Why We Study Theology

Uh You're entering. Outer brightness How can you look upon this end there with such love? Grace overflows my cove. All of my soul and my heart have been revived in you. I'm satisfied.

All right, welcome, Fireflies, to this episode of the Outer Brightness Podcast. Matthew and I are here to have a discussion just between the two of us on why we study theology, why we think it's important, what we've learned from it, both when we were Latter-day Saints and since we've become Christians. And so we figured. It'd be good to just kind of get together, try to do more of a light conversational episode.

So, we're going to try not to dig too heavily into the deep theology today, just kind of talk about what's important to us and about studying theology and what we've like, what we've gained from it.

So, Matthew, quick question for you. As a Latter-day Saint, what was your first introduction to a systematic theology? Tell me about that. Yeah, so. We so as a when I was kind of returning back to my activity to the church, so I kind of went to inactivity in my teenage years, started coming back, and then that's when I was interested in the church.

I started reading a lot more books, uh, started reading in particular from Talmadge, like it's Jesus the Christ and Bruce Hamerkonki's works. And so, but when I first started my react react reactivation, I guess you could say, into the church, my bishop had given me a free copy of True to the Faith, and so that's uh it's It's a small little booklet that has a topical index of topics in alphabetical order from A to Z. And so that was kind of the first, I think, introduction to a systematic text, I guess you could say. When we say systematic theology or systematic text, it's a Christian term that's referring to any kind of text or lecture or book that tries to take all aspects of belief and make it into a coherent, cohesive sort of narrative.

So, like when you read the Bible, it's not a systematic theology text because it teaches a lot about God and creation. And that's where we derive, you know, Christians, that's where we derive our beliefs, but it's not written as if it were a systematic theology text.

So the job of systematicians is to take the Bible and then take all of the teachings of the Bible and place it together in a coherent fashion.

So that's what a systematic theology is. And so other examples that I've read along with Truth of the Faith were Mormon Doctrine. And that's when I spent a lot of time reading. And those two were the primary ones that I read when I was starting to get back into the church. And then later on, as I became a ward missionary from my ward, before I served a mission, I also.

Read a lot of the Gospel Principles because I helped teach that class. Gospel Principles is kind of the manual they use for teaching a course for new members and investigators who are wanting to join the church or just visitors who are visiting the church. It talks about a lot of the basic doctrines like Christ, the atonement, you know, faith, repentance, baptism, all the primary doctrines of the church.

So those are the three main ones that I dealt with originally. All right, good. Yeah, I was trying to remember when True to the Faith came out. It seems like it was closer to when, closer to the end of my time in the LDS church. I left in 2010.

It looks like the copyright on True to the Faith was 2004, but it seems like it was a few years after that, maybe that it started to be passed around pretty extensively in my area, maybe around 2006, 2007 is when I kind of first became aware of it. It's definitely a smaller Topical approach to the LDS faith. I remember when it came out, there was quite a bit of stir about the fact that it treated some previously important LDS doctrines in a way that maybe made it seem like some things were shifting.

So maybe it didn't treat becoming like God as deeply as, say, Bruce R. McConkey would have in Mormon doctrine, which was another of the kind of systematic texts that I was familiar with. When I was a teenager, Mormon doctrine was quoted a lot in sacrament meeting. If somebody was giving a talk and they were wanting to support something that they were saying with a theologian, a lot of times you would hear them say, you know, Bruce R. McConkey wrote in Mormon doctrine, dot, dot, dot, and then they would quote from him.

So it was very much a well-regarded text. And I know it was well-regarded in the generations before, well, in the generation before. For mine as well. My mom had a copy and she referenced it often when she was on her mission in the late 1960s in Germany. But by the time I got to my mission and kind of after, it was starting to be de-emphasized a little bit because of some of the things that he wrote in there.

They had become less popular or less. Appealing to some Latter-day Saints. And so it was kind of being de-emphasized and eventually was pulled from being sold at Deseret Book. But yeah, Mormon doctrine was one that I really referenced a lot, especially later in my mission. But I really didn't dig into it till later in my mission.

Probably the first systematic approach.

Sorry about that. Probably the first systematic approach to Mormon doctrine that I encountered was the lectures on faith. I was given a hardback copy of that as a gift from my stake president when I graduated seminary as a senior in high school. When we went up to the pulpit to shake his hand and get our seminary diploma, he gave us a copy that had our names embossed on the front of it. And I still have that copy.

I took it with me on my mission. It's all highlighted and marked up with notes. But that's definitely a systematic approach to LDS teaching from almost. Almost the earliest years, and it was a text that was used in the Kirtland Temple to teach the school of the prophets.

So it was used to teach some of Joseph Smith's earliest and closest followers what LDS doctrine was at the time. And I know that there's some speculation by some Latter-day Saints scholars and historians that he may not have been involved as heavily in the writing of it as was previously thought, that it may have been written by Sidney Rigdon or by Sidney Rigdon and some others together. But in any case, it was prepared as a systematic theology to teach the school of the prophets. And so, yeah, Matthew, anything you want to touch on there? Yeah, no, I also studied a little bit of the lectures on faith.

There are some interesting tidbits in there that I remember reading when I was first coming into activity, reactivity back in the church. One, which was it says that there were two members of the Godhead, and that those members were the Father and the Son. The Father was a personage of glory, and the Son was a person. of tabernacle.

Some reason that always stuck with me because it didn't say that there are three personages in the Godhead, which is what the LDS Church has taught definitively, at least in DNC 130, I think, right? Where it talks about how the Father is a personage of flesh and bone, the Son also, but the Spirit does not have a body of flesh and bone. And Joseph Smith reiterated that in lectures outside. But yeah, I always thought that was interesting because it says that there's only two, there's only two personages in the Godhead. And so I think maybe that's one big reason why they're not sure if Joseph Smith wrote it because it did have such a different view of the Godhead.

I don't know. That's just my speculation. But yeah, the lectures on faith was also something I dabbled into, as well as teachings of the prophet Joseph Smith. That wasn't really a Systematic text, but it was something that had a lot of teachings in it, a lot of fundamental teachings from Joseph Smith himself that aren't really reiterated today.

So, I think those are probably the major ones. Um, I can't really think of many other systematic theologies that Latter-day Saint would use. Do you? Um, let me think about that for a minute. Uh, none that I've really encountered.

I know there's a there's a book that's pretty popular by B.H. Roberts called The Way, the Truth, and the Life, I think is what it's called. Not sure because I haven't read much in it. Not sure if that's a more of a systematic approach or what that is. Um, it's kind of considered his magnum opus, um, but I'm not sure if it's systematics.

