Early Church History Class DL from GBTS

Well greetings and welcome to The Dividing Line. Do you like my new background? It's it's really very

Pretty because I'm not in Arizona as you probably can guess We are on the road and currently we are at Grace Bible Theological Seminary in Conway, Arkansas and behind the camera is a majority anyways of the

Class that we are having this particular Intensive weekend we did eight to four o 'clock today

And we'll be doing eight to four tomorrow and eight to four on Saturday And we're doing early church history and we're gonna have to pick up the pace because as I knew

I would fall behind Trying to get through AD 600 in that period of time is next to impossible but we will do our best and So this is part of the library and this is part of the you can you can if you'd like to sort of Show folks where we are here in in the sort of central aspect of the seminary and we've got our library around us here and It's What is it five o 'clock in the afternoon here in in Arkansas?

I had to put the camera on autofocus. So I apologize for the Going back and forth.

That's just the way it is now you went that direction but See, the problem is you folks were smart

You are standing right where we really can't shoot you Because you have the

Sun right behind you and not only can the camera not see you but I can't either so Like dr.

Johnson here could stick his tongue out at me right now. Well, okay. I saw that I wouldn't

I wouldn't really know about it, but So we have about I'd what did we have like 23 about 23 students?

Who has who traveled the farthest I want to know who traveled the farthest so so Yeah, go ahead.

Go ahead. This is so this is a squirrel and I Forgot to I was going to tell everybody at the beginning of class that if you're using an iPad

Please be very careful around this individual because he is a convicted iPad killer

It doesn't matter if you're an iPad and you have a tire track on you you're pretty much out of the game

Okay That's all there is to it squirrel Gene Pliot you know,

I Can't think of anybody else in Reformed Twitterdom that has managed to take a common animal and Turned into my own name

Well, that's I understand that I'm just simply saying you you have done something almost no one else has been able to do so I'm not sure that that's really what you want to do in life or a great goal, but you you did manage to do it so Arboreal, okay.

Yes, so we do have some interesting students in our class so you came all the way from Superior no one's farther away than Oregon There you go

But is when you come from Oregon, are you a student or a refugee a

Little bit of both a little bit now, are you in the part of Oregon that is like Completely insane or there a fair amount of sane people around You're just outside the insane, okay.

All right good because during kovat We had a bunch of people come down to apologia from Oregon, Washington Come from California You're in the insane

Metro, okay. Well, all right, then you are a political refugee and so I think we should treat you a special honor

Especially if we're gonna be sending you back to be mistreated amongst the craziness and zaniness there

So we're anybody from Texas. Oh Goodness all sorts of well,

I know that I should have known that one New Mexico, no,

New Mexico, son New Mexico doesn't like me either. So I guess that's okay.

I Know we have one Arizona at least one Arizona. Yep right there But you're sort of a refugee too because you leave you live near the harmonic convergence

Yes, yeah For those who can't hear that the the second

Most beautiful part of Arizona and if you've never been to Arizona, there's everything in that state.

It's not just the Grand Canyon That's beautiful. I haven't seen the Grand Canyon since 1985 though, because I don't want to fight with all of the tourists

So if you want to see the Grand Canyon, but from the bottom there's a place called Sedona and that's

Unfortunately been taken over after the great harmonic convergence of 2000

Forget what year that was Was late 90s, okay.

All right The New Agers moved in and there are crystal shops everywhere.

And oh it is it is amazing What has happened there? It used to be more known for that beautiful Chapel with the cross now it's known for all the

New Age wackos, so it's sort of a Evangelism area to be sure Challenging but beautiful beautiful beautiful area if you ever get a chance

Sedona is well worth going visiting. It's a beautiful state so we are here studying early church history and Let me ask

You guys who are here What do you what do you expect in three days

Having traveled here in an intensive class. What do you What do you expect at the end of this

Anyone we're not telling you because you're the professor.

Okay, so we don't want to say a word What were you? Yes, sir

No mythology 600 yep

Was today's class Different than you expected it or pretty much to be what you expect it to be

Okay, I've got it I've got one about what I expected Oh, no, no, no, no, are you kidding?

