To Mask or Not to Mask the Christian Response

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Welcome to the Rappaport with your host, Andrew Rappaport, where we provide Biblical interpretation and application.

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This is a ministry of Striving for Eternity and the Christian Podcast Community. For more content or to request a speaker for your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.

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Welcome to the Rappaport. Bud, you hear me okay? What? Yeah, it's kind of hard to talk when we got these masks on.

00:28

You're muffled. Yeah, but I got my nice mask that I'm supposed to wear when I go out.

00:33

If you can read this one, for those who are on Patreon watching the video, there's

00:40

R .C. Spire. Yeah, or... No, you're wearing the shirt. I got the

00:45

Billboard t -shirt on, so... Yeah, we're wearing these in honor of our special guest here, but what's your mask say?

00:53

Well, on a backdrop of the flames of perdition is the word repent. Repent?

01:00

Repent, yeah. So you wear that out and people ask you what they got to repent of? It hasn't provoked anything so far.

01:07

Yeah, you're not wearing it enough. Even greater social distancing. You put this on... The thing is with mine, people that don't, you know, if you have to wear this mask, you're going to suddenly go, oh, look at that.

01:19

What's wrong with you people? That must be referring to the people that wear masks. But in case, in case, you know, let me take this off so I can be heard a little better.

01:29

You sound better, actually. Can you hear me better now? Oh, wait. What have you got now? Oh, I'm sorry.

01:34

I still have another mask on. That's John McArthur saying, go home. Is that...

01:40

Oh, let me take that one off. How's that?

01:45

Is that better now? How about that one? Oh, yes.

01:51

See? See, I got Kenneth Copeland blowing away COVID because he blew it away and it's over.

01:56

It was done. Yeah. So we're going to talk today about masks.

02:03

Whether we should wear them, obviously, as you could already tell, that one of the big problems is you can't hear anybody that's wearing these masks.

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And, Anthony, one of the most severe results of all this, the effects, you don't see people smiling anymore.

02:20

Yeah. I was going to say, you know, every great comfort constantly says I judge people by their teeth and I can't do that in front of everybody wearing masks.

02:29

So let us introduce our guest today. That is Dr. Anthony Sebastian and if you don't know, the joke he just gave is the fact that he is a dentist by trade.

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He is one of the speakers at Striving Fraternity and also a speaker with Christian Training Institute with Mike Riddle's organization.

02:45

And so he is joining us. He's actually here with me in person. And so he's going to be preaching at my church this weekend.

02:53

And so we figured we would record with him. And the topic that we're going to talk about is whether Christians should, should not wear a mask.

03:02

Now, Anthony, it would be fair to say you and I have gone back and forth on this. You haven't changed your position at all.

03:09

You know, we'll discuss whether it's rebelliousness or not. But, you know, we want to discuss, because this is a topic that a lot of people are bringing up, whether or not to wear a mask.

03:25

And so this is something I think that would be beneficial because this is a question a lot of people are wearing or discussing, especially when it comes to those churches that are finally, and some still are not, but those that are finally starting to open up and get together.

03:41

And the first thing that becomes a question is, do we wear a mask or not? I'm going to be at the Cruciform Conference in a few weeks and I'll give you some more information about that at the tail end of the show.

03:51

But the, the, you know, one of the questions that everyone's asking me is, do I have to wear a mask?

03:57

Anthony and I were talking about the G3 cruise that we're scheduled to go on and, you know, it's like, you know,

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I'm paying all this money to be on a cruise, but I don't want to have to wear a mask everywhere I go. That's not enjoyable.

04:10

Right. So do we still want to go? These are the things that we have to deal with as we deal with these issues.

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But we wanted to come at this from a biblical perspective and understanding the reasons we should or should not wear a mask.

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So Anthony, let me start with you and ask you, you, you take a strong position against wearing masks.

04:34

So give you an opportunity to explain why you won't even wear this, this beautiful, you know,

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R .C. Sproul saying what's wrong with you people or John MacArthur saying go home, you know, which now more people at least recognize

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John MacArthur or, you know, at least Bud is evangelizing with his repentance and all three of those, all three of those messages strongly.

04:54

And Anthony, you're a consummate evangelist. I know I've seen you doing it. This would be perfect.

05:01

Yeah, I would rather wear it on a t -shirt or on my forehead. You know,

05:07

I think that there's two different arguments to be made and both of which would show that we should not be wearing masks.

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We have a biblical, we have set a biblical arguments as to why I don't believe we should be wearing masks.

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And then let's, we have to look at the science because the reasons that the secular world are giving is, is what they claim to be scientific evidences.

05:29

So does the science actually support wearing masks? That's a question.

05:35

The answer is no. And so we're gonna, we're gonna walk through that today. Well, so from the biblical perspective,

05:42

I think what you were saying is, cause I know you've been working on a message on, on James and the use of the tongue so that, you know, but we have plenty of verses that say, you know, for your first Peter four, eight, you know, love covers a multitude of sins.

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And if the tongue is a, you know, as a sin, that's biblical, isn't it? Or, or, or, you know, we could look at James five, that's within the same context at 520.

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It says that, you know, let him who, let him know that he who saves a sinner from error in his, in all his ways, saves a soul from death and covers a multitude of sins.

06:15

So see, the Bible talks about coverings. Yeah. I mean, Ezekiel 28 says, and I have destroyed you.

06:20

Oh, covering cherubs. So let me just go a different way and suggest that since we brought up science,

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Paul, Paul in, uh, first Corinthians eight says, uh, knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies.

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So that might be a response to that. We've got scientific knowledge, which is highly contentious, even in the secular arena.

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Yeah. But we also have Jeremiah three 25. Let us lie down in our shame and let, let our humility cover us.

06:55

See, that's what I'm not covering. See, so it is biblical to cover. No, we're just going to do battles of the, of the

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Bible versus I got to get my iPad up. These are clearly not talking about coverings, meaning masks.

07:09

These are not the way to interpret scripture. No. Yeah. That sort of has an atoning quality to it,

07:15

I think is what that implies. Yes. So, so, but, but a more serious note though, we will get to, uh, what should be,

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I think, a biblical perspective that we would have on this. I think there is a passage of scriptures that we can use without looking for the word covering and then trying to, you know, make things up, but let's start with the science and then move to the biblical.

07:40

So Anthony, your, your background as a dentist, you, you in your role as a dentist have to wear a mask when you're, you're working with a patient and you have for years, a lot of people don't know some of the background, what doctors understand about the mass.

07:57

So let me ask you, how often do you change your mask and why? Yeah. So I want to preface your question by, by saying this dentists have been wearing masks since the early 1980s as well as gloves.

08:10

Yeah. Well, some, some of us actually remember, and this is, this is, this is beyond Anthony's knowledge. He doesn't understand, but there's some of us that can still remember the taste of our dentist's fingers.

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You know, my dentist as a child was, was obviously a tobacco smoker and I could taste it when he stuck his fingers in my mouth and he didn't wear a mask.

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You have no idea how many patients tell me this. Older patients tell me this. Notice it said older patients tell me this.

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This whipping snapper. I'm not surprised. Cigar smell on, on their hands. So yeah, this goes, certainly it goes back a long time, but yeah.

08:47

So mass has been worn since the early eighties. It was really the AIDS scare that caused this to occur. And it was a fear of, of AIDS and HIV that caused this.

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And I'll tell you, we learned, we know a lot more about HIV today than we did back then. And there are certain protocols that are in place that are in place in medicine that are really good as a result of that scare.

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And there's some that probably are not really helpful. Having said all that, dentists understand aerosols probably better than any other medical profession.

09:19

Now we've got, we've got commercial aerosols, right? So people who work in factories and there are certain masks you have to wear for aerosols there.

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If you're working with, with a LEDs, if you, you know, especially like the old lead paints. Now, if you're working with different chemicals, there are different types of masks and filtration systems you have to not only wear, but the, the room actually has to have certain filtration systems.

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But in medicine, when we, when we're talking about bacteria and viruses and fungus, which is what can infect us, right?