Uh, who is the other? Um. Apostle who was from Europe that was really prolific in writing in the early 20th century. You're talking about Talmadge or not Talmadge, but Articles of Faith by Talmadge might be considered a sort of systematic approach. And I definitely studied that on my mission.

Man, I wish I could remember the other gentleman, but he has some books of theology, but I'm not sure if they're considered systematics either. But he was another person. Pretty prominent theologian in the early 20th century, kind of alongside Talmadge. Today, maybe who does the Exploring Mormon Thought series? Do you remember who that is?

Let me look it up. I think, is it Osler? Yeah, Blake T. Osler, Exploring Mormon Thought, The Attributes of God is volume one. The problems of theism and the love of something is volume two.

Volume three is of God and gods. Volume four is God's plan to heal evil.

So yeah, I'd say probably today, Blake Osler's series of books is probably the one I see Latter-day Saints reference most often. That's kind of a systematic approach. There's also the Encyclopedia of Mormonism, but I don't know how often they would really reference that as like a systematic theology book by the church. I've always heard it referenced as like scholars say about the church, and then they'll reference that book. Because it's not technically officially by the church or even people inside the church, so I think that could be maybe considered one, but that's more of an encyclopedia rather than systematic theology.

Yeah, uh, Johnny Woodsow was the other apostle that I was thinking of. Um, trying to remember the name of his book. Um. Let me find it. He's got one called Joseph Smith a Scientist, but I think his rational theology as taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I think that's his one that might be considered systematic.

I also thought about Legrand Richards and his Marvelous Work in a Wonder, but I think that's not really a systematic book. It's more of kind of like a, I don't know how you would describe it, really. It's kind of more like a narrative style type book. Yeah. Yeah, that's true.

Question though, when you were studying through, you kind of mentioned the different view of God in the lectures on faith. When you were studying through that, Was that hard for you to understand? Yeah, it was kind of difficult. I remember the language being a little bit kind of dry and a little bit, you know, not really modernized.

So yeah, I remember reading it and being a little bit confused, which is why the question and answer section at the end kind of made more sense to me. And that's when it really boiled it down to like, okay, how many people are in the Godhead too? And I was like, hmm, that's strange. But I kind of just chalked it up to, you know, we Latter-day Saints believed in line upon line, precept upon precept.

So I just kind of figured, well, maybe Joseph Smith's concept of God the Father, God the Son was the most developed. And then over time, it was the Holy Spirit that he kind of learned more about.

So that's kind of how I've understood it. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. I do remember being in the first area of my mission and kind of pulling that out. We would go to the branch house for mutual activities.

And I was a greenie.

So I was trying not to, and I was serving in an area with some elders who were in their last weeks of their mission. And they were, you know, they'd kind of, I don't want to say given up, but they were more willing to run around and play and be physical with the girls and in sports and stuff during those mutual nights than I was at the time.

So I would, you know, grab a book and sit in the branch house and read. And I remember reading the lectures on faith and being confused by, you know, how many members are there? And they got ed to wait.

So yeah.

So let me ask you this. When you were a Latter-day Saint, were there aspects of LDS theology that appealed to you back in the day? If so, what were they? I just liked the concept, particularly, of eternal progression. It seemed interesting.

It seemed so different from how Christians talk about it. And it was something I didn't really know when I was growing up in the church. This idea that there's this universe full of gods and that God the Father comes from this line of gods before him. That's something we didn't really talk about. We talked a lot about, like in the book of Abraham, where it talks about, you know, God gave us a plan, you know, and Jesus volunteered to be the savior, and Lucifer also volunteered to be the savior, but everyone would be saved under his plan.

So there's a lot of that teaching in the church in the general conference, but there wasn't a lot of focus, I think, on this like eternal procession of gods going back to eternity, and that we can become gods too by following the restored gospel and receiving the ordinances and everything.

So they're like learning all that. I thought was really fascinating and. Just studying out also a lot of the moral issues I thought was different and interesting. And sometimes I was kind of like, I'm not sure if I quite agree with that.

So maybe that was my little rebellious spirit kind of already taking hold. I don't know. But like I remember in Mormon Doctrine. Bruce Omar Conkey said that drinking cola drinks is against the spirit, not the letter, but against the spirit of the word of wisdom. And I was like, but I see, you know, I go to church events and I see people drinking cola all the time, you know.

So I didn't think, I thought that was kind of interesting. And then a few years ago, from this point in time, the church came out officially and said that you can drink Dr. Pepper and Diet Coke and all that.

So, yeah, there was quite a few issues that I thought was fascinating. And plus, just the little tidbits that you would get from Joseph Smith's writings and the teachings of the prophet Joseph Smith. He talked about, as we mentioned in previous episodes, he talked about when you're baptized, your blood literally changes to Israelite blood if you're not already of Israelite descent. Or he there, he gave an anecdote about how somebody had been given a calling to serve in a particular area and they claimed that they saw a vision.

So I guess it was a time, a period of time where people claimed to have lots of visions. Instead of just shooting them down and saying, oh, no, it wasn't a vision. Joseph Smith asked them, okay, so what was the vision like? The person said, well, the angels came and told me to flee and go to this location. And Joseph Smith said, okay, well, what did they look like?

And he said, well, they had blonde hair and they told me to do this. And Joseph Smith said, well, you can know that they're not angels because A, they told you to flee your calling that God had already given you.

So he kind of set up this idea that if God has revealed something, he's not going to go back and tell you to not do it, which I think kind of is problematic for later history, but we'll leave that for later. And then the second thing is he said that you can. Know that there were not angels from God because they had blonde hair. The idea being the angels always have white hair. And I always found that really fascinating.

And so, like, sometimes you'll see in LDS publications, like artist renditions, where angels do have blonde hair. Like, I think the restoration of the Melchizedek priesthood, I think, if you look at that painting, they all have different colored hair. And so, that always kind of bugged me. I was like, Man, haven't you read teachings of the prophet Joseph Smith supposed to have white hair? Come on.

So, yeah, I liked reading all those tiny little tidbits because that's stuff you don't really learn about, you know, in Sunday school. It's kind of like little, not like Gnostic knowledge, but like little interesting thoughts and ideas that I always felt like was growing my understanding of, you know, of the church and its teachings.

So, that's kind of what I thought was cool. How about you? What were the things that you enjoyed most about learning? Yeah, I think so. As I was coming up in the LDS church, there was it was an interesting time.

