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In this episode of The Narrow Path, Steve Gregg takes live calls on pressing biblical and Christian faith questions. Topics include the biblical perspective on abortion, the morality of murder, and how scripture defines life in the womb. Steve also discusses whether prophecies have ceased, the significance of denominational origins in the 1800s, and the nature of salvation by faith alone. As always, he provides scripturally grounded insights with an open invitation for callers to engage, ask, or challenge his views. Tune in for thought-provoking discussions on some of the most debated issues in Christian doctrine.
SPEAKER 06 :
Good afternoon and welcome to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we’re live for an hour each weekday afternoon. Taking your calls so that you can call in if you have questions you’d like to discuss on the air about the Bible or about the Christian faith or anything related to the concerns that Christians may have. You don’t have to be a Christian to call in. If you’re not a Christian, have curiosity or even objections to Christianity. I’d be glad to hear from you. We have some lines open. We have actually quite a few lines open right now, so if you’d like to call right now, you can get through. The number is 844-484-5737. Again, that number is 844-484-5737. On Wednesday night this week, I’ll be speaking at Church of Christ. in Englewood, Tennessee. If you’re in that area, that’s roughly the Chattanooga area. It’s a bit of a distance from Chattanooga, but if you know where Englewood is and you live anywhere near there, we’d be glad to meet you there. You can find the information at our website, thenarrowpath.com. Now, I think there are two Church of Gods in that town. There is a Church of God church Anderson, Indiana, which is what this one is, I believe. And there’s another denomination called Church of God, Cleveland, Tennessee. Even though I’m very close, in fact, I think I’m sitting very near to Cleveland, Tennessee right now. That’s the headquarters of this other Church of God. But this is a Church of God, Anderson, Indiana denomination. So don’t be confused. There’s two different Church of Gods in Englewood, Tennessee. But you can get the right one to get the address at our website, thenarrowpath.com. under announcements. And then on Friday night, I have a meeting further up in the northeast of Tennessee at Church Hill, Tennessee. So that’s going to be this Friday. So Wednesday night in Englewood and Friday in Church Hill. All right. And so that’s what’s happening this week. I also have a Sunday meeting that’s at the website, too, at a Calvary Chapel. And I think it’s called Lakeview Chapel. calvert chapel but i’m uh it’s uh the little town it’s i forget the name of the little town but it’s on our website and i’ll be announcing it more specifically as the week on because it’s actually next weekend okay well let’s talk to angel in baytown texas angel welcome to the narrow path thanks for calling thank you steve i’m good to talk to you again um
SPEAKER 04 :
God bless you, and I just wanted to get right into it. A couple of weeks ago, my brother had called me and told me his girlfriend is pregnant, and he was hoping to get an abortion. He’s very financially troubled right now, and his girlfriend already has two children of her own, and he believes that any pre-second trimester abortion is okay, things like that, and he He thinks it isn’t ungodly because he himself claims to be a believer. He is a believer, and I know he’s never denied Christ or anything, but as you can see, he’s quite lost in his walk. Yeah. Having a child, you know, out of wedlock to begin with and all this, and so… I do believe he was baptized as a young teen. I’m not 100% sure if he was baptized a little earlier than that, but I think he was a young teen.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, we won’t speculate at this point of whether he was really saved or not. That’s not for me to judge. But your question probably has to do with the abortion issue, or is it something else about this?
SPEAKER 04 :
It mainly does have to do with the abortion issue and just what scriptures, Steve, should I turn to just to prepare me for the talk I have to have with him? Or what scriptures should I guide him to?
