But what I have a more serious problem with are the young Earthers that want us to deny what we know from science.

And as a result, they want us to ignore scientists when they tell us things like, take a vaccine for the pandemic, and guess what?

The science supported not getting the vaccine.

Over six minutes later, we heard her say this.

Now you don't want to even talk.

So, you know.

Well, because it's because you've brought up a topic that I was not prepared for.

If I had known that this was going to be the topic, I would have brought facts and figures with me, but I did not know that this topic would come up, and so I did not bring any facts and figures with me, and I'm not prepared to defend that position.

But you brought these topics up.

I didn't.

Well, okay, you're right.

I did.

This is Apologetics Live to answer your questions.

Your host from Striving for Eternity Ministries, Andrew Rapaport, Foreign we are live, Apologetics Live here to answer your most challenging questions that you have about God and the Bible.

We can answer any question that you have about God in the Bible.

And that is a welcome invitation for you to go to Apologetics Live.

You could do it now if you're watching live.

That'd be good.

But if you're listening on the podcast version or whatnot, you can join us on a Thursday night, 8:00 Eastern Time.

Just go to apologexlive.com scroll down to where you see the streamyard icon.

It's the little duck.

Click on that.

Give permission for your microphone and camera, but at least the microphone because otherwise we don't hear you.

And join us, ask us anything, anytime.

Now with that, we, I'll bring in my co host.

This is, I should say a Ministry of Striving for Eternity Ministry.

And that is the ministry that I work for.

But I got here, Drew from, from the Dead Guys.

Oh, no.

Dead Guys Readers.

Oh, Dead Guy.

Yeah, you read Dead Guys.

Got it.

Yeah, we do.

Yeah.

So you know it, it's, it's a thing.

You're, you're, you're noticing something.

Folks that are watching, what's missing behind.

Me, Drew, that whole bookcase of books.

Yeah.

The only thing left on there is, well, Scrolly Joe's Coffee.

But, but you're leaving the coffee is what, what we're taking from that?

Oh, absolutely not.

It's, it's that the books went to long term storage and the coffee's not going, not going to make it that long.

So yeah, so we're in the process of.

We've spent the last five days packing up half the house and loading it.

Just before the show, I told Drew, you and Tom might need to start without me because I don't know what time I'm going to.

Depends how long it takes to load.

And then when Tom said he probably was going to be late or not be here, it was just going to be me.

And I was prepared for it.

Yeah.

And I didn't want to do that to the poor audience.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So that's no fun for them.

So we got a.

You know, I played that intro because we got a special guest backstage, so we should Bring him in.

Mr.

Chuck Carpenter.

How are you, sir?

I'm doing well, Doing very well.

Thank you for bringing me on.

Yeah, well, you saw this, you saw the topic that we posted on Twitter and you were like, oh, dude, I'm totally up for this.

Oh, yeah, that's.

That's my wheelhouse for sure.

For folks that don't know, your handle on X is Atheist Nightmares.

And so tonight, what we wanted to do, and I said this a few weeks ago, that what I want to do with you folks is, is half times, instead of just doing an open Q and A like we would usually do when we don't have guests or, or specific topic that we want to deal with, we would just do open Q and A.

And we got a lot of questions that you folks all send in and we do appreciate them and I mount them up and.

And then when I'm not here, I leave all the really tough ones for Drew and Tom to tackle.

That's usually how it works.

That's how it works.

No, but what I wanted to do is I want to be able to give you guys answers to the typical challenges you're going to get when you evangelize.

And so we're going to, at different times, whether it be a whole hour, two hours dealing with it, or if it's just going to be a small 10 minute segment.

But I want to start regularly giving you guys some, you know, apologetic answers to things.

It's, it's.

If any of you listen to or listen back.

When I used to do my Andrew Rapport's Daily Rap Report, that was a two minute Monday through Friday.

And what I started doing there was just rattling off, I think I did a couple hundred just challenges that people come up with to, you know, to the Christian faith or from other religions and things like that.

And I was just trying to do them in two minutes to give you guys, you don't need to know a lot.

Sometimes you just need to know one thing to look for and a really good thing.

You know, if you want to get into apologetics on the Striving for Eternity channel, we have a.

A playlist on basically how to.

How to do apologetics and debate, and we teach hermeneutics and logic is what we're doing.

I should mention that right now we're also streaming on Matter of Theology, which is the podcast that, well, I would love to say Drew is part of, but, you know, the last time they've recorded, I think.

I think that was before COVID You know, you're close.

You're close.

We did.

We did one at the beginning of the year, which covered the topic of Steve Lawson.

And then before that, we did one episode all of last year, so all of 2023.

So you're done for this year, then?

You did the one per year?

Yeah, pretty much.

Yeah.

We're getting on the.

Just thinking schedule, you know.

Yeah, I think they.

They record more often than you guys.

That's.

That's true.

But.

So we were.

We did have plans to record some episodes, but it's trying to get Chris's schedule and my schedule to mesh where we can have time to do that.

So we have some episode ideas.

We have one in particular that we are going to talk about where once we can actually get together, where we're basically talking about elders, qualifications of elders, and then disqualified elders and what can disqualify you from being an elder of a church.

And that's going to kind of hit on a little more closer to home for me and Chris, because it has to do with the church that he and I used to go to and serve at some things that happened there.

And so, yeah, and it's.

It's the church where Matter of Theology was actually born out of.

And then we were.

And we basically came alongside to support the church and say, we agree with everything that you're doing in these categories.

And if you tell us, say, hey, you know, the goal was always bring the.

The podcast under the authority of the church, so there's accountability.

And then they started saying, you can't record here.

You can't have anyone from the church on the podcast and all this stuff.

And it was.

It turned into a whole thing.

So it was a roller coaster.

But now there were some things that happened recently, and we're going to address it.

Okay, well, good.

I can't wait to do a response video to that.

Oh, sorry.

Because Andrew is The one we're talking about right now.

Well, I wasn't thinking that.

I was just thinking there's a lot of thoughts I have on that topic.

So.

So I, I think before we get into tonight's topic that we're going to cover is the, the challenge that we often get is God doesn't exist.

Or does God exist in.

And you Drew.

I liked what you had said.

We should reword it as God.

You know, God does exist.

I think that was Tom.

That was Tom that said that.

Okay.

And you know, and some of you are.

That are regular to apologize live if you're not welcome.

If you are.

Hey, how about you share this out right now, by the way, so that folks will know that we're live?

I will say that we have been.

There has been something that went on with YouTube and there's suddenly folks who, who thought they were subscribed, we found this out, are no longer following or subscribed to the channel.

So if you're listening to this on the podcast and you know, go check and make sure you mark that you.

You are still subscribed and mark that you, you know, get the alert so that, you know, when we're live.

But that aside, before we get into this whole thing, you know, but I will start say, actually the.

The folks who are regular, you know, that I have two presuppositions I hold to, and it's that God exists and he has spoken.

Yep.

Those are the two things I'm going to walk into every apologetic encounter with the realization that not only do I know that's true, so does the person that I'm speaking to.

It radically changes the conversation.

And what I'd like to do, though, before we get to that is just talk a little bit about something in the news.

I know none of you have heard about this, but the socialist Pope has died.

I mean, Pope Francis has died.

Was he the sitting Pope?

The current sitting Pope.

He.

Well, not now, because he's in hell.

No, he's dead.

Yeah, because I know there was.

Was a Pope and then he stepped down and then they got a new pope.

No.

So, so, so there was a.

And I would love to know what really happened there.

But you had a pope that.

The rumor was John Paul II really wanted that guy.

And I forgot the.

I forgot which name he took.

But he was a very conservative.

He basically wanted to.

From where we.

The rumors at least that he wanted to deal with all the pedophiles and priests that were doing things to young boys.

And so somewhere along the line.

He just decided, I'm going to step down.

I'm too old for this.

I don't want to have, you know, this isn't for me.

But he stayed in Vatican City.

Yeah.

Okay.

So he passed away.

Francis kind of took over.

And it was just kind of interesting because, you know, many things like that doesn't happen in history that you have a pope's step down.

It's supposed to be till they.

Till they die.

Now, I mean, they did have three popes at one point.

And so the thing is, is that the.

What will now happen if for folks that aren't familiar, is you will have them.

Nothing will happen in Vatican City.

I mean, there's no decisions that will get made.

They have.

Any of the.

Any of the bishops that are over 80 years old, they come to Vatican City and they will be in a conclave.

They will have no cell phones.

There's.

They will jam any.

Any signal, so you can't have any contact with the outside world.

And they.

They will vote for the men that are up about four times a day, they're going to vote, and they keep voting until someone's name comes up, you know, with the majority.

And so basically what happens is, you think about everyone's voting who they want, and someone gets only a few votes.

There's no chance that that person's going to do, you know, going to get it.

So they vote again.

Okay, that guy's out.

So it's kind of like one by one, they're going to drop names until it's down to Pry 2.

And then, you know, one person will get 51% or more.

And so, you know, there's rumor that there's lots of things going on behind the scenes that will be where, you know, maneuvers and all, because, look, it is a political position.

Vatican City is a city.

The Pope has a lot of authority, so there's a lot of benefits for that person to.

To be pope.

I mean, according to Roman Catholicism, he.

He'll get to heaven automatically.

Just needs to spend 15 days in purgatory.

Ten days, I think it is in purgatory.

It's something like that.

And.

But, you know, there is.

This is a good time, folks, and I'm going to plug my book, but it's a good time to go get my book.

What do they believe?

Read the chapter on Catholicism, because now is a great time to just to really understand what it is they believe so that you can communicate with them, so that you can share the gospel with them, because there's a Lot of Catholics who don't understand Catholicism.

And now that the Pope is dead, I mean, this happened with John Paul ii, a lot of Catholics are starting to wonder about their own faith.

So now's a great time to share the gospel with them.

And so I just wanted to start off the show with that.

Now with that.

Chuck, I do got to say you had a killer tweet that you and Drew were talking about before the show.

I don't.

Drew, if you want to set it up or if we just want to let Chuck set it up.

Yeah, I can set it up.

So my tweet that I had posted was about a conference that took place from the group that of all manly men, you know, the, the CN group that we see just ravaging on X all the time.

And the conference was about Christ is King.

And so what I said is, you.

Agree that Christ is king, right?

I agree Christ is king.

So.

And every Christian can agree to that.

Any Christian can agree to that.

But what I said was if you're putting on a conference and the, the topic is Christ is king and you invite a Roman Catholic to speak at that conference, it's no longer a Christian conference.

And then, and then Chuck had a, had a nice response to that, to that tweet.

What was it, Chuck?

What I did is I posted a link to a page on our church's website and if you go to fivesolas.net Catholicism, it is a online tract to use for our Roman Catholic friends.

And it, it goes through five simple points and then a six final point.

And in a nutshell, it shows how Roman Catholicism implodes internally.

So it's a presuppositional approach to dealing with Catholicism.

