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Videos on How to Lead an Evangelistic Bible Study

Numbers of churches have found the evangelistic Bible study series here helpful in their practice of Biblical evangelism.  If you have never led someone else through an evangelistic Bible study, the link above provides an example a lost person can watch that could also be helpful for a believer in learning how to do them.  A series of videos on how to teach these Bible studies is also going up on YouTube.  Study #1 on the nature of God’s revelation in the Bible, study #2 on the nature of the Triune God, and study #3, on God’s law and sin’s consequences, now all have extensive exposition, and study #4, on the gospel, namely, on Christ’s redemptive death, burial, and resurrection, is in progress. Lord willing, when they are complete they will provide as much helpful teaching as a solid college class on Biblical evangelism.

 

Watch the series on how to lead an evangelistic Bible study by clicking here.

 

Of course, a fantastic way to learn to do an evangelistic Bible study is to go with your pastor or other experienced soulwinner to regularly preach the gospel, and learn how to do an evangelistic Bible study from that knowledgeable person in your church.  Watching the videos above may supplement, but cannot replace, faithful evangelism in a faithful local independent Baptist church.

 

TDR

Evangelistic / Apologetic Pamphlet for Buddhists on Buddhism

Since there are many Buddhists in the San Francisco Bay Area, and not a great deal of literature available to reach them with the gospel of Jesus Christ, I have written an evangelistic pamphlet for Buddhists. You can view it at the link below:

 

The Buddha and the Christ:

Their Teachings Compared

 

Because Buddhism does not consider the sovereign, Almighty God important for its religious system, the presentation of the gospel is designed to be especially God-centered, explaining the work of the Trinity to reconcile sinners.  It also seeks to assume that someone has no preexisting knowledge of the BIble or of Christianity, as is the case with great numbers of Buddhists.

 

Both the persons of Buddha and of the Lord Jesus Christ and their respective teachings are compared.  The evidence overwhelmingly favors Christ, to the detriment of Buddhism.

 

If your church does not already have something to evangelize Buddhists, let me encourage you to add it to the resources available on your tract or pamphlet rack.  An easy link to keep in mind with many different resources for the various world religions and groups in Christianity is also available here.

 

Learn when Buddha lived; how much we know about what he did and taught; the evidence, or lack thereof, for the truth of Buddhist Scriptures; the preservation, or lack thereof, of Buddhist Scriptures; the evidence, or lack thereof, for the many teachings of Buddhism; and how these compare to the evidence for the Bible and for the Lord Jesus Christ as the crucified and risen Lord.

 

TDR

The Gospel In the Stars and the Gospel in the Bible

The Gospel in the Stars!

The gospel is in the stars! So say a number of books, such as the Lutheran minister Joseph A. Seiss’s The Gospel in the Stars and the Anglican ultradispensationalist soul-sleep advocate and flat-earther E. W. Bullinger’s The Witness of the Stars, following Ms. Frances Rolleston’s book Mazzaroth: the Constellations. (Amazon affiliate links).  These advocates have been copied in modern times by people like the Presbyterian evangelical D. James Kennedy and Institute for Creation Research leader Henry Morris.

 

southern cross consellation gospel stars seiss bullinger mazzaroth rolleston

Baptists, however, have traditionally held with conservative Protestants that general revelation in creation is not saving. It reveals God’s power and glory (Romans 1), but the gospel is only revealed through His special revelation in Scripture. The “heavens declare the glory of God,” but only through special revelation does salvation come: “the law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul” (Psalm 19:1, 7).

 

It is clear that the Baptists are wrong and the Lutherans, ultradispensationlists, and women Bible teachers are correct. After all, just look at the picture above. You can just look at it and understand that Jesus Christ, the second Person of the Trinity, became Man, died a sacrifical death for the sins of the world, and then rose victoriously from the grave, so that you could receive eternal life by repentant faith alone in Him (1 John 5:7; John 1:1-18; 1 Corinthians 15:1-4; Romans 3:23-28).

 

Right?

 

Or maybe not?

 

The picture above is from the constellation called The Southern Cross. Without my telling you that–in words–would you have even known that there is supposed to be cross in that picture?

