Matt Slick Live

A previously recorded Matt Slick show. 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.

Francis, taking your calls and responding to your questions at 877-207-2276. Here's Matt Slick. All right, welcome everybody. What a day today.

You don't hit the ground running and just going, boy. And now I have the privilege of being able to talk to you. If by any chance you have a question and you want to talk to me, all you got to do is give me a call at 877-207-2276. And we'd love to hear from you.

All right, we got Martin. He said he was trying to call the office. Well, I was on the phone quite a bit on the office phone doing some counseling.

And so it was busy there and just letting you know. That goes back into the voice. The voice goes back in and people listen. For those of you who do not know, we have a chat room set up for during the show and people get in and they talk. We've only got 31 people in it right now, but it goes up to 60, 70, 80, 90.

And as the show goes on in the next five minutes, if that sounds like something you want to participate in, all you have to do is go to the karm.org website, C-A-R-M dot O-R-G. On the right hand side of any page, you will see the links and the stuff that you need for watching the show. It's not a big deal. It's just me with my headset on and talking into it. And you get to watch me sit in a chair. Oh, trust me, it's pretty exciting.

And if that sounds like your gig, well, go for it. But also there's the advantage of talking in the chat. And it's in Facebook. It's also in YouTube. The YouTube chats and Facebook, they both get fed into StreamYard and we can comment. It goes back out so we can have these dialogues. It works great. So you don't have to have any special anything.

It goes on StreamYard, excuse me, it goes on, you just go on Facebook and or YouTube, depending which link you go on. And that's it. All right, folks, we have five wide open lines. Why don't you give me a call?

877-207-2276. Five open lines. And let's see. So I was talking about some marriage stuff today. And every now and then I'll do marriage counseling. And so it's on my heart, you know, it's on my mind a little bit. And I know that there's a lot of couples out there and they struggle with their marriages and they don't really have anybody they can go to, they can trust. But, you know, if you have questions about marriage, you know, feel free to give me a call. Feel free. We can talk.

And it's not a big deal. We, there we go, we'll turn that down. And, you know, there's a theology of marriage. And one day I want to be able to just sit here and do a theology of marriage kind of a thing for the first half out of the show, which reminds me on Friday, on Friday, we're going to have Luke Wayne. He works with Karm and he's an employee on staff at Karm, researcher, writer, and he has done a lot of work on King James only stuff. And so he's going to be on the air Friday, first half of the show at the least.

We might go longer, just depends. And if you have questions about the King James Bible, King James only, you know, questions like where did the King James Bible come from? Did King James translate it himself? What year was it done? What books were included?

Were there any changes or modifications to it? Is it the best Bible out there? Because there are people who say that the King James is the best and you have to go with it.

And there's some who say, no, we prefer it, but hey, you know, we just prefer it. That's all me. I'm not a King James fan because I don't like the these and those.

That's it. When I started committing scripture to memory, I didn't know what to do early on. And I did a couple of King James ones and I remember talking to somebody and I quoted in King James. And I remember the person looked at me like, what? I said, well, if thou will, but you know, and he goes, thou, what are you talking about? And I realized right there, I said, that's it.

I'm not gonna do that anymore. I'm gonna find a translation that doesn't have these and those in it so that I can just talk normally to people when I quote the scriptures. And because I did a lot of beach witnessing and swap meet witnessing and evangelism with the average Joe. And they didn't speak in 1600s King James English, Elizabeth Bethan language. And I figured, Hey, maybe we should speak contemporary. And that's why I didn't go with King James. I'm not knocking it.

It's just, that was me. That's my reason. Now I use the NASB 95 version. I'm going to have to check out the new version that they have, and we'll see.

I'm gonna do some real serious looking into it to see if I would recommend it or not, but I do definitely recommend the NASB 95. It's a good version. All right. Four open lines. If you want to give me a call, 877-207-2276. Give me a call. I want to hear from you. Let's get to Ernie from Gastonia, North Carolina.

Welcome. You are on the air. Hey Ernie. Okay. Hey Ernie. Yeah.

Where'd he go? How are you doing buddy? Pickles will be able to give you a call and ask you a quick question. Sure. No sweat.

What do you got man? Before Christ was Jesus born to Mary, I know, well, I'm gonna let you tell me, but was he considered the son before that? Yes. Because I understand the hyperstatic union, but I wasn't sure if there was already a structure where he was the son. Well, you're kind of mixing things here a little bit, but that's okay.

