Dr. Brown Answers Your Toughest Bible Questions

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Phone lines are open wide. You've got questions. We've got answers. It's time for The Line of Fire with your host, biblical scholar and cultural commentator, Dr. Michael Brown. Your voice for moral sanity and spiritual clarity. Call 866-34-TRUTH to get on The Line of Fire. And now here's your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us today on The Line of Fire. This is Michael Brown, delighted to be with you as we do virtually every Friday. Sometimes we do social media questions, but most Fridays you've got questions. We've got answers.

Phone lines are wide open. Any question of any kind that relates in any way to anything we ever touch out on The Line of Fire, to anything ever write about, talk about, publish on, anything, do an interview on, have a guest on, anything that touches and anything related to The Line of Fire, give us a call 866-348-7884. Also, I've extended this invitation countless times, hardly ever, ever get anyone willing to take me up on it. But if you're a critic, if you're one of those that speaks against me online, posts on social media, puts up videos against me, posts articles, has websites against me, give me a call. Let's talk about why. 866-344-TRUTH.

With that, let's start in Centralia, Washington. Not sure if I pronounced that correctly. Jonathan, welcome to The Line of Fire. Hello, Dr. Brown. Can you hear me okay?

Loud and clear, sir. All right, cool. So I had a question about the canonization of Scripture. I read this book, it was From God to Us by Norman Geisler and William Nix, and they were arguing that how we knew that a book was inspired by God is that it was written by a confirmed prophet or a confirmed apostle. And so I was wondering, how exactly does that work with Charismatic, because I'm Charismatic as well, and we teach that there are still prophets and apostles today. Now, obviously, not the same kind of a prophet or apostle, but if a prophet or apostle today writes a book, it's obviously not going to be a part of the canon.

So how does that work exactly? Right. So first thing, the scholars you referred to are brilliant scholars and do excellent work and have a lot of justification for their positions. I'm just going to respond in a totally separate way and say it's clear that not every book in the Bible was written by a confirmed prophet or apostle. For example, the Gospel of Mark written by Mark, even though we understand that Peter was a key source for Mark, there's no evidence that Mark was—and when we talk about an apostle, we mean one of the twelve. We don't mean others in the New Testament like Barnabas who are called apostles or people through history that have operated apostolic ministry right up until today. We're talking about the twelve apostles, but the author of Jacob, James, was not one of the apostles. So it's not true that every book was recognized because it was written by an apostle or a prophet. I could do the same with Old Testament books. We don't know who wrote Job, for example.

We honestly don't know. I wrote a whole commentary on it, and we simply do not know who wrote it. We don't know who wrote Hebrews, but there's no evidence that in the ancient Jewish world that it was fully understood that Job was written by a prophet. So there are other ways by which Scripture was recognized, and generally speaking, in the providence and wisdom of God, that books were written that were then received and welcomed and recognized by a faith community. So that what Protestant Christians and religious Jews have in common is we both agree that what we call the Old Testament traditional Jews, we call it Tanakh, and scholars we call the Hebrew Bible.

We agree that's canonical. And then we look to Jesus and the New Testament for confirmation of that, which of course we have. And then we look to the earliest believers and the community of believers that was under the apostles and what they welcomed and considered as sacred Scripture. So almost all the books that we recognize in the New Testament fairly early on were recognized. Then there was dispute about some. If you're a Catholic, you look to church tradition.

If you're a traditional Jew, you look to Jewish tradition. For those of us who are not Catholics or traditional Jews, which would be the bulk of our listeners, we look to other means of affirming. But we still recognize that God acted in history, that a community of believers recognized this as Scripture, and then the Scripture is self-affirming. The Bible stands unique in and of itself. There are all kinds of prophecies in New Testament times. We know that the gift of prophecy was very prevalent, not just in the first century, but thereafter for some time and on and off through church history.

We know there were many prophecies in Old Testament times, but unless they were recorded in Scripture, they're not the Bible. So the Bible is uniquely God's Word, stands alone. We are tested by it. We do not test it.

Everything is tested and evaluated based on the Word. If right now the Spirit moved on me and I said, Jonathan, I have a word for you. Pray about this. I believe this is from the Lord.