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We're not talking about the heavy metals and different things that are in, are in regular industry. We're talking about these biological issues.

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Now, when we talk about dentists, we understand aerosols better than literally anybody in medicine.

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We've been dealing with aerosols since the eighties. We have literally 40 years of research of aerosols in understanding what aerosols, what they are, how far they can travel, what travels in them.

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And what are masks actually do now? It would shock people to know this.

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When we wear masks in the dental office, number one, it is not about protecting ourselves against aerosols.

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We've known full well, all these years that aerosols go through masks. This is, this is known, go ask your friendly dentist, your friendly doctor, unless they bought the

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Kool -Aid. But ask him what the research has shown for the last several decades. And they will tell you this.

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The reason why we wear masks as dentists is to block, is to block the splatter.

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Because as we know, as we're drilling on teeth, as we're doing surgeries in the mouth, there are times that you get blood splattering and it does stop the blood splatter.

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But this, I give this as a backdrop, Andrew, because you asked the question about in terms of their effectiveness, right?

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And, and here's the issue is, is what do the masks actually block out and what do they not block out?

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How often do we exchange the masks was your first question. The moment you sneeze or cough into a mask, you are to change your mask.

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When you are in the middle of a surgery and you start to get blood splatter up on your mask, the first chance you get, you change your mask.

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Why? That's the question. Now, why is it? Well, it's, it's, it's very simple.

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When you have, when you cough out or sneeze out stuff, you've got mucus particles, you have saliva droplets, and there's going to be bacteria and fungus and viruses that can, that can and are attached to these droplets.

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The problem is, is that if you took a couple drops of water and put them on your desktop and then took a fan and blew the fan over that droplet of water, how long does it take before that droplet of water aerosolizes?

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15 seconds, 30 seconds. I mean, think about this. When you wash your hands in a, in a public bathroom and then you go to a public dryer, right?

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You hit the button and you wipe your hands and it blows air and it dries a little bit to the heat, a little bit to the air moving.

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How long does it take for your hands to dry? 15 to 30 seconds, maybe. Guess what's happening in your masks?

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You cough or sneeze into it, your droplets dry at 15, 30, maybe 60 seconds.

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And then what do you think happens to all those viruses and bacteria and fungus spores?

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You blow them right through those holes in the mask. See, what people don't recognize, and you can go to the

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CDC website today and you can read this. You can go to the mask manufacturers today and you can read this on their website.

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The coronavirus specifically is 125 nanometers in size, give or take, right?

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Our research shows about 125 nanometers. Our masks, the ones that people are wearing are blocking out particles that are micron sized.

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If you got a really good mask, maybe it's a 10th of a micron. But the reality is that coronavirus is literally a thousand times smaller than the holes in the masks that most people are wearing.

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It makes it sound like it's not really going to protect very much. Well, that's the point, right? That's the science of this.

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And so the media, and I've traced this because I was starting to do live Facebook videos back in early

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April on this subject. At first, the media was lying to people.

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They were saying the coronavirus is some mega sized virus. And so they were claiming it was in the micro sized particle range.

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And just for anybody who doesn't know the math, let me explain it to you. You've got a meter. Then when you take...

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We're in America where you do things by foot. Wow. That's a hard conversion. Well, I...

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Only two, I think. Yeah. So what I'll say is this, is micro is a thousand times bigger than nano.

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That we can know if you don't know a lot of math. I'll just tell you that as a fact. You can go look it up later. So they were lying about the coronavirus.

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They said it was nano sized. They said it was micro sized when it was really nano sized. They were lying. It was a thousand times bigger than what it actually was.

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When people started to catch on with this issue, then they changed the narrative and said, well, it's the droplets.

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The droplet size is micro sized. And that's what we're trying to protect against is the droplets.

15:07

To which now what we were just talking about makes... We can make sense of this now, right?

15:12

Droplets, yes. Droplets can get caught by cloth masks. Yes, droplets can get caught by pantyhose pulled over your head or whatever else people are using today.

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Or their shirt. Or their shirt. Their shirt or a piece of cloth. Bank lobbies are closed.

15:26

So you can probably get away with the pantyhose thing over your head now. I don't know. Yeah, and that right there is kind of interesting because I've always...

15:34

I found it interesting that the Black Lives Matter protests when they were first protesting were not wearing masks.

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And then when they started doing criminal activity, they suddenly were all wearing masks. Everyone thinks it's because of health reasons. I really wouldn't in any way want to wear a mask for any other reason like to cover their face from all the cameras.

15:54

I miss that argument. Well, all right. So let me ask you this. Let's make it a hypothetical because I don't want to confess that I did this in the event

16:02

I did. Going through the grocery store down the soup aisle and I didn't have a mask on or a person didn't have a mask on.

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And a little old lady comes up and says, she's all masked up, very sweet little old lady.

16:16

She says, wow, I really like your cologne. What kind is it? I need to get some for my husband.

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And I said, wait just a second. Or the person may have said, wait, do you realize you could smell my cologne through your mask?

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And she's like, I didn't think about that. I guess cologne is much smaller than the virus.

16:39

Yeah, it actually is not. That's not where I was going with that.

16:47

No, and that's what's crazy about this. It was just a month, maybe six weeks ago that we saw the

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California wildfires really breaking out. And you had the CDC as well as other organizations saying that masks will not help you with smoke inhalation.

17:06

Oh, yeah, well, I can buy that. To which all the scientists were saying, wait a minute, smoke particles are much larger than viruses, especially coronavirus, which is one of the smallest viruses known to man.

17:19

So, yeah, it's really interesting. You know, there's been some guys out there saying, wait a minute, if you can smell somebody's breath through their mask, is it really blocking viruses?

17:31

The same way that you can smell stench through somebody's clothes, right, if they're not wearing deodorant, it's literally the same logic.

17:43

And so we look at the science, and this is what the science is actually showing. The holes in a mask are literally a thousand times larger than the coronavirus.

17:53

And so coronavirus blows right through it. Even the droplets, once the droplets dry within 15 or 30 seconds of being on your face, the virus blows right through the mask anyway.

18:04

And so theoretically, if somebody wants to use masks to block droplets, the only way to do it is for you to carry a bunch of masks in your pockets that are decent masks, and you switch them out every time you cough or sneeze.

18:19

But there's one other problem here. We also know in dentistry and medicine that you cannot wear a mask for a particularly long time.

18:30

And the reason why is because water vapor tends to also break down the mask even further.

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So the mask already has pores in it. The aerosols just from our normal breathing, the water vapor, normal breathing, breaks down those fibers, creates even bigger holes in the mask on a microscopic level.

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So if we're wearing the same mask for several hours, let alone the same mask for several days, guess what's happening?

18:55

We're blown right in and out of this thing anyway. And you're speaking of the masks we're seeing so many people wear, those little blue masks that they use in dentistry and elsewhere, where it's just like the medical masks,

19:12

I guess. It's not one of these sheltered ones, because we will get into the difference between vented masks and non -vented masks.

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But we're talking about the ones where these disposable ones that everyone has, not the cloth, things like that.

19:26

Because I think there is going to be a difference between a cloth mask, like the ones... I mean, I had three of these on, so this is really going to help me, right?

19:32

Because it's got to get through three levels of masks here. But a mask like this is going to be different than those medical masks.

19:38

So let me clarify. Yeah, these are cloth masks. Even the medical masks that people are buying to wear, those are essentially cloth masks.

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So they're not filtered. They're not anything. They're a piece of cloth that is supposed to be more tightly woven, essentially.

19:56

Just to throw this out there, if you actually look at what's available in the stores that they're selling now, because at least here, they're back in stock.

20:03

You can go to the shelf and pull masks down. But if you read the box, it'll say, does not provide protection for antibacterial or is not antibacterial or antiviral.

20:16

What's the point? Yeah, because I wanted to bring this up earlier. Because Anthony, yesterday you were at the store and you posted a picture of what the actual box says on it.

