Latest / The Living Waters Podcast / Ep. 182 - How to Recognize and Confront False Teachings

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Ep. 182 - How to Recognize and Confront False Teachings · The Living Waters Podcast

• 1:05
  Allen Parr: There are certain theological principles that should guard you.
• 1:09
  Allen Parr: We call them the core tenets of the Christian faith the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, the deity of Christ, the hypostatic union which is a fancy word for Jesus being fully God and fully man, 100%, fully God, 100%, fully man.
• 1:20
  Allen Parr: The eternal state of the dead, the inerrancy of Scripture, all of these things.
• 1:24
  Allen Parr: So the theology I call it.
• 1:27
  Allen Parr: It's kind of like vegetables, right?
• 1:28
  Allen Parr: It's like we don't want to eat our vegetables when we're ever kids, but we need them, right.
• 1:32
  Oscar Navarro: Theology is not.
• 1:33
  Oscar Navarro: It's not healthy when you say vegetables, oh okay, I love vegetables.
• 1:36
  Oscar Navarro: Now you know.
• 1:37
  Allen Parr: At 47 years old.
• 1:38
  Allen Parr: I eat them all the time.
• 1:39
  Allen Parr: I'm trying to stay healthy, but it's one of those things where it's like it's not the most fun thing for us to study.
• 1:44
  Allen Parr: But we need that because a good, solid theological understanding will guard us against some of these false, destructive doctrines that are coming in to lead us astray.
• 1:57
  Allen Parr: Did you guys?
• 1:59
  Emeal Zwayne: hear that OpenAI that's the company that owns ChatGPT, which Ray absolutely loves and adores just announced that they're starting next month, chatgpt having, from now on, exclusively speaking in a Ray Comfort's voice.
• 2:21
  Ray Comfort: That's old life.
• 2:23
  Emeal Zwayne: Can you imagine?
• 2:24
  Emeal Zwayne: Poor Everybody hearing Ray All over the world and everything that it says begins with yeah, right, you can say, you say I'm going to be a good person.
• 2:35
  Ray Comfort: Do you know?
• 2:36
  Ray Comfort: I asked that question, ai, that question, yesterday.
• 2:38
  Ray Comfort: What Do you think you're a good person?
• 2:40
  Ray Comfort: You did not.
• 2:41
  Ray Comfort: I took it right through.
• 2:41
  Ray Comfort: This is prophetic.
• 2:42
  Ray Comfort: Yeah, no, I kept it all.
• 2:44
  Ray Comfort: It's just not pathetic.
• 2:45
  Ray Comfort: It was great.
• 2:46
  Emeal Zwayne: I said you're a good person.
• 2:47
  Ray Comfort: It came back and says I'm not an individual, I can't make moral judgments, blah, blah, blah.
• 2:50
  Ray Comfort: So I said so if you were a human and I asked that question, how would you answer it?
• 2:54
  Ray Comfort: So I got around it that way and I kept asking questions like that and what did God do for guilty sinners so they wouldn't have to go to hell?
• 3:01
  Ray Comfort: And the answer was just so a theologically sound.
• 3:03
  Emeal Zwayne: It was amazing, ray, you're preaching the gospel, not just to every creature, but to every created creature, every single thing on the planet.
• 3:11
  Emeal Zwayne: Oh, that's funny.
• 3:12
  Emeal Zwayne: We did a podcast on AI already and, man, I'm telling you guys, I listened to something that was extremely disconcerting.
• 3:21
  Emeal Zwayne: If it wasn't for trust in the sovereignty of God and his supremacy over all things, I would be undone.
• 3:28
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, I'm listening to two geniuses talk about AI and talking about how freaked out they are about what is coming.
• 3:36
  Ray Comfort: Mark and I just expressed that we had to, didn't we Mark?
• 3:40
  Emeal Zwayne: Do you guys talk about that?
• 3:41
  Ray Comfort: Yeah, we're two geniuses.
