Matt Slick Live

A previously recorded Matt Slick Show. I'm live. I'm live today, Monday, 1130.

That is November 30th, 2020. We had an interesting week last week. My internet provider, the modem started going bad. This is like a week and a half, two weeks ago, it started going bad.

And I'm an ex-computer tech, so I know stuff. And I had to get an insert working on it. And I couldn't get it to work. So I called up a place and they sent me a modem. And that modem failed after a couple of days. And then they sent me another one.

That one wouldn't work at all. And so I managed to get an old modem going, and that's what I'm on right now. So hopefully everything will work.

And of course I get a new modem tomorrow. So it'll be the third one in just a few weeks. So that's why. And combined with the holidays last week, it just didn't make it on. No big deals. Good rest anyway. I hope you had a great Thanksgiving. I hope everything went well for you and that you enjoyed fellowship with a bunch of people.

That's right. I hope you had good meetings in groups, without masks, in your homes, enjoying fellowship with one another. That's what I hope you were able to do. And that you're able to visit sick ones, loved ones, et cetera, et cetera.

That's what I'm really glad about. All right. So if you want to give me a call, all you have to do is dial 877-207-2276.

If you're new to the show, you're not sure what's going on. I'm a Christian apologist. I defend the Christian faith. And we tackle all kinds of stuff. All kinds of stuff. I've spent the past week developing an outline on apologetics, presuppositional apologetics, which I'm probably going to turn into a course. I'm thinking about it, trying to look into some venues to be able to teach it, make a booklet out of it, things like that. Really learning a lot of stuff.

And I've been just doing a lot of research and stuff like that to defend the Christian faith. Anyway, we have four open lines. Watch you give me a call.

877-207-2276. Let's get on the phones with James from Long Island. James, welcome. You're on the air. Hey, man. How's it going?

This is actually my third time calling you. So I just have a question about Galatians 519. Where it just lists a bunch of the works of the flesh. And it says sexual immorality, impurities, sensuality, idolatry and sorcery. But the thing that I have a question about is the sorcery because they say in the Greek, it's translated, the word is pharmacia. That's correct. So my question is, is it saying that like pharmaceutical drugs are like sorcery?

No. How it worked back then is people would use drugs for mind altering things in their religious ceremonies. And that's not what we're doing. When you take aspirin, you take morphine, you take whatever, you break your arm, you go get morphine while they're working on you. That's not pharmacia in the sense of sorcery. It's not sorcery. It's just using medicine. Even the Bible says to take wine for your stomach as a medicine.

So medicines are okay. But this is sorcery. Sorcery is by definition using varying methods apart from God. And these methods are therefore automatically sinful because they're apart from God in his revelation. And then to use them as a means to communicate with divine whatever, spiritual whatever.

And part of the ways they would do that is mind altering techniques. When I was involved in the occult, I never did drugs. To this day, I have never smoked pot. I've never done any drugs at all.

Period. Just never have. But what we would do, my friends and I, when we were involved in the occult is do certain things to alter our mental state in order to contact spirits. This is what we did back in my mid-teens.

I remember it quite well. And so sorcery is just another way of, with pharmacia and the drug use in connection with it, is another way of bringing about an altered state of consciousness that then opens up to the spiritual realm for oppression. So this kind of thing is done in Indian sweat lodges. It's done sometimes in yoga, in certain aspects of yoga. It's done in New Age practices.

And more and more, it's infiltrating the Christian church. Contemplative spirituality, the idea of altering the mind by concentrating on a particular object or thing or a phrase over and over and over and over again to bring your mind to a certain place so you can get in contact with God. This is occultism.

It's sorcery. So, okay. Okay. That's just something I was kind of worried about because over this summer, like I just started, like I was struggling with like some, you know, mental health issues and I started taking prescribed, you know, medication, but somebody bought that verse up to me and I was just like, always me taking medication. Is that possibly against God's will for my life?

