Gooding, David: 4 - Arguments 3 and 4

We have spent a lot of time, gentlemen, on what I have called arguments one and two from Paul's letter to the Galatians. Uh, my defense, if I need one, is that these two chapters are, as chapters go, uh, do you see, a third of the gospel, uh, sorry, a third of the epistle. They are very important. It is not unimportant, of course, to take out from such arguments the wonderful verse, chapter two and verse twenty, I have been crucified with Christ, and to preach it to our own hearts and to other people's hearts devotionally. That is very good. But it is also important from time to time, to consider those verses in the context of the bigger argument of which they form part. Now, in this final session today, I hope to go on and talk about arguments three and four. And obviously, we should not spend so much time on each of those as we have spent on the first two. Argument three, in, uh, my understanding of the thing, goes from verse one to six of chapter three. O foolish Galatians, who did bewitch you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was openly set forth crucified, this only would I learn from you, received you the spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now perfected in the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain, if indeed it be in vain? He therefore that supplies to you the Spirit and works miracles among you, does he do it by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? The answer to that question is, even as Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned unto him for righteousness. The argument from the experience of conversion. And we recall, therefore, at this stage that Paul is writing to people that profess to have been saved, profess to have been converted through Paul's preaching of the gospel, and would thereby and thereupon have received the Holy Spirit of God, and have known the convicting power of the Holy Spirit and the assurance that the Holy Spirit gives, and the way the Holy Spirit sheds abroad in our hearts the love of God for us. And so. And Paul's preaching at that time would have been accompanied by some miracles worked. So in, uh, appealing to their conversion experience, we should notice that the experience was a genuine experience. I say that in view of the fact that sometimes people think if if if only they can induce their neighbor to speak in tongues, that is a sign that he has been converted. They'll say that it was of the Spirit, where subsequent behavior shows it was anything but the Holy Spirit, you see. Uh, but here it's a question of what were genuine conversions, response to Paul's preaching, and notice how the sequence goes. Foolish Galatians, who did bewitch you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was openly set forth, openly placarded, crucified. The image, so to speak, was not only conveyed to their intellect, but to their imagination. You didn't come away from Paul's preaching without having a very vivid sense of the death and crucifixion of Christ, and why that crucifixion was necessary, and what that death accomplished. That was the basis of their repentance and faith, that they then received the Spirit. And with these Galatians, it was appealing to the fact that they received the Spirit when? When the Judaizers had come and preached to them? Well, certainly not. It was as the result of preaching Christ and him crucified, and their professed faith in him. But that was indeed the gospel that they preached and the gospel that had this effect with them. So having begun in the spirit, are they now to be perfected by external, uh, ceremonies like, uh, uh, uh, the food laws and so on, are you perfected in the flesh? If the biggest thing was through Christ and him crucified and the receiving of the Holy Spirit, you're now going to be perfected in the flesh. And then the argument from what they suffered. Before they professed conversion, they didn't endure persecution. Now, because they, uh, have received Christ on those terms, they suffered persecution. Abel was murdered, you know, by a very religious man. His name was Cain. Was in the context of offering sacrifices to God. Religion can become very persecuting when you start to preach justification by faith and not by the works of the law. You don't have to read a lot of the acres of the history of Christendom to find how that principle has often been exemplified. Mm-hmm. He therefore that supply- uh, did you suffer so many things in vain, if it indeed be in vain? He therefore that supplieth to you the Spirit and worketh miracles among you, is it by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? And the answer is, it came about this way. And here Paul appeals to his stock basic text, Genesis fifteen six, even as Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned unto him for