Roundtable

Welcome to Have You Not Read, a podcast seeking to answer questions from the text of Scripture for the honor of Christ and the edification of the

Saints. Before we dig into our topic, we humbly ask you to rate, review, and share the podcast.

Thank you. I'm Dylan Hamilton and with me are Michael Deere and David Kassin, Chris Kiesler.

This is going to be one of our quickfire roundtable question podcasts and we are gonna start with one that we found could elicit some decent conversations about the changes in evangelicalism over the last couple decades.

The question reads, the Nine Marks book on membership written by Jonathan Lehman calls Peter a racist for treating the

Gentiles differently when the religious leaders arrived. What do you make of this? I make of this that racism is on the mind and very often in trying to seek for an application that is relevant, the application gets put into reverse and backed full speed through the docking area of the interpretation of the text and unloads a whole bunch of freight that wasn't there originally and then all of a sudden

Peter and Paul are dealing with racism at the Church in Antioch instead of actually what was going on there.

So we have to be careful that we don't take applications, however well intended they are, and then read them back into the text as if it was the meaning of the text.

Now I do think that by studying Galatians 2 and then looking at the context from other passages that we can make some very helpful applications to the way that we love one another, especially in just being straightforward about the gospel, everything changes once we put all of our attention upon Christ and see each other in light of who

Christ is. I think it's going to massively change the way we relate to one another and it's going to glorify the

Lord. However, making this an issue of racism is, well one, it doesn't pay attention to what's there.

This is a very rich text. I'm actually currently teaching through it in Sunday school and this passage is not about racism.

It's about what do you do when you leave one covenant and go to the next? What happens when we're coming out of the old covenant while the new covenant is in effect?

How do we treat Gentiles who were never under the law but the Jews were? And how do we relate to one another in Christ? It has to do with theology.

It has to do with old covenant, new covenant. It has to do with redemptive history. So this is not about racism.

This is about how we relate to one another in Christ and there's an application of that that would solve racism if we would give the text its own ability to speak and not import a whole bunch of junk into it.

Now perhaps best case is Jonathan Lehman is trying to address the hot topic of the day and you know it used to be that folks from Nine Marks and folks in the broader

Reformed evangelical world were really solid on these things and we were just discussing about how there's all kinds of articles and information and sermons and things that were prior to 2012 that are just on point but then everything changed.

I mean you can, I just did a brief survey because I wasn't overly familiar with Jonathan Lehman and he references

Thabiti Adewabile. I think is that close enough? It's close enough.

It'll do. And calls him actually a mentor. Calls him this Yoda master when it comes to race relations and the stuff that I was reading from 2007 and then 2010 were gospel centered.

He actually says race isn't the issue. Your first identity is actually in Christ. That doesn't mean you leave your ethnicity completely behind.

You were made that way and those are, you can rejoice in that heritage because God made you that way and those are good things but it's not your primary lens through which you're looking at Scripture and I'm like these guys are great and then fast forward was it five years maybe less?

Probably less. The book in question in the membership that's 2012. Okay. That's when everything started changing.

Yeah there it is just two years from what I was reading but the seeds had to have been there before and we just didn't didn't see them so I think that the early stuff is good but because it changed so quickly there has to be some problems that I just wasn't seeing in my cursory reading of some of Lehman's works.

So Michael I see what you're getting at. That he is saying racism is bad and he thinks he found an example where somebody was being racist and then

Paul took him to task and that's actually not the core issue. He wasn't talking about that's being that's reading back into the text reading are it's being anachronistic.

It's reading our day back in back into that day when you need to first understand the culture of that day and and then make the applications to our time.

I was thinking about this and we talked about a Wednesday night this is a how racist they were they were trying to get the

Galatians to join them right if you go to Galatians 4 Paul lays it out and he says the reason why they're excluding you is because they're zealous for you they want you to be zealous for them they want you to add their religious practices they want you to to join in on what they had to say because it'll validate them they're coming from Jerusalem they're claiming to be of James you know but we have these religious practices that we're bringing to you and you could be a part of us if you would join in.

So that's how racist they are. They were inclusive? They were well they were excluding them to include them.

Honestly this is this is pointed out pretty well in Buddy Bauckham's fault lines where he calls woke ideology of religion and they actually want you to participate with them in that religion they want you to take their statement of faith they want you to join in with their liturgy their form of repentance it's it's actually not that they want to completely do away with you but they want you to be under that religion as well so I think that there is some truth to that that yeah well and and it's what's so insidious about it is they're in they're in Galatians it's religious practices not ethnicities is what's in question but if you try to join that woke religion you have to incriminate yourself for things that you're not in control of your skin color right

I'm not in control of that but I have to say I'm bad because of it in order to take part in it yeah so we would say that Lehman is off base in his application in Galatians 2 although he may reach a good conclusion that racism is a bad thing he doesn't get that from this text he shouldn't get it from this text right