 

Let’s say you could see that some of the stars there have the shape of a cross if you squint just the right way. Would that mean that you understand the gospel? How many Catholics that worship before a crucifix understand the gospel? Would anyone understand the gospel by simply looking at the picture of a cross, or would someone need to explain to him in words what the cross means? Have people understood the gospel by looking at a cross on a church building?

 

How many people do you know have been truly born again by looking in the sky and understanding the “gospel in the stars”?  How many heathen have rejected their idols and astrology and false gods because of the “gospel in the stars”? What if the number is “zero”?

 

Let’s say another group of stars in the sky forms a circle, so someone decides that it looks like the fat belly of an idol of Buddha. Does that mean “the gospel of Buddha” is written in the stars?  What is another group of stars looks like the letter “Q.” Is that predicting the Quran?  One can draw lines between stars that look like anything.

The Gospel in the Bible!

Does the Bible tell us that the gospel is in the stars as well as in Scripture? The word “gospel” appears 104 times in 98 verses in the Bible: Matt. 4:23; 9:35; 11:5; 24:14; 26:13; Mark 1:1, 14–15; 8:35; 10:29; 13:10; 14:9; 16:15; Luke 4:18; 7:22; 9:6; 20:1; Acts 8:25; 14:7, 21; 15:7; 16:10; 20:24; Rom. 1:1, 9, 15–16; 2:16; 10:15–16; 11:28; 15:16, 19–20, 29; 16:25; 1 Cor. 1:17; 4:15; 9:12, 14, 16–18, 23; 15:1; 2 Cor. 2:12; 4:3–4; 8:18; 9:13; 10:14, 16; 11:4, 7; Gal. 1:6–9, 11; 2:2, 5, 7, 14; 3:8; 4:13; Eph. 1:13; 3:6; 6:15, 19; Phil. 1:5, 7, 12, 17, 27; 2:22; 4:3, 15; Col. 1:5, 23; 1 Th. 1:5; 2:2, 4, 8–9; 3:2; 2 Th. 1:8; 2:14; 1 Tim. 1:11; 2 Tim. 1:8, 10; 2:8; Philem. 1:13; Heb. 4:2; 1 Pet. 1:12, 25; 4:6, 17; Rev. 14:6.

 

I have listed below all the references where the word “gospel” is associated with looking at the constellations in the sky:

 

 

 

 

If you didn’t get it, here is that complete list again, in bigger font:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The gospel is not in the stars. The books at the beginning of this post do cite Scripture sometimes, but they take it totally out of context when they attempt to prove that the gospel is in the stars. The gospel is not in general revelation–it is in special revelation. General revelation condemns; it cannot save. The idea that the gospel is in the stars is unbiblical and false. If you have picked it up somewhere, reject it, along with the other evil teachings of those promoting the gospel in the stars, such as Lutheranism, ultradispensationalism and soul-sleep. Be thankful for Henry Morris’ defense of creation, but reject his false idea that the gospel is in the stars, as well as his willingness to work with the Seventh-Day Adventist cult and anyone else who accepts creation and rejects evolution, pretty much no matter what heresies they believed in on other matters.

 

If you don’t understand the gospel, click here to find out what it is in the Bible.  Search the Scriptures to understand the gospel–it is there, very clearly, all over the place. Thank God for His wisdom and power when you look at the stars, but do not expect to find the gospel where He has not revealed it.

 

The following are some additional resources on the claims of the Gospel in the Stars:

Dave Hunt, The Gospel in the Stars

Danny Faulkner, The Gospel Message: Written in the Stars?

Charles Strohmer, Is There a Christian Zodiac, A Gospel in the Stars?

 

TDR

 

Millions of Muslims are NOT Becoming Christians Because of Dreams!

Many sources report that, in the words of Roman Catholic conservative Dinesh D’Souza, “Millions of Muslims are Converting to Christianity After Having Dreams and Visions of Jesus Christ.” Charismatic sources agree with the Catholics about millions of Muslims becoming Christians through dreams and visions. So do Southern Baptist mission agencies.

