Catching Up on Topics on Today’s DL

Alpha & Omega Ministries

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01:03

And good afternoon, welcome to The Dividing Line. I have absolutely no monitor whatsoever, so I don't know what's going on, but it's good to have you with us.

01:13

Oh, there's a monitor. It's all pixelated and the music's still behind me. I don't know why we're doing it. You just having a slow day out there?

01:19

Just too much stuff at once? Two things, huh? I haven't gotten into that multitasking thing yet, huh?

01:25

That's good. All right. We're off to a good start here. That's better.

01:31

There we go. We got this working. I know we haven't done this very often, so new stuff to you.

01:41

Just a quick note to everybody. I've seen a few people on Twitter going, where are you going to be in Spain?

01:48

We want to come see you and stuff like that. No. You'll be able to see me, but you don't have to go anywhere other than to turn on your television, because this is the exact same situation that we had last

02:02

February 2014, when Michael Brown and I flew over to Spain to record the two debates we did on healing and on the extent of the atonement.

02:17

So the debate with the Jesuit scholar, I believe is live.

02:23

Well, of course it's live, because they're taking phone calls. It has to be live. So it'll be live on Revelation TV, April 15th.

02:29

That'll be a good thing for you to feel better after sending Uncle Barack all that money that he'll use to promote all sorts of evil in the world.

02:41

It'd be a good thing to get your mind off of that. So of course, if you're watching in Europe, you didn't do that, but you have just as much tax as going to other stupid stuff.

02:49

So anyways, that'll be on live on Revelation TV. And of course they eventually post that on YouTube as well.

02:56

And I am going to be doing some other stuff. In fact, I'm a little worried. They've got me doing a late night thing and an early morning thing.

03:04

And I'm not sure where the sleep part goes in between the two of them. But I'll be recording some other stuff while I'm there.

03:13

But I don't know when that airs or stuff like that. So heading to Spain on Sunday, get back next week, might be able to sneak a program in on Friday, possibly, maybe.

03:25

But probably not from over there, I would assume.

03:32

So also one other quick note, I've gotten a lot of people have sent me the most recent

03:41

Simca Yakubovich story. What's this one called?

03:47

A geologist claims stats and science prove Jesus buried in Jerusalem with wife and supposed son.

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Then, of course, you read the subtitle. Canadian Israeli filmmaker. Oh, warning.

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Journalist and geo archaeologist claim they've reached a scientific and theological breakthrough.

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Well, you know, Simca Yakubovich member back in 2007.

04:16

Where is my there? It is. Back in 2007. Yep, 2007.

04:24

I wrote an entire book in what was it, 16 days. I put the somewhere in the, yeah, 16 days.

04:36

Writing a book in 16 days is a challenge. So yeah, 16 days. And it's only 152 pages long, something like that.

04:44

So yeah, 152 pages. But yeah, there it is right there. But from Toronto to Emmaus is what it's titled.

04:54

The Empty Tomb and the Journey from Skepticism to Faith. And it thoroughly debunks the

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Talpiot tomb stuff, demonstrates that it's based upon using third and fourth century

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Gnostic Gospels as absolute linchpins in the argumentation. It's just it's just dumber than a bag of rocks.

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I mean, it's just so we did this long ago. And was because they appeared on Good Morning America with what was the guy that did

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Titanic and and the Blue People thingy movies,

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James Cameron appeared with James Cameron. And they're showing these ossuaries and stuff like that.

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And I mean, oh, it was it was big, you know, until you bought the book and then started reading it and realized it was just a massive pile of hooey.

05:58

But he made his money. He has popped up with other silly, stupid stuff over the years since then.

06:07

And now I guess he figures pretty much like most of our politicians figure that eight years.

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Who remembers anything from eight years ago? I mean, wow. Wow. Eight years happens to be two electoral cycles.

06:25

Well, that's a presidential electoral cycle. That seems to work. So he's back.

06:32

And with a, you know, I don't know how you could get any more discredited than Simca Yakubovich.

06:39

I really don't know. I don't know how you could do it. But there's always a market for gullible people.

06:49

And so when you see that kind of stuff, just keep that in mind that there's always a market for gullible people.

06:57

I was going to say, are you sure that wasn't subtitled wash, rinse, repeat? It seems to be. Seems to be.

07:03

And I'm not he'll he'll make a he'll make some more money off of it. You know, maybe needed to, you know, plan stuff out.

07:10

The mortgage payment was going to make it. So we come up with a new a new spin. But just just be aware of that kind of stuff is is out there and and be ready to be skeptical.

07:20

Be very, very skeptical. Since we did two Radio Free Geneva's last week and then.

07:32

Tuesday of this week had all sorts of this incredible cultural collapse stuff to talk about, which is ongoing.

07:44

Again, I you know, I don't get to scoop Dr. Moeller very often.

