Richard Mouw, Rob Bell, Fuller Seminary, Mustafa Arja, and More

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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 the Dividing Line. We hope we are with you for the full hour.

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If you're listening by podcast, that's probably going to be not too much of an issue. We are having internet service provider issues.

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We know what they are now, but they tell us that it's going to be a couple of days till they can actually get it all fixed.

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And so we may drop in and out. We may disappear. We don't know.

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But right now it's working for now, at least as far as we can tell. And so what

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I'm going to do is I'm going to do the program as if everything's working just fine, and we'll record it and put it up as a podcast.

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And if it's a dead cast, that's the way it works, just the way it is.

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We will try to get through it as best we possibly can. Those in channel, please, if it goes down,

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I realize that they're about to go, I can't hear it anymore. But then stop yammering about it because that's just sort of the way it is.

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And we will go on from there. Maybe I'll just minimize the channel once I see it's dead or something like that.

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We'll figure it out. But we'll go on from there. Did anybody catch the interview that just took place just a couple of hours ago?

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I don't have my Twitter feed up here. I was sort of going quickly. Paul Edwards did an interview with Martin Bashir about his interview of Rob Bell.

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Isn't this amazing? Now the interviewers of Rob Bell are becoming the news.

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Is the Christian blogosphere just bored out of its mind or something? I've always found the emergent stuff boring.

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I realize that it's a challenge. I realize it needs to be dealt with. There's lots and lots of people who do a good job with it.

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I've just never felt like it's something I need to be dealing with all the time or anything like that. Because look,

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I went to Fuller Theological Seminary. I graduated with a Master of Arts degree in Theology with honors in 1989.

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Mao became president in 1993, so about four years before the

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Mao era. I was in the Hubbard era. David Allen Hubbard, I think, was the president of Fuller Seminary when

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I graduated. As I've said many times, I was not on the main campus. I was in the

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Phoenix Extension. I think it's called the Southwest Campus now or something like that. I don't know. We would have professors fly over from Fuller and do some of the classes.

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I remember, for example, me and the folks at school got mixed up.

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I ended up taking a class more than I needed for my degree. It was this ethics class.

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This guy flew over who was the head of extension stuff for Fuller at that time.

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I'll never, ever forget that class because at one point during that class,

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I and the professor began debating abortion because he was pro -choice.

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Of course, I was and am pro -life. At one point, he walked around from the podium.

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The classes met at Grand Canyon University. We were over in the nursing building, as I recall. I think I remember which room it was.

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He walked around from the podium, sat down in one of the student desks. He and I turned our desks toward each other.

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The rest of the class just basically gathered around and we debated right there in class.

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As part of it. The one thing I've said, aside from the fact that I was exposed.

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Karl Barth was the patron saint of Fuller Seminary at the time. All this stuff about, oh, that's just tension in the text.

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I've been through all of it. I wonder at the time, Lord, why are you putting me through this? Why can't I be someplace where we're all on the same page?

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I had to fight. I had to wrestle. I had to learn to listen. It was good for me.

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I would not recommend it today because the main difference between the Fuller of the 1980s and the

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Fuller of today is that in the Fuller of the 1980s, I was not penalized for believing what

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I believed. As long as I demonstrated that I was listening and interacting with what was being said. And so there are a number of times

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I've told the story repeatedly. And since I sometimes tell stories in churches, I think I've told them dividing line and vice versa.

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And there's only one person that we all know of who has listened to every single dividing line and memorized each one.

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His name's Algo. And so, I'm sorry? He's catching up.

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Oh, the rookie's catching up. Well, anyway, so, but I don't remember all those things anyways. So whether I've told it before or not.

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So, and besides, I'm getting old now. So I can repeat stories and you just have to smile and go, and that's nice because that's what you do with old people and repeat stories.

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So I'm sure you're all gonna be very nice and do that for me. But anyhow, we were,

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I was taking a Pentateuch class and the professor stood in front of the class and he held up Gerhard von

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Rath's Commentary on Deuteronomy. Still got it in my library. And I marked it in blue marker.

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Isn't it weird, the things you remember? I bet you we could go in there right now. I could find it right on the shelf because at least

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I do have my Old Testament commentaries organized and I could show you that one. And, oh,

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Cranmer says someone wiped the dribble from his chin. Thanks a lot, Cranmer, I appreciate that. Anyway, I'm the one that said

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I'm old. So I, it's fair, I'm fair game. And he's, he's a palmy guy from Australia.

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But anyway, he held it up in front of the class and he said, this

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I think is the best commentary in English on the Book of Deuteronomy. And so I read it.

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I read it carefully. And we were supposed to write a review. And you're supposed to talk about the positive aspects of it and the negative aspects of it.

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And I remember to this day, I hope I find this. I actually, I might know where this review is.

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I'm going to have to look for it someday, as if I had time to. But anyway, and I got to the positive section and I said, well, this, this commentary has a very nice binding.

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And then I started in the negative section. That's all I could say. And I got like a 98 on the review.

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Because in the negative section, I made my points, demonstrated

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I had read it carefully and had a consistent reason for criticizing the perspective that Gerhard von

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Rot brought to the study of Deuteronomy. So the point is, back then, you could still stand up and say, you know what,

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I happen to believe in the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture. And I know that makes me a three -headed monster here.

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However, this is why I believe it. And you weren't penalized. I don't get the feeling that that would be the case any longer.

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I really, really don't. So been there, done that, got the T -shirt. I'm not sure what that has to do with, the reason

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I'm mentioning all of this, is there have been some developments, continuing developments in the

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Rob Bell stuff. And my explanation for why I've never found the emergence church stuff all that exciting is because I know

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Protestant liberalism. Do we still make available or do we no longer make available?

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I think we still make available the radio debate with Robert Funk, right?

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Okay. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay. If you've ever listened to the, what?

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What? It's a button there. You'll find it. It's 429. Number 429. Thank you. See, Algo knows what's in the debates.

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I know the numbers of that. That's 666, the number of the beast. 616, the neighbor of the beast.

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Okay. We've got that one figured out too. Okay. Anyway, it's number 429 for those of you who need to know those things.

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Now I'm totally lost. Oh, yes. Robert Funk, if you've listened to that, you will hear me.

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That was, I was just about to graduate from Fuller at that time, 1989. And I brought up Von Rotten.

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I brought up a number of liberals because that's the stuff I was having to read. And I was having to listen to lectures from people that are coming from that perspective.

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And so when I hear the emergent guys, other than the fact that my professors didn't dress like Rob Bell, okay?

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They didn't have the really cool glasses and the emo look and the, you know, the,

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I was going to say really small jeans, but anyway, that kind of stuff. You know, they still said the same things.

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They just didn't say it with, I don't know, the, they didn't talk about partying all the time.

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Okay. I mean, like Rob Bell talks about, well, you don't want people at the party. You don't want to be there. I mean, I want to have good parties.

