Join Steve Gregg as he delves into various contentious and thought-provoking topics, ranging from the bombing of a Venezuelan boat to the nuanced understanding of baptism for the dead as suggested in the book of Corinthians. The episode also explores profound religious narratives, including Jesus’ first miracle and how it reflects his obedience to divine instructions rather than maternal influence.
SPEAKER 1 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 08 :
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. Take in your calls if you have questions about the Bible or the Christian faith. I’d be glad to talk to you about those. You can call in and we’ll talk about them on the air. If you see things differently than the host and would like to balance a comment, I’d be very glad to talk to you also. You can call me at the same number as everybody else at this number, 844-484. That number again is 844-484-5737. And tomorrow is Saturday. It’s the third Saturday of the month, which means that we have a couple of meetings in Southern California that have normally happened on the third Saturday of each month. Tomorrow morning in Temecula, there’s a men’s Bible study, 8 o’clock in the morning. You’re welcome to join us if you’re a man and can make it to Temecula. And then if you’re around in the evening in Orange County in the town of Boyna Park, I will be doing a meeting where I will give an overview of the whole Bible in one session. So that’s something that many people have benefited from in the past, and I’ve been asked. We’re winding down these Boyna Park meetings. We’ve been meeting once a month there for the most part. for I think about 12 years, something like that. And we’re just winding that down at the end of this year. So my wife thought it would be good to give an overview of the whole Bible before we wind those down. So anyone who wants to come to those, that’s 6 o’clock tomorrow night in Buena Park. Now, if you’re interested in any of those meetings, you can go to our website, thenarrowpath.com, and look under Announcements. And you’ll see the time and place. of those gatherings and you can join us there if you happen to be in the area. All right, we’re going to talk today to Michael in Englewood, California. Michael, welcome to The Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
SPEAKER 10 :
Hi, Steve. I just wanted to ask how do you feel or what do you think about the bombing of the Venezuelan boat that killed three people?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, I don’t really have much to say about, you know, law enforcement and military engagements and things like that. As near as I could tell, these terrorist groups that are smuggling drugs into this country, we have – We’ve called them terrorist groups, and our country does wage a war on terror, especially those that are trying to invade our shores, so it looks like it’s kind of a typical act of war on our part toward people who are coming to kill our people. From what I understand, now, of course, I don’t know anything more than what the news tells me. I don’t know these people on the boats. I don’t know what kind of warning they were given. I don’t know what they were carrying in their boats, but If the news is correct, and of course you can’t always assume that it is, but they don’t have any alternative information, then these boats were carrying fentanyl, which kills, you know, tens of thousands of Americans every year, and it’s illegal to bring it in. So if somebody’s bringing weapons, if someone’s bringing a bomb into L.A. and they’re going to set it off and kill tens of thousands of our people there, and we intercepted them and blew it out of the water, Most people would consider it a normatively, I guess, justifiable act of war. I’m not involved in military or law enforcement or any of that kind of stuff, and I don’t make any strategies for that. If you’re wondering, do I believe that a government has the right to use force against enemies, foreign enemies, in order to save its own citizens? Well, yeah. In fact, I’m surprised our country hasn’t done that sooner. That’s what we call an invasion. There have been millions of people from other countries have come without permission and against our laws into our country over the past decade. a decade or so or more. And, uh, it’s really amazing. We’re probably the only country on the planet that lets so many full, uh, hostile foreigners invade our country without, without doing very much to stop them. But it looks like we’re, uh, our policies are changing about that. So that’s, I’m not against those policies. Uh, you know, uh, as a Christian, I wouldn’t bomb anybody just because that’s not my role as a Christian. But as a Christian, like, like Paul, uh, or like Christians most of the world over, I do believe that governments have law enforcement responsibilities in protecting their citizens and things against foreign encroachment. So, I mean, to me it’s not an issue that the boats were from Venezuela or anywhere else. Our war is not with Venezuela per se. It’s against the cartels, the drug cartels. And so, you know, if they want to keep coming in range of our military defenses, well, I guess that’s up to them. It seems to me like they would have gotten smarter by now because, really, these little boats – have virtually zero protection against our missiles. So I’m not sure why anyone would be stupid enough to keep trying. Well, I do know because there’s money in it for them if they succeed and they’re willing to take the risk. And, you know, it is a risk because they have been warned. They might as well just not try to do that. Anyway, I mean, I’m not a I’m not a killer. I wish no one ever had to be killed. But I do believe that countries have the right to use force to protect their borders. And so that would be my thoughts about that.
SPEAKER 10 :
Okay. Thanks, Steve.
SPEAKER 08 :
All right, Michael. Thanks for your call. God bless. Robert from the Bronx, New York. Welcome.
