WWUTT 1999 Q&A G3 Day 1, Jesus’ Use of Malakoi, Upcoming Christmas Musical

So how was that first day of the G3 conference? Have you seen anything about a Jesus musical coming up?

And what did Jesus mean by using the word Malachi in Matthew chapter 11? The answers to these questions and others when we understand the text.

This is when we understand the text, a daily study in the word of Christ, for the sake of the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness.

Find all our videos and other ministry resources at www .utt .com.

Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky, and greetings, everyone. Well, day one of G3 is in the books.

Not counting Wednesday. That was pre -conference. I didn't go to the pre -conference anyway. I just came to the convention center and set up the booth on Wednesday.

So Thursday is the first official day of G3, and we're done and very tired, and that's why

Becky is not with me. We thought that we would be able to record a Q &A from the convention center there in the exhibition hall where our table is, our booth at G3, but we were busy the whole time meeting people, shaking hands, some folks that have watched the videos or have been regular listeners to the podcast, and then some people who had never heard of us before.

So we, I think, introduced ourselves to some new faces, maybe made some new friends.

If you're a new listener to the broadcast, welcome. And one of the reasons why you've tuned in is probably because an adorable little blonde girl handed you a brochure.

My two daughters, Aria and Mariah, eight and six respectively, are better promoters of when we understand the text than I have ever been.

They just grabbed a handful of those brochures, and they've been walking around the exhibition hall just handing them out to people.

And on occasion when I haven't seen them in a while, I'll go looking for them, and I'll pass by somebody, and they'll say, hey, aren't you the dad of that adorable little blonde girl running around?

And I said, well, I do have an adorable daughter, if you can tell me where she went. But anyway, they are excited to be here.

They have been pumped about this conference. My kids have loved it. And because we have five kids with us, including our two -year -old, this has been a lot harder than we anticipated being able to find some time to sit down and record a broadcast.

But episode 2000 is next. This is episode 1999. Episode 2000, we said we were going to record on Friday from G3.

We're going to see if we can pull it off. So stay tuned. But I appreciate you listening to this episode.

This is kind of the Q &A before the Q &A. I'm going to respond to a couple of questions here. On the

Friday edition of the broadcast, we typically take questions from the listeners. This is a special edition because it's G3 and it's right before our 2000th episode.

But you can submit your questions by emailing us when we understand the text at gmail .com.

I do have a couple of questions here. One of them has to do with something that I taught on the broadcast earlier this week.

So I'll get to that here in just a moment. But before that, let me mention something about G3 today. The speakers were great.

I didn't walk into the main convention center and listen to a lot of the speakers. I had to catch them on the video feed, which is playing a few booths to our right on the big screen.

But I did hear Steve Lawson's. If you get the chance, look up Steve Lawson's sermon that he preached on Thursday.

I know he's preaching again. I think he's got the closing sermon on Saturday afternoon.

So you want to be looking for the one that he did on Thursday on the first day of G3 about the sovereignty of God.

A pastor friend of mine online said, I love listening to Steve Lawson preach. He basically just gets up to the pulpit and yells about the sovereignty of God.

And I love it. And that's what it was. Such a fantastic sermon. I think that one has been worth the admission of G3 alone.

All of these sermons, all of the speakers will be uploaded to the G3 website in a couple of weeks.

I'm not sure how long that takes. You can watch the live feed. So if you go to the G3 page,

G3MIN .org, you're able to watch it live. But if you miss anything, and I think even some of the breakout sessions which don't get broadcast live, you will be able to find them on the

G3 website later on when they get all that material uploaded. I'm going to have to catch most of the sermons that way.

Some of the stuff I've been able to listen to at a distance, Steve Lawson, like nobody was in the exhibition hall at the time.

So I was able to give more attention to Steve Lawson's sermon. But I'm looking forward to catching a lot of these guys a little bit later on.

It's been wonderful meeting people, shaking hands. Our feet hurt. We're looking forward to the next full day on Friday and trying to get there a little earlier than we did on Thursday so we can catch some folks at the very beginning too.

The cessationist documentary debuted on Thursday night. This is the documentary directed by Les Lanphier, was written by David Lovey.

I was interviewed for this documentary two years ago. So they've been working on it for two years.

I even made a comment on the broadcast a week or two ago that I wasn't sure if I was still in it because it's been so long and they've had much more expert people to interview for this than me.

