WEBVTT 00:00:37.040 --> 00:00:39.520 Welcome to the Stone Choir Podcast. 00:00:39.520 --> 00:00:40.720 I am Corey J. 00:00:40.720 --> 00:00:42.160 Mahler. And I'm 00:00:42.160 --> 00:00:44.560 still woe. 00:00:44.640 --> 00:00:48.000 On today's Stone Choir, we're going to be talking about truth and 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:51.040 lies. This is a subject that we frequently visit. 00:00:51.040 --> 00:00:54.400 We've done a couple episodes entirely about portions of the truth. 00:00:55.120 --> 00:00:58.720 Uh, we did an episode early on on the clarity of scripture, 00:00:58.720 --> 00:01:01.760 and we did another one on speaking the truth plainly. 00:01:01.760 --> 00:01:05.040 Those are both within the first few months of Stone Choir. 00:01:05.040 --> 00:01:07.760 We're going to talk about different aspects of it today. 00:01:07.760 --> 00:01:11.280 The purpose of this episode about truth and lies 00:01:12.240 --> 00:01:16.480 is to demonstrate to you, dear listener, that the truth is a 00:01:17.040 --> 00:01:20.080 much broader category than you want to think it is. 00:01:20.080 --> 00:01:23.840 And the category of lies is also much broader than you want 00:01:23.840 --> 00:01:24.880 to think it is. 00:01:24.880 --> 00:01:28.320 And in the middle is the category of opinion, which is where 00:01:28.320 --> 00:01:29.600 everybody wants to live. 00:01:29.600 --> 00:01:32.240 We all want to hang out in the opinion zone where I 00:01:32.240 --> 00:01:34.960 think my thing and you think your thing, and we're okay. 00:01:34.960 --> 00:01:38.160 You know, somebody might be wrong, somebody might be in error, but 00:01:38.160 --> 00:01:40.720 you can't say that somebody's telling the truth and therefore the other 00:01:40.720 --> 00:01:44.400 man is lying if you disagrees, because it's a matter of disagreement 00:01:44.480 --> 00:01:46.800 and not a matter of truth and falsity. 00:01:46.800 --> 00:01:49.760 I'd like for you to picture a gradient where 00:01:49.920 --> 00:01:53.360 at one end you have the truth and it's a bright white 00:01:53.360 --> 00:01:55.360 light. That's where truth is located. 00:01:55.360 --> 00:01:58.560 That's how we we talk about truth with a capital T. 00:01:58.560 --> 00:02:01.600 We think of it as this metaphysical concept. 00:02:01.600 --> 00:02:06.000 It's this idealized perfected form of something, you know, goddess truth. 00:02:06.000 --> 00:02:08.960 It's one of the transcendentals, which I'm sure Corey will get into 00:02:08.960 --> 00:02:10.080 here in a bit. 00:02:10.720 --> 00:02:14.160 But that's got to be fairly small because it's about God, right? 00:02:14.160 --> 00:02:17.920 If God is truth, then only things that are God can be 00:02:17.920 --> 00:02:21.120 truth. And then we got all this other spectrum of who knows? 00:02:21.280 --> 00:02:22.720 it's people stuff. 00:02:22.720 --> 00:02:25.520 And so in the middle, that's where we have this huge chunk 00:02:25.520 --> 00:02:28.880 of opinions where it's not truth and it's not lies. 00:02:28.880 --> 00:02:32.400 It's just, yeah, some better ideas, some worse ideas, maybe they work, 00:02:32.400 --> 00:02:33.360 maybe they don't. 00:02:33.360 --> 00:02:35.840 It becomes subjective. 00:02:35.840 --> 00:02:40.720 And the reason that we all wallow in this pit of subjectivity 00:02:40.720 --> 00:02:44.240 today is that I think in part mass literacy has been a 00:02:44.240 --> 00:02:47.040 disaster and democracy has been a disaster. 00:02:47.040 --> 00:02:51.600 The intersection of those two things has created a circumstance today where 00:02:51.600 --> 00:02:53.920 every man feels like he has to have an opinion about everything 00:02:54.000 --> 00:02:56.480 and it really measures that he does. 00:02:56.480 --> 00:02:59.520 The problem with that is that most men aren't going to take 00:02:59.520 --> 00:03:02.960 the time to figure out if their opinions match with the truth. 00:03:02.960 --> 00:03:05.760 And they don't really care because you think, well, it's just I'm 00:03:05.760 --> 00:03:07.920 just gonna have a f an opinion and I'll read the a 00:03:07.920 --> 00:03:11.760 couple books that somebody recommended and I'll be on pretty good standing. 00:03:11.760 --> 00:03:15.200 The problem with that is that it doesn't actually reflect whether or 00:03:15.200 --> 00:03:21.360 not the belief that one then holds and espouses is actually true. 00:03:21.360 --> 00:03:24.320 Because remember, truth is sequestered way at the bright end of this 00:03:24.320 --> 00:03:27.360 gradient, where it's only God glowing so bright that you can't look 00:03:27.360 --> 00:03:27.920 at him. 00:03:27.920 --> 00:03:30.160 And then we're not really dealing with truth as men. 00:03:30.160 --> 00:03:33.120 We're dealing with the ideas and subjects, and some are better than 00:03:33.120 --> 00:03:34.960 others. That's where everybody is. 00:03:34.960 --> 00:03:38.560 That's our whole culture today is pure subjectivity. 00:03:38.560 --> 00:03:40.960 And a lot of it is governed by, well, I don't feel 00:03:40.960 --> 00:03:41.920 like that's good. 00:03:41.920 --> 00:03:43.680 I don't like the sound of that. 00:03:43.680 --> 00:03:46.320 How often do you see that directed at someone? 00:03:46.320 --> 00:03:50.320 If you look at dimensions to Corey and myself, it's rampant. 00:03:50.320 --> 00:03:51.840 Guys like, I don't like the sound of that. 00:03:51.840 --> 00:03:53.440 I think that sounds bad. 00:03:53.440 --> 00:03:56.720 Their emotional responses to factual claims. 00:03:56.720 --> 00:04:00.000 Stone Choir has, you know, this will be our eighty-fifth episode, I 00:04:00.000 --> 00:04:03.760 believe. We've never done a single episode about an opinion that we 00:04:03.760 --> 00:04:08.560 held We've had moments in various episodes where we express our opinions 00:04:08.640 --> 00:04:12.160 and we make it very clear within those moments: here's my opinion. 00:04:12.160 --> 00:04:15.040 My opinion is that Adam was a thousand years old when he 00:04:15.040 --> 00:04:16.640 died. Can't prove it. 00:04:16.640 --> 00:04:18.240 I can't assert that that's true. 00:04:18.240 --> 00:04:19.840 That's my opinion. 00:04:19.840 --> 00:04:22.400 But you'll know that that's something that's indifferent. 00:04:22.400 --> 00:04:28.000 It was an indifferent matter, just speculation, pious speculation, that would fill 00:04:28.000 --> 00:04:31.200 in a potential blank in the broader subject of evolution and all 00:04:31.200 --> 00:04:31.440 the rest. 00:04:32.160 --> 00:04:36.080 Everything that we said in the episode 6,000 Years and Counting was 00:04:36.400 --> 00:04:38.400 about true things. 00:04:38.400 --> 00:04:41.600 So we don't do episodes about things that are our opinions. 00:04:41.600 --> 00:04:45.120 I don't think that most people approach the world that way. 00:04:45.120 --> 00:04:49.680 I think most guys don't sequester their own views, you know, inside 00:04:49.680 --> 00:04:50.320 your head. 00:04:50.320 --> 00:04:52.320 You're just gonna share whatever you think. 00:04:52.320 --> 00:04:54.800 And people think, well, we're just sharing whatever we think. 00:04:54.800 --> 00:04:56.400 I think a whole lot of things that I would never put 00:04:56.400 --> 00:04:59.440 on an episode because it's not my place to talk about it. 00:04:59.440 --> 00:05:02.880 I don't want to assert something to you know tens of thousands 00:05:02.880 --> 00:05:05.040 of people that I can't back up. 00:05:05.040 --> 00:05:07.040 And if I do them, it's going to be a small portion 00:05:07.040 --> 00:05:07.440 of something. 00:05:07.600 --> 00:05:08.560 It's my opinion. 00:05:08.560 --> 00:05:10.320 But I would never hold it against you. 00:05:10.800 --> 00:05:14.160 So when we do an episode, it's about things that are true, 00:05:14.160 --> 00:05:17.360 that are demonstrable, that we make a reasoned case for. 00:05:17.360 --> 00:05:20.320 And then we also very carefully say, and we've said from the 00:05:20.320 --> 00:05:22.960 very beginning, don't take our word for it. 00:05:23.360 --> 00:05:27.040 We don't want you to just believe what some guy says, even 00:05:27.040 --> 00:05:29.360 if it's us, because it's a bad model. 00:05:29.360 --> 00:05:31.760 It's a bad model for pursuing truth. 00:05:31.760 --> 00:05:33.200 You don't acquire truth. 00:05:33.200 --> 00:05:37.680 You don't perceive truth by just rolling over a bunch of sources 00:05:37.680 --> 00:05:40.240 and glomming onto the ones that you like. 00:05:40.240 --> 00:05:43.920 If what we say is true, it will bear out in the 00:05:43.920 --> 00:05:47.520 test. When you look at scripture, when you look at reality, when 00:05:47.520 --> 00:05:50.560 you look at the reason presented, you will have to come to 00:05:50.560 --> 00:05:52.480 the conclusion that yeah, what we said was true. 00:05:52.480 --> 00:05:55.520 You may not like it, may make you uncomfortable. 00:05:55.520 --> 00:05:59.360 But either we're telling you the truth or we're lying. 00:05:59.360 --> 00:06:00.960 We're never gonna do anything here 00:06:01.840 --> 00:06:04.880 that you could just say we were wrong about. 00:06:04.880 --> 00:06:06.720 As one of the points we want to make by the end 00:06:06.720 --> 00:06:10.960 of this episode, the vast majority of what men deal with is 00:06:10.960 --> 00:06:13.200 either truth or it's lies. 00:06:13.200 --> 00:06:15.280 And this has spiritual import. 00:06:15.280 --> 00:06:20.400 This is not simply a question of having stronger opinions or being 00:06:20.400 --> 00:06:22.560 strident about beliefs. 00:06:22.560 --> 00:06:26.080 Ultimately, all truth comes from God. 00:06:26.080 --> 00:06:28.080 All truth, every truth. 00:06:28.080 --> 00:06:31.200 And we'll get into the one of the most pernicious lies that's 00:06:31.200 --> 00:06:35.440 going on today, where we have so-called Christians running around screaming, that's 00:06:35.440 --> 00:06:36.880 not the gospel. 00:06:36.880 --> 00:06:39.760 And we'll make the point, the when guy screams that's not the 00:06:40.160 --> 00:06:43.680 gospel, they're almost always attacking something that's true. 00:06:43.680 --> 00:06:48.080 If I tell you that African Americans are 120 times more likely 00:06:48.080 --> 00:06:50.720 to murder you than a white man, they'll say, That's not the 00:06:50.720 --> 00:06:52.080 gospel. That's racist. 00:06:52.080 --> 00:06:52.880 That makes me feel bad. 00:06:52.880 --> 00:06:53.600 I like the sound of that. 00:06:54.240 --> 00:06:57.840 The fact that it's true is immaterial to someone who doesn't like 00:06:57.840 --> 00:06:59.760 it. This is not Christian. 00:06:59.760 --> 00:07:01.600 This is not Christian behavior. 00:07:01.600 --> 00:07:04.080 There's a right and a wrong way to tell the truth. 00:07:04.080 --> 00:07:06.880 We would never say you just need to run around screaming true 00:07:06.880 --> 00:07:07.840 things all the time. 00:07:07.840 --> 00:07:11.040 We did an entire episode on persuasiveness matter saying a lot of 00:07:11.040 --> 00:07:13.360 times you just gotta keep your mouth shut, even if you know 00:07:13.360 --> 00:07:14.000 the truth. 00:07:14.000 --> 00:07:16.160 It's not enough just to be right, but you have to be 00:07:16.160 --> 00:07:18.960 able to do something positive with the truth. 00:07:19.040 --> 00:07:22.000 But if you're not sure, or if you're getting something wrong and 00:07:22.000 --> 00:07:25.200 someone reprimands you and corrects you and says, look, what you said 00:07:25.200 --> 00:07:27.040 was false, this is true. 00:07:27.040 --> 00:07:29.600 Maybe you were just mistaken before and you're confused. 00:07:29.600 --> 00:07:30.160 It happens. 00:07:30.320 --> 00:07:31.520 Happens all of us. 00:07:31.520 --> 00:07:32.160 That's fine. 00:07:32.160 --> 00:07:35.840 It's not fine, but it's a normal part of the human experience. 00:07:35.840 --> 00:07:39.600 When you hear the truth, if you then despise it and you 00:07:39.600 --> 00:07:44.400 double down in your hatred, then it is an unequivocal spiritual problem 00:07:44.720 --> 00:07:47.840 because Satan is the father of lies. 00:07:47.840 --> 00:07:50.640 This is not an incidental statement. 00:07:50.640 --> 00:07:54.560 And note that when Satan is described as the deceiver and as 00:07:54.560 --> 00:07:57.840 the father of lies, it is not the gospel that he is 00:07:57.840 --> 00:07:59.760 accused of deceiving men about. 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:03.440 One of the very worst things about Protestantism is we continue to 00:08:03.440 --> 00:08:05.680 try to relitigate the Reformation. 00:08:05.680 --> 00:08:07.760 It's no longer a going concern. 00:08:07.760 --> 00:08:10.480 It is very rare that you will hear a man anywhere say 00:08:10.560 --> 00:08:10.720 I can 00:08:11.600 --> 00:08:12.320 save myself. 00:08:12.320 --> 00:08:14.080 Now it happens, absolutely happens. 00:08:14.080 --> 00:08:16.320 And when it does happen, when a man says, I don't think 00:08:16.320 --> 00:08:18.080 I need to believe in the right God, I think I'm just 00:08:18.160 --> 00:08:20.480 live a good life and I'm going to be saved. 00:08:20.480 --> 00:08:21.840 You find that outside the church. 00:08:21.840 --> 00:08:23.920 You don't find much of it inside the church. 00:08:23.920 --> 00:08:28.080 When that heresy comes up, yes, absolutely the Reformation arguments are irrelevant. 00:08:28.080 --> 00:08:31.040 The rest of the time, it's simply not. 00:08:31.040 --> 00:08:34.400 And so guys are running around pretending that these things are matters 00:08:34.400 --> 00:08:38.560 of opinion when it's fundamentally almost always either truth or lies. 00:08:39.040 --> 00:08:44.640 And the exhortation for this episode is take the truth more seriously, 00:08:44.640 --> 00:08:47.120 realize it's a much broader scope than you think. 00:08:47.120 --> 00:08:49.360 Take lies much more seriously than you do. 00:08:49.360 --> 00:08:52.480 And we'll demonstrate from scripture exactly what we mean by that. 00:08:52.480 --> 00:08:55.280 And then in the middle of that gradient, where you know you 00:08:55.280 --> 00:08:57.440 have the gray area that we've said in the mill's really big 00:08:57.440 --> 00:08:59.760 and it's a bunch of opinion, that needs to get a whole 00:08:59.760 --> 00:09:02.160 lot smaller because in reality it is. 00:09:02.160 --> 00:09:05.680 The things that are actually subjective, they're incidental. 00:09:05.680 --> 00:09:07.440 They're not important things. 00:09:07.440 --> 00:09:11.040 The things that are important necessarily have to be either be true 00:09:11.040 --> 00:09:11.920 or false. 00:09:11.920 --> 00:09:14.800 And the way that we define true or false in our daily 00:09:14.800 --> 00:09:18.000 lives is not remotely in accord with reality. 00:09:18.000 --> 00:09:20.640 Incidentally, reality and truth are synonymous. 00:09:20.640 --> 00:09:22.880 It's not a thing we're gonna get into today. 00:09:22.880 --> 00:09:25.120 So by the end of this, we hope that you will take 00:09:25.120 --> 00:09:29.360 away that maybe I should speak less, maybe I should be less 00:09:29.360 --> 00:09:34.240 confident in my opinions until I've actually sorted out whether they're true. 00:09:34.240 --> 00:09:38.400 Because just thinking something, if it's consequential, isn't sufficient for you to 00:09:38.400 --> 00:09:39.520 run around saying it. 00:09:39.520 --> 00:09:41.120 You can be wrong in your head. 00:09:41.120 --> 00:09:43.280 You're not going to hurt anyone else if you're wrong in your 00:09:43.280 --> 00:09:47.120 head. But when you're wrong in your head about something that's disprovable 00:09:47.120 --> 00:09:50.000 in reality, and then you go tell it to other people, you 00:09:50.000 --> 00:09:51.680 are becoming a false teacher. 00:09:51.680 --> 00:09:53.600 And it doesn't matter what your intent is. 00:09:53.600 --> 00:09:57.600 You're doing something terrible to everyone to whom you open your mouth. 00:09:57.600 --> 00:09:58.720 And we don't think that way. 00:09:58.720 --> 00:10:00.160 We don't take it seriously. 00:10:00.160 --> 00:10:03.040 Corey and I both take that deadly seriously. 00:10:03.040 --> 00:10:05.520 There's lots of things that we think that we don't say in 00:10:05.520 --> 00:10:07.440 public because they wouldn't be fruitful. 00:10:07.440 --> 00:10:10.000 And it's not a question of like shame or anything. 00:10:10.000 --> 00:10:14.000 It's just the things that are important, the things that are salient, 00:10:14.000 --> 00:10:16.960 are the things that are worth fighting for and fighting over. 00:10:16.960 --> 00:10:19.280 And the truth is that entire ground. 00:10:19.280 --> 00:10:20.560 That is the battlefield. 00:10:20.560 --> 00:10:22.880 The battlefield is reality. 00:10:22.880 --> 00:10:27.200 It's not simply the tiny, shiny, glowy truth of God Himself. 00:10:27.200 --> 00:10:29.280 It's not simply the gospel. 00:10:29.280 --> 00:10:32.960 Creation itself, reality itself, is truth. 00:10:32.960 --> 00:10:36.960 And every attack on that is a lie, and that is fundamentally 00:10:36.960 --> 00:10:38.240 spiritual in nature. 00:10:38.800 --> 00:10:41.680 I've mentioned this before, but it's worth mentioning again. 00:10:41.680 --> 00:10:45.360 This is not a philosophy podcast. 00:10:45.360 --> 00:10:49.120 That of course does not mean that we will not touch on 00:10:49.120 --> 00:10:51.520 philosophy from time to time. 00:10:51.520 --> 00:10:54.560 We will, of course, do that because what does philosophy mean? 00:10:54.560 --> 00:11:00.000 It is simply philosophia, the love of wisdom, and scripture speaks 00:11:00.960 --> 00:11:04.480 of wisdom in many places, and those verses should certainly come to 00:11:04.480 --> 00:11:06.640 mind when I mention that. 00:11:06.640 --> 00:11:10.000 But this is one of those episodes where, at least here at 00:11:10.000 --> 00:11:14.400 the outset, we will touch on philosophy just a little bit in 00:11:14.400 --> 00:11:18.640 order to couch what it is we are discussing and also to 00:11:18.640 --> 00:11:21.440 delineate what we are not discussing. 00:11:21.440 --> 00:11:27.280 Because this is not a philosophical discussion of truth and lies and 00:11:28.000 --> 00:11:33.040 falsity versus veracity and any of a number of related topics. 00:11:33.040 --> 00:11:35.520 We will get into that a little bit as we go simply 00:11:35.520 --> 00:11:40.960 because it is related to what we are discussing but to give 00:11:40.960 --> 00:11:45.520 you the foundation of the discussion, and for those who are somewhat 00:11:45.520 --> 00:11:50.400 familiar with the philosophy in this area, we are dealing primarily and 00:11:50.400 --> 00:11:54.720 almost exclusively in the correspondence theory of truth. 