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You all right, question number one. Do we have good reason to think that God actually has free will? This might seem like a no brainer, and in some ways it kind of is a no brainer, but in other ways, it's like a very interesting question that I think, um, we can spend some time on. So here is the question coming in. Uh, I'll read it as it came to me. Does God lack free will himself, since he cannot act outside of or contrary to his nature? If so, doesn't that make his actions questionable? Um, I'm Mike winger, by the way, here to try to answer your tough questions about the Bible and Christianity and help you learn how to think biblically about everything and thinking biblically about the topic of God's free will. Um, there is some clear answer in scripture, very clear answer. And then there's some less clear area that I will offer my own opinion, my intuitions about. But make sure, you know, that's separated from the clarity that we have in scripture. Um, first, let's tackle the hard bit or the odd bit, the part that will strike many people as problematic, which is, does it make God's actions questionable if everything he does lacks free will, because he can only do stuff according to his nature? So should I then question God? Should I doubt God's actions? Should I find them not trustworthy? I, um, think that this part is actually a no brainer, but let me explain. Let me walk through it with you a little bit. Let's suppose that in any scenario, God will only ever pick the best option, the most good option. And so let's suppose that there even is a most good option, that there aren't a, uh, range of options that are all wonderfully good and can all be chosen. But there was just one that's just according to God's nature. He will always pick this one because it's just the best thing that he could do in that scenario, in that situation.

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Does that then mean I can't trust his actions?

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Um, no. It would seem that it would make God predictable. Yes. If you were able to figure out what the best course of action was in a given situation, you would know God would always do that. Assuming there is such a thing. Like, if I get my wife flowers and I'm like, carnations or roses, is there really a moral quality to which one I pick things like that? Two carnations or three carnations. And that bundle, or this bundle, do I hand it to her now or 3 seconds later? And all that kind of thing are all these moral choices anyway, let's suppose they are.

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Um, that would not make God unreliable or untrustworthy. It would just mean he is predictable. If you could figure out what the best thing is, it would mean that in every scenario, God will always do the best possible thing. You're just adding one layer on top and there's always a very particular nuanced in tiny little details. There's always one thing that's better than all the other options, and that's of course what God will do. So there's no reason why this should make you question God if you feel like there's some lack of free will that's happening there. Um, his nature is good.

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You would only find him problematic if you knew he was going to do the wrong thing in every scenario, or that he would only sometimes do what's good and other times he would do what's wrong. So you get it. We're just talking about predictability here, um, and sort of options. Uh, is God bound by his nature to only one option in every situation?

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And I don't think he is. Okay, I'm just throwing out the hypothetical. Now let's ask the question, does God have free will? And this is something that philosophers have debated, and I'm not a philosopher. I'm not going to pretend to be on the same level of discourse as the philosophers on this issue. I've tried to dip into it enough to at least get familiar with some of this stuff. Um, but let's first say this. What is free will? Um, so there's different schools of thought. There are those who say, you have free will. If you are the source of the actions, it's you and not some. There's no puppet strings on you. You're the one deciding what to do. So this is like a sourcehood version of free will. And it basically says, hey, and we're going to bring scripture into this in a minute. So we will be thinking biblically about it, but we have to understand terms, right? So if you are the one deciding to do it, as long as there's no puppet strings, no external thing forcing you to make that decision, even if you only ever would make one choice, but it was your choice, right? So sourcehood gives you free will. Libertarian free will, you might say. Then there's others who say, um, no, you need more than that. You don't just need sourcehood, you need the freedom to do otherwise. Um, or what some people call the principle of alternative possibilities. Meaning like I'm going to grab my little airbud charger thing here and I can twirl it once or twice. There's two things I'm thinking about doing. I'm going to twirl it once. Big question is, did I really have the option of twirling it twice or was I always only ever going to twirl it once? There, if you wound back the clock, there's no way on earth I would have ever done anything but just once. No. Now I've done it twice. Kind of messed up my analogy. So then there's the question. There, uh, is, is there an alternative possibility, not just sourcehood, God's the one doing it, but the option of God doing something different. Um, now I think that I'm going to affirm that there is. But you see how there are these two different issues. Many, um, people would just say, look, God clearly has the sourcehood one and therefore he has free will. He's the one deciding. Nobody's pulling his strings, nobody's influencing him. And let me give you some scriptures on that. Then we'll come back to the principal alternative possibilities, pap. We'll come back to pap in a second.

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So philosophically, um, you can have your debate about whether you need sourcehood or if you need perhaps sourcehood and the freedom to do something else. Otherwise, if you need both of those, that's how you're going to define free will. Then you can try to apply that to whether you think God has that technical definition of free will or not. But you realize that's, again, that's a philosophical thing. Now I'm going to ask, what does the Bible say about God in particular theologically? Okay, so here's some scripture we're going to get into on this. Um, Isaiah 46.

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We'll look at verses nine through eleven.

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God speaking here says, remember the former things of old, for I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is none like me declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times, things not yet done that has to do with, uh, prophetic statements and saying, my counsel shall stand. I will accomplish all my purpose. Clearly in scripture, you didn't need me to tell you this, but clearly in scripture, God makes choices. He's like, I have a purpose, I have a plan. I'm going to make those things happen. God is an agent who is in control of things. So he's making choices. There is a will that's there, and his choices are based upon his own desires. Revelation 411, it says, for you created all things by your will. That's his will. His decision, they existed and were created. That's how these things exist in the first place. But, um, the centrality, there's no puppet strings, is what I'm suggesting here. They're based on his own desires, not external factors that are controlling him. In psalm 115, verse three, it says, our God is in the heavens, and he does all that he pleases or his desires. So there's willing that's going on here. God is a personal agent. God is not just a force, an energy, or some sort of law that floats around affecting the universe, that we find that kind of treatment of God. And people who sometimes think of themselves as, um, spiritual. Ah, but not religious. Um, which I have a video on that you guys should check out if you're interested in more on that topic. I think that that's a bad thing for people to say, that they're not thinking enough about what they're saying when they say that they're spiritual, not religious. And maybe if they thought more about it, they'd probably. I would suggest maybe they would agree with me that. Yeah, that's probably not a good way to talk.

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At, uh, any rate. Then you have another scripture, uh, psalm 135, verse six, which says, whatever the Lord pleases, he does in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps. The idea here is that in every location in creation, God does whatever he wants. Here's why this is important. There's no puppet strings. There's no overruling factor. There's nothing that's forcing God to want things. There's outside of God, right. It's his own self that is desiring and willing and wanting certain things.