righteousness. With that experience behind them, how do you account for their so soon being, uh, attracted away from him that called them? If, of course, it's merely experience of the fluffy kind that you preach, well, that's one thing. But if it's the gospel of Christ crucified that you preach, which gets at your conscience and at your heart, then these other doctrines call you away from not merely the theory of your conversion, but from Christ, of course. And him crucified. How do you account for it? Paul describes as what happening as, um, a kind of a bewitching. Who has bewitched you? Brought you under a spell, confused your thinking, and your moral sense, and your spiritual sense. But having given the answer, know therefore that they which be of faith the same are sons of Abraham. He now proceeds to his fourth major argument, going down here from verse seven to verse fourteen. And it is a series of quotations from the Old Testament. It's rifle fire. It's not merely random shotgun with few pellets going off in all directions. It's a series of verses quoted from scripture. And as we follow the succession of them and try to, uh, uh, see what the flow, flow of thought is between them and why they are in the order they are. And we ask ourselves, are they simply repetitions, or are they dealing with various points that are at stake? Uh, we shall see, uh, I think, at least I shall try and convince you, that they are in a very deliberate order, and that they are organized to deal with a number of different questions that arise when one is discussing the way of salvation according to scripture. So now the explicit, the quotation of explicit verses of scripture. Let me put out the possible flow of thought between them. Oh, sorry. Question three five. On what terms does God give the Holy Spirit? On the basis of works or of faith? Now notice at that point, he doesn't say to them, uh, on what basis, uh, uh, uh, uh, did you get your wonderful feelings you had? The answer is not determined by their feelings, it's determined by scripture. On what basis does God give the Holy Spirit? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness. That is the gospel that had Paul, Paul had preached to them, that led to their repentance and faith, and thus they received the Holy Spirit. Know therefore, the conclusion from this quotation, know therefore, verse seven, that they which be of faith, the same are sons of Abraham. If Abraham believed God, and it was on that basis, it was that faith in God that was counted to him for righteousness, then it's as those that are of that same faith that can be rightly s- described as sons of Abraham. You will remember the argument of John chapter eight, if I may interpose it here, when, uh, uh, our Lord was talking to those who professed to be his disciples and as professed to believe on him, and when he said they need to be saved from the bondage to sin, pooh, they said, we are Abraham's seed, pooh, never were in bondage to anybody. He says, that's very funny, said Christ, because if you were, uh, uh, children of Abraham, you would do the works of Abraham, wouldn't you? Sons of Abraham in the sense of character. Mm-hmm. And if Abraham got his righteousness by faith in God, not by the works of the law, then it's those that are of faith that are sons of Abraham. So the argument is going. Possible objection. But the term sons of Abraham surely only applies to Jews. How can you say it applies to Gentiles such as these people in Galatia? Or how can you say it applies to Gentiles anywhere? Now, answer? Scripture again. Another scripture. Mm-hmm. And the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith. Notice that way of talking. It was God that foresaw it, of course, but Paul is quoting his scripture, isn't he? And of course, because it is God's word and God's scripture, he says the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, in thee shall all the nations, the Gentiles, be blessed. This isn't Paul, therefore, taking principle of justification that applied to Abraham and just himself taking the liberty of saying it applies to Gentiles as well. The scripture itself said, God said to Abraham, in thee shall all the nations of the world be blessed. All the Gentiles, therefore. Mm-hmm. Conclusion from that? Verse nine. So then they which be of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. Possible objection. But we Jews can merit that blessing by keeping the law that God appointed. After all, didn't they have a m- m- m- a very notable ceremony when Joshua first brought the people into the land and they went up to Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim, like Moses told them to do, and they built an altar, and they plastered the, and they they they wrote out the the law, the Ten Commandments, o- on the thing, and uh, the Levites stood on the two mountains