In the late, maybe mid to late 1970s, there was kind of a renewed interest from evangelical Christians. To witness Latter-day Saints. And, you know, I guess you have also the Tanners having converted to Christianity and doing the work that they were doing during that time. And the LDS church in many ways began reacting to that maybe negative press that came with that or negative perceptions that came with that. You know, you have Ed Decker and the God Makers in that timeframe as well.

So, you know, I very much, the environment I was growing up in Utah at the time was one in which Latter-day Saints were, you know, they wanted to say, we're Christians too. And maybe a little bit differently then than now, where the message is kind of like, we're Christians too, just like you. Back then, it was just we're Christians too, even though we might believe some things that are different. And so the thing that appealed to me growing up in that time was more of a focus on Jesus as Savior. And I kind of, my interaction with the LDS church when I was young, even though I heard, I grew up in a ward in the Salt Lake Valley where people did feel comfortable and were allowed to kind of speak their mind from the pulpit.

In talks that they gave.

So, I did hear a lot of things that you may not hear today. Spoken from the pulpit, doctrines taught from the pulpit that you might not hear today. But, you know, really what was important to me was this idea of Christ as Savior. And that's kind of what I, what I latched onto as a teenager. And as I, you know, as I got older and went on my mission and started studying through the lectures on faith, studying through the teachings of the prophet Joseph Smith, Mormon doctrine, some of the other texts we've mentioned, it was sort of like learning my religion in a way that things, things about my religion that I might have heard in tidbits, like I mentioned in talks here and there, but I never really had dug into pretty, you know, too deeply myself.

And so it was like learning the secret stuff, I guess, or the stuff that's not really talked about. But some of it was kind of shocking and I wasn't sure what to do with it. And I'll, you know, we'll talk about that a little later. But yeah, I think what really stuck with me. Me was the idea of Christ as Savior.

So As a Latter-day Saint, would you say that there was an emphasis placed on studying systematic theology? Was it de-emphasized? If, you know, whatever your answer is, why do you think that is? I don't think it was. I think there was kind of this encouragement to understand the basics, the very, you know, the fundamentals of the faith.

And then there was kind of a not not trying to dissuade people from studying deeper or read other books. You know, like there's, it's not gospel principles. It's. It's called Gospel Doctrine by President Joseph F. Smith.

I think it's a gospel doctrine or gospel something. It's a book that I had, and it had a lot of interesting things in it, but they would always kind of preface it by saying, if you read out of these books, remember that not all of it is quote-unquote official doctrine.

So even when I was in the church, there was this idea that there are things that are officially from the church and that must, you know, you can, that's okay to read and believe, like official church manuals and things. But even writings from the church prophets and apostles was not official. And so there wasn't that, I don't think there was really a whole lot of emphasis on making sure you study these things. They were available. You know, I was always into that kind of stuff.

I would check those books at Des Red Book at that. But there was more of an emphasis on reading and listening to the modern prophets.

So the enzymes and the general conference addresses and the church manuals. Those were kind of what was really emphasized.

So it wasn't that they were not emphasizing whatsoever to read any of these books, but they always were kind of given a word of caution, especially Mormon doctrine, like you said. Parts of it was revised. Twice at least. I think the third revision is one I had. And so everybody would, there would be times where someone would say, well, yeah, it's good, but and then I would say, they would kind of caution you on certain things about it.

Same thing with like Spencer W. Kimball's Miracle Forgiveness. They would say, well, it's good, but read the first, the last chapter first. That's what my bishop at the time told me.

So, yeah, like I said, the emphasis was more on modern prophets and what they had been saying. Rather, and the book of Mormon, of course, like having a testimony to the core, and that's that's really emphasized.

So it wasn't, but it wasn't discouraged by any means to read these other things. It was just kind of like, make sure you know these first, and then if you have any time left over, get to these other books. Yeah, I think generally I agree with what you said. I think that there, from my perspective, there was a little bit of a de-emphasis.

So I remember hearing sentiments like: you know, studying theology or some of the deeper doctrines can be like trusting in the arm of flesh. Because, like you were saying, there was kind of always a reminder that not everything within books written, even by general authorities, is considered church doctrine. And so, yeah, kind of the warnings to not trust in the arm of flesh, and then also warnings, you know, of about the teachings of man mingled with scripture. Those warnings were more, I think, made with reference to broader Christian theology than to Mormon theology, but definitely also towards some of those kind of folk doctrines that crop up, you know, the three Nephites. Cain as Bigfoot, those kind of things that kind of creep up in the teachings of the prophet Joseph Smith or other sources.

And that still pops up in the groups, too.

So they'll be like, Is Cain Bigfoot? And then a lot of LDS will pipe in and be like, No, we never taught that. That's just anti-Mormonism. And I'm like, Well, I mean, I remember reading that account in Switch W. Kimmel's Miracle Forgiveness.

So, I mean, yeah, it was never official quote-unquote doctrine, but it's not like it's completely without merit.

So, right. Let's see.

So.

So, what about as a Christian? What was your introduction to Christian systematic theology or Christian theology in general?

So, when I first started kind of transitioning, I didn't really have like a systematic theology text. What I did a lot of was like I would read commentaries on the Bible. And so, for particular passages like 1 Corinthians 15, you know, I wanted to know, okay, what's the Christian view of baptism for the dead? This passage, how would they understand it?

So, I would kind of read commentaries in that sense and I guess kind of read it in sort of a systematic way. I also bought Ligonier has a Reformation study Bible, and it'll have little vignettes throughout the Bible that talk about different topics, like, you know, creation or God, or Or glory and sanctification and things like that.

So I kind of read those little vignettes and I would. I would learn that way. But primarily, what I spent a lot of time doing because when I was kind of transitioning and when I was trying to figure out what kind of views I wanted to hold or trying to understand the Bible, I was working as an intern in Chicago or just outside Chicago at a lab there. And I was listening to a lot of RC Sprolls Foundation series because at the time it was completely free and for a limited time.

So I was like, oh, neat, cool. I think it was because it was the 2017, you know, Reformation 500-year, whatever, 400-year, 500-year-old, 15, 17, yeah, 500-year. It was like the 500-year anniversary of. Martin Luther and the 95 Theses.

So it was free. And so I listened to those. And it's like a 30 or 40 part series where he goes through a bunch of different topics.

So I would listen to that while I was working.

So I was probably the one where I got the most in-depth systematic study is listening to RC Sproll. And I really connected with the way that he taught and he really divulged the scriptures and understood, explained what he understood of the Bible and how he would also separate what is Christian orthodoxy, what's, you know, what's the historical understanding of something. And then he would kind of say, well, this is what I, you know, maybe how I understand it to possibly mean.