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And then he has such control that he can not only want to do things, that he can make those things happen in the real world. So God's definitely got, um, his own will, his own desires. And again, it's not externally constrained. Another way to say this is consider John one, Genesis one. In the beginning, there's God. There just isn't anything else. Right before anything's made. Read John, chapter one. So here you have the scenario. Right. In the beginning was the word. The word was with God. The word was God. So we have the father, the son, ultimately here being discussed. We can later add, uh, the holy spirit into that mix of understanding who's present in the beginning. We also, then, as you read in first, John, find out that everything has not been created yet in the beginning. Nothing's made yet. So we're talking about, like, sort of that timeless state, um, you would say, sands, time or without time. You could say before time. Do you guys know what I mean when I say before time? It's weird language. Language starts having trouble when you talk about lack of locations and lack of time.

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At any rate, you've got God before creation. I'll use that phrase before knowing how clumsy it is. And there's no puppet strings available like what's there to influence him? There's just God, there's nothing else. And then he makes everything and then he controls all things as much as he desires. And so you don't have any puppet strings on God. He doesn't have external constraints that are telling him what he has to do. Scripture says this kind of stuff over and over again.

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I'm strong on the sovereignty of God, even though I'm not a, uh, calvinist, but I'm very strong on the sovereignty of God and I think every Christian has to be because scripture is so strong on the sovereignty of God. Talks about him guiding and directing kings, showing that nobody has authority except that it's given to them by God. In Romans doesn't mean all those people are doing things God likes them doing with their authority. He allows us to make choices and um, he allows even wicked people to have reign. But he has a, ah, sort of superintendent control over all those things. Even though he allows our chaos, his will is ultimately being done. So Romans 919, who can resist his will? So it's not just um, people, there's just nothing in creation that can resist God's will. So here's ephesians 111. And I'd say I'll throw this out there for my calvinist friends who I love. I love you guys. God's uh, will may, may well include and I think it does us making free will choices, uh, in and amongst all the other things that he's doing. And so I think both those things are in play anyway. Ephesians 111. In him we have obtained an inheritance having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works what all things according to the counsel of his will. Everything. Not just people, not just kings, all of creation like God's. God's got this. He's going to make it all come together the way he chooses. So there we go.

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That's the source stuff. God is the source before creation. He's the only one there. The desires, the choices that he makes arise out of his own desires and he's not constrained or kept back by any external thing. I think that that is significant. That is enough to give us God's free will. But then the question comes up and I racked my brain on this. I may come back later and share something else with you guys. Maybe in the comments someone will give some feedback here. I don't know exactly how to answer with scripture, how to prove. I will attempt anyways, but I don't know how to fully prove that God has the principle of alternative possibilities now. I don't think there's any scripture, any scripture that hints that he doesn't. Okay, so then the scripture might be a little bit like, it's not talking about. It's not answering this question that we'd like to. You know, when God, here's a question. When God said abraham, abraham, could God have said abraham and just said it once, is that possible? Could he have just said abraham and not Abraham? Abraham, is that possible?

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It would seem so. I don't think there's anything I would put out there to limit God on that. I would just say, I would think he probably does. I have a strong intuition that says I have real choices. I'm really doing things, and I really very strongly am aware that I could do other things. That when I'm deciding what to order for lunch or dinner, I actually could pick a different item if I wanted. Um, I shouldn't put it that way. I could literally really pick a different item. I could actually have an alternative possibility there.

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Um, that being said, that's not scripture. I'm not proving it with the Bible when I say that, I'm using my intuition, and I want to be very guarded as I want to think biblically about everything, to recognize the end of my intuitions and the beginning of scripture.

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So could God have said Abraham instead of Abraham? Abraham. Um, that's tough. What we would need is a verse of the Bible that says, in principle, says something like, um, I could have done this, God speaking, saying, I called Israel out. I could have chosen somebody else. That would be him saying in that exact scenario, in history, exactly as it was, I actually could have done this other thing. That would be an alternative possibility. I don't know of a verse that says something like that in a way that's particular, because if God says, um, for instance, if, um, you cried out to me, I would have saved you. Well, but see, that's the scenario that would be different. If the scenario was different, I would have acted different. That's different. We need the scenario to be the same. And for God to declare that he could do something differently, or for scripture to teach that he could, to affirm that principle of alternative possibilities. So I'm not sure. Here's a little stab at it, and I'll show you why this is a challenging thing to try to show in scripture. Matthew 39, but I won't leave you hanging. All right, I'm just going to invite you to the process of me going. Huh? Challenging. Okay. And do not presume to say to yourselves, Jesus speaking here we have Abraham as our father. For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.

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Okay, God could do something that God didn't actually do. Now, you could say, well, he could do it if he wanted to do it, but he doesn't want to do it, so he can't do it. But that's no different than saying he can't do it. If he really could do it, then he could literally raise up children from stones. God has the power to do that and simply make them children of Abraham by him just calling them, you're the children of Abraham. Now, he could even give him his dna. Um, so God could do that. And if God could do that, if he really could do that, that's the principle of alternative possibilities. But here's why this is challenging. Maybe, I mean, this seems like a hyperbolic statement from Jesus. Raise it from these stones, and it's possible that the stones end up being a reference to the gentiles.

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Uh, you know, the gentiles, they get included in the kingdom, we're all living stones in Christ that we become, uh, seed of Abraham by faith. And so the idea here could be this might actually be something God did do. If this is a reference to bringing the gentiles in, um, which would be consistent with other statements in the scriptures, in the New Testament, then it actually isn't an alternative possibility. This is something God actually does. So then I go, oh, okay, well, maybe I won't use that verse. It might give us that principle, but it might not. How about, um, here's another one I was thinking of Hebrews 1119.

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Speaking of Abraham, he considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, raise Isaac his son from the dead, which figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.

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So the way this is taught, this is something that's true. Abraham believed, rightly believed, that God could raise Isaac from the dead. But God wasn't going to raise Isaac from the dead. God was going to prevent Isaac from dying in the first place.

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So if God could have done it but didn't do it, that's the principle of alternative possibilities, it seems.

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But the person who wants to push against this, could counter and say, yeah, but Mike, that's something God could do and was able to do in the event that Abraham fully sacrificed Isaac. But since he didn't, that scenario never existed in history, so it wasn't a true alternative. And I go, ah. Uh, this is why philosophy is annoying to people. So I won't spend a lot of time on it. But I'll say this.

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Um, I think I can go in a backdoor on this one and say, I can show you in scripture that I genuinely have. I think this is true, submitted to your guys consideration, that I genuinely have alternative possibilities. Me, not God. I'm talking about me, but I'm going to suggest then that if it's true of me, then in principle you can't say it's impossible for something that has a will to do something different than whatever option they actually end up picking. Uh, that you can't rule it out philosophically because scripture is saying that it's actually true of me. Here's the verse. No temptation has overtaken you. That is not common to man. God is faithful and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability. That is, you will always have an alternative possibility, at least as a Christian, when you're tempted minimally, but with the temptation he'll provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it. So therefore, you're supposed to resist temptation.

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If you study this passage carefully, you'll see this is clearly a, you have the principle of alternative possibilities as a Christian, at least in regards to certain things.