SPEAKER 06 :
You don’t have to have scriptures specifically about abortion per se because… Abortion is murder. I mean, when you take the life of an innocent human being, and that’s what happens when you abort. There’s no one more innocent than a human baby. And the baby in the womb is certainly human. I mean, whatever species is it? It’s not an ape. It’s not a salamander. It’s a human being. Anyone can prove that to themselves by taking a DNA sample of it before it’s born. It’s a human one. And it’s growing, so it’s alive. So we have a living human in the womb there. And so all you need to do is really talk about how murder is a great crime in Old Testament times. And even in New Testament times, it was seen as having the death penalty affixed to it. So it’s like a very supreme crime to murder. Not to say that even if it wasn’t a crime, you wouldn’t want to kill your own children, I would think. So, I mean, he has a child. Now, I realize that the girlfriend has some other children, and if she brings his child to term, there’s likely to be financial repercussions for him and obligations, you know, paternity obligations. But, you know, that’s what happens when you get a girl pregnant. It’s a sad thing that there’s so much of that that goes on. But, you know, there’s not going to be a reduction in this kind of activity. if people are let off the hook by being able to murder their babies. I mean, when people realize that you’re not really free to murder a baby in God’s sight. If you murder a baby, you know, you’ve shed human blood, innocent blood. And you can just do a search of Scripture about what it says about murder and bloodshed of human blood in the Bible. It’s not a pretty thing. Actually, the Bible says that where there’s human bloodshed, even the whole city where it was done would come under God’s curse in Israel. until the murderer was himself put to death. Now, I’m not recommending anyone be put to death in this situation, but nobody is murdered yet. But he should realize that to kill a human being, an innocent human being, this is how God feels about that. And someday he’s going to stand before God. And, you know, if you murder a baby now because you think, well, I’ll just take my chances with God later, and especially a young person who does it, They’re not thinking straight. And, you know, if they live to be 70 or 80, the time will come when they’ll say, well, I wish I hadn’t done that. Yeah, but you did. You did. And you can’t undo that. Once you kill a person, you can’t go back and put life back in them. You’ve ended a life that God had a plan for. And you basically interfered with God’s plan in that. And, you know, it’s just you need no further scriptures than those about murder because there’s no difference. whether you kill a human being when they’re 95 years old or when they’re five years old or when they’re five months old in the womb. They’re human. And, you know, the lost in our society like to pretend like a person’s not a human until they’re born. Well, how is that so? You know, if a baby can be born and survive, let’s say, at five months into pregnancy, well, it’s obviously a viable human being. So what if you killed a baby in the womb at seven months or six months? Well, you’re killing a viable human being. And there’s a false argument that some people give, liberal Christians, progressive Christians give. They say a person’s not really alive until they’re breathing. And they use this, you know, God made Adam from the dust of the earth, and he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and he became a living soul. Well, right. That’s true. And I suppose if you make a mud statue of a human being, it won’t be alive unless it starts breathing. But the Bible says the life of the flesh is in the blood. It’s not when the baby starts breathing. It’s really when a human being’s life begins. It’s at conception. But very soon after conception, it’s got a blood stream. It’s got blood and it’s got circulation. There’s a heart beating in there before very long. And, you know, even if you killed the baby before that point, you’re still interfering with the progress of a human being that God has allowed to be born and God intends to, would love to save and would love to have a purpose for their life. So, I mean, the Bible nowhere says that babies are not alive until they breathe. Adam wasn’t alive until he breathed, but that’s because he was just a hunk of mud. He didn’t have bloodstream either. He didn’t have a heart beating. He didn’t have consciousness. Babies have consciousness. They’ve got brain waves. They feel pain. You know, they’re human. And if someone says, but they’re so little and they’re out of sight, they can’t really be as important as others. You might say a third grader isn’t as important as a college student or that a three-year-old isn’t as important as a six-year-old because they’re smaller. Right. And some people say, well, you know, they’re not fully human because they can’t live independently outside the womb. Well, neither can a newborn baby live independently. It has to be fed. It has to be cared for. A baby will die outside the womb even after it’s been born, full term. It’s fully dependent on human beings to keep it alive. You know, if we put somebody in a submarine underwater, there’s obviously going to be some breathing apparatus under there. We can say those people would not be viable. in the ocean without that breathing apparatus, so they’re not really human. No, no, there’s, you know, when you’re underwater, you need some kind of lifeline, you know, and babies in the womb have that. You know, astronauts have to have some kind of air supply given to them because they can’t breathe in space. A baby, a human being cannot breathe underwater, and that’s why the baby has, you know, the umbilical there to keep it alive, but it’s still a human. Well, there’s a breathing… Naturally or not, it’s a human. And especially it’s arguable that once there’s blood, and there is very, very early, and there’s even a heartbeat very early, you get a human there. And I believe it’s a human being as soon as it’s conceived. And, you know, what else is it? What species is it if it’s not a human? Name the species that has human DNA and grows into human adults eventually. So, I mean… People are sometimes looking for specific scriptures about abortion. I think, why? The Bible doesn’t have a special verse. You should not kill a