E-mail and Debates

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Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona, this is the Dividing Line.

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The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us, yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence.

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Our host is Dr. James White, director of Alpha Omega Ministries and an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church.

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This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you'd like to talk with Dr. White, call now at 602 -973 -4602 or toll free across the

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United States, it's 1 -877 -753 -3341. And now with today's topic, here is

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James White. And good afternoon, welcome to Jumbo DL number three.

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Here's the plan for today, third day in a row for the Dividing Line. Some of you are either becoming addicted or don't care anymore, one of the two.

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And another 90 minutes, we're going until 530 our time. I realize that it's already seven o 'clock, so it'd be 830

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Eastern time. Thirty minutes, three different segments. I wish to finish the note that I've been responding to beginning on Tuesday.

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I will finish that up in the first 30 minutes or sooner, depending. Then spend 30 minutes on the

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Fernandez -Comas debate. And then I wish to begin an examination of the claims of Roger Perkins, oneness theology advocate.

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Be looking at three debates, one debate with Matt Slick of CARM and two debates with a

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Church of Christ representative. It's really a two -night thing, two sections of the one debate,

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I guess. But I want to start this evening by looking at some of the fundamental problems of methodology that plague many of the oneness advocates, specifically their use or abuse or misunderstanding of biblical languages.

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And I want to talk about some examples of that. And I've queued those up, and we should be able to get to those in the last half hour.

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And then, over the next couple of months, before my trip down to Sydney and Brisbane for those debates, the

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Muslim debate and the oneness debate, I want to be going over statements made by both the folks

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I will be debating, which I think not only helps the audience sort of pray toward those debates, but also the individuals who

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I will be debating, I would think it would make their preparation a whole lot easier. And, in fact,

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I would think it would make it a whole lot harder for me, because I've basically laid out my case, but I think that makes for better debates.

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So that's the role for today. Now, again, I apologize if, and in fact, when we put these in the

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Wayback Machine, we may have to make sure that they run concurrently, because it would be very difficult for folks to really understand everything that I'm saying without having a background first.

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I am responding to an email that I was sent last week that is a very lengthy email. I read all of it on Tuesday and began responding then.

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I've spent an hour and a half so far in response. This will make two hours.

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And it is written by a man raised in a Christian family, and it is questions, but I think objections as well to some fundamental

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Christian thought. And I need to try to finish it up today, if at all possible. So I'm just diving back into the middle of it.

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We're right toward the end. I should be able to finish it off. We will see. I continue with the note.

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It says, to me, this is the most important idea in all of Christian thought. This has to do with God's predestination, judgment, man's culpability.

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Yet even Paul did little more than completely ignore it. When he said, who are you,

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O man, to bring a charge against God? And then simply states, God can do what he wants. He can create people whose sole purpose is eternal destruction and people who get eternal bless.

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All these people had sin projected on them from oblivion, and they complete an ability to obey.

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It is insanely difficult, if not completely impossible, to understand how anyone is culpable in any humanly definable sense of the word.

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Well, that is, to me, a rather surprising statement when we talk about what

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Paul said, because we know what is being referred to here, and that is specifically

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Romans chapter 9. But my concern really is that, and I can understand, it's possible this individual has not encountered an in -depth discussion of Romans 9 that even happens within Reformed churches.

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And I have read Reformed commentators and authors who have, in essence, said that Paul did kick the question down the road, in essence, and did not answer it.

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Let me remind you of what the text says. You will say to me then, why does he still find fault?

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For who resists his will? And then literally,

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Romans 9 20, oh man, who are you, the one answering back to God?

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The thing molded will not say, the molder, why did you make me like this, will it? Or does not the potter have a right over the clay to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use?

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Now, that's not what our correspondent seemed to remember it saying, but I would like to suggest that Paul does answer the question.

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He does not skip the question. He gives a very fundamental and foundational answer to the question.

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He doesn't ignore it. The objection is, you will say to them, why does he still find fault for who resists his will?

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So the objector, after what has been said concerning God's sovereignty in the matter of salvation and the words of verse 18, so then he has mercy on whom he desires and he hardens whom he desires.

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The objector says, well, basically says, how can there be any judgment in light of this?

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How can there be any judgment in light of this? How can he still find fault? Because if his will is the final determiner of all things, then there can be no judgment.

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And the response that our correspondent has missed is the fact that verse 20 begins, oh man, that's the first address is, oh man.

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And if we would but understand what that means, the address is to a creature.

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And is asking the question, in fact, if I could turn this around in light of what has been said in the rest of this email, the rest of this email said it would be absolutely absurd for a creature who knows

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God exists, has knowledge of God's existence to sin against that God.

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That is the ultimate of rationality. Well, may I suggest to you that it's likewise the ultimate of rationality for the creature to answer back to its creator and not recognize his created state?

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Oh man, on the contrary, who are you?

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The one, and then it, let me look back at the email here.

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It says, to bring a charge against God. Well, sort of.

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Yeah, that's one possible way of looking at it. Because it has krinah there.

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So it, but it actually means, apokrinomai, to reply, to answer back again, it has anti in front of it.

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So there is a response being given to God, and it is a response that is inappropriate for the creature.

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And Paul doesn't just simply say, well, he can just, in fact, this is a misrepresentation. I want to correct the misrepresentation.

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When it says, he can create people whose sole purpose is eternal destruction and people who get eternal bliss. That's not what he says.

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That, that's, that is, that is a, again, just as the nature of Adam has been simplified to a mere calculator, that as long as he's got the right information, he'll come out with the right answer.

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And that's not how human beings make decisions. In the same way, I wonder why someone would hear

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Paul in this way. He can create people whose sole purpose is eternal destruction and people who get eternal bliss.

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First of all, as soon as you hear anybody say that the sole purpose of the non -elect is eternal destruction, you are not dealing with someone who's actually really fairly handling the scriptures.

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You're just not. Because they're looking at only the final destinations, and they're not looking at the process by which

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God glorifies himself and by which his attributes are demonstrated, which includes the fact that these are individuals who live in a universe surrounded by evidence of God's existence.

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His fingerprints are all over everything that they touch, everything that they are. They've suppressed that knowledge.

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They've twisted that knowledge. They've engaged in every form of idolatry, and yet he has not destroyed them the first instance they take a breath.

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In fact, he has given them tremendous amounts of blessings. He has restrained them from committing many other sins that they would have committed otherwise, and yet he's done all that for his own purposes.

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If you don't allow that in there, then you're not really dealing with what's being said. I'm sorry, you're just not. And so it is not he can create people whose sole purpose is eternal destruction and people who get eternal bliss, as if those two were just this simplistic equation.

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Because especially the extension of grace, powerful grace, that brings about the salvation of undeserving people who actually deserve destruction, is part and parcel of what's being said here out of the same lump, remember?

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So it's right there. But Paul does not just simply ignore this, because the discussion of the thing molded will not say to the molded, the plasma will not say to the molded, will not say to the placente, the one who molded it, why did you make me like this?

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That's a given. And in verse 21, does not the potter have a right over the clay to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use?

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Now, you may not like, and I can understand, in fact,

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I would submit, just as I said last time, outside of the work of the Holy Spirit in someone's life, there will never be a joyous, willful submission to the recognition that we are the clay in the potter's hand.

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As long as the heart of man remains in rebellion against God, that is something that is going to be absolutely reprehensible.

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But the question remains, if God is the potter and we are the clay, then is there any basis for answering back to God?

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And that's why verse 22 says, what if God, it presents to this objector a hypothetical situation, what if God, although willing to demonstrate his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?

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What about that enduring with much patience? Normally, in these types of objections, the holiness of God, the fact that God's wrath should break forth immediately against any rebel sinner in his universe, all that stuff is just laid aside and the focus is upon, oh, that poor little child in Compton, that poor little person in the

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Himalayas. And so I would say Paul does answer, and he answers rather clearly and rather forcefully at that point.

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So it says, it is insanely difficult, if not completely impossible, to understand how anyone is culpable in any humanly definable sense of the term.

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Well, there's the problem. You're trying to humanly define it rather than allow the divine definition of culpability.