I would say that it's possible that talking about racism might be a valid application of the text however by the problem was is that he is inserting that into the text's own interpretation as saying this is the meaning of a text no it's not the meaning of the text possible you could use this text as an application to exhort and counsel somebody regarding racism but that's not the meaning of the text all right we'll move on to our next question the quickfire round the question reads dispensationalism appeals to Ephesians 3 when it calls the church a mystery that did not exist in previous generations therefore

Israel and the church must be different this is the assumption how would you address that view well

I would say that dispensationalism understanding of the term mystery and identifying the church with the mystery is leaning in the right direction given the context but it's a little bit off base so when we read the second half of Ephesians 2 on into the beginning of Ephesians 3 we are hearing about those who were once far off strangers to the

Covenant strangers to the promises being brought near in Christ and the two made one flesh and Christ is making a new temple the new covenant temple which is made of living stones both

Jew and Gentile together and we see that Jew and Gentile are brought near together into Christ and the idea the idea that Jew and Gentile together are relating to God through Christ on the same basis that would be the mystery okay that would be the mystery now does that pertain to the church yes but here's here's where it needs to be clarified this mystery about the church if it was only about oh here's this moment where Gentiles and Jews can be together in the same worship of God this is and then making it keeping that mystery or church distinct from Israel itself misses all of the unification language in chapter 2 so chapter 2 is about a real genuine unification of Jew or Gentile under the words those who were under the old covenant and those who were not that they are made one in Christ who's the mediator of a new covenant and they are a full participants together in the new covenant temple which is not deficient and will not pass away so there is no retention of Israel as a distinct group in distinct relationship with God preserved outside of Christ there is only in chapter 2 bringing together in the unification of Jew and Gentile by faith in Christ and therefore when you get to Ephesians 3 then we hear about this mystery right so verse 1 of Ephesians 3 for this reason

I Paul the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given to me for you had it by revelation he made known to me the mystery as I have briefly written already by which when you read you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men as it has now been revealed by the

Spirit to his holy apostles and prophets that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ through the gospel of which

I became a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effective working of his power there is no retention of Israel as separate from the church there is only the bringing together of Jew and Gentile as fellow heirs together in Christ right and that that was a mystery in the fullness of the grace of God that is true that is true to put it a different way just to be clear the shock and awe of the gospel that was so offensive to the

Jews the stumbling block over which they stumbled was not that Gentiles were getting added to the

Jews as the people of God because that was in the Old Testament you see you saw that all throughout that's right yeah that the

Gentiles and the nation was going to come so that wasn't offensive no no it wasn't and they were they were accustomed to doing that they read the law of Moses in synagogues throughout the

Roman Empire and they they were recruiting God fearers and proselytes and they wanted people to come in and join but how did you do that by being really

Jewish getting circumcised eating Jewish dietary laws and so on kind of like what happened at Antioch where Peter and Barnabas were kind of like hey this is how you get in because we're the people of God and when you join us you know we're all happy together in Jesus no actually here's the shock and awe it's not that Gentiles are joining

Jews in the people of God it's that Jews like Gentiles need to become the people of God that was the shock and awe because it's the same thing that happened in Isaiah chapter 5 where Jacob along with the other nations are invited to come up to Mount Zion the problem is that the

Jews need to recognize that they are ever as much in need of salvation as the

Gentiles are that if they would just stop calling Gentile sinners and start calling themselves sinners they would recognize that they're all saved on the very same basis and the

Jews don't have a leg up that was the shock and awe that was the mystery revealed that we're all coming together in one new covenant temple on the same level because it's

Christ righteousness not ours at all so yes it is a mystery yes it's shock and awe and grace but it was not about a special group

Jew and Gentile called the church while retaining a separate group called Israel as another people of God the way the dispensationalist tried to parse it out so it's like a assumption that the

Old Covenant is continuing after this being read back into this text here right yes and again in all best intentions reading the

Old Testament forward through the New Covenant not allowing the New Covenant to fulfill the old if you maintain the

Old Covenant if you entrench the Old Covenant if you don't allow the Old Covenant to be obsolete and pass away like Hebrew says it does then you have to find a way for the

Old Covenant to be fulfilled outside of the way that Jesus Christ says it is fulfilled in him the way that the

Apostles say it's it fulfilled in him I mean this this terms this mystery as my dispensational friends will repeat this says look this is a mystery it didn't exist in the

Old Testament that's why it's called a mystery this is something very new that's why the church is is distinct there's your there's your parenthesis because it is a mystery and I think they're infusing the word mystery outside the bounds of the

New Testament they're they're impregnating it with meaning that it's not necessarily implying you want to know what a word means in Scripture see how else it is used and just a few pages over you look at Colossians Colossians 1 and and talks about the mystery the

Colossians 126 27 the mystery is Christ in you or a Colossians 2 was it to 12 the mystery which is

Christ so are you telling me that Christ is a mystery he didn't exist in the

Old Testament it doesn't question it doesn't follow well using that same logic like you just said so the question says

Ephesians 3 calls the church a mystery that it did not exist in the previous generation within the same book

