The Narrow Path 10/29

Music playing... Good afternoon and welcome to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we're live usually Monday through Friday. There was a little mishap at the studio yesterday so we were forced to play a recorded program then. But we're live today and for, well, the foreseeable future.

And this is true Monday through Friday and has been for the last 23 years, actually since 1997. We've been on the air. And we take your calls if you have questions about the Bible or about the Christian faith or if you have a difference of opinion from the host that perhaps the comment should be balanced by some of your insight. You can call me here. I'm going to give you the number although the lines are full. You can call in a few minutes and maybe a line will be opened up. The number to call is 844-484-5737. That's 844-484-5737. Our first caller today is John from Oregon City, Oregon. Hi John, welcome to the Narrow Path.

Thanks for calling. You say that 70 A.D. is when the... I don't know. Where in Daniel is 70 A.D. fulfilled? Well, that depends on the interpreter. I mean, I personally see it fulfilled in chapter 12. But some people see it in other places as well. It's a matter of interpretation. Daniel and Revelation and the Olivet Discourse are all places where people see things differently. My own understanding is that 70 A.D. is not really found in Daniel very often.

It seems to come up at the end largely. But it is found in Matthew 24 in the Olivet Discourse and it is found in the book of Revelation in my opinion. Yes, and we both agreed that Matthew 24, 21 and Daniel 12, 1 correlate.

We agreed on that a few weeks ago. So what would be your question then? So who was the general? What was his name that sacked, you know, fulfilled... Okay, who's the general who conquered Jerusalem? Is that what you're asking me?

Yes. Okay, well don't you know who it was? I mean, that's easy to find out in history.

You don't know who it was? Well, Titus. Right, okay, so why did you ask me that? Well, I wanted you to say it.

So here's the thing. Okay, well why does it help you for me to say that Titus sacked Jerusalem? If it was Titus, then how is it?

Because the verse before 12, 1 makes it really clear that the general that is attacking Jerusalem says that he comes to his name and none shall help him. Well, that's not how it happened to Titus. Right, I don't believe that chapter 11 is talking about Titus, so we've got no problem there.

Well, wait a minute. It's the same storyline. It's the same oracle. Right, but if you look at Daniel 11, if you follow Daniel 11, it's one storyline from Alexander the Great until at least Antiochus Epiphanes.

No one disagrees about that, I hope. And yet, there is space between. It says the king of the north and then the king of the south, the king of the north and the king of the south. But most of the time, the king of the north is a different king of the north than the previous one mentioned.

And the king of the south is a different one than the previous one mentioned. This is going through a period of 300 years summarizing things, and I believe that at the end of chapter 11 and in chapter 12, it brings it to its final close. It doesn't mean that the person that's spoken of in chapter 11 is going to be still living at the time that chapter 12 takes place. In fact, it says he's not. He comes to his end.

You read that yourself. So he comes to his end before that, so it's not Titus. The very next verse, verse 1 of 12, says, at that time. In other words, at the time of the previous verse. Well, at that time period, sure. It doesn't mean that moment.

Do you think it means the very moment that the man dies, then suddenly there's this tribulation? Yes. Okay, well, you and I are going to disagree about that, I'm afraid. But that's okay.

There's nothing wrong with disagreement. Let's talk to Lisa from Halesboro, Oregon. Lisa, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling. Thank you. I really appreciated seeing you last week, my friend and I, and my sister.

We came and saw you last week. I remember. Do you mind if I ask my question, and then would it be okay if I just listened to it off the air? Of course.

Okay. So, my question is, I've had quite a few discussions with a couple of friends in particular and I feel like sometimes when we're talking that I'm talking about like facts or statistics or actual Bible verses. And then their perspective of the argument is, this is how I feel. It's more based on feelings. Even sometimes like a feeling has as much weight as like facts or even scriptures sometimes, and sometimes even more. And so I'm wondering, what's some scriptural advice for that situation? Because sometimes I'm kind of, it kind of makes me feel like I'm not compassionate enough if I'm not having these strong feelings over this other stuff.

And do you have any scriptural advice and like maybe actual scriptures? And if I'm wrong, that's fine too, you know. Well, in the book of Proverbs, it says twice, there is a way that seems right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. Now, if something seems right to a man, that means it feels right to him.

It feels like it's the right thing. But the way you feel about things isn't always reality. And what seems right isn't necessarily the way that will, that aligns with the truth. And so if Proverbs actually says it twice, I don't have the reference in front of me, but I know it's in there twice because I've taught Proverbs many times.