and the people round about, and they of the first mountain pronounced the blessings on those who kept the law, and on the other mountain the, the Levites read out the curses of those who broke the law, and each time each blessing was pronounced, the people had to say amen, you'll see. And each time a curse was pronounced, the people said amen. Well, can't we Jews, therefore, be true sons of Abraham by keeping the law, you'll see, and thus inherit the blessing of the law. Answer? No, you can't. To say, for all those who take their stand on the law, this is verse ten— are under a curse. For as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse. Those who stake, take their stand before God on the basis of the law are under a curse. You cannot, therefore, earn the blessing that was pronounced to Abraham and the blessing that would come upon the Gentiles in him and through him and through his seed. You can't merit that by keeping the law. Oh, but we can. No, you can't. Why not? Scripture again. Proof text. Deuteronomy twenty seven thirty six. Their own law tells them, cursed is everyone that does not continue in all things, emphasis on the all, of course, written in the law to do them. That's their own law talking. Oh yes, the law pronounced the blessing on those that kept the law, but notice the strictness of the law. You have to continue in everything. If you don't continue in all things written in the law, if you come short, then the law will curse you. That's a point still to be made in, as you know it and do better than I, of course, but in your conversation with religious people not yet converted, and they propound to you the proposition that if you do your solid best to keep God's law and do his will, you'll be saved. And it says, you evangelicals, you say salvation's not by works but by faith. Well, that means you could do just as you like, and God's law doesn't matter, and all that kind of nonsense. You turn the tables on them, don't you? You say, all right, no, you, you're going to do your best to keep God's law, and then you'll be saved thereby. Yes, isn't that marvelous? And uh, uh, when you come to die, will you uh, be in position of having kept all God's law? Well, not all of it, perhaps. So you will have come short. And what are you expecting God to say? Well, you did your very best, so you did get out, you did come short a bit, but not enough to be serious, you know. I see. So the law in the end doesn't matter really. It's they who are saying the law doesn't matter. It is the gospel that says the law does matter, that we all come short, and because we come short, we deserve its curse. And the curse must be performed. The penalty must be paid. Because the law cannot be cheated. Sin matters. And it is Christ who bore that curse for us. Cursed, therefore, is everyone that continues not in all. But suppose somebody says, but we Jews can and do continue in all that is written in the law. And are really and honestly convinced that that is what they do. What do you say now? Well, you say, well, you actually you don't, but even if you could and did, justification before God, according to scripture, is not achieved through the works of the law, is not achieved through works, but on an altogether different principle. What do you mean? Well, scripture quote to prove the point, Habakkuk. The just shall live... by faith. That is a basic principle, and not by works. But suppose somebody answers, oh, but I have great faith that if I do my best to keep the law, I shall be saved. I have great faith in that, I'll tell you. Very strong faith. Faith. Answer? But that is to misunderstand what is meant by faith in that phrase, saved by faith. When the Bible says that we're saved by faith, then faith in that context means the opposite of works. Whereas the law is not of faith. Paul makes that, states the fact, do you see verse twelve. The principle of the law is, and now he quotes the scripture, once more, another scripture. He that doeth them shall live in them. Proof text from Leviticus eighteen five. In order to establish the meaning of the terms faith and works, what is their meaning in these technical contexts? That is exceedingly important to define our terms, therefore. And he defines the term, as you notice, not by merely stating that faith is the opposite of works. He points out that the law is not of faith, it is of works. There is the principle enunciated. The one who does these things shall live by them. Here comes another objection. Possible objection. Oh yes. You say we're saved by grace? Well, of course we're saved by grace. I too am saved by grace, for Christ, you see, gives me the grace to do the works that merit salvation. And all the credit goes to him for it, you see. Isn't that nice? He gives me the grace to do the works that merit the salvation. Gentlemen, this is not some imaginary