 

Muslims dream Jesus converts Christianity

 

These visions and dreams clearly prove that:

 

1.) Continuationism is true and cessationism is false.  God is continuing to give revelatory dreams and visions today.  We have lots of testimonials, and testimonials can’t be wrong.

 

2.) Any passages of Scripture that seem to teach the cessation of revelation with the completion of the canon must be reinterpreted in light of the overwhelming proof from the dreams and visions.

 

3.) If this can happen in Muslim lands, it can happen here. Instead of the hard work of teaching people to skillfully preach the gospel, and working so that they grow spiritually to the point where they love to go house to house, we should encourage people to seek after signs, wonders, and dreams, because that is how there will be millions of new converts here in our country as well.

 

Right?

 

Wrong.

 

Why?

 

Scripture is the sole authority for the believer’s faith and practice (2 Timothy 3:15-17).  Scripture is more sure than any experience–even hearing the audible voice of God Himself (2 Peter 1:16-21). Scripture, therefore, must never have its teaching ignored, altered, overlooked, or changed because of what someone claims he experienced.  Indeed, even if everyone in the whole world said something was true, but Scripture said otherwise, the Bible would be right and everyone would be wrong: “Let God be true, but every man a liar” (Romans 3:4).

 

Scripture teaches cessationism, as the studies linked to here clearly demonstrate.  There are no Apostles today or apostolic gifts (Ephesians 2:20), the canon of Scripture is complete (1 Corinthians 13:8-13), and God Word is His completed revelatory speech.

 

Furthermore, Scripture teaches that “faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17); conversion comes through Scripture (John 15:3). Men are “born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever” (1 Peter 1:23). So nobody has been born again because of a dream. The Holy Spirit produces the new birth as sinners, enabled by grace, respond to the gospel recorded in the Word of God. This is “thus saith the Lord.” I don’t care what someone says happened in his dream.  God’s Word is infinitely more reliable than someone’s dream, and Scripture teaches that people are born again through hearing the gospel, not having dreams and visions.

 

So how do I explain the dreams? I don’t need to explain people’s dreams.  The Bible tells me to live by every Word that proceeds out of the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4), but it never tells me that I need to explain what someone said he saw in a dream. I don’t need to explain dreams of people who say they left Islam and rejected Allah and the Quran for Christianity. Nor do I need to explain the dreams of people who say they left Christianity for Islam after having a dream.  How am I supposed to know what is going on in someone else’s head when he is sleeping?  The vast majority of the time I can’t even remember my own dreams.  Yet I need to explain what someone tells me happened in his dream, or what someone tells someone else who tells someone else who tells someone else who prints an article with no documentation in a charismatic magazine about a dream?

 

I am suspicious that these “millions” of converts are allegedly taking place in lands far, far away where it is impossible to verify anything.  For example, in the Dinesh D’Souza video above, there are no sources provided and no way to verify anything.  This is typical–indeed, D’Souza is a scholarly man who tends to document his material far better than does the average charismatic magazine.  With these millions of alleged converts to Christianity, true churches–independent Baptist churches–should be overflowing in Muslim countries, as Islam is allegedly collapsing and true Christians are allegedly becoming a huge percentage of the population. But are these people-if they even exist–becoming true Christians, or leaving Islam for other demonic religions, like Roman Catholicism or Oneness Pentecostalism?  What would someone leaving one false religion for a different false religion prove?  Scripture teaches that we see Christ by faith, enabled by the Spirit, in the Word (2 Corinthians 3:18), and all images of Jesus Christ are idolatrous violations of the Second Commandment (see the relevant resources here).  So are they seeing the real Jesus in a dream? Also, where are all these people? Why is this only (allegedly) happening in places far, far away where we can’t actually verify it? I think of how Jack Hyles claimed that through “God’s power,” allegedly in conjunction with carnal promotion and marketing techniques that manipulated people and are found nowhere in Scripture, he had far more “saved” in one day than the Holy Ghost did on the Day of Pentecost, although not even one person was added to First Baptist of Hammond, Indiana on that day through these “saved” people, and people close enough to the situation to investigate claimed that the vast majority of these “saved” people were just as lost as before. I think of how Keswick continuationist John A. MacMillan, who is promoted among Independent Baptists at schools like Baptist College of Ministry. MacMillan claimed to have an amazing technique for casting out demons, which was copied by him and promoted at one of the yearly Victory Conferences at Baptist College of Ministry and Falls Baptist Church–but people who were close to the situation claimed, on the contrary, that the demons were in control of everything. I think of how Evan Roberts and Jessie Penn-Lewis, with their dreams and visions, destroyed the 1904-1905 Welsh revival. Scripture is sufficient, so even if I were confronted with signs and wonders of the quality that the Antichrist will perform in the Tribulation, I would still go by sola Scriptura–Scripture alone.  But the alleged evidence for these dreams and visions seems to be woefully lacking.  They aren’t like the real revelatory miracles in the Bible before the miraculous gifts ceased.