I'll sort them out for you. There's what's called the ontological trinity in that each member of the Godhead shares the same divine essence. There's the economic trinity. It's where the father, son and Holy Spirit have different roles in the Trinitarian communion. So the father elected people, the son redeems the people, the Holy Spirit applies redemptive work. The son became incarnate, not the father or the Holy Spirit. And the father and the son send the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit does not send the father or the son and the Holy Spirit convicts. So they have different roles. Okay. Now, sonship.

What you're talking about here is a different issue. Sonship has to do with a relationship with the father. So was Jesus, and when I say Jesus, I gotta be careful because more technically speaking, Jesus did not come into existence until 2000 years ago. And what I mean by that is the hypostatic union, the two natures in the one person, that's Jesus, that did not occur until 2000 years ago. But the second person of the trinity, the word, what we call the son, father, son, Holy Spirit, the word was eternal. And so the divine person is eternal. But when the divine person added human nature to the person in, to the divine, the divine and the human nature became a hypostasis, they're called, in the one person, they're under and with each other in the person of Christ. That didn't occur until the community, I mean, until the community, until the incarnation. So when I say when Jesus existed pre, what I mean is, I should be more technical and just use the technical terms. The word pre-existed the incarnation when he became the son, when he became the son in the incarnation.

Okay, I hope that makes sense. Anyway, so the father-son relationship is eternal. And the reason it's eternal is because God does not learn and God does not change his mind.

From eternity past, everything that God has done and would do and decided to do was always eternally known. And so the father, as it says in Ephesians 1-4, very important verse. A lot of people don't get this verse.

It's important. It's Ephesians 1-4. It says, just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. Now, he is a reference of the father, chose us in him, in him as a reference of the son, before the foundation of the world. So the choosing of what?

Well, let's go back to the previous verse. Blessed be the God of Father, of Lord Jesus Christ, who blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. So the Christians, the believers, he chose the believers.

He chose, it's called the elect, that's what to choose means. It's from the Greek klektos and eklegai. And this word here is eklegami. And so we have words for choose, chosen, choice, things like that. To call, chose, calling, called, chosen.

And they are eklektos, eklegai, eklegami. And the word for church is ekklesia. The church is the called out ones, the ones called, the ones chosen by God. So before the foundation of the world, the father chose people for salvation.

And they were chosen in Jesus because they could only be chosen in the redemptive work of Christ. So the father-son relationship was eternally known in this sense, in the eternity past. Okay? What a phenomenal answer. That must have been a great question. The question was great. I don't know if the answer was. The question was a good question. No, you really did help me.

I appreciate that. That helped put it in perspective for me. Yeah, the eternal sonship is basically this. The father from all eternity elected people for salvation and chose us from the beginning, 2 Thessalonians 2.13, Ephesians 1.4, that's what it says.

And he did this before the foundation of the world. That means there had to be a relationship between the ones choosing and the ones chosen and being chosen in Christ. So that eternal relationship existed in the Trinity. As far as we call it, we call it by analogy, the father-son. Of course, in the Trinitarian communion, there was no literal biological father, no literal biological son.

So the terms deal with the issue of authority and headship. And it's used in an analogous way that we are familiar with, a father and his son. And so the revelation of the self-revelation of God is always by analogy. We can never know God completely and totally in his essence because he's infinite, we're not. He's omniscient, we're not.

He's everywhere, we're not. So whenever God reveals himself, it's by analogy. Hence, father and son are analogous. But this relationship of the father-son has always existed from all eternity because from all eternity there were the elect, the ones given to the son or chosen in the son for redemptive work.

And so that relationship between the two always existed from eternity. Okay? Yeah. All right.

That's good biblical theology right there. Go ahead. Yeah, you did well. Do you have another car waiting? We've got two more, but I've got one more question. If you want, you can call back and get in line. How about that?

We'll do that. I have a short one that might be easy. Okay.

What's your short one then? When you said that about Jesus coming into existence at 2000 years, you meant when he was born here. Would the word Christ and Jesus both apply to that?

And we would reference him as a word and as God before? Yes. The hypostatic union, the joining of the human and the divine natures in the single person we call Jesus that began 2000 years ago. Beautiful.

Thank you so much, brother. All right. Because the human nature is not eternal, only divine nature is.

When the divine nature became flesh, that union of the divine and the human is called the hypostatic union that began 2000 years ago and it will continue forever. Okay? Awesome. Praise God for that. Praise God for that is right. Because I can tell you well, and I'm praying for you and the ministry and Nick and Charlie and his wife. Yeah.