No, no, no, no, no No, we are we are barely into the second century and we we haven't actually even gotten to the apologists

So we have just scratched the surface. There's there's no two ways about it But I knew that that would be the case because I want to take the time to read some of the specific material from Ignatius and Clemens and and I just realized the first thing we gotta do tomorrow is do

Diognetus Because that's the best stuff that I know of in that time period and we didn't even get to that today

Goodness, I will forget stuff because there's there's too much to cover there They're just they're just really is

But when I started off talking about My background which did not raise me to have any concern about church history

How many of you felt like you had a similar background to myself? That's that's vast majority.

It's vast majority. Yeah That's what I want to at the very least.

I want this class to Help erase that and to build a connection to those people that Well, many of whom gave their lives and many of whom suffered greatly when we when we get to Cyprian I will read you a a letter

That is it continues to be hard for me to read it After having read it probably 20 times in various Contexts without tearing up it.

It is that amazing to get that connection and Rich was with me once when

I Sort of felt that connection as well When we I debated

Jerry Maddox in 1993 in Denver, Colorado We did seven hours of debate on the papacy over two nights

While the Pope was in town, he didn't attend unfortunately, but He would have been welcome and would have enjoyed his participation would have been fun but we we visited the papal treasures exhibit and they had a display of the actual manuscript at least one page in the actual manuscript p72

I Told you about this morning. I'm sure you all remember that and he wrote it down Right.

Okay But the connection that I felt in looking at that piece of papyrus to someone who lived 1 ,800 years earlier and yet who

Loved the Word of God enough to make a copy of it for him for himself Was really special and it helps us when we see those things it helps us to Remember that when we we believe that Christ is fulfilling his promises to build his church today we are still a part of that and I've seen that desire for connection to the early church abused and Turned into something that was negative but on the other hand

When you use it as a recognition of Christ faithfulness after all these years

It can be a tremendous encouragement and as we face a very

I don't like to use the term uncertain future because actually, we know the future is certain it's in Christ's hands and he's he's going to accomplish his purposes, but Between now and then whatever your eschatology is

There could be some very very very trying times and to be Assured of the fact that Christ is building his church and I'm a part of it.

What does you know? What does that mean? I'm a part of it It's one thing, you know, we talked about this seminary we talked about taking stands for truth and we talked about how we've got all these students coming from all sorts of different places because of a commitment to the centrality of biblical sufficiency

But we're a part of a much much much larger picture Much much much larger purpose

And on the one hand that can make you feel so small you don't matter but that's not the case Your your role is absolutely

Just as central as anyone else's and I've often wondered The guy that copied p72

Could he have had any idea? When he was copying that manuscript That 1800 years later.

It would be an encouragement to someone like me He could have had any idea I Think about that so often when

I look at at people in him We're gonna we're gonna tell Give you a heads up.

We're gonna tell the story of two subdeacons From the year 303 there are a few dates that you all do need to remember for a certain final examination

Everybody who's ever listened to my I've done church history classes in the past and everybody knows

I say it's every church history class and I'm telling you this as an official part of the class There is one day you absolutely have to know

For the final examination and that is the date of the council and I see it which is 8325

Tattoo it on your brain Because you need to know it you now we're gonna know more about the council and I see of them just simply the date

Anybody happen to know the traditional number of bishops at the council nicely? 318 very close.

We have we have 308. That's that's close enough for a cookie and so But this date is close to that it's 303

May of 303 to subdeacons

Are arrested and brought before a Roman official and he wants to know where the

Scriptures are he wants to know where the manuscripts are. They say we're not the readers only the readers would have those

We're just subdeacons. We don't know. Well, who are the readers? and they say

We are not traitors Do with us as you will that's the only historical evidence of their existence and they are executed

We know their names. That's all we know about it We don't know how old they were where they came from where they're married where they had children

Nothing for one little brief moment, but you got to realize for 99 .99 % of all

Christians in history That's more than they ever got We don't know their names But remember the book of Revelation?

No, I'm talking about The martyrs souls under the altar How long?

be patient How long? God doesn't forget he knows exactly for that We only know a few names and we can speculate and I like to think about you know, were they married?

