In this compelling episode, Steve Gregg delves into the history of church structures and challenges listeners to reconsider traditional leadership models compared to those depicted in the early church. Through engaging conversations with callers, this episode also explores personal faith journeys, addressing how believers today can better understand and fulfill their roles within the community of faith.
SPEAKER 1 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 02 :
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 so that you can call in and we can talk in real time about the questions you may have about the Bible, about the Christian faith. Perhaps not just questions, maybe you have problems with it. Maybe you’ve got objections to it. I’d be glad to talk to you. Just feel free to call me in. Call in to me here, and I will be glad to talk to you about that. If you disagree with the host about anything, you’re welcome to call. But if you’re simply wondering how to understand a difficult passage or how to harmonize two seemingly discrepant passages or anything like that, feel free to give me a call. Once in a while, I get an email from someone who says, you know, I had a question, but I didn’t want to call in because I didn’t want to stumble any people who are weak in faith with my questions. Well, the truth is, if you have a question, it’s very possible that those who are weak in faith have that question, too. And it’s to their advantage for you to ask it so we can talk about it and get an answer for them and for you. So please feel free to call in with any question, any objection you may have. It looks right now that our lines have filled up, but they do open up throughout the hour, so let me give you the number. In a few minutes, if you call in, you may find a line open. The number is 844-
SPEAKER 1 :
484-5737.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s 844- 877-484-5737 if you’d like to be on the program today. One announcement I’d like to make, there are a number of you listening who have for many years been attending our Boyna Park once a month, third Saturday of the month meetings where we’ve gone through a number of things over the past, I don’t know, it seems like it’s been maybe almost ten years. I’m not sure how long we’ve been doing it. we’ve kind of gotten, reached the end of that. And the last time I spoke there, I said, you know, I don’t know if we’re going to do this anymore. Well, since that time, and I’ve been announcing this so you may have already heard me make the correction, we are going to have two more meetings in Point of Park. They won’t be two months in a row, though, because I’m traveling. And this is one of the problems with me doing these meetings regularly is I do travel a lot and I’m not always available. But this Saturday, this Saturday, the 19th of July, We will be having one of these meetings, as we have for years, and I’m going to be doing an overview of the book of Revelation. Now, if you haven’t attended any of these meetings, or if you haven’t for a while, if you’ve ever thought about attending these meetings, you may be interested in this one. Because, you know, obviously many of you know my view of Revelation is somewhat different than what many people have thought. And while I’ve never seen anybody as obligated to see it my way, I think everyone ought to be curious. to hear more than one way, especially about something about which there are so many different opinions. Anyway, this Saturday night, 6 o’clock in Boynton Park, I will be doing the overview of the Book of Revelation. Now, two months later, on September 20th, will be our last meeting in that location, and I will be doing an overview of the whole Bible. in a single lecture. So that’s helpful. It’s helpful for people to see the whole Bible in one pass. It’s like, you know, so we talk about theology and we talk about particular passages and we talk about controversies and A lot of times we’re looking at the bark of the trees, but we have not seen the whole forest yet. And it’s helpful to actually see the whole forest in a glance. So we will go through the whole Bible, and I’ll give an overview of it. Not this week, but two months from now. So this Saturday is an overview of Revelation. Two months from this Saturday will be overview of the whole Bible. So that’s out there. Let your friends know. Come, and we’ll be glad to see you there on those dates. Okay. We’re going to go to the phones now and talk to Jeff in Tyler, Texas. Hi, Jeff. Welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling. Hi, Steve.
SPEAKER 06 :
It’s good to talk to you. I spent most of my childhood in a little town, not so little anymore, but called Corona, California, which you will probably be driving through as you go from Temecula down to Buena Park this Saturday. I managed to get to a church in Riverside at the time called Calvary Chapel of Riverside, which was up and growing with a preacher called uh greg laurie who has since become obviously world famous right and uh at times a bunch of us would travel down to what we called big calvary and attend one of the saturday night concerts and i remember looking at your bio online and i saw the picture of you when you were much younger and i looked and i thought i’ve seen that gentleman somewhere before so maybe you were doing a teaching on a saturday night when me and my friends were down there
SPEAKER 02 :
Not at Big Calvary. Not at Big Calvary. I was only 16 then, and I didn’t teach at the big church. I did teach throughout Orange County at home, Bible studies and things like that during that period of time. And I did attend Calvary, Costa Mesa, during those times. We were talking about 1970 to 1974. And I knew Greg Laurie. I never was close to him, but I knew Lonnie Frisbee and Chuck Smith better than I knew Greg. Greg was my age, so there were thousands of us in the church, and he wasn’t that noticeable in those years. But, yeah, the Bible study he took over in Riverside actually was started by Lonnie Frisbee. And later, when Lonnie left the area, Chuck Smith, Jr. ran it for a while, and then Greg took it over, and it became big. Anyway, it’s great to reminisce about those days. So what are we calling that today?
