Dr. Brown Tackles All Your Questions

Well, I bet you do have some questions today. You've got questions. We've got answers. Phone 3-4 Truth.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thank you so much for joining us today on The Line of Fire. How I look forward to just opening the phone lines and taking as many calls as possible.

You know, the regret I have is we only have an hour. So let's dive right in. 866-3-4-Truth, 866-3487, 884, any subject of any kind, any subject as long as it relates to the line of fire at all. And I just want to make a special appeal. Some of you that have supported me, followed me for years are really struggling with where I've been coming from recently. You've had issues with my stance concerning the president or prophecies or things like that. Feel free to call. Feel free to share your concerns. If you're disappointed with me, if you're upset with me, if you're angry, feel free. All right. I'm not going to bite.

I'm not going to try to win a debate. We'll just talk honestly. So I want to open the phones, extend that invitation to you, okay? I know many of you will post on social media as the show's going on, but we can't respond to that, but we do respond to your calls. So 866-3-4-Truth, and we will start in Columbus, Ohio with Tiffany.

Thank you so much for calling The Line of Fire. Hi, Dr. Brown. Hey there. Just want to say my husband and I love you. Well, thanks. I'll take the love also. You bet.

Yeah, we love you. And I just wanted to say, of course, I'd love to sit down and have a coffee chat with you and ask you a million questions. But today, basically, instead of having a question, I just had a bit of encouragement for all of us. A scripture that's been in my heart these past couple days has been Psalm 24. The first part of it, the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. And I just want to encourage all of us to not live like we're defeated and just feel, of course, be alert for bad things, but we can't just live like in doom and gloom.

I'm sure as you see everything on Facebook and myself too, there's a lot of talk with family and friends. It just seems like doom and gloom. But I like what you said before. Why not just pray and believe the best and what that Biden is, you know, hey, why not believe that Biden's the best president we've ever had?

And that really encouraged me. I'm like, we know his policies, we know things, but why not just pray and believe? Why do we have to just live in doom? Well, here goes doom. You know, we can pray and believe.

Yeah. So a few things, Tiffany, and thank you so much. So the first thing, the first thing is this, that no matter what happens, good or bad, God is still God, right? You get a family diagnosis of cancer. Someone dies in a tragic accident.

Your company goes bankrupt. I mean, really bad, negative things happening, things where the devil himself is attacking. Sins we commit, mistakes we make. In all of that, in all of that, God remains consistent. He's always God.

He's always good. And therefore whatever is going on, we can always stop and praise and worship him as God, regardless of what's happening. That's the first thing. The second thing is when you have massive prayer for an election and then an outcome that's different from the expectations of many people praying who wanted to see Donald Trump have four more years and who are deeply concerned about where the Democrat party may take us, that ultimately, even if there was massive fraud and an election was stolen, ultimately God is still at work. And that come inauguration day, I would say God's will was done. It could be judgment.

It could be blessing. When it comes thirdly to praying for the incoming president, that just as we prayed for President Trump, we should pray for Joe Biden. Now you say, well, President Trump surrounded himself with evangelicals and President Trump campaigned on issues that are very important to many of us as evangelicals.

And it's been the opposite with Joe Biden. Well, then all the more pray. When Barack Obama was president, my prayer was God make him the greatest president we've ever had in our history. I was sadly disappointed by decisions he made. Not disappointed.

I expected that. But let's just say sad to see it happen. Sad to see that that he made certain choices and same sex marriage and abortion and various things like that. But that was my prayer.

That was my hope. So for President Trump, I saw the downside and the concerns and the damage that could be done. But my hope and prayer was that the good would outweigh that. So Joe Biden coming in, let's pray that he has an encounter with God.

And let's pray that if the Democratic Party wants to take us in a radical and destructive direction, having to do with our liberties and many other key things in our country, that God would intervene and that everything that's meant for evil would be turned for good. So I'm a fighter. I'm in this day and night. There's never a day I have where I'm not in the midst of intense spiritual conflict in battle.

I'm on the front lines fighting every day. But I'm doing it in faith. I'm doing it in faith. I'm tremendously encouraged in the midst of the pain and burden. I'm tremendously encouraged. Hey, thank you, Tiffany, for the call. 866-34-TRUTH.

Let's go to Jonathan in Clarkston, Washington. Thank you for calling the line of fire. Hello, Dr. Brown. Can you hear me okay?

