UNBELIEVABLE: Should We UNHITCH From the Old Testament? | Andy Stanley vs. Jeff Durbin

Unhitching Christianity from the Old Testament

We need to unhitch our Christianity from the Old Testament as well.

I'm not suggesting the two Testaments are not equally inspired. My point is they aren't equally applicable.

I just got heartburn. That one, that's a quote from Stanley's book. That one gave me indigestion. That is a garbage take. That's two week old spicy garbage. Oh boy, shut up, Nate. All right, let's get into Durbin's response here.

What does Jesus say to them? He says, slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. He actually chastises them, Andy. He chastises them for not believing what? Believing in his own word, the previous revelation of God.

What is the foundation of your faith? I mean, why do you believe what you believe?

The word of the living God, okay.

I mean, in that sentence, zing.

This is going really badly for Stanley, but it would for anybody who wanted to make the kind of claim that he's making. It's pastor versus pastor. On this edition of Debate Teacher Reacts, Andy Stanley debates Jeff Durbin on a very odd position, unhitching Christianity from the Old Testament.

What does that even mean? Who makes the better arguments? We're about to get into it. This is an older video. It came out a few years back, but it has been highly requested by many of you. And so buckle your seatbelts because things are about to get interesting.

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Defining What It Means to “Unhitch”

Unhitch.

Well, let's start with unhitch. Yeah, what do you mean by unhitching the Christianity from the Old Testament?

I don't want to spend too much time on this. So just interrupt me if this.

So this is good, good for Brierley. That's what we need to start all debates off with, which is a definition of terms at the outset. So the two interlocutors don't talk around each other and miss drawing out clash.

All of this trades on what Stanley means by unhitch. When he says that, you know, we should unhitch Christianity from the Old Testament.

It goes too long. That was a term I used in a particular sermon in a particular series, I guess really almost actually a year ago. I just done a 12 part series through the life of Jesus leading up to resurrection.

And it was going well. So I thought, hey, I'll spend three weeks and just keep story going narrative wise through Acts. So I spent three weeks on Acts. So in the message in Acts 15, where I talked about the Jerusalem council and this momentous decision to, and the word I used was unhitch Christianity from the Sinai covenant from circumcision.

And again, whatever, I mean, everybody knows something happened there that was of extraordinary significance for the church. I used the word unhitch. And then to tease my next series, which was called the Bible for Grownups, I made the comment, hey, and perhaps those of us modern Christians.

So I don't watch Stanley and I haven't seen the series that he's referring to, but it sounds like what he did was to point to the Jerusalem council in order to teach something to his church. Now we have to understand the Jerusalem council and there's just way too much to say about it, but suffice to say the original followers of Jesus did not appear to have any intention of ceasing Jewish custom.

They were perfectly fine with continuing to go to the temple and performing the various rituals prevalent in first century Judaism. That's why the first description of the early church includes attending the temple in Acts chapter two.

That's why you'll see Peter and John going to the temple to pray in Acts chapter three. That's why it says in chapter five, that all the Christians gathered together in Solomon's portico. It's because they were continuing to observe all of the customs of Israel.

There was no interruption with regard to any of these things. The difference was those particular Jews had found their Messiah in Jesus Christ. But then something happened when the Gentiles started believing, which is what Jesus had always prepared his disciples for.

Now, all of a sudden, there's this question about what to do with folks who were not raised in this Jewish context. Should they worship Jesus only, or should they become practicing Jews as well? That's what the Jerusalem council was trying to answer.

Acts chapter 15, verse seven, and after there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, brothers, you know that in the early days, God made a choice among you, that by my mouth, the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe in God who knows the heart bore witness to them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he did to us.

And he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith. Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?

But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will. And so, as Stanley points out, the Gentiles who desire to follow Jesus should observe what's sometimes referred to as the Noahic covenant.

Verse 28, for it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what has been strangled and from sexual immorality.

If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well, farewell. These requirements were on top of, you know, repentance and saving faith in Jesus Christ. Many were being baptized as well. This right here is how the Gentiles should live as Christians according to the Jerusalem council.