SPEAKER 06 :
I love Greg Laurie, but I’m glad that fortunately through your teaching I’ve been delivered from dispensationalism. But my question to you, I sent an email and got a response back from Dana saying that you were pretty busy and the best opportunity to get it answered would be to call in. I’ve been going through your teachings on Ezekiel and recall you mentioning someone who compared Ezekiel with Revelation. And I also remember a similar comment from your Revelation study specifically that this person believed Revelation is the Ezekiel of the New Testament. And my question is, do you happen to remember who this person was and where their study was published? And is it available online or perhaps on Amazon? Did you ever follow through on that?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I don’t even remember that being the case, that I named anyone who did that. All the people I know who are responsible students of Ezekiel and of Revelation recognize that tons of the material in Ezekiel is alluded to and reused in the book of Revelation. Ezekiel is one of the books of the Old Testament that the book of Revelation repeats the most. Zechariah is another one. And I think Ezekiel and Zechariah are very similar to each other. They are maybe we could say the closest to apocalyptic books in the Old Testament besides Daniel. Daniel, obviously, is also in those respects. Now, I don’t know anybody who has said that Ezekiel is the Old Testament version of Revelation. All I can say is that. Daniel and Ezekiel and Zechariah are all Old Testament books that Revelation draws imagery from extensively. There are other Old Testament books, too. I mean, Joel and many others, and even Exodus. Tons of stuff from Exodus in the book of Revelation. So you’ve got… You know, you’ve got a recycling of a lot of the images of the Old Testament books in Revelation. And Ezekiel definitely is very much like it. I have no problem saying that Ezekiel comes very close to being an Old Testament counterpart of Revelation because both of them, I believe, are about the destruction of Jerusalem. Ezekiel obviously is about the destruction of Jerusalem in 586. And then Revelation, I believe, is about the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. The two events were the only two times in history that Jerusalem was destroyed. And both of them are extremely similar to each other in significance and in detail. Anyway, I’m sorry, I don’t remember who it might have been. If I did say that, if I did say some writer I knew said that Ezekiel was the Old Testament version of Revelation, you have to remember when I was writing my book on Revelation, I read 50 commentaries. And so it’s possible I did run across somebody who said that.
SPEAKER 06 :
What I specifically remember was not that you named a person. And that’s why I was wondering whether you ever followed up. You said you had just read something. and you did not name a specific author, and you said you hadn’t been able to follow up on it, but you had been, at the time, it had caught your attention that he was saying that Ezekiel was the… Do you recall how long ago this was? Well, this is on your recordings about the teachings on Revelation and on Ezekiel that I downloaded from your website. Okay.
SPEAKER 02 :
My teachings on Ezekiel were recorded in the 90s, which means they’re 30 years old. I need to redo those, by the way. My teachings on Revelation, I’m not sure what year those are from, since I taught it every year and recorded it every year. I don’t know which year those are from. But, yeah, the statement that I made, if I made that statement, I’ll trust you on that, must have been made over 25 years ago, and I can’t remember who I would be alluding to at that time.
SPEAKER 06 :
I’m sorry to say that. Yes, that’s okay. I realize the recordings are old, and that’s part of why I was calling, because I thought whoever that person, the author was, I’d like to check out whatever he wrote. Yeah. But it’s… Anyway, I’ll let you go, but I appreciate having the opportunity to talk with you.
SPEAKER 02 :
All right, Jeff. Thanks for reminiscing about the old days.
SPEAKER 06 :
All right. Take care.
SPEAKER 02 :
God bless. Bye now. Okay. Rich, who is driving through California. Rich, welcome to the Neuropath. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. Hi, Steve. My wife is driving us home to Huntington Beach. Can you hear me okay? You’re on speaker.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, good and loud.