07:53

I don't know if you've heard, but yesterday I think it was yesterday morning. It was yesterday morning. I mean, he he said theology matters, always matters.

08:03

It always, always, always matters. I mean, it was just just just, you know, obviously has decided that my my copyright claim on that is is utterly bogus and hence is just going to run with it, just run with it.

08:21

So that's the way things are in a Genesis three world. And I'm not really sure that that's going to lead to human flourishing.

08:29

But we can we can too can play that game.

08:35

Let's say that. But anyway. If you want to keep up with stuff, you've got to listen to the briefing, because I don't know when he records that thing.

08:44

I mean, I've downloaded it at four thirty in the morning. So even earlier than that, he must he just doesn't sleep.

08:51

But he was noticing that he was noting the Time magazine issue and just the the reality that we have moved so far beyond anything that that for most of our perspectives is even repairable.

09:14

I mean, you you're it's it's to the point where you well, he mentioned and I could tell it was tacked on right at the end of the briefing.

09:24

You can you can almost hear the edit to expand it. The Obama administration coming out and saying that they were going to be proposing legislation to ban reparative therapy for in regards to homosexuality.

09:41

Now, no matter what you think about that, it just amazes me how many people there are in this country that have completely lost any sense of what liberty is.

09:56

Any sense of freedom and are willing to say the government should be able to force you to think this way and think that way.

10:04

And everybody needs to walk lockstep. I mean, it's like. When when do we start calling each other comrade is what

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I need to find out. I mean, it's just I don't even

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I don't even know what to say. It is it is amazing. I mean, fundamentally, this attack upon reparative therapy.

10:29

Is motivated by the fact that homosexuals are nothing, nothing angers homosexuals more than an ex -gay.

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And more and more of them are popping up. More and more of them are putting out videos.

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There's all sorts of testimonies of people. And they just they just they can't allow for that.

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They cannot allow for that. It's a complete denial of their fundamental assertion.

11:03

And that is God made me this way. I cannot be changed and I will not be changed.

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And anyone who changes. Is challenging my story.

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And so there are a few things that make make homosexuals more angry than someone who says, you know,

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I've been there. I know what you're feeling. And yet there's a way out.

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And no, no, no. Can't cannot be cannot be. So the very idea of the very idea that someone would even want to seek assistance, even want to seek help.

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No, no, no. You can't. You can't do that. These people are complete totalitarians. You just need to understand that they they have no problem using the force of law to force everybody to celebrate their lifestyle.

11:54

They have no problem with it at all. And the the gullible, simplistic millennials that go along with them don't realize that when you allow that for somebody else,

12:05

I don't mind that. Yeah, go ahead and force those Christians to celebrate homosexuality. I think it's great. You need to realize once you've given the government that power, then they can do that to you, too.

12:14

And eventually they will. But these folks probably couldn't identify the

12:20

Stasi or the KGB or anything like that, their life depend on anyways, that's requires you to take history classes anyway.

12:29

Had to deal with that stuff on on Tuesday, and like I said, even more stuff has developed since then, which meant that we did not have the opportunity to.

12:42

Look at the Kenyan story. It's amazing how fast these things pass.

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Have you noticed that how many people can even remember where? The little children.

12:56

The mass killing of the little children was and how long ago it was. It was only a matter of months ago.

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It was in Pakistan, but. It's just it's so often now it's so common now that, you know, you get a week out and it's like, oh, we moved on to something else, you know.

13:22

Maybe somebody will dig something up about some more deleted emails from Hillary's private email server or something, but we just move on to something else.

13:31

One hundred and forty seven students. Kenyan students shot by al -Shabaab terrorists, almost every single one of them shot in the back of the head.

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And as soon as the real story started coming out, I knew. As soon as I saw a couple mentions of this,

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I said, I'll bet you anything. You know, some of the some of the news outlets said they they asked students to recite a

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Muslim prayer and they couldn't and they executed them. And I knew what it was. They they demanded the

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Shahada. And so I started digging around for news sources that might have some knowledge of Islam and lo and behold, that's exactly that's exactly what happened.

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There's a horrific picture online taken from up on the second floor of a particular room where there's at least 70 people sprawled out on the floor and they've all been shot in the back of the head, close range execution style.

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And they had all been asked to repeat the Shahada. And if they didn't know it, they died.

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That's it. And they were specifically targeted for being Christians. Now, as with all of these, the automatic response is anger and disgust.

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And, you know, sure, I'm glad they went to their reward. You know, their bodies have been found and they were shot and they were killed.

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And and oh, well, at least there's some justice, not really. But. But the reality is what bothers me.

15:25

I mean, there's also so many things that are just so completely wrong about this. But what bothers me is imagine for a second, just just just imagine for a second.