SPEAKER 11 :
I just have, I think, three questions. One, the first one is… What is or was Jesus’ first miracle?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, the first one, let me answer that first. The first one that’s recorded, and it appears to be the first one he ever did, is in John chapter 2. And that’s when he turned water into wine. Now, the reason I say it’s probably the first one is because after it tells of this miracle, it says this was the beginning of Jesus’ miracles, which means, seemingly, it means the beginning of his ministry of working miracles. So it’s probably the very first miracle he performed.
SPEAKER 11 :
Since you want to answer that, how did he get to do that?
SPEAKER 08 :
How did he get to do what? Turn water into wine?
SPEAKER 11 :
To perform the miracle, yes.
SPEAKER 08 :
How did he do it?
SPEAKER 11 :
How did he get to know that he needed to change water into wine?
SPEAKER 08 :
You mean how would we do it, or how did he do it?
SPEAKER 11 :
How did he come to know that there was need to change water into wine?
SPEAKER 08 :
Oh, well, I mean, he did whatever his father told him to do. And his mother also came and told him that they were lacking in wine. That’s how he learned there was no wine. and that they needed wine, but he actually made it very clear to her he’s not going to do it because she wants him to. He said, woman, what is your concern to do with me? My hour has not yet come. But when the father gave him instructions, he did them. Jesus didn’t just kind of… He wasn’t a burgeoning magician learning tricks and how to fool people and how to do things. He just spoke authoritatively his father’s word. And it’s God who worked the miracles through him. That’s what he said. He said, it’s the father who does the works through me. So how he did it was… out of obedience to his father, and he allowed his father to do what his father intended to do in every case. In many cases, it was something miraculous.
SPEAKER 11 :
Hello? Yeah. My second question is how did John the Baptist die?
SPEAKER 07 :
He was beheaded.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yes, I know he was beheaded. I know all those. I know all the answers. And the last question is the fundamentals of Christianity.
SPEAKER 08 :
I didn’t quite make out that question.
SPEAKER 11 :
What are the fundamentals of Christianity?
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay, I can give you those. But wait, why did you ask? You said you know how John the Baptist died, so why did you ask how he died?
SPEAKER 11 :
No, because Jesus was on earth, and he didn’t have him. I know he said he was cut off because a daughter of some king wanted him cut off. I know that Jesus did not just decide to… to change water into wine, but the mother went to him.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, his mother went to him and told him they were out of wine. She didn’t suggest what he should do. No, no, I know.
SPEAKER 11 :
I don’t think she even knew that he should. I was a Christian since 1958, probably before you were born. So it’s not that I don’t know those things. I’m just trying to get… Because people continue to dump on the Catholic Church as though the Catholic Church is inventing things. they say that the Catholic Church believes that Mary is still a virgin. And every Sunday when they talk about the gospel, they talk about Joseph being Mary’s husband. So they cannot be talking about husband and she’s thinking that. They’re talking about when he gave birth to Jesus. He was a virgin. Okay.
SPEAKER 08 :
Our listeners may have as hard a time understanding as I do, but you said something that I was – I think you said I was dumping on the Catholic Church. I don’t think I do that. I think I mentioned what my differences are with the Catholic Church. I also mentioned what my differences are with Protestant churches and with Eastern Orthodox churches and so forth. I mean, I am entitled to have differences of opinion from any group I want to, and if someone asks me what I think – I’m the world’s greatest authority on my own opinion, so I can give my opinion accurately. Now, then you were talking about Mary, and I think you were telling me that the way that Jesus knew that he should turn water into wine is because his mother said to him. I think maybe what you’re trying to say is that Jesus was beholden to his mother. I know that Roman Catholics, apparently like yourself, believe that we can talk to Mary and she’ll talk to Jesus about it. I suppose maybe that’s what you’re referring to, that somehow Mary learned that the wedding feast had run out of wine, and so she came and told Jesus. But he said that he wasn’t going to do it for her. He said, woman, his answer was, woman, what have your concerns got to do with me? That’s what he said. He said, my hour is not yet. In other words, he’s saying, well, I mean, I’ll take that under advisement, Mom. But I’m not here to do your bidding. You know, he had left home at age 30. He had supported the family after Joseph had died, no doubt, in the carpenter shop. And now he’d left home. And probably all the years he was at home, his mother used to come to him and look to him for the kinds of things a woman would seek help from her husband for. Because Jesus was the man of the house after Joseph died. But he’s now saying to her, you know, I’m not going to be doing your bidding from now on. And by implication, he’s going to be doing God’s bidding. So, I mean, if you’re saying, well, he did a miracle because his mom told him to, and therefore we can ask Mary and she’ll tell Jesus to do things and he’ll do them for her. I think you’re wrong on both premises, first of all. Mary isn’t listening to us as far as I know. So, I mean, I don’t know that I can talk to Mary. She’s gone on. She’s not in this world anymore. She was when she said those things to Jesus, but she’s gone on elsewhere and I can’t talk to her. How would she hear me? You know, she’s not God. So she’s not omniscient and omnipotent and omnipresent. She doesn’t have all those divine traits, at least as far as the Bible