Steve Ray/Gary Michuta

Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line

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

Our host is dr. James White director of Alpha Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church This is a live program and we invite your participation.

If you'd like to talk with dr. White call now 602 nine seven three four six zero two or toll -free across the

United States. It's one eight seven seven seven five three three -three -four -one And now with today's topic here is

James White And good afternoon, welcome to the dividing line on a very very busy

Thursday for those of us around the chat channel and the ministry it has been a

Outlandishly busy day because those you're listening live right now. You already know this fact

I would imagine anyone well know if you if you subscribe by a podcast you might not know about this but if you go to www .aomin

.org Let's just say the world has changed, you know

Some people had said that they appreciated our website because it like the great truths of faith did not change

And I mean

I had hair in 2000 I I looked completely different yes, I did Oh, yeah, it was thinning.

Yes. Come on now, but I still had it. I still had hair in 2000 2001 I'd made Stravinsky's I still

I'd cut it real short, but I still had it And things things have changed

As of today, of course some of us have been looking at this particular template and design for quite some time now, but we've we went live with our new website today and getting a lot of very very high compliments about the website and here comes

Here comes one of the ultra secret web guild now from the from the mailbag

Yes using our new contact page. Oh a new contact page. Yes Ken writes congrats written in Arabic They let me do one thing and look what happens

Congratulations on the new Ken writes Congratulations on the new website when I first opened it this morning.

I thought I was misdirected by my computer Dell Inspiron 1501 Once I figured it was not my computer.

I thought the rapture had happened Either way, I must confess. It looks marvelous in some strange way.

I am going to miss the old blog site By the way, you have made a brother in the Lord stumble a little bit.

I am trying not to covet thy website Great work to all involved and I pray that God will use it as he has the other one

Yes. Well, you know the blog hasn't changed actually it just actually looks a little better and it just got snazzy it got snazzier and it has not changed it at all and So it's same interface for me doesn't look any different for me

Just the final product is a little bit different, but I love the background for those who are wondering

I am about 99 % certain that's Codex Sinaiticus in the background. I'm sure the King James only people go nuts

Devils and stuff like that, but anyway, I think I may have been the one who no

I think I think Mike attract that down, but I tracked down a version of that for myself too, but anyway, so it looks gorgeous and Obviously we are in the process of migrating stuff now

Some of the things that you'll click on especially some of the older things will migrate over Slowly to the new format and it's just sort of how things work

And for those of you wondering why it took us so long as I explained on the blog itself we we've been doing this a while and there's a lot of stuff and When we first started rich was just sort of flying by the seat of his pants

You go out and buy a book on HTML and in fact, I remember when we were on our first server They told him that it was not possible to have a secure shopping cart on their server and rich designed one

Anyways, and then showed him how to do it So the problem is though you do things that way and for a while we used

I know I probably shouldn't say this publicly but for a while we used front page and So that's that creates all sorts of stuff

Behind the scenes it has to be dealt with and that's that's sort of what was great and powerful Microsoft.

Yes So anyway, it's up and if you run across stuff that doesn't work well, let us know and and we'll we'll get to it eventually, but The blog works and that's that's the main thing.

That's it's important there Anyway, one other thing before we take a overseas phone call real quick here is to Mention that For those of you sitting around going.

Well, are you gonna make the announcement again make announcement? We are really really close something big happened today Something exciting.

Let me put this way something happened today that is going to absolutely guarantee the big announcement is going to take place if any of the questions are now gone and We basically only have one thing staying the way right now and Once that one thing is is gone

Then then you now so we made so what that means is watch the blog

Over the weekend and on Monday because you might be seeing something. Okay, just just let you know that you know, maybe who knows but I'm very very excited.

So between the website and that today my goodness It has been absolutely Truly amazing.

What's what's been going on? So it's exciting, but I'm also excited. I Glad to see this because I know who

I'm about to bring on the air is to go all the way over to Okinawa, Japan and say

Greetings, Colonel. I know. How are you, sir? I'm sorry, we we are

Cessationists here on the dividing line and so you'll need to I'm doing real.

Well, let me just mention that I did. Do you remember did I have J on on the deal when he was out here?

That's right, okay. All right, so I I have mentioned moons and many many moons ago My my to then there's the only two marine majors and now colonels who actually like me but Well, okay, but the only two actually okay, there you go, yeah, but I mentioned when when

J was here and and now rich is over in Okinawa, Japan and They're no longer majors.

They're colonels now so I need to salute and do things like that even better than I did before but so you're over in Japan and You're calling in first thing in the morning.

What in the world would cause you to call all the way across the Pacific Ocean? Well, of course, it's you.

I Want actually I I kind of promised that when I had some time off because our son Calvin was just born

I was going to try and call and that never worked out. No, I had a few moments this morning one of our staff meetings got tanked so I decided

I'd give you a call and Live up to my promise and let you put a pincushion. He actually received a call on your program from Japan That's right.

We did and I'm not sure if we had before I'm Rich is rich is shaking his head. So probably not.

