Matt Slick Live: January 2, 2025

The following program is recorded content created by The Truth Network. It's Matt Slick Live!

Matt is the founder and president of the Christian Apologetics Research Ministry, found online at karm .org.

When you have questions about Bible doctrines, turn to Matt Slick Live! For answers, take in your calls and respond to your questions at 877 -207 -2276.

Here's Matt Slick. Hey everybody, welcome to the show. It's me, Matt Slick. You're listening to Matt Slick Live!

Wow, hey, how about that? It is 2025. This is the first show of the year, 2025.

I hope you're all listening. I had a good holidays. I hope you had a good Christmas and New Year, I mean New Years and all of that.

I hope it went well. And mine was kind of just whatever, it was low -key and I enjoyed that, so it was nice.

And I hope that we have a great year. I hope things work out well and that the kingdom of God expands, the

Lord Jesus Christ is glorified and the people of God would then learn more about Him and become even more entrenched in the grace and the knowledge of our

Lord and Savior Jesus. That's what I'm hoping, so good stuff. All right, so here's a little bit of congratulations.

Today, January 2nd, is the 20 -year anniversary of me doing radio five days a week.

I did two years of radio one day a week and then was off for a few years and then moved up here to Idaho and 20 years ago today is when

I started doing radio. So I've been doing radio a total of 22 years and today is the anniversary.

How about that? 20 years ago today, I started here doing radio five days a week. So praise

God for that. If you have any comments about that, you want to call and say, hey, congratulations, happy anniversary, then that's fine too.

To do that, the number is 877 -207 -2276.

You can also email me if you want. You can email me a comment or a question. Just go to their email and send it to, let's see, info at carm .org,

C -A -R -M dot O -R -G, info at carm .org and put the subject line, radio comment, radio question, and then we can get to them.

And it's usually kind of a tough start, beginning of the year, end of the year, because it's holidays and stuff like that and people are kind of accustomed to not, you know, in their same routine.

Excuse me, I may not have a lot of calls today, I don't know. But there you go. Now also, I can officially let it be known that we're doing a trip to Jordan in November of this year.

Going to Jordan, I'll get more information out about it.

It's a 12 -day trip. We just did a few months ago, a couple months ago, we did a 19 -day trip.

We went to Turkey and Greece and Italy. And now we're going to go to Jordan.

I had all my notes. I talked to Eric Johnson, who was filling me in on it, I took some notes. And let's just say

I lost my notes when I rebooted my computer, forgot to save that bit of information. No big deal. But I'll get more information about it and where you can check it out if that sounds like something that'd be interesting.

And some of the things we're going to be seeing over there is Petra. If you look it up, just Petra, it's amazing.

And also we're going to be going to the place of Sodom and Gomorrah and some other places. Now I want to let you know that this will not be a trip for the week.

This is a trip that, for example, the day of Petra, we'll be walking probably 12 miles.

So that's a lot of walking and it's a lot of time. And so you have to be in shape for that.

And what I do when I go on these trips is I walk for a couple of months. I start off one mile a day, then two, then work it up.

And I was doing five, seven miles a day, not a problem. So when we went to the footsteps of Paul, we do our walking, but we had bus stops and things like that.

And it worked out fine. So just letting you know about that. And one other thing about it, what was it?

Oh, yeah. And it'd be a few times we have to go to the restroom outside. So we did that once before on another trip.

I remember that. We went to a big area, and I think it was Ai. And there were no facilities there.

So what happened was there was a big outcropping of rocks. The ladies went on one side and the guys went on another.

That's how it was that time. And nobody complained. It's just part of what it was. That'll happen a couple, three times.

Not a big deal, especially for the guys who are like, yeah, whatever. But the ladies, a little bit more problematic. So those are the negatives on that.

Now, do you feel safe going there? Yeah, yeah. I talked to Eric about that. He said, just like being in Turkey, the same level of just whatever.

It's just like Turkey. It's not a big deal. So I've been to Turkey twice and Israel twice,

I think. I've been to Greece and Italy now once and really enjoy those tours. It's really nice because when

I'm talking about stuff, I can say, hey, I've been there. I've been to Thessaloniki. I've been to Corinth. I've been to Pompeii.

I've been to the Vatican. I've been to the Sistine Chapel, you know, been to the seven churches of Revelation.

It's just stuff. It's really cool to be able to say. All right. So isn't that neat? All right.

Now, wait a minute. Someone had a birthday today, was it? We can put it in the clubhouse. I thought someone said they had a birthday or something.