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When you're tempted to sin, you could do it or you could not do it. If you wind back the clock, you could literally choose a different option. You actually really are at a, uh, crossroads where you're making a true choice between two real possibilities.

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If that's true of me, if I really have choices between possibilities and yeah, it's connected to temptation, all that, but in principle, you shouldn't rule it out for God either. Now add to this that the scripture seems to indicate that God is making real choices that most people probably would read and just, this is a vibe argument, I admit it, but would probably reading the text would probably think God is choosing from real choices he has, not just choosing the only choice he has, that that's just how you would generally read. That's how most humans would understand and respond to the statements in scripture. And we don't have any statement in the Bible that says that God only has one choice. There are things like, uh, God cannot lie and maybe you're thinking of that God can't lie. And I would say, yeah, that's a choice he will not make because of his character. That doesn't remove his free will, but it certainly limits the available options, doesn't it?

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His free will is not going to be exercised in a way that violates. But it doesn't mean he can't choose how to tell the truth. I'm not going to lie. I'll tell you. Um, the testimony of the Holy Spirit that Christ has risen from the dead is going to be still present. But God can speak in different ways. Christ is risen from the dead. Christ has risen from the dead. Christ did rise from the dead. I mean, God would have options of how he communicates things. These seem like real possibilities. All right, well, that's the first question. Um, the encouraging thing about this question is you can fully trust God regardless of whether you're able to wrap your head around these issues or not, whether they annoy you or not. You know for sure that God is good, and he will always do good things, and he's always trustworthy at all times. And challenging questions about the nature of free will are not going to change those clear teachings in scripture. All right, let's go to question number two. And by the way, here's my little announcement for you guys. Um, every week now, I'm going to be doing these Friday q and A's every Friday. That's the plan, assuming I can handle it. Every Friday Q and A's. But I'm only going to do ten questions per, and that means you'll have them twice as often, but they won't be as long, and there won't be as many questions in each of these things. This is going to allow me to slow down a little bit. Sometimes I find myself skipping over questions where someone asks, and, um, I'm feeling like I'm racing through because I've taken too long at other stuff. And then later on I regret it, and I'm like, man, that person pushed to get their question through. They finally got it through, and I gave them, like, the shortest just answer that was not enough. And, uh, this will allow me to avoid doing that as frequently. So let's go to question number two. This is from Riley Flynn. Hey, Pastor Mike. I'm thankful for your ministry, and I'm grateful that God's grace, to me, is that I even get to do this ministry. I, um, couldn't do it by my godliness or my goodness or any of that. It's entirely God's grace. So thankful for that. Um, were papyrus and writing supplies expensive? How did John banished to the island? Patmos have all the necessary items to write down his revelation. Yeah. So the, um, uh, papyrus was definitely like, compared to paper. Today, paper is like, you throw away a piece of paper, it's not even a big deal. Papyrus is very expensive at the time, compared to today. It took more of a process. There was less of it available, it cost more money, and it was considered more precious. Um, that's true.

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They had other things they would write on skins and things like that, and this is why they would work to preserve papyrus, and they work harder to save those types of things. We even have things like, um, I think the term is palm sest. And this is when you have a writing where they would just clean it off. They'd wipe it off and then rewrite a new document onto an old writing. Imagine getting an eraser and slowly, with your pencil eraser, erasing a whole page just to rewrite, because that was just a valuable piece of parchment, uh, or papyrus or whatever. And so we do have reason to think, yeah, this isn't the kind of stuff you just find lying around a prison. You're like, I'm in prison. I'm going to go and get a stack of papyri and start writing some stuff down.

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So how did he do it? How did John write his stuff? I think that the answer is, um, maybe we can get hinted at from the book of acts. In the book of acts, we have Paul, um, in prison. Um, we have people visiting him, people visiting others in prison. We have statements as well in the New Testament about visiting those in prison, visiting people in prison, which was not just about hanging out, it was also about bringing them supplies. We have Paul writing to Timothy and to others. When he's in prison. He's writing to people, and he says, I'm trying to remember, uh, which epistle it is. And he's like, hey, bring me my cloak, bring me my stuff. He's asking for supplies. Because when you were in prison back then, people would bring you things and supply for you food as well. And so you've got probably something like that going on. Um, it's very possible someone just sent a care package to John on Patmos. And back then, if you're stuck in prison like that, it would probably be normal to send someone writing supplies so they could also write back to you whenever somebody else leaves Patmos to take that letter. So I think that's most likely what happened. That seems to fit the culture of the time and some of the indications we have there, there would definitely have been plenty of people that were like, boy, let's send John some supplies. We care about him, we love him, we miss him, and natural, uh, to send him writing supplies as well. Let's go to question number three. Marissa de Moore says, is it wrong to base doctrine on inference? Is it ever legitimate, for example, the context of Hebrews twelve one says nothing about saints watching us from heaven, but some say it's implied by the word witnesses. Ooh, we get to talk about a verse that I think a lot of people misunderstand. Hebrews twelve one. Um, actually, they misunderstand it in a lot of ways. We'll talk about one of the ways in which it's misunderstood here. But first, let's talk about the principle. Is it wrong to base doctrine on inference? Um, inference is a very broad category, Marissa. I would say it depends, uh, that I don't have a rule on it, except that the strength that you use, the grip you use to hold to a doctrine should not be stronger than the clarity with which you got to that doctrine. So if you got to it through inference and through. I think this. I think it's implied here, then you should say, I think this is the right doctrine on that issue, and you should hold it loosely. You can hold it, but hold it loosely. So I don't have an ironclad grip on every doctrine I have as a Christian. I have an ironclad grip on things like the death and resurrection of Christ. Is that just inferred? Is it just implied? Absolutely not. It is 100% clear. I have a very firm grip on, say, less, uh, important, but a doctrine I've studied a lot, which is the idea of women in ministry and ministry roles and marriage roles and stuff like that in scripture. And my grip there is because it's very clear. And I've sought the arguments against that position, and they've made it even stronger because they were bad.

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So, you guys know, I have a big, long series on women in ministry, where, um.

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Uh, I get into all that stuff.

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You hold them depending on the strength of the inference. So what would be an example? Um, there are those who hold to infant baptism, and they hold infant baptism mostly by inference. There's a doctrine I don't hold to infant baptism. I don't think that that's biblical, and I hold somewhat firmly to that idea. I think that that seems pretty clear in scripture. Um, but I'm not going to get in a big old fight about it. But I would defend that view, and I have lots of verses for it, and I've looked at the stuff. So, for instance, infant baptism, they'll say, it says the whole household was baptized. You can infer that that households would probably include children. Maybe we'll run statistical analysis on how often did a household have children, and then we'll say, if the whole household was baptized, then the babies were baptized, too. And it says here, um, in acts that the household believed and they all got baptized. Um, and then I would push back and say, your inference, I think, is wrong. I can't help but have to say this, because it also says the whole household believed and confessed. And of course, babies weren't believing and confessing at, uh, two months old, so they obviously aren't being meant by that term household. Um, there's other statements of the use of the word household doesn't seem to include children, babies. They just seem to talk about them as if they're not there. Um, I know that sounds weird, especially in our culture, we get all mad about statements like that.