de- uh, objection that I thought up out of my own little brain. Uh, uh, uh, in the year of grace, somewhere about, um, let me see, nineteen sixty nine, I spent, uh, one week for nearly a year in a Catholic home in Randallstown, do you see, leading there some Bible studies, and those who attended were mostly Catholics, and most of them were not converted anyway, do you? And I tried to talk to them about salvation, uh, by faith, and all I could get out of them by way of response, do you see, was, ah, sanctifying grace. Sanctifying grace. Judge the extent of my ignorance, I'd not met that phrase before, sanctifying grace. So being in London at one stage, I took the opportunity to go to the bookshop attached to the Roman Catholic cathedral, and I said to the lady, now, um, I have a bit of a problem. I said, I have some Catholic friends that keep talking to me about sanctifying grace. What do they mean? Ha- ha- have you got any book on sanctifying grace? Oh yes, she said, I could recommend a very good book. And so I bought it, you see. Read it, sounded marvelous. To say salvation, it is Christ. Encounter with Christ. That's what it is, relationship with Christ. That's all it is. Not all these ceremonies and things, and in the footnotes it would quote old-fashioned Roman Catholicism, but it was expounding the new look. This was in the seventies, of course. The new look that, uh, salvation is by grace, of course. It there's a sanctifying grace of, of, of personal relationship with Christ. Marvelous, I thought. I read on, and it's distinct from all the other rather lurid things that you would have expected from old-fashioned Roman Catholicism, this opposed the new look, Sanctifying Grace. I was going to think the book had been written by John Stott or somebody, uh, that was Sanctifying Grace. And they said, of course, of course, if, if, if, if, if after this personal relationship with Christ, uh, you sin, of course, ah, that breaks the fellowship, but you, it could be restored through confession and the mass, you see. So, well, they are. But sanctifying grace. And so eventually it got to what happens when we die. And the thing said, when we first see God, we shall be terrified. And shall be glad to escape for a while to purgatory. He prefaced that by saying, when we come to die, none of us will have done anything worthy of eternal damnation. I said to myself, really? I thought that is exactly what we had done. But none of us will feel we've ever done anything worthy of damnation. On the other hand, when we first see God, we should be terrified and glad to escape to purgatory for a while. Sanctifying grace. Of course, uh, there is salvation because Christ gives us the grace to do the works that merit the salvation. Behind that theory, there was a denial of repentance, of course. When we come to die, none of us will believe we've ever done anything worthy of eternal damnation. The refusal to repent. In the sense of Romans three, that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. We know that whatever things the law says, it says to those that are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped. Refusal to repent. And then, not true faith. The Bible says when we see him, we should be, we should be like him, for to see him as he is, according to this wretched doctrine. When we see him, we shall be terrified and glad to escape his presence for a while. No, by salvation by grace does not mean that God Christ gives us the grace to do the works that then merit salvation, so that when we are saved, we shall turn around and say, well, of course it was great God, uh, uh, you know, that was God that helped me. Like a student who smuggles in his professor under the desk to the examination hall and is able to get the professor to help them answer the questions. And then when the s- student qualifies and he gets his degree, he openly confesses that it was all by the grace of the professor who helped him or something of the sort. No, no. That isn't, that isn't how Christ saves us. He doesn't save us by giving us the grace to do the works that merit salvation. Aha, do you see? How does he save us? He saves us, Christ does not redeem us by helping us to keep the law. He redeemed us by bearing the curse of the law we had broken. Why else was he crucified? And to answer that question, Paul comes up with a statement of scripture. Once more, a ex- quotation of an explicit verse of scripture. Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree. Christ redeemed us by bearing the curse for us. Now, this is very important. Perhaps you'll never meet, uh, uh, or you may one of these days, somebody brought up in the Orthodox tradition. They hold that we're saved not by Christ suffering the wrath of God for us, by his suffering. We're saved this way round. Christ came to suffer, to show us how to suffer. We are saved by our own suffering. Bishop Timothy Ware of Oxford, Orthodox bishop, in his Penguin, or is it a Puffin book on Orthodoxy, enunciates this. He won't have atonement, propitiation, substitutionary atonement. Christ suffered to give us the example of how to suffer. We're saved by our suffering. That is what the great Russian novelist Dostoevsky taught in his novel- novels, of course. And what many people think Christ suffered to give us an example. Now, there is a sense in which the suffering of Christ was an example. One Peter chapter two, Christ has left us, suffered for sin, leaving us an example that he, we should follow in his steps, who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth, who when he was reviled, reviled not again, and when he suffered, he threatened not. He left us an example, yes, that we should follow his steps. That is perfectly true. But when it comes to being justified before God, then, of course, it is not by following his example that we are saved. He saved us by becoming a curse for us. Yes. Why need he have been crucified if it wasn't that he had to bear the curse of the law for us? Well, these are simple things, gentlemen, basic, and you know them all very well. All Paul has d- or I've done is point to the fact that Paul has collected these verses of scripture, and they're so at his fingertips. Through much a personal witness in synagogues and preaching and meeting people in the forum and answering their objections and whatnot, that he has them at his fingertips. Actual statements of scripture. It's a good thing to have them, isn't it, in our heads? So, uh, like it says in the Bible, um, uh, p- p- prepare to meet your God. Well, where is that? Your questioner says. Well, now, now this is, well, is it in Matthew? Um, no, no, well, it's somewhere there anyway. Well, that is sort of a awkward pause in the argument, isn't it? It's good to have thought in advance of all these objections, so eventually you'll meet, and you know key scriptures to quote. Not in parrot form, of course not. Do you see? Not merely proof texting, as some people call it, but knowing how to apply God's word and scriptures that are relevant, not only these particular ones, but I point to it as an example of the way that Paul argued. Presently, he's going to use typology when he gets round to chapter four. He went to use a long bit on typology from the story of Abraham and Sarah and Isaac, uh, uh, uh, and Ishmael and all that. But first in his order of arguments, not the typology, but the explicit, straightforward statements of scripture. Yes, he's got his arguments perhaps in the right order, hasn't he? But that's enough for today, and uh, perhaps next time, if God grants us another time, we should be able to move on more quickly. Now we are going into questions. There's a question here, yeah? You'd have thought that if somebody wanted an argument about the validity of the gospel, they would go straight back to the words of their Lord. Yeah. Why do you think he doesn't? Paul doesn't use that argument at all. Ah. Sorry. Well, uh, to be a hundred percent exact, he does, of course. That is to say, he says, uh, his gospel he got from the risen Lord by the revelation of Christ. So he would say that he got the gospel, his gospel, straight from the Lord. Yes? That's number one. Your question, however, is a very import- important question. Why doesn't he cite the words that the Lord spoke while he was here on earth? Well, uh, he may well have known them, of course. He subsequently did by moving amongst Christians. But when he got converted, his own writings were some of the earliest ever written of the New Testament. Uh, Josie. Secondly, he didn't have, uh, in the early days, much converse with the apostles, who were, uh, as is said in Acts one, who were companies, uh, uh, companions of Christ right from John's baptism until the resurrection, and were witnesses of that physical resurrection of Christ. Uh, on those terms, Paul wouldn't have been an apostle because he wasn't with Christ, nor was he in that sense that they were an e- a witness of the resurrection. If he had then quoted the words of the Lord Jesus to the general public and to the Jews, they would have said, how do you know? And you only got that secondhand, and such like things. So it seems to me that that may have been one of the reasons why, in his establishment of doctrine, do you see, he doesn't appeal to the words of the Lord Jesus. In his writings, uh, on other matters, to the elders of the church at Ephesus, he quotes a word of Christ that is not even in our four gospels. But perhaps when Paul quoted it, none of the gospels had been yet written. But he knew of the sayings of Christ, for he quotes the one, um, it is more blessed to give than to receive. And secondly, in one Corinthians, for instance, chapter eleven, he says, I