WEBVTT 00:00:00.960 --> 00:00:01.200 It 00:00:01.200 --> 00:00:03.920 is the 5th of February 2026. 00:00:03.920 --> 00:00:04.960 I am Corey J. 00:00:04.960 --> 00:00:07.120 Mahler. This is at any cost. 00:00:07.120 --> 00:00:09.280 This is the 15th episode. 00:00:09.280 --> 00:00:12.160 It is a question and answer episode, and I will go ahead 00:00:12.160 --> 00:00:14.160 and get right into the questions. 00:00:14.160 --> 00:00:18.880 I don't have any housekeeping matters for this week. 00:00:18.880 --> 00:00:22.320 The first question here, I will pull up the actual wording of 00:00:22.320 --> 00:00:24.960 the question instead of just my summary. 00:00:24.960 --> 00:00:28.480 How do we discern between false brethren and those who will be 00:00:28.480 --> 00:00:34.000 saved as through fire, especially given the current climate? 00:00:34.000 --> 00:00:34.560 And so 00:00:37.280 --> 00:00:40.160 This is one of those questions that is going to just be 00:00:40.160 --> 00:00:45.440 relevant for quite some time, given the reality of the times in 00:00:45.440 --> 00:00:46.560 which we live. 00:00:46.560 --> 00:00:49.760 But of course, this is a reference to the passage in First 00:00:49.760 --> 00:00:54.400 Corinthians, and I'll pull that up here. 00:00:54.720 --> 00:00:59.440 Probably helps if I switch over to Logos so you all can 00:00:59.440 --> 00:01:04.800 see that. 00:01:09.280 --> 00:01:10.480 Come on, Lada. 00:01:10.480 --> 00:01:12.880 There we go. 00:01:12.880 --> 00:01:13.200 So 00:01:21.440 --> 00:01:24.800 So the reference here is to first Corinthians three fifteen. 00:01:24.800 --> 00:01:28.320 If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he 00:01:28.320 --> 00:01:31.920 himself will be saved, but only as through fire, and you could 00:01:31.920 --> 00:01:34.400 also read that as if through fire. 00:01:34.400 --> 00:01:37.280 It's not saying that, you know, purgatory, they try to draw that 00:01:37.280 --> 00:01:37.760 out of here. 00:01:37.760 --> 00:01:39.280 This is not purgatory. 00:01:39.280 --> 00:01:41.440 It is exactly what the verse says. 00:01:41.440 --> 00:01:46.240 You suffer the loss of the works not being actually good. 00:01:46.240 --> 00:01:50.480 So for instance, those who do things they think are righteous that 00:01:50.480 --> 00:01:55.200 turn out not to be righteous, those works d you don't get 00:01:55.200 --> 00:01:58.240 credit for them in eternity, basically, is what is being said here. 00:01:58.240 --> 00:02:02.640 This is also a reference to a few places in the Old 00:02:02.640 --> 00:02:06.000 Testament where there's a reference to God pulling something out of the 00:02:06.000 --> 00:02:11.600 fire, which is Almost a proverb, a prover a proverbial saying, that 00:02:11.600 --> 00:02:12.720 thing being rescued. 00:02:12.720 --> 00:02:15.600 So one of those would be I happen to remember this because 00:02:15.600 --> 00:02:20.720 I just read this passage in Zechariah, but Zechariah three, two. 00:02:20.720 --> 00:02:23.920 And the Lord said to the slanderer, of course, the slanderer being 00:02:23.920 --> 00:02:28.080 Satan, one of his names, The Lord rebuke you, O slanderer, and 00:02:28.080 --> 00:02:30.720 the Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you. 00:02:30.720 --> 00:02:34.240 Behold is not this like a brand plucked from the fire. 00:02:34.240 --> 00:02:39.360 And of course it says Jesus here because the Septuagint uses Jesus 00:02:39.440 --> 00:02:43.200 because it's the same name instead of Joshua as it is translated 00:02:43.200 --> 00:02:47.280 in your Bible undoubtedly if you're using the Masoretic text. 00:02:47.600 --> 00:02:54.080 So, this is a proverbial saying, someone who has been rescued from 00:02:54.400 --> 00:03:02.320 destruction. And so, how do we tell those who are not false 00:03:02.320 --> 00:03:07.440 brothers, but are doing wicked things from those who are in fact 00:03:07.760 --> 00:03:08.640 just wicked? 00:03:08.640 --> 00:03:12.320 They're not even real brothers, they are going to spend eternity apart 00:03:12.960 --> 00:03:16.400 from us. 00:03:16.480 --> 00:03:20.240 It almost feels like I have to say this every episode, but 00:03:20.240 --> 00:03:24.560 it remains true and so it bears repeating. 00:03:24.560 --> 00:03:28.080 Part of this is going to be a wisdom call because 00:03:28.960 --> 00:03:33.120 you simply are going to have to be able to tell true 00:03:33.120 --> 00:03:35.120 brothers from false brothers. 00:03:35.120 --> 00:03:38.000 Part of this is going to, of course, be works, right? 00:03:38.000 --> 00:03:42.080 Because a Christian is known by his works ultimately. 00:03:42.080 --> 00:03:44.720 Yes, it is your faith that saves you, but your faith is 00:03:44.720 --> 00:03:46.400 demonstrated in your works. 00:03:46.400 --> 00:03:49.840 And so you can look at the works of those who are 00:03:49.840 --> 00:03:52.640 claiming to be Christian, and you can run an assessment on the 00:03:53.200 --> 00:03:54.320 basis of those works. 00:03:54.400 --> 00:03:55.920 It's not a wicked thing to do that. 00:03:55.920 --> 00:04:00.400 In fact, that is using your God given wisdom. 00:04:00.400 --> 00:04:04.320 So if you have someone who claims to be a Christian brother, 00:04:04.320 --> 00:04:07.440 but everything he does in his life is wicked. 00:04:07.440 --> 00:04:10.640 And we can, of course, think of the most obvious examples of 00:04:10.640 --> 00:04:16.720 this. You have the female so-called pastor in the rainbow stole saying, 00:04:16.720 --> 00:04:19.600 you know, BLM and all that nonsense, right? 00:04:19.600 --> 00:04:23.440 Clearly not your sister in Christ. 00:04:23.680 --> 00:04:25.280 That's the obvious example. 00:04:25.280 --> 00:04:27.120 We're not asking really about that. 00:04:27.120 --> 00:04:29.280 That's not difficult. 00:04:29.280 --> 00:04:31.200 Everyone can make that call. 00:04:31.360 --> 00:04:34.800 The question is how do you discern those who are 00:04:36.560 --> 00:04:39.280 closer to being Christian, right? 00:04:39.280 --> 00:04:42.640 They're better at presenting themselves as Christian. 00:04:42.640 --> 00:04:43.280 And And 00:04:44.240 --> 00:04:47.520 the better the person is at deceiving, the harder it is going 00:04:47.520 --> 00:04:48.720 to be to detect him. 00:04:48.720 --> 00:04:50.560 That's sort of how deception goes. 00:04:50.560 --> 00:04:53.440 It's one of the reasons that sometimes what Satan is doing is 00:04:53.440 --> 00:04:55.520 difficult because Satan's very good at deceiving. 00:04:55.520 --> 00:04:57.040 He's been doing it a long time. 00:04:57.040 --> 00:04:59.200 He He doesn't sleep. 00:04:59.200 --> 00:05:02.640 He's better than most human beings at deceiving people. 00:05:02.640 --> 00:05:04.720 Most people aren't that good at it. 00:05:04.720 --> 00:05:08.960 And so you can get a pretty good feel for whether or 00:05:08.960 --> 00:05:13.520 not someone is trying to, you know, maneuver you to stab you 00:05:13.520 --> 00:05:16.480 in the back to be sort of blunt. 00:05:16.480 --> 00:05:17.600 You have instincts. 00:05:17.600 --> 00:05:19.280 God gave you instincts. 00:05:19.280 --> 00:05:21.280 In large part you should trust those. 00:05:21.280 --> 00:05:22.960 They're not always accurate. 00:05:22.960 --> 00:05:27.600 Sometimes they're ninety-five% accurate instead of 100%. 00:05:27.600 --> 00:05:31.440 But you should trust them at least as a data point in 00:05:31.440 --> 00:05:33.280 making your final assessment. 00:05:33.280 --> 00:05:38.880 And so if someone gives you a really bad feeling, well, those 00:05:38.880 --> 00:05:42.960 are your God-given senses telling you there's something off here, there's something 00:05:42.960 --> 00:05:43.520 wrong here. 00:05:43.520 --> 00:05:45.040 Listen to that. 00:05:45.040 --> 00:05:47.600 But the biggest part of it is going to be looking at 00:05:47.600 --> 00:05:48.800 those works. 00:05:48.800 --> 00:05:51.840 If you have someone who is producing good works who happens to 00:05:51.840 --> 00:05:54.720 simply be an error, that's a different thing. 00:05:54.720 --> 00:05:56.880 You should want to rescue that brother from his error. 00:05:56.880 --> 00:05:58.640 He is not a false brother. 00:05:58.640 --> 00:06:00.400 He's simply a brother in error. 00:06:00.400 --> 00:06:01.920 There are many of those. 00:06:01.920 --> 00:06:06.160 Most Christians are going to have some false belief somewhere. 00:06:06.160 --> 00:06:09.920 It's not going to damn you if you have some minor false 00:06:09.920 --> 00:06:12.880 belief. There's a question about that later on, so I'll get into 00:06:12.880 --> 00:06:15.120 that when I get to that question. 00:06:15.120 --> 00:06:16.240 Hopefully get to that question. 00:06:16.240 --> 00:06:18.320 There are a lot of questions. 00:06:18.320 --> 00:06:18.640 So 00:06:19.760 --> 00:06:25.920 for the false brothers, it's very similar to what we have to 00:06:25.920 --> 00:06:31.120 do all the time in our current social and political climate. 00:06:31.120 --> 00:06:33.120 We're all accustomed to this. 00:06:33.120 --> 00:06:37.680 If you are dealing with new people, you don't go ahead and 00:06:37.680 --> 00:06:42.320 bring up all of your political beliefs right up front. 00:06:42.320 --> 00:06:45.280 Right? Particularly if you're one of us, right? 00:06:45.280 --> 00:06:48.240 You're a guy who's on the far right, so to speak. 00:06:48.240 --> 00:06:51.680 You're not far right by historical standards, of course, because most of 00:06:51.680 --> 00:06:54.720 us are pretty moderate by historical standards, even if you would call 00:06:54.720 --> 00:06:56.560 yourself far right. 00:06:56.560 --> 00:07:01.120 A separate topic perhaps, but related here. 00:07:01.120 --> 00:07:05.200 You already know how to do this because you know that many 00:07:05.200 --> 00:07:06.720 times you are going to be dealing with people 00:07:07.840 --> 00:07:13.600 in society, in your social life, who would cause you harm if 00:07:13.600 --> 00:07:17.520 you revealed all of the things that you actually believe. 00:07:17.520 --> 00:07:21.040 And so you're already running that sort of assessment. 00:07:21.040 --> 00:07:24.080 Unfortunately, you have to run that assessment in the churches as well, 00:07:24.080 --> 00:07:27.760 particularly these days, because there are many false Christians. 00:07:27.760 --> 00:07:31.200 There are many who claim the name of Christ and don't follow 00:07:31.200 --> 00:07:32.080 Christ at all. 00:07:32.320 --> 00:07:33.760 We run into this all the time. 00:07:33.760 --> 00:07:39.280 You can see many examples of this, particularly on X where any 00:07:39.440 --> 00:07:44.000 number of us at this point will post a Bible verse, sometimes 00:07:44.000 --> 00:07:47.280 in quotes, sometimes not, and then someone says, Well, I don't believe 00:07:47.280 --> 00:07:49.360 that. Well, that's the problem. 00:07:49.360 --> 00:07:54.720 They don't actually believe what Christianity teaches because they aren't actually Christians. 00:07:54.720 --> 00:08:00.240 And so use those skills that you have undoubtedly developed with regard 00:08:00.240 --> 00:08:05.440 to politics and just living your life in society, and translate that 00:08:05.440 --> 00:08:06.800 into the church. 00:08:06.800 --> 00:08:10.160 It's again unfortunate, but that is the reality of where we are 00:08:10.160 --> 00:08:10.480 today 00:08:11.600 --> 00:08:16.160 And you can also think of the verses that speak of handing 00:08:16.160 --> 00:08:18.240 someone over to Satan, right? 00:08:18.560 --> 00:08:24.480 Because ultimately that is the point of driving someone from that fellowship 00:08:24.560 --> 00:08:27.120 is you want him to repent, right? 00:08:27.120 --> 00:08:29.360 That's it's speaking of excommunication. 00:08:29.360 --> 00:08:31.760 And I know that someone in the comments will post weren't you 00:08:31.760 --> 00:08:34.240 excommunicated? Yes. 00:08:34.240 --> 00:08:40.240 By a church that thought that racism, sexism sexism and anti-Semitism were 00:08:40.240 --> 00:08:46.560 sins. Found nowhere in scripture, addressed thoroughly in Stone Choir and elsewhere. 00:08:46.560 --> 00:08:49.520 So for those who want to look for those, that's all there. 00:08:49.520 --> 00:08:51.920 I can put some of that in the show notes as well. 00:08:51.920 --> 00:08:52.320 And And 00:08:53.600 --> 00:08:55.760 obviously I recognize that happened. 00:08:55.760 --> 00:08:57.600 Luther was excommunicated. 00:08:57.600 --> 00:09:00.480 Chrysostom was driven from his church at some point. 00:09:00.480 --> 00:09:04.080 You can think, of course, of Matthew five, right? 00:09:04.080 --> 00:09:07.840 Your reward will be great in heaven because these people who are 00:09:07.840 --> 00:09:12.640 persecuting us today for believing the things that Christians have always believed, 00:09:12.640 --> 00:09:18.960 well, their ancestors, spiritual or physical in many cases, persecuted the prophets 00:09:19.440 --> 00:09:20.560 in the same way. 00:09:20.560 --> 00:09:24.400 So blessed are you when they persecute you for the sake of 00:09:24.400 --> 00:09:27.920 Christ. So I and of course I posted the video of me 00:09:27.920 --> 00:09:30.320 being challenged by police outside my church. 00:09:30.320 --> 00:09:31.200 I'm not hiding that. 00:09:31.200 --> 00:09:33.520 I recognize that's the reality of where we are today. 00:09:33.520 --> 00:09:35.680 It's important for people to see that. 00:09:35.680 --> 00:09:40.080 Like I've mentioned before, when people ask about, say, confronting their pastor 00:09:40.080 --> 00:09:44.400 on some particular issue of false doctrine, usually Judaizing, but sometimes other 00:09:44.400 --> 00:09:50.000 things. Your outcome may very well be that he calls the police 00:09:50.000 --> 00:09:52.560 on you and has you escorted out of the building. 00:09:52.560 --> 00:09:55.040 So I tell people you need to be ready for that. 00:09:55.040 --> 00:09:56.720 It doesn't mean that you don't do it. 00:09:57.040 --> 00:09:58.400 It means you be ready for it. 00:09:58.400 --> 00:10:02.640 But to get back to the immediate question about false brothers, exercise 00:10:02.640 --> 00:10:06.240 the wisdom that God has given you and run the same sort 00:10:06.240 --> 00:10:11.440 of identical friend or foe analysis that you would in the world 00:10:11.440 --> 00:10:17.120 at large with regard to social and political issues. 00:10:17.200 --> 00:10:19.760 Pull up the next question here. 00:10:24.560 --> 00:10:27.440 Next question is about the Lutheran Church. 00:10:27.440 --> 00:10:29.920 I don't believe I answered this one previously. 00:10:29.920 --> 00:10:32.480 I think I answered something that was similar to it. 00:10:32.480 --> 00:10:34.480 And so I'm remembering that. 00:10:34.640 --> 00:10:37.600 But the question is I have been strongly considering joining our local 00:10:37.600 --> 00:10:39.360 LCMS congregation. 