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They will just talk about the people who have agency, and they will ignore the others for the sake of discussion because they have no agency. That's how it seems. At any rate, a lot of people who hold to infant baptism, they hold to it ironclad.

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Right. This is huge fighting issue. Now, many don't. Many hold to it with, um, I think, more openness, or at least more willingness to not turn it into a divisive issue. Exactly. Um, and I understand you may not want to fellowship at a church that disagrees with you on this, and that's fine. Just because you don't fellowship there doesn't mean you have to be all divided about it. Right? So I think you should hold it about as strong as the inference was.

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You should be able to admit if you're an infant baptism person, the inference isn't all that strong. This is more of a tradition thing.

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That's probably just realistic.

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What about Hebrews twelve one, though? Okay, that's my opinion. You guys, I'm not the pope of anything, and, um, I share all this with you, not because you could be like, well, Mike said it, therefore, period. No, but rather so you could work through it and think through it, and you can decide how much of this you're agreeing with scripture. Um, you agree with 100% all the time. Me, you don't and you shouldn't, because I'm going to get things wrong, and I didn't think of that, or, oh, I misspoke, or I remembered that wrong, or I just didn't consider something that I should have considered. So I say, take everything I'm sharing here with a grain of salt, unless I'm declaring simply the plain teaching of scripture on an issue. And so I try to point out those differences. You should notice that, too. Even when your pastor teaches on Sunday, sometimes he's giving you the plain teaching of scripture. Sometimes he's sharing with you some of his inferences, and you don't have to cast him out or just recognize it so you can work through these things. All right. Uh, Hebrews twelve one. Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. I've heard people say, hey, these witnesses are the people who have died before, and they're in Christ. They're the saved, and they're watching us. They're witnessing us as we live out our christian lives. Let's show them that we have faith. Let's be a good example.

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Um, let's do it for their sakes, too. I think that that's a misunderstanding of this verse. And so some would infer from this. Let me read from your question again. Um, saints watching us from heaven, they would infer from this that after people die that they actually have the ability to see what's happening on earth. All from Hebrews twelve one. But I think that this is a major misunderstanding of the meaning of Hebrews twelve one. And mostly because this verse has been taken out of the context. Context is king, right. Well, what is the context of Hebrews twelve one? Well, it's Hebrews eleven where we read about. And I'll just go through some of them.

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Um, after talking about faith, faith, faith, we understand these things. Then it talks about a bunch of people who had faith. Abel. He offered it to God, a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. Then we get into, like, enoch, and we're going to get into Noah, and we're going to talk about Abraham, and we're going to talk about Sarah, and we're going to talk about, I mean, I'm just looking for more names here. We're going to talk about Isaac, and we're going to talk about a bunch of different people who all are kind of pictures of Christ in different ways. Moses and Joseph and all these different people. So Hebrews eleven gives you a list of people who are witnessing to you what faith looks like and what it looks like. To live a life living for the kingdom that's coming. Let me read to you. After giving you all these names, it gives you kind of the summary, right. They were stoned, they were sauna to, they were killed with the sword. Then they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated, of whom the world was not worthy, wandering about in deserts and mountains and dens and caves of the earth. Do you get it? They didn't have this world. They suffered in this world. They didn't have all the pleasures of this life. And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised. Since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us, they should not be made perfect.

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Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, this is not some generic group of people. These are specifically the people mentioned before. They're witnessing to us. They're not witnessing us. They're witnessing to us. Their examples are examples to us of people who give up this world for faith and trust in God, who go through hardship or suffering, who go through lack and who are waiting on God to fulfill his promises to them.

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They're witnessing to us. They're not witnessing us. When you go witnessing, when you go out witnessing, street witnessing, you're not going out to people, watch looking, you're going out to tell people something. These people, their testimonies, their stories, Old Testament saints, their stories, as you read the Old Testament, are speaking to you about faith and about trusting in God. So yeah, that's the witnesses of Hebrews twelve. It's not about them seeing us, it's about us seeing them.

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All right, let's go to question number four. Um, from explorer, who says, where did it say in the Bible that the Messiah will have a second coming? Does Jesus tell his disciples that he won't be fulfilling all of the Old Testament prophecies just yet? Um, okay, so two questions there. Um, this is something I'd like to spend more time preparing so I could gather a bunch of different sources for you because there's a lot more than one. Um, but I think that, um, there's a number of places. So for instance, when Jesus gives, um, communion, he's like, hey, do this in remembrance of me until I come, until I return. That's such a pivotal time because he's talking about his death and then he talks about his return and you're going to keep doing communion. In the New Testament, they continue to do communion long after the resurrection of Christ. After all the things they always were still doing communion until he returns. Every time you do communion, there's a sense in which this is a prophetic statement that Christ will return, he will reign on earth. And we are waiting for that time.

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Um, when Jesus was ascended into heaven, the angels like, hey, why are you standing here looking? The son of man will return just as he left, that there's going to be the second coming. There's, um, other New Testament examples, too. Jesus told all these parables about going on a long journey. Will the son of man find faith on the earth? He kept talking about these long journeys. The implication is that the second coming is going to be a ways out, that there's going to be some distance of time that's going to be going on there. But, uh, you might be like, well, where in the Old Testament does it say there's going to be two comings of Christ? And this is where it's a lot more fuzzy. In a sense.

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It's there, but it's not clearly delineated. Here's a first coming, and there's a list of things he'll do. Here's a second coming, and there's a list rather. The things Messiah will do are just talked about all over the place. And whether they'll happen in one coming or two isn't as clear in the Old Testament. So you just have the events themselves. And this left intertestamental Jews who were before the New Testament during that period, this left them sort of trying to figure out, how do we have all these things the messiah is going to do?