delivered unto you that how, uh, uh, uh, what I received, that the Lord Jesus, in the night he was betrayed, and now he quotes the words, uh, the Lord Jesus, uh, uttered, uh, at the Last Supper in the institution of the Lord's Supper. So yes, he does quote some things from the Lord Jesus, but perhaps not to his establishment, uh, establishing the basic principles of the gospel which he everywhere preached. He is happy to acknowledge in these other circumstances, you'll see, that I deliver unto you that which I also received. And that leaves open where he received it from, and the details of the Lord's Supper he may well have got from the other apostles. He's not against that tradition. What he is preserving is that his basic principles of the gospel he got straight from Christ, from the risen Christ. Therefore, his words go back to Christ. That is his claim. Uh-huh. Uh, the Jerusalem Council in Acts fifteen. the Jerusalem Council in Acts Acts fifteen Oh, yes, yes. and other summits of the church, apostolic church age, um, what similarity or differences do they have to the councils that we read about, you know, in Nicaea and times and places like that? And if heresy, God forbid, but if heresy were to come into the church today, how would we possibly, uh, have such summits or, um, publicize the truth or how, uh, that sort of thing can't happen today. Was it right to have ever happened in Nicaea in times like that? Well, forgive my simplicity, if you say, par- uh, pardon my simplicity, to say, but I get the impression that the church councils were mainly concerned about the question of the Trinity. Does that square with your understanding of them? You will notice that there is no formal doctrine of the Trinity expressed in the New Testament. Is that true? So a lot of what those councils were concerned with, not the only thing perhaps, but what they were concerned with was, uh, deciding how it is proper to talk about the relationship of Jesus to God and to the Holy Spirit. Hence the formal doctrines of the Trinity. That, I would say, number, uh, is number one of the subject matters, you see. That is not, uh, discussed as a basic, uh, doctrine of the gospel in the, in the New Testament. We are required to believe that Jesus is the Son of God, for instance, but the detail, uh, uh, and description of, uh, the relation of, of Christ to God and this kind of thing, and how on the one side you can say that God who keeps Israel never slumbers or sleep, and then go on and say, uh, Jesus, um, slept in the boat on the sea, and yet he's God. You see, how do you resolve things like that, and how may we speak about the Trinity? Yes? But... it doesn't appear to me that to be saved, you have to understand the all the mysteries of the Trinity. I remember one of the early times I was in Russia and gave a talk in a drawing room, eh, most of them unconverted. And the first question that came afterwards, Josie, was from a good lady, a physicist, a very capable physicist. Why do I have to be believe in the Trinity, she says. Because in Russia it is a very prominent thing. They'll tell you, I believe in the Trinity, and that's that, that's a key to heaven. Whether that's saved or not saved, I believe in the Trinity. Do you see? In that sense, I don't think it is a requirement you must be able to explain the Trinity in order to be saved, yes? So that's one of the things I would say about the councils. Secondly, they are progressively later. They are, some of them, summoned by the emperor, you'll see, so that, um, they're in a very diff- different situation from what, uh, uh, Paul is talking about. So come to the council at Jerusalem. We talk about it as a council. But what exactly was it? Juicy. It was the agreement that from the elders at Antioch that the, uh, Paul and Barnabas and come should go up with certain of the men from Antioch to Jerusalem, because it was in response to people who said they came from James. So they went up to clarify this whole matter. Did it indeed come from James? And to get a statement that they all, what they actually believed as apostles all together. Do you see? Whether that was a council in the sense that the later councils were, I'm not so sure. Because when the apostles came to Jerusalem in Acts fifteen, it wasn't, uh, to talk it over amongst themselves. Now, what exactly do we believe, and and have we got it all straight yet? And what is the proper way to speak about it? You'll notice it is not that kind of discussion. They met the opposition, the Pharisees who believed, alas, uh, you see, they see, uh, professed to be believers, who nevertheless said, you, uh, uh, must be circumcised to be saved and keep the law of Moses, and if you don't, you can't be saved. How did they proceed? Well, Peter got up and said, I'll tell you what I believe. And then James got up and said, I'll tell you what