So I liked that too, because it allowed me to say, okay, here's what's the general consensus on this, but maybe here's more details that he personally makes.

So that's what I really focused on when I was first transitioning. All right. Yeah. I remember listening to you mentioned RC Sproll. I remember listening to him on the radio as I would make my commute when Angela and I were first married.

So I'm commuting from Northern Kentucky into Cincinnati and listening to RC Sproll. And, you know, he would do his whole Blackboard thing and you could hear him on the radio wherever he was teaching. He was writing up whatever he was writing. But he definitely did his teachings in a systematic kind of way. And so that was kind of one of my first introductions to Christian systematic theology.

And then when I left, like you, I did a lot of reading and commentaries. You know, my initial step was to, okay, I'll study through the Bible. And I had a book called Through the, I had a book called Explore the Book. By a Baptist writer. I think he was Australian, but huge book.

And I studied, used that to study through the Bible. And then, you know, once I got into Christian Seminary, then I took some general theology classes and then courses as well on doctrine of salvation, doctrines of grace. Was one course, and then Doctrine of God.

So it took some more kind of focused systematic theology courses. Um But the text that I initially, some of the texts that I initially studied through were. were by Jack Cottrell. He was one of the theology professors there at the university that I went to. And he has a book called The Faith Once for All, Bible Doctrine for Today.

And that attempts to be a systematic theology, but it also attempts to bring in biblical theology in some way in that it's you know systematic should flow from the Bible, not from philosophy or any other kind of thing. I remember that kind of being one of the concerns, like I mentioned earlier, mingling the teachings of men mingled with scripture was kind of a concern, I think, that comes out of the broader Restoration movement. And you kind of find that in Latter-day Saint thought as well. But Jack Cottrell also had a, for his doctrine of God course, he had three different books that he had written: God the Creator, God the Ruler, and God the Redeemer. All were about 300 to 400 pages and very, very much systematic theologies on the doctrine of God.

And he's since edited those down to one volume. uh that cover kind of covers all three topics but in a shorter way He has a book called Set Free: What the Bible Says About Grace. And that's kind of his systematic theology on the doctrines of grace and salvation.

So I studied through all of those and they were very helpful. Since then, I've gotten some systematic theologies by Some Calvinists, some reform people, so I can make sure I'm reading and In taking not just thinkers and writers from my own tradition, but from others as well, and comparing those with what the Bible says.

So I've got John Grudem's systematic theology. I have Wayne Grutham. Wayne Grudem, sorry. Yeah, Wayne Grudem. And then I've also got.

Systematic theology by a Catholic and an Eastern Orthodox because I wanted to get their perspectives and look at their perspectives on things as well. To think who John Frame, does that sound familiar? Yeah, he's a reformed guy. Yeah, I've got his as well.

So, cool. Yeah, I've been curious to find non-Calvinist, you know, systematic theologies because that's you know, in the Calvinist, uh, the Calvinist clan, I guess you could call us, you know, you kind of stick to Calvin, his institutes, or you know, maybe Spurgeon's sermons, or I really like John Gill, his body of divinity. That's really awesome.

Some people kind of accused him of hyper-Calvinism. I haven't really run across anything yet that sounded hyper-Calvinist. He seemed pretty solid, but Spurgeon also kind of gave a stamp of approval of John Gill's commentaries. And yeah, I've heard some people get really upset about Wayne Grudem, and like there's kind of the whole controversy about the eternal subordination of the sun. That's like a that's way beyond the scope of this episode.

But some people are saying it's, you know, it's heretical or heterodox. But I think for the most part, yeah, his systematic theology is pretty solid. And then Burkoff is a really solid choice. I've referenced, I've read his. parts of his quite a bit.

And Hodge, I've heard Hodge has a really good one that I haven't read. Personally, but I also bought the Herman Babink's Reformed Dogmatics, and that's really solid. He kind of does a really good summary of simultaneously the Reformed, Lutheran, and Catholic streams of tradition and how they would read something. And a lot of times, including the Trinity, he would basically say, Yeah, they all agree on the doctrine of divine simplicity: that God is simple and not composed of body parts or passions. And so, it's really cool to kind of see his view on how he takes a more historical understanding of systematic theology.

It's still a systematic theology text, it's just he includes a lot of history behind it too.

So, I like that a lot. Yeah, that's good. Cottrell's texts are like that as well. He brings in writers from other traditions and engages with them as he's working through his systematic theology.

So he, you know, he'll, especially in his, I remember in his book, Set Free, What the Bible Says About Grace, he does that where it's like, here's what the Roman Catholic position is, and he'll quote it, you know, from the Catechism or wherever he's getting it. And then he'll also bring in Reformed thinkers and Presbyterian thinkers and interact with what they're saying on various Bible texts.

So that was very helpful to me as I was studying through that. And I was thinking too, like before I left the LDS church, I picked up a book called Christian Theology and Introduction by Aleister E. McGrath and started studying through that. And it's not really, it's not a systematics theology book per se. It's more of a historical theology.

Book. But that book was really fascinating to me because I got to see the strains of thought that would lead to something like Mormonism, right? Got to see those strains of thought kind of weaving their way through Christian history that would end up resulting in someone like a Joseph Smith thinking the way that he thinks.

So it was interesting. Yeah, historical theology can be really great too. I think there's another one that's kind of used as a textbook along with Grudem's. Yeah, Greg Allison, his historical theology book. I think I bought the Kindle copy of that.

Yeah, I read that because I was debating on the whole difference in views of baptism and some groups still give you, you know, the laying out of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost, that kind of thing. And so reading that and seeing like in the early church the different views on baptism and how they kind of developed. And there's the different views on the word supper, you know, the real presence in the supper.

So yeah, it's cool to look at it in both a systematic way and also a historical way.

So yeah, it's very valuable. Good good, yeah. Um so You were talking about the eternal generation of the sun and Wayne Grudem and that kind of being far beyond the scope.

So it leads well into the next question, though. Is studying theology just getting? Let me try that again. Is studying theology just getting hung up on nitpicky things? What do you think?

It definitely can be, but I don't think it's just getting caught up on the nitpicky things. I think a lot of the doctrines that Can cause division are secondary doctrines, so that would be doctrines that are not essential to the faith.