Did they have children How would that impact me if I were in their position

I think about my grandkids What what if what if you're you're put in a position here in the

United States where you either stand firm or If you do stand firm you will not see your grandkids grandkids children

Most of you aren't grandparents almost nobody in here old enough maybe

Yes, no, maybe not yet hoping for You know, okay, there you go

But don't look at me and tell me that that would not weigh upon a person's mind That if you stand firm you're you'll never see them again because I I Want to see them grow up.

I want to see them get married Man, I'd like to actually live long enough to see my great -grandchildren.

I think that would be pretty awesome Though at about that age, it's like, okay, that's that's enough I'm not sure how

Methuselah handled it. I mean, can you imagine? Oh great great great great great great great great great grandchildren

I can't remember any of them anymore. What are you talking about? And I you know, how in the world could you keep up with the birthday presents for a family like that?

It's like wow but seriously, though, I just think of those two subdeacons to just pop in and pop out and Could they have known that their sacrifice could have an impact 1 ,700 years later

But never they've never even thought of it Would never even thought of it, but they wouldn't betray their fellow believers there's gonna be lots of Possibilities in the future of our having to think about stuff like that and Church history allows us to do that.

Church history allows us to have that opportunity of stepping back and It functions as a mirror

Because if the Spirit of God was in them the Spirit of God is in us it's one of the few times that we can have somewhat of a of a distance to look at ourselves and To think of ourselves in that way and that's why

I think church history is so Completely Necessary for a well -rounded theological education and of course as I said so much of our language was developed back then

You're gonna be surprised at some at some of those developments I think as we as we dive into it we think about Nicaea and we think about Trinitarian stuff and stuff like that, but there was more than that though the the form and shape of the church and the function of the church and Ordinances and sacraments and and all those things

All that development started back then and we can either just simply do what most of us have done say it didn't matter

They mess it all up anyways or we can Go no, it does matter and I need to look at those things

So how many of you Sit back here a little bit how many of you are already actively involved as pastors in churches and How many of you are?

moving that direction Okay, that's that pretty much covers everybody So How much do you know about the history of Your own churches your own

Well, I suppose we could talk about Reformed Baptist as a whole There's a lot to be

There's a lot that can be studied. There are a lot of names things like that, but In in this in the cities where you are

Would you say that your churches are representative of Evangelicalism or are they sort of In the minority

In being reformed and things like that anyone minority elements both

Okay When you when you look at Pastors in your in your area, would you would you say?

Would you say that the majority have a serious Perspective on theology or is it more of a

See sensitive type of a context a lot of secret pragmatic secret sensitive so that puts you in a

How many of you'd say you feel like you have at least three close relationships with ministers

Outside of your own church Okay In your area, right?

Okay. All right. Well, that's That's good. How many of you wish you had more? Yeah Yeah, of course

And of course, I would think that that would be an opportunity for us to be a light and to encourage others in maybe reading some books and Getting some resources that would be of assistance to them as well we're going into a

Well, we are in the middle of a political season How many of you feel?

Pressured About how you are going to handle dealing with the key

Sociological theological issues That are very much a part of the the current election cycle how many of you feel pressure that you need to address these issues in a ministerial fashion no one one

I'll just say personally it's huge. I am a software engineer in Austin, Texas.

Okay, so it's a liberal Austin Texas. Yes, they allow

Christians there. I Mean, I mean that that is the biggest blue dot in the state of Texas that there is

Yeah, I'm going to be certain very large Church and we are

A rock band megachurch One of my best friends is

John Cooper, what do you want? Most everybody's going boo Does anybody wait a minute?

Wait a minute. I'm gonna let you finish but how many of you don't know who John Cooper is? Okay, how many of you are simply not raising your hand because you do not want a camera aimed at you ever

Okay, there's an honest man in the back. Very good. Very very good Okay, so I'm gonna stop asking questions because so all of you know

John Cooper Okay skillet are good that you were just all staring at me like I'm not I'm not gonna answer a word this guy's saying

So so, you know you and you know, John, right? Um, not personally, but you know who yes, okay

All right, so you're in a rock when you say a rock band megachurch How would people in Austin confuse that with?