No, no, no. You're fine. Don't worry about taking medications prescribed by doctors for the purpose of healing. And sometimes people bring up the issue, is it okay to take drugs for mental issues?

And the answer is, of course it is. There are many drugs that are very, very helpful. I have two brothers who take a little something for that reason. I don't. But my wife says something I should, if you get my drift.

But no, they do. And they're fine, you know. And Diane Selner was a woman who used to work with CARM and she passed away a couple, three years ago. And she was a retired clinical psych nurse. And we had many conversations about the benefits of psychotropic drugs that were used medicinally in order to help people with certain mental issues.

And they were lifesavers. It's not a problem. I would absolutely recommend under doctor supervision to take whatever in order to help with whatever. You know, long as it's not just the doctor throwing a drug at you to get you out of the office and, you know, go do something else. We're talking, you know, legitimate medical work. Okay.

Not a problem at all. So like, why do you think that God will heal some people from their mental illnesses, but they're not others? I don't know. God doesn't tell us. Why does he save some and not others? Why does he physically heal people and not others?

Why does he convict and not others? Don't know. But I do know this. That all of us who have problems, like I have Asperger's. I have tinnitus at 80 decibels in both ears. I have a deformed bone in my fourth lumbar area. So I have a back problem.

I have my issues. My wife has, it's called Louise Dietz. And it's one of the rarest connective tissue disorders on the planet. She's had open heart surgery. She's got another surgery coming up on a hand next month. She has to take blood thinners, drugs and stuff like this. Why is God not healing her?

I don't know. But I do know this. I use her as an example. She praises God in her sickness and in her frailty. And her faith is not affected by her frailty.

Not at all. Her faith is in Christ. And in her frailty, she praises God. And it's a greater glory for her. And so in heaven, that's what really matters. Ultimately, she'll have a great reward because she has never wavered in her faith during her multitudinous medical problems. So why does he not heal some people? Maybe because it's a greater reward for them in heaven. For them to endure what they've been allowed to endure here on earth.

As they praise him through the difficulties. And so with my Asperger's, for example, which is an autism spectrum disorder. Well, there are disadvantages and advantages to it.

And one of the advantages is to be able to concentrate and remember numbers and patterns. So I use it for the glory of God. I can remember hundreds of verses.

I can understand patterns of logic and things like that. Well, I use it for the glory of God. And so my wife can glorify God too in her frailty, just as you and yours can bring glory to God if you are looking to him through it and praising him.

And as people see your faith and your trust in him, in it, then he is glorified. And you're sending up rewards in heaven. Not that that's the whole reason you're doing everything. Not that that's the whole reason you're doing everything. It's just what happens.

So maybe that's why he doesn't heal you right away. Okay. All right, Matt. Thank you. All right, man. Well, God bless, buddy. Folks, if you want to give me a call, we have three open lines.

877-207-2276. Let's get to Monty from Raleigh, North Carolina. Monty, welcome.

You're on the air. Yes, God bless you, brother Slick. I was just recently introduced to your ministry, and I find it to be very beneficial for me. I just have one question that I need to clear up. Jermaine to the Sabbath.

My studies have shown, and I'm not calling to be adversarial. I'm trying to, I'm trying to get this in my heart exactly how this should, what is God's will. But I overheard you last week give an explanation of why the Protestant church seems to lean toward Sunday as the Sabbath.

Can you, can you help me out here, brother? Sunday is not the Sabbath, but we worship on Sunday, and we call it a Sabbath. There was never just one Sabbath in the Bible. There were several Sabbaths, rest days, and normally speaking the Sabbath is on Saturday, normally speaking, and no one's changed that.

It's still the Sabbath. The thing is that what we do as Christians in the New Testament economy is that we worship on Sunday, and the reason is because that is called the Lord's Day, the day of the Lord's resurrection, and it's called the Lord's Day. And the Lord's Day is spoken of in Revelation 1.

