Baptism practices, biblical text discrepancies, and ministry prayers come under the spotlight in this episode of The Narrow Path. Steve Gregg responds to intriguing questions about how the words spoken during baptism might affect its meaningfulness, offering clarity for those navigating varied denominational practices. Furthermore, listeners are provided with insights into the textual variations between the King James Version and other modern translations, particularly with regards to contentious passages such as 1 John 5:7. Throughout, personal interactions reveal how faith communities interact and support one another, reflecting on the powerful messages from scriptures. As a routine day of listener
SPEAKER 1 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 04 :
Good afternoon and welcome to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we’re live for an hour each weekday afternoon. We do that so you can call in during the program and we can talk to you if you have questions about the Bible or the Christian faith that you’d like to discuss. Perhaps you have a different viewpoint from the host and would like to discuss that. Feel free. You’re welcome to call in. The number to call is 844-484-5737. Right now I’m looking at two open lines. That’s pretty good. There’s not always that much availability right now. So if you want to call right now, 844-484-5737. I want to remember you, remind you, I should say, that tomorrow night, being the first Wednesday of the month, is the Wednesday night that we have our Zoom meeting once a month. And I mentioned it yesterday, and I said, you know, we usually do a Q&A, but I didn’t remember if I had committed to teach on something. I just confirmed with the man who runs that meeting that I did agree to teach on something. So… In fact, I’m teaching on something I’ve never actually given a talk about, even though I wrote a whole book about it. Isn’t that interesting? And that’s my book, Why Not Full Preterism, where I refute full preterism in favor of partial preterism. Now, if you don’t even know what preterism is, you might not have the slightest interest in that. But many of you are savvy enough to know what those terms mean. And… And I did write a book a couple of years ago pointing out the flaws, I believe, in full preterism. And yet I’ve never given a lecture on it. I just haven’t been in the position to speak on it anywhere. So on the Zoom call tomorrow night, I’ll be giving a talk about that. And since it is a Zoom call, I think I’ll be able to take questions after the talk. with anyone who calls in or, I mean, logs in. So if you’re interested in that, that’s tomorrow night. It’s 7 o’clock Pacific time in the evening. That’s evening here. I don’t know where you live. If you’re on the other side of the world, it may be morning, middle of the night. But tomorrow at 7 p.m. Pacific time. And if you want to know how to log in, it’s quite easy. Just go to our website, thenarrowpath.com. Look under Announcements. You’ll see there the login codes, and you can join us tomorrow night. Love to have you. All right, I’m going to go to the phones now because our lines have many waiting people. And our first caller today is from Mark in Hiawassee, Georgia. I hope I pronounced that correctly.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yes, you did. Hi. Thank you so much for your work. I really value your opinions. and I would really value it, about a certain belief I happen to have now about something in 2 Thessalonians 2. Okay. And that is that this man of sin, son of perdition, man of lawlessness that we read about, he has those names, I guess, depending on the translation. Yeah. That this man is a spiritual man construct, inside all men, not some single man who showed up or will show up in some brick-and-mortar temple somewhere. Anytime I begin to conclude something like that in Scripture, I’ve learned to immediately distrust my own conclusions and begin to ask, does the whole of Scripture support this? And if it doesn’t, I pretty much set it aside or throw it in the garbage can.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, yeah, I mean, do you have an idea of when this happened or will happen or what it looks like when it happens? In 2 Thessalonians chapter 2? No, I mean in history. When is the fulfillment of that? What does the fulfillment look like?
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, it all changed for me. I think it This man is a spiritual man inside every man, in the likeness of the old man, the new man.
SPEAKER 04 :
I heard that, and I think I understand that much. What I don’t understand is what is the event that Paul is anticipating. He said that Christ cannot return until the great falling away takes place and the man of lawlessness is revealed. and that talk about what the man of lawlessness will do when he’s revealed. So is there some point in time that you think this happened or will happen, and what will that look like?
SPEAKER 11 :
Okay, sorry, I misunderstood your question. Well, something to do with that, I discovered in reading that text that the star of the show, I’ll call it, is not this man, whoever and whatever it is. It’s his being revealed. And the revealing of him is the star of the show if we read all that text, not the man himself necessarily and what he does. That struck me first. That’s what led me.
SPEAKER 04 :
I was just wondering what you think the revealing of him will be. How is he revealed and how would that be recognized and so forth?
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, in short, I would think revelation among the saints along the way. at a specific time. That’s one way to say it.
SPEAKER 04 :
So you see it as something future and some massive sinful compromise in the church? Is that what you’re thinking of?