00:10:39.360 --> 00:10:42.000 I don't know how many Lutherans in the area I live in, 00:10:42.000 --> 00:10:44.480 or I don't know many Lutherans in the area I live in, 00:10:44.480 --> 00:10:47.120 nor was I raised Lutheran, but I do believe the Lutheran confessions 00:10:47.120 --> 00:10:49.200 are consonant with the Word of God and is the only church 00:10:49.200 --> 00:10:51.680 I wish to advance being a member of. 00:10:51.680 --> 00:10:55.440 One of the obvious things noted after viewing the congregation's staff is 00:10:55.440 --> 00:10:58.160 that there's a female educator in quotes. 00:10:58.160 --> 00:11:01.440 I would presume this may being a Sunday school or Bible study 00:11:01.440 --> 00:11:03.120 teacher again in quotes. 00:11:03.120 --> 00:11:06.160 Do you have any advice on how to proceed visiting the church 00:11:06.160 --> 00:11:08.000 service at this congregation? 00:11:08.000 --> 00:11:11.600 Or is this a clear marker to stay away? 00:11:11.600 --> 00:11:16.240 So I don't think it's necessarily a clear marker to stay away 00:11:16.320 --> 00:11:21.200 because it's going to depend on what educator means, right? 00:11:21.280 --> 00:11:22.640 Could be a teacher. 00:11:22.640 --> 00:11:24.960 We have and in th in that case I mean a a 00:11:24.960 --> 00:11:28.640 school teacher, not a Bible study teacher, it's a different thing. 00:11:28.640 --> 00:11:31.600 In many cases, you're going to have a school attached to the 00:11:31.600 --> 00:11:35.120 church, and so if it's an educator in that sense, that's not 00:11:35.120 --> 00:11:38.720 a problem, because it's going to be a a primary school. 00:11:38.720 --> 00:11:42.400 They're going to be teaching children, which women are permitted to teach 00:11:42.400 --> 00:11:43.840 children, that's fine. 00:11:43.840 --> 00:11:46.560 Women are permitted to teach other women as well. 00:11:46.560 --> 00:11:50.880 There's some limits on that, but that's sort of a tangential issue. 00:11:51.840 --> 00:11:55.360 If you have a woman who is leading the Bible study that 00:11:55.360 --> 00:11:58.560 is mixed men and women, that's unacceptable. 00:11:58.560 --> 00:12:01.280 If you have a woman who is standing up and teaching and 00:12:01.280 --> 00:12:03.680 just saying that she's not acting like a pastor, but that's really 00:12:03.680 --> 00:12:06.560 what she's doing, that's not acceptable either. 00:12:06.560 --> 00:12:11.360 The best way to figure it out is either attend a service 00:12:11.360 --> 00:12:13.680 or watch one online. 00:12:13.680 --> 00:12:19.040 If you're watching online, you can probably get through things much more 00:12:19.040 --> 00:12:22.160 quickly, much more efficiently because you can skip around and figure out 00:12:22.160 --> 00:12:25.040 if she appears and if she does appear what she's doing. 00:12:25.040 --> 00:12:27.680 So I would say just do that. 00:12:27.680 --> 00:12:29.840 Check the live stream if they have it. 00:12:29.840 --> 00:12:34.560 Check their back catalog of stream services if they have that, that's 00:12:34.480 --> 00:12:35.920 the easiest way. 00:12:35.920 --> 00:12:37.760 Or go to a service. 00:12:37.760 --> 00:12:41.600 You could email the pastor and see what he says. 00:12:41.600 --> 00:12:44.240 That's also an option, but I think the easiest way is just 00:12:44.240 --> 00:12:46.640 look at what they're actually doing. 00:12:46.640 --> 00:12:49.120 Women should, of course, not be doing those things. 00:12:49.120 --> 00:12:53.920 I've gone into that before, many places and many times, but 00:12:54.880 --> 00:12:57.680 it's not necessarily a red flag that she's listed. 00:12:57.680 --> 00:12:59.280 People just like to be listed. 00:12:59.280 --> 00:13:00.480 They like to be included. 00:13:00.480 --> 00:13:02.240 They like to be on the website. 00:13:02.240 --> 00:13:04.640 It may be she's doing nothing wrong. 00:13:04.640 --> 00:13:08.800 There's a non-trivial chance she's doing something she shouldn't be doing, but 00:13:08.880 --> 00:13:11.600 the only way to figure out which one it is is to 00:13:11.600 --> 00:13:15.440 actually look at the service or attend one of the services. 00:13:15.440 --> 00:13:15.760 So 00:13:16.720 --> 00:13:18.080 hopefully it's a good church. 00:13:18.080 --> 00:13:21.760 Hopefully she's not doing things that God has told her not to 00:13:21.760 --> 00:13:23.440 do. But these days 00:13:24.880 --> 00:13:28.640 you just have to check. 00:13:28.640 --> 00:13:31.840 The next question is about Greek. 00:13:31.840 --> 00:13:32.880 Hello, Cory. 00:13:32.880 --> 00:13:36.080 I'm early in my Koina Greek journey myself and greatly enjoyed your 00:13:36.080 --> 00:13:38.000 Septuagint series. 00:13:38.000 --> 00:13:39.440 Thanks for the great content. 00:13:39.440 --> 00:13:42.480 I have a few questions about your learning process that would be 00:13:42.480 --> 00:13:43.520 super helpful. 00:13:43.520 --> 00:13:44.800 One, timeline. 00:13:44.960 --> 00:13:47.440 How long did it take you to feel comfortable with your understanding 00:13:47.440 --> 00:13:47.920 of Greek? 00:13:47.920 --> 00:13:50.000 I'll just answer these sequences. 00:13:50.000 --> 00:13:52.080 I'm not fluent in Greek. 00:13:52.080 --> 00:13:56.000 And I'm obviously completely fine admitting that. 00:13:56.000 --> 00:13:59.840 I am probably quite a ways off from being fluent in Greek. 00:13:59.840 --> 00:14:02.720 My German is much better than my Greek my Latin is better 00:14:02.720 --> 00:14:04.160 than my Greek. 00:14:04.160 --> 00:14:05.200 But well 00:14:06.160 --> 00:14:08.160 maybe at this point they're about parody. 00:14:08.160 --> 00:14:08.480 But 00:14:09.920 --> 00:14:14.080 I don't need to have the fluency in that sense because I 00:14:14.080 --> 00:14:16.640 understand the mechanics of how language works. 00:14:16.640 --> 00:14:18.640 I'm pretty good with that part of it. 00:14:18.640 --> 00:14:21.680 And so having access to things like logos, which obviously I pull 00:14:21.680 --> 00:14:23.200 that up all the time. 00:14:23.200 --> 00:14:26.160 You can use the language if you understand the mechanics of how 00:14:26.160 --> 00:14:27.920 a language works. 00:14:27.920 --> 00:14:30.720 Obviously, it helps a lot if you know the alphabet because Greek's 00:14:30.640 --> 00:14:32.400 a different alphabet. 00:14:32.400 --> 00:14:36.960 But if you know those basics and then you understand language, you 00:14:36.960 --> 00:14:42.640 can achieve a lot without yourself being fluent, absent access to those 00:14:42.640 --> 00:14:48.640 materials. So in terms of the timeline, I can't give you really 00:14:48.640 --> 00:14:51.520 an answer because I'm not personally fluent. 00:14:51.520 --> 00:14:56.080 The general rule for a language is going to be something like 00:14:56.080 --> 00:14:58.880 ten thousand hours, I think it is that you want to invest 00:14:58.960 --> 00:15:01.280 to reach a certain level of fluency. 00:15:01.280 --> 00:15:05.040 It's going to depend on the distance of the language from your 00:15:05.040 --> 00:15:07.520 native language and other languages you know. 00:15:07.520 --> 00:15:11.760 So for instance, if you know Italian, right, it will take you 00:15:11.760 --> 00:15:15.200 less time to pick up Latin than Japanese. 00:15:15.200 --> 00:15:17.360 So that's going to partly depend there. 00:15:17.360 --> 00:15:21.440 Greek is a little more distant from other European languages, so as 00:15:21.440 --> 00:15:25.840 an English speaker, it is not something where you have huge overlap. 00:15:25.840 --> 00:15:28.480 You already know some of the term, some of the language, the 00:15:28.480 --> 00:15:33.200 vocabulary, just because English has imported so much from Greek? 00:15:33.200 --> 00:15:39.440 Mostly Latin and French, right, and obviously French ultimately Latin some German 00:15:40.160 --> 00:15:42.640 in the case of French being some German, not in the case 00:15:42.640 --> 00:15:43.120 of English. 00:15:43.120 --> 00:15:47.920 English is a lot of German But not as much of an 00:15:47.920 --> 00:15:51.920 overlap in terms of the overall language, English and Greek. 00:15:51.920 --> 00:15:54.640 So there's a lot of stuff that's going to be new for 00:15:54.640 --> 00:15:55.920 an English speaker. 00:15:55.920 --> 00:15:58.240 Not least of all because English has dropped a lot of the 00:15:58.240 --> 00:16:01.840 things that other languages have, inflection and things like that. 00:16:01.840 --> 00:16:04.480 We have very little of that left in English. 00:16:04.480 --> 00:16:10.160 Personal pronouns basically the only exception the word blonde, which we ultimately 00:16:10.160 --> 00:16:13.520 Latin, but we took it from the French there, and so that's 00:16:13.520 --> 00:16:15.360 why that E is on the end. 00:16:15.360 --> 00:16:18.640 It's blonde with an E if it's referring to a female. 00:16:18.640 --> 00:16:21.200 It's blonde without the E if it's referring to a male. 00:16:21.200 --> 00:16:23.600 Everyone forgets that rule, but it's one of the only things in 00:16:23.600 --> 00:16:27.520 English we have that's inflected other than the personal pronouns. 00:16:27.520 --> 00:16:27.840 But 00:16:28.800 --> 00:16:31.760 that's basically the rough answer for timeline. 00:16:31.760 --> 00:16:33.680 Grammar reliance is the second question. 00:16:33.680 --> 00:16:35.600 Do you still need to frequently reference grammar? 00:16:35.600 --> 00:16:40.480 Yes. For me, the in the sense of referencing a grammar, which 00:16:40.480 --> 00:16:45.600 is telling me functionally how the mechanics of Greek works, I don't 00:16:45.520 --> 00:16:48.960 have to reference it in sense of what most people hear when 00:16:48.960 --> 00:16:52.160 they hear grammar, because I know that stuff. 00:16:52.160 --> 00:16:55.760 I know what the accusative is, I know what the dative is 00:16:55.840 --> 00:16:58.960 and the genitive and all of these things. 00:16:58.960 --> 00:17:06.080 But in order to actually understand how a particular Greek verb has 00:17:06.080 --> 00:17:09.600 been conjugated, yes, of course, I'm going to use logos, but the 00:17:09.600 --> 00:17:14.000 nice thing about logos is I'll go ahead and just switch back 00:17:14.000 --> 00:17:16.400 over to Logos here for a second. 00:17:16.400 --> 00:17:21.120 One of the nicest things about Logos is let's pull up uh 00:17:22.160 --> 00:17:26.560 not the Nets, because the Nets does not have the full thing 00:17:26.560 --> 00:17:27.680 that I want here. 00:17:27.840 --> 00:17:29.680 So we'll pull up the Lexum. 00:17:29.680 --> 00:17:31.280 And so one of the nice things here, right? 00:17:31.280 --> 00:17:32.320 Like garments. 00:17:32.320 --> 00:17:35.040 I click on this and it tells me, of course, it doesn't 00:17:34.960 --> 00:17:38.640 show the interstitial menu to you, because why would it do that? 00:17:38.640 --> 00:17:41.920 But anyway, if you click on a word, it gives you all 00:17:41.920 --> 00:17:45.920 the information you need about the word, which obviously very useful. 00:17:45.920 --> 00:17:48.640 It also gives it down in the lower left, which it also 00:17:48.640 --> 00:17:51.680 does not show in the preview for streaming because 00:17:53.040 --> 00:17:54.960 why would they implement that? 00:17:55.120 --> 00:17:58.480 But with these sorts of tools, you can get a lot done 00:17:58.480 --> 00:18:03.920 in a language in which you are not yet, anyway, personally fluent. 00:18:03.920 --> 00:18:06.880 Methods and resources, the third subquestion, as it were. 00:18:07.120 --> 00:18:09.760 What did you use to learn and what was your overall approach? 00:18:09.760 --> 00:18:13.280 I have some Greek books, just standard language learning books, and then 00:18:13.280 --> 00:18:17.040 I've used some online tools a bit and then most of it 00:18:17.040 --> 00:18:20.480 has just been looking at scripture, switching back and forth between the 00:18:20.480 --> 00:18:25.840 Greek and the English and using the available tools in Logos. 00:18:26.000 --> 00:18:27.360 Because the tools are very nice. 00:18:27.360 --> 00:18:30.240 And no, this is not an advertisement for Lagos. 00:18:30.240 --> 00:18:33.600 I absolutely hate their pricing model and I think that it's highway 00:18:33.600 --> 00:18:41.040 robbery. But the reality of our situation is that these tools overcharge 00:18:41.360 --> 00:18:44.720 and part of it is not their fault to give them credit 00:18:44.720 --> 00:18:45.920 where credit is due. 00:18:46.240 --> 00:18:50.960 Because of course, this is IP intellectual property, and so the ultimate 00:18:50.960 --> 00:18:53.520 owners of these things get to set some of the terms and 00:18:53.520 --> 00:18:54.880 the prices and things like that. 00:18:54.880 --> 00:18:57.520 And so they don't have 100% control. 00:18:57.520 --> 00:19:02.640 But my position, as I've been very clear all along, long held 00:19:02.800 --> 00:19:07.760 position, most resources of this kind at least should be free. 00:19:07.760 --> 00:19:11.200 The men who are capable of using these resources who aren't going 00:19:11.200 --> 00:19:14.800 to get off into crazy trouble on their own with them, should 00:19:14.800 --> 00:19:16.400 have access to these. 00:19:16.400 --> 00:19:21.280 If someone is going to seminary to be a theologian, someone who 00:19:21.280 --> 00:19:24.160 has the skills to do that, he should just have access to 00:19:24.160 --> 00:19:26.160 all of the materials for free. 00:19:26.160 --> 00:19:29.280 You should not be gatekeeping things related to God. 00:19:29.280 --> 00:19:30.880 That's completely ridiculous. 00:19:30.880 --> 00:19:33.280 No Christian should want to do that. 00:19:33.280 --> 00:19:36.480 But tangential issue there. 00:19:36.480 --> 00:19:39.120 The fourth and final sub question. 00:19:39.120 --> 00:19:43.840 You recommend modern Greek pronunciation, very much so over Erasmian. 00:19:43.840 --> 00:19:48.880 However, most koina materials seem to stick exclusively to Erasmian, that's also 00:19:48.880 --> 00:19:53.200 true. What's the best way to learn and practice modern pronunciation for 00:19:53.200 --> 00:19:57.280 Koina? So for for modern pronunciation, you're just learning modern pronunciation. 00:19:57.280 --> 00:20:00.080 You're not learning it for koina, really. 