00:11:54.720 --> 00:11:59.040 And what the correspondence theory is in brief in short, and this 00:11:59.040 --> 00:12:03.680 is essentially the theory to which most philosophers, ancient philosophers subscribed, and 00:12:03.680 --> 00:12:08.000 also many moderns as well, with some caveats and some cases, but 00:12:08.000 --> 00:12:15.440 correspondence theory asserts that is true which corresponds with reality. 00:12:15.440 --> 00:12:19.360 Very simple definition, very easy to understand that. 00:12:19.360 --> 00:12:25.040 Something is true, a statement is true if it corresponds with reality. 00:12:25.040 --> 00:12:28.960 And so if I say right now, I am holding a pen, 00:12:28.960 --> 00:12:32.480 that statement is true because I am in fact holding a pen. 00:12:32.480 --> 00:12:35.120 Now you just have to believe me because this is not a 00:12:35.120 --> 00:12:37.440 video podcast, and nor will it ever be. 00:12:37.440 --> 00:12:39.440 But I am holding a pen. 00:12:39.440 --> 00:12:42.880 Very easy to believe that I'm doing that. 00:12:42.880 --> 00:12:48.800 That That statement corresponds with the reality, and so the statement is 00:12:48.800 --> 00:12:55.680 true. We are not dealing with any of the other various philosophical 00:12:55.680 --> 00:12:57.120 theories regarding truth. 00:12:57.360 --> 00:13:01.760 So we're not dealing with the coherence theory, for instance. 00:13:01.760 --> 00:13:05.280 I'll decline to describe that one because it's not relevant for what 00:13:05.280 --> 00:13:06.640 we are discussing here. 00:13:06.640 --> 00:13:08.400 Just focus on that first one. 00:13:08.400 --> 00:13:14.320 We are describing true statements as those which correspond to reality. 00:13:14.320 --> 00:13:19.760 So necessarily, something that does not correspond to reality is not true. 00:13:19.760 --> 00:13:21.440 It is false, it is a lie. 00:13:22.320 --> 00:13:27.680 With regard to lies, there are many different kinds of lies. 00:13:27.680 --> 00:13:32.720 I will put a an image in the show notes that will 00:13:33.040 --> 00:13:34.480 outline lies. 00:13:34.480 --> 00:13:37.840 I'll go over it very briefly here just to give you essentially 00:13:37.920 --> 00:13:41.360 a framework, a mental framework in which you can place some of 00:13:41.360 --> 00:13:42.640 these things. 00:13:44.000 --> 00:13:49.280 First and foremost, and essentially, there are two kinds of lies. 00:13:49.280 --> 00:13:54.480 You can either distort the truth or you can falsify. 00:13:54.480 --> 00:14:00.320 If you're falsifying, basically you're inventing or you're modifying that which otherwise 00:14:00.720 --> 00:14:01.360 would be true. 00:14:01.360 --> 00:14:03.920 If you're inventing it, you're creating something out of whole cloth, of 00:14:03.920 --> 00:14:09.360 course. Distortion would be minimization or exaggeration. 00:14:09.360 --> 00:14:13.600 You should start to understand there are many ways in which you 00:14:13.600 --> 00:14:14.160 can lie. 00:14:14.960 --> 00:14:17.840 There is essentially only one way in which you can tell the 00:14:17.840 --> 00:14:25.760 truth. The issue of intent is one that comes up throughout 00:14:25.760 --> 00:14:29.840 this episode obviously, but also throughout this entire issue when we deal 00:14:29.840 --> 00:14:32.240 with it in our daily lives. 00:14:32.240 --> 00:14:35.280 Intent is blown out of proportion in some cases. 00:14:35.280 --> 00:14:37.920 Too much is assigned to intent. 00:14:37.920 --> 00:14:41.600 Well and I were discussing this before we started recording. 00:14:41.600 --> 00:14:45.440 I think one good example of this that will resonate with those 00:14:45.440 --> 00:14:48.320 who have watched true crime shows or have an interest in the 00:14:48.320 --> 00:14:52.400 subject, certainly anyone who's been involved in law at all. 00:14:53.600 --> 00:14:58.880 Everyone seems to think, unless they have been trained to think correctly 00:14:58.880 --> 00:15:05.200 about this, that in order to be charged and convicted of murder, 00:15:05.200 --> 00:15:07.440 you have to intend to kill the person. 00:15:07.440 --> 00:15:11.280 You have to intend to kill the person in specific circumstances, because 00:15:11.280 --> 00:15:13.520 just killing the person isn't actually murder. 00:15:13.520 --> 00:15:15.040 But that's not the case. 00:15:15.040 --> 00:15:20.160 If, for instance, you intended to inflict grievous bodily injury and the 00:15:20.160 --> 00:15:22.160 person dies, that's still murder. 00:15:22.160 --> 00:15:24.000 So does intent matter? 00:15:24.000 --> 00:15:28.320 Yes, but does the intent necessarily have to be this specific intent 00:15:28.320 --> 00:15:30.880 to cause the specific outcome? 00:15:30.880 --> 00:15:35.280 No, the same is true with regard to lies. 00:15:35.280 --> 00:15:40.240 It doesn't necessarily have to be the case that you are intending 00:15:40.240 --> 00:15:43.840 to deceive for what you are saying to be a lie. 00:15:43.840 --> 00:15:46.320 It can be a lie if, for instance, you just have a 00:15:46.320 --> 00:15:50.320 reckless disregard for the truth. 00:15:50.320 --> 00:15:55.280 But with regard to intent, there are a number of different intents 00:15:55.440 --> 00:15:58.400 you can have behind a lie. 00:15:58.640 --> 00:16:01.760 You can intend something beneficial. 00:16:01.760 --> 00:16:04.960 It is possible to tell a lie that is for the good 00:16:04.960 --> 00:16:08.080 of another person, and we'll get into that later in the episode, 00:16:08.080 --> 00:16:11.920 but not all lies are necessarily harmful, and not all lies are 00:16:11.920 --> 00:16:14.640 necessarily wrongful Wrongful. 00:16:14.640 --> 00:16:19.920 There's, of course, neutral, and then there's deceptive, malicious, those intended to 00:16:19.920 --> 00:16:21.680 cause harm. 00:16:21.680 --> 00:16:25.760 The issue here of inadvertence or error should be raised. 00:16:26.240 --> 00:16:30.880 If you are simply in error, it isn't really a true lie. 00:16:30.880 --> 00:16:32.400 And this is just pure error. 00:16:32.400 --> 00:16:34.480 This is not you should have known. 00:16:34.480 --> 00:16:38.160 This is not if you had investigated, you would have known this 00:16:38.160 --> 00:16:41.760 is just you are simply an error, you make a misstatement. 00:16:41.760 --> 00:16:43.600 That's not really a lie. 00:16:43.600 --> 00:16:44.480 That's error. 00:16:44.480 --> 00:16:45.520 It's a misstatement. 00:16:45.520 --> 00:16:47.040 It is a different thing. 00:16:47.040 --> 00:16:49.120 It appears the same in many cases. 00:16:49.120 --> 00:16:53.360 It has a superficial similarity, but it is not the same thing, 00:16:53.360 --> 00:16:55.040 they are not identical. 00:16:55.040 --> 00:17:00.560 And then finally with regard to lies, there are the different means 00:17:00.560 --> 00:17:05.120 for how one lies, and that would be omission, you omit information 00:17:05.120 --> 00:17:10.000 in order to typically in that case deceive or mislead, commission, that 00:17:10.000 --> 00:17:15.040 is the affirmative lie, you are creating information, deliberately misstating, and then 00:17:15.120 --> 00:17:20.560 of course there's manipulation where you are often just carefully wording things 00:17:20.560 --> 00:17:23.840 in order to mislead the person, in order to get the other 00:17:23.840 --> 00:17:28.800 person to believe that which is false, even though technically you did 00:17:28.800 --> 00:17:30.640 not say anything false. 00:17:30.640 --> 00:17:32.800 That can still be a lie. 00:17:32.800 --> 00:17:37.440 It is possible to deceive someone with a very carefully worded truth. 00:17:37.440 --> 00:17:42.480 Your intent there is what truly matters, because that intent to deceive, 00:17:42.480 --> 00:17:47.200 even you using the truth is itself a kind of lie. 00:17:47.200 --> 00:17:48.560 You cannot do that. 00:17:48.560 --> 00:17:53.520 You don't get a free pass simply because, well, technically speaking, every 00:17:53.520 --> 00:17:55.760 word I said was true. 00:17:55.760 --> 00:17:59.600 That may fly in the civil courts, but we're not dealing with 00:17:59.600 --> 00:18:00.960 the civil law here. 00:18:00.960 --> 00:18:02.560 We're dealing with the moral law. 00:18:02.560 --> 00:18:04.560 We're dealing with the things of God. 00:18:04.560 --> 00:18:06.720 And there is a higher standard. 00:18:06.720 --> 00:18:09.920 That standard is not simply technically correct. 00:18:09.920 --> 00:18:13.680 That standard takes into account your intent. 00:18:13.680 --> 00:18:15.360 Why are you doing the thing? 00:18:15.360 --> 00:18:19.200 Why are you doing the thing the way you did the thing? 00:18:19.200 --> 00:18:24.160 All of these things matter with regard to truth or lies, truth 00:18:24.160 --> 00:18:25.280 or falsity. 00:18:25.680 --> 00:18:30.800 It's very clear just listening to other Christians talk today that Christians 00:18:30.800 --> 00:18:32.640 don't think the they're liars. 00:18:32.640 --> 00:18:34.160 They don't think that they really can lie. 00:18:34.640 --> 00:18:35.600 Like sure. 00:18:35.600 --> 00:18:37.520 If you lie, you know what sort of lie. 00:18:37.520 --> 00:18:40.560 It's gonna be one of those an example that Corey gave. 00:18:40.560 --> 00:18:43.200 Or, you know, if someone gives you the wrong change at the 00:18:43.200 --> 00:18:44.960 store, they give you too much money. 00:18:44.960 --> 00:18:48.000 If you are going to always return that change, you're an honest 00:18:48.000 --> 00:18:49.520 man. That's defrauding. 00:18:49.520 --> 00:18:52.080 It's a type of lie, not with your lips, but with your 00:18:52.080 --> 00:18:56.560 actions, with your silence, you've actually told a lie by receiving change 00:18:56.560 --> 00:18:59.280 when you knew that you got a twenty instead of a one. 00:18:59.280 --> 00:19:01.760 Christian Christians draw the line there and say, well, okay, I would 00:19:01.760 --> 00:19:02.160 never do that. 00:19:02.160 --> 00:19:04.880 I'm an honest man because I wouldn't do that stuff. 00:19:04.880 --> 00:19:09.680 The problem is that while it's true that what Corey just said 00:19:09.680 --> 00:19:13.520 is absolutely correct, it's entirely possible for an honest man to be 00:19:13.520 --> 00:19:19.040 mistaken, and therefore the thing that he said was not him lying. 00:19:19.040 --> 00:19:22.240 It does not therefore follow that the thing that the man said 00:19:22.240 --> 00:19:24.080 is not a lie. 00:19:24.080 --> 00:19:27.840 Because the content of what a man said, you know, typically, again, 00:19:27.840 --> 00:19:31.680 we're talking about these big ticket items that are going around in 00:19:31.680 --> 00:19:33.280 the world. 00:19:33.280 --> 00:19:35.760 People are getting their ideas from somewhere else. 00:19:35.760 --> 00:19:38.240 Men are not originating their own ideas. 00:19:38.240 --> 00:19:42.000 They're very few actual thinkers in the world. 00:19:42.000 --> 00:19:44.880 Everybody pretty much just passes around whatever they heard on a podcast 00:19:44.960 --> 00:19:47.920 or they saw in a tweet or read in an article, heard 00:19:47.920 --> 00:19:50.320 in a sermon, they got it from somewhere else. 00:19:50.560 --> 00:19:54.560 And so when they repeat it, their intent is completely, you know, 00:19:54.560 --> 00:19:57.600 honest, assume for the sake of generosity. 00:19:57.600 --> 00:20:02.240 Doesn't mean that the intent of the originator was necessarily the same. 00:20:02.240 --> 00:20:03.600 And there are many, many cases. 00:20:03.920 --> 00:20:05.280 We've demonstrated over and over again. 00:20:05.280 --> 00:20:07.680 When you look at the genealogy of many of the ideas floating 00:20:07.680 --> 00:20:09.280 around, they're lies. 00:20:09.280 --> 00:20:12.560 Racism was a lie that was invented just over a hundred years 00:20:12.560 --> 00:20:14.800 ago. It's an absolute lie. 00:20:14.800 --> 00:20:20.080 And it was told for the specific purpose of destroying Western nations. 00:20:20.080 --> 00:20:22.960 And yet today it's a lie that you hear on almost every 00:20:22.960 --> 00:20:24.400 Christian's lips. 00:20:24.400 --> 00:20:28.000 In good conscience, they're doing what they've been taught to do. 00:20:28.000 --> 00:20:30.320 And so what Corey said is correct. 00:20:30.320 --> 00:20:35.040 I wouldn't necessarily call someone who's running around calling people racist a 00:20:35.040 --> 00:20:36.400 liar. It depends. 00:20:36.400 --> 00:20:39.200 Many of them are, but some of them are well meaning people 00:20:39.200 --> 00:20:42.640 who are engaging in what they believe is moral behavior. 00:20:43.040 --> 00:20:46.640 The problem is that what they're saying is itself a lie. 00:20:46.640 --> 00:20:50.320 And when you look at the genealogy of what they're saying, it's 00:20:50.240 --> 00:20:51.360 clear that it's a lie. 00:20:51.360 --> 00:20:54.720 And so that's where the truth versus lie thing comes into this. 00:20:54.720 --> 00:20:56.720 It's not a matter of opinion. 00:20:56.720 --> 00:21:00.560 When you look at the origin of the invention of racism just 00:21:00.560 --> 00:21:04.720 over a hundred years ago, there can be no possible doubt that 00:21:04.720 --> 00:21:07.200 this is a new creation of a new sin. 00:21:07.200 --> 00:21:11.440 And therefore, that all by itself means it cannot be Christian morality. 00:21:12.000 --> 00:21:14.400 And so when you work through all those things, you work through 00:21:14.400 --> 00:21:17.600 the historical facts, you make all the arguments, an honest man will 00:21:17.600 --> 00:21:18.640 say, I was wrong. 00:21:18.640 --> 00:21:21.520 I was saying these things I said in good conscience, I personally 00:21:21.520 --> 00:21:23.760 did. I used to call things racist. 00:21:23.760 --> 00:21:27.760 I was more racist, so-called, than most people, even before I figured 00:21:27.760 --> 00:21:28.960 this stuff out. 00:21:28.960 --> 00:21:32.000 But I had a lot of sensibilities about things that are completely 00:21:32.000 --> 00:21:32.800 gone now. 00:21:32.800 --> 00:21:35.520 Not because I want to be meaner, but because I realize that 00:21:35.520 --> 00:21:41.920 that lie, that specific payload of deception was inserted into the zeitgeist. 00:21:41.920 --> 00:21:44.800 It's everywhere, it's in sermons, it's on every TV show. 00:21:44.800 --> 00:21:46.240 You cannot get away from it. 00:21:46.240 --> 00:21:50.720 Specifically because of the payload that it delivers when it lands. 00:21:50.720 --> 00:21:54.400 So once you realize that a Christian can be a liar because 00:21:54.400 --> 00:21:58.720 of what they're doing without their intent, the passages in scripture talking 00:21:58.720 --> 00:22:01.600 about liars suddenly we realize they apply to us too. 00:22:01.600 --> 00:22:05.680 When we tell things that are false regardless of our intentions, we 00:22:05.680 --> 00:22:08.960 become liars because it's not something we originated. 00:22:08.960 --> 00:22:09.920 I think that's a problem. 00:22:09.920 --> 00:22:13.280 I think that when Christians think I'm not a liar, I don't 00:22:13.280 --> 00:22:17.440 make things up, well okay, that's the origination question. 00:22:17.440 --> 00:22:21.600 If you're not originating new thoughts that are deceptive, Christians think that 00:22:21.600 --> 00:22:22.640 means you're in the clear. 00:22:22.640 --> 00:22:25.040 But where are you getting all the stuff that you are spreading? 00:22:25.040 --> 00:22:29.280 When you're spreading, you know, whatever on Facebook or wherever else, if 00:22:29.280 --> 00:22:32.880 the things that you're saying do not accord with the truth and 00:22:32.880 --> 00:22:36.560 they're demonstrably lies, you're not off the hook because it wasn't your 00:22:36.560 --> 00:22:39.920 idea. It just means that yeah, you have an opinion about something 00:22:39.920 --> 00:22:41.360 you don't understand. 00:22:41.360 --> 00:22:43.520 And as I said, the worst thing is that once someone is 00:22:43.520 --> 00:22:47.040 confronted with the truth, when someone says, hey, look, you need to 00:22:47.040 --> 00:22:51.120 understand that what you're doing in good conscience is actually an evil 00:22:51.120 --> 00:22:54.720 act, your your intent was not evil, but the act of spreading 00:22:54.720 --> 00:22:56.080 this lie is evil. 00:22:56.080 --> 00:22:56.960 They get indignant. 00:22:57.200 --> 00:22:59.120 I can't be a liar, I'm not lying, I didn't make anything 00:22:59.200 --> 00:23:00.880 up. I'm saying exactly what my pastor said. 00:23:00.880 --> 00:23:01.920 How can I be lying? 00:23:01.920 --> 00:23:03.680 Well, okay, you're a papist. 00:23:03.680 --> 00:23:05.120 Like that's not the root of a thought. 00:23:06.080 --> 00:23:08.400 The root of authority is truth. 00:23:08.400 --> 00:23:12.880 The root of authority is reality, which accords with God. 00:23:12.880 --> 00:23:18.240 When God created creation and made reality, it's all true. 00:23:18.240 --> 00:23:20.080 It's a dumb thing to say. 00:23:20.080 --> 00:23:24.560 It's how to logical, but it's because it's so intrinsic. 00:23:24.560 --> 00:23:27.200 In the war that we see in the world today where guys 00:23:27.200 --> 00:23:32.880 call things lib-tarded and woke, we constantly rail against that sort of 00:23:32.880 --> 00:23:38.400 nonsense, derogatory name-calling about it because it hides the fact that it's 00:23:38.400 --> 00:23:39.440 real evil. 00:23:39.440 --> 00:23:43.920 There's actual evil in the world that seems ridiculous if you don't 00:23:43.840 --> 00:23:45.440 understand its spiritual nature. 00:23:45.440 --> 00:23:48.480 And then once you understand the spiritual nature of those attacks on 00:23:48.480 --> 00:23:52.400 reality, some people will correctly identify without, you know, having thought about 00:23:52.400 --> 00:23:53.200 it too deeply. 00:23:53.200 --> 00:23:56.560 They'll say the left is at war with reality. 00:23:56.560 --> 00:23:59.920 That's something that it's fairly common for people to say some variation 00:23:59.920 --> 00:24:00.480 of that. 00:24:00.480 --> 00:24:01.760 And that is true. 00:24:01.760 --> 00:24:06.320 The problem is I think they don't really correctly understand what reality 00:24:06.320 --> 00:24:09.600 is. It's not simply that they're at war with reality as though 00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:12.720 they're a crazy person that's having delusions. 