SPEAKER 05 :
Okay, great. My question is regarding missions and financing, mission trips and the ministry. I know your pattern is to give it away and trust the Lord. I’m a construction missionary of sorts. We do a lot of stuff in Mexico and a lot of different places in the world. We remodel churches and stuff. But the main thing I’m calling about is we do an evangelistic soccer tournament in Mexico, and it’s called Copa Jesus, the Jesus Cup, like the World Cup. And I’m going, actually, in a couple days to Monterey for the fifth one. And, you know, pretty much I don’t get a lot of support from my church. People donate money occasionally, but I feel I don’t like asking for donations. But, you know, how do you feel about asking for donations and, you know, making it known? I know Paul was a tent maker. He provided all his own, you know, financing. Right. The Lord always seems to provide, but… As this thing grows, we’re actually going to do a very large tournament in Peru in October in the Amazon. So it’s getting a little more expensive.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, well, let me jump in here. Well, let me say this. The attitude of the early church, as we read about it in the Dedicae, which was a major book in the first century church about their attitudes about things, was that if a minister comes and asks for money, he’s a false prophet. But then it says, if he’s asking for money, not for himself, but for the benefit of others, he’s not a false prophet. Now, it seems to me that if you are doing something for God, and by the way, thank you for your service in the mission field, but if you’re doing something that’s not for you, and it sounds like that would be the case here, you’re doing this as an outreach for others’ sake, then I don’t know that it would be the same as asking for yourself, even though you’re asking for probably your plane fare and your upkeep and things like that. But those are all entirely, I assume, to help you reach out to others. It’s like I don’t mind asking people – well, I don’t ask people, but I let people know that the narrow path is listener-supported. I don’t mind letting them know that. Right. However, I don’t get anything from it. I don’t get anything from the narrow path. This all goes to pay for radio time so that people can hear it. So anything I say about, hey, we’re listener-supported, is so that we can continue to reach people, and there’s nobody at this end who’s paid anything. It’s strictly voluntary. And the same with your expenses. If you’re just saying my expenses for making this mission trip are thus and so, and you ask people if they would consider contributing to it, I don’t see that as a bad thing. Now, I typically do not want to ever ask for money for myself for a missionary endeavor, not because it wouldn’t be a worthwhile thing for people to contribute to, but Just because, I don’t know, there’s just so many people asking for money for stuff. And I figured, well, if God wants me to go, he will provide for me without my asking. And obviously, that’s my own personal philosophy. Obviously, I got that from people like George Mueller and Jesus. I don’t think Jesus ever asked for money, you know, but his father provided. But, you know, I don’t believe that the Bible says you have to do it that way. I don’t think the Bible says that you have to not ask. I just prefer not to ask. It’s awkward to do so. It may raise questions about your motives for asking and things like that. I just avoid all that and say, if God wants me to go, he will provide for me whether I ask anyone or not. Now, I don’t know that you would want to do that or would have to do that. I don’t think anyone has to do it that way. That’s just the way I always do it. And I can testify this. I’ve been doing that for 54 years in my ministry. I’ve traveled all over the world, and I travel extensively every year, and I’ve never had to ask for money. I’ve never even had to ask people to pay my expenses. My travel expenses, God provides. People do, by the way, people do provide for those things. But I don’t ever ask for it. I never require it or even request it. So, I mean, because God, I figure if God’s behind it, it’s his problem to finance it, not mine. And so that’s one good way to know whether God wants you to go or not. Now, but if you want to, if you have Christian friends and you want them to know, like, this is going to, I’m going to go do such and such a thing and it’s going to cost me such and such amount. And just let them know that and just say, you know, I don’t quite have enough money for it myself, so anyone who’s interested in helping, I’d be glad for it. You know, to tell people that certainly is nothing immoral or unethical about doing that. I wouldn’t discourage it. although I would strongly encourage you, considering just praying and seeing if God would do something unusual to provide the finances. But I’m not going to say to be spiritual you have to do it that way. I’m just going to say there’s different ways to do it. Yeah, there’s just different ways that people choose. I choose one way. Some people choose different ways. There are ministries, obviously, that send out all kinds of fundraising mail and things like that. I don’t even have a mailing list for that. Yeah, so…
SPEAKER 05 :
I like your model. I like your model. I’ll stick with that. Thank you, brother.
SPEAKER 02 :
All right, brother. Thank you for calling.
SPEAKER 05 :
God bless you. And your ministry is very provocative to me. Thank you.
SPEAKER 02 :
Great. God bless you. Have a safe trip.
SPEAKER 05 :
Will do. Bye.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay. Let’s see here. We’re going to talk to James in Fresno, California. Next here, James. Welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 01 :
Hey, Steve. I really appreciate you. I really appreciate your ministry. And, uh, You mentioned the Didache, your last caller there. And I’ve been really studying the New Testament, not the New Testament, but the early church, and just really been noticing some of the difference between the way they operated and the way we operate now as a modern church. And I guess my question to you is, if you could just start a church from scratch, which you may have done in the past, I’m not sure, what are some of the major differences in how we congregate, the traditions, Which traditions would you get rid of and which new ones would you implement that most reflects what you think God wants and how we were originally supposed to operate?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I’ll try to give you an answer in the time we have before our break. But I’d also say if you haven’t listened to them, I have a series of lectures about that very thing called Some Assembly Required. Have you heard those lectures? Yes.
SPEAKER 01 :
I’m in the process of going through everything you have on your website, and I will definitely get to that next.
