Dr. Brown Answers Your Toughest Questions

The following program is recorded content created by Truth Network. That's 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. 866-34-8 7884. And feel free to call if you differ with me, if you think I'm wrong about something, if you've heard something that concerns you and you want clarification, by all means give me a call.

Let us start in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Joseph, welcome to the line of fire. Hi there, Dr. Michael Brown. How are you today? Doing fine, Joseph. Thanks.

Good. Well, I have a question about Tanakh. I'm interested in purchasing a Tanakh, and there are a couple of different publishers that I've been looking at, like JPS or Quorin or Art Scroll, and there's even another by some professor in California who did his own translation. I forget his name at the moment, but I've been looking at different Tanakhs, and I'm just... which version of the Tanakh, if you know of any recommended translations that you would refer me to? Right, so you're speaking about by Jewish scholars, correct? In other words, just a translation of the Hebrew Bible by Jewish scholars to get their perspective as opposed to a Christian translation of the Old Testament, correct? Yeah.

Okay, got it. So the 1917 JPS version is available in public domain, but it's outdated. The language is outdated. It was vastly improved on by the new JPS, also known as the Tanakh. So if I was getting any one, I would get the new JPS version that came out around 1985, and that was by top Jewish scholars with input by rabbis, etc. Obviously, I don't agree with it at every point, but it's learned, it's brilliant, and it does represent Jewish understanding of the text.

So that's the one you're referring to, JPS. It's also called the Tanakh. However, if you want to get more of an understanding, traditional Jewish interpretation, in other words, how do Orthodox Jews read the text, then you would get the stone translation, the stone translation. You can get one big volume with some some notes along the way, and that would then give you insight into traditional Jewish interpretation, but in my view, it's not as good a translation as the new JPS. The other one that you'd be referring to is the translation of Robert Alter, available in three volumes.

Alter is brilliant. It is a well done translation. It has tremendous value.

The notes are very valuable. I would make that a competitor to the new JPS in terms of quality of scholarship. However, it's one scholar with a great literary feel as well versus a team of scholars.

That's why I would still go with the new JPS. But any of these will still give you a Jewish perspective on reading scripture, and you'll see where certain terms are translated differently, certain concepts are understood differently, certain key verses about messianic prophecy and things like that are understood differently. So any of those would open up for you. There are some other translations that I've seen. I haven't been through as carefully, but those are the ones I would point to. So, again, if you really just want to know how Orthodox Jews read it, get the Stone translation. The best overall, I would say, the new JPS, but also excellent, is Alter.

So that's my recommendation. Okay. What about the Quarren? Do you know anything about the Quarren translation? The Quarren was primarily known not for the English translation, but for the Hebrew edition of the text, that very commonly, if I was just reading the Bible in a Hebrew text, the Quarren edition was the one I would use the way it was printed and the manuscripts behind it. The translation is not as excellent. In other words, it's well done, it's done by scholars, but I wouldn't put it in the class of new JPS or Alter personally. So, it's known, it's good, it's Israeli in terms of where Quarren is produced. Now, I haven't studied it as carefully as the others. You can't go wrong with it in terms of you'll still understand how Jewish scholars interpret it.

I just would not put it as quite the same level. Thank you very much. I really appreciate it.

You are very welcome. 866-348-7884. Let's go to Isaac in Charlotte, North Carolina. Welcome to the Line of Fire. Hey, Dr. Brown.

Glad to be back with you. After listening to Wednesday's broadcast on the vaccine and noticing only a few people argued in favor of them, I thought I would give it a shot. No pun intended there. My argument consists of three points followed by a response to a frequent objection, and it's time for about three minutes, but please interrupt me when and as you see fit. Number one, the bipartisan promotion of the vaccine should really make us pause before jumping to the conclusion that the trio of vaccines available in the US, that's Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, are experimental or worse, that they are part of a larger tool of the left to control us. Just to name some notable Republican figures here, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Senator Lindsey Graham, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and the list could go on, but the point is that these characters are not the most friendly with the Democrats and the current administration, and yet they are all going out of their way to promote the vaccine. This is, of course, on top of the fact that the vaccines were developed at the direction of former President Trump and distributed at the direction of President Biden. Point number two, to cast doubt on the safety and efficacy of these vaccines is to cast doubt on the gold standard of medical research and science represented by the CDC, the FDA, the National Institutes of Health, which by the way is headed by a bright Christian, Francis Collins, the United States Department of Health and Human Services, and so on. Now, I'm not saying we should take these agencies as infallible, but what I am saying is that when they make a recommendation, especially when they all make one together, we must have really, really, really strong reasons to doubt their integrity.