Yes, like you're sitting right next to me, sir. Okay, cool. So I have this question about how to explain salvation. Now, we know that the Bible says that all one needs to do to be saved is have faith in Jesus and also repent of sin. But included in all those things are we also have to do things like bear fruit with keeping with repentance and we have to pick up our cross daily and things like that. And so when explaining to the lost salvation, in my mind, it doesn't really make sense just to tell them repent and have faith in Jesus because they might not understand that all these other things are included in those two things. However, on the other hand, when explaining these things, I don't want them to feel that salvation is by works because I was having this conversation with a lost person the other day and they responded with, so if I do all of these works, then I will be saved.

And so that doesn't work. And then the other thing is, what if I don't work hard enough? What if I don't do enough? What if I'm doing really well but realize there's pride? Okay, so I gave up drinking, but now I was nasty.

Okay, I stopped being nasty, but I'm not compassionate enough, so how much is enough? So obviously, that can be a real trap, just like the trap. Well, just believe in him and that's it. So I would frame it differently. I would say up until now, you've been living ultimately for you. You may care about other people.

You may have responsibilities with family, et cetera. You may be God-fearing on a certain level, but it's your life. You've been living your life. And God made us for him. God made us to serve him and love him. So to be born again, to be born anew, to be saved, to have your sins forgiven, means that God blots out everything you did in the past, everything that you don't want anyone to know, the most embarrassing, that he wipes it all. He blots it out.

It's all paid for. And from here on, you now live to do the will of God. You belong to him. So as your life goes on, you're asking, okay, how do you want me to live? What pleases you?

What doesn't please you? And it could be, okay, you were a hit man for the mafia, you know, or whatever. So you leave that behind and that, well, that's a bad analogy because you have to go to the police with that. Let's just say you were an alcoholic, abusive to your spouse, and okay, you understand that Jesus doesn't want you to be an alcoholic and doesn't want you to be your spouse. But what about the rest of your life? Career choices, how you, you know, your life now belongs to the Lord. He becomes the Lord of your life.

And you'll find out that he wants what's ultimately best for you, that he is good and loving and kind. So that's the way I'd present it. I wouldn't present it with a focus on the specific works as much as, take a look at 2 Corinthians 5, 15. 2 Corinthians 5, 15, that if Jesus died for all, then we conclude that we died with him and that those of us who live should no longer live for ourselves, but for him who died for us and rose from the dead. 2 Corinthians 5, 15.

Also, if you look at Colossians 3, the opening verses that we've died and our life is now hidden in the Messiah God now paves the way for put to death therefore the deeds of the body. So that's, that to me is the more holistic way to approach it. Thanks for the question.

I really appreciate it. 866-3-4-TRUTH. We go to Luke in Boston. Welcome to the line of fire. Hey, Mr. Brown, I mean Dr. Brown.

Either way, it doesn't matter. We're good? Yeah, yeah. So I love the show, and I watched Can We Know God's Name? I think that's the name of the video.

Yes, sir. And people were mostly saying and arguing, like in the comments and all over the internet really, that Yahweh was like a pagan god of the Canaanite people, and you know, I'm like a young person. I recently turned to Christ. I'm only 16, and it's really just weird that people like say stuff like this, and that Israel didn't only have one God, but they also worshiped this god named Asherah, and I just want to know your explanation. Yeah, so two separate things. One, the idea that Yahweh was a pagan deity widely worshiped by many different groups in the ancient world is a complete and total myth. Is there a possibility that that name was associated with any other deity at any point? Is that even a possibility?

A vague possibility. In other words, outside of the Bible, the name is not mentioned, basically. If you have a rare word here or there where maybe they're referring to that deity, that's debatable, but there's no question whatsoever that He is the covenant God of Israel by name, however we pronounce it, those letters, W-H-Y-H in Hebrew, Yud-Heh-Vav-Heh, that there's absolutely no question that that name, which occurs about 6,300 times in the Hebrew Bible, is a specific covenant name, and only the people of Israel in history have been associated with that name.

That's a fact, and I can tell you that with my degrees in Near Eastern languages and literature, that's the world that I lived in. So if you have any reference to him outside of the Bible directly, it's vague and it's questionable. As to what the Bible tells us, the Bible tells us that Israel worshiped all kinds of other gods, that they worshiped Asherah, a goddess that they worshiped Baal, that they worshiped other gods. Lists of them, even in the temple in Jerusalem, they would bring in the worship of other gods. That's one reason God destroyed so much of the nation, destroyed the temple, and sent our people into exile into the Assyrians and of the Babylonians.