20:29

And maybe it'd be good for folks to... Because most people maybe not look at the box. But there's a store display where they're selling the disposable masks for people.

20:40

And yet it clearly said what it should and should not be used for. So what did it say on the box?

20:47

The manufacturer. Yeah, so this is literally the most common mask that is being sold out there.

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And it says this disclaimer on the backside of this box. This product is not to be used as...

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And it numbers several things. Number one, as a surgical mask to provide liquid barrier protection.

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Again, it says it right here. Masks that we use as doctors is for liquid barrier protection.

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It's not about aerosols. It never has been about aerosols. So let's be clear about that. Number two, in a clinical setting where the infection risk level through inhalation exposure is high.

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Number three, this product is not to be used for antimicrobial or antiviral protection or for infection prevention or reduction.

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Infection prevention or reduction. Yeah, not good for antimicrobial or antiviral protection.

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Number four, it's not to be used as a respiratory protective device. And number five, for high -risk aerosol generating procedures.

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So this is the very mask that they're selling out to people. It's not the only one, but it's a major one.

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And they're all the same masks. This is the disclaimer that's coming on these boxes.

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So literally people are wearing things thinking they're getting protected. And the box itself tells you this does not protect you against these things.

22:13

So you've got right now, I think, I looked last night in anticipation of our conversation today.

22:19

I think it was 33 states have mandated masks in some capacity.

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And the others may actually have metropolitan areas or particular counties that they're mandating.

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This is widespread, regardless of what is on the back of the box there.

22:38

Okay. So let's deal with a couple things with that. First off, when we speak of the mandate,

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I think there's a difference we have to understand. Okay. Is there a mandate for people to wear masks?

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Or is it a mandate for stores to tell everyone to wear a mask?

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There is a difference because in many of the states, they cannot mandate people wear a mask to the person, but they can threaten a business that doesn't have a sign.

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So there is a confusion that we end up seeing here because in the states, at least in my state, they can't mandate people wear a mask.

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But everyone thinks they have because every store is required to have a sign that says you must wear a mask.

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So the thinking is it's a state issued order. And yet what the state actually says very clearly in the law is that if you have a medical reason, then you do not need to wear a mask.

23:40

And further, they can't ask you what that medical reason is. That's actually in the mandates.

23:48

So the mandate is actually for stores to put it up. Now, we're going to get to this later.

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And I mentioned this last week on the WRAP report. But the reason is fear. And we're going to get to that because that's going to be a major thing.

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But I want to go with one other thing as well is, well, let me answer the mandates first.

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Then I want to go into different types of masks. So what do you think about these mandates and why we see this universal?

24:16

Well, I think it's fear mongering, honestly. I think it's virtue signaling. And I think it's people that just don't have the knowledge base.

24:25

I mean, here's the reality. I have friends across the country, doctors, dentists, and others.

24:31

And nearly everybody thinks this is ridiculous based on the research that we have had since the early 80s.

24:37

We have tons of research about masks. Why is it that there's just a few that are being put in front of cameras?

24:46

And making it sound like masks have protections for people. This is what's really, really puzzling.

24:54

And then you've got politicians that have gotten involved. But I've said from the beginning on this, this was never about science.

25:02

It has always been a political agenda because the policies have been political. And we saw this bear out.

25:09

We saw this bear out with the rioters. They're saying, well, rioting, you can't catch. You have a low risk for coronavirus.

25:16

They're not worried about rioters. But you got to wear them when you're in stores. I mean, how does this work out?

25:23

And that wasn't the only one. There's a number of things that we saw that clearly this is a political type agenda.

25:29

Again, I just mentioned earlier about the smoke inhalation in the forest fires. These masks aren't going to stop the smoke from coming in your lungs.

25:38

But yet, viruses are much smaller. Which is not to say, and I don't think any of us will deny the fact that this is a legitimate disease.

25:49

It's a legitimate threat. The problem is, it's not nearly the threat that everybody said it was in March.

25:56

We don't have millions of bodies stacking up in the street as a result of this plague. For those that have conditions maybe that predispose them to it, to be lethal.

26:06

And the elderly, it seems, are the ones that are most drastically affected by this. Then you need to take some personal responsibility, be prudent, and do what makes sense.

26:16

But you're right in assessing this political motive.

26:24

They leapt on this. And I think we'll get to this more in a bit. Because you're right in the sense that they were, you know, here's the epitome, right?

26:35

Trump, there's video of Trump walking up. He's got a mask on. He walks up to a microphone.

26:41

Before he gets the microphone, he takes the mask off. Well, we don't see the microphone, I guess. The people are like 20 feet away from him, okay?

26:50

They're criticizing him because he takes the mask off to talk to the reporters. Yeah. But there's a video that was out there, probably taken down by now, where they had

27:00

Biden walking up to a stage without a mask. But when he got on stage, he put it on.

27:07

He was just as far from people. So right there, you see they're criticizing Trump for not wearing a mask when talking to reporters and trying to kill them.

27:15

And Biden, who's clearly doing it for a show, because he was walking around without the mask.

27:21

But it was when he got up to the stage, he's putting it on. And so right there, it's like, okay, when he's with the people, he's around people, he wasn't wearing it.

27:31

It was only when he was on camera, right? Clearly, it's a political thing.

27:37

And for the rioters and looters, it's a protection thing, not from COVID. But I want to talk about different types of masks,

27:48

Anthony, because there was something you had said that was interesting to me was when I had to travel, and now that you're getting flying again, and traveling and speaking at different events, the thing that got me was that they required a mask.

28:03

But it couldn't be a mask like I had, which was a vented mask. They wanted one of these cloth ones that we have here that don't vent.

28:12

And I thought that was silly, because in my mind, the vented mask, which has a filter, would protect me better if there was

28:23

COVID in the air, versus a cloth mask that doesn't. And you had explained to me, and we had this come up yesterday in the store, where someone actually admitted to this, what is the purpose for saying that we should not wear a vented mask, which would protect ourselves?

28:41

What's the reason that people are that we're hearing all these mandates and requiring cloth masks over?

28:46

Because when this first happened, Trump was talking all about the N95 mask. Everyone's trying to get an N95 mask. And now they're saying, no, you can't wear an

28:54

N95 mask. You have to wear a cloth mask. Why do they make that difference? Well, one is it blocks most of what you're breathing in, but it has no filter as you're breathing out.

29:06

They're designed that way on purpose. But you know, there's even another thing with the N95s is there's something called fit testing.

29:14

Yeah. So anybody who understands masks, you know, researchers. You just said, yeah.

29:19

And no one that's listening on the podcast knows what Bud just did. You got to read it. Put his mask back on his face and said, repents.

29:28

I wasn't fit tested. No, you have to do something called fit test your masks.

29:33

So I have friends that are EMS guys, and there are times that they're going to be in hazardous situations.

29:39

They have to have once a year, they have to be fit tested for N95 masks. So there's specific masks with specific seals that have to be used because all of our faces are different.

29:48

All of our shapes are different for an N95 mask to work. You have to have something that was on your face and it has to seal all the way around.

29:56

And if it doesn't seal, guess what happens? You breathe. And where does the air come out at all around where the seals not broken?

30:05

I mean, this is no different than if you have a garden hose and you poke a hole in the side of it, where's the water going to start coming out at?

30:10

It's going to start shooting out the side. Well, if we don't have a mask on and that's what's crazy.

30:15

Even these, even these types of cloth masks, these don't actually lock onto our face.

30:22

We put that on. We got to get the picture of the video. I'm not actually putting it on. He just coughed in that.

30:31

But these don't actually seal on our skin. So we have air that's unfiltered being blown out the sides of our mask anyway.

30:40

And even, even when you're wearing these so -called medical masks as you're walking around grocery stores and whatnot, these aren't fitted to your face.

30:47

They're blowing out the sides. They're blowing out the bottom through your chin. I mean, feel it. Start talking or breathing through these masks and start feeling around.

30:55

You'll see air coming out everywhere. Okay. But the argument that we made is that it's going to block some of it.