I understand conservatives, including myself, have a tendency to distrust the government, but I would just encourage everyone here to appreciate the nuances of the situation and use their reasons. Point number three, the worldwide agreement on the safety and efficacy of the vaccine. That is, governments from all different backgrounds and political systems seem to agree on using these vaccines as the foremost tool in blunting the pandemic. Especially pertinent, I must say, is the nation of Israel's remarkable breakneck speed program to inoculate their population with Pfizer's vaccine. The country, I would remind everyone, was headed by Netanyahu, a right-wing leader, during the initial launch of the program. Now, the country is run by a very diverse coalition, and the results are the same, staunch advocacy for the shots. Okay, to briefly address an objection, how shall we deal with the possibility of long-term side effects yet to be discovered? This is a very fair and reasonable question, but there's an easy answer. Historically speaking, any long-term side effect causally linked to a vaccine has been detected within the first few months.

Let me give an example. About one in 2.4 million recipients of the oral polio vaccine became paralyzed. That is, they actually got polio, and this was causally linked to the vaccine. But while the side effect itself is long-term, that is, long-term paralysis caused by polio, the detection of this long-term side effect happened within the first month.

So to restate, given our historical analysis of vaccines and our understanding of biology, it is unheard of to have a long-term side effect developed out of nowhere years later without a biological indicator in the first few months. All right, so I'm going to jump in just in fairness to other callers and give you a full three minutes to speak. So first, Isaac, I appreciate you laying things out systematically in that way, and we did give folks opportunity to call. We had two defending or supporting or encouraging getting the vaccine, and everyone else that called in Wednesday, either skeptical or absolutely against.

So, Isaac, I welcome your call on that front. What someone might say in response is, hey, look, Israel right now is quarantining people from 41 countries, including the U.S., because of problems with the Delta variant. And so if you come there, you have to be in quarantine for a week and have negative tests, et cetera. And then on a daily basis, on a regular basis, I'm hearing horror stories from people who got the vaccine, just got an email from a friend that immediately after getting the second shot out of the blue, this terrible condition in the hospital, they can't treat him. Just reading about kids getting myocarditis, so inflammation of the heart, they're tracking more and more of these. And others would say, we just don't know what happens to DNA. This is the difference here that it's DNA altering, and that may not manifest itself for a long period of time. But here's the key, as I've encouraged everyone, do what Isaac is doing.

Do the research, ask questions, ask God for wisdom, and make informed decisions. Just yesterday, got word of two more friends that died of COVID. One woman who is otherwise healthy and strong before that, almost 85. Another brother, I'd say maybe in his 50s. So that's three people I know have died of COVID in roughly the last two weeks.

I mean, people that were friends of our family or coworkers over the years. So this is very serious. Whatever decisions you whatever decisions you make, make them with wisdom. And if you ask him, what am I doing?

What I'm doing is private between me and God and my family. Why? Because I don't want you to look to me as an example of getting the vaccine or not getting the vaccine when I do not have any special education insight on this. Therefore, because people look to me a certain way, or give me a certain amount of credibility, or attribute certain wisdom or understanding to me, whatever it is, that if I'm going to speak, I want to speak with seriousness. If I'm going to speak, I want to be able to give you something of substance.

So when you're dealing with potential life and death issues, either getting vaccinated or not getting vaccinated, really need to do the research adequately, pray for wisdom, talk to people you need to, and then make informed decisions. Hey, Isaac, thank you for calling in and taking the time to do it. I appreciate it.

866-34-TRUTH is, number to call. All right, just a few seconds before the next break, so we'll get your calls right on the other side of the break. Real quick, if you've read any of my books, regardless of where you bought them, how long ago you got them, and the book blessed you, the book was an encouragement to you, would you take a moment to go on Amazon, amazon.com, because it's the most used book website, and just post a short review.