Ephesians 5 marriage is a mystery it did not exist in previous generations that's just simply not true so mystery and the

Greek word is where we get a word apocalypse from like the apocalypse of John Revelation apocalypses and has the idea of God laying bare something uncovering something manifesting something that we need his help to see and that's of course what 2nd

Corinthians chapter 3 says that when the Jews read the Old Testament the veil was over their face so they can't see the glory of Jesus Christ in the face of Moses okay but when

Christ comes then the veil is lifted and then they see it and they're like oh my goodness look at that that's what happened with Paul that's what happened with Apollos that's what happened with Barnabas has happened with all the

Apostles Christ opened up their minds to understand the scriptures see it was a mystery but he revealed to them the reality of the graces of the new covenant that were promised throughout the

Old Testament so this isn't something new he's revealing something that always existed but was hidden it was shadowy yes so something new has happened but it's really the understanding of something that was always the plan yes and in Christ it all comes together

I mean don't we really really like those mystery novels where in the last chapter in the last you have everybody comes together and the detective because of who he is in his masterful way stitches it all together and rely oh my goodness

I should have seen that that was there the whole time I didn't even realize that I was distracted over here but this was happening and and all throughout the book the author had listed all these clues and if you had just paid attention you would have seen it if you were if you had the inside understanding an insight of the detective then you would have seen it well the mystery that's revealed at the end of the book was it was all there for you to see earlier but it took him to bring it all together and why do we like that so much the

Bible yeah exactly right the best book of them all and so Jesus is the one in whom it all comes together but it was there the whole time but it only makes sense when it's all stitched together in him

David you had mentioned Colossians I think 126 or 27 there's also Paul mentions as I've written briefly elsewhere he also mentions it

Romans 16 verse 25 and there's references to hidden from ages past well who hid it and what was being hid a mystery doesn't mean non -existence it just means not understood or hidden and in Christ it's revealed

I mean that's a very important point because dispensational is based on their understanding of the word mystery will say the church never existed in the in the

Old Testament it's like that's not exactly true I mean it church just me is

Ecclesia just means assembly so you have an assembly of people now there is something new

I mean the new covenant is new that's true it's different from the old but to say that the church didn't never existed in the old in the

Old Testament and apply to this apply Ephesians 3 how do you respond to the person that says look

Ephesians 3 says it's a mystery it says that it is this is something that that was hidden didn't exist is something totally new in it from the

Old Testament they're hanging their hat on that and I think that it's not about necessarily two different people groups it's changing from one covenant to the next and one covenant was focused on one people group and the next covenant is focused on a blending of those two people groups but you don't get to you don't get to say that the

Old Covenant is still in force I think that the Old Covenant is not does not remain in force

I think is is very important but a revelation of mystery isn't creation ex nihilo that you know

God created something out of something that didn't exist there was an assembly of saints who really loved

God and worshipped him and men began to be called by the name of the Lord right with descendants of Adam and Eve and and Seth and so on and so there was worship going on for sure yeah you could say lowercase

C church was going on now the New Covenant temple did not exist in the Old Covenant right that's different there's something new that is true but it's not something ex nihilo and the

Old Covenant did pass away it served his purpose you know John the Baptist did not ascend to the right hand of the father as great as he was of all the

Old Covenant prophets he didn't go to the right hand of the father Jesus did you had mentioned I'm gonna butcher it the

Old Covenant question is who who is in Israel yeah who are the people of God well

Israel and the new built estimate asks hey well who's in Israel right because if you're out outside the camp you're in trouble mm -hmm right and if Rahab gets in yay you know

Ruth gets in Wow who's in right who's in Israel that's the question and then later on in the

New Covenant question is who's in Christ right because he calls himself the true vine as opposed to the and both of those in the old those that are in Israel are the people of God in a new those that are in Christ are the people of God yes so whether you say people of God or as you say church it's are you in or are you out and the question of the

New Covenant is are you in Christ yeah and the attention's on Christ not the church right right you know so in the

Old Covenant with Israel to be a member of the Old Covenant does not mean that you were born again right but in the

New Covenant to be a member of the New Covenant yeah you're born again that's how you came in and so there are distinctions and differences between them wonderfully there is a difference between the shadow and the substance and that's the mystery that has been revealed that there is a difference there between the shadow and the substance between that which what was promised and the very thing that was promised so you have the the shadow being

Israel so correct me if I'm wrong this is an accurate statement we would not say those at this table we would not say that the church replaces

Israel we would say that Christ is the fulfillment of Israel yes and everyone that is in Christ is in Israel true

Israel yeah the tatters of the tabernacle were paraded into the temple and no one thought of the tabernacle anymore it was the temple the tatters of the

Old Covenant were paraded into the new and no one ever thinks of the old it's the new glory amen to that we'll move on to our next question question reads what's the difference between Pelagian ism and semi

Pelagian ism which do we see most in the church today so the difference between Pelagian ism and semi