SPEAKER 11 :
I think, yes. I’m glad you brought that up because just before that, one of the things, I see a coupling, an apostasy being installed in the earth and the, this man of sin, son of perdition, man of lawlessness, which is the root of an apostate, which an apostasy is a plurality of apostates, anyway.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay, well, let me just say, I’ve heard something like that suggested before, but I’ve never really gotten a clear picture of what it is, how anyone would know what this is, or what we’re looking for, or when it happens, or even theoretically, I’m not even sure what it would… be conceived to mean for the man of sin, which was sinfulness in every man. Okay, the fact that every man has sinfulness in him is no question. There’s no question about that. It seems to me, though, that that sinfulness has revealed a great deal in history. I mean, in fact, we see some incredible sinfulness revealed in many people’s lives, maybe most people’s lives, so I’m not really sure what difference we’re talking about, about the man of sin someday being revealed and that being something that has to happen before Jesus comes back. Maybe you’re talking about a general total wickedness of all humanity, I don’t know, being revealed. I’ll tell you, I’m not personally inclined to see it that way, though I’m not really sure what way I do see it. I’ve heard… numerous theories about the man of sin. I’ve heard some preterists say they think it refers to somebody who was in Jerusalem during the three and a half year war of the Jews before 70 AD. Perhaps John Gershala, who was a rebel leader who did horrible things and blasphemous things, or maybe one of the Roman governors at the time. Others have thought that it’s a reference to the papacy. This is something that the reformers all believed. The reformers believed that the papacy, the rise of the papacy, came after a falling away. That is a general apostasy of the church, which happened, you know, in the 5th century or so. And some have thought that, that the man of sin simply represents the whole institution of the papacy. Obviously, many people believe the man of sin is a future antichrist who will arise and be a dictator over the whole world. Now, frankly, none of those interpretations is without a problem. But, I mean, if we add to that the theory that you’re suggesting, that the man of sin is a spiritual man of sin in each of us, or something that is somehow revealed, that makes like a fourth theory. To my mind, yeah, I don’t think that, I mean, I’m not the final authority on any such things as this, but I wouldn’t see it that way myself. Okay. But the temple of God, you mentioned that you didn’t think he arises of some brick and mortar temple. I agree with you about that. The term temple of God is a term that Paul uses there in 2 Thessalonians 2 and in two other places only. So the term temple of God is found only three times in Paul’s writings. And he doesn’t tell us what he means by the temple of God in 2 Thessalonians, but he does in 1 Corinthians 2. I think it’s 3.16, I think it is, and 2 Corinthians 6.16, I believe. He refers to the church. He says, do you not know that you are the temple of God? That is, you, the church. The church is the temple of God. And, of course, Paul uses other terms similar to it elsewhere. He talks about the church being a temple, a habitation of God through the Spirit at the end of Ephesians 2. Peter, likewise, says in 1 Peter 2.5, that we are living stones built up into a holy, a spiritual house, which is, he’s talking about a temple. Yeah, so I mean, we’ve got lots of places in the New Testament where the church, that is the body of Christ, the Christian community is likened to and equated with the temple of God, either with those exact terms as Paul uses in 1 and 2 Corinthians, or in equivalent terms elsewhere. So I, you know, I’m inclined to agree with you, it’s not talking about a brick and mortar temple. Paul never refers to the Jewish temple as the temple of God because God didn’t dwell in it. When Jesus walked out of it, which was before Paul even was converted or wrote his letters, when Jesus walked out of the temple, he said, your house has left you desolate. That is, God doesn’t live there anymore. It’s empty. It’s empty now, uninhabited. And it’s not the temple of God anymore. Why? Because the Holy Spirit came upon the body of Christ and formed the body of Christ into the temple of God. And that’s what Paul teaches. And it’s agreeable with what everyone else in the New Testament teaches. So it does seem to me that Paul is describing something that would happen in the church, in the temple. The man of sin sits in the temple of God. Now, this would be agreeable with the reformers’ idea that the papacy was the man of sin. Because the man of sin, you know, the papacy has actually done historically many of the things, if not all the things that Paul said. the man of sin would do and say, blaspheming and persecute the saints and those kinds of things. And it is in the church. It did arise in the church. But again, your theory, I’m going to let you hold it if you want to, but I personally don’t favor it, of the options. I don’t personally favor that one. But you’re certainly welcome to hold it until you find a better, more convincing viewpoint. Thank you, Mark. I appreciate it. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 11 :
I think I was making it sound more mysterious than I should have. It really flies in the face of dispensational thinking. That’s one of the things that came to me also, looking for some man at a brick-and-mortar temple. And I couldn’t imagine Paul at this point in his life having a brick-and-mortar temple in his mind when he said temple of God. And I thought, secondly, real quick, the opposing and exalting themselves I think is a good description of the act of the self-will inside me. So I’m really bringing it home, personalizing it. Well, I really appreciate your input, Steve, and thank you very much.
SPEAKER 04 :
All right, Mark. Thanks for your call. Good talking to you. Okay.
SPEAKER 11 :
Bye-bye. Okay.
SPEAKER 04 :
Bye now. Our next caller is Michael from Denver, Colorado. Michael, welcome.