It can even just be one line. If the book was a blessing to you, it's just a way of letting others know, and it's a way for free that you can share the good news, encourage potential readers, and hopefully we can touch more people with the message. Straight back to your calls. It's The Line of Fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get into The Line of Fire now by calling 866-34-TRUTH.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us on The Line of Fire. You've got questions, we've got answers. 866-34-TRUTH.

Let's go to Steven in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. Welcome to The Line of Fire. Thank you, Dr. Brown. I appreciate it.

Sure thing. So a few months ago, I think around mid-April, I reached out to you with an idea about reading Romans 8, 29-30 of those whom God foreknew, predestined, called, justified, glorified, from the perspective of being the Israelite, rather than a reference to all believers. Yep. And what we briefly touched on at that time was, you know, he uses the word, his people whom he foreknew, in Romans 11, 1, and 2, as explicitly Israel, which is the beginning of the chain. And from that verse on forward, Romans 8, 29-30, there were no immediate red flags, but the big question was, what about the context coming into that verse? I get that Paul referred to the whole church before that. Right. What I wanted to show you was, he actually starts Romans 8 talking to the whole church, like for verses 9-17, he's talking about everyone with the Spirit of God is a child of God.

Yep. But right around verse, let's see, Romans 8, 23, he transitions away from the whole creation to specifically we ourselves with the first fruits of the Spirit. So for that whole paragraph, verses 18-22, he's talking about the creation, the creation, the creation, the creation, and how the creation is waiting to obtain the glory of being a child of God. And then he says, and not only the creation, but we ourselves who have the first fruits of the Spirit grown inwardly, as we wait eagerly for adoption of the Son. So that's his transition away from everybody, we're all believers waiting to be a child of God, to just those who receive the first fruits of the Spirit.

All right, so just to jump in, have you gone through all of Romans whenever he speaks of we? Because my impression would be that, okay, off the top of my head, as I think of verses as you're talking, my impression is that we, this was the first generation of believers, Paul, Roman believers, others, these were all within the first 30 years, so when he's saying we who receive the first fruits, he'd be talking about all the early believers, Jew and Gentile. Do you think then when he says we, up until this point, that you can make a case he's talking about Jewish believers, or would you make the case that because he says the first fruits, that that indicates Jewish believers? I think, I've actually gone through Romans several times to try to highlight who he's talking about in each section, when it's specific to the Jews, when it's about all believers together, and for this section, when he says we ourselves who have the first fruits of the Spirit, I think he's talking about the first group of people to receive the Spirit, which would be Acts chapter 2, rather than Acts chapter 10, where the Holy Spirit comes to the Gentile, and the reason for that is... So, just to anticipate something, my problem is that from there on to the end of the chapter, which is so gloriously for all believers, if God is for us who can be against us, that you don't have to wrench all of that away from all believers because the us is just the first fruits of Jewish believers.

No, actually, what we would do is, since he's transitioned to we ourselves who have the first fruits, is we continue reading those first-person plural pronouns from the perspective of those who received it first. He specifies in Romans 15, 27 that the Gentiles have come to share in the spiritual blessing of the Jews, so when he speaks through this next paragraph of Romans 8, 26, he says, likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, so when he says likewise, he's comparing two things, he's comparing two things, and instead of comparing early church to early church, I think what he's comparing is how the beginning of Romans 8 is the Holy Spirit for all believers. Now, likewise, the Spirit for just we ourselves are the first fruit. All right, now, would you agree, and I love the fact that you're digging, you know, if someone's writing a doctoral dissertation and they're trying to argue for a unique point, they'll get challenged like a hundred points along the way to sustain it.

Sure. So what you'd have to sustain here is when he says, likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, because doesn't he say, doesn't say everybody else, the rest of us, the likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, the likewise seems to be going back to God's help, not to a group of people, as I would read it. So again, that would challenge what you're saying. Right, so what he does is around verse, so Romans 8.14, he says, is when he's talking to a whole church about how everyone with the Spirit of God is a child of God, he says it a few more times, and then in Romans 8.17, he says, we'll be heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him, in order that we may be glorified with him. This continued idea of being glorified as a child of God, as he transitions into just Jewish believers, and says they are his people whom he foreknew, he predestined them, meaning he chose them for adoption as sons. He called them, he justified them, glorified them as a child of God. Following that, the context afterward, is again a reference to, you know, who shall bring any charge against God's elect?