Yes, you're supposed to quit this job and go to seminary and work as a pastor in the inner city. You're like, wow, I've been praying about that, and that's exactly what I feel the Lord was saying. Okay, that is at best an individual word from the Lord for an individual. It has nothing to do with being the Bible, which is God's authoritative truth for all people for all times. So even if there were a million apostles and a million prophets today, nobody can add a syllable to the Bible.

Do you have any sources, like a book or two, that you would recommend to read more about this subject? Yeah, Jonathan, just on the canon of Scripture itself, there's a book written a few years back by F.F. Bruce that remains valuable.

F.F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture. You can also look for writings by Roger Beckwith.

That may be a little bit more technical. So that's B-E-C-K-W-I-T-H. Robert Beckwith, his writings on canon are also excellent. And then, for more of a Jewish perspective, Sid Liman, L-E-I-M-A-N.

He's got a widely respected book on canon as well. Hey, thank you for the call very much. I appreciate it. 866-34-TRUTH. Let's go to Daniel in Bellevue, Nebraska. Welcome to the Line of Fire.

Hey, thank you so much. I just had a quick question. I thought I heard you say that the next time Trump runs for president that you would not support him because of all the damage. I thought he did a lot of great things, but what was the damage specifically? Can you expand on that?

Sure. 2024 is a long ways off. My hope is that we'll have a different candidate than Trump or that Trump himself will become a different man. So let me just really quickly give my evolution of thinking with Trump. During the primaries, I didn't trust him at all. I never thought he would do all the good that he did and keep his word on so many platforms. I preferred Ted Cruz, but I would have taken basically any of the other candidates before Trump, any of the other Republicans. I kept saying, though, that if he gets the nomination and it's him versus Hillary, then I'll reevaluate. So I cautiously began to support him because of the life and death issues where I said, OK, if he does what he says, it's going to be better than Hillary. But I had concerns all the time because of the type of person that he was. You can have good done with a lot of collateral damage.

You can be a businessman and you work 80 hours a week and you become a multimillionaire in the process your wife and kids leave you because they never see you. Right. So with everything in life, there there can be a positive and negative and has to be evaluated. So I was cautious. I voted for him in 2016 and was pleasantly surprised, amazingly surprised at what he did at the promises that he kept. I kept getting grieved because the kind of person that he was. But I thought, OK, I can do damage control for that. I can say that's not me.

That's not who I am. But I did support him. And then come 2020, I voted for him really without hesitation.

Seeing that the options with Biden and what happened is this. I was concerned all along with his recklessness. I was concerned with his general divisiveness and the effect that that was having on the church. I was concerned that I saw more and more Christians getting more and more carnal, more and more Christians mistaking the gospel for for MAGA, more and more Christians wrapping the message of Jesus in the American flags if the two were one. I kept getting grieved when he called people dogs and throw people under the bus. But I thought, OK, weighing it out if it's, you know, 60, 40 or 70, 30, whatever, he still gets my vote without hesitation over Joe Biden in the immediate aftermath of the elections. When I saw his, in my view, complete reckless speech and what it was stirring up across the country, when I watched how Christians were flipping out, oh, no, oh, no, no. Forget whether it was stolen or not with the election was stolen or not.

The reaction, the response. It was as if the hope of all hopes died and it's over and people were flipping out. And when I saw the combination of this, I I realized that things were worse than I had known. So I appreciate all the good he did. Perhaps Roe v. Wade be wonderful, glorious to see it overturned this year. And that would be very specifically because of the three Donald Trump appointees, the Abraham Accords and I mean, so much, so much good was done, undoubtedly. But I believe so much damage was done to the church. Our witness to the nation was hurt terribly.

I've heard from so many pastors who've lost so many people and interacted with so many. Don't want to talk to you anymore because about the church tarnished its witness with identification with Donald Trump. When I saw his recklessness right up to January 6th, throwing my pants under the bus that day, I said, I cannot in good conscience support someone like this again. Again, 2024 is a long way off. He can change. But unless there was a real, real change in the church and our attitude and our posture and a change in him, then if it was him versus someone else, I'm speaking now from at present, things could be different.

Twenty, twenty four. But for my present vantage point, I would say more harm than good. And in conscience, I couldn't support someone that could do that much damage. Right. So here's what we're going to do, Daniel. On the other side of the break, if you want to respond briefly, you'll be able to do that.