I'm very familiar with that verse. It makes it very clear that you can't trust something just because it seems right, especially if you have a word from God to the contrary. In other words, if God says one thing, but you feel something else, well, how is it that you place your emotions above the integrity of God? Are your emotions always correct? Have your emotions never misled you? Obviously, anyone who's intelligent and honest would say, yeah, my emotions have misled me a number of times in relationships and out of relationships and in investments. Yeah, your emotions lead you wrong. In fact, your emotions have probably led you wrong sometimes in your theology. So it doesn't really matter what you feel if you have factual information up against what you feel. And the Bible is factual. By the way, my wife looked up these verses in Proverbs for you if you want the reference. It's Proverbs 14, 12 and Proverbs 16, 25.

They both say the same thing. So that's what I would point out. Now, you're right. We live in a time where a couple of generations have been encouraged to just go with their feelings, to not worry about facts or arguments. I mean, we now have some younger generations that don't even want to hear anything other than what they want to believe, what they've been taught to believe. And unfortunately, the church has people like that, too. You're one of those people, I can tell, that wants to know what the scripture says. Not everyone in the church wants to know what the scripture says. They want to know that what they want to feel is okay with God. And that's a very different thing than wanting to know the truth. And, you know, it says in 2 Thessalonians, chapter 2, that because they do not receive the love of the truth, and by the way, you can use this passage also with your friends. Are they Christians we're talking about here, or not?

Oh, she's gone. Okay. Okay, I don't know if your friends are Christians or not. Nonetheless, it says in 2 Thessalonians, chapter 2, that those who do not receive the love of the truth, God sends them a strong delusion, so that they might believe the lie, so that they may be condemned who did not believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. That's 2 Thessalonians 2, verses 5 through 12.

I mean, excuse me, 10 through 12. So, those are the things I would say to them. You know, what you want to believe should be the truth, even if it's an inconvenient truth, you know? And many truths are inconvenient, unfortunately. The most inconvenient truth is that we are sinners, and that we're in trouble with God, and that we have to go His way.

And the truth will set us free, but only the truth will. So, if someone says, well, I've always just felt that God would do this or that or the other thing, well, I mean, the thing is, ask, you know, what's the basis for your feelings? What is the credibility level of your feelings? Again, have your feelings ever deceived you before? And, of course, your friends, if they're not entirely stupid admirers, will tell you, of course, their feelings have misled them at times before.

They know of things they used to believe and feel, but they now don't anymore. And so, that would be my advice to you about speaking to such a person. Okay, let's talk to Don from Vancouver, Washington. Don, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.

Hi, Steve. Hey, I had a question, but I think more importantly, starting tomorrow and for the weekend, I'm going to be praying for the coming election. It's a very important election in passing as well, by the way, and I'd just like to urge others to do that as well.

All right. If they could join me. That certainly is good advice. Amen. If they don't.

Hey, thanks, Steve. Yeah, if you don't, I was going to say, if they don't pray for it, then they can't blame anyone else than themselves for the destruction of this country, if that takes place. And that's not melodramatic. That's what we're facing.

That is what we're facing. So I did this last election. It wasn't my prayers, and I'd do it again this time. Anyway, thanks, Steve. Appreciate it. Okay, Don. Thanks for your call. God bless you. Okay, bye. Bye now. Okay, Damian from Boise, Idaho.

Welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling. Hey, brother Steve. God bless. Hi.

Thank you. Hey, I have two questions. My first question is, I'm going through the study of Revelation.

When Christ tells the church in Ephesus that they are in a fallen state, does that mean that they've lost their salvation? That's my first question. And then my second question is about when the sons of Israel are complaining about them eating, their parents ate the sour grapes, but now it's on them. So were the kids paying the consequences of their parents? Is that what was going on or was that just kind of, they were just kind of saying that in the air? And if that was what was going, sorry, that's my two questions. Yeah, so I kind of, I'm thinking of like the whole Black Lives Matter movement. They're saying that they deserve some type of reparation back because of, let's just say their ancestry or slaves or whatever.

Right. And then I had a friend kind of quote that idea of what was going on in Jeremiah and Ezekiel. And I just wanted to cross that by you and see if that was what was really going on and if that was even valid.