If you do, let me know. And like I said, today's a 20 -year anniversary of me doing radio five days a week, and praise

God for that. Now, I just want to let you know that one of the things we want to do is expand the show.

And I talked to the people in charge about that. And so we're going to look into that a little bit.

If you like the show and you want it to continue and you want it to be on more radio stations, would you please consider supporting us?

Just go to karm .org forward slash donate and whatever you put in there.

If you want it specifically for radio, just send an email. Hey, I'm so -and -so sent a donation for this month, and that's for radio.

And it helps us to determine what's going on there. And the matching funds drive went really well.

I want to say thanks to all of you who contributed. It's pretty good.

It was good. It was enough to help us out for two months operating costs, which is good.

That's if nothing's coming in. And so it really helps us to be able to keep our head above water.

Really appreciate all of you for that. See all that good stuff. You see all that good stuff.

All right. Let's just jump on with Herb from Raleigh, North Carolina. Herb, welcome. You're on the air. Hey, man.

Congratulations on your 20 years and Happy New Year to you and your family. Hey, thanks a lot. I got a quick update.

Thank you so much, buddy. I just want to tell you, Tuesday, I sent you an email to carm .org.

I hope you get it about that unsolved mystery story about it was three children back in 1914 or 17,

I believe it was sometime in that period that saw an image of Mary. Oh, yeah.

And it's pretty amazing story. I don't know if you've heard of that, but that's what I was. I remember this much younger of seeing that on TV.

So I know a lot about it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There was something there. It's been highly investigated. And something occurred.

There are people seeing things and it's been filmed. And also the observers, not everybody could see everything, but there were observers who were watching people in the crowd.

They were all looking up into the sky, tracking, you know, their eyes are all tracking the same object up in the sky.

And it's an official apparition. The Catholic Church says of Mary and it's supposed to be really

Mary. And if I read you the quotes of what that apparition said, it's obviously a demonic manifestation.

It's a demon. And the Catholic Church can't tell the difference. Yeah. It's demonic.

In fact, I'll read some of the quotes. You know, I'll get my file open and go to it. But yeah, it's a demon. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, buddy, I got to get back to work, but I just wanted to update you on that. But I figured it was probably something more to it than it seemed to be and such as demonic.

So that's what I was trying to describe. I never remember something like that many years ago watching that show.

And I just wanted to let you know about that. I hope you have 20 more years of good times on the radio and 20 more years of life and maybe more than that.

Well, by God's grace, you know, I'm blessed. I'm 68 and people never guess my age.

And they just think I'm 15 years, 10, 15 years younger and I can walk quickly and I'm in good shape.

So I'm very blessed. Well, I'll tell you a funny short story that happened to me when I was 40.

I'm 68, too, like you are. I was 50 the other day. I was dreaming. But when

I was when I turned 40, I went to a little restaurant. I won't say it on the air, but it's a country type restaurant and they have a senior discount.

And when I'm 40 years old and I walk in, very nice lady is OK with the senior discount.

It'll be whatever. I said, why did you give me the senior discount? I look that old. She said, well, kind of.

I said, well, forget it. I'm not eating with you today. I'll go somewhere else. No, I'm kidding. I stayed.

But I couldn't believe it. At 40 years old, she said I looked 60. So while I'm aging fast,

I didn't know I was going that fast. It was bad lighting. That neon light can make you look bad.

So, you know, you never know. Yeah, well, I look in the mirror every day and I seem to have more wrinkles and less hair.

So I don't look in the mirror no more. I look in the mirror because it wakes me up. What it startles me. Oh, that's right.

And that gets me going. So that helps. Yeah. Well, look, have a great year.

I'm always praying for you and listen to you every single day. I can. Well, good. Thanks for your help. God bless.

All right. Thank you. All right. Well, good stuff. You know, since you brought up the issue of the

Fatima thing, I'm going to do is read some of the apparitions comments. I'm going to read six of them, three from Guadalupe in 1531, and then

I'll go to the three in 1917 from Fatima. And I want you to see the progression of the demonic manifestations there.

Then what I'll do, because there's a text that someone wants me to get to on dealing with John 20, 23, which is easy to do, and I'll explain that.

So I'm going to say something here. The there's a lot

I would say this. The Roman Catholic Church is not a

Christian church, OK? And it's an apostate false church, just like the

East Orthodox. Now, when I say that, I'm going to say this because I'm going to get a little bit because he brought it up.

I've got nobody waiting. When I say that, it's not me just being mad or being narrow minded or closed minded.