SPEAKER 02 :
Right. So at thenarrowpath.com, which you’re familiar with, obviously, but maybe some listeners aren’t, at thenarrowpath.com, Under the tab, it says Topical Lectures. There’s quite a few series of lectures, as you found. One series is called Some Assembly Required, and it is about the very thing you’re asking. I think it’s six lectures, and I do go into detail more, and you may find that helpful. In answer to your question, I would do everything I could to to avoid turning the gathering into something that looks like a corporation-owned theater, you know, with performances and things like that. I would also never appoint any leadership unless it was absolutely necessary, unless they were qualified. Now, I’ve been involved in starting a number of house churches in my life, and we’ve never appointed leaders. Not because I don’t believe in leaders. I believe in leaders. We just didn’t have need for them because the men in the church, they were all heads of households, and they were all mature Christian men. And I think a lot of groups just figure a church has to be a corporation. It needs a board of directors. It needs a CEO and that kind of stuff. And I don’t think that was true in the early church at all. I think church is a family. And I think that if leadership is needed, because let’s just say there’s some people there who, are unstable or they need some shepherding, they’re not self-feeders and stuff like that, then I’d say, well, acknowledge some leaders. But I think to create leaders for no reason except that we think we need them is to follow the way that I think the church went after the apostles were dead. Now, did the apostles appoint leaders? Yes, they often did. Not always. Now, for example, Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey in Acts chapter 13 and 14, they established churches on their outward leg of their trip from Antioch up into Lystra and Derbe and those areas. And then when they came back, who knows, weeks or months later, we don’t know, they visited each of these churches again, and then they appointed leaders in them since the churches were young and needed leadership. But what’s interesting is those churches existed before. and the apostles left them functioning without leaders for a period of time. Eventually they came back and appointed leaders, but those churches were real churches. They were apostolically founded churches, and they didn’t have any leaders until maybe some months after they were founded. The apostles came back and decided to look and see who might qualify and appoint some leaders officially. But Corinth, for example, was a very troubled church, but we don’t read of them having any official leaders. which is strange because Paul wrote more to that church than to any other church in the Bible. And they had more problems, the kind of stuff that you’d want the leaders to handle, is that you had leaders than most any other church had. And yet he never addressed the leaders as he did, for example, in Philippi. He addressed the leaders in Philippians 1.1. He talked about leaders in Thessalonians 5, 1 Thessalonians. He talked about leaders, you know, he taught Timothy to appoint leaders and Titus to appoint leaders in churches. But In Corinth, he didn’t. Why? I don’t know. He apparently didn’t think there were any qualified there. Someone came close in chapter 16, verse 15. He said, you know, the household of Stephanas. He said they’re the oldest Christians in the whole country. He said they’re the first fruits of Achaia. They’ve been there longest. They’ve been saved longest. He says they’re also addicted to serving the saints. And he said, submit to people like that, which is very interesting. He didn’t say, recognize them as elders. He didn’t appoint them as elders. I’m not sure why. But he did say, submit to people like that. In other words, submission is to people who are really spiritual and mature people, not people who hold some kind of an office with a you know, a stripe on their sleeve because they hold rank. I think the church today and very shortly after the apostles died, especially after the fourth century, began to structure itself like a pagan organization with a top-down leadership authority structure. And every church I know today has one, except for some very unusual churches. I think Plymouth Brethren do not. I appreciate that about them. They are dispensational, so I don’t go there, but But I do appreciate Plymouth Brethren churches. They don’t have any leadership, but they’re very spiritually minded people. A lot of house churches don’t have any official leaders, though some of them do. But the thing is, I’m not against official leaders if they’re needed. I’m against the assumption that the church is not a church unless it has some kind of authority structure. Jesus said to his disciples, the rulers of the Gentiles… exercise authority over them, meaning in a top-down sort of way. Every organization and nation of the Gentiles, they have rulers. But he said, it shall not be so among you. He said that to his disciples. You don’t set it up that way. And this is Matthew 20, verses 25 and 26. It says, it shall not be so among you. Whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. Whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave. So leadership in the church is supposed to be the opposite of leadership in secular organizations. But most churches today, it’s not the opposite. It’s a duplicate of it. You go to most churches and the leadership structure is very much like the leadership structure of any corporation. CEO, board of directors, that kind of stuff. And what do they do? They dominate the church. I don’t say they’re all tyrants. I’m not trying to implicate them with bad motives or anything like that, though you certainly will find that plenty enough. But not all pastors are tyrants, but all of them are in a system which is set up the way Jesus said it’s not supposed to be set up. And so, anyway, I’d say for more details on that kind of thing, my lectures, Some Assembly Required, on our website, are obviously free, like everything else. Anyone can listen to them. And I go into that in detail. I give a lot of the scriptural information. basis for those things.
SPEAKER 01 :
Okay. Well, thank you, Steve. It seems like we kind of did the same thing Israel did by wanting a king to be over us.
SPEAKER 02 :
Exactly. Exactly. Think about it. Yeah. When God set up Israel under Joshua’s day, he did not appoint a successor to Joshua to rule them. Instead, God ruled them. The people were supposed to be just obedient to God and do what he said. And then when they went out of line… He appointed temporary leaders to deliver them and stuff. But then, after those leaders died, there was a vacuum again that God did not fill. God is the leader. Christ is the head of the church. The Bible says the head of every man is Christ. And many times, like Roman Catholics think the head of the church is the Pope, and Protestants think the head of the church is the pastor and stuff. This is simply different than what the New Testament teaches. It’s certainly different than what Christ or the apostles taught. In fact, seemingly… It’s the opposite of what they talk. Anyway, I need to take a break. I appreciate your call very much. You’re listening to The Narrow Path. God bless you, brother. You’re listening to The Narrow Path. Our website, again, is thenarrowpath.com. I’ll be back in 30 seconds. Don’t go away. We have another half hour to go.