I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day, and I heard behind me a loud voice, etc. So he's talking about Sunday. In 1 Corinthians 16, now concerning the collection for the saints, this is verses 1 and 2, collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia, so do you also, verse 2, on the first day of every week, that's Sunday, each one is to put aside and save as he may prosper, but no collections are made when I come. In Acts 20 verse 7, and on the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul began talking to them, intending to depart the next day, and he prolonged his message until midnight. So he's preaching on Sunday, and they're having tithes on Sunday for 1 Corinthians 16. In 2 Corinthians, excuse me, in Colossians 2, 16 and 17, it says, Therefore let no one act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival which is yearly, or a new moon which is monthly, or a Sabbath day which is weekly, things of which mere shadow of what is to come.

So in other words, let no man judge you in regard to the festival, new moon or Sabbath. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877-207-2276. Here's Matt Slick. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. All right. So let me read a little bit more. I didn't.

I hung. Okay. That's okay. Go ahead. Okay.

So I hung through the break, primarily. I was very pleased with the explanation. I can't write quickly enough to get down those scriptures, but I will endeavor to look at whatever I can glean from the other side. I'll tell you what.

Let me read one more verse. But this is just an article I've written on my website. Have you heard of CARM.org? C-A-R-M. Just into CARM.org. Yes, sir.

Please go ahead. That's the website. I've been working on the website for 25 years.

It's had over 100 million visitors. CARM.org. And just go there in the search engine. And we're going to be changing the site in the next month or two. Just type in, why do we worship on Sunday instead of Saturday.

Or you can just go to Google and type in C-A-R-M. Just type that in. And then type in, why do we worship on Sunday instead of Saturday. And it will come up to the article.

And you can check it out. But let me read one more thing to you, okay, about this. Because this is important too. This is Romans 14, verses 5 through 6. One man regards one day above another, and another regards every day alike.

Let each man be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes it, observes it for the Lord. And he who eats dust shall feel the Lord, etc. Now, if we're supposed to keep the Sabbath on Saturday, then why does Paul the Apostle tell us that one man regards one day above another, another one regards every day alike.

And you need to be convinced in your own mind. If we're obligated to follow just the Sabbath of Saturday, then he wouldn't have written that. So because the Sabbath ultimately points to Christ. The Sabbath means rest, and we find our rest in Christ. That's Matthew 11, 28, and Luke 10, 23, I believe. And it says, Jesus has come to me, all the way, every leg, and I will give you rest. So the rest, the Sabbath is actually a prophetic representation of the work of Christ and how we're finished with the law in the area of having to do things in order to be right with God, by sacrifice or law, whatever it is. And that Jesus did everything, and we can rest in him. That's why the Sabbath is no longer necessary to be kept on any particular day. We're free to worship on any day. So if you and I were on a plane together, and we crash landed out in the ocean, and we're out there for days and days before we land on a deserted island, and we don't know what day it is. We've lost track. Very good.

What day are we going to work? You know, we've got one in seven chance of getting it right. We'll be in sin. No, that's not how it works. Okay. Indeed. Okay.

Indeed. Well, I would go back to the reference on com.org, but I did want to tell you, I do so much enjoy your ministry, and I believe that you're serving the body of Christ in the best possible way. You know, thank you very much for saying that. You don't know how that ministers to me.

You don't know. I'm almost brought to tears. The reason is because that is my goal in life, to serve God in the best possible way, according to the giftings that I have, to the maximum ability that I have. And I just really value what you just said. Thank you very much.

Well, these seem to be perilous times, and I'm a firm believer in my heart that nothing is going to change till Jesus comes back anyway. So I just wanted to thank you and get that clarified. Well, you're welcome.

And praise God. And thanks for listening and check out the site. Okay. God bless you, brother.

God bless. Okay. Hey, folks, if you want to call, we have one open line 877-207-2276. Kelly from the northeast someplace. Hi. Hi, Kelly. How are you? Hi. Thank you for taking my call and my question.

Sure. If somebody texted that a particular church that purports to be Christian is a cult, have they committed blasphemy against the Holy Spirit? Not at all.