 

Note that the question is not if God is powerful enough to give people dreams.  The question is not one of God’s power. It is one of what He has said He would do in His inspired revelation, the Bible–and in that revelation He has said that the giving of revelation through dreams has ceased.  Nor is there a category of “non revelatory” dreams that are infallibly from God. If God gives infallible truth, then it is revelation. If it is not infallible truth, then God is not speaking in the dream, for God cannot lie, but only speaks and reveals infallible truth.

 

What if I come across someone who actually is serving the Lord faithfully in a true church, but who says that having a dream was part of how he became a Christian?  Doesn’t that mean that I need to reinterpret Scripture?  No.  God is sovereign, and He can use all kinds of things to get people thinking about religion or about His Word. I know someone who is a faithful Christian who, before his conversion, liked to watch creationist videos while smoking pot.  That doesn’t mean I commend the pot smoking.  I know someone else who called on a ghost (likely a demon) to come to him, and then says that the ghost came at night and almost killed him.  The demonic intervention led this person away from agnosticism to openness to the supernatural, and years later he became a Christian.  That doesn’t mean I support agnostics calling on ghosts or demons.  So if someone says he had a dream and that led him away from Islam to Christianity, I’m glad if he trusted in Christ, while everything contrary to Scripture that took place in his life–including the alleged revelatory dreams–are chalked up to God’s merciful and providential grace, and need no further explanation. (This is even apart from the fact that we cannot see people’s hearts, and even in true churches people without the new birth can enter and appear to be genuine believers for a time, so I cannot rule out the possibility that the person who claims to have been born again after seeing a dream is not a true child of God.)

 

So are millions of Muslims being born again because of dreams?  No. Nobody is being born again because of a dream.  Are Muslims having dreams that lead them to all kinds of religious experiences?  Very possibly.  Why?  There could be all kinds of reasons. I do not need to speculate.

 

What I do need to know is what Scripture teaches.  The Biblical truth of cessationism is being weakened in some independent Baptist churches because people are not thinking Biblically, but are allowing what people say is happening in their dreams to justify changes to Biblical beliefs on charismata.  You are dreaming if you think it is right to change one’s doctrine and practice from what Scripture teaches because of what some other person says he saw when he was sleeping.

 

Never change or set aside God’s Word because of an experience or what someone says.  That was part of Satan’s original technique that caused the Fall in Genesis 3.  Go with Scripture–not the dreams.  As Christ said, “thy word is truth” (John 17:17).  Give Muslims gospel truth, such as in The Testimony of the Quran to the Bible pamphlet.  Reject the dreams. Do not be deceived.

Christianity: Pro-Racism, Pro-Slavery White Man’s Religion–Reject it for Atheism!

I have written a pamphlet dealing with attacks upon the Bible and Christianity from its (alleged) racism and (alleged) support of chattel slavery, compared with the (alleged) anti-racism and anti-slavery position of atheism.  It deals with the objection that “Christianity is the racist white man’s religion” and, as the Freedom From Religion Foundation claims, “[W]hite supremacy [is] interwoven with Christianity … inextricably intertwined.” (Sources for all quotes are in the pamphlet.)

