Homosexuality, Rick Warren, and the Pope!

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 It's 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 morning, welcome to the dividing line on the 23rd of December This has always been a weird calendar up here because it it starts with Monday and ends a

Sunday so it sort of throws you off but it is that week and We have a lot of things to talk about today on the program the only program this week because for some reason

We're not going to do one on Thursday for whatever reason that might be.

I Would like to start with well More of what we face in our culture today.

I have a segment here To play this is from MSNBC Featuring and curry and Rick Warren, as you know

Rick Warren has been asked to deliver the opening

Prayer at the inauguration. It's amazing. They even allow this type of thing anymore in our country but that has caused all sorts of hand -wringing from all sorts of people

There have been conservatives that are going what in the world are you doing? This is an inauguration is a celebration of a political victory and this was a political victory of the radical left and So what are you doing?

And then of course those on the left? Especially those to whom

Obama owes so much the gay and lesbian forces that give so much money and are so active in the promotion of their own lifestyle and The denigration of the

Christian worldview that They are just all upset because Warren of course was for Proposition 8

We need to recognize that in our society today. There is such a hatred of God's truth such a hatred of God's law

God's holiness that there is a constant spin that is irrational illogical and Challenged by everyone, but we hear it so much

That it's sometimes difficult to know how to respond to it I'd like to play some of the segments here and just see how deeply biased prejudiced bigoted in fact

The news media is even in the way. They think clearly this is this is their Their worldview that they are espousing and and they may be so deeply influenced by it

So prejudiced by they didn't see it. They even recognize how Prejudiced they are for example the idea that by holding to Christian belief and by holding to the definition of marriage that mankind has followed as Far back as we can possibly trace historical records

That we are hurting people yes Instead of recognizing the reality and that is there is a revolutionary movement to completely change

Thousands of years of human history to completely overthrow human culture instead of recognizing it for that instead

Proposition 8 is about banning gay marriage. It's not about defining marriage the way.

It's always been defined no no no no It's about banning gay marriage. It's it's not about affirming anything

No, no we have to put everything in the negative, and if you were for proposition 8 or what was it here 201?

102 okay one of them, whatever Whatever the number was here, you know after every other year

They assigned those numbers and after a while that all become blur But anyway, we had the same thing here in in Arizona and of course

I voted for it was to define marriage as between one man and one woman and So you you weren't promoting anything positive there

You had your position has to be defined in light of homosexuality in light of the deviancy in light of the tiny little percentage of The population say that is that rational no of course.

It's not rational is that defensible no How does it get defended by people screaming at you? That's that's how the homosexual activists are defending their position by screaming at you

And have you noticed it's fascinating to me, and I'm gonna get to it, but it's fascinating to me that The homosexuals have taken to screaming at Christians shame on you isn't that amazing

Isn't that a fulfillment of Romans chapter 1 those who are suppressing the knowledge of God those who have twisted and turned and reversed?

God's ordained mechanism of Procreation the continuation of the human species etc.

Etc That they who who live in shame would be the first ones to scream shame at someone else when that other person dares to expose their own sin isn't it the height of hypocrisy, but a fulfillment of Romans chapter 1 isn't it so let's listen to some of the comments here.

I found them fascinating and Then we'll we'll go on from there Barack Obama's facing criticism from many liberals over his choice of the

Reverend Rick Warren To deliver the invocation at his inauguration Reverend Warren has been a vocal supporter of California's Proposition 8

That's the proposition that bans gay marriage Let's see that bans gay marriage not not that this is commensurate with what

Christians have believed from the beginning That this is exactly what the what the Bible has taught despite Newsweek's You know hackneyed piece of pseudo scholarship

Nothing like that at all. It's got to be defined so that you are doing something negative it's all spin somebody sat down and and wrote all this out and sent out the various outlets and it demonstrates to just how completely biased

The media has become there's there's you know if you get you if anyone gets their information from these sources

You're you're not to be able to walk a straight line let alone think straight in that state Dateline NBC's and curry sat down with Reverend Warren joins us now.

I know that you asked him why About the backlash now to his support for this marriage ban and how that might affect the politics moving forward with Barack Obama What did he say to you about it?

He's it's so interesting. You know he actually has a reputation until November of being a reconciler somebody who brings people from different points of views together

But in November when Proposition 8 was on the California ballot He stood up and took a position that he was against gay marriage now notice

You if you're gonna be a reconciler then you can't be against gay marriage you it's just just not possible for you to take a stand a

Biblical stand in regards to what marriage is you have to hold this position you must accept gay marriage or by Definition you are divisive you are backwards you are hateful.

Just just by definition That's just the way it is and in doing so he outraged a community that he has been courting and has taken care of with AIDS attention a

HIV funding he is why would you be courting a Population defined by its sin.