But I am. I'm in the documentary. It's a great documentary, and not just because I'm in it.

It is extremely well done. And you will love it as a tool to perhaps minister to your continuous friends, your charismatic friends who think that these miraculous sign gifts are still at work today and at work in charismatic churches.

It was a documentary. I wouldn't say documentary, but it was arguments just like the ones that are being presented in this documentary that brought me out of continuism using the scriptures, pointing to what

God's word says about these things. A friend of mine took me through God's word to give me a biblical understanding of tongues.

I listened to Justin Peters, not Clouds Without Water. That's what it's called now. But his seminar was called

A Call for Discernment, I believe was the name of it before he changed it to Clouds Without Water. And so I listened to all four or five parts of that when it was on YouTube.

And that did a lot for me in helping me to recognize these guys aren't really prophesying anything.

They aren't really performing these miracles. And a lot of it is a con.

And a lot of these people are even very immoral in their lifestyles. And Justin demonstrates that in his seminar.

That's not all the same thing as what you're seeing in the cessationist documentary. All I'm saying is that this is going to be a good tool to help those who still hold to a continuous view or a charismatic view that the miraculous sign gifts are still at work today and at work in charismatic churches.

I would highly encourage you to check out this documentary. Again, it's entitled Cessationist with some great names in there.

Justin Peters, as I mentioned, Phil Johnson, Steve Lawson, Jim Osman, Joel Beeky, trying to think of other names

I can, Nathan Busenitz is in a lot of it. They use a lot of Nathan Busenitz and he did a fantastic job.

So check out the cessationist documentary. I'm not sure if there's a website, but I'm sure you can find it. And there's a link to it on G3 because they help produce it.

Once G3 came alongside, I know that that helped the production of the documentary quite a bit.

So Friday is next on Friday evening. They're going to be showing the essential church documentary that was put out by Grace Community Church.

And then Saturday is like a half day. It goes from nine in the morning until one thirty or something like that.

But we're looking forward to Friday being able to meet more folks. And God willing, I'll I'll knock out this 2000 episode.

What a great thing to be able to accomplish 2000 episodes. So come Monday when

I record episode 2001, I'll be able to say there are thousands of episodes of when we understand the text.

And that will be true. Today, for this this brief

Q &A, I've got a few questions to respond to. And once again, if you want to email questions to us to be answered on our

Friday Q &A, you can send them to when we understand the text at gmail dot com. This question has to do with something that I taught earlier this week out of Matthew chapter 11 when we've looked at this section concerning John the

Baptist. So this is from Jason. He says, Greetings, Pastor Gabe. I thoroughly enjoyed today's podcast.

I think this was Tuesday's. However, I wanted to point out that you mentioned that the angel Gabriel spoke to John the

Baptist parents in the book of John instead of Luke, which I found humorous because I thought

I was the only one that did that. Yeah, I was bouncing between three gospels, Matthew, Luke and John.

So I was bound to get them mixed up. I know at one point I did say Luke correctly as being the book where you find the story of the angel appearing to Zechariah, Elizabeth being with child, the angel appearing to Mary and then you have

Mary's song all there in Luke chapter one. John one is where you have the account of John the

Baptist who is asked, are you Elijah? And he says, I am not. So are you the prophet?

No. Who are you then? And he says that he's the fulfillment of the prophecy that was given to Isaiah. And he also talks about how

God appeared to him and told him the one on whom my spirit rests. He is the

Messiah that has been prophesied. So all of that's there in John one. And I guess just bouncing amongst all of that,

Matthew 11, John one, Luke one. I just had a moment where I said,

John, instead of saying, Luke, I know I've got it all straight in my head.

It just doesn't come out my mouth that way. But, yeah, I'm glad, Jason, you feel vindicated in that you make these mistakes, too, in mixing up the

Gospels. I do it occasionally. Also, he goes on to say this is still Jason's email. The Greek word malakoi that Jesus used to describe the type of clothing that John was not wearing is only used one other time in the

Bible, which is first Corinthians six, nine that Paul used to describe effeminate, the effeminate. So can you offer more insight into that?

OK, let's look at those two passages together. I'm going to read again from Matthew 11 and then we'll go to first Corinthians six.

So remember, this is after John the Baptist disciples come to him and ask him on John's behalf because John is in prison.