How dare I say something like that about the Catholic Church or whatever? The issue here is purely theological. I'm not the only one who holds this position.

There are literally thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of Protestants who understand the Roman Catholic Church is false, as well as the

East Orthodox. Now, both of them are on the rise. People are turning to them. The East Orthodox Church is a false church also teaches a false gospel, a false priesthood and a false

Mary. And so they they promote works, righteousness. Both groups do, even though they say they don't.

And the adherents will do whatever they can to weasel and word twist to make it sound like they're biblical when they're really not.

And so I've had thousands of conversations with them, thousands of hours over over decades, you know, doing this.

So, like I said, I was never a Catholic. I was never an East Orthodox. You know, it's not nothing about who

I was wronged by somebody. It's not like that. This is purely theological issue. So I'll be able to get into a little bit today.

I don't know. But this is a serious thing. I'm going to say it again. The Roman Catholic Church is not Christian.

If you believe official Roman Catholic theology and you die in it, you're going to hell. And if you believe official

Eastern Orthodox theology and you die in it, you're going to go to hell. The reason is, is because both of them preach a false gospel.

They both teach that you have to be baptized in order to be saved with variations in that. But they teach that and they have to keep commandments in order to be saved.

And that in Eastern Orthodoxy, that you gradually become godlike, not in their nature, but it's called theosis, that you achieve justification through your works, your faithfulness throughout your entire life.

It's just a false doctrines from the devil. And the same thing, similar thing goes to with Roman Catholicism that teaches that grace is infused kind of a thing into your soul through the sacraments.

And if you sin, you lose grace. And if you go to the church, you get grace back in your soul as long as you maintain that grace.

And, you know, that's how you stay saved and things like this. It's all demonic. It's all false doctrine. And I have no problem saying it.

I have no problem at all whatsoever saying that because it's true. Now, there is the break.

So what we do is because he brought up the Fatima thing, 1914, 1917, excuse me,

I'm going to read some quotes and we'll get to that. And then I'll get to John 20, 23, and we'll just talk.

If you have questions or comments, give me a call. 877 -207 -2276.

We'll be right back. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

Here's Matt Slick. Everybody, welcome back to the show. It's 20 after. If you want to give me a call, it's easy.

877 -207 -2276. Look at the Dave real fast before I do the

Catholic thing. Dave, welcome. You're on the air. Yes, congratulations on your 22 years,

I really appreciate your program. Praise God. What my what my question is, in 1st

Samuel, Chapter 28, Samuel has died and saw what to do.

And he goes and finds a woman who a witch or whoever that can tell the door.

Yes. And yep. And asked to do bring

Samuel back. Did she really bring Samuel back? Because I'm reading this thing. It sounds like it's just like Samuel talking to arguing about why are you doing this?

Was that really Samuel? Was this an evil spirit? I believe it was Samuel. It's in 1st Samuel 28.

And Samuel rebukes him because if the

Lord's not doing this and why are you doing this? So he's giving glory to God and he's he's going back and speaking of the things of God and pointing him to God and says, you're going to be with me here pretty soon.

It means he's going to die. So I have no problem with it actually being Samuel because people do live after they're they're dead.

They continue to exist in a conscious state. We know that from Moses and Elijah in Matthew 17 with the transfiguration of Jesus, we have this here.

So I have no problem with that. Now, there are those who would disagree and say it's not true. But that's their opinion.

I believe it was actually Samuel. OK, which of Indore was shocked. Yeah. Go ahead.

Yeah. When Samuel said you're going to be with me. Well, what was Samuel at this time? Dead. Was he in the afterlife?

He was present with God. Was. Was he present with God when he said this?

Well, that's what the New Testament you quoted 2nd Corinthians 5 8 or 1st Corinthians 5 8, I think. And so that's a different context.

It says you'll be with me, he said. So there's some theology about what happened before the crucifixion, where they were when versus what happened after the crucifixion, where they were.

But in that context, it looks like Samuel were in the boat of the dead, Hades, most probably

Abraham's bosom, most probably. And that's where he was. And it was brought back to which of Indore there was shocked because this is really him.

And this is revelatory because she's familiar with the demonic manifestations, with the familiar spirits who had come forth to imitate things.

And this was really him. And she OK, I'm in trouble now. So I believe it really was

Samuel. OK, yeah. What concern to or what

I'm a little bit confused, which when he said he'd bring it, he's going to be with him.

Yeah, he's going to die. He would. Yeah, he did. He died. And he would. It was over.