00:20:00.080 --> 00:20:02.480 It's not sort of 00:20:03.520 --> 00:20:10.080 the difference here is that Greek hasn't changed as much as English 00:20:10.320 --> 00:20:11.920 in the same period of time. 00:20:11.920 --> 00:20:14.240 Of course, English isn't that old. 00:20:14.240 --> 00:20:17.280 But it's closer to say what German has done. 00:20:17.280 --> 00:20:21.040 And so I've mentioned before, I can pick up a German text 00:20:21.040 --> 00:20:24.240 from the 1500s and get through it just fine. 00:20:24.240 --> 00:20:27.200 There will be some quirks, there are some rules that have changed, 00:20:27.200 --> 00:20:31.360 there have been some standardizations in terms of spelling, but by and 00:20:31.360 --> 00:20:35.440 large, any German speaker can pick up a text from the fifteen 00:20:35.520 --> 00:20:37.280 hundreds in German and read it. 00:20:37.280 --> 00:20:40.320 So I have a Luther Bible that's on my shelf over here 00:20:40.400 --> 00:20:43.040 from fifteen forty five. 00:20:43.040 --> 00:20:46.400 That's not that much more difficult to read than modern German. 00:20:46.400 --> 00:20:48.400 English is not the same. 00:20:48.400 --> 00:20:49.840 Because English has changed a lot. 00:20:49.840 --> 00:20:52.800 You have Old English, you have Middle English, you have modern English. 00:20:52.800 --> 00:20:56.320 And I'll put a link to Caucer in the show notes for 00:20:56.320 --> 00:20:58.480 anyone wants to go and look at it, you can see how 00:20:58.480 --> 00:21:00.240 much it's changed. 00:21:00.240 --> 00:21:03.840 For Greek it's not as big of a change, so just learn 00:21:03.840 --> 00:21:07.440 how modern Greeks pronounce their words and then read the koina as 00:21:07.440 --> 00:21:08.720 if it were modern Greek. 00:21:08.880 --> 00:21:11.920 There are some things that have changed, there's some spelling quirks and 00:21:11.920 --> 00:21:15.760 things like that, but you won't have trouble doing that. 00:21:15.760 --> 00:21:21.200 And the reason I recommend that you learn modern pronunciation in Otkoina, 00:21:21.200 --> 00:21:22.720 really it's kind of twofold. 00:21:22.720 --> 00:21:29.280 One, Erasmus just constructed his pronunciation rules, partly because he didn't want 00:21:29.280 --> 00:21:32.640 any vowels to sound the same. 00:21:32.640 --> 00:21:35.680 The problem is natural language has things that sound the same. 00:21:36.000 --> 00:21:36.960 That happens. 00:21:36.960 --> 00:21:41.120 I can think of a number of different vowel pairings in German 00:21:41.360 --> 00:21:44.160 that are not the same but sound the same. 00:21:44.160 --> 00:21:45.840 And English does the same thing, of course. 00:21:45.840 --> 00:21:48.560 English a little less so because So, because English has a lot 00:21:48.560 --> 00:21:52.880 of weird sounds from importing other languages and blending them together. 00:21:52.880 --> 00:21:56.560 But the second part of the reason would be that you have 00:21:56.560 --> 00:22:01.280 an entire world of materials available to you if you are learning 00:22:02.000 --> 00:22:06.560 modern pronunciation, because the Greek still exists. 00:22:06.880 --> 00:22:08.480 The Greek language still exists. 00:22:08.480 --> 00:22:10.560 The Greek language is still in use. 00:22:10.560 --> 00:22:14.640 If you are learning Erasmian, that's not in use because it was 00:22:14.640 --> 00:22:18.160 never in use, because it was never a real thing. 00:22:18.160 --> 00:22:24.240 It was a constructed pronunciation of Greek specifically for use in biblical 00:22:24.240 --> 00:22:30.400 studies. So just use modern Greek because you're going to have more 00:22:30.400 --> 00:22:33.840 materials available to you, and it will actually be helpful as well. 00:22:33.840 --> 00:22:37.360 Because, say, you want to visit Greece at some point, you'll actually 00:22:37.360 --> 00:22:39.280 be able to speak to people. 00:22:39.280 --> 00:22:41.040 Not if you learn Erasmian. 00:22:41.040 --> 00:22:43.440 They'll look at you like you have two heads. 00:22:43.440 --> 00:22:43.760 So 00:22:44.720 --> 00:22:46.800 it just makes more sense to learn modern. 00:22:46.800 --> 00:22:51.200 There's no there's no benefit to learning the Erasmian other than 00:22:52.080 --> 00:22:56.240 you can talk to pastors who also learned it. 00:22:56.240 --> 00:23:00.640 But I don't think that's very compelling. 00:23:00.960 --> 00:23:04.640 The next question, moving on to some of the questions from 00:23:05.760 --> 00:23:10.240 X, I believe now. 00:23:10.240 --> 00:23:13.680 I don't know that I will get to many of the questions 00:23:13.680 --> 00:23:14.960 in the chat this time. 00:23:14.960 --> 00:23:18.240 I will go through and write them down because I have a 00:23:18.240 --> 00:23:19.360 lot A lot of questions. 00:23:19.360 --> 00:23:27.600 I will not get through all of them this episode. 00:23:27.680 --> 00:23:31.840 But the next question, what are your thoughts on why the left 00:23:31.840 --> 00:23:35.520 can organize so easily often around a single issue while the right 00:23:35.520 --> 00:23:39.440 cannot seem to do so, even on a very small scale. 00:23:39.440 --> 00:23:43.440 I'm thinking about the American context specifically, it seems like there are 00:23:43.440 --> 00:23:48.560 relevant internal and external factors. 00:23:48.560 --> 00:23:55.120 This is very true, and it certainly makes things more difficult in 00:23:55.120 --> 00:23:57.760 the American context. 00:23:57.760 --> 00:23:58.400 Because 00:24:00.400 --> 00:24:03.520 let's see, what is the the best way to start for the 00:24:03.520 --> 00:24:04.560 core reason here? 00:24:04.560 --> 00:24:09.120 The core reason really is that politics is the identity of the 00:24:09.120 --> 00:24:09.600 left 00:24:10.560 --> 00:24:16.160 That is who they are because they ultimately found their life on 00:24:16.160 --> 00:24:22.560 that. They don't have any other coherent organizing principle, they don't have 00:24:22.560 --> 00:24:25.600 something that means more to them than politics. 00:24:25.600 --> 00:24:27.760 Politics is their life. 00:24:27.760 --> 00:24:29.920 Politics is their core. 00:24:29.920 --> 00:24:34.080 And so it's going to make it easier to organize people when 00:24:34.080 --> 00:24:39.040 you are appealing to their highest principle to speak about principles they 00:24:39.040 --> 00:24:42.400 don't have, but when you are appealing to them in that way 00:24:42.880 --> 00:24:47.680 versus the right, well anyone on the right has things that he 00:24:47.680 --> 00:24:48.720 cares about ultimately 00:24:49.920 --> 00:24:51.520 more than politics. 00:24:51.520 --> 00:24:53.600 And that's correct, you should. 00:24:53.600 --> 00:24:56.480 You care about your family more than politics. 00:24:56.480 --> 00:25:00.320 You care about politics because you care about your family. 00:25:00.320 --> 00:25:04.080 You care about God more than you care about politics. 00:25:04.080 --> 00:25:08.000 You care about politics because you care about God, because you want 00:25:08.000 --> 00:25:11.760 to bring our politics in line with what God demands. 00:25:11.760 --> 00:25:13.840 Ultimately, that's what Christian nationalism is. 00:25:13.840 --> 00:25:17.040 It's sort of a sh a short A short summary of that, 00:25:17.040 --> 00:25:17.360 but 00:25:18.560 --> 00:25:21.440 politics is the end goal for the left. 00:25:21.440 --> 00:25:26.400 Because the left is animated almost exclusively by power. 00:25:26.400 --> 00:25:28.160 Which they're not wrong for that. 00:25:28.160 --> 00:25:29.280 They recognize that power 00:25:30.160 --> 00:25:32.400 ultimately is what matters in these affairs. 00:25:32.400 --> 00:25:33.360 And that's true. 00:25:33.360 --> 00:25:35.280 The person who has the power sets the rules. 00:25:35.280 --> 00:25:38.400 Might makes right in a certain sense of right. 00:25:38.400 --> 00:25:42.560 Not in the sense of ultimate moral good versus wrong, right? 00:25:42.560 --> 00:25:46.400 But in the sense that the person who has the power gets 00:25:46.400 --> 00:25:48.480 to set the terms and say what is right and wrong. 00:25:48.480 --> 00:25:49.520 That's absolutely true. 00:25:49.760 --> 00:25:52.320 the left is better at recognizing that than the right, at least 00:25:52.320 --> 00:25:53.200 these days. 00:25:54.080 --> 00:25:58.400 In the American context, there's another aspect of it. 00:25:58.400 --> 00:25:59.680 It's actually perhaps 00:26:00.560 --> 00:26:02.960 two facets, same thing. 00:26:02.960 --> 00:26:07.120 The first part of it would be that we have this strain 00:26:07.120 --> 00:26:10.960 of individualism and just sort of being 00:26:12.240 --> 00:26:18.160 obstreperous almost, just being disagreeable in the US, particularly on the right 00:26:18.160 --> 00:26:20.000 side of politics. 00:26:20.720 --> 00:26:23.680 That has been there since the beginning in the American context. 00:26:23.680 --> 00:26:28.240 Part of it is going to be constitutional, not uppercase C referring 00:26:28.240 --> 00:26:32.320 to the document, but lowercase C referring to the people, because 00:26:33.600 --> 00:26:36.800 just some of the people who came over here from Europe were 00:26:36.800 --> 00:26:38.880 more like that than average. 00:26:38.880 --> 00:26:42.240 And it has entrenched over time a bit of its genetic in 00:26:42.240 --> 00:26:43.120 our case. 00:26:43.120 --> 00:26:46.240 Partly because, you know, we have the Scottish admixture and things like 00:26:46.240 --> 00:26:51.760 that, people who are a little less agreeable, and Germans aren't entirely 00:26:51.760 --> 00:26:53.760 agreeable when it comes to certain things. 00:26:53.760 --> 00:26:56.640 So part of it is going to be constitutional in that sense 00:26:56.640 --> 00:27:00.160 for us and then in Germany entrenched and sort of a feedback 00:27:00.160 --> 00:27:03.680 loop with how our society has been organized. 00:27:03.680 --> 00:27:08.400 And then there is also the fact, the second facet of this, 00:27:08.400 --> 00:27:12.000 libertarianism has long been a force 00:27:12.960 --> 00:27:16.400 on the right side of politics in the US. 00:27:16.400 --> 00:27:21.600 Left as well, but very minor over there because left libertarian never 00:27:21.600 --> 00:27:24.080 really got any traction. 00:27:24.080 --> 00:27:31.280 Supposedly, right-wing libertarianism has for many years, decades, been part of the 00:27:31.280 --> 00:27:34.640 right wing in the US context. 00:27:34.640 --> 00:27:39.840 And so because of that, and because of the intellectual push they've 00:27:39.840 --> 00:27:42.640 had, they've had fairly good funding in some cases. 00:27:42.640 --> 00:27:47.440 You have various outfit outfits putting out all these pieces trying to 00:27:47.440 --> 00:27:51.360 push libertarianism and libertarian thought. 00:27:51.360 --> 00:27:55.600 And it gets tied up with the American love of freedom and 00:27:55.600 --> 00:27:59.200 liberty, regardless of whether or not the person who is advocating for 00:27:59.200 --> 00:28:02.160 those things knows what either term means. 00:28:02.160 --> 00:28:06.480 And because of that fact, it makes it more difficult to get 00:28:06.480 --> 00:28:09.440 men to follow orders, to fall in line. 00:28:09.440 --> 00:28:15.120 And ultimately, if you don't have people willing to follow orders, you 00:28:15.120 --> 00:28:17.040 don't have an actual movement. 00:28:17.520 --> 00:28:20.640 All you have is a bunch of people in a room arguing 00:28:20.640 --> 00:28:23.040 with each other and not cooperating. 00:28:23.040 --> 00:28:24.960 That's the problem the right has. 00:28:24.960 --> 00:28:28.320 It is very difficult on the right to be a leader because 00:28:28.320 --> 00:28:31.040 most men are not very good at following orders. 00:28:31.040 --> 00:28:34.480 They always want to question your orders. 00:28:34.480 --> 00:28:39.040 Which I'm not saying you can't question the orders of a leader, 00:28:39.040 --> 00:28:41.280 but there's a time and a place. 00:28:41.280 --> 00:28:44.640 If you're in the middle of a battle and your commander tells 00:28:44.640 --> 00:28:49.200 you to do something, unless it is completely and utterly insane and 00:28:49.200 --> 00:28:51.600 you know that because you're in a position to know it and 00:28:51.600 --> 00:28:56.000 he isn't, so unless you have a compelling, truly compelling reason 00:28:57.280 --> 00:29:00.000 to ask him about his order, right? 00:29:00.000 --> 00:29:01.360 You just obey. 00:29:01.360 --> 00:29:03.600 That's what you do as a soldier. 00:29:03.600 --> 00:29:03.920 And 00:29:04.880 --> 00:29:08.160 we are going to have to recognize that we are actually in 00:29:08.160 --> 00:29:08.720 a war. 00:29:08.720 --> 00:29:12.720 It is not simply political disagreement. 00:29:12.720 --> 00:29:14.000 It's a war. 00:29:14.000 --> 00:29:17.200 And so in a war, and given that we are in a 00:29:17.200 --> 00:29:20.000 war, men need to learn to follow orders. 00:29:20.000 --> 00:29:23.280 That's going to be difficult on the on the right side of 00:29:23.280 --> 00:29:27.120 things in the US context for all the reasons I mentioned and 00:29:27.120 --> 00:29:29.200 some others as well. 00:29:29.200 --> 00:29:34.160 The left does not have that problem because again, no animating principle 00:29:34.160 --> 00:29:37.440 for them except for politics and power. 00:29:37.440 --> 00:29:40.960 So for them, politics is the goal. 00:29:40.960 --> 00:29:44.480 It's the end, it's the thing toward which their life is oriented. 00:29:44.480 --> 00:29:46.640 For the right wing it's not. 00:29:46.640 --> 00:29:51.120 And so you have men who are going to have competing principles, 00:29:51.120 --> 00:29:55.440 as it were, because they want to try and make whatever the 00:29:55.440 --> 00:29:59.360 leader has said, whatever someone has told them they need to do, 00:29:59.360 --> 00:30:04.560 consonant with these other things that demand a greater allegiance. 00:30:04.560 --> 00:30:08.160 The problem is that all of those things about which you actually 00:30:08.160 --> 00:30:10.640 care, and I'm not saying they're wrong, again, I'm saying those are 00:30:10.640 --> 00:30:13.200 right, you should care about those more, but all of those things 00:30:13.200 --> 00:30:18.000 about which you actually care, you can't get to them, you can't 00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:23.040 defend them, you can't achieve them without the power. 00:30:23.040 --> 00:30:27.200 The left recognized that aspect of it much better than the right. 00:30:27.200 --> 00:30:29.840 The right needs to get more serious about the fact that if 00:30:29.840 --> 00:30:33.360 you do not have political power, if you do not maintain political 00:30:33.360 --> 00:30:36.720 power, and if you don't crush your enemies when you have political 00:30:36.720 --> 00:30:40.960 power, you will never achieve all the other things that are more 00:30:40.960 --> 00:30:43.600 important than political power. 