SPEAKER 01 :
Yeah. Hi, Steve. Thank you for taking my call. It is so good to speak with you again. And I just had a quick question, then I’ll take my answer over the air. So the guy that helped Jesus carry his cross, Simon of Cyrene, I was wondering if, you know, after the day of the crucifixion, is there any kind of information on what ended up happening to him? And also, In the book of Acts, I’ve heard that his children or his sons were possibly mentioned. Do you know anything about that?
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, first of all, his sons are not mentioned in the book of Acts. But in Mark, chapter 15, where the man is mentioned, it says in verse 21, Now they compelled a certain man, Simon a Cyrenian, the father of Alexander and Rufus. as he was coming out of the country, passed by to bear his cross. So it says that this mentions, as I think other Gospels mention this too, but this mentions only… This here alone tells us that Simon was the father of Alexander and Rufus. Now, we have to assume there’d be no reason to mention that about him unless some of the readers were expected to be familiar with Alexander and Rufus. I mean, what’s the point of mentioning if this guy had sons by these names if the readers… had no knowledge of Alexander and Rufus. The point is, I believe that Mark is trying to identify Simon more exactly for the purpose of his readers. Now, Mark almost certainly wrote to readers in Rome. It is believed that Mark wrote that in Rome when he was with Peter there, before Peter was martyred there. And so Rufus and Alexander, the sons of Simon of Cyrene, were very possibly in the church of Rome. And therefore, Mark, in telling the story, mentions them as known people in it. Now, when Paul wrote the epistle to the Romans, in Romans 16 and verse 13, Paul says, Now, we don’t know for sure, but And many scholars believe this Rufus that Paul was greeting. Now, remember, Paul’s writing to the Roman church, and he’s greeting people who are there, people in the Roman church that he knows. He says, greet Rufus. Now, Rufus is not said the son of Simon the Cyrene, but that may be simply because there was one Rufus in the church that everyone knew, and they didn’t have to identify him any further than that. Likewise, in Mark 15, 21, when it says Simon the Cyrenean, It was the father of Alexander and Rufus. No further identification of Alexander and Rufus are given. It’s as if their names are known. As men in the church of Rome, they were familiar to the reader. So, yeah, there’s this man, Simon of Cyrene, who carried Jesus’ cross. Apparently, his sons became part of the church in Rome eventually and were greeted by Paul in Romans and were mentioned by Mark in telling about the story. Now, Simon himself, we don’t know what became of him. The fact that his sons became prominent in the church after their father had carried the cross for Jesus may suggest that their father also had become prominent in the church. Of course, by the time Paul wrote Romans or Mark wrote the book of Mark, the father may have died, being older and many decades having passed before these things were written. But his sons were still known in the church, probably still living in the church. So, Those are ways we can speculate from the data we have. We can’t be 100% sure. But I believe the Bible scholars would mostly follow that train of thought, at least the commentaries I’m aware of would. So, yeah, I think you’re right in that, that this man was known not before he carried Christ’s cross, but afterward was known. And not surprisingly, he played a rather significant role in the story. Okay, Yolanda from Katy, Texas. Hi, Yolanda.
SPEAKER 02 :
How are you, Mr. Steve?
SPEAKER 04 :
Fine. Did you see the video I sent to you and your friend?
SPEAKER 02 :
I did. I was going to tell you I really appreciate that her husband surprised us with that. We appreciate it. It actually brought tears. I was like, it’s so awesome that you took the time to do that. Thank you.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, her husband had written to me and said it was her birthday. He sent me a picture of him and her and of you and your husband.
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, good. Well, hopefully when you get out here in April, we’ll get a chance to see you again. Yeah. I’m looking forward to finding out what your schedule will be. I know Dana’s still scheduling appointments out here, so hopefully we get a chance to connect again.
SPEAKER 04 :
But I think, didn’t we meet at the Church of Christ there in the Texas area, in the Dallas area?
SPEAKER 02 :
We did not make it out to Dallas. When we were here prior to, when Dana was not with you, the one prior to, and I forget where, and it was closer to us, about an hour away. Dallas is about four hours away. Okay. So that’s all we did. That’s what we’ll take.
SPEAKER 04 :
All right. Well, let’s move on to your question. Yeah.
SPEAKER 02 :
My question is this. I was speaking to a young lady who is King James only, and she believes wholeheartedly that all other translations, of course, are corrupt. And I know the message in the Living Bible, not the New, but the Living, are paraphrases. But I’m not sure how to actually address why those, like NIV, ESV, all of those, NASB, are not corrupt. Can you give me a quick synopsis before you go into your break? as to why the other versions are not corrupt?