And so he was going to be with him. Well, I figured, well, Samuel is the same man. So I don't think so,

I don't know whether you're well, that's another discussion. That's another discussion. But he said he'd be with me.

So Saul blew it. But people can he blew it.

Let's just say that. And it looks like he was going to go. It would be saved anyway, even though Saul made a lot of I mean, yeah, he's made a lot of mistakes, a lot of goofs, but he did say he could be with me and he did not

Hades, but Abraham's bosom for Luke 16, 19 to 31. That's what

I believe. OK, yeah. So in your opinion, you think that Saul was saved?

Yes, I think so. Yeah, OK. All right.

It's very interesting. Yeah, I appreciate your comments on that.

Sure. All right. I guess that's something I'm here for now. Right, buddy. I appreciate it.

All right. You take care. OK. OK. All right.

So now what I'm going to do is get to the apparition stuff about Mary, the previous caller.

Like I said, I do that every now and then go through and try and show people what Catholicism teaches and how seriously bad it is.

So you have to understand these things really are bad and they are demonic. And so what

I'm going to do is read to you six quotes, three from Guadalupe in 1531 and three from Fatima in 1917.

Both of these are recognized by the Roman Catholic Church as being officially Mary. They're saying, yes, it really was

Mary. It was really her. These are really her words. And what gets me is so many people are willing to just throw down logic, throw down scripture, throw down anything, trample it underfoot because it tickles their ears and tickles their hearts because an apparition of a woman, a demonic manifestation, what it is, a demonic, a manifestation of, so to speak,

Mary. And then they just believe whatever this says. And the the stupidity of this whole kind of a thing is just to me is just tremendously embarrassing to any individual.

How do you know that these apparitions are true? Because the Catholic Church says so. Well, you believe the Catholic Church is true. Why? Because it says it's true.

How do you know? We get all these things. And the issue here is, what does the scripture say?

Now, what the Catholics will do then in the E .O. Well, how do you know that the scriptures are true?

What we are the ones who gave you the scriptures. We have the authority. They always point to the church. They don't bear witness of Christ.

It's always about their church. And it goes on and on. But nevertheless, what I'm going to do now is read three apparitions from 1531.

Remember, this is what the Catholic Church says is officially Mary. Then we'll get to the 1917 Fatima stuff. This is the first one.

It says, no, no, for sure. My little my dearest, littlest and youngest son, that I am the perfect and ever virgin

Holy Mary. So the apparition says it's Mary. How do you know that is one of the questions

I would ask, well, how do you know? How do you know this apparition really is

Mary? And, you know, it's because it says so.

I, you know, I got to tell you, you know, my mom and dad, you know, we moved a lot. My dad was in the service.

My mom had a really high IQ. My dad was had a high IQ. Also, one of the things they taught me was just don't follow the crowd.

Don't follow the crowd. Don't just believe something because someone says it. It's one of the things they taught me from day one.

You check things out. You examine stuff. Don't follow the crowd. If, you know, if everybody's doing drugs, does that mean you should?

Of course not. You know, they taught me to think. All right. So if I was sitting there, so the apparition comes up and it's on apparition, it's for Mary.

How do you know? Don't ask questions like that. Why shouldn't

I? This is important stuff. So anyway, here's number two.

I am truly your merciful mother, yours and all the people who live united in this land and of all the other people of different ancestries.

My lovers who love me, as the apparition says, my lovers who love me, those who seek me, those who trust in me here.

I will hear their weeping, their complaints and heal all their sorrows, hardships and sufferings.

So now the apparition says that you got to love her, love the apparition, you know, the apparition will hear their weeping and complaints and will heal all their sorrows, hardships and sufferings.

The apparition says it will. And that the people of different ancestries, my lovers who love me, those who seek me, those who trust in me.

Would you ever hear a disciple of Jesus say something like that? Would you ever hear one of the apostles?

Yes, you have to understand, you have to love me, seek me and trust in me.

You say that is a heretic. That's not what an apostle would teach, but the church has no problems saying it's

Mary, which he teaches. So we'll get to number three after the break. We'll be right back. Please stay tuned for more.

It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

Here's Matt Slick. All right, everyone. Welcome back to the show. If you want to give me a call, 877 -207 -2276.

Let me finish with the quotes. Then we got a call about the Trinity and then we'll get to John 20, 23.

We've got some good stuff going on here. So, um, the third quote from this apparition in 1531, which the

Catholic church says is officially Mary says, uh, am I not here? I, who am your mother.

Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not the source of your joy?

Are you not in the hollow of my mantle in the crossing of my arms? Do you need anything more?