So the Bible itself tells us that we worship many other gods. You just read the book of Jeremiah and God's heart is bursting and breaking over that. Here, read 2 Kings chapter 17. 2 Kings 17. Look at the summary that's there about the idolatry of Israel and Judah.

And then 2 Chronicles 36. Right, so 2 Kings 17, 2 Chronicles 36. Yeah, all these other gods were worshiped.

They worshiped the gods of the nations. From day one, God warned about that. Deuteronomy 7, another good passage for you.

2 Kings 17, 2 Chronicles 36, Deuteronomy 7. All the warnings about worshiping other gods. It's the Line of Fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get into the Line of Fire now by calling 866-34TRUTH.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks, friends, for joining us on the Line of Fire. If you get my emails, if you don't get the emails, go to askdrbrown.org. When you sign up, we'll send you some neat info through my background testimony, some of the vision of the ministry and what God's called us to do.

You also get an immediate free mini book, a real eye-opener, Seven Secrets to the Real Messiah. So let us be in touch with you, askdrbrown.org. Also, if you appreciate the work that we're doing and want to help, but you're not able to spare a lot of money with everything else going on in life and your other commitments, of course, everyone has to just give where they feel called to give, but would you consider becoming a Patreon supporter? So it's just $10 or more per month, which many of you, I think, could easily do if you felt to do.

Obviously, some not, but pennies a day, 30-something cents a day. Patreon.com forward slash A-S-K-D-R Brown. Patreon.com forward slash A-S-K-D-R Brown. You get two bonus videos that we send you every single week, and then the joy of knowing that your funds are helping us to reach many people, and you get treasure in heaven. So would you consider that? It would be a blessing if you could join us there. Patreon.com forward slash A-S-K-D-R Brown is the place to go. And again, if we've been a blessing to you, it's a way that you can say, hey, let me stand with you on a regular basis just with some change every day. It makes a difference, helps us reach a lot more people. All right, let us go to the phones.

Rolando in Houston, Texas. Thanks for calling the line of fire. Hi, Dr. Brown. So the year just started, and I'm trying to read the Bible from the beginning to the end.

Yes, sir. And I always run into a problem when I get to Genesis 1, trying to understand what the light is on the first day, and then what's the difference from that light and the light that we hear on day four. So both of them say that they separate day and night. And so every time I read Genesis 1, I get stuck there trying to understand the difference between those lights.

Yeah, so Rolando, you're not the first one to get stuck there. The key thing, when you're reading through the Bible, is to make notes of where you have a question or an issue, and then if you're trying to read through the whole Bible in a year, right? So you have your pace of how many pages or chapters you're going to read each day, and how are you going to divide that, but you're always going to have questions coming up.

So the good thing to do is jot those down, and then as you have extra time to do more study, come back to those. But sometimes if you get stuck, either you'll be in Genesis 1 the rest of your life because there's so much there, you know, to dig into and learn from. So there are different possibilities in terms of what happens with God saying, let there be light, but it seems, reading it, that the light was independent.

That's the feeling you get. You have darkness, and light just shines. In other words, it's not associated with sun, moon, or stars.

It just shines. So that could be what happens, and now God appoints sun, moon, stars as the vehicles through which the light will continue to shine in the cycle of day and night as the world goes on. That to me, again, I'm not a scientist. I'm not looking at this in any cosmological way or astronomical way or anything like that.

I'm just looking at the text. So the feeling I would have reading it without knowing any science or what's being conveyed there is the light just shines independently. God speaks it, and it happens. And then on the fourth day, he then says, I am now tying it in directly with this, the sun, moon, stars, etc. Even the moon for light, the moon has no independent light. The moon reflects the sun. So somehow it's as if the light that shines initially is now concentrated in stars like the sun and these others, and they radiate it. That to me would be how I would read it and understand it.

Some would say they were created then, but they were not set in motion until that day. Either way, it's kind of the same thing, that what was just happening independently now happens through them. So does that unhang you up, that explanation? Yeah, because sometimes I just overthink certain versions, and I just sit there trying to understand them, and I'll sit there for a long time, and I never get to the next chapter. Yeah, so the thing to do, again, there's the worm's eye view of study and the bird's eye view. So I'm going through the book of Isaiah now, writing a commentary on it.