I know you asked for my perspective, but you may want to probe further or respond briefly. And then got a bunch of other calls looking at the subjects. They look great. Want to talk to every single one of you. I'm sure we'll be able to get to you. 866-348-7884 is the number to call. Come on, friends. Let's rise up together and stand tall and strong for Jesus, our King. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866 three for truth.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Hey, you know, if you live in the greater Charlotte area, as we do, our friends at Skillet, you hear their music now every day, the resistance. They are the featured band at Winter Jam on February 6th. Yeah. In fact, I plan to be there, get to spend some time with them.

So anywhere near greater Charlotte, check it out. 866-348-7884. You've got questions. We've got answers. So, Daniel in Bellevue, Nebraska, just wanted to give you an opportunity. Again, I'm not telling anyone else to do just answering questions. Honestly, if you had a follow up for me or just wanted to give a brief response. No, I appreciate you stating your reasons for that. And, you know, I too didn't like what happened with Pence also.

But if it came down between Biden and Trump, I'm going to vote Trump. But anyway, I wanted to understand. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah.

Thanks for holding through the break, sir. Fully understood. I get it. I totally get it.

I voted for Trump twice. Right. I get it. And and we don't divide over this. Let me just say this, though. And I'm sure every one of you will agree with me if you're a follower of Jesus. Let our identification with Jesus be far, far louder.

A hundred times louder than our identification with a politician or political party. In other words, let us be far more known as Jesus people than Trump people or Republicans or Biden people and Democrats. Let us all agree on that. Amen. All right. Let us go over to Vicki in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Thanks for calling the line of fire. Hello. Hey, there. Hi. I have a question in reference to Josiah. Yes.

And we. And the prophecy that was made by if I if I say the prophet's name right, Hilda. Yeah, Hilda, actually. But just say it like regular H. Hilda.

Yep. As she stated, that he would, you know, basically die in peace. But we know he didn't. He went up against King Neko in Egypt, even though he was told, I have nothing to do with you.

You don't need to be doing this, Josiah. But he went went ahead and he and he did not die in peace. So my question is this, that God doesn't always necessarily get involved with the affairs of man, even though he is God. He gave us free will. And so therefore, the her prophecy could have been correct. But Josiah took it upon himself to interfere. So I just want to know your thoughts on that.

Yeah, Vicki. That's a perfectly legitimate reading of the text that God said, listen, terrible judgment is going to come. Horrific judgment is going to come because of what Manasseh did and what your people are doing now have been doing before you've called them to repentance. Terrible judgment is coming.

It's irreversible. But I'm going to spare you. I'm going to take you out of the way. You know, Isaiah 57 speaks of that the righteous die and no one knows why. God took them before the trouble came, before the danger came. So that's what God's saying. You know, you're not going to die in divine judgment. You're not going to be taken captive by another king. You're not going to be killed.

You know, when the when the city is is besieged, et cetera. And that's the word to Josiah. But then he goes out and meddles in a situation we shouldn't. So he dies prematurely.

But even dying in peace. The other way to read it is this. So so your way of reading it is perfectly legitimate and in harmony with prophecy. You'll find a relevant principle in Jeremiah 18. OK, Jeremiah 18, you'll find a very, very relevant principle of prophecy where God says, if I promise to bless a nation and then they do the opposite instead of blessing, I'll curse and the reverse. Right.

So he can say, I'm going to do this here. The prophecy and Nineveh by Jonah in 40 days, Nineveh will be destroyed. That was the word. Right. They repented.

God didn't do it. So your way of reading it. But it was eventually. Yeah, you're right.

Nineveh. Well, that was subsequently. But in other words, God didn't do it for some time after that because they did repent. The other way of reading it, Vicki, is that it simply means not that you'll die laying in bed one night, you know, just of natural causes as an old man.

No, he doesn't. There's no date set on it. Right. But it simply means die in peace. You are not going to die as a result of the divine judgment coming on the city. You will be spared from that. And he could have been spared by meddling in something he shouldn't have. He gets killed in battle and that's it. He dies. So either way is legitimate.