Yeah. His wife really needs a lot of, a lot of prayer because I know Charlie well, trust me, she needs a lot of prayer. And my wife needs a lot of prayer too. You know, they both, my wife and his wife have something called stupid as husband does.

So they're going to deal with a lot of stuff. All right. All right, buddy. All right. Thank you. All right, man. God bless. God bless.

All right. Hey folks, if you want to call, we have three open lines, 877-207-2276. Let's get to Peter from Georgia. Peter, welcome. You're on the air. Hello. Hi, how are you doing?

I'm doing all right by God's grace. What do you got buddy? Yes. So, you know, I, I first saw your first video back in 2013. Those were the apologetic videos. And since then, you know, following ministry, we got a break coming up. Can you hold on buddy? Peter, hold on. Okay. Sorry.

There's a hard break. We got to go and folks be right back after these messages, please stay tuned. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877-207-2276.

Here's Matt Slick. All right, buddy. Welcome back to the show. Let's get to Peter.

Back to Peter. Hey, are you still there? Yes, I'm still here. All right, man.

What do you got buddy? All right. So I, uh, when I tuned in earlier, I heard you say that, uh, you were trying to this, uh, you were called to also speak on the issue of marriage.

Yeah. You mentioned something, uh, I'm a young 26 year old male and, uh, I'm believing God for a godly marriage. So what advice would you give to a young man like me, you know, who's of course a Christian, but of course is, is on that path to speak, uh, you know, God centered marriage. Are you married now? No, I'm, I'm single, but of course that's something I'm believing God for.

Okay. Well, what I would, the first thing I would tell you is that, uh, you get on your knees on a regular basis and you pray, uh, there's many things to pray for, but you pray that God would make you the man that he wants you to be in order to be a good husband. A lot of times what men will do is to say, Lord, please bring me a good wife. Uh, you know, blonde, blue eyed of 36, 24, 36 who makes great sandwiches and they'll pray what they want in a woman.

And they're making the mistake to do that when it's first. Okay. First it should be Lord, um, make me to be the man that you want me to be so that when you trust me with a wife that I might live for you and show her how I'm living for you as a godly man. That's what you need to pray before you pray for a good wife and then pray for a good wife.

You know, Lord, I want, I'd like to have a wife who is godly, who loves you more than she would love me. You know, that's, that's hard to pray, but it's, it's true. Let me tell you, my wife, uh, for example, uh, her faith never wavers and we've had our tough times and, uh, we're still married because we're Christians.

We've had some tough times. And so her greatest asset is her love for the Lord Jesus Christ. She's extremely dedicated to Jesus, period. That is her greatest strength.

And I'll say that publicly and I'll say it privately. And I do, it's her greatest strength is that she loves the Lord Jesus. You got to find a woman like that because you want her heart to be for Christ, because if it's for Christ, she will never go out on you. She won't lie to you. She'll be faithful to you. She'll stick with you.

Even when you're a jerk, you want a woman who's going to be there. And in the same time, you need to be, um, desiring to be a good godly man. You ask God to change your heart. And I'm going to warn you, I'm going to warn you that when you do that, he will. Amen. He will change you.

Amen. And here's the thing is a lot of times men want to get married, uh, for the wrong reasons. Now there are reasons that can be both right and wrong. It's good to want to have a wife for companionship, for the glory of God, to raise children for him and for, um, uh, sexual, um, intimacy. There's nothing wrong with it. Okay. Those are good things because we, you know, we're guys, we need that kind of thing.

But if that's the only reason, then that's a selfish reason. And so we've got to be very careful. And also you got to learn, I'm going to a lot of stuff here. The Trinity is the model for marriage because marriage is a three-way covenant. A covenant is a pattern agreement between two or more parties. It's a three-way covenant because it's a covenant between you and her. It's a covenant between you two and the congregation and the people who see your covenant balance, you know, and it's a covenant between you two and God. So it's horizontal with each, with other, you and other people. And it's vertical with you two and God, but it's also internal.

It's amongst you two. You promised to be faithful to each other, to exclude others in certain things. And so the model of this in the Trinity itself, because God is the one who loves and you're to love your wife as Christ loves the church and he is, his love for her is sacrificial. And so you need to emulate that sacrifice for your wife, which is hard to do sometimes.