would tell me. So, You know, I don’t know how I could talk to her or why I would. Why would I? I would talk to God because that’s what Jesus said to do. Jesus said, when you pray, say, our Father, which art in heaven. Now, if you want to say instead, our Mother, which art in heaven, I can’t stop you, but I would say this is not what Jesus said to do. And if you’re going to pray, you know, if you really want results from your prayers, I do. I want results from my prayers. So I don’t make up my rules about prayer as I go along. I figure if God gave instructions to me about prayer, I’m going to follow those as closely as possible because it’s hard enough to get prayers answered even if If you do, I certainly don’t want to innovate and do other stuff. So Jesus said when you pray, pray to the Father. He never said to pray to anyone else. So that’s what I do. If you want to pray to somebody else, you can do that if you want to. But you’re certainly not following Jesus in that. See, as a Christian, my duty is to follow Jesus. He said, what are the fundamentals of the Christian faith? The fundamental of the Christian faith is that Jesus Christ is Lord. He’s the King. He’s the Messiah. The word Messiah means the anointed King. God sent Jesus to be King and to be Lord. And the fact that he is, is the fundamental declaration of the Christian gospel. So, I believe the fundamentals of Christianity are you surrender to Christ as your King and Lord, and you do what he said. And in connection to this business about praying, that would mean that, among other things, if I’m going to do what Jesus said, I’m going to do what he said about prayer, too. Because, you know, the fundamental Christian duty is to obey Jesus. And so, I mean, that dovetails well with the whole question of, praying to God. Now, you also raised the thing about John the Baptist, but I don’t have time to go back into it. I couldn’t understand what your point was. You asked how John the Baptist died, and I told you, and you said you already knew, so I guess that’s a mystery to me of why you asked that. But we’ve talked a lot to you now. We have a lot of people waiting, but I appreciate you joining us, and I hope that clarifies some of the things you were curious about. Leland from Boston, Massachusetts. Welcome.
SPEAKER 05 :
Thank you. Good afternoon, Steve. Yeah. Mike, could you expound on what the Lord meant when he said the kingdom of heaven is like a child? And perhaps you could use the other chapter and verses which explain with regard to the kingdom of heaven being like a child.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, actually, Jesus never said the kingdom of heaven is like a child. He did say that if we want to enter the kingdom of heaven, we have to do so like a child. In other words, he said you have to humble yourself like a child to come in. And here’s what he said in Mark chapter 10. This is when he said, let the little children come to me. Do not forbid them. That’s verse 14. For of such is the kingdom of God. Then he said in verse 14, In verse 15, Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child. Now that means the person is like a little child. It doesn’t mean the kingdom of God is as a child. He’s not comparing the kingdom of God with a child. He’s comparing the person who’s entering it as a child. He says, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it. So maybe you’re understanding him to be saying something different about that. Maybe you thought he was saying that The kingdom of God is like a child, but he says you have to be like a child to do that. So I think that was perhaps a misreading on your part, which I think I can understand how you might have read it that way, but that’s, I think, a misunderstanding. All right. Thank you. Jerry from Worcester, Massachusetts, two Massachusetts in a row. Jerry, welcome.
SPEAKER 03 :
Hi, Steve. I’d just like to ask you a question on the book of Corinthians. And as you know, it was a Gentile church, a lot of worldliness. And my specific question today is, what does it mean when he’s talking about the resurrection in chapter 15, which is a wonderful exposition on the resurrection and the final day and the trumpet, that if the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized for them? Could you just… Give your opinion or show the different understandings of what that passage means, that people were actually being baptized for the dead.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, this is a statement that has been answered 40 different ways. I say that because I encountered a commentator once who said he had encountered 40 different explanations of this verse. This is, of course, 1 Corinthians 15, 29. Paul said, otherwise, what will they do who are baptized for the dead if the dead do not rise at all? Why, then, are they baptized for the dead? Now, most people I know say that Paul was aware of some religious group that practiced baptism by proxy for the dead. Now, this is something the Mormons today practice. They believe that everyone has to be baptized to be saved, and if they have relatives who died before they were converted to Mormonism, They feel like they need to be baptized, but it’s a little late if their bones are in the ground. So they teach that living Mormons can be baptized in place of dead loved ones who were not baptized in their lifetime. So they’re being baptized in their place. It’s a proxy thing. That’s what the Mormons do, and I think that many Christians have assumed, just like the Mormons apparently assumed, that Paul is referring to that practice, living Christians being baptized on behalf of dead people who were not baptized Christians, so that dead people who neglected that step could have that box checked, and they could then be saved, hopefully. I don’t think that’s… I mean, it’s possible. I mean, we know that Mormons practice it, so Paul might have known some groups that practiced it, though he is not saying that it was his practice or that Christians should practice it. He does mention people who are baptized for the dead, but does he mean