You have to dig deeper, see how the words are used. Is there any more nuance to dying in peace? I think there's a lot of nuance to the way God talks about it. And I know there's a lot of similarities, but your way of reading it perfectly legit based on biblical prophecy and how God works and how he can make a pronouncement.

But then we can do things that then alter what happens. You know, God, God says through prophet to Eli, I intended to bless you and your family. I said I would. The Hebrews, I said I would.

But you did this far be it for me to honor those who dishonor me. These are great questions. We dig in the word.

These come up. That's that's why we do the show. Eight six six three four truth.

Let's go over to Josh in Kansas City, Missouri. Welcome to the line of fire. How are you doing, Dr. Brown?

I am I am really, truly blessed. Truly. Thank you. Sorry about the background noise.

It's a commercial truck. Actually, I don't I don't hear it. Maybe others do, but I don't.

So we're good. Oh, OK. Just making sure I did. Anyways, I actually wanted to make a comment on something you had a few shows ago. You mentioned this thing about religious pushback.

Mm hmm. And I was wondering if I could actually talk a little bit about what I do for my content. Yes, sure. OK, so I actually have called in a couple other times before I went by Logical Christian for a while, and now I actually make music because. You don't mind if I give a little back story?

It's just got to be quick, just because we have lots of calls and try to be fair to everybody. Yeah. Basically, over the years, I've seen a lot of family and friends being negatively affected by things like drugs. And then in 2019, a friend of mine was murdered because he was involved in it.

And then and then after that, I finally had enough. And so I use my music basically to say it like this. I kind of have my own version of pushback in my fans because I wrote a track to a guy named A$AP Rocky who who writes about drugs and makes them look cool. Basically saying, like, if you guys don't want to do good with your platform, then maybe you shouldn't have it at all. And I think that's a way of showing that I think that would be a good way of pushback as well, showing, you know, hey, we're not going to stand for this anymore.

We're not going to let you push people around and lie to them. That needs to stop. Yeah. Yeah, Josh.

Yeah. Look, when I talk about pushing back every day, all around America, all around the world, there are followers of Jesus who are swimming against the tide and going against the grain of the society. That's a given every single day, sharing the gospel, standing up for what's right, fighting against injustice, rescuing those who are being hurt. This happening every day in the battle will continue until Jesus comes. Many times we we get worn out.

Many times we just sit on the sidelines. Many times we become discouraged or we have a theology of pessimism. So I'm constantly trying to encourage, build up strength and say, hey, together in Jesus, we can make a difference. But the drug epidemic is is horrific. It's not something that God specifically has laid on my heart over the years to really focus on in a major way.

God set me free wonderfully from from heavy drug use when I got saved in the end of 1971. But it is it is a massive crisis in America, destroying so, so many lives. So whatever we can do to make a difference, to expose lies, to say, hey, it's not the way you think it is to tell the truth about the people whose lives are being destroyed. You mentioned someone colleague of yours friend getting murdered because of trying to get involved here. We need to tell the stories and we need to push back with truth. We never tried to intimidate or bully as followers of Jesus, as if that's our way of bringing about change. All that'll do is just create more bullies on the other side. And then the battle will get in the flesh. But there's so many things we can do.

And Josh, using music is one of the most powerful tools available. Thank you for the call and keep up the good work. Eight, six, six, three, four, truth. I tell you what, I don't want to rush your questions. So on the other side of the break, let's just see Peggy Montel, Mark Henry, others. I'll be getting your way.

Just my question I ask. Oh, every few days. Have you visited vitaminmission.com? I have been so excited to partner with Dr. Mark Stangler. He's my personal physician as well.

My personal doctor, even though he's in California, we're in regular contact and and he's always there to help. But he's developed such wonderful health supplements. There are a number of them I've taken every day for years and I highly recommend them when he suggested we partner together as a way to bless our ministry. I was thrilled because I know you'll get get things that really benefit you. Help you as you seek to live a healthy life.

These are great supplements that can help in so many other ways. And you'll get a discount on all your orders, even if it's a lifetime subscription to something you just keep getting, you get the same discount. And then Dr. Stangler, in turn, makes a donation to our ministry.

So it's win-win for everyone. And I believe you'll be blessed and we'll get to reach more people. So go to vitaminmission.com.