Pelagian ism is the difference between Star Trek and Star Wars bring it you've had many people you've had many people's ears get closer to the mic and you've had many people just leave and log off just now so in Star Trek and he doubles down humans are basically neutral they could end up being good or bad it's not they don't really need any help it's nice if you have help and all that but ultimately you know pure full free will you can go one way or the other okay in Star Wars everyone's a little cagey and and suspect and you know everything's a little bit dirty and decrepit you know

Lucas's idea of his his artistic vision for Star Wars is everything is dilapidated and falling that falling apart and he's not working and stuff's broken and in Star Trek everything is shiny the doors always work you know so on and so forth and in one is like the the virtue of the human heart and will and opportunity to you can do you can do right because there's nothing inherently wrong with you okay and the other other ones like yeah all a bunch of suspects for good reason now the

Pelagian ism named after the monk Pelagius who was in conflict with Augustine was pushing back against Augustine's view of the depravity of man and the fact that without God's grace intervening man is not going to have anything good going on in his life at all and in semi

Pelagian ism which was kind of a modifier of obviously Pelagian ism I think his name was

John Cassian is the most famous monk theologian who kind of put this forward the idea is that okay

Adam's fall does have an effect on you it does hamper you but you still have enough capacity in your life in your heart in your will to of your own accord without any nudging at all choose

God go God's way and when you do you're gonna find all kinds of help but God is a gentleman and he doesn't force himself on you he doesn't he doesn't invade your life he doesn't if you're hiding in the trees of the garden he doesn't come looking for you he lets you hide okay if you're hiding out by the banks of the river he doesn't bushwhack you and wrestle you in the middle of the night without your permission if you're on your way to Damascus to go hunt down Christians he doesn't knock you off you're a donkey and blind you he's not like that God is a gentleman right so not the

God of the Bible so which one's more common in the churches well Pelagian ism you're gonna find in Protestant liberalism

Unitarians High Church Episcopalian that have given up on scripture altogether except for the readings that last one hurt sorry but semi

Pelagian ism is going to be the most common in the in the moral therapeutic deism that has largely replaced the gospel in big -box churches and larger well -received denominations semi

Pelagian ism is a thing to go and they're just begging you some of our hymns are very semi Pelagian please just let him in he's just wanting to be in your life you just have to say yes won't you do that you know

I had a professor in my evangelism class in college who said the job of the evangelist is to wear down the resistance of the hearer until the bar is low enough for the

Holy Spirit to jump over Wow yeah that is semi Pelagian ism it acknowledges the resistance but you can whittle it down until finally they give in and they open the door and the

Holy Spirit can finally come in Pelagian ism from Pelagius who was opposed by Augustine this is fifth century and it was declared a heresy yeah so if you engage in or adhere to Pelagian ism you deny original sin you're also you're very moralistic and you can can choose to be sinless you can choose to be sinful they were talking that you have no moral in your in your normal natural state you have no moral compunction left or right it's a clean slate tabula rasa and Augustine comes in and says no it's actually by God's grace because you are so sinful you choose sin so you have to have

God to change you semi Pelagian ism then came concern tries to have this middle ground and my question then is

I think it's because of the it was Aristotle's ideas of you know free will and then then choice and they would that they just wanted to have this this idea of some kind of human choice you know for human responsibility

I'm trying to figure out why these guys came in to create semi Pelagian ism when Pelagius was was so clearly defeated by Augustine why was semi

Pelagian ism so important and why is it so pervasive well it's to defend God from the charge of being the author of evil yeah so I mean if you don't have a legitimate measurable free will that God has to respond to you and he's waiting for you to respond to do what you do so he can respond to you if that doesn't exist then who gets the credit for all these awful sinners semi

Pelagians would say you need God's grace they said he says it is a vital component they say you still need it yes but it's to defend

God from charges of being the author of evil essentially is for some people that the logical conclusion of Augustinian ism is to eventually

God is responsible for everything including evil and if he's responsible then isn't he culpable so what about all these commandments of God gives all these commands to people to follow but if he did but if they don't have the capacity to do them to respond then isn't he an evil

God to tell somebody repent of your sins and believe in Jesus Christ they would say the command assumes the ability of the person to follow it otherwise

God's not being honest well yeah well that's what I think kicked it off Augustine had prayed it's a short prayer that basically the full quote is grant what you command and command what you will and plagiarist took issue with what do you mean grant what you command if you're saying he commands things but it's still up to God to grant them what if he doesn't grant them then you can't be held responsible because God didn't grant it so like you said the

Romans nine right it's argument exactly right yeah so it's a legitimate thing to talk about because there is a concern how do these things fit together however

Romans 9 tells us how to handle it how to handle it is God is God and you are not he's the he's the