00:24:12.720 --> 00:24:17.680 They're actually quite literally at war against creation itself, which is why 00:24:17.680 --> 00:24:21.680 we have men and women defiling their bodies, trying to turn themselves 00:24:21.680 --> 00:24:23.200 into the opposite sex. 00:24:23.200 --> 00:24:26.560 Nevermind the fact that every cell in your body has the sex 00:24:26.560 --> 00:24:28.160 with which God created you. 00:24:28.160 --> 00:24:29.600 You can't get away from it. 00:24:29.600 --> 00:24:33.040 If you're a man, you have a man's skeleton forever. 00:24:33.040 --> 00:24:35.440 You have a man's brain forever. 00:24:35.440 --> 00:24:37.280 You have a man's hips forever. 00:24:37.280 --> 00:24:40.000 You have a man's skin forever. 00:24:40.000 --> 00:24:44.480 Every aspect of our bodies has elements that are intrinsic to both 00:24:44.480 --> 00:24:48.640 our sex and our race, as we've talked in other episodes. 00:24:48.640 --> 00:24:49.920 The left is at war with that. 00:24:50.320 --> 00:24:53.920 The left is at war with creation as God created it. 00:24:53.920 --> 00:24:57.920 And so when we say they're at war with reality, it's because 00:24:57.920 --> 00:25:02.000 they are deceivers who are seeking to invert everything. 00:25:02.000 --> 00:25:06.160 They're seeking to invert creation because it's a war against God. 00:25:06.160 --> 00:25:11.200 And as we've said in numerous occasions, the Protestant desire to continue 00:25:11.200 --> 00:25:15.280 to relitigate the Reformation means that we keep going back to the 00:25:15.280 --> 00:25:20.800 toolbox that has no arguments, no weapons against the new battles. 00:25:20.800 --> 00:25:23.280 Satan is not attacking how we're saved. 00:25:23.280 --> 00:25:25.600 Satan is attacking how we're created. 00:25:25.600 --> 00:25:27.120 It's a different question. 00:25:27.120 --> 00:25:28.960 It's a different tack. 00:25:28.960 --> 00:25:32.880 And the difference that we are seeing today is that the world 00:25:32.880 --> 00:25:37.040 and the church are almost in perfect harmony and agreement with the 00:25:37.040 --> 00:25:38.640 attacks on creation. 00:25:38.640 --> 00:25:44.560 And even the scattershot collection of conservative Christian bodies that are trying 00:25:44.560 --> 00:25:48.560 to hang on to some semblance of creation, they have been divorced 00:25:48.560 --> 00:25:53.840 from the underlying philosophical underpinnings that are necessary to actually defend it. 00:25:53.840 --> 00:25:56.800 Which is why we've done episode on the sexes, did an episode 00:25:56.800 --> 00:25:58.240 on marriage itself. 00:25:58.240 --> 00:26:03.040 Once you understand the ontological reality of those things, the arguments about 00:26:03.040 --> 00:26:05.840 the political and the religious get a lot simpler. 00:26:06.080 --> 00:26:09.920 Once you understand that God did this specific thing, He made you, 00:26:09.920 --> 00:26:12.240 He made me, and He made us different. 00:26:12.240 --> 00:26:15.040 I am created mostly English. 00:26:15.040 --> 00:26:17.360 Corey is created mostly German. 00:26:17.360 --> 00:26:20.560 Each of you is created mostly something or other. 00:26:20.560 --> 00:26:21.760 That's how God did it. 00:26:21.760 --> 00:26:25.280 He did all these various things in all these various ways because 00:26:25.440 --> 00:26:26.640 that's who he is. 00:26:26.640 --> 00:26:27.600 It's amazing. 00:26:27.600 --> 00:26:31.280 There's seemingly infinite variety in the world in all things. 00:26:31.280 --> 00:26:33.200 Now you can look at a pet and just look at its 00:26:33.200 --> 00:26:37.440 fur. And every single hair is different, different lengths, different colors, different 00:26:37.440 --> 00:26:40.480 shapes. It's incredibly fascinating and beautiful. 00:26:40.480 --> 00:26:43.840 God puts that kind of attention to detail in the smallest places 00:26:43.920 --> 00:26:45.680 because He loves variety. 00:26:45.680 --> 00:26:49.920 So there's no despising of diversity to point out that things are 00:26:49.920 --> 00:26:55.520 different. When you approach things from the perspective that to despise reality, 00:26:55.520 --> 00:27:00.000 to despise the created truth of the world is actually an attack 00:27:00.000 --> 00:27:03.760 on God, then the admonition that you become a liar when you 00:27:03.760 --> 00:27:07.760 do that involves all the passages in scripture that deal directly with 00:27:07.760 --> 00:27:08.960 us being liars. 00:27:08.960 --> 00:27:12.240 So I'll give you just a few examples here because they're dire. 00:27:12.240 --> 00:27:14.960 This is not small stuff. 00:27:14.960 --> 00:27:19.280 In Proverbs twelve is written, lying lips are an abomination to the 00:27:19.280 --> 00:27:22.720 Lord, but he who acts faithfully is acceptable to him. 00:27:22.720 --> 00:27:27.360 Psalm one hundred one No one who practices deceit shall dwell in 00:27:27.360 --> 00:27:31.920 my house, no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes. 00:27:31.920 --> 00:27:36.080 Matthew five talks about in the Beatitudes Jesus describing when lies are 00:27:36.080 --> 00:27:40.400 directed at us blessed are you when others revile you and persecute 00:27:40.400 --> 00:27:44.480 you, and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my 00:27:44.480 --> 00:27:47.760 account. How often do we see that in the world? 00:27:47.760 --> 00:27:51.120 Where someone is targeted and they're picked out and they're selected for 00:27:51.120 --> 00:27:54.800 that sort of evil and reviling and persecution because they told the 00:27:54.800 --> 00:27:55.920 truth about God. 00:27:55.920 --> 00:27:57.600 We see it in lots of cases. 00:27:57.600 --> 00:28:02.560 Guys who will go to bat correctly against the sodomy agenda, against 00:28:02.800 --> 00:28:06.320 the transgender agenda, there are lots of guys who have paid the 00:28:06.320 --> 00:28:10.320 price for defending different aspects of God's created order. 00:28:10.320 --> 00:28:13.840 Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to find someone who would go to bat 00:28:13.840 --> 00:28:14.560 for all of it. 00:28:14.560 --> 00:28:18.960 Because often the very same guys who will rail against sodomy correctly 00:28:19.280 --> 00:28:23.040 then scream racist and scream Nazi in the other direction. 00:28:23.040 --> 00:28:27.280 See, they understand that when they're receiving the reviling for Christ's sake, 00:28:27.280 --> 00:28:29.920 because they've said one thing that's true about creation. 00:28:29.920 --> 00:28:32.800 All right, I'm good, not a liar, I'm standing up for Jesus, 00:28:32.800 --> 00:28:34.320 my reward is great in heaven. 00:28:34.320 --> 00:28:36.800 And then they turn right around, they see another man who's defending 00:28:36.800 --> 00:28:40.000 a different part of creation that they don't understand, that they've been 00:28:40.000 --> 00:28:42.400 catechized to believe falsely about about. 00:28:42.400 --> 00:28:45.600 And they spread exactly the same kind of hatred that they were 00:28:45.600 --> 00:28:46.720 just receiving. 00:28:46.720 --> 00:28:50.240 And everyone thinks that these are just like matters of opinion and 00:28:50.240 --> 00:28:52.480 it's personality conflicts and all that stuff. 00:28:52.480 --> 00:28:53.040 It's not. 00:28:53.040 --> 00:28:55.760 It's about what is true and what is false. 00:28:55.760 --> 00:28:58.720 And the truth is usually easy to discern. 00:28:58.720 --> 00:29:00.640 The truth is not that tricky. 00:29:00.640 --> 00:29:03.680 As one of the messages of this episode, the truth is a 00:29:03.680 --> 00:29:04.800 broad thing. 00:29:04.800 --> 00:29:06.880 It is not confined to God. 00:29:06.880 --> 00:29:10.640 The truth is all things that are real, and some of them 00:29:10.640 --> 00:29:11.440 are bad. 00:29:11.440 --> 00:29:13.760 Like truth doesn't mean wonderful. 00:29:13.760 --> 00:29:15.920 It is true that you will die. 00:29:15.920 --> 00:29:16.960 Why will you die? 00:29:16.960 --> 00:29:19.840 You're sentenced to death because of the sins of your father. 00:29:19.840 --> 00:29:23.040 Every one of us has the father Adam who sinned against God. 00:29:23.040 --> 00:29:24.080 He is our head. 00:29:24.080 --> 00:29:25.600 We inherit his sin. 00:29:25.600 --> 00:29:28.240 We're punished because of that, and that's the truth. 00:29:28.240 --> 00:29:29.760 We can't get mad at it. 00:29:29.760 --> 00:29:31.680 We can't have an emotional reaction. 00:29:31.680 --> 00:29:34.240 We can't say, God, you're so mean, that's not fair. 00:29:34.240 --> 00:29:36.720 We say, okay, that's really bad news. 00:29:36.720 --> 00:29:37.600 What's the fix? 00:29:37.600 --> 00:29:39.840 And that's when the gospel comes in. 00:29:39.840 --> 00:29:45.040 Another passage that is frequently used about love actually contains something at 00:29:45.040 --> 00:29:47.600 the end about truth that I don't think think people usually pick 00:29:47.600 --> 00:29:48.160 up on. 00:29:48.160 --> 00:29:49.760 First Corinthians thirteen. 00:29:49.760 --> 00:29:51.440 Love is patient and kind. 00:29:51.440 --> 00:29:53.200 Love does not envy or boast. 00:29:53.200 --> 00:29:54.960 It is not arrogant or rude. 00:29:54.960 --> 00:29:56.960 It does not insist on its own way. 00:29:56.960 --> 00:29:59.200 It is not irritable or resentful. 00:29:59.200 --> 00:30:04.480 It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. 00:30:04.480 --> 00:30:08.320 So this love passage lists a whole bunch of things that love 00:30:08.320 --> 00:30:10.960 isn't. And what's the one thing that it says love is at 00:30:10.960 --> 00:30:11.600 the end? 00:30:11.600 --> 00:30:13.760 Love rejoices in the truth. 00:30:14.160 --> 00:30:17.120 You may say that you don't fit any of those things, you 00:30:17.120 --> 00:30:21.280 don't boast, you're not irritable, therefore you have love. 00:30:21.280 --> 00:30:23.120 Do you rejoice in the truth? 00:30:23.120 --> 00:30:26.160 Because if you drop that end of the sentence, you don't have 00:30:26.640 --> 00:30:28.800 the true love that God's talking about. 00:30:28.800 --> 00:30:30.160 It's an impossible test. 00:30:30.160 --> 00:30:32.960 No one can pass all of it perfectly, which is why Christ 00:30:32.960 --> 00:30:34.400 lived the perfect life. 00:30:34.400 --> 00:30:36.080 Again, that's the gospel. 00:30:36.080 --> 00:30:38.480 This is not a setup for us to try to earn our 00:30:38.480 --> 00:30:41.520 salvation, but it's a reminder that when you start looking for truth 00:30:41.520 --> 00:30:44.960 and lies in Scripture, you're going to find that you are condemned. 00:30:44.960 --> 00:30:45.760 You should. 00:30:45.760 --> 00:30:48.720 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the 00:30:48.720 --> 00:30:50.320 truth is not in us. 00:30:50.320 --> 00:30:53.360 We should rejoice in all truth, all of it. 00:30:53.360 --> 00:30:55.600 We should rejoice in everything that is true. 00:30:55.600 --> 00:30:57.520 Truth is not just about the gospel. 00:30:57.520 --> 00:31:00.000 It's much bigger than that. 00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:04.080 The Christian approach of trying to make everything about the narrow confines 00:31:04.080 --> 00:31:07.440 of John 3.16 Is not a Christian approach at all. 00:31:07.440 --> 00:31:10.560 And it's a deadly error that we're facing today. 00:31:10.560 --> 00:31:14.160 Because if that's the only thing you can rejoice in, then you're 00:31:14.160 --> 00:31:16.800 free to be wrong about all these other things because they don't 00:31:16.720 --> 00:31:19.200 matter. I don't have to rejoice in the truth of how I'm 00:31:19.200 --> 00:31:22.480 made. I rejoice in the truth about how Jesus died for me. 00:31:22.480 --> 00:31:23.520 And we do. 00:31:23.520 --> 00:31:27.440 That is the most important thing that we've ever been told that 00:31:27.440 --> 00:31:28.880 Jesus died for us. 00:31:28.880 --> 00:31:30.640 But it is not the only thing in our lives. 00:31:30.640 --> 00:31:32.320 It's not the only thing in the universe. 00:31:32.320 --> 00:31:34.560 We were created for a purpose. 00:31:34.560 --> 00:31:35.840 That's the truth. 00:31:35.840 --> 00:31:38.720 If we don't love all the things about that, we are not 00:31:38.720 --> 00:31:41.120 fulfilling the command of love that God gives 00:31:41.120 --> 00:31:42.960 us. When 00:31:42.960 --> 00:31:47.680 an author writes a book, within that book, within the world created 00:31:47.680 --> 00:31:53.200 in that book, the author creates a set of truths. 00:31:53.200 --> 00:31:58.960 Now, if the author is skilled, those things will be coherent. 00:31:58.960 --> 00:32:02.160 There will be a lack of contradictions. 00:32:02.160 --> 00:32:06.160 That is not always the case for human authors. 00:32:06.160 --> 00:32:10.240 God does not have the limitation of human authors, of course, and 00:32:10.240 --> 00:32:13.920 so when God writes a book, there are no contradictions. 00:32:13.920 --> 00:32:18.080 Everything in scripture, for instance, is true. 00:32:18.080 --> 00:32:22.640 To give an example that will work for many of those listening 00:32:22.960 --> 00:32:26.800 because you may have read the novels when you were children, or 00:32:26.800 --> 00:32:28.800 had them read to you, you may have read them to your 00:32:28.800 --> 00:32:30.320 own children. 00:32:30.320 --> 00:32:33.920 If I were to tell you that Aslan from C. 00:32:33.920 --> 00:32:37.280 S. Lewis's books was a good was a goat. 00:32:37.280 --> 00:32:40.080 I would be lying about what C. 00:32:40.080 --> 00:32:41.280 S. Lewis wrote. 00:32:41.280 --> 00:32:44.800 Because of course Aslan is a lion representing Christ. 00:32:44.800 --> 00:32:48.640 I don't feel that's a spoiler for anyone who's read those books. 00:32:48.640 --> 00:32:50.240 That should be obvious. 00:32:50.720 --> 00:32:55.520 With regard to the work of CS Lewis, if I lie about 00:32:55.520 --> 00:33:00.080 something that he wrote, yes it's a lie. 00:33:00.080 --> 00:33:02.080 It's a fairly minor one, though. 00:33:02.080 --> 00:33:04.000 He's a human author. 00:33:04.000 --> 00:33:08.160 That series of books is not of the utmost importance to anything, 00:33:08.160 --> 00:33:10.720 really. I'm not saying it's a bad series, I'm not saying it's 00:33:10.720 --> 00:33:14.000 particularly good series, I'm not saying anything about it with regard to 00:33:14.000 --> 00:33:17.440 quality, I'm simply saying it is a series of books written by 00:33:17.440 --> 00:33:20.800 a human author, and whether you speak the truth about it, or 00:33:20.800 --> 00:33:26.320 lie about it, does matter but not that much. 00:33:26.320 --> 00:33:30.240 The same cannot be said He said with regard to God's books, 00:33:30.240 --> 00:33:32.320 and yes I do mean the plural. 00:33:32.320 --> 00:33:37.520 If you lie about what is contained in Scripture, every single Christian 00:33:37.520 --> 00:33:41.600 recognizes that is a grave sin, at least every Christian should recognize 00:33:41.680 --> 00:33:44.080 that is a grave sin. 00:33:44.080 --> 00:33:45.680 And so when you have 00:33:46.800 --> 00:33:51.920 supposed pastors who stand up and try to excuse sodomites, and try 00:33:51.920 --> 00:33:56.400 to explain away the passages that condemn them, that's lying about God's 00:33:56.400 --> 00:34:03.680 word. We all recognize that is grave sin, that is extreme wickedness, 00:34:03.680 --> 00:34:07.440 that is an abomination, both the defense of the thing and the 00:34:07.440 --> 00:34:08.800 thing itself. 00:34:08.800 --> 00:34:11.440 But God wrote two books. 00:34:11.440 --> 00:34:14.080 Vitally important to remember this. 00:34:14.080 --> 00:34:18.560 The first, and most important, is creation. 00:34:18.560 --> 00:34:24.080 Scripture is second, because it Because again, I will remind you, what 00:34:24.320 --> 00:34:28.800 does God say about himself to what does he appeal as an 00:34:28.800 --> 00:34:32.640 example of his greatness when he speaks to Job in the book 00:34:32.640 --> 00:34:33.680 of Job? 00:34:33.680 --> 00:34:35.600 He appeals to creation. 00:34:35.600 --> 00:34:38.480 He does not appeal to his written word. 00:34:38.480 --> 00:34:42.080 In fact, that is pretty much what God always does. 00:34:42.080 --> 00:34:46.640 He appeals to his greatness as revealed in creation. 00:34:47.440 --> 00:34:50.080 Yes, every word of Scripture is true. 00:34:50.080 --> 00:34:54.160 Yes, Scripture is of the utmost importance for Christians. 00:34:54.160 --> 00:34:59.200 But creation also contains truth because creation also is truth, because again 00:34:59.360 --> 00:35:02.400 creation is God's first book. 00:35:02.400 --> 00:35:08.080 Every single thing written in the book of creation is true. 00:35:08.080 --> 00:35:13.600 And so when you speak falsely about creation, when you lie about 00:35:13.600 --> 00:35:18.480 creation, you are doing the same thing as if you lied about 00:35:18.480 --> 00:35:23.360 what is contained in the pages of scripture. 00:35:23.360 --> 00:35:27.680 So if you say that sodomy is not a sin, that oh 00:35:27.760 --> 00:35:33.440 it's actually about lack of hospitality, it's about not being welcoming to 00:35:33.440 --> 00:35:38.480 sojourners and strangers, instead of sexual sin, that's not what the story 00:35:38.480 --> 00:35:40.400 of Sodom and Gomorrah actually is. 00:35:40.400 --> 00:35:43.040 If you say that, that's a wicked lie. 00:35:43.040 --> 00:35:45.680 You are lying about God's word. 00:35:46.160 --> 00:35:50.880 With regard to creation, if you say the races of men don't 00:35:50.880 --> 00:35:52.240 really Don't really exist. 00:35:52.240 --> 00:35:53.120 They're all equal. 00:35:53.120 --> 00:35:53.840 There's no difference. 00:35:53.840 --> 00:35:55.280 We're all the same. 00:35:55.280 --> 00:35:59.040 You are doing the exact same thing as the one who attempts 00:35:59.040 --> 00:36:02.960 to lie about how God views sodomites. 00:36:02.960 --> 00:36:05.360 You are committing the same sin. 00:36:05.360 --> 00:36:11.280 In fact, the second one, lying about creation, may very well have 00:36:11.280 --> 00:36:14.800 worse consequences longitudinally than the first. 00:36:14.800 --> 00:36:18.240 In this case it may be debatable because they're both horrible. 00:36:18.240 --> 00:36:24.320 But lying about creation is still lying about God. 00:36:24.320 --> 00:36:27.440 And in fact, what is lying about God? 00:36:27.440 --> 00:36:31.680 Particularly if you are doing it with intent, but even without intent. 00:36:31.680 --> 00:36:34.720 Lying about God is blasphemy. 00:36:34.720 --> 00:36:38.960 What we're talking about here is violating the first table of the 00:36:38.960 --> 00:36:40.720 Ten Commandments. 