Contendsday

Welcome back, everyone. Today is Wednesday, May the 31st. I'm Ryan Hill.

I'm John Galantis. You're listening to Clearview Today with Dr. Abidhan Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearviewTodayShow.com. If you have any questions for Dr. Shah or suggestions for new topics, send us a text to 252-582-5028, or you can email us at contact at ClearviewTodayShow.com. That's right. You guys can help us keep this conversation going by supporting the show, sharing it online, leaving us a good review on iTunes or Spotify, anywhere you might get your podcasting content from.

We're going to leave a link in the description of this podcast so you can do just that. Today's verse of the day is coming to us from the book of 1 John 3.17. It says, Whoever has this world's goods and sees his brother in need and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? So many times in the Bible, especially in the Gospels and beyond, our attention is called back to an active faith. It's not just what you believe.

It's not just what you know in your head. It's how are you living out what God has done in you? So if you have all of these resources and God has blessed you in that way, and you see someone in need, and you're just like, Oh, someone else will do that.

I'm not going to help them. How can you say that the love of God is in you? Because God himself stepped out of heaven. God, the Son, Jesus, set out of heaven to meet us where we were in our sinfulness and our brokenness and bring us back into a relationship with God. So if we have the capability to reflect that, even in some small part, and we don't, we need to examine what it is that we actually believe about the Gospel. That's right, because the Bible is very honest about life with its reality. It's not always just this big spiritual truths or this cosmic sort of thing, the attributes of God. All that stuff is great, but it also tells you how to live in this day-to-day life. And all of us see people in need. We see it every single day. We may not see people out on the streets every day begging for money, but there's someone in your life who needs something, and he probably needs something from you. And if it's within your power to do that, if God has placed that person in your life for a reason, and you're not acting on that reason, you're not obeying him, then hey, it's to your detriment.

That's what he's called us to do is to be the salt and light of the earth and use those acts of service to glorify him and to point people to him. Absolutely, absolutely. You know, I had a question come in today from Roger G. This was an odd one.

And I was kind of, I wasn't going to read it, but I was like, you know what? I think this is something that is actually can be a edifying discussion. What's a trait that you typically find in women that you wish you had? Hmm.

That's an interesting question. What's a trait? It was typically, it was phrased as what's a trait you typically find in the opposite sex, but since we don't have any women on the show, what's a trait you typically find in women that you wish you had? Like for me, women can multitask. See that's what I was going to say too is multitasking and multitasking well, because I feel like I can juggle a couple of things at a time, but I'm not, I don't feel like I make any progress on many of them. I'm just kind of keeping things afloat.

Yeah. I don't know if multitask is the right word, but they're aware of many things at once and they're all on the front brain. So like for me, Ellie's talking to me like we're talking right. And then I look over here and there's something and I'm reading it. She has become mute. She literally has, it's like someone press mute and she's not talking. Whereas she could, I could be talking and she can read something, she's reading it. The front brain is registering. And then she's also hearing what I'm saying. And then there's babies over in the corner doing stuff. And she's also aware of that. Whereas if I'm reading something or if I'm looking at TV, I'm not hearing everything else just is on mute and it's not happening until some big crash or some emergency that I've got to go deal with.

And now this is no longer on my brain. It's only one thing at a time. I have heard it put this way because a lot of times it's put in the terms of like women can multitask, men can't.

And it's just like, we are just, you know, just negligent in that. Really what it is is that women have the capability to multitask and men have the capability to laser focus on things. So there's strengths and weaknesses to both. Which is why God, I mean that just goes back to God has designed us, male and female, husband and wife, to be complimentary to one another. We're designed to complete one another and cover each other's weaknesses.

But if I had to pick one, I think it would be multitasking well. Because I have the tendency to be like, okay, there's too much going on. You need to pause for just a second. I got to focus on this. What are some other traits that women have? They're very, they're very discerning. Yeah.

Yeah. Spiritual discernment much higher in women. Maybe, maybe nurturing would be like up there.

Cause I feel like there are some times that it would be helpful to our wives for us to be a little bit more nurturing. Versus like, stand up. You're fine. Yeah.

You're okay. Like a lot of times it lives like, Hey, you were too harsh there. I was like, yeah, there are times where Gavin, there was, I feel like I could have gone like a little harder there. Yeah, exactly.

There are times where like Gavin has, like when we talked about him falling at first watch, that was the very first thing I was like, see son, that's why I tell you, that's why you don't stand up in your chair. And she's like, Hey, Hey, Hey, come on. That's not what we say right now. I was like, Oh, okay. I thought, I thought that was, okay. That does come much more and I'm not like cold and callous to my kids, but that does come a little more naturally for women to kind of be that, that nurturer, that caregiver.

