of the Berlin Wall and what happens in the

Eastern Nations the Eastern Bloc nations once they fall into the sway of the

Soviet Union and so you just and of course, I've grown I grew up during the

Cold War, so That doesn't necessarily mean you're getting accurate information at all times, but you you have to deal with those those realities and so I asked some others and I Was given the name of a book by Gary North on the subject and then also interestingly enough

Thomas soul and I've downloaded souls the audio the audible version of Souls book obviously

I only did that day for yesterday. So haven't gotten to it Yet, but soul not only a brilliant social commentator

But his primary work and I believe yesterday Dave, I think day before yesterday was his 90th birthday

He must what must he be thinking as he watches all this going.

I guess nobody was really listening Yeah Feel sorry about that, but happy birthday to Thomas soul

He has a book on Marxism. And so that would be Anything but that soul has done is very very very good but so much of it is

You know, it is interesting that after the McCarthy era in the 50s

There was such a backlash to that which was seen as so heavy -handed that if you opposed communism if you if you

Put really a lot of effort out there. You're automatically just labeled as a McCarthyite as a crazy kook and That's exactly how they accomplished what they've accomplished in Completely taking over the educational institutions of the

United States I mean, I've said many times the reason the wall came down in 89 is because they didn't need it anymore

They had already accomplished their invasion They had started invading in the late 50s in the 60s they came through the porous

Educational system it took over the professorships We saw what was happening.

We chuckled about it because it seemed so crazy. But hey, you know, are we really threatened by students? banging on Windows or standing in classrooms screeching because they can't actually argue with you because they're not bright enough to They're just mind -numb zombies and and that's over there.

It's not that's not where I am and now they are in charge So that's that's why why keep the wall up You're not keeping people in anymore because the invasions already worked now let's just go get all the goodies from the people have been working hard all these years and So the walls came down and that's that's sort of what what happened there

So You can get a lot of that from just reading the history of the past century Which it would of course include reading histories on the subjects of the massive you know the

Well, I don't know The gulag archipelago will take you like three months to read

Solzhenitsyn Still considered by most to be the greatest literary work of the last century

His own suffering under the the communists and and things like that.

So you do have that kind of material as well But like I said, it takes most people literally months of concerted effort.

It's huge I'm not sure how many pages it is, but it's massive massive

Second question. What does evangelism look like in a time of persecution? This person

I'm used to engaging with unbelievers in public, but I can see a day where that would end in an arrest very quickly

Mm -hmm Do you think we should always look to imitate the apostolic example of boldly preaching

Christ in a public square or are there times? Where a more undercover approach is beneficial.

Well, there you go We all should be thinking about this

Because the answer to that Requires us to Seriously, well, first of all seriously requires us to think through some eschatological issues.

First of all If you're if you're literally Functioning on the idea that Tomorrow's it

Make no plans to the future. Don't worry about the next generations. It's all gonna wrap up tomorrow

Then that's gonna completely change How you're approaching this issue Secondly When we look at the early church because it mentioned apostolic example when you look at the early church

When you look at both how the Apostles did what they did and then how the early church up to The Edict of Toleration So up until the peace of the church in 313 and then during and then it then it changes because now you have a transitionary period between 313 and 380 approximately and Then under Theodosius you have the proclamation that what is left of the

Roman Empire because this is just 30 -40 years before The barbarians sack

Rome basically and so Rome's might is Collapsing during this time period and of course the pagans blamed it on Christianity, by the way

Christians have been blamed for a lot of things but the pagans blamed it on Christianity Julian the apostate for example was

In that time period and you know, one of his arguments was hey, we were doing great until Christianity came along and so our gods are punishing us for not truly worshipping them, you know, and so you've got

Julian the apostate comes along and so that's part of the argument, but Here's here's one of the things to keep in mind

When we look for examples, are we looking for examples of In a situation where the church is the small minority in a pagan context

That is where the vast majority of people do not believe That there is one

Creator God So in the early church, they believed that there were

Gods who themselves were created So that's the context the early churches is is dealing with but then

Once you have sacralism come into existence and the church -state union takes place Now you've got a different situation where you you're now dealing with people who

Claim to be Christians, but are so only nominally. So how do you deal with the state?

When the state uses its power to promote heresy so Once you have the relation that type relationship that this this is what takes us up to the time of Luther This is this is a situation where you know,

Luther's staying before Charles and and Charles represents the Holy Roman Empire the the political authority and Do you submit to the political authority when the political authority is telling you to In essence anathematize the gospel, but they're claiming to be

Christians. Is that different and then

The Protestant War is after that and what happens in the United Kingdom where everyone claims to be a

Christian even and once again the United Kingdom where almost everybody's claiming to be a Protestant Christian and Yet there are now divisions and wars

Is that different When when the when the persecuting authority

Claims to be Christian. How does that change the dynamic?

from when the persecuting authority hates all Christians and Is in fact pagan

These are all Extremely challenging issues that have to be brought to the fore and Right now we have lots of brothers and sisters