So, essential to the faith would be like you know, understanding God, there's only one God and that He's revealed in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as three distinct, inseparable persons, co-equal, co-eternal. Um, also, the sacraments of the church, you think that it's an essential to have the sacraments in terms of the Lord's Supper and baptism. Specific views concerning those can have differences. And if people want to know more about the essentials versus secondary and tertiary doctrines, we did our interview with Jenny Howard on that.

So, um, yeah, we do get it hung up a lot on secondary and even tertiary doctrines, like you know, just bring up eschatology, which is the study of the end of the world and the last final things. And Christians will just, you know, start, you know, throwing tomatoes and uh heads of lettuce at each other. But uh, yeah, so it's it's not entirely nitpicky things. I think a lot of it is important. And in terms of like, so for example, the eternal generation of the Son, some people are worried that that could lead to a Form of subordinationism, like the Arian controversy, where Arius in the fourth century was saying that the Son, so Christ, was, he did not always eternally exist.

He believed that he was God or a God and kind of subordinate to the Father.

So he's kind of a lesser being of a different substance than the Father. And so some people think that this modern idea of eternal generation of the Son could lead to that kind of controversy. And so there's certainly times where I think that studying these things out is important. And I don't know, I've always been on the fence on this eternal generation of the Son topic. I don't know if it's how I feel about it.

And there's been no official council declaring heresy either.

So I think, but I think it's definitely important to study out the most important issues and have those kind of sets, you know, understood correctly from a biblical perspective. And then, and sometimes we do get upset over like eschatology and all like premillennialist versus post-millennialist versus amillennialist versus infralapsarian and superlapsarian. That's a topic that also. reformative argued about.

So it can it can get into the realm of Picky things. And I think we should do that with definitely with a spirit of charity, spirit of love, and trying to cherish God and his truth rather than using it as a bludgeon to beat people over the head with. And I think, unfortunately, a lot of Latter-day Saints see evangelicals being so passionate about theology and they see us debating it between each other and they see, oh, see, you guys can't even get along. You know, you don't agree on it. But it's kind of like, you know, when you see a bunch of brothers fighting in the court, in the yard, you know, like wrestling with each other, it's like, oh, well, you guys aren't even brothers.

Look at you. You're fighting all the time, you know, but it's understood at the end of the day, you know, like when you dust each other off, that you're still brothers. And so as Christians, we still recognize each other as brothers, despite the fact that we may even have very strong disagreements with each other on topics like baptism.

So it's, I think, understood in a proper way and in the proper context, I think these kind of debates and disagreements are not only good, but I think necessary in a sense. Yeah, I think you're right. And I think they're good for the reason I was kind of talking about before as well. Like with when I studied through. McGrath's Christian theology and introduction, and I said I was able to see kind of some of the currents of thought that flowed in and out of Christian theology and were brought up by certain writers at certain times.

Without studying that, you really are left with the impression that Joseph Smith arrived on the scene and taught some of the things that he taught and that they had never been taught before, never been discussed before. And that's very much not the case when you actually understand some of the things that were taught in the past or were maybe even if not taught were part of Christian discussion in regards to other groups that they were, some of the Christian apologists were interacting with, like the Gnostics, like the Manichaeans. And so it's very much important to have that base of understanding.

So, you're not left just thinking, you know, hey, Joseph Smith, you know, got everything directly from above and, you know, was it was an empty vessel that didn't have a couple of millennia almost of Christian thought that he had the ability to understand and talk with others about. You know, I think sometimes there's this, I like to call it the country bumpkin motif that people do with Joseph Smith, where it's like, you know, he was a farm boy. How do you think he would have known all this kind of stuff? And it's like, you know, we live in a world where we have the internet. Back then, they had books and they had discussion and they had, you know, sermons that they heard.

And, you know, Pastors are a lot of times very, very learned men, even back then. They studied, they read. And so he had the ability to hear of things and know of things that sometimes we like to think maybe he didn't because he was a farm boy. I don't think he was as unlearned and, I don't know, dumb as sometimes some people try to make him out to be. I think that's pretty evident from his own writings.

Yeah, and like you said, it's people talked about it. We kind of were separated by 100, 200 years from Joseph Smith's childhood. And back then, the U.S. was very, the whole culture was like saturated in Christianity. And so maybe you did have a lot of different groups, a lot of different ideas, but it wasn't uncommon to be in the marketplace or the common, you know, the commons or just walking around town and people would be talking about ideas or different things about the Bible and sharing their different views or hearing about different groups or such and such preachers.

And so it was like just part of the fabric of society a little bit. You know, they didn't have movies and have TV, nothing that stuff.

So they would talk and they would debate about theology a lot of times. It's like, you know, like you can go to your barbershop today and you'll overhear somebody talking about Survivor or, you know, American Idol or whatever TV show is popular these days. And someone will chip in and be like, oh, yeah, yeah, I saw that. That was great. Or, you know, a sports team, you know, they'll talk about their favorite sports team that lost a game.

That's kind of how theology was back then. You know, it was a common thing that people talked about. And people were understanding about the Bible and they understood the mound builder myth or the lost tribes potentially being the ancestors of the Native Americans. These were common things people talked about.

So yeah, I agree that it is important to have this historical understanding of theology and to see why groups don't just come up out of nowhere. You know, they usually derive their doctrines from people that came before them or they synergize different views from different groups to kind of form their own theology. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes people that I discuss Mormonism online with get a little frustrated with me because I often make the suggestion, you know, people will ask me, you know, where do you think Joseph Smith got this idea if it didn't come from Revelation, you know, this, that, or the other idea, whatever we're discussing.

And I'll often say, well, you know, his family, his father and his brother, Joseph Smith Sr. and Hiram, were both Masons, Freemasons. And they're like, you know, so what? It doesn't come from Freemasonry. You can't find it in Freemasonry.

It's like, well, even if you can't find a specific thing as part of Freemasonry teachings and lore and practice, that's not all Freemasonry. Is. I subscribed to a Freemason podcast a few years ago and listened to it quite extensively to try to understand some things about Freemasonry. And what I learned, one of the things that I learned from that is that part of Freemasonry, part of the culture of Freemasonry, is to study everything, the esoteric. And they have publications that they produce and read and talk about in their meetings that cover topics from Atlantis to biblical studies to whatever interests a particular Mason to write about something, they will publish and talk about it and read papers in their meetings.

And so it's not surprising to me that Joseph Smith would be aware of, say, Immanuel Swedenborg through maybe his father, his brother encountering those types of ideas through Freemasonry.

