Matt Slick Live

The following program is recorded content created by the Truth Network. It's Matt Slick live. Matt is the founder and president of the Christian Apologetics Research Ministry, found online at karm.org. When you have questions about Bible doctrines, turn to Matt Slick live.

For answers, taking your calls and responding to your questions at 877-207-2276. Here's Matt Slick. Hey everybody, welcome to the show.

It's me, Matt Slick. I'm back in the country and got back on Saturday, Sunday. I can't remember yet. I got up at 530 this morning. I got up.

Oh man, I was wide awake, so I got up and worked. Any rate, hey, welcome to the show. If you're new to the show, my name is Matt Slick.

You're listening to Matt Slick live. I'm a Christian apologist, defend the Christian faith, teach theology, and do all kinds of stuff like that. If you want to give me a call, all you got to do is dial 877-207-2276. I want to hear from you. If you are so inclined and you don't want to call and you're afraid of the radio because I do know there are people afraid of being on the radio, being on air. If you want, you want to talk to me, you can do a different way.

All you have to do is just email me at info at karm.org and you can just type in question for radio, radio question, whatever it is, and I can take a look at that and what I'll do is I'll answer them on the air. On Fridays, I do hate mail. Now there's a problem. You know what a drought is, right?

A drought is when something is, there's not enough rain. Well, there's a drought of hate mail. I'm going to have to unearth some old hate mail in order to keep us entertained because as many of you know, I love hate mail. I love to read hate mail why I'm not a Christian or why I'm full of evil or how calm is stupid. I just get a kick out of that stuff.

I really do. In fact, when I was on the Israel trip, some people made comments about the hate mail. One guy goes, man, I love it when you hate mail. I said, why?

He goes, you crack me up when you laugh. So they enjoy it when I have fun with it because I really do. So if you hate me and hate what I do, write me some hate mail, info at karm.org and maybe I'll write it and I'll read it on the air. Now I'm going to tell you though, sometimes people write me hate mail and their grammar's not very good, so I have to correct it sometimes. But if you are interested in how to write hate mail properly, we have an article on Karm on how to write a hate mail to me and the proper grammar and the syntax has to be good because hey, come on, if you can't write the hate mail correctly and I'm getting confused by the bad grammar, well then it's a waste of time. Write concisely. Write clearly. Call me a jerk.

You are a jerk. See, that's good hate mail. You can easily read it and stuff like that and I enjoy that kind of stuff. So if you hate what I do, you can do that. You can call me up or you can email me. All right, and that would be at info at karm.org.

In fact, I'm going to check right now to see if there's any hate mail. Okay. Okay. All right, got that and ooh, that's right. Look at that. Yeah. Oh man, look at this. Okay.

Lots of stuff. Okay, we have four open lines, eight, seven, seven, two, zero, seven, two, two, seven, six. You want to give me a call? Let's get to Chris from Georgia. Chris, welcome. You're on the air. Hi. Hey brother Matt. Hey.

I love what you do. Thanks for taking my phone. Sure. I have a question for you regarding an article that you posted a couple of years ago regarding friendship.

Okay. And I noticed that links on your website do it, but the article is not there. It's not there? Yeah, it was entitled friendship evangelism, this either friendship nor evangelism. And when the article disappeared, the actual content, I wondered if it was because maybe your views had changed or if you still hold that same view. Well, I'm looking to see. We transferred everything over and it's possible that we just missed it.

We just went, oh, skipped a line in our spreadsheet, did something like that. So what I'm going to do right now, literally while I'm talking to you is I'm going into the, let's see, into the back channel of the KARM website, friendship evangelism. And I'm just now doing a search. There's almost 6,000 articles.

And what is friendship evangelism? It's in draft mode. Oh, and it says, that's in draft mode also. That is interesting. Okay, so now I can click and edit it and I can take a look and see if something's up. Maybe, let's see, I don't know if Laura or Charlie, guys know anything about that? I'm looking at them on the camera.

Nope, they don't know anything. It's in draft mode. And so you can do this right now live. And so what I'm going to do, why is it in draft?