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And I would suggest to you that that divine definition of culpability, and we're going to have to go into this in the discussion in the

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Fernandez -Comas debate as well, is seen over and over again in Scripture in such things as the holding of Joseph's brothers accountable for their sin.

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Their sin was the result of God's intention. That's exactly what God intended to happen, to get

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Joseph into Egypt to save many people alive. God's intention is perfectly good. Man's intention is evil.

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Man is judged on the basis of what his intentions were. Isaiah chapter 10,

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God brings Assyria against Israel to punish Israel, and then he punishes Assyria for what they did against Israel.

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Now, is this Assyria, this wonderful good country that God forces down and makes them do bad things?

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No. If anything, God has to restrain their evil. He uses them to punish his covenant people, but because they do it all with I, I, I, they never acknowledge

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God, they are proud and arrogant, then he punishes them. Same action.

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God's intention is holy and good. Man's intention is evil. What are they judged upon? Some type of concept of libertarianism?

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No, they're judged on the basis of the intentions of their heart. Acts chapter 4, the church prays to the sovereign

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Lord. Herod, Pontius Pilate, the Romans, the Jews, gather together against your holy servant

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Jesus. All sorts of different intentions. Herod's a nut. Pilate's a political coward.

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The Jews hate Jesus because he's exposed their religious hypocrisy. The Romans just kill people.

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And what does the church understand? One action. God sovereignly determined the action.

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They weren't forced to anything. In fact, they were constantly with hell. How many times did it say his hour had not yet come?

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They wanted to kill Jesus. Not yet. Nope. Can't do that. They're restrained. And what are they judged upon?

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The fulfillment of their desires. Now, if you want to say, well, yeah, God just sort of made us so we could never have evil desires.

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Then what you're saying is you, you really do want some kind of mechanistic determinism where mankind is just a puppet on a string.

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And that's not how he's made us. That's not how it works. It goes on to say,

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I have no problem with what Paul said. An infinite being can obviously do whatever he wants. There is no doubt about it. My contention is that there's no possible way for humans to define characteristics of a

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God who creates feeling, dreadfully minuscule beings simply to destroy them. He's never done that.

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I want to, because I know who this person is. I want to in first person say to you,

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I don't know where you got that. That's not what God has done.

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God has created this universe to bring about his own glory and to redeem a particular people in Jesus Christ.

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And you have somehow become so focused solely upon those who are justly punished by a just God that you've lost sight of the mercy and grace that he's extended to all of them, let alone the mercy and grace in Christ Jesus that brings about the redemption of this.

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Well, people that according to scriptures, a number greater than the sand of the sea. And I don't understand that.

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Simply destroy them. No, I, that's not, that's not the God I worship. And I doubt that that's really the

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God you've been introduced to over your life. It continues on, not just a few either.

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It is highly unlikely the roughly 30 % of the world that claims to be Christian actually have what we describe as saving faith.

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I would agree with that at this point in time. I mean, I don't know. I don't know their hearts, but I would definitely agree that a large portion of what calls itself

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Christianity isn't. Neither do I judge God's actions and purposes solely by polls of today in our current situation.

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That means billions upon billions of people are going to incur infinite misery simply because they lived with no possibility of anything else.

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No, no, triple no. It's not simply because they lived.

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They lived in a universe soaked with evidence of God's existence and they suppressed it and engaged in idolatry.

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They followed the lusts of their hearts. They did so willfully. They had to be restrained from doing more than that.

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You can't ignore that part. At least 70 % of humanity is created to be torn limb from limb, tortured in indescribably brutal ways for all of eternity.

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That is not why they were created. That is not why they were created.

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I can fully understand why someone encountering the Bible's God -centered teaching that God is glorifying himself, that it is all about God.

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It's all about the demonstration of all of his attributes to all of creation. I can understand how someone understands that theology but doesn't get the

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God -centered part of it and becomes focused not just upon man but specifically upon unregenerate enemy of God man.

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Boy, I can certainly see how that would end up creating some massive imbalances, massive imbalances.

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But that's what we've got here, is this poor, minuscule little creature that's been created just to be beat up on, as if his evil is not something he loves.

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And yet he does love his evil. Oh, but God should have kept that from happening. Well, you and I have a minuscule amount of the information that is available to God.

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And to judge him on that basis, that takes us right back to Romans 9. Who are you? Oh, man. This is obviously an enormous problem for any human being with even a modicum of empathy or feeling.

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Depends on what your empathy and feeling is focused upon. If your empathy and feeling is focused upon what you think are these poor, abused little creatures, okay.

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Doesn't seem to be any empathy or feeling for God's holy law. How do you deal with man's sin?

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How do you deal with what man does to man? I mean, just look at the last 150 years of human history.

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How many millions of people died? I just watched, sadly, a very troubling video about a week and a half ago of the

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Taliban executing a bunch of Afghani policemen. Brutally, brutally.

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How does that happen? Oh, well, you know, but since God knew it was going to happen, then, you know, he's just unfeeling and they're just doing what they've been forced to do.

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No, they wanted to do this. In fact, every day, God restrains them from doing worse.

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He doesn't get any credit for it, that's for sure. But anyway, it is obvious why most

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Christians don't believe what the Bible clearly teaches about predestination and is really, whether in scripture or not, nothing but a logical consequence of an omniscient

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God. I would even say most people that do believe in predestination never think about what it really means. I'm not going to dispute that.

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In this sense, there are many people who, by God's grace, have, in his grace, been given true teaching and just are sort of apathetic about it and don't think these things through.

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Let me tell you something, brother. When I was first introduced to these things, I remember spending some long hours trying to think through these very ramifications.

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And we certainly have, I think I can say, over the years, the 900 -some -odd hours of dividing lines we're currently streaming live across the internet 24 -7.

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And that's not including, I mean, how many times have I spoken during that time? Sermons at churches all across the

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United States and now in the UK and Australia and Sunday school classes at PRBC.

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I mean, we're talking thousands and thousands of hours. And sometimes

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I'm criticized for raising issues that are a little uncomfortable for us to talk about these things. Well, maybe your experience is that a lot of people don't think these things through.

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And you're right. I think there are a lot of people that don't. But here we are sitting on the dividing line and we're thinking them through.

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And it's not the first time we've done it. And that's one of the reasons I asked and received permission to discuss this.

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And to do so openly. It is unbelievably unsatisfying to hear

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Paul's response. My friend, you haven't heard Paul's response. Because I can't think of anything more satisfying personally.

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I remember when I first started really wrestling with Romans 9, that I saw the connection between Paul's response and,

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I don't know if anyone, the existence and attributes of God by Stephen Charnock.

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What an incredible work. I mean, you cannot speed read this stuff. It's, you have to ponder it.

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You have to chew on it. And I remember seeing the connection between what

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Paul was saying. If you just knew the grandeur and glory and trustworthiness of this

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God, then you would understand that Paul did give an answer. And I can tell you, my friend,

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I am satisfied with Paul's answer. And I would suggest that anyone thinks it was a surface -level, kicking -the -can -down -the -road type answer, that you just haven't understood it.

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Like I said, not because an omnipotent deity could not do as he wishes, but simply due to the fact our entire faith is based upon words like love, sacrifice, mercy, goodness, righteousness, evil judgment, etc.

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And none of these can be properly understood or defined in any meaningful sense with what we know about eternal predestination and culpability from conception.

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I know this is what you believe. I have not, in having read all of this, found any foundation for that assertion.

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You have read into the story of Adam and Eve. You have confused categories.

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And I'm sorry, I see no basis for that. I can identify love.

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All I have to do is look at the cross. In fact, I can identify love and recognize that the true

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God has such a manifold varieties of love that it is appropriate to say that God has shown love for every single creature, in provision for them, in making his sun to shine upon them, and for everyone that is born unclean, a stench in the nostrils of a holy

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God, yet he has shown them patience and mercy and grace.

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And again, the real question that has to be asked by a person who knows his or her own heart is not why bad things happen to people.

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Notice I didn't say good people because there ain't no such thing. But why good things happen to anybody in light of the reality of our sin.

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I can define all of these. I can define judgment in regards to Joseph's brothers.