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We're going to have parties in heaven, you know? And you know, it's all meant to appeal to the people who want a real appealing

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Jesus, you know, who parties with them and stuff like that and all that kind of stuff. And so I've heard all this stuff before.

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The emergent church is just a bunch of guys that were raised as fundamentalists that rebel against their fundamentalist upbringing.

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And sometimes, look, folks, I understand that. I mean, there's just two elements of it.

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There's the elements of fundamentalism that are anti -intellectual, that are closed -minded, that don't know what anyone else believes and figures everybody else is just on their way to hell because they don't believe exactly what

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I believe. I understand that kind of fundamentalism. And I understand what happens when you break out of that and you start finding out that, well, there are some really good

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Presbyterians out there. They're not all going to hell. You know, I mean, there is a fundamentalism that's like that.

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I understand that. And I'm not a part of that, even though historically,

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I would be in the fundamentalist camp in the sense of affirming the fundamentals. Obviously, there is a maturity where you discover that there are people outside of your camp that are actually

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Christians. The problem is, once you realize that things are wider than you thought, it's the pendulum effect.

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And all of a sudden, all the boundaries are gone and everybody's going to heaven.

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And you swing all the way over the other way. And it doesn't matter what anybody believes anymore.

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See, I understand that part. And that's where they've gone overboard, is it's one thing to recognize that your little teeny tiny traditions about certain things do not define the body of Christ to there's no definition of the body of Christ at all anymore.

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And justification by faith doesn't matter. And all the rest of stuff doesn't matter. And off we go into some form of gobbledygook universalism, which, and the kind of Rob Bell, Doug Padgett, I can't answer a question if you put a gun to my head type of theology that it is absolutely amazing to listen to, but accomplishes nothing.

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Folks, what does the world hear when they hear people doing this? They hear one or two things. Either those people have no convictions and they don't know what they believe and they're just pulling my leg.

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Or those people sound just like me. So why in the world should I listen to them anyways? Because I'm not convinced of anything.

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I know I don't know the truth one way or the other. And it sounds like they don't know it either. These people can't do apologetics.

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They cannot obey the command of 1 Peter 3 .15. How can Rob Bell? Think about it.

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Remember, we played some Rob Bell from the clip where he was talking to the Jewish lady. He had the opportunity to give a defense to the messiahship of Jesus and the uniqueness of the sending of Jesus.

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Did he? No, he couldn't. Because you don't want to offend anybody, you see. And they don't do apologetics.

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They cannot fulfill 1 Peter 3 .15. They cannot give a reasoned defense. All they can do is just, you know, say nice things and la -la -la.

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And there it goes from there. Oh, Sy Timbrukengate is in channel.

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Hi, Sy. How are you doing? Sy is our presuppositional apologist that was...

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Remember, I commented on his appearance on the unbelievable radio broadcast. And so I think he's been back on since then.

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Or will be. One of the two. I think Justin either said he was going to be or I don't remember now. Anyways, hi,

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Sy. Nice to see you in channel today. And I'm glad that the feed is still working because that's very nice.

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Anyhow, this morning, Phil Johnson linked to two interpretations.

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Remember, Piper had said goodbye, Rob Bell. And one of them was

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Doug Padgett's video response where he said that what Piper did was a despicable thing. That Piper was telling his followers to stop listening to Rob Bell.

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And he's not one of us. Well, Doug, neither is you. You ain't one of us either.

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That's the whole point, man. I'm sorry to have to inform you of that, but you ain't one of us either.

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That's just sort of how that works. And I'm not sure how it was despicable to say these are the lines that are definitional and important.

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And we're going to stick with them. We're not going to abandon these things. But one of the interpretations was by Michael Cron.

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And I don't know who Michael Cron is. I'll be honest. I'm sorry. I do live somewhat of a sheltered life.

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I do not try to know everybody. I'm not a networker or anything like that. Sorry. But this was really, really interesting.

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And he has a picture of Rob Bell. He says, rock star of the church world. The question, as Time Magazine put in their 2007 profile on Bell, is whether he can sell his approach to the rest of evangelicalism or whether, as Christianity Today editor

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Andy Crouch puts it, he will remain more of a singular rock star in the church world. Some may see the release of Love Wins and its surrounding controversy as Rob Bell's brass ring moment when he crosses over from rock star in the church world to an even more popular rock star of mainstream spirituality.

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Instead, Love Wins may very well be Rob Bell's Dear John, no Piper pun intended, letter to evangelicalisms.

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Here's why I think that. Then under the McLaren moment. About a year ago, Brian McLaren released a new kind of Christianity to a similar, although significantly less colossal response by most of the same people who have taken issue with Love Wins.

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In addition to those voices, people who had long been on the sympathetic side of McLaren's writings were now also saying that he had finally gone too far.

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Even Scott McKnight, who described himself in relation to McLaren as a friend and a chronicler for two decades, began his review of a new kind of Christianity with what now seems a prophetic statement.

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Brian McLaren has grown tired of evangelicalism. In turn, many evangelicals are wearied with Brian and ended with,

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Unfortunately, this book lacks the generosity of genuine orthodoxy. And frankly, I find little space in it for orthodoxy itself.

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Reviews and responses similar to McKnight's appeared frequently at first, with many who had been on the fence finally stepping off, but onto the opposite side of McLaren.

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But the frenzy faded, the reviews dried up. And since that time, it seems that many evangelicals following the lead of early reviewers have stopped paying much attention.

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Case in point, Brian McLaren just released a new book three days ago, in fact, and also, as it turns out, published by Harper One.

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By the way, you all know Harper One is Bart Ehrman's publisher as well. They're not really well known for their orthodox material.

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And we've hardly noticed. I hadn't heard about it. Had you? I didn't hear it. You can make the case that all eyes are on Rob Bell at the moment, and that McLaren has flown under the radar on this one.

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But maybe there's a simpler answer. Maybe most evangelicals just don't care anymore. Love Wins is

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Rob Bell's McLaren moment. And this is what I think Piper was getting at when he said, farewell,

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Rob Bell. When the current Love Wins hype is over, and the book completes, it's guaranteed run as a bestseller.

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And there's no question about that. I mean, look at me. I've bought it in hard copy and Kindle copy.

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So that's double cha -ching cha -ching for Rob Bell. Rob Bell will be able to release a book twice as controversial in the future and receive less than half the fanfare.

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Harper One should enjoy the flood of free publicity from the power writers of the evangelical blogosphere this time around.

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Next time out, the bait will be much tougher to sell. We have not seen the last of Rob Bell, to be sure.

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What we are seeing, though, is the end of his tenure as the resident paradoxical wildcard threat of evangelicalism.

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Right or wrong, the current gatekeepers of evangelicalism seem to have thrown him off out of the deck and will now, along with their followers, consider him just another mainstream liberal

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Protestant trying to sell himself and his books to the masses by offering a pleasant and palatable Jesus to people who are looking for, well, exactly that.