I don't know. So I'm going to do right now, pending review, I'm publishing it. So there it is. I just hit publish.

Okay. Oh, it's going to be formatted out. It's not a very good format. It looks like it's been copied twice into the same issue, the same thing. Oh yeah, it's all messed up.

But at any rate, I just released it. So probably during a break I'll look at it and make the format okay. That's what it looks like when it happens.

You've got a format messed up and we didn't get to it and clear it up. Boy, okay. Yeah. Oh, now I know why. Okay.

Now I know why. It all came back to me. I know what's going on. Okay. So I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to unpublish it and have a reason for that.

Now it's all come back to me. I get it. Thanks for the note in the private chat.

And what I will do is rewrite it so that it's publishable. Okay. So there you go. All right. Okay. I can't tell you why. Okay, go ahead.

Can you still hold the same view? And my reason for asking is I actually sent an email to info at harm.org about three years ago. And what was interesting is a gentleman replied to that email and referenced, I think first Peter three 15 in support of friendship, which is contrary to an article that you have published, basically saying that first Peter three 15 if I'm not misquoting yours is not a good argument for friendship evangelism. And so I just, I wanted some clarity because I value your opinion so much and your website's been such a wonderful resource to me for the better part of the decade. And I really respect your views and whatnot.

And so I just wanted to see what your current thinking is on friendship evangelism, if it's biblical or not. Well, let me just say that the reason we had to unpublish the article is because of the author who wrote it. It wasn't me. And there's reasons behind all of that. So we took that stuff down from that individual.

All right. Having said that, so friendship evangelism is good or bad, depending on how it's defined. If friendship evangelism means, because there's different definitions, different ways people assume it and mean it. If they mean, for example, you have a neighbor and you never mentioned the gospel because you're just trying to be nice and set an example, then that's not good friendship evangelism.

Friendship evangelism that would work is occasionally you bring up the Lord, you're trying to set the tone of a friendship because you got to live next door to somebody, for example, and you do that. As a matter of fact, we have someone who comes over and she did this today about 20 minutes ago. She's a young girl who is in the neighborhood and she comes over and cleans her cat boxes. So we pay her a little bit for it. And so she is an atheist and she's young and I'm witnessing to her. And like today, for example, she comes in the front door and she won't look at me. And I know why, because I make her smile all the time. And I'll say, are you smiling now? And she goes, I'm not smiling at you. I go, look at me. And then she's smiling.

What do you call that? And we just have fun. And so she knows I'm a Christian and I know she's an atheist and I try and plant seeds of truth periodically without overwhelming. So that's a form of friendship evangelism. And friendship evangelism is good when the goal of it is to get someone into a relationship with Christ, but the gospel must be preached and Christ must be taught sometime during that.

But because there are variations that are so critical, there are so many different issues of how that might work. You may not see your neighbor but once a month. You may see the neighbor once a day. How much do you say? What kind of personality does that person have, et cetera.

There's just a lot of variables involved. So generally I would say friendship evangelism is okay if what you're trying to do is just be a friend to somebody and ultimately plant the seeds of the truth of the gospel. And that's what your overall goal is over a long period of time. I have no problem with that. On the other hand, like when I was in Israel just a few days ago, I met a Catholic priest in the hallway of the hotel. And I said, excuse me, can I ask you a question?

Now I had about one minute because he had his luggage or he was going to go downstairs and do something and I was going to do something else, a different direction. And I said, continue with what the gospel is. And he said, well, it's faith in Jesus. And I said, so what's the gospel according to the Catholic church that saves you from your sins?

And he couldn't answer the question. And so I said, you don't know what the gospel is? And I said, you are responsible for the people underneath you. And you can't even tell me what the gospel is that forgives you of your sins. God's going to hold you responsible.

I went right in swinging. And I told him that he needed to repent of his false teachings and that the Catholic church is not Christian and that he needs to study Romans 4, 5, and 6. I told this to the priest all within a minute to a minute and a half. So there's a direct approach because you're not going to be able to see the guy again. There's the indirect approach, which some people call the conventional evangelism.