It is valid. Actually, Ezekiel 18 is a very important scripture against the mentality of the social justice movement, because the social justice movement thinks that you are guilty because who your parents are, what race they were, what economic class they were, and maybe even just what gender you are, too. But the truth is, no one is responsible for anything that their parents did or grandparents or great grandparents. You go back four generations to the time of slavery, and frankly, nobody alive today was involved. And therefore, nobody has any responsibility for it. It's not, you don't punish the descendants for their father's sins. And that's very strongly stated in the Bible in chapter 18 of Ezekiel and also in the law of Moses itself.

The judges were forbidden to punish a son for his father's sins. So anyone who thinks that that's a good idea, again, they may be going by their feelings and not by the scriptures. What was your first question? Remind me. Remind me of your first question.

Okay. Yeah, so my first question was about the Church of Ephesus. Oh, the Church of Ephesus. Does that mean that they've lost their salvation? Well, they have left their first love. And he says, remember, therefore, from where you have fallen, repent and do the first works or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place unless you repent. Now, this is a threat to a church as a whole, not to a particular individual.

He's not talking about an individual who's left their first love. The church has left its first love, and the church can be removed. Its candlestick or its lampstand can be removed, which means the church can be removed. It's no longer going to be one of the lights in the world for the gospel's sake. And, of course, that church is gone.

There is no city of Ephesus today, and there's no church in Ephesus today. So, now, whatever happened to the individuals in it, just because a church is under judgment doesn't mean that there's no one who is saved, because he says to them in verse 7, To him who overcomes I will give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God. So, we've got, a church is made up of individuals. Individuals in the church may be saved while the church itself gets lost. Remember, in those days, all Christians in any town were in the one church of that town. And so, if the church was going downhill, they didn't really have much of an option, but to be in that church anyway.

But, they didn't have to go downhill with it. They didn't have to lose their first love. So, the church is threatened with having its lampstand removed, and that is a threat that, in fact, must have been carried out, because they're gone now.

They've been gone for centuries. But, individuals, those who overcome, are said to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God, which means they're going to be in the new earth and have eternal life. So, the church left its first love. That is, it became less loving as a church, corporately. It's interesting that a church, all these seven churches in Revelation, are accused of having a particular dominant characteristic about them.

But, in each case, there's a promise to the overcomers. That is, those who overcome the peer pressure and the downward trend of the church, and who remain faithful unto death, those are the ones who are going to have salvation. So, it's not necessarily saying the church lost its salvation, as if to say everyone in it was lost. But, the church disappeared. The people who died, though, who were followers of Christ, were saved, just like you and I are.

Okay, gotcha. So, just real quick, back to that question about the grave. So, the kids weren't paying the consequences of their parents, right? No, they were paying the consequences for their own sins.

They were saying, our fathers ate the wild grapes, but our teeth are set on edge. In other words, it's a proverb that was saying, why should one generation do the bad thing, and the younger generation suffer the consequences for it? And, basically, Ezekiel said, don't say that anymore.

That's not true. Because the soul that sins, it shall die. If your fathers were bad, and you turned to righteousness, you won't die. If your fathers were righteous, and you turned to wickedness, well, then, you'll die. So, the idea here is that every individual answers to God for their guilt, for their crimes, or for the responsibility and reward for the good works. So, he's essentially saying, if you're going to die, it's not because your father sins, because you're sinning. Your fathers, indeed, may have sinned, and they may have, in fact, started the trend of downward decline in your society, but you're still part of it.

You're still declining. You're not following God. So, don't blame this on your fathers. This is on you. Okay, cool. All right, brother, thank you so much, and God bless. Okay, thank you very much for your call. God bless you, too. All right, our next caller is Jonathan from Ottawa, Canada.

Jonathan, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling. Hi, Steve.

How are you doing? Fine, thanks. Okay, I had a question here, which I don't believe you've answered specifically on past shows, so hopefully it's something new for you, at least on this show. So, my question is generally, and then I'll get into specifics, about how preterists, or even partial preterists, have interpreted the phrase fullness of the Gentiles in Romans 11, and from what I've gathered, I believe you see it as something that's going to be reached when Jesus returns, and probably you're looking at it as something numeric, some number known only to God. Beyond that, I've heard other interpretations, and it seems like these other folks, like, for example, Don Preston, who I think you've debated before, but you didn't actually get into that, they think it's already fulfilled, right?

So, presumably before or at 70 AD. So, here are the two points that I've heard that are different. I heard someone say that it was fulfilled at the conclusion of Paul's own unique ministry to the Gentiles. And I've heard another view, and I think this is Don's view, he doesn't see it as numeric, but rather as relational fullness. And then he contrasts two different Greek words, the word for fullness, pleroma in the Greek, versus its antonym, hetema. And basically, I think he's trying to get across the idea that one is talking about a restoration and a victory, versus a falling away or cutting off, and defeat.