And so I don't know if you want to go through the nuts and bolts of that or not, but that's.

That's was basically the tweet.

Yeah, Give it, give it.

Give us not may not the whole thing, but maybe a couple minutes, a three minute overview.

Yeah, sure.

So.

So it goes through five points and, and what you do is you could pull this up on your phone or other device if you're talking with a Roman Catholic.

Or we.

And at the bottom you can actually, we have PDF printable versions.

And so you go through the five points and you just say, hey, you know, I came across this website and it has some facts, supposed facts about Catholicism.

Would you look at these and, and affirm whether these are true or not?

And they're obviously going to say yes, hopefully, anyway.

And so point number one is that the Bible is the word of God.

And then so there's a verse, second Timothy 3, 16 is quoted, says all scriptures inspired by God.

And then there's another quote, the Bible is the word of God regarding recorded in human language and that is quoted from a church synod of bishops.

And then it provides a link to that actual quote.

And and so your Roman Catholic friend is going to look at this and say, okay, so the Bible says it's the word of God and then our authority says it's the word of God.

And so yes, I agree with that.

And then so point number two is God does not contradict himself.

And so it goes through the same approach.

It gives a Bible verse or two and then it gives Roman Catholic official these official Roman Catholic quotes, right?

And so, so they can't deny it.

And then point number three is that the living teaching office of the church also speaks for God.

And so there's quotes from official Roman Catholic teaching that teaches that.

And then point number four is that the living teaching office of the church teaches faith plus works for salvation.

And so there's a bunch of official quotes for that.

And then point number five is that the Bible teaches salvation by faith alone.

And so there's some Bible verses quoted for that.

And there's a lot.

And then so then final point number six is this is that if the Bible is the word of God, point number one, and God does not contradict himself, point number two, then the Roman Catholic Church, which claims to also speak for God, point number three, discredits itself as the one true religion because it contradicts the word of God by teaching faith plus works for salvation.

Point point number four, when the Bible, which came first clearly and unmistakably teaches faith alone for salvation, point number five, and then it leads into the biblical gospel.

So that's it in a nutshell.

And I agree with you, it doesn't.

Look, one of the things I like to do with Roman Catholics if they're really practicing.

If they're not, they don't.

And we've done this on this show when we've had some come in.

But the question is what is the Bible equal in authority to the Church Magisterium and Tradition?

And they'll say yes, but there's a problem because I'll ask them do I need Tradition and the Church Magisterium in order to interpret the Bible?

To which they say yes, because that's Roman Catholic teaching.

The problem is that if I need something to interpret the Bible, then that thing, whatever it is, is greater than the Bible.

It's not equal to the Bible because it's required to be able to read it.

The Bible.

Right.

So the Bible can't be equal in authority with the Church, Magisterium and the Tradition, because it's needed.

Those are needed to interpret the Bible.

So truthfully, since you need the Church to interpret both Tradition and the Bible, there though they get.

They get on us for being sola scriptura that we are.

Scripture alone is our authority.

Their ecclesiastica.

Sola sola ecclesiastica, the Church alone, because that's their ultimate authority.

That's the authority that they use to interpret tradition and the Bible.

So it's.

It.

Let's see, we got.

We got Zach backstage, and so let me bring Zach in before we get onto our topic.

See, maybe he's gonna talk about our topic or.

Zach, welcome.

Hello.

Good to be here.

I've been listening to your podcast for a while now.

I do actually have a question kind of on the Catholic.

Because I engage a lot with Eastern Orthodox.

Okay.

There's some on my.

My wife's side of the family, so every time, holidays and stuff, I just saw Easter, so we'd engage.

And one thing that came up is I want a baptism.

And I've listened to your arguments on water baptism, and I know you go to John.

They go to John 3, and they use the verse that's, you know, be born in water and then of the spirit.

And you make the argument that the water represents birth.

Do I remember correctly in the John 3.

Yes.

Yeah.

So using that.

Because I was kind of thinking through this and I was kind of curious where you would go, though, if somebody were to bring up, like, aborted children.

Yeah.

So when it comes to.

Well, I'll just.

I won't even stop with aborted children.

I would.

I would end up saying that any.

Any child in the womb.

I can't answer where they would go.

Right, right.

Because there's not.

There is.

I know I've.

I've seen people that try to make an argument, you know, David, when he loses his son, that he says, you know, he can't come to me.

I can go to him and feel, say, see, he knows he's going to see his.

His child in heaven.

Well, first off, that's.

That's an idiom.

He's just saying he can't.

The child can't come back to life.

He's going to go to death.

It has.

There's no.

Nothing in there of a promise of seeing him again.

And even if you want to say, make the case that that is saying that the problem there that you end up having is when you make the argument that David is saying he can see his son.

Well, we have to remember that David also knew from a prophet of God that he would, that he was going to lose his son.

So did that prophet, said prophet also tell him he would see his son again?

Right.

We don't know that.

So the, the point being is there's no specific passage in scripture that says that all children go to heaven or all children go to hell or what happens to any children.

And so now let's see.

So we got this.

Let me just touch on that real quick.

Andrew.

Yeah, and I'm going to go to more.

This passage that someone put.

Challenge.

Challenge.

I think it's important to make sure that we don't try to speak where God doesn't speak.

What we're sounding dispensational is take what scripture says and then trust that God and his goodness and his kindness, but also in his justice, will do what he feels is right according to his will.

So we can hope we can trust God, but we should not try to speak where he does it.

Gotcha.

Okay, so Salmon's captain says Jesus denies his deity divinity.

In Mark 10:18, no one is good except God alone.

So isn't Jesus God?

Right?

Well, yeah.

So therefore Jesus.

This is good.

That wasn't a hard question.

I thought that.

I thought it was back to the question of the.

I thought that was coming up with the topic that we had.

So, so, yeah, so.

So, Zach, I would say that.

And this is hard.

I mean, look, I lost, I lost a child that was still in the womb.

Would I like to, to meet that child one day?

Yeah, but what happens to that child?

I don't know.

And as a good dispensationalist, as, as you know, Drew was sounding there, you.

We don't, I mean, this is the core thing of dispensationalism.

I'm just saying we don't want to speak beyond what scripture says.

I feel like that's just a good.

Reformed and biblical and dispensational view.

We don't, we don't, you know, spiritualize what does.

Should it be spiritualized?

That's all.

You know.

But, but you, you know, we.

Because I think I, I think I told you, me and my wife at the beginning of last year miscarried.

And so, you know, it's one of those things we would like to say, you know.

Absolutely.

That baby is, is in heaven.

But the thing is, is there's no definitive verse like you said.

And so what we do is we, we pray to the Lord, we hope in him, and then we trust in him that, that, yes, that baby will be there, we will get to meet him, but at the end of the day, it's also, if, if that baby is not, then we know we still rejoice in God because, you know, he did what.

What was right according to his will.

And, and, you know, my first pastor had a comment where he said.

You.

Know, someone asked him, why doesn't the Bible say, like, what happens children?

And he said, we just don't know.

And he said, why doesn't the Bible tell us?

And, you know, it's interesting, he said, if, if the Bible said all children go to heaven, what really would be our argument against abortion?

Right.

It's the greatest heaven filling machine created by man.

Exactly.

And, and if you think about the, you know, in Mormonism, the age of accountability is 8.

And if you think about, remember there was that woman, Yates, I forget her first name, but she killed, like, all of her children.

Her oldest was going to turn 8.

She realized he was, he was a sinner.

And she wanted her children to be in heaven so badly that she killed all six of her children because she really believed what the Mormon Church told her or the Church of Jesus Christ Latter Day Saints.

Well, we would have.

We, you know, like it would be if all children go to heaven.

If that's the case, then, you know, we really shouldn't stand up against abortion.

Right, right.

Because yes, it's murder, but it's sending people to heaven.

And so you have that.

And then the flip side is if all children go to hell, well, now you think about all those people who lose children, like my wife and I, or like Drew and his wife and you.

You know, the guilt, that would be on you for that.

So, yeah, that was my pastor's answer, and I thought it was pretty good.

Does that, does that answer your question, Zach?

Yeah, I just was getting caught up with either thinking, I guess, of the absolutes.

Like since Jesus says you have to be born of water, then what happens to those kids, I guess is my rationale how I was thinking.

Okay.

Yeah, Scripture doesn't expand on it, so it makes sense.

So any, any, any other questions you have for us tonight?

No, that's all I got right now.

All right, well, if you, you're welcome to.

I'll put you backstage.

And you can always just in the private chat, let us know if you want to Come back on.

So there's a lot of discussion in the chat here, Drew, that I answered a wrong question.

They're saying, you read it.

I read it.

Yeah.

So.

So he didn't read the question.

Right.

He skipped the question.

So.

So.

So let me see if I can get at what.

What's being asked here is in Mark, chapter 10, the rich young ruler is coming to Christ and he's saying, good teacher.

And Jesus says, why do you call me good?

No one is good except God alone.

And so what they're asking is, if Jesus said no one is good and he just called Jesus good, then that would mean Jesus would be denying his own deity.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, yeah, that.

That's, you know, if you want to read it literally and totally ignore the way that we see in scripture, Jesus and basically almost all Jewish people, even today, speak.

Yeah, go ahead, because that's all you got, is taking people out of context.

Yeah, Basically what he's doing there is.

Is asking a question of force, Nicodemus, to have to deal with the fact that he has to acknowledge the rich young ruler.

Sorry, the rich young ruler, that he's.

That he is God.

That's.

That's actually the.

The.

The.

The point of the rich.

So the thing, Solomon.

And you come in and ask if you have more questions on it.

But the.

The thing is, is that.

But is the rich young ruler someone who God is that ends up being saved?

No.

He walks away because of his riches.

Okay, so the issue is he's putting on the front, calling him good, but what does Jesus want him to recognize?

Jesus is asking the question so that he would recognize that Jesus is God.

So this.

If this is the passage you turn to, you have to take it out of context to ignore the fact that Jesus whole point of asking the question is to point out his deity.

He wants the rich young ruler to realize he's God.

Yeah, and there's a lot going on in this passage, too, because not just point out that Jesus is God, but also point to the rich young ruler in his own depravity.

Because he comes to Jesus and he says he doesn't call him Lord.

Right.

He calls.

He just refers to him as good teacher.

And Jesus is redirecting that to going, only God is good.

And then he goes into this moral lesson about the law and comparing the law to the rich young ruler.

And the rich young ruler is going, oh, yeah, well, I've.

I've fulfilled the law.

Yeah, absolutely.

Okay, great.

Then go sell everything.

Give it all to the poor.

Give it all away, sell everything and then.

No.

Well then who is the only one that is good?

It is God.

And so is Jesus.

God?

Yes.

Is Jesus good?

Yes.

But he's taking the focus off of just being a good teacher and he's actually revealing himself as Lord.

Because who can condemn a person like that and demand something like that?

It's God.

Yeah.

And, and you know, let me put this up.

And, and so if you want to come on in, that would be great.

We can have easier discussion.