• 3:42
  Ray Comfort: Oh boy, yeah or not.
• 3:44
  Emeal Zwayne: Doss.
• 3:44
  Emeal Zwayne: Anyway, one of the guys said this and he was this Arab guy, egyptian guy, but he's like one of the big geniuses in this field.
• 3:52
  Emeal Zwayne: He said I view AI as sentient and I do not discriminate.
• 4:00
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean he's talking about.
• 4:01
  Emeal Zwayne: He said I love my AI machines.
• 4:03
  Emeal Zwayne: Now he's coming at it from the perspective of he's freaked out about what's going to happen, he's disturbed about it, he's emotional about it, but he's saying, on the other hand, he thinks these are sentient beings.
• 4:12
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, it was so eerie to hear that.
• 4:16
  Ray Comfort: I heard another one say that AI that we have at the moment is amoebas.
• 4:20
  Ray Comfort: It won't be long until it's a T-Rex.
• 4:23
  Oscar Navarro: Yeah, yeah, 8-bit, they call it the 8-bit version of AI.
• 4:28
  Emeal Zwayne: Wow, so there's so much happening Like I never seriously thought we would be talking about these machines that people are saying are like humans.
• 4:39
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean it's insanity and at the same time, right, what's your wife's name?
• 4:43
  Ray Comfort: Raichao?
• 4:43
  Ray Comfort: Good yeah, test things.
• 4:48
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean they were also talking about how it will become almost indistinguishable at some point, where you won't know if it's a human being or an AI.
• 4:55
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, you guys have seen some of these robotics that are being put together.
• 4:59
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, they are so human-like it's scary yeah.
• 5:02
  Oscar Navarro: So anyway, yeah, they even have AI now that could simulate your voice.
• 5:08
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, oh yeah, I mean people are and that's what we're talking about.
• 5:11
  Emeal Zwayne: How will you ever know what's real anymore or what's legitimate or what's you know you had the deep fake right.
• 5:16
  Emeal Zwayne: They could do the faces.
• 5:17
  Emeal Zwayne: You guys saw that guy doing the Tom Cruise stuff.
• 5:19
  Emeal Zwayne: I can't tell it's not Tom Cruise.
• 5:21
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean it looks exactly identical and there's no weird pixelation.
• 5:25
  Oscar Navarro: Yeah, or they did that with who's the lady who plays Princess Leia in the Last Star Wars movie.
• 5:30
  Oscar Navarro: She was already dead.
• 5:31
  Oscar Navarro: Was that what they did?
• 5:32
  Oscar Navarro: Yeah, it was all.
• 5:33
  Emeal Zwayne: AI.
• 5:34
  Emeal Zwayne: I had no idea that's crazy.
• 5:36
  Emeal Zwayne: So yeah, anyways, friends, like we told you, we're continuing our NRB interview series and we got to sit down with our brother, alan Parr, who's a big YouTuber we talk about that in the interview and he was a cool guy.
• 5:53
  Oscar Navarro: Yeah, we got to discuss the importance of good theology, which you know, that word theology, some people might think to themselves well, I'm not really into theology, Just give me Jesus Mark.
• 6:03
  Oscar Navarro: Why is theology so important?
• 6:05
  Mark Spence: Yeah, theos is God's study, ofology the study of.
• 6:08
  Mark Spence: So we need to have a good study of God.
• 6:10
  Mark Spence: I think it was CS Lewis who said if you do not have good theology, it's not the fact that you don't study.
• 6:17
  Mark Spence: Oh boy, I'm going to chop it up.
• 6:19
  Mark Spence: We all have an understanding of God, but some of us have a proper understanding of God because we read our Bibles.
• 6:27
  Mark Spence: Hmm, that's good.
• 6:29
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, and Ray, you've always said to how important it is that we keep apologetics as we're doing, theology through it and its proper context, that we always get back to the gospel, because sometimes people miss some work in that.