three-year-old, or you should not kill a 30-year-old, or you should not kill a 100-year-old. All those people are people, and so is a baby in the womb. So all you need is the command to don’t kill human beings, innocent human beings. And that’s, you know, if he doesn’t buy it, probably he, I mean, you were talking about how he was baptized before and so forth. I’m sure part of that was to speculate about, well, do you suppose he’s saved or not? I don’t know if he’s saved or not. But I can’t relate with a person who’s actually saved and doesn’t care whether they murder somebody or not. You know, the Bible says in 1 John, no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. It’s just contrary to the nature of a regenerate human being, a Christian. They’re not murderers. So I think your brother probably would be confused, like many young people, I assume he’s young, by the fact that our culture says that baby’s not a human being. It’s not a living human being. And that’s what they make up to make themselves feel okay about it. There’s not one rational argument in the world for saying that’s not a human being. It’s a human being at an earlier stage of development than when it comes out of the womb. But when it comes out of the womb, it’s at an earlier stage of development than when it’s 16 years old. And when it’s 16 years old, it’s at a different stage of development than when it’s 70. Human beings go through stages of life, and it begins when they’re conceived, and it ends when they die. And to interrupt that for convenience, to avoid expense, to avoid inconvenience, well, I mean, I guess that’s why people murder adults, too. It’s because they find them inconvenient or expensive. You know, there’s no okay reason, you know, to kill an innocent child. So that’s all you really need to know. That’s all he needs to know. Now, he may do it anyway. Okay. And if he does, he can repent, but he can’t bring that child alive again. And, you know, if he repents genuinely and really serves Christ and is a true disciple, I believe he could be forgiven if he does that. But no one should be thinking that way. No one could be thinking, I’m going to just kill my mom and I’ll repent so I’ll be okay with God. Well, if I do repent, nothing will grieve me more than knowing I killed my mom. You know, it’s like if you really repent, you’ll carry that for life. The Apostle Paul said, when he was a Pharisee, was persecuting Christians. And he later got forgiven. But he never lived it down. There never came a time where he didn’t think, I’m the worst person of all because I persecuted the church. He said it a few times. So, I mean, just to say, well, you can be forgiven if you sin. Well, there’s truth in that. You can be if you really repent. But if you really do repent, the effect that will have on your mind is, I can’t. I can barely live with myself knowing I killed a baby, you know. So he just needs to realize that he’s under pressure right now. He’s under pressure financial and perhaps otherwise. He might feel I’m not old enough to be a father. Well, I don’t know. If the girl doesn’t abort the baby, I wonder if she would raise it. or give it up for adoption. You can always give a baby up for adoption because there’s a lot more people waiting for babies to adopt than there are babies being born out of wedlock. So he’s got other options. Murdering a baby is not an option for a Christian. It’s just not on the table as one of the things that you can do.
SPEAKER 04 :
All right. Thank you, sir. I appreciate it.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay. I’m sorry that you and your brother and his girlfriend are in this circumstance. And, again, actions have consequences. And, you know, if we don’t want these consequences, we should avoid the actions that bring them about if we can. All right, Angel. God bless you. I’m sorry to hear about this story.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thank you. God bless you, too, Steve. Bye-bye.
SPEAKER 06 :
All right. Bye now. Let’s see here. Rich from Los Angeles, California. Welcome. Welcome.
SPEAKER 11 :
Hi, Steve. Thanks for taking the call. I really appreciate your radio show and your website. It’s just been great for me. I have a question about the, I guess, in particular, the book of Psalms. I noticed that a lot of Psalms are attributed to David or Sons of Korah. Is that actually indicated in the ancient manuscripts, or is that just something that somebody doing the translations has surmised?
SPEAKER 06 :
Actually, what’s called the psalm titles, and not all the psalms have them, but quite a few of them do, but the psalms that say a psalm of David or a psalm for the sons of Korah or a psalm of Solomon, a couple of them say, even one of them is a song of Moses, but those titles are believed by Hebrew scholars to go back almost at least as long as the psalms themselves. Now, the psalmist’s did not seemingly write those titles. So we don’t know for sure that they didn’t. But I don’t know that scholars would insist that those titles are quite as old as the Psalms themselves. I say they wouldn’t insist upon it, but it’s entirely possible that they are. In general, I think that conservative Bible scholars believe those Psalm titles are pretty reliable.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. Okay. That’s it. Appreciate it. Thank you so much.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, Rich. God bless. Thanks for your call. Jacob in Orange County, California. Hi. Welcome to The Narrow Path.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hi, Steve. Thank you for your ministry. I know that airtime is valuable, so I’ll try to read this quickly. I was reading 2 Samuel 24 where it states that the anger of the Lord burned against Israel and incited David basically to conduct a census. But then later, David’s heart is troubled, and he believes he sinned, and the Lord seems to confirm that David did sin because he brings about punishments. And my question is, I know you disagree with Calvinism, as do I. I don’t know if they use this instance to support their beliefs, but how do you see instances where the Lord is said to incite someone to action, like possibly sinful action, or like as a pharaoh when he hardens his heart?
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
Is that like just a special circumstance, like a one-off occasion? How would I explain this to a Calvinist brother who, you know?