I mean do you court? the adulterer generate the adulterer group do you court the

Theft group do you court the I mean we can just go on down the line the murderer group or whatever you know

Is that is that what a Christian is supposed to be doing in the first place is really a question that First crosses my mind he's really reached out and created great relationships with people in the gay community

And so they were very hurt by his position when he came out against gay marriage to take a look at what he and notice

They were very hurt You mean they thought that he was for gay marriage or that if you if you minister to people who have

AIDS That means you somehow have to embrace this idea of Adulterating the concept of marriage turning into something it never was before Throwing Jesus's words under the bus.

Is that what you must do or you're going to hurt someone? Does does what

Ann Curry believe that the Bible? When it says you shall not commit murder is hurting murderers

When it says you shall not steal that it's hurting thieves When it says you shall not commit adultery that it's hurting adulterers

Is this how is this how? Discussion is to take place in our society now based upon who you think you're gonna be hurting

Why doesn't anyone ever ask what hurts Christians? Oh? That doesn't really matter much does it had to say to me

How have you reconciled yourself with that pain that you've caused because of that loss of faith in you well

How do you? Reconcile yourself with that pain you've caused you've betrayed them.

Oh my goodness The scary thing is she thinks this way it is utterly irrational.

It's utterly absurd, but she thinks this way and That's how people who who get their thinking from the mainstream media.

That's how they think too It is amazing I Because if that hadn't passed the pain that would have caused to Far million eight millions more.

I think would be more severe, and here's what I'd see in this end for five now You can't see it.

They cut back to her and she's doing this and you know Channel 12 here in Phoenix is normally what

I would have on the morning if I want to catch the news or something so I see Ann Curry all the time and So after a while you know who's who and you know what she's thinking and she's like what?

How can that be how silly is that and they specifically cut away from him to show her doing that?

Just to communicate. I mean let's face it We know what editors are and and we know where the editors are coming thousand years every single culture and Every single religion has defined marriage as a man and a woman not just Christianity Judaism Islam Hinduism Buddhism your position has well while all of that is true while all of that is true.

I'm sorry That's not how I would have answered the question I would have answered the question the way I was addressing it earlier

And that is what do you mean causing pain to someone and are you seriously suggesting to me as a

Christian that if I? present God's law God's rules as to how mankind is to live that the way that Mankind is to experience life in its fullness that those who reject those rules who purposefully

Flout those world rules and flaunt them and and says I will not I will not obey those things

That I should be accused of hurting them When we have laws in our land that say you are not to commit acts of pedophilia

Are you hurting pedophiles and when you say you're supposed to have laws against bestiality are you hurting those that engage in that and?

Think and think go beyond the emotions turn on the mind

Let's think reasonably and logically for just a moment that is

Passing out of Western culture you don't think logically you think emotionally who cares if the result is a mishmash of silliness

People wonder why do we see such massively? Incoherent rulings from judges in our land, that's why

You still have a few that judge on the basis of law and then you get the rest who throw law out and judge on the basis of motion and The result is horrible raise the specter that you are homophobic

That is why you laugh That is why yeah people are angry gay people are angry and gay people are angry.

You're a homophobe Evidently if you voted for eight you're a homophobe

Is so irrational it is so absurd that it's it's difficult to even know how to respond to such things so if you

Believe that the definition of marriage defined within the page of Scripture if you believe what

Jesus said then you're a homophobe Well, then logically by necessary Logical compulsion is not and curry in most of Western society

Christophobes Are they not heterophobes, I mean if we're gonna start using this kind of absolutely inane irrational illogic then

How can there be any public discourse left? I don't understand it how if you're just gonna throw this type of stuff around.

It's just how is it? Possible for them to be civil I could someone who would maybe deny who would say

I don't like what you are You understand I don't know don't sit there and say yeah, yeah Rick say no no and do you hear what you're saying

I? Mean the circularity of her of even her questions Absolutely beyond the pale.

I don't like what you are You are not defined by the decision that you've made to go against God's law

God's creative decree defines you not your sin first of all and Then well you you you're just you're just a terrible mean horrible person.