So this is a by the way Your website does look really good. I kind of was surprised to see it was active today when

I went to find a phone number Yes, great job on that. And I did want to you know,

I know I can't Just reminisce and take up your time today, but I did want to say

I enjoyed the Conversation with James Renahan the other day. Mm -hmm he

I Enjoy learning about you know Baptist confessions and that sort of thing, you know as you know

I'm on the Puritan board and we have quite a few Reform Baptists so that's one of the confessions the London Baptist that we accept and and I I I'm a big fan of confessional

Baptists one of the things that I've noticed for a while is One of the things

I'm concerned about in the founders movement in the Southern Baptists, in fact, it's that I Mentioned to others is that I'm concerned that Yeah I don't know if what you want to call it naked

Calvinism where people just kind of latch on to the five points and think That they're becoming reformed just because they know what the tulip

Acrostic is and they they can kind of prattle that off and and I I've always noted that that kind of approach doesn't really sustain in the same way that a confessional approach to the scriptures will in terms of just keeping people united and I don't know if you if you've noticed any

Concern there, but I've seen some concern in terms of the type of people even that that try and come into say reformed

Conversations in some cases and they kind of have a solo scriptura approach to being a in calling themselves a

Calvinist and It really makes for lack of unity and lack of ability to kind of work together towards that end

Well, I remember back in 2001. I was speaking shortly after 9 -11 in North Carolina at Colin Smith's Church, and he asked me to speak in the subject five points is not enough or something along those lines and and basically it was a discussion of those elements of reformed theology that go beyond merely

Enunciating the tulip or something like that. There's an entire Hermeneutic there's a there's a entire concept of worship there's an entire concept of the authority of Scripture that normally is not a part of a lot of Evangelical churches and so right, you know people can latch on to those those five points and recognize

Yes, this is biblical teaching but to be balanced then there's there's more that goes into you know

The whole concept of you know, I think it takes time to work the sovereignty of God into into I mean

The fallen man the natural man is opposed to all those things anyways And so it's right, you know

It's something that we we learn and we grow in over time and in the consistent application of the of the principles to the way that we the way we worship and so yeah,

I I fully understand what you're referring to there and And understand that there is

I think a danger we frequently refer to cage stage Calvinists And those are the the

Calvinists who have just you know, they're the ones running around and instead of evangelizing they're whacking everybody over the head with Arthur W.

Pink's the sovereignty of God and Yeah Yeah, I agree in fact one of the things one of the things that you know,

I tend to Southern Baptist Church out here in in Okinawa and you know, I I found that really one of the problems that Calvinism has and I Mike Horton kind of confirmed this to me that Really we do have the scriptures have a powerful message in terms of the in terms of the sovereign grace of God to save us

And if you if you really work with people to help them to understand the scriptures as God initiating grace and showing them how

Romans 5 to 8 Establishes the believer in the surety of his faith that he he may struggle and he may he may

Cry out like who will deliver me from this body of sin, but that his confidence is not that he began a good work himself but that God began it and will complete it to the end and what

I found is that if you if you stay away from you know destroying people destroying people's listening or attention span by by insisting upon terms and Leading with the terms first and going up to somebody and saying are you semi

Pelagian? Are you Calvinist or something like that? And they're like, I don't know what you're talking about I just heard that's evil but if you start with the idea that well, why would you want to give that a surety of your salvation up for something now that rests in the hands of man and I found that a number of people will will embrace

God's Sovereign grace in salvation without even knowing that they're embracing, you know, the categories that we would call

Calvinism, right? Yeah, well as you know my my normal approach with folks is is to go directly to Jesus his own words and and try to establish a person in the word first and foremost and then as they grow then you can use the theological terminology that helps them to understand the interrelatedness of things and stuff like that, but certainly,

I think that if you can argue somebody into a position and it's not based upon the work of the

Spirit making the word to come Someone else to come along and argue him back out again And I've talked to plenty of quote -unquote former

Calvinists and I think that's you know a part of the reason for that So so you're in a church over there now, you're you're not going to be over there forever though.

You're going to be heading back Yeah, I'm coming back this summer and I'm waiting to find out where I'm going

Now how many times have you been in the wonderful sands of the

Middle East Uh, just that one time in 2003, you know, you you actually had a picture of Jay and I on your blog back then

I did and and your spider. I use that for cred every now and again to show that i'm really reformed because I know

James like Yeah, well, yeah, he has less hair than I do yeah, but uh,

Jay and I have shot ak -47s together so that's uh, Yeah that you still haven't been through phoenix yet to get to do that.

So yeah, uh, but uh, but I well Well, yeah, just don't do it in july that's uh, not really a good time that would remind you

That would remind you way too much of uh that place over in the middle east believe me It sounds like you need ak -47.

So based on what you keep saying about where you work No Yeah, I think we need a surge around here personally.

I think that way When you talked about your your big announcement I thought you were going to say it kind of sounded like you know at first like something was happening

Momentous like you were moving and I I kind of for a second thought he was going to say phoenix is becoming too dangerous

I'm moving somewhere I don't know why that first occurred to me. We're moving to bad dad actually You know, actually

I I did want to say what I told you and emailed it I really do appreciate what you're taking on in the uh, the muslim apologetic.