But notice something, they appealed to the Old Testament to figure this out. Did they not? They even quoted from Amos in order to draw their conclusion about what to do. Is that unhitching the Old Testament from Christianity?

Does this support Andy Stanley or not?

Forget these exact words, we need to consider, we need to unhitch our Christianity from the Old Testament as well. Kind of paralleling that there was a momentous detachment from what it meant to be a Jesus follower for Gentiles, that perhaps we need to think through some of those things ourselves.

It really was a tease.

In fact, in the message I said, and we will come back and talk about this more in the next few weeks.

Well.

So again, it sounds like Stanley is claiming that the early church, which did not consist of only Gentiles, unhitched themselves from the Old Testament. And his support comes out of Acts chapter 15, where the Gentile believers were only told to adhere to certain kinds of traditions, abstain from idols, idolatrous things and immorality and from what has been strangled and from blood.

But does it say that they were also to abstain from the Old Testament? Was that one of the requirements? So remember, Briarley just asked Stanley for a definition of unhitch. And then Stanley just told a story about how he used the phrase, how he used that word unhitched.

But did he really explain what it means? So what I'm doing right now is I'm just walking this out loud, okay? I'm walking together with you and talking out loud. Hopefully soon we'll get to some cross-examination.

And understandably so. People took that phrase and it sort of became the banner under which I do all ministry. And interestingly enough, in our churches, everyone was scratching their heads, like, why is this such a big deal?

Because I teach from the Old Testament all the time. In fact, that next series was a four-part series and two were from the book of Genesis. So in terms of my track record, nothing could be further from the truth that I don't teach from the Old Testament, don't believe the Old Testament, don't think the Old Testament points to Jesus.

All the things people keep reminding me of on social media, I'm like, I know. And if you actually paid attention to my history of preaching, you'd know that. But again, hey, we're all busy. I don't expect everybody to drop in and listen to all my sermons.

So that's kind of the history of how that word became associated with my whole view of Christianity. I do use the term in the context, within a specific different context within the book. So, and then of course, and you guys can appreciate this.

Then the next rumor was, well, Andy wrote Irresistible because of all the flack he got from the sermon. Well, the sermon book came out in September and nobody knows anything about publishing. You know, you don't.

So these are all interesting stories, but he was asked to define what the word means. I haven't heard a definition yet. Have you?

Get a book out that quick. So that's kind of the brief history of the term and my tainted reputation that perhaps I earned, but my communication style in our local church is super specific and I'm pretty consistent and I understand people could drop in from time to time, you know, may misunderstand my approach.

And I take responsibility for that.

Well, thanks for

Okay, so that's the brief history of how I came to use the words. Not what Stanley was asked. And I'm not saying that he didn't answer like on purpose, but you know, maybe he just started riffing and he missed the question, but the fact remains he didn't answer the question.

Explaining obviously some of the background too, because it was, yeah, it was about a year ago now, as you say, that you first preached the sermons, as it were, that initially caused some controversy.

And then obviously the book, if you like, was the more full explanation of where you were going with that. As I understand it, the book is really actually, what your primary concern is, is with reaching the next generation, a post-Christian generation, which as far as you can see, just doesn't necessarily buy into the idea that the Bible is the word of God and so on.

And you have to start at a different place in that case. And you're trying to say, well, actually we need to go back to the early church because they didn't have the Bible as we have either. And just take us through that.

What you're responding to, how you think that

The Early Church, the Temple, and the Jerusalem Council

So again, if Stanley is saying that the early church did not have the Bible, I would just like to know, what did they read? Remember a moment ago, we noticed that the early church attended the temple, right?

Look at Acts 2, verse 46. And day by day, this is the early church, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God, right?

What do you think was read at the temple? Yep, you guessed it, the Old Testament. So what does it mean to claim that the early church didn't have the Bible? That they unhitched themselves, whatever that means, from the Old Testament?

I imagine Jeff Durbin is gonna have some things to say about all this. Let's find out.

We can in fact make the gospel irresistible again for this next generation.

Yeah, a little bit of the backstory is about nine years ago, I was watching a video, Sam Harris, who was at a university setting, doing his Sam Harris thing where he dismantles the Bible and there goes Christianity.

