Friday, January 26th | Lightning Round Questions

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We're going to leave a couple of links below so you can do just that. The verse of the day today comes from James 1, verse 12. Blessed is the man who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love him.

That's right. It's not just blessed is the man who has to go through trials, has to go through storms of life. It's also if you do the right things. If you perform well, if you resist that temptation, then you will be blessed as well. That's one of the things we often overlook is that, oh man, I fell into temptation, but God's grace is more. It's like, yes, that's true. But James is also saying, you know what?

You should celebrate the wins when you get it right. And blessed is the man who does that. And don't just fall back on that old like, oh, I'm only human, I'm only human, I'm only human. Well, you know what? If you're a believer, you're not only human.

That's right. You have the presence of God living inside of you. You have the Holy Spirit. So James wouldn't write this if it wasn't possible for you to overcome temptation.

Yeah, you might be only... Go ahead. It's difficult. It's tough for sure. And you may fail, you may falter, but that doesn't mean a win is impossible. Yeah, that's right. You may be only human, but you're also the temple of the Holy Spirit. That's what your body is.

And so it's important, like I said, to celebrate when those things go right and you're able to resist that temptation. Yeah. Things have gone kind of wrong. Kind of wrong for me. Oh, no. Not really, not really. But there's a story that I wanted to tell because it involves some driving and some pranks that I think were fine. David thinks they went a little too far. It involves some driving, some pranks, and some others.

Yes, yes. So backstory is I was in a very minor car accident. I was not bad.

Everybody's fine. I was by myself. I was at fault. But I was a little shaken up. I was rattled, right? So I didn't want to talk about it on the show because I didn't think it was all that big of a deal.

And now that a little bit of time has passed, I don't mind talking about it. I was in a car accident and the horn was just like stuck. Oh, that's the worst.

That's terrible. Even when I turned the car off, it was just stuck. My nerves.

It tore my nerves all to pieces, right? I would say three days later, maybe even two days later, I'm in Wake Forest and I'm with my son. I've got my son. So out of your normal driving area. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a couple of towns over where there's a lot of heavy traffic. And I just hear, and I was just in an accident like two days ago. My nerves are still kind of shot. I'm like, what, what, what?

So I just stop right in the middle of the intersection, which you should never do. But I was like, my head was on a swivel. I was like, what, what, what is it?

What is it? I got a call from David. Now, again, I was just in an accident. I was like, I know better than to answer my phone while I'm driving. But I'm like, what, what in the world?

What is it? So I just like, okay, okay. I drive past and now I'm back on the interstate. I answer with my steering wheel. I go, hello. David was like, Hey, I'm so sorry.

That was my mom. So you wait for us. I'm in a town that is not mine. I'm driving around with my son. Someone lays on the horn and then instant like, Oh, David's calling me instantly. Wonder what's happening. Yeah. And so I go, hello. And he goes, I'm so sorry. That was my mom.

Maybe what we need to have Christie on the show to try to explain. No, you don't. You don't want that.

No, you don't need that. All right. Take us into the ad. Oh, we're going to get Dr. Shaw. We're going to continue with our episode in just a second. Make sure you write in.

Let us know any questions you have for Dr. Shaw. 2-5-2-5-8-2-5-0-2-8. Oh, yeah. Today's lightning round questions.

Oh, that's right. Today's lightning round questions. So we're going to be reading y'all's questions.

Yes. Write in and let us know. Give us those questions or you can send them to us at contact at clearveetodayshow.com. We'll be back after this. What's going on, listeners?

My name is Jon. I'm David, and we hope you are enjoying the podcast thus far. You know, we really appreciate how many of you download the podcast every day, but we also want to remind you that we are first and foremost a radio show. Clear View Today is actually syndicated through the Truth Network, and we just want to let you know right now that in addition to hosting the all-time best Christian talk show of all time, hashtag Clear View Today, hashtag Clear View Today, the Truth Network also, as it turns out, has an extensive library of Christian programming. We really love everything they're doing at the Truth Network because the whole goal is to encourage, challenge, confront, and uplift listeners with the life-changing truth of Jesus Christ through Christian talk radio. And listen, we know we are not the only show wanting to expand its audience. So if you have a vision for your show or for your ministry, why don't you consider syndicating your show through the Truth Network because they rely on decades of experience of self-syndication with a full array of features for your long-form or short-form content. Make sure you visit the Truth Network online today at truthnetwork.com, or you can give them a call at 336-759-0363. Again, that's 336-759-0363. Well, John, are you ready? I was born ready, my friend. Let's hop right back in.