00:30:43.600 --> 00:30:47.280 You need the means to achieve the ends. 00:30:47.280 --> 00:30:52.480 For us on the right wing, politics is the means to the 00:30:52.480 --> 00:30:54.160 ends we seek. 00:30:54.160 --> 00:30:58.560 For the left, politics is the end, and so they will do 00:30:58.560 --> 00:31:00.960 anything to achieve it. 00:31:00.960 --> 00:31:04.400 We need to be willing to look at politics and political power 00:31:04.800 --> 00:31:07.120 in the way that they look at all these other things they're 00:31:07.120 --> 00:31:09.120 willing to do to achieve that. 00:31:09.120 --> 00:31:11.440 Because otherwise, they win. 00:31:11.440 --> 00:31:14.480 The side that wants it more generally wins. 00:31:14.480 --> 00:31:16.800 We need to want it more than the left, and we need 00:31:16.800 --> 00:31:20.240 to be willing to wield it in a way that even they 00:31:20.240 --> 00:31:23.040 aren't willing to do quite yet. 00:31:23.040 --> 00:31:25.840 Now, I think they will in the near future if they should 00:31:25.840 --> 00:31:31.440 have power again, but we need to be ruthless, because that's politics. 00:31:31.840 --> 00:31:32.160 And 00:31:33.040 --> 00:31:36.000 again, men need to learn to follow orders. 00:31:36.000 --> 00:31:39.600 We need to treat it more as if we are which we 00:31:39.600 --> 00:31:44.400 are in reality, soldiers in a war instead of men 00:31:45.280 --> 00:31:48.720 discussing philosophy around the dinner table. 00:31:48.720 --> 00:31:53.040 That's how politics has been read has been treated by the right 00:31:53.040 --> 00:31:54.560 wing for many years. 00:31:54.560 --> 00:31:56.880 That's not what it is. 00:31:56.880 --> 00:31:59.840 Politics is a knife fight in a bar. 00:31:59.840 --> 00:32:03.760 You need to take it a little more seriously than discussing the 00:32:03.760 --> 00:32:06.720 philosophy of Kant over coffee. 00:32:07.040 --> 00:32:09.920 Kant would approve of the coffee incidentally, but 00:32:11.520 --> 00:32:14.480 we just don't take it seriously in the same way the left 00:32:14.480 --> 00:32:18.000 does. And it's for a number of reasons, but that needs to 00:32:18.000 --> 00:32:21.840 change and it needs to change yesterday. 00:32:25.600 --> 00:32:28.320 I have a question here from the chat. 00:32:28.320 --> 00:32:31.520 Hi, I'm EO, but I love the podcast. 00:32:31.520 --> 00:32:34.800 How do I start to get educated on political science? 00:32:34.800 --> 00:32:38.640 What reading material podcasts, etc. 00:32:39.200 --> 00:32:46.480 I don't know of that many podcasts for political science, 00:32:46.480 --> 00:32:48.000 but if you need say 00:32:48.960 --> 00:32:54.000 the philosophy background for it, there is the history of philosophy without 00:32:54.000 --> 00:32:59.440 any gaps is probably one of the better summary podcasts for philosophy 00:32:59.440 --> 00:33:02.160 to give you and at this point it's many, many hours of 00:33:02.160 --> 00:33:06.560 listening, but it will give you sort of the foundation you need 00:33:06.560 --> 00:33:12.480 for many political ideas because many political ideas ultimately are philosophical. 00:33:12.480 --> 00:33:12.560 So 00:33:14.160 --> 00:33:16.800 you can you know pick You know, pick and choose the episodes 00:33:16.800 --> 00:33:20.720 that are relevant, listen to the political philosophers instead of others. 00:33:20.720 --> 00:33:25.600 But insofar as reading is concerned, that is almost an endless number 00:33:25.600 --> 00:33:27.280 of suggestions. 00:33:27.280 --> 00:33:29.360 But for anyone on the right wing, you probably want to read 00:33:29.360 --> 00:33:31.440 Schmidt first. 00:33:31.440 --> 00:33:33.920 That's just the reality of the matter. 00:33:33.920 --> 00:33:37.520 So definitely read Schmidt 00:33:38.480 --> 00:33:39.120 and then 00:33:40.400 --> 00:33:42.640 looking at what books I happen to have near. 00:33:42.640 --> 00:33:45.600 Most of my political science books are actually in another room, but 00:33:47.120 --> 00:33:52.000 it's partly going to depend on what your goal is with reading 00:33:52.000 --> 00:33:52.800 political science. 00:33:53.040 --> 00:33:54.160 Why are you reading it? 00:33:54.160 --> 00:33:56.480 Are you reading it to get into politics? 00:33:56.480 --> 00:33:58.240 Because then you want practical? 00:33:58.240 --> 00:34:01.040 Are you reading it because you just enjoy it? 00:34:01.040 --> 00:34:04.480 Then you probably want to go heavier on the philosophy. 00:34:04.480 --> 00:34:10.080 So depending on your goal, you you're going to tailor your reading 00:34:10.080 --> 00:34:11.600 list to that goal. 00:34:11.600 --> 00:34:14.800 So if it's just for enjoyment, then you know, read whatever you 00:34:14.800 --> 00:34:19.440 like. But if it is for discussing with other men Other men, 00:34:19.440 --> 00:34:23.760 it's because you want to understand this fundamental aspect of humanity and 00:34:23.760 --> 00:34:27.760 human nature, then go heavy on the philosophy, even more so than 00:34:27.760 --> 00:34:31.520 the straight political science, as it were. 00:34:31.520 --> 00:34:36.560 But the practical side of things, read about actual campaigns that worked. 00:34:36.560 --> 00:34:39.840 It's the same sort of thing that you have over in the 00:34:39.840 --> 00:34:40.640 military, right? 00:34:40.640 --> 00:34:44.160 The military will read about historical battles and what worked or didn't 00:34:44.080 --> 00:34:47.680 work because theory is one thing, but it's sort of like a 00:34:47.680 --> 00:34:48.320 battle plan. 00:34:48.320 --> 00:34:51.040 It doesn't survive contact with the enemy. 00:34:51.040 --> 00:34:54.960 So you can read political theory all day. 00:34:54.960 --> 00:34:58.240 You're not going to get a real deep understanding of how the 00:34:58.240 --> 00:35:02.320 game is actually played, how the sausage is actually made, until you 00:35:02.320 --> 00:35:06.880 actually start looking at real campaigns, real politicians, and probably get involved 00:35:06.880 --> 00:35:08.560 in it as well. 00:35:08.560 --> 00:35:08.880 So 00:35:09.840 --> 00:35:13.680 tailor your reading list with regard to what it is you want 00:35:13.680 --> 00:35:15.280 to achieve. 00:35:16.080 --> 00:35:19.120 The spectrum is philosophy on the one end and reading about the 00:35:19.120 --> 00:35:21.680 nitty-gritty of running a campaign on the other. 00:35:29.280 --> 00:35:31.760 Next question is nice and short and easy one. 00:35:31.760 --> 00:35:33.440 Will you start a Bible study? 00:35:33.440 --> 00:35:34.080 I have 00:35:35.360 --> 00:35:41.600 begun the process of revising my notes on Genesis, partly because obviously 00:35:41.680 --> 00:35:44.160 this time they will be based on the Septuagint instead of the 00:35:44.160 --> 00:35:46.160 Masoretic text. 00:35:46.160 --> 00:35:49.600 And I don't know when I will start that, but I do 00:35:49.600 --> 00:35:53.600 intend to at least do a Bible study on Genesis. 00:35:53.600 --> 00:35:57.680 I'll make the video freely available and the audio and whatnot. 00:35:57.680 --> 00:36:00.080 I won't give a timeline on that because again I have no 00:36:00.080 --> 00:36:02.960 idea when I will manage to set the time aside and actually 00:36:02.960 --> 00:36:04.160 get through that and finish that. 00:36:04.400 --> 00:36:09.040 But yes, I do intend to resume I did a Bible study 00:36:09.040 --> 00:36:10.640 back at my church in California. 00:36:10.640 --> 00:36:13.200 I do intend to resume doing that. 00:36:13.200 --> 00:36:18.320 So hopefully in the relatively near future, but I guess we will 00:36:18.320 --> 00:36:24.720 all see how that goes. 00:36:24.720 --> 00:36:29.840 The next question What makes someone Lutheran? 00:36:33.440 --> 00:36:37.840 I actually want to abstract this one out at least one level, 00:36:37.840 --> 00:36:41.360 I think, because I will answer the question itself, but I think 00:36:41.360 --> 00:36:44.160 abstracting it out a level is perhaps more helpful here. 00:36:48.880 --> 00:36:51.680 My first answer would be of course that a Lutheran is just 00:36:51.680 --> 00:36:53.520 a Christian. 00:36:53.520 --> 00:36:58.720 That is what you should believe about whatever denomination is your denomination, 00:36:58.720 --> 00:37:04.080 whichever one you claim, because if you think that you're some other 00:37:04.080 --> 00:37:08.320 thing than Christian, why are you still that denomination, right? 00:37:08.640 --> 00:37:13.040 You are part of your church, part of your denomination, because you 00:37:13.120 --> 00:37:16.080 believe it teaches the Christian truth. 00:37:16.080 --> 00:37:20.400 And so if you are a Baptist, it's because you don't believe 00:37:20.800 --> 00:37:22.880 that baptism saves. 00:37:22.880 --> 00:37:29.680 If you are any number of usually non-denominational Baptists as well, you 00:37:29.680 --> 00:37:31.920 probably don't believe in the real presence. 00:37:31.920 --> 00:37:34.560 Because if you believed in the real presence, you would not stay 00:37:34.960 --> 00:37:37.120 in one of those churches. 00:37:37.120 --> 00:37:38.080 If you 00:37:38.960 --> 00:37:46.160 don't believe that the Mass, the Roman Catholic Mass forgives your sins, 00:37:46.160 --> 00:37:50.000 you're probably not going to stay in a Roman Catholic Church. 00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:54.000 And so my first answer again is that I am a Lutheran 00:37:54.240 --> 00:37:58.800 because I believe that that is simply another word for Christian. 00:37:58.800 --> 00:38:01.040 For those who don't know the history, the 00:38:02.080 --> 00:38:08.000 Roman Catholics during the time of the Reformation started calling the Protestants 00:38:08.000 --> 00:38:11.840 Lutherans because they were trying to say you follow a man instead 00:38:11.840 --> 00:38:13.200 of following Christ. 00:38:13.360 --> 00:38:16.880 Perhaps never realizing the irony of the fact that they call themselves 00:38:16.880 --> 00:38:24.480 specifically Roman, but leaving that aside, the Lutherans just said, okay, fine. 00:38:24.480 --> 00:38:26.960 We'll keep that term, we're fine with it, because we believe what 00:38:26.960 --> 00:38:31.280 Luther has taught, and so we agree with that. 00:38:31.280 --> 00:38:35.440 But to give sort of the abstracted out answer to the question 00:38:35.680 --> 00:38:38.000 and get into some specifics as well 00:38:39.440 --> 00:38:43.200 You have different levels at which you can answer that question, right? 00:38:43.200 --> 00:38:45.760 And you can do that with any denomination. 00:38:45.760 --> 00:38:46.400 And so 00:38:47.360 --> 00:38:50.320 the first one would be what is a Christian, right? 00:38:50.320 --> 00:38:56.560 Well, a Christian is one who believes in Christ crucified for sinners. 00:38:56.560 --> 00:38:59.520 Right? You can expand that out, you can talk about all the 00:38:59.520 --> 00:39:03.760 different points in the Apostles Creed, the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed, 00:39:03.760 --> 00:39:06.560 you can point to the Lord's Prayer, you can say, you believe 00:39:06.560 --> 00:39:10.000 the Ten Commandments, and you believe this, that, and the other, right? 00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:13.600 You can go through all those specific points, but ultimately, a Christian 00:39:13.600 --> 00:39:15.760 is one who believes in the gospel. 00:39:15.760 --> 00:39:18.160 Which is why we can say that Adam was a Christian, because 00:39:18.160 --> 00:39:22.160 Adam believed Genesis three fifteen, spoken to him directly by God. 00:39:22.160 --> 00:39:25.680 That probably helps a little bit, but perhaps didn't help with the 00:39:25.680 --> 00:39:26.800 tree bit. 00:39:26.800 --> 00:39:27.120 But 00:39:28.320 --> 00:39:31.520 believing in the gospel is what makes a Christian. 00:39:31.520 --> 00:39:35.440 But in another sense, there are those who will believe that a 00:39:35.440 --> 00:39:38.320 Christian is simply someone who attends church, right? 00:39:38.320 --> 00:39:40.480 Much of the world says, well, he's a Christian, he goes to 00:39:40.480 --> 00:39:42.240 church, he must be a Christian. 00:39:42.240 --> 00:39:45.760 That doesn't make him a Christian in the ultimate sense of being 00:39:45.760 --> 00:39:46.720 a Christian. 00:39:46.720 --> 00:39:51.520 This gets back into the difference between being something essentially and being 00:39:51.520 --> 00:39:54.880 something according to believing in the tenets of it, right? 00:39:54.880 --> 00:39:55.200 And 00:39:56.320 --> 00:39:58.800 you know, it's the no true Scotsman thing again, right? 00:39:58.800 --> 00:40:02.000 They're you're Scottish because you're born Scottish. 00:40:02.000 --> 00:40:05.680 Not because you agree with the design of the flag or you 00:40:05.680 --> 00:40:07.920 like Scotch or you love golf, right? 00:40:07.920 --> 00:40:09.520 That's not what makes you Scottish. 00:40:09.520 --> 00:40:11.360 You're Scottish because you're Scottish. 00:40:11.360 --> 00:40:13.200 You're American because you're American. 00:40:13.200 --> 00:40:15.200 That's something you are essentially. 00:40:15.200 --> 00:40:17.440 Christianity is an ideology. 00:40:17.440 --> 00:40:20.400 In order to be a Christian, you actually have to believe the 00:40:20.400 --> 00:40:22.480 tenets of Christianity. 00:40:22.480 --> 00:40:25.920 You can't just say, I'm a Christian, and then you're a Christian. 00:40:25.920 --> 00:40:27.360 That's insufficient, right? 00:40:27.360 --> 00:40:28.480 Think of what Christ says. 00:40:28.480 --> 00:40:33.360 Lord, Lord, did we not No, I never knew you. 00:40:33.360 --> 00:40:35.920 So to be a Christian you actually have to believe in the 00:40:35.920 --> 00:40:38.320 tenets of Christianity. 00:40:38.320 --> 00:40:41.760 By and large, what that means is believing what is taught in 00:40:41.760 --> 00:40:42.480 the creeds. 00:40:42.480 --> 00:40:44.720 There's a reason we have creeds, right? 00:40:44.720 --> 00:40:48.160 You have creeds because they're a summary of the faith founded in 00:40:48.160 --> 00:40:52.320 Scripture, and they are a short way to explain what do you 00:40:52.320 --> 00:40:57.440 believe? The Apostles' Creed is the short statement of the Christian faith. 00:40:57.440 --> 00:40:57.760 So 00:40:58.960 --> 00:41:01.280 that's ultimately what it means to be a Christian, right? 00:41:01.280 --> 00:41:03.520 It's belief in the tenets of Christianity. 00:41:03.520 --> 00:41:08.000 So to be a Lutheran is to believe in the exegesis of 00:41:08.000 --> 00:41:13.040 Christianity as set forth in the binding documents of the Lutheran Church. 00:41:13.200 --> 00:41:15.920 which would be the Book of Concord, which I don't think I 00:41:15.920 --> 00:41:17.920 actually have on my desk right now. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:19.280 I think it's over here somewhere. 00:41:19.280 --> 00:41:19.520 But 00:41:20.480 --> 00:41:24.080 the Book of Concord is one of the answers to what it 00:41:24.080 --> 00:41:28.720 means to be a Lutheran because that is ultimately the definition of 00:41:28.720 --> 00:41:33.360 Lutheran understanding of the Bible. 