what the Mormons mean? Does he mean living people being baptized on behalf of people who’ve died without being baptized? Well, that is a very common viewpoint. usually the Christians who hold it would say, yeah, Paul knew of people who did this, but he’s not endorsing it. And it would seem strange for Paul to bring it up because he’s bringing it up as an argument for the resurrection of the dead being a real thing. And he’s saying if it’s not, why would people be baptized for the dead? But the thing is, if the practice he’s talking about is not one that he endorses, then how would this be an argument for a doctrine that he endorses? That is, if he’s saying, oh, well, we know that resurrection is true because people are baptized for the dead. Why would they do that if there’s no resurrection? Yeah, but if he doesn’t believe in baptizing for the dead, why would he use that as an argument for a doctrine that he does believe in? You know, one answer to that might be that there was some group of, denying the resurrection of the dead, some cult, heretical group. But they were nonetheless baptizing people for the dead in the Mormon sense of the word, and therefore saying these people are inconsistent. They’re denying that there’s a resurrection, and yet they baptize for the dead. That’s a possibility. And again, like I said, one commentator said he had found 40 different explanations of this verse. And the reason for that is that there’s no other place for that expression, baptism for the dead, used. But there is another thing that has crossed my mind, and I have encountered it somewhere. This came to my mind many, many years ago, decades ago, and I wondered if it was possibly true. And then I later found one of the old commentators who had expressed this opinion too, which doesn’t make it true, but it made me feel like I’m not alone in it. Paul has been arguing that if there’s no resurrection of the dead, then Jesus is dead. He said that earlier in the chapter. In verse 13, he said, but if there’s no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen, which means he’s dead. If Christ isn’t risen, he didn’t rise. He’s dead. So he’s saying, if the doctrine of the resurrection is false, then Christ is dead. Now, on that assumption, in verse 29, he could be saying, otherwise, what will they do who are baptized for Christ? The dead, that is for Christ. The word for, the preposition for there can mean with reference to. So why are people baptized with reference to a dead man, Jesus, if the dead don’t rise? He said if the dead don’t rise, Jesus is dead. Why would we be baptized with reference to him if he’s not alive? Now, in this case, he would be talking about Christian practice. Christians are, in fact, baptized in the name of Jesus. We’re baptized into Christ. We’re baptized, therefore, with reference to Christ. And by doing so, we are testifying that he is risen from the dead. And, therefore, how can anyone who has had Christian baptism deny the general doctrine of the resurrection? That’s what Paul is saying. So the dead in this particular case, if this is the correct understanding, would be the dead Jesus, who is only dead, of course, if there’s no resurrection, but that’s the condition he gives. If the dead don’t rise at all, that means Jesus didn’t rise either. And so he’s dead. So why would you be baptized with reference to him? So that’s the second idea. There’s 38 others that I don’t know and I don’t really care to investigate. But if somebody uses this verse to say, well, we should be baptizing living people by proxy for people who’ve died. That is taking one interpretation of this phrase, one that I don’t necessarily, I don’t see being unambiguous at all, and then saying that this is Christian duty, although Paul does not describe it. This is necessarily Christian duty. So it’s just a weird verse. What I get from this verse, and I get this from reading lots of the epistles, is that Paul’s writing to somebody other than me. Now, his writings apply to me. But he’s not writing to me. The Apostle Paul did not have Steve, Greg, me in mind when he wrote this epistle. He had some real people in mind who were his friends, Christian friends he knew in Corinth. And he and they shared a lot of common frame of reference that most of us today don’t share. Paul had, before writing either of his two epistles to Corinth, had spent 18 months in Corinth. And then he left and went to Ephesus and wrote these epistles to the Corinthians. But having spent 18 months with them, they’d done a lot of talking. They’d heard a lot of preaching and teaching from Paul. He probably preached every day. So they knew a lot of stuff about Paul’s ideas and his phraseology and so forth. that we wouldn’t know because we weren’t there. And this is what we need to read the epistles through this understanding, that Paul is writing to real people who had some shared frame of reference with him. He could allude to things that they knew, but we don’t. If we think of 2 Thessalonians, remember, he talks about the man of sin must be revealed, but first that which hinders him has to be taken out of the way. Now, he doesn’t say what that is, but he does say, remember when I was with you, I talked to you about these things. In other words, he figured they know what he’s talking about, but you and I don’t. I mean, we can guess, we can have theories, but they knew. And I think this business about why are people baptized for the dead I think that the Corinthians who knew Paul well probably could make more sense of that than we can. And we can, in a sense, only guess what that really means. We can have educated guesses, but we can’t be sure if we’re right. That’s true of a number of rather personal things Paul says in some cases in his epistles. We need to take a break, but we’re not at all done. We have another half hour coming up. Don’t go away. The Narrow Path is a listener-supported ministry. If you’d like to write to us, the address is The Narrow Path, P.O. Box 1730, Temecula, California, 92593. The website is thenarrowpath.com. I’ll be right back. Don’t go away.