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They experienced judgment. And yet what they did was predestined by God. There's no question about that.

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And I say God was absolutely just to do what he did. He used them to save many people alive.

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He could have just simply struck them dead. And you'd have to admit that would be perfectly just. And yet you seem to have a problem because he lets them live and then he uses them.

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And his judgment comes upon them in other ways. I can identify all of those words.

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Our foundation of belief simply cannot be laid without understanding this incredibly important question. Everything is based on it alone.

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I don't agree with that. I do agree with your identifying this as a central issue.

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And it is a central issue. And I do agree that this touches on the very nature of God.

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But I think that there are even more foundational things in regards to God's existence and attributes and holiness and purposes that I've had to keep bringing in to provide an answer here.

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And your focus has been a little bit up the ladder. Yes, far more foundational than most people.

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I give you credit for that. But still not quite there. I think there's more.

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I think there's more. So believe it or not, that's the note. That's all of it.

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And I hope once again, if there are people in our audience that have been troubled by this discussion, well,

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I apologize for that only in the sense that if that being troubled has been due to my lack of ability, ability, clarity of thought, preparation, whatever else it might be, then

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I apologize for that. But I do not apologize for raising issues on this program that I admit can be very troubling for people.

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It is troubling for people to think difficult things through. But I have said many, many times it is far better to think these things through within the context of faith than to be thinking them through within the context of unbelief out there in the world.

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That's why I say to the church, your preaching and your teaching, your

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Bible studies, your fellowships, do not fall into the trap of trying to avoid difficult subjects.

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That's where people's toes should be stepped on. It should be in the context of faith.

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And I really hope that this discussion has been of assistance, not only to the one who wrote to me, but to others as well.

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We are going to take a break. Yeah. And in fact, we'll take two breaks today, if you can arrange that.

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Oh, great master of ceremonies. We're going to take a brief break and then come back with half an hour on the

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Fernandez. Under the guise of tolerance. Modern culture grants tolerance. Okay, we'll just dive right into it now.

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That wasn't supposed to do that, huh? We have a studio audience. So, you know, whenever you have a studio audience, the pressure's on Rich to just perform perfectly.

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And that's, of course, when everything doesn't work. So we're going to try it again, maybe with some outgo music here or something like that.

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And is that the stretch thing you're doing there, Rich? Stretch it out. We're going to do the

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Fernandez comest debate in the next half hour. And then in the last half hour,

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I want to address the issue of Roger Perkins, oneness theology, that whole issue.

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Lots left to do on the dividing line today. Stick with us. We'll be right back. Under the guise of tolerance, modern culture grants alternative lifestyle status to homosexuality.

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Even more disturbing, some within the church attempt to revise and distort Christian teaching on this behavior.

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In their book, The Same Sex Controversy, James White and Jeff Neal write for all who want to better understand the

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Bible's teaching on the subject. Explaining and defending the foundational Bible passages that deal with homosexuality, including

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Genesis, Leviticus and Romans. Expanding on these scriptures, they refute the revisionist arguments, including the claim that Christians today need not adhere to the law.

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In a straightforward and loving manner, they appeal to those caught up in a homosexual lifestyle to repent and to return to God's plan for his people.

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The Same Sex Controversy, defending and clarifying the Bible's message about homosexuality.

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Get your copy in the bookstore at almen .org. What is Dr. Norman Geisler warning the

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Christian community about in his book, Chosen But Free, A New Cult, Secularism, False Prophecy Scenarios?

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No, Dr. Geisler is sounding the alarm about a system of beliefs commonly called Calvinism. He insists that this belief system is theologically inconsistent, philosophically insufficient and morally repugnant.

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In his book, The Potter's Freedom, James White replies to Dr. Geisler, But the Potter's Freedom is much more than just a reply.

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It is a defense of the very principles upon which the Protestant Reformation was founded. Indeed, it is a defense of the very gospel itself.

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In a style that both scholars and laymen alike can appreciate, James White masterfully counters the evidence against so -called extreme

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Calvinism, defines what the Reformed faith actually is, and concludes that the gospel preached by the

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Reformers is the very one taught in the pages of Scripture. The Potter's Freedom, a defense of the

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Reformation and a rebuttal to Norman Geisler's Chosen But Free. You'll find it in the Reformed Theology section of our bookstore at aomen .org.

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The history of the Christian Church pivots on the doctrine of justification by faith. Once the core of the

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Reformation, the Church today often ignores or misunderstands this foundational doctrine. In his book,

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The God Who Justifies, theologian James White calls believers to a fresh appreciation of, understanding of, and dedication to the great doctrine of justification and then provides an exegesis of the key scripture texts on this theme.

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Justification is the heart of the gospel. In today's culture where tolerance is the new absolute,

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James White proclaims with passion the truth and centrality of the doctrine of justification by faith.

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Dr. J. Adams says, I lost sleep over this book. I simply couldn't put it down. James White writes the way an exegetically and theologically oriented pastor appreciates.

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This is no book for casual reading. There is solid meat throughout. An outstanding contribution in every sense of the words.

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The God Who Justifies by Dr. James White. Get your copy today at aomen .org.

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I guess we'll just skip the coming back music. Rich is having that, you know, just having one of those days,

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I guess, you know, and I just got too much stuff going on out there, I suppose. But we're going to dive back into the

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Fernandez -Comas debate anyways, because it's now 4 .31 p .m., and you might want to just get everything queued up for that short break at the top of the hour.

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But this debate took place a few weeks ago. We've already been dealing with various issues.

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Last time we didn't get very far because I spent so much time looking at things like 1 John 5 .1

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and the various texts in the Bible that talk about the relationship of regeneration and faith that were never mentioned by either side in the course of this debate.

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Unfortunately. And so we brought those up, discussed a couple of things. We will now continue with Dr.

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Fernandez's opening statements. However, this makes God's election rather arbitrary.

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I'm sorry. This is now the section on unconditional election. We've already objected to the phrase arbitrary.

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A sovereign God who is the ultimate authority in all things cannot be arbitrary.

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The very term arbitrary is primarily applied to creatures who have multiple possibilities from which they can choose.

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The biblical teaching in Ephesians 1 is very, very clear, and that is, God's choice is based upon the good purposes of his will.

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And that, I think, for any Christian should be a sufficient answer, but evidently that still gets the accusation of arbitrariness.

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Let me read it again. I know we're all familiar with this, but it's directly to the subject.

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He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ himself, according to katatein eudaikion to thalamatos autu, the kind intention, the good intention of his will.

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I simply have to ask a question of any Christian. Do you accept what scripture says that it is the only kata that is here, is not according to looking down the corridors of time, not according to some kind of external standard by which he could be identified as being good.

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The kata that is used here is the kind intention of his will.

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And we saw in Romans chapter 9, we'll see in Romans chapter 9 again, that is contrasted with man's will.

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We saw it in John chapter 1, not by man's will, not of blood, not by the will of man, but according to God's will.

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And that's why it's then ais epainon doxas teis caritas autu, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he graced us in the beloved one in Christ Jesus, the singular, the beloved one in whom we have redemption.

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So we may go ahead and take a look at Ephesians 1, since again, one of my concerns about the format of this debate is there was no exegesis.

35:11

There's a listing of verses. There is no exegesis of the verses. And that always leads to a bit of a problem.

35:19

He chose to save some for no apparent reason. Not for no apparent reason, Dr. Fernandes.

35:26

What, in fact, isn't it funny? I just read that. He chose to save some for no apparent reason.

35:31

You mean no apparent reason in them? Or no apparent reason, period.

35:39

Obviously, he chose to save to the praise of the glory of his grace. And so who is it that he has to save?

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He has to save sinners. Demerited sinners, people deserving of death. He saves them to the glory of his grace, which he freely bestowed on us in the beloved one.

35:57

And so unless that is meant, well, for no apparent reason, as in, if that's an objection, then are you really holding the position that the reason any one of us is saved is for an apparent reason?

36:07

We've got something to boast of over somebody else? That what we did attracted

36:13

God's grace? That was something that Chris Comus tried to keep bringing up. Is it what you're saying is, is we will be able, if it really is us, it's not a result of God's choice, it's our choice.