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He's going to die, but he's also going to reign. How does that work? So there were some jews, and we actually have record of this. Like, we have documented record of this, who thought that there would be two messiahs. There would be one m messiah who would suffer and who would die, and a different one who would reign. You see, because they're trying to work out what they're seeing is the first and second coming, but they don't understand it yet. The clarity of the first and second coming comes new Testament. But the teaching that establishes it is in the Old Testament, you have the suffering servant of, uh, psalm 22 of Isaiah 53. You've got, he's suffering, he's suffering, he's suffering. But you also have him ruling and reigning, and you have Daniel, where he's the stone that comes cut without hands. It smashes the statue and sets up the kingdom on earth. You've got the events that are happening in the first and second coming without all the descriptions in Daniel, you do have stuff about the time of the gentiles, and there's going to be this sort of prolonged time of God doing some sort of work amongst gentiles. Um, that that's going to be happening. So you have other stuff too. And again, I'd like to spend more time, pull together an actual whole study on this topic. It'd be worth doing. But there's a few things for you to look at. When you read in psalm 22, do you get that there's a first and second coming, clearly? Um, not clearly, but it's inferred, I'll use that word, where you have, uh, the dying of the son of David, and there he is suffering and dying. And it describes the crucifixion of Jesus a thousand years before. Um, you have crucifixion of Jesus happening, like 700 years before crucifixion is even happening. And it describes it in a way that fits perfectly with what Jesus went through. But then at the end, it gives strong indication of some resurrection type event. Right. He's going to prolong his life and he'll see his seed. And then the whole world, the gentiles of the world, are going to turn to the God of Israel because of this event. Meaning that when this person dies in psalm 22, it's not over. It's the beginning of some new thing and it involves a bunch of gentiles getting saved, effectively in modern parlance. Right. So that's there. It just isn't called first coming, second coming. The first and second coming are how it plays out.

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There's probably more we could talk about. Um, in Daniel it talks about the suffering messiah in Daniel nine. But also in Daniel it talks about the son of man coming in the clouds of heaven, and there he is worshipped. And so there's actually two comings in Daniel, but it's just not made as clear as we have it in the New Testament. I hope that helps you out all. Uh, right, let's talk to Cheyenne. Uh, Cheyenne from Luke 517. She has a question. Uh, the power of the Lord was with Jesus to heal. That's what the verse says. Did Jesus not always have this power, or does Luke emphasize it here because of what happens next? What's your take on this? Well, let's look at that verse in context. Did Jesus always have the power to heal?

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Luke 517.

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Um, let me just back up a little bit and we'll see where we're at in the gospel of Luke here.

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All right, just for my own sake, if you got anything out of that, good for you. Uh, Luke 517. On one of those days, as he was teaching, pharisees and teachers of the law were sitting there who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem. And the power of the Lord was with him to heal.

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And behold, some men were bringing on a bed a man who was paralyzed. And they were seeking to bring him in and lay him before Jesus. But finding no way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and led him down with his bed, threw the tiles into the midst before Jesus. And when he saw their faith, he said, man, your sins are forgiven you. Then there's this cool thing where Jesus is like, I'm gonna prove to you that I can forgive sins by having this paralytic rise up and walk. And boom.

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That's amazing stuff. Amazing stuff. So here's the different elements that I would see in this shannon, uh, for you to consider, for everybody to think about one other than just this exact moment. Jesus, did he have the power to heal when he was 9215? Right. 29, right before the filling of the spirit at, uh, baptism. And he does his first miracle at the wedding in Cana. And then he continues doing amazing miracles. His family's shocked. It appears that he did none of these things throughout his life. None that were public anyways, none that anybody knew about. And I don't think we should postulate some secret ministry life of Jesus during this time, um, and make weird stuff about it, um, because people are prone to do that sort of thing.

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But what we can do is say, like, yeah, it looks like this sort of thing was not happening before the baptism of Jesus, before God says, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. The spirit descends, and then he's doing these miracles. Could he though? Could he at nine, could he have had the power to do it? I think Jesus, okay, he's God in the flesh. He could override his human abilities and do anything he wants at any time. But he chose to walk in a certain way of obedience, humbling himself, coming in the form of a servant. As a man, he's still God, but he's God behaving and living in a human life. And so Jesus could, right? He could do anything, but he won't until he's going to do so with the power of the Holy Spirit, with the leading of the father, and in a way that is going to show submission and godliness, uh, in a human way, okay, he's still God as he does his miracles and all that. It's not kenosis for anybody who's worried about that. Not at all. Um, okay, that being said, why at this exact moment is Luke saying? Is that what Luke means? Luke means now that the Holy Spirit and the baptism has happened, all that now there's the power to heal.

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Um, and the power of the Lord was with them to heal. I think actually what might help clarify what's meant here is by looking at what Jesus does in Nazareth in the gospel of Luke. Let me, um, see if I can find that. It'll just take me a minute because I don't remember what chapter it's in.

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Um, maybe some of you guys remember, but, uh, the event in Nazareth, it says that Jesus could not heal many, could not heal many. And the issue there is their lack of, uh, it's in, it's in Luke as well. So in Luke, Jesus is in Nazareth, there's a lack of faith and so he doesn't heal. Yet here in this other location, you've got the power of the Lord's presence to heal. This may be more commentary on the faith that the people were having at the time. Uh, when the next thing that happens in this passage is these men are frantically, uh, I shouldn't say frantically, but there's definitely with a strong sense of conviction and commitment, they're digging through the roof to lower their friend down. This paralytic, this is like a lot of faith that's present for Jesus. And so this, uh, power present to heal may be a reference to the faith that the people were having at the time. That would at least be consistent with another passage we have in the gospel of Luke. So those are the different elements that stand out to me. Um, I guess I've summarized it for you. I don't need to go look it up, but you guys can look up the story of Jesus going to Nazareth and he doesn't heal very much in Nazareth because of that lack of faith.

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Yeah. So the lesson there is we need to have faith. Does that mean God will always heal you when you have. No, no, but it's a discussion of. It's exactly what the paralytic was meant to tell you, that Jesus can forgive your sins and this healing is meant to prove it. And what was the key? You having faith. You trust in Christ. You will be forgiven of your sins. He's crucified for you. He died for your sins. The punishment and the shame that you feel that you deserve that went to Christ, totally taken off your shoulders, taken to the grave buried there, risen in newness of life. You just trust in Christ and you will be given that grace. So let's go to question number six. Ashley Lowe says. Hi Mike. Hi Ashley. Do our prayers for the unsaved actually increase their chances of being saved versus if they didn't have anyone praying for them?

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Um, this is somewhat controversial. To answer this question, um, I just want to acknowledge that controversy that not all believers are going to agree with me.

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Um, some would probably say something like, I'll try to present it in a way that I think they might agree with. Um, that God has predestined some to be saved and they're going to be saved whether or not you pray. But whether or not you pray is already factored in. And so it's something that God will use in the course of saving them. But it's not you in this moment, whether you right now go and pray for them or right now you don't. Let's say you spend the afternoon praying for someone in your family.

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If you don't do that, if you do do that, it's not going to change the end result. They're already chosen.

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Um, they probably would say this differently than that. That sounds a little clumsy. I'm just trying to be clear. Sometimes clear can feel clumsy.

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My uh, impression is that it does make a difference. And I think again this is inferred. It's inferred that when you're praying for people to be saved that the implication is, um, that they might actually be saved, that this can happen. And so, um, I think that we live in a world where as christians, if we witness more, more people actually get saved, and if we pray more, more people actually get saved, does that mean that their lack of salvation, here's where I don't want to go with it. Their lack of salvation falls on you. Well, they didn't get saved because you didn't pray enough. And I think that this is, um, I may be on my own here, maybe most christians would disagree with me on this and you guys feel free to, and maybe I'm wrong and maybe I'll come out and say, boy, I didn't understand this very well earlier on, so I hold this loosely, okay?