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If a situation developed where gunmen went into a school in Saudi Arabia and lined students up and stood behind them and said, quote,

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John 316. And if they couldn't splatter their brains all over the place like they did to these 147 students.

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Now, I'm not talking about the hypocrisy of the world's press, because, oh, yeah, that would be that would be all over the place that, you know, there would be, you know, massive coverage of that.

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I'm not talking about that. What I'm asking you to think about is if that happened, if a group of four or five gunmen went into a school in Saudi Arabia, killed 147

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Muslims because they couldn't quote the Nicene Creed or John 316 or something like that, and they used a specific.

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Biblical something that's that's that's central to Christian experience as their means of detecting their victims, what would the result be?

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Amongst Christians around the world, the blogosphere would explode.

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It would explode. With. All sorts of Christian leaders and laypeople not only condemning the action, but very strongly saying these individuals were not

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Christians. No believer in Jesus Christ is going to behave in this fashion.

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This is not Christian behavior. These men were not Christians. They were hate mongers. They're under the wrath of God.

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It would be everywhere. Could we imagine a time, however, where it's not happened once?

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It's not happened twice. It's happened five thousand times.

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It just it's every few weeks. Another slaughter, another massacre, another atrocity.

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Might it get to the point eventually? Where the response would become less and less and less?

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Well, I suppose it could, but I could not imagine a time when it would be overly difficult at all to Google the most recent massacre and find clear, compelling condemnations of those types of outrageous activities.

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Now, the fact is that there are many

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Muslims and I don't get any brownie points for this and we aren't going to get a single donation from anybody for my pointing this out.

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But there are many Muslims. Whose stomachs are turned.

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By the idea of using the Kalima, the words of the

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Shahada as your test case before you blow people's brains out.

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I am thankful that they are disgusted by that and I just have to assume that the reason

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I don't see more outrage is because this kind of thing just has been going on for so long now.

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And so many tens and hundreds of thousands of people have died at the hands of these militant

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Muslims that I think a lot of the non -militant Muslims are like, we've condemned all this before.

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Though again, I can't imagine how you could ever get to the point to be honest with you.

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Where especially upon hearing something like this, that you would not be just completely incensed by this activity.

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And there needs to be an acknowledgement on the part of many of my Muslim friends that there are far, far, far too many people who claim the name of Islam who would never engage in this type of activity.

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Never do it. However, they do not condemn the ones who do.

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They do not condemn the ones who do. To my

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Muslim friends who say no, this is not appropriate.

21:16

This is not right. Where are the entire videos? Where are the entire books providing clear, compelling, powerful refutation of the theology of the fiqh, the interpretation of Hadith and Sharia that are utilized by ISIS and Boko Haram and Al -Shabaab and all these militant, murderous, satanic groups.

21:57

That's the only way to describe them. Why I've, and some of you will have to confirm this because I've said it to you.

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Why isn't, why aren't the most popular books on the shelves of Islamic bookstores today, refutations of this kind of activity?

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I think it's something y 'all need to be talking about, doing something about.

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I know y 'all say, well, sure, this group over here condemned it. There's always the condemnations.

22:37

Well, where are, you know, I linked a little while back when the, when the

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Coptic Christians were killed on the seashore. I linked to a

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Sunni cleric arguing against ISIS. And the few of you who maybe made it all the way through had to be pinching yourself to do so because it was boring.

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It was not compelling. It was not exciting. It was clearly not the kind of presentation that's gonna have any impact at all upon the target audience at all.

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The closest I've seen anything was something from Norway that Yasir Qadhi did. I mean, at least

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Yasir Qadhi is, is passionate and he's bold. And that was, what, over a year ago?

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How many attacks have taken place since then? It just, as I, as I looked down at that floor and those, and they were all sprawled out, they had been shot in the back of the head, because people, the body lands in a certain way when that happens.

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And you just know that they had been asked to say the Shahada right before they died.

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And I could say it, but I wouldn't, by God's grace.

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I can say it and say it properly. But the, the use of that kind of,

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I mean, I've heard entire sermons on the glory of the Shahada, the glory of the Kalima, how it's the very essence of Tawhid and, and so on and so forth.

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And yet, where's, where's the passionate denunciation of these things? The denunciations are there, but they're not passionate.

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If they were passionate, they would have to have results. It's one thing saying bad, bad, bad. If you don't do anything about it, what does that accomplish?

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Where's the books? Where's the videos? Where's, where's the, where's the debates? I mean, I know people who shoot people in the back of the head aren't going to be debating about anything, right?

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But they're, they have their supporters. I'd like to see what's going on there, which by the way, that reminded me of something.

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I, I listened to the opening statements of the debate from yesterday.

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Unfortunately, the debate from yesterday at Wayne State College, and I'm pretty certain Wayne State College.