Not at all. Call them out as cults. Mormonism is a cult. Jehovah's Witnesses is a cult. Christian Science is a cult. But I would clarify that it wasn't a cult as in what you named, but it was a church that purports to be Christian. A lot of churches purport to be Christian, but we don't know if they are or not.

But sometimes people will call a church a cult when it's not a cult. They have just simply sinned. They just sinned. It's not blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.

It's certainly forgivable. And it's not blasphemy? Well, it's not blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Blasphemy is a term that can have a slight variety of meanings in that you have said something wrong against God or his work or against Christ or against the truth. So to say there's a really good church preaching very good stuff and to say it's a cult, that would be a form of blasphemy because it would be condemning the teaching that is orthodox and true. But it doesn't mean that the person who says it can't be saved.

It just means the person is either ignorant, overly judgmental, or doesn't know what he or she is talking about. Well, say that that person repented and that they are really, really sorry. And that they believe in eternal security and so they're thinking if they did it and they were saved, then they didn't lose their salvation. But it torments them because they're sorry. They didn't mean it in terms of teaching that they believed were, you know, they weren't talking about the whole church, but because they used that word and they texted it, they're really, really sorry. But then they wondered when they made that text that they did it while they were a false convert and then they came and repented and then they feel they're just tormented.

That's the context. Well, if they're tormented, then they need to do what everybody who's tormented by the sin and guilt that righteously condemns us is we crawl to that cross and we appeal to the grace of God for all of our guilts. And he'll forgive us if we ask. It's not like you would ask and then he said, well, you did that.

Here's how it works. In Colossians 2 13, it says, he forgave us all our transgressions. Verse 14, having canceled the certificate of debt consisting of decrees, which was hostile to us, he took it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Now, Jesus equated sin with legal debt. In Matthew 6 12, Luke 11 four, he said, forgive us our sins, forgive us our debts in the prayer our Father art in heaven. So Jesus equates sin with legal debt. He canceled the certificate of debt at the cross.

Our sin debt was future to him. It's canceled at the cross. It's not dependent upon your repentance. It's not dependent upon your baptism.

It's canceled at the cross. You're justified when you believe. So the sin debt is canceled at the cross for God's people. And then when you believe you're justified, the righteousness of Christ is then at that point added to you. But when you're born before you repent, you're in a kind of a now and not yet state of having your sins ultimately paid for, but not yet redeemed.

It's called a now and the not yet tension. And then when you believe, because God grants you belief if it's 129, then you're justified. So the conclusion, hold on, after the break, I'll say the conclusion, why I told you this, because it's necessary to understand the typical theology of the situation. Hey folks, we'll 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. We're looking back to the show. Okay. Um, let's see. There we go.

Back, back on, back on right here. Okay. There we go. Sorry about that. Kelly. You're still there.

Thank you so much. I'm just saying that it was blasphemy, but not blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Am I hearing you correctly? It could be considered a blasphemy. It could be if we're to use blasphemy in a broader sense, but when people say they're tormented and they're worried about it, they've understand something. Jesus removed our sin at the cross. That's what it says in Colossians 2 14. He bore sins in his body at the cross.

First Peter 2 24. So he canceled the sin that at the cross. So all the sins yesterday today and tomorrow that we commit have already been taken care of by Christ.

Period. We need to understand that. So when we sin, what we need to do is confess our sins to Christ and acknowledge what God has already done and trust and continue to trust in his cleansing and forgiveness. Therefore, there's no need to be tormented by our sin. Now, we ought to be convicted. No, it's not.

No, it's not. We ought not. We ought to be convicted of our sin, and we should feel bad when it's appropriate, because if we sin, it's bad. But we should not be tormented unto the issue of do I lose my salvation?

No. Okay. Christ doesn't lose any, because that's the will of the fathers that Jesus not lose any. That's John 6 37 through 40.

Okay. I'm tormented by thoughts that when I did that, maybe I was a false convert, and now I have no hope. If you were a false convert, if someone were a false convert when they said it, but now that doesn't make any sense, because if they were a false convert, are they a true convert now? If they made a mistake back then, it doesn't mean that they're not a convert now.