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And um, I'll tell you why I hold it. Maybe there's a pragmatic reason why I'm holding to it, which can be dangerous. Um, can cause us to hold things that aren't accurate because we feel like they're helpful and I don't want to do that. But just acknowledging all my little biases here. Okay, so my view would be that it really makes a difference, but that this does not mean, like, if I go out and evangelize right now and somebody gets saved, like, say I turn off the stream and I evangelize, someone actually gets saved because of it, that maybe that person would or would not have come to the Lord. I don't know. I, uh, don't know. Now the Lord knows, and he's made his decisions ahead of time and all that, but he's factored in all this stuff. And so these are real free will decisions we're making. And as I do evangelism, somebody might actually get saved.

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We're to pray for people. We're to pray for people. And I think this is implied for their salvation. There's more scripture on this that I'd share if I had more prep time. Um, so, yeah, I'm lacking certain verses I'd share with you, but they're not coming to my mind. Um, so doesn't that mean that it's my fault if someone doesn't get saved? I think, no, that's not the case. Let me give you an analogy. Let's say that somebody's fallen into a pit, and every morning I run by that pit, and I go, hey, you want to help? And they go, forget you. I don't like you. I'm going to stay in this pit. And I run by every morning for a week. So for seven days, I go by, hey, went out of the pit. Can I help you? Come on. Come on, man. You don't need to stay in that pit. Nah, go away. I don't like you. I don't want your help. I'm going to stay in this pit. And then on the 8th day, I think, you know what? Just forget it.

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I'm not going out for my run. I'm not going to go tell this person to come out of the pit. I'm not going to offer him help anymore. And that 8th day is the day he would have said yes.

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And then he gets stuck in the pit forever because of it. Dies or something. Weird analogy, but it works, I think.

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So. The man dies, the man's gone. The man's standing before God, and he's like, I would have accepted help that 8th day.

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Uh, does that mean that he's not guilty for staying in the pit?

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No, that was his choice. He rejected over and over and over again. These are the consequences of his decisions. It's sad, it's tragic, but it would be his own fault. Now, you can feel how this would be controversial for many people. Um, and this is, again, why I share that with you. Feel free to totally disagree with me on this.

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I think that there's a similarity to evangelism in this is that as I share the gospel over and over again, a person who rejects it over and over again, if they die in that rejection, it's on them. The difference with the pit thing is, um, with the pit, you need me to come by and help you out of the pit. But with evangelism, all you need is this person's heart to say, I want you, God. I want you, God. You don't need an evangelist to show up over and over again. Once they know the gospel, they could turn at any moment. So the pit analogy falls apart in one spot. The person in the pit on the 8th day could be there all day going, help, help. And nobody's helping him. Whereas that would never happen in evangelism, the moment the heart turns to God. But is there a chance that if I'd run by and it was the gospel, and I was sharing the gospel one more time, that person might have got saved? Maybe. Um, here's the pragmatic side. I will live like that's true because it will motivate evangelism and it will help me realize the validity of my actions. And because it seems like that's what's happening in scripture, is that when evangelism happens and people get saved, it seems as though if evangelism didn't happen, those people would not have gotten saved. That's what it looks like in scripture now. Many would just say, no, God would work it out. He'd send somebody else. Somehow those people would hear the gospel and get saved. I'm not confident that that's the case. Um, and now there's a whole big discussion we can have on that. And about like, well, what about is it maximal number of people saved? And maybe if they got saved, someone else wouldn't. I'm not going to get into all that today. I think we should live like our evangelism really makes a difference.

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And you guys feel free to disagree with me. Push back. Let me know your thoughts on that. Um, in scripture, when people evangelize, when Jesus is saying, hey, look, the fields are white with harvest, pray, therefore, that there'll be more harvesters, I think that's a real need, not it. Not a felt need, put it that way. Anyway, there's more that should be said on this. I feel as though I'm opening cans of worms. I don't mean to do that to you guys. The bottom line is, of course, that Jesus saves and all who put their faith and trust in him will be saved. And there's nobody sitting in there going, I just want Jesus and I can't have him. Oh, if only someone would come. No, that person would be received by Christ immediately. Um, they don't need the Evangelist, but maybe there's a hard heart out there. And if someone had just gone to them and they witnessed and they shared that something would have changed.

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Justin Baldwin, how can I discern the difference between demonic influences and my flesh when it comes to sinful struggles?

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Uh, that's a good question, Justin.

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I, um, think I used to try to do that, um, and I gave up, um, for the most part, I don't know exactly the difference. And I stopped sort of worrying about it too much. So you get a thought or an idea and you think, was that for me, or is that the enemy? And I don't know. Always know which one's worse because you're like, well, see, if it's me, then I really wanted to do that. If it's the enemy, then the enemy is putting those kind of thoughts my way. And, um, they're both bad news, but the answer to both of them is pretty similar.

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But here's where I used to say this, and I think there's village to do this. Um, if you have a thought and you're like, what was that? Why would I even think that? Why would I even have that in my mind? Then that would seem to be more likely an external source, right? This is like a thought that's just not me. I would think more likely that's the enemy, okay? That's like the fiery dart from Satan, and you quench that with a shield of faith. Lord, I'm just going to trust in you, redirect my heart and mind towards good things.

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But here's where it gets complicated for me. Satan uses your flesh to tempt you, right? Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness, but he was tempted with hunger, which he was very hungry. Naturally he was hungry, but without any work of the enemy in his life, uh, he was tempted by Satan using his natural desires for food. And so, yeah, the enemy is going to want to tempt you, going to want to manipulate you, using the things that you're already weak in, that you're already struggling with. And so even if you identified something as this is me, like I struggle with fill in the blank sin, you're going to feel that temptation as natural within you, but it may also be something that the enemy is using in your life. Paul, um, warns us about an example of this. Paul warns us about division in the church. And he's like, forgive one another, be gracious to one another, don't be malicious. All these things in ephesians and stuff, colossians gives us all these interpersonal relationship commands. And he says, because we're not ignorant of Satan's devices, Satan's going to use the division that's natural among humans. So how do you draw the line?

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I don't know. I just know, hey, this is a temptation. It's certainly something Satan wants to use, whether it's him or not. I'm not really. Or his kingdom. I don't think Satan's personally attacking me. I just know when I say satan, I just mean that kingdom.

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Um, I don't worry about it too much. Um, yeah, but if you have thoughts that are clearly like, where did this even come from? I don't normally even think those things may be so uncomforting for you to be like, maybe that's just the enemy. Because then you feel like you can maybe more easily shake it off and move forward. And maybe there's a value in that. Um, Satan does do this in scripture. Satan put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus. That was an idea from Satan. Was Judas bent that way somehow? Yeah. Seems like he know he was stealing, uh, which means he was lying, he was faking, he was manipulating. Um, we know that there was already stuff that was going on there. He used that desire for either money or control or something.

