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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 we can take your phone calls. If you have questions about the Bible or about the Christian faith and want to call in and discuss them, feel free to give me a call. I’m looking at two open lines on our switchboard at the moment, so that’s good for you if you want to get through now. The number is 844-484-5737. That’s 844-484-5737. And I say let’s just go right to the phones now and talk to Scott in San Francisco, California. Scott, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 06 :
Oh, I see. Thanks for taking my call. I understand that you don’t believe in Calvinist doctrine. I know a lot of Calvinists, and they’re very biblically literate, and they believe that they’re saved by faith alone through God’s grace alone. And I consider them to be my brothers and sisters in Christ. They affirm the essentials of the faith. But I know many Armenian Christians and Baptists who are convicted that Calvinists are unsaved and bound for hell. And I’d like to know what you believe. Are they Calvinist Christians? And are they our brothers and sisters in Christ?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I’ve never met an Arminian who said that Calvinists are not Christians or that they’re bound for hell. That sounds much more like the attitude that many Calvinists have about others who are not them. I mean, Calvinists many times appear to be more interested in converting Arminians to Calvinism than converting unbelievers to Christianity. But then I could understand that a little bit since they believe that unbelievers… if they’re elect, will get saved in any case, inevitably. But I’ve never really known Arminians to take a position that Calvinists or any other theological position that they disagree with is somehow damning. So, no, I don’t think they’re damned. I don’t agree with their understanding of the doctrines that are distinctive of Calvinism. Now, I’ve read Calvin’s Institutes, and that’s quite a chore. It’s a very big book. But I have to say I agree with most of what he said because most of it is just what Christians say. All Christians, just what the Bible says. But there are distinctives of Calvinism that are not what the Bible says. They are an interpretation of certain passages of the Bible. And, yeah, Calvinists can be very scholarly. It’s a view that attracts a lot of intellectuals for some reason. And so… You know, a person who’s a Calvinist and decides that that’s a very important thing for people to be can easily arm himself with about 50 verses of Scripture that sound like they would make the points that they’re trying to make. But to say they’re scripturally literate, before I would say anyone is scripturally literate, I would have to say they have to do more than just be able to quote some Bible verses. They have to be able to exegete them. In other words, it’s not Not how many verses are there that you can press into your service, but are you understanding them according to their context and what the authors are trying to say? In my experience, Calvinists who use a lot of Bible verses are not using them very responsibly. They’re ignoring context. They’re ignoring who the audience is, what is being said and what’s not being said. They’re ignoring the train of thought that leads up to the verses they quote. which would have corrected them if they had noticed it. So, you know, I remember a famous Calvinist teacher saying that, you know, the reason Calvinism is better than other views is because it’s so exegetical. And I think, really? I really was surprised to hear him say that because my experience of reading Calvinists and their quoting of Scripture, I think, you know, a little bit of exegesis would help them out here. You know, they’re just proof texting. They’ve got a verse that sounds like it says what they want it to say, and so they Rust it forward as an argument for their position. But even a little bit of exegesis, a little bit of noticing the context, for example, would disabuse them of that argument. So, you know, when we say somebody is biblically literate, we might mean they can quote a lot of Bible verses. Well, I’ve been biblically literate in that sense since I was a child, but I certainly didn’t know my theology very well. I had proof texts for things I believed. And as I learned more, I had to realize that, well, a lot of these passages aren’t really intended to support the point I’m using them to make. So I personally think every time, I mean, I’ve debated quite a few Calvinists, some of them leaders in the movement. I’ve read their books. I’ve been exposed to Calvinism for 50 years. And I simply am not impressed with their knowledge of the Bible. I’m not even impressed with how many Bible verses they can quote. Quoting Bible verses isn’t the same thing as knowing the Bible, because lots of people can quote Bible verses. Even atheists can sometimes do it. I heard of an atheist professor in a college who had memorized the Gospel of John and could quote it verbatim. But he didn’t know God. He didn’t believe it. I’m not saying Calvinists are like that. I’m just saying it shows that you can know a lot of Bible without really embracing it or understanding it properly.
SPEAKER 06 :
Even the devil knows scripture. And maybe I’m misusing the term Arminian. There’s people from fundamental Baptist background that are most critical. But definitely a lot of Calvinists are very argumentative and rude as well. I just really appreciate your perspective. Thank you so much.
SPEAKER 02 :
Sure, yeah. In my experience, many times the Calvinists are the more rude and argumentative than their Arminian counterparts. The fundamentalist churches you’re talking about, I’ve run into those too. Sometimes they have a really weird attitude, and if they’re Arminian, then they probably wouldn’t think Calvinists are saved. Some of them don’t think you’re saved if you’re not using the King James Version of the Bible. I mean, there’s some people who feel that their narrow view about things makes them the only Christians in the world. And these people are, well, in my opinion, they’re not very good Christians. I mean, not that my judgment of them is going to matter on the Day of Judgment, but judging from what the Bible says about what makes a person spiritual or mature or Christian, These people, in my opinion, would not qualify. But, yeah, the Armenians I know are more like me. I mean, we don’t judge anyone for being a Calvinist. We just think their views are mistaken. Anyway, I appreciate your call very much, Scott. Thank you so much. Have a great day. Thanks for calling. All right, let’s talk to John from Dearborn, Michigan next. John, welcome to The Narrow Path. Hello, Steve. Hi. Hi.