31:02

It's going to reduce some of it. Now they're trying to say, well, we got to stay six feet apart, social distancing, because that's how far the, if you have

31:10

COVID and you sneeze or cough, the aerosol can travel that far before it falls to the ground.

31:16

And so that's why the six feet distancing and the mask is going to bring it down to two foot or one foot distancing is the argument.

31:24

So we should wear masks so that if we have it, we're not spreading it as far. Yeah, that's what they say.

31:30

But again, we go back to the droplet issue that yes, it can block droplets. It can block that type of heavy moisture until it dries, right?

31:38

As we're breathing, as we continue to breathe. So we cough, droplets get caught in the mask. We continue to breathe 15, 30, 45 seconds.

31:46

It dries. And now the viruses are blown right back out. This is what's really interesting too.

31:51

This six foot rule, do you recognize? Now, there's, I got to tell everybody here, there is zero research that supports a six foot rule.

32:03

There's nothing. There is also zero research that supports some of the stats you're hearing today, which is you're 65 % less likely to catch coronavirus wearing a mask and 75 % less likely if you and the other person is wearing a mask.

32:20

But I saw it on CNN. I mean, it's on the news. It wouldn't be fake news, would it?

32:25

Yeah, well, you know, we've all been asking for these double blind placebo studies that have been done to test this.

32:33

This science has not been done. They have not done research on this. I can also tell you as a dentist, you can find these videos on YouTube, by the way.

32:42

What they did is they simulated drilling on a patient. So water and all that kind of stuff.

32:48

And what they're doing is, this is part of OSHA in seeing what surfaces do we have to clean in a dental office to disinfect in between patients.

32:57

And so as the patient's sitting there on the chair and you're doing drilling, what they did is they put red dye in, not that you can see, you can only see with a

33:07

UV light, but they put a red dye into the drill water. So this is aerosolized stuff.

33:14

Same stuff that would be coming out of our lungs. And they were drilling on this dummy head. And when they got done drilling, just for a few minutes, they stopped the procedure.

33:24

They shut off the lights, took out the black light to see where all the splatter went.

33:30

It traveled 10 to 12 feet. So you're saying we need 10 to 12 feet?

33:36

Yeah, I'm just saying, don't tell anybody that. And now we're going to have to prove our part. But even then, that's only because you had walls stopping it.

33:44

I mean, we had 10 to 12 feet where it's slamming up on walls to the point that you can detect it, which shows that how much an office is supposed to be disinfecting the surfaces between patients.

33:57

Aerosols go a whole lot farther than six feet. Some evidence shows it might be 25 or 30 feet for aerosols.

34:04

So you're saying the science doesn't support the mask. There's another thing that you've talked about, being with your background with the dentist office, is that the way people clean the surfaces are not doing anything as well.

34:18

Because what we see people do in between every customer, you go to a food grocery store, they spray something on there and then immediately wipe it down.

34:26

And that's supposed to be to disinfect. Does that actually disinfect? No. So let me tell you the process that we have to do in the dental office or in medical offices.

34:35

Every bottle, if you now assuming they didn't put something, a different chemical into a different bottle to use, right?

34:44

You're not supposed to do that with chemicals. It's against OSHA standards. So assuming that the chemical belongs to the bottle that it's in, every bottle is going to have what's called a kill time on it, which means that it's going to, there's certain standards set that even tuberculosis, which is notoriously the hardest thing to kill on surfaces, we want to know what the

35:05

TB kill time is. And whatever the TB kill time is, tuberculosis, we know that other things will be dead in the time it takes tuberculosis to be broken down and not be infectious.

35:17

So every chemical has this. The fastest, quickest one on the market is ones that are made with pure hydrogen peroxide.

35:28

Half a percent, one percent hydrogen peroxide. And it's put in a stable form in this bottle that has a one minute kill time for TB as well as coronavirus and others.

35:40

Most of the chemicals that are used though in industry are actually three to seven minute kill times.

35:47

Now, what does this mean? This is what you're supposed to be doing according to OSHA. And if you don't do this, your office can get fined and literally shut down.

35:56

You have to spray your surfaces or wipe your surfaces, either one. You have to spray or wipe to remove any types of stuff you can see on the surfaces and stuff you can't see, right?

36:10

You're wiping down all the macromolecules as you wipe everything down. After you've, it's not really cleaning, but once you've cleaned the surface, once you've taken that first pass, you now have to go back over the surface a second time, right?

36:26

And either spray it all down and then leave it untouched for the kill time.

36:33

Or you have to wipe it and leave it wet for the kill time, which means that if your kill time is five minutes and I guarantee you the stuff that is being used in stores like your home depots and whatnot is not the expensive one minute kill time stuff that I use in the dental office.

36:50

They're using the three, five, seven minute kill times, which means that for a surface to actually be disinfected, you have to spray it, wipe it, spray it, and then let it sit wet until the kill time is up.

37:04

And then you can either wipe it down or just let it continue to just evaporate.

37:13

That's the reality. That's not what's going on in any stores at all. Okay, so then let's, after this break, what

37:20

I want to do is I want to move to talking about some different things. Specifically, I'm thinking specifically of, you know, this thing we brought up earlier of fear, why we think there is, why are the masks being put out there for us to, you know, to wear?

37:39

What is behind all this? And then after that, we'll start to move to a biblical perspective right after this break.

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to host a Bible interpretation made easy seminar in your area. All right, and for those who are not patrons, those that are not supporting us on Patreon, you may want to at least for this episode to see, you know,

39:23

Bud has found a good use for his mask as a decorative item. That'll help.

39:32

Yeah, yeah. That actually, actually, you know, Bud, that will help because now it actually acts as a backdrop so that, you know, if you're in a room that is, you know, where you're recording and there's just nothing to absorb sound, you may have something there that you could use the face masks to absorb sound instead of putting those foam cushions in front of the microphone.

39:54

You know, we should, you know, mark that. I'll have to just go become

39:59

Patreons to see what you did. Make it your own. Okay, so Anthony, let's talk about, we mentioned earlier, this fear mongering, as you put it.

40:11

What is, I mean, I mentioned last week's episode on why I think that politically people started using these masks as a way to get fear controlling people.

40:22

This is something that, it was interesting politically how almost overnight when we had

40:30

Trump saying that, you know, and Dr. Fasci, by the way, like everyone wants to forget this, that it was Dr.

40:36

Fasci that was saying masks aren't effective and then, and Trump supporting that and claiming that and as soon as Trump said it, all of a sudden, like overnight, every

40:45

Democrat, every news agency, everyone had to wear a mask. In fact, we're even supposed to, and I saw this from a company that said that we're even supposed to wear masks like we're doing right now on a

40:55

Zoom call, right, because we're talking about on Zoom. And I'm watching people in these

41:00

Zoom meetings when they're in their home alone and they got their mask on their face during a

41:07

Zoom call with no one in the house. That is clearly not to protect, I mean, the coronavirus does not work through the airwaves to the electronics and pass through that way through the internet, right?

41:19

So requiring a mask when you're on a video call clearly has absolutely nothing to do with science.

41:27

But you brought it up, I brought it up, fear. How are they using masks to instill fear in people?

41:34

Well, look, here's the reality and I think we just need to speak out.

41:40

Should a Christian fear death? No. No, right?

41:46

We don't feel, why? Because we know that we've got something better. The leader's Christ and I as a gang.

41:52

Yeah, that's right. So we don't have fear. We have to recognize first and foremost, fear is because people fear death.

42:02

Most of this world's unsaved, they fear death, which should cause us to go out and preach the gospel more as Christians, right?

42:11

That should be our response. Well, I was going to say, and I know you've run into this because I've run into it and you're far more faithful with regards to evangelism than I am.

42:20

But when I run into people, they are legitimately afraid. Non -believers, legitimately.

42:26

And I don't try and absolve that. You need to be afraid, but here's what you need to be afraid of.

42:31

It's not this disease. It would be what would happen if you die of this disease or a car accident when you leave your office.