And I think there's a contrast between those two. And then he makes a big deal about this word never being used in a strictly numerical sense in the Bible. So, from that I gathered that, and this is my interpretation, that for Gentiles, thanks to our relationship to God's Father, having been born again, saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, that's what he was getting at. So, did you get all that?

Well, I think so. The term the fullness of the Gentiles is only found one time in Scripture, so obviously we don't have any other places to compare it with to see how it was used elsewhere. It's only found in Romans 11.25, and that's where Paul said, for I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest some of you be wise in your own opinion, that hardening in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.

So, the hardening in part of the Gentiles is still going on. So, I know Don Preston believes everything was fulfilled in 70 AD, and that the church came into its glory at that time, that the glorification of the church and everything took place in 70 AD. First of all, I don't really see how anyone could really argue seriously that way, because the church in 70 AD, I mean, after 70 AD was certainly not more glorious than the church before.

If anything, it became more compromised. I mean, to suggest that any perceptible improvement of the church took place after 70 AD over, let's say, the apostolic church before that is, to my mind, misguided. But as far as whether the fullness of the Gentiles can refer to a number of Gentiles or a qualitative, you know, improvement, I don't know.

I don't know if it can mean that or not, because it doesn't really have another place in the Bible that uses the term for us to cross-reference. I would say this, though, that even if we're talking about the fullness in the sense of the full victory or the full glory or the full, you know, whatever, inheritance of the Gentiles, restoration of the Gentiles, yeah, that didn't happen in 70 AD. I mean, I would see that as still future, whether we're talking about a number of Gentiles or the quality of the Gentile conversion.

So I just don't see that as a very good argument to me. Okay, so when I was talking about restoration, one way I was thinking about it was, I guess Gentiles have always been welcomed into the spiritual Israel throughout history, but that was a mystery up until a certain point. When that ceased to be a mystery, when that mystery was revealed, and it was obvious that the doors were open for the Gentiles, like let's say at the point of Acts 15, why couldn't we say at that point that that was the fullness? Well, frankly, it says the hardness in part has happened to Israel until that happens.

It seems like Israel had an ongoing history considerably longer than that, even to this day, and the hardening is still present. So I don't think Acts 15 would mark the fullness of the Gentiles. Now, you know, the full awareness of the mystery that the Gentiles have a place in the body of Christ with the Jews, that didn't come about in 70 AD. Paul had that revelation. He was writing about it in Ephesians and in Colossians and even in Romans chapter 16, which was a long time before 70 AD. That was even before 60 AD, as far as Romans was. I mean, the books of Colossians and Ephesians were probably written between 60 and 67, but no one believes Paul lived to 70 AD.

So if the mystery being revealed was going to happen in 70 AD, then Paul let the cat out of the bag real early. Yeah. Okay. I guess that sort of answers my question and gives me something to think about.

Just add something a little bit different at the end, something unrelated but related to the previous cult. I just want to make a point about Black Lives Matter. Like, they don't like to be labeled as a group, like, all black people are like this and blah, blah, blah. So they don't like that, but they don't seem to have a problem going the other way. So I see a lot of hypocrisy with the Black Lives Matter movement, you know?

They want to have it two different ways. Well, yeah, the left always is hypocritical. The left has no legitimacy in terms of truth, and truth is not a left-wing value.

That's what Dennis Prager often says is so true. They don't care about truth. They care about power. They care about winning, and you can see how the left won in the Bolshevik Revolution and in, you know, Maoist China and everywhere else that the left won. They did so not by following truth but by lies and propaganda and by stifling the voice of opposition so no one could hear the opposite side. That's not what people do who are interested in truth.

So, I mean, yeah, they're not a truthful group. I appreciate your call. We've got a break coming up here, and we have a lot of calls waiting. We have another half hour coming, and so this is not the end of the program, but at this point I need to let you know that The Narrow Path is listener supported, which means that I'm out of time. Welcome to The Narrow Path with Steve Gregg.

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Remember thenarrowpath.com. Welcome back to The Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg, and we're live for another half hour taking your calls. If you have questions about the Bible or the Christian faith or see things differently than the host, you may call and we can discuss those things. The number to call is 844-484-5737. As I speak, there's one line open, but if you call and find all the lines have filled up, just call back in a few minutes. You may find another line has opened.