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I could, someone verify this is outside of Chicago. Uh, if someone could verify that for me,

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I think that's where I had my encounter with Eric. Um, uh, if it's, if it's the same one, what's uh, what's

25:39

Wayne State coming up as it, does it say it's in Illinois? I'm showing this in Northea, in Northeast Nebraska.

25:45

What? No. Uh, wouldn't that be ironic? Shavere finally gets to a lab, to, to Nebraska, huh?

25:55

The, uh, was it? I think that's what it was. I'm pretty sure it was Wayne State College.

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Uh, why don't you just look up the, uh, the, uh, Shavere, um, Nabeel Qureshi debate, see if you can find the location and just, just let me know.

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Anyway, I, I got to see, to listen to just the opening statements this morning while I was doing a 15 kilometer row.

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And, um, so I can't comment too much more on it than that.

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Uh, because the debate doesn't. Okay. This is Wayne State University.

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Okay. Detroit, Michigan. I was in Detroit. Okay. So university would have been the key thing. Okay. Um, debate takes place after the opening statements.

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The opening statements were interesting. Um, I certainly heard a number of, of arguments that, that I would utilize from Nabeel, one or two that I wouldn't.

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Um, I'm not a big Elohim, plural fan. Uh, I don't,

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I don't, I don't know what that one gets anywhere. Um, but from Shavere, we're writing a book on this subject.

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So, uh, pretty much already had his outline, shall we say, and was exactly what

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I expected. And it's, you know, uh, scattergun, you know, all sorts of different topics.

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You can never get to all of them. You're trying to inculcate doubt and the constant cite a liberal scholar as so -and -so says, quote them.

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And two minutes later, repeat that point as an established fact.

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Listen to Shavere's debates. Shavere, it's what you do. You know, that's what you do.

27:55

You've done that. I've pointed this out over and over and over again, especially in our cross -examination periods or crossfires or, you know, whatever we call them.

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Um, that's what you do is you will say as this liberal female

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Roman Catholic theologian said, and then two minutes later, and as we've shown scholarship has proven mere assertions are not scholarship scholarship and, and, and proving anything at all.

28:27

Um, so, but I haven't finished it. Obviously the give and take afterwards is where, is where debates really take place.

28:34

So everybody was saying, you need to review this. It is, you know, we'll see. We'll see. We'll, we'll try to get to it eventually.

28:42

Um, so, um, all right. Uh, boy, I'm not getting through this as fast as I thought it would.

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Um, but that's the way I am real quickly on March 26th.

28:57

So while back, uh, Bart Ehrman, remember old Bart? Yeah. Good old

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Bart. Bart Ehrman gave us yet another example of the fact that Bart Ehrman's PhD is in the early development, um, of the, uh,

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Alexandrian text type, and it is not in theology.

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It is not in theology. And, uh, me, me, me, uh, you know, when you change the time of the dividing line, you can't expect your wife to remember what you changed the time of the dividing line too.

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And when she's at work, uh, that ain't gonna do you any, any good. Um, missed call.

29:46

Yes. I know I missed that call. Anyways, Bart Ehrman, he, he's a fascinating fellow because his narrow range of expertise is in textual criticism.

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He has left that field and now is doing the church history thing. But even there, he gets involved in theology every once in a while.

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And people just go, well, if you're an expert in the early development of Alexandrian text, I must be an expert in everything.

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As long as you're an unbeliever. Anyways. And so he writes an article, is

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Paul at odds with Matthew. And he's talking about Paul and his opponents in Galatia.

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And he says, Paul was incensed this interpretation of the faith and assisted with extraordinary vehemence that was completely wrong. The Gentile followers of Jesus were not, absolutely not supposed to become

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Jewish. Anyone who thought so rendered the death of Jesus worthless. It was only that death and the resurrection that made a person right with God, nothing else, certainly not following Torah.

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Well, that was part of it. Anyway, I often wonder whether Paul and the author of the gospel of Matthew would have gotten along.

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Matthew's gospel was probably written about 30 years after Paul. He put, he puts Matthew, uh, in between 80 and 85.

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Uh, I certainly would not put that far back, but of course we're talking about Bart Ehrman here. Uh, Matthew, like the other gospel writers did not produce his account simply out of antiquarian interest to inform his readers what happened 55 years earlier in the days of Jesus.

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He is not a disinterested biography or an objective history. It is a gospel. In other words, it is intended to proclaim the good news about Jesus and the salvation that he brings.

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When Jesus teaches something in his gospel, Matthew expects the teaching to be relevant to his readers and they will want to do what Jesus says.

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There is no doubt that Matthew would agree with Paul. It was a death and resurrection of Jesus about salvation of the world. The gospel is not entirely about Jesus' death and resurrection, but it is largely about that.