So the apparition is now saying you don't need anything more than the apparition that the apparition is, uh, will protect you and is a source of your joy.

This is demonic because that which is truly from God will bear witness to the Lord Jesus Christ.

That's just how it works. This is not doing that. Now I'm going to jump ahead to 1917

Fatima, Portugal. And, uh, let's check this out.

It says here, uh, this is on May 13th, 1917. Are you willing to offer yourself to God to bear all the sufferings?

He wants to send you as an act of reparation for the sins by which he is offended and for the conversion of sinners.

So the apparition is talking to these three children. And, um, says, are you willing to offer yourselves, uh, uh, to bear the sufferings that God's going to send you as an act of reparation by the sins of which he's offended?

This is demonic. It's, it's from the pit. It's from the demons. The reason is because Jesus is the one on the cross who, uh, repaired the sin that he took care of the sin that at the cross,

Colossians two 14. That's what he did. We do not atone for our sins.

We don't make sins right before God by our sacrifices. Jesus did that.

And we look to Christ. This is why this is obviously a demon speaking because it's, it's undermining the cross of the

Lord Jesus Christ and saying that they can buy their own sacrifices, their own sufferings, atone for the atonement, um, uh, repair, make reparation for the sins by which he,

God is offended. This is just filth. Okay. Number two, I will take a

Sinta and Francisco shortly, but you will stay here for some time to come. Jesus wants to use you to make me known and loved.

He wishes to establish the devotion to my immaculate heart throughout the world. I promise salvation to whoever embraces it.

So the apparition is now promising salvation to everyone who has devotion to the immaculate heart of Mary.

Now demons, what they want to do is they're going to move away from Christ. They're going to point to themselves.

They're going to want you to seek them. And then ultimately what they want is sacrifices offered to them.

Sacrifices, uh, is something that demons and the demonic systems in the old Testament, the different kinds of sacrifices they were to demons.

And even in the pagan theologies of Greece and stuff like that, uh, there were sacrifices to their, the false gods, these demonic beings, sacrifices for something that would come after a devotion to them and a trust in them and their ability to save you.

The reason I'm saying that is check out the third, the third apparitions statement.

This is July 13th, 1917 at Fatima. Sacrifice yourselves for sinners and say often to Jesus, especially whenever you make a sacrifice, make a sacrifice.

Okay. Oh Jesus, it is for the love of the, for the conversion of sinners and in reparation, it's also the sacrifices are also in reparation for the sins committed against the immaculate heart of Mary.

Now you make sacrifices to fix the problems you did when you sinned against the American method, heart of Mary, folks, demons.

This is demon theology. This is what this is. It's not God. And the reason we know is because that's not what the scriptures teach.

The scriptures teach to the contrary. So this is really interesting stuff. Now, if the Roman Catholic church says all of these apparitions and all these statements are true, well, then you can't trust the

Catholic church. It's one of the proofs of its apostasy. It can't even tell the difference between a demonic manifestation and the

Bible teaching. And why? Here's the reason I'm going to go to a verse that I'm going to read to you. This is a, this is very important.

This is John 10, 27. My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me.

So Jesus says, my sheep hear my voice and they follow me.

All right. So we're not supposed to follow the voice of another shepherd.

Now the Catholic church claims to be the shepherd. It wants to tell you what you need to believe and how to go to God.

And you go through it and through Mary and through the sacraments and all the stuff. And because I hear the voice of Christ, I do not listen to the false shepherd of the

Catholic church or these Orthodox church. Let's get to Alberto from Georgia. Alberto, welcome. You're on the air.

What do you mean, Leslie? My question is, have you seen the video when Mark Driscoll went to do in that with that teenage age about the

Trinity and a lot of, I hear a lot of preachers accuse him being a moralist, but I was watching the video and he said he's, he believes in the

Trinity, you know, to the greatest persons. And a lot of people are falsely accused. He has a good heart because he wanted to unite the get together.

He did. He, he works with the Trinity people and the United Pentecostal church.

So he, he's, he believes he's Pauline. So he has good intention to do. Okay. What's your question?

What's your question? What's your, what's your question? That's why they, what, what, what my question is, why do people force me to accuse him?

Don't get, he's not who people, people on the internet.

No, no, no, no, no. Accused who you mentioned two people, Driscoll and T .D.