You know, people wonder if they were false converts when they did whatever. I often look back at some of my history in my life and go, was I really saved then? And I don't have an answer for sometimes, and so I don't worry about it, because I say, you know, all I know is God was merciful. There are times I look back in my life as a Christian like, what was I thinking?

What the heck was I doing? Why didn't God just kill me? Well, all I can say is he's merciful, and as I look back, you know, there could be cause to say maybe I wasn't saved, but there's cause to say maybe I was saved, and so I just trust God where I'm at now, redeemed. So I can believe now and not say this and not think, oh, I committed that sin and so it's over, but I can rest on my promises that he forgives me if I come to him.

Of course. He will never leave you or forsake you, Hebrews 10-5. And he says- So if someone commits the unpardonable sin, that means that they wouldn't ask for repentance then, right? Right, because this conviction of the Holy Spirit couldn't be upon them. Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is spoken of in Matthew 12, 22-32, and it's to say, as the Pharisees, as the Jews were saying, that Jesus was performing his miracles by the power of the devil instead of the Holy Spirit, but the power of the evil one.

That's why Jesus says, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. Okay. So that's- you haven't done that, and they haven't done that. Don't worry about it. What you do is trust Jesus.

Trust him. Thank you so much. Your website has been very helpful. Praise God. I'm thankful for that. You're welcome, Kelly. God bless you.

All right. Well, let's move along to Cynthia from New Jersey. Cynthia, welcome.

You're on the air. Hello? Hi. Hi, Cynthia.

Hello, hello, hello, Matt. This is Cynthia from New Jersey. Quick- I just want to say something very quick about the last caller, that woman I hope she's still on. I just want to tell you, I just sense in her such a humble, beautiful spirit, and it has got me choked up, and I just am praising God for her because of her humbleness and her sweet, sweet spirit.

So, if she's still listening, thank you. And that's it. Now I'm going to move on to something else really quick that's not my main question. Who picks the commercials that come on your, you know, when we're on break?

Do you or no? They- I don't have anything to do with that. It's up to them. It's just up to them. I know the guy who's the owner of the network.

I'm like, why does he have Charles' family there? But that's not any of it, you know. Whatever. Okay, now here's my question. I've been in a PCA church for two years now.

I am going through formal membership class. I don't even believe in that, but I'm going to do it. Okay.

Okay. Last week's meeting with my pastor, me and this other girl who are doing it together, they don't believe in the rapture. They think we are in the tribulation now. They don't, and they don't believe in the rapture because they think that means three comings of Christ. He doesn't come through time. He only comes twice. I tried to explain the difference between when he comes and lands on the mount.

That's the one that is when he comes back, but nope. They don't believe in the literal thousand year millennial reign because they said that that thousand years is- it doesn't necessarily need a thousand, okay? So anyway, and also that is real. I kind of thought they- without saying it, I think they believe in replacement theology because of something else he explained, and I'm so confused now because I was so happy to be in this little tiny Presbyterian P.C.A. church. I don't know what to do at this point, so help me clarify P.C.A.

and what they think and why they think it. All right. Just so you know, I used to be a Presbyterian pastor, P.C.A. pastor, all right? Okay.

And so they said they were all millennial, which means they don't believe in a literal thousand year reign of Christ, but the reign of Christ was begun at the time of Christ, and they move on from there, and I affirm that myself. That's what I affirm. Okay, I don't know that. All right.

Okay. It doesn't mean I'm right, it's just that's what I affirm. I have my reasons, and people say, oh, you don't believe the Bible.

No, I just, you know, we'll talk and I'll give you my reasons. Now, if they were to say that the rapture is not going to occur, how can they deny that? It's right in 1 Thessalonians 4, 16 through chapter 5, verse 2. That's what it says. So I wouldn't agree with them on that either.