So you see context, people, situations affects everything about it. I don't know if I've helped you at all in that, but do you see what I'm saying? Yes, sir. Yes. Do you have time for one more follow on question? Sure.

We've got nobody waiting right now, so go for it. What a blessing. I had an atheist friend who worked with me. He served faithfully in the Air Force for many years, and he had heart surgery. And I tried a whole friendship of evangelism, this whole build-up relationship over time, and I'll talk to him about the gospel. I'll flip in, you know, praise the Lord if you were there, or if somebody takes the Lord's name in vain, I might type up and say, He's alive and reigning at the right hand of the Father, something along those lines. Just to say they knew I was a Christian, but I never actually did a whole gospel presentation, and he died pretty suddenly. And so my follow on question is, because I love that you contrasted, you know, what the atheist is doing for you with the Catholic priest, is there a place, or is it proper for someone in my position to think, well, I don't know what tomorrow's going to bring, I don't know if I'm going to see this person again. I think that I will, but I've struggled with that, with not presenting the gospel and then feeling like I haven't done the good that I know I ought to do, even though I am trying to build up this relationship so that I eventually have a door in.

What counsel would you give me, I guess along those lines? Well, the first counsel I'll give you is that God is sovereign. God's the one who opens up the mind to believe truth, Acts 16, 14. Jesus opens the mind to believe scripture, Luke 24, 45. God grants that we believe, Philippians 1, 29. He grants repentance, 2 Timothy 2, 25, as many as have been appointed to eternal life believe, Acts 13, 48.

Your job is in sales, not production. God is the one who produces the Christians. Your job is to preach the gospel when appropriate. It's not appropriate, for example, in a movie theater to stand up during a movie and start preaching the gospel. It's appropriate at various times when the Holy Spirit moves upon you. I would never say that there's always a perfect time or not a perfect time, and that we can certainly make mistakes, but you've got to understand that God is sovereign through all of it. As you speak the truth to people, as you're trying to witness, even the fact of saying what you did, you know, he's alive and reigning, is a testimony to the truth of the resurrection of Christ, and it's good. Now, if you didn't give a full presentation of the gospel, it doesn't mean the guy doesn't hear it someplace else. It doesn't mean that you failed.

It means you did what was right at the time when the circumstance, and God took him according to his sovereign plan when it was time. Hey, hold on. We've got to break. We'll be right back. Folks, four open lines. Give me a call, 877-207-2276.

We'll be right back. As a veteran, you get a lot of advice, but wisdom's harder to come by. A lot of people imagine themselves in our shoes without understanding the weight on our shoulders. The truth is, few can understand the pressure of finding your own way after serving in the military.

But few isn't none. You've got support. You can't control the chaos, but you can chart your way through it. Steady yourself. Take a breath. You're not alone.

You're not alone. She's a great lady. I will be down there for her retirement party. I'll be down there for a day or two or three, I don't know. That is on the 24th of this month, which is a Friday, so I'll be down in that area. Hey, maybe we can meet. People want to do that.

That'd be fun. All right. Let's get back on the air with Chris from Georgia. Okay, Chris.

Would I tell you help at all? Yes, I think it did. Yeah. I've considered, I mean, I've subscribed to the doctrine of grace and whatnot, but I've reflected in some of those moments on the sovereignty of God, but I still wonder if some of that reluctance, as a throwback to that article that was published and then unpublished, sorry for that confusion. But yeah, they said nobody goes to hell because they weren't friends. So just, I guess, trying to figure out the right balance of prioritizing gospel proclamation above friendship, because if I don't experience any persecution or any loss or any, you know, if I'm more nervous about social ostracism than the gospel, I feel like maybe that's, I don't know, maybe it depends on a case by case. Well, it's a good concern you have, you know, where you want to be able to be right with the Lord and say what is the right thing at the right time.