Calvinism So the preaching is reformed

Oh There's some people that just dismissed you immediately upon the same time but I will not necessarily in here

I'm just simply saying somewhere Well, Austin, yeah, definitely is just so weird to me

I Think most of the most of the leftists in Austin sort of feel like they're surrounded and they develop a siege mentality there unlike Portland Seattle, San Francisco where they own everything

And it sort of works the other direction so so you would feel a pressure with the election because you're on you're in a blue you're in a massively blue spot in the middle of a red state and so You're against You're running against the the flow

I get that But how about anybody else? Let's put this way are you dealing with?

Social issues such as transgenderism Definition of marriage

Genetic manipulation Vaccine mandates.

Are you dealing with things differently in? 2022 than you did in 2014

So So what you're saying is

Even though the media is so plainly biased and even though leftist churches are

Haven't have absolutely no Compunction whatsoever about about doing that.

There's still very much the idea that Even though it has theological ramifications you can't talk about it from the pulpit mature

Yeah, so you can address you can address the issues but you just can't say who's actually representing the issues which

Yeah, so like well, we all know What that means? Yeah, but yeah,

I I get it Anybody else? I mean this just seems to be when

I talk to folks at least And maybe this is a difference when I talk to folks privately this is a big big issue, but This is

I think Homosexuality and the transgender issue that's going on.

I think there's been an emboldening Happened in the church this last time Month it happened in june june.

Well, it was the first time i'd seen many many pastors step up and speak out more boldly

Yeah, I actually did a post talking about uh, the fallacy of the pride flag and Had over 15 000 likes on instagram and tons of comments and tons of shares

There's a little bit more aggression. I would see in the christian church than there was in previous years

I think we realized finally that it wasn't you know in the 70s. It was you know, we just want acceptance and then it was toleration and now it's it's uh, you know, uh, it's celebration and it's like Condemnation that you don't right this trend that I think has happened and I think that pastors are finally realizing

If we don't stop and push back now It's just going to we're just going to push further and further back.

And so there's just been a I think an intense An intensity and a magnification of pushback.

Yeah, uh that has been enlivened. I think that covid purified the church unique way um

Purified that that's an interesting term Yeah, how would you define that I think that it it brought um clarity of Of where people were at maybe things that were unsaid in previous years were forced to be said it also revealed who had spying to stand up against government mandates, uh and where their loyalties laid but I think that there was some sort of Resistance for the first time in my lifetime to the american evangelical church, which

I believe actually produced Some emboldening that I haven't seen before right my generation

Yeah, see I was I was raised in a milieu. Um That would that would basically say, uh, you never make political statements from the from the pulpit

And we we believe in the myth of neutrality that uh, we could be neutral on these things and Church was never going to be a threat or the government was never going to be a threat to us

And and stuff like that But everything's changed so much over the past few years that I think a lot of people are still trying to get reoriented to the

Well, you can't get reoriented to a landscape that's changing constantly And that that for us older folks, that's the top part

You younger folks You've grown up in a world where you expect it to be different next month than it is this month

And I most of my life was lived You know Next last year is going to be pretty much the same as this year and next year and everything else

Um, so you're used to the the ground shaking under your feet. I I don't know that I can ever adjust that it's it's hard um

But It's i've had to come to realize that you

You can't just keep your mouth shut and interestingly enough I was

I was saying in 2000 Um That the homosexual movement was not asking for equal rights.

It was asking for uber rights. Yeah And I had a lot of people who said, ah, you're you're just overreacting you're you know stuff like that and and now we see

It's not even uber rights. It's You will capitulate to us and you will celebrate us and you will not open your mouth to criticize us or say anything or you will be

Fired canceled your bank will will make it impossible for you to get your money out

Uh, we won't we won't honor credit card charges and donations to your ministry and everything else it's just Astonishing where it's gone, but it really in hindsight we should have gone.

Well, duh where else could it have gone? There's no stopping point. There's it's not a slippery slope.