42:40

That's what you need to fear because you're going to face God. You're going to face judgment and you have no hope and you have no

42:47

God and give the gospel. So in that sense, it's been a great opportunity for evangelism.

42:54

Yeah, absolutely. One of my favorite verses recently in evangelism has been,

43:01

Hebrews 10, 31, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. So I can transition really fast about somebody's fear right into this verse.

43:11

And of course, the verse before that says, for we know him who said vengeance is mine, I will repay.

43:17

And again, the Lord will judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. You know, this gives us a wonderful segue into talking to somebody about spiritual matters, what they're truly afraid of.

43:30

They're not afraid of coronavirus. They're afraid of the results of or potential results of coronavirus.

43:37

That's the bottom line as we talk about fear. But the thing that I've noticed is with this whole fake pandemic, which it is because when you look at what a pandemic is and you look at the actual numbers of people who are getting this and dying from this, it's not at the pandemic level.

43:56

It is a disease that's affecting the world, but it's not a pandemic as they originally predicted.

44:03

So, and just to clarify, right? The virus is real. Yes. But what we're claiming it's capable of doing is not.

44:12

Yeah. And the fear that people are having is that because people are using this virus to drive fear, what's happening is that they're providing basically a false narrative for this so that they could drive the fear for political purposes in my mind.

44:32

We'll get to that. But they're using it, not looking at the science.

44:39

Okay, because there aren't enough, there's not enough results that we see in people dying that this is some pandemic.

44:47

But yet we saw how people are using this to shame other people.

44:54

We had this at the store where a woman was upset with someone for not wearing a mask and even said, because the person says, well,

45:04

I have a health condition, which they do. By the way, I was going to mention this earlier, when I had to go into the doctor's office at the hospital or something, they require you to wear the mask.

45:16

Well, they went to take my blood oxygen level. Now they had a problem.

45:21

The mask was restricting my breathing. I was breathing in carbon dioxide, not oxygen, and I almost got to dangerous levels.

45:29

Okay, I was at 96 % and 95 % is where they start having concern. So me wearing a mask restricts my breathing and breathing that carbon dioxide can actually put me in an unhealthy condition.

45:41

So I can't wear a mask. This other person is in a similar situation.

45:47

And you had someone that actually turned and said, well, you're not supposed to wear, you know, because they were like, I can't wear a mask because of a health condition.

45:53

I was, well, you're not wearing the mask to protect yourself. You're supposed to wear it to protect me.

46:00

Right? And that is the problem. They think the mask is going to protect you wearing a mask. The mask you're wearing doesn't protect you.

46:06

But somehow someone else wearing a mask is going to protect you when it's not protecting them.

46:12

Like it just shows the nonsense of it. And so it's clearly not, you know, like they even, when that person is saying that they recognize that the mask they're wearing does not protect them, which is a question you always ask people when they say, you know, do you have a mask?

46:26

And you usually say, is your mat, does your mask work? And when they say, yes, you go, okay, then you're fine.

46:32

And if they say, no, you say, then you should take it off anyway. You know, or the other thing you've been doing, where someone points to the mask and what do you say?

46:40

Then I say, it's blue. Somebody actually, somebody who did that to me yesterday, virtue signals, she's pointing like this.

46:48

I go, it's blue. And she started laughing. So the mask is being said that it's to protect others.

46:56

And this is the reason I was given on the flight of why I should wear a non -vented mask was to protect others.

47:02

But if the mask I'm wearing doesn't protect me, how is the mask I'm wearing going to protect others?

47:08

Well, it's not. So it just seems amazing that overnight they went to, well, everyone's got to wear a mask.

47:15

How is this notion of wearing a mask? How does, how do we see that being used to control people?

47:22

Well, again, it's fear. I mean, think about this. We've literally woken up one day in bizarro world where everybody's walking around with face coverings.

47:35

And as the numbers have come out, bud, you said it earlier. Originally, we had numbers that were touting millions of people were going to die from coronavirus, right?

47:46

Tens of millions, if not half the country is going to be infected pretty quickly, the way that they were saying it.

47:53

They were talking about how you can catch it on, it could live on surfaces for three days. Nonsense, by the way.

47:59

It could live on surfaces for three days. It could live in the air for days. I mean, all kinds of stuff. And the governors and president to a degree all kept saying the whole thing we need to do is just flatten the curve.

48:14

The reason why we're going to have all kinds of deaths that they were predicting deaths is because of a fast spread of the virus, more so than what the hospitals could handle.

48:23

So the hospitals were going to be overloaded. They wouldn't be able to treat patients and we get lots and lots of deaths. So in the meantime, you've got hospitals, temporary hospitals that are being built in New York City and in other areas by the military and National Guard to be able to have extra beds when needed.

48:42

And what ends up happening? Within just a few weeks of this all starting, I have friends who are getting laid off around the country, nurses and doctors, because our hospitals, all of a sudden, they don't have the regular work they're doing and they're not getting the coronavirus patients they were anticipating.

49:00

Yeah, infections were rising, but the reality is that within three and a half to four weeks after all of this process started, so to speak, the curve had already been flattened.

49:10

So the very reason why people were to be cautious, the reason why they shut down the economy, shut down the country, was to make sure the hospitals wouldn't get overloaded.

49:19

But we found out pretty quickly it wasn't going to happen, that we had plenty of room.

49:25

Well, the thing there is, is that, and you hit on it, when we started this 14 days to slow the spread, that's exactly what it was.

49:33

It was to slow the spread. It was not a cure. Now everyone's arguing this is a cure. I mean, the thing that gets me is you look at places like Hong Kong and China and Japan where wearing a face covering ever since SARS became commonplace, and yet they also are suffering with COVID.

49:55

Now, if the majority of people are wearing masks, then they should have been protected. And yet it spread there as well with lots of people wearing a mask.

50:04

And guess what? It's spread in some of those places even faster than America when you look at it per million. That's the one thing they never want to do.

50:11

Yeah, they don't want to look at per million, right? Because China probably has way more than America, but they're not giving those numbers.

50:18

We're doing far more testing so we have better numbers than anybody, but we also have more people than most of the other countries.

50:24

So when you look at per million, the United States' infection rate with COVID, we're like 10 in the world.

50:32

When you look at death rate, we're like 11 in the world. So it's just that we have more people.

50:37

So you got to look at it as apples to apples per million. When you do so, you realize that these other countries where wearing a face covering is common did not protect them any more than it did here in America.

50:49

They had just as many people get it or not, if not more. They had people who died from it, if not more.

50:56

So when we look at the masks, I just go, okay, let's just use common sense here and realize this is not supporting a mandate, but it does support controlling a population.

51:10

You know, it's interesting when you actually look at the raw numbers about, okay, so the curve was flattened.

51:16

It was flattened early. They should have started opening up the country. They didn't. They kept moving their goalposts, right? They kept changing their supposed end game.

51:24

But as time has gone on, we have looked at numbers like in the state of Ohio where I reside.

51:30

And as if it was either beginning of June or beginning of July, they looked at the total number of deaths in Ohio this year versus the last five years.

51:38

And guess what? Did it go up significantly? Nope. No, well, the fact is that you see these reports about higher numbers of positive tests.

51:52

Okay, that's a good thing. Because what does that mean? The actual fatality rate is getting much, much, much more.

51:59

Yeah, that's right. So, and part of the issue too is, as we've seen with the fear mongering, as states have increased their antibody testing, which means that you had it at some point, you may never even gotten sick because your

52:14

God -given immune system actually worked the way it was supposed to work. You didn't get sick, but you still test for it.

52:23

And they were adding those to the numbers. So when Arizona supposedly had their flare -up back in late

52:29

June, early July, and Florida had their flare -up, it wasn't new coronavirus cases and more people getting sick again.

52:37

It was antibody testing that they're now adding to the rolls the number of people who had coronavirus. So yeah, it's been really disturbing.

52:47

One of the things that's been interesting too is that they looked at numbers of total deaths in Ohio.

52:53

I don't know about the United States, but in Ohio, up until about a month ago, and not only is it negligible in terms of difference between previous years, but it appears now that there's less deaths this year than there were last year.