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So that was part of it. Um, yeah.

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Uh, it may not always be a clear yes or no. It may be just that there's this middle ground. I don't know when it's me and my flesh and the enemy and I think about the world of flesh and the devil are these three things we have to overcome in this life according to first John, right, the world of flesh and the devil. And yet, if it wasn't for my flesh, the world and the devil wouldn't have much of a grip on me. And so what I have to focus on is dealing with my own flesh and my temptations. Ah, largely, that's where my battles are.

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All right, number eight, Chai says in two Timothy 316, when it says all scripture is God breathed. What would the author have meant by scripture? Because as far as I know, books like Jude and revelation hadn't been written yet. What a great question. Yeah. Um, in two Timothy.

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We don't have all of the New Testament available yet. So does it. Some would actually take this to say, oh, I should actually calculate which books were written prior to second Timothy. And those are the ones that are all God breathed. And then anything else, like maybe hebrews wasn't yet anything else, revelation.

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I will include those as not scripture or not God breathed. Um, because scripture means writings. But there's another way to read this text, and I think it's more accurate.

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What if scripture is a category and not a list?

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Think of it this way. Scripture as a category, not a list. Scripture is another way of saying all God inspired writings or all of the writings, the holy writings are, uh, God breathed.

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If it's a category, then it would apply to all scripture whenever it shows up, because that's the nature of this kind of thing. Scripture with a big capital s. Scripture, that's God's word. It's all inspired by the Holy Spirit. Therefore, if revelation is scripture, then revelation is God breathed. If any other letters that may have been written later on in the New Testament, those are all God breathed. And I think that that's how. Pardon me. I think that's how we should take this passage. It's a description of the nature of scripture. It's not a, um, statement about specific scriptures, previous and prior to a certain point in time and not others. Any scripture that comes and it would seem artificial to be like all scripture in the past is God breathed, but future scripture isn't, that would be very artificial. So it's more of a category than it is a list.

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And I'll go to question number nine. Um, this one is anonymous.

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And, uh, this is a slightly adultish question, but guess kind of adultish. So you guys have been warned. A few seconds to go watch a cartoon. Um, okay. Is asexuality real? I know believers who say they're asexual or not sexually attracted to anyone. I think this may be true of me, but could it just be God guarding my heart from lust over the years? I'm 23.

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Um, well, let me say this. Uh, I'm nervous about you asking this kind of question to someone like me. Um, I have not experienced that in my life, okay. Of not having those kinds of attractions and stuff like that. And most people are more along the lines of, I have a lot of attractions towards the opposite sex, usually. Um, and that's the healthy, godly way for things to go down. But there are plenty of people, and an increasing number, I think, that would identify themselves as asexual. Just as you look around the world, and I think that this.

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I can't help but wonder if the over sexualization in our culture is causing this sort of negative feedback. Because instead of it being this sort of sacred thing that you're looking forward to, that you're waiting on, that you're prepared for, instead, it's this thing that you're saturated in, non marriage type of, especially pornography and that sort of thing. You're just saturated in this kind of stuff. And I think it can mess people up. Um, and then the trauma of seeing some of that and experiencing some of that stuff at very young ages is not healthy and not good. I worry that this is just a worry of mine. This is why I'm worried about you asking me this question. I wonder if that environment of hyper sexualized culture, your generation, 23 year old, your generation, is more sexualized than any generation that we've had in recent western culture. For sure. It's crazy, the amount of stuff you guys have seen and gone through, and it's just like nuts. And the sex positivity movement, which is just about as much of an oxymoron as pro choice, um, it doesn't make any sense. At any rate, what would my counsel be to you? Um, as a believer, Jesus said there are about eunuchs is the term. Now, he says there are some who are eunuchs by men's hands, some who made themselves eunuchs, uh, for the kingdom of God.

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Now, that word eunuch, you're thinking that means castration, right? But actually, at the time, there were plenty of people that were eunuchs that were not castrated. But they still use the term to refer to someone who was celibate, someone who is not sexual, that is not inherently wrong. Now, that is against the culture of their time. So the Jews in the first century, they were thinking, you have to be fruitful and multiply that command to Adam and Eve. That applies to all people of all time. We have to keep doing that. So they would have thought that that was wrong, that living single is wrong. You should have kids. Everybody needs to do it. And while the majority of humans do need to do it, jesus was like, yep, some people make themselves eunuchs for the kingdom. And then Paul comes in, in one corinthians seven, and he says, hey, if you can control those desires, he doesn't even say if you're asexual. He just like, hey, if you have control over yourself, meaning you're not overwhelmed, you're not like, man, I'm really going to be in sin if I don't have a good relationship here. Um, he goes, if you're good with that, then seek to serve God with it. In other words, be a eunuch for the kingdom. Now, again, we're not talking about physically mutilating yourself. That would be a bad thing. You're not going to violate your body like that. We're talking about someone who has self control, not who does surgery on themselves. Right? That would be wrong, but somebody who has self control. And they're like, yeah, I'm fine, I'm fine.

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But here's the thing.

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I worry that there's a significant number of young people right now that are influenced by our culture into, like, feeling asexual. But it's because of the toxic sexual nature of our culture. And if they just got away from all of that toxic stuff, and if they got into healthy relationships, that it would stir up something wonderful in them, and they would see the wonder of marriage and the beauty of it, and they would love it, and they would be like, yeah, I went through days, and so I don't want to encourage someone at your age to make some strong decision about this. I would say, first, my counsel to you. My advice to you as a brother would be, first, stay sexually pure.

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Don't engage in any kind of pornographic stuff. Don't engage in any type of disordered stuff outside of marriage stuff. See? Then if your desires for marriage increase, and then maybe that's a sign that, yeah, go for it. And if you do decide to stay single, then do what Paul and Jesus talked about and be single for the kingdom. And not just so you can have tons of personal playtime. Right. But be single for the kingdom. Get involved in your local church. Be the one who's going to be doing the food ministry and going to be serving here and there. And you've got all this extra time so you could study and then teach Bible studies and stuff, and be that much more active, serving the kingdom of God in your local communities, doing online ministry and stuff. Um, do it for the kingdom, and don't just do it for playtime. That would be my counsel to you. As someone who's told by Jesus to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, take it with a grain of salt. Consider getting counsel from others and letting them know how you feel, um, and what you're going through. And, man, I hope that that's some wisdom for you. All right, the last question for today. And again, there's only ten questions now on these Friday q and A's. But I'll do the Fridays every day. Every week, rather once a week. That is, as of this moment, right, as of February. Whatever today is, I am planning to do them every week. But if for some reason this just isn't working out, I might change plans. Maybe. You're watching this video a year from now and you're like, is he still doing weekly Fridays? Just check the YouTube channel. Check the website, biblethinker.org. We try to keep, um, the schedule available there so you guys can see if I have weekly stuff or not. Anyway, ten questions every week from the live chat. I take your guys questions, and this is the last one. Daniel Binkley says, does Mark 1321 to 23 refute present day claims of Jesus physically appearing to people, or is this a misapplication of the text? Grateful for you and your ministry. Thank you, Daniel. I'm grateful for you and your question mark. Uh, 1321 to 23. Does this refute the idea that people would claim I had a physical manifestation of Christ? He came and showed up today.