They do all the time. The number is 844-484-5737. Eli from Riverside, California. Welcome to The Narrow Path, and thanks for joining us. Hello, Steve.

How are you? Thank you for taking my call. I wanted to know your take on Ephesians 5-11. As you know, Halloween is this Saturday, and many churches, including the church that I attend to, they do activities for the family, especially for the kids, you know. But I heard a lot of pastors that use Ephesians 5-11. The churches shouldn't do any type of activities during Halloween because that's basically we're treating the devil.

I was doing a little research, and Halloween, I believe it was 2,000 years ago, they started like Christians, you know, like people would pray for the dead and all that. Now, of course, it has changed, so I just wanted to hear your take on that, and I'll take your answer off the air. All right.

Thank you for your call. Well, the verse you mentioned is Ephesians 5-11. It says, Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. And I think that there are things about Halloween, the way it is practiced, that are unfruitful works of darkness. Of course, Halloween is even a witch's Sabbath now, and a lot of evil is done, you know, secretly at Halloween. But a lot of things in Halloween are quite innocent. And as you said, Halloween actually had Christian beginnings. It was All Hallowed's Eve, All Saints' Eve, and there were Christians who did kind of superstitious things to commemorate the saints.

And they thought the demons would come out in force on that night to oppose the honoring of the saints, and so they made jack-o'-lanterns and things like that, from what I understand, to scare off demons and maybe even put on scary costumes. Now, this is what I've read. Actually, I've read different things. And so, you know, you've got to believe whatever you've got to believe when you find out some source that seems good. But, you know, originally it was a superstitious Christian holiday, and then it was taken over because it corresponds with some things that the witches value. And so now it's seen more as, you know, you've got the monsters and the witches and those kinds of phenomena associated with it.

Therefore, you have a choice. Is it that when you're celebrating Halloween, are you continuing a practice that was started by Christians for Christian purposes, and which has been taken over by the dark side, but it really belongs to the Christians since they originated it. Is that the way to look at it? That's kind of how I look at Christmas, some of the things in Christmas, some of the ways that Christmases have started off on the dark side, but were taken over by Christianity. Now, if they were taken over, they're, generally speaking, not regarded to be related to darkness and to evil and paganism and so forth. And one could argue that Christmas once was, at least the winter solstice, was once a pagan holiday, and Christians kind of co-opted it. And whether they should have or not is maybe something that could be debated, but the fact that they have means that very, very few people think of Christmas as a pagan holiday. I mean, there are a few pagans in the country that holds pagan religion, and they still probably celebrate the winter solstice as they did in the past, but really, 99% of the people in the country, when they think of Christmas, they're thinking of something that's associated with Christianity. And so it's not really a pagan holiday anymore. And even the things that are done on it that used to be done in paganism, I don't know that they're done in paganism anymore, but they certainly are done without any reference to paganism in the transformed holiday. Now, I'm not a holiday person. I just don't care about holidays.

As far as I'm concerned, all days are alike, and so it doesn't matter to me what people do on any given day as long as they're not sinning. And I would say that about Halloween, too. Churches, you know, it may seem that they're compromising with the world when they have costume parties or things like that and give away candy and do things, but frankly, I don't know that wearing costumes for kids is a sin in itself. If it was not done on Halloween, if little kids dressed up like cowboys and Indians and so forth like they used to do when I was a kid, it wasn't Halloween, necessarily.

It was just playtime. Kids like to wear costumes and pretend to be things. So I don't know if they do it on Halloween. It's any more sinful than if they did it any other day of the year. I would say that anyone who's even remotely involved in the occult is sinning, and if Halloween is an occult holiday for them, then they certainly shouldn't do it, and the church should never think that's okay. But the church is probably not thinking of itself as celebrating a pagan holiday. They're probably just seeing it as a time for the kids to have fun and maybe even an alternative to kids celebrating the holiday. The fact that it happens on the same day may just be logistical. If you want to get kids off the street from doing trick-or-treating and you're having an alternative, if you have it at the same time, that's probably the best way to keep them from doing both.

So, I mean, it could be just logistic. It's because someone thinks that October 31st is really, really a different kind of day than all other days, and it was the pagans, let's say, who decided that was true. Well, we don't have to agree with them about that. I don't agree with anyone about October 31st or December 25th or any other day being different than other days. What makes a day different is if you think about it differently, even your birthday. I don't really think much about my birthday. I realize it's not a pagan thing to celebrate your birthday. I just don't see how my birthday is different than any other day. So the earth has gone around the sun 365 times since the last one, and now it's come back around to the same position. If that's significant in some way, I have failed to see how it is so.