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Bingo! There you go. Michael Cron hits it on the nose and he's exactly right.

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I really do think that this is exactly what

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Piper was getting at and that will be the future. But it is fascinating as a result to then notice the blog of President Richard Mao of Fuller Theological Seminary.

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Excuse me. It is written

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March 15, 2001. 2001, yeah, March 15, 2001. He's prophet. March 15, 2011.

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And here Richard Mao titles it, The Orthodoxy of Rob Bell.

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I told the USA Today reporter that Rob Bell's newly released Love Wins is a fine book and that I basically agree with his theology.

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I knew that the book was being widely criticized for having crossed the theological bridge from evangelical orthodoxy into universalism.

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Not true, I told the reporter. Rob Bell is calling us away from a stingy orthodoxy to a generous orthodoxy.

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Now, Richard Mao is the perfect mirror picture of what has happened to Fuller Seminary.

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Once a conservative Bible -believing seminary, no longer. Obviously, you'll still find people there that,

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I mean, like I said, I was there, but that was 20 years ago now. And actually coming up on, well,

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I started in 85. So yeah, 26 years ago. Anyways, and you can always find good folks, but you can also look at an institution as an institution.

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And Fuller, like almost every other theological seminary in the world, which in and of itself is an interesting area of discussion.

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And I discussed that, by the way, with the staff of Trinity Law School. And Lane Chaplin will be posting that discussion

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I had with the staff. Eventually, he has other things to be doing this weekend, but sometime next week, hopefully we'll be linking to that.

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I discussed why that is. Why is it that almost every theological seminary goes left and not right, moves away from orthodoxy?

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I think there are reasons for that. It has to do with our view of scholarship and some correctives that I think need to be a part of understanding what

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Christian scholarship is. Anyways, Mal is a perfect example of that.

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My first indication of just how far off the beam Richard Mal was, was back in the days of AOL, he was interviewed about Mormonism.

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And I asked him a question in this AOL chat room, they had announced this, about the most fundamental difference between Christianity and Mormonism, monotheism.

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And he completely compromised monotheism. Well, you know, those original, the original

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Jews were probably henotheists and there was polytheism. And so we really can't say, you know, so we can't know whether there's one true

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God or not. You know, you can say, oh, I believe that, but the idea that makes that it's therefore true, that's just a little bit too much, you know.

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And of course, he became absolutely infamous in November of 2004, when he betrayed the entire evangelical community.

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He was used to greatly damage outreach to the

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Mormons. He's the worst enemy Mormonism has ever had, because by his false friendship, he has greatly degraded the outreach to Mormon people, who need to hear a clear proclamation of the gospel.

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What they have is a false gospel, and the false Christ cannot save. Richard Mall stood in the tabernacle in Salt Lake City and apologized on behalf of all of the evangelicals.

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And of course, I've addressed this many times. The new edition of Ism Or My Brother has a whole section on this in it, where I point out

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Mall's errors on these things. But as it may, he pretended to apologize for all evangelicals.

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He certainly didn't speak for me. For having misrepresented Mormonism. You know, that was the same time when

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Ravi Zacharias spoke at the tabernacle. Now, Ravi's presentation was fine, but how can you even begin to recover after Mall has pulled a stunt like that?

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I mean, it was just breathtaking what he did. So I'm not at all surprised that Mall would say...

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Now remember, he's written the one, you know, what was it? Calvinism in the Las Vegas airport, or something like that.

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What was the name of his book? He calls himself a Calvinist. Hello! I don't think so. At least not in any meaningful biblical sense, in actually believing what it means.

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But his whole thing... For example, let me just read from his blog here.

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In a book I wrote several years ago, Defending the Basics of a Calvinist Perspective. Basics. I told about an elderly rabbi friend who struck me as a very godly person.

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He would often write to tell me he was praying for me and my family. When he died, I said, I held out the hope that when he saw

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Jesus, he would acknowledge that it was him all along and that Jesus would welcome him into the heavenly realm.

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Some folks zeroed in on that one story to condemn me as a heretic. I find their attitude puzzling.

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Maybe they think that folks like Rob Bell and me go too far in the direction of leniency. But what about folks who go in the other direction?

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I just received an angry email from someone who pulled a comment out of something I wrote a few years ago in Christianity Today.

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A prominent evangelical who criticized those of us who have been in a sustained dialogue with Catholics. Because remember, he signed the 94

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Evangelicals and Catholics Together statement. Again, not at all surprising.

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For giving the impression that a person can be saved without having the right theology about justification by faith.

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I really doubt that's what his correspondent actually said. I imagine his correspondent said something along the lines of, you're saying a person can be saved while denying that justification by faith is true.

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But they hear it differently. They spin it. That's part of the liberal

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Protestant way of doing things. My response to that, of course a person can be saved without having the right theology of justification by faith.

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A straightforward question. Did Mother Teresa go to hell? My guess is that she was a little confused about justification by faith alone.

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If you think that means she went to hell, I have only one response. Shame on you. Shame on you.

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Isn't that what they were doing up in Madison? Shame, shame, shame. And evidently that's what homosexuals are doing now.

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Is they just start chanting, shame, shame, shame. I understand why the homosexuals are doing it.

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Because they know what shame is. They experience it every day. They're having to suppress it. Their whole lifestyle is one of shame.

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And so they're projecting that back onto people. They have no theological or moral grounds for saying that to somebody else.

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But it's a projection issue. And I understand it makes them feel good to just chant that at somebody else.

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Try to make somebody else feel the shame that they feel with a constant experience of conviction due to their suppressing the knowledge of God and the perversion of their sexuality.

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But I'm not sure where the union guys came up with it. Yeah, it sort of works in San Francisco. Let's try it here in Madison. But anyways, here now we have the president of Fuller Seminary saying shame on you if you actually believe that there is a gospel by which you must be saved.

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And that the Roman version of it isn't it. You know, everybody likes to talk about how wonderful Mother Teresa was.

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Well, yeah, I've got some problems with Mother Teresa on many, many levels.

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But let's say Mother Teresa was the most wonderful, self -giving person on the planet.

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There's evidence that she wasn't. But leave that to the side. I mean, I personally think the idea of helping people to suffer is not only creepy, it's not even

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Christian. Okay, you need to understand that. That she had resources, money available to her that she would never allow to be used to alleviate the suffering of the people she was ministering to.

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Because in Roman Catholic theology, suffering is edifying and sanctifying. That's only creepy.

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I think it's evil. But anyways, that's a whole nother issue. Let's say she is the nicest person you've ever met.

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President Mao, her righteousness is as filthy rags before the

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Lord, sir. Have you read that in the Bible anywhere? If she was everything that you say she was, then where does she deserve to be?