Don't forget to do that. As soon as we come back, I'm going straight back to your calls. 866-342. You've got questions. We're doing our best to come up with solid answers for you. It's The Line of Fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on The Line of Fire by calling 866-344.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us on The Line of Fire. You've got questions. We've got answers. Always remember that we have thousands of hours of free resources at our website, askdrbrown.org. Askdrbrown.org.

Just waiting for you to dive in. And you can search for all the subjects you're interested in. You'll find we may have written a bunch of articles on it, maybe did some videos on it, maybe have a debate on it, Line of Fire broadcast on it. So be sure to go there regularly. Check things out. If you're not on my email list, oh, you want to be.

Yeah, well, don't be a want to be. Do it. Askdrbrown.org. Just click on, you'll see the link for the email. Just put your first name, last name, address if you want us to have it, and then your email address, of course. And we'll immediately send you a really neat mini e-book, Seven Secrets to the Real Messiah. We'll share more about my testimony background, what our ministry is doing, and how we can be a blessing to you. And then every week let you know about latest videos, latest articles, special resources. So Askdrbrown.org.

Sign up for the emails. All right, we go back to the phones. Peggy in Dallas, Texas, welcome to the Line of Fire. Hi, Dr. Brown.

Hey. I have a question that I need to know what your interpretation of the scripture of departing from me, I never knew you, that Jesus said. I have a friend who left our church and said that that was the scripture that she was brought to, as far as not knowing who Jesus really was, and she left the church and started going to a Jewish home group.

So I just needed to, I wanted to call to find out what your thoughts on that was. So just to be clear, when you say a Jewish home group, do you mean messianic Jewish, that there are Jews who believe in Jesus, or a traditional Jew that does not believe Jesus is the Messiah? I believe the messianic one. I was there, I visited one time, and the only, they went through scripture. She told me that they believe in spirit-filled baptism, that type of thing. Okay, so she's with other Jewish believers as opposed to being in a church. Okay, the words I never knew you are spoken to people who don't belong to the Lord, right? They claim we did all these miracles and all this stuff, and he says, I never knew you. So either these were people that were always imposters and deceivers, based on which he says, I never knew you, or they were true believers that were used by God in miraculous power and then fell away.

And then Jesus used what was a Jewish formula for excommunication and said, I never knew you. But either way, I'm not sure how that would tie in with why she would leave, unless she thought that your church was, was she saying that your whole church was not of the Lord because you weren't following messianic Jewish teaching? Was that what she was claiming?

I don't know that. I know that she hasn't really gone to a regular church anymore. She was going for a long, long time. And so I was just curious when she invited me to go to this home group to see what it was all about. Yeah, I would try to find out more of what she was saying. If she's just with other believers, Jew and Gentile, who believe it's important to recover the Jewish roots of the faith, and then it's beautiful to celebrate the biblical calendar, and they don't put that on someone else, they don't judge someone else by that. In other words, if you're at a church, you worship on a Sunday, and you celebrate Easter rather than Passover, they don't judge you for that. Well, that's fine. She could be in a good, healthy place and just with a different burden and emphasis if she still believes the basics of the gospel.

If she's saying that you are not saved unless you observe the Torah, or that you are in sin because you're worshiping on a Sunday, then she's in serious error, and you just pray that God would bring her to a place of balance. Hey, thank you very much for the call. I appreciate it.

866-34-TRUTH. Let's go to Montel in Burlington, Iowa. Welcome to the line of fire. Oh yeah, it's finally my turn. I'm excited. Oh yeah, man.

Thanks for holding. Well, first of all, I wanted to say, your class or your school keeps escaping me. By God's will, I'll be doing your school this year.

I'm taking some online classes. Wonderful. Well, we'll be waiting for you. Absolutely. And then, so my question is, I've watched you since I was in high school.

I spent six or seven years studying you and James White and Michael Heiser and all those guys. My question is, I'm kind of in a debate right now with this Christian brother on polygamy. And not necessarily polygamy, but polygamy, how do you say the other word? Right, right, that's just the more technical way of what we generally refer to as polygamy. Yeah, so polygamy versus polygyny, yeah. The debate is, he's a pastor friend and he obviously thinks it's okay. I obviously don't think it's necessarily God's purpose or what God intended. I've been looking for some debate videos or some history, reliable history that I can find.