Potter you're the clay stop whining and fear God put your hand over your mouth job it doesn't answer the question it just says recognize that God is sovereign he he he hardens whom he hardens he shows mercy to whom he shows mercy and so he has trophies of grace and trophies of wrath and destruction and what are you gonna do about it you're not going to make excuses for you as well who can find fault for who can resist his will who are you a man to answer that way to your creator it doesn't answer the question it doesn't resolve all of the philosophical logical conundrums it just says thus far and no further here's a little sign on the side of the cliff that says don't go past this point because it's not safe it's not allowed it's not part of the program it's not part of the tour but stand right here on the edge and enjoy the sweeping vista of this

Grand Canyon be in awe worship but don't go try to jump that Canyon you asked about the pervasiveness earlier like where does that come from sure

I think when we're reading Romans 9 it seems like he's answering a natural question from just about anybody that would come across this yeah this truth about God just as well but there is an interesting book that I've heard of I think by a man named

Caldwell that says semi Pelagian ism and Pelagian ism in general in the

English -speaking world actually has its root in how much Pelagius had influence in the

British Isles and it was actually a problem that they came across in there in the way that they developed their theology on the

British Isles there because he was a British monk yes yes and so he makes the case that English -speaking peoples have been plagued with Pelagian ism and semi

Pelagian ism because of the work that he had done there it's very true in the fifth century it's very true in the Senate of Dort when all the representatives from the

Reformed churches came together to respond to the remonstrance and came up with the five points of Calvinism it was the contingent from the

British Isles who were advocating for the most Arminian sounding options to tulip there is a distinction a minor between semi

Pelagian and Arminian ism and it's not it's not really important why but it's it's really the you know the necessity of grace and where that comes from but what they were advocating for was hypothetical universalism yeah because they need they were trying to retain the idea of the free agency to an extent of greater breadth than others were because they don't want to make

God the author of sin and they want to make sure that man is responsible for his sin

I mean and and I can see that and the the Pelagians is from this is more anecdotal but the because they were so works based because you earn your salvation they were actually very moral people and they wanted to they were the good dudes you know they were good citizens so it attracted a lot of people says now you need actually need to be a good person

Mormons yeah yeah they're like like Mormons Mormons are great citizens I've served with a lot of them and and their their line is you're saved by grace after all that you can do right like that's the

Mormons that's the Mormons line and it's not that far off from what we see with plagiarism kind of gross oh it's terrible yeah so if you if you really want to see that you can do a cursory search

I found that modernism calm had a good this is the differencing between Pelagian semi

Pelagian Arminian and Augustinian and if you really want to see how they are listed out of regarding how you know

Sotoma and everything else it I found it very very useful but we would reject both plagianism and semi

Pelagian is met this at this table yeah yeah all right well we'll move on to the last question of this episode the question reads does the

Bible use the words soul and spirit interchangeably to refer to the same immaterial substance of a person or are they two distinct things

I've heard this explained both ways but I would love to hear your understanding of the subject

Michael so when we think of the terms soul and spirit the idea that they are two separate things probably comes from a reading and understanding of Hebrews 4th verse 12 says the

Word of God is living and powerful and sharper than any two -edged sword piercing even to the division of soul and spirit and of joints and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart now the question is is this a kind of spiritual anatomy of the inner man or is this an expression are we to take this in its literary form or its literalness are we going to say okay there's a part where this is soul and it's not spirit and this part is spirit it's not soul

I don't think you can really derive a whole theology out of a passage like that especially when we look at the inner man is described in a variety of terms for example

Jesus answered said this is the Great Commandment and when he asked what is the law he was the man answered you shall love the

Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul with all your strength with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself so quoting some stuff from the

Old Testament but we have heart soul strength and mind well what about the will what about spirit so we've got six different expressions to talk about the inner man and they're used interchangeably throughout

Scripture so I don't think it would be wise to say okay we are operating in various parts as the inner person

I have I have spirit I have soul and that's the way that Irenaeus or is it

Ignatius came up with the inner man he said well everyone has a soul but you lost your spirit when you sinned and then you get that back when you're born again he was trying to come up with different ways of talking about spirit and soul other people say you're made up of three parts inside you have will and you have soul and you have spirit and they try to come up with those divisions and where those are at and again systematizing things is a way of trying to understand them distinguishing things is a way of trying to understand them however when we read the

Scriptures we don't see them being distinctive torn apart from each other placed into their own categories we do see though the division that is there is the outer man and the inner man we have body and we have soul or we could say body and spirit the only division that we really see is the one that's unnaturally caused by death it is not natural it is not according to the original design and so we say

Adam the Adamic prototype that we should be absent from the body and present with the

Lord that's severance of the inner man from the outer man is death death biblically separation it's not non -existence it's some sort of separation severance and when

God made man he made us body and soul not body soul spirit not body soul spirit will he made this two parts but these two parts are to be seen and understood as a as a whole so here's some examples some ideas about creation okay when the

Lord God for man of the dust in the ground he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living being body spirit or you say body soul nafash in the