But he says no.

Then guys say teacher.

He doesn't use good teacher because only God is good.

Actually no.

He probably speaking Hebrew would have said rabbi, which is a common term.

And no one is referred to as a good rabbi.

They're referred to as a rabbi.

Yeah, but I mean even in here, like I'm looking at the LSB right now, in verse 18, began asking him, good teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?

Yeah.

And Jesus says, why do you call him, Call me good?

Correct.

No one is good except God alone.

You know the commandments, do not murder, do not commit adultery.

So he's, he's shifting the, he's shifting the focus to the individual.

He's saying these are the, this is the law.

Now compare yourself according to the law and see that no one is good.

Only God is good.

Jesus doesn't deny his deity because Jesus is the only one that can ever say he.

That he never broke any of these commandments.

And, and yeah.

So the, the thing is, notice you don't in Hebrew when we, when we pray, when we speak.

You wouldn't just refer to God the Father.

You, you always have to put something.

Almighty God, the righteous God.

Here's something he says here.

He says, Irenaeus doesn't.

Yeah, I was going to get that.

Because he gave Aaron some things about Irenaeus.

Aaron also believed that Jesus believed to be lived to be 50 years old and had a 15 year ministry.

There's no way when we go through the biblical that are is correct there.

So in some places, I'm sorry, Irenaeus is wrong.

And he taught that those things were apostolic teachings that he learned from the apostle John.

Yeah.

So.

Okay, so since you brought that up, I'll go, I'll do this and then we'll come back.

So he, he Salmon King's captain says ar referred to these verses saying only the Father is good.

I'm not taking it out of context.

Okay, you may not be taking Irenaeus out of context.

You are taking God out of context.

Irenaeus is not inspired.

And as my friend Matt Slick says, you know, my church father can beat up your church father.

These guys were not as precise as we are today.

Right, okay, we, we dealt with that last week.

We discussed that topic.

So the, the, the thing is that when he's calling him good rabbi, you wouldn't do that.

Okay.

So Jesus is trying to, in asking the question, get to the question of why do you call me good?

In other words, do you recognize he's God?

That's the, that's what he's trying to get at.

And then he's trying to get him to understand what goodness is by going through the law so that this guy would see that his wealth isn't.

He is, he's a, as typical people who are, who are wealthy, they're very self sufficient and they, they're self reliant.

They don't rely on God, they don't look for God for provision.

And so what you have is a guy who is that way.

Well, Jesus is trying to break him down to see that he is in need of a Savior.

Yep, that's the goal of it.

And to see that God is standing right before him.

So this passage in its context, Jesus is displaying to him or trying to get him to understand that Jesus standing in front of him is God.

Yeah.

And Melissa makes a great point here.

She says when he said I am.

Right.

So the I am statements that Jesus makes throughout John, those, that's Jesus declaring that he is God.

And, and what in, in John 8 and John 10, when he says the Father and I are one, when he says before Abraham I am, what do the Jewish people do?

The Jewish leaders pick up stones to stone him.

And he says, for what good works do you stone me?

And the answer is not for any good works, but you being a man, claim to be God.

So the fact is that the religious leaders knew exactly what he was saying because they understood what I am is.

They understood what the Father and I are one are.

Because no one would refer to God the Father or in any way without some sort of, you know, supertive type of language like almighty or all righteous or all powerful.

They don't, just as Jesus would say, my Father, they saw that as blasphemy.

And he doesn't back away from the blasphemy.

He says, my Father and I are one.

So, so okay, so he's saying here.

Yeah, I saw that.

We don't know if Jesus ever said I am though.

It's, it's not found in the other gospels.

Okay.

Salmon King.

Captain, let me ask you a question.

Just help me out.

If every newspaper, but one, or, or just, just one newspaper says that Donald Trump is, is President United States, but all the others don't, does that mean he's not?

Right?

I'm just, just help me out here.

Is it.

Is your argument that everyone must mention exactly what you say they must mention or else it's not true?

Or is it that you say that just because if, if one gospel mentions it, the one that is emphasizing that Jesus is God, not the one that's emphasizing his kingship or his humanity or his servanthood, but the one that's are the argument it's making is that Jesus is God.

And by the way, just so folks know, 48 of the Gospels, Jesus is presenting his d.

Exposing his deity, either directly or indirectly.

You want to sit here and say Jesus didn't claim to be God.

He said he had power to forgive sin.

The Jewish leaders think in their mind.

They don't say it.

They think in their mind who has the power to forgive sins but God alone?

And what does he do?

He challenges what's easier to say your sins are forgiven or rise up and walk.

So to prove that he has the power to forgive, which means he's claiming to be God.

What does he do?

He heals a person.

So what do you got?

He takes the name son of man, which is a claim of deity.

He takes, he takes the fact that he reads their mind, something only God can do.

He heals the sick.

Again, something only God could do.

He proves that he has the authority to forgive sins.

Again, something only God can do.

Just in that section, he has four different ways he shows that he is God.

48 of the Gospels.

He controls weather.

He can, he can raise the dead.

All these things.

The fact that his enemies, demons, everyone knows he claimed to be God, but someone who can't even use his real name, because I don't think his name is, you know, Salem Captain, I doubt he, you know, that's his, his real name.

But, but we should believe someone like.

That over God, you know, and this is why it's important to take all the gospels together, because there's some that don't say things that others do.

Right.

Like in the beginning of John, you have Jesus cleansing the temple.

Whereat in the Synoptic Gospels you have Jesus cleansing the temple during the holy week.

Well, are there two cleansings of the temple?

Yeah, so there's two.

But you only get that if you have all four gospels.

And why is he.

Are There two cleansings of the temple because he's fulfilling the role of the Levitical priests in cleansing the house.

That gets corruption in it.

Correct.

And so Salmon says, pastor, other prophets raised the dead, though.

I agree.

And how did they do it?

They prayed to God, which Jesus did not.

Jesus said come out.

Yeah.

Jesus didn't need to pray to God to do it, because he is God.

Yeah.

He just made the command.

Oh, we scared Chuck away.

All right.

I'm sure you scared Chuck away.

Yeah.

So.

All right, let's get to.

I'm sure Salmon Captain is going to have more.

I encourage him to come on in and we can.

We can discuss it if you want.

Nope, there's Chuck.

His Internet probably gave out or he was just scared.

I mean, these arguments that I'm trying.

To do research and anyway, so you.

You accidentally kicked out.

I want to know what Salmon Captain's, what his worldview is.

Is, is he an atheist or.

Or what?

Well, if he comes in, we can find out.

So just go to apologexlive.com and scroll down to the duck icon.

That's the stream yard icon.

Join us here.

Just give permission for your microphone and camera to be used with your browser and join us.

He says he's Muslim.

I believe Jesus was a prophet of God.

There you go.

So, you know, I should post what he said, so if people can see it.

So I guess the question is, does Salman Captain believe, as the Quran says, that the Trinity is the Father, the Mother and the Son?

Because what.

That passage, what that Surah is teaching shows that the author of the Quran cannot be God because he doesn't know what the Trinity is.

The Trinity is not the Father and the mother and the Son.

It is the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

They're not three gods, as the Quran teaches.

They're one God, as the Bible teaches.

So this is the thing.

If, if you want to challenge us, then come on in and we could challenge you with.

With your Quran and, and see that your Quran is.

Is not.

It's.

It has inconsistencies within it.

And I bet you don't even know that there's textual criticism that needs to be done on the Quran because there's many versions of the Quran, many variances within the Quran.

So we talked about that last week, too.

Yeah, so.

So he's saying here the Quran is infallible, but yet it.

It teaches something that before there was biology.

It teaches that the.

The seed of the man is in the small of the back, not in the testicles.

So if it's infallible.

Again, the author of the Quran doesn't know basic biology.

So, so he says, he says no.

So the verse talks about other people who believe Mary was worshiped.

People today, Hell Mary for example.

The, the problem is, is that no one did that really at that time.

Sorry.

And, and the, the Muslims will always go to some fringe group which there goes to show you that if, if God wrote the Quran, he would know that that's a minor group.

And, but that's all that Muhammad would know about, you know.

And, and I mean then you have, if you go into hadiths, it becomes real interesting because you have Muhammad who, you know, he fancy.

He had three wives.

He had one wife.

And you know, in his early years he's, he's actually a really great leader.

Just I took a class on Islam history, Islamic history class, and it was, it was fascinating to see the, the transformation that came about.

But he was, he was really a, a good leader early on.

He had one wife, he taught, he ended up teaching about having one wife, he taught about having one God.

He, he was getting those, those influences.

And so what ended up happening though is when he became this big tribe, they went from being like the protectors of the merchants to the pirates of the merchants.

And because he had to feed the people and, and a lot of his, his things changed.

So he ended up.

After his first wife died, he remarries.

He has three wives.

Many know of Aisha, the youngest, the one that he, he married six years old, didn't consummate till nine.

But the, the thing is, appeal focus on that.

But I like to bring up the fourth wife because Muhammad came out and said there would only be, you know, you can only have three wives.

But one day he was going by his, you know, his adopted son's house and fancied his son's wife and well decided he was going to marry her.

And I like how his one wife, Aisha said it.

She was like, oh, the Prophet, you're so good.

God always gives you what you want.

And Muslims always go, oh, see that's, that's, that's true.

God gives Muhammad what he wants so he can have a fourth wife.

Even breaking the law of incest, by the way.

And the reality is I don't think that's how Aisha said it.

I think she was a little bit more sarcastic.

It seems that everything you want is you, you credit God for, but it's really you who want it.

That's how I think she she was saying it.

And so he's saying that's not why he married.

Okay, so, so why.

Why do you marry his son's daughter?

Something he said was a sin.

And it was only after he married, after he.

He has her, that he ends up claiming that, oh, well, you know, it's an adopted son, so it doesn't.

Doesn't count as the incest law.

Isn't that convenient that he.

He ends up violating the law, but adjusts the law to satisfy his actions?

Very much, actually, like Joseph Smith did.

So.

All right, well, let's move on.

Yeah, that was a little Islam lesson.

Let's get into.

So let's.

Let's talk about does God exist?

All right, this is a challenge we get often and what we have.

And, and Chuck, you're asking your.

Your comment about putting links.

Only hosts are allowed to put links.

That's why.

So if you.

I shared it in the comments.

Yeah.

Okay.

So the, the link he wanted folks to go is 5solas.net/is Islam.

You can also go to strivingforattorney.org we have a whole thing on what Muslims believe, which is snippets of my book.

What do they believe?

So.

And so that was me going through the Quran.

I didn't go through Hadith, by the way.

So this is a challenge.

Does God exist?

Or you'll.

It'll be more offered.

It won't end, not as a question, but as a statement.

God does not exist.

And this is something we often get.

I'm gonna, I'm gonna let.

Because I know Chuck is.

This is like right up his alley.

He loves this.

This is presuppositional 101.

So I'm gonna first let Chuck answer the question.