SPEAKER 06 :
Sure. So it begins by saying the wrath of God was burning against Israel. And he moved David to number the people, which brought eventually a judgment on Israel. Not on David, per se. David actually didn’t end up suffering more judgment than the rest. It was the nation that suffered. This was apparently God being angry at the nation for sinning, and he punishes the nation for sinning. Now, we’re not told what their sin was, but we don’t really need to be told. There’s so many cases of them turning against God in Scripture. This apparently was another case, and so God was going to bring judgment. In this case, he did so by David numbering the people and by punishing the nation because of that. Now, does God make people sin? Did God make David do a wrong thing? Well, if you look at the parallel in Chronicles, it actually says that Satan moved David to do this. Now, I don’t see this as a contradiction, because… The Bible indicates that Satan also brought afflictions on Job, and yet Job said the Lord gave and the Lord took away. We understand that in afflictions and in temptations and virtually every negative thing in our life, the devil probably plays a role, but God is behind it in that the devil can’t do it unless God lets him. And many times I believe God doesn’t let him. In the case of Job, the devil complained to God. I can’t touch him because you’ve got this hedge around him. And I believe that God, in general, unless he wants something exceptional to be the case, he protects us from most of the wiles and animosity of the devil. But when God has a purpose in it to allow the devil to do his harm, he’ll step aside and let him do it. And I think that’s true when it comes to this temptation of David, too. God doesn’t tempt people to sin directly, the Bible says. But he allows the devil to do it. And we see, again, Chronicles in the parallel to this says it was the devil. You know, in Samuel it says, you know, the Lord moved him. But he moved him in the sense that he apparently allowed Satan to do it, just like he allowed Satan to afflict Job. You know, I don’t know all the reasons behind this because the story is told, it’s introduced and even told in a way that leaves out many details that we would like to have. First of all, we don’t know why it would be a sin to number Israel. God had Moses numbering Israel in the book of Numbers. That wasn’t a sin. It’s not clear why it would be a sin for David to number them. But apparently it is. And in the account, it mentions that God or David told Joab, the general, to go out and take the census. And Joab objected to it on principle. We don’t know what the principle was, but he said, you know, why would you do this? Why would you do this bad thing? And David said, just do it. So something about it. David knew it was wrong. Joab knew it was wrong. We just don’t know why it was wrong. Some people think it was that David had bad motives for it. Some people think David was proud. Some people think there’s some other reason, and there may have been some other reason. I don’t know, and the Bible doesn’t tell us why it was wrong for David to do this. But we’re told that it was wrong, and punishment came on Israel because of it. Now, there’s other things about the passage that are hard to understand. The census is different in Samuel than it is in Chronicles, and so forth. Even the judgment was different. There’s some textual variance, apparently. that we have to deal with. So this story has a lot of complications in it. But the overall picture seems to be that because judgment was to come on Israel, God allowed Satan. to move David to do something that David shouldn’t have done. And when judgment came, David was actually able to choose the judgment and which judgment it would be, and it came on Israel. And, you know, it’s a very strange story because of the things that are not explained for us. But you’re asking, well, don’t the Calvinists think that God, you know, causes everything, including the choices we make? It looks like God is choosing David’s choices here, even to sin. And I would say, first of all, like I said, it’s not that God made David sin or put it in his heart to sin, but he allowed the devil to tempt him, which, in this case, David was vulnerable to that, and he did sin. The other thing to note is that even if God had put it directly in David’s heart to do something, and I don’t think God does put it in good people’s hearts to do bad things, but like in the case of Pharaoh, when God hardened his heart, Pharaoh was a bad guy, and God judged him by making him incapable of repenting. And that’s not the only case in Scripture we have. One of the ways that God judges evil people sometimes is by directing them to make bad choices that will harm them because that brings the judgment God intends. In this case, David was not a bad person. He just did a bad thing. And I don’t think that God tempts or forces good people to sin or even to be tempted to sin. But he does allow us to be tested, and the devil does set seductions before us and appeals to our flesh and so forth. And God allows us to be subject to those tests. But the Bible does say in Proverbs 21.1, the heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord. As the rivers of water, he directs it wherever he wills. And this simply means that God governs the world in various ways, including turning the hearts of kings a certain direction because… Every case I know of where God directed a king to do something or another is so that the ramifications or the consequences would come upon the nation. A nation is judged, an evil nation is judged by having evil kings or kings that do evil things or kings that bring disasters upon them. And so God will direct, like he hardened Pharaoh’s heart, that brought disaster on Egypt and all their gods, it says in Exodus 12. God put it in Cyrus’ heart to let the Jews go back to their land after their captivity. So it had bigger ramifications than just the man. A king represents his nation, and his decisions impact his nation. So to bring a negative impact on Israel, because of whatever sin it was that’s not listed for us, God did it in this case by allowing David to be tempted and to fall to the temptation of doing something that he shouldn’t do, which brought the judgment on. I can’t explain everything because I don’t think anyone can. Honestly, I don’t think anyone can. I mean, there are certainly people who know more than I do, but I’ve never encountered a commentator or anything that could make complete sense of the story for the simple reason of so many parts are left out. And most importantly, what Israel did that brings the judgment on them, why it was wrong to number the people. I mean, these are things that are like subtexts in the story that we’re not given any details about. So it remains one of those stories in the Old Testament that just has confusing or perplexing aspects that we may never fully understand. All right, I’m going to have to take a break here. We have a hard break at the bottom of the hour, and we have another half hour coming up, so don’t go away. You’re listening to the Narrow Path Radio Broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg. We’re on Monday through Friday. We buy time on radio stations, lots of them all over the country, and they’re expensive. And we don’t have any commercials. We don’t have any sponsors. We sell nothing, and we have no overhead, but we do pay those radio stations. And for that, we… depend on God to provide what’s needed to do that. And that usually comes through listeners like you. If you’d like to help us stay on the air, you can write to us at The Narrow Path, P.O. Box 1730, Temecula, California, 92593. Or you can go to our website where everything is free. But you can donate there if you wish at thenarrowpath.com. I’ll be back in 30 seconds. Don’t go away.