Okay. Generally speaking, the P.C.A. is what's called cessationist, also, I believe, the cessation of the charismatic gifts, which I don't agree with that. So what you can find in different presbyteries around America, believe it or not, within the overarching P.C.A. denomination, you can find different presbyteries, which are subgroups of two or three states, you know, under a presbytery kind of a thing, depending on the population.

It might be just the Southern California presbytery, the Northern California presbytery, things like that, but who knows? You can have a slight differentiation between beliefs, and it's okay to do that. So what I would do if I were you, it depends. I'm not into membership either, but I did it at a P.C.A.

church because of the necessity of moving into ministry. Well, okay, whatever, you know, that's all right. There's good reasons for it, but I still don't like it, but whatever. So just take them aside, or say you'd like to have a meeting and discuss some of these issues. What's the reason for being on mill? Maybe they have great reasons, maybe they don't.

Oh, and the P.C.A. also believes in baptizing infants, which I believe that too, but not for the purpose of salvation, but as a continuing covenant faithfulness of God that included children in the Old Testament, and I believe it continues in the New Testament. But it's not for salvation, but it's a covenant sign, okay? And that's what they explained to me, but then why don't they have a baptismal tank, where when somebody does turn their, you know, be saved, older, go ahead. Because they affirm sprinkling as well, which I can make the case for. So you can get re-baptized by sprinkling? The question is, is sprinkling or pouring or immersion all valid forms of baptism?

And all three of them are. In fact, most probably Jesus was sprinkled at his baptism. Because he had to fulfill Old Testament law, per Matthew 3.15. And I can give you the verses I got on my card, you can look up, why was Jesus baptized? And I go through the scriptures and show you how to fulfill the law, this is what it was doing, these are the chapters in the Old Testament, and you had to have water applied to him, and the only way it was applied to a priest, because he was becoming a priest, a high priest after the order of Melchizedek, most Christians don't know this, but he holds a priesthood, prophethood, and kingship, three offices, prophet, priest, and king. At any rate, so he was fulfilling Old Testament law in order to enter into the priesthood, the requirement was to be sprinkled. That's out of, numbers, no, numbers 87, I believe it is, or is it Leviticus?

No, numbers 87. So, you know, it's like, what I would do is use this as an opportunity to be challenged and to learn. There are things you're going to agree with them about, and things you're not going to agree with them about. But you'll have the right to say, you know, when you affirm, I affirm with reservation these things. And you have to work through those, work through those with them in advance. Because if I were in your church, and they would say you had to believe in, that there's no rapture, I can't do that. If you say I can join with reservation in this area, that's fine.

But then you're agreeing to also submit to the leadership and eldership and things like that, which is fine. Yeah, yeah, that I don't mind. Okay? Okay, thank you, thank you, thank you, I love you. Okay, Cynthia, God bless. All right, hey folks, we'll 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. Welcome back, everyone. Let's get on the phones with JR from California.

JR, welcome. You're on the air. Hello, sir. How are you doing today? Doing all right, by God's grace.

What do you got? Yeah, first of all, I just want to say thank you for your website. Thank you for all your videos. It helped me a lot through my faith, and I appreciate that. God bless you, sir. God bless, thanks. So the question I have, I was talking to an atheist online, and he brought the verse numbers 31, verse 18, they can keep the virgin women as sex slaves.

I just want to see your take on that. I didn't see this on your website, so I just wanted to see if you can answer this for me. Where does it say in the verse that there to be sex slaves? I just googled it. I don't know what translation it was, but I just googled numbers 31. That's not what it says, all right. It does say verse 18, but all the girls who have not known men intimately spare for yourselves. So the first thing you're going to do with an atheist is realize that what they're probably doing is going to an anti-Christian website, and they're reciting something that they've read.

They've not done the homework, and this is what I'll say to them repeatedly. Have you read the context? No. Have you done any research on it? No.

Well, why would that happen? Well, you're implying that you have a moral stand by which you can then judge this. You have no moral standard. You have no objective standard. To say that this is wrong means that you believe in a universal moral absolute, but you can't have that in your atheistic worldview, so you're just messed up from the beginning.