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President Mao, evidently from the modernist liberal

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Protestant, she along with every Buddhist and every good Hindu and la la la belongs in heaven.

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Because they don't have any concept of the holiness of God. But if she was everything she was propped up to be, what would she deserve?

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Heaven? No. See, and this is where the divide is wide indeed.

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Because liberal Protestantism really doesn't believe there was a need for something as radical as the cross.

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And that's why much, many people in liberal Protestantism have turned against the whole concept of the penal sacrifice of Christ and penal substitution.

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No, no, it's just an illustration of God's love and all the rest of this stuff. And that's the essence of liberal

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Protestantism. We've heard it all before. Well, let me take it back. I have, but I recognize most of my evangelical brethren and sister and have not.

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And that's why they see a rob bell and they see it packaged with nice music.

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And, you know, you've got your background music and you've got the great camera shots and all.

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And you're using these worldly means of altering the mind and making it more susceptible to hearing these messages.

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I think Paul talked, what was the term he used? Persuasive words of wisdom? Yeah, something like that.

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And it's all packaged up real nice. And oh, this sounds great. This sounds great. So let me just say to Richard Mao, shame on you, sir.

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Shame on you for abandoning the gospel. Shame on you for your destruction of meaningful outreach to the

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Mormon people. Shame on you for putting the Mormon people in a position where they can be insulated from the clear proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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And shame on you for thinking Mother Teresa was good enough to go to heaven because she wasn't.

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She needed the gospel just like anybody else does. I remember years and years ago, my senior year in college,

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I got to go along with a group because I was a department fellow in anatomy and physiology and I worked a lot of the science department stuff.

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I was a science major, science and Bible. And we did a hike through the

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Grand Canyon. I think it's the last time I saw the Grand Canyon, actually. It's amazing. But we did a North Rim, South Rim hike through the

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Grand Canyon. We stayed a couple days down at the bottom. And if you're wondering, by the way, the rims of the canyon are as cold as Flagstaff and the bottom's as hot as Phoenix.

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So it's a really major... It's beautiful, but it's major.

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I just remember it was stiflingly hot at the bottom and we were basically sitting in a stream to try to stay cool.

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And there was a group of us. And there was a non -Christian lady with us and I was seeking to proclaim the gospel to her.

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And she was talking about how she felt like she was a good person. And I used where we were as an illustration.

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And I said, what if the entire human population was on the South Rim of the

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Grand Canyon? And the South Rim is more sheer as far as the drop -off goes than North.

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The North is a little bit less extreme and then the South is very, very much up and down.

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And there are places when you're going up the South Rim where you can just look off the side of the cliff and it's just like, it's a long ways down.

31:32

And they lose hikers and people in there all the time. And that's why

31:37

I would never ride a donkey down that thing. I ain't going to trust that dumb animal. Of course, it doesn't want to die either, but still, it ain't happening.

31:45

And I said, what if the entire world's population were on the South Rim of the Grand Canyon and a huge fire were coming northward?

31:52

And I'm not sure what there would be to burn there. There's not much there, but anyways, it's just an illustration.

31:59

And the only way to survive was to jump across the Grand Canyon.

32:06

And so the world's greatest long jumper gets back and he gets up ahead of steam and sets a new world record.

32:14

And of course, what's the new world record? Splat. Now he went farther than anybody else.

32:22

Everybody else would not get as far. They'd hit more rocks on the way down. You might have people, you know, in wheelchairs, you know, and they go over the end.

32:31

You're sort of like Nana on channel, you know, just that's it, you know. But just because of the goal, it doesn't matter how far you get.

32:44

You all end up in the same place. You might get farther than somebody else. On your way down, you might feel better.

32:50

I got farther than that other guy. Splat. The point is the goal is too far. And the standard is absolute holiness.

32:59

There is nothing, absolutely nothing that we can do to meet that standard of holiness outside of Jesus Christ.

33:07

Now, maybe Mal would say, well, I'm sure Jesus Christ will accept anybody who lives such a wonderful good life.

33:13

Well, again, that's not, that sounds very good and moralistic if that's where you're coming from.

33:19

But I thought the Christian message always been that it wasn't our works of righteousness adjoining us to Christ. It's actually faith in him and in his gospel.

33:31

You believe the gospel can save you, not what you do, not your sufferings or anything else, or your prayers to Mary or anything else that goes along with it.

33:41

And so I say shame on Richard Mal. Shame on Richard Mal for his compromise with Rome.

33:46

Shame on Richard Mal for his compromise regarding Mormonism. And shame on Richard Mal for defending

33:52

Rob Bell's new book, which likewise does not understand the centrality of God's freedom and the true nature of divine love.

34:02

Shame on Richard Mal for all of that. Oh my, 877 -753 -3341.

34:08

I always get myself in all these troubles. But I'm just going to skip the rest of what

34:19

Mal had to say. I think we've covered enough of that. 877 -753 -3341.

34:24

I'm already over halfway through. I'll go ahead and take the one phone call we've got. And then

34:30

I've got some things I want to play. And we'll try to put that all together here.

34:35

But let's go ahead and talk with Ben from Illinois.

34:41

Hi, Ben. Got to turn Ben on here. Now, are you there? Yeah, I sure am.

34:47

Hi, how are you doing? Pretty good, how are you? Good. So I was calling to see if you might want to say a few more words about what you were talking about.

34:55

I believe it was this past Tuesday on R .C. Sproul and the getting outside of yourself.

35:03

Well, I put a video up of that, which normally means I felt that was fairly straightforward.

35:09

What would you like to address? Well, I guess I didn't feel like Sproul's observation was real clear.

35:27

And so I went online and read his comments in that book that you mentioned.

35:36

It seemed to me that he had a pretty good point. And it's not something that's lightning strike, nails in the coffin or anything.

35:47

But I guess I would wonder, what does it mean to you to be autonomous versus to rely on God for your knowledge?

36:08

I'm sorry, I'm not following you. The point of the caller was that his understanding of Dr.

36:19

Sproul's point was you cannot escape yourself. You have to begin with yourself. And the fundamental clash between evidentialist apologetics and presuppositional apologetics and what

36:34

I would see as a reformed epistemology versus a non -reformed epistemology is that, as Van Til and his interpreters have said, and I think you can trace this all the way back, certainly

36:47

I believe Calvin made this point very, very clearly at the beginning of the Institutes. He does talk about the controversy over where you begin.

36:56

Do you begin with man's knowledge of himself or do you begin with man's knowledge of God or God's self -revelation?

37:04

And I believe that a consistent position, biblically speaking, would be that we have to begin with God's self -revelation, especially, you know, sometimes people want to argue about, well, what could

37:17

Adam have done, blah, blah, blah. Well, we're post -Adam. We're post -Fall. So leaving the philosophical speculation to the side, where we are today as fallen creatures, where do we need to begin?