And when you figure out how to do that, please let me know, because I don't. I'm serious. You know, there's only one time in my entire life when I witnessed to somebody that I thought I did a really good job. And I'm not saying I did a really good job. I'm saying one time when I thought I did and I still think I did, but maybe I didn't because it's up to God. But the point is I don't know of any perfect time, perfect thing, perfect way. And so what I do is I just move forward and I try and I try and cater the words to the situation because there are appropriate times to present the word and inappropriate times. We don't want to be overbearing and then shut someone out from the gospel. And the thing is, you know, you and I could be out evangelizing together and there could be two people and you and I are so to speak back to back talking to two individuals and you and I could give the exact same word for word gospel presentation one person rejects and no one might accept. And it's a mystery. And so I've learned over the years that I don't know of any perfect situation and perfect set of words. And I always have regrets about what I should have done and should not have done. And then I lay it all before God and I ask him to bless the words beyond my ability to understand how they might work in someone's heart, even if it's not presenting the full gospel, but maybe just presenting, but he rose from the dead because it's a truth statement.

And that could be enough in someone's heart and mind, illumined by God to get them to that place of salvation. And so, you know, it's just a tough one, man. It's a tough one. I say just do your best and trust God. I appreciate your advice.

Thank you so much. Yeah. So let me ask you, though, are you regretting not giving him what you think is the full gospel before he perished? Oh, for sure. When I got the news, I was driving there along distance. I mean, I cried the whole way home. I'm not a big, teary guy. But yeah, no, I definitely had regrets, not because I think it would have changed anything, but because I questioned whether or not I was faithful in those moments.

What I've found, spending the last 20 years now working in corporate America, is that there's often a pressure to not say things, especially the co-workers, where you can risk loss or ostracism or any number of things. And so, yes, I regretted not putting those things first, especially in light of versus like Mark 10 days. Yeah. You know, I remember I worked at Hewlett-Packard, and I was a computer tech.

There's like 45 of us. And we had a special room that we were allowed to go into that no one else was because we had people's computers. We had access to their accounts.

It was a secure environment. In that environment, a lot of the guys that I worked with were foul. On the floor, they weren't.

But in that room, they let the guard down, and they would be foul. They used the Lord's name in vain. And I was there for four years. And I never cussed, and I never joined in their filth, but I never condemned them. They figured out after about three or four months, why are you so different? And I told them. And I said, look, I've been a pastor, and I'm not going to participate in your guy's stuff. I'm not judging you. I'm just saying I'm just not going to do that. And I don't know if I did give them the gospel at any particular time or any particular individuals, but I do remember being careful because you can't preach.

You'll lose your job. I had a wife and baby, or kids at the time. But what I did do was let them know there were certain boundaries and certain things because I was a Christian who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, God in flesh.

I'd say it like that. And so there's ways to get around things and to say things, but that took months to prep before they started asking me. And that's what I had been hoping for. That way there was no risk of anything, and yet at the same time they got to hear truth. So was that the right approach? Maybe someone would have said, I'd have preached to them sooner. Okay, maybe you would have. But I didn't.

I waited. And I found that they actually started changing their behavior when I was around. I never asked them to, except for one area. I said, when you use the Lord's name in vain, that bothers me. It's just a personal thing. I said, I'm not saying don't. I'm just saying that's what it does to me.

I said, you guys do what you want. And I never pushed them. But they actually started changing because they respected me. And I just remembered a story. You got me thinking about this. And I remember this. These two guys, one was a big guy and they were roommates. And they were renting out a refurbished church. And they were living in the attic of a refurbished church. And this was their rental room that they were in.

They played games and stuff, you know, online games. This one guy, his name was Torrance. He was a huge guy.

And they called him Toe for short. He was a good guy. And he came to me once. He goes, Matt, I got to tell you what happened. I got to tell you what happened.

And I said, what? And he said, you know, so-and-so and I were out there playing our games online, blah, blah, blah. We heard a knock on the door. And he said, we went to the door. It was like 2 o'clock in the morning.

And he opened up the door and a woman was standing there. And we could have the break. I'll tell you what happened. And we'll be right back, folks. After these messages, please stay tuned.

There's that break. We'll be right back. So at the bottom of the hour, let's get back on with Chris. We've been talking about this. Are you still there? Yes, sir.

All right. So what happened was this woman knocked on the door. They were shaken up by this. They said that this woman knocked on the door at like 2 o'clock in the morning.