SPEAKER 05 :
I am interested in your opinion about the role of women in secular society as compared with the role of women in the church and if there is really a difference because there are many women that are heads of government, governors, presidents, prime ministers, heads of heads of businesses, Mary Bob and General Motorshead, are those appropriate for women in your view?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I mean, just like men, women would have different responsibilities in different positions they’re in. For example, a single woman who’s a Christian would be subject to her father’s authority. A married Christian woman would be subject to her husband’s authority. In the body of Christ, the positions of church leadership are intended to go to men, which does not mean that women can’t do any kind of thing that’s leadership, but as far as being the shepherds of the flock, Paul said he didn’t put women in those positions. He put married men in that position and assumed that their role as husbands kind of demonstrates what kind of leaders of the church they’ll be, because They have to be the heads of their home, and if they can’t manage their home, they’re probably not going to be able to manage the church either. Now, women are not heads of the home in the Christian church. In the secular world, the world has done a lot in my lifetime to try to erase all distinctions between men and women to the point where, I mean, it was inevitable, but they’d eventually say it doesn’t really make any difference. If you’re born with male or female genitals, you’re just the same as anybody. You can be whatever you want. It doesn’t matter. Men and women are not distinctive in any special way. That’s the outgrowth of radical feminism, which actually sponsored the gay movement many decades ago, and now that movement has morphed so that, I mean, just anything that’s a compromise of God’s plan for men and women is considered to be, you know, okay. Now, outside of the body of Christ, of course, People do what they want to, and they don’t have to obey Christ until, of course, he returns, in which case they’ll be judged for whatever it is they’ve done. But nobody outside the body of Christ is going to make them behave like Christians, and we can’t make them. Now, what about women who are leading countries or corporations? Well, you know, Paul said, who am I to judge those who are outside the church? God judges those outside the church. Those inside the church we judge. We need to make sure the church is in order. We don’t have to make sure the society is in order outside the church. But I would have opinions. I would believe that if a woman is as competent as a man in a given case, there’s no reason she shouldn’t be the head of a corporation. Unless, of course, she has other womanly responsibilities like, you know, being home with their children, for example. I believe that women should be available for the children. I believe even outside of the church that the nuclear family is still a biblical thing, the traditional family. And I don’t think that children do well if they don’t have two parents. And, you know, if both parents are out of the home, to a very large degree, they don’t have any parents except a few hours a day. And I don’t think that’s good for children. So I don’t think it’s good for society to simply say, It’s as normative for a woman to be, you know, working outside the home as inside the home. But I’m not making a moral statement or a scriptural statement about that necessarily. I’m just saying God has set up families to be a certain way, and there are certain things that can happen in society that undermine that. And one of the things that’s undermined that is the idea that women should be out in the workplace as much as men. Now, some women don’t have much choice in the matter. You know, their husbands don’t support them or they don’t have husbands or something like that. And, you know, they’re forced to be in the workplace, which is sad because if they have children at home, then their children are being neglected in some measure. But, you know, I think that women heading up corporations – I don’t know that they ever do better than some man could do. I’m not saying that men are better than women because they’re men. I’m just saying, you know, there’s almost always a man that could do it. And, you know, there’s very seldom a situation where only a woman can take the spot and make it work. I suspect that when women are put in those positions, in most cases, and I’m not going to say I know every case, so I could be wrong about some. In most cases, I think they’re put there because… The corporation thought it was pretty cool to have a woman in that position and to be able to say they did. Sort of a DEI kind of a mentality, even before there was what we called DEI. More like the radical feminist ideas that women bosses, girl bosses, you know, are the ideal for a woman’s, you know, psyche and for her career and things like that. But you can only really believe that. if you don’t think that being a mom to your children is an ideal thing. So I’m in favor of women being in their homes for their children. Now, if they don’t have children or if they don’t have husbands to support them, then, of course, this is I consider to be subnormal. I don’t think they’re in the wrong to not have a husband or to not have children. But, you know, if they can’t have children, then no one can blame them. In which case, getting a job I think is okay. I don’t see anything wrong with that. I do think there are social problems, though, in thinking that women working outside the home is just as normal as a woman being home raising her children. I think that generations of children have suffered for lack of a mother in the home, and many have lacked even more or hurt more for lack of a man in the home. Most of the criminals in prison don’t have a man in their home where they grew up. And so their mothers had to try to work it out themselves. There’s lots of deviations from the normal situation, which we can say in a fallen world and an imperfect world, sometimes you just have to go with it. You just have to do what has to be done. But that doesn’t mean that we should desire to have the society remain that way. I think we should look for ways to normalize normal society. family life, if possible. Now, a woman who’s the head of a corporation certainly isn’t going to have very much time for her children, just like a man at the head of a corporation probably doesn’t have as much time because he’s got more responsibilities. He’s got employees instead of children that he has to look over. But I think that the more a woman is taken away from her family, the less good that is for her family. So I’m not making that a moral issue. I’m just saying I think that women, for them to aspire to be, you know, the heads of corporations, I’m not sure why. I mean, for the money? Well, why not be more content with less money? And if you can support your family on less and be more with your family, that’s certainly, if I were a woman, I’d choose that. In fact, if I was a man, I’d choose that. I’d rather be with my family than working for money. Now, Steve, specifically, specifically…
SPEAKER 05 :
If you agreed with the policies supported by Hillary Clinton or Kamala Harris, would you vote for them?