All right. Welcome back to Clear View Today with Dr. Abbadan Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at clearviewtodayshow.com, or if you have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text, 252-582-5028. That's right, and we are here once again in the Clear View Today studio with who? With Dr. Questions, who also just happens to be a PhD in New Testament technical criticism, also just by Sheer Kowinkie-Dink, happens to be a professor at Carolina University, author, full-time pastor, and the host of Today's Show. I'm not saying that Dr. Abbadan Shah is Dr. Questions.

I'm just saying I've never seen him in the same room at the same time. Solid Batman reference. What I really want is, you know, those decal stickers that you can put on, like, laptops and stuff. I really want one that is a silhouette of Dr. Questions and it says, the doctor is in. Dr. Questions, because the fans are dying to know, has anybody ever seen you out on the road and goes, oh my goodness, there's Dr. Questions, and then they just lay on the horn? No.

No. But it did happen when I used to have my little Chevy S10. That's one of my first vehicles that I ever purchased with my money. Prior to that, I was just driving Nicole's vehicle or whoever, you know, whatever, that was handed to us, given to us.

But this was one that I had purchased for only, if I'm not wrong, like $1,000, $1,200, maybe more than that. And I put a bumper sticker that says, Jesus died for your sins. Ooh, I see. And I'm on US-1, just minding my own business, driving, and I hear this kinky, kinky, and I'm like, huh, I don't know. And then again, and then the person drives past me, so I'm like, what is your problem? And as they're driving by, they're like, and I was like, what?

What is your problem? Whatever. And there was like a couple of people in the car and the one who was in the passenger side was just kind of giving me a thumbs up. And I'm like, you're just being a jerk, making fun of me. I don't know why, but making fun of me. And then as I'm driving down, just kind of upset a little bit, you know, why would people do that? There's no reason.

Why were you being condescending to me? And then it hit me, oh, they were honking because of my sticker. Because they love Jesus. It's the bumper sticker. Yeah, the honk if you love Jesus.

You forget, you put it on there. Yeah, but mine didn't say honk if you love Jesus, it just said Jesus Christ died for your sins. This is just sort of honking in affirmation. Yeah. You're like, yes. We agree. You're a man of convictions.

And I was like, will you leave me alone? Yeah. Why?

I ought to. Yeah. How was the, I know we got to get into the lightning round questions, but in India, how is the horn honking as opposed to how it is here?

Is it way more prevalent over there? Oh, wow. Great question. I have pictures to show you.

Maybe we can drop them in there. Yeah, I'll tell you what. Let's say that's the first lightning round question.

No one actually sent that in, but I'm just dying to know. So every vehicle, most every truck or transport truck, like a tractor trailer or a small truck will have on the back, the words, horn, please, okay? Horn, please. Okay. Yes. Like they want you to honk the horn? Yes. Wow.

Really? Horn, please. And it'll have the word okay. It means do honk the horn. If you want to pass me, honk the horn. If you're behind me and whatever, you have to honk.

So horn, please. Okay. Wow. We can Google it and you'll see. Yeah.

I want to Google it. Unlimited thousands of those signs. So they want you to honk the horn? Yes.

Because that's how you pass. That's how you, they call it overtaking. Yeah. Horn, okay, please. That's it.

Horn, please, okay. Wow. Huh.

It's got its own Wikipedia page. Oh, really? Yeah.

Horn, okay, please or sound horn is a phrase commonly painted on commercial vehicles like trucks, buses and local taxis in India to alert drivers of vehicles approaching from behind to sound their horns if they wish to overtake. Yes. Wow. Wow. No clue. That's it. That's as David pulled it up too. Yes.

I never, we never, I never know. Please, okay. Well, when Americans or for that matter anybody from outside comes to India, they are amazed by some of the signs in the back of the trucks. For example, there's another one that says, use your dipper at night. Your dipper?

Yeah. What is a dipper? So they think like dipper, like I'm taking a bath and there's like this dipper, this little mug. Like a ladle or something? A ladle. And I use the ladle at night.

What does that mean? No. What that means is your lights. Dim them. I mean, hit the lower lights. Dip the lights. Okay. Okay.

So you'll also find that in the back of the trucks. Wow. Use your dipper at night.

Insane. So I had a missionary who came to India one time and he's like, at first I was like, cause you know, they didn't have showers. Like growing up there were no showers.

There was this buckets of water and then you just take a mug and you do it. So he said, I thought they meant like take a shower at night. That's your time. Go take care of business. The truckers really want me to know that.