But if both of us were nurturer or caregiver, then I don't know what our kids would be like. Cause there's gotta be an element of firmness there too. Not that she's not firm, but I don't know. It's just balancing. I don't think all women have this, but I think a lot of women typically are way more organized in their thinking, but they're like, they, they can put things in categories and they can they can like labels that like, you know what I mean? They're just clean.

They're they're clean and they kind of control their environment. At least Ellie does. Ellie's very neurotic about the environment is going to be controlled. Everything's going to be labeled. Everything's going to be in its proper place. It's going to be color coded.

And so then when I come in, it's easy to find it. You say neurotic, but that's just organized. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's no her, her level. And we can talk about this on another show, but hers is a hundred percent. Ellie and I have talked about this cause Ellie and Ellie and I are a lot alike in that regard. I can be pretty neurotic when it comes to I would like to do that.

I would like to, I would like to care more. Like I would like to, I don't know if I really want to care more that there's like a sock on the floor that shouldn't be there, but I do think my life would be tidier if I did. Cause like I can throw like socks, jeans and a shirt on the floor and be like, I'll get it whenever it bothers me.

That's making my eye twitch a little bit, a little bit just to think about. Yeah, so be it. Maybe that's not a feminine quality. Maybe that's just a type a, type b thing.

It could be. I don't know. Okay. We're going to get Dr. Shaw for today's episode, but if you guys have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text to 252-582-5028, or you can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com.

We'll be right back. Hey everyone, my name's Ellie and I'm David. We want to take a minute and let you know how we can actually serve you as you're listening to Clear View Today. The Bible paints an extraordinary picture of who we are as a church body. The mission of Clear View Church is to lead all people into a life changing, ever-growing relationship with Jesus Christ. A huge part of leading people is praying for them. A big reason that Christians have unanswered prayers in their life is because they're not praying.

You know, 1 John 5, 15 says, and if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of him. If you're listening to the Clear View Today Show, we want to know how we can pray for you as well. There's a number of ways that you can get in touch with us at Clear View and share your prayer requests, but the best way is by texting us at 252-582-5028. You can also send us an email at prayer at ClearViewBC.org, or you can download the Clear View app on iTunes or Google Play.

You know, on that app, there's a dedicated prayer wall that helps us to get to know what's going on in your life, how we can pray for you, and how we can take any necessary steps to get you moving in the right direction. Thanks for listening. Now let's get back to the show. Welcome back to Clear View Today with Dr. Abbadan Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ.

You can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com, or if you have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text at 252-582-5028, or you can always visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com. That's right. If today is your first time ever tuning into the Clear View Today Show, we want to welcome you and let you know exactly who's talking to you today. Dr. Abbadan Shah is a Ph.D. in the New Testament, textual criticism professor and Carolina University author, full-time pastor, and the host of today's show. You can find all of his work on his website at AbbadanShah.com.

That's right. Dr. Shah, we are excited about tonight. It's Wednesday. Lots of things going on at church. What can we look forward to tonight with the different activities happening here at Clear View?

Well, lots going on, but digging deep is happening tonight. Digging deep is where we're studying or following Paul's missionary journeys through Turkey, through Asia Minor. So, we will be going to places like Tarsus, where Paul was born and raised, going to places like Iconium, Derby, Lystra. I mean, these are places where, you know, like Lystra is where Timothy was born.

That's right. And so, I was able to go there and stand on this hill, and it hasn't been excavated yet. I mean, there's pottery lying around all around you from ancient times, and you're standing on top of this hill. Underneath is Timothy's hometown. Incredible. Incredible.

That's amazing. One of the things I think people respect about Clear View and look forward to coming is that we do dig deep. I mean, I know that's kind of the name of the Bible study, but it's also just the culture that you've kind of built into your preaching style. And I think as an extension, your members, the congregation, they want to go deep into God's Word.

Right. And there's a reason behind it because, you know, the further we get away from the Bible, you know, we're losing, and it's been coming for a couple hundred years. I mean, let's back up to the time of enlightenment. So it's been coming for a long time, but it's very prevalent now because kids are growing up who did not grow up in the Bible culture at all.

That's right. And so they go off to colleges and other places, and they get even more bombarded by anti-Bible or anti-Scripture rhetoric that the Bible is not the Word of God. The Bible is like any other book. You know, everybody has their Bible.