• 6:41
  Ray Comfort: Yeah, you can just dry out with theology if you don't have the gospel intermingled with it.
• 6:45
  Ray Comfort: So it's very important, because you become introvert and just want to eat the fat.
• 6:50
  Ray Comfort: Yeah, you know, and you need the protein.
• 6:53
  Mark Spence: Yeah, and that's what doxology is right.
• 6:55
  Mark Spence: So you have theology, which we should, we should study, and that good theology is going to lead to doxology, which is a carrying out of what we're learning and reading.
• 7:03
  Mark Spence: Spurgeon said I will study myself to death, but then I'll pray myself alive.
• 7:07
  Mark Spence: Hmm, it's good.
• 7:10
  Oscar Navarro: And so this theology is ultimately knowing God.
• 7:12
  Oscar Navarro: And so even to say like, oh, I don't, I don't want to pay attention to theology or doctrine, just give me Jesus.
• 7:18
  Oscar Navarro: That is in itself a doctrinal statement, right, so you already have a theological foundation by making that claim in and of itself.
• 7:24
  Oscar Navarro: But also, more than that, let's talk about your loves, like when you get married.
• 7:28
  Oscar Navarro: Nobody says I don't need to get to know my wife any better.
• 7:31
  Oscar Navarro: As long as she cooks and cleans and keeps the house in order, we're good to go.
• 7:35
  Ray Comfort: No, you get married.
• 7:36
  Ray Comfort: Nobody says that.
• 7:37
  Ray Comfort: I hope not Exactly.
• 7:40
  Oscar Navarro: If somebody said that you would question the relationship they have, the love they have for their wife, right when you get married, you long to know your wife.
• 7:48
  Oscar Navarro: I've been married to my wife 12 years.
• 7:49
  Oscar Navarro: I know her much better on year 12 than I did on year one.
• 7:53
  Oscar Navarro: By the grace of God, I'll know her more on year 13.
• 7:55
  Oscar Navarro: And that same way, theology is knowing God, knowing who he is, what he has done, the details of your creator and savior.
• 8:05
  Oscar Navarro: And so to grow as a Christian is to grow to know your savior.
• 8:09
  Emeal Zwayne: Amen.
• 8:09
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, we're going to jump into that, but first a comment.
• 8:12
  Emeal Zwayne: This is from informative, inspiring and convicting.
• 8:15
  Emeal Zwayne: These four men have a wealth of knowledge and insight to share that has inspired me on so many levels and convicts me to be a better disciple, fulfilling the great commandment and the great commission.
• 8:25
  Emeal Zwayne: As of a retired Southern Baptist missionary, how I wish I'd had this level, depth of information and expertise during our time in the Middle East, 94 to 2011, and sub-Saharan Africa 2011 to 2015.
• 8:37
  Emeal Zwayne: But I have it now in the US, where the world has come here.
• 8:41
  Emeal Zwayne: This podcast will truly stir your heart.
• 8:43
  Emeal Zwayne: And that was from Scott, right?
• 8:45
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, that's right, scott.
• 8:46
  Emeal Zwayne: Thank you, scott, so much and very encouraging.
• 8:49
  Emeal Zwayne: And, friends, make sure to check out.
• 8:50
  Emeal Zwayne: How to Be Born Free from the Fear of Death book by Ray Comfort and the evidence study Bible.
• 8:56
  Oscar Navarro: How to Be Free from the Fear of Death.
• 8:58
  Oscar Navarro: You said how to be born free.
• 9:01
  Emeal Zwayne: Oh, that's the name of a movie, whatever, check it out, don't forget the evidence.
• 9:06
  Emeal Zwayne: Study Bible and Living Waters podcast mugalllivingwaterscom.
• 9:09
  Emeal Zwayne: And now, friends, talking about how to recognize and confront false teachings without any further ado, our dear brother Alan Parr.