That's worm's eye. It's been years doing that. But then bird's eye, I may be trying to get a flow of something, 20, 30 chapters in Isaiah, and just read them all through, or the few times I've been through the Bible in 40 days, just the reading plan, or whatever the time frame is. So you're just reading tons of chapters every day, and you're like, I got 30 questions from today's chapters. So you just make note of them and keep going. Then as you have extra time, go back to them.

Because otherwise, like I said, you'll read through the Bible, or you won't get through the Bible in a lifetime. All right, God bless you, man. Thank you so much for calling. Here, write the question down, and then call me and keep reading. All right, 866-3-4-TRUTH.

Let's go to Kola in Rochester Hills, Michigan. Thanks for calling the line of fire. Hello. That's all you do, brother.

Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, hey brother Brown. Appreciate all you do, and just thank God for you and your ministry, brother. I have a question for you regarding baptism. I'm usually used to like a Protestant form of baptism where, you know, the minister tips the person back into the water, you know, buried in the likeness of his death, and then raised to walk in newness of life. And I was thinking, what would have first century baptism look like when John the Baptist or the apostles, when they baptized people?

I'm just very curious as to what the method they would have used. Yeah, there was certainly immersion that was practiced. And if you're with us on a tour of Israel, our next one we've pushed back to March of 2022, but if you're with us on a tour of Israel, one day when we're in the old city of Jerusalem and being around the temple ruins, you'll see these baptismal pools. They're all over near where the temple was, because Jews would be ritually immersed before going in and things. So you'd have the steps coming down one side and out the other side, like you have in some of our baptismal tanks, you know. You come down one side, walk out the other side. So it was immersion that was practiced. But normally, if you're like, say, in a Messianic Jewish congregation and you watch how it's done, it's self-immersion. In other words, whether you put your hands on your heart, whatever, but you would dunk yourself, not fall backwards, but squat down, go into the water, and come out.

When I have baptized people in the River Jordan, I've said, we'll do kind of a combination. You're going to go straight down. In other words, I'm not going to put you down.

You're going to go straight down, but I'll lay my hands on you and pray over you as we do that. So that's what it would have been, and you may see that in some movies that have it more accurately. So it's not the backward way that we're used to, you know, so you die and you rise, but just going straight down would be the common way. Now, there's also evidence that from fairly early on in church history, that if there was not the ability to fully immerse, that people could have been sprinkled. That does seem to be something that goes back, and I have zero problem. By the way, I've never told churches, don't baptize people with, you know, the going back and coming up. I've participated in those for years.

I mean, decades in America and other countries. But the first century practice would have looked different, would have been the, you go down the water and you come straight up with the person there standing next to you. So that's the, but I don't want anyone listening, oh, so mine's not valid. No, that's not it.

It's the doing of it and what it symbolizes. That's the big thing. So thank you for the question. Yeah. Absolutely. Appreciate it.

You bet. God bless you. 866-34-TRUTH.

Let's go to Maria in Cleveland, Ohio. Welcome to The Line of Fire. Thank you.

Hello, Dr. Brown. I appreciate your balanced approach and my very favorite book is Playing with Holy Fire that you wrote. I'm calling because obviously we have had a lot of prophetic voices that are also just as balanced as you are.

And with the whole election. And I'm wondering how can we have conversations with scriptural backing in order to, to combat the question of if they were a true prophet, they wouldn't have gotten it wrong. So, and maybe, I don't know, I did watch the program, the Remnant Radio, so I've heard a lot of what you've had to say on this, but I would just like to know how would you approach that conversation with some scripture? I believe the prophetic voices are good, solid people. Again, I very much appreciated the balanced approach. I did kind of struggle a little bit with that show towards the end because I felt some condensation, you know, some consent, them being a little condescending, but overall I thought it was pretty balanced. So if you could Got it.

Yeah. And I can only comment about my part on Remnant Radio and encouraging the brothers there to not despise prophecy, et cetera. So a few things, we'll probably have to unpack the, the rest of this on the other side of the break. Let me say first that in the very near future, I'm going to be doing a live stream on Facebook, trying to explain how good people could get things wrong, how prophetic leaders could, could make a mistake and get into some depth.

So folks, if you follow me on Facebook, Ask Dr. Brown, Ask Dear Brown on Facebook, I'll be posting that or if you're on my email list, it could be as early as as this weekend. It could wait till after Inauguration Day, just trying to get the Lord's mind as to how to help and serve the maximum number of people. But Maria, we come back, I'm going to break this into three areas. Number one, is prophetic ministry still for today? Number two, what role should it have?