So maybe I'm just a scrooge or something, but I just don't have any... I don't get alarmed if people celebrate holidays or if they don't. So I'm not going to criticize churches that do something as long as what they're doing isn't really pagan.

And if someone says, well, it's pagan because it's on October 31st, then I think the person who says that may be putting too much stock in days and seasons, and so forth, which Paul said he didn't want his converts to do in Galatians 4.10, I think it was. All right, let's talk to... let's see who's been here long. It's going to be John from Jackson, Wyoming. John, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.

Yes, Steve. On the subject of the deity of Christ, I've heard you talk on that, and you tend to, I guess in your opinion, would extend grace to a believer who is not sure or doesn't... couldn't say for sure whether Christ was God or not, a full deity. And I would probably agree with that, but wouldn't you think it would be a deal breaker for somebody to come out and deny that Christ is deity, such as the Mormons or Jehovah Witness? Well, if they know indeed that He is God and they deny it, yes, that would be very sacrilegious.

That would be an insult to God. If they are, let's just say, in the same state of mind as the apostles were before they knew Jesus was God, and that would be some years after they began to follow Him, they came to know that He was God. They didn't know it when He called them from their nets. They didn't know while He was going around with them for three years, but they did come to know that later on. Remember, even on the last day He was with them before His crucifixion, Philip said, show us the Father. And Jesus said, have I been so long with you and you don't know me? Basically, He's saying, you don't know me. You don't know about me and the Father. It's surprising to me.

I would like you to have learned it by now. But Jesus, I think, had only revealed it in subtle ways. And frankly, I think the New Testament has enough clear statements about the deity of Christ to require anyone who's very, very knowledgeable of the New Testament to believe in the deity of Christ. But I think a lot of Christians or believers or people who want to be Christians are not very conversant in the New Testament, and they're not very good at putting together passages that sound different from each other. I mean, not everyone's got a mind that synthesizes the information well. That's something I've always tried to do is synthesize all the things in Scripture so that my view will agree with every statement of Scripture. But when somebody hears that someone said Jesus is God, and yet they're reading in the Bible that He's the Son of God, and they don't know how those two things go together, they might think they're being faithful to God and faithful to Jesus by keeping that separation between Jesus and the Father. I mean, they need to be taught, of course. People need to be taught. And the disciples of Jesus certainly made that separation initially, but then they were taught, and the Holy Spirit led them into all truth.

But that takes a while for some people. And so I'm not going to be the judge. I'll let God be the judge. What I do is instead of deciding that if someone doesn't see it as I think they should see it, instead of my deciding that they're not saved, which is not my call to make, I'd rather just teach them to see it the way I see it if I can.

Just let them know why I do think that and make the best arguments and hopefully persuade them. But if they can't see it, I'm going to leave it in the hands of God to decide what their status is with Him. But doesn't it come down to the historic Jesus?

I mean, you just can't believe. I mean, to me, the Mormons don't have the historic Jesus in view. I mean, they've got somebody else that they're calling Jesus. I mean, it seems like you have to come down to the historic Jesus.

Well, I agree. I agree it has to be the historic Jesus we're talking about. But again, the disciples were walking with the historic Jesus, and they still didn't fully understand all of who He was. And I think that that's entirely possible for someone to believe in the historic Jesus and still not fully grasp who He was.

Now, the Mormons, of course, if they know their theology, they know that the Jesus that their church teaches is the brother of Lucifer, and He's not in any sense God. And therefore, I mean, if they read their Bible, they should easily find out that that's not correct. But again, they read their Bible through the grid of what they've been taught, and their teachers can certainly be blamed.

That's why James said teachers have the stricter judgment, because most people are fairly dependent on their teachers for their first impressions. And once they have their first impressions, even when they read the Bible, they sometimes see it through the grid that their teachers created for them, and they can't see easily what it's saying. I mean, if you were, for example, I don't know into what denomination you were converted, and if you're still in the same denomination, I'm not. I was in a particular denomination when I was converted, and now my views are different on some things. But my first teachers definitely presented me with a grid to read the Bible through, and so I saw, when I read through the Bible initially, I saw everything the way they did because, you know, the screen prevented me from seeing things that were against it.

The human mind does that. So, I mean, that's why it took so long for there to be a Reformation, I think. That's why so many godly people in the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages didn't understand.