37:31

And I would argue that we need to begin with God's revelation because of our self -centeredness, the twistedness of our minds, the darkness of our minds in sin.

37:44

And when you're dealing with an unbeliever, you're dealing with a person who, from a biblical perspective, is suppressing the knowledge of God.

37:52

They already have a sufficient knowledge of God to know that he exists and they need to give thanks to him. And so you either take that seriously and deal with it, or if you start with man and you don't start with what the biblical anthropology is, you're going to be arguing in circles with the person forever.

38:13

And I just don't see how you accomplish anything doing that. I've never seen it accomplish anything.

38:18

I'm not saying that God can't draw a straight line with a crooked stick and he can use less than biblically accurate mechanisms to bring people to a knowledge of himself, but the goal of the

38:31

Christian apologist is to be consistent with Scripture and with the message you're proclaiming.

38:37

And I just don't see any way around, if you're going to start with man, eventually you're going to have to get to the point of saying, yeah, well, man's not the measure of all things.

38:46

Actually, God has to be at the center for anything else to make sense. And then they're going to say, wait a minute, why didn't you start there? Why did you convince me to come this far based upon a different grounds?

38:54

Now you're shifting your grounds. I don't want to ever have to deal with that. I don't want to have to argue with somebody in that way.

39:01

And so you need to be consistent from the start. So I know what objection he was referring to, the caller

39:10

Ian from Utah was, and I've heard it many times before, and I think it is a basic thing that we need to think through.

39:17

And that is, what is the starting point? And Ventile and Bonson and others have argued,

39:23

I think rather convincingly, that even Adam was dependent upon divine revelation, and much more so his descendants who have fallen into spiritual death.

39:35

The primary source will always be divine revelation and not self -reflection or a starting point within oneself.

39:42

So I just disagree with the statement, well, we all start with ourselves. If we all start with ourselves, we'll always end up with a

39:50

God that looks like ourselves. And that's a problem. Well, I guess the way

39:57

I understand the objection is, Skoll is just saying that, you know, if we're going to use our judgment, then we should acknowledge that we're using our judgment.

40:10

But if we're not using our own judgment, then, well, there's no judgment being made there.

40:17

And it seems sort of like a trivial thing, and I don't think that he— Well, Ben, let me ask you a question.

40:24

As an agnostic who's done debates against Christians, why should you be overly concerned about Christian apologetic methodologies?

40:31

Because you don't believe God is spoken anyways. Well, I just like to better understand what you think and how you approach these things.

40:39

Well, I think Jamin explained it to you fairly clearly in the debate that he did with you, don't you? No, this issue didn't come up.

40:48

Well, I listened to it, and the fact that you think it didn't come up says a lot to me, actually, because I think that it did, if you're familiar with what the form of argumentation was.

41:02

But I'll just be straightforward with you, Ben. I wouldn't expect you to understand this, because fundamentally, this is a spiritual argument, and you don't accept that there is any ultimate authority in that field to begin with.

41:18

So I can understand why the distinctions that I would be making would be lost upon you, because we don't have a common foundation upon which to discuss it.

41:32

Well, I guess that's all there is to say, then. Well, as far as apologetic methodology goes, yeah.

41:38

I mean, you and I shouldn't be discussing apologetic methodology. We should be discussing why you, as a creature, believe that we have anything to talk about at all, because,

41:51

I mean, what we should be discussing is something completely different. What we should be discussing was, for example, the agnosticism that I heard coming out, but the inconsistent agnosticism that I heard coming out in your discussion with Jamin, and things like that.

42:06

It just doesn't seem to me that R .C.'s, from my perspective, inconsistency between holding reformed epistemology and a non -reformed method of apologetics, that's just not—I can have that conversation with Ian or somebody because we have a common foundation, but you and I don't have a common foundation to make that overly understandable, do we?

42:32

Well, I would think that we do, but if that's not something that you'd want to talk about, that's okay.

42:38

I understand. Well, I think that there are ways of discussing things. That's why I felt like Ian's call was very useful, is because I can talk to Ian on the basis of commonality, but that's because Ian's not suppressing the knowledge of God and not claiming to be an agnostic, and you are.

42:59

And so we would have to discuss something much more foundational and basic. I don't discuss Christian theology of predestination or something with agnostics.

43:11

I mean, why? What does that accomplish? I guess

43:17

I just thought it would be interesting. But again, if you don't— But see, I don't consider what I believe something that's interesting.

43:25

I consider these matters of life. So for you, it's sort of like, well, this is an interesting area to discuss.

43:34

No, for me, it's a part of divine revelation. It may be interesting to you, but that's like saying, well, yes, you think these things have eternal verities, but it's just a matter of discussion for me.

43:49

That in and of itself is a denial of what I believe. And so what I'm saying is, since we have much more fundamental things that we need to be talking about in regards to your denial of divine revelation, going beyond that into other areas is skipping the foundation.

44:10

And you're left with, well, I feel this. Well, I feel that, and I don't know how useful that actually is.

44:20

Well, if you want to talk about that, that's fine. Otherwise, I can just let you go.

44:26

Okay, well— I'd like to appreciate your comments, though. Okay. All right. Thanks, man. I appreciate it. Thanks for your call.

44:32

All right, bye -bye. Before we get to—I don't even remember what that call was, to be honest with you.

44:42

If you can give me some more information on that. I did want to get to—and I don't want anybody to think, wow, you can even recognize people when they call in.

44:51

Jamin's in channel. And he mentioned that in channel. That's how I knew that. And so I appreciate

44:57

Jamin letting me know that. And I'm glad that I listened to Jamin's dialogue with Ben.

45:07

And if someone would be so kind—the problem was, if I recall correctly now—and this is so weird because I'm thinking—the whole time, once I realized who

45:17

Ben was from what Jamin's had in channel, the whole time I'm thinking about exactly what route it was

45:22

I was riding when I listened to the dialogue between Jamin and Ben. And I do recall that, unfortunately,

45:31

I think—I don't know that I—did I link to it on the blog? I think I might not have because the recording was so bad.

45:43

The—Ben's side was real clear. Jamin's was fine for the first, like, five minutes or something.

45:49

And then it was really hard to follow. I really had to listen very, very carefully. And maybe—I may not have mentioned it or linked to it because the recording just wasn't good.

46:00

So I don't even know if it's still up or anything like that. But it was interesting to listen to. But it was really—yeah, the main recording died, yeah.

46:10

So—but if y 'all would like to hear it, maybe if it's still available, I can track it down or something like that. Anyhow, I did want to get to this before we get to our other phone call.

46:21

And we're running out of time here. We've only got a few minutes left, so I may not even get to that. We'll find out real quick. I might be able to be real—oh, okay.

46:31

All right. I'll try to get to it right at the end of the program. I was listening to another debate yesterday.