Jakes. So T .D. Jakes, why do people accuse him? Yeah, because he's, he's a denier of the

Trinity. He's a modalist. He is. Okay. And, um, when

I, I saw that video and I was upset by it because, uh, and I've met, uh,

Mark Driscoll and he uses karma. He knows of karma and stuff like that. And I was, uh, bothered by the lack of specificity from, let's just say the questions that needed to be asked about, uh, two

T .D. Jakes. So, um, you know, do you believe that God is three persons? Yes.

Okay. Well, move on. You don't ask a question like that. You say, do you deny that God is one person in any way, shape or form?

Just one person. If he says, yes, I deny it. Okay. Let's further clarify. This is so important. You have to ask several questions.

Do you deny that the one person becomes, uh, takes different modes or appearances? If he says, yeah,

I deny that. Do you affirm that God exists eternally as three distinct, simultaneous co -eternal persons?

Yes. So in the affirmation of the three persons, you're also denying that God is one person. Is that correct?

Yes. You have to go back and forth different ways like this so that it's all recorded and very specific questions have to be asked.

And he didn't do this with him. And so I thought there was wiggle room, uh, in that, uh, it's unclear.

Now, if I were to interview T .D. Jakes, let me tell you, it'd be, it'd be different. I would get a lot of questions.

Uh, I would want to ask very specific questions and find out. I know how to hold people's feet to the fire.

Okay. I know you saw it, but he said that. We need Margaret to ask him. He said, he believes he believes in a ladder, a ladder one.

And the three biggest thing person, he believes in a Pauline. So he said that, that, like you said, he, he, we, we, as human beings, we can never know, uh, uh,

God, like Chris was saying, it's like a, you know, he's, he's, he's mysterious in one way,

Mr. Mystery, but at the same time, he's knowable. So, so, but still he didn't, he didn't completely deny that Trinity.

I think I was in the video. He said that he still believes that the ladder. Yeah. You see, but yeah, and I would just do, you know,

I haven't looked at it for a while, but I remember being quite dissatisfied with that, uh, that series of questions.

Um, and I, I do not believe in, from what I understand later and stuff that he still affirms, uh, he denies, still denies the

Trinity. You have to be specific when you do questions like this, you have to affirm and deny.

You have, you ask questions of affirmation. You ask questions of denial. Do you affirm this? Do you deny this?

I had to be specific. I wish these guys would have me on, you know, and say, okay, we'll want you to grill somebody on doctrine.

Great. Let me ask you. So, you know, I got 20 questions. Let's see how you do, you know? And, uh, you know, and I'd love to do that.

Of course, no one, they don't have me on. I don't care. My last name is slick. I'm a slimy, you know, Calvinist who's believes in the charismatic gift.

So nobody wants me. Let's go out and eat some worms, you know? So that's how it is.

Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you. All right.

I'll send it to you in a way. I was thinking, you know what? You know, then you go watch it. I did a way earlier.

I did earlier. You have to look at that email. I was saying earlier, they send it to you.

All right. Thank you. God bless. I don't hear. Thanks. Okay.

All right. Talk to you later. All right. Um, yeah, so this is a serious thing and, uh, let's see.

And TD, TD Jake's. Uh, uh, so yeah,

I could do some research on it. Maybe I will. I don't know if someone has me. I have so much to do.

It's just so much to do, but I need to need to, you know, get on top of all these things are so much. All right.

So someone asked me to deal with John 2028. There's the music. I will tackle that right after the break and the last segment of the first show of the year 2025.

May the Lord bless you. Be right back after these announcements. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877 -207 -2276.

Here's Matt Slick. All right, everyone. Welcome back to the show. The last segment of the hour.

If you want to give me a call, it's easy. The number is 8772. Zero seven two two seven six.

So now what I'm going to do is get into John 2023. This is a verse that is used, uh, by Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholics.

They want to authenticate their apostolic, uh, authority.

So let me explain a little bit and then I'll explain what the verse is and how to respond to them with it. So the

Roman Catholic and East note, you know, the RC and the EO both teach that they, their churches are the true church and that salvation is found inside of their church, the true church, and that their church has the apostolic authority because they have the lineage that goes back to Peter and the apostles.

And what they stay in their churches is what is true. They have the authority. And, uh, it comes from many verses,

Matthew 16, 18 and 19 and John 2023. Here's one of the verses I use.

If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them. If you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.

So as a C this is apostolic authority to be able to forgive sense.

And Jesus is talking to his disciples. That's what he's doing in the first day of the week.

He's talking to them and he's telling them something. Now, first of all, when you do an interpretation of something, you look at what the context is, who's it being addressed to what's going on.