So I think Latter-day Smith. Saints just need to understand what Freemasonry is. It's not just a fraternal order, it's very much this idea that you're free to learn, right, anything you can, and you study anything you want to. And that's kind of a current that flows through Freemasonry that I think impacted Joseph Smith as well in his lifetime. You're listening to Outer Brightness, a podcast for post-Mormons who are drawn by God to walk with Jesus rather than turn away.

Outer brightness, outer brightness, outer brightness, outer brightness. There's no weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth here, except when Michael's hanger that is, hanger that is, hanger that is. We were all born and raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, more commonly referred to as the Mormon faith. All of us have left that religion and have been drawn to faith in Jesus Christ based on biblical teachings. The name of our podcast, Outer Brightness, reflects John 1.9, which calls Jesus the true light which gives light to everyone.

We have found life beyond Mormonism to be brighter than we were told it would be, and the light we have is not our own. It comes to us from without. Thus, Outer Brightness. Our purpose is to share our journeys of faith and what God has done in drawing us to His Son. We have conversations about all aspects of that transition, the fears, challenges, joys, and everything in between.

We're glad you found us, and we hope you'll stick around. Matthew, what insights have you had as you studied theology? What new things have you learned that have blown your mind? Or what things have you learned that have helped you during times of struggle? I think at the very beginning, and it still fascinates me, is just the doctrine of the Trinity has been something that I always just latched onto and found it so fascinating.

I don't know. It's almost like as Latter-day Saint, I wanted to be able to say, I believe in one God. And it's like when you say that as Latter-day Saint, you have to add an asterisk there that says, well, you know, I believe in one God, the Father, and in his Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost, or I would say, I believe in one Godhead. But I can never really just say flat out, I believe in one God. Period.

No other gods exist like him, none before, none after. You know, I couldn't really say that. And so that was part of my transition period: I was reading James White's letters to a Mormon elder, and he focuses on that. And he talks about that passage, Isaiah chapter 43, specifically verse 10, where he talks about, you know, when it says the word God is Elohim, and he says, I, the Lord, you know, the Lord is the term for Yahweh or Jehovah, saying there's no gods, there's no Elohim before or after Jehovah. And like, when I just consider that text, that blew my mind at the time.

I was like, yeah, okay.

So as Latter-day Saint, I believe at the time, I believe that Elohim is the father of Jesus, of Jehovah, and that he organized his spirit intelligence into a spirit body and that Jesus attained Godhood. But according to this text, it says that there's no gods, there's no Elohim before or after Jehovah.

So how does that match up? That doesn't make any sense to me. And I wrestled with that for so long. And that was one of the texts I think that God used to kind of soften my heart, bring me to faith. And so that was one.

Thing that's that stuck with me, and this idea that, like, okay, there's only one God. This idea of God stretching back to eternity that I thought was interesting before, that's not the case. There's just only one God. And I think at first it was maybe a little bit not disappointing, but you know, life-changing or shifting in my ideas. But the more I thought about it, the and the simplicity of it, there's only one God, and He's everywhere, and He's all powerful, He's never changing, He's never, it made me realize, Yeah, God's not like at all, and that's that's an amazing thing, that's a wonderful thing.

And it always gives me new things to think about and just how amazing and different God is, and yet He still shows love to us. And so, that alone was kind of one thing that I really latched onto. And then, when you think about the Trinity and think about, okay, the Father is just as much God as the Spirit as the Son is, you know, it's not like the Father is a greater God, the Son is a lesser God, and then the Spirit is like another God tagging along. They're all equally God. And you can pray, since you can pray to God, you can worship God, and you should worship God.

You can pray to the Father or to the Son. To the Holy Spirit. It's just that in scripture, Christ instructed us to pray to the Father in His name through the power of the Holy Spirit. And that's kind of like the standard. But there's nothing to say that you can't pray to the Lord Jesus.

And as I was attending my church that I now am a member of, there are a couple of hymns in our hymnal where they are praying to the Holy Spirit. And I thought that was really awesome. And it kind of scared me or irked me a little bit because I was like, should you really be praying to him? But then I really thought about it. I'm like, well, he's God.

You know, why can't I pray to God? It's the same God. It's not a separate God. And so it took a lot of time to work through all these issues in my mind as a Latter-day Saint. You know, it felt weird, but it was exciting to.

Know that I can just pray to the Lord Jesus Himself, I can have a personal relationship with Jesus, I can talk to Jesus, it doesn't have to just be talking, you know, to the Father, which is not a bad thing at all. But you can actually pray to Christ and thank Him directly for what He's done for you. And so, those are things that just blow my mind. And there's a lot of other things too. I've really been getting into St.

Thomas Aquinas and his Summa Theologiae recently because there's kind of a controversy in the Reformed community about the doctrine of divine simplicity. This idea that God is not composed of body, meaning He doesn't have arms, bodies, legs, or other complex parts. He's not made of parts, whether physical or metaphysical, you know, like His attributes are He's not composed of parts like that. He's simple, and He's not composed of pat, and He doesn't have any passions, which means that He has emotions, but His emotions don't change from moment to moment like ours do. You know, God, He's constant, simple.

And then the more I think about divine simplicity, the more it makes sense that there's a single God united in essence who's the same from eternity to eternity, and we can trust Him because of that. He's not going to. Change tomorrow. He's not going to be greater tomorrow and lesser yesterday, is kind of like I sort of believed as a Latter-day Saint. I believe that God is always progressing in some sense, but God is just always all-powerful.

He's always perfect, and we can always trust Him.

So, those are things I think that really stick out in my mind in terms of what blows my mind or what I really value in terms of Christian theology.

So, how about you, Paul, after my long, my long, not diatribe? I don't know what you would call that. No, that's good. That's good. Yeah, I've had a few.

So, studying through Dr. Cottrell's text on grace, and like I kind of discussed earlier, he compares how Roman Catholics view certain passages, how Calvinists view certain passages, how non-Calvinist Reformed folks view certain passages, Lutherans, and also, you know, in places where it's appropriate, interacts with Latter-day Saint thought as well, as he's aware of it. One of the things that I really appreciate about Dr. Cottrell, and I think that I may have a different, maybe a little bit different take on him than some. I think, you know, within the Latter-day Saint faith, I think some people viewed Bruce Armenkonki as kind of a hard liner, maybe, because of his seven deadly heresies speech that he gave at BYU.

And Dr. Cotrell is viewed in that way, I think. by some. At least that was my impression as I heard some of my fellow students talk about him when he wasn't around. But having taken classes with him and knowing that his history of having attended Princeton Theological Seminary, he made a conscious decision to go there as someone from the Restoration movement because there are some significant theological areas of disagreement between the Reformation, the American Restoration Movement, and Calvinist and Reformed thought.