They were up playing games. And they opened the door. And she stared at them at the door, raised her hand, pointed a finger at them and said, God wants his church back. And they were like freaking out.

And she stared at them. And they just closed the door. And they came to me and told me about this. Now, why would they do that? Because of what I represented to them.

And they were shaken up by it. And I said, God's trying to reach you guys. You need to repent.

You need to turn to Christ. And there was opportunities that came up. So it's a form of friendship evangelism if you use it in a broad term. But I did tell them the gospel though. I remember.

I told these guys many times over the years. Anyway, okay? Yeah. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. All right. And just so you know, there have been plenty of times when I've regretted not saying more.

So it happens. All right, brother. Thank you so much. May the Lord continue to use your ministry mightily.

And may he continue to use you mightily as well. All right. Preaching the gospel is a mighty thing. So praise God. All right, brother. God bless. Okay.

All right. Let's get to Gabriel from Maryland. Gabriel, welcome. You are on the air.

Hi, Matt. Thanks for taking the time to take my call. Sure. So what do you got? So my question is about Samuel, 1 Samuel 1740. Yeah. That's the one about the five stones that David picked up. Okay. And I have a theory that I want to run by you to see if it passes muster.

Okay. So my theory is that the five stones that he picked up represent the five cities of the Philistines. For these reasons, because one, the five cities of the Philistines were listed and specifically numbered and mentioned earlier on in the book. Two, David, when he's talking to his brothers and to King Saul shows no hesitation whatsoever about fighting Goliath. He speaks as though he's guaranteed success.

And he would only need one stone for success. So it seems like he needs the other four as a prayer, as a representation to God to let him be successful in conquering the other four cities. You know, how Goliath was of Gath, so the other four cities. Okay. And throughout the Bible there are other moments when certain things are counted to represent other counted things.

Like with the, I have an example in 2 Kings 13, 18, where the number of times the king struck the arrows on the ground was to be the number of times God would strike Syria. So does that sound reasonable to you? Absolutely.

The two existing, okay. It does. What I'd like you to do is, if you would, is email me at info.com.org, the five cities reference in that area because I've written an article on this and I want to check out what you're saying because I never thought of that.

It never occurred to me that that might be an additional reason why. It might be representative. So I want to check that out. So if you could send me that information, I'd love that. But let me read something to you also. 2 Samuel 21, 20-22, and there was war at Gath again. And by the way, just four days ago I was in the valley or overlooking the valley where David and Goliath fought. How about that?

So I don't even have pictures of it. They're just there. So this is 2 Samuel 21, and there was war at Gath again. There was a man of great stature who had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot, 24 in number, and also he had been born to the giant. And when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimei, David's brother struck him down. These four were born to the giant at Gath, and they fell by the hand of David and by the hand of his servants. So the four were born to the giant, to Goliath it looks like. So five stones would be one for Goliath and the four for his offspring because of the issue of blood revenge, which was a concept back then. If you hurt somebody in your family, you had to go hurt them equally or more, the enemy. And so if you were to kill Goliath, the children would come after David.

So he was ready to take the whole family on. That's what I think is the reason. Yeah, I've heard that one from Vernon McGee, too. So it's definitely a possibility.

Sure, but so is yours, and I love that. I never thought of that, never considered that. So this is why I'm seriously interested in you providing me that information so I can go check it out because if I look at it and go, hey, that's good, what I can do is modify the article and say here's a possible additional reason. How about that? Absolutely.

I'll send it to you. Yeah. In fact, it reminds me because when John 4, maybe someone knows this one. I heard this in passing.

Let's see. Because in John 4, 18, Jesus says to the woman at the well, you've had five husbands, and apparently five is also the number of cities or kingdoms that had been ruled in that area. It was something to do with this, and I heard it in passing. They mentioned it, and I was like, what was that?

I forgot where I heard it, but it was one of those things that stuck in my head, and I haven't been able to figure it out. But maybe someone listening might know what that is, and they can send me the information on that, too. I love to have people like you call up and you go, hey, what about this?

I learn a lot that way, and I appreciate that. I hope you do send me that information. Will do. Thanks for taking the call. Sure, man. Good stuff, Gabriel. I really appreciate it.