So I just jump all over like a monkey in a cupcake, rip them to shreds politely that they don't have any right to even complain. And I'll say, furthermore, the verse is not translated correctly. Let's go to a good translation, and I'll say it like that, and say, you need to go into your homework.

You have it in your homework. It's shameful. And I'll say to them, I'm required to do homework on varying forms of atheism, on epistemological issues, metaphysical issues, rationalism, empiricism, platonic norms. I got to know all this stuff to argue with you guys, and you guys don't even do your homework when you raise a verse like this. I said, you're shameful. Now, let me give you an answer.

This is what I do with them, okay? In the context here, what's going on is that the Midianites had been very bad to Israel, and the Midianite women would have died. They would have been culpable in their practice of Baal worship.

I think it was Baal worship. At any rate, the Israelites, they exterminated the Midianites and prevented them from ever causing Israel to sin again. The virgins were probably spared because they hadn't had any practice or any role in the pagan sexual worship of the false gods by which they would produce more Midianites that then would be raised up against Israel. Furthermore, without killing them, they're sparing them, which is a good thing, and then they get to be grafted into the Israelite community in line. They'll end up being married because it was wrong for a Jew to just have a sex slave, because that's called adultery, fornication. That's not what they would do. The only way they could have proper sexual relations was with a wife. That's how it's supposed to be done. I'll explain this to the Israelites, to the atheists, and say, you guys, you don't even do your homework, and yet you come up and you answer this, you look at this stuff, and say, why should I take you seriously if you have another question?

I interact with atheists a great deal on a regular basis. Thank you so much, sir. That fulfills me. Thank you so much. Alright, man.

God bless, buddy. Alright, let's get to Melissa from Virginia. Melissa, welcome. You are on the air.

What do you got? Are you there? Melissa? Are you there, Melissa?

I hit the right button. Let's give you another five seconds here, because the topic is an important one if you're available. I don't hear her. Okay. Oh, unmute.

Okay. Now I can hear you. Can you hear me? Yes, now I can hear you. I was just going to click you off, but you made it just in time. So what do you got?

Well, it still says mute, but there you are. Okay. Yes, I've been listening to your conversations tonight, so I won't go into a whole lot of details, but I had a marriage that fell apart for unknown reasons to me. Anyway, just a significant relationship loss, and I've struggled for almost four years, and I've not been able to get my legs back under me. And so in terms of faith and wavering faith, I mean, this has affected me on every level. And I just can't seem to, I mean, I know God's Word is true.

I know there's landmarks in my life that there's no doubt who was behind that. But I'm just, I'm struggling because, you know, God's Word speaks to that He will protect us from the foul or snare. He will, you know, keep our feet from stumbling. He will give us feet like hind feet to let us scale the heights and, you know, but I'm just, I'm struggling. I mean, how can I confess and testify to others to win them, not win them, that's not the right word, but to usher them towards Jesus when I can't explain so much, like you talked about the healing to the fellow earlier, you know, and especially when, and I've heard you say that Jesus fought it all on the cross, and that's always been my belief.

But at the same time, His Word and the New Testament specifically speaks to, you know, continued sin and this kind of thing. Doubt and lack of faith are a sin. Well, let me ask you, do you have a, do you have a, can you narrow it down to a single question? And let me just, because I've got a background information you're struggling. How do I gain my, my solid faith back before all of this? Let me ask you, let me ask you.

Go ahead. What's your faith in, the resurrection of Christ or how well the circumstances are around you? It's definitely in the resurrection of Christ. I just wonder if I've let out with the little things done with me, you know, because of my lack of faith.

No, no, no, no, no. You understand something. Your hope is in the resurrection of Christ, not your circumstances, but you're a real person and your circumstances are affecting you when you're having problems. You look at the Word and you wonder, why are these things being allowed to happen to me when God says ABC, but DEF is happening to me? Well, He also says DEF can happen to you as well. Okay.