SPEAKER 04 :
We highly recommend that you listen to Steve Gregg’s 14 lecture series entitled, When Shall These Things Be? This series addresses topics like the Great Tribulation, Armageddon, the rise of the Antichrist, and the 70th week of Daniel. When Shall These Things Be? can be downloaded in MP3 format without charge from our website, thenarrowpath.com.
SPEAKER 02 :
Welcome back to the Narrow Path Radio Broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we’re live for another half hour taking your calls. Most of our lines are full, but it looks like maybe one line is full if you’d like to call in with your questions about the Bible. Or with your differences with the hosts that you’d like to bring up, you’re always welcome to do that. The number is 844-484-5737. By the way, that announcement at the bottom of the hour about my series of lectures called When Shall These Things Be? That’s my series on eschatology. It’s 14 lectures, very detailed biblical studies on it. And, by the way, the title, When Should These Things Be?, is, of course, the question the disciples asked Jesus in the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, verse 2, when Jesus predicted, Not one stone of the temple will be left standing on another. They said, when shall these things be? And what shall be the sign of these things? So Jesus gave an answer. The answer that I give in the series is certainly not now. When will these things be? Not right now. They are not talking about what’s happening right now. And this, of course, differs from what probably the most popular teachers say. would say on the subject, because they are typically dispensationalists. Anyway, there are alternative ways of looking at such things, and in fact, so much so that the whole church has largely taken a different view of these things than the dispensational view through its history. And you might be interested in… a very thorough biblical analysis of those things. If you go to our website, thenarrowpath.com, under the Topical Lectures tab, I mentioned to our previous caller my series called Some Assembly Required, which is about ecclesiology or the church. My series on eschatology is called When Shall These Things Be? And there are many, many others. Over 1,500 of my lectures are posted online, all free at thenarrowpath.com. Okay, we’re going to go back to the phones and talk now to Kevin from River Rouge, Michigan. Hi, Kevin. Welcome.
SPEAKER 07 :
Hey, Steve. Good to talk to you. I want to say something real quick about the last two questions.
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, your voice is real garbly. Are you in a bad spot?
SPEAKER 07 :
No. Can you hear me now?
SPEAKER 02 :
Not very well. I mean, I can hear what you’re saying, but it’s like you’re kind of talking underwater, garbly.
SPEAKER 07 :
How about now, bud?
SPEAKER 02 :
It’s still bad, but go ahead and give me your question as quickly as you can. We won’t have to endure the garble.
SPEAKER 07 :
Okay, yeah. Just about when the idea of aerostyling philosophy was introduced by… what one writer in tale calls the dumb ox in Greek mythology, that is that the body was the prison house of the soul, and that somehow we need to free the soul from the prison house also.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, that’s, yeah, you’re right. Greek philosophy did teach that the body… was the prison of the soul, and therefore, that was Plato and Aristotle, the Greek philosophers had that view. Frankly, many Christians have kind of taken that approach too, though it’s not biblical. It was based on the Greek assumption, again, this is a pre-Christian assumption, from the philosophers, that everything physical is negative or bad, whereas everything non-physical is spiritual and good. So in their view, anything that’s spiritual is good, and that would include demons, right? because they’re spirit, not body. So anything that’s spirit is good, and anything that’s physical is evil and are bad. And therefore the body, which is physical, is bad. But we have a spirit that’s good in us, is what the Greeks thought. And death is the release of the good spirit from the prison of the bad body. Now, this idea that there’s this immortal soul, that lives within the body, was brought into Christianity. And I’m not saying that it’s wrong. I’m just saying it wasn’t taught in the Old Testament. I’m not sure. I mean, when Jesus distinguished between the body and the soul, he may have been endorsing that idea. He said, do not fear him who can kill the body and can do no more, but fear him who, after he’s killed the body, can also destroy the soul. Of course, he’s not indicating that the soul is indestructible or immortal, but he does suggest that after the body has been killed, then there’s the soul to deal with. And so Paul, of course, talked about how when we are alive in this body, it says we are present in the body or at home in the body, are the terms he used. But he said when we die, we are absent from the body. That is, we’ve gone somewhere else. He said in one passage, we’re absent from a body and present with the Lord in 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 5, excuse me. And in another place, in Philippians 1, he said he’s looking forward to dying so he can depart and be with Jesus, which he said is far better. So the New Testament does seem to support the idea that there’s a non-physical spirit or soul that dwells in man, though it does not teach necessarily that that spirit is immortal. If the story of Lazarus and the rich man is to be understood as a true story and not just a parable, then it is teaching that both Lazarus, the beggar, and the rich man, after they died, they were conscious after death in Hades, one in a better place than the other. But they