36:26

Then that means that when we're in heaven, we'll be able to look at those who are condemned and, well, you know, we all had the same prevenient grace, but my heart was just a little more, you know, pliable, a little softer.

36:40

I was a little more spiritual than those folks down there in hell. I, you know, and, and Dr.

36:46

Fernandes is responsible. I'm not saying we earn anything. No, that's not the point. The point is that either it's

36:54

Qatar, according to the kind of intention of his will, Ephesians 1, or the

36:59

Arminian, it's according to the kind intention of my will, because I'm the one that ended up making that decision.

37:08

We're all given prevenient grace, according to Dr. Fernandes. And so what do we do with it? Well, my will somehow did something more with it than somebody else's did.

37:18

Is that really the position that we want to take? He chose to reject others for no apparent reason.

37:25

He chose to reject others for no apparent reason. I guess the only objection here is to the freedom of God and giving grace.

37:35

So what's the opposite of that? Now, Dr. Fernandes was in a negative position, so he didn't have to prove his own position.

37:41

But the reality is, in a Christian debate, you are asserting a particular theological position.

37:49

You're asserting a particular truth. And so it sounds like what he's saying is that God's grace, who gets it, is determined based upon our actions, especially in light of having received.

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But that doesn't work for prevenient grace. So I guess it's only saving grace, this distinction that really isn't there.

38:13

If I am picking apples and all the apples are the same to me, then my choice of which apples to select is arbitrary.

38:22

Thankfully, there is a vast difference here because we're talking about rebel sinners. We're talking about those who are under the righteous judgment of God.

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And we're talking about the extension of grace so as to save these individuals through the self -sacrificial giving of himself in his son.

38:47

Now, that is not parallel to picking apples. It's just not.

38:53

It is meant, I think, to create the sense of arbitrariness. But I would use a different phrase in light of the kind intention of his will.

39:03

That is, God is free in the matter of the giving of his grace.

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Grace must be free and it must be sovereign. Otherwise, it's no longer grace. And Chris Comas did make that point.

39:19

Non -Calvinists like Jacob Arminius believe this does damage to God's justice and goodness and that it also calls into question

39:26

God's love for mankind. Really? I would like to counter that by saying it calls into question whether you believe

39:35

God can have more than one kind of love. Because it seems that Dr. Fernandez is functioning on this ground that God's love must be of a monochrome variety.

39:48

What I mean by that is, again, it's the same error that Dave Hunt is most famous for, at least most famous for in our discussions of late, but Norman Geisler makes the same error, that either

40:01

God's love is a redemptive love for every single person or God doesn't love anybody. Now, I've pointed out that human beings, we would have no respect for a human being that loved in that way.

40:13

We would have no respect, I've used the illustration, I've never heard anyone even try to punch a hole in it.

40:20

We would have no respect for a man who comes, who wakes up in the middle of the night and a man has broken into his home and is attacking his wife.

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And the man stands there looking at the two of them struggling and he goes, oh,

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I love you both so much. I don't know what to do. I just love you both so equally.

40:45

We would have no respect for a man like that. By the way, you try at my house and dude, your history, just so you know.

40:57

We don't have any respect for that and we shouldn't have any respect for that because we recognize that that is a view of love that is subhuman.

41:09

Maybe there's some species of slug that's like that, but we don't want to be that way and why then do we want

41:15

God to be that way? God can have redemptive love and God can have other kinds of love.

41:25

In fact, I've wanted to add, I just, I thought of a question that I've never asked in a debate and maybe

41:31

I'll remember to ask it next time if I ever get a chance to do these debates again. We don't get a lot of people that want to do that. But what does it mean if God's love has to be undifferentiated and equal for every person?

41:46

Could someone explain to me what the Bible means when it says, when it speaks of the disciple whom

41:53

Jesus loved? Ever thought about that? The disciple whom

41:59

Jesus loved. He didn't hate him? Thanks, Rich. I appreciate that.

42:05

Just work on the next break, okay? We're going to have to dock your pay today. What does that mean?

42:12

Because Jesus clearly loved all the disciples, right? And yet there was a disciple that he had, he had a different kind of love for a special love.

42:26

Really? Honestly? I mean, yeah, he did. How can that be? Well, because God made us with that capacity.

42:35

And guess what? If he made us that capacity, then he has that capacity as well. That's where it came from.

42:40

That's the whole point. In my opinion, the Bible teaches that God chose to save those he foreknew, would freely accept

42:47

Christ, given the assistance of prevenient grace. This does not mean that we earn our salvation.

42:53

It does mean we freely accept the salvation Jesus earned for us. Now, I think we're, maybe

43:01

Sam, we in channel will remember, how many prevenient graces were we up to at this point?

43:08

I think, was it seven? Six? I've forgotten. I've lost count now.

43:14

But because when I was writing, there were at least, I counted at least six in the opening statement.

43:20

So maybe it was four. Maybe that makes five. I'm not sure. But the point is, we have this huge concept that, you know,

43:30

Dr. Fernandez is going to say, well, once you adopt a Calvinistic worldview, then you start, you know, twisting the scriptures, start reading the scriptures through this lens.

43:39

Well, you know, we have to be able to respond to that accusation. But I would like to suggest that prevenient grace has become the extra biblical concept by which

43:50

Dr. Fernandez has constructed the entirety of his soteriology. And where does it come from?

43:57

David Hewitt says five. Now we are on number six. I would never question Dave Hewitt's counting, because he seems a little bit like a accountant type guy to me.

44:06

So I'm going to say we're on six. Thank you, David. That's what, that's what we get for having a channel is we've got guys that are paying better attention than I am.

44:16

We accept God's saving grace through faith. Peter tells us that we are elect according to the foreknowledge of God, the

44:25

Father. What does that mean? That was what was so very disappointing about this debate is that you, you get these brief citations, you get no exegesis.

44:37

I would, I would, I've written to Dr. Fernandez. I've offered to send him to Potter's Freedom where I have a discussion of what is foreknowledge and what is the difference between the noun foreknowledge and the verb to foreknow when it comes to God.

44:55

As Dr. Fernandez considered that when the verbal form is used to foreknow when

45:01

God is the subject, it is never facts of history that are the object.

45:08

Now, God's foreknowledge is exhaustive.

45:14

We're not open theists, and I'm thankful that Dr. Fernandez is not an open theist, but he's a

45:20

Molinist. And so I would question appropriately,

45:27

I think, the grounds of God's foreknowledge from the

45:32

Molinistic perspective, because his knowledge of what will happen in the world he actuated is all based upon decisions that he made, based upon this concept of middle knowledge, that somehow

45:45

God knows what any creature will do given a circumstance. And last night, I was in the middle of actually making dinner, and all of a sudden the thought of, obviously,

45:57

I was still thinking about the dividing line from earlier today, all of a sudden the thought struck me. And it was a further expansion of the objection to Molinism on what's called the grounding principle, the grounding objection.

46:08

What's the grounding of this concept of middle knowledge? How could God have knowledge of what creatures will do if those creatures have not been decreed to exist yet?

46:16

Because it's his decree that makes me who I am. So if it's his decree that makes me who I am, how then can he know what

46:23

I would do in any given circumstance before he decrees to make me the way that I am? And I started thinking about the fact, you know, it's interesting,

46:32

I'm 48 years old. I have to keep reminding myself what my age is, because I'm now a USCF cyclist, and you're actually sort of like a year older on your

46:42

USCF license than USCF license, than you actually are in life.

46:48

And so I keep thinking I'm 49 because I race as a 49 -year -old. So after the end of the year, I'll race as a 50 -year -old, even though I'll only be 49.

46:55

So it really confuses me, especially when you get this old. And Rich, you fully understand this because you're even older than I am, but anyway, you've been experiencing these problems for a long time.

47:05

Don't reach for that microphone button there, son. But anyways, I was thinking that how

47:13

I respond to things today is different than how

47:18

I responded to things 25 years ago. Why? 25 years of living, 25 years of life, hopefully 25 years of sanctification, 25 years of experiencing the grace of God.