It is because we're selfish twins, but this is what you're to do. And you want to have a wife who wants to serve God by serving her husband and helping her husband. And it's a whole other theological thing a lot of people don't realize what a wife's job is. They think it's to go out and make a lot of money and then you put your kids in daycare. You know, if you have to do that, you have to do that.

But the priority is the children once they come into the family, et cetera. I could talk a lot about this, but anyway, you got me going there. Amen.

Amen. No, thank you so much. You know, like I said, I had, I first heard about your ministry back in 2013. I would watch your apologetics, you know, when you share scripture with other people who did particularly believe in Jesus.

So I'll just keep watching, you know, I've been watching the videos. Thank you so much for your faithfulness to the Lord as well, because it's an inspiration to younger men like myself. Well, let me tell you, my faithfulness to the Lord is the product of his great and incredible grace and the burden he put upon my heart because I deserve eternal damnation.

I was a fornicating occultist on my way to hell. God saved me by his grace and he's kept me by his grace and he put the burden on my heart to do what I do so he gets all the glory. Amen. Amen.

Amen. All right. All right, brother, thank you so much for your time and thank you so much and this is great for me and I'll continue.

I pray God bless your ministry. Hey, thanks a lot, Peter. Appreciate it. All right.

God bless, buddy. All right. Okay. All right, let's get to Monique from Greensboro, North Carolina.

Monique, welcome. You're on the air. Thank you. Are you able to hear me okay? Yes. Your guide. Okay, good. Okay. I just wanted to ask about Melchizedek.

Of course you do. Where's founding Hebrews? Is it one of the things that, and my question is, you know, if there's any more you can tell me about, of course, you know, without father, without mother, without beginning, without end. The only thing I've ever heard as far as a servant is type and shadow and Melchizedek in reference to type and shadow and all this, but I wanted to ask, number one, of course, if there's more to know about it and if this is just one of the things the scripture gives us that information and doesn't, you know, doesn't expect us or purpose us to know more.

Well, the reason it says without father, without mother is because it was a phrase used to designate greatness in authority and position. Now, some people will say that Melchizedek was a pre-incarnate Christ, but that would be a problem because that would mean that the pre-incarnate Christ was actually living as a king and priest for many, many years, walking with among people. That's not what happened because the incarnation is, you know, 2,000 years ago. So, Melchizedek is a type, a representation of who Christ was. In this sense, he's both a king and a priest and prophetic to some degree. So, Jesus is a high priest after the order of Melchizedek and this is why the book of Hebrews speaks of this because the Jews put a lot of credence in their priesthood, the ironic Levitical priesthood, but Melchizedek was a priest at a different time without a different genealogy, so to speak, and that's what Christ is after.

That's why he was brought up that way. We've got a break, so hold on, okay? Hey folks, we'll be right back after these messages.

We have one open line if you want to give me a call at 877-207-2276. We'll be right back. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877-207-2276.

Here's Matt Slick. All right, everybody, welcome back to the show. Monique, are you still there? I am. All right.

So, where were we? You were talking about the fact that, you know, it's not to say it's Jesus, it's probably, you know, in some other form of, you know, type of shadow of Jesus, and then why it's mentioned in Hebrew, but I don't remember the last thing you said and I wanted to hear that. It was just more detail about when you're coming after the order of Melchizedek and the father. Right, the phrase, without mother and father, is just typologically representative of the person of Christ later on who is the true priest. The Aaronic Levitical priesthood was subordinate to the Melchizedek priesthood, and Jesus is a high priest after the order of Melchizedek, and you can go to Hebrews chapter 6-7, I think it's 5-6-7, and it'll talk about that. And also go to Genesis 14, talks about Melchizedek, and notice it says that Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine. Now he was a priest of God Most High.

Bread and wine represents, excuse me, represents the communion. So this is typological, it's about Christ ultimately, and it's put in place so that later when Jesus was baptized, because he was baptized to enter into the priesthood. Because in Matthew 3-15, he talked about why he got baptized. To enter, hold on a sec, it was to fulfill all righteousness, to fulfill means the Old Testament. In order to enter into the priesthood, a man needed to be 30 years of age, Jesus was 30. Had of a verbal blessing given to him, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. Had to be anointed with oil, which is the representative of the Holy Spirit in 1 John 2-27. And had to be sprinkled with water, that's Numbers 8-7. So the priest, and this is the law of the Old Testament, the baptism that Jesus underwent according to the law had to be sprinkling.