Hebrew he nafasht the nefesh into him he in sold him he breathed his spirit into him and then man became a living spirit so body soul so he so Genesis 2 7 says we're two parts okay but they're designed to be together as a as a as one as a one whole so we are not a animal an animal is a body with no soul okay and we're not an angel which is a spirit with no body we're special we're distinct there's something different about us we're humans created in God's image body and soul we were designed as a mediator between heaven and earth right we were to reflect

God's glory with our relational transverses where we're loving God supremely loving each other rightly stewarding creation righteously

I really like what Herman Bavinck writes on this he says a man is spirit who if necessary also exists without a body right on death but this spirit was from the beginning organized into a soul meaning what adapted to and arranged for a body that's what that means an angel is a spirit not a soul why are we called a soul because we've been organized for a body adapted and arranged for a body and is bound also for his intellectual and spiritual life to the sensory and external faculties so he says man is a being existing between angels and animals related to but distinct from both he unites and reconciles within himself both heaven and earth things both invisible and invisible and precisely as such he is the image and likeness of God so the emphasis is not really on soul versus spirit but on body and soul or outer man inner man are brought together and I did some reading on this and and my understanding was always that soul and spirit are distinct

I'd say I didn't see as I mean I think that what you said generally is is true but there are different words in Hebrew and different words in Greek for soul and spirit and they appear to be used

I don't see a whole lot of it being used interchangeably but that seems to happen but most of the examples that I found like first Thessalonians this is one that says man may the

God of peace himself sanctify you completely and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless and in that verse you read in and out of Hebrews 4 it seems to be the intent is your complete self everything about you this is but both the inner and the outer all of you all parts of you so I'm understanding that but the idea of especially in Greek when you're dealing with psyche and mind which you know psyche and soul know yourself the sense of sentience

I mean animals have sentience but they don't have the pneuma they don't have this the spirit they know that that which is of God because they're not made in the image of God so is it improper then to apply mind sentience to animals but not have a not have a spirit that's something that's unique that this spiritual aspect is unique to humanity or does the

Bible really speak as far as humans go I say no you have a body and soul but animals just just have the body is there ever anything in Scripture that would that would help us see animals as having some kind of sentience but not really

I guess I just I see the humanity having the spiritual aspect that's the part that's the image of God so it really more of a three -part versus the two -part and I don't want to be dogmatic about that but that's what

I'm I'm seeing and I'm really interested in what you guys because I could be totally wrong on this but yeah

I see this I see the three and I could be completely wrong I've heard people use the Trinity as an example now from Scripture that gets a little challenging because you have

God the Father Spirit you have the Son who has a body but is divine so he's got a dual nature and then the

Spirit the Holy Spirit which is spirit and so I've heard people try to say we're made in the image of God and because God is a

Trinity made up of a body and to unify a spirit and spirit then we're the same way and I would point to the

Thessalonians verse but then I was looking through people who hold to that kind of tripartite there seems to be a type of hermeneutic within that camp so many of the people that that held that were dispensational or charismatic and I wondered about like as they're reading it with a more literal framework if you're reading those verses it talks about the completeness like you said the completeness but when they see those words being used they seem to pull it out one of the issues though is there's a place in John where Thomas is talking doubting

Thomas and you put your hands here sure and Thomas says my Lord and my God well the

Jehovah's Witness will say my Lord he's talking to Jesus and my God and they separate those and try to say those are two different things versus he's giving a description of Jesus my

Lord and my God I tend to think when I'm reading these verses that talk about spirit and soul that they're using descriptive language of the inner man they're not trying to to make the division but I know that there are people in history

I think there were several on this list that were not dispensational or not charismatic and I'm like why why did they end up on that tripartite list and so there's some reading on my part to be done but I think it's more of the inner man versus outer man

I got that interesting feeling when he was reading the text of splitting the marrow from the bone and the soul from the spirit as marrow and bone outer man soul and spirit inner man as well but I this is one of the questions that I didn't get around to like looking up at all so you guys are outpacing me here yeah so I would say yes there is distinctions in the use of the terms obviously we're given these different terms for a reason and if we were to read heart mind soul strength if we're to read heart and spirit soul and spirit or heart and mind or mind and spirit and these are all various combinations you can kind of just do your own searches throughout the scriptures why not just be efficient sure and say the real inside you you know or whatever but the point is that these different terms are referring to the complexities of the inner man well we do that now if so if you get news and you'll say that cut me to the core or I felt that in my gut or it cut me to the heart we we have these different descriptions that are functioning in the the same way this poetic language and I think that that's what the language is getting at is kind of this over encompassing of what the inner man is and what the outer man is so so again

I'm not saying that there's not a reason to say to emphasize to talk about the soul and the spirit but it would be very

I think the question is biblically given the gospel and given the doctrines that the scriptures are primarily concerned with why would we be splitting up soul and spirit and if we were going to split soul and spirit why not heart mind strength will etc why stop here and not there those questions don't have clear answers additionally one of the tests of theology and doctrine is if you take something away what happens like for instance you take the doctrine of hell away from theology and oh my goodness all the dominoes that fall okay but if you take away a very clear developed perhaps from the scholastics or from some some group sure a difference between soul and spirit if you take that away but you're still you're still saying