47:31

But those things that I experienced were often the results of not only the free actions of other creatures, but they were also, from the

47:41

Molinist perspective, reactions to natural disasters, things that happen in this world.

47:49

And those are all under God's control. God can micromanage those things to make me freely do the things that He knows that I need to do to fulfill my purpose in the world

48:04

He has actuated. It's this micromanaging. Everyone's still free, but I'll be perfectly honest with you, this concept of freedom is just, it is about as rich and full as driving through the

48:16

Universal movie lot. There's lots of sets up there, but then you turn the corner and they're all just facades.

48:23

There's nothing to it. There's no substance to it. And that's certainly how I view Molinism. But I was thinking about the fact that, wait a minute,

48:31

I'm different today because of the things

48:37

I've experienced in this life. And so the whole idea that God could have middle knowledge of how

48:44

I would respond, that would then be impacted by what God in His decree chooses to do in any actualized world.

48:55

So there just isn't any means of defending this idea of middle knowledge.

49:00

It's just a philosophical puppet show. There's just no substance to it.

49:07

I just, I don't know what its attraction is. I know what its attraction is to non -reformed folks.

49:13

I don't understand its attraction to reformed folks. And there are people who are going, I like that. And I'm like, really, honestly?

49:20

You really want to embrace a concept of God's knowledge that is not based upon either

49:25

His natural or free knowledge, His natural knowledge of Himself or His free knowledge of what He decrees to do? Really? You want to have something that just sort of comes from someplace else?

49:34

Why is that? I don't get it. Anyway. First Peter 1 verses 1 and 2. This is why Jesus wept over Jerusalem.

49:41

Okay, here we go. Number one happens twice in the opening statement. And I have explained this.

49:47

I haven't gotten response back, but I've explained this. Dr. Fernandes, here we go. After a while, you just have to chuckle.

49:56

Our Arminian friends cannot read Matthew 23, 37 in context.

50:01

They just can't. How many times on Radio Free Geneva, how many times over the past 12 years, since we went back on the air in 98, how many times have we documented somebody?

50:12

Norman Geisler, Dave Hunt. In fact, it was Dave Hunt's miscitation of Matthew 23, 37 that led to what love is this and all the rest of that stuff.

50:23

How many times we heard people misquoting, not just out of context, but actually misciting the words of Matthew 23, 37.

50:34

They just have to have a place where Jesus wants to gather someone, but they will not.

50:41

So their will stops Jesus. That's not what

50:47

Matthew 23, 37 says. It's a condemnation of the Jewish leaders.

50:54

The you would not is the Jewish leaders. The ones that he would gather are their children, the followers.

51:01

It's a direct parallel to Matthew 23, 13. You not only keep people from going in the kingdom of heaven, you bind burdens on them.

51:08

You won't lift a finger. It's a continued condemnation of the Jewish leaders. It has nothing to do with the context.

51:14

And yet how many times have we documented? Then someday we're going to have to ask

51:21

Algo, because Algo probably knows exactly how many times, exactly in which programs they were, that we have documented this particular thing.

51:31

And well, here it goes. Because he did not choose them, but because they were not willing to come to him.

51:38

They were not willing to come to him. That's why he weeps over Jerusalem. That's not what

51:44

Matthew 23, 37 says, but he's going to repeat this in just a few minutes. So we'll point that out again then. Matthew 23, 37.

51:51

God's election is based upon one condition, faith in Christ. His faith does not earn or merit our salvation.

51:59

It merely accepts God's saving grace. Consistent Calvinists teach that Jesus died on the cross only for the sins of the elect.

52:08

So now we move again. That was the whole discussion of unconditional election. But if you were going to interact with the

52:19

Reformed view of unconditional election, wouldn't you maybe provide at least some comments, some counter exegesis of the key texts that they used to teach it?

52:34

You know, maybe something from John 6, maybe something in John 10, maybe Ephesians 1, maybe

52:41

Romans 8, the Golden Chain of Redemption, something along those lines.

52:49

I would think you would just try to offer it anyways. That's at least how

52:55

I do debates. I try to listen to what the other side says and incorporate into my opening statement refutations of their best points.

53:03

Take it away from them before they can even start. That's just how I do it. He did not die for all mankind.

53:11

If Calvinism is true, we are being deceptive if we tell our unbelieving neighbors that Jesus died for their sins.

53:18

And of course, I would change that statement to, first of all,

53:25

I would challenge Dr. Fernandez, where did the apostles ever preach that way?

53:31

You do this because Jesus died for your sins. When the death of Jesus Christ is mentioned, it is specifically placed in the context of those who believe and repent.

53:44

They always find Jesus Christ to be a perfect savior. But where is the preaching by the apostles?

53:52

Because Jesus died for every single human being, you need to do this. Where is that? Acts must be full of it because— full of that teaching, sorry.

54:02

Acts must be full of that teaching because that's certainly how it must have been done, right? And yet every time you have the presentation of the death of Christ, yes, it takes away the sins of God's people.

54:16

It brings about justification. It's for those who believe. It's for those who repent.

54:23

Why isn't there this general concept of atonement? Maybe it's because the disciples understood what atonement meant.

54:31

They understood that propitiation means actually that which takes away the wrath of God and brings about forgiveness of sins.

54:40

And that therefore if Jesus Christ has propitiated the sins of the world in the sense of every single person rather than the world without exception,

54:48

Jews and Gentiles, men from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation— which by the way, it's interesting. Dr.

54:54

Fernandez is going to criticize the use of the phraseology tribe, tongue, people, and nation. That's Revelation 5.

54:59

That's the people in heaven describing the very work of the Lamb of God. That's how he has— that's the effect of his death.

55:07

That's a biblical interpretation of the effect of the death of Christ. We'll have much more to say about that.

55:15

We do not know if they are of the elect. In fact— That's true. That's true. It's very true.

55:21

And I want Dr. Fernandez to think about that. We don't know who the elect are.

55:27

And so, Dr. Fernandez, many times your objections were based upon thinking that we can know. We cannot know.

55:33

And so, we can say to anyone, if you'll repent and believe, you will find Jesus Christ to be a perfect Savior.

55:43

Is there something wrong with that? You see, the difference between what I just said— if you'll repent and believe, turn from your sins, believe in the

55:52

Lord Jesus Christ, you will find him to be a perfect Savior. That's totally different than saying, because Jesus has died for you, do this.

56:03

Fundamental difference. Huge difference in theology. Jesus has no intention of saving the non -elect, if Calvinism is true.

56:12

And that would be why. Well, because we believe that the Trinity acts consistently with itself.

56:18

And if there is a divine decree to save the elect based upon the good pleasure of his own will, then why would the second person of the

56:26

Trinity bear the sins of those that the first person of the Trinity has not decreed to save, and the third person of the

56:33

Trinity is not going to come and apply the benefits of his death to in the first place? John 6 says that the

56:42

Father gives a specific people to the Son, and the Son will be a perfect Savior for them, and he will not lose any of them.

56:50

How does he do that? What is the fundamental mechanism that makes him a perfect Savior? It is his substitutionary atonement.

56:56

And I would like to point out to Dr. Fernandez that substitutionary atonement is a reformed concept.

57:03

Don't say Jesus died for anybody. Arminianism, as it developed, made it very, very clear they reject substitutionary penal atonement, because they recognize if Jesus Christ bears in his body the sins of every single human being on the planet, what's the only possible result of that?

57:20

Universalism. Everyone's going to be saved, because there's no basis upon which to condemn anyone any longer. Oh, well, unbelief.

57:27

Is unbelief a sin? Did Jesus not die for it? I sure hope so. I experience unbelief every day. If Jesus didn't die for unbelief, we're in big trouble.

57:35

Big, big trouble. Is it misleading to even tell people that God loves them? No, it's not misleading to tell them that God loves them, because the fact that God's wrath has not fallen upon them, and God has now brought someone into their life to proclaim the gospel to them, is a demonstration of a kind of love.

57:53

But, Dr. Fernandez, I would strongly suggest you consider the wisdom of taking the redemptive love of God, and turning it into a peanut butter love of God, that, well, it's everybody's.