Who are living? Under totalitarian regimes So you can't if you decide to camp out outside the government -sponsored abortion mill in Beijing with a sign that says babies are murdered here

You will not get to cry out to anyone other than the military militarized police

Who take you away never ever ever to be heard of again So When you have the freedom to do that That's different than when

You know that if you show up outside that abortion clinic, not only it could be alone, but you are

Sacrificing your life that that's gonna be it You're not gonna be able to reach any of those women you are committing state -sponsored suicide

That's you just know that's what's gonna happen Maybe for a great cause but what did you accomplish in that cause and so the church in China has been struggling with these issues for many decades now and Has not come to all the same conclusions

Obviously the state -sponsored quote -unquote church is very different than the non state approved church

But in the non state approved church because in the state approved church, you just have to whatever the

Communist Party the CCP tells you to believe that's what you believe and And so you just take out all the central aspects of the

Christian faith and then Put G in there someplace and and and you're good, but the non state sanctioned church

How do you Do evangelism? It's not street evangelism, obviously

It is person -to -person evangelism it is Familial it is within a tight community.

It's still dangerous because every young person goes to the state -sponsored school and Has it drummed into their mind?

That Anyone who would present to them anything other than the supremacy of Xi Jinping is

A traitor and is dangerous and should be reported immediately We've been talking about Karen Karen is just the first wave of What the state will want in in in that situation, so the danger of Opening up about your faith.

It's constant you really have to Take up your cross deny yourself take up your cross but if you want to see more than one person come to Christ, then you you have to do it in such a way that you're able to continue to do so and maybe even disciple this person and and then they can do that for something and it's been working because by all estimates there are

Many many many millions of believing Christians not not in the faux state church but in these unregistered churches and so It has to be done very carefully

Certainly one of the things that before especially because there's been a real crackdown Recently over the past few years, but before then one of the common requests was we we need theology we know that we need theology, but we don't really have it and and it's very difficult to To train men.

They don't have the the wonderful things that we have in the freedom of seminaries and freedom of information and books and resources and and Everything else that we have

I mean a lot of us have books sitting on our shelves that haven't been open for years that that Would have so much value in places like that, but they can't get there

We have the overabundance for now Well, we will have that how long we're gonna have that is a really really good question

The cancel culture cancel culture is that far away from book burning really really is

If you if you'll, you know first you start with the monuments then then you head for the libraries that's that's the historical way of doing it and right now what that means is purging

Google and The net and YouTube and Everything else in the process.

That's that's where they're that's where we go. Next just watch I hate today You know, we can just sort of sit back and go.

Well, we told you so So, I know

I've been thinking about seeing you know digging in and Tracking down interviews and things like that with some of our our brave brothers and sisters

Who have been ministering in China Because it is the same playbook and we may be able to learn from them in that process

So, yeah not sure when you say undercover approach if you mean personal approach rather than You know sitting out on the street corner with a sign and being arrested within 13 .4

seconds. Yeah How much longer do you think biblical biblically faithful seminaries will last before they are shut down by the government

What would you recommend to someone who is thinking about entering the ministry in a time like this? What will the future ministry training look like after faithful seminaries are forced to close?

Oh goodness These are good questions Yeah, how much longer not much longer not in the way that they're functioning now

What's gonna happen is there's the you've you've got to wean yourself from the government milk

And that's gonna be really hard for big box seminaries with the big libraries and the big buildings and the big overhead and all the on -campus

Housing they have been dependent upon government money. Not just the government giving them money

There was a Supreme Court case yesterday about About religious groups and getting money and stuff like that but primarily in the form of Pell Grants and So you you you get the

Pell Grants you can take out federal loans student loans and And that's the money we're talking about and very plainly and I a

Video of me years ago Not that many years ago about five years ago on Wretched with Todd Friel said, you know, what do you see in five years?

And I said I see the government Using its financial leverage to shut down Biblically faithful seminaries so that you can't say anything about homosexuality.

You can't say anything about Marriage you can't say anything about transgenderism things like that. Well, I Just simply ask any

Semi -fair person Looking at what's happening in our land today if the

Democrats take the White House the Senate and and the house You don't see that happening by the end of January.

I do Maybe mid -february Give you a couple weeks

But I see Massive changes. I see the end of homeschooling That's gonna be the big thing any any totalitarian government has to Control the minds of the children and hence homeschooling will not be possible

The jack -booted thugs will take your children away. There is just absolutely No two ways about it and I know people are sitting out there there you'll never get my kids

I'll get it well Again there have been Christians who've been dealing with these issues for a very very very long time in Germany Homeschooling has not been allowed for decades and yet there are still

Christians in Germany but they have to deal with the Extremely deleterious effects of this type of thing and that's where churches have to make decisions you

Yes, sir. I think you're spot -on on the homeschool issue I think that's actually the bigger part of the picture as to what the government will be doing

But the question actually assumes that by that point in time Many of these seminaries that we may look at now haven't already imploded

Because we're seeing so many within the seminaries turn to social justice and Turn to all of these secular ways of thinking that the question of the biblically based seminary