And so he made a conscious decision to go and study with those who were quote unquote the enemy. Even though, like you were saying, it's it's brothers that we're brothers, right? And and it, what I what I really appreciated about him is he treats it that way. Um And in his texts, even though he may stridently disagree, when he taught us in class, he presented the best reformed thinkers and he interacted with their thought in ways that were charitable. He didn't seek to misrepresent it, but he said, here's what they teach.

Here's where I disagree with it. And I appreciated that about him.

So studying through his doctrines of grace was very helpful to me in that regard to get clear on where the differences lie and really understand the teaching of salvation by grace through faith. Another area that, you know, even going back to my days when I was still in the LDS church, I've written about in one of my articles on beggar's bread, and it's also published on From watertowine.org. There was this period of time where my wife and I were going through, had been through a miscarriage, and it was a very difficult time for us. Um, as a couple, uh, that's uh, you know, a miscarriage is one of the events that is very challenging to a marriage, and so we had been through that. And I went to a gathering of an online discussion group that we had kind of formed with other Latter-day Saints, and we decided we would get together in person in Salt Lake City.

And I went to this gathering, um, and we were doing what's called a clearness committee, which is a Quaker approach to getting clear on something that you're thinking about, something that you're worried about, trying to pondering, trying to figure out.

So, I had you know, decided I would go through this clearness committee and talk about the struggles I was having thinking about this miscarriage and natural evil and all of that kind of stuff that comes with all the theological thoughts that come with a loss like that. And I remember one of the participants asking me some pretty pointed questions, and the idea of a clearness committee is they just asked. Ask you questions, they don't provide commentary, and you just answer the questions, and you're supposed to, the questions are supposed to help you get clarity. And this one one guy asked me some pretty pointed questions, one of which was, did God kill your baby? And I remember really struggling with that question and my answer and kind of stumbling through my answer because on the one hand, If God is sovereign, then there are some implications there for the answer to that question.

And so, you know, as I've gotten further along in my life as a Christian and I've studied texts and through the Bible on the sovereignty of God, where the answer to that question for me in the past might have been one where I would be tempted to be angry at a God who is sovereign.

Now, it's comforting to know that God is sovereign in all things. And I wouldn't have answered that way, what, 17 years ago that I had that clearness committee? I wouldn't have answered that way then, but I do now.

So, yeah, studying theology has helped me through some pretty difficult times. Yeah, thank you for sharing that. It's something that I've always thought about too is because as a Calvinist, I believe that God's sovereign, but and it's something our pastors constantly ask us, you know, like, okay, we always talk about the sovereignty of God, has control of everything. But when, but when talking, When hard times really hit us, are we still going to believe that? Or are we going to follow Job's friends who kind of told it, well, it was your fault that this evil has befallen you?

Or his wife, where she said, well, just curse God and die, kind of a thing. Yeah, so that's great that that study kind of helped you through kind of, you know, understanding that trial you'd gone through.

So thank you for that. I can't really say I've gotten had really difficult situations to that extent, but definitely there's times where, you know, where something happened, like an emergency happened. And I was, I was first worried about it. And I'm like, well, I can't do anything about it.

So, you know, I thought I was like, well, this is one of those moments where they say you just got to trust God. And I'm like, it's hard, but you just got to do it. And, you know, and in those times, you know, God pulled through.

So I'm grateful for that. But yeah, it's, I think definitely theology is supposed to inform how you worship God and how you live your life. Because otherwise, if we just talk about God on Sunday and then you come home and then, you know, you live your life like an atheist, then it's, you know, it's like, what's the point? Yeah. Yeah, I came across a statement, and I it's years ago, and I can't put my fingers on who said it.

It was a It was a Christian theologian. I don't know if it was Aquinas or who might have said it first, or if it was just a way that it was presented. But it ultimately goes back to. Teaching in Philippians. But the idea is that right thinking leads to right living and that that's kind of the basis for theology.

And so as we close, I think let's just each kind of give some advice to our listeners on studying theology.

So that would kind of be my first one is to say that right thinking leads to right living. And that flows throughout any theological topic that you are studying, be it the doctrine of God or the doctrine of Christ or the doctrine of salvation by grace. Right thinking leads to right living. If you think about, you know, what that, what implications that has for the doctrine of God, it's, you know, rightly understanding who God is and God's nature leads to a right form of worship of God. Not rightly understanding who God is and his nature can't lead you to a A right mode of worship for God, worship of God.

The other kind of bit of advice that I would give is be charitable. You know, we see a lot of times Latter-day Saints. I saw earlier today, a Latter-day Saint posting about the Trinity. And, you know, there are a lot of misunderstandings of the Trinity. You know, like, how can you have three beings who are all 100% God?

You know, a misunderstanding of what Christians are saying when we're saying that each person of the Trinity is. Fully God. We're not saying that each person of the Trinity is 100% God, so you have 300% deity, you know, like things like that, that are just very basic misunderstandings. And what I mean when I say be charitable with that kind of thing is don't buy into those knee-jerk reactions and thoughts on what your dialogue partner is saying. Really try to understand what they're saying.

Latter-day Saints ask that of us as Christians. And it's something that even we, as ex-Latter-day Saints, need to be cognizant of because we don't want to fall into misrepresenting Latter-day Saint teaching either.

So be charitable in trying to understand what your dialogue partner is saying and understand it to the best of your ability and really desire to understand it so that you're not misrepresenting what is being said. Matthew, what about you? What advice would you have? Off, I feel a little bit attacked. Are you talking about the thread that I participated in?

Uh with uh Okay. With a certain Latter-day Saint? I don't know. Which thread are you talking about? And which group are you talking about?

I don't know. I just saw it on my feed. I'm not sure which group it was in. But it's, it's, you know, it's someone that I think it was a thread you were involved in because I think you commented on it. And I'm not attacking you.

I'm just, I mean, I thought your I thought your response to the gentleman was appropriate because he is kind of someone that comes back to those kind of low-hanging fruit attacks on the Trinity often and often looks uninformed as a result.

So.

Yeah, no, yeah, I was just joking. But yeah, with certain people, it's difficult when they make the same strawman arguments over and over and over again. And you correct them in patience and in love, and they come back with the same strawman arguments over and over and over again. And so sometimes I just have to say, look, we've, how many dozens of conversations have you had with Christians? And you use the same strawman.