58:04

Does that mean that in eternity to come, you're going to have an eternally disappointed

58:11

God? Since he only has one kind of love, it's redemptive love, and yet failed to redeem however many you end up think are going to be in hell.

58:23

Wouldn't that mean that God for eternity is going to be weeping over those people? I know some people who actually say that.

58:28

Sorry, don't see that in scripture anywhere, but I do know some people actually say that.

58:35

Is that what's going to happen? Or is God's love for them going to change at some point in the future?

58:42

Interesting concept, I think, that we might want to consider. Okay, we're going to take our last break, and then move into something even more challenging, maybe, the issue of the

58:56

Trinity. We'll be right back. This portion of the dividing line has been made possible by the

59:12

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59:20

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Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church invite you to worship with them this coming Lord's Day. The morning

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59:55

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01:00:02

where the ministry extends around the world through the archives of sermons and Bible study lessons available 24 hours a day.

01:00:09

Hello, everyone. This is Rich Pierce. In a day and age where the gospel is being twisted into a man -centered self -help program, the need for a no -nonsense presentation of the gospel has never been greater.

01:00:21

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01:00:28

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01:00:34

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01:00:43

We are to come before the holy God with an empty hand of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Alpha and Omega takes that message to every group that we deal with while equipping the body of Christ as well.

01:00:54

Support Alpha and Omega Ministries and help us to reach even more with the pure message of God's glorious grace.

01:01:00

Thank you. And welcome back to The Dividing Line, a jumbo

01:01:18

Dividing Line today, 90 minutes. And I don't know if we're going to continue those next week or not.

01:01:24

We might do a couple more. I don't know. Rich, wait a minute. Rich, what are you going for?

01:01:30

Are you going to sit there? I just go 24 -7.

01:01:37

Bring a bed in. I couldn't really do it 24 -7. This is long enough.

01:01:43

There's no two ways about it. But I've got a lot of stuff to cover. And if we want to get phone calls in, there might be people who would like to comment on some of the things we've said over the past four and a half hours of programming.

01:01:54

So if I want to keep covering debates next time, we might have to do a 90 -minute one on Tuesday, just so we can maybe open the lines at the end.

01:02:02

30 minutes. Tell everybody, wait to the end, but don't wait to the end of the end. Call in at such and such a time.

01:02:08

Well, wait until you start getting the people from the Wayback Machine who want to talk about something you said. Yeah, that I said at 3

01:02:14

AM that morning on the Wayback Machine. Episode number 35. Yeah, right. Yeah, that's it. Hey, I heard you say that was 1998.

01:02:21

Really? I said that? OK, that's nice. Anyway, third topic for the program today.

01:02:31

I have a feeling, but this says that someone from Georgia is in channel.

01:02:38

And said, hey, could you tell my friend John? I said, hey. So someone's in channel that seems to know we have a studio audience today.

01:02:46

So that's a little bit scary. But there you go. Yeah, I know. And it looks like Cairo DL.

01:02:54

So Cairo makes me think of somebody else. But I won't even go there. But it's from Georgia. That's all

01:03:00

I know. Anyhow, one of the two things I need to be doing between now and October.

01:03:07

Do forgive me, folks, if I am somewhat limited in my mental faculties.

01:03:13

It helps me to be commenting on things that I'm thinking on and writing on and preparing. I have fallen way behind in my book writing, unfortunately.

01:03:21

I have debates coming up in October. And so I really need to focus more. And one of the two debates that I'm doing in, well, one of the debates

01:03:32

I'm doing down in Australia. It's in Brisbane at the end of my time down there. Is with Mr. Roger Perkins, who is a fairly well -known oneness

01:03:40

Pentecostal advocate. Now, it's been interesting to me. I was listening this morning.

01:03:46

I drove up to Prescott Valley. And I did a ride I've never done before. Everybody else had always done this ride.

01:03:52

I finally decided I needed to finally get around to doing this ride. I rode from Prescott Valley up over Mingus Mountain to Jerome and then back again.

01:03:59

And I know I'm a strange person. But I didn't want to listen to anything while I was riding.

01:04:07

Because anyone who's ridden that road knows it's tough road. It's very narrow from the top down to Jerome.

01:04:12

It's very rough. And so I didn't want anything in my ears. I wanted to be able to hear. But driving up and back, stick the iPod in.

01:04:21

And I was listening to a fellow by the name of Michael had come into channel. And he had been very kind to direct me to some links.

01:04:28

And I was listening to a man he described as sort of a student of Roger Perkins doing a debate.

01:04:35

But man, was he completely different in his... I mean, he's quoting Jimmy Dunn and all these liberals and stuff.

01:04:41

And it's like, well, that's not what I normally hear from one of his Pentecostals. Roger Perkins sounds like you're much more standard, mainline, one of his

01:04:49

Pentecostal than this guy did. And so I don't know if we get around to playing some of his comments. But I found it very, very interesting, some of the things that he was saying.

01:04:57

It seemed to be a very different take on things. But one thing that I discovered was in almost every one of these debates,

01:05:07

I get mentioned by name. And it seems that the debate that I did with Dr.

01:05:16

Sabin back in 1999 has sort of become the standard. I mean, it's studied by everybody on the one side.

01:05:24

This is what they're going to say. And this is how we try to get around it type of thing. And I had no idea.

01:05:33

I will say to my oneness friends, by the way, I have had a standing challenge to David Bernard to debate forever.

01:05:40

I have said, I will gladly go to St. Louis. I will go to the Irshon Graduate School. I will debate at the

01:05:45

Irshon Graduate School against David Bernard, but I've never had that taken up. Anyway, it's fascinating that in 1999, in one week,

01:05:57

I did debate back on Long Island with a Muslim and with a oneness advocate within just a few days. And that's what

01:06:03

I'm going to be doing in Sydney and Brisbane in one week, within a few days of each other, a debate against a Muslim and a oneness advocate.

01:06:10

And what makes that interesting is they often use the same arguments. Yes, sir.

01:06:15

Can I plug something real quick? No. While you were off - See, I knew that my response could be relevant at that point.

01:06:22

While you were off riding the mountains of Arizona today, I found the tongues debate that you did with David Bernard.

01:06:28

I know that. I know that. And we - I tweeted that. We digitized that. Good. And that will probably go up on the shopping cart tomorrow.

01:06:37

Okay. And it will have the option of being coupled with the Saban debate. Was that an MCA program?

01:06:43

That was an MCA program. Okay, yeah. Turned out a lot of - Andy Anderson back when he was still alive, yes. Trimmed out a lot of extra commercial stuff.

01:06:51

Charles Stanley coming in talking about how neat Andy is and stuff like that. Yeah, so that's going to go up tomorrow.

01:06:57

Yeah, I was glad to see that. And so there is that debate. But of course, it's a radio debate.

01:07:04

And hence, somewhat limited in its value as far as I would love to do something fuller in person with video cameras and stuff like that.

01:07:13

Anyway, what I wanted to comment on was something that I have noticed and it has bothered me.

01:07:20

And I do not mean this in a disrespectful fashion. But it is something that I have seen over and over again.

01:07:27

And I think it needs to be addressed. And I'm assuming that Roger Perkins will probably hear this. I probably need to write to him, let him know that I'm doing this.

01:07:35

But I have a feeling he probably is already aware of it. And other people have let him know. As I have listened to Roger Perkins' debate with Matt Slater, the

01:07:48

Catholic, and then with a Church of Christ minister, representative that went for two nights.

01:07:56

One of the things that I've noticed is a propensity, especially in the debate with the

01:08:04

Church of Christ minister, to utilize Greek resources in a very poor way.

01:08:19

Thayer's, Strong's, W .E. Vine, and once in a while some citations of Bauer, Arndt, Gingrich, and Donker.

01:08:26

Or Bauer, Donker, Arndt, and Gingrich, third edition as we have it today. And what

01:08:32

I hear is, well, this lexicon says this. And that's taken to be the final authority in all things.

01:08:41

It is painfully clear to me, as I listened, especially to the debate between Mr.

01:08:47

Perkins, and I'm sorry that I've forgotten the Church of Christ fellow's name. I meant to listen to it today.