When the government goes to topple it Will it even be around? Yeah, well

Union approves that Seminaries can continue to like zombies walk along long after they're no longer biblically faithful at all and Just like Others who are you know, again the term is useful idiots

Used by these movements will then be discarded by these movements. And so the social justice folks will find themselves it's just a matter of Those of us who are conservative will be the first ones in the gulags and then these other folks the social justice folks will show up eventually unless they're willing to completely apostatize and Then we can have a grand old time discussing how they helped to bring all this to pass and have some debates and things like that Yeah, that's what's gonna happen

What would you recommend to someone who's thinking about entering the ministry in a time like this? Wow That would in a time like this

You really really have to look somebody in the eye and say

Are are you ready? To make this kind of commitment. This this is this is truly taking up the cross.

This is joining the death march. This is There's you know, are you married do you have children what what what what's what does she say about this situation because you're talking

None of the comforts of life Most of us may not have them in the near future because that's what socialism brings but tremendous hardship

Which requires a Tremendous commitment to the people of God and to the gospel

You have to be farsighted. You have to be looking down the road going. Okay, things may look really really bad in our context right now but the fact is

God made us in his image This lie this secular lie cannot satisfy

Yeah, the technology That we have today Could prop this system up for a long long time.

It could be rough, but it can't last It does not have any substance within it. It contains in itself the seeds of its own self -destruction

These people will turn on themselves and so what's gonna rise up out of the ashes who is going to lead

That movement toward an understanding of this is

Jesus's world and so If you are called in such a fashion

That that is really the only thing you can do not that you don't possess abilities to do other things

But you could never be fulfilled if you did them then Then yeah, but I I can't

I can't think of a time in the past Where I can think of times in the past where people made extremely

Light -hearted decisions to enter into ministry where You thought that that could be something that you decided you know as a young child by yourself without Talking to your elders about getting insight and things like that today

I Think would be a time where you would have to have some of the strongest commitments to Truly looking into the future and Thinking about those generations that are coming and how to lay that foundation so What will the future of ministry training look like after faithful seminaries are forced to close?

Well, it'll look like 2nd Timothy 2 to look like what it should have always looked like to be honest with you

And that is it. It'll have to be done within the local church and that's what China is having to do and they're struggling

We'll be hiding books Of course most of the time that'll be on heart on little little teeny tiny

You know jump drives you can it's hard to find stuff like this You know, if if the government can't find he says he throws it away if the government there

Thankfully, they're fairly Fairly strong little things if if the government can't find drugs

It's pretty tough to find little things That's pretty easy to hide something like that and you can you can you can get an entire library on something like this these days

Yeah, it's tough to sniff this out, you know, that's that's true but you can put entire libraries literally on stuff like this and so I've only joking and I wasn't joking when

I've said that I Foresee a time when this program will be distributed by people

Meeting in dark alleys and passing jump drives as they walk past each other type thing, you know

By the way on that point I got a call before the show where a gentleman was asking me

How he could get one of those jump drives with everything on it and it's like we haven't actually done that yet but there are a lot of things in the the mix as As you you personally got to witness the other day.

So I would be really interested in the size

That would be needed To have the audio not the video

But the audio of all the debates and the audio archive of The dividing line

I'll actually be able to answer that probably by the end of the summer That'd be interesting to me.

Yeah. Yeah that that that I'd like to I'd like to see that I'd like to see that Because That that that would yeah, that would be very very interesting

Okay, so Matt there you go Not sure if any of that was overly useful

John brother John This question has to do with the issue of God and sin

Viruses and This is the Odyssey this is the

Odyssey is the justification of God in light of the existence of evil

That's it comes from Theos and Dik -I -Ao to justify God's existence in light of the existence of evil and Generally issues like diseases the plague

Natural Disasters the tsunami in 2000 was that 2005?

I forget what year that was in Indonesia where hundreds of thousands of people wiped out in a very brief period of time this is the

Odyssey and every Christian has to deal with the Odyssey I Wish I truly wish that this was

Something it was handled as a part of a basic theology class early on for all new believers, but it isn't

Most believers pick this stuff up over time from Multiple sources and hence end up with a theodicy that is not always overly tight as far as being consistent

And so this was raised by the discussion earlier in the week of Graham Codrington's rejection of John Piper's statements about Piper Everybody knows

Piper views himself as somewhat of a prophet not in the fully charismatic sense of that but semi charismatic sense of that and Therefore When he decides to go all out on something

That's how he talks and He was straightforward and I agreed with what he said he said this is not a time for sentimental views of God and that's right

So How do we understand that in light of The issue of permission

The idea that God is not responsible for creating sin though. Sin was in his hidden will now

Immediately when we talk about hidden will we're talking about his sovereign decree and That being different than his

Will that is revealed to us in his law and so Classic example in his prescriptive will

Which is revealed to us you shall not kill and Yet we have numerous instances in scripture where God decreed the death of an individual and Of course, the biggest example is

Acts 4 27 28 the cross itself And that's central to the very definition of what

God's purpose has been and so the relationship between the decree and The prescriptive will which is revealed to us.