You know, like, I don't know how we can explain to you any better. You know, you know, we've had tons of people try it. And so it's kind of like I try to point that out to show: like, look, we're, if you want to learn, we're here to teach you. But if you want to keep throwing the same straw man against the wall, you know, I don't see what the point is.

So sometimes I do that. And there are some people who will be receptive to that. And there are some people who will see what you say and then they'll go start the same conversation in another group.

So there's just people. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And it's it's difficult because, yeah, sometimes sometimes they you kind of I think some people need to hear that because you know, um, sometimes we need to be called out on doing something we shouldn't be doing or being disrespectful. Or, like you said, LDS asks us to be respectful of them and their beliefs and to use the correct terminology and to read what they're saying. And, but a lot of times that same courtesy is not returned to us.

So, I think it's I think it's right in the right spirit, in the right context to say, hey, look, you're asking us to do what you're not doing yourself.

So, you know, let's, let's, so I think there is, there's a lot of, you know, like, what does the passage say? You know, he's innocent as doves, but is uh, Something is snakes. Wise as serpents, exactly.

So, you know, sometimes, sometimes it does require that. But I think if someone is honestly trying to understand, I would talk to them in a much different spirit than in that situation.

So, yeah, it really does take charity and patience. And it takes, and plus, I think, I think when you're studying theology, be careful of the sources you're reading because. Not all sources are created equal. And so I'm not saying that you can't read anything you want, you know, but there are certainly sources that may be misleading or may not be solid information. I'm trying to think of one off the top of my head, but.

Like, if you're trying to find a systematic theology or something like that, I could, I, uh, I can't really think of one off top of my head that would be bad for you, but but just be just be mindful of who the author is, what their background is, um, their training, their perspective, and um understand that you know, you might be really enamored with a particular author. You know, like I, the more I've started reading Aquinas, like I really like the way his brain thinks, he's so logical in the way he dismantles arguments against the Trinity. But at the same time, I have to remember, like, you know, he, there's a lot of things about his theology that I don't agree with personally, and that's okay. You know, you don't have to agree 100% with somebody to take what they have to say, consider it, think about it critically, and then you know, use it in my life. And I think our conversation with Fred Anson, that really, he really talked a lot about that and why that's important.

So, that's kind of my advice I would give. And yeah, I would agree with you. Just do it in charity and with the purpose of ultimately glorifying God, because we're not just here to study, just to become smarter or show, like, oh, you know, I've studied the Patristus, I've studied, you know, I've seen. Studied St. John of Damascus or St.

John Chrysostom. And, you know, I know all this stuff that you don't know. And that makes me more right than you are. You know, we're not supposed to use it like that. We're supposed to use it to say, to make our lives richer, it's kind of like a part of our sanctification, being conformed to Christ's image, and to give us ideas on maybe on how to share the gospel.

Like I've been reading Aquinas and thinking, maybe, you know, I've used a lot of arguments from scripture and from the Book of Mormon to compare those, but I'm thinking maybe this would be a different route to go. You know, maybe I could take some of the arguments that Aquinas uses for God, like, is God finite or is God infinite? And that's one topic that I made. Didn't really gain much traction, but I've been thinking about topics like that that could maybe open the door to some discussion.

So, you know, if you're into apologetics, maybe think about that. You know, trying to think of it first, primarily, how it brings you closer to Christ and glorifies God. And then secondarily, after that, okay, maybe I can use this to, you know, to defend the faith or something like that. Yeah, that's good. I really appreciate it.

I appreciate what you said about being cognizant of what you're studying.

Some of the first advice I was given as a new Christian was. To be aware of the publishers, who the publishers were of the books that I was reading, who the authors were and what their background and theological persuasion are, so that, not so that I can just attack certain theological persuasions, but so that I can understand where an author is coming from. If you understand that someone is writing from a reformed perspective, then when you get to some of the areas of their book where they're going to discuss some of the, you know, or approach scripture in a uniquely reformed way, you'll understand that better, why they're doing that. And you can kind of interact with the arguments that they're making and the thoughts that they're presenting in a way that's informed, right? You know, they're coming from a reformed perspective, or you know they're coming from a Presbyterian perspective, or you know they're coming from an American Restoration Movement perspective.

It helps to know that so that as you're interacting with their thoughts, you can understand: okay, why are they thinking in such a way? Is their position consistent with scripture? Is their position the most consistent with scripture of the positions that I've studied? All of that's important. All right, Fireflies, that's the end of this conversation.

We hope you've enjoyed it. We tried to stay really kind of high-level with this one and kind of avoid getting down into the weeds on theological topics and just kind of discuss our experiences in studying theology.

So, we hope you enjoyed it, and we'll see you next time. We thank you for tuning into this episode of the Outer Brightness Podcast. We'd love to hear from you. Please visit the Outer Brightness podcast page on Facebook. Feel free to send us a message there with comments or questions by clicking send a message at the top of the page, and we would appreciate it if you give the page a like.

We also have an Outer Brightness group on Facebook where you can join and interact with us and others as we discuss the podcast, past episodes, and suggestions for future episodes, etc. You can also send us an email at outerbrightness at gmail.com. We hope to hear from you soon. You can subscribe to the Outer Brightness podcast on Apple Podcasts, Cast Box, Google Podcasts, Pocket Cast, Podbean, Spotify, and Stitcher. Also, you can check out our new YouTube channel, and if you like it, be sure to lay hands on that subscribe button and confirm it.

If you like what you hear, please give us a rating and review wherever you listen and help spread the word. You can also connect with Michael the X Mormon Apologist at from Water.com. to wine.org where he blogs and sometimes Paul and Matthew do as well. Music for the Outer Brightness podcast is graciously provided by the talented Brianna Flournoy and by Adams Rode. Learn more about Adams Road by visiting their ministry page at adamsroadministry.com.

Stay bright, Fireflies. Lord, to whom shall we go? Oh you Have the words of eternal. And we are believing. And I've come to know That you The Holy One of God, the word made flesh, the risen Son.

Heaven and earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord endures forever. All of this world is indeed. But the word of our God through ages remain, Lord, you promised that we as your church would remain upon this rock and the gates of hell. Will not prevail against us. Cause you have power to keep your word unspoiled in purity.

Heaven and earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord endures forever. All of this world is indecay, but the word of our God through ages remain as the rain calls down from heaven and waters the earth, bringing it light.

So the word that goes out from your mouth will water to the mouth. Empty, but does what you desire Lord? We hear your word and believe in you. Heaven and earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord endures forever. All this world is in decay, but the word of our God through ages remain of God remains.