46:39

That's what I do when I ride. And this one is an interesting one. Samuel Green is a

46:44

Christian apologist down in Australia. I have listened to, I think, all of Samuel's debates with Abdullah Kunda.

46:51

I'll be debating Abdullah in Sydney in October, Lord willing. We need to—I need to get—Abdullah,

46:57

I know you listen, so we need to get—need to get that nailed down as to topics and stuff like that. But this was a debate with someone else, and that caught my attention.

47:08

I found it real interesting. And this is a man by the name of Mustafa Arja. Mustafa Arja.

47:17

And I would be really interested in seeing if maybe

47:23

Abdullah could help me along these lines. Maybe a doubleheader type thing.

47:28

I debate Abdullah and then debate Mustafa or something like that. That would be—I'd be up for doing that.

47:34

I really would try to get to, you know, if we have one venue, it's a whole lot easier. We're already set up and just maybe do two debates back to back.

47:42

I mean, that's exhausting for me. There's no question about it. But if I'm, you know, flying, if I'm spending 14 hours in an airplane from LA to Sydney, I might as well, you know, get some excellent material out of it, hopefully.

47:58

As I listened to Mustafa, I was grinning.

48:06

You couldn't tell I was grinning because I was probably flying down South Mountain at that point. And, you know, underneath our helmets, we all look the same.

48:14

And you couldn't tell if I was grinning or grimacing or what. But because I could tell exactly what sources

48:21

Mustafa Arja is using and who he listens to. It was fascinating.

48:27

I've gotten to the point—I'm still not an expert yet—but I've gotten to the point where I can listen to Muslims and go,

48:33

OK, he likes this type of theology and that type of theology. And he's listening to this source and that source.

48:38

And, hmm, I bet you he's got Ibn Tamiyah on his library wall and so on and so forth. But as I listened to him speaking, the first thought across my mind was, wow, he's listened to a lot of Shabir Ali debates.

48:56

Because he's repeating the Shabir Ali line over and over again. But then he ran into this one part, and I just had to start chuckling.

49:06

I just had to start chuckling. Let me play for you a section from—now, this is a specific section of a debate that Bart Ehrman did with William Lane Craig.

49:20

I have played this on The Dividing Line, played it shortly after the debate took place. I've done presentations on this.

49:28

Last year, when I was in New York, I did a presentation on this.

49:34

It's on video. It's on YouTube. It's not like people have not responded to this, but the

49:40

Muslims don't hear the responses. They just don't. It's sad. Listen to Bart Ehrman.

49:49

And those of you who know Bart Ehrman, you know. And make sure to turn my

49:54

PC off for a moment. And now you can turn it back on. Those of you who listen to Bart Ehrman know he uses the same presentation over and over again.

50:02

When I debated him, he used the exact same presentation he used against Dan Wallace in New Orleans six or eight months earlier.

50:10

Exactly. Same slides, same order, same jokes, everything. Once you've listened to one

50:16

Bart Ehrman lecture on a subject, he's just going to repeat it over and over and over again with the slightest of modifications.

50:25

So with that in mind, listen to Bart Ehrman on the historicity of the Gospels. Here we go.

50:42

Well, hold on a second. I thought I had it right where I wanted it.

50:47

I'm using a different little program here. Let's back up a little bit. Here we go.

51:21

What day did Jesus die on and what time of day? Did he die on the day before the

51:28

Passover meal was eaten, as John explicitly says? Or did he die after it was eaten?

51:34

Now, just catch that. As John explicitly says. Now, I have done entire presentations.

51:40

I have a whole presentation on this. It might be on my YouTube page. I'm going to have to look and see. I did it at Covenant Grace Church in St.

51:48

Louis. I know I did an entire hour on it. I've done it in other places where I go through each one of these things, and especially the

51:54

John, the day of Jesus' death thing. Take it apart. Point by point.

52:01

I'm not the first one to have done it. I'm stealing it straight from A .T. Robertson's stuff from the 1930s. The point is, all this stuff isn't new.

52:08

It's been refuted over and over and over and over and over again. The internet makes us dumb as to history.

52:15

But did you catch that? Explicitly says. Keep that in mind. Explicitly says. Did he die at noon, as in John?

52:22

Or at 9 a .m., as in Mark? Did Jesus carry his cross the entire way himself?

52:28

Or did Simon of Cyrene carry his cross? It depends which gospel you read. Did both robbers mock

52:35

Jesus on the cross, or did only one of them mock him, and the other come to his defense? It depends which gospel you read.

52:42

Did the curtain in the temple rip in half before Jesus died or after he died? It depends which gospel you read.

53:16

Listen to the presentation of Mustafa Arca in his debate against Samuel Greene.

53:28

Hello. It's a YouTube thing, and it worked just fine a second ago. He's taking a drink now, sorry.

53:38

But I guess you sort of have to tap it to get it going again. Now, the reason why we can't tell is because we read the

53:54

Bible vertically. For any book, you read it from top to bottom. But try to read the

53:59

Gospels horizontally from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and put the stories, again, side by side, and you'll see how the image of Jesus leading up to the crucifixion has been reworked and modified over time.

54:16

Now, this is partially Ehrman. You can get to the specific Ehrman quotes. But that's also

54:21

Shabir Ali's primary gospel argument. Remember Biola 2006?

54:27

Been there, done that, got the t -shirt, you know? It's commonly accepted that out of the four Gospels, Mark is the earliest, although in the

54:35

Bible it's Matthew that's shown first. Then Matthew, Luke, and John is the last gospel, according to the majority of the

54:45

Christians. According to our Christian friends, Jesus was a willing sacrifice.

54:51

Now, if Jesus is willing to die, why would Jesus pray for death to be taken away from him?

54:57

According to Mark, chapter 14, verse 34 to 36. This is the incident in the

55:03

Garden of Gethsemane when he falls on his face. Okay, time's going by. But you hear he's using the Shabir Ali, you need to read them horizontally and not vertically, etc.,

55:12

etc. So listen to this question that he answers during the question and answer session. People have handed in questions.

55:17

Listen to this one. Okay, to both speakers, can you give examples of gospel contradictions?

55:25

Can the variant in the gospel accounts be harmonized? I mentioned some of the contradictions.

55:32

I mentioned some regarding to the resurrection. Who went to the tomb on the third day? Was it

55:37

Mary alone or Mary with other women? If it was Mary with other women, how many other women were there?

55:43

Which ones were they and what are their names? Was the stone rolled away before they got there or not? What did they see in the tomb?

55:49

Did they see a man, two men, or an angel? It depends which account you read. It depends which gospel you read.

55:55

And there are many other examples, but I'm not going to get through them all. So there are contradictions. It depends on which account you read.

56:02

It's straight out of Ehrman. And in the earlier one, I wanted to get to it. He specifically cites the day of Jesus' death and uses the exact same quotation when it says unequivocally or which

56:16

John specifically uses. He never says, by the way, I'm quoting an agnostic by the name of Bart Ehrman.