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, there’s a couple of factors that the King James only people appeal to. One of them is that the King James Version was translated from a set of manuscripts of the New Testament, which we refer to as the Textus Receptus. That’s Latin. It means the received text. And they believe that was the very best uncorrupted version in the Greek. of the New Testament, and the King James is pretty much the only Bible printed today in English that used it. Now, the New King James also did, but the King James and the New King James follow the textus receptus in the New Testament, and modern translations do not. Now, the reason they do not is because after the King James was translated in 1611, way later, in the 1800s, At early 1900s, other manuscripts of the New Testament have been found that are older, much, well, not much, but over a century older than the Textus Receptus. Now, scholars mostly believe, not all of them agree, but most of them believe that these older manuscripts, which would be the Vaticanus, the Sinaiticus, and the Alexandrinus texts, these ones are older than the texts of Receptus and differ from it in some ways. In my mind, they don’t differ from it in very important ways, but they have some differences. So the modern translators have felt like, oh, well, these manuscripts that they didn’t have back when they translated the King James in 1611, they didn’t have these older manuscripts, and now we do. And they say, well, these older manuscripts, obviously being older, are closer to the original. And insofar as mistakes may have been made in the process of copying and so forth, the earlier manuscripts would have fewer such mistakes. And if we find differences between those early manuscripts and the later Textus Receptus, they would say, well, probably the Textus Receptus is the one that had the mistakes made because it deviates from the earlier manuscripts. This is how they reason. And they have other reasoning, too, from it. But the idea is that modern translators usually prefer what’s usually called the Alexandrian text to the text that was used by the King James. Now, the King James only people are kind of fond of the King James. By the way, I’m fond of it, too. But I wouldn’t make any of the arguments they make. I’m not King James only. I’m fond of the King James translation. I think that they just don’t like change. There are some people who really don’t like any change in their religious life. And they grew up with the King James, just like I did. And they don’t like reading a version that leaves a word out that was in the King James, or there’s a verse different here or there. And so I think they see it as a sinister thing. In many cases, they say that the Alexandrian text, which the modern translations have used, It was put together by Gnostics or heretics of some kind who were trying to remove from the Bible certain doctrines about Christ. So they’ll say, well, some of these passages in the Textus Receptus, which was used by our King James, it mentions the Lord Jesus Christ. And in the Alexandrian text, in the same verse, it might say simply Jesus Christ. or the Lord Jesus, or something like that. So, in some cases, the word Lord, or the word Christ, might be not found in a verse in the Alexandrian text, where it is found in the text as Receptus. And they say, there you go, somebody’s trying to remove the idea of Jesus being Lord, or the idea of Jesus being Christ, for example. Now, this is, I mean, I don’t mean to be… insulting, but it’s a silly statement. Because though it is true, there are verses in the Alexandrian text where the word Lord or the word Christ are not found, although the same verse has those words in the text of Receptus. Nonetheless, hundreds of times there are the word Christ and the word Lord is used about Jesus in the Alexandrian text too. Nobody went through there and removed the word Lord and Christ systematically to eliminate that doctrine. It’s a copying error. Either someone copied it wrong in the earlier manuscript or in the later one. But it’s not sinister. There’s no doctrine of the Christian faith that you can teach from the King James Version that you can’t also find in the Alexandrian text. That is, there are words here and there different. But all the doctrines of Christianity are the same in either one. So the King James only people just don’t seem to know much about that whole situation. And they’ve heard, you know, teachers that are kind of cult leaders. In fact, I just got a letter of apology from someone who had posted a bunch of junk on our Facebook page. And he said he had been under the King James only cult under Peter Ruckman. Peter Ruckman is kind of the guy who kind of started this King James only thing. And they have all kinds of silly arguments like that. But the other problem they have is that the King James does try to translate from the text it uses more or less word for word accurate. And many modern translations don’t. The NIV… The New Living Translation, certainly the Message and Passion Translations, which I don’t like at all, a lot of these do not aim at a word-for-word translation. They’re more of a paraphrase. Some of them follow more closely than others, the text, but they still do not go for word-for-word translation. And this is another complaint they have. I have that complaint, too, but I think there’s room for both kinds of translations. I think a word-for-word translation is the most valuable kind, but I think that having more paraphrastic translations can expand your thinking, too, as long as you’re not using them for study. I mean, if you use them just for devotional reading or something, a paraphrase like the New Living Translation or the NIV or some of these others, they might kind of make you see a verse through another kind of angle. And so I don’t think it’s altogether wrong. But the King James is one of the translations that is more word for word. But the main thing that King James only people want is one that uses the textus receptus. And they don’t seem to realize that the Textus Receptus is not a manuscript. It is a manufactured text by Desiris Erasmus, who just kind of put together the best reading, he thought, from a bunch of manuscripts that were available to him. He was not inspired. He’s just another guy, another Catholic scholar. Hey, I’m out of time, but the view is not very good. I actually recommend James White’s book, the King James only controversy. He wrote a very good book about that. We need to take a break at this point. You’re listening to The Narrow Path. We have another half hour coming, so don’t go away. Our website is thenarrowpath.com. I’ll be back in 30 seconds.
SPEAKER 05 :
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SPEAKER 04 :
Welcome back to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we’re live for another half hour. Taking your calls if you have questions about the Bible or the Christian faith or an alternate view from the host you’d like to talk about. The number is 844- 844-484-5737. We have two lines open right now. And so if you call right now, you can get through and probably get on the show today. The number 844-484-5737. All right. We’re going to talk next to Ann from Syracuse, Utah. Hi, Ann. Welcome.