Sorry folks, I mean that's what it says. So he entered the priesthood after the order of Melchizedek and fulfilled those typological requirements of the Old Testament to enter into that priesthood. That's why he was baptized.

It was not to identify with sinners, it was to fulfill the requirements of the law. And so this is why the book of Hebrews talks about Jesus, the high priest who lives forever to make intercession for us. Furthermore, a high priest has to be a male, can't be female. And so if Jesus is not a man right now, if he's just a spirit, as a lot of people think erroneously, then he would not be a high priest if he's just a spirit, not a man, because you have to be a man to be a high priest. And if he's not a high priest, then we don't have an intercessor.

If we don't have an intercessor, we're lost. So Jesus is a man right now in a glorified, resurrected body who was baptized in order to enter into the priesthood of which he is our eternal intercessor. Hebrews 6-25, or Hebrews 6-20 and 7-25. Okay. Yeah, and that was you answering the other question, because that's what I was coming out of when I was first talking about Melchizedek and I was going to ask if there was any other place in scripture that talks about him in any more detail, you said Genesis 14. Yeah, Genesis 14, Psalm 110. Psalm 110, okay. Okay. Okay, I missed it in the Psalm. Okay, yeah, I never understood the Jesus is spirit thing, because he said that the prince will still be in his hands when we see him, you know, so I don't, you know, that's weird that people would think spirit without body. So how would you, go ahead.

No, Jesus is a man right now, he will always be a man. Okay, but go ahead. Yeah, it says the man Christ, Jesus, though. But yeah, okay, well, thank you very much. You're welcome. And I still pray for your wife, it sounds like somebody I'd love to have coffee with, because I can relate to her on a lot. It's a long standing illness and walking faithfully with God and without bitterness, that's the miracle and the grace of God for that.

Yeah, it is. Bless her, bless you, and thank you for answering the question. Okay, well thank you, God bless.

Okay. All right, hey folks, before we get to the next caller, two things really fast. One is we're going to have Luke Wayne on on Friday, he'll be a guest, he's on staff here at CARM and we'll be talking about King James only stuff.

So if you've got questions about King James, he's your man on Friday, he'll be on the air with me. And also, hey, I'm going to set my wife up here. She's got all these issues and I'm trying to get her, she's going to get mad at me, I'm trying to get her to get on the air with me and talk about her faith with the Lord through all the sicknesses, all the challenges that she's had. And she's going to get mad at me, don't say that over the air, you know, all that kind of stuff. If you want her to do that, email us, go to the CARM website and say, Mrs. Slick, we want you on the air to talk about your faith in the light of all of these things because, you know, and give reasons why you want to hear it.

Maybe we can get her to do it. Okay, so there you go. Let's get on the air with Chris from Raleigh, North Carolina. Chris, welcome. You're on the air. Hey, Matt, thank you for taking my call.

Sure. I have a question, interesting question for you about the very first line, the first word of the Bible is Jesus mentioned in it. And the reason I ask is I know, okay, let me first tell you what I Okay, all right.

Well, maybe I have that a little wrong. But I saw a very compelling breakdown on YouTube a while back about the first word being something to the effect of bearish sheet or by a sheet. I don't know, Hebrew.

But the the, how it went is, if you were to spell that out with using the ancient Hebrew alphabet, like the pictographs that Abraham would have used, and you interpret that it says the sun, something to the effect of the Son of God is crushed by his own hand, either on the cross or, or by the covenant or something like that. And my question is, is very simple. Is that is there truth in that? Is that true? I don't know.

I've never heard that. So I can't say it is or isn't. But I'm looking at it seems like it would be really easy to I mean, you know, just I don't, you know, like, if I went to somebody, I don't know anybody who knows Hebrew or is familiar with the ancient Hebrew pictographs, but somebody ought to know that. I mean, it seems it's really a wild, what I would do, you know, what I would do is call up, for example, I'd go to Florida, Reform Theological Seminary, RTS, call them up. And maybe my old Hebrew professor is still there.

Mark Futada. And ask, see if you can talk to him if he's still there. If he's not asked, talk to the Hebrew professor, and ask and see. And see what he said. Let me know. You know, yeah, I'll do some research for you.

I'll call you back. What was the name of the organization again? It's Reformed Theological Seminary, RTS.

Got it. In Florida. There's also Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. And then there's also one that I went to, which is Westminster Theological Seminary in San Diego. So there's some good sums out there you can ask the Hebrew professor. Now let me, let me tell you that the first sentence of Genesis is really interesting because it has seven words in it. Seven words. And what it literally says is, in the beginning, God created God, heavens, and earth. But between God and heavens, there's an article. It's Aleph Tov, which is the first letter and the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet. And it's not translated into anything. It's just there.