That's exactly what we want to talk about on today's episode, is giving people confidence in God's Word. You know, we talked about this last week on the Contend episode, and even yesterday we mentioned it briefly in the episode that the Bible, Scripture, is the inspired Word of God. And I want to dive a little bit more into what that term inspiration means. What does it mean that the Bible is inspired, and how is that different than God revealing His Word to us?

What does that process of inspiration look like? Yeah, the word is theopneustos. Theo, what does he think theo means? God. Pneustos, like pneumatos, you know, is breathing, okay?

Neustos is breathing. So God breathes or God's spiration. And so these are the words that have been breathed by God. The Bible is God's Word, breathed by God. So, you know, the word is referring to something that God did two other times. One is the creation of the world. You know, by the word of the Lord, the heavens were made, and the host of them by the breath of his mouth means he said and it happened. I mean, think about it.

What else can you do? I mean, he thought and it happened. That can be true, but then we would never know. So he actually said it. So angels heard it. So there's a record of it. There's a record of it.

He could have thought it, but it would have been no record. And the second time is the creation of human beings. And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the earth and he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and the man or man became a living being. That's the second time God breathed.

Third time, of course, is the word. I think that's helpful for people to understand that when we say that it's inspired, it literally does mean God breathed. It's helpful for me because I always thought that was just poetry. This is the breath of God.

But those are the words that's actually used. He's breathing. His breath is what's creating something. And I think it's helpful because when people hear and I was this way for a while before I understood that all scripture is given by inspiration of God. Like I think like you said something that I like and that expires me. Now I have this urge to do something with it because I'm inspired.

And that's not what it means. They say the Bible is inspired by God. There's a connection there, but it's not the same output.

It's more than just, wow, you know, that makes me think, what can I do? That's inspiration. But the connection is different when it comes to the word of God. By inspiration, we mean that God directed the thoughts of the writers so that they were exactly his thoughts. So the words that came out were Peter's words or John's or Paul's or go in the Old Testament, Moses or David or Isaiah, Jeremiah, rest of them, they were their words, but they were God's thoughts. And because they were God's thoughts, he protected the inerrancy of those words. He protected them. You see how incarnation was fully God became fully man.

We don't need to be scared of that. So also when it comes to scripture is fully God's word and yet fully man's in the sense that God is the one directing them and using their personalities, their educations, their locations. I mean, the way Daniel wrote, he was using Aramaic. Why Aramaic and not just Hebrew? Because he was in the land from where Aramaic came. Where did Aramaic come? It came from Babylon.

People don't think about that. But Aramaic, just to give a quick history, has had two different periods of usage. One was an earlier period. And we're talking about, oh my goodness, you're talking about the time of Abraham. That's when Aramaic was top of the world. And then it sort of dipped down and then it came back up in the neo-Babylonian era.

And I'm being kind of general here. Okay. So it had this ebb and flow and from which Hebrew is also connected. So in Daniel's time period, he's using Aramaic because he's in Babylon, not ancient Babylon.

This is a neo-Babylonian. Right. Right. Yeah. Do you think that's the major difference between Revelation where God is saying, like he's speaking to Moses and he's saying, this is exactly what the Lord says. I'm telling you what it is. Versus inspiration.

It's not that they're inspired by God, but his thoughts become their thoughts. Yes. Okay. Yes.

Okay. He directs them, but it's not a mechanical dictation. We don't do mechanical dictation when it comes to... Some people think that it's like God just so controlled the hands that they were pretty much irrelevant.

Like robots. Yeah, they were irrelevant. But then think about if Jesus's humanity was irrelevant, then he is not one of us. That's true.

That's a great comparison. I don't know that I've ever actually thought about those side by side as Jesus being fully God, fully man, and we have no problem with that. But the Bible being fully God and fully man, I mean, it's the words of men completely inspired by God. Why do we take issue there?

Why is that a sticking point? Are revelation and inspiration in contest with each other? No, of course. No, no, no, no.

They're not at all. Let me give you a quick, quick, quick difference between those two things. Sure. Revelation versus inspiration. God to human rider is revelation.

Human riders to others then and now. We're talking about inspiration. Okay.

So the Bible has revelation and inspiration. Yes. They're not competing with each other. They are going hand in hand. It's like a chain. I see.

Yeah. He uses the people where they are. He uses like their personalities, their gifts, their circumstances, their experience. Like I'm thinking, just like you were talking about with Daniel, I was thinking about Paul, like Paul being raised, training under Gamaliel, being raised as a Jewish person and then using those experiences to write those epistles.

I mean, I guess you could say that God orchestrated all that and he did, but he used those thoughts to sort of direct his words where he wanted them to go. Peter says that, you know, he talks about Paul being such brother Paul's writings, which uneducated and evil men or something like that, he says, who twist to their own destruction. And he even admits that some things that Paul writes are hard to understand. Peter says that. Now think about their provenances.