SPEAKER 02 :
No. Well, I mean, it depends who they’re running against. If I agree with their policies and they’re likely to, you know, enact those policies and their opponent in the race is somebody whose policies I think would be disastrous, yeah, I would vote for them. I mean, assuming their husbands don’t mind it. I mean, there are such things as women heads of state, and even in Scripture there have been a few. There have been queens. There have been one of the judges was a woman. You know, I mean, but Isaiah, you know, in Isaiah chapter 3, I think it was, he kind of was talking to Israel or Judah about how, how messed up their society is. And one of the things he mentioned is women are your leaders, you know. And I don’t think that women are made for the cutthroat decision-making and stuff that heads of corporations and heads of state often have to be involved in. Women are more sympathetic, more emotional in most cases. Now, I’ve known men who are as emotional as women, and I’ve known a few women who seemed as rational and, you know, strictly business type as men. I remember Elizabeth Elliot, one of my favorite, uh, female teachers and authors. Um, she said that, you know, people used to say she was like a, a man in a woman’s body. This is before they were talking about transgender types. They were saying basically her, her temperament was more like a man. And it really was. She was, I mean, if she was running the state, I probably would feel comfortable with that. So she didn’t even believe that women should be pastors. Um, because she read the scripture the same way. The thing is, though, I wouldn’t see any advantage in having a woman head of state just because she’s a woman. If she was the most qualified, if she was the best, if it didn’t require her neglecting her other wifely or motherly duties, yeah, okay. I’m not against women, and I’m not saying women are incompetent. I’m just saying that most women… have a different kind of temperament than most men. That used to be the case. I mean, I think women have been conditioned to be more like men through the last generation or two, and men have been conditioned to be more like women, which I don’t think those are good things because I think men still have it in their nature. to be more aggressive, more, you know, to ignore their emotions when you have to do something out of rational reasons more often than not. So it’s just a generality. I mean, if I find out that, you know, Margaret Thatcher was the head of, you know, Great Britain, I don’t think, oh, I feel so sorry for Britain. I mean, she was probably better than the liberal leaders that opposed her. But that’s not a biblical question, in my opinion. That’s just a pragmatic issue. In most cases, I’d rather have a man leading the government and a corporation, but I don’t think it’s immoral for a woman to be there, necessarily. All right? I guess we’re done with that call. Let’s see here. Well, then who’s next here? We’re looking at, okay, Michael from Inglewood, California. Michael, welcome.
SPEAKER 03 :
Hi, Steve. Hello, Michael. Yes. I don’t know if this ever has happened with you, but say I’ll read Genesis, and then I’ll know Moses had a wife. Then I’ll read it again, and I’ll say, well, I didn’t know he had a son. I’ll read it again. I’m like, oh, he had two sons, and I don’t know if that happens to you, but I kind of have to talk about, well, I just read something on Lot. I didn’t know he had four, possibly four daughters and two son-in-laws. And I guess my question is considering that the two daughters that came out when they left, they went to Zohar.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, you’re not talking about Moses now. You’re talking about Lot. Correct. You said Moses. Yeah, you were talking about Moses before. Okay, go ahead. Yes.
SPEAKER 03 :
So with Lot, I don’t really understand why his daughters slept with him to get pregnant, because they earlier left Abraham, so it was people on the earth, and also they went to Zoar, which was not destroyed. Did they sleep with him because they thought they were the last people on earth, or just to continue Lot’s line?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, they spoke as if they thought they were the last girls on earth, but they might have been using hyperbole. Remember… they had fled to Zoar, but then Lot was afraid to stay in Zoar, so he and his daughters went up in the mountains. I think they lived in a cave or something like that. So he was kind of paranoid, and they may have just thought, well, there’s no one on the planet that we can have as husbands, which doesn’t mean there’s no men on the planet anywhere, but in their circle, there’s no one, and they weren’t in a position to meet anyone. I think that’s probably how they were thinking. So They would have known, I think they would have known that there were more people on Earth, unless they were far enough from Zohar that they didn’t even know that it had been spread. I mean, if they were way out in the mountains remotely, they might have thought the whole world was judged when Sodom and Gomorrah was judged. I don’t know what they were thinking. But they did apparently think this was going to be their only opportunity to have children. So they did what they did, which is immoral.