01:08:54

It's on the tip of my tongue, but you try doing 90 minutes of DL for three days in a row and climb the mountain

01:09:00

I climbed this morning and got up at 3 .30 in the morning and do it and remember everybody's name. But anyway, it's painfully obvious in listening to that debate that neither of the individuals debating can read

01:09:17

Greek. There are many, many people can read

01:09:24

Greek far better than I can. I am not currently teaching Greek. When I am teaching Greek, that really, really helps because you're forced to do constant exposure.

01:09:32

But I do preach regularly. I'll be preaching the next two weeks. I try, as I address a text, to translate it in the pulpit without an

01:09:44

English translation there. I can't always do that depending on how much time I've had. I don't know that I'll be able to do it this Sunday morning, but I'll try.

01:09:53

There are portions of the New Testament that are still difficult for me to read as far as just the vocabulary or syntax that's concerned.

01:09:59

But there are other portions that I can sight read rather easily. Those who have taught

01:10:06

Greek and even those who think that I'm a complete moron will have to admit, yeah, he's taught

01:10:12

Greek. He's taught Greek on the graduate level. And I can come up with lots of students.

01:10:18

I have students that I taught Greek to that are earning their PhDs today in various seminaries across the land.

01:10:24

Fully accredited ATS seminaries, by the way. And they'll tell you, yeah, he knows

01:10:31

Greek. And I've taught people Hebrew too. I don't know Hebrew nearly as well as Greek because I don't have as much call anymore to use it as I did as I do

01:10:39

Greek. But I can tell when people can and cannot read it. And it was painful to listen to Roger Perkins and this

01:10:49

Church of Christ fellow going back and forth, throwing lexicon entries at each other when they clearly have no knowledge of lexical semantics at all.

01:10:58

As if this is the final authority. Well, Thayer says, well, Thayer is a Unitarian. Well, that doesn't mean anything.

01:11:05

Well, it does. Just because you look up a word in a lexicon and even if you happen to at least do it right and happen to notice that you sort of should look at what the lexicon says as to the use of that particular word in that particular verse, if it's a full enough lexicon to list that for you, even when you do it right, that's still simply giving you that lexicon's understanding of where that usage falls in what's called the semantic domain of the meaning of the word.

01:11:40

And a lexicon is never the final authority in interpretation. Never.

01:11:48

Real exegesis takes place on a much deeper, fuller level and that's called syntax.

01:11:55

It's called context. It's called the usage of words in relationship to other words.

01:12:02

For example, I've told beginning Greek students for years, from my perspective, the single most important thing to get down and learn the

01:12:12

Greek language to be able to read the Greek language with, yes, Bruce Reeves, thank you. With, how'd you get that?

01:12:19

Did someone mention channel? I didn't even see it. Huh? You just knew it. Oh, you googled it.

01:12:25

Oh, thank you very much. It was Bruce Reeves that Roger Perkins was debating. Um, the thing

01:12:32

I tell people all the time and I'm going long here, but the thing I tell people all the time, participles,

01:12:39

Greek participles are the oil of the language. And if you can understand their syntax, not just identify them.

01:12:47

Oh, that's a present. Oh, that's an heiress. There's so much more than that. There is so much interaction between the participle and the verb.

01:12:54

And, oh, it is just, you get participles down. You get the syntax of participles down.

01:12:59

And you get a proper understanding of the Greek article, which almost nobody has.

01:13:08

And you will be well on your way. Now I'll admit, by the way, there is, there is also. An area of Greek grammar and syntax that I struggle with to this very day.

01:13:20

Infinitives. I will admit infinitives that they're not quite as important as the participles.

01:13:25

But, hey, I'll admit there are things that just don't stick with certain people. But anyways, I can recognize when someone really does know the language and when they don't.

01:13:35

And man, listen to this. I could tell neither one of them did. And it was just so painful to listen to this.

01:13:41

Let me, let me give you an example. This is from the second day of the Reeves Perkins debate.

01:13:52

And, well, here, let me just play it and you can, you can hear for yourself. Now listen, you got up here tonight and talked about heist.

01:14:00

Ladies and gentlemen, I want you to see this. In fact, I'll come back to this one. This is Sayers. This is a chart that he used with Jason Weatherly.

01:14:08

This is him, and he used it again tonight. Of course, I can't use Mr. Don as my chart man.

01:14:13

But he used heist and he put it up there as heist. And he referenced John 1030. You all remember that?

01:14:19

He said John 1030 and it's referring to heist. Ladies and gentlemen, John 1030 is not the word heist.

01:14:26

It's the word hen. He don't even know which Greek word is which Greek word. And Jason Weatherly nailed him on that.

01:14:34

And he has done it again tonight. It's not even the same Greek word, ladies and gentlemen.

01:14:39

And this is the kind of scholarship that's standing before you tonight. It's not the neuter singular hen that is used in Galatians 3 .20.

01:14:50

For example, God is one person. It's the masculine singular heist. He did it in the Jason Weatherly debate.

01:14:56

He's done it again tonight. It's not even the same Greek word. If you don't know what word is which, sir, don't call me a liar and a devil.

01:15:06

Okay, now, I was, when I first heard this was, was riding down South Mountain.

01:15:14

And it's dangerous. When you've taught Greek to ride down South Mountain when you hear something like this, because it might be one of those things where you're right off the side of the mountain and that's the end.

01:15:25

And that would be a bad thing. In first year Greek, first year

01:15:30

Greek, baby Greek. You learn the word for one and you learn it in its lexical form.

01:15:40

And what is its lexical form? Heis, mea, hen. Heis, mea, hen. That's its lexical form because you see it has three gender forms, but it's the same word, heis, mea, hen.

01:15:54

And in fact, if you look it up in Bauer, you'll only find under heis, heis, mea, hen.

01:15:59

You won't find an entry for mea. You won't find an entry for hen. Now you just heard Mr. Perkins stand there saying, what kind of scholarship is this?

01:16:06

You don't even know which Greek word it is. And the reality is Mr. Reeves was right. Heis, mea, hen is one

01:16:13

Greek word. One is masculine. One is feminine. One is neuter, but it's the same word.

01:16:21

And so all of his comments had been based upon the fact that it's one word. Now, if you want to try to argue that, well, because it's the neuter, it has one meaning, then you're going to have to do that syntactically.

01:16:33

But don't sit there and say, well, it's different words. That's just not the case.

01:16:40

That's not the case at all. But the other thing really bugged me, and I don't know if we're going to get far enough into it to do this.

01:16:46

I just wanted to find that one thing. But it would take a tremendous amount of time on my part to piece together all the comments that were made about John chapter 10, verse 30 in all three of these debates.

01:17:03

In fact, at one point, Mr. Perkins raised a point of order during Mr. Reeves speaking, again, on the issue of heis, mea, hen.

01:17:14

And nobody, including the moderator, really understood enough about the language to be able to correct, just say, look, look it up.

01:17:22

Lexical form is heis, mea, hen. If you want to say that there's some major difference between the gender forms, then make your argument from there.

01:17:30

But it's not a different word, for crying out loud. But nobody did that.

01:17:36

But what was much more frustrating for me, much more frustrating for me, was that I listened to discussion in all three of these debates of John 10, 30.

01:17:48

I and the Father are one. That's obviously a very important text utilized by oneness people, the interpretation basically being that I am the

01:17:56

Father. Or I and the Father are one, so that we're just like this one person here.

01:18:02

It depends on which oneness perspective you're talking to and how they understand it. But I and the

01:18:08

Father are one. And we had discussions. And in fact, what was interesting is at one point,

01:18:14

Mr. Perkins quoted it in Greek. Ego kai hapater, hen esmen.

01:18:23

And he's correct. By the way, it did. Oh, one thing this morning.

01:18:29

The other fellow, I've forgotten his name. Again, I apologize for that. But the fellow that I was listening to doing a debate that I think he actually was one of the people introduced

01:18:37

Perkins in this debate. But he did it the same. He did it.

01:18:43

And Mr. Perkins does it. Logos. Logos. There are two possibilities of the pronunciation.