Chuck, how do you answer the question, does God exist?

All right, that is a great question.

And the, the pin to tweet I have on my X account actually answers this.

And it starts out saying that the biblical God is.

I'm not going to read the whole thing, but it sort of gives you an intro and into sort of the problem we have, especially when it comes to atheistic skeptics who ask this question.

So my article starts out as this is that God is spirit, as we see in Isaiah 31:3 and 2, 2nd Corinthians 3:17, and Romans 8:16.

And indeed Luke 24:39 states, See my hands and my feet, I.e.

myself, touch me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see that I have here.

Jesus contrasts his resurrected body with the nature of a spirit, implying God's nature is not physical like humans.

When it comes to empirical evidence, which means evidence that can be observed, tested or measured scientifically, God being spirit presents a challenge because spirit is by nature non material and invisible and therefore not detectable through scientific means like matter or energy.

As such, proof of another source required.

The proof of the existence of the supernatural or the immaterial God must be transcendental in nature refers to something that relates to the conditions or structures of human experience, things that go beyond or transcend the physical world, but are necessary for us to perceive and understand it.

And it is within this understanding that the following is offered for consideration.

The biblical worldview is the only seriously considered or widely held surviving worldview that makes sense of the reality in which we find ourselves.

In any world view, philosophy or religion not based on the revealed authoritative holy word of God, consisting solely of the 66 books of the Old and New Testament scriptures known as the Bible, results in logical absurdity and or evil.

This is because the biblical worldview is the only one that accounts for the existence of and provides a foundation for immaterial reality, such as the laws of logic and morality both being universal, unchanging and authoritative, and any other worldviews attempting to do so collapse in on themselves through internal contradiction.

And then it goes on to talk about how, you know, Scripture grounds the laws of logic and morality to be universal, changing and authoritative.

I had myself on mute.

And why is it not posting all of us?

Hold on.

There you go.

I gotta click the right button.

So, yeah, yeah, that.

That's my pinned tweet.

And I do have another tweet.

I wish I could pin two tweets because I've got another one that I really love and just look for it.

It's called Shining the Light on the Atheist Problem and it explores biblically why atheists reject the.

The truth that they've been given.

Why do you.

Okay, why?

And by the way, before, just in case he's still out there, I'm going to just go back to Solomon for a second.

He says, pastor, I hope you come to Islam and realize Jesus was only a prophet.

Thank you.

He says, pastor, you don't know Islam.

That's really funny.

I wrote a book called what Do They Believe?

I've had three imams read it and tell me I understand Islam.

I'm just saying it seems that authorities in your religion say I do.

Okay, so what is the atheist problem, Chuck?

Okay, so.

So the atheist problem is.

And I've got this One up here too.

So first you have the biblical data is that the Bible declares that God is light, that is spiritual light, Psalm 27:1 and John 1:5.

And Jesus Christ, God the Son and flesh, is referred to as being light on earth, as seen in John 1:4 and 5 and John 1:9.

And Jesus himself claimed to be this light, John 8, 12, John 9, 5, John 12:35, 36 and John 12:46.

This light, which is spiritual light, exposes the unbeliever sin as seen in Psalm 98, Ephesians 5:13 and Hebrews 4, 12, 13.

But the unbeliever does not want his sin exposed.

Therefore he hates the light and as such scurries into the darkness of willful ignorance, as we see in Job 24, 13, 17, Isaiah 2, 19 21, Hosea 10, 8, John 3, 19 21, and Revelation 6, 15 and 17.

All of these describe how the atheist or, or the, the, the sinner doesn't want to sin exposed.

So here's the analogy and this is real quick.

So the atheist is like a leper who does not want to admit that he is a leper.

The light exposes his leprosy representing sin.

Therefore he crawls deep into a cavern, far enough down where the light no longer reaches him in this darkness.

He no longer sees the leprosy upon his skin and therefore declares that he is in fact not diseased, that is spiritually clean or a good person.

And to keep up this willful ignorance, he declares there is no light.

He shouts Just look around.

Just look left and right.

There is no evidence of light.

However, from every location on the cavern's floor, the entrance up at the top can clearly be seen with the light from above shining through it.

The atheist simply refuses to look up to see that light.

And this is the atheist problem.

And I mean we, I mean we would say the atheist problem really is Romans 1, right.

They know God exists and they suppress that truth in unrighteousness.

That's, that's ultimately the light exists, but they, yeah.

Choose to be willing, willingly ignorant.

And, and Romans 1.

I mean this is, this is the verse to go to folks for this because, and I always loved, you know, a friend of mine, he's, he's been on the show before, Saitim Brunicate.

He and I were in California.

He actually, in his film how to Answer the fool talks about this scene, but he and I were in California together.

We, we had just gotten back from getting some pizza.

We're walking over to where we're going to do some open air.

And there's this guy on a bike, and he's, you know, Psy just starts up a conversation with him, sharing the gospel with him, and the guy has a book on Buddhism in the basket in his bike.

So Psy starts talking about that, and this guy says, well, you know, I really don't believe God exists, but I'd like to study different, you know, different views other than Christianity.

And Psy says, well, why don't you want to study Christianity?

You know, why do you?

He goes, well, I don't believe God exists.

And Cyrus looks at the guy, goes, yes, you do.

And he shakes his head, goes, yeah, you're right.

You know, he was at least honest with himself.

But Romans 1 makes it clear, you know, that they know God exists.

This is, you know, if I start in verse 18, it says, for the wrath of God has been revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness, righteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.

Because that which is known about God is evident within them, not outside of them, within them.

For God made it evident to them.

For such, since the creation of the world, his invisible, invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen being understood through what has been made.

So they are without excuse.

If you are going to do apologetics and you're going to answer the question, does God exist?

Or the challenge that God does not exist, you need to know whether memorized or ready.

Available.

Romans 1:18 to 20.

You.

You just have to be able to bring that right up because that is the answer.

They're.

They're going to sit there and say, well, God doesn't exist.

Well, God doesn't agree with you, and he knows everything you know.

And so here we get secret.

Okay, that's.

That's.

I'm sure their name.

I'm sure that's what mommy called him or her or not.

It's probably someone that's trying to be secret.

But they say God is dead.

Well, then it's not God, exactly.

Thank you.

You.

You stole.

It says, go on.

God doesn't agree.

God because he doesn't exist.

He says, God doesn't agree because he doesn't exist.

Or she.

I don't know whose secret is.

But the.

The reality is the God that does exist secret is the one that you're trying so hard to suppress.

I mean, it's the thing that I was asked to be on a podcast, and the question that they wanted to know is, why is it that professing atheists are always talking about God.

The reason being is because they're trying to suppress the truth they know.

I mean, you ever notice Chuck Drew, that the one, you know, you can always tell the person who used to smoke cigarettes and stopped because they are the ones that can't even walk past somebody without telling them how bad cigarettes are for them.

Right.

Or how bad it smells.

Right.

Because it's always the person that's trying to suppress something where they see it everywhere and they feel like they got to say something.

That's what the professing atheist is.

You know, those that are running around, they want to.

It was funny because on that show, I think it was the bold apologia show that I was on, where we discussed it.

And it was funny because we talked about the fact that.

What do you see when you run a Christian group, Atheists that want to come in.

Yeah.

And, and they even lie their way in.

We have, like in our Christian apologetics group on, on Facebook, we have, we asked the question, are you Christian?

And they lie to get in.

Yeah.

And the thing is, is if you're so certain that God doesn't exist, then why do you care about people who talk about God as existing?

Like, why.

Why is that a big thing for them?

Well, and the question I always ask people is, do you, do you read books?

And I was on an atheist program not too long, two, two professing atheists.

And they, they, it's, they just like to debate anything.

So the show is, that's debatable.

And so they, they like to debate.

So we, I go on there and they're arguing that, you know, God doesn't exist.

I said, okay, do you guys read books about atheism?

Do you, you know, and this is a common thing, I'll ask people, do you read books?

Do you watch YouTube channels?

Do you, do you learned and study on what atheism is?

Because by the way, folks, they don't actually teach what atheism is.

They teach that Christianity is wrong.

It's not that they really believe in atheism.

It's that they don't believe in the Christian God, the God of the Bible.

They'll even accept any other God, but not the God of the Bible, really.

I mean, an atheist would say there's no God, but when you're willing to say, well, there could be other gods, but not the God of the Bible, he's wrong.

He's the only one that can't be God.

Okay, that's, that's not good logical Arguments.

But what you end up seeing what they do is they, they sit and they read and they study this, the anti Christian views of that they call atheism.

And yet they also don't believe Santa Claus exists.

And so I'll always ask them, okay, do you believe Santa Claus exists?

And they'll, they'll say no.

I say, well, do you go to the mall and cry out in December, Santa's not real.

Santa's not real.

Santa's not real.

You know what?

The answer I have always gotten to that is no.

They always say we don't have to do that because everybody knows Santa Claus isn't real.

And well, first off, no, the kids don't know it.

And B, thank you very much.

The fact that you're trying to say God isn't real.

God isn't real.

God isn't real is because you know that everyone knows he does exist.

Exist.

If everyone, if everyone, as they say, really believe God doesn't exist, then there would be no reason to say it.

And if you really believed God doesn't exist, there'd be no reason for you to waste the 70 or 80 years you got on this life to try to combat Christians to argue against it.

And they go, oh, that's because you guys control everything.

You guys, you know, you force your religion on us.

Then you know the clip that I played?

Yeah, exactly.

Well, that clip that we played at the beginning, I played that for Chuck because, you know, Chuck also had a, an engagement with, there with godless grandma, who that was.

And the, the, the thing that godless grandma tried to do was say, well, you Christians, you're, you're problematic because you, you force your beliefs on us.

We have it in one of the other clips where she said, we for you force your beliefs on us.

Really?

When does name the law that's requiring you to go to church on Sunday?

I don't know that law.

Right.

I mean, they sit there and say that Christians are forcing their beliefs on everyone and we're controlling the law.

If Christians controlled the law, abortion would be illegal.

If Christians, you know, controlled the law, homosexuality would still be illegal.

Transgenderism would be illegal.

So the fact that you have that is the fact that it's the professing atheists that are trying to control everything.

So Secret now says, what's next?

The Easter Bunny doesn't exist either.

Yep.

So we, we know the Easter Bunny doesn't exist, just like Santa Claus doesn't exist.

But the fact that if God doesn't exist, Secret, you wouldn't Be able to make rational arguments using an immaterial part of you, that rationality that's not physical.

You wouldn't be able to use knowledge, truth, laws of logic, or morality.

Yet you do have all of that.

And so, you know, the reality is, is that you use that.

That proves that even in your argumentation, you know God exists because you rely on God to make your argument against God.

Now, Secret says, my mom was diagnosed with lagma.

Ligma.

I think that's short for something.

I don't know what that is.

Yesterday, I don't know if that's, you know, if that's a.

He's saying, like cancer or something like that.

And he did say it's a he.