SPEAKER 07 :
Thank you. My question is, How can we, as people that appreciate what you do, how can we pray for you in your ministry?
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I have got all the same needs anyone else has, to tell you the truth. I mean, I appreciate people praying for us. Many people write and say they’re praying for us, and I’m very glad because I actually feel very blessed, and I feel like the Lord’s been good to us. I have to assume it’s partly because of people’s prayers. But… I don’t personally have outstanding, special needs that come to my mind. We say, well, how can I pray for you? Pray for my holiness. Pray for my health, I suppose. I’ve been in good health. And for the health of my family. And I will say this. I have some children, some of my children, who are not following the Lord. Of course, that weighs heavily on me. So you could certainly be praying for that.
SPEAKER 07 :
Thank you very much. I also have children, same situation, that have went far from the Lord, and so I understand that very well. Thank you.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I appreciate your concern. Is that it today?
SPEAKER 07 :
That’s it.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay. Well, thank you very much. God bless you.
SPEAKER 07 :
Thank you for all you do.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 07 :
Bye.
SPEAKER 04 :
All right. God bless you. Bye now. Okay. Cody in Baytown, Texas. Welcome to The Narrow Path. Hi, good afternoon, Steve.
SPEAKER 10 :
Good to speak with you.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 10 :
Hey, my question was regarding, first of all, I’m not at all a prosperity. I don’t hold to that. You know, I remember reading, when I first started reading the Bible on my own for the first time, and where Paul writes in 2 Timothy 4.20, you know, he writes how they ventured on, and he said, I left Trophimus sick and my leaders. And I thought, well, surely, you know, surely if God just, You know, these guys were the ones doing the preaching and the healing, and if it was just name it and claim it, you know, he wouldn’t have left him sick.
SPEAKER 04 :
It certainly sounds like a negative confession, doesn’t it?
SPEAKER 10 :
Right, yeah, exactly. But anyway, so that always let me know. But I was reading in the Gospels, and several ones, Mark 10, 29 through 30, and then also in Luke 18, 29 through 30, you have this portion where Jesus says, truly, I tell you, no one who has left home or brothers, sisters, mother, father, children, or fields for my sake and for the gospel who will fail to receive a hundredfold old or a hundredfold. And he says in this present age and in the age to come eternal life. And the fact that it, you know, it specifies that you’re not, I wanted to ask you, would that, would that have been, Because he’s speaking in terms of discipleship and the cost of what it would take following him and, you know, how we would have to give up those things. Do you think what he’s referring to is the family? Like, of course, they won’t possess these houses, but how they, you know, and you’ll have brothers and sisters who are in Christ. Is that what he was talking about?
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s absolutely what I think he means. Yes. You know, Matthew also has the passage in Matthew 19. But in Matthew and Mark, he says you’ll receive a hundredfold. And people have used that as sort of a promise you can make. Well, you want to get $100? Put a dollar in the offering and you’ll get $100 back. You want $1,000? Put $10 in the offering. You get a hundredfold back. But Luke, in his parallel, has Jesus saying you’ll receive many times as much, not a hundredfold. And obviously a hundredfold is just a figure of speech, meaning a lot more. You’ll get a lot more in this life than what you give up. Now, notice Jesus said this when Peter, well, this is after the rich young ruler died. refused to become a disciple when jesus said sell what you have and give to the poor and come and follow me and the man left and didn’t do it and jesus was musing over this the tragedy of this man and how hard it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom and peter said well lord we we have left everything what shall we have and so it’s very possible to see his answer as being in answer to what peter said what shall they have those who have left everything those who have abandoned everything are they out you know are they are they going to come out uh losers for this? He says, no. If you’ve left houses, lands, these are major sacrifices. He’s not talking about put a dollar in the plate and you’ll get a hundred back. He’s saying, if you’ve left your home, if you’ve left your job, if you’ve left your family, if you’ve basically sacrificed everything to be my followers, don’t worry. You’re not going to be the poorer for it. You’ll be much better off than if you had not. You’ll receive much more. as a follower of mine. Now, of course, he said in this life and in the next life, eternal life after this. Now, what about this life? How did the apostles who had forsaken everything receive much more than what they lost or what they gave up in this life? Well, I think you’re right. They had a lot more brothers and sisters in the Christian church than they ever had in their nuclear family that they left behind. They had many more homes open to them. Everywhere they went, where there were churches, they’d be welcomed into the homes of people. They had a huge family, hundreds of homes around the world. And frankly, I mean, you don’t have to be an apostle for this to be true, although I think it primarily had to do with them as apostles, or at least as preachers who’d forsaken everything to follow him. But, I mean, one thing I’ve appreciated all my life as a minister is that I can go all over the world, and there’s people who offer me a room to stay in. I mean, not permanently, but, you know, for overnight or whatever. You have a family, a global family, and it’s like you’ve got a lot more. brothers and sisters and homes and such, then you could have given up. And so I think that’s what he is saying to them. He’s saying, don’t think that you’ve made some kind of a sacrifice and God’s now indebted to you some way because you’ve missed out on something for him. But you’re going to get a lot more. What God gives you back in terms of your lifetime will be a lot more than what you’ve given up. And that’s true even of money, probably. I mean, if you serve God for a long time, over time, God provides for you. If you add up all that he provides for you over a career of ministry, it’s going to be, you know, it’s a lot more than you probably had when you left everything behind to follow him. So I think what he’s simply saying is, you know, me telling the rich young ruler to give up everything and follow me might seem kind of harsh. In fact, you who have left everything to follow me, you might feel like you’ve, kind of made a big sacrifice. But don’t whine about it. You’re actually going to be better off altogether in this life and the next because of that sacrifice. I think that’s what he’s saying.