00:41:33.360 --> 00:41:37.920 So that is one of the answers to what is a Lutheran. 00:41:37.920 --> 00:41:43.920 Do all Lutherans know everything taught in the Book of Concord? 00:41:43.920 --> 00:41:45.360 Well the answer is no. 00:41:45.360 --> 00:41:48.880 You can go to my timeline and find me catching pastors, Lutheran 00:41:48.880 --> 00:41:51.680 pastors, who don't know things that are taught in the Book of 00:41:51.680 --> 00:41:53.040 Concord Of Concord. 00:41:53.040 --> 00:41:57.120 And so, does that make them not Lutheran? 00:41:57.120 --> 00:41:58.560 I don't think that's fair. 00:41:58.560 --> 00:42:00.640 I actually don't believe it would be fair to say that no, 00:42:00.640 --> 00:42:03.040 you're not Lutheran because you don't know absolutely everything taught in the 00:42:03.040 --> 00:42:04.800 book of Concord. 00:42:04.800 --> 00:42:08.240 You can be a member of a church, a member of a 00:42:08.240 --> 00:42:11.360 denomination at different levels, as it were. 00:42:11.360 --> 00:42:16.240 And so you can be a Lutheran because you believe in what 00:42:16.400 --> 00:42:18.720 Lutheranism teaches. 00:42:18.720 --> 00:42:22.000 You can be a Lutheran because you're a Christian and your whole 00:42:22.000 --> 00:42:25.360 family's always been Lutheran and you just attend the Lutheran church, even 00:42:25.360 --> 00:42:29.920 if ultimately your doctrinal and theological knowledge is pretty shallow. 00:42:29.920 --> 00:42:34.000 In fact, in some cases, that's probably good for most people because 00:42:34.320 --> 00:42:40.560 if you just simply rely on Christ and maybe you don't understand, 00:42:40.560 --> 00:42:42.800 you know, the 00:42:45.840 --> 00:42:48.960 The union of God and man in Christ, right? 00:42:49.200 --> 00:42:52.880 You don't understand how the nature of 00:42:53.760 --> 00:42:58.240 man and the nature of God interact and how the attributes of 00:42:58.240 --> 00:43:01.600 one don't become properly the attributes of the other, but they can 00:43:01.600 --> 00:43:05.600 be exercised through the union because of the personal right, you don't 00:43:05.520 --> 00:43:07.200 have to get into all that. 00:43:07.200 --> 00:43:10.160 Most Christians don't understand all of that stuff, and that's not what 00:43:10.160 --> 00:43:11.840 ultimately makes you a Christian. 00:43:12.160 --> 00:43:18.160 the same as the very hyper technical specifics as between, say, Lutherans 00:43:18.240 --> 00:43:18.960 and Reforms. 00:43:18.960 --> 00:43:22.240 So if I were to argue with a Reformed theologian, we're going 00:43:22.240 --> 00:43:25.200 to get into some pretty hyper technical stuff. 00:43:25.200 --> 00:43:29.200 Do you have to believe on either side and understand all of 00:43:29.200 --> 00:43:31.760 that to be a Lutheran or a member of the Reformed Church? 00:43:31.760 --> 00:43:33.280 The answer is no. 00:43:33.280 --> 00:43:37.360 And so, the basic definition of being a Lutheran is to know 00:43:37.360 --> 00:43:41.920 the small catechism, and to agree with the small catechism, because that 00:43:42.400 --> 00:43:43.600 is the basic statement. 00:43:43.600 --> 00:43:45.520 It's what we teach to all Lutheran children. 00:43:45.520 --> 00:43:47.680 In fact, they memorize it. 00:43:47.680 --> 00:43:50.880 So that's another one of the answers you can give. 00:43:50.880 --> 00:43:54.000 But you can see there are different answers to this sort of 00:43:54.000 --> 00:43:57.840 question, depending on exactly what it is you mean. 00:43:57.840 --> 00:44:02.880 So, at the top level, as it were, the fullest definition of 00:44:02.880 --> 00:44:05.920 what is a Lutheran is the Book of Concord, because that is 00:44:05.920 --> 00:44:09.120 what we teach, that is what we hold, that is the statement 00:44:09.120 --> 00:44:10.800 of Lutheran belief. 00:44:10.800 --> 00:44:14.880 But at the basic level, at just a more functional, realistic level, 00:44:14.880 --> 00:44:16.320 it's the small catechism. 00:44:16.560 --> 00:44:20.720 Because that's what everyone who joins a Lutheran church is supposed to 00:44:20.720 --> 00:44:25.280 believe. In fact, we typically have people explicitly state that they believe 00:44:25.280 --> 00:44:29.280 the teachings of the small catechism when they join the church. 00:44:29.280 --> 00:44:32.000 They don't always have someone say they believe in the entirety of 00:44:32.000 --> 00:44:33.200 the Book of Concord. 00:44:33.200 --> 00:44:36.000 I would hope that at least elders and others in positions of 00:44:36.000 --> 00:44:39.200 authority would read the Book of Concord and understand it, but again 00:44:39.280 --> 00:44:41.840 the average person doesn't really need to do that. 00:44:42.160 --> 00:44:45.200 You don't need all of the women in your church, for instance, 00:44:45.200 --> 00:44:48.960 trying to be a theologian and reading the Solid Declaration. 00:44:48.960 --> 00:44:51.280 The children in your church are not going to read it and 00:44:51.280 --> 00:44:52.240 understand it. 00:44:52.240 --> 00:44:54.560 But the small catechism they can understand. 00:44:54.560 --> 00:44:58.080 And that's going to be the same sort of different levels that 00:44:58.080 --> 00:45:00.720 you will find in any church. 00:45:00.720 --> 00:45:05.760 Because over in the Reformed camp, how many maybe some more in 00:45:05.760 --> 00:45:09.680 some reformed churches, but how many men in your church have actually 00:45:09.680 --> 00:45:11.680 read the Institutes? 00:45:11.920 --> 00:45:14.800 How many of those who read it understood it? 00:45:15.600 --> 00:45:17.600 So just because 00:45:18.560 --> 00:45:23.520 someone says he's a Christian doesn't mean he is, but just because 00:45:23.520 --> 00:45:28.800 someone doesn't understand all the nuances of a particular denomination, a particular 00:45:28.800 --> 00:45:33.120 tradition, doesn't mean he isn't a member of that tradition. 00:45:33.520 --> 00:45:36.480 So yes, it's not a question where there's sort of a cut 00:45:36.480 --> 00:45:40.800 and dry neat answer because it depends on what exactly it is 00:45:40.800 --> 00:45:45.200 you're asking and what exactly is being answered in response to that 00:45:45.200 --> 00:45:48.960 question. But hopefully that explains what it means to be a Lutheran. 00:45:48.960 --> 00:45:51.760 The basic answer is you believe the small catechism. 00:45:51.760 --> 00:45:53.200 You want to know what Lutherans believe? 00:45:53.200 --> 00:45:54.800 Read the small catechism. 00:45:54.800 --> 00:45:57.840 You want more information on what's in the small catechism? 00:45:57.840 --> 00:46:01.440 Read the Augsburg Confession, the Apology of the Solid Declaration. 00:46:01.440 --> 00:46:04.000 Read the small call articles for fun because it's fun to read 00:46:04.000 --> 00:46:06.960 Luther. You can read the power and primacy of the Pope if 00:46:06.960 --> 00:46:08.960 you want to know why we reject Rome. 00:46:08.960 --> 00:46:13.520 Right? There are more documents, but the basics the basics are all 00:46:13.520 --> 00:46:15.040 there in the small catechism. 00:46:15.040 --> 00:46:17.040 That is the basis of what we believe. 00:46:17.040 --> 00:46:20.240 That is the Lutheran exegesis of Scripture. 00:46:20.240 --> 00:46:23.040 And I am a Lutheran because I believe that is simply what 00:46:23.040 --> 00:46:24.480 Scripture teaches. 00:46:24.480 --> 00:46:28.000 I'm not a Lutheran because I like Luther, I'm not a Lutheran 00:46:28.000 --> 00:46:30.400 because I'm of German extraction. 00:46:30.400 --> 00:46:33.920 I'm a Lutheran because I believe that what is set forth in 00:46:33.920 --> 00:46:38.160 the small catechism specifically and in the book of Concord generally is 00:46:38.160 --> 00:46:40.960 consonant with Scripture on all points. 00:46:40.960 --> 00:46:42.560 That's why I'm a Lutheran. 00:46:42.560 --> 00:46:46.320 And so again, I believe it just means I am a Christian. 00:46:46.320 --> 00:46:51.360 We say Lutheran in order to distinguish from other groups because, for 00:46:51.360 --> 00:46:56.080 better or worse, we are not all united in our in understanding 00:46:56.080 --> 00:46:58.400 of Scripture and in what we teach. 00:46:58.400 --> 00:46:59.520 I wish that we were. 00:46:59.520 --> 00:47:01.120 It would be better if we were. 00:47:01.120 --> 00:47:05.120 We would be able to provide and present a unified front against 00:47:05.120 --> 00:47:09.840 so much evil in the world, but I would hope that at 00:47:09.840 --> 00:47:12.560 least we can all agree on some basics and 00:47:13.440 --> 00:47:17.280 cons and act in a concerted way to try to make things 00:47:17.280 --> 00:47:18.320 better, right? 00:47:18.320 --> 00:47:21.520 Just because we disagree on some specifics doesn't mean that we can't 00:47:21.520 --> 00:47:22.240 get along. 00:47:22.240 --> 00:47:24.960 We don't have to hate I don't have to hate the reformed 00:47:24.960 --> 00:47:30.080 or the Anglicans, whichever camp the Anglicans ultimately want to be in. 00:47:30.080 --> 00:47:30.960 We disagree. 00:47:31.520 --> 00:47:35.280 We're going to keep disagreeing, but we're Christian brothers and we can 00:47:35.280 --> 00:47:36.240 work together. 00:47:36.240 --> 00:47:39.280 And the same is true of the Roman Catholics, even though, yes, 00:47:39.280 --> 00:47:43.600 our confession certainly has some choice phrases to say about your Pope, 00:47:43.600 --> 00:47:46.640 but I've heard choice phrases from Roman Catholics about the Pope as 00:47:46.640 --> 00:47:50.560 well, so hopefully that answers the the question in a way that 00:47:50.560 --> 00:47:55.040 is actually useful. 00:47:55.520 --> 00:47:59.840 The next one is related. 00:47:59.840 --> 00:48:03.600 What are the minimum beliefs that are required for salvation? 00:48:03.600 --> 00:48:07.760 What level of doctrinal error puts someone outside the faith entirely, and 00:48:07.760 --> 00:48:11.680 perhaps most central to my question Do you think that someone being 00:48:11.680 --> 00:48:14.720 in severe error in terms of the law, that is being correct 00:48:14.720 --> 00:48:18.560 about the gospel and the identity of God, but being incorrect about 00:48:18.560 --> 00:48:22.400 some component of what obedience looks like, can on its own lead 00:48:22.400 --> 00:48:24.160 to damnation? 00:48:25.280 --> 00:48:28.080 This one again is going to have I think I can limit 00:48:28.080 --> 00:48:31.760 this one really to two different levels instead of getting into something 00:48:31.760 --> 00:48:32.400 that's a little 00:48:33.920 --> 00:48:37.840 longer, a little more nuanced, perhaps. 00:48:37.840 --> 00:48:38.080 But 00:48:39.200 --> 00:48:42.800 there are two different kinds of error. 00:48:42.800 --> 00:48:46.400 And really only one is truly error, right? 00:48:46.400 --> 00:48:50.560 Error is in this case a false belief. 00:48:50.560 --> 00:48:55.280 It is an unintentional false belief. 00:48:55.280 --> 00:48:59.280 It is something that is done with neither the intent to be 00:48:59.280 --> 00:49:03.680 in error or with knowledge that you are in fact in error. 00:49:03.680 --> 00:49:06.720 Those are related, of course. 00:49:06.720 --> 00:49:10.320 God does overlook error. 00:49:10.320 --> 00:49:13.840 Scripture doesn't give us the exact contours of that, but it literally 00:49:13.840 --> 00:49:16.480 says that God overlooks error. 00:49:16.480 --> 00:49:19.600 And so God takes that into account. 00:49:19.600 --> 00:49:20.480 God is perfect. 00:49:20.480 --> 00:49:23.280 He knows what you knew, when you knew it, the depth to 00:49:23.280 --> 00:49:26.000 which you knew it, if you were confronted with your error. 00:49:26.000 --> 00:49:28.160 He knows all of those little specifics. 00:49:28.160 --> 00:49:32.080 And so his judgment is absolutely perfect because he can take everything 00:49:32.080 --> 00:49:33.280 into account. 00:49:33.280 --> 00:49:35.200 He knows all of your thoughts. 00:49:35.200 --> 00:49:39.920 He has perfect knowledge in a way that no human judge could 00:49:39.920 --> 00:49:41.120 ever have. 00:49:41.120 --> 00:49:45.200 And so you can rely, of course, on God being perfect in 00:49:45.200 --> 00:49:50.560 his judgment, perfect in his assessment, perfect in his sentence. 00:49:50.560 --> 00:49:50.960 But But 00:49:52.560 --> 00:49:58.080 don't worry too much about those who are in some kind of 00:49:58.080 --> 00:50:02.720 error like the ones you mentioned there, you referenced anyway. 00:50:02.720 --> 00:50:05.200 I don't mean not to worry about them in the sense of 00:50:05.200 --> 00:50:06.720 trying to get them out of the error. 00:50:06.720 --> 00:50:09.040 If you have the opportunity, by all means try to get them 00:50:09.040 --> 00:50:10.000 out of the error. 00:50:10.000 --> 00:50:14.320 But if someone has mistaken beliefs about 00:50:15.200 --> 00:50:18.640 the specifics of what it is What it is Christians are supposed 00:50:18.640 --> 00:50:20.960 to do with regard to good works, right? 00:50:20.960 --> 00:50:23.520 That's not going to damn him. 00:50:23.520 --> 00:50:25.040 He's in error. 00:50:25.040 --> 00:50:29.040 Like I said earlier, most men are in error in some way 00:50:29.040 --> 00:50:30.800 in some things. 00:50:30.880 --> 00:50:33.360 Obviously I'm Lutheran. 00:50:33.360 --> 00:50:36.800 I believe the Reformed are in error with regard to election. 00:50:36.800 --> 00:50:41.840 I believe the Roman Catholics are in error with regard to transubstantiation. 00:50:41.840 --> 00:50:44.960 In turn, the Roman Catholics believe that I am in error with 00:50:45.040 --> 00:50:45.200 regard 00:50:46.400 --> 00:50:50.000 to the real presence, the way that the Lutherans interpret that in 00:50:50.000 --> 00:50:54.080 the supper the sacramental union, we call it the Sacramental Union because 00:50:54.080 --> 00:50:57.680 the Reformed believe that we're in error with our formulation of the 00:50:57.680 --> 00:50:59.040 real presence. 00:50:59.040 --> 00:51:02.960 And so of those three groups, we all believe the other groups 00:51:02.960 --> 00:51:05.360 are in error, mutually. 00:51:05.360 --> 00:51:07.920 That doesn't mean that everyone in that camp is damned or this 00:51:07.920 --> 00:51:09.920 camp is damned or all the Lutherans are damned at the Reformed 00:51:10.320 --> 00:51:11.360 happen to be right. 00:51:11.360 --> 00:51:14.720 I don't believe they are, of course. 00:51:14.720 --> 00:51:17.360 Because ultimately the core of the faith, as I said earlier in 00:51:17.360 --> 00:51:20.080 the episode, is Christ crucified for sinners. 00:51:20.080 --> 00:51:22.000 Do you believe in the gospel? 00:51:22.000 --> 00:51:23.920 I'm never going to be a gospel reductionist. 00:51:23.920 --> 00:51:27.600 I'm not going to say nothing else matters because all truth is 00:51:27.600 --> 00:51:31.280 one. All error is bad. 00:51:31.280 --> 00:51:34.080 All error is a moral failing. 