This isn't rational. This isn't even rational journalism It's it Well, I could give you a hundred gay

Of course not I have always treated them with respect when they come and want to talk to me I talked to him when the protesters came we served him a water and doughnuts now remember

This is a man who is not sure that serving people water and doughnuts is Necessarily Also written the purpose -driven life

This is a book that sold actually I know it's been reported 20 million actually more than 30 million copies in All languages worldwide and he has in this way

Try to cause people to understand that they have a purpose in his view God's purpose And he and he has given 90 % of his income of all the millions

He's made to helping people suffer less for humanitarian causes So he is a guy who actually through his church has done a tremendous

Tremendous amount of good, and he has a reputation as a guy who despite his personal views on any issue one way or another

Tries to stand up and reach across with us however however in this case in standing up against gay marriage

He has unleashed a firestorm It's never standing up for the Christian view of marriage no no no no it's always standing up against the radical position see

Hopefully it by pointing these things out. You'll be able to point them out. Maybe you know

Christmas Day Maybe you've got some family members who think like Ann Curry And hopefully

I'm encouraging you to point out the irrationality Of this kind of worldview this kind of thinking

That precludes any kind of meaningful conversation whatsoever and and but that firestorm is with liberals

And so just as you just reported earlier liberals are upset about He is being some liberals are upset about his choice by Barack Obama to speak as inauguration

He is also being erased by conservatives by many conservatives who view that his position

Means that Barack Obama is standing up and also reaching across to people on both sides of these issues

I don't see any difference though I mean when I'm when the pastor in a religious church gets up and stands up and says my religion

Does not permit the marriage between two people of the same gender That's what happens in that church, and he's the head of that church, and he has every right to say that but now

Here's here's the mindset folks. This is what's coming You can say whatever you want inside your church, but don't you dare

Live in light of it outside your church Your religion has no place.

This is this is the voice of secularism. This is the voice of Europe today You can have your belief inside your church

But don't let it impact the way you do anything outside your church it cannot impact law it cannot impact society and This is because this constant drumbeat of well you have a religious worldview and we have the scientific worldview and We don't have to defend our worldview.

We don't even have we There's not even a clash you see because the religious worldview has nothing to do with science or has nothing to do with history

It's just a myth. It's just what's happens between your ears, and this is what people think

This is exactly where they are that you it's it's you can see it in scholarship when when people say well

We can't oh We can't allow God in history, you know no historian could allow to say well

God had anything to do with this You know cetera etcetera etcetera It's this kind of I have my worldview, but I am

NOT gonna admit it I'm not gonna recognize it. I'm not gonna compare it with a Christian worldview or anything like that Given that the vast majority of those involved in media

Have a a worldview that is thoroughly opposed to God It shouldn't be surprising what we're hearing coming out of these ladies mouths when he comes out and supports

Proposition 8 banning gay marriage. He's talking banning gay marriage banning gay marriage banning gay marriage.

It's it's a mantra They can't even see past it. They even see it themselves. They're slaves to this stuff about secular marriage

He's talking about marriage that happens without the sanction necessarily of any church that happens in a government setting does he see any difference?

Between those two I mean he was coming out against a government proposition not something that happens within the walls of his own

Congregation he see what happens in the walls your congregation is now completely separate You Christians cannot have anything to do with governmental action or the society around you

And all you gotta do is just look at look at San Francisco look at this wonderful secular city, and how's it turning out?

Entire places in San Francisco you can't even go at night. You the the the the good citizens of San Francisco Hide in their homes at night in many places

And that's what they want for all of us. It's interesting. You know one of the answers. He has to that is that the

The pro that the idea of gay marriage was so well funded in terms of Groups come can't come forth and had basically said you know we're gonna fund the fight against this band that he felt

That it was his responsibility to come out and say wait a minute We need to also we need to create a balance here so that people hear both sides one of the issues

He said is that you know he cannot He was concerned that there would be an infringement on his freedom to speak about it because if in fact he came out

He was worried that this that this Proposition 8 would prevent him from getting up on the pulpit and speak speaking out against same -sex marriage

So you know we go into all of that, but also we talk about you know Him as a man in our interview on dateline in yeah, and so on and so forth and blah and blah and blah

So there you have there you have that now before we take any phone calls

At the very same time today Fox News Pope accused of stoking homophobia after speech

Pope Benedict was accused of stoking homophobia today After a speech in which he declared that saving humanity from homosexuality was just as important as saving the rainforest from destruction

The pond have made remarks yesterday in the end of year address to the Curia the

Vatican Central Administration He said that humanity needed to listen to the quote language of creation and quote

To understand the intended roles of man and woman and behavior beyond traditional heterosexual relations

I'm sorry to understand in generals a minimum and behavior, okay, and would have been nice to have had a break there and Behavior beyond traditional heterosexual relations was a quote destruction of God's work and quote

Quote the tropical forests do deserve our protection But man as a creature does not deserve any less and quote

Benedict told stories scores of prelates gathered in the Vatican's Clementine Hall Quote what's needed is something like a human ecology understood in the right sense

It's not simply an outdated metaphysics if the church speaks of the nature of the human person as man and woman and asked that this order of creation be respected and Quote it is not the first time that Benedict has issued the curious speech to throw out a controversial idea two years ago

He complained that Islam had not yet learned had yet to learn the lessons of the Enlightenment But the comments were quickly denounced by gay and lesbian groups both inside and outside the church a very poorly constructed sentence