00:36:40.720 --> 00:36:44.880 You are not permitted to have another God, you are not permitted 00:36:44.880 --> 00:36:49.360 to speak falsely about God, and that includes the things of God 00:36:49.520 --> 00:36:51.520 and the things created by God. 00:36:51.520 --> 00:36:55.520 And so as Christians we must speak truthfully about creation. 00:36:56.400 --> 00:37:00.720 As Woe was saying, many of these things that are supposedly opinions 00:37:00.960 --> 00:37:03.280 are not in fact opinions. 00:37:03.280 --> 00:37:11.440 They are matters of truth or falsity, of truth or Lies. 00:37:11.440 --> 00:37:15.760 Whether or not you like strawberry ice cream is a matter of 00:37:15.760 --> 00:37:21.040 opinion. How you feel about a particular flavor of ice cream is 00:37:21.040 --> 00:37:22.640 not very meaningful. 00:37:22.640 --> 00:37:24.400 It may have some meaning for you. 00:37:24.400 --> 00:37:26.720 It may have some meaning for those who care about you and 00:37:26.720 --> 00:37:29.280 want to get the thing you like for you, if they're picking 00:37:29.280 --> 00:37:32.240 up ice cream at the store or the shop, whatever it happens 00:37:32.240 --> 00:37:32.880 to be. 00:37:32.880 --> 00:37:35.840 It's not that it doesn't matter, it matters. 00:37:35.840 --> 00:37:37.200 But it's a minor matter. 00:37:37.840 --> 00:37:40.080 It matters in a small sense. 00:37:40.080 --> 00:37:41.680 That's a matter of opinion. 00:37:41.680 --> 00:37:44.320 Things like that are matters of opinion. 00:37:44.320 --> 00:37:48.080 They're matters of opinion because they actually don't really matter. 00:37:48.080 --> 00:37:53.600 Things that are matters of the truth always matter, because they are 00:37:53.600 --> 00:37:54.800 more important. 00:37:54.800 --> 00:37:58.640 They are grander things, they are the things of God. 00:37:58.640 --> 00:38:03.120 So again, if you lie about the reality of human race, you're 00:38:03.120 --> 00:38:04.480 lying about God. 00:38:04.480 --> 00:38:09.680 If you lie about the reality of human sex, male and female, 00:38:09.680 --> 00:38:11.920 man and woman, you're lying about God. 00:38:11.920 --> 00:38:17.280 You're lying about his creation, you are blaspheming the Creator. 00:38:17.280 --> 00:38:20.800 These are matters of the utmost importance. 00:38:20.800 --> 00:38:25.200 Because lying about God, and particularly lying about God in God's name, 00:38:25.680 --> 00:38:31.200 as so many modern pastors do and modern teachers, that's abominable. 00:38:31.200 --> 00:38:34.160 That is high-handed impenitent sin. 00:38:34.160 --> 00:38:37.680 And yes, that is the case even if you are in error 00:38:37.760 --> 00:38:42.080 and believe wrongly because you have a duty as a teacher to 00:38:42.080 --> 00:38:46.640 investigate the truth and to teach correctly. 00:38:46.640 --> 00:38:50.000 Teachers are held to a higher standard. 00:38:50.000 --> 00:38:54.720 Teachers and pastors, because of course pastors are also teachers, teachers will 00:38:54.720 --> 00:38:57.280 receive the stricter judgment. 00:38:57.280 --> 00:39:00.720 Because if you take up the mantle of teaching, you have a 00:39:00.720 --> 00:39:03.280 duty to teach correctly. 00:39:03.280 --> 00:39:06.160 And you may say, Well, I was just in error, I didn't 00:39:06.080 --> 00:39:08.160 know, I d it doesn't matter. 00:39:08.160 --> 00:39:11.200 Why did you take up the mantle of teaching if you did 00:39:11.200 --> 00:39:16.000 not have the capacity to discern that which is true and false? 00:39:16.000 --> 00:39:20.880 Whether or not God has given you the talents, the abilities necessary, 00:39:20.880 --> 00:39:26.560 the capacity needed in order to teach, is a matter of true 00:39:26.560 --> 00:39:27.920 or false. 00:39:27.920 --> 00:39:31.120 Either you have those things, or you do not. 00:39:31.120 --> 00:39:36.160 If you do not have them, attempting to exercise them is wrongful, 00:39:36.160 --> 00:39:37.360 is sinful. 00:39:37.360 --> 00:39:41.280 This is one of those matters that is sometimes difficult for people 00:39:41.280 --> 00:39:44.480 to understand, so let me give an analogy. 00:39:44.480 --> 00:39:47.920 Let me compare it to something that will make it very obvious, 00:39:47.920 --> 00:39:50.720 very straightforward. 00:39:50.720 --> 00:39:55.280 All gifts, particularly spiritual gifts, but of course all gifts flow from 00:39:55.280 --> 00:39:59.040 God. Your height is from God. 00:39:59.040 --> 00:40:01.840 Your intelligence is from God. 00:40:01.840 --> 00:40:05.680 Everything you have is a gift from God. 00:40:05.680 --> 00:40:11.120 Every good and perfect gift flows down from heaven from God. 00:40:11.120 --> 00:40:17.040 And so, if you have intelligence and eloquence and all these things 00:40:17.040 --> 00:40:20.720 that teachers are supposed to have, well that's a gift from God, 00:40:20.720 --> 00:40:24.400 and you should use those to the glory of God. 00:40:24.400 --> 00:40:27.440 And some will think, well, these are things that perhaps you can 00:40:27.440 --> 00:40:30.160 learn and to some degree perhaps. 00:40:30.160 --> 00:40:31.600 Some of them no. 00:40:31.600 --> 00:40:35.520 Intelligence is hardwired, you can't learn intelligence. 00:40:35.520 --> 00:40:39.760 Discernment is largely a spiritual gift, you can't learn that. 00:40:39.760 --> 00:40:43.440 You can train that gift, certainly, to the degree you've been given 00:40:43.440 --> 00:40:47.440 it. But to give you that promised analogy, the 00:40:48.800 --> 00:40:51.200 Prophecy is a gift from God. 00:40:51.440 --> 00:40:54.960 Whether or not you are a prophet, and probably no one to 00:40:54.960 --> 00:40:58.320 whom I am currently speaking, or perhaps no one who will ever 00:40:58.320 --> 00:41:02.560 pick up this podcast, is a prophet, but whether or not you 00:41:02.560 --> 00:41:06.400 are a prophet is a matter of whether or not God has 00:41:06.400 --> 00:41:08.960 given you the gift of prophecy. 00:41:08.960 --> 00:41:13.520 If you do not have it and you attempt to exercise it, 00:41:13.520 --> 00:41:16.560 we call that a false prophet. 00:41:16.560 --> 00:41:21.920 And that's lying in God's name, that's high handed impenitent sin, that 00:41:21.920 --> 00:41:24.320 will damn you to hell. 00:41:24.320 --> 00:41:28.320 That compares directly to those who attempt to take up the mantle 00:41:28.320 --> 00:41:32.720 of teacher and do not have the capacity to do so. 00:41:32.720 --> 00:41:36.800 It is the same sort of thing as declaring yourself a prophet 00:41:36.800 --> 00:41:39.920 when you have not been given the gift of prophecy. 00:41:39.920 --> 00:41:43.920 If you compare those two things it becomes abundantly clear where the 00:41:43.920 --> 00:41:46.800 problem lies and why this should not be done. 00:41:46.800 --> 00:41:50.720 It's simply, again, to return to what Woe said earlier, it's the 00:41:50.720 --> 00:41:55.120 issue of mass literacy and this delusional belief that has been inculcated 00:41:55.120 --> 00:42:02.240 into society of equality, this egalitarianism, this supposed belief that all 00:42:02.240 --> 00:42:07.120 men are created equal, which is abundantly and obviously false. 00:42:07.760 --> 00:42:12.000 God has given different gifts to different men, and He will require 00:42:12.000 --> 00:42:17.440 from them different things, different results, because God requires you to use 00:42:17.440 --> 00:42:21.360 the gifts that He has given you he doesn't require you to 00:42:21.360 --> 00:42:24.000 attempt to use gifts he hasn't given you. 00:42:24.000 --> 00:42:27.760 If God didn't give you two legs, if you were born with 00:42:27.760 --> 00:42:32.000 one leg, he does not expect you to be a sprinter. 00:42:32.000 --> 00:42:35.840 If God didn't give you the abilities that are necessary to be 00:42:35.840 --> 00:42:40.000 a teacher, he doesn't expect you to be a teacher. 00:42:40.000 --> 00:42:43.520 The same as if he didn't give you the gift of prophecy, 00:42:43.520 --> 00:42:47.120 he doesn't expect you to attempt to be a prophet, because you 00:42:47.120 --> 00:42:50.400 can't do it. 00:42:50.400 --> 00:42:55.040 But to return to the issue of truth and lies, the subject 00:42:55.040 --> 00:43:02.000 of the episode, the fundamental reason that these things matter with regard 00:43:02.000 --> 00:43:06.400 to everything in life and not just with regard to scripture is 00:43:06.400 --> 00:43:10.800 because again, when we speak of the truth, we are speaking of 00:43:10.800 --> 00:43:15.680 that which corresponds with reality, and reality is just another term for 00:43:15.680 --> 00:43:20.720 creation. And so if you speak falsely, if you say something that 00:43:20.720 --> 00:43:25.920 does not correspond with reality, but rather is contrary to reality, you 00:43:25.920 --> 00:43:30.160 are lying about creation, and to lie about the creation is to 00:43:30.160 --> 00:43:33.760 lie about the creator, in the same way that to lie about 00:43:33.760 --> 00:43:36.240 what is written in a book is to lie about what the 00:43:36.240 --> 00:43:37.760 author has said. 00:43:38.000 --> 00:43:40.640 Creation is God's first book. 00:43:40.640 --> 00:43:44.080 We do not get to lie about what He has done in 00:43:44.080 --> 00:43:48.640 creation, because when we do that, we are lying about God. 00:43:48.640 --> 00:43:53.840 We are blaspheming, the creator of the universe, something that at the 00:43:53.840 --> 00:43:58.720 very least as Christians, we should want to avoid at all costs. 00:43:59.120 --> 00:44:02.320 And so with regard to these matters, we need to speak the 00:44:02.320 --> 00:44:05.760 truth. If you don't know the truth on something, as Wo said, 00:44:05.760 --> 00:44:09.360 and as we've said many times before, it is entirely fine to 00:44:09.360 --> 00:44:11.520 remain silent. 00:44:11.520 --> 00:44:15.200 You do not need to have a position or an opinion if 00:44:15.200 --> 00:44:17.280 it happens to be an opinion, which in most of these cases 00:44:17.360 --> 00:44:21.040 it is not, but sometimes we use the term in a way 00:44:21.040 --> 00:44:23.200 that conflates some senses. 00:44:23.200 --> 00:44:27.040 That you do not need to have a position on everything. 00:44:27.040 --> 00:44:28.000 I have no position 00:44:29.040 --> 00:44:33.360 with regard to basically anything in quantum chemistry. 00:44:33.360 --> 00:44:37.920 I know too little about the subject to have any positions or 00:44:37.920 --> 00:44:40.960 any opinions on things on which one could have an opinion with 00:44:40.960 --> 00:44:43.600 regard to that subject matter. 00:44:43.600 --> 00:44:48.240 I have very few opinions on woodworking because I don't know it 00:44:48.240 --> 00:44:48.880 very well. 00:44:48.880 --> 00:44:52.240 I'm not going to say this joint versus that joint is better 00:44:52.240 --> 00:44:54.480 or worse. 00:44:54.480 --> 00:44:59.760 I have positions and opinions on things about which I am knowledgeable. 00:44:59.760 --> 00:45:02.720 That is the way men should conduct themselves. 00:45:02.720 --> 00:45:08.640 The overwhelming majority of subjects and subject areas, you should have no 00:45:08.640 --> 00:45:12.480 position, no opinion, because you don't know anything about them. 00:45:12.480 --> 00:45:17.520 And that is the same for me, for Woe, for everyone else. 00:45:17.520 --> 00:45:22.800 Because the world of information out there, the sum of information in 00:45:22.800 --> 00:45:28.160 reality, in creation, approaches the infinite because it was created by the 00:45:28.160 --> 00:45:33.920 infinite. You simply cannot know everything, and so you do not need 00:45:33.920 --> 00:45:37.360 to have an opinion or a position on everything. 00:45:37.360 --> 00:45:41.280 It is entirely acceptable to hold your tongue. 00:45:42.400 --> 00:45:42.560 I 00:45:42.560 --> 00:45:46.960 want to focus now briefly on the first lie ever told, because 00:45:47.040 --> 00:45:48.640 it's a pretty big deal. 00:45:48.640 --> 00:45:53.360 In Genesis three it's written Now the serpent was more crafty than 00:45:53.360 --> 00:45:56.400 any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. 00:45:56.400 --> 00:46:00.000 He said to the woman, now listen very carefully to this, did 00:46:00.240 --> 00:46:04.240 God actually say you shall not eat of any tree in the 00:46:04.240 --> 00:46:07.600 garden? And the woman said to the serpent, We may eat of 00:46:07.600 --> 00:46:09.680 the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said you 00:46:09.680 --> 00:46:11.600 shall not eat of the fruit of the tree in the that 00:46:11.600 --> 00:46:14.320 is the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it lest 00:46:14.320 --> 00:46:15.040 you die. 00:46:15.040 --> 00:46:18.320 But the serpent said to the woman, You will not surely die, 00:46:18.320 --> 00:46:20.480 for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will 00:46:20.480 --> 00:46:23.600 be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. 00:46:23.600 --> 00:46:26.240 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, 00:46:26.240 --> 00:46:28.240 and it was a delight to the eyes and that the tree 00:46:28.240 --> 00:46:31.280 was to be desired, to make one wise, she took of its 00:46:31.280 --> 00:46:34.000 fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who 00:46:34.000 --> 00:46:35.520 was with her, and he ate. 00:46:35.520 --> 00:46:37.600 Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they 00:46:37.600 --> 00:46:41.440 were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin 00:46:41.520 --> 00:46:46.560 claws. The first lie that Satan told was not you will not 00:46:46.560 --> 00:46:47.440 surely die. 00:46:47.440 --> 00:46:51.680 The first lie that the deceiver told to deceive deceive Eve was 00:46:51.840 --> 00:46:55.680 did God actually say, You shall not eat of any tree in 00:46:55.680 --> 00:46:56.880 the garden? 00:46:56.880 --> 00:47:01.520 The question itself was the first lie, because it was completely the 00:47:01.520 --> 00:47:04.480 opposite of what God said, and Satan knew it. 00:47:04.720 --> 00:47:09.200 There was a very specific reason why Satan gave a question that 00:47:09.200 --> 00:47:11.120 had no bearing on reality. 00:47:11.120 --> 00:47:14.400 It was similar to what God said, but it was very clearly 00:47:14.400 --> 00:47:17.600 a functional, fundamentally false misstatement. 00:47:17.600 --> 00:47:20.400 Satan said, You shall not eat of any tree in the garden. 00:47:20.400 --> 00:47:21.440 And then Eve corrected him. 00:47:21.840 --> 00:47:22.320 no, no. 00:47:22.320 --> 00:47:24.480 Just the one tree in the midst. 00:47:24.480 --> 00:47:27.200 What did Satan do when he said this? 00:47:27.200 --> 00:47:30.000 He triggered covetousness in Eve. 00:47:30.320 --> 00:47:35.120 She suddenly coveted the fruit that was fit to make one wise. 00:47:35.120 --> 00:47:40.080 And so by Satan falsely framing the question as you can't eat 00:47:40.080 --> 00:47:42.720 any of this fruit, Eve's respondent, look we can all the we 00:47:42.720 --> 00:47:43.680 can eat all the fruit. 00:47:43.680 --> 00:47:46.480 Everything is here for us, except for that one. 00:47:46.480 --> 00:47:48.880 And Satan said, Well, that one's the good one. 00:47:48.880 --> 00:47:50.240 It's not gonna hurt you. 00:47:50.240 --> 00:47:52.240 And so she looked at and she loved it. 00:47:52.240 --> 00:47:56.080 Like he tricked her, he deceived her with a question. 00:47:57.040 --> 00:48:01.120 Now note this lie from the deceiver, and he's called throughout much 00:48:01.120 --> 00:48:04.000 of the rest of scripture the deceiver because of what he says 00:48:04.000 --> 00:48:09.360 here. He deceived her by twisting what God had said and done. 00:48:09.680 --> 00:48:12.960 It was God's will that they not eat of one tree. 00:48:12.960 --> 00:48:16.080 He made her greedy by saying, Oh, God said you can't eat 00:48:16.080 --> 00:48:17.520 any of this stuff, didn't he? 00:48:17.520 --> 00:48:19.920 And so she just marched right into it. 00:48:19.920 --> 00:48:22.800 She got excited, just like so many of us get excited online 00:48:23.200 --> 00:48:26.320 when we see that somebody's wrong about something and we march in 00:48:26.320 --> 00:48:29.840 there and straighten them out, not realizing that it was a trick, 00:48:29.840 --> 00:48:31.280 it was a setup. 00:48:31.280 --> 00:48:33.680 Satan knew exactly what she was gonna do. 00:48:33.680 --> 00:48:37.840 Satan wanted her to correct him and to say what God said. 00:48:37.840 --> 00:48:41.600 Satan tricked Eve into confessing God's command. 00:48:41.600 --> 00:48:43.600 And that's how he got her. 00:48:43.600 --> 00:48:46.880 Because it wasn't the command itself that was the problem, it was 00:48:46.880 --> 00:48:50.320 the inherent covetousness that she had for that which she had been 00:48:50.320 --> 00:48:52.320 denied by God's command. 00:48:52.320 --> 00:48:54.880 Satan said, God said you can't eat any of this stuff? 00:48:54.880 --> 00:48:56.320 She's like, no, it's all for us. 00:48:56.320 --> 00:48:57.440 Just the one thing. 00:48:57.440 --> 00:49:00.080 And so then the one thing that she couldn't have became the 00:49:00.080 --> 00:49:03.360 focus. And that And that's how he deceived her. 00:49:03.360 --> 00:49:06.800 It's very interesting when you look at the definition of the word 00:49:06.800 --> 00:49:12.480 that's used for deceiver or deception, the root, planos, it's the same 00:49:12.480 --> 00:49:14.880 root for the word that we have for planet. 00:49:14.880 --> 00:49:18.160 Before they knew what planets were when they were first identified in 00:49:18.160 --> 00:49:20.720 the stars, they were called wanderers. 00:49:20.720 --> 00:49:23.600 That's how that's where planet came from, because they wander. 00:49:23.600 --> 00:49:25.840 That is the word that is used for deceiver. 00:49:25.840 --> 00:49:27.200 Why is that? 00:49:27.200 --> 00:49:29.680 On one hand, on the gradient, on the you know, the good 00:49:30.080 --> 00:49:34.320 side of the gradient, we have the truth, God's eternal truth, all 00:49:34.320 --> 00:49:38.080 things that are true, all things that are real. 00:49:38.080 --> 00:49:43.040 The opposite is not absolute black lies and malevolence. 00:49:43.040 --> 00:49:47.200 The opposite, the deceiver, when Satan is repeatedly called a deceiver in 00:49:47.200 --> 00:49:51.280 Revelation, he's called the one who causes her to wander. 00:49:51.280 --> 00:49:55.440 He deceived by causing Eve to wander away from the truth. 00:49:55.440 --> 00:50:01.040 Now this is a crucial distinction because the truth requires laser focus. 00:50:01.040 --> 00:50:07.360 It requires absolute certainty and devotion to that which is actually true. 00:50:07.360 --> 00:50:09.120 Every detail. 