So I'm gonna just ask everyone right now that is listening, for all the Christians out there, would you play for.

Pray for Secret and his.

His mom.

Hold on, hold on, hold on.

It says ligma disease is a fictional disease commonly used in memes and online.

Humor is not a real medical condition.

Okay, so, yeah, Zach says he's trolling.

See, and here we are concerned for him and his.

His mother.

But.

But, hey, that's what.

That's what atheists do.

Right?

They.

They actually don't care about people.

They.

You know, I find it interesting that they.

Their argument is that we should love one another, we should do right by one another.

And yet what do they do?

They go out of their way.

His mom as a.

As his mom getting a disease as a joke.

Yeah.

To mock Christians, you know, so, yeah, but this is.

This is what happens when you deny that God exists.

Right.

I had a debate many years ago that the subject that the person asked.

I love when people ask, challenge me to a debate on topics where they take the position to defend, and it's a really bad position.

But he asked for the debate that secular humanism is superior to Christianity, which was really good because I brought up an article from the Atlantic, which is not a Christian magazine in any way.

It's a very liberal magazine.

And, you know, they actually did a study.

There were several studies that were done in their.

Their arc.

Their conclusion of the study was they said God doesn't exist, but we're basically.

It's better that we think he does because they realize when people truly believe that God doesn't exist, they mistreat people because they don't think of there being an afterlife, and they don't think that there's any accountability.

So if they can get away with it, they try.

They do.

They don't Care.

But when you.

When you recognize that there is an afterlife, that you are accountable to an infinitely holy God that knows every thought of your mind, then they act more, act better for society, which is what the article was trying to argue, is that we have to do what's good for society.

So.

So tell me to read that.

What it.

That ligma is again.

So.

So I'm familiar with fictional disease commonly used in memes for humor, online humor.

Okay.

It's.

Hold on.

The term ligma is a play on the word lima, a type of citrus fruit.

It is often used as a phrase to say that someone is lying.

A humorous way of saying that someone is lying.

So he was saying he was lying.

All right.

Yes.

Yeah.

I don't.

Well, let's.

Let's do this.

You know, this.

You know, secrets.

You're muted, Chuck.

Chuck, you're muted.

We see.

We see your mouth moving, but we don't hear a thing.

I was so profound.

And y'all didn't.

No, sorry.

So I was gonna say.

Yeah, my research shows that, you know, ligma is trying to trick you into saying, what is Ligma?

And then the answer is going to be a profane statement based on the sound of the word ligma.

As far as I'll tell, I.

Okay, I got it.

Yeah.

Well, I don't get it, but that's okay.

I usually miss these things.

All right.

No, that's okay.

Don't worry about it.

Yeah, there.

He accidentally kicked himself out again, and we need to kick him out just because he was going to say a bad word.

So.

Yeah, now.

Now, secret is I.

I wish these people would come in and stop being keyboard warriors.

You know, he says, if I'm not a direct descendant of Abraham, can I still be saved?

Yeah, Drew's not a direct descendant.

He would be safe.

Chuck is not direct.

Gentile.

Yeah.

I mean, the fact that I am a direct descendant doesn't mean that I am saved either.

By the way, I believe Paul makes that argument in Romans.

Romans as well.

Well, you know, the thing is, Drew, I'll tell you a little secret.

Secret really stunk up the place.

And so I think what we need is we.

We need something from maybe Farmstead's Cottage.

Kind of like I got right here.

My.

My Casino Noir, which is the cologne that I got from Farmstead Cottage.

And if you guys want.

I mean, there's a whole bunch of products.

This is a company that Drew here has started selling colognes, perfumes.

We've got.

We've got A lot of stuff.

We've got room sprays right here.

We've got wax melts as well.

And we have.

We just started with the beef tallow body butters.

What is that used for?

Oh, and we also got car diffusers as well.

Okay, cool.

So if you guys, if you guys want to get some of that, you know, in case secret smells up your place too.

No.

So you just go to farmsteadcottage.com farm steadcottage.com if you use the promo code SFE, you will get 10 off.

And I've heard rumor on this show when I was not here that, you know, the first hundred or first thousand dollars that is raised.

100.

I tried.

Yeah, I was gonna just say a thousand.

It's a good try.

It was a good try.

First hundred dollars.

Thousand.

Thousands of dollars rolling in.

Yeah, sure.

Okay, so guys, we need $10,000 in.

So go out there and.

And get some products.

You know, I actually do have the cologne, and he sent me a sample.

I have to say, legally, I have to say he did send me a free sample.

That has no influence on, on my opinion of it.

I won't tell you my wife's opinion because she hates all colognes.

But.

So you wouldn't like that opinion.

But, but yeah, no, do, do check it out.

Farmsteadcottage.com also to let you know, I don't know if they're still doing this, and I know, Drew, this will make all the difference for you, but I believe that they may, their sale may still be going on, but plunge is having like a thousand dollars off if you wanted to get a plunge right now.

So I, I look, I firmly believe in this product because I use it every single day.

I cold plunge every day.

We had, you know, we had some movers come in that helped out.

We had people from church came to help me move today.

Some of the movers and one of the guys who is a Muslim came.

He was helping move, and he just stuck only his face in the cold plunge.

Like after, after we were all working out and hot and sweaty, he was like, oh, this will cool me down.

He stuck his.

His face, just his face, and he's like, oh, that's cold.

You're like, a couple minutes later, he's putting a jacket on.

But cold plunging has some absolute great benefits.

It is the hardest thing you're going to do all day.

I mean, anything you do after that becomes.

I mean, banging your head against the wall in a conversation with secret is even easier after, After I deal with the Harder thing of getting into a 40 degree water for five minutes.

So if you want to, if you want to get into the health benefits of cold plunging, go to plunge.com actually I got to change this because we do have a, we do have a different one.

You could just go to strivingforeternity.org plunge that should get you to the same place and actually I'm going to test that right now to make sure because that'd be really bad if it was not true.

So let me see.

Strivingfraternity.org Plunge if I spell plunge right do.

So let's see if that gets us there then.

I'm waiting and.

Oh, I spelled it wrong again.

There's an E there.

Yep.

So that should get you there.

I.

So if you go to Striving for Eternity slash plunge, that will get you to to the Plunge website and you can get a discount there.

Encourage you guys to, to do that.

It is, it really is very good for your.

Your health.

Another good thing for your health while your biblical health at least would be to.

Well no, that's the wrong one.

I that's my pillow.

But I was going to talk about Lagos.

The biblical health of my.

Yeah, the big health of my pillow.

Lagos, one of the supporters here.

You can go to lagos.comsfe and get some discounts there when you, when you order.

The nice thing about what they've done recently, Lagos was always known for being super expensive and that has changed now you can get yourself a, you know, a you know, package with Lagos for I think we calculated Last time just 7 or $8 as low as 7 or $8 if you, you know, if you, if you get it and pay it all in advance in two years.

And so that is probably the, the best you, you could do just to get started.

But you can get the sets for $20 a month.

You can, you can get a really good package that will help you in your study of God's word.

So I encourage you guys to go to logos.com sfe just get one of their subscriptions there and you'll be able to start really digging in deep into God's Word.

I use my Logos as you regulars know very much.

And so it has a lot of advantages.

One click you can get to the languages and, and see, you know, dig deep into different words.

So I find it very helpful.

Even Drew uses it, I think.

Yeah, every now and then.

I usually.

I mainly use it when before I'm preaching while I'm doing sermon prep because when I'M doing word study because it.

Does make it so much easier.

Just the.

And, and you can actually, I have set up the, the way that I have mine.

I have my own.

They have like a passage guide.

So they have these different guides.

So I was able to create a guide that uses everything that I do.

So I, it breaks down the word for word so I can look at every word that I'm looking.

It looks at my outlines and it, it puts it all into one guide for me.

So it's very helpful.

And I do have a, some training on the Striving Fraternity YouTube channel on Unlogos, if you want to.

To do that.

All right, so there was a.

Well, let me ask this.

Any other question or any other things you guys want to say about the fact of God?

Does God exist?

That, that challenge that people have.

Nah.

I mean, the only thing that I would say before I let the atheist nightmare jump in there is, you know, there's always going to be typically a trap that they want you to fall into, which is the evidence trap, which is going to be, you know, give me the evidence for believing in God.

And so when we were approaching apologetics, we're approaching this question of does God exist?

We have to understand that neutrality is a myth and no one is coming to the table neutral because they have certain presuppositions.

And a presupposition is what you believe before you believe anything else.

And so because they have certain presuppositions about truth and about God, whatever evidence you try to bring them, they're going to interpret that through the lens of their presuppositions.

And so what we have to do is not think that we can be neutral.

We have to stick to our presuppositions with is that God exists and he has spoken, which is what Andrew said when we first started discussing this, this question.

And so we can't waver from that because as Andrew said in, in going over, you know, why all the things that we do that we do on a daily basis as that show and point to why God exists and how God exists because we deal in logic and reasoning on a daily basis, right?

We deal with morality on a daily basis.

If God doesn exists, there is no reason for me to be moral in any way to anybody.

Then morality just becomes a personal preference.

And why should I hold to your personal preference rather than my personal preference?

Right?

So we have to make sure that we don't fall into the trap of evidences.

Now, evidences are, are good.

They're, they're fine, but they have to be used in the right way.

But don't.

But every time you throw out an evidence, they're just going to interpret it, interpret that through their presuppositional lens, through their worldview, and then they're going to give their evidences and you're just going to go back and forth and you're not going to get anywhere.

So stick to yes, God does exist, and he has spoken.

Let me tell you what he says about himself through his Word.

Very good.

Aaron just joined us, so we'll give Aaron a shot to Aaron is one of the speakers at Striving for Eternity.

He also is has his own ministry, the Evermind Ministry podcast called well, he's got two, but his the podcast he does regularly is Truth Love Parent.

And so if you want to search for that on your podcast app, it's Truth Love Parent.

And he has another one called Celebration of God.

So, Aaron, does God exist?

Someone challenges you with that.

What would be thy answer?

Oh, man, oh man.

So I approach these conversations, I try to do it a couple different ways.

One of them is to really make it unique to the conversation with the person I'm having at the moment.

So it's a general question from an unknown individual.

I can't ask them questions, I can't find out.

I haven't heard their arguments, and so on and so forth.

So just in a.

In a very broad way like this.

It's hard, I think, for me to make an argument that is just absolutely beyond all shadow of a doubt going to convince anyone.

It's ridiculous.

But as I gather ingredients for my argument from the individual with whom I'm speaking, I might find out that the individual that's not that they don't believe in God, it's that they're angry at God.

A lot of atheists are very angry at God, which I find interesting.

I don't believe in Santa Claus and I'm not angry at him.

And I'm not angry at him because I don't believe he exists.

And be the stupidest thing in the world for me to be angry at something that doesn't exist.

So as I'm pulling the ingredients for my argument from the person with whom I'm speaking, I'm tailoring it to them.

So I think what, what was just said by Drew was really wise.