SPEAKER 01 :
Thank you very much.
SPEAKER 06 :
Welcome back to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Craig, and we’re live for another half hour with our open phone lines. We have a couple of lines open. This is a good time to call because sometimes we don’t have so many lines open. We have two. The number to call is 844-484-5737. So if you’d like to ask a question, maybe you’d like to call disagree, you’re welcome to do that. The number to call, 844-484-5737. All right, our next caller is Mike from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Welcome to The Narrow Path, Mike.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, hi. How are you doing? You’re 100% on that abortion council that you were given. Amen. Guys should just get married and take care of their families. But anyway, I have a question. I kept on hearing that in Romans, supposedly, there might be a verse that we are saved by faith alone. I can’t seem to find it. Do you know, is that in Romans, a verse? Yes. A phrase like that?
SPEAKER 06 :
Paul discusses that subject and makes statements like that beginning near the end of chapter 3. Actually, he mentions it briefly in chapter 1. It’s kind of a theme of the early chapters. In chapter 1, he says, let’s see here, verse 17, Chapter 1, verse 17, for in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, the just shall live by faith. Now that’s where Paul introduces the idea. At the end of chapter 3, he says, where do I want to start that? Verse 21, chapter 3, verse 21, but now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith, in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe, for there’s no difference, etc., etc. Then down in verse 4, he says, verse 1, What then shall we say that Abraham, our father, has found according to flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace, but as debt. And then he says in verse 5, but to him who does not work, but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness. And then he mentions David, just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works. He means by faith apart from works.
SPEAKER 07 :
The idea is presented, but the phrase, I was looking specifically for the verse that said, you are saved by faith. faith alone. So that’s not really in there. It’s just the ideas presented.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, I think the word alone is in there in some of this discussion. I’m not my eyes scanning the page. I’m not finding the word alone in there, but I believe they’re right there.
SPEAKER 07 :
I couldn’t find it either. That’s what I was wondering. I know you knew about it, but I thought maybe you might know exactly what you’re talking about. I couldn’t find it, but the ideas seem to be presented there. All right. Thank you.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay. God bless you, Mike. Thanks for your call. Let’s see here. We’ve got John from Phoenix, Arizona. John, welcome.
SPEAKER 02 :
Hey, welcome. Hey, I always just had a question, and I keep going over it in my mind. It can’t seem to resolve it, and it’s kind of spiritual in a way, and maybe you can help me. I was looking at how the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Joseph Smith was supposedly found in the 1840s, and then William Miller and Ellen Gould White and the Great Disappointment and then the Seventh-day Adventist. I mean, 1820 for the LDS and 1840 for the Seventh-day Adventist. Then you had the American Civil War in 1861 to 1865. Then in 1890-something, you started the Charles Taz Roberts and the Tracton Watchtower and Tracton Society.
SPEAKER 09 :
Charles Taze Russell. Yeah, Charles Taze Russell.
SPEAKER 02 :
And I just keep thinking, within 100 years… all those things happen, you know, like three of these, you know, uh, basically branch religion started in that horrible war. And, you know, I just thought, you know, I just don’t know why these three religions would start in just in the 1800s, a hundred years, if there was something in any of the scriptures, the Bibles or the, anything about that. Cause you know, maybe it’s the end times or, you know, you can say that there, the book of Mormon is telling us things that we never knew that we always was there. And, You know, and whatever. I don’t know. You know, but I just find it odd that these three religions would all start up within 100 years of each other. And now millions of people believe in them. And here you have the Catholics. And, you know, I’m not a Catholic or anything like that or supportive. But, you know, they’ve been around supposedly around 2,000 years. And within, you know, 100 years, the LDS, Seventh-day Adventists, and the Jehovah’s Witnesses popped on the scene. And here we go, you know.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, so you’ve made some observations. What would your question be?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, is there some special thing why you think they all appeared within 100 years of each other? Was there some kind of a spiritual deficit within the United States at that time?