Right. So what a lot of times happens on the, the, the prosperity teachers on TV, they only give you the positive side. They don't tell you about God's discipline. They don't tell you about how God will be with you through the desert times and that these difficulties do come. Sometimes what happens, sometimes what happens is when we have to face a difficulty like you're facing and the, the consequence of sin that's upon you, sometimes what we're obligated to do during that is to purify our faith. What's it in the resurrection of Christ, the person work of Christ or in our circumstances, the more you realize that it's in Christ, then the less you have to worry about whatever it is you're going through now, not to dismiss it because it's important, but it enables you to be able to trust him through the difficulties because he's probably preparing you for something later on of greater need, not in a bad way, but a lot of times what happens when God allows people to go through such trauma is that he's perfecting you and preparing you, as Philippians 1, 6 says, to be used by him in another way, another level.

And how you are during this is important. I would recommend you... What was it in the resurrection of Jesus, please? Philippians 1, 6. I'm confident as this very thing that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of our Lord Christ Jesus. So he's perfecting his work in you. And you have to realize that sometimes the perfection of the work of God in you means you don't even know where he's at. You don't even feel like he's there with you. Sometimes his circumstances are just imploding. Sometimes you just don't know.

Are you there? That's true. That's how I feel right now.

Just very alone and the pandemic doesn't help. Yeah, I know. That's because of the sin of our governmental leaders who, you know, it's ridiculous. But here's the thing. You have an opportunity, and I'm having to talk quickly because, you know, we're almost off the air and I don't have time to really spend, you know, to get deep.

But let me tell you something. You have a rare opportunity right now, and that is to go into your prayer closet, wherever that is, and lift your hands up to God and praise him. You praise his name and you glorify him and you thank him for his great mercy of saving you, his great mercy of keeping you. And you can tell him you don't understand why you're going through what you're going through. But yet you look to him through it. You trust him beyond your ability to understand. You trust him beyond your ability to feel.

You don't feel close, but you know he's faithful. You praise him. It's easy to praise him when things go well, and people often turn their backs on God when things go bad. You have the rare opportunity right now to praise him.

And maybe what he wants is for you to depend on him to such a degree like that that your circumstances, so to speak, and their importance follow away as you see the greater importance of Christ. And then often what happens is a blessing comes flooding down the hillside and you're swept along with it. Thank you. I appreciate that. Well, you know, it's okay.

It's okay to go through this and to hurt and to wonder and to have doubts, not too many doubts, but to struggle with all this stuff. You're a human being. You've had sin perpetrated on you. You're suffering the consequences.

And how much longer after these years can you maintain? It's okay to talk to God about it all. It's okay.

You're just a normal person. Okay? Thank you.

You're welcome. All right? Be blessed.

I am. And part of the blessing was getting to talk to you, actually. Thank you. Seriously, because I go through the same things, similar things, and by saying what I did to you, it reminds me of what I needed to hear as well. So I'm not just saying this. By me speaking it to you, I got to minister to myself because there are some things we haven't to go through lately that have been difficult.

You know, we've got to praise him. And I just want to be a soldier in his army, but I also know that when a tool is broken, you put it away or get rid of it. And I don't want to be a useless tool. A tool is only as good as the hand that wields it.

A broken tool in the hand of a master is still a great tool. My daughter's a master at drawing. She can take a broken pencil and make a perfect drawing out of it. She's a genius at it. She is.

One of my daughters is. And so, you know, if you're a broken tool, great. My favorite coffee cup is a broken cup.

I have a vase that's broken vase from 330 BC. It's my favorite because it's broken. We're all broken. In the hands of the master, we can do great things.

So praise God for being broken. Okay. All right. God bless Melissa. Hey, sorry, Charles from Louisiana. I'm sorry, Danielle from North Carolina.

And sorry, Jack from Nevada. Please call back tomorrow. Okay. And we can talk again. God bless you all and vice-grace. We'll be back here tomorrow to talk to you. Bye.