In the beginning, God, first and last, created the heavens and the earth. Interesting, huh? Yeah, very interesting. Zechariah 12.10, they shall look upon me, and then that same Aleph Tov is there, first and last, whom they have pierced.

It's there. Also, the very first letter, the very first letter of the entire Bible in Hebrew is Beth. Well, if you look at it, it's a C, except it's a backwards C. And people, scholars, Hebrew scholars, have concluded that that meant the universe was begun out of nothing and had a definite beginning because of the shape, like a C, except not with a round, but with the corners, like a C with two corners. And it's pointing from the right to the left. That's how it is in Hebrew.

And they concluded that it's the beginning of the universe right there. Interesting. Okay. How about that? Okay.

Yeah, no, thanks for the insight. I'll track that down and give you a call back someday. Sounds good, buddy. All right. God bless. Have a good evening. You too. You too. God bless. Bye.

All right. Let's get on the phones with Isaiah from North Carolina. Isaiah, welcome. You're on the air.

Thanks. How's it going today? It's going, man. Let's go.

What do you got? I liked the advice you gave a couple of calls back about asking God to make you into the man and the husband that you should be one day. And I just had a question concerning marriage and courtship.

Okay. I'm courting a girl now who's Christian, but I say this humbly, like pretty like a baby in Christ. And I've been a Christian reading my Bible for some years now. So I guess like I'm more spiritually mature. And I'm just wondering one of my prayers, maybe it's selfish has been like, Lord, help her to know you more like I know you or something like that's not selfish. And that's okay. Yeah. And just at what level, cause I see a lot of fruit and I, even though she doesn't know scripture like that, like I see a lot of like, if I'm being bitter, she's actually been forgiving.

I'm like, man, she's really, yeah, she doesn't even know the verse that she's doing this right now. And I know it and I'm not, but at what point. Hold on buddy. We got a break. Okay. Hold on. Cause we're going to get to this. All right. Good stuff. Hey folks, we'll be right back after these messages. Please stay tuned.

Welcome back to the show. Isaiah, are you still there? Uh, yeah. All right. Okay.

So I got this great woman who seems to live Christ better than you do, even though you know more. Right. Pretty much. Okay.

It's pretty typical because guys have thick skulls and women have softer hearts and they tend to do that, which is godly a little bit more than we do sometimes naturally, which is what it is. So what's your question? Right. Um, so sometimes I take her to church and I've let her know how important, you know, that is to me, like I want God, the kids and everything. Praise God. Um, but sometimes I met with some resistance in the area of like, I don't understand why I need to go to church or et cetera.

And I'm like, I don't know how this would work. Um, I just would like some advice about according in general and kind of the importance to lead with humility, you know? Well, what you said is she, one thing that's really concerned me right away is that she's not all that interested in going to church. Right. That she has doubts about going. Yeah. That's a major serious warning flag.

It's very serious. See in the heart of the Christian, the Lord dwells and we seek fellowship with him. I certainly understand. Well, that church is boring and let's find a different one, that kind of a thing. But if she has doubts about the necessity of going to church, if that continues, you can't marry her because you don't want to enter into marriage with a woman who isn't convinced that you need to go to church. That's a sign of not being saved. I'm not saying she isn't saved.

I'm just saying it's a serious concern because if they don't want to go to hear the word of God and are not led to do that, you know, that's just not acceptable. So what you need to do is let her, uh, follow your lead very politely. If she shows resistance, uh, the more she shows resistance, the less, uh, she's a viable candidate for, uh, for courtship. And so, uh, what you would need to do is, is, is, uh, lead her in a godly way and hope for the, and pray for her that those signs of, Hey, you know what, let's go to church someday. I'm looking forward to it.

That's what you want to kind of see, um, have happen. You know, my wife, you know, you know, my wife, you know, she's been sick. She had COVID she's been laid up for a few weeks actually because of stuff. And you know what she'll do? She'll go online on Sunday and watch a church service. That's a good sign. You want that in your future wife.

If it's not there now, then is it going to be there later on? And then when you say we need to go and start resenting it, then you got a problem. You see what I'm saying? Right. Pretty cut and dry. Yeah, it is.