were conscious and could talk and so forth, but they were dead. It was their spirits or their souls, apparently, somewhere else than in this world. It does not tell us they were immortal, by the way. I mean, the fact that the rich man was still seen as conscious after death does not address the question of whether he was immortal after death and would never perish. I mean, it would suggest there is such a thing as soul survival after death. But how long that would last, we’re never told. Anyway, these are mysteries that the Bible does not expound upon. I will say that the idea that there’s a spirit in our bodies that leaves us at death does seem to have some support in Scripture. Though we’re not going to live forever as disembodied spirits, the Old Testament and New Testament teaching is that that spirit is going to be embodied in the resurrection in another body. or a remake of the same body. The same body is going to be renovated and transformed and will live in our bodies forever, which will then be immortal. And thus it’s different than the Greek idea, because the Greek idea would say, no, once you’ve escaped the prison of your body, why would God ever put you back into a body? Because it would be physical, it would be another prison. No, the Bible doesn’t teach that the body is a prison. The Bible teaches that your body ideally is a temple. not a prison. And so the idea that the physical world is evil because it’s physical is simply not biblical. God created the whole physical world in Genesis chapter 1, and when he was finished doing all this physical stuff, he said, it’s good. It’s very good. So the Greeks were mistaken in denying the goodness of the physical creation. And they may or may not have been accurate when they believed there’s an immortal soul living in our bodies. But The idea that we are imprisoned in these bodies and we want nothing more than to be freed from them and be disembodied is not a biblical doctrine. We will look forward to being freed from these bodies, but not that we’ll be disembodied forever, as Paul said, that we’ll be clothed upon. We’ll be not naked, but clothed further, he said in 2 Corinthians 5. And that will be eventually with an immortal body. other body, which is physical, like Jesus’ resurrection body was. It still had flesh and bones and holes in his hands and things like that after he rose from the dead. It was physical. And so physicality is not the problem. The physical world does provide a venue for a lot of evil to take place, but the evil is not caused by physicality. The evil is caused by sin. And in the resurrection, sin will have been defeated, but physicality will continue. Because that’s simply what God made from the beginning. He intended for man to live in a physical world, which is why he made a physical world for him. Okay, let’s talk to Troy in Cottage Grove, Oregon. Hi, Troy. Welcome.
SPEAKER 03 :
I have a question. Last week you spoke on the book of Revelation. You said John spoke of the temple. In chapters 1 and 2. Did I hear you correctly when you said that?
SPEAKER 02 :
I said he spoke of the temple where? I didn’t catch the end of your statement.
SPEAKER 03 :
In chapters 1 and 2 of Revelation.
SPEAKER 02 :
No, no, chapter 11, verse 1 and 2.
SPEAKER 03 :
Okay, I misunderstood you then. I double-checked that this week and found out to be true.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Chapter 11, verse 1 and 2 says, there is a picture of the temple still standing, which was going to be given over to be trodden underfoot by the Gentiles, but had not yet been. So my point was that the temple apparently was still standing when John wrote this.
SPEAKER 03 :
Okay, I’ve heard you say that before.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, good enough. I just wanted to check that. Okay, Troy, thanks for your call, brother. Let’s see here. Daryl calling from Maine. Welcome to the Narrow Path. How are you doing?
SPEAKER 10 :
Hi.
SPEAKER 02 :
Brother, I’m so sorry. I know you’ve called before, and I’ve always tried to make out what it is you’re saying, but… The Lord’s Prayer.
SPEAKER 10 :
The Lord’s Prayer.
SPEAKER 02 :
The Lord’s Prayer. Okay.
SPEAKER 10 :
It’s…
SPEAKER 02 :
We pray that his will will be done on earth as it is in heaven, you say?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, I’m so sorry.
SPEAKER 02 :
I’m unable to really make out what your question is. Is it true? I apologize.
SPEAKER 10 :
I’ll tell you what.
SPEAKER 02 :
I’ll tell you what. Why don’t you write a letter and ask the question there and then send it to me, and I will read it on the air.
SPEAKER 10 :
I can’t make out what you’re saying.
SPEAKER 02 :
The address is The Narrow Path, PO Box 1730.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s PO Box 1730.
SPEAKER 02 :
And that’s in Temecula, California. Temecula is T-E-M-E-C-U-L-A, California. The zip code is 92593. So 92593. And if you’ll write to me at that address, I’ll be glad to answer your question on there. I’m really sorry every time you call because I can understand part of it sometimes, but not enough to really give the answer that you’re seeking. So probably the best thing you can do when you have questions is write them to me, and I’ll be glad to take them on the air. God bless you, brother. I appreciate your call. Okay. By the way, we’re going to talk to another caller, Susan from Worcester, Massachusetts, but I’m looking at quite a few empty lines right now, and we still have – 15 minutes before we’re done. So if you want to call in, you may be able to get through. The number is 844-484-5737. That’s 844-484-5737. And, again, we have some lines open right now. You could get through. Someone will get through before the end of the program. Susan, welcome to the narrow path. 37.