SPEAKER 01 :
Everyone is welcome to call the narrow path and discuss areas of disagreement with the host, but if you do so, please state your disagreement succinctly at the beginning of your call and be prepared to present your scriptural arguments when asked by the host. Don’t be disappointed if you don’t have the last word or if your call is cut shorter than you prefer. Our desire is to get as many callers on the air during the short program, so please be considerate to others.
SPEAKER 08 :
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, about Christianity, anything like that, or a disagreement with a host, feel free to give me a call. We have a couple of lines open as I’m looking at the switchboard right now, and the number to reach me is 844- Once again, that number is 844-484-5737. All right. We’re going to talk next to Wendell from Evansville, Indiana. Hi, Wendell. Welcome.
SPEAKER 06 :
Thank you, Steve. I was just wondering what your idea is about the Book of Revelation. Many people… I think it’s kind of like an update of most of the Olivet Discourse. There’s those time markers in the early part of Chapter 1 that this is going to soon happen, and people just assume that it’s about the Olivet Discourse. And I agree that I think the entire New Testament was written before 70 A.D., John is the gospel that doesn’t even mention the Olivet Discourse that I can recall. And then what gets me is there’s no reference in an entire book of Revelation about Jerusalem. There’s a reference about New Jerusalem. The first one is the letter to Philadelphia. That’s one of the two churches that don’t have any condemnation. It talks about New Jerusalem. And then in, I think, chapter 21, it’s a couple times mentioned New Jerusalem. But no reference, the entire book, about Jerusalem.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, let me address that. I agree with you that the book of Revelation is kind of John’s version or his substitute for the Olivet Discourse. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all present the Olivet Discourse, where Jesus talked about the destruction of the temple. He said not one stone of the temple will be left standing on another. They’ll all be thrown down. The disciples said, when will this be and what sign will there be before this happens? And Jesus tells them in what we call the Olivet Discourse that it will happen in that generation. and that the sign of it will be what Jesus called the abomination of desolation, which Luke paraphrases for us when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies. He said in Luke 21-20, which is his version of the Olivet Discourse, Luke paraphrases abomination of desolation to the words Jerusalem surrounded by armies. Now, Revelation talks, I believe, about the same subject, which is why, as you pointed out, the book tells us, that these things must shortly take place, and these things, the time is at hand, and so forth. Just like Jesus in the Olivet Discourse said this will happen in this generation, well, Revelation was written even later than the Olivet Discourse, and said, yeah, time is at hand. And I agree with you that it was written before 70 AD, so we’re on the same page about that. Now, you said that Revelation doesn’t mention Jerusalem, and you’re right, it doesn’t mention Jerusalem by name, But I do believe it is talking about Jerusalem, using different names for Jerusalem. One place we can see this, certainly, is in Revelation 11, 8, where it says about the two witnesses, their dead bodies shall lie in the streets of that city, that great city, which is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, where our Lord was crucified. Now, there’s only one city on the planet where Jesus was crucified, and that was Jerusalem. But he says it’s spiritually called Sodom and Egypt. Well, that’s understandable, too, because Isaiah chapter 1 refers to Jerusalem as Sodom. So, I mean, that kind of, he’s using the term figuratively for it, but Revelation says, yeah, it’s the city where Jesus was crucified. It’s spiritually called Sodom. And he adds to that, it’s also called Egypt. And it might even be true to say that it’s even called Babylon in the later chapters of Revelation. Many people believe that Mystery Babylon, because she’s drunk with the blood of the martyrs and the apostles and prophets, And Jesus said that Jerusalem is the one who’s got that blood guilt on them for all the prophets that were killed. Therefore, Babylon, just like Sodom and Egypt, of course, it’s not literally Jerusalem, but Revelation is using symbolic language, as Revelation 11a says. This is spiritually called that. So, you know, I think probably we are to understand this is reference to Jerusalem and its demise. But if you mean by that, The book of Revelation doesn’t mention the fall of Jerusalem as an accomplished fact when it was written. And therefore, it must have been written before Jerusalem fell. I think that might be the point you’re making. If it is, then you could be right about that, because it does speak of this city as going to fall. It’s going to fall at the time Revelation is written. So the temple is even still standing in Revelation 11, verses 1 and 2, which we know the temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. So I think there’s pretty solid evidence inside the book that it’s written before 70 A.D. And yeah, it doesn’t speak of the fall of Jerusalem as an accomplished fact, which I think is the point you were making. Is that correct?