And number three, how could good people get this wrong? So we'll come back and unpack that for you. If you don't have my book, Playing with Holy Fire, or wake up call to the Pentecostal Charismatic Church, I think you'll find it super helpful, especially today. All right, we'll be right back.

is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks so much for joining us on The Line of Fire. It's Friday, we've got questions, we've got answers.

866-34-TRUTH, the number two call. Just got a call from Maria in Cleveland asking about the prophetic ministry today and prophecies about President Trump that have not come to pass, etc. So number one, I reiterate with you that New Testament clearly speaks of prophetic ministry continuing until Jesus returns.

Don't have the time to unpack that now, we've done that many, many times. But I believe it because it's written, as I have in my chapter in authentic fire, sola scriptura, and therefore charismatic, because I believe the Word of God is the final ultimate and true witness. Therefore, I believe in the gifts and power of the Spirit for today, including prophetic ministry. As for the place of prophetic ministry, that's where I believe we've really gotten off. That because we don't just have local church settings and leadership teams out of which someone ministers, that ministries just become totally detached. Like you just have a teaching ministry and you're teaching the whole body and you're completely separated from evangelists and prophets and apostolic people and even a local pastor. Or the same way, you're just an evangelist, but there's no connection to the local church.

None of that works well. So some things happen, especially in recent years, as God has raised up many people gifted prophetically in different ways, that this has just become kind of a thing in itself. And rather than a prophetic leader saying, this is my ministry team, I'm part of this church or this ministry flow, and God's been speaking these words to me, and I really believe their words for the nation.

I've shared them with the team. I've gotten input from these pastors on the team and from these apostolic brothers, and we really feel this with the Lord saying, so we're submitting it like that. It's just everybody's got a word. It's just being posted.

It's just kind of rampant out there for the body, and then I figure out and sort through. And sometimes you're getting, if you subscribe to all the lists, you're probably getting hundreds of potential prophetic words every week. Certainly, that's not the way God is speaking, just blabbering all this out.

I don't, excuse me, I don't mean people are blabbering. I mean just a flood of constant words from God more than you can even process. That's not the way he would speak and deal with us. So I believe things have been out of order in that regard, and then all the more when we're told you have to believe the prophets. 2 Chronicles 20 is a specific situation where prophets spoke to the king to go out and believe God and put the praise and worship in the front of the battle, and they would win. The king, and that's the word, listen to the king, follow him, believe the prophets, believe God, you'll prosper. It's not a general word to the body that with the prophets say you have to believe it. No, we are each God's people. We are all Jesus' sheep. We all hear his voice.

We are all indwelt by the Holy Spirit. We all have the word of God, and everything must be tested. So in the Bible, when all the prophets were saying the same thing in the Old Testament, they were virtually always wrong, and you had one prophetic voice or two like Jeremiah or Ezekiel or somebody else, and everybody rejected them, and they were speaking the truth. So just because everyone's saying the same thing doesn't mean it's accurate.

In fact, you have to really wonder when they're all saying the same thing that's inaccurate. That being said, you have men of God, women of God, people who love the Lord, people who are not charlatans, people who are God-fearing, some of them are my friends and colleagues who have absolutely said that Donald Trump will serve a second term and that he will be inaugurated on January 20th. So my appeal is, for everyone's sake, I'll say if. If that doesn't happen. I'm a thousand percent sure it won't happen, okay? But if that doesn't happen, then what will you do? At that point, if, just if, if, okay? If it doesn't happen, at that point, will you acknowledge there was error? Will you acknowledge something was wrong?

Because my fear is— So what about the ones that are? That are acknowledging that already— Acknowledging that it's wrong, like, for example, like Jeremiah Johnson came out and he said, I publicly apologize. I mean, he's a balanced voice.

He's a very balanced person. Jeremiah— So how do we handle that? Right. Okay.

So just, I want it to be a bit more comprehensive of my answer for, to cover these spaces. So yeah, Jeremiah, by the way, there's, people say, yeah, Jeremiah did it because Dr. Brown put him under pressure and he's like an elder to Jeremiah or a father to him and he put him under pressure to do this and he's caving in. Jeremiah wrote his letter of repentance and apology weeks ago and told me about it. I'm not on his ministry board.

I don't, he, okay? He told me that he wrote this and was waiting for the right time to release it. So I had zero to do with influencing, oh, you got to do, no, to the contrary, he came to me and some other colleagues of mine and said, I feel to do this, I'm convinced I was wrong and I'm going to be writing a letter of repentance and apology.