I have a soul you're still saying I have a spirit you're not saying we don't have those things you're just saying we're not gonna make a big deal about their distinction you take away the big deal of the distinction what happens in theology usually it gets clearer in my estimation

I'm not everyone's gonna agree with me on that but my point is how do I sustain mm -hmm how do

I sustain a theological investigation into the distinction between the soul and the spirit in a way that I've got scripture really bringing that forward in ways that that matter to redemption and to worship and to sanctification yeah like is it telling you to do something different than your soul then with you like the way that it's a

Bible instructs us on how to live remains the same yeah what the way that God interacts with man remains the same either way yeah it's like with your heart worship

God with your spirit worship God with your soul worship God it's the same type of interaction and God is sovereign over if you split it up God is sovereign over that and how he interacts and the heart of man is in the you know a channel within the

Lord's hand well so is the spirit so the soul I kind of think of the different terms of the inner man in terms of postures okay if I'm gonna emphasize the spirit it's a posture of perhaps maybe paying more close attention to to God the soul is gonna be the man in a posture perhaps more internally aware if you're gonna think about the the heart his relation human relations if you think about his will what is my duty my task there's a lot you know or strength my inner man's connection to my outer physical body whatever these inner words are

I don't see them as distinct big distinct parts that I would say in a sense they're kind of your posture you need all of those words and those emphases to capture the complexities of the of our inner man

I agree Paul does not say that although my body is wasting away my my soul versus my spirit is being reduced no my other my outer man is wasting away my inner is being renewed day by day and he says yeah so our bodies are failing and our bodies are decaying and we will get a new body you know and we're not even going to discuss body versus the flesh you know someone

Sarx just just ignore that one for a while it's a whole nother conversation I think even if you did include those

I think you're still gonna come back to that gospel issue that if you whether you take a two -part or a three -part where the soul and spirit are basically talking about the inner man or whether they're very distinct the gospel stays the same the body is is wasting away but the inner man is being renewed day by day and we're waiting for the resurrection of the dead yeah and I would say it's good to retain the distinctions that are there so long as we don't overemphasize them

I would say the only thing left to say is the reason why it would be important to talk about body or talk about body soul spirit okay is because these are terms that were used throughout the development of Christology to clarify who

Christ is so I don't want to throw away the gains of the Chalcedonian definition and you know everything that was achieved in the development of Christology I think that those terms are still very important to be able to try to talk about who

Jesus Christ is in his two natures one person you have to get into the talking about soul and spirit and so on when you talk about who

Christ is I don't want to throw away those terms in their importance at all but just trying to figure out how it actually you know lands home for when you're trying to counsel somebody or you're pastoring or you know how does this work out in in someone's life do

I want them thinking about you know do I want them navel -gazing and thinking about well that's my part of my soul but how's my spirit doing over here and you know and I'm not saying that people do that I just don't don't see this direction of it so we got some people at this table that are two -part others that are three -part and it's not really a gospel issue and but and and we're not saying ignore the differences that it's not important but as far as priorities go

Paul did not only any of the biblical writers really focused on the distinctions between those that was not a focus of theirs except that Christ was fully human and fully

God yeah and and as as it was said that whatever is in humanity that needed to be redeemed

Christ had it all so he's our full Redeemer in every possible way I once had someone told me that their spirit bore witness with my spirit that I was a

Christian so then I went back and read that verse it's like that's not what that says at all it doesn't say anything and I don't even know how you would identify that that's happening or how did you have that conversation with your spirit so hmm yeah it's supposed to be the

Holy Spirit bearing witness with your spirit the right child of God yeah yeah the your assurance comes from God directly not from you know the person standing next to you at the checkout aisle there we go well why don't we move on to recommendations

Michael all right my recommendation I was looking at this earlier

I think it's called the pundits a folly yeah pundits folly by Sinclair B Ferguson I was reminded of this book because David was showing me a book about Ecclesiastes but more than that in a moment

I had remembered a very short pithy book by Sinclair Ferguson on Ecclesiastes called the pundits folly and in some ways it's like a long evangelistic tract in a way getting to the you know what's the point of living life without knowing

God and it's also full of rich imagery and good poetry and to me it was just a fantastic way to get into the book of Ecclesiastes so pundits folly by Sinclair B Ferguson David I would recommend you listen to some old tapes of Sinclair Ferguson he's got a wonderful Scottish burr and it's just he's just fantastic I think there are beams of light heavenly light that's coming from back behind his head as he speaks

I had mentioned modernism calm I've recommended them before we talked about plagiarism 7 plagianism and you can find an article there that will really help you talk through some of the distinctions if you listen to our discussion on that and you want to have a little bit more reading

I think that that would be helpful we also talked about dispensationalism we'd actually talked about you know you know here and there and on January 7th this year 2025

Keith Foskey had a bowtie dialogues he is a great pastor he is out of Jacksonville Florida and his podcast is called your