You shall not kill you shall not steal Etc, etc The interplay between them it's not a matter of contradiction

It is a matter of the interplay between them, this is always the issue where you have time and eternity and How does time and eternity relate to?

one another We are creatures that live in time our language is time bound and Therefore any description we give of The eternal state and that which exists outside of Time will necessarily be extremely limited and the danger is we will

Transport from the lower realm categories and issues into the higher realm and I don't think that in this life.

There's anything we can do about that. We are limited Scripture becomes the one window that we have that allows us to see past where we are

So the the question is my understanding has been one of God allowing sin to enter

Being that it was in his sovereign plan But we should make sure to say God isn't not to make sure to not say that God is

Responsible for creating sin or causing man to sin. This is of course the issue of primary and secondary causes this is the very challenging area that all

Christians have to deal with But most Christians don't deal with so Anyone who makes the statement

God created all things And God knows what the outcome of that creation is has to answer these questions

My experience is the vast majority opt for easy out

Theories that are incoherent that cannot Stand up to any kind of external examination what

I mean by that is Open theism for example is the obvious instance of someone saying

Well, I want to say that God created all things But there's no way that God could have known what was coming and still be a good

God And so I'm gonna say God does not know exhaustively all future events specifically

He does not know what free moral creatures are going to do. That's what open theism teaches that opens the door for autonomous human will

It also opens the door in its fuller forms like process theology for Situations where God is growing and learning and and things like that and developing over time and getting better Now the open theist doesn't want to go there, but it opens the door to it

And it's sort of hard to see how they can't go there But leaving over the ism aside if we say that God knows all future events he has exhaustive foreknowledge

Then we have to deal with the odyssey in many of the same ways

It's just that Most people don't really have an answer. They'll just simply say it's mystery.

I don't know. I just can't go here I can't say that and When you come to specific examples such as We'll go ahead and use

COVID -19. It would be much. I think I think it's much better to look to 1347 to 1351

Which my wife has become an expert on recently. I tied up. Yeah, I did She's been watching the the

Great Courses Plus class on Black Death So she now now we can have fascinating conversations about Because I've read a number of books on that subject and listened to that that course to last year or the year before But that that one seems much more useful because Despite our media and despite the panic

The survivability rate for COVID -19 is currently sitting at 99 .7

4 % I think So Average age 81 globally,

I think So, you know the great the great mortality the

Black Plague 50 to 70 percent mortality rate one form of it would kill you in less than 24 hours and in a really ugly fashion and And in major cities you in some major cities you had as many as 70 % of people gone

In just a matter of weeks. You couldn't didn't have enough people to bury the bury the bodies And across Europe 40 to 50 percent of the people gone in just a matter of years

Yeah, that was big okay, that's that's That's a serious pandemic

To put it nicely and so the question is did God know about it? Did God know it was coming?

Did did God know when he created it was going to happen? Or is it just a possibility if we believe in?

Predestination the answers to all those questions have already been built into the package

Because if you believe in the personal aspect of the atonement

If you believe that in Christ that all of the elect are joined to Christ in his death

So it's not just some generic Impersonal thing That we truly die with Christ.

We're truly buried with him. We truly raised are raised up with him That means if so, in other words if you hold an orthodox

Historically orthodox understanding of predestination election and That is that the elect are known to God and are the subject of his favor then

When they live and when they die Has to be a part of his decree how could he elect someone and then something comes into his creation that Kills that person before the time when they were going to be regenerated and brought into a knowledge of their

Savior That that can't that can't work So the decree has to include everything that can kill humans

Which is a lot of stuff. I Mean a virus is a teeny teeny tiny little thing so The decree has to be exhaustive

You know some people want to try to say well, you know, God sort of God takes care of the big stuff But he leaves he doesn't sweat the little stuff.

It's the little stuff that determines all the big stuff. I mean There are so many instances of huge battles that have determined entire wars

Which were decided by the tiniest little thing. It wasn't the big general

It was a private somewhere that turned the tide one way or the other Little things the fabric of time has if you understand

Fractal mathematics. I love fractals. I most of you know, I've been doing fractal art forever you you change the smallest little factor in fractal mathematics and the result is

Massive it's huge. That's why they say weather is fractal. You know, you've heard the story that a a butterfly

Taking off from a bush on a mountainside in Colorado can determine whether a hurricane does or does not hit a city in Florida and That's true

That little wind current whether the butterfly goes this way or that way at a certain time that time tiny little factor blown up across the nation can have that kind of impact it it literally can and People sometimes struggle to understand how that works, but it does

So that I don't know how much R .C. Sproul. R .C.

and I never talked about fractals, unfortunately we didn't have a lot of time in the few times we met for Lengthy discussions of things like that, but I don't remember any discussion of fractals.