And it occurred to me, wow, there's a false assumption that skeptics for generations have leveraged and have baited Christians into this debate. Really what I think is a false assumption and the assumption is as the Bible goes, so does Christianity.

So if you dismantle the Bible, Christianity goes away, you've undermined Christianity. If it's a 66 card, house of cards, if you pull out Genesis, pull out Leviticus, pull out Revelation, the whole thing comes tumbling down, which is just not true.

And I thought, this is, you know, once upon a time, maybe this didn't matter because you had to buy tickets to debates, who's gonna read their books. But now every middle schooler, high schooler, college student has access to all that misinformation.

And now you can find out what else is in the Bible, think about this, without ever opening a Bible or owning a Bible or even holding a Bible. And so I just

So imagine that Stanley saw Sam Harris, quote unquote, dismantling the Bible. And his reaction was to start thinking about unhitching Christianity from the Old Testament. Like, is that what happened? Why not do what others have done?

What I do at this channel and just defend the word of God. I don't, Durbin's about to jump in here.

Welcome, pal, this is really about nine years ago to step back on sort of the classical apologetic method that I was taught, I mean, I didn't make any of this up, you know, 35, almost 40 years ago, to say, hey, I would like to, the way I say it is, I would like to tether the faith of this generation to the event that created the movement that eventually brought us the Bible, to tether their faith to the event that launched the movement that eventually brought us the Bible.

So none of this is new, it really just is a different approach. And it's really putting the spotlight in terms of the foundation of our faith on the event of the resurrection, which every apologist who ever debates any of the new atheists or anybody else, eventually they get to the issue of the resurrection because the documents documenting the resurrection aren't dependent on an inerrant scripture, they're just dependent on a historically reliable scripture.

So, you know, that was the thing that motivated me. And so I've been talking about this for many, many years, and I kept being misunderstood as people kind of dropped into specific sermons. So one afternoon, Dr. Geisler, he's 86 now, he called me at home.

I remember standing on the front porch, he said, Andy, you have to write about this. I'm like, I don't wanna write about this. That's not my thing. I mean, that's technical. That's a, you know, he says, no, you're gonna continue to be misunderstood if you don't write about this, it's not enough to talk about it.

So I did a little short ebook called Why the Bible Tells Me So Isn't Enough Anymore, and then eventually I wrote Irresistible. So my heartbeater, the reason I did all of this really is to shift the approach, to shift the conversation and to really, I mean, I ask church leaders all the time, what's the faith of the next generation worth?

And I think it's worth everything. And so I just began to wanna help church leaders tether the faith of this generation to the event of the resurrection that brought us the movement, the church that eventually brought us the Bible.

So it's

Why not teach the word of God to the next generation and show them that it can be defended? Explain to them why it's true and show them that it's completely relevant to their lives in the 21st century.

Why not do that? Why is that not an option? I don't understand. Does it take more work or something?

Nothing new, it's really just sequential. And anyway, but I understand why it's a little bit, well, it makes people nervous. I get that.

And obviously a large amount of the book is given over to the whole question of how are we to treat the Old Testament as regards to the New Testament and so on. And ultimately, as I see it, the position you come down on, and I'll give a quote from the book here is, you say, I'm not suggesting the two testaments are not equally inspired.

My point is they aren't equally applicable. And that's the big difference for you on this, in this argument.

That's

The New Testament, Inspiration, and the Authority of All Scripture

Ooh, I just got heartburn.

That one, that's a quote from Stanley's book. That one gave me indigestion. They're not equally applicable. The Old Testament is not as applicable as the New Testament. Boy, I thought this was gonna be a debate teacher reacts and here I am, I'm doing a pastor reacts.

That is a garbage take. That's two week old spicy garbage right there. What did the Apostle Paul mean when he said this? Second Timothy three, verse 16, all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

What was the scripture that the Apostle Paul was referring to when he wrote this letter to Timothy? What was scripture? What was he talking about the New Testament only? Well, was that even a canon of text when Paul wrote this letter?

No, he was talking primarily about the Old Testament.