So I knew about it because he told me weeks and weeks back, just to clear that up. So the fact is he understands why he got things wrong. In other words, he had strong warnings back in 2018 that if Trump did not humble himself, that he would be like a Nebuchadnezzar and would be removed. And if the church did not stop looking to him in an idolatrous way, that he would be removed.

And somehow he got away from that warning. And, and at a certain point misinterpreted a dream and felt that Trump would be real, like this is what he said in his, in his letter and what he said to me and others, right? So I'm not sharing anything he hasn't shared. So what he can look at it and see how he got things wrong, where he made the mistake, and then we'll keep processing it together. You know, all of us are talking, bunches of leaders, we're talking together to process this in a pastoral way. But how did people get things wrong?

It's very easy for me to see. Very easy for me to see how it could happen, especially the more voices that were speaking it. And many times God may show us what he wants to do, but it's conditional on certain things on our end.

You know, for example, with that, with the house of Eli, God said, I had said this, that you and your house were going to serve me forever, but now far be it for me, because those who don't honor me, I won't honor. So there are multiple reasons that people could get things wrong. Here's where we have to start. And, and I, I know there's much more I could say to answer, but I'm going to be doing more extensive teaching on it. So please, if you're not following me on Facebook or Twitter, AskDrBrown on Facebook, Dr. Michael L. Brown, two L's in there, Dr. Michael L. Brown on Twitter, or just get our emails, AskDrBrown.org. I'll be letting you know when I'm going to be doing a more extensive teaching on how Eric can come in and how we can make these mistakes.

But here's the practical bottom line. Let's all start with humility. I tell God over and again, on my knees before the Lord, Lord, I am not the corrector in chief. The man of God I deeply respect has reminded me of that many times. Nancy and I will talk about don't just talk, hear God, do it, you know, be it, speak what he wants you to speak.

So I am before the Lord. I am not the man, I am the right one that's going to fix everything, okay? No, rather, I've been blessed and helped by prophetic brothers and sisters for years.

I've helped them, we help each other, we all grow and learn together, and every one of us, one way or another, has gotten things wrong. So my goal is to be constructive, helpful, and those of you who are absolutely sure that I've missed it here, I deeply disappointed you, that I'm not in faith, that I've caved in based on circumstances, although I never prophesied Trump's re-election, and that I'm going to have to eat humble pie on January 20th. Oh, I'll eat massive humble pie. Turns out Trump has inaugurated, bigger than massive humble pie, you'll never hear a stronger apology from you in pain than you'll hear from me, all right? My question to you is, if he's not, again, I say if, for the sake of those believing, what will you then say? Will you then say, oh, no, no, no, he really is the president, but it was still, no, it's still going to happen, come March, you watch, or you're going to say, okay, now we can have that conversation. So let's all come to this with humility, all right?

Let's come to this with humility. Thank you so much for the call, Maria. 866-34-TRUTH.

We go to Toby in Davis, California. Welcome to the line of fire. Hi, Dr. Brown.

Hey. So my question has to do with this whole political process, this past election, and whatnot. So I genuinely believe that Trump, in spite of his character flaws, was better for the country and for the world, does that matter, than the alternative for various reasons. And so I had my reasons, because I generally believe that he was for America's betterment, but yet sometimes I feel gaslit when some friends, other Christians, call me a Christian nationalist. So my question is this, is there a dotly place for love and concern for one's country, or for supporting an imperfect man like Trump for president, sort of like an abandonment of our Christian profession?

Right. It's a very important question, and I try to address it at length in Evangelicals at the Crossroads, where we passed the Trump test that came out in July of last year. I addressed it in Donald Trump is Not My Savior.

It came out in 2018. Number one, I'm glad I voted for Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020. I make no apologies for it. I feel it was the right thing to do. I preferred voting for him then sitting out the election, and obviously I could not vote for Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden because of many of my biblical convictions.

So I make no apologies for that. I sold out nothing in my own heart or sold them doing it. Number two, others could not vote for him. They sat out or they put in a third party candidate or they just wrote someone else's name in. They felt that out of concern for where Donald Trump could drive the nation, that you had two bad destinations, one with the Democrats and one with him, and therefore they could not vote for him. I've always respected that. I've said I understand that, and if that was your position, I respect that.

Number three, I believe the error, again, my own viewpoint, which is what you're asking for, I believe the error was the way that many Christians look to him. He's going to fight for us. He's the champion.