We were primarily talking about justification, but His famous statement that if there is even one

Renegade Adam in the universe that God cannot be sovereign because that one renegade

Adam Could overthrow all of his intentions and purposes. I think shows an understanding of What fractal mathematics would likewise demonstrate?

so the the point is that when we use the term permit

Calvin is well known for having He recognized that one of the ways that people were trying to get around The proclamation of God's sovereign decree was the idea of permission

When you permit something you do not you are you are avoiding the issue of causation

But the issue of causation doesn't go away, so where does it come from?

This is why we have spent time many times in the past warning about the final result of the freewill theists and the attempts by people like Leighton Flowers to say

That there are things that arise in the universe Completely separate from the will of God That in some mysterious way he may have had knowledge of I Like I've said many times.

I think Leighton wishes. He could be an open theist, but Somehow God Has knowledge of these things, but they don't arise from God they arise

Outside of the creative activity of God, so there's multiple creators. There's more. There's multiple sources of things

It's it's sort of necessary for any type of freewill theism To deny that God is the origin and source of all things

But when you say God is the origin source of all things you're not saying that God is the primary cause of all things

God creates the universe it has its own true existence and Secondary causes are actually established

By his sovereignty rather than diminished they have true meaning the incarnation proves this

Jesus isn't just a robot Jesus isn't just a puppet What happens in time is real?

But it is secondary in comparison to the primary

Source that gives rise to everything which is found in the eternal decree of God So when we say

If we if we talk about Covid all right. Do we say that God permitted this well you could make that statement, but what do you mean by it?

Are you saying that it arose from something outside of God's sovereign purposes?

Did it did it arise from Satan's work? Did it arise?

Naturally or just by happenstance or just a random action because within the secular perspective

That's how any virus arises other than when mankind does it himself Until until a few years ago.

We developed CRISPR technology Had to be done rather randomly We did a lot of it by blowing up nuclear weapons on the surface of the planet not realizing

What radiation would do as a result and messing with the DNA of our bodies? But before that it was just all random and so in the secular world it is all random it just it just happens

But there is no randomness in the Christian worldview and if God has

Exhaustive knowledge of all future events there can't be anything random. Let me give an example And it's it.

I think it's a good example. It's important example From Isaiah chapter 41 and we've we've talked about this many times before but I just want to I just want to emphasize it here briefly

When God is Rebuking the idolatry of his people and he's rebuking the false idols.

He says Present your case Yahweh says is Isaiah 41 21 present your case

Yahweh says bring forward your strong arguments the King of Jacob says This is he's he's he's talking about the idols the idols are being put on trial and They have been made of wood and metal and so on and so forth.

And so, all right you want to you want to compare

God's Israel you want to you want to go after idols? All right present your case

Yahweh says bring forward your strong arguments King of Jacob says let them bring forth Let those idols bring forth and declare to us.

What is going to take place as For the former events declare what they were that we may consider

Get rid of the instant detail surgeons here that we may consider them and know their outcome or announce to us

What is coming declare the things that are going to come afterward that we may know that you are gods indeed do good or evil

That we may anxiously look about us and fear together. This is called Sarcasm in case we're not used to it.

I'm not sure that anyone can use sarcasm anymore I mean look at Babylon B gets in trouble

Constantly for using satire. This is this is a form of satire Declare the things that are going to come afterwards that we may know that you are gods indeed

Do good or evil you're looking at this idol sitting there, which can't move then have a mouth

That's that's the whole point of all this Do good or evil that we may anxiously look about us and fear together

You can just hear the prophet. This is dripping with satire Behold, you are nothing you are a zero and Your work amounts to nothing and he who chooses you is and that's a very important Hebrew word right there to Eva Abomination To Eva he who chooses you is an abomination.

So here's the here's the point God says, all right get in the witness box.

Let's hear your best arguments And so let them bring forth and declare to us what is going to take place so the ability to know the future is one of the

Definitive attributes of God Let them bring forth declare to us what is going to take place as For the former events declare what they were

That we may consider them and know their outcome Now that I haven't heard a lot of people emphasizing this but but it must be emphasized

Because God does not just say See in this trial the false gods This is where we learn a lot about the true

God is where he says this is what false gods can't do and only I can't

I can tell you what's coming and I can tell you what happened in the past now, wait a minute,

I I've taught history for decades So I can tell you what happened in the past not exhaustively

There's a lot of times yet. We have to go. Well, we don't know what happened The farther back you go the more spotty things become

But even in modern warfare Sometimes you just go we don't know why that But that's not all there is that God is not sitting here saying

I am the greatest historian ever He says as the former events declare what they were.

That's the historical part That we may consider them and what's the last part here know their outcome

Ta eschata in the Greek septuagint That's where we get eschatology the last things of the the final things know what the outcome of it was

See, that's where historians have to stop because historians can only tell you what happened they can only speculate and Sometimes we have information.

Sometimes we know something about what the motivations of people involved in something were But most often we don't know how can

God tell us what the outcome is because it's part of his sovereign decree Same reasoning and tell you what's gonna happen in the future.