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, let me just jump in here so we don’t say the same things over again. A lot of other movements also besides these cults you mentioned began. I mean, Christian science arose at that time. Darwinism arose at that time. Marxism, Karl Marx, living in the 19th century, you know, a lot of, you know, a lot of errors were introduced to Western civilization during that century. And I’m sure a sociologist, which is not what I am, might be able to, you know, list a number of factors in society that made it right for that kind of thing to happen. I don’t know if the Civil War had something to do with it, but as far as the spiritual dynamics of it and whether that’s a significant time or not, I’m not sure I could say. I mean, it was the case that the Reformation… happened like three centuries earlier than that. So it wasn’t like the Roman Catholics were the only game in town until these cults started popping up. There were many Protestant denominations before that. But, you know, there’s just, I think what it is, is when freedom of religion and freedom of speech really catches on, people begin to think for themselves more and express what they’re thinking, and for the better and for the worse. I mean, I’m glad there’s freedom of religion and freedom of speech, because if there wasn’t, and we all had to conform to one’s idea of what we had to believe, it might be that we all had to conform to it. I’m glad that I have the liberty of conscience in our society that didn’t exist, before, of course, the United States Constitution. But, of course, the Constitution was like almost a century earlier than that. But the point I would make is that when people have freedom to think and to interpret, I mean, think about it. For a long time in Western Europe, most everyone was Roman Catholic. And when the Protestant Reformation came along, it kind of broke that hegemony and gave people the right to think differently. Now, some people think that wasn’t a good thing because look how much division there is. Well, I don’t think that having differences of opinions is the same thing as division. I think people can have differences of opinions and still be quite united in Christ. Yeah, for those who think that everyone should believe the same way, seeing all these denominations and then these cults arising and so forth is seen as an unqualified evil. But on the other hand, if everyone’s going to think the same way, whose way is it going to be? Which church? Eastern Orthodox? Roman Catholic? Lutheran? Which one’s going to dictate to the rest of us what we’re supposed to believe? I like the idea of freedom, and I think that freedom always involves risk. people thinking wrong and starting movements and deceiving people. But where there’s a free expression in the marketplace of ideas, the truth will always have the best argument, and the truth will tend to dominate. There will still be people who don’t accept it, but the truth never has to suffer through more information, more truth coming out. Obviously, error comes out, too, when people have the choice. But there are people who think it is eschatological. I mean, I know those Romans certainly thought so. Certainly the Millerites, the Seventh-day Adventists, they thought they were in the end times. They thought that their movement was a return to true Christianity as Jesus was coming back. Jehovah’s Witnesses had the same ideas. I don’t know much about the eschatological fervor of Mormons. Maybe so. But the point is there is one thing that could be possibly related to it. I’m not saying it is. And that is that in Revelation 20, it talks about just before Jesus comes back, or maybe not just before, but there’s going to be a little time, a little season, when Satan is loosed to deceive the world again. And many have thought that maybe that was when he was loosed. All these deceptions came in, secular and religious. On the other hand, there’s been secular and religious deceptions since the beginning of time. There’s been false religions. And there’s been false philosophies. So I’m not going to argue that it was a spiritually significant time. I think it could be, as I said, a result of simply more liberty of expression, more liberty of free thought. This can lead people to come up with all kinds of wrong ideas. But it also gives the people who have the truth the freedom to express that widely. And that’s a good thing. Anyway, that’s I can’t say, you know, anything more about that. Like, I can’t say, well, there are a lot of demons unleashed on America at that time, because I don’t know if that’s true. We don’t have that information given to us in the history books or in the Bible. So just, I don’t know. The answer is, I can’t, we certainly can’t be certain. We have theories. Dennis from Fort Worth, Texas. Welcome to The Narrow Path.
SPEAKER 03 :
Hi, Steve. Thanks for taking my call. I’ve heard you answer this a few times, but I had a slightly different point on the blasphemy of the Spirit in Matthew 12, 31. I was reading through 1 Samuel, and I came across 1 Samuel 3, 14, where Eli’s house was cursed because his son’s We’re priests and living sinfully. And it seems like there was a correlation to the way the Pharisees were being towards Jesus in that, I guess, the way it hit me, it seemed that they knew that they were wrong, yet they were the spiritual leaders of the time. Do you see a correlation there?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, that’s the most common phenomenon in Israel’s history. I mean, the priesthood was typically compromised. And, I mean, Eli’s sons certainly were, but they were not the last generation of priests to be compromised. You know, there were a lot of them, probably most generations of Israel. But also, even at the time of Christ, it was the chief priests, Caiaphas and Annas, and their associates that crucified Christ. So, you know, a corrupt priesthood is commonplace. And you’re right. The Pharisees, though they weren’t priests, they were spiritual leaders in Israel. And Jesus seemed to be directing his remarks toward them. But to say that general corruption… on the part of spiritual leaders is, as Jesus put it, something that they have no forgiveness in this age or the age to come, would raise questions about the meaning of that statement. There certainly must have been some corrupt religious pastors or leaders or priests in the past who became Christians later and repented. So I’m not sure that this generic idea of generic corruption in the religious leadership would be what Jesus is describing specifically.
SPEAKER 03 :
I mean, it certainly is an atrocity. Yes. The reason I was making that connection was the last part of the verse in Samuel, where it said, Eli’s house shall not be atoned for by sacrifice or offering forever.