Okay. Where did Peter grow up? Around Galilee, right?

He's coming from Capernaum. He's coming from around the Sea of Galilee, fishermen community, but not uneducated. In fact, if you remember, I preached a message on Peter's background. He came from a solid, God fearing, you know, Old Testament believing Jewish family.

And they were the families waiting for the coming of the Messiah. So, you know, we just see one part of the story, which is like, oh, this bumbling fishermen. No, there was more to him. Right. Yeah.

You can't read first and second Peter and be like, that guy's a fool. Yeah. No, he's no, he was on the level. He knew what he was talking about.

Yeah. They are humble people. And that's why you say, you know what, who I like in the Bible is Peter. He's reminds me of me. Peter was grew up, grew up in a very good Jewish home.

All right. He had a good upbringing. That's how he could bring up Old Testament passages so well. Paul, on the other hand, grew up in Tarsus. Now, Paul himself tells us that he grew up in no mean city, you know, kind of a King James, New King James translation. What he's saying is that I don't come from some ordinary city. I come from Tarsus. Now, having been to Tarsus, I can tell you what he was trying to say.

He was saying, we have lots of high level education in our city. Tarsus was an ancient city going all the way back to the Noah's flood. Wow. After Noah's flood. Yeah. One of Noah's grandsons was responsible for starting Tarsus. Tarshish.

Okay. And then of course through the years, through the centuries, you know, Tarsus was famous for lots of, lots of things. And so there were, there were trade going on during Solomon's time, but Tarsus, and of course, when Jonah was running away from God, he ran to Tarsus.

Why? Because big city could disappear then. And then stoic philosophy was there in Tarsus. We went through some of the museums in Adana.

Adana is the big city around Tarsus. Going to the Adana Museum, I was like, oh, I get it now why Paul said this is no mean city. Look at the statues around here. And those statues were from several hundred years before the coming of Paul. By the time Paul was born, those things were already historic. Yeah. So he's saying, look, I don't come from some ordinary city.

And then he was sent to study with Gamaliel who was like a Harvard professor of the time. And all that information is completely irrelevant if God is just controlling their thoughts and actions, like all the context that the Bible gives us. Like that's true. I think about that. I've just, it's kind of coming to me now. So I'm trying to formulate into words, but basically if God is just telling them what to write and what to say, then there's a lot of useless context in the Bible that we could skip over.

I don't need to know who Paul was if that's the case. Welcome to the Quran. Yeah, really? That's what it is.

Huh? There's no context. They're just sayings. They're statements.

The statements that kind of build up the worth of God or the glory of God or, or just the power of God, really. That's that's Quran. Quran is a text without a context.

Wow. Where do you get the context from? It's from the Hadids. From the other books written by commentators on what they think Muhammad must have been writing about. Are those sacred, those writing? No, Hadids are not considered sacred, but they're considered important.

Okay. So, so you have two periods. You have the early revelation periods in Quran. I'm talking about Quran right now. Then you have the later revelation to Muhammad period where early visions, this is what he must have said, late visions. This is what he must have heard. And he wrote down. Now here's a question.

How do you know which are early, which are late? Right. That's true.

There's nothing in the Quran that says that. How do you decide, how do they decide? Well, how did they decide this? They decided it based on, I think this must be early. Oh, wow.

How, how scientific. Based on just knowing the Quran, this has to be late. So the Quran has no real authority. No, it's not about authority here. It's about no context. It's just open to interpretation until that interpretation is decided for you. Right. And then there are people who disagree. There are Islamic scholars who say, no, this is from the early Medina years.

These are from the late Medina years. So you get the point. You don't have to do that in the Bible.

Right. There are places that you go, I wonder what the context is, but most of the time, the context is given. In fact, much of the Quran would make absolutely no sense if they did not rely on the Bible, especially the old Testament, because a lot of times they say things like about, well, you know, when, and I'm not quoting anywhere, just give an example that I made up, but I can give you more, you know, if you ever wanted that, I have a bunch of data on that. But you know, when Abraham, you know, when God said to Abraham, if he didn't have the old Testament, how would you know who Abraham is? You don't know, but that's how what Quran does. You know, when David at the time of the battle said this, again, this is not an exact statement in the Quran. I'm just kind of making one up, but I can show you many more, but how do you know David? Yeah.