Which sounds like the case of lesbians were protesting what he said about Islam Well we all do that don't wait anyway

And then of course we have to let the gays be the Reverend Sharon Ferguson chief executive of the lesbian and gay

Christian movement Describe Benedict's comments as totally irresponsible and unacceptable in any shape or form

I'm not sure she said it that way, but I just have a She said it is more the case that we need to be not that we need to be saved from his comments

It is comments like that that justify homophobic bullying that goes on in schools

And it is comments like that that justify gay bashing hear this this is their mantra

There's no I I have yet to encounter any of these folks that will get beyond this mantra of Thoughtlessness Throw out the names get the emotions going let's not deal with the issues

It's amazing absolutely amazing there are still so many instances of people being killed around the world including in Western society purely and simply because their sexual orientation of Their gender identity therefore you can't talk about this

You can't talk about this to your fault Would someone like to logically connect the dots there well there is no connection between the dots, but that's

The situation we're facing in Fact it seems like they gave her more quotation than they gave the

Pope In fact it goes on from there. Yeah, they gave much more space to the

Homosexuals to respond to that then to what the Pope said and all the Pope was simply saying was basic fundamental

Straight out of history. Why is it? That Christians and Jews and Muslims and so on so forth have stood against this kind of stuff because of what they believe about God being the creator of all things and defining for us what human life is and once you have

Now the second and third generation of people Who have been removed from the influence of believing that God is their creator now?

We see the irrationality that comes as a result now. We see the human animal The result of random mutation and chance over time you think these things are not connected you better believe they're connected

Because the only way this kind of irrationality Can survive and can be promulgated is when people do not believe they're created in the image of God they have no transcendent value there is no transcendent truth and So you can reason like this you can think like this you can act like this and Who's to tell you differently and So you can turn everything upside down Because just as Romans chapter 1 describes it

They've exchanged the truth of God for a lie They've exchanged the creator for the creation they have twisted things upside down and so I think back to that video of those protesters and the one little old lady and They knocked the cross out of her hands and when they're going after her then you can see you can also see if you watch

Carefully, they're they're not they're not just accidentally stepping on the cross. They're stomping on the cross.

They hate Christianity They hate it

Because it reminds them of their Daily struggle to suppress that conscience that tells them over and over again that what they're doing is sinful in the eyes of God and If you dare say that and if they get enough money and enough corrupt politicians in their pockets

They will want to see you in jail for saying that you better believe it.

You better believe it so in that amazing you it's

And again, I said as many times we're gonna take our break and then come back with the phone calls But I've said as many times

I wish there was a way To put a barrier up at the door of the church that when you walk through it all this worldly Foolishness See thinking like this is thinking with a reprobate mind

These people are thinking with a reprobate mind. They cannot think with the mind of Christ spiritual things are foolishness to them

But there is a reprobate mind There is a way of thinking where you have been fully conformed the image of the world and you're thinking an exact opposite way that makes it next to impossible to for you outside of the renewing work the

Holy Spirit to even begin to understand the things the Spirit of God and even then when our own people come through that door if we are not

Constantly emphasizing to them the need to be in the word the need to be exposed to God's truth Then the world is going to conform their thinking to its way and then they're going to start perverting the faith

To fit this new way of thought and That takes us back to something

I've said many times before theology matters what you believe matters and As we live in a society that is not slowly becoming more and more anti -christian

But at an inc breakneck pace becoming more anti -christian It's a little bit like the old frog in the pan idea, you know if you turn the heat up slowly, he'll sit there until he till he fries and that's what we've been doing and We've been going along with worldly ways of thinking and really because it's just a little bit.

It's just a little bit It's just a little bit But now it's going so fast. I don't know how anybody can't see

The massive chasm that exists between a godly worldview a worldview that takes God as creator seriously and the worldview that the world is now demanding of us and one of our greatest jobs each and every day fellow believers is

That we must put effort into thinking how we are going to talk to these people

We must understand where they're coming from But we must think ahead as to how to in the best way

Take the subjects of discussion that we would be encountering in our world today and express them in A Christian fashion because we still have the opportunity to do it without getting chucked in jail.

We still do we better take advantage of it Because I don't know how long that up. That's that's gonna last really don't

I don't know anyway 8 7 7 7 5 3 3 3 4 1 we've already got a couple phone numbers a couple phone callers after we clear the calls

I'm gonna be looking at some other subjects. We'll talk to you a little bit Public crimes the criminal mishandling of God's Word may be

James White's most provocative book yet White sets out to examine numerous crimes being committed in pulpits throughout our land every week as he seeks to leave no stone unturned

Based firmly upon the bedrock of Scripture one crime after another is laid bare for all to see

The pulpit is to be a place where God speaks from his word. What has happened to this sacred duty in our day?