Seriously, good stuff. I'll call back later. Okay, you send me that info, the info at info.com.org. All right, buddy? Appreciate it. Okay.

All right. All right, let's get to Buskman from Dayton, Ohio. Hey, Buskman, welcome. You're on the air.

Hey, man. Once again, it's always a pleasure to talk to you. I missed you another week when you was in Egypt. How did your trip go, sir? It went well.

Let's see. We saw about 50, a buddy of mine and I, we counted 50, give or take two, things we kind of figured out, 50 things we saw. And we walked about four to six miles a day, climbed 10 to 15 stories equivalent, average a day, three different hotels, bus rides. We saw the West Bank, Palestine. We went to, like I said, the battle scene of David and Goliath. We walked through Hezekiah's tunnel.

We saw the foundation stones of the fortress, but the palace of David. We saw David's tomb, Joseph's tomb. We saw the place where Abraham and Sarah were buried. We saw so many things, the Golgotha, and I was privileged to be able to give communion at Golgotha in a small room.

Wow, man. One of the things, we went to Masada. We went to the Qumran Caves, a dead sea, the Sea of Galilee. We went out on the Sea of Galilee on a boat. We saw a museum in Jerusalem, went to the Holocaust Museum.

It was a great trip. And get this, on the way back, I lost my hearing aids, and they're expensive. And so without my hearing aids, I put a lost and found request in, and I've got to figure out what I'm going to do because I need them, because my wife, when she's fatigued, doesn't talk real loud, and I say, what, a lot, and that's a stress on her. So it's one of those things.

I have a routine, and they're just gone, and I'm just talking out loud. And I'm going to say this also. We had two guys who went, one from Brazil, who's with Karm, and another guy from Golgotha, Columbia, he's with Karm.

And it's the first time we'd all three been together. And also Dave, Dave Kimball, a friend of mine, he's on the board of directors. He went, and so all four of us were there together.

It was really great. Dave, the guy from Brazil, lost his wallet. Now, get this. He said he was frantic. He lost his wallet, had $40 in it.

Absolutely would be. Oh, yeah, $40 and several credit cards. Okay, we've got a break. I'm going to tell you what happened because it was like, are you serious?

Oh, yeah, it's good stuff. Hey, folks, we'll be right back after these messages. We have four open lines if you want to give me a call, 877-207-2276. We'll be right back. It's Matt Slick live, taking your calls at 877-207-2276. Here's Matt Slick. Hey, everybody, welcome back to the show. Let's get back on here to Buskman. Are you still there?

Still out here, Matt. Hey, please tell me you're going to post your picks on karm.org. Is that possible?

Yeah, it is. I've got a lot to post. I've got to decide what I'm going to do and how I'm going to do it. Wow, that'd be awesome. Yeah, there's a lot of stuff, and I'm suffering from jet lag still.

I'm kind of in a dark 30 this morning, and anyway, no big deal. So get this. So David Brito, our missionary that we support in Brazil, he lost his wallet. It's pretty serious, right? So he's there in Israel, and he told us what happened, that he was out at a store. He was out someplace. We all came back to the bus, and he gets to his room, and the wallet's not in his pants. And he's like, oh, my goodness, what am I going to do? So he was frantic. He said, well, are you going to talk to the lobby desk and see if anybody's reported anything in the bus?

You know, the standard stuff. He's pretty agitated, and I don't blame him. So he goes away, and he comes back 10 minutes later, and he says, I found it. I said, really? And he goes, you won't believe where it was.

And we're like, what? He said he got on his knees, and he prayed. He asked God.

He went to the hotel room. He said, God, please, I need this wallet. And he said, while he was praying, he had a flash in his mind that said, look in the trash, in the room, in the trash can. And he was puzzling, why the trash can? And it flashed in his head, really strong. And he went over to the trash and lifted up the bag, and there was something heavy underneath it, and the wallet was at the bottom of the trash, inside. Yeah.

And he has no idea what got there. I am not surprised, because, brother, our Lord has done things like that with me. But I still stand back as a human and say, oh, my Lord and my God, just comic business, all the middle friends. Well, because of that, I was praying, God, please just give me my hearing aids back, because they're very expensive.