Aye, aye, aye.

I mean, this is, to me, this is like elementary stuff, ladies and gentlemen. I mean, like, I don't know. It shouldn't be this easy to miss stuff like this. If you know your Bible, if you're a good student of the scripture, and hey, especially if you teach the Bible to a church, these kinds of things should pop up immediately.

Like, why didn't these things pop up for Stanley? Like, what's going on here?

Certainly one of the differences, and I'm glad you brought this up because all the book reviews make it sound like the whole book's about the Old Testament, and it's not. My discussion about the Old Testament is really taking people on a journey to understand really the distinction, from my perspective, of the New Covenant and the Old Covenant, and that the New Covenant is supported primarily by the resurrection, which, and the other way I'd say this is, you know, the Old Testament's at the beginning of our book.

How do you know about sin without Genesis, you know, or maybe Isaiah or something, right? How do you know about God and his promises of redemption without the Old Testament? How do you even understand the vast majority of Jesus' teaching in the gospel since they consist of either allusions to the Old Testament or outright quotations from the Old Testament?

I, oh boy, shut up, Nate. All right, let's get into Durbin's response here.

I think it's important. Andy said that it's not a difference in theology, it's a difference in approach in terms of approaching the law of God and these issues. I think it's important because I think it is deeply theological.

The theology underneath us as a foundation will lead to practice and to methodology, and in terms of where we're at today with a culture, that's where it's at today. I think we need to get closer and closer to the worldview and the theological foundation of the apostles that were preaching in the book of Acts and how they were approaching the world.

And in order to do that, we have to go to the text itself. And I think what you can see just universally throughout the scriptures is an appeal to the self-attesting authority of the word of God, always and in every case.

Even when bringing up something like an example like the resurrection of Jesus, Peter actually says, and Andy refers to this in some of his work in 2 Peter 1, 16 through 19, when he refers to the fact that we were eyewitnesses to his glory, he then goes on to say, but we have something more sure, the prophetic word.

And so he bases actually the certainty and the surety of his testimony, not on the fact that they were eyewitnesses. He, of course, mentions that we're eyewitnesses to him.

So for reference, this is what Durbin is citing. 2 Peter 1, 16, for we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was born to him by the majestic glory, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.

And we have the prophetic, here it is, and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.

A lot of Jewish imagery, probably some idioms there. And then he goes on to talk about how prophecy is produced. But that, for reference, is what Durbin is talking about.

But he has something more sure, the prophetic word. And I think this is interesting too, and I would just say this with, and I love and respect Andy a tremendous amount, but I think it's providential, brothers, that in this moment we have, just behind us in the last week or so, we have William Lane Craig, who is a brilliant, brilliant man, who I think is probably the best out of any of us to talk about the historical evidences for the resurrection of Jesus Christ and all those things.

He's a brilliant man. He was talking to another brilliant man that I've actually had on my program, Ben Shapiro, and he was talking about the resurrection. Anybody can go see this online. I'd encourage you to do so.

When Dr. Craig points to the historical evidences and the logical consistency of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, at the very end of this strand of amazing evidences and logical argumentation, Ben Shapiro's answer is, I find that uninteresting.

Right, right. Do you remember this? I think I did a video on that too. You watch something like that, what Durbin is describing, and you think to yourself, man, what went wrong, right? You've got one of the foremost Christian intellects alive appealing to Ben Shapiro.

Why didn't Shapiro budge on his beliefs? I actually gave my own explanation in the reaction that I did, but it seems like Durbin is suggesting that it's because Dr. Craig did not rely on the authority of the word of God more.

I think that goes back to the issue of, where Andy says it's not a difference in theology, it's a difference in approach. And I think that it is an issue of theology and the condition of man, because in that case, I think we need to look what the scriptures say about someone like, say, Ben Shapiro, when there's an argument of historical evidences and logical consistency, the problem, according to the Apostle Paul in Romans chapter one, is not a lack of evidence or knowledge of God.

Paul says that we all know God, that the problem is that we're suppressing the truth and unrighteousness, for that which is known about God is evident within them. And here's what it says, for God has made it evident to them.