00:51:34.080 --> 00:51:36.640 It's not just an intellectual failing, it is a moral failing to 00:51:36.640 --> 00:51:38.240 be wrong. 00:51:38.240 --> 00:51:43.200 And so I'm never going to trivialize or minimize that, but I 00:51:43.200 --> 00:51:45.680 am similar not going to say that you're damned because of it, 00:51:45.680 --> 00:51:46.800 because that's not what scripture says. 00:51:46.800 --> 00:51:48.240 It's not what God says. 00:51:48.240 --> 00:51:51.680 God says we should try to be perfect, right? 00:51:51.680 --> 00:51:53.840 Be perfect as God is perfect. 00:51:53.840 --> 00:51:56.960 But Scripture is also very clear that we can't do that. 00:51:56.960 --> 00:51:59.600 That's one of the reasons we need a savior, because we're not 00:51:59.600 --> 00:52:04.400 perfect. Christ paid that price for all of our sins, for all 00:52:04.400 --> 00:52:11.360 of our errors, but we should desire to believe correctly. 00:52:11.360 --> 00:52:14.400 We should desire to do the things that God has commanded that 00:52:14.400 --> 00:52:17.280 we do and not do the things he is commanded we not 00:52:17.280 --> 00:52:21.120 do. It does not mean that we are damned when we fail. 00:52:21.120 --> 00:52:22.400 Because that's just sin. 00:52:22.400 --> 00:52:24.800 Sin is missing the mark, right? 00:52:24.960 --> 00:52:27.520 We are going to sin, we are going to continue to sin 00:52:27.760 --> 00:52:29.840 even if we are Christians. 00:52:29.840 --> 00:52:32.400 That's one of the reasons we pray the Lord's prayer, right? 00:52:32.400 --> 00:52:34.080 Forgive us our trespasses. 00:52:34.080 --> 00:52:37.280 We need to pray that all the time because we're always committing 00:52:37.280 --> 00:52:38.000 some kind of sin. 00:52:38.000 --> 00:52:41.040 We have the inclination towards sin with sin which is yes itself 00:52:41.200 --> 00:52:43.600 sin. I know the Roman Catholics are going to disagree with me, 00:52:43.600 --> 00:52:45.200 concupiscence is sin. 00:52:45.200 --> 00:52:48.000 Desiring to do that which is wicked is sin. 00:52:48.000 --> 00:52:51.120 Acting on it is another sin. 00:52:51.120 --> 00:52:54.640 We recognize this in our our law as well, in some cases. 00:52:54.480 --> 00:52:59.680 for instance, the conspiracy to commit a crime is a crime. 00:52:59.680 --> 00:53:02.800 Committing the crime is another crime. 00:53:02.800 --> 00:53:05.200 Committing it in a part of a conspiracy may be a third 00:53:05.200 --> 00:53:05.680 crime as well. 00:53:05.680 --> 00:53:09.040 So So we recognize this in our positive law, it's not just 00:53:09.040 --> 00:53:12.160 something that we recognize in the moral law because the positive law 00:53:12.240 --> 00:53:14.960 in some ways does flow from God's moral law and it should 00:53:14.960 --> 00:53:15.920 do so. 00:53:17.680 --> 00:53:23.440 But the second aspect of this is is once your error has 00:53:23.440 --> 00:53:29.440 been rebuked, if you persist in that error, it is a different 00:53:29.440 --> 00:53:34.640 thing. It can then transform into impenitent sin. 00:53:34.640 --> 00:53:36.960 That's when you are in danger. 00:53:36.960 --> 00:53:37.600 Now 00:53:39.280 --> 00:53:43.040 you have to recognize here that there are again two different sort 00:53:43.040 --> 00:53:44.960 of aspects or paths here, right 00:53:45.840 --> 00:53:49.680 On the one hand, let's say you rebuke someone. 00:53:49.680 --> 00:53:53.600 You bring up a passage of scripture, you say, what you just 00:53:53.600 --> 00:53:57.680 said disagrees with this passage of scripture, you're wrong. 00:53:57.680 --> 00:54:00.240 Well, he has two ways he can he has multiple ways he 00:54:00.240 --> 00:54:02.640 can react, but two key ways he can react. 00:54:02.640 --> 00:54:07.360 He can agree with your interpretation and recognize he's wrong, or he 00:54:07.360 --> 00:54:10.720 can disagree with your interpretation and not rec we're gonna say you're 00:54:10.640 --> 00:54:13.680 right for the sake of the hypothetical and then not realize he's 00:54:13.680 --> 00:54:18.080 wrong. Well, there's a difference between those two, right? 00:54:18.080 --> 00:54:23.920 Because in the one case, he's still wrong, but he's not willfully 00:54:23.920 --> 00:54:28.160 wrong. So it does depend on the intent. 00:54:28.160 --> 00:54:29.920 Intent matters. 00:54:29.920 --> 00:54:33.760 It matters in our civil courts, it matters in our criminal courts, 00:54:33.760 --> 00:54:35.920 it matters in God's court. 00:54:35.920 --> 00:54:39.680 Because if you intend to do evil, that is worse. 00:54:39.680 --> 00:54:44.560 If you do evil knowingly, it is worse than doing it accidentally. 00:54:44.560 --> 00:54:49.440 So if someone is rebuked and doesn't believe you, right, for whatever 00:54:49.440 --> 00:54:50.400 reason he doesn't believe. 00:54:50.400 --> 00:54:51.600 He doesn't understand your argument. 00:54:51.600 --> 00:54:52.800 He thinks that you're insane. 00:54:52.800 --> 00:54:53.600 He thinks you're evil. 00:54:53.600 --> 00:54:54.800 Whatever it is. 00:54:54.800 --> 00:54:56.320 He's still an error. 00:54:56.320 --> 00:55:00.800 That's different if he goes, I see what that says. 00:55:00.800 --> 00:55:04.000 That's not my God. 00:55:04.000 --> 00:55:06.400 That's where you're in danger. 00:55:06.400 --> 00:55:09.200 That person is now in danger of damnation. 00:55:09.200 --> 00:55:12.880 He is in danger of hellfire if he is just rejecting part 00:55:12.880 --> 00:55:15.200 of scripture because he doesn't think that's his God. 00:55:15.200 --> 00:55:17.120 I God God's not like that. 00:55:17.120 --> 00:55:18.240 God wouldn't do that. 00:55:18.240 --> 00:55:20.800 You don't get to disagree with God in that way. 00:55:20.800 --> 00:55:24.320 And so when you read the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and 00:55:24.320 --> 00:55:28.320 you see very clearly that God burned Sodom and Gomorrah to ash 00:55:28.960 --> 00:55:33.840 for sodomy, for homosexuality, for specifically male homosexuality, right? 00:55:33.840 --> 00:55:36.240 You see that clearly in the pages of scripture. 00:55:36.240 --> 00:55:37.920 There is no denying that. 00:55:37.920 --> 00:55:41.600 If someone reads that and then says, I don't believe that. 00:55:42.080 --> 00:55:43.040 That's not my God. 00:55:43.040 --> 00:55:46.880 God would never do God would never burn a city because of 00:55:46.960 --> 00:55:51.200 the sexual wickedness of the inhabitants of that city. 00:55:51.200 --> 00:55:53.040 That man is in danger. 00:55:53.040 --> 00:55:56.560 Because that man is reading the plain word of God, the clear 00:55:56.560 --> 00:56:00.080 word of God, and rejecting the clear teaching. 00:56:00.080 --> 00:56:02.640 That is immense danger. 00:56:02.640 --> 00:56:04.000 And so it depends. 00:56:04.000 --> 00:56:08.320 The answer to your question ultimately is that it that it depends 00:56:08.320 --> 00:56:12.640 on the nature of the error, and it depends on the intent 00:56:12.640 --> 00:56:14.800 behind the error. 00:56:14.800 --> 00:56:20.320 Because intent can transform something from error into willful wickedness, into impenitent 00:56:20.320 --> 00:56:27.200 sin. Now, to answer another aspect of the question that was definitely 00:56:27.200 --> 00:56:31.680 asked there in the question, there's a difference between rejecting core parts 00:56:31.680 --> 00:56:34.480 of the faith and being in error about 00:56:36.000 --> 00:56:37.520 Ancillary matters. 00:56:37.520 --> 00:56:40.880 Not unimportant matters, but ancillary matters, right? 00:56:41.120 --> 00:56:46.560 So if someone thinks, for instance, that the moral law, let's let's 00:56:46.480 --> 00:56:49.440 say even less than that, someone who's confused about the difference between 00:56:49.440 --> 00:56:51.360 the civil law and the moral law. 00:56:51.360 --> 00:56:53.920 Right? He looks at the Old Testament and says, Well, they have 00:56:53.920 --> 00:56:57.840 these punishments for these crimes, and these sins are treated in this 00:56:57.840 --> 00:57:02.400 way, and this is an abomination, and that's this, and doesn't understand 00:57:02.400 --> 00:57:07.280 it, perhaps, that's a different thing from saying, I don't believe Jesus 00:57:07.280 --> 00:57:09.360 was God. 00:57:09.360 --> 00:57:11.680 You're not saved if you don't believe that Jesus was God. 00:57:11.680 --> 00:57:12.240 You can't do that. 00:57:12.240 --> 00:57:15.280 You can't reject a core tenet of the faith. 00:57:15.280 --> 00:57:15.600 And 00:57:16.480 --> 00:57:18.400 one of the best ways to look at that is again the 00:57:18.400 --> 00:57:21.680 creeds. Look at what is in the Apostles' Creed. 00:57:21.680 --> 00:57:26.240 Anyone who rejects any part of the Apostles' Creed is in danger 00:57:26.240 --> 00:57:27.600 of hellfire. 00:57:27.840 --> 00:57:32.640 If someone just doesn't understand the distinction between the civil law and 00:57:32.640 --> 00:57:35.680 the moral law in the Old Testament and thinks that, well, that 00:57:35.680 --> 00:57:39.680 was then and this is now, and granted, without hopefully getting into 00:57:40.000 --> 00:57:43.600 thinking God changed, right, you can't do that, but if he's just 00:57:43.600 --> 00:57:46.080 confused, that's a different thing. 00:57:46.080 --> 00:57:49.120 It's still sin, he's still an error, he needs to be rebuke 00:57:49.280 --> 00:57:53.840 rebuked, but that alone is not going to damn him. 00:57:53.840 --> 00:57:56.720 So there's a dis there's a distinction there, a very important distinction 00:57:56.800 --> 00:58:01.280 between the core tenets of the faith and things that are not 00:58:01.520 --> 00:58:02.880 core to the faith. 00:58:02.880 --> 00:58:07.040 But again, all truth matters, and so the error is still sinful. 00:58:07.040 --> 00:58:10.320 He should not remain in that error, and once rebuked, then it 00:58:10.320 --> 00:58:13.920 can become impenitent sin. 00:58:13.920 --> 00:58:18.080 Which is, you know, one of the reasons that sometimes for certain 00:58:18.080 --> 00:58:19.600 men it's better not to know, right? 00:58:19.600 --> 00:58:24.160 Because if they know, then well now you're responsible. 00:58:24.160 --> 00:58:26.720 Now that you've been rebuked, you have a duty to do something 00:58:26.720 --> 00:58:28.480 in response to that rebuke. 00:58:28.480 --> 00:58:32.400 Whereas before you were simply an error. 00:58:32.400 --> 00:58:35.840 But the overall answer then to the question is it depends on 00:58:35.840 --> 00:58:38.160 a lot of specific moving parts. 00:58:38.160 --> 00:58:41.520 It's similar to what you would have in any given criminal case, 00:58:41.520 --> 00:58:45.520 because of course ultimately When you start looking at how scripture is 00:58:46.640 --> 00:58:51.760 sin's a crime, God is a judge in a criminal court. 00:58:51.760 --> 00:58:53.600 That's one of the best ways to look at it. 00:58:53.600 --> 00:58:58.880 And I constantly run into things in theology where I can use 00:58:58.880 --> 00:59:04.960 a legal analogy that is directly on point, if not virtually identical. 00:59:04.960 --> 00:59:06.560 It's the language that God used. 00:59:06.560 --> 00:59:11.520 I know the EO particularly don't like that fact, but God's the 00:59:11.520 --> 00:59:13.760 one who calls himself a judge. 00:59:13.760 --> 00:59:16.640 God's the one who calls it a judgment. 00:59:16.640 --> 00:59:19.360 God's the one who treats these things as a crime. 00:59:19.360 --> 00:59:21.520 God's the one who has a court. 00:59:21.520 --> 00:59:25.520 I mean Satan acts as a prosecuting attorney, till he was cast 00:59:25.520 --> 00:59:27.360 out of heaven anyway. 00:59:27.360 --> 00:59:32.640 It's very clear that this is conducted in a legal manner. 00:59:32.640 --> 00:59:35.600 Even the way that we are saved, think about it. 00:59:35.600 --> 00:59:38.400 You're not made righteous in this life. 00:59:38.400 --> 00:59:40.240 Yes, there's a process of sanctification. 00:59:40.240 --> 00:59:46.560 You're improved somewhat in this life, but you are declared innocent by 00:59:46.560 --> 00:59:50.320 virtue of Christ's sacrifice. 00:59:51.200 --> 00:59:52.400 these are legal terms. 00:59:52.400 --> 00:59:54.960 We're dealing in legal theories here. 00:59:54.960 --> 00:59:57.600 That is simply the way that scripture speaks about these things. 00:59:57.600 --> 01:00:00.240 It's the way Christian needs to think about these things. 01:00:05.120 --> 01:00:07.920 The next one is also a short question. 01:00:07.920 --> 01:00:12.080 How can scripture be inerrant if the canon is errant? 01:00:12.320 --> 01:00:14.800 And I think there are really two questions here, so I'll answer 01:00:14.800 --> 01:00:16.080 both of those. 01:00:16.240 --> 01:00:22.320 The easy one is that the canon of Scripture is not errant. 01:00:22.320 --> 01:00:24.400 Can't be. 01:00:24.400 --> 01:00:27.520 And the reason for that, of course, is that God is the 01:00:27.520 --> 01:00:32.240 author, ultimately the author, of the canon of Scripture. 01:00:32.240 --> 01:00:36.160 Nothing God has written, or caused to be written by the hands 01:00:36.160 --> 01:00:39.760 of men, via inspiration, is in error. 01:00:40.080 --> 01:00:41.920 It is inerrant. 01:00:42.640 --> 01:00:44.960 Capitalize that I go ahead. 01:00:44.960 --> 01:00:48.320 It is perfect in all particulars. 01:00:49.840 --> 01:00:54.320 The other part of this, and really perhaps the more interesting question, 01:00:54.320 --> 01:00:58.640 right? The underlying question that causes people trouble. 01:00:58.640 --> 01:01:02.000 How do we know what the canon of scripture is? 01:01:02.240 --> 01:01:04.640 And we've got into this before a little bit. 01:01:04.640 --> 01:01:07.440 Lutherans don't have a canon of scripture, and so that's sort of 01:01:07.440 --> 01:01:10.080 the easy answer for the Lutherans we just sort of say we 01:01:10.080 --> 01:01:12.640 don't have one and then we scuttle out of the room, right? 01:01:12.640 --> 01:01:15.200 Leave everyone else to fight over it. 01:01:15.200 --> 01:01:19.200 Which is it has its time and its place, but how do 01:01:19.200 --> 01:01:19.440 we know 01:01:20.400 --> 01:01:22.320 which books are in scripture? 01:01:22.320 --> 01:01:25.200 In part, scripture authenticates scripture. 01:01:25.200 --> 01:01:29.120 Scripture has cross-references all over the place. 01:01:29.120 --> 01:01:32.560 And so if you pick something up and find zero references to 01:01:32.560 --> 01:01:35.360 that thing, and and then that thing doesn't reference any or part 01:01:35.360 --> 01:01:39.040 of scripture, you already pretty much know that's not scripture. 01:01:39.040 --> 01:01:40.960 You can pretty much leave that one aside. 01:01:40.960 --> 01:01:41.760 Maybe it's useful. 01:01:41.760 --> 01:01:43.040 Maybe it's Maccabees, right? 