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And then if anyone says to you, look, here is the Christ, or look, there he is, do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform signs and wonders to lead astray, if possible, the elect. But be on guard. I have told you all things beforehand.

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Okay? Uh, I get the temptation to be like, see, anybody who claims that they've seen Christ, you're wrong. When he comes, everyone will see it. If you keep reading in Mark, right, everyone's going to see. They will see the son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. Everyone's going to see every eye. Everybody's going to see Jesus. So therefore, if you say you see Jesus, you didn't.

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Um, I get that temptation. But I think that that's an over application of Mark. And I think that I can prove that, because Paul in the gospel, uh, after the gospel of Mark, in the book of acts, Paul sees Jesus physically.

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It was a physical appearance of Christ. And as you read the account in acts, and it was real, there was a, uh, look, here is the Christ, but how is it different than what Jesus describes in Mark 13? In Mark 13, Jesus is describing when is the second coming going to take place and what is it going to look like. And he talks about all sorts of signs and all sorts of wonders and things that will happen that are not the second coming. Then he warns us, anybody who tells you, come over to this secret place that Jesus has showed up in relation to the second coming, don't listen to them, because when the second coming happens and it's a global return of Christ, he's returning to the earth. He's not just a vision or showing up for somebody physically like Paul, but he's actually returning for the second coming. Don't listen to him. Everybody's going to know when that happens. Nobody needs a postcard. Nobody needs to check Twitter. Nobody needs to have their friend tell them. And this would have saved so many things. Um, the Jehovah's witnesses teach that Jesus had, like, a sort of secret return, and he came to a secret room. Uh, and that's exactly what they claimed. And mark 13 would refute that. I talked to a Buddhist who, um, he was sort of a Buddhist. He was kind of a new agey guy, and who was going to this channeling place where this guy would channel, and he said he had channeled Jesus, that Jesus showed up. And he was like, I'm a Christian and a Buddhist because I found Jesus's return. He's returned over here. And I was like, uh, how do I go there? And he goes, oh, it's kind of a secret room, and I was supposed to tell you about it. So I read to him this text from mark 13, and I said, does what you're describing sound a lot like what Jesus described? And he goes, yeah, it does. And I said, so Jesus warned us specifically that he wouldn't do that, right? That there's this sort of secret, like, hiddenness to it, this come and gather around my fake version of Jesus. This seems qualitatively different than what Paul experienced when Christ showed up for him. So, in principle, I can be open to Jesus having appeared to somebody. But if that person brings new revelation or that person starts to try to gather, uh, a following after themselves, I'm going to be very suspicious if they start saying, come, look, here is the Christ, and they want me to go visit this Jesus. And it's just some dude, like, there was a guy in Mexico a little while ago who was, like, sleeping with multiple women and claiming that he was the return of Christ and all that. There's always people like this. Anybody who claims they are the return of Christ, that is what this applies to. Um, and it would save us a lot of pain if we listen to that, of course. So, yeah, on, um, that note, am I skeptical of people that claim they saw Jesus? Yes. Paul had some stuff going for him. Paul had his ministry with miracles. Paul had his affirmation by the other apostles. Uh, he goes and meets Peter and them, and they're like, you know what you are called of God? You are called by Jesus to go. So he has the affirmation of the other apostles. It'd be difficult to even get that nowadays. Like, you can't, you just can't get it. There's no way to go, hey, other apostles, do you approve of this person who claims they saw Christ? You just can't have that. And so I'm a little skeptical of people who claim these know, Benny Hinn claims that Jesus sat down with him and they talked. And then these guys that look, these fake people who get up like Benny Hinn and Kenneth Copeland and stuff like that, you guys know they're fake, right? You do know. You know these are not real, are m, these are men who make themselves rich while lying about God and, uh, preaching their prosperity stuff. But what they'll do is they'll have this story of their moment where they m met Jesus, and this makes them a true apostle or true person that can be trusted. And it's like a secret kind of experience. But there's no validation of this when you actually, they can't go to the apostles to get it affirmed. So I could never trust people that way, the way I trust Paul. I couldn't trust a modern person. I don't have that validation possible anymore. Historically speaking, there's no apostles the way the capital a apostles like we have in the New Testament, in my view. Um, but there's other concerns. Um, these people don't teach solid biblical stuff, like, so often. People who are like, oh, I saw Jesus. And then they come out and the things they're teaching are not consistent with the New Testament. They're distortions of the word. They're verses out of context. Paul never did this. Paul, his message, and the twelve, like their message was the same. Their message was the same.

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There was agreement there. They had the same gospel. Uh, Peter even affirms in his writings, he says that what Paul writes is scripture. He calls it scripture, that they have the same gospel message. You don't have this with these other people. So with you, Daniel, I'm probably on the same page as you being like, you tell me Jesus physically appeared to you. I'm like, great. Don't think that makes you some authority to me. Um, and I'm very suspicious of your claims, if that's what you're trying to be. There's no way to validate. And if your teaching is not consistent with scripture, then I'm going to suspect that you're deceptive or deceived or both. All right, y'all, that's about it. So, um, I hope that this has been fruitful and helpful for you. Um, the ten questions thing is a lot better for me personally. Um, I think I can handle ten questions with more focus and clarity and hopefully better answers than if I did ten more. From this point on, I start going faster and shorter answers and I feel like I'm cheaping out on you guys. Um, so that's what we're going to do. I will be back next Friday at 01:00 p.m. Pacific time. That's whatever time it is in California. When it's 01:00 p.m. That's when I'm going to be doing my thing. And I hope you guys can join me for the live stream or catch me after the fact. And that it's a blessing to you, an encouragement to you. And let's pray. Father, we ask that, uh, you give us discernment, Lord. We pray for that balance. We want to have incredible faith and trust in you, in your word.

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We want to have love and compassion and respect for believers and authorities around us in the church and elders and leaders and all that. But we also want to be wisest serpents, not be foolish, um, gullibly getting sucked into people who use your name to enrich themselves and misrepresent the ultimate gospel of Christ and turn grace of God into sin. Permission to sin or turn your promises into, um, money grubbing. We pray for wisdom, Lord, so that we can have that sort of gullible innocence that we need and should have. As innocent as doves and also to be wise as serpents. Help us be truly discerning people who.