It's not nothing dumper. You know, I'm just saying it's a concern. If she's desiring not to go, or she doesn't desire to go, they're slightly different. You want to see that? Yeah, we need to go. We need to hear that word of God. That's good. Cause you want to see where is her heart before the Lord?

Is it really that strong for the Lord? Or is it a necessity to go with resentment? Because marriage will only increase that. Okay. I appreciate it.

I know it's, I'm not telling you what you want to hear, but I'm telling you what you need to hear. Okay. I hear you. All right.

Hope I didn't ruin your day. Just pray and leave. No, I mean, that's what I called in for though. Okay. But here's what I want you to do. And I want you to harp on it, on her about it. I want you to just lead godly in a godly way as a man. You just say, Hey, I'm going to church Sunday.

If you want to go, please, you're welcome to, if you don't want to, that's okay, but I'm going to be going. And no pressure on her, no pressure. And just see what manifests. And you continue to pray for her and you ask the Lord to change you in light of this, to be a better man for her.

And that he would work in her heart that she would desire him more. That's what you got to do. Okay. I appreciate that. Yes, sir. All right. Okay, man. You let me know what happens. All right. I will. Okay. God bless.

All right. Let's get to Mark from North Carolina. Mark, welcome. You're on the air. Oh, thank you, man. This was the first time calling. And you gave some really good advice to that guy.

I was 34 when I got married and I was waiting on a godly woman and praise God, he gave me the perfect wife. He gave good advice to that guy. Well, good. And it means there's two perfect women out there. Yours and mine. That's good. Amen. Amen. Praise God. I know I've listened to you enough and I think I know the answer, but you don't believe in a pre-trib rapture.

Do you believe in a literal 1000 year millennial kingdom? Personally, I don't. No. Praise God. You know, I've always wondered, you know, that's one of the hardest things for me to, the pre-trib to me, I don't know why everybody can't see that.

See what? That is true or not true. For a long, long, beg your pardon? That pre-trib is true or not true?

Which one do you want? Oh, no, there is no pre-trib rapture. The church is going to go right to the end, the last day.

According to John 6, the last day, the resurrection. That's right. And the first one is taken when Jesus comes back or the wicked, not the good. Matthew 13. That's exactly right. And I don't know why people can't, so clear in Matthew 13 and with parable in Luke 20, the resurrection is the last, the end of the world.

That's right. But I didn't know, how did you come to understand that there is no literal 1,000 years? There's one verse that really, it just, the Holy Spirit brought me to it one night and it, like a ton of bricks, uh, was lifted off of me. And that was Revelations 20, verse 5. And it says, this is the first resurrection. And everybody, including myself, believed that that was the rapture, but it's not. It's a spiritual resurrection. And it's, it's all through God's word. Yeah.

A lot of people hold to the idea that the first resurrection is being born again because we were dead in our trespasses and sins, but he made us alive. That's exactly right. Right.

That's right. Amen. Amen. I'm so glad, it's so, so refreshing to hear someone that, and you and I are in such a minority.

It's just amazing to me that other people can't see these things. Well, you want to know why we're in the minority? Yes. We're in the minority because the, uh, Ryrie, no, the Schofield Reference Bible, which was a great Bible, it put in the pre-Trib pre-rapture notes. Uh, and a lot of people bought the Bible and got the notes and got, uh, implicated with that idea. Yeah. And into the seminaries. Yeah.

A lot of sems do it too. I've talked to so many, that's exactly, I've got a very good friend, bless his heart, he's a retired pastor now, but he thought I was crazy when I started talking to him about these things. Over time, he's starting to scratch his head. And like I say, he, he was a burden, well-known, pays more people to Christ than I could ever treat. Well, he thought I was crazy, and now he's scratching his head.

He's almost 97 years old. Well, I got something for you then. I, you know, if you want to write it down, but you can go to 1 Thessalonians 4, 16 through chapter five, verse two. And it talked with a rapture there. 1 Thessalonians 4, 16 through chapter five, verse two, because it's a man-made chapter break.

But you read through chapter five, verse two, and it talks with the rapture, that come like a day, uh, the day of the Lord come like a thief of the night, and that's the rapture. That's what the context is. Right. Okay.

No problem. So, according to the premal view, that's supposed to happen before the thousand years. And then the new heavens and new earth are made, uh, after the thousand, the literal 1,000 years, right?

That's their view. That's right. 2 Peter 3, 10.

Right. But it says that the day of the Lord come like a thief in 2 Peter 3, 10, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar. But the day of the Lord come like a thief is also when the rapture occurs. So where's the literal thousand years?