It's God who justifies. He's reminding us, like, who can accuse you of the sin that you've been forgiven? Because right after this, in Romans 9.4, he says, they are the Israelites, to them belong the adoption and the glory.

So it belongs to them. And then the rest of Romans 9 is about how, even though this belongs to the Israelites, not all of them remained faithful. Some lacked faith, they lacked obedience, and were therefore cut off, and then the Gentiles with faith and the obedience of faith were grafted in. And one last point I really want to quickly tell you is, I've identified somewhere around 14 references in Romans to this idea of, to the Jew first, and then to the Greek, throughout the whole book of Romans, so that when we get to, we ourselves, we have the firstfruits of the Spirit. I think that's a reference to the Jewish believers as a continuation of that theme, because I haven't actually seen any reference in Romans yet to where he refers to himself with the Roman Gentile as a specific group that will cease to be a specific group sometime in the future. Got it.

The early church would cease to be a church. All right, well, listen, Steve, yeah, and I just got to jump in, in fairness to other callers. So I appreciate what you're doing.

You're doing the right thing. In other words, this has to work with a consistency in a way that would have been understandable to the original readers without someone having to sit there with a scorecard and say, well, this means this, this means this. So what I'm going to do as I think about it, or I mean Romans, I'm just going to look at the we, the us, the different expressions. As I said off the top of my head, it raises some questions.

And then the flow here, because what's non-negotiable to me is when Paul is talking about the Spirit working on our behalf and the larger thing of Romans 8 28, right, because this is, we can talk about this another time, that the we, the us here, or the call according to his purpose, Romans 8 28 is all believers, that all things work for the good, or in all things God works for the good, those who love him to those who are called according to his purpose would suggest all believers, if that just gets limited to Israel, that kind of undermines a lot of the promise that follows, even God giving his son for us all. So I'll look at that, but I appreciate where you're going with it. And I'm sure, well, not sure, but I expect we'll have another conversation. So thank you for the call. 866-34-TRUTH.

Let's go to Sean in League City, Texas. Welcome to the Line of Fire. Hey, how are you doing today?

Doing well, thanks. Good, good. I just wanted to ask you about, what is it, Revelation 5, 10, and basically, if you read in the New King James, it talks about, it says, you have made us kings and priests to our God, and we shall reign on the earth. If you read in almost any other translation, ESV, NASB, NET, NLT, and Amplified, it all changes us into them, but my point is that it says it's completely different. The object isn't us anymore, like the elders, it would be the people who are not elders, like New King James says, you have made us kings and priests, well, and like the NASB says, you have made them into a king and a priest to our God, and they will reign, instead of we will reign. Yeah.

So I'm wondering why. It's different manuscripts, that's all. In other words, the King James, New King James, MEV, some others, follow one set of Greek manuscripts that they believe are the most accurate. The other is the NASB, ESV, NIV, NET, most modern translations follow another set of ancient Greek manuscripts that they believe. One says these are the oldest, the other say these are the majority, so you have these little discrepancies here and there. And what you need to do is look at the larger context and see which seems to make better sense.

Overall, the message is the same whether we're kings or whether we're a kingdom, we are ruling and reigning under the Lord as his vessels. But it's simply a difference in manuscript, that's all it is. In other words, it's not that they're translating the same Greek, that they're accurately translating different sets of Greek manuscripts. It's a debate among scholars that you need to look at it and see contextually which seems to make the most sense. Okay, yeah, I was following along with Michael Heiser and his, you know, he did 24 Elders and his book, The Divine Council, and I'm kind of trekking with that a little bit, but when I got to there and I was in the New King James, I was like, what is he talking about?

And then I looked into different translations and I went, oh, he's reading from the ESV, I'm reading from New King James, so it doesn't work if you're a New King James. But secondly, do you ever have any contact with Paul Ravenhill? I had spoke to him, it was a blessing to be able to talk to him.