SPEAKER 03 :
And they would have known that from the… From the Noahic law, is that right?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, there’s no mention of that in Noahic law, but they, you know, I think all cultures knew that, you know, pretty much. You know, well, I’m not sure they all did. There were pagans that, you know, obviously had incestuous relationships, but I think they knew that’s not something their father would approve of because they had to get him drunk to get him to do it. So, I mean, they knew they were doing something at least he would not approve of and, therefore, against his standards. Okay. Thanks, Steve. All right. Well, thanks for calling. Good talking to you. All right. Let’s talk to Elijah from The Villages in Florida. I don’t know where The Villages is, Elijah. Where is that? The Villages, it’s, do you know where Leesburg is? No, I don’t. So I guess I’m not going to know. Anyway, I just hadn’t heard of it before. Go ahead.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yes, no worries. Okay, so my question is a little bit… It’s a question that I was just wondering about for a while, and I had kind of found a way to resolve it, and it took me adopting this mentality of kingdom theology, you know, that we’re… Instead of, like, escaping this world and going to heaven, our job is to usher in the kingdom of God to come down to earth, but… I still – there’s still, like, some – I guess just some clarification. That’s why I wanted to call in. I wanted to know why would it be a noble thing that God desires us to seek after to, like, save someone’s physical life here on Earth if when they die they’re in a better place with God in heaven? Like, why – and, like, when I look at some of Jesus’ stories where he, like, raises Lazarus from the dead, it’s like – Those people are ultimately going to die again. Like, what is the, I guess, motivation to that, if that makes sense? I know it sounds cynical, but it was always something that I wanted.
SPEAKER 02 :
I understand what you’re saying. And the question makes sense if we assume that the real reason that God made people is so that they would go to heaven.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right.
SPEAKER 02 :
Because if that’s all God wants, if God just wants a lot of people to go to heaven… We might as well kill them when they’re – just baptize them and drown them. You know, they’ll go right to heaven. Right. And there’s no danger of backsliding. Might as well kill the babies in the womb. Might as well kill babies as soon as they’re born so they can go to heaven. You know, I mean, in other words – Exactly.
SPEAKER 04 :
Exactly.
SPEAKER 02 :
So if that’s really God’s plan is that we all should just – he just wants everyone to go to heaven, then it doesn’t make much sense to save lives, because the sooner they die, the better, so they can go to heaven. Unless they’re not saved yet, of course. But there’s lots of saved people. We might as well just go around and kill them all so that they stay saved. But I think that, of course, even if you believed that heaven was the main issue, you wouldn’t want to kill all the Christians just so they’d go to heaven, because then who would evangelize the other non-Christians? You have to evangelize them for them to go to heaven, too. But it’s more than that. It’s not just that God wants people in heaven. He has a plan for the earth. And his plan is to be worked out through his people. He has, you know, the Bible says we’re his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works. that we should walk in. There are certain things God has planned for us to do, and that has to do with promoting his kingdom. Now, you mentioned his will is for us to bring in the kingdom or something like that, and I don’t really object to that idea, but lots of people object to that. They think that this is some kind of a humanistic idea that we’re going to use political pressure or something to bring in the kingdom. I just believe that Christ brought the kingdom, and we are to seek the kingdom and to promote the kingdom, and whatever we do, should be for the advantage of the kingdom of God. And so every person who is born, potentially, God has a plan for them to be used in the promotion of the kingdom of God and the living in the kingdom of God, which is, of course, what we’re born into when we’re born again. So to, you know, to let people die when we could save them. is a mistake. Now, if we can’t save them, we have to assume, okay, it’s their time to go. God has a time for everyone to go. And if there’s nothing we can do to save them, then after we’ve made our best effort, we just say, I guess it’s time to release them to God. Let them go to heaven now because God’s not keeping them alive. But if we can save them, that may be one way that God intends to keep them alive to serve His purposes later on. So, You know, we know that saving lives is a great thing to do if it can be done. We also know that when righteous people die, they go to be in a better place. But that also ends their opportunity to serve God and promote his purposes here. I need to take a break. Our website is thenarrowpath.com. I’ll be back in 30 seconds. We have another half hour. Don’t go away.
SPEAKER 01 :
Small is the gate and narrow is the path that leads to life. We’re proud to welcome you to The Narrow Path with Steve Gregg. Steve has nothing to sell you today but everything to give you. When today’s radio show is over, we invite you to visit thenarrowpath.com where you’ll find topical audio teachings, blog articles, verse-by-verse teachings, and the archives of all the radio shows. Study, learn, and enjoy. We thank you for supporting the listener-supported Narrow Path with Steve Gregg.
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. If you have questions about the Bible or the Christian faith, I’d love to talk to you about them. If you disagree with the host, by the way, you’re always welcome to call and say so. We don’t have any restrictions on that. In fact, I enjoy that. Feel free to call and balance comment or tell me in what way you disagree. We’ll be glad to hear from you. The number to call is 844-484-5737. So it’s 844-484-5737. Our next caller is John from Kelseyville, California. John, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling. Hi, Greg.