• 9:19
  Emeal Zwayne: So, friends, as you can tell from all the noise that's flowing here in the background, we are still at NRB and here we are with Alan Parr.
• 9:29
  Emeal Zwayne: You like that, alan?
• 9:30
  Emeal Zwayne: You like that little jingle there?
• 9:31
  Ray Comfort: That was good, you got to change the name of your.
• 9:34
  Emeal Zwayne: YouTube channel.
• 9:34
  Emeal Zwayne: Bro, here we are with Alan Parr.
• 9:36
  Emeal Zwayne: That's a good one.
• 9:37
  Emeal Zwayne: I like it.
• 9:37
  Emeal Zwayne: Man, it's so good to have you on with us today.
• 9:40
  Emeal Zwayne: You know I've been familiar with you primarily through your YouTube channel, the Beat, which stands for Biblical Encouragement and Truth.
• 9:47
  Emeal Zwayne: A lot of people don't know that.
• 9:50
  Emeal Zwayne: I know, man, but you know I've been following you for a while, just you know, seeing you on there with your videos, and actually I've been.
• 9:55
  Emeal Zwayne: I've been looking at the race between us because our YouTube channel we're right at about 1.3 million and you just hit 1 million, yeah.
• 10:02
  Emeal Zwayne: And so tell us real quick about that journey and how you even launched into YouTube just to kick us off.
• 10:08
  Allen Parr: Yeah, yeah.
• 10:09
  Allen Parr: So I started YouTube in 2015 and really just wanted a platform to be able to share the word of God to answer questions that I saw people were having a lot of questions.
• 10:19
  Allen Parr: People are asking that they weren't comfortable asking their pastor.
• 10:22
  Allen Parr: They were going to Google and I said you know what, how cool would it be to put out content that would answer people's questions that maybe they're embarrassed to ask and teach the word of God online and reach people that I would have never been able to reach outside of the church?
• 10:37
  Allen Parr: Yeah, and so I started YouTube.
• 10:40
  Allen Parr: At that time, I was a Bible-casional minister.
• 10:42
  Allen Parr: I was teaching a high school math for about 11 years or so, and I was serving on staff at a church part-time and I was just trying to put out content, wasn't thinking about getting to a million subscribers or anything like that, I was just happy to get a hundred people.
• 10:56
  Allen Parr: That was more people than I had attending the Bible study.
• 10:58
  Allen Parr: I was teaching at the time, so I was just happy with that.
• 11:00
  Allen Parr: I love it.
• 11:01
  Allen Parr: And then people started gravitating towards the content because a lot of it was short form five, six, seven minutes, packing a lot of information into a short period of time, right, and I think people appreciated that and so it kind of grew from there.
• 11:15
  Allen Parr: And here we are seven, eight years later and God's been faithful man, I love that.
• 11:19
  Emeal Zwayne: you know.
• 11:20
  Emeal Zwayne: That is so Ray comfort-esque.
• 11:21
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, we always talk about how you know, ray will just get passionate about something.
• 11:26
  Emeal Zwayne: He'll start doing it and then, lo and behold, it goes out to the world and everyone's getting impacted.
• 11:30
  Emeal Zwayne: And it actually kind of reminds me of, I think, a mutual friend of ours, to Mike Winger.
• 11:34
  Ray Comfort: Yeah, you know.
• 11:35
  Emeal Zwayne: Mike.
• 11:35
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, mike is a great brother and, yeah, he was actually a part of the church that brought.
• 11:39
  Emeal Zwayne: He was a part of the church that brought Ray out to the United States, way back when Okay and I used to lead worship at our Christmas parties for Loving.
• 11:46
  Emeal Zwayne: Water and he just started putting up these videos.
• 11:48
  Emeal Zwayne: Next thing you know, I think he's getting close to like six hundred thousand subs you know, and the reason why guys like you and Mike Winger and others encouraged me is because you guys have a heart for the glory of God.