Calvinist podcast with Keith Foskey he's not like most Calvinist he's nice and I I do like him he's very funny but what

I've appreciated about his approach when he does bowtie dialogues as he pulls people in that are friends but do not agree with him and he had a whole bunch of dispensationalist and there were different flavors of it and the different flavors that I didn't even know and I appreciated his approach

I appreciated the way he handles them and treats them with with respect that that these men of God really have earned and it was a master class

I thought in in dealing with people with whom you disagree and give it a listen and you may look at some more of those bowtie dialogues that he has in his in his archive so Keith Foskey your

Calvinist podcast bowtie dialogues from January 7th Chris I would recommend what has often falsely been called

CS Lewis's space trilogy if you read book one you'll figure out why that's a misnomer but his ransom trilogy that deals with travels to outer space so -called very interesting each one is vastly different from the one that comes before it and then the third one specifically that hideous strength is a fiction and he did a a nonfiction treatment of the abolition of man kind of talking about the theology of it very very interesting talks about science it talks about man's relation to science and that type of stuff and the ransom trilogy

I'd recommend reading those it's a nice book a nice book nice and nice nice it's a reference from that history

I recommend a book that I've been listening to on audible called the richest man in Babylon which was sort of recommended a while back by David there and then we had sort of a short discussion about it in the group chat it is a book of parables that I believe are fictional correct but it's a book of parables that deal with saving money lending money work wisdom and all the things that might encompass a man's day around finances and work in general and how to handle those especially under a hard money currency system and I've found it actually a breath of fresh air that it was in narrative form most books about finance are very dry matter -of -fact systematic and there's very little creativity involved in them there are a few

I would say modern -day economist writers that do well as writers but they still don't go to the lengths which this writer went and I'm forgetting the author's name at this point but he did a great job weaving in a narrative and parables into lessons about finance lessons about savings and how wisdom must come first and we know that it is biblical wisdom that's the best type of wisdom that we want it's not to Ron Burns is it it's not

Ron Burns this book is by George Samuel Clayson so George Samuel Clayson it's a very short read but it is well worth the time

I've listened to it twice so far I might might have a third time here pretty soon so we can have discussions even though I could probably discuss it now but it was a fun read so I recommend that so what are we thankful for Michael I'm thankful for technology and for those who think about it and help disciple others to understand it and its point in its proper employment in our lives so very thankful for a bit of book called productivity if that was really good talk about how technology is wealth how to manage that I just listened to a podcast by CR Wiley and Jonathan Harris's interview of him on AI and technology it was really well done but it was thankful thankful for the technology that we have the capacity to do all these really productive things but then to also understand working with tools and how to use them properly so but I'm thankful for these tools they they're great

David I am thankful for my daughter just today

I had several other parents and teachers come up to me and tell me how she's handling herself in rather difficult circumstances with some difficult people that she has to work with she's class president for at her school in her intergrade for a senior class so there's some some responsibilities just run meetings and the problem with meetings is that they have people in them and they're not always easy to deal with and I had one teacher in particular say that she is handling it with so much class and grace style that she is just gifted with this she is well equipped for this and I'm just thankful for the young lady that she has become and that people really look to her for help for guidance leadership you know administration how can what can we do what does

Elizabeth think about this it's just it was really nice to hear and you had mentioned the richest man in Babylon and that was a book that I went through with her we're just teaching basic finance and I thought that narrative style would appeal to her and it was it was it was she didn't fall asleep you know as we read it so you read yourself and maybe share it with your with your family if you like so I'm very thankful for my daughter

I had mentioned that hideous strength there's a chapter in it actually there's a there's a place called st.

Anne's and it's a group of people that are trying to get away from the tyranny of the world and the things that are happening there but they all have different roles and they're all working kind of in the background you see them doing different things what

I am grateful for are the the laborers I had an experience here recently here at the church one of the ladies that cooks the meals on Wednesday and we had a meeting about music and we're talking all these different things and she's managing some of the

YouTube stuff and just in the background I didn't know anything about it and she's got these lists which is helpful to me because I'm working with music and picking out songs and stuff like that and she's been maintaining this you know going on she got out you know done by alphabet all that stuff and I'm like recently or someone else

I found out was meeting with this person discipling and then there was a need that was met by someone else

I just find out all these people are working you know in the background I'm just grateful for laborers who serve the

Lord and serve the people around them very blessed by it amen well I'm thankful for false narratives and myths that are being shaken or dropping away that are fading they felt like a mist that hangs over you and that hangs over your family your people

I'm so thankful for those things falling away and whether they're they're falling away a lot at a time quickly or slowly over time the

Lord as we talked about earlier things being mysteries he reveals things to us when he wants to and when things have been built up and brought up in the way as veils he cast them aside so I'm just so thankful that we get clarity over time in our walk with Christ to see the false narratives that are built up see the false myths that are built up and they just fade away they have no power over us anymore we can laugh at them when they're brought up and they're used as cudgels against us we can just say yeah you know what