SPEAKER 09 :
Good afternoon. How are you?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I’m fine, but you’re going to have to turn your radio off because I don’t want to hear me talk twice.
SPEAKER 09 :
All right. Okay. Are you there, Susan?
SPEAKER 1 :
Hi, I am. Is that better?
SPEAKER 02 :
It’s certainly better, and by the way, everyone who’s listening, if you call in, do not listen to the radio when I answer your call, because we’ll be distracted by it. Okay, go ahead.
SPEAKER 09 :
Thank you for telling me, and then that might help people ahead of me, too. Sure. I just wanted your opinion, or if other people called in and have talked to you about this before, but, you know, I… My heart is so soft, and I feel like I understand God’s plan. I know God’s plan, and I understand God’s plan, and I have so much faith. Yet the things that we’ll see and that we know that are coming up because, you know, we understand – his plan and purpose and we understand his truth. And it’s like the more knowledge that you have, sometimes it’s a blessing and sometimes it’s a curse. But, you know, my children don’t, one of my kids really understands what’s going on and the other one doesn’t and doesn’t really care.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, Susan, what is your question? What is your question for me?
SPEAKER 09 :
So my question is, How do you handle that? Are there other people out there that you just hope that God pays special attention to when Christ returns and will help them understand?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, there’s plenty of people out there who have concerns about their children. Sounds like you’re saying you have a couple of children, one of them you’re not so worried about, but one of them just doesn’t care. understand whatever, Christ or the gospel or whatever. Yeah, many of us, myself included, have some children in that condition. And it’s a great grief, obviously. And all I can say is I don’t know of any guarantees that God will make for those children other than those that could be perhaps implied from what we know of his character. But, you know, we don’t know that God will intervene in their lives before they die to reveal himself to them. I mean, think about the things God can do that he’s done before to people. I mean, for example, Saul of Tarsus, you know, he’s out persecuting Christians and then Jesus just appears to him. Now, I don’t expect that to happen to very many people because that’s a pretty unusual thing. But it means that there’s really not much that’s beyond God’s possibility to do if he wants to reveal himself to people. And I think we should be praying that he will do that to the people that we know and care about who are, you know, blinded and don’t understand. They’ve got blind hearts. I don’t know anything else we can do. Of course, we… People need to see Jesus as well as hear about him, and they can’t see him directly, but they can see us. And it’s possible for us to live and be the kind of people that people will say, wow, I see Jesus in you. And, of course, it doesn’t mean they’ll love Jesus, but if they can see Jesus in you and you correctly represent him to them, that’s probably the best thing. hope you have, besides praying for them, of reaching them. So, I mean, there is, if you’re asking me what is God going to do for them, or about them, I don’t know. I know that God loves them. I know that God wants them to be saved more than you or I want our own children to be saved. God wants everyone to be saved. There are things he can do, but that would be essentially miraculous. God has not promised he’ll do miraculous things every time we’d like them to be done. He doesn’t always miraculously heal people. He doesn’t always miraculously protect people from accidents and things like that. He can, but that’s just not the way he usually operates. He’s not a God who just kind of runs the world on miracles. He lets the world, in many respects, be governed by us. That’s what he made us for is to give us dominion over it, to run it. But because we do run it with his appointment, we are able to ask him to intervene. Now, if he sees that as the best thing, if he sees that as an occasion when intervention in a unique or miraculous way would be the very best thing that could happen, then we can trust that he’ll do it. But we’re not told that he’ll do miracles every time we’d like him to, even the ones that we think are very, very important. We do know this, though, that God, with reference to the people we know who do not know him, God can reveal himself to them in various ways. He can reveal himself in their hearts or show himself to them. I mean, lots of people have, like some people have even died and come back, you know, and said, oh, I saw Jesus. Now they love God and they didn’t before. There’s just a lot of things that are possible. But we have to leave it to God to decide what way he chooses. But we can certainly be praying that he will do something for them to draw them and bring them to himself. And then we trust him. That’s what we do when we pray. When you pray, you’re committing it into his hands. just like if I have a car that’s broken and I take it to the mechanic and I say, here, please fix this. You know, I don’t stand over it and tell him what to do and, you know, try to interfere and things like that while he’s working. I don’t know how to fix the car. I just commit it to him and I leave it in his hands and trust that if he’s competent, he’ll do the right thing and get it fixed. And that’s what we have to do with God, that when we pray, we’re putting things in his hands. And we have to do that many times with loved ones who we wish, you know, wish could see more clearly than they do. Thank you for your call. We’re going to talk to Sherry in Little Rock, Arkansas next. Sherry, welcome.