One, can you point me in the direction of some? And two, obviously I've said certain things that I don't think is scriptural, necessarily, consistently. But what was your reason?

I was listening to Michael Heiser on some of it, too. What was the history of what you would say, and what would be your opinion? Yeah, sure thing.

And I'm just searching on my own website here. Where I've written about polygamy, it's normally in debates about same-sex quote marriage and things like that. Okay, I'm not aware of a lot of Christian resources that talk about this because it's really not discussed. It's, you know, not debated in most of our circles.

But let me just respond very, very quickly. God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Eve and Yvette and Yvonne, right? And then Jesus in Matthew 19 explicitly speaks of God's pattern of creation at the beginning. One man, one woman and the two becoming one. And then this becomes an image in Ephesians five for Christ and the church.

So the the one plus one is God's ideal that was established at the creation that Jesus reaffirms. Yes, polygamy exists from early on in the human race. Yes, it continues to this day in many countries around the world.

It remains here. And it was even accepted under the law. For example, the king was told not to have too many wives. However, the Old Testament consistently teaches against polygamy by constantly showing the problems. Jacob having two wives and the problems that that arise because of that. The conflicts because of David's multiple wives.

Obviously, things getting completely out of hand with Solomon. So the Bible is teaching us by example that it's not a good thing. It may have just been the only way for certain peoples to survive in the midst of the ancient world.

And childbirth could be so difficult and and different problems just to keep generations going. But it was never God's ideal. When you get to the New Testament, as I said, Jesus lays out one man, one woman together for life is God's design. And then Paul instructs that if you're to be a leader in the church, you can only be married to one wife.

So this is now aggressively setting this forth as the norm. And then the people are taught to follow the example of their leaders, which is why over time that and then God's heart in terms of what's best for men and women. It became eradicated from most of Christianity in much of the world. You still do have pockets of Christian faith in different parts of the world that practice polygamy. And what miss missionaries basically determines if they lead someone to the Lord who's got like six wives, that the best thing to do is just leave it as is and teach the next generation with this person having to understand they could never function in leadership.

So that's that's my answer to those who support it or think it's fine based on based on scripture. Hey, I appreciate the call and your years of listening since high school. It's six, six, three, four truth.

Let's go to Mark in Roswell, Arizona. Welcome to the line of fire. Thank you, Dr. Brown. Thanks for taking my call. And I've been listening to you for many, many years and you're my one of my go to sources for all things of theology and doctrine.

I appreciate that. Hey, I've got a question for you. Are you in the Roswell with the whole alien thing? Is that is that the same place? Yes. Yes, sir. Unfortunately, I am. Yeah.

Got it. OK, but this you're you're a person. You're not an alien, right? No, no, no, I'm not a real person. OK, good. I just want to just want to clarify that because I'm sure some people are wondering, OK, just messing with you. Go ahead. I'm sorry.

OK, no, no problem. Concerning the Donald Trump prophecies back through 40 years ago when I was in Bible school, I got caught up in the word of faith movement for a while. And and then I believe that God kind of brought me out of that and brought me into a more balanced understanding. But one of the things that I remember basically was the belief that God had given us the authority basically to speak things into existence, such as the song, I believe that those things which I say come to pass and I'll have whatsoever I say. So I think sometimes concerning these prophecies that did not come to pass, I think a lot of people assume that these people say, well, God told me and some of them actually might have. But I think sometimes it's just a matter of their doctrinal belief that they can speak that into existence. So they were prophesying that Donald Trump would become president.

He would do those. And they believe that by speaking those words in authority, that they would make it come to pass. I wonder, you know, your thoughts about that. I mean, I did hear many people say, you know, the sayeth the Lord or the Lord showed me, I'm telling you, I guarantee it. Trump will be president. Biden will not sit a single day in the White House, et cetera.

Others talked about dreams they had or visitation. So the ones I heard definitely were claiming that God told them and obviously they were wrong. And the bogus thing, well, he did win, but it was stolen. Just even if it was stolen, you were telling us who was going to be in the White House and it was going to be Donald Trump, not Joe Biden. So you were wrong.