Click here to read the pamphlet Biblical Christianity vs. Atheism on Racism and Slavery

 

You may think that such claims are so ridiculous that they do not deserve a refutation.  You are correct about them being ridiculous—and, as Bethel Baptist Church, where I serve the Lord, is not majority white now and has not been for a very long time, reflecting the ethnic diversity of the area, it is indeed a very foolish claim.  However, sadly, in secular college campuses and in liberal media these egregious falsehoods are regularly propounded.  Not that long ago a very angry black man at a place where I was passing out gospel literature said that all white Christians were supporters of white nationalism.  (He also said, ironically, that they all denied it when he said that to them.  Hmm… ).  He said he had a degree in religious studies. (Perhaps they should give him his money back.)  In any case, the attack on Christianity from its alleged racism and pro-slavery position is very much out there.

 

Christianity white man's religion

 

The pamphlet demonstrates that:

 

1.) The Bible rejects racism.

 

2.) Christian churches in Bible times rejected racism—for example, the church at Antioch had a leader in the category of “prophet and teacher” whose name was “Simon the Black” and another born in Africa, while the rest were all from Asia; an African whose family became close to the Apostle Paul helped Christ carry His cross; etc.

 

3.) Christian churches and the wider realm of Christendom were profoundly impacted by Africa.  Did you ever think about the fact that possibly the two most influential people in the history of Western Christendom were from Africa—namely, Tertullian and Augustine?  Furthermore, the ancient Anabaptist movements, the Novatians and Donatists, were both led by African Anabaptists.  Did you know that the Baptists were the first group of churches in the American South to come out against slavery?

 

4.) Christianity very rapidly spread from Israel to Africa to China to India to Britain.

 

5.) Ancient paganism was pro-slavery while Christianity was pro-slave (since it taught that “All Lives Matter,” and therefore the lives of slaves, people of darker and lighter skin, etc. all matter), and Christian influence, unique among world religions, led to the abolition of slavery.

 

Am I Not a Man and a Brother: The Official Medallion of the British anti-slavery society has a black man in chains kneeling in prayer for help

 

6.) Modern racism actually stems from the Enlightenment and its rejection of Biblical Christianity, combined with the anti-creation philosophy of biological evolution.  (This fact should be taught in all public schools, and at the very least every student in Christian schools needs to know this.  Did you know it?)

 

7.) Slavery exists today in atheist countries such as North Korea and China, in accordance with the racism of people like Karl Marx, Charles Darwin, Hegel, and David Hume.  Everyone should know that Darwin anticipated genocide by whites of “lower races”:

 

“The … Caucasian races have beaten … [others] in the struggle for existence. … [At] no very distant date … the lower races will have been eliminated by the higher civilized races throughout the world.”

 

Everyone should know Marx said:

 

“Let us … speak of the beautiful side … of the slavery of the blacks in the East, in Brazil, in the Southern States of North America. … [S]lavery is an economic category of the highest importance. Without slavery … you would have … the complete decadence of modern commerce and civilization. … [S]ave slavery … [c]onserve the good side of this economic category.”

 

8.) The pamphlet then explains how spiritual slavery is the worst problem people suffer today.  It illustrates that the root causes of racism (pride) and slavery (covetousness) are sins that the reader has been guilty of, and how, through the ransom payment of Christ, they can become spiritually free from the control of the sins that lead to racism and slavery now and eternal hell fire in eternity.

 

I would suggest reading the pamphlet yourself, keeping the link or a few copies on hand for people who run into this objection when preaching the gospel.  I would also suggest that Christian schools, in history class, when they teach the Enlightenment and the impact of evolution and its pre-and post-Darwinian influence in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, make sure students know that modern racism came from these movements.  Missionaries in Africa, the Caribbean, and, frankly, on most of the globe should know these things and share them with those to whom they minister.

 

Cancel culture should cancel Darwin, cancel Marx, cancel Biblical skepticism, cancel evolution, cancel atheism, and cancel agnosticism.

 

Everyone should recognize Christianity is the best friend of those who are against racism and slavery.

 

Click here to read the pamphlet Biblical Christianity vs. Atheism on Racism and Slavery

 

TDR

How Even Apparently Conservative Evangelicals Justify Disobedience to Scripture as a Deconstruction

Today churches have gone “woke.”  Many accept critical race theory and same sex relations.   Before contemplating those extremes, we might consider something short of that and what leads to it.