56:22

But he uses the exact same language. That's why I've said over and over again, who is the

56:29

Muslim's favorite agnostic? Bart Ehrman. They quote him.

56:35

They don't give him reference as often as they should. Sometimes they do. And there you had this.

56:41

It was just fascinating to be riding along going, I know who you've been reading. And I really...

56:47

And again, you know why I'm saying this. I've said for over and over again, I'm looking for the consistent

56:53

Muslim apologist who will use sources consistently.

57:00

And when you're using Bart Ehrman and Bart Ehrman doesn't believe God has spoken in your book or mine, you're not being consistent.

57:09

That's just the way it is. Well, time's going by real fast. We want to get one last call in.

57:15

I have to go a minute or two beyond here. But let's talk to Lars. Hey, Lars.

57:20

Hello, Dr. White. Hi. Good. How are you? I'm doing good, thanks.

57:27

So I'll try not to keep you too long. I just wanted to call to apologize, ask your forgiveness for the call

57:34

I made back in mid -December, called into the dividing line. And accused you of violating 1

57:40

Corinthians 1 .12. It was with regard to defending Calvinism. I had at the time said, you're going too far,

57:47

Dr. White. And, you know, you're basically dividing the church with what you're doing, and you should really not go as far as you're doing.

57:55

I made that call about a week after I discovered your ministry. And needless to say,

58:01

I've learned a lot more since then. You know, I agree with most of the five points of Calvinism.

58:08

The only one I have trouble with is irresistible grace. I'm still trying to sort through that.

58:15

Hopefully, I'll get Potter's freedom at some point, too. Sure. But just wanted to apologize for that.

58:24

And— Well, I normally don't take offense. I just think the thing to remember is that the application, 1

58:32

Corinthians 1, I'm a Paul, I'm a Paulus, I'm a Cephas, I of Christ. There is a spirit of denominationalism there, or following after a particular person, that fundamentally denied that all of those individuals were all servants of one message.

58:53

Right. And I would have been, at the very least, banished from Geneva by Calvin.

59:02

And I might have been drowned by Calvin, okay? So I do not put John Calvin up as the epitome.

59:09

He's not my homeboy. I've tried to illustrate in my use of any figure of the past a consistent biblical examination of someone and a recognition that I try to recognize the good that came from God's grace in their life and in their teachings, and recognize that I would also have differences.

59:35

And that the dividing line— and that's why we call the program the way we call it— the dividing line is always divine revelation.

59:42

There has to be a dividing line, but there needs to be charity on the other side of that dividing line.

59:51

And that's why we have people on this program who do not agree with me on every jot and tittle and people are shocked that I can actually— in fact,

01:00:02

I get criticized rather often for some of the recommendations I make or the fact that I won't attack my

01:00:09

Presbyterian brothers even though I've debated them on paedo -baptism. I call them my brothers, and there are people who think

01:00:15

I'm a great compromiser because you won't stand firm on that and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so, you know, each one of us has to make our decisions as to where we draw those lines.

01:00:25

And I at least try to be consistent but it comes down to a point eventually where you have to draw the line and say, well, hirshte ishish kan yishtandir ish god helvamir and leave it to the

01:00:40

Lord at that point. So when it comes to God's freedom in salvation and the impact that has upon apologetics,

01:00:49

I do not, in the modern sense of the term, apologize for feeling that that is something that needs to be made very, very clear because if we don't lay that out, then people will be confused as to why it is that someone like myself and William Lane Craig give such different answers to the same questions, even though we allegedly believe many of the very same things.

01:01:09

And I'm not doing other people any good if I am not open as to why those differences exist and feeling that those differences are important and they need to be discussed and even in fact debated, even though that unfortunately rarely happens.

01:01:24

So that's really where I'm coming from on that. Sure. Thank you very much. I know you're already running over, but the one, like I said, the one point on the five points of Calvinism here that I have some trouble with, and it may help you to know,

01:01:41

I've been born and raised in what's referred to generally as the Brethren. Oh yes, of course.

01:01:47

Yeah, I heard you make mention to that on a recent sermon audio podcast. Yeah, I actually was preached at a

01:01:55

Brethren church while I was in Ireland. So I've actually been, in fact, the only

01:02:01

Brethren churches I've ever preached at were outside the United States, which is really interesting. I spoke at a

01:02:07

Brethren church in Italy as well, yeah. So I have a book here by F .B. Hull, it's just titled

01:02:14

Salvation, that has a good chapter on election and free grace that's been helping me. But one of the questions that I have that I don't think

01:02:23

I buy your argument on, that's been on your articles and your website is 2

01:02:28

Peter 3 verse 9. It says, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

01:02:35

I only have the King James right now. You make the argument that in the context, we know it's talking to believers and all, the word all there is then referring to all believers.

01:02:47

I'm not sure if I buy that. You say that there are other examples in the New Testament where the same structure is used, where a group of people is addressed and all means just that group of people.

01:02:58

Offhand, do you have any examples where that occurs? Well, I'm not sure what you're referring to as far as other sections in the

01:03:07

New Testament. I mean, it's simply a matter of following the pronouns in 2

01:03:13

Peter 3 verse 9. Uh, you have in the previous context, a discussion, uh, you know, 2

01:03:21

Peter is addressed to a particular people. And then it's, uh, the third chapter says, uh, this is now the second letter that I'm writing to you, beloved.

01:03:31

In both of them, I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the command of the

01:03:37

Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first of all, that scoffers doesn't, the scoffers are the scoffers, is he identifying the people he's writing to as scoffers?

01:03:47

No, this is a, now a different group. It's, it's, it's not direct address anymore. He's talking about two beloved believers about scoffers.

01:03:57

So now there's another group. He's, he has now distinguished between the you and somebody else that scoffers will come in the last days of scoffing, following their own sinful desires.

01:04:06

They will say, not you will say. So now we have two groups in view. Where is the promise of his coming for ever since the father's fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.

01:04:17

For they deliberately overlooked this fact, not you, but they, that the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God that by means of these, and that by means of these, the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished.

01:04:32

But by the same word, the heavens and earth and now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

01:04:38

But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, back to the direct address, that with the

01:04:44

Lord, one day is a thousand years and a thousand years is one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward who?

01:04:53

You. Not wishing that any, any of who? Any, sorry, my

01:05:00

Greek is limited to knowing what the letters are. Well, he should perish.

01:05:06

Yeah, but as soon as you say, as soon as you say, not wishing that tenos, any should perish, you have to ask a question.

01:05:14

Any of whom? Right. And so you either have to defend the positive exegesis that the any means all of mankind.

01:05:26

Right. And you also have to be able to refute that the any means any of you.

01:05:31

Now he changed the address back at what? The beginning of verse eight.

01:05:37

He changed it back to you, and we already know the you is in contradistinction to scoffers, those who reject the message, so on and so forth.