And if you haven't publicly fixed that and then privately dealt with the error, you need to. That being said, the word of faith, it's a serious error in word of faith teaching that you can just speak something into existence. We can speak what God says, right? If God says something in his word, then it's good for us to confess it and speak it and say, Lord, what you say is true and take hold of it. That's powerful. So word of faith, people do that. But the idea that if I just speak the thing out, it'll it'll happen by my creative word. Power is a serious error. There are probably some who did that. Mark, the prominent ones, though, seem to claim, will definitely claim that God spoke to them.

Of course, they were very wrong. We'll be right back. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Welcome, friends, to the line of fire, 866-34-TRUTH.

All right, back to Mark in Roswell. Was there something else you wanted to ask me quickly? Yes, sir. Concerning the Hebrew writing of the Bible, I believe that the sovereign God of all the universe who has destined everything and sees when a sparrow flies, do you not believe that in his providence he designed the Bible, he destined the Bible to be written in the form of the Hebrew language that it was, and that there is something special about that, and it's not just a Canaanite, Semitic language? I really believe that, you know, and I also believe that he destined for, you know, the Septuagint and the New Testament to be written in Koine Greek, when it would be the language of all people to be spread around the world. But I just believe that, you know, in his sovereignty, there's something special both about the Hebrew and the Greek, and the reason that God inspired the Scriptures to be written that way in the beginning, later, of course, to other languages.

Yeah. Well, certainly I agree with you that God sovereignly chose Hebrew and then some portions in Aramaic in the Old Testament, and then Koine Greek for the New Testament. Obviously, God chose to communicate through those languages, right?

But just like Koine Greek, that's its common Greek, it's the Greek that would be used if you were to make it a contract with your neighbor, you know, I'm going to give you the cow as a deposit for this piece of property, right? So the language itself was not sacred, but it was the best way to communicate to the most people at that time. As for Hebrew, it is a Canaanite dialect.

In other words, my masters and doctoral studies were in Near Eastern languages and literatures. So Hebrew is very close to Phoenician, and it's a little further removed from Ugaritic, which would be North Canaanite. And then it's a sister language to Aramaic and to Arabic. Dialects like Moabite and Ammonite, you know, with very limited inscriptions, but sister language to those, you know, those are the Canaanite dialects. And it's called Sfot Kanaan in Isaiah 19, which is literally the lip or language of Canaan. So it was a Canaanite dialect. If you read these other inscriptions and other literature, then a little bit further, like Akkadian, the Babylonian or Syrian, you'll find tremendous similarities with Hebrew.

Obviously, God chose it for a purpose and he arranged everything in terms of the people groups, et cetera. But don't look at it like a supernatural language. You know, the Aramaic of the Bible is regular Aramaic. Some would call it imperial Aramaic, but it's regular Aramaic.

We have it used in other places. So what's most important is the nature of the words and what's communicated. So, yes, God sovereignly chose these for his purposes.

The choosing of Hebrew as to why is less obvious, though, than the choosing of Greek just at that moment in history when the maximum number of people could be reached through it. Hey, thank you for the comments, questions. Let's go to Henry in Zachary, Louisiana. Thanks for calling The Line of Fire. Hey, Dr. Brown. Hey. First, I wanted to tell you, I read your book Breaking the Stronghold of Food, and man, it really blessed me. And I was able to give it to somebody. Quick story. I purchased it on Amazon in the afternoon.

And I went to a thrift shop and I found it, a signed copy. That was crazy. Seriously? Sweet. Yeah, that was nuts.

I was like, this is sovereign right here. So I'm also the guy that called about my nudist friend a while back. So hello again. Got it.

OK, that's a call we all remember. Yeah, go ahead. So I'm calling because me and my wife are about to plant a church in Lake Charles, Louisiana. And if you were going to plant a church, my first question is, what would be your first steps? Like, for example, we're being sent out of our church, but we're kind of pioneering everything here. Yeah. What would how would you structure your church government? And it's very simple. Yes.

So I'm I'm not a church planting expert by any means, but have been involved for so many decades with churches serving in leadership, served in various capacities of church leadership and have worked with many church planters. So the key word is team, team, team, team. It's never a one man show. I do believe in in plurality with headship. So let me get to the government part and and that someone asked me for recommended books on this yesterday. I said, I really can't recommend books on best church government structures.