SPEAKER 07 :
Listen, I’ve got two questions. The first one will be simple. I’ve seen your debate with Dr. Brown and yourself about Israel and stuff. Very good debate and stuff. But I don’t see any debate between, say, an amillennialist and a dispensationalist. Now, I’ve seen some amillennialists and premillennialists, you know, but not specifically dispensationalists. And so you can maybe address that. The other thing is, I know you’ve talked about Israel, and you know what? The way I see it is there has to be something to this, Greg. Israel in that land, you know, I mean, they’re the only people that kept their religion for thousands of years. It doesn’t mean that they’re saved. It doesn’t mean they still have to accept Jesus, and if they die in their sins, you know, they’ll answer for that, you know, so good. I’m not saying there’s two separate ways of salvation or whatever. But, you know, the thing is, God never abandoned Israel throughout the Old Testament, even if they rebelled. And God is not abandoning Israel, even though they’re rebellious. They’re still there. They’ve been attacked. They’ve been surrounded by hostile neighbors. And they’re still there. There’s got to be something to that.
SPEAKER 02 :
So let me ask you this. Do you believe that a Jewish person who rejects Christ and dies, do you think they go to heaven or hell?
SPEAKER 07 :
No, they go to hell.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, so they’re not that special to God, right? So in other words, they’re not special enough for him to take them to heaven, but they’re special enough for him to give them a piece of real estate the size of New Jersey. Why is that even important? If you’re going to hell… What consolation is it that you get a little piece of real estate the size of New Jersey? By the way, many individual Jews are rich enough to probably buy that much land somewhere. So, I mean, what is the specific advantage of having that land? I mean, how is that special?
SPEAKER 07 :
I don’t understand.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah?
SPEAKER 07 :
Are you there?
SPEAKER 02 :
Uh-huh, go ahead.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, the reason why is it’s an indication that God is sovereign over… And it was through the Jewish people that the Messiah came, and he’s not going to – he never abandoned the Jewish people, even though through his rebellion. Most of the kings were evil in his eyes. He always stayed stuck with Israel, right? I mean, he couldn’t abandon because he was going to have to come from the line of David. Now, the Messiah has come. I grant you that, you know. But there’s something to that. If God didn’t want that land for them to be, why is there an error in the first place?
SPEAKER 02 :
Why did they what in the first place?
SPEAKER 07 :
I said, I said, if God doesn’t want them to be there, right, then why are they there in the first place?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I mean, why are the Russians where they are, the Ukrainians where they are?
SPEAKER 07 :
It is God’s sovereignty to allow them to be there.
SPEAKER 02 :
OK, fair enough. So so in other words, then the presence of. the Russians in Russia is also an evidence of God’s sovereignty. I agree.
SPEAKER 07 :
I agree totally.
SPEAKER 02 :
But that doesn’t tell us that the Russian people are special in God’s sight, because every race has a place to live.
SPEAKER 07 :
No, because the Russian people didn’t bring forth the Messiah.
SPEAKER 02 :
And they didn’t specifically… I mean, okay, that’s fine. I agree. But the fact that a people brought forth the Messiah… doesn’t make them special to God after they’ve rejected the Messiah.
SPEAKER 07 :
And I’m not saying they are, because they still go to hell if they don’t accept Jesus as their personal Savior.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 07 :
One has nothing to do with the other.
SPEAKER 02 :
I agree. And so I wonder why someone would say that they’re still special if they’re going to hell just as much as any Gentile is going to hell. I don’t understand how that makes them special to God. Now… As far as them being in the land, like I said, all nations are in some land. For 2,000 years, they weren’t in the land. Maybe they weren’t special at that time, and now they suddenly became special, even though they still reject Christ as much as they did then. I don’t really see anything that’s changed. But when you say God never rejected them, I think that he actually did. Because it says in Deuteronomy chapter 28, Moses is speaking to Israel. And he says, you know, in verse 15, if it shall come to pass… if you do not obey the voice of the Lord your God to observe carefully all his commandments and his statutes which I command you today, that all these curses will come upon you and overtake you. And then he lists a whole bunch of curses, and one of them he says in verse 45 and 46, Moreover, all these curses shall come upon you and pursue you and overtake you until you are destroyed. Because you did not obey the voice of the Lord your God to keep his commandments and his statutes which he commanded you. And they shall be, these curses shall be upon you for a sign and a wonder and on your descendants forever. So the sign or the wonder, God says, is if you are disobedient to me. And by the way, he’s talking about breaking the commandments that Moses gave. But how much worse is it to violate Christ himself? In fact, the writer of Hebrews says that. He says it’s worse. to violate Christ than to break the Ten Commandments. In Hebrews chapter 10, it says in verse 28, anyone who rejected Moses’ law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment do you suppose will be those thought worthy of those who trampled the Son of God underfoot? So, you know, to violate Christ is worse than violating the law. Now, Moses