01:01:43.040 --> 01:01:46.720 Maybe it's a book that isn't part of Scripture, but is useful 01:01:46.960 --> 01:01:48.080 as history. 01:01:48.080 --> 01:01:50.320 It's useful in another way. 01:01:50.320 --> 01:01:54.080 Just because something is not scripture doesn't mean it's useless. 01:01:54.080 --> 01:01:57.200 Plenty of things are useful and not scripture. 01:01:58.400 --> 01:02:01.200 How do we know that the canon of scripture exists, right? 01:02:01.200 --> 01:02:02.880 What is the canon of scripture? 01:02:02.880 --> 01:02:06.720 That's sort of a fundamental underlying question here. 01:02:06.720 --> 01:02:07.040 And 01:02:08.240 --> 01:02:12.800 it's the difference between knowing the canon and defining the canon, right? 01:02:14.720 --> 01:02:15.600 This is 01:02:16.480 --> 01:02:21.360 this is an important point because this gets into sort of the 01:02:21.360 --> 01:02:25.600 core of some of the objections to scripture and things like that. 01:02:25.600 --> 01:02:32.240 The canon of a particular author is defined by the fact that 01:02:32.240 --> 01:02:34.880 the author wrote the things. 01:02:34.880 --> 01:02:36.160 Right? And so 01:02:37.040 --> 01:02:44.560 I can look at my shelves here and say, you know, 01:02:44.560 --> 01:02:46.080 I have some books by Luther. 01:02:46.080 --> 01:02:48.000 We'll go back to Luther just because I have him on my 01:02:48.000 --> 01:02:49.040 shelves here and 01:02:50.080 --> 01:02:56.160 I have some books by various other authors as well. 01:02:56.160 --> 01:03:02.960 What qualifies those books as being part of the ouvoie, the canon 01:03:02.960 --> 01:03:05.200 of that particular author. 01:03:05.200 --> 01:03:07.280 The fact that he wrote them. 01:03:07.280 --> 01:03:08.960 That's it. 01:03:08.960 --> 01:03:13.440 It is a book by that author, it is authored by that 01:03:13.440 --> 01:03:16.480 author, if he in fact authored it. 01:03:16.560 --> 01:03:21.280 It's practically tautological, but that's because it is the essence of the 01:03:21.280 --> 01:03:24.640 thing. And so you'll have those who will say, How is it 01:03:24.640 --> 01:03:28.720 that we have this can because the canon pre exists. 01:03:28.720 --> 01:03:31.040 Because God is the author of the canon. 01:03:32.000 --> 01:03:36.000 How we know the canon is a separate question. 01:03:36.000 --> 01:03:39.440 Whether or not it exists is a core matter. 01:03:39.440 --> 01:03:44.560 If you believe that God wrote anything, caused anything to be written, 01:03:44.560 --> 01:03:50.240 then the canon exists independently of whether we have access to it, 01:03:50.240 --> 01:03:53.280 whether we have all of it, whether we know how to understand 01:03:53.280 --> 01:03:59.120 it, whether we whether we accurately identify which books belong to it. 01:03:59.120 --> 01:04:05.120 For instance, Martin Luther wrote some number of works during his life. 01:04:05.120 --> 01:04:10.640 The Weimar Ausgaba, the complete works of Luther in the Weimar edition, 01:04:10.640 --> 01:04:14.560 supposedly contain everything he wrote. 01:04:14.560 --> 01:04:17.280 Could we find something else that he wrote? 01:04:17.280 --> 01:04:20.720 Sure. Could we have lost things that he wrote? 01:04:20.720 --> 01:04:25.600 Sure. That would mean that we have a partial canon with regard 01:04:25.600 --> 01:04:26.560 to Luther. 01:04:26.560 --> 01:04:29.520 We don't have the totality of his works because we lost some 01:04:29.520 --> 01:04:31.760 along the way. 01:04:31.760 --> 01:04:35.200 If for instance we have we have the Bible, right? 01:04:35.520 --> 01:04:39.840 And let's say a thousand years from now, somehow they lose the 01:04:39.840 --> 01:04:42.160 book of Numbers. 01:04:43.040 --> 01:04:46.240 Does that mean that Numbers is not part of the canon? 01:04:46.240 --> 01:04:51.760 No. Because Because God, being the author of the book, this time 01:04:51.920 --> 01:04:55.680 through Moses, but God being the author of the book, it is 01:04:55.680 --> 01:04:57.920 part of God's canon. 01:04:57.920 --> 01:05:03.520 Just because, in this hypothetical, our descendants in a thousand years no 01:05:03.520 --> 01:05:06.720 longer have that book doesn't mean the book ceases to be part 01:05:06.720 --> 01:05:07.760 of the canon. 01:05:07.760 --> 01:05:10.960 It means they no longer have access to it, it means they 01:05:10.960 --> 01:05:12.240 now have a partial canon. 01:05:12.960 --> 01:05:14.800 It's a different thing. 01:05:14.800 --> 01:05:18.560 And so the canon is inerrant. 01:05:18.560 --> 01:05:24.800 Whether or not a particular group has that inerrant canon is a 01:05:25.200 --> 01:05:27.920 separate question. 01:05:27.920 --> 01:05:30.640 And I don't know that I want to get too deeply into 01:05:30.640 --> 01:05:33.520 how we know which books are part of the canon, because that's 01:05:33.520 --> 01:05:37.360 a long discussion, and it gets somewhat involved, and I'd probably want 01:05:37.360 --> 01:05:39.520 to bring up a bunch of exhibits and things, but 01:05:41.440 --> 01:05:45.200 The existence of the canon is an independent thing from whether or 01:05:45.200 --> 01:05:48.800 not any particular group at any particular time has the totality of 01:05:48.800 --> 01:05:51.680 the canon. 01:05:51.680 --> 01:05:54.800 Related, but distinct things. 01:05:54.800 --> 01:05:57.600 It's vitally important to keep that in mind. 01:05:57.600 --> 01:06:01.360 The canon as it exists with regard to God having authored these 01:06:01.360 --> 01:06:05.680 things is inerrant by definition. 01:06:05.680 --> 01:06:12.080 Whether or not any particular written version of the Bible, printed version, 01:06:12.080 --> 01:06:14.960 say the Masoretic text that we have, right? 01:06:14.960 --> 01:06:20.240 That's errant, because the Masoretic text has corruptions from the Jews in 01:06:20.240 --> 01:06:23.440 it. And so does it still contain the Word of God? 01:06:23.440 --> 01:06:25.520 The answer is yes. 01:06:25.520 --> 01:06:27.280 Is it the Word of God? 01:06:27.280 --> 01:06:30.160 I would have to say no with regard to the Masoretic text 01:06:30.240 --> 01:06:34.240 because of those corruptions before the Jews, but it contains the Word 01:06:34.240 --> 01:06:35.520 of God. 01:06:35.520 --> 01:06:40.720 And so it is a partially correct version of the canon. 01:06:40.720 --> 01:06:44.880 It is not the perfect version that God inspired. 01:06:45.200 --> 01:06:47.840 We have that, of course, that's the Septuagint. 01:06:47.840 --> 01:06:50.560 Thankfully we have that as well, because God said he would preserve 01:06:50.560 --> 01:06:51.440 his word. 01:06:51.440 --> 01:06:53.120 We rely on God. 01:06:53.120 --> 01:06:56.480 Which is another aspect of this, of course, and I think I 01:06:56.480 --> 01:06:58.800 think I'll finish this answer here because I don't want to get 01:06:58.800 --> 01:07:00.480 too deeply into it. 01:07:00.480 --> 01:07:00.800 But 01:07:03.280 --> 01:07:03.600 God 01:07:04.880 --> 01:07:07.360 states that he will preserve his word. 01:07:07.360 --> 01:07:11.920 If we believe God, then we must believe that he has preserved 01:07:11.920 --> 01:07:13.040 His Word. 01:07:13.040 --> 01:07:14.800 Where did He preserve it? 01:07:14.800 --> 01:07:16.720 Because it has to be preserved, right? 01:07:16.720 --> 01:07:20.880 If it is just unknown somewhere it's not in a cave somewhere, 01:07:20.880 --> 01:07:24.720 right? It's the Septuagint, because that's what God preserved for us, it's 01:07:24.640 --> 01:07:28.480 what God preserved for the early church, it's what Christ Himself used. 01:07:28.480 --> 01:07:31.920 He preserved his word because he promised that he would. 01:07:31.920 --> 01:07:35.600 So when we believe God, we believe that He preserved His Word. 01:07:35.600 --> 01:07:38.640 And we find that he actually did. 01:07:38.640 --> 01:07:41.440 Again, one of the minor proofs of the fact that God does 01:07:41.440 --> 01:07:44.720 exist. It is he is the God of Scripture. 01:07:44.720 --> 01:07:47.680 But answer for another time, right? 01:07:47.680 --> 01:07:53.600 I think that pretty much addresses how we can know that scripture 01:07:53.600 --> 01:07:58.240 is inerrant and in what way we mean that scripture, first that 01:07:58.320 --> 01:08:01.040 what we mean by scripture, and then second that we mean that 01:08:01.040 --> 01:08:07.360 scripture is inerrant because it's that distinction between the thing existing and 01:08:07.680 --> 01:08:12.960 a particular instance of it being in error or not, right? 01:08:12.960 --> 01:08:15.840 A quick additional example. 01:08:15.840 --> 01:08:18.640 There was the thing called the Wicked Bible at one point. 01:08:18.640 --> 01:08:20.640 It had a single misprint. 01:08:20.640 --> 01:08:23.680 It said thou shalt commit adultery. 01:08:23.680 --> 01:08:25.520 That was errant. 01:08:25.520 --> 01:08:29.200 It did not mean that there was no inerrant word of God. 01:08:29.200 --> 01:08:31.840 It meant the printer made a mistake. 01:08:31.840 --> 01:08:36.320 And so that printing, with regard to that one line, that one 01:08:36.320 --> 01:08:39.840 word, was an error, it was errant. 01:08:39.760 --> 01:08:44.000 But that is a distinct matter from the canon itself existing and 01:08:44.000 --> 01:08:50.480 being an errant. 01:08:50.720 --> 01:08:56.640 I think I will save this question about the restorationist for next 01:08:56.640 --> 01:09:01.760 time because it has some subparts to it and I don't know 01:09:01.760 --> 01:09:05.280 that I want to get into it right now. 01:09:05.360 --> 01:09:10.240 I will quickly scroll through the chat here. 01:09:10.240 --> 01:09:12.880 I don't know that I will get to all of it, but 01:09:12.880 --> 01:09:14.160 let's see. 01:09:21.600 --> 01:09:25.440 I have someone saying that as a German from Russia, they preserved 01:09:25.440 --> 01:09:26.960 the medieval German accent. 01:09:26.960 --> 01:09:29.520 That's probably true with regard to certain regional accents. 01:09:29.520 --> 01:09:33.360 Germany, not to the same degree as Britain, but Germany certainly has 01:09:33.440 --> 01:09:36.240 regional accents. 01:09:36.240 --> 01:09:39.600 I know because I've tried to talk to a Bavarian before, and 01:09:41.040 --> 01:09:45.040 no. I know standard German, I do not know Bioish 01:09:48.160 --> 01:09:52.960 A quirk of accents though we actually have some of the accents 01:09:52.960 --> 01:09:57.440 in the US are closer to what would have existed centuries ago 01:09:57.440 --> 01:10:00.720 in Britain because we preserved them and the British did not. 01:10:00.720 --> 01:10:07.760 Which is kind of ironic. 01:10:07.760 --> 01:10:08.960 Let's see. 01:10:30.000 --> 01:10:34.640 I think that may be just about it for this week. 01:10:34.640 --> 01:10:38.000 I do see some other questions here in the chat that I 01:10:38.000 --> 01:10:40.880 am going to write down for next time. 01:10:40.880 --> 01:10:43.680 I don't know that I want to get into them necessarily this 01:10:43.680 --> 01:10:50.960 time. Someone asked about which 01:10:50.960 --> 01:10:52.880 internet theologians to avoid. 01:10:52.880 --> 01:10:57.040 Uh the answer to that is most of them because most internet 01:10:57.280 --> 01:11:01.520 theologians are just not going to be very good. 01:11:01.520 --> 01:11:04.320 But that's true for most theologians, period. 01:11:04.320 --> 01:11:11.040 Because most theologians are not lowercase O Orthodox, they are usually trying 01:11:11.040 --> 01:11:13.600 to push some sort of agenda. 01:11:13.600 --> 01:11:16.400 Part of that, of course, is they haven't yet passed through the 01:11:16.800 --> 01:11:20.480 filter of history, which I don't want to get into this too 01:11:20.480 --> 01:11:23.600 deeply right now, but it's important to recognize that many of the 01:11:23.600 --> 01:11:27.840 things that have been handed down to us from previous centuries, from 01:11:28.080 --> 01:11:34.480 previous millennia in some cases, they were things that were worth preserving. 01:11:34.480 --> 01:11:37.040 That's why we have them. 01:11:37.040 --> 01:11:39.520 Most things produced in any given era 01:11:41.520 --> 01:11:44.080 are Are not going to be worth preserving. 01:11:44.080 --> 01:11:49.840 And so we have Shakespeare, but there are probably hundreds of others 01:11:49.840 --> 01:11:54.720 whose works were not preserved because they weren't as good. 01:11:55.040 --> 01:11:58.400 To some degree that's true of the Greek playwrights, to some degree, 01:11:58.400 --> 01:12:02.240 we just lost things due to time and weather and the reality 01:12:02.240 --> 01:12:05.360 of living in a fallen world where things fall apart. 01:12:05.440 --> 01:12:11.120 But you do have to recognize that there is a filter that 01:12:11.120 --> 01:12:16.960 acts naturally historically because things that are worth transmitting are the things 01:12:16.960 --> 01:12:19.200 that tend to get transmitted. 01:12:19.200 --> 01:12:22.320 It's not always true, but by and large it is. 01:12:22.320 --> 01:12:25.600 And so the reason this is important is because when you're looking 01:12:25.600 --> 01:12:29.360 at things in your current era, they have not yet passed through 01:12:29.360 --> 01:12:30.560 that filter. 01:12:30.560 --> 01:12:35.200 And so don't necessarily look back at history and think, wow, they 01:12:35.200 --> 01:12:38.720 were so much better at all of these No, many times the 01:12:38.720 --> 01:12:41.840 stuff that was terrible just didn't get passed forward to us. 01:12:41.840 --> 01:12:45.120 And many of the terrible stuff today won't get passed forward to 01:12:45.120 --> 01:12:49.360 future generations because it won't be preserved because it's terrible. 01:12:49.360 --> 01:12:52.800 So just something to keep in mind when you're looking at what 01:12:52.800 --> 01:12:57.360 the past has transmitted to us in light of what we have 01:12:57.360 --> 01:12:58.640 today and vice versa, right? 01:12:58.640 --> 01:13:02.960 Don't necessarily think that the past didn't produce garbage as well because 01:13:02.960 --> 01:13:05.760 garbage doesn't get preserved. 01:13:06.000 --> 01:13:08.560 Think of it in a physical sense, right? 01:13:08.560 --> 01:13:12.560 Your actual literal garbage you're not going to keep around and then 01:13:12.560 --> 01:13:15.760 someone in a hundred years will have access to it. 01:13:15.760 --> 01:13:19.520 But if you have family heirlooms, you probably will pass those down. 01:13:19.520 --> 01:13:25.280 The same thing happens with culture. 01:13:32.720 --> 01:13:35.280 I think I can answer this one quickly to what extent is 01:13:35.280 --> 01:13:39.200 German and the Luther Bible still valuable for theology and Lutheranism, even 01:13:39.200 --> 01:13:42.000 though Luther didn't make use of the Septuagint. 