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It is 28 chapters long and at least eight chapters are focused exclusively on what happened during the last week of Jesus' life in Jerusalem, including the crucifixion and resurrection.

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This is a clear, the climax of the story and for Matthew and as for his predecessor, Mark, the death of Jesus is seen as a ransom for many.

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It is through his death that he will save his people from their sins. Matthew 1 21. So Paul would agree. So Matthew would agree with Paul here, but so would

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Paul's opponents in Galatia. The controversy with the Galatian opposition was not over whether Jesus' death brings salvation.

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It was over whether the followers of Jesus who accept that death need to keep the Jewish law. Well, immediately we see how surface level

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Ehrman's understanding of the theology of the New Testament is, the background of the

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New Testament, the book of Galatians itself. Again, being a textual critical scholar does not make you a stretch of the imagination.

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It just doesn't. And so it wasn't a matter of needing to keep the

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Jewish law. It was whether you had to enter into the covenant via circumcision and that whether the covenant promises were limited to those who first entered into that covenant and then it was just for them afterwards.

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And this is why you had the separation between Jews and Gentiles when the people in James came. It wasn't just a keeping the whole thing.

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Now, Paul's argument is going to be, if you keep one part, you're going to have to keep the whole thing. But that's just because his opponents were picking and choosing which part of the law had to continue to be kept in making you right before God.

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By making circumcision prior to, it isn't faith alone that saves. That's only available to a person who first obeys these things.

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Which, wow, sounds a whole lot like the Seventh -day Adventist doctrine of investigative judgment. But anyway, I digress.

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I continue on with Ehrman. And it does seem to me that this is where Paul and Matthew split company. Again, remember that when

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Matthew decides what to present about Jesus's life in the gospel, it is not simply so that people can know what really happened in the past. It is so that the life and teachings of Jesus can direct the lives of his followers in the present.

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And what does Jesus say about the Jewish law in Matthew? He says that his followers have to keep it. One of the key passages is something that you will never find in the writings of Paul.

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And then he quotes, not suppose I came to destroy the law, the prophets came not to destroy but to fulfill, etc., etc.

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Again, totally misunderstanding how often Paul said exactly that.

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I mean, right in the middle of proclaiming justification by faith in Romans chapter 3, what does he say? Do we therefore nullify the law?

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No, we establish the law. And then he explains what the purpose of the law is. I mean, it's just amazing how the opponents of the

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Christian faith, especially in this area, have such surface -level arguments.

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At least go and grab some good new perspectivist stuff and throw it at us.

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It's not like we haven't heard that before either. But it just shows such an incredibly shallow understanding of New Testament, of the whole state of New Testament studies right now.

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And that shouldn't shock us because Ehrman's last book was about the various views of Jesus on the part of the authors of the

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New Testament. And he confessed in that book about how he had had major changes in his understanding of things just in the study and writing of that book.

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And the stuff he came to understand was basic, simplistic stuff, stuff that, I'm sorry, anybody who calls themselves any kind of New Testament scholar should have known this stuff a long time ago.

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And he's changed since then. A lot of people would applaud him. Yeah, you've changed since then. I mean, he's now said on his blog that all the gospel writers consider

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Jesus to be divine in some fashion. It used to be his view was, oh, no, no, no,

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Matthew, Mark, and Luke, they didn't believe in Jesus being divine anyways, just John. Now he says they all did on different levels.

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But they all did. They all viewed him, in fact, all my Muslim friends out there, if you're still using

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Bart Ehrman, you're not even understanding what Bart Ehrman's currently saying, which is a shame, but not overly surprising.

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So he's even changed since then. So I just, why does the world give such weight to what this man says?

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I mean, the books that he's written, just the books that are most popular are just that, they're popular level books, especially when it comes to theology,

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New Testament history, so on and so forth. And so I really don't think

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Matthew's Jesus did not mean what he says. He gives no hint that following the law this closely is impossible to do.

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He seems to think it is possible. God gave a law, you should follow it scrupulously, even more scrupulously than the righteous scribes and Pharisees.

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If you don't, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Again, amazing, even interpretations of Matthew.

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Not again, you can, you can make any of the New Testament writers say almost anything you want, as long as you can separate them from one another.

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There is no New Testament theology. You can't, you can't have Matthew and Mark and Luke or you can't, you know, it's easy to come up with any type of theology, as long as you can atomize the text of the

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New Testament. And Ehrman's been doing, been making a lot of money off of that for a very, very long time.

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But none of this shows any serious understanding of Paul's view of the law, the concept of good works, any of these things.

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The concept of the law as our schoolmaster bring us into Christ, doesn't even worry himself with such things.

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You're just, you're just feeding the flock with this, feeding the people who want to hear you say what you've got to say.

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All right, I want to leave enough time because I told the author of this article. I don't, all right,

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I'm going to go ahead and give this guy some free advertising. Radio Free Phoenix.