53:11

Well, I think Ohio is one of those states that has a mask mandate. So that has probably helped you guys.

53:16

That's what did it. Yeah, that's what they would like to tell us, right? You recognize in Ohio, and this is funny.

53:23

I mean, you go to the big cities and granted, I'm one of the few people that are walking around with no mask on.

53:30

I haven't worn a mask since day one, walking into places. You rebellious. I'm rebellious.

53:35

No, I just don't want to lie. So I walk around without a mask, but once you get out of the big city and you get into suburbs and you get into some more rural areas, nobody's wearing masks.

53:46

Nobody has them on. This is only in big city areas where you see people doing it.

53:53

Okay, so you brought this up. You said you don't want to tell a lie. So does wearing a mask promote a lie?

54:02

I believe it does because that means I'm buying into the narrative in what the government and some scientists in front of cameras are saying.

54:11

They're saying that these protect you. I know better. They don't. So I'm not going to lie by wearing a mask on my face.

54:20

And it goes hand in hand really with fear because that's the other part of it. Part of this is a scientific response for people to see and we recognize they're unbelievers, so they're not going to see it the way we do as believers.

54:33

But the other half of it is I'm not going to live in fear either. Okay, so after this break, what

54:39

I want to do is let's talk about a biblical perspective. We understand science, not supporting it.

54:45

And we know we're going to go a little bit longer here today, folks, but we wanted to give you guys some of the science behind it because that's what's being attacked.

54:51

That's what we're being told we're ignorant on. It's strange that it's the Christians using science and the politicians using the words.

54:59

So we know who's giving lip service and who has data. But after this break, I want to talk about the biblical ramifications and biblical arguments.

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ScribingForEternity .org All right. So as we come back, what I want to do is, you know,

56:41

I want to play something from Alistair Begg, and that might set the stage. I did want to ask you a question.

56:49

I'm afraid this, but I think that if I ask this next question, you brought it up in the chat.

56:54

I was going to ask this, but since you put it in the chat, I now have to mention it. But this may be a whole nother show.

57:03

You mentioned masks today, vaccines tomorrow, Mark of the Beast later, conditioning.

57:09

Okay. One of the questions I wanted to ask, and I know Dr. Silvestro's position on this, so I know it's going to be a long one.

57:16

So that's why I didn't ask it, but now we have to. So really quick, Anthony. Are vaccines going to be a magic bullet to solve this?

57:26

No. No, we are. So look, I'm going to say this.

57:32

Here we go. Dr. Sherry Tenpenny is a good friend of mine from, she's from the

57:38

Cleveland area. She is a world known researcher, world known holistic doctor.

57:45

She's a medical doctor, trained medical doctor for years, went into holistic side of things. If you read anything on vaccinations or against vaccinations, her name will be mentioned somewhere in the paper or somewhere in the research.

57:57

And we are going to have her on some shows here in the near future. On the Apologetics Live. Yeah. Yeah, on Apologetics Live.

58:04

Well, maybe I'll have her here. Yeah, or maybe here too. To walk through some of these issues.

58:10

There's a whole lot with vaccinations. I'm not going to get into all of it today of the harm that many of them cause.

58:17

But I will tell you this. Because unlike when you do Apologetics Live for me, when you do like a five hour show of what's supposed to be a two hour show.

58:23

You notice this, bud. Every show he comes on goes long. It's not my fault.

58:30

Like in Apologetics Live, you have people in the comments like, hey, let's go a little longer. Let's go a little longer.

58:36

I'm like, okay, we're going to go a little longer. Three hours later. But no, in all seriousness, the type of virus that coronavirus is, they don't work well in vaccinations.

58:50

And what you're not going to hear unless you start going onto different websites to see the people that have been harmed by these types of, specifically this type of vaccine for this type of virus.

59:01

Gardasil has been a vaccine that's been out there for several years. It's supposed to be for females.

59:08

It's given to males too. For HPV, because if you prevent HPV, you will also prevent the cervical cancers and oral cancers that can be caused by HPV.

59:19

So they've been giving Gardasil vaccines to people once they become of what's secular science, what secular people call the sexual age, you know, teenage years.

59:28

And there has been a path of destruction left with the original Gardasil vaccines.

59:36

Women, athletes across the country, given it to them in teenage years that are paralyzed, some from the waist down, others who have muscle issues, muscle control issues.

59:49

There's a decent percentage. And I'm not saying 50%. I'm saying like 5 % of women who have gotten this have had major permanent ill effects from this type of vaccination.

01:00:03

The same thing is going to happen if we rush a vaccine. First of all, I'm never taking it, but if we rush a vaccine for the same type of virus, we're going to be in trouble.

01:00:14

So let's share this from Alistair Begg. Bud, you had sent this. So let's interact with this.

01:00:22

Well, here I am all masked up and trying to make sure that I am obeying the rules and paying attention, but it's really pretty difficult.

01:00:33

I wanted to let you know that I, along with everyone else, have been trying my best to make sure that I don't invade other people's privacy or dishearten them in any way.

01:00:46

But we've really developed a couple of distinct parties, the masked party and the non -masked party.

01:00:53

And I was saying to our pastoral team the other day that Romans 14, I think, is a bit of a help in this, insofar as the people that Paul is addressing were equally committed to Jesus and they were strong in their faith.

01:01:07

And yet he describes some as weak and some as strong. And the issue there, again, is not a matter of their spiritual stability, but it is their perspective on things, debatable matters, in the case of Romans 14, diets and special days.

01:01:25

And I think there are some principles that apply as we try and navigate these strange waters now.

01:01:32

And I think that Paul's advice earlier than chapter 14, where I think it's in chapter 12, he says, in as much as it is possible for you, try to live in peace with one another.

01:01:45

So as we think of being back in one another's company, let's pay heed to that.

01:01:51

And let's not judge one another, but prefer one another in love. Okay, so let's deal with what he's saying there, because, you know, it was interesting because I, first off,

01:02:04

I don't, you know, he's talking about masks, not masks. Is this a privacy issue? Like that, that was,

01:02:11

I didn't know how that worked in. How is this privacy? I didn't get that one, but let's, let us deal with a biblical argument for this.

01:02:19

He brings up Romans 14. Romans 14 deals with the idea of eating, eating things that were offered on titles, eating things that could cause someone else to stumble, eating things that would cause you to stumble.

01:02:31

In other words, sitting against your conscience. I'll say this, and then

01:02:36

Bud and Anthony, I get your, you know, get your feedback. But I think if there is someone who believes that them not wearing a mask is a sin, in other words, if they're believing that they're protecting their neighbor, because that's how a lot of people are using it, is

01:02:54

Alistair used it in a different way of privacy. I don't get that one, but I understand people that use the argument saying, this is to love my neighbor.

01:03:03

But, you know, there becomes a whole lot in that. And is this really showing love to a neighbor? I know, Anthony, you're going to probably get into the fact that showing love to your neighbor is to not lie to them and cause them to be in fear because that's what wearing a mask is doing.

01:03:17

It is driving people to be afraid of something that they don't need to be afraid of with the level of fear that we have.

01:03:25

We don't fear the flu. We know we're going to get sick. And you see with even President Trump, three days later, he's symptom free.

01:03:33

Okay, now, granted, he, I'm sure, got the best medicine and all that, but then make that available and then we can go on with life.

01:03:41

But what I end up seeing with it is, first off, if someone thinks they're in sin by not wearing a mask, then don't sin against your conscience.

01:03:50

I'll say the same thing the other way as well. If someone thinks it's a sin to wear a mask, they shouldn't be encouraged to wear a mask.

01:03:58

And I think that's what Alistair was trying to say is we shouldn't be judging one another. In our church, I don't know about Bud for your church and Anthony for yours, but in our church, we don't have a requirement for wearing a mask.

01:04:09

We have a set of seats in the center where people that don't care to social distance, don't care to wear a mask, they sit there.