I believed. They both believed the same thing. In other words, it wasn't a council in the sense of debate, like the big councils were. How do we right and properly talk about the Trinity? That, they didn't discuss what do we really think about salvation and... The apostles just gave their view. They all agreed, of course. So there was a, it seems to me, a material difference in what happened at that council to what happened in the subsequent councils. Mm-hmm. Does that seem fair to you in your knowledge of church history? It is for differences like that that many scholars have declined to call that thing at Jerusalem a council. They weren't, uh, talking, discussing among themselves, what is the real gospel? Uh, uh, what do we say it is? What do you think it is, John? Well, I think it is this, and um, and well, how could that be? Uh, no, they weren't. They just delivered their belief. Mm-hmm. And confounded, of course, the, uh, Pharisees who said you have to be, uh, uh, um, circumcised and keep the law of Moses. In fact, if you listen to the views that were expressed by first Peter and then James, they said some very severe things about the, this view that the Pharisees propound. Why do you propose to put a yoke on the neck of the believers that neither we nor our fathers could put up with, says Peter? And James holds forth, and he says, these men, they claim to come from us, they didn't come from us, and they subvert your very souls. That's what James says. Mm-hmm. What it was there for, they went to Jerusalem. That's the only way they could stop the slanders that had come down to Antioch from men that said they came from James and began to teach the, uh, people that, uh, you had to be circumcised and keep the law of Moses to be saved. The only way you could scotch that rumor, because they claimed to have the authority of James for saying it, was to go up to Jerusalem and get a public statement from the apostles. Mm-hmm. Hello there. Just, there was a last part of that, um, question that got me thinking about a friend I was talking to recently who's in the Reformed Church in the States and finds it very comforting, he says, to to have a synod that the church can fall back on when they're, when issues of doctrine come up. And so, as as Matt was was saying too, if if nowadays something comes up, is there... why is it we don't have that? Should we have that? How do we deal with such things now? In, as we understand it, not having a headquarters to on Earth to, to call to and send our problems to. Well, it can be very comforting, can it not, for, for, uh, people to gather together as elders and responsible people to discuss, uh, these kind of things that come up from time to time. Uh, so yes, I- I'm not saying that you shouldn't arrange them. What we need to remember is that while it might be a c- a comforting thing to fall back on synods and whatnot, um, Catholics would claim it's a very comforting thing to fall back on Trent. And not all councils have been good councils. And if you take practical matters, like whether homosexuals should be appointed as bishops, and you have, uh, to say, a council called of all members of the Anglican Communion and churches within the Anglican Communion to London. To say, it doesn't necessarily lead to a, um, a universal adoption of the truth, if you see what I mean. So councils in those days have, uh, these days have their limits. What we have in the New Testament are apostles defining the gospel, and any subsequent council has to appeal after all, to the apostles, doesn't it? Now, those who believe in an apostolic succession, and there are many big churches that do that, don't they? But are now extending the term apostle, you see, very largely. And, uh, I don't think with an audience like this, I have to argue against the notion of apostolic succession. Do you see? Apostles were special, sui generis, as you might say. Mm-hmm. So yes, if, uh, Christians wanted to gather together and said, now what should attitude should we take to government legislation that says you mustn't publicly any longer preach that Jesus is the only way for salvation. Uh, now how do we, uh, behave in the light of this government edict and, uh, the possible persecution and imprisonment that should arise and whatnot? Well, uh, many churches might like to get together, all their leaders, all their evangelists, and talk about it. Yeah? I myself would be wary of denominational headquarters that then give an official view of what the brethren teach. Because in that sense, I- I'm prejudiced. I- I- I don't belong to the brethren, as you know. I belong to a church in Belfast near what used to be the Gasworks. I belong to a local church, and after that I belong to the church which is his body. I don't belong, as far as I'm aware, to a denomination and a denominational council that then decides what