SPEAKER 06 :
Uh-huh. Yeah, well, that would mean that Eli’s house is doomed to not be priests anymore. Right. Yeah, because in chapter 2, they’re just the chapter 1 here. Well, I mean, God didn’t pronounce that specific judgment on every corrupt priest in Israel’s history, and most of them were after Eli’s time. They just weren’t of Eli’s house. Eli’s house priesthood ended, and the house of Zadok pretty much rose to replace it. And the Bible talks about the house of Zadok as, you know, it’s like it was going to be permanent as long as Judaism was practiced. Anyway, yeah, I mean, I see what you’re saying. He says the house of Eli will not be atoned for. And Jesus said those who commit the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit will not have forgiveness. But, yeah, we’d have to have something, I think, a little clearer than that because there’s so many priests. Even Saul of Tarsus, who became Paul, he was not a priest, but he was a Pharisee. He was a leader of the opposition to Christianity, and therefore we would say corrupt leader, and yet he became a Christian. And in the book of Acts, we read actually many of the priests actually turned to the Lord too. which means that they weren’t following Christ before that time, but they did repent. So, you know, I’m not going to necessarily paint with as broad a brush as I say corrupt Christian leaders can’t be forgiven. Eli’s family could not be given a second chance to be the priesthood after this, and that’s what I think it won’t be atoned for means.
SPEAKER 03 :
Gotcha. Thank you. That helps a lot.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, Dennis. God bless you. Thanks for your call. Our next caller is Kevin from Northford, Connecticut. Hi, Kevin. Welcome.
SPEAKER 10 :
Hi, Steve. Thanks for taking my call. Yeah, I just wanted to comment on something and ask a question about it. I happened to tune in in the car when you were talking to somebody about the issue of abortion. And I recently came upon Scripture. It’s Psalm 51. It’s somewhere between verses 5 and 8. and it says something to the effect of I was guilty or you found me guilty from conception.
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s verse 5.
SPEAKER 10 :
Is it verse 5? So I had never seen that before, and to me that kind of spoke to me because I always had my doubts about whether or not abortion was, really a sin when it was, quote-unquote, just a glove of cells. And, I mean, I generally believe that it was, but I just was looking for something a little more fortified to back up that point of view when speaking with people. And that kind of like, for me, that kind of like reinforced that for me. It makes me feel more comfortable. It also seems to be a really good piece of scripture to verify the idea of original sin.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, it’s the only verse in the Old Testament that Augustine appealed to when he was coming up with the doctrine of original sin. That was his favorite verse, actually. I didn’t know that. Yeah, there’s not many verses in the Bible that really lend themselves to teaching Augustine’s doctrine, but that was the only one in the Old Testament he appealed to, and then in the New Testament he appealed to one in Romans 5. But, of course, he was saying that David is saying that he inherited Adam’s sin when he was conceived. That’s what Augustine thought, and that’s what the doctrine of original sin teaches. I don’t know that David is affirming that he inherited Adam’s sin. When he said, in sin my mother conceived me, it could mean any number of things. It could mean that from the time I was conceived, I was already corrupt.
SPEAKER 10 :
In which case… No, I took it, yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah. But it’s not impossible, since this is poetry, that he could be using hyperbole, because David Ellsworth talks about how the wicked go astray from the womb, speaking lies. You know, well, the wicked don’t speak any lies from the womb. They don’t talk yet. So, I mean, these are… But also, I mean, it’s not impossible to read it to say that his mother was sinning when he was conceived. You know, that he was… Born out of wedlock. In sin my mother conceived me. I think that would be a very natural way to understand that. But it’s not entirely clear how David meant that. But as far as David having some testimony about the humanness of himself in the womb, we have from him Psalm 139. Beginning at verse 13, David says to God, You formed my inward parts. You covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are your works, and that my soul knows very well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in secret and skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. He means in the womb. Your eyes saw my substance being yet unformed, and in your book they were all written. The day is fashioned for me when as yet they were none of them. So he’s saying when I was in the womb, you were shaping me. You were watching me. You know, obviously, Jeremiah chapter one, God, God told Jeremiah that he was called to be a prophet from his mother’s womb.
SPEAKER 10 :
One five. Yep.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah. And also, you know, obviously in Luke chapter two. Or one, I guess it is, when Mary visited Elizabeth. Yeah, the baby in Elizabeth leapt for joy in her womb. Yes, yes. And was filled with the Spirit. So, I mean, that the baby in the womb is human is certainly presumed everywhere in Scripture.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah. So, the one about Elizabeth. I don’t see it saying directly that the baby was filled with the Holy Spirit, but that he leaped with joy when his mother was filled with the Holy Spirit. But my question to you is, can we interpret that use of the word joy there as being joy in the way it’s used in describing the nine fruits of the Spirit? Yeah, the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit, one of which is joy. Is that the same joy? Do you know if it’s a different… Ancient word or the same word?
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, I assume it’s the same word. It could be a different one, but joy, no matter how many different Hebrew words there are for it, he was rejoicing in the Spirit. I believe it does say he would be filled with the Spirit back in chapter 1, where Zechariah was told that his child would be filled with the Spirit from his mother’s womb. Here it is.