So the problem is a sinful suppression of the truth, not that we're neutral towards God, that we just don't have enough evidence or lighter information. The problem is actually breaking through that simple suppression of the truth.

And it's not to say that we don't use historical evidences and have those things, it's to say that that's not really the problem. The problem is that we won't take God at his self-attesting word, we won't believe God, we don't want his word.

And I'll just say one final word on that in terms of

I don't know if the Apostle Paul would have applied Romans chapter one to somebody like Ben Shapiro. Romans chapter one has, at its focal point, the Gentiles, the pagans who did not honor God. These were not Jews who refused their Messiah.

This was a different group in the eyes of the Apostle Paul. Romans chapter two arguably is probably more applicable to someone like Shapiro. Maybe you disagree with that. I just don't think that Romans chapter one, when you pay attention to the characterization in the latter half of that chapter is thinking about Jews.

I think, to me, I think that's pretty clear.

Jesus, the Prophets, and the Old Testament in the Gospels

What we build on after the resurrection, so post-cross and post-resurrection, when Jesus is on the road to Emmaus, there's a moment where he chastises these people who now see him alive from the dead.

And what does he chastise them for? He chastises them for not believing all that the prophets and Moses had spoken concerning him.

Okay, so I know I just took issue with something Durbin said, but what he's doing right now is he's coming back with some New Testament examples of how Jesus and the disciples relied on the Old Testament.

And he's right. I gotta tell you, it's not gonna be very hard to refute Stanley's position here. The examples are all over the place. So good for Durbin on this.

There's a consistent theme throughout the scriptures of the self-attesting nature of the word of God, and that the problem with fallen humanity is not a lack of evidence, insufficiency of evidence, a lack of good, logical argumentation.

The problem is that we are rebels against the king. We don't want God in our thinking. And so what we do is we exchange him for an idol. And again, you see just this consistency throughout the Old and New Testament that the problem is that we will not accept God at his word.

And the answer from scripture is Romans 1 .16. It's the good news, the gospel is the power of God for salvation. That's what God uses to raise people to life. But I think we need to ask ourselves the question, do we believe?

Well, hold on.

So let's not go too fast over that because Durbin is making a really great point, okay? If we quote the scripture, let me back up. When we engage the next generation, and that's what Stanley was concerned about, right?

That's kind of the initial premise that led him to think about his whole sermon about unhitching Christianity from the Old Testament in the first place. When we engage the next generation and we read the scripture, when we give him the gospel, what do we have to fear?

It isn't the Holy Spirit, the one who's doing the lion's share of the work anyway. Ezekiel 36, verse 26, look at this. And I will give you a new heart. This is the Lord speaking. And a new spirit I will put within you and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.

And I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. Oops, wait a minute. I can't use that passage if I'm supposed to unhitch Christianity from it, right?

But that's what happens when God moves. And when someone hears the gospel, the Lord removes their heart of stone and replaces it with a heart of flesh. And they hear and they respond to the gospel by following after Jesus and obeying his commands, amen?

So we don't have anything to fear from quoting the Old Testament. The Lord knows his people. He knows who is his. Jesus said the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. All we have to do is just go and reap, amen?

Eve, that Christ is the foundation of all knowledge, all knowledge or not. And I'll just say one final word here so I don't go on too far and take too much time. That when we talk about approaching the current atheistic or unbelieving or agnostic culture and worldview with the Christian worldview and we try to cater our theological approach or apologetic methodology to it, I think that we're losing the strength of the biblical worldview and the gospel when we step into the unbelievers position and we assume neutrality along with them.

And we try to actually borrow from their standards and methodology rather than actually showing them that without the biblical worldview, without starting with Christ in your thinking, there is no meaningful appeal to logic.

There's no meaningful appeal to evidences. We don't have uniformity in nature, which is the foundation of all appeals to evidence whatsoever without the biblical God. So if we don't start with the self-attesting word of God under our feet, standing on it, we don't even have a coherent appeal as Christians to laws of logic, to morality, ethical appeals, or to an appeal to any evidence at all.