He was pretty accessible at one time, about in 2020, early 2020. I spoke to him on two different occasions, but he's pretty obscure and he's not as accessible as, for instance, like if you look up David Ravenhill on... Yeah, so Paul, sorry, just to jump in, we've got a break coming up. I'm in regular contact with David Ravenhill. Paul and I got to know each other when I was close with his dad from 1989 to 1994 when Len went to be with the Lord at the age of 87. Paul stayed in my house with Len and Martha in the fall of 1989, and we were in touch here and there afterwards, but he was a missionary for years and is one of those deeper life guys, I mean, not one of those get in front of everybody and be on social media and as a man of prayer and sharing the word.

So no, I've not been in touch with Paul in a very, very long time, several decades, I would say. It is my joy to be with you today on The Line of Fire. Thanks so much for tuning in. Here's a number to call, 866-3-4-TRUTH. If you're listening live, watching live, 866-348-7884. If you're watching on TV or internet after the show or listening by podcast, welcome, welcome, but you can call in because it's not live. We don't have the technology yet where one week after the show, you can call in and then I can retroactively answer you and then we can put it in the show retroactively for people to listen to or watch in the future.

Maybe one day we'll get—well, probably not in this world. So if you're watching live, great time to call now, 866-3-4-TRUTH. We go straight to the phones.

Let's start with Matthew in Florida. Welcome to The Line of Fire. Hey, Dr. Brown.

Hey. I met the Lord in 2017 and came out of a lifestyle of homosexuality. I bumped into a ministry, a ministry that got baptized in, that has a—well, let's just say like a real appreciation for 1 Timothy 2, verses 11 to 13 or so about women not allowed to teach men, so on and so forth, wearing head coverings. And I've always been like, you know, just going with the flow of things, because what Scripture says.

But I've always had like a—I've never been 100% settled on it, and I've just been sort of submitting to it my pastor's size because—for whatever reason. But anyhow, within the last three weeks, I'm sure you've seen the name like Apostle Catherine Crick started coming onto the scene. I'd never heard her name before, and it sort of reinvigorated all these thoughts again for myself, because, you know, I also am with other ministries where women prophesy and women heal the sick and women do everything. But I just—I'm just very confused, probably triple-minded on the whole topic about whether women are permitted to have authority over men, whether they're allowed to be pastors, whether they're allowed to be apostles. And I'll just end my statement-slash-question with, my ministry is the only one that I personally am involved with that takes this position. Every other ministry that I sort of see on the internet takes this position that it was cultural, it was only for back then, it's not for now, and I just feel like I want to call in and see what your thoughts are on the matter.

Yeah, absolutely. So Matthew first, I'm thrilled that the Lord's worked in your life and brought you out of homosexuality. He's faithful and He will keep you. And we know that people, gay activists and theologians, will try to make the argument, look, what Paul taught about women was cultural, what the Bible talked about homosexuality was cultural, but of course that breaks down on every level, in that, number one, God unambiguously states that He made men for women and women for men, and every reference to marriage, family, parenting throughout the Bible is always male-female. And to this moment, no human being enters this planet without a biological mother and a biological father.

That's the first thing. The second thing is the statements against homosexual practice are very strong and very damning, just like the statements against adultery or other things. So the practice of that, not having an attraction, but the practice of that is universally condemned.

Paul never says if a woman teaches, she will not inherit the kingdom of God, obviously. So for sure, when it comes to head coverings and those things, that was cultural, because that had to do with the way people lived back then, that in much of the ancient world, both Jewish and Gentile, it was very common that a married woman would not go out of the house with her head uncovered, that if she went out of the house as a married woman, that she would have her hair covered, either with a veil or something else that would be covering her head. And because that was the culture, that was normal. In other words, it's not that the Bible said that that's the way someone should dress.

There's no passage in the Bible saying it. That was the culture. So the question comes up, if you're meeting in someone's home, it's their private home, but it's a public meeting in the home. It's a house church.

Should the women cover their heads or not? That's why it was an issue. But even in that setting, Paul talked about women praying and women prophesying. And if you read Romans 16, you find a whole list of key women church leaders. Now, there's a debate about whether Junia was called an apostle or she was well-known among the apostles. But there are a number of significant women leaders that Paul references in Romans 16.