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, the point I was trying to make is… all at once starts talking about the seven churches in Asia Minor. It’s like, well, what does the seven churches in Asia Minor have to do with the destruction of Jerusalem?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, that’s a good question, too. Yeah, that’s a good question, too. Why would, if Revelation is, as many people say, including myself, if it’s talking about Jerusalem, why would the letter be sent to Turkey, where these churches were? Well, I think some people say, well, if it’s about Jerusalem, Jesus should have had this letter sent to Jerusalem instead of to Turkey. But Jerusalem didn’t need to receive it. The church in Jerusalem already had this information in the Olivet Discourse. Jesus had told them almost the same basic stuff in the Olivet Discourse. That was told to the apostles in Jerusalem. you know, before Jesus left, even before he died. So the church in Jerusalem already had this information, the warnings and all that. I think the reason that, you know, John’s letter was sent to Ephesus and the other churches of Asia was that, you know, the fall of Jerusalem doesn’t have the same immediate relevance to the Gentile churches as it does to Jerusalem itself. But it’s certainly of interest because the whole early church, was kind of in a confused state as to whether they belonged to the Jewish religion or not. That’s why the Jerusalem Council had to meet to decide whether a Gentile is becoming Jewish and getting circumcised when they become a Christian. And the answer was no. But there were still many, even the Roman government, who confused the Christian church with the Jewish faith. because both were monotheistic, and the Romans had never heard of monotheistic religions until they heard it in Judaism. And then Christianity, which also had Jewish leaders and a Jewish Messiah and was monotheistic, the Romans just typically thought of Christianity as another kind of Judaism, like the Sadducees and the Pharisees were different kinds of Judaism. They thought the Nazarenes were the Christians were. In fact, Josephus, I think it was, said that when Titus destroyed the city of Jerusalem, he thought he was ending the Jewish religion and the Christian religion at the same time. Now, when Jerusalem was destroyed and the Christian church still flourished, it became obvious that Christianity has its own identity and it’s not just part of Judaism. And that was something that the churches of that time, that was an important point to them. It made it very clear. Christianity is not just another Jewish sect. It’s something that survives independently of the temple and so forth. So, I mean, that might be why it was sent. And remember, John, his home church at this time was Ephesus. He was on the island of Patmos when this happened, but he had been sent there from Ephesus. And after he left Patmos, he went back to Ephesus and died there. So that was his home church, which would explain why, you know, if Jesus is sending this revelation to Gentile churches, he might have John send it to the church that John was affiliated with, as opposed to churches he was not. So, you know, I don’t know if I know all the reasons, but Revelation didn’t have to be sent to Jerusalem because Jesus had already given them that information in the Olivet Discourse. And if God was going to give a book talking about that subject to Gentile churches… it would reasonably be the churches that John has had direct contact with and a relationship with. Those are kind of my thoughts about the question. Thanks for your call. Let’s talk to James in Florida. Welcome, James.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah, hi, Steve. I have just a question. I’m not going to argue. I’m 88. And if you don’t mind, I just wrote this little note down so I don’t get all balled up. And I like your opinion. I never heard a sermon or a teaching on Genesis, oh, now I lost my, Genesis 1, 26 through 31. And I could read it if you want me to, but I’m sorry.
SPEAKER 08 :
No, no, I know that’s for God, so let’s make man.
SPEAKER 12 :
And the second story I was heard and I accepted was a reiteration of that. which I’ve studied the Bible for years. I taught years ago Sunday school, but I never got on to that. And it seems to me that, you know, when you read the first one, there’s no… Let me say… Now I lost where I’m… So I’m just going to talk. There’s no dangerous trees and no death in the first creation. And I’ve read about the… a little bit on the Yahwist and the Priestley, the ancient writers, and the other two that I forgot about. And somebody wrote those things, and they were put in. And if they’re by God, somebody ought to talk about them once in a while. I’m serious. And I’ve never heard those mentioned until I had called up one group and I had some ridiculous answers there, just over this and over that.
SPEAKER 07 :
So your question is what exactly?