It's a cliff There there's no place to stop at a cliff. It's it's just going all the way

Some people say they're going to overplay their hand And there's going to be a reaction

But that assumes that they don't already control the media and the educational system

And my big concern is when I talk to young people today, and i'd be asked

If any of you have university ministries When I talk to young people They're statists

And what I mean by status is they believe The state exists to make them happy And therefore they look to the state for everything

The state has to has to solve every problem and so they're they're They have no

Ground to understand what it means to be self -sufficient and to handle things for yourself

How do you get someone like that to vote To limit the power of the state because their status it's become their ultimate authority

Uh, that's that's the big concern that I have is Outside of a massive work of the spirit of god we are up against an incredible Incredible barrier any of you do university stuff go on university campuses um

Uh, I have friends Right Um, but it is it's like you were saying, um earlier

That I mean, that's all you know, and that's all these families are wanting to drink. You didn't know Right And so when someone comes with I mean

Yeah, that's true. That's true and it's It's really the whole thing brightest

Into that so It doesn't make sense everybody understand

There's chaos but it Everything is supposed to be in the air flying

Going up. Yeah, that's just how it is. So Like I was presenting the lord the lord's grace is showing time to grace um

A marriage or friendships where you see oh

Yeah, self -sacrifice why would someone sacrifice for somebody else why would somebody serve somebody else we can definitely show that uh to this younger generation, but uh

It is a huge challenge. It is such a huge challenge to be able to explain What's going on the world around us um

And in the church, I mean, let's let's go ahead and and mention it. Um I've i've never seen the kind of division the ease of division

That we are experiencing, um in the church today and i've i've sort of explained it by saying

A unified healthy church is a blessing on a nation Therefore if our nation is under the judgment of god we can expect this kind of division

And have to learn how to be faithful in the midst of that kind of division But at the same time when you look at the early church

They found division to be the greatest scandal Even when they were under the greatest pressure from outside So they're being persecuted

And they still believe that division is a heinous sin before god That is to be avoided

So sometimes I wonder if we've just gotten so used to being divided So used to I don't like it here i'll go find someplace else

Don't like you do things. I'll start a new church It really makes me wonder if we've just gotten so used to it

That we don't even think about The possibility of What it would be like to have a unified testimony to the world

Because the division look think about it in our own in our own culture Every time um, there's a movie coming out.

How many of you have heard the 1946 movie? one two Just two

Nobody else. Okay. Good. I'm glad so that I can warn you You're you will you will hear and be warned now there's a movie coming out called 1946

The thesis of the film is that homosexuality did not exist in the bible Until it was put in there by the revised standard version committee in 1946

When they trend they mistranslated the greek term arson equates or arson equate in the plural in first corinthians chapter 6 and in uh

That's a good idea. Very good in first corinthians chapter 6 and in first timothy 1 10

And So the whole idea is there is no biblical foundation for a resistance to or a conviction a conviction against Homosexuality and so they're going to be interviewing these scholars and all the rest of stuff

You've I would imagine you've seen The memes and the videos on tiktok where people have been promoting this idea

It really has an impact in fact the first time I addressed it on the dividing line was because one of the uh members of skillet

Contacted me and said how do we respond to this? And so I did a whole segment on the dividing line on it

And then it just kept blowing up and happening more and more and more and so i've done even longer segments, um demonstrating what

The new testament actually says on that particular subject but that involves understanding greek lexicography and the development of Lexicons and how we do all that kind of stuff.

That's how that's why they get away with it That's how they can use that type of complexity To silence christians because that's what they're seeking

They're seeking to silence christians if we don't know how to defend it then we'll maybe not say it as loudly but there's an example of of a a belief a what we

I I grew up and we didn't talk about this stuff in church That's not the stuff you talk about in church.