SPEAKER 10 :
Right, exactly. All right, that makes perfect sense.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thanks, Steve. All right, Cody. God bless you, man. Good talking to you. Chris in New Haven, Connecticut. Welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 09 :
Thanks, Steve. Can you hear me okay?
SPEAKER 04 :
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER 09 :
Okay, thanks for taking my call. The reason for my call was I actually wanted to respond to the gentleman earlier that was talking about the man of sin, the man of lawlessness. All right. So it’s more of comments than a question, if I may. Personally, I do believe that the man of lawlessness or the man of sin is actually going to be a real man, a physical man that is going to appear on the earth. But I also wanted to mention that we see a lot of pictures and paintings of Jesus, and most of the paintings we see of him are, you know, he’s this good-looking guy with long hair and so forth, and we see in Scripture that it doesn’t appear that Jesus was actually good-looking, quite the opposite. You have no form or comeliness, and when we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire. So it seems to be that Jesus was not really a good-looking guy. So the reason I’m going there is because that, I believe, those pictures are actually a picture of the Antichrist, These are my thoughts. Some people can disagree, and that’s fine. And those are the reasons I say that, because those contradict Scripture completely, including the Shroud of Turin. Now, as far as… Well, let me stop here.
SPEAKER 04 :
Let me stop here. Couldn’t we simply say that the pictures are inaccurate without saying that they are pictures of the Antichrist? Are you saying that… that the Renaissance painters and so forth, that they were somehow inspired by the devil to paint the Antichrist? Or couldn’t we just say they used their imagination and did the best they could, and we probably can’t trust the accuracy?
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, yeah, I mean, and that’s a fair thought. Like I said, I mean, people could, you know, and you can disagree with me. The reason I say that is, and yeah, they could be inaccurate, but… you know, Satan himself could appear as an angel of light, very good looking. And again, it is contrary to scripture and even modern pictures show that. So, I mean, you know, that’s my thought. Okay. But so, yeah, I mean, you know, they said we could have a dialogue about it, but I wouldn’t think it.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah. I wouldn’t think it very important, but go ahead.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, sure. That’s fine. That’s okay. Now you mentioned, what is the event? that will precipitate this revealing, so to speak. Now, this might be a little out there for some people, I understand, but when the Antichrist is revealed, Satan is going to have to explain away in some shape or form the catching up of the church, the rapture, as people call it. And I believe what’s going to happen is, and again, these are just my thoughts, but I think what’s going to happen is… there’s going to be this massive UFOs or whatever people want to call them, and they’re going to appear, and because the world’s going to have to explain what this agenda is, otherwise I don’t know where they’re going with that agenda because it’s legitimate. It’s been happening to people. I believe it’s demonic. But they’re going to have to explain that away. So what could happen is the Antichrist, will appear in the sky, just as Jesus did, and save everybody from this. So it’s going to be a good cop, bad cop situation. And he’ll appear, just like in the pictures, and people will accept him because he’s, oh, that’s Jesus. We’ve seen so many pictures of him. That’s him, that’s him. And they’ll worship him because they’ll think that’s him.
SPEAKER 04 :
Let me just say this. Would you be willing to admit… that about 99.999% of what you just said is speculation?
SPEAKER 09 :
Fair enough.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay. Can you then tell me what value there is in that kind of speculation?
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, I see where you’re going. The value is, I guess we have to be discerning. There’s a value in discernment and being on our guard to not being deceived. And this is, you know, that’s where I’m going with it.