A man I know well pastors in the same city as a conservative evangelical does, and the two discussed separation.  The conservative evangelical church accepts membership of many and widely varied doctrinal and practical positions.   Everyone is worldly also to sundry degrees, many very much so.

The conservative evangelical graduated from Masters Seminary and in general follows its way of thinking and operation.  In a conversation, the man who I know well mentioned to the conservative evangelical 1 Timothy 1:3:

As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine.

Paul besought Timothy to charge the pastors at Ephesus that they “teach no other doctrine.”  That’s very clear.  “Teach no other doctrine” is one Greek word, heterodidaskaleo.  This matches up with what Paul also said in 1 Timothy 6:3-5:

If any man teach otherwise, and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness . . . . from such withdraw thyself.

Here’s what the conservative evangelical, who went to Masters Seminary, said:  “We teach that “doctrine” there [in 1 Timothy 1:3] is [or means] ‘the gospel.'”

This is the kind of dealing with scripture or teaching that justifies disobedience to scripture.  Is “doctrine” “the gospel” in 1 Timothy 1:3 and in 1 Timothy 6:3-5 among other verses of scripture?  Of course not.  Still, that’s how conservative evangelicals will go ahead and understand “doctrine.”  “Doctrine” refers only to “the gospel” in that passage.

Calling “doctrine” “the gospel” is a type of deconstruction.  Rather than a verse asserting absolute truth, a person assigns a meaning that he conceives at that moment in time.  In Is There Meaning in this Text?  Kevin J. Vanhoozer writes (pp. 21-22) about the deconstruction of the postmodernist Derrida, the one most associated with it:

The belief that one has reached the single correct Meaning (or God, or “Truth”) provides a wonderful excuse for damning those with whom one disagrees as either “fools” or “heretics.” . . . Neither Priests, who supposedly speak for God, nor Philosophers, who supposedly speak for Reason, should be trusted; this “logocentric” claim to speak from a privileged perspective (e.g., Reason, the Word of God) is a bluff that must be called, or better, “deconstructed.”

A teacher or preacher may dismantle Christianity by deconstructing the language.  Christianity is based upon language, the language of the Bible.  Rather than say you don’t believe the Bible, you can just deny a “single correct meaning.”

Deconstructing the biblical text allows and even instructs men not to believe and obey the Bible.  They not only disobey, but they disobey while thinking they’re obeying, because of the deconstruction of the language of scripture.  A church can grow in numbers from the welcome of plenteous and diverse disobedience, while still labeling it obedience.  It doesn’t fool God now or ever.

Leading an Evangelistic Bible Study–How To Videos

Regular readers of What is Truth? are likely aware of the series of evangelistic Bible studies here which can be downloaded and personalized for use in your Baptist church here.  People who are not willing to sit down or meet over Zoom with a church member can be directed to view the series itself taught here on YouTube.

I have had the privilege of doing a series at Bethel Baptist Church on how to lead one of these studies with a seeking unconverted person.  We are almost done going through teaching study #3, “What Does God Want From Me?”  There are currently twenty-four videos in the series (and counting) as I write this blog post. Church members who watch this series will be well equipped to lead an evangelistic Bible study.  If you would like to watch the series on leading an evangelistic Bible study yourself, or recommend it for others in your church, you can access it here:

Watch the series on how to lead an evangelistic Bible study by clicking here

Please check back regularly as new videos are added to the series and we move through studies #4-7, Lord willing, and put what you are learning into practice by being Christ’s instrument for making disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, and teaching them to observe everything Christ has commanded (Matthew 28:18-20).  You can subscribe to the KJB1611 channel to be notified whenever new videos are posted.