The charges are as follows prostitution using the gospel for financial gain pandering to pluralism cowardice under fire felonious eisegesis entertainment without a license and Cross -dressing ignoring

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Hello everyone, this is Rich Pierce In a day and age where the gospel is being twisted into a man -centered self -help program

The need for a no -nonsense presentation of the gospel has never been greater I am convinced that a great many go to church every

Sunday yet. They have never been confronted with their sin Alpha and Omega ministries is dedicated to presenting the gospel in a clear and concise manner making no excuses

Man is sinful and God is holy That sinful man is in need of a perfect Savior and Jesus Christ is that perfect Savior We are to come before the

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

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

Thank you And welcome back to the dividing line on a

Tuesday afternoon I wonder how long it's gonna be till we have to figure out how to do this, but I could some pirate way, you know

So that they can't find us Because you know offshore

Sure Yeah, that may be How does that work if we're doing it here?

You have to bounce it off a server on the sea. You still have to go through some American server or something So, I don't know.

Well, we just may well hire it satellite Yeah Hey, anyways,

I again want to thank everyone who has made it a Merry Christmas for us around here in the sense that my

Amazon wish list I've been very thankful for the folks who have helped there and then

I posted what was that Friday or Saturday? I posted a notice that It's one of the last isn't that one of the last machines we made because we used to make our own machines

We used to go up to fries and we'd grab all the components I've been putting band -aids and bailing wire on that.

Yeah, it's it's well, I think it's as old as The na -27 machine in there because that's the last one.

It may have been upgraded a couple of times since then But yeah, it's all it's old. Yeah, we put in a Last year,

I kept running into a problem where it was overheating Yeah, so I put in a liquid cooling system and that kind of kept it at bay for a while and Age is age man.

It's just gave up the go. So that's the unit that we use to render Video not the

YouTube videos, but the big big big big big videos There's a huge difference if you're not familiar with these things between the video

File size and what you're working with to create a DVD a high -quality DVD and what I'm throwing up on YouTube Which is 320 by 240, you know, that's my files are there.

They're not small. I mean My first computer had a 20 megabyte hard drive on it. So that would that would be about three seconds of most of our modern video but It has to work hard.

Okay, it really has to be dedicated and work hard do its thing And like I said on the blog it rolled over twitched a few times and sort of like when you nail a cockroach with raid

It gave up the ghost and so we have put up a Little I don't know what you call it item in the bookstore

That you can donate toward that we've got I think about a third of it I think has been covered so far and I'm very thankful for that but we still need the other two -thirds so I want to let you know about that those of you who have benefited from our videos and DVDs and things like that and it's right as we're trying to take a lot of our older stuff and Get it digitized get it available some of the stuff that we had stuff on videotape that has still not been transferred over to DVD and Those are the ones that people like to buy those debates because I still have hair then

Is that quite as much of a glow so we want to to get that stuff Out there so you can help us with that look in the bookstore.

You can find the The unit there and people keep saying well, why don't you go to a Mac? You've gone to a

Mac Hey, I've tried to I've tried to sell the Mac to to mr. Pierce, but he likes he likes the programs he's used to and we have them in Windows versions, and they're not cheap programs either so That move is not an inexpensive move unfortunately to be able to do so We still got did you not do we not have one machine?

That's still win 98 Yeah, our shipping machine, it's when I need Windows 98 yeah, yeah,

I mean you know is that the one that makes the chorus It's got a fan in it. That's got a bad bearing in it when it fires up.

It needs to warm up It's got a little creaky but it you know it still runs the the

UPS and the Postal software, and it still helps me fill the orders and and someday.

It's gonna We have for 20 some -odd years lived by the credo that we make a penny scream.

Yeah this day. It's bloody murder Before we let it go, and we're trying to be the best stewards that we possibly can but things are starting to age other age

In these times we have to kind of reach out and ask for help. Yeah, that's right, so well

So anyways letting you know that's there and so if you've enjoyed those DVDs then keep that keep that in mind

Let's get our phone calls, and I'm not going to go in the right order sorry, but I'm gonna go in the logical order in other words the topical order and Given that this is a question about homosexuality.

Let's go with Justin hi Justin. Yes, hello. Hi. Hi I'm a

Calvinist. I'm a Christian. I appreciate your ministry, and it would always be best to go with the Christian part before the

So we got that okay, yeah, I I've noticed that there.

There's two camps basically here. There's gays outside and gays inside the church And so my question is kind of twofold well.

Let's let's make sure let's let's let's clarify that one right now What we're when we're talking about the church so in other words we're talking about those who don't make any

Pretensions toward any kind of profession of those who do right yeah? I think

I'm thinking more along the lines of some of your liberal Mainstream churches right right which

I which I would consider not to be a part of the Church of Christ, but Christendom Yes, right, okay, kind of like the church visible being a church and right exactly there you go, okay?