Like the truckers have a personal thing. It's important that you know that. Cool.

That's insane. Well, on today's episode, I'm glad you started us off, Jon. We're getting ready for lightning round questions. We're taking your user submitted questions. Those we tell you text in 2525825028. We love getting those questions. So we've compiled some of them and we are excited to pose them to you, Dr. Questions, today.

I'm ready. I think. This comes from Frank C and Frank Caliendo himself. Frank.

I'm sure it is. Frank wants to know what's the biggest thing in life that you've changed your mind about? Oh, wow.

That's a, that's a deep question, Frank. That's the biggest thing in life that I've changed my mind about. Yeah. Wow.

I mean, I'm going to have to mull on that for a long, cause I mean, it's not just what are the things you've changed your mind about, but the biggest thing in life. You want to, you want to, you want to move? No, I can do it.

I can do it. Is the idea that people outside of America have about Americans. Okay. And they think that Americans have no values. They are morally and sexually just one of the most promiscuous people in the world. They don't care about their children.

The children are doing whatever they want to and parents are like, Hey, well, you know, it is what it is. Coming to America was a wake up call for me. I guess if I can say that wake up call. Do you think that's an Eastern thought or just a non-American thought? I would say more Eastern. Okay.

Yeah. I won't say Europeans as much because Europeans are more exposed to the West, to America. So they don't, I don't think they think that way cause they know better. But most Easterners, if they're simply going by the soap operas or sitcoms, that's a good point or Hollywood movies or tabloids, what they think is that most Americans live their lives like that. Like what are those soap operas?

Like Young and the Restless, General Hospital, Days of Our Lives, Dallas, who shot JR after all these years. I still don't know. But they think that most Americans are just sleeping around, you know, causing all kinds of things behind each other's backs and causing trouble. And when I came to America, I was shocked. I'm like, wow, my parents had rules for me. But these parents here are strict. They're strict. They monitor their children's time and they have church and youth and all that. They have to go.

And we had that, but it was nothing like what we have here. So that was a big awakening for me to go, okay, so there is the Hollywood side of things. There is a Madison Avenue side of things that portrays a certain American value.

And then there are the average everyday Americans, and they're two different groups of people. Very much. Very much. That's a good point.

Media, maybe not the best depiction of America, beyond America. But it makes sense, though, because I'm constantly, even after 10 years of knowing you, I'm still surprised to find out things about India that I only would have known from what media shows me. Right. Yeah. By eating monkey brains. Oh, I don't know about all that. Indiana Jones. Or just playing with cobras. Oh, that's true.

Temple of Doom didn't do any favors. I did not see a single cobra in the wild growing up. Never once. Never.

Never. Cobras and mongooses fighting, none of that? I've seen mongoose.

Okay. But I never saw them fight. Oh, really? Never saw a Bengal tiger out in the open. Never in my life. They weren't just roaming those three streets or anything. No.

No. Robert Eames, this is a long one, it says, Typically, when people think of a congregation, like a church congregation, they think of one unified body of like-minded believers, essentially a hive mind. But the reality is each person has their own unique worldview influenced by experience.

So how do you as a pastor manage leading 700 individuals but still make them feel like a community? It comes down to focusing on what matters. What matters to me is the gospel. What matters to me is the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. What matters to me is that Jesus is the only way, truth, and life. What matters to me is the Trinity.

We worship the triune God, Father, Son, Spirit, three in yet one. What matters to me is the Bible is the inerrant, inspired, authoritative word of God. What matters to me is that the church will remain.

The church is the bride of Christ. And I can give a few more. What matters to me is there's a real heaven, real hell on the other side, and Jesus is coming back. So as long as we major on those things, I believe there is room for unity. We're not expecting uniformity, but we expect unity on those things. Good point. Great point. Now, there are things that I would tell people, like, for example, Genesis account. Is it literal?

Is it figurative? Are those really 24-hour days that God made the heavens and the earth in or were the ages? I would say to people, you're welcome to Clearview. You can even join Clearview if you believe in the long age, day age theory.

But if you're here long, you'll know we hold to the 24-hour day view. And everything sort of feeds into that. Yes. It's a literal interpretation. And we do understand figures of speech, too. So we don't think for a moment that we think God is a big chicken with feathers trying to bring us all under his wing. We know God. Those are anthropomorphisms.

So anyways, I would say unity in the essentials is important. Great answer. So good. Our next question comes from Lawrence T. Lawrence says, why do Mark and Luke have Gospels telling the story of Jesus when they weren't his disciples and never met him? I kind of had a sneak peek on this one yesterday.