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hello. Hi. Hi. So my question is, I’m saved. I know I’m going to heaven, but I don’t know what I need to be doing now. I don’t want to just get in the door to heaven. You know what I mean? I want to be able to have some crowns to lay at Jesus’ feet. So I don’t know what I need to be doing.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, and neither do I, because God has something for you to do, but it’s different than what he has for me to do or for any other person to do. He has a gift that he has given you that comes along with an assignment and responsibility to steward that gift for the advancement of his kingdom, to advance the knowledge of him among people who don’t know him or even among people who do. to help them to grow in grace and the knowledge of God. There’s all kinds of things people can do. We had a caller earlier in the program. He’s running an outreach missionary sports program in Mexico, it sounds like, and things like that. So, I mean, that’s different. But everyone has something that God has given them to do. Now, honestly, some people, what he gives them to do may not sound as glamorous as other people do. Many people might even think it a drudgery to simply care for some sick people, maybe a sick spouse, maybe some shut-ins somewhere, or to just raise children and bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I mean, running a household can be done for the glory of God. What Paul said is whatever you do, whether you eat or drink, do all to the glory of God, which means that even the most mundane things we do, some of which obviously we have to do, we can still do those for the glory of God. It appears to me that Paul is saying what’s going to matter most is that our priority is to glorify God in everything. It’s not going to matter so much whether we are doing the same kind of activity that somebody else is doing for God, Remember, the Gospel of John closes with this somewhat amusing but challenging story about Peter and John. After Jesus rose from the dead and at the end of the book of John, chapter 21, when Peter was talking to Jesus and apparently they’re walking along the beach. And John is following behind, apparently within earshot, or at least close enough to be obviously following. And Jesus tells Peter that Peter’s going to die someday in a way that’s not going to be pleasing, because Peter was crucified, after all, eventually. And Peter sees John behind him, and he says, well, what about him? And the King James, I think, says, what will this man do? And basically says, you know, is John going to have to, you know, I’m going to be crucified. What’s John going to have to go through? And Jesus answered him. This is in John 21, 23. If I will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? And actually verse 22 is better. He says it the first time there, but longer.
SPEAKER 1 :
21, 22.
SPEAKER 02 :
And John says, Jesus said to him, if I will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me. In other words, John may have a different thing to do than Peter. Don’t worry about whether you’re doing the same thing someone else is doing. Just follow Jesus. So what you need to do, I suppose, is simply make sure that you are totally surrendered, totally committed to Jesus. And that you’re responsive to the opportunities he gives you to promote his kingdom in some way or another. I’d like to recommend a book that I wrote. And since I don’t sell books, I can tell you, you can hear the audio book of this free at our website. The book is for sale at Amazon, but I don’t sell books. I don’t try to get people to buy them. But the book is called Empire of the Risen Sun. This is not a novel. The title sounds kind of like a novel. It’s really a retelling of history through the biblical lens, but it’s also a treatise on the kingdom of God. And there’s two books by that name. It’s Empire of the Risen Son, book one and book two. The first one explains the whole plan of God for the world, which is the kingdom of God. And the second one explains our role in it as disciples of Jesus. And very many people have told me that these books have helped them, you know, focus on the purpose of their being a Christian and so forth. And I think it would help you, probably, given your questions. So, you know, you could buy the books if you’d rather read them, but you can listen for free from my website, and it won’t cost you a penny. So if you go to thenarrowpath.org, There’s a tab up near the top that says Books. If you click on that tab, you’ll see the books, Empire of the Risen Sun, Book 1, and Empire of the Risen Sun, Book 2. And you can listen to them there. And I would think they would be of help to you. And by the way, if you’d rather read books, yeah, I don’t sell them, but you can get them from Amazon. Just look up my name and my books will come up. All right. Yeah, I don’t know what more to say about how you will serve God, but you’ll do so in whatever way God gives you and gives you opportunity to do, I would say. Oh, we’ve got quite a few calls waiting right now. And I’m looking at the clock. Looks like I don’t have any time to talk to anymore. There’s the music. This is only Monday, though, and we’re on Monday through Friday. So if you haven’t gotten through today, call tomorrow and call earlier, and we’ll try to get to your call. If you call earlier, we will get to your call. The Narrow Path, as I said earlier, is a listener-supported ministry. What that means is the expenses are paid not by advertising dollars, because we don’t have any advertisers. There’s no commercial breaks. One of the few hour-long programs on the radio that have no commercial breaks. Because we have no sponsors. We also don’t have anything for sale, which is kind of unusual for radio programs, too, although there are others that don’t. But all the income comes from unpredictable sources of people like you who want to keep it on. If you do, you can contribute. You can write to The Narrow Path, P.O. Box 1730, Temecula, California, 92593. Or you can go to our website, thenarrowpath.com. Let’s talk again tomorrow.