I find it fascinating Um, maybe it's because I get my fill of calvinist discussion already But uh, you know, i'm glad you're doing that I I always find it fascinating when you're taking them apart and showing what they believe because It's sort of a little a conundrum to most of us and it gives us more apologetic tools when we're dealing with them

Well, I really uh coming for me that means a lot and uh, you're thankfully you're not alone in having said that it's been very encouraging

And uh, I just hope everybody remembers that about three years down the road and i'm in the final stretch, you know dissertation preparation and i'm really uh

Strange I come on the dividing line as if i'm not already, but anyway Well, sir, thank you very very much for your phone call and i'm glad Glad you get to listen to the dividing line over there and congratulations on the little one and hope you're sleeping through the night by now

I am but my wife Don't put that on the radio too late All right, thank you god bless all right

Bye -bye That's uh, colonel lino from okinawa japan calling in today and uh,

You can go back actually are the blog archives sort of not up at the moment Uh, i'm not sure. I thought saw some discussion about that.

I'm not sure if they are or not, but um, well They would probably link over to the vintage site Okay, and go down to the bottom but I I know that that's being worked on to try to get that uh, readily available

Yeah, you could uh, you could do a search and track down the uh stuff I put up during the gulf war with uh with the marine majors at that time.

They're up. They're up. Okay, okay Yes, micah tells us that they're up and so if micah says it then it must be true.

So Anyway, uh, once again, uh tremendous. Thanks to the ultra secret web.

Was it the ultra secret web guild? Is that what I called it that would ultra secret web guild? Website guild well website still one word.

So ultra secret website guild which someone I point out is Uswg which someone said what you swig

That's like, okay, never mind, uh, whatever, uh, whatever we're doing there so All right, eight seven seven seven five three three three four one, uh, and adam is calling.

Hi adam Hey, dr. White. Hey, what's going on? Hey, I just wanted to first of all tell you

I really appreciate the Ministry and I I have a lot of respect for you as a scholar and so forth and uh

I saw uh calling in today because I saw your uh, teleplot tomb video. Uh -huh that you posted on there and um,

I wanted to comment on on that I uh actually had the uh, the great privilege of uh taking uh, classes

In a hebrew from a professor here at trinity And dr. James hoffmeyer who's a christian archaeologist

And now this is really weird because earlier today you're going to find this strange adam earlier today

Rich popped into the chat channel and he had a guy on the phone and from from someplace else,

I think um who uh was asking uh had run into a professor who was saying that there's no

Uh external evidence outside of the bible for the exodus and he was and he was asking for resources

And I had given one and then another person in the channel, uh gave your professors um

Uh reference, uh to a book that he had done on that very subject Oh, yeah, and then put the url and channel and I was looking at his bio

Not more than two hours ago and now you call and you took hebrew phone. Isn't that weird? Yeah, oh that is that is weird, but I'm actually going through I had

I had to stop because i've got other classes now But I actually have his book on on that israel and egypt and also

And also, uh, so forth. But anyways, I was I was dialoguing, uh with him. He's a very uh, he's a very uh,

He's been through a lot because he's in a field where um, He gets quite a bit of attacks from the left and so forth

Well almost anybody sadly who is who believes in inspiration who works in the old testament area is going to get that there

The liberals so own the old testament area that you can It's almost like trying to be a promote intelligent design within a biology department.

It's it's almost like you're just not allowed to Oh, yeah, and and uh, and that's one of the neat things being a major in hebrew studies

Here is you get really prepared for that But specifically on the issue of the video you were talking about that We were we were talking about the uh stela that mentioned, uh bait the weed the house of david and uh, the guy in our class was saying that uh

We were that uh, there was a video on pbs saying how that was all a forgery and everything like that And dr.

Hoffman looking he said that was on a controlled xx, you know excavation and he's like that's what That's what they said and they said and he said

I can't believe that even dr Hoffman said something like I can't even believe that saw the light of day and then I came in with uh

I can't even believe this towel pop mess last easter saw the light of day and dr

Hoffman responded with well, I know why that is and i'm like you do And he goes. Oh, yeah, he's like I was actually on before this mess came out.

He said I was on Uh with I think he said simcha yakubovich. Yeah, simcha yakubovich and uh, he uh

He said that that man on this program had nothing to do with it. He said I could not believe

How much of an anti -christian jew this man was? And uh, he's always denied that but uh, his his his biases are are rather glowing.

Yes Yeah, and and I just found it hilarious. You know, this is this was long before You know, dr.

Hoffman said this was before this pop -up mess came out And what was hilarious about the the whole thing?

is uh Is uh, I I watched your video and he's and he said i'm just reporting i'm just presenting the evidence

Yes, if I had a dollar for every time the liberals in the old testament said i'm just reporting the evidence

I could be I could retire right now. Yes, you could I mean, you know, uh, but I just but they're but they're the media darlings

And if you if you even raise the possibility of bias in the analysis

Uh, it's automatically taken as a concession on your part and the other side must be right and so on and so forth

It's just it's just what we're up against That's why we have to do so much of the communication within the church because we're not get the media to help us right so That's that's one of the interesting things.