TDR

John 20:28 and the Watchtower Society

John 20:28 is  a very difficult passage for the Watchtower Society or so-called “Jehovah’s Witnesses” to explain away.  The Watchtower, in its New World “Translation” that was made by seven “translators” who did not know Hebrew or Aramaic, and only one of which had ever taken a single course in New Testament Greek in his life, egregiously mistranslates John 1:1 to affirm that the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ, was “a god,” supporting a form of polytheism in the Watchtower, where their god Jehovah, who is different than the true Jehovah God of the Bible, is allegedly the Almighty God while Christ is a secondary true god, a “mighty god.”  The Watchtower Society claims that their deity is “the God,” and only the true God is called “the God,” while Christ is merely “a god,” a secondary true god.  Their mistranslation of John 1:1 is awful, but, in my opinion, is not the first place to go to in order to show members of the cult their error.  While the facts are not at all on their side in John 1:1, it is too complicated in Greek for them to believe you; they will believe their cult over what you say.

 

However, their misinterpretation of John 1:1 leaves them with a huge problem in John 20:28.  In John 20:28–the climax of John’s Gospel–we read the following. Notice John 20:28:

 

John 20:26 And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. 27 Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing. 28 And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God. 29 Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed. 30 And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: 31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.

 

In Greek, the Apostle Thomas calls Christ “the Lord of me and the God of me”–so Christ is called “the God” in the climactic section of the gospel of John!  Christ then says that Thomas is “blessed” for having confessed the Lord Jesus as “the God” (v. 29), and then the Apostle John explains that this confession is involved in believing on Christ to receive life in His name (vv. 30-31).

Here are pictures of John 20:28 from an interlinear Greek New Testament.  I recommend that you download or take a picture of these pics and keep them on your phone or  other electronic device.  Then, when you run into a member of the Watchtower Society, you can tell him that you noticed this in the Bible and would like to get his explanation.

John 20:28 2028 interlinear my Lord and my God the Lord of me and the God of me Thomas Jesus Greek literal translation

 

John 20;28 interlinear pic the Lord of me the God of me Jesus Christ Jehovah

 

John 20 Jesus is Jehovah literal Greek John 2028 20:28 the God the Lord my Lord and my God

The interlinear here is J. P. Green’s Interlinear Hebrew-Greek-English Bible, 4 vol. ed., the volume on the New Testament.  I believe Green’s interlinear, based on the Textus Receptus, is the best interlinear that is out there.  I personally do not need to use an interlinear because my Greek has passed that stage, but on whatever occasions I would need to use one, I use Green’s (I have a leather-bound version of the NT portion of his interlinear and a big one-volume work that has the OT and NT. I am not sure if the leather-bound version is still in print.)  If you want an interlinear, here are (affiliate) links to where you can get it on Amazon:

New Testament:

 

 

One volume edition Old and New Testament (bigger book and smaller print):

 

Four volume set:

Usually people in the Watchtower will refuse to talk to you if they are aware that you know what you are talking about–they seek to prey on the Biblically ignorant, not show their (alleged) truth to those who know God’s Word, because once you know the Bible well you are not going to get sucked into their cult.  So it is wise to ask questions of members of the Watchtower when you seek to evangelize them, because as soon as they know you understand Scripture, they probably will not want to talk to you any more.

 

So what can you ask a member of the Watchtower? Something like the following (which also includes their very feeble attempts to explain the text away):

 

In John 20:28, at the climax of John’s Gospel, the point to which the whole Gospel has been building after the prologue of 1:1-18 and before the epilogue of chapter 21, Thomas answers and says to Jesus, “The Lord of me and the God of me” O Kyrios mou kai ho Theos mou (John 20:28), addressing Jesus Christ as “the” God.  Christ commends Thomas for this statement, saying he was blessed, and that those who similarly confess and believe that Jesus is “the God of me” are blessed (20:29).  Why do you think Thomas calls Christ “the God of me”?

 

The only explanations from members of the Watchtower that I have heard are the following:

 

1.) Thomas was taking God’s name in vain, like people who say “Oh my G**,” because the Apostle was surprised at Christ’s resurrection appearance.  However, Christ would not have commended the Apostle for taking God’s name in vain.  One of the Apostles taking God’s name in vain is the climactic confession of the whole Gospel of John?  That “explanation” is ridiculous.

 

2.) Thomas was not really speaking to Christ when the Bible says Thomas “answered and said unto him.”  But that also is to read into the Bible what it does not say, rather than drawing from the text what it does say.  The “him” in 20:28 refers to Christ in 20:27.  That is simply what the grammar requires.  Thomas “answered” and “said unto” Christ, “him” of 20:28 who had appeared to Thomas.  It cannot possibly be speaking about God the Father.