They ask Jesus, are you the one who is to come or shall we look for someone else? Jesus tells them, go and report to John what you hear and see.

The blind receive sight and the lame walk and the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up and the poor have the gospel preached to them.

And blessed is he who does not take offense at me. And so then once John the

Baptist disciples depart, they go back to John to answer to John exactly what

Jesus said. Jesus says to the crowds, what did you go out into the wilderness to see a reed shaken by the wind?

And I said on Tuesday that John the Baptist was not a weak man. That's what a reed shaken by the wind symbolizes.

But John was not weak. He was a strong man, stood strong, even out in the wilderness, proclaiming the way of Christ.

Verse eight, but what did you go out to see a man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who wear soft clothing are in king's palaces.

Verse nine, but what did you go out to see a prophet? Yes, I tell you, and one who is more than a prophet.

This is the one about whom it is written. Behold, I send my messenger ahead of you who will prepare your way before you, which is a prophecy that was made in Malachi three one.

So coming back to verse nine, this is the verse that Jason was talking about here.

What did you go out to see a prophet? Yes, I tell her. No, sorry, that's not verse nine. Verse eight. What did you go out to see a man dressed in soft clothing?

And the Greek word there is Malachi. The only other place Malachi appears is in First Corinthians chapter six.

So now let me turn there in First Corinthians six nine.

The apostle Paul says, or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do not be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the

Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God. So Paul saying to those Corinthians no longer walk in those sins, you who have been cleansed of these things, do not be deceived.

The people who are in these sins will not inherit the kingdom of God. And what he what he mentions again in verse nine are the sexually immoral, the idolaters, the adulterers and the effeminate and the homosexuals now effeminate.

So the Greek word, therefore, effeminate is Malachi, and it literally means soft.

So coming back again to what Jesus said in Matthew eleven eight, what did you go out to see a man dressed in soft clothing?

Behold, those who wear soft clothing are in king's palaces. Now that is Malachi again.

So there are some that will try to say that there's nothing wrong with the way that Malachi is used in first Corinthians six.

It could mean the cowardly. It doesn't have to mean homosexuals. That's the argument that they try to make because they want to try to remove that homosexuality is a sin in the

Bible. And it's most clearly a sin, according to God's word. So they try to soften this word for soft.

Well, it depends on how it's applied here in Matthew chapter eleven. It's with regards to clothing.

And in first Corinthians six, it's with regard to sin. So what kind of sin?

Well, in the context, you're talking about the sexually immoral, the idolaters, the adulterers, the effeminate and the homosexuals.

Now, the way that the English standard version translates this, I'm reading from the legacy standard, but the

English standard version translates Malachi and Arsinoe Coitis, which is the other

Greek word that is translated homosexuals. The English standard version puts those two words together to describe both the giver and the recipient in a homosexual encounter.

Sorry for being graphic here, but this is the this is the description of this text. So the

ESV translators understood that to mean the giver and the receiver in this sinful act.

And so they translated it, translated it as those who practice homosexuality.

But the legacy and the new American standard will both have the effeminate and homosexuals.

Most translations will translate that out into two different words, not putting it together in one category.

So the effeminate or effeminate man, men would be soft men. These are men who act like women and especially with regards to sexual immorality, because that's the context of these first sins that are mentioned here.

Sexual immorality, idolatry, adultery, effeminacy and homosexuality. Five sins that are listed.

And then in verse 10, you have five more. Nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

It's pretty evident what Paul is referring to there in first Corinthians six.

So how about the application of that word in Matthew chapter 11, where Jesus uses

Malachi when applied to men in the context of sexual immorality?

First Corinthians six, nine, it means effeminate. But there is a possibility that when

Jesus used this word in Matthew 11, eight, he was referring to the effeminate.

He was referring to men in soft clothing. I'm just giving you a possible understanding of this. So in verse seven, once again,

I'm back in Matthew 11, verse seven. Now, as these men were going away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John.

What did you go out in the wilderness to see a reed shaken by the wind? That would be a weak man, right?

But what did you go out to see a man dressed in soft clothing? That's also a weak man.

But with the first illustration, a reed shaken by the wind, that could be a poor man who's out in the wilderness living homeless, whereas a man dressed in soft clothing would be a rich man.

But it still could be a reference to such a man being effeminate because Jesus goes on to say, behold, those who wear soft clothing are in king's palaces, the

Herod's. You know, I'm talking about the offspring and the family of Herod, the great.