You're never going to convince somebody.

All of the amazing arguments that have been given over the years have, have.

It's easy for somebody just to turn the blind.

I mean, Jesus, God tells Us in Romans, chapter one.

Everybody is born with the knowledge that God exists, and yet they suppress that.

What makes me think that they're not going to suppress whatever reasons or evidences or logical conclusions I present?

So in those conversations, I'm more interested in asking questions and having conversation and presenting certain considerations so that I can better figure out the individual with whom I'm speaking and really, if anything, try to get a pulse of why they are rejecting God and then address that.

Because sometimes the person, just as an example, because I brought it up already, the person who is angry at God said they don't believe that God.

Exactly.

God can't exist.

And I'm mad at him.

I'm gonna be trying to figure out why they're angry at him, because I might not have a conversation necessarily about evidences of God until I've gotten to the place where I understand their anger.

And hypothetically speaking, again, let's just say that they lost a spouse after a short period of being married, and they just.

That their spouse believed in God, but God allowed this person to die.

This is all hypothetical.

Well, then I can start to have a conversation with them.

At that point.

That's really more about, well, you know, bad things happen and people do things to us that are wrong.

Do we stop believing in them?

Some.

Some person comes in and murders my spouse.

Do I stop believing that that person exists?

No, I just hate that person potentially, or I'm mad at that person, or the case may be because of what they did.

So you.

Which one is it for you?

Do you not believe that God exists?

Or do you just.

Do you believe that there is something out there and you're mad at him?

So anyway, I could keep going and literally any person with any conversation, I could take in a lot of different directions.

But I would encourage.

I say this as a biblical counselor, and I think I can argue it as an apologist, that there are good boilerplate answers that can be given, there are good evidences, there are things that can be said.

But if we're not careful and we just spit out an answer, that answer sometimes is not going to be the most helpful.

Not that it's inaccurate, but not the most helpful answer in that moment for that person.

Which is why when we see Jesus giving the Gospel, telling people about him throughout the New Testament or throughout the Gospels, we see that he approaches it in a different way every single time.

Same truth, but specifically unique to what they were saying.

The woman at the well was different than Nicodemus, was different than the demoniacs that's how I want to approach it, and I think we're wise to do that.

I'm not saying that you can't get up and speak.

Do street apologist work out there where you're saying things and then you're getting responses from people.

But as you get those responses from people, you would be wise to not just go with your boilerplate script, but to start to understand what answers these people need to be talking about.

Yes.

Now, one thing I'm chuckling at is totally unrelated to what Aaron said was we know that one of the hosts here is more tolerant of the other because, well, Drew just banned Secret.

He banned this person, Secret, who's been just trolling the.

See, I want Secret to come in here so we could have a fun discussion.

But, you know, as most cowards do, they.

They want to be.

They hide behind a fake name and act as keyboard warriors because they know if they actually came on camera, they would actually have to give an answer.

And, and actually some of his comments, you realize he didn't have answers.

Yeah, look, I thought I put him in camera.

I'm curious who we have with us, because I.

I don't know this gentleman.

Oh, this is, this is Chuck Carpenter.

He is on X.

He's known as the atheist nightmare.

And nightmare, I should say.

So I do.

I do want a quick, just reference.

Gonzalez here says they asked you, does God exist, not why people don't want to believe in God.

Okay, this question here.

Okay?

Yeah, man, man.

They asked you, does God exist, not why people don't believe in God.

Yeah.

And I think if you had listened to my answer, I think the short of it would have been that, first of all, yes, God exists, but my argument, my apology, my reasons for why God exists, I would not be taking my own advice just to start throwing out a bunch of stuff, talking about this guy's razor over here and this epistemology over here that every atheist has heard.

I would want to make it unique to the individual asking.

So that's why Mr.

Or Mrs.

Ms.

Gonzalez.

That's why I.

I'm sorry, I guess I should look at the picture here real quick.

That looks like a Mr.

Gonzalez.

That's why I didn't give an argument for it.

Now, I want to point something out just to show, you know, here you hear Aaron giving an answer different than you heard from Drew, from Chuck, myself.

Why?

Well, you know, what you're seeing with, with Aaron, as he said, he's a biblical counselor.

He approaches things with a mindset of A counselor, Drew and Chuck, well, they battle people online often.

And so dealing with.

With.

With doing more apologetics, I'm.

I'm more pastor at heart, but I do a lot of apologetics.

And so what do you.

What do you see?

You see that sometimes God.

God has given us all different.

Gifted, giftedness, and we bring that in.

So we're going to answer differently.

None of us are saying there's only one way to answer this.

Right?

There's different ways to handle this and address the issue when people are challenging us that God does.

Doesn't exist.

You know, Drew just bans people.

He doesn't even put them in timeout.

I thought I did the timeout button.

Maybe they didn't want to be timed out, so they banned themselves and exited.

You know, I wonder if I can.

I was trying to see if there's a way to, like, unban him.

There probably is.

I'll have to look into it.

But.

But.

Yeah, no, the.

But the point being is we each approach it differently.

You know, it's interesting.

I remember many, many years ago, I was in studio with.

With Greg Kokel.

He got a call from somebody, and the guy.

The guy says, I'm an atheist, but.

And he asked the question, and it was really funny because we're sitting in the studio, Greg is answering the question.

Question.

And when we're in the break, I turned to Greg and I'm like, greg, why didn't you address the fact that he's an atheist?

He goes.

He is.

He totally missed that part because he focused on the question.

And he go.

And he looks at me, goes, typical.

The evangelist.

You immediately you pick up on I'm an atheist because you want to share the gospel.

He's like.

And I'm just sitting here giving, you know, an apologetic to the.

To the question being.

Right.

Some of that background we bring into our apologetics.

So be.

Be mindful of that.

Drew, you were gonna say something?

Well, yeah, just talking about the distinction between the answers that we gave versus what Aaron gave, because what Aaron's wanting to do, especially as a biblical counselor.

And you would have heard this if you listen to his.

His answer is he's understanding that there's a deeper issue, and he's wanting to get to that deeper issue by talking to that person.

And so when Mr.

30 up here talks about.

Makes his comment that he says it's extremely convenient to say when someone doesn't believe in God, it isn't because the theist arguments fail.

It's because they're angry with God.

Very, very convenient.

Well, that's because.

Wait, wait, read the rest of it.

What does the rest say?

You're never wrong.

Exclamation point, exclamation point.

You know, and kind of the, the joke in apologetic circles is when talking about atheism is they know two things to be true.

God doesn't exist, and I hate him.

Right.

And so what Aaron's.

The answer that Aaron gave is he understands that it's a heart issue.

And at the deeper core of the issue is that there's an.

The person is angry with God and he wants to uncover that.

Yeah.

And that's what a counselor does.

He just came back and he.

I asked him to clarify his comment for me and he did.

He said, you say you don't believe in God, but you actually just angry with him is avoiding the argument and very condescending.

Okay, fine.

So let's just say that somebody says that, you know, I don't believe in God.

I think he's an absolute jerk.

I hate it.

Him, you know, whatever.

They're using terminology like that.

I say, you want my proof?

My proof for God?

You are my proof for God.

You hate him.

You don't hate the Easter Bunny, you don't hate Santa Claus.

You don't hate the Sandman, you don't hate any other fictional.

You don't hate Voldemort.

You hate God.

You are my proof that God exists.

And I leave it right there.

If somebody's going to actually make that argument, they've made the argument for me because.

And this is what I was trying to get to before.

Their very reaction is evidence of the fact that they don't actually believe that God doesn't exist.

Otherwise they could not, they would not waste a moment of their life hating him.

Yeah, because they're only going to live how many years?

70, 80 years.

And you're going to spend that, you're going to spend all that time doing this.

Like it makes no sense.

It's, it's not what someone would do if they really believe that.

Now I see secret is back.

So did you do something there?

I, I get.

I guess I did put a timeout on, and then that timeout ran out.

Okay.

And he came back.

So I guess I did do it.

Right.

Okay, well, good.

It's interesting.

It said it was banned and he.

So let me deal with a couple of things that we had here because we, we did have some other.

And I thought this one was, was pretty good.

Mr.

Zora 23 says, what's the greatest Challenge you've faced with your faith.

Anyone.

Anyone have something they can, they really want to.

That comes to mind.

Yeah.

I mean, I'll do mine is because is I, I love God and my longing is to please God, right?

So I want nothing more than to please my Lord and to serve my Lord.

And yet I fail every single day.

But in failing, right, all that does is drive me back to him, to commune with him, to repentance and then to, to worship to God who is merciful and gracious.

But my struggle is, you know, my longing to continue to grow in sanctification because I'm, I'm always wanting to be at the end of the sanctification road, glorification, which can't happen until I'm dead.

But, but even though I know I progress, it doesn't feel like I progress all the time, right?

And because sometimes it's that three steps forward, one step back, two steps forward, one step, you know, and so because my longing is to please my Lord, it's every time I sin and I know I sin and I fall short.

As a husband, husband, as a dad, I know that I have displeased him.

And, and those are, those are kind of the greatest challenges, but they are blessings because all they do is continue to drive me back to prayer, back to repentance, and back to the comfort of Him.

Yeah, I, so.

And I didn't know how to.

There's a couple ways to read the question, right?

So, and this is where I don't know.

So he or she is saying, well, he, I guess because, says Mr.

So he's saying, what's the greatest challenge?

So I don't know if it's the challenge of what has caused you to doubt or question your faith.

That's how I first read it.

And I didn't.

I don't really have anything like that.

And, and the reason being is, you know, and this may not be the case for everyone.

I'll put, you know, Aaron on the spot in this sense is, you know, Aaron grew up in a Christian home.

He didn't grow up in a, in a household where believing in Christ would get him kicked out.

Right?

So when, when I was converted to Christianity, to Christ, it, it was something I knew.

The, the ramifications of that was that I would, would be.

As soon as my parents found out, I would be not only kicked out of the house, I'd be kicked out of the family they would bury in a casket and tell everyone I'm dead.

And in fact, those that know my Testimony.

That's, that's what they did when they found out, they went and they went casket shopping.

So I didn't really, I don't really have things that challenge me.

I go, oh, am I wrong?

But I did, when I first became a Christian, I did approach it in a very logical.

I mean, I'm an engineer for a reason, right?

So a very logical way was I went through the scriptures to say, you know, is there a way I could prove that the Bible's wrong?

So I was looking for ways to, you know, to see whether what I was believing, what was inaccurate.

One of the ways I chose to do it was to just knowing that people don't do well with numbers.

An example of this would be if you read the Book of Mormon.

And I wrote a computer program many years ago to calculate birth rates and death off of death rates.

And so Joseph smith in the 1800s, when he's writing the Book of Mormon, the death rate is very different in warfare than it would be in first century or before.

And so he has so many people dying here in the Americas that there would had to have been a birth rate 15 times the highest birth rate we've ever seen in history.

And so it's just, it's, it's not realistic.