Yeah. It references the old Testament without giving the proper context of who those people actually are. Same with Jesus. And to Jesus, we said, well, who is Jesus? The Bible tells us who Jesus is. The old Testament is about Jesus. The four gospels are about Jesus. Paul takes, you know, he doesn't go back to how Jesus was born. He focuses on who Jesus is before he was born, who he, what he accomplished and what he's going to do. All that is given. There's context, but the Quran doesn't, it just says, you know what we said to Jesus talking about, you know, the Allah said to Jesus and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

If you didn't have the new Testament, how would you know who Jesus is? Right. It's almost like, it's almost like understanding and believing the Quran is by prerequisite. You have to understand the Bible too, but it doesn't give you that. Right. So I guess, but, but will they get in trouble for reading the Bible?

Well, here's what they say. The Bible has errors. Well, don't you use the Bible to get your context? Then you have errors.

Why would you use an error-ridden book to justify something in your sacred book? Right. Exactly.

Some, some done that up there. Yeah. If the Quran is inerrant, at which I don't know if they claim it is, I assume they would. They do not have necessarily the doctrine of inerrancy, but they have a whole different idea.

I see their idea of the Quran is that the original Quran is in heaven. Okay. And so, but what you have in your hand is that Quran, as long as it's in Arabic and there's only one. So it's, it's, it's very different. I see translations are not the word of God.

Okay. The word of Allah. They're not the word of Allah. So they, they would have no concept of like, this is my Bible that I read. No, no, no, no. It exists totally separate from them.

No. Is it a bad thing to have, or is it just not the word of God? Like would they get in trouble for having a translation? No, no, they have translation. Just, but it's not God's word. But, but if you ever argue from the translation, they will stop you and say, but that's not in the Arabic. I see.

Now, now, I mean, why do you want to even debate then? I see my dad used to do that in the early days. He would go and they would invite him and he would debate.

And then they would get into a shouting match and then everybody's clapping for the other part. He said, look, if you're going to do that, I come from one of you. I'm not coming back. No, no, we're sorry. We're sorry. Hey, everybody quiet.

But then the second question, they would get all up, you know, yeah, that's right. I'm not coming back. Oh, we were sorry. We're not doing it. They're doing it.

Well, you can tell them to be quiet. But I think it's, I think it's important to look at how the Bible was given to us and how it was inspired. And then compare that to how these other religious books, like last week we looked at the Hindu sacred texts, looking at the Islamic sacred texts, you can see there's a clear difference and you can see that the Bible is truly unique in that way.

Oh, very, very. But, but to explain these concepts and to explain to people, this is what it means and this, by the time you even start explaining, let's go back to my dad's debates. He talked about it a little bit and I faintly remember because this was, this was back in the seventies, in the early seventies that this would even happen.

And then by the time eighties, it was all gone. Trying to explain the concept of the incarnation itself was very difficult. Oh, does God have a wife? Where is his wife?

Who is his wife? Mary? I mean, you know, then they would be like, no, that's not, it's a virgin, you know, all kinds of weird stuff. But if, if I cannot begin with incarnation, how can I explain to you the Bible, which has the same idea behind it? Fully God's word and yet fully man's personalities, gifts, trainings, experiences, and yet it's without error because God is supernaturally directing that whole process.

So also God, second person, the Godhead became fully man. And yet, because he is God's son, he's without sin. In fact, he cannot sin. It's not that he didn't sin, he cannot sin. But if you don't get past incarnation, why do we even debate? It's impossible.

That's right. It's so helpful for us to hear, you know, how, what separates the Bible? What makes the Bible unique? How, how we can have confidence that what we have is the word of God. It's not something that was made up by men sitting in a dark room somewhere trying to make manuscripts work with one another. This is God's word breathed out to us.

So important for us to understand that. If you guys have questions or suggestions for new topics, or you want to learn more about inspiration, God's word, what it means that God's word is inspired, breathed out by him, send us a text to 252-582-5028. Or you can visit us online at clearviewtodayshow.com.

Don't forget, you can partner with us on that same website. Click that donate button and be part of the Clear View Today show family impacting the nations for the gospel of Jesus. Well, I mean, if you want me to give the final quotation for the day, okay. So according to the Upanishad, which is a Hindu writing, you know, it says, from the unreal, lead me to the real. From darkness, lead me to the light. From death, lead me to immortality. It seems very inspiring, doesn't it?

It seems like, man, sort of bright and hopeful. Jesus said, I am the way, the truth and the light. No one comes to the father except through me. It means I'm not just telling you go there or hope somebody leads you from unreal to real and from darkness to light and from death to more. No, I'll take you there.

Yeah, that's right. It's not just show me the way, it's I am. I am the way. Beautiful. We love you guys. We'll see you tomorrow on Clear View Today.