We know that when the Bible talks about Priscilla and Aquila, it normally puts her name first and say that they taught Apollos and discipled him in Acts the 18th chapter. So women involved in ministry, that goes back to Jesus in his earthly ministry having prominent women with him, although none of the apostles were women. And when he rises from the dead, he reveals himself first to women and tells the women, go tell the men, and the men don't even believe. So Jesus clearly raises up the status of women that could even sit at his feet as he's teaching like Miriam Mary does in Luke the 10th chapter. And then we know Acts 2, your sons and daughters will prophesy, right?

So the Holy Spirit is poured out on men and women. The only debatable issue to me, so there's no debate as to whether women can prophesy, heal the sick, preach, teach, be used in a thousand different ways. And Paul even tells Titus to have the older women teach the younger women. If all women were unreliable, easily deceived, then you don't have the older women teach the younger women.

That's just more deception. The only issue is women having authority over man. And what Paul is writing about in 1 Timothy 2 is really emphasizing usurping authority, taking authority that doesn't belong to them. That being said, my understanding of Scripture is that headship is male. In other words, just like in the home, the husband has a certain role, so the husband and wife are one and they live lives as one and the husband lays his life down for his wife and yet he is still the head of the home with a certain responsibility. That's why the vast majority of world leaders are male, the vast majority of pastors worldwide are male.

I believe that's the way God wired us and set things up. It's not to say that you can't have a woman like a Deborah raised up and that God has used women in very significant ways through history as missionaries, as preachers, as prophetesses, and many, many other things, but I don't see it as the norm. I've preached in churches pastored by women.

I don't see it as the norm, but I recognize God's raised them up and used them. I know other women in ministry, but they are in ministry under the authority of a church or under the authority of an apostolic leader or some even under the authority of their husband and they feel that's important. Within the context of a local church, I would see women fully released to do all kinds of ministry under the covering authority of the senior leadership.

And beyond that, again, the pattern I would see is male headship. However, I would absolutely receive from an anointed woman teaching, preaching, ministering, as long as I knew her life was in right order, have no problem doing that whatsoever. As for the woman you mentioned, Catherine, actually, I'm not familiar with her.

I haven't heard her name. I do see apostolic ministry as primarily male. Could God raise up a female church planter who goes into a region and does apostolic work and plows the field and plans to do works and raise up leaders? God could.

It's just not the norm of him working. But anytime he works with a human being, we are flawed in one way or another. We don't have perfect doctrine or perfection in another area. So he's still working with us in the midst of our imperfection.

The same with women. So hopefully that answers your questions. If on a personal level, if you're at home in the church where you are and you feel covered there and it's helpful and edifying and you just have these minor differences, that's fine.

If you find it restrictive and legalistic in other ways and not giving full expression to the gifts within women, then you could prayerfully ask the Lord where he wants you. So that's my understanding of Scripture and my counsel to you. Okay? Okay, thank you. Can I just ask one more 22nd question? Yeah.

Go ahead, real quick. Well, where does this whole cultural argument come from, where the answer is always now, well, that was only for that particular time? And why are people so freely, like, I'm seeing 90% of the online ministries now that I bump into are just using that argument for this particular topic.

When did that become so popular to say that? Yeah, so there's a good answer and a bad answer. The good answer is it's always important to read the Bible in its cultural background, to understand why a certain thing was said.

Look, could you understand if you're reading about the presidential elections in 2020 and you live in Mongolia 400 years from now and you don't even know who Donald Trump or Joe Biden are, you're gonna have a hard time really understanding the nuances of what actually happened and what the issues were, etc. So whenever we can read the Bible in its cultural background, that's wonderful, that's helpful, that's good. The bad answer is a lot of times we just don't like what's in there and we just try to write it off as just for that day.

So there are ways that you test that theory out. In other words, you see, okay, where is this taught elsewhere or where is this based on a universal principle? You know, for example, Leviticus 18, when God lists various sexual sins, starting with incest and including bestiality and adultery and homosexual practice and other things, when he lists them, he says to his people Israel, don't do these things because the Canaanites did them and I drove them out, the land vomited them out because of these sins.

This is wrong for everybody. So if you see a prohibition repeated Old Testament, New Testament, or made on universal principles, then you can't write it off to culture. So Matthew and Kander, a lot of people are not doing good study, a lot of popular ministries are not really grounded in proper scholarship, and when something goes in a way that they don't like and it seems not to fit, we just write it off as cultural. So we've got to be real careful with that. We've got to be very, very careful before we write the thing off and say it was just for that day.