Where's room for it? Since there's only one day of the Lord. The day of the Lord will come like a thief.

Yeah. And I ask people all the time, if you believe in a thousand year millennial kingdom, literal, when have they raptured? I mean, the Bible only talks about one rapture.

Most people would agree with that. When you ask them, well, okay, well, at the end of the thousand years, when are they raptured? They have, well, it's not in the Bible. So there you should tell us the false doctrine right there.

Right. They're going to say that Satan's let loose and that there's going to be another rapture of some sort. Some say that, and some say that Satan comes down and stops the battle of Armageddon at that point. But then the new heavens and new earth occur then, but there has to be a rapture then to get them out. So there's two raptures. They have to say there's two raptures and the Bible never teaches there's two. That's right. And the same thing with the judgment.

There's one judgment, the day of judgment, not days of judgment, two times. You're such a wuss. I love your show so much. Well, I'm glad, but I know for one thing's for sure, I sure make a lot of people upset, but you know, I want them to read the word and be challenged. Well, that's me too.

And I get a lot of resistance when I talk about this, but it's amazing to know that people are open-minded to the Holy Spirit. They will actually listen to you. Yeah. Well, people get... Few and far between.

That's right. People get attached to a certain position and say it has to be true. And when you start asking them questions about it, they go, what? It's like two men in a field, one is taken, one is left. People say that's the rapture, but the context, no, it's the wicked who were taken.

It's very simple. And then they're taken to a place of destruction because that's what the Bible says when they read the context. How come people don't read these things? It just gets me. Anyway. It's like they study, but they don't study correctly.

They just don't... Well, they... Yeah. We could talk about that. I've actually written articles on this on my website, but I hope pre-trib rapture is true because I don't want to go through it.

I'm a chicken. Oh, that would be a blessing, but it ain't happening. Yeah. I'm with you.

It'd be a blessing, but they'll believe it's going to happen. That's right. All right, ma'am.

We've got to call our callers. Wait till we get going. Okay. Okay. All right. God bless. All right.

I like that guy. Let's get over to David from Raleigh, North Carolina. Dave, welcome. You're on the air. Thanks for talking with me there, Matt. I appreciate it.

Sure. My wife and I have been kind of chewing on some things over and we got some questions about the power of prayer and they're in the Bible that talks about, you know, we are to pray for those in authority over us. Uh, and we pray for things to come accomplished and yet we run right up into the thing about, we had to hand all of our cares and set them at the feet of God because it's all being done by God's plan.

So it's kind of, I don't know if this is kind of like a contradictory type deal because with all the politics going on nowadays, everything seems like it's going through chaos and anarchy. Yet we pray for the government. We pray for the leaders, but we know that God's plan is going to come out in the end.

So where are we on all this? Our job is to pray because God wants us to pray and the one who benefits in prayer is us because in the practice of the presence of God, that's where prayer is and we are affected. Then we, our hearts change and we start praying according to the will of God. Now, the funny thing is about prayer. The more we pray, the more apparently we influence God. Now, when I say that the influence is ordained by God from all eternity. So how does that work? The answer is simple.

I don't know. But God tells us to pray and it's like evangelism. God has to elect people to salvation.

He grants a day of belief, Leopold 1.29. He chooses people for salvation, 2 Thessalonians 2.13. But yet when we pray and we evangelize, apparently more people are predestined by God to be saved. So for some reason, we can't fathom our prayers make a difference with God. As James 5 16 says, the prayers of a righteous man unveil much with God.

How does it work? I don't know. So I got to say, I don't know, but I just pray and I go do.

I trust God and move forward. He's bigger than me. He's smarter than me.

He doesn't ask me for any advice. Yeah. Yeah. And that's it. And prayer does so much even for an individual's own soul.

Absolutely. And it's funny because when you pray, your heart changes and then you find out that more of the things around you are in God's will and you just recognize it. And the less you pray, the less you recognize.

It's interesting. Part of giving a tune to God. That's right. Tune to His will. Move to, I like to say move, I like to say move.

You jump into the river of God's will and are carried along with it instead of hobbling on the side, praying for His will to come to you. Make a difference. Yeah.

Hey, we're out of time, buddy. Got to go. Okay. Sorry about that. Dave from Winston-Salem. Sorry about that also.

And Roberta from Utah. Call me back tomorrow. Okay. Sorry for the long wait. By God's grace, back on here tomorrow. Talk to you then.