01:05:45

So I'm simply stating that when it says he is patient toward you, and therefore when it says not wishing that any of you should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

01:05:58

Right, but I'm not sure. So the word tenos there, the any, and then the word pontos, the word all, what you're saying is that that's referring to all of you or any of you, right?

01:06:09

I mean, how else? I mean, if you want to say, if you want to say, well, there is a far antecedent and it's not the near antecedent.

01:06:19

It's not patient toward you, even though he's just said that, even though he's he's he's just specifically, you've got ice hummus right there.

01:06:29

And may be luminous tenos is is a subordinate clause following right after that, that that's not the that's not the audience.

01:06:38

That's not where we should derive our understanding of this sub clause.

01:06:45

We should leap to another context. Then I would say that on an exegetical basis, you have to be able to prove that from the context.

01:06:55

Okay. And my whole point is that there's no reason to do that. That the close context is that he is patient toward you, not wishing that any of you should perish, but that all of you should reach repentance.

01:07:07

And that's exactly what fulfills the reason why the parousia of Christ has been delayed.

01:07:13

Why does anyone today? Why is any of the elect today in Christ? Because God delayed the parousia so that the entirety of his elect people could be gathered in down through the ages.

01:07:28

It makes perfect sense in the context. It doesn't disrupt the flow. And in fact,

01:07:33

I would suggest that if you read into it, and I would suggest it is a reading into it, a far fulfillment where the patient toward you is irrelevant to the sub clause that immediately follows it.

01:07:45

It introduces an entire disruption of the flow, a topic he's not addressing that he then immediately drops and goes on to talk about the delay of the parousia.

01:07:56

So I just think that that a fair reading of the text in its simplest form does not lead you to the normal understanding of 2

01:08:07

Peter 3, 9, though I know there are many people that read it that way, but they almost never read it by quoting the whole text and the flow of the text.

01:08:17

They only quote the one verse and then they can make that far application without anybody ever calling them on it. So that's...

01:08:23

Do you see why? If you've got isumos, ytinos, and pontos, which follows right afterwards, is that not the natural reading of it?

01:08:34

That's... I totally see your reasoning. I'm not sure if if there's not another way to look at it.

01:08:41

You know, this may be a case of Romans 14, 1, he who is weak in the faith received. You know, I'm just not...

01:08:47

Oh, I'm not trying to force you to see it the way

01:08:52

I'm seeing it. I'm just... I think what you have to admit is that there is no fundamental objection on an exegetical basis to what

01:09:00

I'm saying. No, and your interpretation of it's perfectly valid, but I don't think mine is invalid.

01:09:06

One of the reasons I say that, I've discussed this with my dad extensively over the last few months, ever since this came up as something that's been bothering me.

01:09:15

And his argument keeps coming back to the point, well, why would Jesus weep over Jerusalem if he was only willing for those who were already elect, who were elect, to be saved?

01:09:28

If he was not desirous of others to be saved who would not be saved, then why would Jesus weep over Jerusalem?

01:09:34

Okay, well, that's changing context, because that's not what Peter's talking about, first of all. Secondly, remember that in Matthew's version of that story,

01:09:47

Luke mentions weeping. Matthew does not, especially because he places it within a judgment context.

01:09:55

And thirdly, when you say, why would Jesus weep?

01:10:01

Well, my response to that would be, are you saying that God weeps because he doesn't accomplish what he wanted to accomplish?

01:10:09

Are you saying that God weeps because his love for mankind is genuine, but that doesn't mean that it necessitates that his will is to save all of mankind?

01:10:22

I mean, let me put it this way. Will God be weeping in eternity? No, in any, well...

01:10:29

Why not? I'm not asking, Lars, I'm not asking you to answer right now.

01:10:36

I'm just asking you to think about it, because fundamentally, I'm hearing an assertion being made that, well,

01:10:44

God, Jesus weeping means that he wanted to do something that he cannot accomplish, rather than Jesus wept, for example, in John 11.

01:10:57

Why? Think about the context of Jesus weeping in John 11. Was it because he was not...

01:11:03

The consequence of sin, right? Exactly, and in fact, those were not those tears within the context of what he was about to accomplish.

01:11:12

He was about to raise Lazarus from the dead, and yet he still wept because he truly entered into our experience of the grief of death and separation because of the existence of sin.

01:11:23

It does not follow, then, that Jesus's tears means that he wanted to do something that he can't accomplish.

01:11:31

Those are not tears of frustration, but they are tears that... They're the same type of tears that the psalmist weeps when he sees

01:11:38

God's law trampled under feet. Okay, so what you're saying, in other words, is that Jesus's tears over Jerusalem are sorrow over the consequence of man's rebellion, but it is not saying that he was trying to redeem

01:11:52

Jerusalem but was not able to. Well, he's going to redeem some there, certainly. I mean, look at Paul and all the other early believers.

01:11:59

But it is not tears of frustration that, oh, I just wish that I could do something that you are not allowing me to do.

01:12:08

That's not what you have in the prophetic message in the Old Testament, and that's not what you have there either. So think those things through,

01:12:14

Lars. We went way, way long, but I do appreciate your call. And believe me, hear one more thing, brother.

01:12:21

I don't—this is not something— I've never told a caller, you need to agree with me on this right now.

01:12:30

You need to drop your resistance to this. This is something that you have to think through. This is something that the

01:12:36

Lord has to convince you of by the testimony of the whole testimony, the whole counsel of God.

01:12:44

Because if I can talk you into something, then someone else can come along and talk you back out of it. Right.

01:12:49

I honestly believe that the reason a person should embrace Reformed theology is because they have seen that the whole counsel of God fundamentally affirms

01:13:02

God's freedom to glorify himself as he sees fit, and that that works out in the way that Reformed theology presents it.

01:13:10

So you keep looking at it. Don't accept any surface -level answers, but also don't accept those people who say, well, you just need to allow for tension in the text.

01:13:22

I think when it comes to this issue, God has spoken clearly, and he'll bring you to that understanding in his way, and no one can force you there any faster than he's going to take you there.

01:13:36

Well, thank you very much, and hopefully I'll call back sometime. All right, thanks. Thank you for your call. God bless. Bye -bye.

01:13:41

All right, thank you very much for sticking with us for the extra almost 15 minutes on Dividing Line today.

01:13:47

But hey, at least we got it through live. Without dropping out, we'll probably lose the internet two minutes after we sign off here.

01:13:54

But Lord willing, we'll be back on Tuesday of next week. Watch the blog, because I need to do something next week, and I'm trying to juggle some stuff as far as weather goes.

01:14:05

So watch the blog. I might need to do some moving around. We'll see how it works out. But thanks for listening today on Dividing Line.

01:14:12

We'll see you next week. God bless. I stand up for the truth

01:15:02

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01:15:08

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