SPEAKER 04 :
I’ll tell you where I part company from you on this particular thing is that I don’t believe, as you do, I don’t believe there’s a pre-tribulation rapture. So I don’t think Christians are going to disappear and then everyone’s going to wonder where they went and someone’s going to have to explain it and they’ll think it was UFOs and then Antichrist will appear in the sky. I think much of your theory depends on the confusion and so forth that would come as a result of the Christians disappearing in the rapture. Now, I believe in the rapture. All Christians always have, basically. I mean, the Bible has taught it, and all theologians have always believed there’s a rapture. But many people think that the word rapture refers to taking Christians out of the world seven years before Jesus actually comes back to earth. That’s called the pre-tribulation rapture. That view has not been taught in the church throughout most of history. That’s a rather new view in history. But I believe the Bible teaches that the rapture or the taking up of the saints, both the living and the dead saints, will occur when Jesus returns, not seven years before, not three and a half years before, not 11 weeks before, no period before. The Bible says Jesus said that he will raise up his people on the last day. But that’s also the same day he said that he’s going to judge the world. He said in John 12, 48, I guess it is, he said that he’s going to judge those who reject him. on the last day. And he also said in John 6, four different times, that he’s going to raise his people up on the last day. So I believe the raising up of the people of God and the rapture is on the last day. And so it’s not seven years before the last day or three and a half years before, as some people suggest. So there’s quite a few different views on that. And I can see how Those who believe in a pre-tribulation rapture would begin to speculate, well, this is going to be strange when, you know, maybe a quarter of the world’s population or maybe a fifth just disappear. It’s going to be very noticeable. How are people going to explain this? And I’ve heard for about 50 or more years, people suggest, well, they’re going to say UFOs took them away, blah, blah, blah. So, I mean, the theory is an old one, not ancient, but I’ve heard it since I was a teenager. I’ll put it that way. I’m 72 now. So it’s been around a long time. But, you know, if I believed in a pre-trib rapture, then I would think maybe some of those speculations may come close to what will happen. On the other hand, whether there’s a pre-trib rapture or not, I can’t imagine how any of those speculations would be of value to me to know. You know, there are so many things I don’t know that would be of value for me to know. And so I just don’t get interested very much in speculations about things that, whether they’re right or wrong, it would make no difference to me or to anyone else I know. So I don’t get into that. But you’ve shared your thoughts on it. It’s very clear you’ve given some thought to the scriptures and to your theology. Good thing to do. But we all need to keep learning. I appreciate what you shared there. Thank you, brother. Let’s talk to Elizabeth from Dublin, Texas. Hi, Elizabeth. Welcome.
SPEAKER 06 :
Hi. I just have a quick question, and I’ll take it off the air.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 06 :
What are the proper words to use when someone is being baptized? I keep hearing different things.
SPEAKER 04 :
You mean, do you say in the name… Okay, okay, gotcha. I understand.
SPEAKER 06 :
Go on.
SPEAKER 04 :
You’re wondering whether they should say in the name of Jesus or in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit?
SPEAKER 06 :
Yes, correct.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, okay. All right, I’ll address that. Thank you for asking. Thank you. Jesus said in Matthew 28, 20 or 21, he said, baptize in the name of the Father… and of the Son and the Holy Spirit. But in the book of Acts, we read of people being baptized in the name of Jesus, or in the name of the Lord Jesus, or in the name of Jesus Christ. In other words, the same meaning but different words. It’s very clear that it’s not the exact words that are used that are important. It’s the person. Who are you being baptized into? Paul said in 1 Corinthians 10 that when the Israelites came through the Red Sea, they were baptized into Moses, which means they were identifying with Moses as their leader. They’re going where he’s going. You know, he’s going to be the one directing them from now on. They left Egypt, where they were under Pharaoh’s leadership, crossed the sea in order to be under Moses’ leadership. And Paul says they were baptized into Moses. Now, we’ve been baptized into Jesus. That’s what the Bible says. So, you know, if we say I baptize you into Jesus or into Jesus Christ or into the Lord Jesus Christ or into the Messiah, the Lamb of God, or into the Alpha and the Omega, I mean, we’re talking about the same person here all the time. So I think it’s simplest just to say in the name of Jesus. But as long as, and it’s not the words, it’s the reality. It’s not what formal words are spoken. The question is, Are we acknowledging that this person is being baptized into Jesus? If so, then the person doing the baptize can mention Jesus by any legitimate name for him. Now, what about the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit? Now, not all would see this as I do, but I believe that the name singular… of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is a reference to the name of Jesus. It says in Colossians chapter 2 that in him dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. That in Jesus dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And by the Godhead, I would take that to be the triune God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We’re all manifested in Christ. And so Christ is the name by which we came to know the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. When the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit lived among us in a person, that person was Jesus. So the name singular of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, I think, is the name of Jesus. Now, one reason I think that has to be the case is, although I could imagine people making other explanations of this. But the reason I feel compelled is because the apostles baptized numerous people in the book of Acts, and we never read of them saying, I baptize in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. But they always say, I baptize in the name of Jesus or something equivalent to that. So they must have believed. that in obedience to Christ, their baptizing in the name of Jesus was in fact baptizing in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Because Christ told them to do that, and they certainly wouldn’t have been disobedient. And so that’s what I think. It doesn’t really matter which formula is used. Some pastors I’ve known who just want to play it safe because there are people who are legalistic about what is said or is not said during a baptism. Some pastors say, I just baptized you in the name of the Father and of the Son, Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit. And that seems to cover all the bases. And I can’t imagine how it would offend anybody, least of all God. All right. Let’s talk to Alex from Sacramento, California. Hi, Alex.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hello, Steve. Let me take you off speakerphone. Okay. Good idea. Hello. Hi, Steve. Hey, I’ve been listening to you for a few years and learned so much. So let me make this quick. We have a little bit of time. For months now, I’ve had these three questions written down on my bulletin board. You may not be able to take them all, but here’s one. Something that I’ve been wondering about for years, and it just occurred to me. I’m wondering what it says in the Greek Bible as far as the Lord’s Prayer goes. Okay, what’s the question? Let’s see. The question is, in my King James, the NIV, they removed the second half of verse 13. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s because the Texas Receptus has it and the Alexandrian text does not.