We talked about it a little bit. Right. So the criteria for Gospels, OK, or even New Testament writings is, for one, they need to be old, antiquity. So you've got to go back to the time of the apostles, cannot be 200 years later. They also need to be written by an apostle or an associate of an apostle.

Mark was Peter's associate. Luke was Paul's associate, but at the same time, Luke also talks about how he researched everything from the eyewitnesses. So he also wrote his gospel very soon. And then, of course, other things, orthodoxy means what they're talking about, what they're describing, what they're narrating needs to go along with orthodox Christianity. The things that I just talked about, what matters to me, those are the things. And also receptivity, were those Gospels received by others?

Yes. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John were the only four that were received by the early church. There were other Gospels that came a couple of hundred years later.

The Gospel of Thomas, Gospel of Peter, Gospel of Mary Magdalene, these are all Gnostic Gospels. They were not even there in the first or the second century. They came later.

So we cannot put them on the same level. Sorry, Bart Ehrman, you know better, you know better. You're such a smart guy, and yet you sometimes fudge the lines and make it look like the church has picked a few. And then in your footnotes and then in your long paragraphs in there, you put it in there that, oh, those are Gnostic, by the way, and they came later. Yeah, but don't worry about that.

It's all good. He won't even say that. He will lay it out and you go, there it is. But just the way you write, you make it look like these Gospels were just handpicked because they suited the agenda of the early church. And then, of course, spiritual value. The church derived spiritual value from reading Mark and Luke just as well as Matthew and John, but they did not derive the same level of spiritual value from the other Gospels. So anyway, long answer, those are some of the criteria that was used by the church to call them Gospels. And it was not voted on. This was not voted at the Council of Nicaea, sorry, Dan Brown and your Da Vinci code.

This was not voted at the Council of Constantinople or Chalcedon. These were already in use and were considered to be on the same level as the Old Testament writings. I appreciate that you did the long answer for that because I think the question has an undertone of the criteria is very loose when really the criteria for canon of Scripture is actually way stricter than even I would have thought. The most Christians don't realize how strict the criteria is for something to be considered the Word of God.

Now, there is not a list of criteria out there. Not different people have talked about it, Eusebius has talked about it, Athanasius has talked about it, but they don't list these things. These are the observations made by scholars as to what was the common discussion when it came to these writings we call as New Testament. Oh, so some of them were talking about them as written by an apostle or an associate. Others talked about the antiquity of those books as well as the orthodoxy of the books. Some others talked about some other mix and match of those points. And that's how we have those points today.

I love it. Christopher P. writes in, how do you advise those who doubt in their faith, is it a sin to doubt? No, no, no, it's not a sin to doubt at all.

In fact, that's part of the growth in Christian life. That's how we mature, that's how we grow is when we doubt. So doubting is not a sin.

Doubting is actually, sometimes God allows us to doubt. I went through a period of doubt in my life and guess what? I was here. I was at Clearview. It was not Clearview at the time, it was Tabernacle. No, I was not like doubting as in, oh my gosh, I'm not sure what to do. It was not like that. It was just questions I had.

So even though Sunday morning I would get up and preach and Sunday night I would preach and Wednesday night I was preaching, I was doing my PhD work in New Testament textual criticism. There were questions I had. It's like, there's a question, I'm not sure.

Have people considered that? Because that really shakes our faith. And then here's what I would do. Because I had enough of faith in the veracity of the Gospel, the truth, the Bible, Jesus Christ, I had enough faith to go, okay, my question is a real question, it's a big one. But because I am already in the faith, I'm not going to deny my faith. I'm not going to put my faith on hold until I get this thing figured out. No, I'm going to continue in my faith and research this question and figure out what's really happening. And if it's going to undermine my faith, then it is what it is. But I have a feeling it's actually going to bolster my faith.

And here's what happened. 10 out of 10 times it actually ended up bolstering my faith. I grew in my knowledge, I grew in my faith, I grew in my understanding of the Word of God, theology, apologetics, philosophy, all those things. I actually walked away going, thank God for that doubt because now I know why I believe. That's right. See, and that's such a great perspective because you continued in your faith.

Yes. That doubt was there and it was a real doubt and it was something that needed to be addressed and you did address it. But in that pursuing of that answer, in that resolution of that doubt, you still maintained your faith. And your faith was strengthened as a result.

Like one of the doubts I had was, what if all this, and it was a very simple doubt, it's like, what if all this is just made up by the church just so they can control people? What if other religions are all on the same level? And I'm like, wait, I grew up around those other religions. Let's look at them carefully.