But anyways, I I thought I would share that story with you Especially in light of your video. Yes, indeed well

I think there's probably gonna be some more of it because uh As easter gets closer you're going to hear more and more of the whole thing

I wouldn't be surprised to see these guys back on, uh, you know the today show and stuff like that So we'll see what happens

Right. Okay. Adam, keep up your hebrew studies. All right. All right. God bless. Bye. Bye 877 -753 -3341.

Let's talk with mike. Hi mike Hi, dr. White doing good Well, yeah good

Good Um, you know for a moment there I thought maybe I would be on topic this time when I was calling but I think

I might be wrong Well, we haven't actually established one yet. So, uh, I think we're probably fairly uh fairly open for the moment.

I've got some stuff to play a little bit later But what's uh, what's up? well, um, i'm gonna bring it right back to the same old topic again again just because I haven't worked all the way through yet, but um, i've been

Pondering over, uh some things lately and uh, I was wanting to know your opinion because I value it and uh

I uh was actually on uh, rc sprawls website and Um, they had off a friend of mine told me to go over there

They're offering a free book and um, I said, oh, well, you know, i'd always like to have one of those and it was something about doing a uh

A review of the book on your blog So I started a blog and uh

Uh, my first uh post on there was asking the question Um, well, let me let me say like this when

I present um the gospel to an unbeliever or Um, or the concept of god to an atheist basically, uh, or the idea that they wouldn't agree with um, they would object and say uh, you know, no, how could

I believe in This god that you that you're, uh, you know claiming to be true if if he's such a brutal, um unloving you know tyrannical type person or being um and I i've had

I've had a problem thinking through this whole idea when you present someone with Who god is that who claims to be a christian?

and uh You you speak of god's sovereignty or um his plan the election of his people and uh, just his plan in saving his people and I mean specific plans that he has uh concerning those things the doctrines of great grace basically and they uh, they reject these things and they say no god's not like that and he uh,

Basically just allows things he stands back passively uh while we do our thing and he might you know, just guide things along and as the time goes on and just make sure they come to the end and I was actually in a class with a

With a professor of mine who who was explaining these things and I asked him I said you know, really what's

What's the difference? I'm sorry. I'm having a problem with seeing what the difference between that is and open theism and uh

You know, he gave me an idea, you know He gave me his uh idea of how it's different, which I didn't quite see, but how

Do you suppose that uh someone who would reject these things of god

Are are not just totally rejecting god Well, I a couple things. Um, sometimes they are

I mean, let's One of the one of the problems that we face In a lot of evangelical churches today is the idea that we just Automatically give credence to any profession of faith, even if there's nothing

That comes along with it. No changed life. No obedience to the word of god things like that. And so um, some some of the people who respond so strongly may well not be christians, uh,

That's certainly a possibility and when we see former christians and see people joining other religions and things like that Um, that's a clear indication that uh, you know, first john 2 is still relevant

They went out from us so it might be demonstrated. They were not truly of us and so there is that aspect of it, but You you generally don't just automatically assume that if someone disagrees with something you say

Uh that's uh, they're automatically an unbeliever because they disagree the question becomes is there?

Uh, is there demonstrated a a true desire? To Live and believe in accordance with the word of god that really is the issue people can be ignorant or people can come from a

Background that gives them some major hurdles to get over there can be some experiences in their life

Uh that may have something to do with uh with some of the hurdles they have to get over And it's a matter of sanctification.

It's a matter of uh, Growing in the grace and knowledge of the lord jesus christ. And so I know of people who who struggled against uh

The sovereignty of god and struggled against a recognition of of god's power and authority and his right as the creator uh who today embraced those things some of them went through a process where they

Embraced those things because they had to but they didn't like it and only over time Came did these things come to be precious in their in their estimation things like that.

So um the difference would be whether there is Uh, you know and i've talked to we have these folks pop into channel all the time these these people have absolutely positively not the first desire uh whatsoever to uh

Stop their rebellion to to be instructed out of the word of god to submit themselves to anything

That attitude among you know from an atheist or a quote -unquote agnostic or just your plain old unbeliever

Is very easily recognized when it comes to a quote -unquote christian Uh, there are obviously certain questions that you can ask that will

I think unmask a similar attitude uh, and maybe on issues that are not quite as um,

Shall we say Disagreeable or don't necessarily bring up the same level of of argumentation

Concerning moral issues god's right to determine the morality of our lives. I've found that there's frequently a complex there

It's not just the sovereignty of god over salvation It's also the sovereignty of god to determine what is moral and what is not moral

Uh what the church should and should not do? Uh, you can determine that fairly easily by by you know asking questions as to whether this person really does have a desire to be obedient to the word of god and uh, if they do not then there's room for exhortation and and correction and if that remains the case then you have a you know, obviously some ground to be very concerned about the person's eternal state, but I do believe that a respect for the word of god and desire to be obedient to the word of god

Comes with regeneration. I believe that the spirit of god Causes us to recognize the voice of the shepherd and to to hear that in the word of god and so a person who

Really does not have any interest in those things is a person that I think is is truly in grave danger

But I think we need to extend as as much um Patience as we possibly can on that level

And the sense of making sure that we have explained what we're talking about Uh as clearly as possible because sometimes it might just be the way we're presenting it not to the actual belief itself and so Sometimes that's why having two or three witnesses is good as sometimes those other witnesses

Express things better than we do or at least in a different way So that can help a lot too.