01:18:51

If you want to use modern Greek pronunciation, it's logos. If you want to use the Erasmian, which distinguishes between the

01:18:57

Omega and the Omicron, it's logos. But it can't be logos because it's two Omicrons.

01:19:03

Okay. That's one of my pet peeves. That and saying Psalms and Revelations.

01:19:10

Put those three together. And those are my pet peeves. And we're now past my pet peeves.

01:19:16

Back to John 1030. He knew it in Greek. He had memorized it in Greek. But the one key exegetical, interpretational issue of John 1030, nobody, including the

01:19:30

Christians in the debate, ever brought up. So to listen to hours where this text is brought up over and over again, and nobody brought up the key issue, was very frustrating to me.

01:19:46

And so I'm going to help Mr. Perkins right now. I'm going to point out what the key issue here is, and I'm going to invite him to be ready to actually deal with it.

01:19:57

Because even though he can quote it, for some reason he didn't notice that the verb is plural.

01:20:05

Right there. He said it. Esmen. Well, what is Esmen? Esmen is the first person plural form of I'me.

01:20:14

I'me, I, Esmen. Esmen, first person plural. And that is why

01:20:20

John 1030 can be appropriately and properly translated as, I am the father, we are one.

01:20:28

Not we, not I is one. It's not hen

01:20:33

I'me. Even in John 1030, the text carefully distinguishes the father and the son.

01:20:45

Which then leads once again to the difficulty, and it is difficult to listen to, the difficulty of listening to oneness advocates trying to explain how

01:20:58

Jesus can be basically not one person with two natures, that's what we believe, but two persons.

01:21:09

Because this is this son, and in at least classic oneness theology, the son came into existence at his birth in Bethlehem.

01:21:18

He may have had an ideal pre -existence as an idea in the father's mind, but the deity in Christ is the father, the son is not divine.

01:21:28

He is indwelt by a divine person. And so now you have a creature who came into existence at Bethlehem saying,

01:21:40

I and the father, we are one. In what context? In the salvation of God's people. In the salvation of God's people.

01:21:48

The father has given them to me. In fact, in reality, John 1030 is just another one of those tremendous

01:21:54

Reformed texts. Because Jesus said, my sheep listen to my voice, and I know them, they follow me.

01:22:04

And I give them eternal life. And they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

01:22:12

Now, if that's just the son speaking, if that's just a human being speaking, then the human being is our

01:22:20

Savior. If that's just a human nature speaking, then the human nature is our

01:22:27

Savior. But then the human nature in oneness theology says, my father who has given them to me is greater than all.

01:22:37

So now you clearly have one person referring to a second person using personal pronouns.

01:22:45

He is distinguishing himself from the father. The father who has given to me is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the father's hand.

01:22:55

I and the father are one. This is not an identification of the son with the father.

01:23:01

This is a plural pronoun, because we have two persons here. And this divine person is speaking about another divine person, and how he and the father are one in the salvation of God's people.

01:23:18

And I am in the son's hand. I have, what's

01:23:24

Colossians 3 .3 say? You have died, and your life has been hidden together with Christ in God.

01:23:34

And that, my friends, is a divine truth, because he's a divine person.

01:23:41

I am not saved by a mere human being. I am not in a mere human being's hand.

01:23:48

This is not just the human part of Jesus talking to the divine part of Jesus.

01:23:53

This is not a schizophrenic communication. This is one divine person who recognizes only his own existence in the presence of the father,

01:24:04

John 17 .5. And by the way, if I might mention that in the last few moments we have here, we will get to this very early on in the slick presentation, in Mr.

01:24:15

Perkins' presentation in the Matt Slick debate. But just sort of in rushing and passing, he threw out a claim that, well, uh, according to Bauer and Thayer, parasoi, at your side,

01:24:31

John 17 .5, glorify me with the glory that had you, had with you, parasoi, parasaioto, actually, with yourself, uh, before the world was.

01:24:41

They really struggle with John 17 .5. And what was one of the key passages I used in our debate in 1999, John 17 .5?

01:24:47

They really struggle with it. They've got it, it's very difficult to explain how an idealized, uh, thought in God's mind existed and was glorious in the presence of the father.

01:25:00

And so they've tried to come up with a way and just quickly said, well, you look at Bauer and you look at Thayer and it says it can be in the mind.

01:25:07

That is not how you use a Greek lexicon. I looked up Bauer, doesn't cite

01:25:13

John 17 .5, it says in heaven. When it does cite 17 .5, it says in heaven. That's when he was in heaven.

01:25:21

And Thayer, when he uses the term mind, doesn't cite 17 .5. So let me just mention to Mr.

01:25:28

Perkins, I will have, I don't have to bring the books with me. I have Thayer and Lo and Nida and B -Dag and everything else sitting right here in accordance on my friendly

01:25:37

Mac and it's on my iPad now too. Yay, Yahoo, thank you, accordance. So if you're going to cite any of these sources, kiddles, any of these things, please be accurate because I can check you out.

01:25:56

And what you're going to hear in these presentations is this rat -a -tat -tat, submachine gun, throw everything out there type thing that no one could ever refute everything in the time allowed, unfortunately.

01:26:09

But I listen very carefully and I take very extensive notes and only

01:26:16

Gerry Matytix can talk faster than I can in a debate anyways. So I'm just simply saying, be very careful when using these sources because not only do

01:26:27

I have them, but I understand them and I understand their proper usage. And unfortunately, what

01:26:35

I hear very often in these debates is not a proper usage of these sources, but an abuse of these sources.

01:26:43

And that concerns me and I just hope as I go through this, we're going to dive next time into the opening statements from Mr.

01:26:52

Perkins in the Matt Slick debate. I have the option, I can hit that stop button and say, now let's go check the sources.

01:27:00

Let's go look at this first. Let's exegete this first. That's what we do. That's what I'm doing with Phil Fernandez.

01:27:07

And I consider Phil Fernandez a brother in Christ. And we'll do the same thing in dealing with what

01:27:14

Roger Perkins has to say as well. And so we'll be looking at that. In fact, let's go ahead.

01:27:21

We've got just a minute or two, but let's go ahead and get it started. Yes, I did have it at the right place.

01:27:29

You might want to tweak this a little bit because the quality is a little bit off, but here's how Roger Perkins began his opening statement.

01:27:36

I have to excuse my southern drawl. I'm originally from the Mississippi. I just kind of overlooked that a little bit.

01:27:43

I'll be using the KJV, my spiritual references. I still have to kind of overlook the Mississippian language and archaic speech.

01:27:50

But let me hurry it down. And I'd first like to point out that he continuously used the word each in a prior debate that him and I conducted.

01:27:59

And I'd like to clarify this when he comes back. Perhaps he's changed his view. I don't know. But he acknowledged to me that the

01:28:05

Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were each separate. He used the word separate persons, each with their own mind, and each were individuals with omnipresence.

01:28:17

The classic doctrine of the Trinity is defined by the theologians that he did not acknowledge separate persons.

01:28:23

So right away, he has placed himself outside the pale of orthodox Trinitarianism, and he's kind of standing alone right away.

01:28:30

And I'd like him to clarify for other minds still holding the position that they are separate persons, each with their own mind.

01:28:37

Um, Matt Slick is not unorthodox to use that language, because obviously

01:28:42

Matt Slick does not teach that there is a separation in being, that each one shares fully in their participation in the one divine being.

01:28:53

They are not separate in the sense of being separated from one another in their participation in the divine being.

01:28:59

So that's just a misrepresentation of what Matt has been saying all along on that particular issue. You can find that language used by, well, any theologian,

01:29:10

Trinitarian theologian who has addressed that issue down through the ages. The issue is that they are distinguishable from one another, that there are certain attributes, certain actions by which we can distinguish the

01:29:22

Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, which of course is a key issue in dealing with oneness theology. So we will dive back into all of this.

01:29:30

Thank you for your patience for 90 minutes, three times this week. We'll see you,

01:29:35

Lord willing, next Tuesday here on The Divine Line. God bless. The Dividing Line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega Ministries.

01:30:30

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01:30:36

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01:30:41

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