So in verse 21, Jesus said to them, peace be with you. As a father has sent me,

I send you. Who's he talking to? He's talking to the disciples. Now that's what it says in verse 19.

Now, is he talking to all people and the successors of the disciples down through history? Is that what he's doing right there?

Well, it doesn't say that, but what they'll do that our CEO, what they'll do is they will claim that it is what's happening, but why?

And I asked him, how do you know that? Well, because it's what our church says and how you know, the church is true.

It goes on like this. Okay. So they'll say, but that verse, I'll say, they say, if you forgive the sins of any, their sins are forgiven.

That's how they'll quote it. Those sins are forgiven. It's not what it says. It does not say if you, your sins, if you forgive the sins, your sins are forgiven.

It says, if you forgive the sins, their sins will have been or have, uh, their sins have been forgiven.

So this is important because of what's going on in the text. It says they have been, now

I'm going to go into the Greek here. Look at this a little bit. I want you to look at this. Okay. And what we find here is the, uh, perfect passive indicative, the perfect tense in Greek is

I have been pluperfect as I had been a past or aorist is

I was so have the perfect tense in the

Greek, really simple. You know, I have been hungry, which means you still are.

I had been hungry. You used to be hungry, but you're not right now. That's a difference in the tense.

And so it says, if you forgive the sins, if you do this, now what is interesting is it's in the aorist.

If you forgive the aorist is past tense. It's not present tense. If you forgive, which in English is present tense, but in the

Greek, it's the aorist, which is past tense. It's like saying, if you forgive them, if you forgive them, them, it's a weird kind of a tense for us to understand.

But in the Greek is going on talking about a past tense kind of equality that if you do this, if you have, if you've, it's been done by you, there's since have been forgiven.

Now, wait a minute. Are we saying then that the disciples have the authority to forgive sins?

And now I'll ask them that. And what these guys will say is yes, they do. And I have, so I have a second question.

If they have the authority to forgive sins, then when they forgive sins, is

God obligated to follow suit and forgive them? That's the killer question. And they've stumbled over that question so many times because if the disciples have the authority and then they forgive, are they actually exercising it perfectly every time?

I wouldn't say they were perfect every time. I mean, only Jesus is that. So if they were to erroneously say to someone, your sins are forgiven.

Is God good? God's now got to go. Okay. I got to forgive them now because they said so. I asked him, is that what happened?

And they didn't go out. No. Well, then what's going on here? What is going on that if you do this forgiving, if it's in the state where you've done this, their sins have been forgiven.

The question is, are they actually doing the forgiving or are they pronouncing the forgiveness that already was?

They have been forgiven. If I lead someone to the Lord and they've had a life of sin and not that a formula, lead them to the

Lord and all that. But I mean, you're there and you talk about the Lord and you, you lead someone to Christ and you, you, uh, you know, all intents and purposes, you ask the person to pray, to receive

Christ as savior and to repent of sins. And this person really does this. Okay. It's a real conversion.

So at that point, I could say your sins have been forgiven. I'm not the one doing the forgiving.

And so God is not obligated for me to do the forgiving. Now, what they might say is, well, yes, because you don't have the authority.

Oh, I love that. When they say that, I said, really, you don't want to go there. Do you? And they say, yes, we do.

So, okay, I'll get to that in a second. So they'll say that and they want what they want, what these groups do, what they want to do is say that their church is the true church, their church has all the authority and their church has the apostolic lineage and the heritage or the pedigree, and that because of that, they have authority.

That's just how it is. And you're a stupid Protestant and you don't have authority,

Matt. You don't have the authority to interpret scripture, to forgive sins like our church does.

And then you see what, um, uh, the, uh, the people will, you know, they'll give you a nice church service with a lot of bells and smells, and they'll go through and they say, see, we have the apostolic stuff.

They said, look, see, see all the gold and the silver up there. And you see all the garments that, uh, that, um, uh, that the priests are wearing, you see all that.

And you see the incense and, uh, the icons and the statues. You see, we're the true church.

We have all of this stuff. We're really old. Oh, okay. Hey, I'll just bow before those statues and icons and I'll pray to the saints.

Just like you tell me to do because you have the authority. Uh -huh. So, um, so here we go.

All right. This is what Jesus says in Luke 5, 24 and 25, but so that you may know that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic.

I say to you, get up, pick up your stretcher and go home immediately. He got up before them, picked up what would have been lying on.

So he did that. How was the authority of Jesus demonstrated that he could say, be healed.

And they were in Matthew 10, something very interesting happened.