Okay well, I certainly want to continue to be patient with people and I I want to I don't mean to put you on the spot or anything, but um one example that I can think of one that really

Has caused me to to really have a problem with this issue is Uh, I know of a person from my hometown um who grew up a muslim and uh

You know was converted, uh in his teenage years and his father uh, like disowned him and uh

I mean he continued uh, I mean he he got really close with the pastor, uh, the church that he was at and then

Um when someone did confront him with these things or tried to discuss these things with him uh, he he was very uh

Should I say, uh, irate and uh, not very Um christ -like in his response or should

I say reaction? Uh to the things that were presented to him well this person just happens to be someone you had some interaction with in the past Okay, that's not not ringing any bells, but do do realize that uh, uh, especially in a situation

Where you have a former muslim you can have all sorts of uh issues at that point regarding um their understanding of what you're saying the frequently they will retranslate what you're saying into Muslim categories a lot of people for example mentioned, uh that uh, eric and canner's responses to me

Seemed to indicate that he was uh translating everything I was saying into islamic categories of fatalism and things like that and uh, so Oh, well, actually that's what

I was referring to. Oh, well, I wondered if it wasn't but uh, Uh, you know and I I don't know how many probably at least a dozen people wrote to me during that entire debacle and uh said have you have you given consideration to the idea that possibly canner is uh, just so prejudiced, uh against uh khadar and That concept within islam that he all he can hear is you saying the same thing

I said, yeah, I have given consideration to that and that's why my approach is always very much a biblical approach and um, you know,

I try to differentiate those things as strongly as possible, but uh, yeah, that's that's possibility and uh, but you know when it when it comes to someone like uh, like eric and canner, you know,

I I think the best that we can do in this life is to Speak the truth and love speak it firmly speak it clearly when you have the opportunity of correcting someone who's in error

Doing so and then leaving the rest to god. I mean, I cannot look into the man's heart Uh, he does things that just just I I roll my eyes when

I see him being tased um in the uh in the liberty chapel, uh,

And then making a lame connection to something, you know, uh and calling that preaching. I I I look at that and I just shake my head

But you know what? Um There's that's not what i've been called to make changes.

I can only uh do what i've been called to do So I just have to try to make a the strongest contrast

I can Uh, you know i'm addressing islam too and i'll be perfectly honest with you.

I i'm I don't want this to sound wrong, but I I hope he does not uh engage in debates with uh with islamic apologists because having

Uh looked at some of his materials and how he engages in debates. I think it would be a disaster

The the man was converted age 13, I believe and i'm sorry, but uh anyone

Uh Anybody who came along and claimed to be an expert in christianity because they were christian up to age 13

And then became a muslim all the rest of us sit around going. What are you talking about? Uh, what do you mean?

You're an expert because you were raised as a christian up to age 13, you know We wouldn't give the person, you know a second thought but uh, since it's the other way around for some odd reason.

Um, Folks, uh give that credibility. So I don't know it's uh, it's an amazing thing. But anyhow.

All right, mike. Thanks for your call Thank you, sir. All right. God bless Well what I wanted to get to today and I thank everybody for their phone calls

Uh, very interesting and as always a wide variety of subjects addressed on the dividing line Uh was uh wanting to make sure the phone lines are open for another, um, 25 minutes

For all of the kind folks, uh who have been leaving comments on the youtube videos

In regards to the steve ray gary machuda situation and I happened for the first time in months

Months, and it's all algo's fault um But uh, I happened on to the envoy web board as well.

I had not looked there in ages Uh art sippo, you know had started his own blog and so you you could get all the the zaniness you wanted

Uh distilled down to one brief portion of insanity right there on his blog

So it was you know, it was real easy didn't have to go through web boards are boring to read, you know

They're they're it's difficult formatting and stuff like that So I hadn't gone there for ages, but then I think the last time he blogged was like in july or something.

So anyway, I went to the um I went to the uh envoy web board to see what gary machuda was saying and some other people were saying and And uh, that's just again, uh as is the norm here

If you dare open your mouth and say anything, it doesn't matter what you say It doesn't matter whether you back up what you say.