SPEAKER 10 :
Oh, really? What’s that? Can you tell me that scripture?
SPEAKER 06 :
What was that one? Yeah, Luke 1, verse 15. Zechariah is being told by the angel about John the Baptist. He will be great in the sight of the Lord. He shall drink neither wine nor strong drink. He will also be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother’s womb.
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, wow.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, so, and then, of course, it was the next chapter, or later, I guess the later chapter, in the chapter where he leaped. He leaped in the womb, and then Elizabeth said he leaped for joy in her womb. Yeah.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, yep, yep. Okay, I just… So I’m doubting myself again because I was feeling kind of relieved about the use of the word conceived when I came across that just yesterday in the Bible. And I don’t have my Bible with me, so I don’t know how I was interpreting it. But I’m going to have to go back and look at it again.
SPEAKER 06 :
Brother, I’m almost out of time. I’ve got some people waiting. I need to really try to give them some time. Okay, Kevin, thanks for your call. Thank you, Steve. Good talking to you, brother. Thank you. Appreciate your call. Bye-bye. Bye now. All right, Hank from Youngsville, North Carolina. Welcome to The Narrow Path.
SPEAKER 05 :
Hi, Steve. Thank you for taking my call. My question is concerning prophecies. I heard you say that you believe in the gift of prophecy, that it still exists. I read in 1 Corinthians 13, verse 8, that whether there are prophecies, they will fail. Could you perhaps enlighten me on this? How do we evaluate prophecies? current prophecies, even if they do exist? How do we evaluate them as truth?
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah. Well, of course, Paul says in the next chapter that the church should have the prophets in the church speak two or three of them, and the others should judge the prophecies. So, obviously… People who claim to be prophets don’t always speak rightfully, and the idea is to judge a false prophet from a true prophet. But when it says in chapter 13, if there are prophecies, they will fail. If there’s knowledge, it will vanish away. Most people understand that to mean that he’s speaking about a time when the gift of prophecy will cease to exist, that it won’t be in the church anymore. There won’t be a gift of prophecy. And I don’t have any problem with that understanding. The difference is that some people think that Paul is saying that it will cease to exist before Jesus comes back. That is, that the church will go on until Jesus comes back, but they won’t have the gift of prophecy among them after, most people would say, the apostolic age. Now, when Paul talks about that, he kind of makes it very clear, when that which is perfect is come… then that which is in part will be done away. He said we prophesy in part. And so some people understand this to mean that that which is perfect when it comes will mean the end of the gift of prophecy in the church. Now, those who say that very often will identify that which is perfect as the end of the apostolic age or the completion of the New Testament writings or something like that. And so they say, well, when the New Testament was completed, the gift of prophecy was removed from the church. God didn’t have it there anymore. Although Paul goes on to say, for now we see through glass darkly, but then we will see face to face. I don’t think that’s happened yet. I don’t think we see Jesus face to face yet, even though the New Testament is complete. I don’t think prophecy has failed. I think when Jesus comes back, we’ll see him face to face, and that would be a better prophecy. a better way of looking at when that which is perfect has come. It would be Christ and the complete perfection of his purposes in earth and so forth when he comes back. On the other hand, we don’t have anything in the Bible that says that prophecy… will disappear before Jesus comes back, but we have 1 Corinthians 1.7, which suggests it will be with us until Jesus comes back. 1 Corinthians 1.7 says that the church will lack in no gift. awaiting the revelation of Jesus Christ, which I take to be the second coming. So it’s not like Paul is saying that the church will have its gifts until Jesus comes back. I will say this. There’s no evidence in history that the gifts of prophecy ended at the end of the apostolic age because the church fathers in the second and third century wrote as if they took it for granted there were prophets in the church. They mentioned prophets in the church before. The Didache, which was written in the generation after the apostles, has a long section where it talks about how to recognize a true prophet and a false prophet if they come to your church. So the idea that there were true prophets, even after the apostles were gone and after the New Testament was finished being written, would indicate that the church had no idea that the gifts had ceased or that the prophecies had ceased to be valid. Mm-hmm. Thank you very much for that, Steve, and God bless you and your ministry. God bless you, too. God bless you, too. And it’s good to talk to you, brother. Thank you. All right. Well, the music is playing. That means we’re out of time. You’ve been listening to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg, and we’re live Monday through Friday, taking your calls. Probably, if you get anything out of this radio program, you’d get a lot more information even out of our website, because there’s approximately 1,500, I’ve been told, of my lectures posted that you can listen to for free, MP3 files. A lot of them are also in videos on YouTube. But it’s all free to you if you’d like to go to our website, The Narrow Path. There’s almost endless resources for you there. So go there. We are listener-supported. If you’d like to write to us, the address is The Narrow Path, PO Box 1730, Temecula, California, 92593. The website is thenarrowpath.com. Thanks for joining us.