On what basis are we saying that? We need to bring in the larger testimony of Scripture to make that point. But thank you for asking. By the way, if you want a Bible that gives you a lot of cultural background, a study Bible, there is the Cultural Backgrounds Bible.

Just get online and search for it. Cultural Backgrounds Bible, John Walton, Craig Kean are some of the editors of that. So on every passage where there is interesting cultural background, from the ancient Near East, from the Greco-Roman world, from the Jewish world, it'll give you that Cultural Backgrounds Bible. So it's just a study Bible. And the key thing always, Matthew, as you grow, major on the majors, there are always going to be distractions.

Major on the majors and give yourself to those, put down real solid foundations, and that's the key to staying strong and growing, and let secondary things remain secondary. Okay, thank you for the call. We will be right back. It's The Line of Fire with your host, activist, author, international speaker, and theologian, Dr. Michael Brown. Your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Get into The Line of Fire now by calling 866-342.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us on The Line of Fire. During the break, I just got an email from me. Yeah, I'm on my own mailing list for emails that go out from our organization. So if you got that, you would have just gotten a summary of all the videos of the week that we put out, what it's about, what we just put out. So if you missed any, there they are. And then another day, you'll get a summary of the key articles that we just put out. So you'll know that, actually, the articles today and videos on Wednesday. And then really on Monday, if we've got a new special resource or special announcement, we'll send that out. If I'm speaking in your area, you get an email and you'll find out. If you've got something brand new coming out, you'll be the first to know. So make sure you sign up for the emails, askdrbrown.org.

Just put down your name, email address, and we will joyfully be in touch with you and keep pouring good stuff into you every single week. There was a question I was unable to get to. We just lost that caller about the difference between being not under the law and yet upholding the law. When Paul says we're not under the law, for example, Romans 6, he means we're not under the law as a system of righteousness. We're not under the condemnation of the law, and we're not under the law as a tutor to bring us to the Messiah.

When he says that faith establishes the law, what he means is that when we understand that the law was also teaching justification by faith and also pointing us to the Messiah, that when we have a right understanding of faith rather than tearing down the law, it upholds the law. All right, let us go to the Netherlands. Darren, welcome to the line of fire. How are you?

Doing very well, thank you. I have a question about how to, I refute an argument that Jews say a lot. They say that Jesus can be the Messiah because he is not the literal physical seed of David.

Yes, so the way we answer that is twofold. First we point out that the Messiah is also greater than David. Daniel 7, he comes in the clouds of heaven, Psalm 110, David addresses him as Lord, Master. So the Messiah is greater than David and the Messiah is pre-existent, so if he was simply the physical son of David, a physical descendant of David, he would be less than David. The Messiah is greater than David, but he must also be descended from David. And in point of fact, we understand from early testimony and even our reading of Luke's Gospel, the third chapter, that Jesus' mother, Miriam Mary, is also a descendant of David. And therefore, in his physical birth, he is ascended of David, but he is also the son of God and therefore greater than David.

This is the only way that he can fulfill his role of being both human and divine. And I would point out that there are some examples of a genealogy being traced through a woman. We know, for example, when it came to inheritance, for example, in the book of Numbers with the daughters of Tzolovchad, that when there were no men to whom the inheritance could be given, the inheritance was given to the woman. So that would be passed on through the mother. We also know, for example, in 1 Chronicles, the second chapter, there's a genealogy and it mentions, Shehshon had no sons, but only daughters, and he gave one of his daughters to another man to marry, and then the genealogy is now traced through the daughter. So you do have these examples of genealogy being traced through a woman or inheritance coming through a woman. So our understanding is that Mary, Miriam, the mother of Jesus, was herself a descendant of David. So he is physically a descendant of David through his mother and yet born of a virgin, so he is also greater than David. And I would turn that around and I would ask them, how could the Messiah be greater than David, come in the clouds of heaven, be highly exalted, sitting at the right hand of God if he is merely a son of David?

I would turn that around as a challenge and objection to the Jewish friends with whom you talk. Is that helpful? Yes.

Yes. Wonderful. Well, thank you for your interest, my dear brother. And make sure you check out AskDrBrown.org or ASKDRBrown on YouTube.