It doesn't matter where you provide Citation after it doesn't matter if you're quoting the jerome bible commentary, which of course is sold by these various organizations

In their libronics library setup in the catholic study bible stuff. It does not matter

It is the very and i've just i've experienced this now since 1989 and that is

I was one of the first people at least with catholic answers to respond to them

Using church history now, obviously it wasn't just church history. But in other words, I didn't allow them to just Uh waltz all over us as most protestants do

Uh when it comes to the issue of church history, I dared to challenge them with citations and when you challenge these folks um with any citations of church history, they go nuts and You can see this reading the commentaries that have been left

I had to delete one because it was something about the bald snake had slithered into youtube and stuff like that And it was just uh, just you know fell a little bit below the the level but uh still plenty of uh

Plenty of the nastiness that we saw last summer. Remember what happened last summer with jimmy aiken and stuff like that Uh who used to be a big blogger, but now you go to that blog and there's almost nothing going on there uh, but um

Wanted to make sure you know, uh, i've left the comments on my youtube stuff And everybody's like you don't have comments on your blog

You won't give us you won't turn your website into a place for us to post nasty insults of you uh, yeah, but I left comments on youtube and Uh, then

I tried to leave a response on gary machuda's video um where I invited people to call and it never appeared

I don't know I don't know what happened to it, but Oh, well, uh, so the phone lines are open eight seven seven seven five three three three four one for all of you who have been saying oh steve ray's scholarship is

Exemplary and it's been defended yet once again uh, well, um, here's your chance um, and I'll tell you what since it takes time to um,

To dial that number. Let's listen to to that phone call. Let's listen to the whole thing again and Listen to it all at once so you can hear exactly why?

when I first started, uh listening to this catholic answers program I got to this point And I was

I I said in channel. I said I can't believe he just said this This this is unbelievable

And so I sent some other people in the channel to go listen to it and all of them who knew anything about church history Are going

I can't what what? Why didn't somebody stop him? Why didn't somebody correct him?

Well, and then when I did, uh, Well, everything broke loose. So let's let's listen to the phone call from uh from steve that came in, uh, a week ago

Monday, uh to catholic answers live for steve ray on the subject of jerome.

Here we go My question is about saint jerome and I know you had kind of mentioned him before a little bit and i've heard that he was uh,

Some people claim him to be kind of a rogue and that he got shunned away from rome and then he actually kind of believed in the protestant notion that the deuterocanonical books were

Were not inspired and shouldn't be in the bible. Is that true? Yes, first of all, the reason that he gives for leaving rome was that he could not get the dancing girls out of his mind

And he said that rome was so wicked that he was tempted to These things would be going through his mind instead of the scriptures and prayer and in order to try and get all the

Images of the dancing girls out of his mind. He moved out to the deserts of bethlehem where he said they continued to haunt him

So, you know the saints are a lot like us um in many ways, but that's he went out there to for the austerity of it and to Translate the bible from the hebrew and the greek into the latin and yes, he tended to go to the point

Of the of not accepting the deuterocanonicals as part of the canon of scripture

He was an exception by the way, he stood out from all the other fathers And there's an excellent book i'm going to suggest that you get by a good friend of mine named gary mishudda

And it's called why catholic bibles are bigger And it's a very easy read and he gives all of the documentation

About jerome and so on what happened is jerome went to the east and he was there with the jews in israel

And he accepted the hebrew canon the jewish canon that the that the those who spoke hebrew were using

And the but the whole church as a whole was using the greek Septuagint of the canon which included all of the deuterocanonical books

And in fact i'll just close with this jerome even used the deuterocanonical books as scripture and my friend

Book why catholic bibles are bigger shows that that even towards the end of his life Jerome was still using the deuterocanonical books as scripture so He did cause a bit of problem there

But he was unique and he was alone in that and the whole vast Witness of the rest of the church did include the deuterocanonicals and by the way

They weren't even taken out of protestant bibles until the 1800s Yeah All right.

Thank you very much. You're welcome. Jason. Thanks for the call Well, uh, there you go played the whole thing including the advertisement for gary machuda's book

So you can hear the whole thing. Did he what was the question that was asked did?

Jerome believe that the deuterocanonicals were inspired and should be a part of the bible

And steve ray In responding said that he was alone and unique in that viewpoint

And that all the rest of the church fathers held to the deuterocanonicals

Now if if you had not been watching the videos i've been putting up if you hadn't been doing reading

And you heard that or let's put yourself in the position of the standard listener

To catholic answers live and That means you're going to give credibility

To steve ray steve ray has written a number of books uh, ignatius press puts out steve ray's books

He has made all sorts of movies about the early church fathers

In fact, we have time i'll go back and play some of his comments there because you may have noticed i've put videos up um comparing very clearly

The mishandling of ignatius, for example by steve ray with a dividing line we did

Back in 2004 almost four years ago now where I was teaching a seminary level class

On the special topics in patristics and we went through Uh the section the letter to the smirnians by ignatius provided the contrast there

You can either watch all five of those videos on my youtube thing or just wait for each friday between now and the end of february

It'll appear on the blog. So, uh, whichever way you want to do that, but provide a lot of response those things

But the average catholic is going well, you know This guy's putting out movies And films and books and he's being promoted and I didn't

I didn't hear catholic answers say anything there. I didn't hear uh, uh, Jerry usher go.

Well, you you know steve. Um That that doesn't seem quite. Um, you know, uh, that's not what i've heard, you know, uh in other in other context

No, I didn't hear any of that And so what's the person going to believe when they hear that what was steve ray's point steve ray answered a question

That asked him whether jerome believed the deuterocanonicals were inspired in a part of the bible and he said yes but He even tried to modify that by saying but he sort of contradicted himself in essence

And that he was unique and alone and the whole broad rest of the witness of the early church embraced those books

Now that's false That's not even arguable that that there that is not even an arguable point

I mean immediately I cited the jerome bible commentary Which is a roman catholic source?