00:50:09.120 --> 00:50:11.760 Satan just needs you to wander off the path a little bit. 00:50:11.760 --> 00:50:13.680 It doesn't matter which way you go. 00:50:13.680 --> 00:50:16.720 See, this first lie, although the lie of you will not surely 00:50:16.720 --> 00:50:21.040 die, was a complete inversion The first deception of the question wasn't 00:50:21.120 --> 00:50:25.040 inversion. It was kind of an inversion of the actual command. 00:50:25.040 --> 00:50:28.880 But the point was not, you should go do all these terrible, 00:50:28.880 --> 00:50:31.760 evil things, just ignore all what God said about fruit. 00:50:31.760 --> 00:50:32.480 Go kill Adam. 00:50:32.480 --> 00:50:36.400 Go poison him, go, you know, do something super bad. 00:50:36.400 --> 00:50:39.120 Satan just caused her to wander. 00:50:39.120 --> 00:50:42.400 This is the appeal that it's intrinsic to every man. 00:50:42.400 --> 00:50:45.920 It takes laser focus to stay on the truth, and it's very 00:50:45.920 --> 00:50:48.480 easy to be distracted by anything else. 00:50:48.480 --> 00:50:51.280 And so I think when we look at the world around us 00:50:51.280 --> 00:50:56.000 today, the notion the deceiver is rooted in wandering, and then you 00:50:56.000 --> 00:50:59.280 look at all the things in our lives that are sources of 00:50:59.280 --> 00:51:02.720 distraction, they take on a very different context, don't they? 00:51:02.960 --> 00:51:09.440 Whether it's sports ball or video games or drinking or church, if 00:51:09.440 --> 00:51:12.720 your entire focus is maybe you want to become a monk. 00:51:12.720 --> 00:51:15.520 You love God so much you want to go whole hog and 00:51:15.520 --> 00:51:17.680 devote every moment of your life. 00:51:17.680 --> 00:51:20.880 If you have another vocation, if you have other duties that you 00:51:20.880 --> 00:51:24.560 would necessarily have to neglect in order to do that, perhaps you're 00:51:24.480 --> 00:51:27.200 wandering from the path that God actually wants. 00:51:27.200 --> 00:51:32.240 The things that Satan uses to cause us to wander aren't necessarily 00:51:32.240 --> 00:51:34.480 evil in and of themselves. 00:51:34.480 --> 00:51:36.720 Alcohol is a blessing from God. 00:51:36.720 --> 00:51:39.280 Too much alcohol is destruction. 00:51:39.280 --> 00:51:40.720 Same with calories. 00:51:40.720 --> 00:51:43.120 You die without a certain number of calories. 00:51:43.120 --> 00:51:46.560 And yet if you have too many, it leads to your destruction. 00:51:46.560 --> 00:51:50.240 And so wandering from the path of what is true is the 00:51:50.240 --> 00:51:53.200 deception. It's the deceiver's bread and butter. 00:51:53.200 --> 00:51:57.520 It's not always complete inversion, even though that's ultimately the goal. 00:51:57.520 --> 00:52:02.640 The goal is always ultimately the complete inversion of creation, of reality. 00:52:02.640 --> 00:52:05.680 But he gets there by causing you to wander. 00:52:05.680 --> 00:52:09.280 Lust is often called in a relationship wandering eyes. 00:52:09.280 --> 00:52:12.960 Sure, he's a faithful husband, but when a pretty girl walks by, 00:52:12.960 --> 00:52:14.160 he checks her out. 00:52:14.160 --> 00:52:15.920 That's a wandering eye. 00:52:15.920 --> 00:52:19.920 Jesus condemns that specifically because he's already lusting in his heart, and 00:52:19.920 --> 00:52:22.960 the adultery is a fate of compli at that point. 00:52:22.960 --> 00:52:25.280 He's already done in his heart, why not follow through? 00:52:25.440 --> 00:52:27.200 In for a penny, in for a pound. 00:52:27.200 --> 00:52:27.760 I liked it. 00:52:28.080 --> 00:52:28.880 I saw it. 00:52:28.880 --> 00:52:30.720 I saw that it was good. 00:52:30.720 --> 00:52:31.920 Just like Eve. 00:52:31.920 --> 00:52:33.600 That's how temptation comes. 00:52:33.600 --> 00:52:37.360 Satan's deception is with temptation to cause you to wander just a 00:52:37.360 --> 00:52:39.920 little bit, even if it's an ordered desire. 00:52:39.920 --> 00:52:43.920 If it's disordered because it's the wrong girl, then it's sin. 00:52:43.920 --> 00:52:46.800 And so when we're looking at what is true and what is 00:52:46.800 --> 00:52:50.320 false, and we're looking at the nature of Satan, the father of 00:52:50.320 --> 00:52:54.560 lies, just keep in mind that the father of lies, his go-to 00:52:54.800 --> 00:52:57.840 move is initially wandering. 00:52:57.840 --> 00:52:58.960 You will not surely die. 00:52:58.960 --> 00:53:00.160 It's not going to be as bad. 00:53:00.160 --> 00:53:02.640 You know, you've you've heard that these things are gonna happen if 00:53:02.640 --> 00:53:03.040 you do this. 00:53:03.040 --> 00:53:03.600 Don't worry about it. 00:53:03.840 --> 00:53:04.880 It's gonna be okay. 00:53:04.880 --> 00:53:07.920 Just take one sniff, take one bite, it's not gonna hurt you. 00:53:07.920 --> 00:53:10.960 And then you get into it, and it destroys you, because you 00:53:10.960 --> 00:53:14.960 wandered off the path of truth of what is godly, and the 00:53:14.960 --> 00:53:19.200 destruction will inevitably follow if you continue to wander down that false 00:53:19.200 --> 00:53:24.880 path. When we don't view truth and lies in this context, it's 00:53:24.880 --> 00:53:27.280 so easy to gobble up lies left and right. 00:53:27.280 --> 00:53:30.240 Because the lie that Eve gobbled up was a small one. 00:53:30.240 --> 00:53:34.160 She retorted Satan with exactly what God said, or at least close 00:53:34.480 --> 00:53:34.960 to it. 00:53:34.960 --> 00:53:38.160 We're not sure about the extra part that was tacked on about 00:53:38.160 --> 00:53:40.080 not touching it. 00:53:40.080 --> 00:53:41.920 But she responded with confession. 00:53:41.920 --> 00:53:45.280 She confessed what God had said against the false statement that Satan 00:53:45.280 --> 00:53:45.760 had made. 00:53:45.760 --> 00:53:48.320 And that was how he caused her to wander. 00:53:48.320 --> 00:53:51.440 I think this is what we see today with people shouting, that's 00:53:51.440 --> 00:53:54.880 not the gospel when someone says something that has nothing to do 00:53:54.880 --> 00:53:56.000 with salvation. 00:53:56.000 --> 00:53:58.240 There are many things in life that have nothing to do with 00:53:58.240 --> 00:54:01.920 salvation. If you listen to a podcast or read an article that 00:54:01.920 --> 00:54:07.120 talks about proper health and proper nutrition, if you don't follow those 00:54:07.120 --> 00:54:10.400 guidelines, you will be less healthy, whether you know it or not. 00:54:10.400 --> 00:54:14.160 And so when you learn about it, if you read dietary advice, 00:54:14.160 --> 00:54:17.440 like the best possible way to feed yourself, to care for your 00:54:17.440 --> 00:54:20.720 body, and you do the exact opposite, you're going to get the 00:54:20.720 --> 00:54:22.160 inevitable result from it. 00:54:22.160 --> 00:54:25.040 Because it's baked into the behavior. 00:54:25.040 --> 00:54:29.840 The fact that not everything is about the gospel refutes nothing, because 00:54:30.000 --> 00:54:35.120 gospel matters, as they specifically relate to how God saves us, are 00:54:35.200 --> 00:54:36.720 in fact very narrow. 00:54:37.040 --> 00:54:39.600 One of my mutuals on X pointed this out yesterday. 00:54:39.600 --> 00:54:40.960 It's a brilliant observation. 00:54:40.960 --> 00:54:43.680 Lately, a bunch of guys have been running around shouting, well, that's 00:54:43.680 --> 00:54:44.560 not the gospel. 00:54:44.560 --> 00:54:47.040 It's a refutation of what guys post online. 00:54:47.040 --> 00:54:50.800 Is though if you're not saying John 3.16 with every post you 00:54:50.800 --> 00:54:51.840 are evil. 00:54:51.840 --> 00:54:53.680 You're not a good enough Christian. 00:54:53.680 --> 00:54:58.320 And my friend pointed out, if you apply that test to Scripture, 00:54:58.320 --> 00:54:59.840 Scripture is then evil. 00:54:59.840 --> 00:55:03.120 To say that's not the gospel applies to most of Scripture. 00:55:03.120 --> 00:55:06.480 In fact, saying that's not the gospel, the way these guys lie 00:55:06.480 --> 00:55:09.280 about it, it damns most of the gospel themselves. 00:55:09.280 --> 00:55:12.240 When you read the gospels, most of the gospels is not the 00:55:12.240 --> 00:55:13.760 gospel. It's in there. 00:55:13.760 --> 00:55:17.760 It's in there abundantly, but the abundance is because of how important 00:55:17.760 --> 00:55:18.240 it is. 00:55:18.240 --> 00:55:20.240 It's not by volume. 00:55:20.240 --> 00:55:24.160 The test by volume of how much gospel is present is ridiculous. 00:55:24.160 --> 00:55:26.000 It's anti Christian. 00:55:26.000 --> 00:55:29.520 And yet this new attack has emerged where guys want to sound 00:55:29.520 --> 00:55:32.480 pious and they don't know what to say, and they hear something 00:55:32.480 --> 00:55:35.280 they don't like, and they say that's not the gospel. 00:55:35.280 --> 00:55:37.920 They're doing exactly what Satan did to Eve. 00:55:37.920 --> 00:55:42.800 They're introducing a completely false non sequitur and using it to invert 00:55:42.800 --> 00:55:47.600 the situation because what they're fundamentally doing is setting the gospel, which 00:55:47.600 --> 00:55:50.640 they're misconstruing, against things that are true. 00:55:50.640 --> 00:55:53.040 They're not saying that guys who are posting a bunch of stuff 00:55:53.040 --> 00:55:55.760 that aren't the gospel are even liars. 00:55:55.760 --> 00:55:58.240 They're saying, well, sure, that's true, but it's not the gospel, therefore 00:55:58.240 --> 00:55:59.760 it's invalid. 00:55:59.760 --> 00:56:02.320 That's fundamentally Gnostic. 00:56:02.320 --> 00:56:04.800 As we said in the Gnosticism episode early in the year, I'm 00:56:04.800 --> 00:56:06.080 not using that flippantly. 00:56:06.080 --> 00:56:08.880 I'm not just name-calling by calling it Gnostic. 00:56:08.880 --> 00:56:13.600 If you are so focused on one narrow aspect of doctrine that 00:56:13.600 --> 00:56:17.680 when a man says something that's true, you shout him down, you 00:56:17.680 --> 00:56:21.280 do not love the truth, and you are not a Christian. 00:56:21.280 --> 00:56:24.480 These are the stakes here. 00:56:24.800 --> 00:56:25.040 To 00:56:25.040 --> 00:56:31.280 return to the issue of philosophy just briefly and sort of tangentially. 00:56:31.280 --> 00:56:35.040 In philosophy there's a thing called a razor, which essentially is just 00:56:35.040 --> 00:56:40.480 a tool for helping you think about a particular type or class 00:56:40.480 --> 00:56:42.080 of problems. 00:56:42.080 --> 00:56:45.120 The most common one, or at least the most well-known one, is 00:56:45.120 --> 00:56:50.800 probably Occam's razor, which there's some irony in how abused that razor 00:56:50.800 --> 00:56:54.400 is and the way in which it is particularly most often abused, 00:56:54.400 --> 00:56:57.120 but that's a topic for another time. 00:56:57.120 --> 00:57:01.120 I want to give you a razor for dealing with problems in 00:57:01.120 --> 00:57:02.640 this area. 00:57:02.640 --> 00:57:05.680 It's a very simple one. 00:57:05.680 --> 00:57:12.000 If a response to a particular purported fact that has been advanced 00:57:12.800 --> 00:57:19.920 is tangential and attacks something ancillary about the fact or 00:57:19.920 --> 00:57:25.440 the consequences of the fact or the speaker, then you should be 00:57:25.440 --> 00:57:32.000 very deeply suspicious, because the person launching that attack almost certainly has 00:57:32.000 --> 00:57:34.160 ulterior motives. 00:57:34.160 --> 00:57:37.440 To give a concrete example, and this ties into what Woe was 00:57:37.440 --> 00:57:41.360 just saying, but the concrete example makes it easier. 00:57:41.360 --> 00:57:48.480 If you point out that statistically speaking, looking at the crime 00:57:48.480 --> 00:57:52.320 data, at least as best as they are reported these days, in 00:57:52.320 --> 00:57:59.200 the United States, blacks are overwhelmingly more likely than any other group, 00:57:59.200 --> 00:58:02.880 particularly than whites, to commit violent crimes. 00:58:02.880 --> 00:58:06.320 And someone responds to that, well that's racist. 00:58:06.320 --> 00:58:07.600 That's an example. 00:58:07.600 --> 00:58:11.280 That should trigger your defense with regard to that razor. 00:58:11.280 --> 00:58:13.680 Because what has that man said? 00:58:13.680 --> 00:58:17.200 And more importantly, what has he not said? 00:58:17.200 --> 00:58:20.800 He's said I don't like that. 00:58:20.800 --> 00:58:23.840 I don't like what you've said. 00:58:23.840 --> 00:58:25.440 It makes me uncomfortable. 00:58:25.440 --> 00:58:26.880 I don't want you to say it. 00:58:26.880 --> 00:58:29.200 He said a bunch of stuff like that. 00:58:29.200 --> 00:58:32.240 What he's really said is I want you to shut up. 00:58:32.240 --> 00:58:37.520 But what he has not said is that's wrong. 00:58:37.520 --> 00:58:44.000 If the thing being advanced, if the purported fact were wrong. 00:58:44.000 --> 00:58:49.280 If the man speaking were in error, the correct response is and 00:58:49.280 --> 00:58:52.320 would be that's wrong. 00:58:52.320 --> 00:58:56.560 It would be no look at these data, I have an answer 00:58:56.560 --> 00:58:57.760 to that. 00:58:57.760 --> 00:59:01.840 What you just said is wrong, but they don't attack you by 00:59:01.840 --> 00:59:05.120 saying that what you've said is wrong. 00:59:05.120 --> 00:59:09.600 They attack you by saying that what you've said is racist, or 00:59:09.600 --> 00:59:16.640 sexist, or misogynist, or kinist, or supremacist, or any of these 00:59:16.640 --> 00:59:20.640 other words that are meant to terminate the discussion and also serve 00:59:20.640 --> 00:59:24.480 as a threat, because they're threatening, I am going to attempt to 00:59:24.480 --> 00:59:30.080 ruin your life by branding you as these various things that society 00:59:30.080 --> 00:59:36.480 says are unacceptable, instead of actually addressing the point you've made. 00:59:36.640 --> 00:59:41.520 A serious man who is dealing with the conversation, dealing with the 00:59:41.520 --> 00:59:45.760 topic in a serious manner, will address the actual thing that has 00:59:45.760 --> 00:59:48.320 been advanced, which is the fact. 00:59:48.320 --> 00:59:53.440 Boiled down to its simplest, one man has said, X is true. 00:59:53.440 --> 00:59:57.120 And then the other man has said, I don't like you. 00:59:57.120 --> 00:59:58.880 It's irrelevant. 00:59:58.880 --> 01:00:02.880 It may be tangentially related because he may say I don't like 01:00:02.880 --> 01:00:07.360 X, which is tangentially related in the mathematical sense. 01:00:07.360 --> 01:00:11.200 It has one point of contact with the thing. 01:00:11.200 --> 01:00:13.840 But it is not a refutation, it's not an actual response 01:00:15.200 --> 01:00:19.120 And so when someone takes that tack, you should be on your 01:00:19.120 --> 01:00:24.000 guard. You should recognize that person is intending to mislead you. 01:00:24.000 --> 01:00:26.160 He is trying to lead you astray. 01:00:26.160 --> 01:00:28.320 He is acting in the place of the sever. 01:00:28.640 --> 01:00:31.360 That is the very sort of thing that Satan does. 01:00:31.360 --> 01:00:34.720 It is not the sort of thing Christian men should do, and 01:00:34.720 --> 01:00:37.120 it is certainly not the sort of thing for which Christian men 01:00:37.120 --> 01:00:39.120 should be known. 01:00:39.520 --> 01:00:39.680 I 01:00:39.680 --> 01:00:44.000 want to give you an example from 1 John to illustrate one 01:00:44.000 --> 01:00:48.400 of the things that we frequently say about determining whether or not 01:00:48.400 --> 01:00:51.600 someone's confession that they're a Christian is true or not. 01:00:51.920 --> 01:00:55.040 I'm going to read a couple paragraphs so I don't pluck anything 01:00:55.040 --> 01:00:55.760 out of context. 01:00:55.760 --> 01:00:57.120 I'm not proof texting here. 01:00:57.120 --> 01:00:58.640 I hate that. 01:00:58.640 --> 01:01:00.880 In first John two it is written. 01:01:01.040 --> 01:01:03.920 My little children, I am writing these things to you, so that 01:01:03.920 --> 01:01:05.120 you may not sin. 01:01:05.120 --> 01:01:08.000 But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, 01:01:08.000 --> 01:01:10.080 Jesus Christ, the righteous. 01:01:10.080 --> 01:01:13.600 He is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only, 01:01:13.600 --> 01:01:16.880 but also for the sins of the whole world, and by this 01:01:16.880 --> 01:01:19.280 we know that we have come to know him if we keep 01:01:19.280 --> 01:01:20.640 his commandments. 01:01:20.640 --> 01:01:24.640 Whoever says I know him, but does not keep his commandments is 01:01:24.640 --> 01:01:27.600 a liar, and the truth is not in him. 01:01:27.600 --> 01:01:31.120 But whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God 01:01:31.120 --> 01:01:32.320 is perfected. 01:01:32.320 --> 01:01:34.800 By this we may know that we are in him. 01:01:34.800 --> 01:01:37.920 Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same 01:01:37.920 --> 01:01:39.760 way in which he walked. 01:01:39.760 --> 01:01:42.640 So when you hear that you're praying thinking that sounds like works 01:01:42.720 --> 01:01:45.520 righteousness, that sounds like self justification. 01:01:45.520 --> 01:01:47.840 Or you'll say, Well yeah, I go along with that, but obviously 01:01:47.920 --> 01:01:51.280 I can't believe it because then that would be works righteousness. 01:01:51.280 --> 01:01:53.840 There are a lot of passages in scripture when we actually just 01:01:53.840 --> 01:01:58.560 take them at face value, especially Protestants who correctly understand that we 01:01:58.560 --> 01:02:02.320 can't save ourselves have the wrong reaction and we get angry with 01:02:02.320 --> 01:02:03.280 the text. 01:02:03.280 --> 01:02:07.200 God says whoever says I know Jesus but does not keep his 01:02:07.280 --> 01:02:10.400 commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him. 01:02:10.960 --> 01:02:14.000 Now, this is important because I'm going to go two chapters later 01:02:14.000 --> 01:02:16.880 and show you where the proof textures leap into this. 01:02:16.880 --> 01:02:18.160 First John 4. 01:02:18.160 --> 01:02:21.520 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see 01:02:21.520 --> 01:02:22.720 whether they are from God. 01:02:22.720 --> 01:02:26.000 For many false prophets have gone out into the world. 01:02:26.000 --> 01:02:28.240 By this you know the Spirit of God. 01:02:28.240 --> 01:02:31.600 Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh 01:02:31.760 --> 01:02:35.680 is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is 01:02:35.680 --> 01:02:36.720 not from God. 01:02:36.720 --> 01:02:39.840 This is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard is 01:02:39.840 --> 01:02:42.240 coming and now is in the world already. 