 

One Watchtower elder told me that only the “the Lord of me” was addressed to Christ while “the God of me” was addressed to the Father.  However, looking at all the NT verses where the construction of John 20:28 appears, in all 61 instances, the same person gets the whole address (Matthew 11:4; 12:39, 48; 15:3, 23, 28; 16:17; 17:11; 19:4, 27; 21:21, 24, 27; 25:26, 37, 44; 26:33; Mark 6:37; 7:28; 9:12, 38; 11:14, 29; 12:17, 34; 14:48; Luke 1:19, 35; 3:11; 4:8; 7:22; 8:50; 10:41; 11:45; 13:8, 15; 17:20; 20:34; 24:18; John 2:19; 3:10; 4:10; 5:11, 19; 6:26; 7:16, 21, 52; 8:14, 33, 48; 9:20, 27, 30, 34; 10:25, 33; 12:34; 14:23; 18:5; 20:28).  So this attempt to evade what sure looks like the plain sense of John 20:28 also fails badly. Thomas called Christ both “the Lord of me” and “the God of me.” Thomas answered and said to Jesus, “the Lord of me and the God of me.”

 

Because this text is so difficult for the Watchtower to explain away, they attempt to conceal from their members that Christ is called “the God” in John 20:28 (as He is in Hebrews 1:8).  The Watchtower hopes that their “Jesus is a god, but not the God” explanation for John 1:1 works and that nobody notices that Christ is called “the God of me” in John 20:28.  That is why this fact is very helpful and something worth pressing a Watchtower witness on.

 

The original audience who got the Gospel of John would have concluded that Thomas was “the Lord” and “the God” of Thomas, and that those who similarly believed were blessed (20:29).  The Apostle Thomas was blessed when he confessed Jesus to be “the Lord of me and the God of me,” and I am blessed to make the same confession, 20:29.  If members of the Watchtower repent, they also can make the same confession and receive eternal life through repentant faith alone in the one God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and who is in all three Persons possessed of the glorious Name “Jehovah.” (Matthew 28:19).

 

You can learn more about the blessed truth of the Trinity by clicking here.

 

I discuss John 20:28 in the videos on the Trinity in the series on how to teach an evangelistic Bible study here.

TDR

The Gospel of Matthew: Matthean Authorship, Early Date, Infallible Truth

The Apostle Matthew wrote Matthew’s Gospel.  But do you know when Matthew was written, and what the historical evidence is for Matthew’s date?  Was Matthew the first, second, third, or last gospel written?  Did Matthew copy from another gospel?  These, and similar questions, are answered in my written study on the evidence for the New Testament here.  But if you want a video on Matthew which answers the questions above, click here to view “Historical Evidence for Matthew’s Gospel: Apostolic Authorship, Early Date, God’s Infallible Word on YouTube (from the last Word of Truth Conference at Bethel Baptist Church), or click here to view the video on Rumble, or view the embedded video below:

 

 

Sadly, in relation to the date question, not only theological modernists but too many theological conservatives and evangelicals ignore the actual ancient historical data to adopt dates significantly later than the data support, unnecessarily weakening the case for Christ.  This video does not do that, but argues for the date for Matthew, c. A. D. 40, actually supported by history.

TDR

Baptism & Salvation Debate Page, Douglas Jacoby

I have created a page for resources on the Douglas Jacoby-Thomas Ross debate on baptism.  Both parts of the debate video, as well as links to the places where the debate is live on Rumble and on YouTube, the blog posts where the speakers answered questions from the audience that were not discussed in the debate proper, and further resources, are all on this page.  I would, therefore, recommend that you visit this page in the future and make it your point of reference if you share the debate with others.

 

Click Here For the Page on the Douglas Jacoby / Thomas Ross Debate, “We Are Born Again Before Baptism” (part 1) and “We Are Born Again In Baptism” (part 2)

 

Baptism Salvation Debate Douglas Jacoby Thomas Ross

TDR

AUTHORS OF THE BLOG

  • Kent Brandenburg
  • Thomas Ross

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