Which listed a number of people prior to jerome Who likewise held what's called the hebrew canon the shorter can the can that protestants hold to?

Which does not include the deuterocanonical books which included melito of sardis at the end of the second century

It included athanasius in his 39th festal letter from 367 And others serial of jerusalem,

I haven't yet produced the video on that that has his Statements or hillary's statements and we haven't even gotten to jerome yet.

But uh, uh It's just inarguably false And it is indicative

I think of the state of modern pop catholic apologetics That as i've said many times as long as it serves mother rome

You can say anything you want. It doesn't matter if you contradict other catholic apologists It doesn't matter if you contradict catholic scholarship as long as it serves mother rome all as well

And that's what we're seeing here now, I don't know why gary mchudda decided to um

Sacrifice himself upon the altar of steve ray because that's what he did. I mean when he produced that that Video where he accuses me of false statements and half trues and misrepresentations and all the rest of stuff

Um i'm not done Yet refuting every single thing.

He said it's not difficult to do I mean talk about just completely sacrificing yourself

Just throwing yourself out there in front of the bus saying i'll take this one for you steve I don't know. Does he does steve have something on gary?

I don't know Just good buds there. I'll take this one steve. I don't know but all

I can say is okay If you want to give me the opportunity of documenting

Over and over and over and over again that no one should bother buying your book

Um, okay fine Uh, you know set up spike. Oh, it's over with you know, that's that's that's easily done

And so far we've looked at melito We've looked at athanasius And I honestly believe that if you could find unbiased people

To compare what mishuda put out and what I responded with um, there hasn't been an argument there either

There hasn't even been a contest It's been black and white real simple one side has

All the scholarship on its side including catholic and orthodox In reading the same documents in the same way

One side has the original languages and the original sources and the other guy doesn't and that's how it's been so far and uh, so I don't understand it.

But uh, it's not the first time this kind of thing has happened and in general what normally happens when you challenge these folks is they find some reason to Um go do something else and until you move on to another subject basically

You know, uh last year, uh with the uh, the beckwith situation Uh, you had jimmy aiken uh, you know

Jimmy aiken who's always posting stuff on science fiction and things like that and humorous things and stuff like that.

He he can't figure out Uh that a a photoshopped picture of the the muslims, uh going after salman rushti

He couldn't figure out the parallel between that and what was going on in regards to roman catholics

Uh demanding that i'd be more charitable to roger beckwith while calling me a heretic, you know Sorry, but he knew exactly what

I was saying He knew exactly why it was right on right on the nose But he used that as his excuse to no longer deal with the actual issues

Of the things that uh, did I say roger beckwith frank beckwith? I kept probably kept saying roger beckwith because i've had his book out sitting on my desk recently my apologies frank beckwith

I don't know where roger beckwith is these days But his book the old testament can the new testament church is an excellent read on this particular subject rather dry

But an excellent read on this subject, but uh, it's not the first time that it's happened and a lot of these folks just There's there's something about a keyboard

That makes you say stupid things and this is true for all of us, isn't it? But it's even more true for others Uh the anonymity of the keyboard the fact that you don't hear your voice.

I don't know what it is, but remember guardian Remember guardian, uh, you know, uh, all these lies that uh, james white all these lies

So so I called him on it he calls up well Give me 90 days to put it together

And then we get to the night and night is well i've been moving So well, you'll get it and we're now, you know about another 90 days past that and uh, it ain't gonna happen because He didn't have anything in mind when he said it.

He was just blowing his top and he hasn't had Uh the intestinal fortitude to go well, okay, I was just you know blowing my top

Uh happens all the time happens all the time. That's why the phone lines are still dead uh right now and and remain dead and will remain dead because the same folks who sit behind a keyboard and go

Oh, you're mean and terrible and horrible nasty. They will not call in because they know that i'm going to ask direct questions

I'm going to say okay If you're going to call me And say that I am uh purveying false statements

Then let's have the false statement and let's look at the original documents. Shall we? Let's look at the original context, you know

I mean I say when gary mishuda tells the world that athanasius said his canon was not altogether accurate

Gary mishuda is misreading athanasius There is nothing in what he said that is supportive of this idea and My reading of athanasius is the reading of the drum bible commentary and of the eastern orthodox and of protestant scholarship, too

And so the reason that we should read it like gary mishuda says is exactly what?

from the text And I can go into the text and say see here. He here he gives his list He says these are the fountains of salvation.

No man should add to these Then he goes and talks about the deuteroconicals. He makes the clear distinction

He does not say oh, um, you know what I just gave you really wasn't all that accurate. Let me expand on it

In no way shape or form does he does does he do this? It is a gross misreading of His text and it's one that I don't know of anybody else who's read it that way

Uh, so i'm not i'm not uh, idiosyncratic here anything along line these lines uh, but um, i'm just you know, giving you exactly what uh, what the text says

And so, uh, well, that's interesting. I wonder uh I'm wondering if our visitor and channel right now isn't uh, isn't a muslim

Since I was addressing that particular issue in the last response to akhmed didat

We have someone in um In channel jesus is the god man

He has two natures that is human nature dire is god nature and if you say human nature Then how can that save anyone is the exact error?