You don't talk about homosexuality in church That'll offend somebody And so as normal the church ends up behind the eight ball we're always responding we're not we're not ahead of the curve we're always behind the curve and so There's an example of how we can try to say

God's word says this and the enemy always has somebody who claims to be a christian on the other side to be able to say

Oh, no, he doesn't Oh, no, he doesn't that division results in Us not having a unified voice to be able to say

You want to know why judgment's coming upon our nation? Here's why How can that even happen when you have so many people who call themselves christians who

Will deny that there is any such thing as a grounds for god judging this nation

Um, so that division is a we've just become used to it we really really have and it is a

It's not it's I was gonna say it's not a blessing and in that context. It's not but at the same time

Um, I did preach a sermon once called. Um What was it called the blessing of apostasy

The blessing of apostasy And what I meant by that was in first when when john says first on tonight

They went out from us so it might be demonstrated. They're not truly of us It's a horrible thing

When unbelievers Stay in the church and drag down our witness

And our witness to the world you would think that the clarity of the proclamation of the gospel would be enough to drive out the the driftwood uh, but sometimes there are those who just want to They they get stuck and they want to stay there.

I'm not exactly sure why There is a a a blessing to the purification of the church someone said, you know, the church has been purified well

The dividing lines have been made clearer But I think there are still more to be to be discovered

Along the way. I really do um So how many of you are excited

About choosing a paper topic for early church history Okay We're all like i'll put my hand up what am

I supposed to do? Let me tell you something this may not work for everybody but There are sections of chapters in my book on the trinity that were originally papers in seminary

And when I chose topics in seminary I already knew what

I was going to be doing So that's helpful and I Thought to myself what can

I write for this class that will have the longest utility

That the most benefit Not for me to get a grade in a class But to provide to others so for example,

I did a paper called uh The trinity the definition of chalcedon and oneness theology

I had to go to my professor ask for an extension to do longer to to write longer than than he had given us um, because it was a big topic

I haven't found too many professors who are unwilling to do that. Actually, uh You you like when you find somebody in your class so excited about your subject

That they're probably more excited than you are uh on the subject um But that paper has been i've used that for for quite some time

And it's it's still available on our website part of it's in the forgotten trinity And i've you've seen it in debates that i've done with oneness advocates

And so when you are thinking about Your paper topic for the class um

I challenge you to think along those lines Maybe think about where you where you are in in the church right now

Um, what can you do To make your study something that won't just have a benefit at the end of the class

But that what you produce maybe not the paper itself, but you could produce something from it

That could have immediate positive impact in your church Um I would

I would encourage you like during the next two days um My hope would be that as we're covering something as we're talking about something all of a sudden you go

That's something that's really really important. That's something that my people need to know or that's something that There's that group in my church and they would really be excited about that Make a note of it and think about how you could

It takes time to write a good research paper And If you're going to invest that time, why not have it useful 10 years down the road?

Right. I mean, I just think that's a That's how I did it and I got a lot of enjoyment out of Seminary and it also by the way, and you may feel this way even today having finished class

You may be feeling man. I wish I had a better professor than we've got. Um And one of the best ways to actually do that because I Almost all of my professors were way to my left

Way to my left my my systematic theology professor. Oh my goodness Oh my goodness.

Um his big area of expertise Was process theology.

Dr. Johnson is looking at me with With a with the look of oh, i'm not sure we want you teaching.

Um His big thing was process theology whitehead and god going universe going in and out of existence and god absorbing the good and shuffling off the bad and But I will give him this credit he

He presented the process theology perspective And this is how he did everything he would present

The one side and then he would present a critique of it and then he'd never tell you what he actually believes Sort of drive me crazy um

But he presented the process theology thing and he was really good at it. He really did understand it

And then his first critique of critique critique of it was Now the first obvious problem is process theology is that the god of process theology looks absolutely nothing like the god of the bible now he didn't then say and therefore this is all heresy, but uh, because he really couldn't do that, but uh,

He made it pretty clear that yeah, the god of process theology is just pure philosophy and the god of the bible's nothing like that and so That's how far to the left a lot of my uh professors were

But if I was excited about the class anyways I could still learn There are a lot of people left that are really smart

And sometimes they see things that we don't see And so you can take those insights and they'll get you lots and lots of facts and you can run with it and do good stuff with it and not be limited by um

The fact that you have disagreements with that individual. So if no, it's not going to happen to you here, obviously but if you do find yourself in a

Educational situation where you're having to learn from somebody who's not quite Exactly on your wavelength

That's what I'd suggest you do I got a lot out of seminary Even though everybody was way off to one side of it

I did have some fun along the way Like the one class in the

Pentateuch where I've told the story before but that's all right. Um Where we had to write reviews of these commentaries uh, we had to Who is that guy?