Let's go beyond the rhetoric. Let's stop just reading Wikipedia or somebody's idea of what these religions are. And so I actually did papers on Islam and Christianity, did my own research on Hinduism, Buddhism.

And I was like, I always knew this, but now I know it. They're not even on the same level as Christianity. They're not even answering the questions that people are asking.

You wouldn't have pursued that if you hadn't doubted. Right. Right. It's kind of like we said yesterday with the gospel. You don't get the good news unless there's bad news for the good news to alleviate.

And that was in a way my bad news that brought the good news. Amen. Yeah. Amen.

We've got time for probably one more question. It comes from Mike C. Hi, Dr. Shaw. Shout out from Anaconda, Montana.

Yay! Thank you, Mike. Thanks for listening from Anaconda. If you missed that, Anaconda is our fourth most listened to location. Which is so much.

Which is crazy because we're in North Carolina. Hey. But hey, thank you.

Thank you for listening. And we're only syndicated on the East Coast through radio. Hopefully that'll change soon. But Anaconda, Montana. Anaconda, Montana. They're with the Cleveland Today Show. Love it. Love it. Thank you. So Mike's question is, thanks so much for your show. I'm a very young pastor, 28 years old. Pastor Mike. So many members of my congregation ask me to preach on problematic passages that I feel are over my head. How do you know which difficult passages to address from the pulpit and which to save for another time? I would say, just the way the last question was about doubts. You will have those kind of difficult questions. I would immediately get up in the pulpit and start preaching on all the hard texts of the Bible. Like people like F.F. Bruce have written on it, Walter Kaiser, I think, also wrote on it. A couple of other famous scholars have written on the hard texts of the Bible.

I wouldn't recommend that. I would actually tell you, just take your time. Work through those questions, those texts, and educate yourself and look at the pros and the cons. I love perspective books. I love counterpoint books, where here's the question or here's the topic. Here are four views. Here are three views. And I love to read them and then listen to the rebuttals of the other authors against that each perspective.

And then I will look at the text and look at theology and then make my own decision. And sometimes it's like, oh, wait, there are three perspectives when actually there should be the fourth perspective. And here's the fourth one. And the fourth one trumps all the other three. And that becomes my view. So two things I wanted to point out, because number one, you gave me or you let me borrow one of those books when I had to write a paper on Original Sin. There was four different ones on Original Sin. And I hadn't grown to that point yet. So I was like, I don't know who's right. Who do I listen to?

Somebody tell me what to think. And so working with it with you, that actually helped a great deal to kind of round out and not finalize, but just kind of get in perspective where we fall on the topic of Original Sin. Number two, you've written one of those books yourself. And it's available right now in the show notes of this show, cleaveatodayshow.com. Can we recover the original text of the New Testament? That's it. I blanked.

I was trying to say change of the goalpost and I knew that was it. Can we recover the original text of the New Testament? By Dr. Abaddon Shah, along with three other New Testament scholars. That's right.

You can pick it up today. That was good. That was a good lightning round question. Love it. Thank you so much, Dr.

Questions. Very welcome. Thank you, guys.

Thank you. You taking the hat off? Yeah, I'm taking the hat off, man.

I got to find a new... I want to get a top hat. A top hat would be good. This might be the last time we see this hat. Like the Bonanza horse's hat?

I think so, yeah. It's a big lime green 10 gallon hat with a big old question mark on the front of it. This one here, it just ain't doing it for me. Love it. Thank you guys for writing in. Make sure you're sending us those questions.

252-582-5028. They're so important. We use them for lightning round questions, and it lets us know that you're benefiting and loving the show. I want to encourage you to visit clearveetodayshow.com. You can partner with us financially on that same website, be a part of what God is doing through our show in the days and weeks ahead, and I want to encourage you to visit mightymuscadine.com as well. Check out their line of products as well, and use the promo code today, that's T-O-D-A-Y, for a discount on your purchase as well as a portion of those proceeds coming right back here to the Clearvee Today show. John, any thoughts you want to leave our listeners with over the weekend?

Nope. We'll see you guys next week. We've got a whole new lineup of shows for you as we round out January 2024. The first month of 2024 is coming to a close. Hopefully, you've been walking with us and just finding encouragement and strength in the Clear View Today show. If not, hey man, I don't know what to tell you. There's always next month.

Yeah, February's a new month. We'll try again. Love it. We love you guys. We'll see you on Clear View Today. We'll see you next time.