01:04:17

We have seats on the wings where anybody who comes in with a mask, we encourage them to sit there because if they're wearing a mask, they're showing that they have concern.

01:04:26

We've instructed folks that if you see someone with a mask, you keep some distance there because it's showing respect to that person.

01:04:33

And so we've set church up so that those that want to wear masks, they could be there protected, no one judges them.

01:04:42

Those that want to wear a mask or don't want to wear a mask, they can all sit together. But this is the thing

01:04:49

I would be looking at. Is this an issue where you have a stronger brother and a weaker brother and you don't want to put a temptation for them to stumble in front of them?

01:04:59

He's using that this is an argument, but I think this is the best that they can come up with.

01:05:06

There's not some clear passage that's going to answer this question, but we have principles that we could use.

01:05:13

With that as a backdrop, Bud, I'll start off with you because you've been kind of quiet today. Oh, I'm sorry.

01:05:20

Anthony was complaining during the break. We got to let Bud speak. I felt bad.

01:05:25

I mean, is this going to be five hours? I'm going to have to leave and let my wife know. Yeah, this is going to be brief.

01:05:33

No, I think that the issues are very complicated when you move it into the realm of what does it look like for me to be faithful?

01:05:43

You have churches that in sort of an appeal to Romans 13 and they have a mayor or they have some edict from the governing authorities that have said you've got to do this.

01:05:56

You can still meet and in Florida, we've been pretty well able to continue meeting, but certain counties have requirements that you've got to wear masks.

01:06:06

So a church has chosen, the elders have determined we're going to do this. We're going to require masking and provide like you're doing,

01:06:14

Andrew, for social distancing, but they're also requiring masks. So a believer in that church who is required to submit to the elders, we don't suspect anything nefarious.

01:06:29

They've got noble motives. How do you counsel somebody in that situation who they may be opposed to the mask?

01:06:35

And not only that, they may also have a medical condition. Maybe they're asthmatic. They can't wear that.

01:06:42

What does it look like for them to be faithful within the body of the local church?

01:06:49

So you have an appeal to a Romans 13 situation. You have an appeal to the royal law of your neighbor.

01:06:57

And then you also have an issue of Christian liberty, which

01:07:04

I'm concerned that in some of the conversations I've had, we are really easily capable of confusing our constitutional liberties with what our

01:07:15

Christian liberties are. So that's another issue. So it's very convoluted, but the person who's in a church, their elders have decided you've got to wear masks.

01:07:25

They don't want to. What do you tell them? Anthony, you're the guest.

01:07:33

Okay, say this question again. But I want to make sure I heard it clearly. So a church, the elders have determined they're going to wear masks because the local government has said you've got to mask up.

01:07:45

So they're going to do that in the worship service. You can't come unless you're masked. So in other words, an individual has a problem with that.

01:07:52

That's a member of the church. They want to be faithful. What should they do? And let me ask this as a broader question, is not wearing a mask a violation of obedience to your government in Romans 13?

01:08:05

Yeah, so I did a Facebook live video on this back in April. And where do rights come from for people?

01:08:13

Because I don't think a Christian does any good service if we are mixing what you just said, but if we're mixing our

01:08:21

Christian rights with constitutional rights. But I think the thing we have to make sure we understand is that our constitutional rights, at least as we read in the

01:08:31

Declaration of Independence and our constitution is based off of a correct understanding, a biblical understanding that our rights come from God, a creator

01:08:38

God. Right. And so from a secular perspective, when people are saying we have to follow

01:08:46

Romans 13, or 1 Peter 2, right? That's those are the other verses that talk about this.

01:08:52

And I would dispute people on some of the interpretations out there.

01:08:57

But here's the thing, if you're going to be submissive to the government at all costs, which again, I don't think that's a biblical position, but if you're going to be submissive to the government at all costs, which part of the government do you listen to?

01:09:09

What is the law of the land, our constitution and bill of rights, or these mandates that do not have the ability, even if you pass them the law, to supersede the constitution of the land?

01:09:24

See, even I think that even when people try to use the Romans 13 arguments, it fails because ultimately our constitution trumps any law that anybody could ever make in this country.

01:09:37

So that's one major problem. I think that any type of pastors that would make that type of mandate, we need to talk to them.

01:09:50

I think they need to recognize their error in their ways. Because again, from a constitutional perspective, that's a problem.

01:09:57

Now, of course, I make the argument in Romans 13, 1 Peter 2, that we see, yes, we're to be submissive to government, but at the very same time that we're supposed to be submissive to government,

01:10:07

God also says that the government is a servant of God whose responsibility is to punish the wicked and allow the good to continue.

01:10:17

I'm paraphrasing, of course. But this is what the government's responsibility is. When they are not carrying out that responsibility, we have now a responsibility to reject what the government says and follow

01:10:28

God. Now, where that fine line sits, we can debate. But I do see that dichotomy there that has to be dealt with.

01:10:38

And I've seen way too many people from the beginning of this just say, bow down to government, bow down to government, bow down to government, without really thinking through this at all.

01:10:47

And unfortunately, a lot of pastors have done this as well. When it comes to Alistair Begg, I'm very disappointed with his response, by the way, throughout this entire process.

01:10:58

I live in a suburb of Cleveland. I could drive east 45 minutes and attend Alistair Begg's church.

01:11:04

Or I could attend the church I attend, which is 25 minutes west. And it's a small reformed

01:11:10

Baptist church. So I could go to either one. We live under the same so -called, yeah, we live under the same so -called mandates in Ohio, same governor, same area of town in the

01:11:25

Cleveland suburbs. So we live under the same rule. Why is it that some churches didn't close at all?

01:11:33

Some Baptist churches, they just kind of went under the radar and didn't close. Why is it some churches like ours said, you know what, let's give the benefit of the doubt.

01:11:41

Let's close for a few weeks. Let's see what happens. And once we recognize that this is tomfoolery, especially with the whole flattening of the curve and seeing that they didn't really, they didn't really care about flattening of the curve, right?

01:11:55

The curve was flattened and they still wanted to hammer down more on Ohioans. Our church and many other small churches decided to open.

01:12:03

We went through Romans 13, Romans 14. Our elders put out a statement regarding their view on these passages.

01:12:12

And that in Romans 14, look, yes, if you want to wear a mask, wear a mask. If you don't want to wear a mask, don't wear a mask.

01:12:17

Don't violate your conscience. We have areas of the church that are sectioned off that if you don't want to be around people, you want to maintain a social distance.

01:12:25

Here are places you can sit where people without masks, they won't sit there. So we've established all those things.

01:12:33

I'm just disappointed a guy of the stature and clout as Alistair Begg took five months longer to come to that decision than a lot of faithful, small church pastors have done across the country.

01:12:46

Yeah, and I think the thing is, is that you see a lot of these well -known preachers, pastors who are criticizing people while they're saying not to judge.

01:13:00

And yet they were being critical of people who were saying, we want to keep meeting.

01:13:06

And so, yeah, I do have some concern there as well. Yeah, and I will say this.

01:13:12

I mean, I was really, really hoping for MacArthur to open early. I was disappointed that he didn't.

01:13:19

I was disappointed it took so long. The thing I have learned through this process, though, is

01:13:25

John MacArthur, he played everybody. I mean, he was a chess master.

01:13:31

He and his elders were a chess master in how they handled the situation because they literally gave all the grace they could possibly humanly give to the point of being completely above reproach in how they handled the governor and handled the situation in California for months.

01:13:49

Literally blameless. And while they did this, they got all their ducks in order behind the scenes with the federal judges that are elders and attend church at his church, the sheriffs that attend at his church, all the people of power.

01:14:05

He got all that stuff in line, everybody on board ready to go, including a phone call from President Trump that we all knew about several weeks before he actually said it out loud to mainstream people.

01:14:19

He methodically got this all done in order so that when he came out, he was ready.

01:14:26

And so when a couple weeks ago when the court came up with another ruling saying, oh, you need to close.

01:14:32

And I have people calling me, asking me, so you think MacArthur's going to close this, Sonny? You think he's going to close again?