So my question is twofold first is is our argument our defense Against the gays and lesbians the same for both of those camps well in the sense that In Western culture today both camps are using the same arguments when encountering a

Christian There is a huge body of literature that has been published over the past especially ten years

Virginia Mullencott and Skenzoni and and others have been cranking out books most of which cite each other

But cranking out all sorts of arguments on every single text that could possibly be raised

Almost every single text could possibly raised in reference to the subject homosexuality so the unbelieving

Homosexuals like to use that to bash Christians because most Christians. Let's face it most evangelicals don't have a clue about the law

And how ceremonial and moral laws relate to one another anything like that so they love doing that just for the enjoyment of it

And then the quote -unquote religious gays Utilize the same type of argumentation to to try to present their their perspectives and from my perspective

It's I think I More than a lot of people have a right to say that they don't have a leg to stand on because all you got to do

Is go watch my debate with John Shelby Spong? my debate with Barry Lynn and my debate with Dee Bradshaw and find out for yourself if Religious homosexuals or defenders of religious homosexuality can even begin to Substantiate their position and meaningful debate and the answer is they cannot there there isn't any question

I think in anybody's mind then all three of those debates. It wasn't even close. It wasn't even a contest that they just could not even begin to defend their position, so I think that at least

There might be a slight difference in dealing with the religious homosexual in that you're not necessarily

Dealing with some of the baggage of overt atheism, but in my experience even the

Metropolitan Church Has obviously cannot produce a coherent theology

Because how could you even begin to define such things as the Trinity or the deity of Christ when you have such a low view of?

Scripture that is required To come up with the the homosexual interpretation of Romans 1 and things like that so It does end up being very very similar in in my experience in dealing with both groups

Okay, and my second part of that question is the scriptures for the religious group what who?

You know like you said they have kind of a low view of scripture obviously But what sort of scripture passages are basic outline?

Would you give okay? Have you have you seen the book I co -authored the same -sex controversy?

No, I haven't nothing that one Yeah, yeah, that's that's where I would start obviously simple because we we attempted to address all of the key texts that that do come up in this and Answered question after question after question because as you go through this huge body of literature that has been produced

And I can guarantee you that was one of the least Enjoyable projects I've ever worked on but As you go through them you'll find three four five six different ways of trying to get around each text and they're all they're all

Contradictory and sometimes the same author will use multiple contradictory the same text so so we attempted to address all of those things and so you know it's not difficult to To list these specific texts that have to do with homosexuality

Obviously you're dealing with Sodom and Gomorrah you're dealing with Leviticus 18 and 20 you're dealing with Probably the temple some of the print temple prostitutes in the

Asherah in in Kings and other places like that you're dealing especially with with the Romans chapter 1 you're dealing first Corinthians chapter 6 and all of them

You know have various ways that homosexual advocates have tried to get around them

There are scholarly ways that are Incoherent and inconsistent, but you have to know what they are there are all sorts of lexical ways

They try to say arson a coy taste does not mean homosexual and yet these are two terms that come directly out of The Greek septuagint and Leviticus 18 and 20 that Paul utilizes

Anyone who read his writings would know exactly what he was referring to it's not even it's not even questionable, but Since there are all these quote -unquote scholars and the vast majority of people you're talking to you can't read the languages themselves and They're they're they're prejudiced one way or the other already

They accept what the quote -unquote scholars have to say without a whole lot of You know fight shall we say on that issue so but on the other end we also tried in our book to point out that If you limit yourself only to dealing with those texts all you're dealing with are the negative prohibition texts

And there's there's a just as in the deity of Christ there. There's a whole realm of evidence that Christians frequently ignore

It's the same thing here We need to recognize the vast majority of the evidence we have here is in Jesus's own positive teaching about the nature of marriage look at Ephesians chapter 5 and the

Description there of the relationship of Christ in his church, and that cannot possibly be made into anything relevant to homosexuality

Roma Obviously in Matthew chapter 19 Jesus Takes it as as a given that man is created male and female and that the family is is defined in these ways

That's that's the foundation And I just wish the people who have the opportunity of being on these programs

Would go on the offensive and I would say what you're saying to us is that we need to abandon what

Jesus himself Taught Jesus himself taught man and woman This is the way it's been from the beginning and you are telling

Christians We're to be ashamed of what Jesus Christ himself lived and taught that's what they need to be saying instead of the oh, yes

Yes, yes, but but you know I have lots of gay friends. That's not how you respond to this stuff you need to go on the offensive and and Demonstrate what these people are really telling us to do and that is stop believing what you have believed for 2 ,000 years.