It's part of his sovereign decree If it's gonna happen in this universe, it's part of his sovereign decree

Right now I showed you all the picture and I sent

John this picture, too I showed you all this picture that I took of Albireo and Right now

Differing amounts of hydrogen are Being fused into helium in the cores of those two stars that form

Albireo There are different temperatures or different sizes One's beautiful gold.

The other is beautiful blue. There's a reason for that but the point is There is a certain number of tons of hydrogen

Being fused into helium in the cores of those stars Which is why we can see them because it produces massive amounts of energy even though it's 434 light years away so God knows exactly how much helium is being converted in In Hydrogen is being converted to helium in the cores of both of those stars and Every star that forms the

Milky Way that's a hundred to a hundred and fifty billion In every one of the hundred to a hundred fifty billion galaxies

God knows because it's a part of the very fabric of Time that he brought into existence and according to Colossians chapter 1 he in Christ Holds all these things together soonest again.

We don't know that in the secular worldview. Nobody knows that but the challenge

Remember, this is Isaiah. This is the Isaiah that gives us Isaiah 7 and Isaiah 9 Isaiah 53

This guy's got a really good track record You know What he has said was going to happen is what has happened

Interestingly enough, that's the one where the same book we have God saying Tell me what's gonna happen because I'll tell you what's gonna happen and then we see it all being fulfilled

Fascinating stuff fascinating stuff So that's a lot of background to When we say

It says but we should make sure to not say that God is responsible for creating sin or causing man to sin

This is the issue of the Odyssey and What we need to say is that actually

Post Adam that there has to be two two areas here

Pre -fall post fall post fall is not that difficult in The post fall universe

God is restraining evil He says he does we have examples of him doing so He's restraining evil

But The real issue and And so post fall.

It's not like God has to come up behind a fallen human being who wants to do good and Put a gun to his back and say do bad stuff.

No The the reality is he has to restrain evil he has to keep

Joseph's brothers from killing Joseph And still accomplishing his purposes through that there is restraint the philosophical issue is

Well, what about pre -fall? How can the fall of Adam?

be known to God part of his decree without God creating evil

That was the question that Basically Calvin Says when

God makes an end of speaking we make an end of speaking Scripture does not answer that question.

Not in the way that we want to answer it as fallen being human beings post -fall and That's where Calvin and Edwards who were not contemporaries obviously, but Calvin Edwards part ways is because Edwards thought he could answer that question and he couldn't he tried and He ended up in a morass as a result and that's why

I've always used those two probably two of the greatest minds The church has ever seen

That got the two of the greatest minds that God has ever redeemed but one

Recognized Presuppositionally That when it comes to answering questions about Adam's nature, we got two chapters

Can we pick something up maybe in a statement in a minor prophet or a comparison somewhere in the

New Testament or something But we basically got two chapters and they aren't focused upon telling us about the nature of Adam Anything we get from those two chapters is really speculative and so If God wanted us and felt like we had to be able to answer that question.

He would have given us the answers and one of the things that people chafe at is

Thus far and no farther the things are revealed belong to you and your children of things that are hidden they belong

God and When it comes to the nature of Adam and how

Adam in a pre -fall state Relates to the sovereign decree of God.

We are given next to no information All we are told is a judo judge of all the earth always does, right?

in the end God is going to be justified in everything he has done and his grace is going to be glorified and No one will receive injustice

The number who will receive mercy and grace is as the sand of the sea do with that what you will

The one who rose from the dead said it was true. The one who rose from the dead said it was true.

So we do affirm That there is a meaningful distinction between primary and secondary causes

We do affirm that God holds men accountable For acting upon the desires of their wills the desires of their their will acting on the desire of their heart.

Sorry and We do affirm

That God has never forced any individual to do evil, but God has decreed every act of evil that has taken place and in his

Providence has suppressed Far more evil in the heart of man than has ever been

Demonstrated by the heart of man For which we almost never give him. Thanks. It's true

What was the last time any of us? Gave, you know, we saw all this evil exploding around us over the past couple of weeks

Could have been a lot worse Could have been a lot worse If you're still living in your home and have food and clothing on your back, it could have been a lot worse

We do we give thanks. No, we're normally we're complaining That's sort of how we work Okay, let me

I need to figure to finish this up So the question is asked would it be accurate to use a similar outlook the

Coronavirus is in God's plan because all it happens is due to what he has foreordained Yet he didn't cause it to happen meaning he reached he restrained himself from stopping it as To fulfill his will

I'm not not sure how that works Or does this approach not work and limit

God's sovereignty the the question is What is the origin and source of these things we have to affirm

In light of Psalm 139 and it's it's a basic biblical teaching about the nature of man

That my my days are written in his book. I mean the only way that you can have this tapestry of God's intention and purpose over time is if my life is here and then my kids are here my grandkids are there and So I'm We're gonna have the kids over tomorrow

Tomorrow night. They're gonna be staying with Nani and Punkle and so you know, we're making plans as to you know, what treats we're gonna have and what food and and You know

The fact that our one cat will allow them to pet him The other cat will be will voluntarily banish himself to the outdoors in the heat as long as they're there

That's just the way it is so, you know, we're making we're making plans and and so there's always

Just as there were with my kids and my kids will tell you this with my grandkids

We have serious discussions about worldview and human life and morality and what the

Bible teaches about our calling in this world and and and so Nani and Punkle, that's me and my wife

We want to have continue to have and I would say have had up to this point a positive influence upon their lives

Does God not know how long that influence is gonna be? He has to It has to be a part of his decree.