And I need them, and I do, because I have 80 decibel ringing in both ears, and they help reduce that a little bit. It helps keep me sane. So, at any rate, the trip was awesome, and I do enjoy talking about it.

We walked through Hezekiah's tunnel, which was amazing. I had a bad episode, though, my acrophobia really acted up. It was on the edge of a lot of things, and I don't do well with that. I got traumatized when I was a kid.

But the guys were good about it. And then we met, like, if Donna's listening, hey, Donna, how you doing? So, Donna, she loves my book, The Influence, and we met in LAX, and she goes, man, I love your book. I read it three times. I give it to a bunch of people. They've read it multiple times. You're giving it away.

You know, the book, The Influence. And so, she said, I'm so tickled to meet you. She gave me a hug.

I love your book. And we sat next to each other on the plane to Istanbul. And then we had just a couple of rows difference, or something like that, to Tel Aviv. And then we happened to sit next to each other on the bus. And then, on the way back from Istanbul, we happened to sit right next to each other again. And we're like, that is weird. There's all these people all over, you know. And so, she was a sweetie. There's a lot of good stuff.

I'm sorry, just reminiscing. But I took a lot of film on stuff. This is why I want to get a new camera. I use my phone camera for a lot of stuff.

And I need a better camera so I can do video work, webcam stuff. And I'm finally going to start doing some stuff. Excuse me. So, you got me talking about the trip. And Thursday, I'm going to be showing pictures here after the Bible study I teach in the house. You know, I'm just going to tell everybody, if you can go to Israel, you're going to love it. You're just going to love it. Especially the cattle. It's on my bucket list, Matt. The Lord is that it's obviously going to be him. I'm a blue collar man, Matt.

God owns the cattle on a thousand hillsides, that's what I would say. Well, the only reason I could go is because people went under my leadership headship as far as who you're signing up under. And I was able to garner enough from that to reduce the cost so I could go. But we're talking about doing the footsteps of Paul next year. We go to Turkey, and then Greece, and then Italy.

You're a man after my own traveling heart, Matt. Because I'd love to see the Holy Land first, and then where Paul went. My brother's done the trip to what Paul did.

Now, he's never been to Israel. But my brother did that, and he sent me pics of the supposed-to-done, one of the jail cells that the Apostle Paul was incarcerated in. Oh, no way.

I'd love to see that. Yes, yes. And it was just a little porthole, Matt. It was just a little tiny window, if you will, on the stone building. And it was just breathtaking.

Just the picture seeing it, Matt, was breathtaking. Well, we saw the Hippodrome right next to the place where Paul was imprisoned on the Mediterranean. We saw that. Wow. We saw the very room that Jerome translated the Bible.

Jerome himself. Wow. Oh, yeah. Yeah. You know, it's just... So how does... Go ahead. No, you go ahead. Well, I'm just going to say, when you're teaching and reading the Scriptures, even in your own time, how does this really... that's got to really transform your Bible studying and your Bible teaching, does it not?

Yes. Like the guy who called up about David and Goliath. Now, it's the first time I've been there, but we were on the hill looking down in the valley where they fought. Absolutely, gosh.

And it's just awesome. We went to Gethsemane and I brought back a small branch of... I think it was all over the tree. A small branch, brought it back from the Garden of Gethsemane. That is craziness, Matt.

I would love that, dude. You know, it's just a delight. And another delight is the people. You're all sharing the same experience. And I'm going to say this, too. Eric Johnson, he's with Mormonism Research Ministry, MRM.org.

He heads these trips up. And so I know Eric, and I'll be staying at his place in a couple of weeks. My wife and I, hopefully, well, I will be for sure. My wife's going.

For Sandra Tanner's retirement party. And Eric does a great job. He's been doing this, he's been to Israel like 15 times. And he knows the ropes, he knows where to go, he does a great job. And he's the guy who puts these things together.

He reaches out to people and we arrange trips. And so we're talking about doing the footsteps of Paul. And I'm like, yeah, man, I'm interested. Definitely take photographs on that and post that on CARM when you go there, Matt.