We've got a whole teaching series that you can watch where we get into a lot of these things if you haven't taken advantage of those, and of course, my five-volume series in writing on answering Jewish objections to Jesus. All right, let's go to Olivia in Kershaw, South Carolina. Thanks for calling the line of fire. Hey, Dr. Brown, thank you so much for taking my call.

Sure. My husband, who is a believer, wants our 12-year-old daughter to have the COVID vaccine, but I cannot get a clear answer or piece about her receiving it, despite praying and asking God for wisdom and doing my own research. In light of Ephesians 5 22, where it says wives should submit themselves to their husbands, do I need to submit to his wishes in cases like this? Okay, so obviously, it's a very delicate situation on every level, right? You could be thinking, what if I don't vaccinate her and she could be exposed to the Delta variant or some other strain of this virus and it could injure her health? Or what if I vaccinate her and that affects her long term? And then you don't want to be unsubmissive to your husband if he insists on something, but if he insisted on you giving your daughter poison, you would be right to say no. So it's a very delicate situation and one where I have to tread very, very carefully. I cannot give you any medical advice, obviously.

I'm not qualified to do that in this situation. Do you have a genuine concern that in vaccinating her that you might be causing her short term or long term physical harm? I am concerned about the long term effects that we that none of us just none of us know about. I'm also concerned about getting her vaccinated and then she gets COVID because that's happening now too with people who have received the Pfizer vaccine. They're still getting COVID even after having been vaccinated. But your biggest concern is not she gets vaccinated and still gets COVID. Getting COVID is the same either way or maybe it's lesser or whatever.

But the biggest issue, if you had to boil it down, is you are not sure about the safety of the vaccine long term for your that you are concerned that by doing this that you would be willfully having her inject it with something that may cause her long term physical damage. That's the concern. Correct? That is the concern. OK. Is your husband 100 percent sure that that will not happen and cannot happen?

Yes. He's very he's very passionate that they're I mean, he is willing to admit that, yes, we don't know the long term effects, but he believes that the vaccine is very safe. He and I have both had the vaccine.

He feels it's very safe. He he has had a lot of autoimmune issues himself and is just concerned that she's going to get this virus. And then those you know, she may have some of the same autoimmune issues that he's got that he believes that he got from a virus many years ago so that he's more afraid of getting the virus than he is a vaccine. Right.

Do you have any data of of children your daughter's age actually dying of covid that did not have other serious health issues? No. Right.

Got it. So what I would I would do this is say, let's get on our knees together and ask the Lord because do you have a history of honoring your husband? I'm not perfect, but I do believe that I've been praying and seeking God on this issue. And I just feel like God sort of like dumped this in my head, the scripture in my head. And I thought, well, you know, if if I'm if I'm supposed to submit to him in this way, I mean, then I should. And I need to trust the Lord for that I need to trust God at his word that he'll take care of the future.

Right. And listen, Olivia, again, I'm not giving medical advice of any kind. And whatever I'm saying may be medically sound or medically unsound.

We don't know. But if you have peace, so I'm going to make this a generic decision, OK, I'm going to completely separate this from from covid. And so just in general practice that as as whether it was a husband and wife situation or a parent and child situation, which is a little different, or an employee, an employer or someone in the congregation, a leader, all these are different situations with authority. The husband and wife being the closest together is one that that in general, if you have peace about submitting to the decision of of someone that is over you or someone that carries ultimate responsibility and the weight of it is on them and they have a good track record of being reliable, solid people, then you trust God in that way. If you feel that you would be sinning by doing that, then you cannot in good conscience go along. But if it's the former and that's where you're at, then God bless you. May he lead you. If it's the latter, then share that real concern. But I would just having said that last point is that it'd be really good to just together say let's get on our knees, say, Lord, we just want your will.

And you say to your husband, honey, you know, this is what you feel strongly about. We'll do it. But let's not do anything based on fear. Let's honor the Lord and let's let's have wisdom and let's really look at this.

Is our daughter's life really in danger without the vaccine? Hey, thank you for the call. And Daniel, I'd love to hear from you. Give me a call early next week if you can. Everyone else, sorry I couldn't get you, but as always, we'll open our phone lines as much as possible. May the Lord's grace be yours. Amen.