My days are written in his book. I mean, that's that's the direct statement of Scripture But logically we can see why that is because my life has influence in their lives and because of this

Contraption sitting in front of me that I'm staring at a lot of other people's lives There are people in ministry today because of Alpha and Omega ministries

Many many people that means there there is this, you know, you throw the pebble into the pond and out go the waves and That's there's lots and lots of waves that are interacting the only way that therefore this can all resound to his glory is if it is a part of his decree and And so have

Christians Has COVID -19 been in the sovereignty of God a

Part of how he has brought his saints to himself in death. Yes Yes just as tuberculosis heart disease every form of cancer

Traffic Accidents bridge collapsings floods tsunamis lightning strikes

Has as God ever brought one of his home real fast in a lightning strike.

Yeah Was that fortuitous? What was

God going oh Man One of my one of one of my people just got zapped by lightning

Next week. I was gonna have him witness to somebody. Oh, what am I gonna do now is no

That's not what's going on. That's how a lot of people view things. That's that's not how it's going on. So We need to I believe that if we're going to Utilize examples from Scripture from Genesis 50

Isaiah 10 acts for so many instances through the prophets and into the life of Jesus and the

Apostles in the New Testament We want to use our language in such a way as to emphasize what's emphasized in Scripture and what's emphasized in Scripture is that all of this is going to result in God's glory and it's not like he's just trying to pick up the pieces and And so that's why

I didn't object to Piper's statement Kovat 19 could not have come into existence as Kovat 18 because you do know the 19 is the

From 2019. That's when it was first identified It couldn't have been Kovat 18 and it couldn't have been

Kovat 20 Or God's purposes couldn't be fulfilled in his in his elect in his people

That is when he chose to bring it into existence That is when he chose to weave it into everything else that he's doing and accomplishing in this world, which we cannot see

Necessarily from our perspective, that's why we're called to trust But he does so and That's why the plague struck in 1347 and not 1346 and every time it came back

Give me another example One of the things that I've loved about studying

John Calvin Because he's hated by so many people and even amongst

Calvinists. He's looked at as this cold intellect

Until I read his biographies and Came to recognize that when the plague came to Strasbourg He loved being in Strasbourg, he didn't want to go back to Geneva he loved being amongst his own people

French -speaking congregation and when the plague came there, he did not leave he ministered to his flock as a pastor that changed him and his writings

Have been determinative of entire forms of government since then You don't tell me that that Infection of the plague that came into Strasbourg at that time was not purposeful in God's intention.

Of course it was You couldn't see at the time But it was He was accomplishing his purposes

So and then the last question is So should we say? That God gave me cancer or God gave me

COVID -19 Well Piper does Piper wrote an entire book Don't waste your it wasn't called what's called.

Don't waste your cancer. I think that was the name of it because he had prostate cancer You have the book

It's good Thank you Yes, don't waste your cancer

So what what is he saying What he's saying is we should embrace

The sovereignty of God that creates providence because as I view it providence is the actions of God in time

Which comes about from his decree as to what time was was to be all about We are to embrace and to love

God's providence because he's good Because his grace is beautiful because his grace gave us an empty tomb and a perfect Savior and United us to him and Therefore we should not be like the people of the world that are constantly questioning

God's goodness but we should be amongst those who are constantly confident of God's goodness and that therefore and see

I Know you got to get out of here You're good for another ten, maybe

You got to understand and I'm answering this for John. I haven't said anything more about John Maybe someday

I'll be able to tell you more about John But I was a hospital chaplain and again fascinating Providences of God that forced me into that forced me into that.

I Was forced into being a hospital chaplain rich remembers We we lost 60 % of our funding in one day

And I had to find something because we didn't I got kids family had to find something and Ended up in that situation and it changed me.

I mean it really changed me it was Tough work extremely tough work

Everything that I read about it before I started doing it Violated my understanding of theology.

I couldn't find a single book That's because I hadn't gotten hold of Puritans as far as having a lot of resources amongst them

But I had to come to understand that That the people that I saw suffering when

I I don't know how anyone could continue working as a chaplain and not believe

That God has a purpose in every situation that they're looking at. Otherwise, it just becomes a random mess and I would think would drive people into atheism.

I really do to see all that suffering and if your theology says

This is not God's hand God's gonna do his best to make something good out of it, but it's all random.

That means See, that's why you become an open theist So you can say

God didn't see any of this coming Yeah, but he created it so it would happen So why in the world would you worship him if he didn't even see if it's coming?