We need it. He's the one that can save America and preserve the free world. The way they look to him, even getting caught up in the cult of personality, check my website, AskDrBrown.org, for the article, Is There a Cult of Trump?

And look at it and see how it lines up for you or for others that you love. So one was the way that we look to him was dangerous and idolatrous. You don't look to any man like that, especially a political leader. Two, I believe that he failed to hear Godly counsel and wisdom, failed to humble himself, failed in his public dealings to be a decent human being, and therefore he was removed. To the extent that we defended his behavior at any cost and could find no fault with him, to that extent, and to the extent that we look to him as some type of a political deliverer or messiah, to that extent, we did sell out.

I have articles as a Trump supporter saying, don't sell your souls in support of Donald Trump. We'll be right back. 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us on the Line of Fire, 866-34-TRUTH.

Let's see, we go to Lewis in Rochester, New York. Thanks so much for calling the Line of Fire. Hey, Dr. Brown. Hey. Love you and the Lord.

Thank you, sir. My question is on the Restrainer and Thessalonians. I'm not too sure where it's found in Thessalonians right now. I don't have the Bible in front of me. But I believe that there's five beliefs on the Restrainer. One is the Church, second is the Holy Spirit, third is God, the next one is Satan, and the other one is Michael the Archangel. I think those are the ones that some people believe in, and I wanted to know your opinion. Yeah, 2 Thessalonians, the second chapter, the one that restrains will restrain until it's taken out of the way. The Greek speaks of a who and an it, which is interesting.

So it could be two aspects of the same. In the book that Craig Keanor and I wrote, Not Afraid of the Antichrist, Why We Don't Believe in a Pre-Tribulation Rapture, he actually says there are more than 30 different interpretations of views. You listed five. Oh, more than 30, wow.

Yeah, there are a whole lot. It cannot be the Church and the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is here on the earth at work right until the last moment, and the Church is here waiting for the Lord's glorious return.

You know, that's an interpretation that became known really with the rise of dispensationalism and pre-teaching, but was pretty much unknown before that. An argument could be made for strong government and governmental leaders as being the restrainer, because remember, the antichrist is the man of lawlessness, right? So even in the ancient world, in Paul's day, although the Nero's and the Caesars, the leaders of the Roman Empire were often corrupt despotic men, the fact is the Roman Empire had a certain function of restraining chaos. And Paul writes in Romans 13 that the authorities God has put in place, be it the governor, be it the king, that their role is to restrain evil and support good. Now, often they get it reversed, in which case we have to obey God, not man.

But that's what they're supposed to be there for. So if you have, say, an emperor and an empire, and that is restraining just chaos in the world, and then that's taken out of the way, what would happen? In other words, you'd look at that like that in Paul's day. So could it be the very structure that we have of authoritative governments with law and order, that that's part of the restraint, and when that is then taken out of the way, you can have the one-world government taken over by an antichrist-type figure who now is just going to impose his rule over everything because there's nothing to stop it? That's a possible view. That makes sense to me, and grammatically you can have the who and the what, but I am so undogmatic on that except to say what it isn't. Is it some angelic being?

Is it possible? You know, people say, why wasn't Paul more direct? Well, if he was speaking about something that could have been interpreted to be Roman Empire and emperor, et cetera, then if he's writing a letter saying they're going to be taken out of the way, that could be misinterpreted as seditious. So some scholars think that's an indication that he was talking about it because he was so careful the way he phrased things. Right, and the way that I looked at it is that he said he was talking to the Jewish audience, I believe, and he said, you know who the restrainer is.

Yeah, to the Thessalon believers, they mainly, there were some Jews among them, but they mainly came out of idolatry. Right, so in other words, he's already talked to them about these things. He's already been with them and spent time with them, and either that, he's already talked about this specific subject, or they should be able to get what he's saying. Right, so that idea, though, ask yourself the question, what is stopping complete lawlessness in the earth today? Obviously, the church has a troll and the Holy Spirit's at work, and God is the ultimate one who restrains evil. I believe, if not for God's restraining hand, that there'd be total chaos on the planet right now, that we wouldn't be able to sit here having a normal life even for 24 hours, that God's restraining hand is at work. But is he also working through government? Is he also working through law authority in the earth? Like, you just take police presence out of a city, you'll have total chaos, right?

You take military presence, that America has no military, suddenly we'll be invaded from every side. Hey, just thoughts there. Thank you, Louis, for the question.

Appreciate it very much. Wish I could be more dogmatic on that, but I can't. 866-34-TRUTH.