the brethren churches teach. That I am very wary of. An issue we have to deal with today is, um, so-called evangelical movement coming together with, um, Catholics, uh, reaching out, as it were, with the gospel together. How do we react to that? You mean how we should react to it? Yes. Uh, well, there was a, a, a very big dispute that arose in the States, do you see, eh, on this matter of Protestants and Catholics coming together, do you see? Or at least it was Christians and Catholics coming together, I heard at one stage, which was a funny title. Of course, the implication of the title, Christians and Catholics coming together, already presumed that Catholics are not Christians, you see. And there, such one as... Oh, his name's on the tip of my tongue. Uh, yes, Jim Packer, you'll see. Great and godly man, said some what appeared to be many evangelicals extreme things, and I think I'm right in saying that he, uh, somewhat apologized and and stepped backward from them. I think the old idea, as you'll see, that, um, hmm, twenty years ago, maybe, there came a lecturer from Fuller in the States. Fuller is a Bible college, famous Bible college, and there came a lecturer from that who addressed this kind of a problem in the Belfast Bible College, you'll see, gave a lecture. And friends of mine who had worked with Catholics and and and had seen a number of Catholics saved came down to this lecture with these converted Catholics. The lecture turned, uh, uh, uh, proceeded on the following kind of ideas. You know, we used to hold a very, uh, great distance between us Protestants and Catholics, but then we began to sh- work together in sort of social good works and things like that. And that has proved very, very beneficial, said the lecturer, you see, because we've got to know what Catholics actually believe, and lo and behold, there isn't much difference between us. So we've all pricked up our ears. He said, for instance, I discovered through working together with Catholics, um, that they feel it is good to talk to pre- pray to the Virgin Mary, because they say, um, that in many societies, children find it difficult to speak to the fathers direct because the fathers are rather distant, forbidding, authoritarian, uh, the personalities. So they find it much easier to speak to the mother, and the mother speaks to the father for them. Well, the lecturer found this very reasonable. I don't know where he'd been all his life, because I heard of that argument for decades and decades. It seemed all new to him. And from that he began to deduce that, that yeah, why wouldn't we have a more united front? Do you see? But that shows where my uncertainties would begin. Working in social causes, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, could be right if you were a missionary in the swamps of Hooja Jooju place, and you got some dreadful disease, and the only hospital you could get at was a hospital run by missionary Roman Catholic nuns, I expect you might go to it. You'll say, pardon? And relief work and all that kind of thing. But when it comes to work together for the gospel, how can that be done? If your Catholic, in his heart of hearts, has the gospel that Paul is here denouncing. How can you speak with a clear voice? I remember being in Spain in the early nineteen seventies, you see. And the local Jesuits, uh, asked if they could come and talk, do you see? And when they came, these dear monks, they, what they proposed was, why couldn't we cooperate in various works and things? And I said, well, gentlemen, there is a pri- prior difficulty, isn't there? I don't think we believe the same gospel, do we? And I quoted one or two things, oh, that we don't believe anything of it anyway, they said. Now, that was true of the Jesuits. It's more true than of many, of many Catholics now at the, at the university level than you might think. I don't necessarily believe in the virgin birth. It is a myth. If you ask them, do you believe in the virgin birth, they'll say yes. If you know enough to ask them, do you believe in it as an historical event, they'll say no. If you ask them, do you believe in the resurrection of Christ, yes, of course. But some of them, if you ask them, do you believe in the resurrection of Christ as a historical event, no. They are sold on Bultmannism. And I say that knowing some of them. And some of the, uh, softening of the, the, the, the differences have come about because of that very reason. Do you see? So, I would say we have to be very careful. The question of locally engaging and supporting, uh, some good social work, like a hospital in some area or something of this sort, or, uh, uh, this and that, that's one thing. But joining together is a- as churches in a gospel work or something. That seems to me a very doubtful thing on the very basis of what Paul is explaining here. You see. Mm-hmm.