And so because people make mistakes with numbers, so I, I was like, hey, if I could see if anybody lived beyond the flood, that would be a problem.

And that would, that would be somewhere.

Yeah, they would.

People would not do the math.

They wouldn't think to do that when, when, if they're making it up.

And so I got close with, with Noah's grandfather, who's the longest person to have ever lived.

That's recorded in the Bible.

Methuselah.

And he died the same year of the flood.

His, his Abraham, or Sir Moses's father, that Noah's father died two years before the flood.

So there was no one that we have recorded that went beyond the flood.

Right.

So.

So I, I didn't really have challenges in that way.

But Drew, you took it a different path.

And again, that's, again, here.

What do you see?

Someone asks a question, we could see different ways of, of it being interpreted.

And see, I don't like, kind of like you.

I don't have challenges like with my faith where, like, I have an assurance of my faith.

I don't have any challenges with it.

Yeah.

So, Aaron, sorry, I'm typing away.

Challenging.

My faith from the perspective of causing doubts.

I have to say, I, I, all throughout my life, at various times, I'VE I am a very, I had a handle growing up called the Philosophy Child.

I would call radio stations and I wouldn't give my name.

I'd say I'm the philosophy Child.

And I, you guys probably picked up on this deep thinker type of thing and I oftentimes would, would toy with different arguments against the existence of God, things like that.

Now I'd find myself going down certain, certain lengths before I would hit a wall.

And some, some arguments I was able to, you know, like hit a wall pretty early and say, well no, that can't, that's not a decent argument.

Other ones I was able to take.

And sometimes I was just, sometimes I doubted my salvation, my faith just because I was able to make a legitimate art, well, a quasi legitimate argument for atheism to a certain extent before I came face to face with truth and all that one broke down too.

I actually like those arguments more.

I like to, instead of trying to give the evidence for God, oftentimes like to make arguments against the poor evidences and the poor arguments that there can't be one.

But on a more personal note, there have been two times in my life where I have contemplated suicide.

Contemplated, didn't act on it by God's grace.

And in those times those are challenges to my faith because nobody contemplates suicide who believes, believes in an all loving, all sovereign God who is wisely doing, bringing everything into your life for his greatest glory and your greatest good.

So in those moments I wasn't sitting there going, I don't believe God exists.

I don't believe all this is a lie.

I was just so focused on my pain and my experience that practically the things I was thinking about, the conclusions to which I was coming and just be better off if I were dead, these were all lies contradicting what the scriptures reveal.

It's in a similar way, kind of like Peter, you know, Peter was walking on the water.

Jesus was right there walking on the water.

As long as he kept his eyes on him, he was doing the miraculous.

But then he looks away at this wave.

And it wasn't that he was saying Jesus doesn't exist.

He's not powerful enough to help me walk on the water.

He wasn't saying any of that.

His faith was, was challenged by the wave.

And that's kind of, I think then my biggest struggles, not that I sit back and I go, well this can't be real, but that in those moments that I'm blinded from the truth of the Scriptures by the overwhelming feeling of my current experience to which I then have to counsel myself and talk myself back into reality.

Well, no, God is sovereign.

He is loving.

He is doing this for this reason.

Then look at what the scripture says here and let's, and let's remind ourselves what God's doing through this here.

And he will give you an opportunity to give you, he's faithful, to give you a way to escape temptation.

And he, and he wants me to have joy in this scenario.

Right.

And here's how I can do that.

And it's at those moments that my eyes are back on him and I'm back walking on the water again.

Yeah.

And I think there's nothing that says Christians can't go through something like that.

It's the fact that just what you said, they get their, they start focusing on self rather than God.

So Mr.

30 says, okay, yeah, cold plungers are cool, but can we please address the problem of evil?

Cold plunges are evil.

That's the point.

Mr.

They are evil.

They're hard.

But I'll say this, there is no problem of evil.

I mean, there really isn't.

The problem of evil is a problem for the professing atheist.

Evil is not a problem for the Christian because we can explain why there is evil because man sinned in the world.

So what you have, there is, you have a case where people are saying, well, this is the problem for you because if you deny God exists, there is nothing evil.

That's an immaterial thing.

How can you declare something good or evil?

See, evil, what evil is, evil is the good is, is from the nature of God.

Evil is the opposite of good.

So you cannot have evil without first having God because you need some standard of goodness that's absolute, universal, okay.

And immaterial.

So you need God to say, when you say they're, you know, the problem of evil, it's only a problem for the professing atheist.

It's not a problem for the Christian because we know God exists.

Yeah, yeah.

What is evil and why?

And by what standard do you call it evil?

Yeah.

So this next one I think is, is from someone.

I think this person is you, Aaron.

You mentioned a quote comment from him earlier.

Mayor Gonzalez, does God exist?

Yes, he does.

In our minds and hearts.

Now I think this person is a professing Christian.

So, but I do want to, I, I do want to caution with this because a lot of Christians would use an argument like this that God exists in our minds and hearts.

But the reality is God exists without our minds and without our hearts.

God existed before there was a human being.

And so I want to caution you just.

Because when you.

If there's a song that is sung, that was actually the, the writer who.

I forget who it was, but he wrote this toward a Jewish person that he was trying to evangelize.

And the chorus of it says, how do you know that God exists?

Or how do you.

How do you sound like.

How do you know God exists?

He lives within my heart.

It's a really bad argument because the argument says.

Well, first off, it's saying, I know he exists by something subjective.

That's what the, the, the professing atheists do.

Their argument is, God doesn't exist exist because I don't like him.

That's subjective.

We're making objective.

And so I want to say you want to make an objective argument.

It's not based on your mind and heart, because God existed before there was a human mind or a human heart.

Okay, let's see.

Oh, secret.

Had one.

He said said in all caps.

Do you guys actual believe because it's ax, not ac, but actually think Abraham lived for 900 years?

No.

No, none of us do.

Because the Bible actually says in Genesis 25 that in verse 7, these are all the years of Abraham's life.

He lived.

That he lived 175 years.

So, no, we don't believe he lived 900 years because that's not what the Bible says.

However, we do believe that Methuselah lived 969 years, just in case you're wondering.

That's true.

And we do.

And because.

Because God said so.

And unlike Secret, God doesn't lie nor hide behind pseudonyms.

Okay.

Mr.

30 said, wouldn't a Christian have a presupposition?

Drew, you were talking about.

I think it was when you were talking presuppositions.

This is when this came out.

Wouldn't a Christian also have presuppositions that would lead them to interpret evidence against God's existence?

Because I said we have presuppositions.

Yeah.

I want to ask Chuck, you've been kind of quiet for a bit.

How, how would you answer Mr.

30 here?

Yeah, I, I would agree.

We definitely have presuppositions.

And, and what you do, if, if you, if you take the presupposition of the biblical worldview, it makes sense of everything, of, of life around us, of our reality, every other worldview of religion.

If you, you know, adopt that and, and, and look at, through that lens of the world, all of those fall apart.

So that's how I would Answer that is that yes.

And presuppositions always cloud or change how you view pure facts.

I don't like the term that, you know, facts don't care about your feelings.

Right.

They, well, they sort of do.

They at least care about your world view and how you view those facts and interpret them.

Yeah.

And one of the first things I, I teach in hermeneutics class is to question your presuppositions to a text.

You, you need to know what your presuppositions are.

I, I think the problem is, is that, that for professing atheists who deny that God exists, they don't know what their presuppositions are.

I ask it often because I have no problem telling you what my presuppositions are.

In fact, I did so on my, on this show already.

My, I have two presuppositions.

God exists.

He has spoken.

Why do I have those two?

Because God said in Romans chapter one, as we read earlier, that he has made this evident to us.

So we, we know this.

It's, it's not something we have to sit here and guess at.

It's something that it, God made it evident.

He says that the, the people who suppress it do it in unrighteousness because that's what is known about God is evident within them.

So it is the starting point.

Oh, there we go.

You know, it's almost time to end the show because his daughter comes in to give dad a kiss good night.

We love that.

Does she, does she know we actually enjoy and make comment every time she gives you a kiss?

Well, you explained she came on the show that one time and I think we talked about it a little bit, but I, I, she would do that anyway even if I weren't on the show.

So, so yeah, I mean, I think, I think it's important for us to, to know what our presuppositions are, are right.

Because what, what Here, here's the whole thing, folks.

That, and I know Chuck's going to agree with this part for sure, but why is it that the professing atheist wants to say, well, look, you put your presuppositions aside, enter into my world, let's talk about science and, and all of this stuff.

And let's, let's just look at, can we prove that God exists?

Exists?

Well, why.

The answer to that is, well, why don't you go and prove that your science exists?

Because the answer is you want to use science, but all that science uses immaterial things like truth, knowledge, ability to reason, laws of logic, morality.

You need all those immaterial things to do your science and those things require God.

So I'm sorry, but if God doesn't exist, you can't explain the immaterial.

So throw all your reasoning out the window.

You can't do that.

Not only that, in order to even have science, you have to have order.

And you don't get order from chaos.

Right.

It's just, it just doesn't work.

You have to be able to like use the scientific method in order to test something.

So yeah, how does that work in a, in a materialistic, chaotic, ever evolving world?

Right.

Your measurements would constantly be inaccurate.

Here's the thing about presuppositions though.

There is a presupposition doesn't have to blind you to what I'm just going to refer to as logic.

Okay?

It doesn't have to blind you to fact.

I don't believe Santa Claus exists.

That is my presupposition.

But if scientists, explorers were able to find at the very point of the North Pole, a giant workshop filled with abandoned toys and stalls for reindeer and so on and so forth, I'm not going to sit there and go, oh, that doesn't exist.

You know, those were, those were, those were, that's AI.

You know, if I read the research papers and I saw the pictures and we had this conversation with these explorers, I'm not just going to sit there and deny it.

Because as my starting place is that Santa Claus doesn't exist.

I think as a rational human being, I have to be able to say, yes, I have a, I have a belief system, but when this other information is presented, I need to be able to look at it realistically, rationally, logically.

And if it does contradict my presupposition, I need to be, I'm going to say humble enough, not so arrogant that I can't be wrong.

So you know, if an atheist is going to come to me with a proof which is impossible, but with some type of evidence that God doesn't exist, I can talk about that, I can hear what you have to say.

But you need to also be willing to hear my criticism of your evidence or my being able to show you how your evidence is actually.

And this is what we've done.

This, Andrew just did this, Andrew just gave a really good example, a short, simple example of how even your own arguments are self defeating because it requires impossible, supernatural, divine things for you to even make the argument.

And if you're not going to be able to rationally logically respond to that criticism of your argument, then your presuppositions are so blinding you that that's really, really dangerous.

And I would argue that no, pre suppositions shouldn't do that.

Sure, it's a starting place, but you should be able to rationally look at things and discuss it like a, like a human being, like an intelligent human being who could have an adult conversation.

Not using pejoratives, not tearing down somebody's character, not throwing out baby with the bathwater, not saying asinine things simply because you can.