He came out three weeks ago on homosexuality And said that the bible really doesn't have any one particular view um

Oh drat pretty well -known old testament name and it's just escaping me at the moment um, it's been a long day and Uh, I remember

I had to read his commentary on genesis But I had to read gerhard von roth's commentary on deuteronomy.

I still remember what it looks like. It was that mustard green I guess it'd be mustard yellow. Uh, it's mustard green.

You probably don't shouldn't eat it. Um But the mustard mustard yellow commentary,

I think on deuteronomy by gerhard von gerhard von roth And you're supposed to write a review and give positive and negative stuff about it

And so I wrote my review and the positive section said This commentary has a very nice binding

And then I moved into the negative part, um, now that was a risk Because the professor had held all these up and said

I feel like this is the best Commentary in english available right now

But I got a 98 on it Because when I critiqued it I doubt he agreed with my critique

But what he saw was I had actually read the commentary I had read it fairly And was interacting with it that way.

So I did have some fun with some of that um Though most it was more like the day in class where one of my favorite professors, but again to my left

Was explaining how fuller had abandoned the view of inerrancy And so I just had to put my hand up and give the other side basically and say why

I Sometimes feel like a bit of a freak here And what was interesting was afterwards

A third of the class is tracking me down saying you said what I've always wanted to say So, um, yeah that was that was an interesting providential, uh experience so um

Do you guys have any? questions you'd like to ask To the entire audience of the dividing line in front of the entire audience of of the dividing line

Can the camera guy ask one the camera guy can ask whatever he wants He's holding the camera. You could turn it around and stick in your eyeball if you wanted to that would be pretty weird but What have you found is the best way to begin teaching early?

Uh, I have done uh I have done that outside of a formal class situation that is teaching early church history to a church the hard part is going to Is is to get in touch with the people who would actually want to do something like that And they may not be they may not know

That they would benefit from that. That's the point and so, um a a well thought out

Uh Flyer advertisement With some really cool quotes now you you'd know the character of your church if it's a younger church

Then you're gonna be looking for a certain kind of quote if it's a more mature church

You know a little bit more Stodgy like like dr. Johnson. Um When you uh,

I just woke him up he was falling I I I saw the head go in this direction So I had to wake him up. Um Then you're going to use a different set but you you a way to use some early church quotes or some facts from the early church or Uh, see early church and later church are different Um, so I would

I would focus upon Uh some really cool quotes from nicaea and stuff like that And say did you know your belief in this that other thing?

Was deeply impacted by events from 1700 years ago Uh, would you like to meet some really cool neat dead guys?

um Then you need to come thursday night at such times along those lines And you'll you'll get a few you'll you'll get the p you'll get a larger turnout at the beginning than you'll have at the end

Um But like I said the later church that boy there's a lot of stuff you can do

There's a lot of stuff you can one of the sad things about teaching this class is I can't tell you the story of munster

How many of you heard me tell the story of munster? one two three four Okay, four um

Was that on was that on sheologians? Yeah. Okay uh If you want to hear the wildest craziest

Story of church history bar. None There is nothing crazier than this Wilder than this more insane than this.

Um Go look up my daughter has a webcast called sheologians It's very popular. It's amazing.

I was a g3 when I would especially when women would come up to me I would go so do you do you know my oh sheologians listen to it all the time.

It's like, yeah, it's great Uh years ago I was in belfast northern ireland talking to a group of irish people and I I mentioned sheologians and Like two -thirds of the no one one one third one third of the audience said yeah, we listened to sheologians like wow

Okay in ireland. All right, cool She used to be james white's daughter now. You're summer's dad.

That's right. That's right I'm summer's dad and and she's yeah, that's that's true uh, and that's Fine with me, uh that that works well, but I in january of 2019.