We go over to Michael in Puerto Rico. Thank you for calling the line of fire. Yes, sir. Dr. Brown, I just wanted to share that I'm a little bit disappointed with the evangelical support for Donald Trump, but I think the Church is not conscious of the status of North American civilization in the context of the course of world history, you know, with the rise of China and with the decline of the Western civilization. I think that's the issue that we're facing in the book of Revelation. Let me just ask you this, Michael, real quick.

What has disappointed you? Well, I think because of all the racial tensions we were having, and it seems that Donald Trump was stoking the situation with the racial tension, that the Church would still support him, even though there was, you know, so much racial tension that he wasn't addressing. Got it. Yeah, in my mind, Michael, I would respectfully differ with you there. I don't believe that he was stoking racial tension. Many of my friends, people of color, might see things differently. I believe that's a narrative that the liberal media has been pushing from day one and portraying him to be a racist, and I don't believe he was stoking racial fires. But in any case, I know you didn't call about that, and that's another discussion.

With all my differences with the president, I voted for him, never believing that he was a racist as president. But either way, you're a specific question today, sir. Yes, sir, but I hope in the Messianic Kingdom we can understand with prophetic hindsight the times we're living in. But my question is that, in Daniel 9.27, the New English translation of the Septuagint, the NET, publishes two versions of Daniel side by side, and even though I prefer the Orthodox Study Bible from the Greek Orthodox Church, the NET says, where the Masoretic text says he will confirm a covenant of Heber, Berit, the Old Greek of the NET says the covenant will prevail. And so I was wondering if you think that the covenant will prevail is compatible with translation for that phrase, in that verse. Yeah, so Michael, it's clearly not what the Hebrew says in terms of Daniel 9.27. And, you know, New Jewish publications started, during one week he'll make a firm covenant with many, for half a week he'll put a stop to the sacrifice, the meal offering at the corner of the altar will be an appalling abomination, etc.

There's nothing about the covenant prevailing in that context. The question would be, is the NET accurately translating the Septuagint? And the NET translation of the Septuagint is one that I own as well, that's the most modern translation of the Septuagint that I also got. So is it accurately translating the Septuagint? They would be reliable translators on that. Is the Septuagint rightly understanding the Hebrew there?

I would say no, but it's a very difficult passage overall. And as many times as I've read it, I've seen other ways that it could be read in Hebrew. So one, is the NET Septuagint translation a good translation? Yes. Those are good Greek scholars involved in that. Two, did the Septuagint rightly understand the Hebrew there?

In my view, no. So thank you for the question, much appreciated. Oh, let's see, we still got time. Let's go to Jamie in Charlotte, North Carolina. Thanks for calling the line of fire.

Hey Dr. Brown, thanks for taking my call. I had a question. I was, on my trip to Israel, we, our leader, did a teaching on the zealots of the time when Jesus—and you know, even some of his disciples, if I remember correctly, were family members, maybe Peter, that they wanted military victory because of all the injustice that had occurred to the Israelites. Right.

And so I wondered if there was a parallel between the Christian movement now, or even the Trumpism, where we want, you know, some kind of, you know, victory, but we're falling into the same camp as the zealots. Right, it's a fair question. I wonder if you could talk about that.

Yep, so in a minute, I'm going to try to answer that. Number one, there are times when it is right to have a military, an act, time to fight back, time for aggression. There are times for that.

And those of us who live in America believe that the Revolutionary War was justified. So there are times for that. So others say, well, are we at that point now in America? No, certainly not. Certainly not the time to take up arms against the government. Certainly, categorically not.

It's one thing if someone tries to break into your home or people raiding your neighborhood in the question of self-defense. It's a totally separate, totally separate question. Okay, so are there potential parallels? Yes, the zealots were grieved over evil, over wrong, over injustice, over the oppression of the Romans. They were grieved, but they tried to take matters into their own hands, failing to recognize that the greater issues had to do with the Jewish people's repentance toward God and recognizing the Messiah when he came. So the parallel would be that rather than us first and foremost saying God is your people, whether we need to repent and get things right, because that's the big issue in America today is the state of the church. That's what's going to determine the state of the nation more than the who's in the control of the government. It's the state of the church. So to the extent we get militaristic and hypernationalistic and wrap the cross and the flag, that's when the parallels would be very real.

And of course it ended terribly badly, the zealots. All right friends, make sure you're following me on social media. I may be doing a special broadcast over the weekend. We'll let you know.