SPEAKER 12 :
Why do you think that preachers and pastors just ignore those verses, those five or six verses there?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, I don’t know. I’ve never heard pastors ignore them. I certainly have never ignored them. I mean, in my lectures online, I teach through Genesis verse by verse. Don’t leave anything out. But, you know, there might be lots of verses in the Bible I’ve never heard a preacher preach about, but that doesn’t mean that he hasn’t preached on them. I haven’t heard every sermon anyone’s given. So I can’t answer for the preachers. Now, I will answer for your thought that the creation story in Chapter 1 of Genesis says has or lacks features of the creation story in Genesis chapter 2. You mentioned that in Genesis chapter 2, we obviously have the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But you mentioned that in Chapter 1, there’s no mention of any dangerous trees, you said. So what’s up with that? Well, I believe there’d be no need for Genesis Chapter 2 if Genesis Chapter 1 had everything in it that could be said about the subject. Genesis Chapter 1, it looks to me, is just an overview of of the general activities of God in a six-day period of creation. And then, of course, the first three verses of chapter 2, he rests and makes the seventh day a holy day. But the creation has passed over rather quickly each day, including the sixth day when God made man and woman, it says. It’s a rather quick overview of the whole week. Now, because not all the things, not all the days of that week, were equally significant in what God did. And the most significant thing he did was on the sixth day when he made man and woman I believe chapter 2 revisits the sixth day and gives us more detail. In Genesis 1, verse 27, it simply says that he made man in his own image. Male and female, he made them. So we’re told in Genesis 1, he made both sexes on the sixth day, and we’re told nothing else about it. But in Genesis 2, we find that he made the male first, and then he made the female first. same day, and certain other things happened that day. And on that day that he made them, he gave them instructions to avoid a certain tree. Now, he didn’t say it was a dangerous tree. I mean, obviously it was spiritually dangerous for them to disobey God, but it could have been any kind of tree. If God said don’t eat it, then I guess eating it would be a spiritual danger. But the tree itself, we don’t know of the tree having any negative things about it, except that God just told them don’t eat it. And they did, which was a bad thing for them. Now, these two different stories, one just amplifies on the other. And you mentioned the Yahwist and the Priestly and the Deuteronomist and the four strands of the documentary hypothesis. There’s the Elohist, the Yahwist, the Priestly, and the Deuteronomist traditions. These ideas, that there are four strands like this, came up in the 19th century among people who were not necessarily believers in the inspiration of Genesis. They didn’t believe that Moses wrote it, although the books say that he wrote it. I mean, of the five books of Moses… three of them mention, or four of them mention that Moses was their author. Well, three of them do. And the Jews believed that Moses was the author of all of them, and so did Jesus. Jesus said that Moses gave them the Torah. Now, skeptical scholars in the 19th century said, no, Moses didn’t write any of this. In fact, they said he couldn’t have because writing was not yet invented in Moses’ day. They really believed that. They believed that there were no written documents anywhere that early, because writing didn’t exist, so Moses couldn’t have written it. Well, of course, they know better than that now, because hundreds of years before Moses, there was the laws of Hammurabi that were contemporary with Abraham, Moses’ great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather, you know. And so in Abraham’s day, there was writing. And even in Palestine, in Moses’ day, there was writing, because we’ve found the Rosh Hamra texts more recently in the 20th century, which date from Moses’ time, and they’re written stuff. So the idea that Moses couldn’t have written it has been abundantly disproven. That theory just arose from the ignorance of the skeptical scholars in the 19th century. And in the absence of believing Moses wrote these things, they came up with other theories. They said some of this material uses the name Yahweh for God. Some of the material uses the word Elohim for God. And they concluded gratuitously, it seems to me, that the same author wouldn’t write both. I’m not sure why, because I could call God Elohim, and I could call him Yahweh, and I’m one person. Why couldn’t Moses have done the same thing? But they decided, no, we’re going to see different origins for these two streams, the Yahwist and the Elohist. And then there was, of course, the book of Leviticus that held this priestly stuff. And they decided that Moses didn’t write that either, couldn’t write any of it. So some group of priests wrote that. And then the book of Deuteronomy tells lots of the same stories again with differing detail. And they say, well, that’s yet a different tradition. So they have these four different traditions, which they argued none of them were written by Moses, although the Bible says that Moses wrote all of them. So I guess we have to decide, did Jesus know Jesus? Who wrote them? Or did these skeptics know who wrote them? And these skeptics, by the way, came up with their skeptical views because they mistakenly thought Moses couldn’t have written them. We now know that he could have. But they were pretty entrenched in what’s called the documentary hypothesis. By the time they realized they were wrong in their first premise, they had entrenched themselves very deeply in the development of this four different views from four different sources idea. And that idea is, I think, doesn’t have any grounds to stand on. It was a replacement for the Mosaic authorship. since they ruled that out. But now we know there’s no reason to rule out that, so we might as well just stick with what the Bible says about itself. I mean, the writers of the Bible knew who wrote it, because they wrote it. And therefore, if Moses wrote it and said, hey, I wrote this, and then Jesus confirmed it, and the apostles also confirmed it, I’d say, well, okay, if the writer knew, and Jesus knew, and the apostles knew, who is it in the 18th or 19th century who knew otherwise? And how did they know? How did they figure that out? They just made it up. So, I mean, that’s kind of where I stand on that whole thing about the different traditions.
SPEAKER 12 :
So that’s fine. So you accept the second story as it is as,
SPEAKER 08 :
with the condemnation uh yes i yes i do hey i need to take another call we’re running out of time we got my lines full but i hope that’s helpful to you all right let’s talk to uh nelson in fort worth texas nelson welcome yes uh thank you for taking my call there i just got two brief questions um
SPEAKER 09 :
In the Gospels, it says, is not this Jesus the son of Joseph? So where do we get proof that Joseph died and Jesus was taking over as head of the household? And the second question is, where do we know about John going back from Ephesus, back to Ephesus after being on Patmos? So I have to listen.