You're so arrogant.

You can't be wrong.

Let's have that conversation.

Which, unfortunately, it's hard to find atheists.

What I found is it's hard to find atheists who will have that conversation.

And when you do, those conversations almost always end the same, with the atheist going, something like this.

I'm gonna have to give some more thought to that.

You brought up some interesting points.

I'm gonna have to really think about that.

Those are the only two conversations I've ever had, and that's how they always end.

The one who is too arrogant to admit that he might be wrong, and that just descends into all sorts of ugly.

And the one who goes, that's actually kind of interesting.

I hadn't thought of that before.

Yeah.

Hey, Drew this.

This Every Everyday Patriot, he says, remember, science is fallible.

It's the study of fill in the blank scriptures, infallible.

But is that Chris Huff?

I mean, it looks like, doesn't it.

Look like Chris Huff?

But it looks like a picture, but.

I don't think Chris does that podcast.

Yeah, yeah, I've never heard of the Everyday Patriot.

Yeah, I might have to check it out.

So as on cue, Mr.

30, I love, I love.

Oh, yeah.

He says, whoop, too many comments there.

He says, yes, it is Huffing Huff.

Oh, Huff has a new podcast, Everyday Patriot.

Yeah, there we go.

I'm gonna have to go check that out.

So, as if on cue, Mr.

30 says, I would really love to get an answer to what is your best evidence other than the Bible?

Thank you.

Give me your best evidence for science, but don't use any science book.

Well, and what's funny, I already answered his question.

I, I, I, I wasn't, My argument wasn't, the Bible says, it's perfect, therefore, like that.

Because he, he accused me of circular reason.

Well, yeah, hold on.

Yeah, I wasn't even doing that because.

He says that he was talking about circular reasoning, and then he got into a discussion of 66 books.

And he says if I drew enough circles, I would probably get 66 perfect ones eventually.

That's the whole point.

That's the whole point.

You and you wouldn't I bet you wouldn't get them perfect anytime.

Not even one.

But fine.

You want to say if you do, you know, a couple trillion of them, maybe you could get 66, but you wouldn't get 66 in a row first time like the Bible.

And that's the, that's the right there is the difference.

So, so let me let me just mention briefly here some speaking events we got got coming up.

I'll put this up here.

If you guys next weekend, the first weekend in May, which I believe is next weekend.

Let me just double check the calendar.

It is.

It is.

Okay.

May May 2nd to the 4th is the the Truth conference.

So if you go to striving for eternity.org truth-conference-25 I believe it's it's in there.

There's a it's in the recent blogs is a link to it.

And that conference is going to be May 2nd to the 4th.

Second and third is the conference there.

John John Harris will be there.

I'll be there.

There's really interesting what this conference is.

It's more than just a conference.

It's actually a gathering for, well, mostly pastors, but others who would like to to get into discussing what to do within when church denominations start, well, kicking out people within their own denomination because they're not woke.

Well, that's what happened to a bunch of the guys that are speaking.

They're kicked out of the Evangelical Free Church that is pretty much open to any everyone except anyone that stands up against the WOKE agenda.

I guess so.

So yeah.

Aaron, you got any speaking events coming up for that you're doing with STRIVE Training or with Evermind Ministries?

Yes, I have one coming up here.

At the end of May, May 22nd through the 24th, I'll be in Winston Salem, North Carolina, at the Thrive Homeschool Conference.

I'll be talking about within that within that homeschooling world, I'll be talking about an educational philosophy that I created called Expectational Education.

I do have a whole series about expectational education on my podcast.

And even if you're not a homeschooler, that expectational education has application to every learning environment on the planet, even if it's just your job.

How what God wants the best way for us to learn and to grow to accomplish the best that we can.

And the second thing I'll be speaking on at that conference is the four types of homeschooling parents.

I'll give you a teaser.

They don't know this, but you guys know there's actually five types and how we can be that fifth type.

I also have a podcast series on my podcast called the Fifth Parent, which doesn't talk specifically just about the niche that is homeschooling, but really looks at all of our responses and different ways that we naturally parent parents.

But the fifth way that God would have all of us parent to his honor and glory.

And you know the only thing that's behind me there isn't since my books are all packed is my Squirrelly Joe's coffee because, well, that's staying with me because when I go to the apartment that's going with me.

So if you want to get yourself some good squirrelly just coffee, just go to strivingforternity.org coffee you can get.

I believe it's 20% off your first order using the promo code SFE.

My daughter actually went and got coffee as a gift for her, for her in laws, I think it was sister in law and her husband and used the code and was like thrilled that she got 20% off.

And then she realized that it was a one time thing.

So she was really bummed when she went to order coffee for herself.

I couldn't get this cat.

So if you're Jewish like me, order a lot that first time.

Get the, get as much.

Get the 5 pound bags like I now get.

But I'll put up one final comment just because it makes me laugh.

Mr.

30 says like, come on.

Not even engaging with the actual point, just insisting upon the Bible.

I ask you a question of the group and Andrew says quote, proof science without a science book, unquote, quote.

No.

You prove science without using science.

Correct.

Without.

Well I said I might have said without using a science book.

That's possible.

But he's like tear argument lame.

It.

It shows.

This is the, this is the funny thing.

What this shows is that Mr.

30 is not actually listening to what's being said.

Right?

He's looking for.

And this is what you find with most professing atheists.

They're looking only to attack.

They're looking for how they could, they could attack folks rather than actually hear what's being said.

Because if he actually listened, he did get his answer.

The answer is you, you can't.

Do you want me to make a rational argument?

The rational argument requires God.

You cannot say God does not exist with first relying on your God given ability to reason.

So if you deny God, you have to explain how you have an ability to have something like reason, which is immaterial and not part of the physical world.

Therefore it can't come about by pure chemical reactions.

How does that happen?

Because you first have to defend your worldview.

I know you want us to give up our worldview to come into your worldview of nonsense, but that's the whole point.

You have nonsense.

I, I would like him to step out of borrowing from the Christian worldview and into his worldview to try to make an argument for his worldview.

Correct.

Because he's trying to use logic and reason in order to argue for his position.

But he can't have that because you, you can't make sense of anything outside of the Christian worldview.

Yep.

So, you know, I think that I, I think there'll always be, unfortunately, those like, we've seen that.

Well, I mean, I wish they weren't such cowards.

They'd actually come in and defend their arguments.

But that's probably why they're behind a keyboard, because they actually don't have to engage in arguments.

But the challenge to Mr.

30, to secret, or to any of you other professing atheists, you're welcome to come in here and give us your, your challenges, give us your arguments.

It's much better when you come in so we can actually engage with them rather than see a question, wait three minutes, answer that question, wait for a response.

It's much better when you come in.

But I understand that many of you don't want to come in because, well, well, a, you're cowards.

That's why you don't use your real names.

And B, because you can't really reason your way out of a wet paper bag.

And so it's much easier to ignore what we say and just keep typing like a madman.

But hey, you'll be accountable.

You'll be accountable to God whether you like it or not, whether you want to admit to it or deny it.

And so my challenge to many who are listening is this.

The fact is, and it is a fact that you will die one day and you will give an account to the God that you are trying so desperately to suppress, so desperately to deny.

You, just like all of us here are a sinner.

You broke God's laws.

You've lied, you've stolen.

God is infinitely holy and infinitely just.

And because of that, that will have for you an infinite consequence.

Because of who he is, when you break his law, you are accountable to Him.

If I lie, if I threaten the President, United States, I have a different consequence than if I threaten Aaron.

So that, why is that?

Well, Aaron, you might beat me up and you know, you do have a couple more black belts than I do.

Well, we can agree to that.

I mean, you got three.

I don't have that many.

So, so the thing is that.

But what if the offense is the same?

What made the difference?

Well, I'm going to be thrown in jail by threatening the President because of his position.

Well, God is infinitely holy and has a higher consequence to that, that violation against him.

And so you as a human being who is given a, has a knowledge of God, it doesn't matter that you suppress it, you will be accountable to him.

And so my, my concern is that you would turn to God and live, that you would stop trusting yourself as a good person or your good nature or in my case, your, your genealogy or your, you know, who you were born, born of, Abraham.

Stop trusting those things because that's not going to get you right with God.

You need to turn from your sin of thinking you're good or you're good.

Having your good works will earn you merit and turn, turn to Jesus Christ and live.

It's only in Jesus Christ we have the forgiveness of sins.

And if you want to deny that for the professing atheists out there as we have on the Show Secret and Mr.

30, the reality is you could try to deny it.

You can mock Christianity all you want, but every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess.

And it is appointed unto man once to die and then the judgment.

You are foolish to think you can avoid the judgment just by saying it doesn't exist.

That is like jumping off the, the Empire State Building claiming that you don't believe in gravity and expecting somehow you will not suffer the, the law of gravity.

Your denial will not help you.

It is the ultimate of foolishness to try to deny the existence, existence of God and deny the accountability you will face.

And so I plead with you and I beg of you before your death, please turn from trusting yourself and turn and trust God.

With that.

Next week on the show we will, we will be tackling I, I think a topic of the, the can we trust the Scriptures, which is the follow up to this one.

Right.

What were the two presuppositions?

I said we start with God exists.

He has spoken.

Well, the second biggest challenge we get after God exists is, well, the scriptures have been edited, they've been changed.

You can't really trust them.

I will if you want to be prepared.

Get my book that's right there on the screen.

What do we Believe?

And you can, you can read right, right there, Chapter two, where I go into what's called textual criticism, where we go into all of that.

So that'll get you prepped for next week's show.

And Tom never made it in.

So folks, please be.

Yeah, so please be playing praying for Tom Shepard, our co host here.

He is probably having to deal with it sounded like one of the guys on his crew.

Did you know he had to go and.

And fix something?

They did, I guess so he thought he'd be late, but since he didn't make it here.

Yeah, but I would encourage you guys to not just follow Striving For Eternity, the YouTube channel and follow the Politics Live, the podcast.

But we are partnering with Open Air Theology and we're.

We're sharing streams.

Well, actually, no, they're just sharing our platform because they haven't figured out how to link there's on here.

So we could share like we do with Matter of Theology, but do go to Open Air Theology's YouTube channel.

Check them out.

They.

They do a show every.

Usually every Saturday night.

So.

Good.

Good stuff there, Chuck.

Thanks for coming in.

You.

You are a special guest who was really quiet.

Yeah.

I'll have to learn to speak up more.

But not really sort of aghast.

But the, the polite atheist nightmare.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

No.

And the reason we kept joking that he's our special guest was he, he, he said he wanted to come in and he was afraid.

It sounded like he was.

He was a special guest of the show.

Said we are now.

Yeah.

So.

Hey, but it's always good having you you in.

I know you're.

You're a busy fellow, so the fact that you make time to, to come in here, we appreciate it.

Yeah.

And with it.

Thank you.

And with that, folks, remember to strive to make today an eternal day for the glory of God.

And we will see you next week.