Lord willing, yeah, if you can, post that on CARM as well. Well, I've got to do something. The thing is, I'm working on another article.

You know how it is. I'm super busy, I need a lot of help. I just need a lot of help, yes.

I've got so many things to do. But anyway, you had a question, I guess, right? Believe it or not, I did. And basically it was an encouragement for the last brother that called you that said, hey, I don't know if I did a good enough job because my friend passed away. And I know you only have a few minutes and you probably have somebody else on the line. Tell that brother to be encouraged.

I had the same experience, only my second brother, I'm one of five children. Number two was a God-hater. If I can use your platform, Matt, to speak to Mr. Brother if he's still listening. He was a God-hater. He hated God.

And he would beat up on Christians if he ever found out that you believed in God. So my brother made a statement to our mom and said, you know what? The only person that will ever convince me that there's a God is my brother in speaking of me. Well, brother, I committed a grievous sin that actually caused my wife and I to separate.

And long story short, this is what happened. My brother passed. My brother passed away.

I cried a pool of tears probably at least 12 inches in diameter when I found out he died because I was so guilty. I was like I was the one that could have converted my brother. And a person came and said, you are not responsible for your brother's salvation.

Jesus is. Did you ever tell him of Christ? Yes, I did. Faithfully, yes, I did.

Then your job is done. Get up from your face and stop weeping. And I realized from that, it took me a lot of heel. It did. Even though this deer, and who knows, it could have been an angel in this, and it was a female. It was a female in a white shirt and caught the story and told me, get up, you know, and everything that I just said. And it took me probably a year or two that really sent me in what that deer Christian said to me.

And it could have been an angel, I don't know. But the long story was is, be faithful. My brother knew that I repented of that greedy of sin before he passed, brother. So, just as Matt has said, trust in the sovereignty of God to have touched that person that you cared about. And always remember these verses, 1 Timothy chapter 2 verses 3, 4, and 5. And just know that God wants those people saved even more than we loved ones want them saved. So, take encouragement, brother, and know that you did what God wanted you to do, and trust in the sovereignty of God instead of our own human frailty.

Amen. That's all I got, brother. That's all I got, brother. All right, man. Appreciate it, brother. Appreciate it. Okay, I hope that encourages you.

Absolutely. And I'll get off the line so you can take another call before the end of your show. God bless you, brother. All right, man. All right, God bless.

Thanks for calling. Bye-bye. All right. Good. That's good.

All right, then. Now, let's jump over to Dave from North Carolina. Dave, welcome. You're on the air.

How you doing? I'm Matt. Just had a question. Let me turn this off for a second.

Here we go. When someone called, like the caller you said, when you talked about Jesus at Lord, when you speak of the Lord, so-and-so-and-so, who are you thinking about when you call someone, when you call Lord? Are you thinking of Jesus? Are you thinking of God in general? Because I don't seem to ever have the inclination to use those words. I thought I was a Christian. I mean, I feel like I did impulse-forward. I mean, I feel like I did inspiration from the Holy Spirit from time to time, but I don't ever have that inclination to use that.

And, of course, Jesus said, that's one of the criteria is you have to call him Lord. So I was just wondering what is it that- I was going to say, first of all, we have less than a minute on the show, and I want to talk to you. So, if you would, call back tomorrow. I'm not going to dismiss you right now.

Oh, we've got like 15 seconds. Okay. I don't have time to get in to talk- I have this verbal syndrome, too. Okay. Okay, yeah. But I want to talk to you about this. Sorry.

Could you call back tomorrow about it? Because the music's going to start any second. There it is. And let's talk about this, okay? Because I think it's important for you and for others. Okay.

Can you tell me what's top of the clock Eastern? Okay. Yeah. Okay. All right. 6 p.m. is when we start. We start for one hour, okay? Okay.

Call back tomorrow. Let's talk about it. All right. Thank you.

Because I do want to talk to you, brother. All right. God bless you. Boy, timing. Hey, folks. By God's grace, we're back on air tomorrow. We'll talk to you then. Bye-bye.