So Durbin is cooking. Okay, and well, so I'll go ahead and sidestep the whole presuppositionalist thing. I don't fully agree with it. And I, personally, I utilize whatever apologetics tools I believe are appropriate to have meaningful conversations with non-believers, that's a rabbit trail.

But Durbin is cooking. And because Stanley is just already on weak footing, there wasn't much that Durbin had to do to overcome Stanley's claims. And I think he did. Now, arguably, there's a quicker, faster way to get there.

Okay, so when Stanley makes the claim, and the first thing that he does is he does not define what unhitch means, that's probably the first question that should be asked is, well, hold on a second, I didn't really hear a definition.

Could you actually spell one out for me clearly so that I and the audience can understand it? And then force Stanley to justify himself somewhere in the New Testament where this is taught, this idea that we should unhitch ourselves from the Old Testament.

Okay, but again, that would be something that belonged more in a formal cross-examination than I suppose this kind of loose, unbelievable is not a formal debate by any stretch. It's a great show, it's a great platform for engaging different kinds of ideas, but it's not a formal debate.

And so, anyway, there are way too many biblical examples, whether it's the ones that I already brought up already, or Durbin's examples that do serious damage to undermine Stanley's claims. And so that's kind of where I think the discussion could be that could draw out a better clash, just put it that way.

Because again, I mean, to be technical, we just never heard a definition of unhitch. So anyway, there is a few minutes of back and forth that resembles cross. Stanley jumps in and ask Durbin some questions, so let's go there right now.

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Cross-Examination on the Resurrection and the Old Testament

I think, Jeff, I think you just went in a circle. So let me ask you a couple of questions. Here's my opinion. If Christ has not been raised, your preaching and your faith is useless, right? Mm-hmm.

Yes.

That's not original with me, you know that. And also, you don't believe,.

Well, I should say that.

Do you believe Peter and John believe Jesus was the Messiah between the crucifixion and the resurrection, or did something happen to their faith after the resurrection? I mean, and people always go to the Luke, is it Luke 16?

Yeah, Luke 16 passage, yeah, Luke 16, which is so silly to me, okay, because Jesus is in a parable. He's talking in a parable.

Okay, so we started off with some interesting garden path questions, right? So setting the garden path just means developing a line of questions that begin more benign at the beginning, but then they lead to a doozy of a question, or they should, at the end, right?

And it's a setup, okay? And so Stanley asks, well, do you agree with scripture that if Christ is not raised and we are all to be pitied, essentially? Durbin says, yes. Well, then Stanley asks another question, but then he interrupts his own question to provide some commentary, I don't know, he really should not be doing the work of his interlocutor for his interlocutor in that sense, right?

A lot of times, if you do this kind of a thing, like if you pause and then you try to like provide some commentary, you divert like this, essentially you end up losing the original thread. So Stanley should be very careful about when to insert his own commentary and when to just simply ask the question.

Technically, in formal debates anyway, you would never provide commentary at all in cross-examination. The commentary is for the other segments of debate, if at all, okay? But this isn't a formal debate.

Like I said, this is unbelievable.

Let me read the verse right before this. The law and the prophets. This is, I mean, this is now, this is Jesus. These are Jesus' words teaching. The reference you just gave us was within the context of a parable about Abraham's bosom and all that.

The law and the prophets were proclaimed until John, John the Baptist. Since that time, the good news, contrast, since that time, the good news that the kingdom of God is being preached and everyone is forcing their way into it.

So

By the way, that phrase, look at this, Luke 16, 16. The law and the prophets were until John. Since then, the good news of the kingdom is preached and everyone forces his way into it. That has been in a bit of an interpretive mystery for many a Bible scholar.

Why?

Well, it's just the awkward way that the phrase reads. Jesus also said the same thing in Matthew 11, verse 12. The kingdom of heaven has suffered violence and the violent take it by force, okay? And we know this phrase is important because in Matthew, that right there is the center of a chiasm.

But what is it saying? I agree with D .A. Carson who says that the way that the Greek reads, it's not that the kingdom suffers violence. It is the kingdom itself that is advancing with great force. And so Carson offers a different way to read it.