said if they violate the law, all these curses will cling to them and to their descendants forever. And in the same chapter, Deuteronomy 28, he goes on to say, if they are disobedient, he says in verse 63, and it shall be that just as the Lord rejoiced over you to do good and multiply you, so the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you and bring you to nothing. And you shall be plucked off from the land where you go to possess. So I’m not sure why you would say God never rejected them. He said he would. He said he would if they rejected him. Now, see, God is not unfaithful, but the covenant is conditional. That’s the point he was making. If you keep my covenant, you’ll be blessed in all these ways. You’ll be my special people. That’s what God said at the very beginning in Exodus 19, 5 and 6, that if they want to be his special people, they have to obey his covenant and obey his voice. That’s Exodus 19, 5 and 6. Now he tells them in Deuteronomy, if they don’t, then he’ll destroy their nation. They’ll be brought to nothing. Curses will remain on them. So I guess the question we’d have to ask in light of this, have they kept the covenant? Are they in obedience to God today? Because this is not anti-Semitic. Moses was not an anti-Semite. Moses is the one talking here. I’m not an anti-Semite. I don’t have anything against the Jews. We’re just talking about whether they’re God’s chosen people or not. I could say that the Irish are not God’s chosen people, but that doesn’t mean I have something against the Irish. I believe Christians are God’s chosen people. I think the people who love Jesus and are in Christ are God’s special people. Those who reject Christ, I don’t think they are special to God because they’re lost. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 16.22, if anyone does not love our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed. Now, he wasn’t talking about Jews particularly, but there’s a lot of Jews that would fall under that, just like Gentiles. They don’t love the Lord, Jesus. And so he said, let them be accursed. So there’s really a new covenant here now, and it’s about Jesus. It’s not about what God said to the Jews at Mount Sinai. That was a conditional covenant. And he said, if you break it, I’m going to break you. You’ll lose the land I gave you. Now, here’s the thing. Someone could say, well, they did lose the land back in 70 A.D., but now God has given it back to them. Well, why? Are they more obedient now? The thing that got them kicked out, has that thing changed? Are they more obedient to God now? They are less obedient to God now. Because before 70 A.D., the Jews at least had the temple. They were still offering sacrifices. They still had priests. In other words, they were following the law of Moses. And yet, they were wicked enough in other respects. They were compromised, but they were destroyed because they obviously killed Jesus. Now, 2,000 years later, what are they doing? Anything different? Yeah, they are different. They don’t have a temple. They’re not worshiping God. The majority of the Jews in Israel are atheists by their own profession. Less than 20% are Jewish by faith. Less than one-half of 1% are Christian by faith. That’s a pretty secular country, a lot more secular than America, probably more secular than Britain and some of the European countries. So Israel is a secular, God-rejecting country. I don’t say that to hate on them. I’m just describing the demographics. The people in that country do not believe in God or in Jesus. So exactly why would we think that there’s some kind of special promise to them when God said otherwise?
SPEAKER 07 :
Are you there? Yes. Yeah, you make a good point, Steve. The only thing I’m saying is, Steve, you know, they’ve paid a heavy price while they’re in that land in unbelief. They’ve been attacked numerous times. They were attacked October 7th. Like Moses said.
SPEAKER 02 :
It’s like what Moses said they were doing.
SPEAKER 07 :
But what I’m saying, Steve, is they’re still there. They have not been abandoned. If God didn’t want them to be in that land, they should have been wiped out years ago.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, that’s an opinion. I don’t know that there’s any reason that anyone should accept that opinion. Just because people haven’t been wiped out, that doesn’t mean that God has uniquely spared them. I mean, there’s Buddhists in Tibet who have been there for thousands of years, probably, longer than Christianity has been around. And, you know, I don’t think we can say, and therefore, the Buddhists in Tibet are special to God. I think Buddhists in Tibet are just like anyone else. They need Jesus. Jews in Israel, same thing. They need Jesus. So I’m going to have to disagree with you about that, but you’re welcome to your opinion. I think that, you know, I suggest you listen to my lectures at my website, thenarrowpath.com, on the subject of Israel. I’ve got 1,500 lectures, so in order to make it easier for you, I’ll tell you where to go. If you go to thenarrowpath.com and click on Topical Lectures… There’s a series called What Are We to Make of Israel? And by the way, I’m fairly pro-Israel, much more than people would think. I’m not anti-Semitic, but I’m also not anti-biblical exegesis. And when people say God made an unconditional covenant with Israel, I’d say I’d like to see where that’s found. Because Moses said it was not unconditional. The prophets didn’t say it was unconditional. No one said it was unconditional. God makes covenants, but there’s conditions on them. And great privileges attached to keeping those covenants and great disadvantages attached to disobeying them. I appreciate your call, John. We need to go on, but I’d love to talk to you all day long if we had the day free. Let’s talk to Tim from Vancouver, B.C. Hi, Tim. Welcome.