I mean, I'm talking about people like St. Francis of Assisi or Hiralamo Savonarola or some of these Catholic people, Madame Guillon, and so forth. I mean, these people who loved God, but they were seeing everything through a grid, even Mother Teresa in her lifetime. She's a wonderful godly woman, but she saw the Bible and Christianity through the grid of the Catholic Church that she had been raised in all her life.

Now, we might say, well, she should have read the Bible well enough to get around that. Well, we could all say that about people who hold the wrong doctrines. They should read the Bible better and not be mistaken. But there's many things a person could be mistaken about and still be trying to understand the historical Jesus, trying to understand the Bible, but they're struggling with things, prejudices that they've been, you know, force-fed. So, I mean, I'm not trying to make it an excuse for people who don't believe the truth. I think that whenever I meet someone who doesn't believe the truth, my desire is to convince them of the truth because I think that's our role, is to give them all the truth and the reasons for seeing it that way. But those who just can't see it that way, for whatever reason, maybe we're not good at explaining it.

Maybe it's never been explained to them before. Then we have to let God decide whether they are His true followers or not because the disciples were true followers of His before they knew He was God. So I'm not making excuses for these people or saying it's okay.

I don't think it's okay for people to be wrong, but it is something we have to live with. I think everyone should be seeking to be right, that is, to seek to have the truth, but if in the time of our seeking we retain some views that we're mistaken about, I don't think God necessarily hates us for that or is going to condemn us for that. But I'm not God. That's just how I see God. I see God as the one who really wants everyone to be saved and is, frankly, I think He'll save everyone He can find an excuse for saving, which is why there are some people in the Old Testament committed for their faith who were pretty raunchy people like Samson. God is more inclined to save than to damn, but of course if somebody is a rebel against Him, they can't save them unless they cease being a rebel. But if they're not rebels against them but they're just making what for them is an honest mistake, I don't really see God as the type of God who says, Wow, you weren't omniscient.

You didn't understand everything. Well, straight to hell for you. I mean, that's just not how I see God.

But many Christians do, and they may not like my approach, but the way I see it, God wants everyone to be saved, and the only ones He won't save I think are the ones He can't because they're in rebellion against Him. Thanks. Okay, God bless you, John. Thanks for your call. All right, let's talk to Dave from Howell, Michigan.

Dave, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling. Hello, Steve.

Am I coming through? Yes, sir. Hello? Oh, great, great. Steve, it's a wonderful program. Boy, we're going to need you through these holidays with all these crazy times, wonderful voice and your knowledge.

I want to become a contributor very soon. I'll get right to my point. You know, I guess I'm pretty much a really strong, red, white, and blue type of John Wayne American, and what I would like to ask is this. With all these crazy times, it seems like America's, you know, maybe the world is turning into Babylon overnight here. But what I'd like to ask is, when it comes to things like civil war and taking up arms, I'm sure Franklin and Jefferson and Washington, they had to, you know, these things were in their mind perhaps.

Can you reflect on, you know, things might be getting crazy. Can you reflect on what Scripture is going to tell us, you know, would the Trinity never ask us to engage in these behaviors? Can you reflect on what the Bible would tell us about that? Well, when it comes to civil war, that's a hard call because it depends on what the war is about. If you're warring to save, you know, all the black people from slavery, you know, a Christian might easily see that that's something that God would favor, but others might think not.

Obviously, during the civil war, there were people who thought that God was not opposed to that. So it makes it very difficult to know if the side you're supporting is all right. Now, I do believe that at this moment in history, this particular country is divided into two sides, and the sides themselves are certainly evil versus good. That doesn't mean everyone on each side. For example, I believe the one side is very evil.

It stands for things that are evil. It doesn't mean everybody who's on that side fully understands that and is an evil person. Likewise, I think that the other side stands for things that are good, but it doesn't mean that everyone who's on that side is a good person. They might be bad people who happen to see it the same way as good people do on these issues.

I would not feel comfortable engaged in a war against fellow Americans who I did not know to be evil. Even if they were supporting, let's say, a party that I know to be evil, I don't know if they know that to be evil. It seems to me that very many people in this country are ignorant of what's really going on, partly because there's been a news blackout for the most part in the media and things that you and I know because we actually do some research to find things out. We know there's some real evil on the other side, but the news media doesn't really publish that. In fact, Facebook and Twitter and those companies have refused to allow there to be enough information out there to let people know how evil one side is.