01:13:42.000 --> 01:13:44.480 He actually did make use of the Septuagint. 01:13:44.480 --> 01:13:45.440 He spoke Greek. 01:13:45.440 --> 01:13:46.960 He had access to it. 01:13:46.960 --> 01:13:49.280 He just did not rely on it to the extent that he 01:13:49.280 --> 01:13:51.680 should have, which is to say exclusively. 01:13:51.680 --> 01:13:54.720 It is It is based in large part the Old Testament on 01:13:54.720 --> 01:13:57.520 the Masoretic text. 01:13:57.520 --> 01:14:00.080 So does it still have utility? 01:14:00.080 --> 01:14:01.440 Of course it does. 01:14:01.440 --> 01:14:06.240 Should we want to replace it with a Bible that is based 01:14:06.240 --> 01:14:08.000 on the Septuagint? 01:14:08.000 --> 01:14:12.160 Absolutely. And I also don't have that currently on my desk. 01:14:12.160 --> 01:14:15.680 There is already a version of the Septuagint translated into German. 01:14:15.680 --> 01:14:16.880 You can buy it today. 01:14:17.200 --> 01:14:19.440 We already have that in German. 01:14:19.440 --> 01:14:22.320 We have some options in English, none of them are great yet. 01:14:22.320 --> 01:14:26.160 Hopefully the one that is coming out, I believe it's supposed to 01:14:26.160 --> 01:14:28.320 be next year, will be a good option. 01:14:28.320 --> 01:14:29.680 But it already exists in German. 01:14:29.840 --> 01:14:34.320 The Septuaginthe Deutsch is I have a physical copy of it somewhere 01:14:34.560 --> 01:14:36.240 somewhere in this room. 01:14:36.240 --> 01:14:39.600 But you can buy it, unfortunately, this is another one of those 01:14:39.600 --> 01:14:42.160 cases where it is overpriced. 01:14:42.160 --> 01:14:42.800 It is 01:14:44.160 --> 01:14:47.920 hundred something dollars to get a copy of it delivered to the 01:14:47.920 --> 01:14:51.760 US, unfortunately, but it's available. 01:14:51.760 --> 01:14:52.960 It does exist. 01:14:52.960 --> 01:14:54.960 That's what I would say you should use if you want to 01:14:54.960 --> 01:14:59.200 study scripture in German, not necessarily the Luther Bible. 01:14:59.200 --> 01:15:02.720 The Luther Bible of course has historical utility in the sense that 01:15:02.720 --> 01:15:05.520 you can look at the development of the German language and it's 01:15:05.520 --> 01:15:07.360 one of the major sources of that. 01:15:07.360 --> 01:15:11.360 So it has that usage, but no, my position is the same 01:15:11.360 --> 01:15:13.120 in any given language. 01:15:13.120 --> 01:15:17.120 We should be relying on the Septuagint, not on the Masoretic text. 01:15:17.120 --> 01:15:20.240 We should not be using the Hebrew period. 01:15:20.240 --> 01:15:23.760 Same thing is true in German as is true in English, French, 01:15:23.760 --> 01:15:25.840 Japanese, every other language. 01:15:25.840 --> 01:15:26.160 So 01:15:27.040 --> 01:15:30.880 it has utility, but not what we should be using to study 01:15:30.880 --> 01:15:36.960 scripture, particularly when we already have the Septuagint translated in German 01:15:41.680 --> 01:15:44.960 Think I will answer one more question. 01:15:44.960 --> 01:15:48.160 If my backlog starts to get too long, I'll just run for, 01:15:48.160 --> 01:15:50.960 you know, ninety minutes at some point or two hours and get 01:15:50.960 --> 01:15:52.320 through some of the backlog. 01:15:52.320 --> 01:15:55.840 But for now I'll leave some questions for next week. 01:15:55.840 --> 01:16:01.040 Regarding concupiscence, is it a sin if some part of you desires 01:16:01.040 --> 01:16:05.280 sin, but you would still morally abstain if given the opportunity, if 01:16:05.280 --> 01:16:09.280 your steadfastness would overcome your desire? 01:16:09.280 --> 01:16:12.640 I kind of touched on and answered that one, but to be 01:16:12.640 --> 01:16:17.680 more explicit, yes, it is still sin, because the desire to sin 01:16:18.000 --> 01:16:19.520 is sin. 01:16:19.520 --> 01:16:22.880 But it's just like the example I gave with the legal example, 01:16:22.880 --> 01:16:25.440 right? Conspiracy. 01:16:25.440 --> 01:16:26.800 Creating the conspiracy 01:16:28.000 --> 01:16:30.880 may very well be a crime. 01:16:30.880 --> 01:16:34.240 Usually you have to have a an act in furtherance of the 01:16:34.240 --> 01:16:37.760 conspiracy, not just talking about it, but depends on the law of 01:16:37.760 --> 01:16:38.640 where you are. 01:16:38.960 --> 01:16:43.600 Creating the conspiracy, making it a concrete thing, is a crime, probably. 01:16:43.600 --> 01:16:45.040 I'm just going to say it is a crime. 01:16:45.040 --> 01:16:47.360 I'm always going to give the attorney answer because I don't want 01:16:47.360 --> 01:16:49.600 someone saying, Oh, you gave me bad legal advice, right? 01:16:49.600 --> 01:16:50.720 It's not legal advice. 01:16:50.720 --> 01:16:52.800 I'm not teaching you criminal law right now. 01:16:52.800 --> 01:16:57.040 But the conspiracy, for the sake of our hypothetical, is a crime. 01:16:57.040 --> 01:17:02.560 Doing something in order to pursue the conspiracy, probably also a crime. 01:17:02.560 --> 01:17:07.280 Committing the actual crime that was the point of the conspiracy is 01:17:07.280 --> 01:17:08.480 a crime. 01:17:08.480 --> 01:17:12.800 Committing it as part of a conspiracy is a crime. 01:17:12.800 --> 01:17:15.200 The same thing with regard to sin. 01:17:15.200 --> 01:17:18.640 The desire to sin because it is a z it is a 01:17:18.640 --> 01:17:22.960 desire to act contrary to God is sin. 01:17:23.280 --> 01:17:28.800 Doing something concrete in order to try to obtain the sinful end 01:17:28.960 --> 01:17:30.400 is a sin. 01:17:30.400 --> 01:17:31.520 Obtaining the sinful end 01:17:32.640 --> 01:17:34.000 is a sin. 01:17:34.000 --> 01:17:36.720 Not repenting is a sin. 01:17:36.720 --> 01:17:40.320 Persisting in that sin is a sin. 01:17:40.320 --> 01:17:43.200 And so I I don't want it to be to the point 01:17:43.200 --> 01:17:45.600 where you get neurotic about the law and oh I'm a terrible 01:17:45.600 --> 01:17:48.000 person and I'm sinful and I can never do anything. 01:17:48.000 --> 01:17:49.120 Don't do that. 01:17:49.120 --> 01:17:50.880 Don't despair. 01:17:50.880 --> 01:17:53.680 I'm not going to say it's a sin, but it is, but 01:17:53.680 --> 01:17:58.400 don't despair because of course, the sacrifice of Christ is of infinite 01:17:58.400 --> 01:18:01.440 value. God has already forgiven all of your sins. 01:18:01.440 --> 01:18:03.760 He knows that you are a sinner. 01:18:03.760 --> 01:18:05.920 He knows you're going to continue to sin. 01:18:05.920 --> 01:18:09.760 He knows the sins that you are going to commit five years 01:18:09.760 --> 01:18:13.120 from today, you have no idea what those well you probably know 01:18:13.120 --> 01:18:15.600 some of those sins, but many of those sins you have no 01:18:15.600 --> 01:18:17.200 idea what they are yet. 01:18:17.200 --> 01:18:19.280 You may not even recognize them at the time. 01:18:19.280 --> 01:18:20.960 God knows each and every one of them. 01:18:20.960 --> 01:18:22.880 Christ knew each and every one of them when he went to 01:18:22.880 --> 01:18:26.480 the cross, and you are forgiven for those already. 01:18:26.480 --> 01:18:30.720 Yes, of course, pray the Lord's prayer, ask God for forgiveness, repent, 01:18:30.720 --> 01:18:35.360 which properly means to turn away from that sin, but don't despair 01:18:35.920 --> 01:18:39.600 because of the fact that yes, you're going to sin a lot 01:18:39.600 --> 01:18:43.840 in this life, and you basically can't 100% avoid it. 01:18:43.840 --> 01:18:48.080 The Christian life is not a life of perfect avoidance of sin. 01:18:48.080 --> 01:18:52.720 The Christian life is a life of repentance for sin, because we 01:18:52.720 --> 01:18:58.720 live in a fallen world, and a fundamental aspect of this that 01:18:59.360 --> 01:19:04.960 most people get wrong because it doesn't seem intuitive at first, but 01:19:04.960 --> 01:19:07.280 you have to understand a little bit of Christian theology to know 01:19:07.280 --> 01:19:09.360 why this is the case. 01:19:09.360 --> 01:19:14.320 You are not a sinner because you sin. 01:19:14.320 --> 01:19:20.000 You sin because you are a sinner. 01:19:20.000 --> 01:19:26.800 If you understand original sin, that is the conclusion, the natural, inevitable, 01:19:26.800 --> 01:19:30.640 necessary conclusion of understanding original sin Original sin. 01:19:30.640 --> 01:19:35.040 And unless you arrive at that conclusion, that understanding of why you 01:19:35.040 --> 01:19:39.760 sin and the interaction there, the direction of the causation, you don't 01:19:39.680 --> 01:19:42.960 understand original sin until you get to that. 01:19:42.960 --> 01:19:47.840 And so again, you sin because you are a sinner. 01:19:47.840 --> 01:19:52.240 You are a sinner because our federal head Adam fell and took 01:19:52.240 --> 01:19:54.000 everyone and everything with him. 01:19:55.120 --> 01:20:00.960 You are restored in Christ, but you are not perfected in this 01:20:00.960 --> 01:20:08.160 life, because justification, that juridical, that legal declaration that 01:20:08.160 --> 01:20:13.680 you are wiped clean, your slate is wiped clean, you are innocent, 01:20:13.680 --> 01:20:18.080 you are forgiven for the sake of Christ, that is once and 01:20:18.080 --> 01:20:21.600 done It was finished on the cross, it's applied to you when 01:20:21.600 --> 01:20:23.760 you are given the free gift of faith. 01:20:23.760 --> 01:20:30.960 Sanctification is progressive in this life, and final sanctification, complete, perfect sanctification, 01:20:30.960 --> 01:20:33.840 not in the reformed sense, but in the sense that I think 01:20:33.840 --> 01:20:39.360 you all understand what I'm saying, that sanctification happens at the resurrection, 01:20:39.360 --> 01:20:42.880 at the second coming, if you're still alive when it happens, right? 01:20:42.880 --> 01:20:46.240 So you are not going to be perfect in this life, but 01:20:46.880 --> 01:20:49.520 that's not the point of the Christian life. 01:20:49.520 --> 01:20:53.120 So don't despair just because you know concupiscence is sin, so that 01:20:53.120 --> 01:20:56.480 desire to sin is sin and then pursuing it and committing it 01:20:56.560 --> 01:20:57.840 and hiding it and 01:20:58.800 --> 01:21:04.400 Your instinct, your immediate reaction, should always be to turn to God 01:21:04.400 --> 01:21:06.480 and ask for forgiveness. 01:21:06.480 --> 01:21:08.400 Don't hide from God. 01:21:08.400 --> 01:21:10.000 God hates that. 01:21:10.000 --> 01:21:12.000 Don't do that. 01:21:12.000 --> 01:21:15.360 You don't have to look at God and say I can't come 01:21:15.360 --> 01:21:19.120 before you because I'm this unholy wretch, I've done this horrible thing, 01:21:19.120 --> 01:21:23.280 I've fallen into this particular sin, yet again I've done the thing 01:21:23.280 --> 01:21:24.240 that I hate to do. 01:21:24.240 --> 01:21:26.400 Think of the words of Paul. 01:21:26.400 --> 01:21:29.200 I do the very thing I do not want to do, and 01:21:29.200 --> 01:21:31.520 I do not do the thing I want to do, because of 01:21:31.520 --> 01:21:34.560 the sin that is in me, right? 01:21:34.560 --> 01:21:36.720 Turn to God, that's what God wants. 01:21:36.720 --> 01:21:40.080 God wants you to turn to him and ask for forgiveness and 01:21:40.080 --> 01:21:40.960 try again. 01:21:40.960 --> 01:21:44.000 Pick yourself up, turn to God, try again. 01:21:44.000 --> 01:21:47.200 Don't despair, don't think that oh I've fallen for it again. 01:21:47.200 --> 01:21:48.880 No. That's what Satan wants. 01:21:48.880 --> 01:21:51.840 Satan wants you to wallow in it and keep thinking about how 01:21:51.840 --> 01:21:54.480 terrible and awful you are and focusing on that. 01:21:54.480 --> 01:21:55.920 Focus on the cross. 01:21:55.920 --> 01:21:56.960 I could point behind me. 01:21:56.960 --> 01:21:58.080 Look at the cross. 01:21:58.080 --> 01:22:01.120 That's the answer. 01:22:01.120 --> 01:22:04.080 All of your sins are forgiven. 01:22:04.080 --> 01:22:06.320 That's what you should do as a Christian. 01:22:06.320 --> 01:22:09.280 So, yes, concupiscence is sin. 01:22:09.280 --> 01:22:11.840 But that sin was also forgiven at the cross. 01:22:14.160 --> 01:22:20.480 And I think that I will probably call it there for this 01:22:20.480 --> 01:22:27.120 week. Once again, just as a sort of little bit of housekeeping 01:22:27.120 --> 01:22:28.720 here at the end, you can submit questions 01:22:29.760 --> 01:22:32.480 on the forum, omniforta.com. 01:22:32.480 --> 01:22:36.320 There's a request category specifically for this. 01:22:36.320 --> 01:22:39.120 If you happen to put it in another part of the forum, 01:22:39.120 --> 01:22:39.680 I'll move it. 01:22:39.680 --> 01:22:40.960 It's not a big deal. 01:22:40.960 --> 01:22:45.040 But that does help me to try to organize these questions and 01:22:45.040 --> 01:22:47.440 link things so people can find it in the future. 01:22:47.440 --> 01:22:51.200 If you ask questions in the chat or on X, wherever else 01:22:51.200 --> 01:22:54.880 you happen to ask them, Telegram, I do write those down, try 01:22:54.880 --> 01:22:58.240 to collate those as well and get them into the show at 01:22:58.240 --> 01:22:59.920 some point. 01:22:59.920 --> 01:23:02.880 If you have asked a question and it has been a while 01:23:02.960 --> 01:23:05.360 and I have not answered it, referenced it, said I'm going to 01:23:05.360 --> 01:23:08.720 answer it, something like that, by all means, I don't object to 01:23:08.720 --> 01:23:09.760 you reminding me. 01:23:09.760 --> 01:23:11.680 Perhaps it slipped through the cracks. 01:23:11.680 --> 01:23:15.760 Perhaps you asked it and it got hidden or suppressed or something. 01:23:15.760 --> 01:23:17.040 That happens on X all the time. 01:23:17.040 --> 01:23:21.200 I try to find things and their moderation team to be charitable 01:23:21.600 --> 01:23:23.040 has hidden it from me. 01:23:23.040 --> 01:23:25.600 So bear that in mind. 01:23:25.600 --> 01:23:28.240 But thank you for those of you who submitted the questions. 01:23:28.240 --> 01:23:29.280 Thank you for your time. 01:23:29.280 --> 01:23:31.520 I am glad I was able to answer the questions for you. 01:23:31.520 --> 01:23:34.800 Hopefully answer the questions in a useful way. 01:23:34.800 --> 01:23:38.000 If you have a follow-up question, by all means feel free to 01:23:38.000 --> 01:23:39.440 ask that as well. 01:23:39.440 --> 01:23:42.640 And I finally managed to get this on a Thursday instead of 01:23:42.640 --> 01:23:46.000 a Friday, so I won't say just yet to have a good 01:23:46.000 --> 01:23:49.360 weekend, but survive Friday and then have an excellent weekend and go 01:23:49.360 --> 01:23:51.120 to church on Sunday. 01:23:51.120 --> 01:23:54.320 I will see all of you next week, and may God bless 01:23:54.320 --> 01:23:59.680 you in the interim.