SPEAKER 10 :
Hey, Steve. Hey, kind of related to the last caller there. I believe, I’ve listened to a lot of your teaching on Israel, and I feel that it’s overwhelmingly against the idea of them being chosen in the age of the church. I just heard an interesting argument that was pretty solid in terms of the end times revival of the Jews that some people believe in. And it was based on Joseph when he gets sold into Egypt by his brothers. And then he’s reigning in foreign land, kind of like over the Gentiles, you could say. And then when he’s reunited with his brothers, they accept him. And I heard the argument that since Joseph is a type of Christ, that it’s kind of like the age of the Gentiles and then that coming to fulfillment and the Jews then accepting Christ at the end of time. I don’t believe that, but I thought it was an interesting take, and I was just wondering what your thoughts were.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, there are many things in the life of Joseph that I think kind of point in the direction of him being a type of Christ. It’s interesting that although the New Testament identifies many Old Testament types of Christ, Joseph is not one of them. There’s nothing in the New Testament that tells us he’s a type of Christ, but it does look like many things in his life would parallel Christ. But even when somebody is a type of Christ, it doesn’t mean that everything in their life parallels it. David was a type of Christ, a very strong type of Christ. And yet, you know, he did some sinful things that don’t parallel anything in Jesus’ life. You know, there’s, I mean, Adam is said to be a type of Christ. In Romans 5.12, Paul said that Adam was a type of Christ. Yet he… He’s mainly known for his sin, not for his righteousness. So when we say somebody’s a type of Christ, we mean that there are things about them that parallel Christ. We don’t mean that their whole career does or everything they did does. And so, I mean, Joseph, you’re right. He was rejected by his brothers, just like Christ was rejected by many of the Jews. The thing is, though, many of the Jews didn’t reject him. Tens of thousands of them followed Christ, even in the first century. In Jerusalem, the Jerusalem church was many, many thousands large, and they’re all Jewish believers. So it’s not quite true that the Jews as a whole rejected Christ. Only some did, and some received him. And then, you know, and then the time of the Gentiles. Well, okay, the Gentiles have been blessed by Jesus in the last 2,000 years. Now, at the end of Joseph’s life, his brothers came back, and they were reconciled. So some say that that’s predictive of what will happen with the Jews. And I’ll say, well, I hope so. I truly hope so. I love Jews. I’ve never met a Jewish person I didn’t love. I mean, some of them are a little obnoxious, but some Gentiles are too. I don’t have anything against Jewish people, not anything at all. I tend to favor them just by sentiment, you know. They’re the people that I read about in the Bible, you know. So I’ve always been really kind of favorable toward the Jews, but I have to realize that the Bible itself says that if they don’t follow Christ or if they don’t obey God, they’re not really any better than Gentiles who don’t obey God. But let’s just say, like Paul, my heart’s desire, Paul said in Romans 10.1, my heart’s desire before God is that Israel may be saved. Yeah, me too. I’d love it if they’re saved, and many of them are. Many Jews have gotten saved, and hopefully many more will. In fact, if the whole nation would turn to Christ, nothing would please me more. So, I mean, if that’s going to happen, then great. I just don’t think we can predict it on the basis of a possible typology with Joseph. If that part of his life corresponds to a type of Christ, then maybe it points that direction. But I would expect to get that information from, say, the prophets, or preferably from Christ himself in his teaching, or the apostles. And I don’t find it taught there. Of course, people are going to say, what about Romans 11, 26, says all Israel will be saved. Well, first of all, if he means ethnic Israel, okay, then I guess they will all turn to Christ. But that doesn’t mean anything about the Middle East. Most Jews who are saved today are not in the Middle East. America has more Messianic Jews in it than Israel has. So, I mean, being saved, for a Jew to be saved doesn’t mean anything about where they live. It has to do with who they follow, and that’s Jesus. So being a saved Jew, and there are many of them, doesn’t mean that they live in the Middle East. So if Paul said all Israel will be saved, and if he meant by that, ethnic Israel, then that’s great. It means that just as it is today, there’s many, many, probably 100,000 Messianic Jews in America. And maybe there’ll be more. Excellent. I’m all for it. I’m all for the Jews. I’m all for all people because God’s for them. Jesus died for them all. So I have nothing. I have no racial animus toward them. I’m just not willing to twist the scriptures in order to say something that dispensationalists came up with less than 200 years ago, which is contrary to what the Bible always said and that the church always said. And that’s the point. I mean, the most popular views about Israel come from dispensationalism. And I’m not dispensational anymore. I used to be, but I studied my Bible. That changes things a lot when you do that. Anyway, yeah, I don’t see that the situation with Joseph necessarily is predictive, but I’d love it if it was. I’d love to see that happen. Hey, thanks for your call. Let’s see. We’re going to talk next to – it’s going to be Cynthia in Sacramento, California. Cynthia, welcome.
SPEAKER 09 :
Hi. How are you doing, Steve?
SPEAKER 02 :
I’m well, thanks.
SPEAKER 09 :
Great. I just love your program. Praise God for you. Thank you. The question I wanted to ask, how should Christians’ views on the redistricting – How should we view that? I’m kind of torn now, you know, how to vote.
SPEAKER 02 :
You’re talking about gerrymandering? Gerrymandering the states?