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Remember he showed up on Twitter last week and talked about being under our bunker and there is a storm coming.

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I don't, I don't know who Radio Free Phoenix is. I have no earthly idea. I don't even know who

38:39

Dr. Oakley 1611 is on Twitter. It's a channel rat. I can tell that because stuff we're saying in channel will all of a sudden appear in obtuse fashions on Twitter.

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But wasn't Wayne State also where Shake a

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Wall's last minute fill in? No, we do not even talk about him. That is the name that shall not be mentioned.

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And the debate that never happened, which I do not even include in my, in my debate list.

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Anyway, Radio Free Phoenix just posted a meme. It's a picture of Shabir and it says

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Nebraska. Nope, I've never been. So we know he's listening.

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He might be in the bunker underneath because he says he's in the bunker underneath our offices. And so he just might be getting a head start because he can listen.

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He doesn't have the 30 second delay. I have no idea, but Nebraska.

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Nope, I've never been. Yeah, I don't think he's ever been there either.

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Anyway, who was it that sent this? Oh, Tony Costa sent this to me first and then a couple of other people sent it to me.

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It was an article from Freaking Ministries. F -R -E -A -K, capital

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E -N -G, all one word. Never heard of it before. Sorry. I found the

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Twitter address, got in contact with the person. He said he didn't write this.

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It was one of the contributors, put me in contact with the guy who actually wrote it. And the guy was very nice and said,

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I'm traveling today, so I can't really interact today, but I'll be interested to hear what you have to say, et cetera, et cetera. And I think before I left this morning,

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I saw an invitation to go on their webcast. Well, I've said I'm going to be covering it on mine and so we'll see.

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But it was an article called The Pedals Drop, Why Calvinism is Impossible. Not why

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I would take an Arminian view, right?

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He's a Molinist, a Molinistic view, but why Calvinism is impossible. Absolutely impossible.

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Well, I've been called a Calvinist a few times in my life, so that caught my attention.

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And I started looking through it and here's a guy who claims to have once been a

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Calvinist. Now, I'll be perfectly honest. I'm not going to go through and mention what the guy's name was, because I don't even have the app where we had the conversation.

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I'd have to go looking for stuff in Facebook or something to pull this up right now.

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But I can tell.

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I'm going to take a wild guess here, just a wild guess. But I've been doing this a few years, actually a few decades, well, more than a few decades.

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And I don't think you really were a

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Calvinist. You may have, for a brief period of time, thought you were, bought into a couple, bought a few roses or tulips or some other kind of flowers.

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Uh, maybe you liked bacon, uh, as, uh, you know, there's the bacon acrostic as well.

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Uh, uh, huh. And maybe you grew a beard. Yeah, it's possible.

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It's possible. Um, but just like other certain, certain other people who have written books about being former

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Calvinists. Um, anybody who claims to be a former

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Calvinist, I'd like to know what church you went to, how long you went, how long you taught and how many funerals you did as a

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Calvinist. And if you weren't in a reformed church that had reformed worship, if you have, if you haven't had at least three debates with friends about exclusive psalmody, not a

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Calvinist, not a Calvinist. Um, if you, if you really don't, if you've not read the institutes and at least one

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Charles Haddon Spurgeon sermon, at least one, it's just required. Even, even Presbyterians have to read at least one Spurgeon sermon.

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Um, seriously though, if you can be re be moved from your conviction by one of the most basic arguments that every

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Calvinist has already thought of and responded to a thousand times, then you probably weren't really a Calvinist. What did somebody say?

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Cervetus? Yeah. Cervetus. Oh, I'm out. I'm out. You know, that's it. Yeah. No, that's, that's not what it was.

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Um, here's here. Well, let me just read after teaching these points to my youth group students.

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Okay. Several years ago, this philosophy started to seem unsettling.

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Moreover, around that time, I really started getting into apologetics. Ironically, a Calvinistic pastoral colleague of mine introduced me to the work of Dr.

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William Lane Craig. I started watching his debates in November of 2010. I watched a video of Dr.

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Craig debating Christopher Hitchens at Biola University. I was starting to love this guy until he made a passing comment that he didn't agree with Calvinism.

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Remember? We've shown this one. And when Hitchens asked him to identify a false

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Christian view, the only thing he could come up with, he couldn't come up with the papacy. He couldn't come up with Mormonism.

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Jehovah's Witnesses. It's the Calvinist. It's the Calvinist. Anyway. Whoa. He says, stop the presses.

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Did this guy who is systematically destroying all of these atheistic arguments, just announced Calvinism? Now immediately,

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I, I, I just want to say to our, our author here, um, you obviously didn't know

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Greg Bonson, did you? He hadn't, hadn't, uh, hadn't really dealt with the apologetics issues at that point in time.