SPEAKER 08 :
What does that mean?
SPEAKER 04 :
That means for the King James… Well, both are Greek, but they’re different sets of Greek manuscripts. King James was translated from this Texas Receptus, which has those words in it. Modern translations use some earlier manuscripts that have been found since that time. The King James translators didn’t have them because they translated back in 1611, but other manuscripts have been found since then. Okay. Modern translations follow what’s called the Alexandrian text on that and does not possess those words.
SPEAKER 08 :
It just seems like that’s the last thing anybody wants to take out of the Bible. To me, that’s kind of like the most important thing we should know out of the Bible.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, well, nobody is taking it out of the Bible. No one is taking it out of the Bible. Each translation translates what they find in the Greek text that they’re using. But there are two Greek manuscripts, and some have it and some don’t. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay, okay. Let’s see, another thing. It’s the same thing. On your show a while ago, somebody, 1 John 5, 7, my Bible says it.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, King James has it. The others don’t. That’s similar.
SPEAKER 08 :
So it’s the same thing?
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah. The truth is that 1 John 5, 7, there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit. These three agree in one. That is not found in any ancient Greek manuscript at all. It’s a funny thing. The modern translations don’t have it, but they’ll mention it in a footnote because people are used to seeing it in the King James. The King James Version is translated from a manuscript called the Textus Receptus. That manuscript was put together by a man named Erasmus, who was using whatever Greek manuscripts were available in his day, which was the early 1500s, and putting together what was called an eclectic text from the existing Greek manuscripts. And he couldn’t find that verse in any of the manuscripts, although it was found in the Latin Vulgate, which had been around for a long time. Now, the Catholic Church was commissioning Erasmus, and when he came up with his first version of the Greek text, he didn’t have that verse in it. But it was in the Latin, so the Catholic Church said, why didn’t you put that verse in your Greek manuscripts? I can’t find it.
SPEAKER 08 :
How far are you going back? When was it put into the Bible? I’m telling you.
SPEAKER 04 :
I’m telling you right now. This is in the 1500s. The Catholic Church said to Erasmus, why didn’t you include that verse? He said, because I don’t know of any Greek manuscripts that contain it. But if you supply me with one, I’ll put it in there. So they came up with one, all of a sudden, out of nowhere. They obviously wanted that verse in there. Now, he included it, true to his word, he included it in the Texas Receptus, but it put in a footnote saying he doubted that it was authentic. But it’s been in the King James, and any Bible that uses the Texas Receptus has that verse in there. But even Erasmus, who put together the Texas Receptus, said he had serious doubts about its authenticity. Modern translators, generally speaking, don’t have any doubts at all. They don’t believe it’s authentic. So that’s why it’s not in the modern translations.
SPEAKER 08 :
The older, wherever they got the statement out of the older manuscripts, those, in my mind, are the, it’s just like the church until the 4th century. You know, they were the real Christians and everything changed, like you’ve been saying all this time. But the older something is, if it came from the apostles, I think we can, let’s see.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, we accept anything that came from the apostles. The question is, The apostles’ writings have been copied for us through the ages, and so we have manuscripts. We don’t have their handwritten copies. We have copies of copies of copies. Fortunately, those copies have not been changed much because we can compare the copies that were made in the 4th century with later copies from, say, the 7th or 8th century, and they’re almost exactly alike. I mean, there are some differences, but there are no significant differences. I mean, it’d be amazing. It’d be miraculous if there were no differences.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay. By the way, August, it’s… Very quickly, very quickly, I’m done.
SPEAKER 04 :
Hey, brother, I’m done in one minute. Give me your question quickly.
SPEAKER 08 :
August 25th, 2023, your talk you had with Max, your explanation on the world’s religions, is the best. Jesus checked off all the boxes. He had eyewitnesses. And the way you explained that was amazing. You know, everyone just believed what the other guy said. But that was great. And here’s the last thing, real quick. For God so loved the world, it says the world. Doesn’t the word imply one? If it said for God so loved this world.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, the world is used lots of different ways in scripture. I believe that means the whole population of the world. Other times it can mean this world as opposed to other planets. Other times it means something else. But I’m out of time. I wish we could have gone faster on that. We’re out of time. I’m done in five seconds. Our website is thenarrowpath.com. Thanks for joining us.