01:02:42.240 --> 01:02:45.680 Little children you are from God and have overcome them, for he 01:02:45.680 --> 01:02:47.920 who is in you is greater than he who is in the 01:02:47.920 --> 01:02:51.040 world. They are from the world, therefore they speak from the world, 01:02:51.040 --> 01:02:54.400 and the world listens to them, we are from God. 01:02:54.400 --> 01:02:58.480 Whoever knows God listens to us, whoever is not from God does 01:02:58.480 --> 01:02:59.600 not listen to us. 01:02:59.600 --> 01:03:02.720 By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of 01:03:02.720 --> 01:03:06.800 error. So the proof dexter will want to ignore John two entirely 01:03:06.960 --> 01:03:09.280 and use this definition of Christianity. 01:03:09.280 --> 01:03:11.200 By this you know the Spirit of God. 01:03:11.200 --> 01:03:14.880 Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh 01:03:15.120 --> 01:03:16.080 is from God. 01:03:16.080 --> 01:03:19.440 And every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. 01:03:19.440 --> 01:03:20.560 It's very simple. 01:03:20.560 --> 01:03:23.120 That's a basic definition, and it's true. 01:03:23.120 --> 01:03:26.640 The problem is that it is only true in the context of 01:03:26.640 --> 01:03:28.240 first John 2. 01:03:28.240 --> 01:03:31.120 How can we confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh 01:03:32.000 --> 01:03:36.000 if we do not that's saying I know him to confess that 01:03:36.000 --> 01:03:38.400 Jesus has come in the flesh is to say I know him, 01:03:38.400 --> 01:03:41.280 but if you do not keep his commandments you're a liar. 01:03:41.280 --> 01:03:44.320 So see the confession with your lips to say, oh yeah, Jesus 01:03:44.320 --> 01:03:45.920 came. He's I I believe in Jesus. 01:03:45.920 --> 01:03:47.200 I'm I'm a Christian. 01:03:47.200 --> 01:03:49.840 If you don't keep his commandments, you're a liar. 01:03:49.840 --> 01:03:51.440 This is not works righteousness. 01:03:51.440 --> 01:03:53.360 This is the Christian life. 01:03:53.360 --> 01:03:54.880 Do you see the problem here? 01:03:54.880 --> 01:03:59.600 It's very easy to focus in on that really easy sounding passage 01:03:59.600 --> 01:04:03.120 in first John four, where every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ has 01:04:03.120 --> 01:04:04.560 come from the flesh is from God. 01:04:04.560 --> 01:04:05.200 Okay, great. 01:04:05.200 --> 01:04:06.800 That's all our pastors, isn't it? 01:04:06.800 --> 01:04:08.320 Every pastor pretty much confesses that. 01:04:09.120 --> 01:04:12.640 How many pastors who say I know Jesus don't keep his commandments, 01:04:12.640 --> 01:04:15.360 who tell me you don't have to keep his commandments? 01:04:15.360 --> 01:04:18.800 God calls that man a liar and says the truth is not 01:04:18.800 --> 01:04:19.760 in him. 01:04:20.160 --> 01:04:23.520 Now, again, this is not works righteousness. 01:04:23.520 --> 01:04:26.160 We can't possibly follow God's commands perfectly. 01:04:26.160 --> 01:04:27.200 We cannot. 01:04:27.200 --> 01:04:30.560 Every one of us will sin multiple times a day. 01:04:30.560 --> 01:04:32.560 Every day we sin in all sorts of ways. 01:04:32.560 --> 01:04:34.480 We have original sin. 01:04:34.720 --> 01:04:38.480 The only thing that washes that out is Christ's blood on the 01:04:38.480 --> 01:04:40.560 cross. That is the gospel. 01:04:40.560 --> 01:04:43.040 The only thing that saves us is Christ. 01:04:43.040 --> 01:04:47.520 Nevertheless, as Christians, we must keep his commandments. 01:04:47.520 --> 01:04:50.720 Now, must doesn't mean or you're not saved. 01:04:50.720 --> 01:04:53.040 This is the hard part here, or the easy part. 01:04:53.040 --> 01:04:54.400 Like it's not tricky. 01:04:54.400 --> 01:04:57.360 Yes, you must keep his commandments, and yes, you will fail, and 01:04:57.360 --> 01:04:58.960 yes, you must keep them anyway. 01:04:58.960 --> 01:05:02.320 That's not a source for despair, because the salvation has already taken 01:05:02.400 --> 01:05:04.480 place at the cross. 01:05:04.480 --> 01:05:08.000 When we have faith, we receive the gift that was given on 01:05:08.000 --> 01:05:10.480 the cross, and we know that we're saved. 01:05:10.480 --> 01:05:14.400 And in that context, keeping God's commandments is joyous. 01:05:14.400 --> 01:05:18.240 Here's why it's so deadly to use the definition from John 4 01:05:18.480 --> 01:05:20.880 against the definition in John 2. 01:05:20.880 --> 01:05:24.560 If your only definition, which is the typical one for most Christians, 01:05:24.560 --> 01:05:27.520 every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh 01:05:27.520 --> 01:05:28.560 is from God. 01:05:28.560 --> 01:05:29.280 Okay, great. 01:05:29.280 --> 01:05:30.240 That's all our pastors. 01:05:30.240 --> 01:05:33.520 That's everybody who says he's a Christian confesses Jesus came from God. 01:05:33.520 --> 01:05:34.320 Okay, fine. 01:05:34.320 --> 01:05:36.080 Look what we find in Luke 4. 01:05:36.080 --> 01:05:38.400 And in the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit 01:05:38.400 --> 01:05:41.360 of an unclean demon, and he cried out with a loud voice, 01:05:41.360 --> 01:05:44.240 Ha, what have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? 01:05:44.240 --> 01:05:45.680 Have you come to destroy us? 01:05:45.680 --> 01:05:48.320 I know who you are, the holy one of God. 01:05:48.320 --> 01:05:50.960 But Jesus rebuked him, saying, Be silent and come out of him. 01:05:51.760 --> 01:05:56.880 This demon confessed Jesus precisely the way first John 4 says to. 01:05:56.880 --> 01:06:00.080 He said, You are Jesus of Nazareth, you are the holy one 01:06:00.240 --> 01:06:01.040 of God. 01:06:01.040 --> 01:06:04.240 That was the very confession in John 4 that we're told is 01:06:04.400 --> 01:06:07.120 saving. Then this is coming from a demon. 01:06:07.120 --> 01:06:12.720 Why? Because he was noting a fact, but he did not keep 01:06:12.720 --> 01:06:14.080 God's commandments. 01:06:14.080 --> 01:06:15.360 Demons are liars. 01:06:15.360 --> 01:06:18.160 They are always and ever set against God. 01:06:18.160 --> 01:06:20.720 And so the reason he was hanging out in a synagogue and 01:06:20.720 --> 01:06:23.760 then screaming only when Jesus showed up, because that was the first 01:06:23.760 --> 01:06:26.080 time there was any holiness in that place. 01:06:26.080 --> 01:06:30.080 Jesus came into a synagogue where he often found demon-possessed men hanging 01:06:30.080 --> 01:06:31.360 out quite casually. 01:06:31.360 --> 01:06:35.040 They're very comfortable until a Christian walked in, and then they freak 01:06:35.040 --> 01:06:36.400 out and start shouting. 01:06:36.400 --> 01:06:38.400 That's a subject for another day. 01:06:38.400 --> 01:06:42.400 But the confession of this demon is the same as the confession 01:06:42.400 --> 01:06:43.680 of many clerics. 01:06:43.680 --> 01:06:46.720 They say, Yeah, Jesus of Nazareth, he's the Holy One of God. 01:06:46.720 --> 01:06:47.680 Okay, great. 01:06:47.680 --> 01:06:50.720 Do you say that we keep God's commandments or we're liars? 01:06:50.720 --> 01:06:54.560 No. So do you see how truth and lies are in all 01:06:54.560 --> 01:06:55.360 of these things? 01:06:55.360 --> 01:06:57.520 It is all it is always the test of if you're a 01:06:57.520 --> 01:07:00.640 liar, you disagree with anything God says. 01:07:00.640 --> 01:07:02.080 Not the gospel. 01:07:02.080 --> 01:07:05.680 It's very often the case, it's almost always the case, that the 01:07:05.680 --> 01:07:08.960 things that are lied about in Scripture by evil men, the things 01:07:08.960 --> 01:07:12.000 that are denounced as lies are not about the gospel. 01:07:12.000 --> 01:07:13.520 They're not about how we're saved. 01:07:13.520 --> 01:07:15.760 They're not about even who Jesus is. 01:07:15.760 --> 01:07:18.800 They're about whatever it's going to take to get you to wander. 01:07:18.800 --> 01:07:22.080 And that is why Corey and I have such an adamacy about 01:07:22.080 --> 01:07:22.880 the truth. 01:07:22.880 --> 01:07:26.560 If you're laser focused on all things that are true and only 01:07:26.560 --> 01:07:30.480 those things that are true, there's no room for you to wander. 01:07:30.480 --> 01:07:32.080 And no one can do it perfectly. 01:07:32.080 --> 01:07:34.880 It's an impossible task, even to try to just focus only on 01:07:34.880 --> 01:07:35.840 what's true. 01:07:35.840 --> 01:07:38.480 And frankly, as human beings, we don't have the capacity to do 01:07:38.480 --> 01:07:39.280 that all the time. 01:07:39.280 --> 01:07:40.160 We need a break. 01:07:40.160 --> 01:07:41.520 Everybody needs a break. 01:07:41.520 --> 01:07:44.560 It's not that you have to go 100% 24-7. 01:07:44.560 --> 01:07:46.960 You would die if you tried to do that. 01:07:46.960 --> 01:07:49.040 We're not exhorting perfection. 01:07:49.040 --> 01:07:50.480 We're exhorting obedience. 01:07:50.640 --> 01:07:53.040 And that simply begins with saying, when God said it, that means 01:07:53.040 --> 01:07:53.760 it's true. 01:07:53.760 --> 01:07:56.800 And I love it because I love God and the truth is 01:07:56.800 --> 01:07:57.600 in me. 01:07:57.600 --> 01:08:01.440 When we see something that's true, like whoever doesn't keep his commandments 01:08:01.520 --> 01:08:04.000 is a liar and the truth is not in him. 01:08:04.000 --> 01:08:08.880 Love responds to that with joy to receive that truth with gladness. 01:08:08.880 --> 01:08:12.240 This is basic Christian preaching that you never hear. 01:08:12.240 --> 01:08:15.440 You do not hear clerics and pastors talking about this stuff. 01:08:15.440 --> 01:08:16.560 They should be. 01:08:16.560 --> 01:08:20.320 This is the stuff that is most urgently needed today. 01:08:20.320 --> 01:08:23.520 We need to hear that we have to obey God or we're 01:08:23.520 --> 01:08:26.000 liars. When do we take lying seriously? 01:08:26.000 --> 01:08:27.120 Oh, I don't lie about change. 01:08:27.600 --> 01:08:29.600 I don't make stories up and hurt people. 01:08:29.600 --> 01:08:31.200 I'm not a liar. 01:08:31.200 --> 01:08:33.440 Do you ever lie about any of these things that are basic 01:08:33.440 --> 01:08:34.800 observable truths? 01:08:34.800 --> 01:08:37.680 Do you ever lie about anything that's in the scripture? 01:08:37.920 --> 01:08:41.760 Of course you do, knowingly or unknowingly, it's almost always unknowingly. 01:08:41.760 --> 01:08:43.760 We're capable of making mistakes. 01:08:43.760 --> 01:08:46.480 And they can be a mistake that wasn't intentional. 01:08:46.480 --> 01:08:50.560 The intent doesn't matter because Satan is the father of lies. 01:08:50.560 --> 01:08:52.400 He originates every lie. 01:08:52.400 --> 01:08:56.640 Every Every lie has a father and his father's name is Satan. 01:08:56.640 --> 01:09:00.880 The lie comes from hell because it causes us to wander. 01:09:00.880 --> 01:09:03.680 And note that wandering is a matter of degrees. 01:09:03.680 --> 01:09:05.680 The wandering is always small. 01:09:05.680 --> 01:09:07.360 It's just a little bit and a little bit and a little 01:09:07.360 --> 01:09:11.920 bit. It's almost never going from zero to a hundred. 01:09:11.920 --> 01:09:16.880 No one goes from pursuing perfect truth to pursuing perfect evil. 01:09:16.880 --> 01:09:20.320 That big sloppy area in the middle where all the opinions are 01:09:20.320 --> 01:09:23.280 hanging out, where they're not opinions at all, but that's what we 01:09:23.280 --> 01:09:25.840 think. That's where people get sloppy. 01:09:25.840 --> 01:09:28.640 That's where they get messy because they think, ah, it's fine. 01:09:28.640 --> 01:09:33.200 That is Satan's playground because that place of wandering is the place 01:09:33.200 --> 01:09:35.520 where all these errors creep in. 01:09:35.520 --> 01:09:38.720 And any error, see you call it an error, you can call 01:09:38.720 --> 01:09:40.720 it a lie, you call it a mistake. 01:09:40.720 --> 01:09:43.840 The bottom line is if it is not true as opposed to 01:09:43.840 --> 01:09:45.760 God, that's an impossible bar. 01:09:45.760 --> 01:09:52.160 Logic and reason plus scripture give us access to almost everything that 01:09:52.160 --> 01:09:53.440 we need to understand. 01:09:53.440 --> 01:09:55.600 There are things in scripture that are mysteries. 01:09:55.600 --> 01:09:58.640 We've talked on many occasions about things that when you look at 01:09:58.640 --> 01:10:01.920 everything that scripture says, all you can do is say amen, I 01:10:01.920 --> 01:10:03.680 don't get it, and I believe it anyway. 01:10:03.680 --> 01:10:06.480 There are a few places where that's how it works when you're 01:10:06.480 --> 01:10:11.920 talking about the supernatural, about Christ's nature, about communion. 01:10:11.920 --> 01:10:14.480 The only way to understand it is to say something that is 01:10:14.480 --> 01:10:17.200 objectively irrational. 01:10:17.200 --> 01:10:20.320 Fully God and fully man, but it's not two separate things, it's 01:10:20.320 --> 01:10:21.040 one thing. 01:10:21.040 --> 01:10:22.480 All we can do is say that. 01:10:22.480 --> 01:10:24.000 We can't make sense of it. 01:10:24.160 --> 01:10:26.320 If you think you have it figured out, you're probably in trouble 01:10:26.480 --> 01:10:28.960 because I promise you it doesn't make sense. 01:10:28.960 --> 01:10:31.520 You can say what's true, and we must. 01:10:31.520 --> 01:10:35.200 That's why we were given the creeds by faithful Christians fifteen hundred 01:10:35.200 --> 01:10:38.160 years ago Every word of the creeds is true. 01:10:38.160 --> 01:10:39.120 You know what's interesting? 01:10:39.120 --> 01:10:40.960 I'm not going to do it for the sake of time here 01:10:40.960 --> 01:10:44.240 today. Go read the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed. 01:10:44.240 --> 01:10:47.360 The Apostles' Creed doesn't have a word of gospel in it. 01:10:47.360 --> 01:10:51.200 It's the definition of Christianity and it talks about who God is. 01:10:51.200 --> 01:10:54.480 Now I'm not saying anything negative about the gospel here. 01:10:54.480 --> 01:10:59.920 I'm saying that God, as he defines himself, is about more than 01:10:59.920 --> 01:11:01.440 just saving us. 01:11:01.440 --> 01:11:04.800 He saves us because he loves us because he is love. 01:11:04.800 --> 01:11:06.320 And that is the truth in scripture. 01:11:06.320 --> 01:11:07.600 That is the truth of the gospel. 01:11:07.600 --> 01:11:10.240 It's revealed to us only in scripture. 01:11:10.240 --> 01:11:10.960 Nowhere else. 01:11:11.200 --> 01:11:15.040 Never in the natural world will you discover that God loves you 01:11:15.040 --> 01:11:17.040 so much that he died for you on the cross? 01:11:17.040 --> 01:11:18.880 You can only find that in Scripture. 01:11:18.880 --> 01:11:21.360 But where do you find Scripture in reality? 01:11:21.360 --> 01:11:24.640 You find it in a book on a shelf. 01:11:24.640 --> 01:11:30.000 When we don't take truth as seriously as God commands us to, 01:11:30.000 --> 01:11:32.240 we're naturally going to wander. 01:11:32.560 --> 01:11:34.160 it's always gonna happen. 01:11:34.160 --> 01:11:36.640 And so, as we've said a couple times, I want to reiterate 01:11:36.640 --> 01:11:41.120 it again: a lot of people should have a lot fewer opinions. 01:11:41.120 --> 01:11:44.640 Don't be so quick to have an opinion, including about anything that 01:11:44.640 --> 01:11:45.040 we say. 01:11:45.040 --> 01:11:47.680 We've said from the very beginning, don't just believe us because you 01:11:47.680 --> 01:11:50.080 heard it and it sounded like a really good argument. 01:11:50.080 --> 01:11:53.200 Believe it because you're convinced that it's true. 01:11:53.200 --> 01:11:57.760 When that switch flips and you're like, oh man, that explains it. 01:11:57.760 --> 01:12:01.280 I didn't get it before and suddenly it just clicks. 01:12:01.280 --> 01:12:03.280 That is the truth in action. 01:12:03.280 --> 01:12:05.600 And that's got nothing to do with where you heard it or 01:12:05.600 --> 01:12:06.640 where you read it. 01:12:06.640 --> 01:12:08.640 It's true and it's yours. 01:12:08.640 --> 01:12:11.360 The truth has no owner, but it has a creator, and his 01:12:11.440 --> 01:12:12.480 name is God. 01:12:12.480 --> 01:12:15.680 Every lie ever told to cause us to wander from that truth 01:12:15.920 --> 01:12:17.680 comes from Satan. 01:12:17.680 --> 01:12:21.360 So that's the reason that both of us take lies so seriously. 01:12:21.360 --> 01:12:24.080 And that's the reason we call so many things lies. 01:12:24.080 --> 01:12:26.000 That many men are like, oh, that's a mistake. 01:12:26.000 --> 01:12:26.960 It's an error. 01:12:26.960 --> 01:12:29.760 If I come to you and say two plus two equals five, 01:12:29.760 --> 01:12:30.960 you would laugh. 01:12:30.960 --> 01:12:31.920 You would think it was absurd. 01:12:31.920 --> 01:12:33.520 I was making some joke. 01:12:33.520 --> 01:12:37.040 But if I become adamant, you probably just say I'm crazy. 01:12:37.040 --> 01:12:38.080 It is a lie. 01:12:38.080 --> 01:12:40.080 It's a demonstrable lie. 01:12:40.080 --> 01:12:42.320 Regardless of what my intention is. 01:12:42.320 --> 01:12:44.240 The things that are true are from God. 01:12:44.240 --> 01:12:45.120 Even math. 01:12:45.120 --> 01:12:46.560 Math is true. 01:12:46.560 --> 01:12:49.760 One of the reasons that the pure sciences, the hard sciences, have 01:12:49.760 --> 01:12:52.800 a lot of appeal to rational men. 01:12:52.800 --> 01:12:56.800 It's the reason that men dominate those fields almost not exclusively anymore, 01:12:56.800 --> 01:12:59.760 but still very heavily, is that they are so heavily dominated by 01:12:59.760 --> 01:13:02.800 reason. There's no subjectivity in math. 01:13:02.800 --> 01:13:05.360 There's no subjectivity in engineering. 01:13:05.360 --> 01:13:09.920 There's subjectivity in the art of how pretty a bridge is, but 01:13:10.240 --> 01:13:15.360 the mathematical forms and the equations to achieve a safe bridge, those 01:13:15.360 --> 01:13:16.320 are absolute. 01:13:16.320 --> 01:13:19.280 And you violate those and you can guarantee that that bridge will 01:13:19.280 --> 01:13:20.640 fall. That's true. 01:13:20.640 --> 01:13:21.600 That's truth. 01:13:21.600 --> 01:13:23.360 It's got nothing to do with salvation. 