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I immediately did what any good aspiring theologian would do and turn to Google. Pretty soon I stumbled upon the doctrine of middle knowledge,

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Molinism. I guess he didn't stumble upon my responses to that or my many challenges to William Lane Craig to debate that.

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Nah, probably didn't. In a nutshell, this view basically attempts to logically reconcile God's sovereignty with human freedom and responsibility by stating

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God chose to create a world in which he knew with omniscient certainty how human beings would freely choose.

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Well, yeah, we've been down that road many, many, many times before I keep

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Googling my friend and find where William Lane Craig likewise said, um, that God has to deal with the cards he's been dealt and then figure out how that works.

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And then listen to some of your Molinist friends trying to explain what William Lane Craig means, or what they'll do is at that point is saying, yeah, well,

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William Lane Craig isn't the only Molinist. Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. He's not the only.

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At that point, I would prefer this guy over here, that guy over there.

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And, you know, I've got my pile of Molinists down here. We could pull them out. Well, you know, on that,

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I like that guy. And on this, I like that guy. That's that's what ends up happening when you when you get into it.

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So anyway, it soon occurred to me that the dichotomy between Calvinism and Arminianism is a false one.

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That is to say, there are other possible options to consider, namely open theism and Molinism, open theism and Molinism.

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You do realize those are on opposite ends of the spectrum, right? OK, I began saying all four of these views and comparing and contrasting all their claims and affirmations.

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Initially, I was bent on disproving these other views because of my commitment to Calvinism. I honestly studied them almost every single day for over a year to demonstrate they're wrong and why

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Calvinism is true. And one day I was driving home from the church office after scrutinizing

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Molinism all day. That's a problem. And I called my wife and said, I think I'm losing my faith in Calvinism.

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I freely chose to label myself a bonafide Molinist. Well, OK, let's look at his let's let's look at the argument because time's running out here.

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Here is I have developed several logic based arguments demonstrating the fallaciousness of Calvinism.

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There's your problem, my friend, because there is almost nothing in here.

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Exegetical couple of Bible verses, but. Exegesis, you know, if you spend all day studying

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Molinism. That's a problem. That's a problem. I've spent a lot of time studying

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Molinism, but I'm going to spend a whole lot more time in scripture than I am saying. Anyways, I've developed several logic based arguments demonstrating the fallaciousness of Calvinism, and I am planning on sharing them all in the future.

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But as for now, I'll focus on one of them. I call the omni argument against Calvinism, the omni argument against Calvin.

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It looks like this. Number one, if Calvinism is true, whomever God provides irresistible grace to will go to heaven and not suffer eternal hell.

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Number two, if God is omnibenevolent, he would not desire to, nor would he send anyone to suffer in hell for eternity for choices they were powerless to make.

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Number three, if God is omnipotent, he could provide irresistible grace to all people. Number four, if God is omniscient, he would know how to provide irresistible grace to all people.

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And number five, some people suffer eternal hell. Six, therefore, either God is not omnipotent or omniscient, feel free to pick at least one, or Calvinism is false.

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Now, first of all, a bunch of those steps weren't even relevant. They didn't even need to be there.

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It's just showing off, I think, but it was not relevant to your argument.

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Secondly, please, please, my friend, do not claim that you developed this argument, because we have addressed every form of this argument so many times, not just on this program, but to be honest with you,

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I can point you to Calvin addressing these arguments, which, given that you didn't know that Calvin had already addressed those arguments, might mean that you weren't really much of Calvin.

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Probably wasn't in the Wikipedia article. Well, now be nice. So this is not,

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I'm sorry, if you want to see a much better form of this, sorry, but a much better form of it, then go listen to Jerry Wall's very popular

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Why I'm Not a Calvinist video. Surprised you haven't seen it. Or if you have, maybe you sort of took it from him and didn't realize you were taking it from.

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But there's nothing new here. Nothing. I almost almost feel like saying nothing new here.

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Just just move on on past. But what I want to focus on was.

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Why is it that former Calvinists don't seem to be able to represent or or criticize their former position overly accurately?

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If Calvinism is true, whomever God provides irresistible grace to will go to heaven and not suffer eternal hell.

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Well, what's irresistible grace? What is this stating? Well, it's stating if Calvinism is true.

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God can save perfectly his elect.

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That's all it's saying. Why are you even stating it this way? If Calvinism is true,

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God can save whom he pleases in the fashion that he pleases to do so at the time he pleases to do so because it involves resurrection to spiritual life.

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They're spiritually dead. They've fallen in Adam. They reject God. They hate

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God. And God can save his elect people at any point in time.

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Irresistible grace is simply the statement, the recognition that man is dead in sin and that God is able to take out a heart of stone, give a heart of flesh.