01:14:38

I'm like, no way. He's in this. He's so in this right now because he spent all this time preparing getting an order.

01:14:47

And I think what MacArthur did is vastly different than Alistair Begg did, who just didn't bother opening because he was kowtowing to the fear mongering going on.

01:14:56

And the way that MacArthur did this with the way he opened, one, it became national news.

01:15:02

Two, it became an encouragement for other churches, which is why he did it the way he did it.

01:15:09

But there is a difference. There are other churches that tried to open up and got in trouble with the government.

01:15:17

They have lawsuits and they lost because of their arguments. What is MacArthur's argument? His argument is not for against the health issues or the mandates.

01:15:29

He's actually arguing for the constitution. Yeah, it's the First Amendment. Correct. He's arguing with the constitution and that is what's making it difficult because the way they laid out the argument, the government cannot go against their own constitution.

01:15:45

It's in the constitution. We have the right to assemble.

01:15:51

And that argument is one that they're having a hard time with. And because of this, this will then set the precedent where every other church can argue to open up based on the

01:16:01

First Amendment. And one by one, they're going to fall. We're already seeing governors where the Supreme Courts, the state

01:16:06

Supreme Courts are overruling these mandates that they're saying they're too far reaching. They don't have the authority to do these things.

01:16:13

I think these things are going to continue. But when we look at this biblically, oh, it looks like you're going to you're going to say something before.

01:16:20

Yeah, I mean, I just wanted to read the First Amendment for people because this is what MacArthur is using is here's the

01:16:26

First Amendment. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or of the right of the people to peaceably assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievance.

01:16:42

That's literally the language of the First Amendment. So this is what MacArthur is going going going towards is this proper understanding of what the rule of the land actually is.

01:16:51

But here's what's even more interesting about this is at the same time that California and Governor Newsom are banning churches, they are allowing under the same clause the homosexuals to gather together in their parades in June and July.

01:17:07

They're allowing BLM to gather and what they were calling peaceably assemble. We know it wasn't peaceable, but oh, no, no, no.

01:17:15

Haven't you heard the news that they were peaceful? It was it. Trump was sending people in to do rioting and looting to make it look like they weren't.

01:17:22

That was all Trump. Don't you know that? Yeah, that's right. I mean, even though they were saying the rioting and looting was for reparations, right?

01:17:28

Yeah, but that's a big problem because you look at the First Amendment of the

01:17:33

Constitution and you're allowing rioters and looters and people to, you know, what they say, peaceably protest or peaceably assemble.

01:17:42

Well, you know what? The religious argument is the exact same amendments. Well, and seeing this is the thing.

01:17:47

I think this is where a lot of people said enough is enough. When churches weren't allowed to open, when when you're being told you can't worship

01:17:55

God indoors, outdoors, you're not allowed to sing, you know, all these rules.

01:18:01

I mean, outdoors, it had to be distanced and limited to 10 percent of the people outside, things like this.

01:18:08

And yet you can have people by the thousands gathering on the streets shoulder to shoulder, setting things on fire, throwing stones at police and all that.

01:18:17

The hypocrisy, I think, is what ended it for most people. But the issue, I think, we do have to end on is this idea that although we may be in the position that masks scientifically are not going to support you, they're not going to protect you.

01:18:34

I mean, we do have to be aware biblically that there are some who are following the news and are getting all afraid for them.

01:18:44

We would want to encourage them that for the Christian, we don't fear death. We shouldn't be fearing these things.

01:18:50

Does that mean we don't protect ourselves? No, protect yourself. But if the mask is not protection, then why do it?

01:18:57

If you're helping the government to instill fear against, you know, the church, because that's where they really want to come against.

01:19:05

We're seeing that, especially in California. But why would we want to further a lie?

01:19:11

Why would we want to further instill fear in people? But if it comes to our fellow brother and sister, if they have that fear, we don't just say, grow up.

01:19:22

We need to disciple them. But it starts with doing things that won't cause your brother to stumble. We want to educate them.

01:19:30

Not just tell them to get over it. We need to educate them, which is what

01:19:36

I hope this show is doing, is to give some of the science. That's why I wanted to talk with Dr. Silvestro.

01:19:41

So you have the science, you have the understanding. But then biblically, we need to stand up.

01:19:48

Because if we don't stand up now, we're not going to be able to stand up later when they further it.

01:19:55

You know, it really is like Bud was saying, the mass today, vaccines tomorrow, Mark of the

01:20:00

Beast after that. It really is. Because this is all conditioning. This is only phase one, folks.

01:20:07

Do not think that those that are the anti -Godders in this world who want to control the

01:20:16

Marxists, do not think that this is the end of this. This is only the trial run.

01:20:24

They're watching this to see how they can more effectively control a mass of people.

01:20:29

They're going to find another way to use fear. So this pandemic, which isn't really a pandemic, we're going to see another pandemic that's not a pandemic,

01:20:37

I'm sure, somewhat soon when it's convenient for them. And they're learning how to use fear to control people, to get not only their way, but to silence

01:20:50

God's people. If you're noticing, there's across the country, it's only two groups of religious people that are not, they're being told they can't worship.

01:21:02

I mean, I find this very interesting. I'll go to New York for the example. Resurrection Sunday came about.

01:21:08

Churches can't be open. They were warned. You cannot have church open. They're going to arrest people, all this.

01:21:14

Most recently in New York, just this week, you're seeing protests in New York, which somehow those protests have to be immediately stopped.

01:21:22

The police are coming in and stopping it right away. Why? Because you have a lot of Jewish people that are being restricted for the

01:21:27

Jewish holidays. And they're being told they can't, they cannot serve their

01:21:32

God. Okay, they're not allowed to worship on this, on a holiday. But when it was

01:21:38

Ramadan, you know what New York did? Ramadan not only set up like 70, 75 places where they can get halal food.

01:21:44

The city, what happened to separation of church and state? The city provided food. They can cook in their homes.

01:21:51

They didn't need, I mean, there's no other restaurants. They provided food. They even went into the mosques.

01:21:56

The mayor went into the mosque to mark out where people can kneel and pray that's far enough apart.

01:22:03

Wait a minute. The churches can't gather. The synagogues can't gather. But the Muslims, the city was coming in and helping them.

01:22:11

So this is not a cross the board thing. This is clearly targeted to specific religious groups.

01:22:20

And so this is, I think, an issue where Christians do need to stand up and say enough is enough.

01:22:27

Kind of like MacArthur did say, look, we've tried to do all we can to honor the government, to love our neighbor.

01:22:33

But at this point, this is something else. Now this is something where it is more than just our religious freedoms.

01:22:40

It is the controlling of people for a system of government that wants to end

01:22:46

Christianity. We need to stand up now. Anthony, any last words you have?

01:22:53

No, I think you guys have said this best. This is literally a test run for what else the

01:23:00

Marxists want to do in this country. I think they've known that fear is the way to be able to control people the quickest.

01:23:08

And to watch how many people folded so fast and for so long has given them an unbelievable blueprint to do exactly what they want to do in the coming years.

01:23:21

Bud, any last comments from you? No, I would just say we have to recognize that there is a spiritual side to this.

01:23:28

And we have a sovereign God who is for his glory, for our good, those that love him, allowing this to go on.

01:23:35

And there may be watershed moments that come along like I think MacArthur and that whole situation could be that we need to be very keen about and prayer for those things because we have an enemy.

01:23:49

And he is the God of this world. And our Lord is allowing all of this to go on.

01:23:56

And we need to prayerfully and biblically consider what's it look like for us to be faithful through the midst of this and continue proclaiming the gospel.

01:24:06

But I would just mention, I'm still, you know, that verse, I think, from the Message Bible in Exodus, thou shalt not covet.

01:24:19

I think you meant cover. Oh, covet, not

01:24:25

COVID. Well, you know, here's what we want to do in closing out.

01:24:35

We're going to be done, but this is a wrap for the Wrap Report. However, I did do an interview and I want to play that interview now on about a conference that is coming up shortly.