Uh that akhmed didat makes because he does not recognize the hypostatic union

And allow that to factor into the situation And he is presenting the exact same false dichotomy uh, that was uh, very much a part of Akhmed didat's presentation too.

So maybe we get done with the dividing line here. I can jump in channel and Address that particular subject with him

Uh, but I would be interested if someone in channel would ask, uh, the gentleman if he is, uh, if he is a muslim uh, because we're only about eight minutes out from the end of the program and we can

Uh, certainly, uh be be ready to talk to him or if he'd like to call um, and uh and ask the question, uh, because uh, you know,

I spent quite some time explaining it in two videos So so far, but it I I think part of the reason that muslims have a hard time hearing it

Uh is because a lot of christians don't really think that way. In fact, interestingly enough, I suppose I should make mention

Um, that's what I discussed in the bible study last evening at phoenix foreign baptist church was the hypostatic

Union and why it is relevant to us. Why is it it is important and in fact how it impacts the entirety of the christian faith

And even on a daily level, uh, that is I described its relationship to the gospel atonement uh to to Christ role as our high priest uh, the texts in hebrews that talk about his understanding our weaknesses and things like that all go back to the issue of The hypostatic union and what we believe jesus christ was according to scripture and I started that discussion

Uh from uh the basis of uh, first corinthians chapter two and paul's description of jesus as The lord of glory and he's talking about the rulers this age and he says that they would not have crucified the lord of glory

And here you have I think one of the key texts that shows the new testament writers view jesus in this fashion

And that is that they utilize a term crucified which is obviously only relevant to the physical body and yet Uh, they say they that he crucified they crucified the lord

They would not have crucified the lord of glory. And so lord of glory clearly, uh, the glorious lord lord the same term used for Jehovah in the in the greek septuagint.

So the glorious lord a term of deity and yet the crucifixion is uh predicated of one person and this division of the natures in the question that's being asked by uh, the gentleman in um

He says he's studying islam, but is not a muslim says I have no religion Therefore, uh

That question Hopefully we'll stay around till uh till after uh after the program's over and as soon as it's over i'll i'll run into channel and And chat with him, uh the same time so we'll we'll do that But anyway, uh, so my plans are to continue uh going back to our subject to continue the discussion of uh, mr.

Machuda's video Next we'll look at other people before jerome Uh that likewise held this viewpoint further demonstrating the error of steve ray's statement

And then we'll look at jerome And then uh already I think uh, you know,

I might put up a video about this or not. I might just link to it Uh, but carrie over at uh at james swan's blog has done a great job in uh interacting with uh, gary machuda's materials regarding the council of trent

Uh, he took exception Uh to my noting that there was a vote taken in regards to the canon discussions

That demonstrated the deep divisions now, I almost laughed as soon as I saw this Because it was how long ago was it now?

I think it's less than a month Well, I might have been right at a month Uh that it was machuta who was raising the issue

Of whether me and james swan are contradicting each other because machuta pointed out

That james swan was talking about The various of the uh leaders at the council of trent and how they're

There was these divisions between them and he was saying well, uh, james white quoted from uh,

I think it was westcott Uh who said that there was no one there known for their learning and now james swan saying this man

He was and of course that man opposed the deuteron canonicals. So he knows there was divisions

He knows that kayatan was not alone And that there were other people who likewise held that viewpoint and the vote

Demonstrates the divisions that existed Amongst even the small number of prelates at the council of trent

He says oh, but the final vote was unanimous. Oh, well, yeah uh, that's that's sort of like, uh, you know when the tin horn dictator in the mid in the in the central america, uh

Claims he gets 98 of the vote because he's the only person on the ballot I'm sure what the other two percent was but we don't know who voted because they're dead.

Uh, but uh, yeah Oh, that's that's Is that supposed to mean something? That fine once the vote's taken one side wins then you all get together and say, okay

Well, we all stand together that mean that has just as much relevance to what I was talking about as looking at vatican one

And recognizing that there were people who came into vatican one with strong Disagreements disagreements including john henry carlin newman

About the whole idea of defining papal infallibility And then afterwards they basically shut their mouths and said well, you know what the church says is what

I believe and uh, Uh, is is that relevant to the documentation that prior to vatican one?

There were people who disagreed who held a different view And my point all along had been this is a clear perspective uh that uh was

Represented in church history up to the time of the council of trent It was there.

There's no question about it Uh, and it preceded jerome and followed after jerome

It wasn't just jerome that did this it seems to be machuta's argument that it's uh, People just following up jerome and that's what happened there.

Anyway. Hey, thanks again for listening to dividing line today. Thanks to our callers Thanks to everybody who's been uh hitting the website today and going hey, that's nice We will be back next tuesday and my advice to you is you might want to tune in.

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