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All number one is saying if Calvinism is true, the biblical doctrine of regeneration is true. OK, all right.

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Why not just say that? Number two, if God is omnibenevolent, he would not desire to nor would he send anyone to suffer in hell for eternity for choices they were powerless to make.

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Now, I'm sorry. Not only is there a typo in there that I've skipped over twice, but that is an incoherent statement.

51:55

It's theologically, historically incoherent. If God is omnibenevolent, what do you mean omnibenevolent?

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What do you think it means? I don't know how many times we have had to rein in the omnibenevolence folks who take that phrase.

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And it's I feel like using that way off to often use meme. Of from my name is

52:30

Inigo Montoya. I'm going you killed my father. Prepare to die. From Princess Bride.

52:35

Yeah, Princess Bride. Was he? Yeah, he was. He was the same one who said you keep saying that, but I don't think the word means what you think it means.

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I don't think that means what you think it means. Exactly. That's what we need. We need the we need that as a sound file or maybe a video file.

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I can just pop it up and I don't think that word means what you think. It's Mandy Patankin, just so you know.

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OK, yes, I know that. Anyway, I would never win

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Jeopardy because I have way too many movie trivia things and I just that's not me. What does omnibenevolence mean?

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You have an entire concept packed into this that you could never even dare to try to bring it anywhere close to the

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Bible. Because there would be just. So many things in the

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Old Testament alone that would make this kind of omnibenevolent argument explode into a thousand pieces.

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It's just it's just it's the way it would be. So it would be. So if God is omnibenevolent, he would not desire to, nor would he send anyone to suffer in hell.

53:56

Now, just stop right there and you've got universalism. But then you have this statement for eternity, for choices they were powerless to make.

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So I think what you're saying. Is that unless so that there can't be any spiritual death, there can't be slavery to sin.

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There must be libertarian autonomy.

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So you've you've packed all sorts of stuff into this complicated, incoherent statement that assumes but does not state as part of the argument.

54:45

Autonomous free will. There is no spiritual death. There is no

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I mean, federal headships out the door of Romans five out the door. You know, just check that check that stuff out the door, because this this stuff is not derived from Scripture, just as Molanism has never been derived from Scripture.

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It isn't it's squished onto Scripture. It's a philosophy that's pressed onto Scripture.

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That's what Molanism is. That's what this is for choices. Why is someone sent to hell?

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Well, evidently, the idea here is for choices they were powerless to make. So people are sent to hell for not believing in Jesus rather than being sent to hell because they are sinners who cannot stand in the presence of a holy

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God. And so the idea is, well, if God's save anybody, then he has to save everybody.

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And so man has to have autonomous free will, but God can't have autonomous free will. Because if God saves anyone, he has to save everybody.

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That's that's the false assumption that is behind even even the thought pattern that is that is presented here.

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So there would, you know, a couple of other things. If God is omnipotent, he could provide irresistible grace to all people.

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Well, OK, if God's omniscient, he would know how to provide it. Number four, irrelevant, just completely, completely irrelevant.

56:19

And then you have this. This symbolic logic presentation afterwards, which is really impressive, but what you really need to do is, first of all, come to a much better understanding of the system you once claimed to believe in, but don't believe it any longer and clearly did not not understand it.

56:45

And if you had been a Calvinist of conviction. Well, let me let me back up here.

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There is a difference between being a Calvinist of tradition and a

57:00

Calvinist of conviction. I'm not a Calvinist of tradition. This is something that I I was forced to adopt once I really embraced the idea that consistency is something important in the definition of truth and in the interpretation of the

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Bible. If you had been a Calvinist of conviction, then the foundation of your reformed theology would be exegetical.

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And hence. Your rejection of Calvinism were you to leave it would be primarily exegetical in nature, not philosophical.

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So why did you embrace what you thought was Calvinism? Was it not.

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A philosophical position to you, it sounds like it was, it sounds like it was because this is not the kind of argument that someone who was truly convinced of the necessity of reformed theology, this is not the kind of argument that they would make against their foreign position.

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And so what concerned me also about this was this is someone called the thinking theist

58:21

I'm linked to a freewill Calvinism Romans nine article that was outrageously shallow, outrageously shallow.

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But then there was this note and we're almost out of time very quickly.

58:42

I'd like to thank Mike Lycona for giving me the idea of the title of this article and maybe a future book.

58:55

Okay, well I did refer him to our responses to Jerry Walls, which

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I think would pretty much deal with everything that was found here. But it is interesting the stuff that you will find on the web.

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Well, like I said, next Tuesday, not going to be able to do the program, we'll be in Spain.

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But fly back on Thursday, if I recall correctly. Hopefully we'll shoot for Friday.

59:27

We'll see. Who knows, you know, if the person sitting next to me has the

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Zambezi flu or something. You have no way of knowing.