Who are now living in the palace there in Jerusalem, the Herod's have often been depicted as being effeminate men, that their men are soft, they wear soft clothing.

And so it could be that when Jesus said that, that is what he was referencing. These Herod's that live in the palace and behave or conduct themselves in a soft, effeminate way, but that's not

John the Baptist. And this could be done very righteously, of course, because it's Jesus. This could be

Jesus making a dig at the Herod's who had thrown John in prison.

And we know what happened with Herodias, the wife of Herod Antipas, convincing her daughter to ask

Herod for John the Baptist's head on a plate. Now, I'm not saying about this that Jesus would have been calling the

Herod's homosexuals. We don't know that was the case because, of course, Herod had quite the affinity for Herodias's daughter.

But but for Jesus to make this dig at the Herod's because they had arrested

John and thrown him in prison, they were soft. John was not soft. The Herod's were soft because they could not handle what it was that John said.

And when he calls them out for their sin and how because Herod had married his brother's wife, therefore he was guilty of adultery.

They hated John. They threw him in prison. Herodias wants John the Baptist's head because because she's also frightened of him.

So Jesus is demonstrating how brave and courageous with the strength of God John the

Baptist had and the soft ones, the effeminate ones. And wasn't

John the Baptist out in the wilderness? That's the one that that's the ones that are sitting in King's palaces. So it could be that was the reference that Jesus was making there.

Hence why we've got the the use of the word Malachi in Matthew 11, 8.

Good question, Jason. And I kind of went a long way to explaining that, but I hope it made sense.

And that is one way that we could understand exactly what Jesus was referencing there in Matthew 11, 8.

When I talked about this on Tuesday, I talked about it mainly from the standpoint of John could have been of religious prestige, but he gave that up because he was obeying

God and went out to the wilderness, gave all of that up to proclaim the word of God and to baptize in preparation for the coming of Christ.

But that is a possible understanding there of Matthew 11, 8 with regards to Jesus taking a shot at the

Herod's, who were, of course, wicked. I've got a couple other questions here.

Let me get to at least this one from Ryan. What are your thoughts on this musical called

Journey to Bethlehem? Yes. Are you aware of this? So there is a musical of Mary and Joseph.

Leading up to the birth of Christ, I guess it's supposed to be Matthew one and two and Luke one and two, but it's being portrayed as a musical.

I'm not going to play the trailer because it's got music in it. If I do that, my podcast is going to get flagged.

It won't post to Facebook or YouTube because it'll have copyrighted material in it.

So I can't play the trailer. But yeah, there's this Journey to Bethlehem musical that's coming out. Lecrae plays the angel

Gabriel that appears to Mary and Antonio Banderas. Yes, that Antonio Banderas is he plays

Herod in this thing. It's a musical, like I said. What are my impressions of it?

Well, there's not a lot that you can tell from a trailer. I haven't seen the movie, of course. It doesn't come out until November.

But here's my first impressions from the trailer. And some of this is a guess because you don't quite know the context of some of the jokes and the clips that they see.

But this is at least what I'm getting being communicated from the trailer. It looks like they try to create like this romantic tension between Mary and Joseph.

And in doing so, they make it look like Mary and Joseph are actually not crazy about each other in the very beginning.

Or maybe Mary is not sure of Joseph. It also kind of looks like they didn't meet each other until the day they were promised to one another.

And we don't know that that was the way that that went. It is unlikely that Joseph and Mary did not know one another until this day that they were betrothed to each other.

They probably knew each other the whole while. And if it was the sort of a thing where Mary was promised before she was even too young to know that she was being promised to Joseph, then she would have known the whole while even growing up before she was of marrying age.

That's the man that I'm going to be promised to marry someday. Or it could have been that Joseph went to Mary's father and asked for her hand in marriage.

And there was some exchange of vows, some dowry that may have been exchanged for Joseph to be able to have

Mary as promised to him. And then when she came of age, then they would have been married.

So, yeah, I'm not crazy about that. It looks very Americanized anyway. That's not surprising the way that they create this sort of romantic thing between Mary and Joseph.

Let's see my second impression of this trailer. It looks like Mary asks

Joseph to believe her. So, of course, this would be after Gabriel appears to Mary and says you are going to be with child, which it doesn't give us a whole lot with that.

Lecrae playing Gabriel appears to Mary. We don't know exactly how they're going to script that.