You know All right, I appreciate okay, thanks, Justin all right all right God bless them by eight seven seven seven five three three three four one.

Let's talk with Russ hi Russ Hello, Russ Hello, yes, sir.

Okay. It's the the connection broke for a second there Well, I after hearing what you've been talking about.

I'm just going to briefly mention the inerrancy thing at the end, but I Were I guess we're probably not allowed to mention

URLs right? Oh, well, I don't know what what do you what what's your question? I was gonna back you up the whole so -called homosexual garbage is mostly propaganda and is not rational and There's the great article.

Have you ever heard of touchstone mag .com? Yeah, in fact I had the gay invention

I'm not familiar with that one. I had a touchstone article up on my other system this morning, but it was on a different subject

But if you I'll just you know email on your site to give it to you what the

URL is But it's called the gay invention from 2005 at touchstone mag .com

and Explodes the word homosexual is irrational homo means same sex means opposite.

Tell me how that works Well, I understand that there are some who don't even feel that we should use the term homosexual and things like that I think we know what the issues are

My concern obviously is that Christians especially bring a Christian worldview to this discussion so many religious people try to reason on this subject without a specific

Christian worldview and people People in the church today are having so much pressure put on them to think like the world and to be ashamed when they think

As Christ would have us to think we need to Recognize that pressure and fight against it and speak as Christians and not be ashamed of it

And I think that'll that'll help a whole lot But actually your question on inerrancy will work fine because that's actually going to transition right into what

I wanted to close the program with So go ahead with it. It's not gonna be a problem real quick It he that all it also test like using even using sex as a verb which when

I was a kid We didn't weren't allowed if you use sex as a verb, you'd have your mouth washed out with soap now

It's in the pulpit. So that whole article talks about how basically even the church has been brainwashed on the subject.

Anyway Excuse me. Anyway, I'll cut this short I'm a young earth creationist and I'm real quickly that I'm I'm so frustrated by Basically because of church politics the inerrancy council said oh, well, we'll let the older through the used extra biblical authorities to overrule

Genesis for the age of the earth. Okay. I'm sorry. I'm sorry inerrancy council. What are you referring to?

Yeah, you know council of biblical canary. You mean? Chicago Chicago statement. Okay.

I just need to know what you're referring. I apologize. That's right. But anyway, but so I'm kind of Just for what it's worth.

I've I've kind of coined my own replacement of Supra errancy above error as opposed to without it also, there's you have the additional aspect that well some of that tends to be headed in the

Evidentialist direction which kind of like well, what if somebody comes up with a bigger pile of evidence? Will you will you cave in?

So I've just kind of Am since you're you're the scholar What what do you think of the word

Supra errancy versus inerrancy? Of course, I'm sure you're pro inerrancy But well, you know, it actually it's it's an interesting term and and I could see a level of Usefulness to it on on a number of areas.

I don't know that we can avoid the discussion of allegations of error

Obviously, but there does I have I have begun to emphasize in some of my sermons of late

The fact that there I think there has has been a degradation in Christian scholarship and in Christian thinking

Where we it's certainly reflected within seminaries where you have

Biblical theology and then you have systematic theology. You have Pauline theology. You have Johan in theology you have

Petrine theology and There is a sense in which many of those coming out of seminaries have this idea

That you can view the Bible in in an atomized fashion where you can put

Paul over here and John over here and Peter over here and you can contrast them and You can in essence set them at at each other's throats

And in fact, you can even do that within authors as well And the idea of a holistic view of scriptures is very rare in most theological education today

And yet I have been struck by the fact that these scriptures themselves frequently speak of themselves in that kind of holistic fashion and When Jesus rises from the dead in the longest

Narration we have of what Jesus does after the resurrection in the gospel of Luke Every his entire focus is

To direct and drive his followers to the scriptures and in fact there's this beautiful line

Luke 24 where when Jesus meets with the disciples after after the The two on the road to Emmaus now they've come back and when

Jesus meets with all of them That's that night. It says he opened their minds to understand the scriptures now

The scriptures there are are all of the Old Testament. It's it's Moses and it's David and it's it's it's a holistic perspective and I think we've lost a lot of that I think that's that that was the foundation of the great heights of theology that that we were able to To explore but don't seem to be exploring any longer because we don't have a foundation to get there we're so muddled in you know trying to Put Paul against James and so on and so forth that the idea of seeing scripture as a whole and that the harmony of Scripture that clearly is part of its own claims for itself

Just is is not there for a lot of people anymore. And so I would think that The Supra idea would would maybe point toward that that there is a an entire witness of scripture that exists above and beyond just the the

You know individual texts there is a harmonious message and to say that I realized

I was talking to someone I won't mention Briefly last week and to even mention that kind of high view of scripture.