It's just not my my focus or think thing I've read about. But I can tell you my understanding. So if if if I if there was a healthy congregation right to me, you do have an identifiable senior pastor, senior leader. So he is the the chief elder with a team of elders together of these men of God.

And they could serve with their wives. But but they'll be primarily male leadership. You pray together. You you you come to leadership decisions together.

You help direct the church and shepherd the flock together. And there is a senior leader who is going to be the main visionary and the one driving this, but not a one man show, not working independently. So you need to have the right people, mature Godly, that share the vision and affirm your leadership. That's really important.

OK, you can't be fighting about it. There has to be this harmony and they have to be standing with you as you're doing the right thing and leading the way. OK, then you may have others that teach in different settings, small groups. You may have other you know, you may share the pulpit, not only preach all the time, you know, once you're developing public services and meeting together, assuming you're going that model, not just house church. And then you'll raise up specific people to serve in different capacities, overseeing, be it music or children's ministry or youth or community outreach or things like that. You've got a gifted evangelist, help them equip the body and leading community outreach. And then those that are under the supervision of the elders, which would be the deacons who are practically serving the physical and material needs of of the body. But but again, you never just want to have the whole burden that all the ministry falls on you or that you are the only one that can make authoritative decisions on the flip side. You don't want to have, quote, a board that that just hamstrings you all the way.

And they're only thing they're judging is how much money is coming in. As far as the plant, you get your right team. You begin to either to reach out your community, start small groups where you begin to announce meetings maybe once a month and weekly and build from there. But others could give you better counsel on that. Hey, thank you for the question. All right.

Owen in Lexington, Kentucky. Thanks for holding. Time is short, so please dive right in. Hi. Thanks so much for taking my call. I have a little bit of a two-parter.

I hope we can do it. But my question is, what are your thoughts on Christians participating in religious practices like yoga? All right. There are some who claim that yoga is just a method of breathing and physical exercising and that it in and of itself, it is completely neutral. I've even seen Christian yoga classes, holy yoga classes advertised like that, you know, and they've got a Bible in the picture. And that's the claim.

My dear, dear, super close friend, Yesupadam from India, who was, well, born and raised, spent his life in India. So he knows Hinduism inside out. According to him, there is no such thing as neutral yoga.

According to him, it's there is something wrong with it. It's philosophy. It's practice that it's not just a matter of take a deep breath. There's more to it and that Christians should not participate in it.

So I will let his words speak for themselves. I have never studied it for three minutes personally. I've never looked at the details of the practices and can it be totally neutral, etc. But my friend in India, who's also a deeply spiritual man, strongly counsels against it. So I'll let his words speak for themselves and say, on my own end, I have not studied it sufficiently, but I take his words seriously. And the second part was just how would you respond to someone saying there is a counterfeit to everything God made.

Therefore, I can participate in it without making any significant changes. Well, I mean, how how far do you go to that? In other words, are you saying that any practice that a human being comes up with must have a divine equivalent? Like what would be the divine equivalent of torture or someone that received sexual pleasure from torture? Or, you know what, I don't want to let my mind go in terms of every kind of dark, ugly, murderous, horrific practice.

But there's all kinds of stuff that's out there here. What's the divine equivalent to abortion or child sacrifice? Look, the Israelites did things in the Old Testament. God said, I never intended this for you.

This never came to my mind. So there is just darkness. There is just evil. Now, it's a totally separate question to say, like William Booth said, God owns every note. Right. So, you know, you could say, well, music in and of itself is not right or wrong. It's the message with it or how it's played or how it's used. So you could say, hey, these are just breathing exercises.

Hindus or others discovered them and use them for their purposes, but they're just breathing exercises. That would be the argument. But to say just because the thing exists on the one side means there must be a holy equivalent on the other side.

Obviously, plainly not. Hey, thank you for the question. Sorry we couldn't get to everybody, but we got to a whole lot of folks and look forward to being with you next week. One more reminder. Go to AskDrBrown.org if you don't get my e-bless. Oh, we've got some important announcements we're sending out next week about a brand new book. Yeah, you want to know about this. Trust me. So go to AskDrBrown.org. Send it for e-mails. Have a blessed weekend in Jesus. Another program powered by the Truth Network.