It's doing just now just doing his best trying to make everything going. Oops. Oh, yeah. I made a mess Let's let's all work together to try to make this this work better or in the standard evangelical explanation is

Yes, God knew all this was gonna happen, but he doesn't have any purpose for it because he doesn't have a sovereign decree

So he Created this universe with all this senseless pain and suffering in it that has no reason no purpose

And that's some somehow supposed to make you feel better about God Yep, I create it.

I knew it was all coming, but I don't have any purpose in it praise be, huh? That's not how

I see Anything in Scripture. That's not how I read Isaiah That's not what

Isaiah believed No way. Mm -hmm. That's not Romans 8. That's not Romans 9.

Mm -hmm. No way a certain that Ephesians 1 So yes, we're saying

God has a purpose and that means yes um You know,

I've I'm old enough now we can we can talk about You know Piper had prostate cancer.

I'm personally of the opinion. I Think we've all got it It's just when it decides to do its thing

Let's be honest with you. I think that's probably the best explanation It's the great fear of any guy probably like breast cancer for a woman prostate cancer for a guy

Um The Phil Johnson just announced publicly he's got it

Piper had it We don't even seem to realize we live in a day where It's only been over the past few decades.

There was anything we could do about any of this stuff Discovering it or treating it. I mean, it was just simply a death sentence for All of human history, it's just been a death sentence.

That's it. That's how God's gonna take you out And so When you think of how many of God's servants down through the ages have gone into glory

Through these methods and mechanisms. Are we saying that that was not God's hand?

we really had to think these things through and It really forces us to go so when

God calls us to trust Even in the midst of pain and suffering

Maybe that's what the trust is about Maybe what I'm being called to do is to trust his goodness

When I can't see it When I have such a limited perspective When I'm just looking down from and I can't see one last illustration

Just popped into my head and it's a geeky one. So sorry, but I was

I Told you the story on the last program about my wife and I going out and we wanted to take pictures of Milky Way but we ended up hiding the car because of Eyes that were staring at us out in the darkness

That I shot at I was fun and how many satellites we saw zooming around and all sorts of neat stuff like that but one of the things that I got to talk to my wife about was

Sagittarius a star and Sagittarius a star Is something that mankind did not know about until 20 years ago

It had been theorized but We we got the evidence of it starting about 20 years ago and You have looked up at the sky day or night and Your eyes have looked at the part of the sky where Sagittarius a star is but you've never seen it even on that most beautiful clear camping night at High altitude where you saw more stars than you could ever imagine and you saw the

Milky Way you looked at Sagittarius a star but you didn't know it and Mankind has always done that didn't know it

The Sagittarius a star is the massive black hole at the center of our galaxy

How do we know it's there we can't see it there's all this dust in the way That's what the Milky Way is.

It's unlike the Manichaeans It's uh, yeah whole nother topic there

Yep, not our to go Unlike the Manichaeans that's not where the light is returning to the realm of light.

No, that's that's a lot of stars and dust That is the rest of our galaxy.

And if you look toward Sagittarius the constellation Sagittarius Sagittarius a star is where the center of our galaxy is and through the use of infrared we've been able to look through all that dust and And see that there is something at the center of our galaxy that can take stars that are ten times more massive than our own and Whip them around at a million miles per hour you've got to have a lot of gravitational power to whip around a star ten times massive than our own and In our solar system ninety nine point eight percent of everything in our solar system is in the

Sun All the planets and even massive Jupiter Point two percent.

So you take something ten times bigger that whip it around at a million miles per hour. You're fairly powerful

That's what Sagittarius a star is. That's the massive black hole at the center of our galaxy Mankind had no idea of it for our entire history until over the past 20 years.

It is not visible to us there is Too much dust between too much stuff between us in the center of our galaxy for us to see it

So how do we come to know about it? We were given the ability to see it through infrared spectrometry

Spitzer We have a couple of them up there now and Unfortunately are delaying what's gonna be the super duper one that we're relaunching later on web.

I think is the name anyway But Spitzer is the primary one that's found so much out there in the infrared area we had to be given

The sight to be able to see our natural sight

Couldn't do it When it comes to spiritual things, this is what gives us the ability to see

When we don't use this as the lens We will only have

Human traditions human guesses nothing more. So there you go

I think I got to everything from my two friends and Hopefully all the rest of you

Found the discussion to be useful. Maybe a little challenging maybe a little weird, but hopefully useful

These days when we talk about we'll be back again next week. We're always wondering

What's gonna happen between? Yeah, lord willing deo valente deo valente we will be back

Because I mean I'm seeing more and more stuff about people who've been banned from YouTube and and everything else and I just think

It's a matter of time. By the way, what that means is Bookmark ailment org get an

RSS feed going ailment org Feedly I set up feedly and and and stuff

Because we're really going to look to try to head this off and It'll take them longer to get rid of us there

Than any place else. So ailment org bookmark it if all of a sudden

You don't see us on Facebook. You don't see us on Twitter Obviously, I'm on parlay and That may that may be

You know when the when the big two go that may be where we can do announcements and stuff like that.

You know, we'll see but Lord willing we'll be back again next week.