And that being so, you might find some people on the other side who they don't have the information you have, and therefore they don't know they're on the side that's evil. I don't know why they would be so stupid because, frankly, anyone should know that there's one side in this particular election, for example, that is for killing babies right up until the moment of birth. That's their official position, and some leaders in their movement have been in favor of killing babies after they're born if the parents don't want them. Anyone who says that's not true is simply not paying attention, hasn't read what the Democrats say. I just named them the Democrats.

They are the ones who read their platform, read their platform. You know they want to kill babies, and generally speaking, the other side does not want to kill babies. If that was the only issue, that would be enough to say one side is purely evil. We would say Hitler's evil because he killed innocent people, he killed millions of them, about six million, we're told, but we've killed 60 million babies who were supposed to be protected in their mother's womb, and there's one party that's saying we should keep doing it and more. If that's not evil, then the Nazis are not evil, but the Nazis were evil, that's the point.

Nazism is evil, and so is anyone else who has the same evil in them that the Nazis have. But I still wouldn't, you know, I'm not the type to say I disagree with you, I think you're evil, so I'm going to kill you. So engaging in a civil war would not be my choice to be in. I'd rather war with words and with ideas because I don't know, but the person I might be fighting, possibly even killing if I'm in a war, that they might not be a true Christian who's just not as informed. And I just wouldn't, I'd feel terrible to think that I might kill somebody or hurt somebody who's a brother in the Lord.

Yeah, if I can just real follow questions really quick, I hope I'm not sounding too foolish. Obviously, you know, it's all, I'll be specific, you know, I think Antifa's out of hand, and I'm sure there's a lot of traditional Americans that think that maybe, you know, maybe something, just don't get straightened out quick, maybe a stand needs to be made and there's only one way to do that. Well, a stand does need to be made.

Way out of bounds. Right, a stand does need to be made, and certainly law and order Americans far outnumber the members of Antifa. And I would say that to stand up to them would be a righteous thing to do. I would think that, frankly, you wouldn't need to use lethal force even though they sometimes do.

I mean, they throw bricks and things like that. I mean, I would think that police with rubber bullets or bean bag, you know, shells for shotguns that won't kill people but will stop them and then put them in jail. I mean, I'm for law and order because that's what God made government for, is to punish evildoers and to praise those who do well and to protect those who are innocent. This country, in many of its larger cities, is simply abandoning that and is very evil for doing that. The governors are evil, and the mayors are evil, who do not allow the police to do their God-appointed job.

And frankly, it seems to me like most of those governors and mayors that are doing that are on one side of the political spectrum. But I do think that if the police are forbidden to stand up, then I think the citizens should stand up, but not necessarily to go out there with guns blazing and shooting down people. I think these people, frankly, I think Antifa are people who are pretty much loser people anyway. They don't have the courage of the convictions or else they wouldn't wear a mask.

You wear a mask because you want to do something bad, but you don't want anyone to know that you believed in doing that. So, I mean, these are chicken. They're cowardly losers. And they're not tough. I mean, they're tough when somebody hands them a pile of bricks and says, listen, the police won't shoot back, the police won't stop you, go and break things and kill people even, which they did recently. These are just cowards.

But if someone says, listen, the citizenry is going to stand up to you, and they're going to, frankly, use force against you too, perhaps not deadly force, but force nonetheless, then most of these cowards, I think, would just go running. So I think in any situation like this, though, like where these ideas may come up, I think the bottom line is the Holy Spirit will tell us beyond the shadow of a doubt whether anything of that nature would be acceptable or proper. Would that be correct to say? If we are walking in the Spirit, yes.

Yes, I believe so. Okay. Thank you. God bless. Merry Christmas. Thank you so much, Steve. Okay, same to you. God bless you. You know, I want to take another caller, but they'd only get about 30 seconds.

I don't think that'd be good. Sometimes I say, will you take 30 seconds, and they'll say yes, but then they really can't say what they want in that period of time. So I'm going to have to say no more calls today because I'm going to hear that music in just about a minute, I think, or less.

I'm going to hear it in about 10 seconds. So I should just sign off by telling you The Narrow Path is a website as well as a radio program. And on the website we have hundreds and hundreds of resources that are free and nothing that's for sale. It's thenarrowpath.com. We have lectures, MP3 files you can download for free of the radio program going back many years, also of my teaching verse by verse through the whole Bible and other teachings like that. So you want to check it out, thenarrowpath.com. If you'd like to see a topical index of subject calls from this show you can listen to for free, you can go to another website, www.matthew713.com. That's matthew713.com. If you want to write to us, you can go to our website and donate if you want to. It's thenarrowpath.com. Let's talk again tomorrow. God bless you.