They they cannot help but laugh they find it to be so ridiculous and so outdated and And I certainly put myself outside the realm of a lot of of quote -unquote acceptable scholarship today to actually believe that there is such a thing, but that certainly is what those who came before us believed and I think they were definitely on to something that maybe we in our

Technologically laden age have missed so you see what one of the things also that you were talking about the obvious irrational just anyway, just crazy stuff about we're going down the tube and that is

Our society not just our country was founded on the scripture I don't think people take seriously the supernatural power that was involved.

I think they're just so rationalist They don't really believe in supernatural power of the scripture Well, obviously obviously many of those in in amongst the founders did believe in the fact

I had spoken The well, I know but today Obviously, they are embarrassed by the backwardsness of many of those founders who expressed with great clarity their belief that Jesus was the

Lord of the nations and that that God had revealed his law and That that would be the foundation of this nation.

So they're embarrassed by those things Do you think since God since God that the God used his supernatural power in his word to create our?

Literacy that we've turned our back on it. He's now removing it Well, there's there's no question that that we are experiencing

God's wrath for for many many reasons And I think the reprobate, you know The question is is the reprobate mind that we see in our society the result of God's wrath or what's bringing

God's wrath? Well, yeah, that's what John Piper says. It is the judgment of God Yeah, and then

I love CS Lewis's that hideous strength Merlin pronounces the curse of Babel on the enemies and he says those of you

Who have despised the Word of God let now the Word of man be removed also. Yeah, they think there's there's a lot of truth

That hey Ross, I got one more point. I get to the program today. Thanks for your call. God bless you All right, God bless. Bye. Bye Quite true very quickly.

I wanted to touch on another issue Just in the last four minutes here and that is

I was reading a thread on the Puritan board that will sort of get us back into our subject next week on the issue of the text of Scripture and The discussion was about the

Westminster Confession of Faith 1 8 and the 1689 is the same thing And it says the

Old Testament Hebrew Which was the native language the people of God of old and the New Testament in Greek which at the time of the writing of?

It was most generally known to the nations being immediately inspired by God and by his singular care and providence

Kept pure in all ages are therefore Authentical so as in all controversies of religion the church is finally to appeal unto them the question came up in regards to what this means and there were about half the people who voted in the

Well half the people who voted one way or the other I think it's 23 24 And then seven abstentions or something in this poll that was taken about half of those

Believed that a person who would use a critical text that is the

Nessie Allen text in a Bible Society text other than the quote -unquote received text remember received text is the

English version of saying Texas receptus and the received that very language is from an

Advertising blurb in 1633 the Elsevier brothers were selling this and they called it the received text there has never been a church council

There was never any counselor got together and gathered manuscripts and examined variants and so on and so forth

But it's called the quote -unquote received text, and it was the text that was used by default

For a large period of time and so about half the people who took a position on this said that a

Presbyterian elder who holds the Westminster Confession of Faith would be violating his ordination vows to utilize anything other than the

TR Now the problem I have with this and I would need a lot more time to really develop this and maybe we can do so Beginning next week with the next program the problem.

I have with this first of all what TR. I mean I know whenever I talk with folks that have these

You know and I appreciate the high view of Scripture that many of these people have I have a very high view of Scripture myself obviously

But one of the things I've experienced over the years is when I talk with these folks remember the debate It's online the debate

I had with Doug Wilson on this when he got into the textual when he got into the received text ecclesiastical text stuff for a while When did the wheels fall off for Doug was when

I started asking specific questions. What about this specific verse? what about this specific verse and That's where you know they sort of don't even want to go there

Well, I don't know we don't want to get involved in those things. We want to talk overarching here Well the text doesn't exist outside of those.

That's the problem. I Mean what is the received text is it the is it the blue case bound?

version from the Trinitarian Bible Society That that no Greek manuscripts ever read exactly like that.

Well. It's just the general Byzantine, okay When did that become the quote -unquote received text

I want to know these things I think it's important if you could talk about well It's the text that the church has received when who?

I'm a little uncomfortable with that because that was of course the Roman argument in defense the Vulgate Against the use of the

Greek New Testament was well the received text is the Latin Vulgate of course has been used for 1100 years

I want specifics so I have a little bit of concern When I hear people defending a text that that contains blatant errors

Revelation 16 5 and other places and doing that on the basis of the authority of The Westminster Confession of Faith or the

London Maps Confession of Faith for that matter, so that'll give us a good start I think in the next program as we

Continue on with our discussion of that and then listening to the radio program that we were listening to and continuing on here on the dividing

Line thanks for listening. We'll see you next Tuesday. God bless The dividing line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega Ministries if you'd like to contact us call us at 602 nine seven three four six zero two or write us at p .o.

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