SPEAKER 09 :
Yes, yes.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay. Well, let me just say this. I think it’s legal, okay? So it’s not always advantageous to conservative people, and it’s not always advantageous to liberal people. California? California? When they gerrymander, it probably helps the Democrats more. Texas gerrymandering probably helps the Republicans more. But it’s not a moral issue because it’s not breaking any laws. You know, when Gavin Newsom says that, you know, it’s unconstitutional and, you know, Texas is breaking laws, I wouldn’t trust him on his constitutional expertise. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. No, it is quite constitutional, but whether it’s a – Whether it’s good for one party or the other, that’d be the only concern. And since God is not really, you know, God is more interested in eternal things more than the specific interests of a party, I don’t really have anything to say. I would say that, you know, if gerrymandering ends up causing more districts who are going to vote the way that I like things to go, then that’s cool. If it has the opposite effect, then I’m not as happy about it. But I can’t really make that an issue, a moral issue or a spiritual issue. That’s just doing the political things that the political apparatus allows politicians to do. All right. Let’s talk to Derek from Vancouver, British Columbia. Derek, welcome.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hi, Steve. How are you? Good. First-time caller, been listening for a long time. I myself am a Messianic Jew. I’ve never been to the Middle East. I thought I’d mention that. It was good to hear a lot of things you had to say about the Jewish people, which I completely agree with. My question is, take a little bit of a turn of a page here. I was listening last week or maybe the week before, and the topic of rapture came up. And as we all know, rapture is probably one of the biggest… misunderstood or talked about topics that Christians seem to not agree with or get along with. My question is that you mentioned something, Chuck Swindoll was brought up about it, and we know Chuck Swindoll was a pre-trib believer. My question was is We’ve seen 1 Corinthians 1.10 and 2 Timothy 2.14, how Paul talks about not arguing about such things. It doesn’t edify the kingdom of God, nor does it just confuse the non-believers. My question, though, is, You had said something about how you believe or you think that in that topic, Chuck was wrong on what he feels and where he’s at. Now, my thing is not to have you defend yourself in any way. It’s not about that. It’s just more… When I hear Christians say things like that, I wonder sometimes if the Holy Spirit speaks to us and gives us our own convictions of our heart when we read Scripture, that maybe somebody like-minded to yourself, that is, that believes in the post-trib, will be drawn to the Word of God or to Christ through the like-minded thinkingness of yourself, unlike somebody who thinks that it’s the pre-trib and would be more towards that. Not that that would bring them to Christ, but that So I guess my question is, why is it about somebody being wrong or right and not just, hey, you know, when a rapture comes, it comes. If it’s pre-trib, we’ll see you there. If it’s after, I guess we’ll be going through some things together. Instead of it being about right or wrong, I guess, is what I’m trying to find out.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, well, when I say someone’s wrong, I don’t mean that they are bad people. Like, oh, that’s wrong for you to do that kind of thing, meaning that’s immoral. Now, when I say somebody is wrong on a doctoral thing, I just mean that their interpretation of a passage, in my opinion, is not the right one. They’re seeing it differently than it should be. Now, you know, nobody has to agree with me, but if someone asks my opinion, I’ll tell them what my opinion is. You know, I believed in the pre-trib rapture. I had a lot of verses that I used to support it. As time went on, I looked at those verses again and realized that they didn’t have, not one of them had anything to say about that subject. All the verses I used to support the pre-trib rapture were really about other subjects, and they were not talking about the pre-trib rapture. So once I realized that, I thought, well, I guess I don’t have as much scripture to go on as I thought about that. And then I began to read scriptures that rule it out. like when Jesus said that he’s going to raise up his people on the last day. Well, he said that four times, and the last day, if there’s seven years after that, then it wasn’t the last day, and you have to wonder why he called it that. Why would you call that the last day if there’s seven more years or a thousand more years even left? I believe that the expression the last day, which Jesus used to speak not only of the time when he would raise up his people, as he said, But also the time when he would judge those who rejected his words in John 12, 48. He said those who reject his words will be judged on the last day. So the last day, I believe, is the last day of the judgment. It’s the last day of history. And that’s when he said he’ll raise his people up. So since I had no scriptures to suggest otherwise, I just thought I might just go with what Jesus said about that. But there was more, too. I mean, Paul said in 2 Thessalonians 1, 8, that the persecuted Christians would receive rest when Jesus comes with his mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on those who don’t know God and who don’t obey the gospel. So 2 Thessalonians 1.8 said that the persecuted Christians will experience rest not seven years before that point, but when Jesus comes with his angels in flaming fire, destroying the wicked. So the impression I have is that there’s one day When Jesus comes and destroys the wicked and he gives rest to his people as the rapture and so forth. If they were raptured before that, then there’s no sense talking about them getting rest at that particular time. Jesus also said when he returns in Matthew 25, 31, that he’ll call all the nations before him. That included sheep and goats, which included people who were going to eternal life, as well as people who were going to, you know, eternal fire. So… The righteous and the unrighteous seem to be brought before Christ on the day of judgment at the same day. So those are some of the things. Now, that’s just reasons that I changed my mind. I first found out that the 20 verses or so I was always using to prove the preacher of rapture, I mean, just studying them on my own, I realized, oops, it’s not really honest to use those verses that way since they’re not saying that. And it was after that, sometime later, that I began to see the scripture taught differently. the opposite of what I thought, so I had to change my views. Hey, I appreciate your call. I’m out of time for the program today. You’re listening to The Narrow Path. We are listener-supported. Our address is The Narrow Path, P.O. Box 1730, Temecula, California, 92593. Our website’s thenarrowpath.com. Have a good weekend, and let’s talk again Monday.