SPEAKER 08 :
Okay, we know that from the early church, of course. The early church knew him, and they’re the ones who tell us about it. There’s what we call the church fathers who lived in the time of, some of them in the time of the apostles or immediately after the time of the apostles. And some lived, you know, two or three generations after the apostles. But they knew what happened to them, and their writings tell us what happened to them. As far as why people call Jesus Jesus, the son of Joseph, even after Joseph was dead, Jesus would forever be known as the son of Joseph. It’s just like my last name is Greg, but let’s just say my last name, like my wife’s maiden name, was Peterson. Now, Peterson means the son of Peter. I mean, it may not mean that anymore, but that’s how the name came to exist, or Johnson. or Robertson, or something like that. Those mean the son of John or the son of Robert. Jesus referred to Peter as Peter the son of John or Jonas. That’s how people were recognized. Jesus was the son of Joseph in society. That’s because Joseph was his legal father, and that was his last name, as it were. It’s not really a last name. It functions as a last name. Now, how do we know that Joseph had died? Well, for one thing, by the time Jesus started his ministry, Mary and the other kids were traveling around with Jesus. We see that in John chapter 2. Not all the time, perhaps. But we don’t see Joseph traveling with him, but she does. But probably the most important thing is that when Jesus was on the cross, he committed the care of his mother to John, which would hardly make sense if she had a husband to take care of her. It seems obvious that Joseph was needed by God to fill the role of raising Jesus as a boy into adulthood. And then apparently he had lived out his days and passed on. and therefore Mary needed somebody else to watch over her since her husband apparently was dead. That’s why Jesus committed her care into the care of John. So that would be how we deduce that, I’d say. Jeff from Boise, Idaho, welcome.
SPEAKER 02 :
Hi, Steve.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hi.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, is this a – Is it the duty of every Christian to share the gospel and to fulfill the Great Commission? I could ask that question in a slightly different way. Is it sin if I don’t?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, it would be a sin to neglect the commission, but not everybody has the same role in fulfilling the commission. The church, the body of Christ, has many members and many gifts. Many people do different things. Paul said in Ephesians 4.11 that God gave some evangelists. He gave some apostles. Now, apostles were like missionaries. Evangelists are people who preach the gospel. But he also said there’s some who are not those things. For example, some are prophets or some are pastors or teachers. And let’s face it, most people are none of the above. Most people aren’t pastors or teachers or necessarily evangelists, but the church is. has all these members. It’s like if I said, the purpose of my body is to raise my kids. Okay, well, my hands will do part of that, my mouth will do part of that, my ears and eyes will do part of that, my feet will do part of that. Raising the kids is the general project of me. But not every member of my body will do the same part. And the same thing is true if the body of Christ is to make disciples of all nations. Well, some are going to go out and preach in foreign lands. Some are going to stay home and disciple the people who’ve already been converted in their homelands. There’s going to be some people who will evangelize locally and not go overseas to other nations. And there’s others who will simply support the work financially or with their volunteer help and so forth. Now, all of these things are recognized as different gifts. Paul mentioned the gift of giving, the gift of helps, the gift of showing mercy, the gift of leading, the gift of teaching. You know, there’s all kinds of gifts. So, I mean, yeah, we all have to fulfill the Great Commission, but that doesn’t mean we’re all evangelists. It means that we’re all part of the united project of the body of Christ to make disciples of the whole world. And we should do the part that we’re gifted at. Now, not all people are gifted at speaking. Some can’t teach. Some can’t preach well. but they might be able to do something practical. They might have a gift in helps or give money. You know, this is part of the project, too. As every part does its share, the job gets done. If any part says, well, I’m not interested in this project and doesn’t do their share, then, yeah, that would be sin because we live for the purpose of the Great Commission. But I myself, for example, have not traveled to every country, and I haven’t evangelized that much in other countries. I have done some. I mostly, when I go to other countries, go there to teach Christians, teach the Bible. I have done some evangelism in other countries, but that’s not my principal calling. And if I had done none at all, it wouldn’t mean that I was not involved in the Great Commission. Because the Great Commission is not just to preach to people, but to also teach them to observe all things Christ, to command it. That’s pretty much the part I’ve played. But what if you’re neither a teacher nor a preacher? Well, then you can do what it is God gave you to do, to help the project, because there’s lots of things to do. And, you know, if the only thing you have to do is to give, well, then that’s involvement too. So, yeah, you don’t want to shirk the Great Commission. But if you say, well, I don’t feel very much like I’m an evangelist or a preacher, yeah, well, you’re probably right about that. Maybe you’re not. So if you’re not, don’t do that. Do what you’re supposed to do. Hey, we’re out of time. I appreciate your call, Jeff. You’re listening to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg. We’re on Monday through Friday at the same time. We’re listener supported. If you’d like to help us stay alive here on the air, I should say, You can write to The Narrow Path, P.O. Box 1730, Temecula, California, 92593, or go to our website, thenarrowpath.com. Thanks for joining us.