I was in munster At the new testament institute there um doing an interview about cbgm and and uh stuff like that and uh, so I Got to I got to take pictures of the cathedrals there and the three cages that are still hanging there

And so I went on the sheologians when I got back and we did a two -part series where I told the story

And it takes that long to tell the story of munster If I can encourage you to do this

If if a major movie studio Simply took the factual

Outline of what happened They would not have to create any new characters They would not have to embellish anything

If they just simply told the story as it happened, it would be a blockbuster It'd be a blockbuster.

No one would believe it actually happened But it would be a blockbuster you it is that unbelievable

I can just see if you're if you know the story jan mathis and his

Followers racing out toward 5 000 soldiers on their horses Assured that god was going to give them deliverance and they being absolutely massacred in front of everyone watching from the walls

What a scene that would be wow, they wouldn't have to cgi anything it would just be Astonishing so church history can provide you some really cool stuff like that So if you were doing like reformation church history

Wow, you can do a lot with that I mean you could make some really you can get some people really excited about that if you if you wanted to um, but we'll have to do that at another another time, um, maybe when we

I don't honestly this is shocking to me And I hate to put you under pressure, but maybe somebody else can help because you have some other people from the staff back there, but What are the required history classes?

This is this is one right early church history Uh -oh

When you see when you see them all looking at each other, uh, then you realize We're not sure about that.

Um Is there a medieval reformation? Just reformation we just skip the medieval period we just Come on, that's where thomas is we when do you cover thomas?

Or are we not covering thomas? I I I can just see your hair messed up a little bit more with a wild eye.

Look we're not doing thomas Uh, no, you have to do it normally it's it's

Up to 600 And then 600 through the reformation And then modern church.

That's normally how it's how it's divided up. So um But reformation stuff, oh man, you can

I would have so many pictures up on the screen for that because i've been all over germany and stuff like that taking pictures

It would just be way too much fun Way too much fun. Well, anyway, believe it or not guys.

It's been well some of you're all going. Yes. We know it's been an hour uh it's been an hour and uh

Uh, I I know that some of the comments may have been a little bit hard to hear but you can turn the volume up That's that's what the internet's for uh, but uh

Pray for us, uh for the rest of the class, uh for me for strength and for the class simply to stay awake

Uh, because they will have a final exam And it will it will test their knowledge of the subject

And hopefully get to go home and share this with other people And then I get to go home I left my home on september 6th and I believe it's september 29th, so Uh, i'm looking forward to seeing the old homestead and um, i'm not going to recognize my own house because while I was gone solar panels were installed on the roof, so my wife is not happy that I was not there for that, but their

Problem is once you sign up for that. They don't care what the schedule is and they aren't ain't gonna tell you Uh, we are definitely discovering that right now that it's just sort of like well

We'll get there when we want to on our schedule. We don't care what your schedule is So that's sort of how that's working out uh, but i'm looking forward to getting getting home and uh,

It will be probably like 103 degrees when I get there, but uh, it will eventually cool off um, we've had we've had 103 up till October Was it 31st?

Yeah, I it does not cool off in phoenix until november So Believe me, we enjoy every cool day because there's not very many of them

Uh, we really do but anyways gentlemen, thank you for sitting around, uh for that conversation having listened to me for about seven hours today anyways, that's pretty astonishing that you do this but uh, and for everybody else, um

Look up grace bible theological seminary online. See what uh, see what we're all about here. I think you'll find

Uh The program to be very challenging and very useful to you as well and we didn't this time interview uh

Dr. Strand, dr. Johnson and stuff like that because we just wanted to give them some time off and besides that um,

I got dr Johnson out of bed really early this morning because he had to give me a ride and I I'm, just getting the feeling you may not be an early morning type guy

I'm, just really not sure I I may have ruined his day today. So and and thank you to Dr.

Messerschmitt Uh for holding he's literally holding the camera. Uh, I I don't have the stand for it.

So He is being a cameraman Uh today and so we appreciate you doing that.

So thanks for listening to the dividing line today. We will I have no idea When in the world we will do another program and I know that there are really controversial things happening

I just didn't think it was appropriate to Address those controversial things

Sitting here right now with everybody else sitting around even though they're all probably going. Oh Um, but we will we will get to it.

I know what's going on. I heard yeah, okay we'll give it a few more days before we