Jesus summoned his 12 disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits to cast them out and to heal every kind of disease and every kind of sickness.

That's the authority, right? Verse eight, heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons freely.

You received freely. Give, we don't do it freely. They, you know, you got to come in, you got to do the sacraments, do the rituals, and then you can get it under our authority.

It's not free anyway. So notice what Jesus says. He says to the disciples, you have authority over unclean spirits to cast them out, heal every kind of disease and every kind of sickness.

Did they go out and do that? Yes, they did. Now, the EORC, they say, well, we have the authority of the disciples, the authority of the apostles, you do in Luke seven, 14 through 15,

Jesus raised the dead on command. We know that he did that. Peter raised the dead on command.

That's acts nine, 40 through 41. See, he says right there, Peter sent them all out and knelt down and prayed and turning to the body.

He said, Tabitha, arise. And she opened her eyes. We saw Peter said she's had up.

He said, rise. She did. Peter had the authority. And how about this? And acts nine, thirty four.

Peter said to him, Anais, Jesus Christ heals you. Get up and make your bed immediately. He got up.

There you go. That's the authority right there. Paul healed on command in Acts 14, eight through ten.

At Lystra, a man was sitting who had no strength in his feet, laying from his mother's womb, who had never walked.

This man was listening to Paul as he spoke, who, when he had fixed his gaze on him and had sent, oh, excuse me, and had seen that he had faith to be made well, said to the said with a loud voice, stand up right on your feet.

And he leapt up and began to walk. So we see Jesus, Peter and Paul right there on command.

They could heal. That's the authority. Does the heal priests do that?

Do the Catholic priests do that? They have the authority. Remember, they could forgive sins. Now here's the thing. There's what's called non -falsified ability.

Back in the day, some of you may be familiar with Heaven's Gate. It was a cult in San Diego.

I lived there in San Diego. And when it happened, I was on TV talking about this stuff. They interviewed anybody who could spell the word cult.

And there's a bunch of people who killed themselves, like 40 some odd people. And they did it by suicide because there was a

Hillbop comet was coming and it was a spaceship on the far side of the comet and that they were going to be taken by the spaceship.

It's called non -falsified ability. How do you prove there is not a spaceship on the other side of the comet?

The only way to do that send a rocket with satellites with cameras and you go up there and do that. Well, that wasn't the case.

So the claim can't be proven to be false. It's just a claim. It's like me saying there's an ice cream factory in the fourth largest moon of Jupiter.

It's not falsifiable. I can say it doesn't mean it's true, but you can't falsify it, which means you can't show it to be false.

A lot of times, cults work in what's called non -falsified ability. Here's an example of it.

I forgive you of your sins. Okay. Is it done? Well, how do you know?

See, that is different than, okay, your, your, your son is dead. I'll go raise him from the dead rise from the dead.

Now he rides from the dead. That's not falsifiable. There's the evidence. There's the proof where the

EO and RC abide in is in the area of non -falsified ability. They want to claim they have the authority to do something like forgive sin, which is an abstraction.

This forgiveness, something that God does. It's a reality when God does it for us, but you see the

Catholic church and the EO say that they have the ability to do this, but you can't test it. There's no way to verify anything.

This is why, this is why Jesus gave them authority over the unclean spirit so that they would have the authority to speak for Christ.

If they don't have that ability, they can't demonstrate that. They don't have the authority of Christ. So where is the authority of Christ and the

Roman Catholic church in the East Orthodox church, the way it's revealed in scripture, they don't have it, but what they'll tell you is, well, we can forgive sins.

How do you test it? How do you test prove? There's not a ice cream factory in the fourth largest moon of Jupiter.

How do you know? Well, because we just say, so just trust us. Cause we're the true church.

What we say is true. Just believe, just trust us. Yeah.

The verifiability come when you can raise the dead, cast out demons, heal the sick and cure all sorts of diseases.

As Jesus said that they could do in Matthew chapter 10, they don't manifest that, so they're not really exercising any authority.

There are, they're posers. They're posers. They're pretending to be in this.

It's bad. Hey, there's the, uh, end of the show. We're out of time. The Lord bless you.

And by his grace back on there tomorrow for more truth from the word of God.

Remember everybody, one last name slick. Don't trust me. You trust scripture. You trust what

God says and it better point to Jesus Christ as a way, the truth of the life and through him and him alone.

Can you have your sins forgiven? That's what you got to believe. That's the word of God. May the Lord bless you by his grace.

We're back on there tomorrow. We'll talk to you then. Have a good one. Another program powered by the truth network.