It's not going to be faithful to the text. I can tell you that right now. However, they're scripting that saying that she is going to be with child.

The Holy Spirit is going to come on her. There's kind of a thing going around right now in our intersectional feminist victim culture mentality that Mary just kind of had this forced on her that she didn't get to choose.

And so I just kind of wonder if the script is going to portray Mary as voluntarily accepting this.

Yeah, I am going to do this. Not that the Lord has chosen her for this, but that she gives permission.

I just kind of see it going that way, especially with Lecrae's involvement in this, because Lecrae is very woke.

He went very woke with especially with the push of the Black Lives Matter movement. He's an LGBTQ ally on top of that.

So not a guy that I would want to put in my Christian movie, if that actually was the standard that we're trying to meet here in this particular film.

So when so after, of course, Mary has been told that she's going to be with child of the

Holy Spirit. Mary asked Joseph to believe her in the trailer. Rather than an angel of the

Lord appearing to him now, maybe they still do that in the movie, I don't know, but at least the way that they portray it in the trailer, it looks like Mary asks him to believe in her.

Rather than the angel telling Joseph, as we read about in Matthew one, don't be afraid to take

Mary as your wife, because what is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. OK, third impression,

Joseph is kind of a dork in the trailer. He doesn't really seem like a competent man, and this is the common portrayal of men, of even fathers in television and in movies over the last 20 plus years to make them just just look like buffoons.

And that's what Joseph kind of comes across as in this trailer. Like Mary is the strong one.

Mary is the smart one. She's the leader here, whereas Joseph is just kind of he's just kind of along for the ride.

He got pulled into this because of some sort of marital arrangement long before any of these things were decided.

You know, anyway, these are just the first impressions that I'm getting from the trailer. I am not expecting this to be a faithful narrative.

Am I going to go see it? Very likely, because, you know, I'm a glutton for punishment and I go see these things and then

I write reviews of it on my blog. So, yeah, I may go see this film. Ryan, thank you for alerting me to it.

I had not yet watched the trailer until you sent it my way. I had heard this was coming out, but had not seen the trailer yet.

So, yeah, if it's if it's terrible, you'll certainly hear about it from me. If it's any good, you won't hear from me.

But I don't think that's that's going to be the case. All right. I'm going to wrap things up there because this is almost a half an hour here.

So we're going to say that's a good precursor to our 2000 episode. God willing, we'll be coming up on Friday and we are hoping to be able to record that from Atlanta, Georgia, with people around us walking through the exhibition hall here at G3.

So thank you so much for your prayers and support of this ministry over the years and continuing to support us with just letting people know about the broadcast.

We would not have become what we are if it wasn't for word of mouth. Folks just sharing a video or sharing a podcast or telling a friend or something like that.

And so we thank you so much that this has meant enough to you to continue listening and then to even share it with others.

Our desire is just to preach Christ. We don't make money off of this. I've never done ads.

And my commitment to you has been that as long as I can help it, there will never be ads in my videos or on this broadcast.

We do what we do because we love the Lord. We will advertise some other things like G3 or the cessationist documentary or Justin Peters or Grace to You or Ligonier or any of these other things.

We'll mention those things because we love these ministries and what they're doing and think that you can receive a lot more

Bible content even from these other resources. So it's our privilege to be able to do that. Nobody's ever giving us kickbacks.

We do it just because we love Christ and we love his body, the church. Jesus Christ died for our sins.

He rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven. He is seated at the right hand of God where he intercedes for us.

And he is coming back again to judge the living and the dead. Whoever believes in him will not perish under the judgment of God.

But our sins are forgiven and we have everlasting life with him as a fellow heir of his eternal kingdom.

Put your faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ and live. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this time together that we have considered your word.

We have considered Christ. We have heard of sin and the judgment that is coming against sin.

But we have also heard the gospel and how Christ cleanses us from this sin, clothing us in his righteousness, that we may live righteously before you.

So guide us and direct our steps according to your spirit, that we may be pleasing sons and daughters of our father who is in heaven.

Bless the G3 conference this week. As things continue, the gospel is proclaimed and may this ministry reach millions as it has done with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen. Pastor Gabe is the author of several books and Bible studies available in paperback or for your e -reader.

For titles and more information, visit our website at www .utt .com. Join us again tomorrow as we grow together in God's word when we understand the text.