01:13:23.360 --> 01:13:25.360 Not talking about the gospel at all. 01:13:25.360 --> 01:13:29.200 But if you have a gospel-centered engineer building your bridge, don't ever 01:13:29.200 --> 01:13:30.400 cross it. 01:13:30.400 --> 01:13:33.280 You need an engineer here who cares about the truth who's focused 01:13:33.280 --> 01:13:35.440 on that because that's his job. 01:13:35.440 --> 01:13:39.200 The gospel is necessary for those who think they can save themselves 01:13:39.360 --> 01:13:41.520 or don't know they need salvation at all. 01:13:41.520 --> 01:13:44.640 And we constantly need to have that faith renewed. 01:13:44.640 --> 01:13:46.640 But it's not everything there is to say. 01:13:46.640 --> 01:13:51.200 Don't let someone come along and distract you just a Satan distracted 01:13:51.200 --> 01:13:54.000 Eve with the wrong question at the wrong time. 01:13:54.000 --> 01:13:57.600 Because that trick is exactly why every one of us is condemned 01:13:57.600 --> 01:13:58.800 to death. 01:13:59.760 --> 01:14:04.240 Some of these things may seem like relatively minor matters. 01:14:04.240 --> 01:14:08.160 For instance, two plus two equals four is true. 01:14:08.160 --> 01:14:10.480 Two plus two equals five is false. 01:14:10.480 --> 01:14:12.640 That may seem like a minor matter to you. 01:14:12.640 --> 01:14:16.400 As Will was saying, if you're building a bridge, that error, that 01:14:16.880 --> 01:14:19.200 lie is no longer a minor matter. 01:14:19.200 --> 01:14:22.080 The same is true with regard to so many of these things 01:14:22.080 --> 01:14:25.520 that we encounter in our everyday lives. 01:14:25.520 --> 01:14:30.960 If someone says something that is false, it may be obviously false. 01:14:30.960 --> 01:14:34.400 It may not be obviously false, but still false. 01:14:34.400 --> 01:14:36.480 It may seem something small. 01:14:36.480 --> 01:14:39.440 It may seem like a matter that you can just set aside 01:14:39.440 --> 01:14:41.680 or let slide. 01:14:41.680 --> 01:14:43.120 But the question is always 01:14:44.000 --> 01:14:46.080 where does that lead? 01:14:46.080 --> 01:14:52.320 What are the consequences of that false belief, of that lie? 01:14:52.320 --> 01:14:59.760 Even minor errors or small lies, depending on perhaps the intent 01:14:59.760 --> 01:15:07.680 here. But even small lies over time can build into something monstrous. 01:15:07.680 --> 01:15:11.280 The Reformation was not undoing 01:15:12.240 --> 01:15:19.040 an error of false teaching, a lie, of a year ago, or 01:15:19.040 --> 01:15:21.440 a decade, or even a century. 01:15:21.840 --> 01:15:29.600 Satan built up false teaching in the church over centuries. 01:15:29.600 --> 01:15:33.440 He does the same thing in society, and we see the fruits 01:15:33.440 --> 01:15:35.360 of that today. 01:15:35.360 --> 01:15:40.880 All the little false things that he injected into society over centuries 01:15:40.880 --> 01:15:45.680 are coming to a head, and many Christian men are defending the 01:15:45.680 --> 01:15:48.240 outcome of all of those lies. 01:15:48.240 --> 01:15:49.360 They're defending the conclusions 01:15:50.640 --> 01:15:54.080 because they aren't examining the etymology. 01:15:54.080 --> 01:15:57.920 They aren't examining the pedigree of the things they believe. 01:15:57.920 --> 01:16:02.160 A good example of this that comes from everyday life, as it 01:16:02.160 --> 01:16:05.440 were, something with which many of you will be familiar, in some 01:16:05.440 --> 01:16:08.880 cases, perhaps even firsthand. 01:16:08.880 --> 01:16:14.240 We have lost spacecraft because of a minor imperfection in the heat 01:16:14.800 --> 01:16:21.120 shielding. You could be missing a few tiles, if it happens to 01:16:21.120 --> 01:16:24.160 be in the wrong place, and you can lose a billion dollar 01:16:24.400 --> 01:16:28.480 spacecraft. We've had minor miscalculations 01:16:29.360 --> 01:16:34.640 and slammed things into Mars at ballistic speed instead of landing on 01:16:34.640 --> 01:16:36.320 the planet. 01:16:36.320 --> 01:16:42.160 These are the sorts of things that happen with seemingly minor errors, 01:16:42.160 --> 01:16:48.400 seemingly minor falsehoods, somewhere at some point, perhaps far back in some 01:16:48.400 --> 01:16:54.880 cases. Things that are minor or seem minor often are not so, 01:16:54.880 --> 01:16:59.840 and particularly when it comes to matters of the truth, because again, 01:16:59.840 --> 01:17:01.120 any lie 01:17:02.080 --> 01:17:07.520 is lying about the things of God, because all truth flows from 01:17:07.520 --> 01:17:07.760 God. 01:17:08.800 --> 01:17:12.800 That is why God hates lying lips. 01:17:12.800 --> 01:17:20.320 God hates liars, because liars are necessarily lying ultimately about God. 01:17:20.320 --> 01:17:21.680 Think of the words of David. 01:17:21.680 --> 01:17:25.120 Against you you only have I sinned. 01:17:25.120 --> 01:17:29.040 Yes, you are harming others with your sins, because don't forget David 01:17:29.040 --> 01:17:33.440 was saying that after he stole a man's wife and had him 01:17:33.440 --> 01:17:37.920 murdered. So certainly he sinned against the man as well, but ultimately 01:17:37.920 --> 01:17:40.800 speaking, all sin is against God. 01:17:40.800 --> 01:17:44.960 And so of course all lies in the sense we're using this 01:17:45.120 --> 01:17:46.000 are against God. 01:17:46.000 --> 01:17:49.360 I want to give that carve out I mentioned earlier. 01:17:49.360 --> 01:17:53.920 The most obvious example would be I'll give a very easy one 01:17:53.920 --> 01:17:56.400 to grasp, a blunt one. 01:17:56.400 --> 01:18:00.560 If you work in criminal law and you are a detective or 01:18:00.560 --> 01:18:04.800 a DA, be most likely one of those two, and you happen 01:18:04.800 --> 01:18:09.920 to be dealing with a particularly gruesome crime scene, you do not 01:18:09.920 --> 01:18:11.040 need to give all 01:18:12.000 --> 01:18:16.240 and exact information to the family of the victim. 01:18:16.240 --> 01:18:19.120 It may very well be that some of the things you say 01:18:19.120 --> 01:18:23.520 are in fact lies, but those would be those lies earlier that 01:18:24.000 --> 01:18:27.040 mentioned, with the beneficial intent. 01:18:27.040 --> 01:18:28.960 Those are not in view here. 01:18:28.960 --> 01:18:33.920 Some of those things are necessary simply to keep society running as 01:18:33.920 --> 01:18:35.200 best we can. 01:18:35.200 --> 01:18:37.120 That's not what's in view here. 01:18:37.120 --> 01:18:42.240 We're talking about things where you are lying about reality in a 01:18:42.240 --> 01:18:47.600 destructive way, in a harmful way, a deceitful way, a malicious way. 01:18:47.600 --> 01:18:51.040 The kind of lies that Satan tells. 01:18:51.040 --> 01:18:57.280 And even these small lies, again, build up over time. 01:18:57.280 --> 01:19:02.640 These sorts of things, in fact many great sins, as it were, 01:19:02.640 --> 01:19:05.920 don't start off as a big sin. 01:19:05.920 --> 01:19:09.680 They start off as something small. 01:19:09.680 --> 01:19:15.680 Don Giovanni or Lithario doesn't open up his opening line isn't would 01:19:15.760 --> 01:19:18.080 you like to go commit adultery? 01:19:18.080 --> 01:19:21.120 That's not how these things work. 01:19:21.120 --> 01:19:24.320 These things start off small. 01:19:24.320 --> 01:19:27.600 False teaching in the church starts off small. 01:19:27.600 --> 01:19:30.880 It's not It's the wrong emphasis on an answer. 01:19:30.880 --> 01:19:35.920 It's the wrong wording of a question, perhaps maliciously. 01:19:35.920 --> 01:19:38.880 In the case of the question it may be that Satan is 01:19:38.880 --> 01:19:42.480 maliciously wording the question in order to deceive 01:19:43.520 --> 01:19:47.520 Now, wording a question in order to trap someone is not always 01:19:47.520 --> 01:19:49.840 wrongful. Intent matters. 01:19:49.840 --> 01:19:53.040 If you are a teacher, and particularly if you are a teacher 01:19:53.040 --> 01:19:57.120 of teachers, it may very well be that you should ask some 01:19:57.120 --> 01:20:02.320 questions that are traps, because you are instructing your students to be 01:20:02.320 --> 01:20:07.200 wary of those things, to be prepared for them, that intent matters. 01:20:07.200 --> 01:20:11.680 But Satan, when he uses these things, he knows where he's going. 01:20:11.680 --> 01:20:13.920 He knows what he wants to accomplish. 01:20:13.920 --> 01:20:17.760 He is attempting to lead you astray, to lead the church astray, 01:20:17.760 --> 01:20:20.080 to lead society astray. 01:20:20.080 --> 01:20:23.760 And so lying about things that may seem small, that may seem 01:20:23.760 --> 01:20:28.560 minor, that may seem like something over which there's no real reason 01:20:28.560 --> 01:20:30.320 to fight. 01:20:30.320 --> 01:20:32.400 That may be how it starts. 01:20:32.400 --> 01:20:34.560 That is never where it ends. 01:20:35.280 --> 01:20:40.560 Because sins compound, sins get worse, as we have mentioned so many 01:20:40.560 --> 01:20:45.520 times, in life, in all things, and for all things, not just 01:20:45.520 --> 01:20:50.960 for human beings, but for nations, for civilizations, for empires, for organizations, 01:20:50.960 --> 01:20:52.240 for churches. 01:20:52.240 --> 01:20:56.720 You are always headed Godward or hellward. 01:20:56.720 --> 01:20:58.560 There is no other option. 01:20:58.560 --> 01:21:01.760 You cannot stand still in this life. 01:21:01.760 --> 01:21:04.720 The only thing that stands still is death. 01:21:04.720 --> 01:21:06.560 Life doesn't stand still. 01:21:06.560 --> 01:21:10.160 And so you are moving in one direction or the other. 01:21:10.880 --> 01:21:15.120 If you are supporting, and most certainly if you are telling, echoing, 01:21:15.120 --> 01:21:22.160 supporting, defending lies, you are moving hellward because you are certainly moving 01:21:22.160 --> 01:21:24.080 away from God. 01:21:24.080 --> 01:21:28.880 And so defending the truth is a worthy endeavor, even if it 01:21:28.880 --> 01:21:30.960 seems like a small truth. 01:21:30.960 --> 01:21:33.680 Why would you give Satan the opening? 01:21:34.240 --> 01:21:37.520 Oh it's just a chink in the armor. 01:21:37.520 --> 01:21:39.120 Why would you permit that? 01:21:39.520 --> 01:21:41.760 Why would you leave that weakness? 01:21:41.760 --> 01:21:46.400 You don't leave an opening for Satan. 01:21:46.400 --> 01:21:49.520 Perhaps it's because I live in the South, but one of the 01:21:49.520 --> 01:21:53.360 examples that immediately springs to mind is mosquito netting, or perhaps it's 01:21:53.280 --> 01:21:55.840 because I like camping. 01:21:55.840 --> 01:21:59.200 You don't leave a two centimeter or even a one centimeter hole 01:21:59.200 --> 01:22:00.800 in your mosquito net. 01:22:00.800 --> 01:22:05.120 Because if you do that, the net is worthless. 01:22:05.120 --> 01:22:09.600 You haven't accomplished anything because the mosquitoes will definitely find that opening, 01:22:09.600 --> 01:22:13.120 as everyone who lives in an area with mosquitoes knows full well. 01:22:13.120 --> 01:22:15.200 You do not leave a chink in the armor. 01:22:15.200 --> 01:22:20.080 You You do not leave somewhere undefended, particularly when you are dealing 01:22:20.080 --> 01:22:25.520 with an enemy that is as intent on finding that opening, that 01:22:25.520 --> 01:22:29.440 is as persistent as a mosquito or Satan. 01:22:29.440 --> 01:22:32.160 Satan is going to find the opening. 01:22:32.160 --> 01:22:35.680 It's one of the reasons that he identifies with the serpent and 01:22:35.680 --> 01:22:37.920 is described as a serpent. 01:22:37.920 --> 01:22:42.160 Everyone who knows about snakes knows if the head fits, the snake 01:22:42.160 --> 01:22:46.080 fits. If the snake can get its head through an opening, the 01:22:46.080 --> 01:22:48.640 rest of the snake is going to follow, and it's getting in 01:22:48.640 --> 01:22:50.720 wherever that place is. 01:22:50.720 --> 01:22:55.280 So if you leave an opening, in, say, your chicken coop, if 01:22:55.280 --> 01:22:58.480 you live in an area where snakes steal your chickens, if it's 01:22:58.480 --> 01:23:02.880 big enough for the snake's head, you're losing your chickens. 01:23:02.880 --> 01:23:07.360 Incidentally, raccoons are pretty devious too at squeezing through small places. 01:23:07.680 --> 01:23:11.360 But you can't leave that opening, because when you leave the opening, 01:23:11.360 --> 01:23:17.360 what seemed small at the time turns out, in hindsight, to be 01:23:17.360 --> 01:23:20.320 particularly destructive. 01:23:20.320 --> 01:23:24.880 And when it comes down to it at base, every lie comes 01:23:24.880 --> 01:23:26.480 at a cost. 01:23:26.480 --> 01:23:28.960 A number of costs, really. 01:23:28.960 --> 01:23:32.720 It may be that you do not pay the cost, although you 01:23:32.720 --> 01:23:38.080 will certainly pay the personal cost that comes with denying the truth, 01:23:38.080 --> 01:23:43.520 but someone will pay the full cost, will pay that cost each 01:23:43.520 --> 01:23:45.600 and every time. 01:23:45.600 --> 01:23:48.960 I want you to think of the example of sin. 01:23:48.960 --> 01:23:52.800 We all pay for our own sins in our own lives. 01:23:52.800 --> 01:23:56.160 There's a certain cost, a certain personal cost to sin. 01:23:56.160 --> 01:23:59.840 Some sins have significantly higher costs than others 01:24:01.360 --> 01:24:04.400 But you don't pay the full cost of that sin. 01:24:04.400 --> 01:24:07.920 You can't pay the full cost of that sin. 01:24:07.920 --> 01:24:09.760 That's good news and bad news, of course. 01:24:09.760 --> 01:24:12.080 It's bad news if you're not a Christian, it's great news if 01:24:12.080 --> 01:24:12.960 you are. 01:24:12.960 --> 01:24:16.480 Because Christ paid that full cost on the cross. 01:24:16.480 --> 01:24:21.200 Because the cost of sin, the debt owed to the truth, is 01:24:21.200 --> 01:24:25.040 infinite, and so only Christ could pay that. 01:24:25.040 --> 01:24:30.480 Those in hell are paying for their sins, but because they are 01:24:30.480 --> 01:24:38.480 finite and the debt is infinite, the punishment is also necessarily infinite. 01:24:38.640 --> 01:24:44.640 They are attempting to pay an infinite cost, an infinite debt, with 01:24:44.640 --> 01:24:47.600 a finite amount of currency. 01:24:47.600 --> 01:24:50.080 And that is why hell is eternal. 01:24:50.080 --> 01:24:53.680 And that is why it was necessary for Christ to die in 01:24:53.680 --> 01:24:55.120 our place. 01:24:55.120 --> 01:25:00.480 Because Christ being God, his worth, his value is infinite. 01:25:00.480 --> 01:25:03.840 And so he cancels the debt of sin against us. 01:25:04.400 --> 01:25:09.920 But every lie incurs a debt to the truth. 01:25:09.920 --> 01:25:12.720 Someone will pay that. 01:25:12.720 --> 01:25:16.960 In the sense that lies are sin, Christ has paid that. 01:25:17.200 --> 01:25:21.920 But do remember there are also temporal costs, and so society will 01:25:21.920 --> 01:25:24.080 pay the cost of these lies. 01:25:24.080 --> 01:25:27.760 You can see this across the world, the societies in which truth 01:25:27.760 --> 01:25:30.880 is valued, in which it is held in high esteem, in which 01:25:31.360 --> 01:25:35.920 honor matters, are better societies, those are the places you want to 01:25:35.920 --> 01:25:40.640 live. The places in which lying is as easy as one breathes, 01:25:40.640 --> 01:25:41.840 no one wants to live there. 01:25:41.840 --> 01:25:45.760 It's why they're fleeing from those locations to destroy the better ones. 01:25:45.760 --> 01:25:47.520 The truth matters. 01:25:47.520 --> 01:25:52.160 The truth will build up a society, or if you deny and 01:25:52.160 --> 01:25:56.560 denigrate the truth, that rejection of the truth, those lies will tear 01:25:56.560 --> 01:25:59.600 down and destroy society. 01:25:59.600 --> 01:26:04.160 It'll do the same thing in your life, in your relationships, in 01:26:04.160 --> 01:26:07.440 your church, in your country. 01:26:07.440 --> 01:26:10.320 The truth absolutely matters. 01:26:10.320 --> 01:26:14.480 This is not something over which Christians get to agree or disagree. 01:26:14.480 --> 01:26:16.960 This is not a matter of opinion. 01:26:16.960 --> 01:26:21.280 Speaking the truth, yes, of course, as best we can in love, 01:26:21.280 --> 01:26:24.400 but still But speaking the truth matters. 01:26:24.400 --> 01:26:27.440 And that is part of what it means to love someone is 01:26:27.440 --> 01:26:29.120 speaking the truth. 01:26:29.120 --> 01:26:32.000 I'm not talking again about those white lies. 01:26:32.000 --> 01:26:35.760 I'm talking about lying to someone in a way that is destructive 01:26:35.760 --> 01:26:37.760 or harmful. 01:26:37.760 --> 01:26:40.240 You can think of the obvious examples. 01:26:40.240 --> 01:26:44.800 If you tell a drug addict, Jesus loves you, just as you 01:26:44.800 --> 01:26:47.280 are, that's harmful. 01:26:47.280 --> 01:26:51.040 You can tell him Jesus loves him, but Jesus wants him to 01:26:51.040 --> 01:26:53.120 repent and change his ways. 01:26:53.120 --> 01:26:56.320 He doesn't want him to continue being a drug addict. 01:26:56.320 --> 01:27:00.480 He doesn't want a prostitute to continue being a prostitute, go and 01:27:00.480 --> 01:27:02.080 sin no more. 01:27:02.720 --> 01:27:06.720 Telling the person the truth matters. 01:27:06.720 --> 01:27:10.800 So you can tell a sodomite Jesus loves you. 01:27:10.800 --> 01:27:16.000 But you also have to mention Jesus hates your so-called lifestyle. 01:27:16.000 --> 01:27:19.600 He hates what you are doing because he hates sin. 01:27:19.600 --> 01:27:22.160 And yes, he also hates sinners. 01:27:22.160 --> 01:27:24.880 So you need to turn from your sin. 01:27:24.880 --> 01:27:28.320 You need to repent and be forgiven of your sin. 01:27:28.320 --> 01:27:30.880 You need to go and sin no more. 01:27:30.880 --> 01:27:34.800 It is necessary to tell that truth, because if you do not 01:27:34.800 --> 01:27:38.640 tell that truth, then you are displaying in fact not love, but 01:27:38.640 --> 01:27:43.440 hatred in the form of indifference, or if you wish to distinguish 01:27:43.440 --> 01:27:50.880 those two, indifference, which quite frankly is worse than hatred. 01:27:50.880 --> 01:27:54.400 As Christians, we need to defend the truth. 01:27:54.400 --> 01:27:56.560 We need to be known for speaking the truth. 01:27:56.560 --> 01:27:59.120 We need to be known for defending the truth. 01:27:59.120 --> 01:28:02.160 And that's not just the truth that's easy. 01:28:02.160 --> 01:28:07.520 It's not just the truth that gets you awards from polite society. 01:28:07.520 --> 01:28:11.440 It's not just going to the anti-abortion march, which is very easy 01:28:11.440 --> 01:28:15.440 for Christians to do, because Christians don't disagree on that issue. 01:28:15.440 --> 01:28:18.000 And yes, I'm saying that those who think abortion is fine are 01:28:18.000 --> 01:28:20.080 not Christians, because they aren't. 01:28:20.080 --> 01:28:23.760 They've demonstrated that in their beliefs and in their actions. 01:28:23.760 --> 01:28:27.280 But that's the easy truth to defend, because that's the one for 01:28:27.280 --> 01:28:28.640 which you get awards. 01:28:28.640 --> 01:28:31.280 That's the one for which people slap you on the back and 01:28:31.280 --> 01:28:35.520 shake your hand and say, aren't you a good person? 01:28:35.520 --> 01:28:40.560 The truths that need defended the most are those that are unpopular, 01:28:40.560 --> 01:28:44.000 those that will not get you a handshake, those that will get 01:28:44.000 --> 01:28:48.400 you shunned in polite society or cast out. 01:28:48.400 --> 01:28:52.560 Because those are the places where Satan is attacking. 01:28:52.560 --> 01:28:56.320 Satan isn't attacking the places where you can get away with speaking 01:28:56.320 --> 01:28:57.600 the truth. 01:28:57.680 --> 01:28:59.200 Why would he care? 01:28:59.200 --> 01:29:00.640 That doesn't matter. 01:29:00.640 --> 01:29:05.360 He can tear down some other section of the wall and infiltrate 01:29:05.360 --> 01:29:07.040 all of these things. 01:29:07.040 --> 01:29:10.960 Your life, your relationships, your church, your society. 01:29:10.960 --> 01:29:14.880 Because no one's paying attention to that part of the wall. 01:29:14.880 --> 01:29:20.080 Whatever is undefended, that is what Satan is going to attack. 01:29:20.080 --> 01:29:24.720 And that specifically is the place where Christian men must be ready 01:29:24.720 --> 01:29:28.400 and willing to defend the truth at all costs. 01:29:29.440 --> 01:29:34.320 One of the specific problems that we face today is that men 01:29:34.320 --> 01:29:36.880 don't really take the Word of God as seriously as they think 01:29:37.520 --> 01:29:38.400 they do. 01:29:38.400 --> 01:29:41.360 Now, the good news is that that's a very easy thing to 01:29:41.360 --> 01:29:45.040 reframe. Okay, you love scripture, you love every word from the mouth 01:29:45.040 --> 01:29:46.000 of God, good. 01:29:46.000 --> 01:29:48.080 That's exactly what you need to do. 01:29:48.080 --> 01:29:50.080 Here's what God's Word says. 01:29:50.080 --> 01:29:55.120 The Christian should respond with, Amen, and Lord forgive me if he 01:29:55.120 --> 01:29:56.480 disagreed with it. 01:29:56.480 --> 01:30:00.000 The Christian cannot respond to the Word of God with, well, I 01:30:00.000 --> 01:30:00.800 don't like that. 01:30:00.800 --> 01:30:02.240 That doesn't sound right. 01:30:02.240 --> 01:30:06.400 And yet that is the normal experience that we often have when 01:30:06.400 --> 01:30:10.080 we point to the parts of scripture that are neglected, that are 01:30:10.080 --> 01:30:14.160 misunderstood, that are reviled because they're inconvenient. 01:30:14.160 --> 01:30:17.200 Because some of the words from the mouth of God apply to 01:30:17.600 --> 01:30:20.160 the parts that we're getting wrong today. 01:30:20.160 --> 01:30:24.560 And that includes this pernicious lie that, well, that's not the gospel 01:30:24.720 --> 01:30:27.120 is anything other than a deception. 01:30:27.120 --> 01:30:30.160 Anyone who ever says that to you is a liar. 01:30:30.160 --> 01:30:33.040 I can guarantee you, 99% of the time when someone says, Well, 01:30:33.040 --> 01:30:36.160 that's not the gospel, it's totally irrelevant. 01:30:36.160 --> 01:30:39.040 And for them to do that is to commit deception. 01:30:39.040 --> 01:30:40.880 And they're doing it in the name of God. 01:30:40.880 --> 01:30:44.400 I'm going to read several passages for you to illustrate exactly what 01:30:44.400 --> 01:30:46.240 I'm talking about here. 01:30:46.240 --> 01:30:47.920 For Matthew four. 01:30:47.920 --> 01:30:50.960 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to 01:30:50.960 --> 01:30:53.920 be tempted by the devil, and after fasting forty days and forty 01:30:54.400 --> 01:30:57.760 nights he was hungry, and the tempter came to him and said, 01:30:57.760 --> 01:31:00.720 If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become 01:31:00.720 --> 01:31:04.960 loaves of bread, but he answered, It is written, man shall not 01:31:04.960 --> 01:31:08.640 live by bread alone, but from every word that comes from the 01:31:08.640 --> 01:31:10.480 mouth of God. 01:31:10.480 --> 01:31:13.200 This is the first time in Scripture that Jesus says it is 01:31:13.200 --> 01:31:16.640 written, and incidentally he's quoting the Septuagint. 01:31:16.640 --> 01:31:19.280 I checked, I was hoping that Satan would have quoted the Hebrew, 01:31:19.280 --> 01:31:22.480 but he didn't he used the Septuagint too, which frankly is even 01:31:22.480 --> 01:31:26.640 better. Because Satan doesn't try to argue over the nature of things, 01:31:26.640 --> 01:31:28.000 he tries to twist them. 01:31:28.000 --> 01:31:32.560 So even Satan concedes that scripture is the Septuagint and that the 01:31:32.560 --> 01:31:35.360 Septuagint is breathed out by God. 01:31:35.360 --> 01:31:38.240 So Jesus says, Every word from the mouth of God is what 01:31:38.240 --> 01:31:39.200 man shall live by. 01:31:39.200 --> 01:31:39.920 Okay, great. 01:31:39.920 --> 01:31:40.560 We all believe that. 01:31:40.560 --> 01:31:44.080 Some be private hanging up on a wall in your house. 01:31:44.080 --> 01:31:46.400 Here's some of the words of God that have to do with 01:31:46.400 --> 01:31:50.000 the gospel that you probably didn't pay attention to before and you 01:31:50.000 --> 01:31:51.600 probably don't like it when you hear it. 01:31:51.600 --> 01:31:52.880 Listen carefully. 01:31:52.880 --> 01:31:54.640 Revelation fourteen. 01:31:54.640 --> 01:31:58.960 Then I saw another angel flying directly overhead with an eternal gospel 01:31:59.360 --> 01:32:02.880 to proclaim to those who dwell on earth, to every nation and 01:32:02.880 --> 01:32:04.880 tribe and language and people. 01:32:04.880 --> 01:32:08.240 And he said with a loud voice, fear God and give him 01:32:08.320 --> 01:32:12.000 glory, because the hour of his judgment has come, and worship him 01:32:12.080 --> 01:32:16.640 who made heaven and earth, the sea and the springs of water. 01:32:16.640 --> 01:32:20.080 So what's the eternal gospel in heaven? 01:32:20.080 --> 01:32:22.160 Fear God and give him glory. 01:32:22.160 --> 01:32:25.600 If someone says, Well, that's not the gospel, who's right? 01:32:25.600 --> 01:32:29.840 Now, gospel is used in two different senses and both are valuable. 01:32:29.840 --> 01:32:32.880 Again, none of what we are saying here today is in any 01:32:32.880 --> 01:32:35.520 way attack on John 316. 01:32:35.520 --> 01:32:37.760 It's precious to every Christian. 01:32:37.760 --> 01:32:40.640 But every word from the mouth of God is not the gospel, 01:32:40.640 --> 01:32:41.840 not in that sense. 01:32:41.840 --> 01:32:45.120 However, every word is from the mouth of God and is the 01:32:45.120 --> 01:32:48.400 gospel, which is to say the good news, because it came from 01:32:48.400 --> 01:32:52.000 God. So what Jesus said about every word being something we need 01:32:52.000 --> 01:32:56.000 to hang on applies to the eternal gospel, which is fear God 01:32:56.000 --> 01:32:56.960 and give him glory. 01:32:56.960 --> 01:32:58.400 That's all law. 01:32:58.400 --> 01:33:00.640 God says that the law is the gospel. 01:33:00.640 --> 01:33:02.080 I'm not confusing the two. 01:33:02.080 --> 01:33:06.560 Lutheran heads are detonating right now because that's some sort of cardinal 01:33:06.560 --> 01:33:07.840 sin. It's not. 01:33:07.840 --> 01:33:10.240 It's talking about something completely different. 01:33:10.240 --> 01:33:12.800 Every word of scripture is from the mouth of God and that 01:33:12.800 --> 01:33:13.920 makes it good. 01:33:13.920 --> 01:33:15.600 That makes it true. 01:33:15.600 --> 01:33:16.960 These are definitional. 01:33:17.840 --> 01:33:20.240 It gets worse from there for you guys who don't like that 01:33:20.240 --> 01:33:21.520 version of the gospel. 01:33:21.520 --> 01:33:23.760 Second Thessalonians one. 01:33:23.760 --> 01:33:26.880 This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that you may 01:33:26.880 --> 01:33:29.680 be considered worthy of the kingdom of God for which you are 01:33:29.680 --> 01:33:33.600 also suffering suffering, since indeed God considers it just to repay with 01:33:33.600 --> 01:33:36.000 affliction those who afflict you. 01:33:36.000 --> 01:33:38.880 And to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as 01:33:38.880 --> 01:33:39.520 to us. 01:33:39.520 --> 01:33:42.640 When the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels 01:33:42.640 --> 01:33:47.360 in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God 01:33:47.520 --> 01:33:51.440 and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord 01:33:51.440 --> 01:33:56.000 Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the 01:33:56.000 --> 01:33:58.560 presence of God and from the glory of his might, when he 01:33:59.040 --> 01:34:02.160 comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, and to 01:34:02.160 --> 01:34:06.240 be marvelled among all who have believed, because our testimony to you 01:34:06.240 --> 01:34:07.120 is believed. 01:34:07.120 --> 01:34:10.320 To this end we will always pray for you. 01:34:10.320 --> 01:34:15.120 Jesus is coming in flaming fire to inflict vengeance on those who 01:34:15.120 --> 01:34:17.920 do not know God and on those who do not obey the 01:34:17.920 --> 01:34:20.160 gospel of Lord Jesus. 01:34:20.160 --> 01:34:22.000 Does that sound like the gospel to you? 01:34:22.000 --> 01:34:23.120 Obey the gospel? 01:34:23.120 --> 01:34:24.160 Is that the gospel? 01:34:24.160 --> 01:34:27.760 It should be, because that's what God says very clearly. 01:34:27.760 --> 01:34:31.040 He's saying the same thing in 2 Thessalonians that he says in 01:34:31.040 --> 01:34:36.640 Revelation. It's not the narrow gospel of we are saved because of 01:34:36.640 --> 01:34:38.400 Christ's death on the cross. 01:34:38.400 --> 01:34:41.760 It is the gospel, the good word, the good news of every 01:34:41.760 --> 01:34:43.360 word from the mouth of God. 01:34:43.360 --> 01:34:47.360 If we don't love this gospel too, we don't love God. 01:34:48.000 --> 01:34:52.160 the gospel is what God says saves us. 01:34:52.160 --> 01:34:54.240 Christians have to deal with that. 01:34:54.240 --> 01:34:57.360 And again, the conclusion is not works righteousness. 01:34:57.360 --> 01:35:01.520 This is not dabbling in Pelagianism or semi-pelagianism or any sort of 01:35:01.920 --> 01:35:04.880 heresy. It's saying that what God says is true. 01:35:04.880 --> 01:35:06.480 Let's take it seriously. 01:35:06.480 --> 01:35:09.280 There's nothing I can ever do to save myself. 01:35:09.280 --> 01:35:12.400 And yet I am commanded by God to obey the gospel. 01:35:12.400 --> 01:35:15.360 And if my response to those words from the mouth of God 01:35:15.360 --> 01:35:21.520 is anger, is umbrage, is disgust or confusion, something's wrong with me. 01:35:21.520 --> 01:35:23.520 Nothing's wrong with God's word. 01:35:23.520 --> 01:35:26.080 It's wrong with what I thought the gospel was. 01:35:26.080 --> 01:35:29.280 And again, it's two different things, not two different things. 01:35:29.280 --> 01:35:33.600 The gospel, John three sixteen is a subset of the gospel every 01:35:33.600 --> 01:35:34.720 word from God. 01:35:34.720 --> 01:35:37.600 The man who runs around shouting, but that's not the gospel. 01:35:37.600 --> 01:35:39.120 Where's the gospel in that? 01:35:39.120 --> 01:35:43.200 Is a liar because he didn't love this part of Scripture. 01:35:43.200 --> 01:35:46.560 He doesn't love the parts of Scripture that calls Cretans liars. 01:35:46.560 --> 01:35:48.240 He doesn't love any of that stuff. 01:35:48.240 --> 01:35:51.200 He loves the part that gets him off the hook when he's 01:35:51.200 --> 01:35:52.800 hating Christians. 01:35:52.800 --> 01:35:54.880 First Peter four says the same thing. 01:35:54.880 --> 01:35:58.560 Yet again this is an eschatological period. 01:35:58.560 --> 01:36:02.320 Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes 01:36:02.320 --> 01:36:05.520 upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to 01:36:05.520 --> 01:36:09.360 you, but rejoice in so far as you share Christ's sufferings, that 01:36:09.360 --> 01:36:12.480 you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. 01:36:12.480 --> 01:36:15.360 If you are insulted for the name of Christ you are blessed, 01:36:15.360 --> 01:36:18.400 because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you, that 01:36:18.400 --> 01:36:21.600 let none of you suffer as a murderer, or a thief, or 01:36:21.600 --> 01:36:23.920 an evildoer, or as a meddler. 01:36:23.920 --> 01:36:27.200 Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, 01:36:27.200 --> 01:36:29.520 but let him glorify God in that name. 01:36:29.520 --> 01:36:32.160 For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of 01:36:32.160 --> 01:36:35.200 God, and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome 01:36:35.200 --> 01:36:37.840 for those who do not obey the gospel of God? 01:36:37.840 --> 01:36:41.440 And if the righteous is scarcely saved, what will become of the 01:36:41.440 --> 01:36:43.120 ungodly and the sinner? 01:36:43.120 --> 01:36:47.120 Therefore let those who suffer according to God's will and trust their 01:36:47.120 --> 01:36:50.880 souls to a faithful creator while doing good. 01:36:50.880 --> 01:36:52.240 And that's it. 01:36:52.240 --> 01:36:55.680 Let those who suffer according to God's will and trust their souls 01:36:55.680 --> 01:36:57.920 to a faithful creator while doing good. 01:36:58.640 --> 01:37:00.400 That's not saving ourselves. 01:37:00.400 --> 01:37:02.560 That's obeying the gospel. 01:37:02.560 --> 01:37:06.240 We're not pointing these things out to try to shift the emphasis 01:37:06.240 --> 01:37:07.600 of Christianity. 01:37:07.600 --> 01:37:10.720 We're trying to point out that these are some neglected matters. 01:37:10.720 --> 01:37:13.920 We don't need to do another whole episode on that, but when 01:37:13.920 --> 01:37:17.600 you find these passages, they have a fundamentally different definition of the 01:37:17.600 --> 01:37:21.680 gospel, one that says fear and love God, one that says obey 01:37:21.680 --> 01:37:22.640 the gospel. 01:37:22.640 --> 01:37:25.360 If your first instinct is to hate those words from the mouth 01:37:25.360 --> 01:37:28.640 of God, you have a deep seated spiritual problem. 01:37:28.640 --> 01:37:31.360 The good news is it's very simple to fix. 01:37:31.360 --> 01:37:34.880 You have been taught falsely by someone who was a false prophet, 01:37:34.880 --> 01:37:38.160 probably a well-intentioned man who is repeating what he heard. 01:37:38.160 --> 01:37:39.360 He didn't know any better. 01:37:39.360 --> 01:37:42.720 He either never read these parts or just glazed over 'em, didn't 01:37:42.640 --> 01:37:45.360 believe 'em, whatever. 01:37:45.360 --> 01:37:48.480 Doesn't change what God is or who he is or what he 01:37:48.480 --> 01:37:49.360 has said. 01:37:49.600 --> 01:37:52.640 When God tells us something, that means it's true. 01:37:52.800 --> 01:37:54.880 That includes obeying the gospel. 01:37:54.880 --> 01:37:57.360 It's good news because of that last sentence. 01:37:57.360 --> 01:38:01.280 Therefore let those who suffer according to God's will entrust their souls 01:38:01.440 --> 01:38:05.120 to a faithful Creator while doing good. 01:38:05.120 --> 01:38:08.000 The faithful Creator keeps his promises to us. 01:38:08.000 --> 01:38:11.520 He keeps the promises of the gospel that says that He died 01:38:11.520 --> 01:38:15.440 for our salvation, that Christ died for our salvation, and therefore we 01:38:15.440 --> 01:38:16.480 do good. 01:38:16.480 --> 01:38:19.760 This is the Christian life, to obey the gospel. 01:38:19.760 --> 01:38:24.240 Any pastor, any cleric who comes to you with another message than 01:38:24.240 --> 01:38:26.400 this, comes from hell. 01:38:26.400 --> 01:38:29.120 He is a liar whose conscience is seared. 01:38:29.520 --> 01:38:31.760 Because these are the plain words of God. 01:38:31.760 --> 01:38:33.040 These aren't tricky. 01:38:33.040 --> 01:38:36.640 There's no subtle reading of this that turns obey the gospel into 01:38:36.800 --> 01:38:38.400 don't worry about it. 01:38:38.400 --> 01:38:40.000 Not how this works. 01:38:40.000 --> 01:38:42.560 There's no possible argument against this. 01:38:42.560 --> 01:38:44.560 This is truth. 01:38:44.560 --> 01:38:46.400 I am not mistaken here. 01:38:46.400 --> 01:38:49.360 Either I'm telling the truth or I'm a liar and I am 01:38:49.360 --> 01:38:52.960 damned. If I'm a liar and I'm damned, it's for saying exactly 01:38:52.960 --> 01:38:53.760 what God said. 01:38:53.760 --> 01:38:57.200 But there's no mistaking these sorts of passages. 01:38:57.200 --> 01:38:59.680 We as Christians need to have a kind of passion for the 01:38:59.680 --> 01:39:03.040 truth that allows us to see these and say, Amen. 01:39:03.040 --> 01:39:05.760 Even if it turns out that we have to re-jigger something in 01:39:05.760 --> 01:39:09.440 our belief, that means our belief was contrary to scripture, hopefully in 01:39:09.440 --> 01:39:10.400 some small way. 01:39:10.400 --> 01:39:11.920 In this case it is. 01:39:11.920 --> 01:39:16.560 The notion that the gospel is God's salvation for us is vital 01:39:16.560 --> 01:39:18.080 to the Christian faith. 01:39:18.080 --> 01:39:20.720 The notion that the gospel, the good news is every word from 01:39:20.720 --> 01:39:23.680 the mouth of God, is vital to the Christian faith. 01:39:23.680 --> 01:39:25.680 These things are not at odds. 01:39:25.680 --> 01:39:27.920 They're one in the same. 01:39:27.920 --> 01:39:32.320 But the fear and love God eternal gospel is a superset of 01:39:32.320 --> 01:39:34.480 the Jesus died for you gospel. 01:39:34.480 --> 01:39:38.240 Both are good news, but everything that God said is good news 01:39:38.240 --> 01:39:39.440 because he said it. 01:39:39.440 --> 01:39:43.120 Even the parts that are scary, even the parts that condemn us, 01:39:43.120 --> 01:39:45.840 because he is a loving and faithful creator. 01:39:46.160 --> 01:39:49.360 And we should do good, and thanks for that.