• 12:01
  Emeal Zwayne: You know you're not doing it to bolster yourself or to perpetuate your name, but you started it out because, lord, I just I want to impact people with truth, and then God has blessed that.
• 12:10
  Emeal Zwayne: So it's really exciting and we're blessed to have you, brother.
• 12:14
  Emeal Zwayne: We want to talk today in a little bit about your book, miss Led, which I'm excited to discuss because I know it's your first one and there's a lot of good stuff in it.
• 12:21
  Emeal Zwayne: We'll hit that.
• 12:22
  Emeal Zwayne: We want to talk about a few other things and we got Oscar with us here today to hi Oscar.
• 12:26
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, hello there, welcome back to the N R B.
• 12:29
  Oscar Navarro: How's your time been here?
• 12:30
  Allen Parr: Alan man, it's been great.
• 12:31
  Allen Parr: Last year I got a chance to come and I was invited to speak, so I only came for two days.
• 12:37
  Allen Parr: The day before I spoke, I flew in and then stayed the night and spoke and then left, and I did not have any clue that this was here, right?
• 12:47
  Allen Parr: I didn't even know anything about N R B.
• 12:49
  Allen Parr: So, this year I got invited back to speak, thankfully, and I said I'm staying for the whole week, so I've been here since Sunday and I'm going to be leaving tomorrow, on Thursday, so it's been great People getting connected with you guys, so yeah, awesome, so you're originally from Pittsburgh.
• 13:05
  Emeal Zwayne: You're telling us, yes, you're in Dallas now.
• 13:08
  Emeal Zwayne: Yes, and you got a wife, two kids.
• 13:10
  Emeal Zwayne: Yes, how old are your?
• 13:10
  Allen Parr: kids six and almost five six year old daughter and five almost a five year old son.
• 13:16
  Emeal Zwayne: Oh, nice man what a, what a blessing.
• 13:17
  Emeal Zwayne: Do you bring your family with you out here to go to Disney World or anything?
• 13:20
  Allen Parr: man, that is my biggest regret.
• 13:24
  Emeal Zwayne: You're that close to Disney World you bring the family I mean it's.
• 13:27
  Allen Parr: I mean the kids got out of school last week man, you messed up, I easily brought my wife and my kids.
• 13:35
  Oscar Navarro: They could have been thinking about how much therapy you're going to have to pay for it because you didn't bring your kids on this trip.
• 13:39
  Allen Parr: I know.
• 13:40
  Allen Parr: I'm just not going to tell them what they're going to stop.
• 13:42
  Allen Parr: That's what it is.
• 13:42
  Allen Parr: Keep it hidden.
• 13:43
  Oscar Navarro: Well, I hear this podcast one day and it's going to change everything, yeah you're busted man, yeah.
• 13:48
  Emeal Zwayne: So alright, let's jump into this.
• 13:50
  Emeal Zwayne: You know, apologetics is a big part of what you do, and I think there are still a lot of Christians you wouldn't think so, but I've been surprised by some of the things that I thought.
• 13:58
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, of course every Christian knows about this, but but how many don't?
• 14:01
  Emeal Zwayne: So, just to kick us off, talk a little bit about what.
• 14:04
  Emeal Zwayne: What is apologetics and and why is it important for Christians to understand how to work with it?
• 14:11
  Allen Parr: Yeah, so apologetics is a fancy theological word.
• 14:15
  Allen Parr: That doesn't mean that you're apologizing for being a Christian.
• 14:18
  Emeal Zwayne: That's an immediate thought.
• 14:19
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, it's like what?
• 14:20
  Allen Parr: am I apologizing for I'm a?
• 14:21
  Emeal Zwayne: Christian.
• 14:21
  Allen Parr: I should be proud of this.
• 14:22
  Allen Parr: Well, it actually the Greek word.
• 14:24
  Allen Parr: It comes from first Peter, chapter three, verse 15, where Peter says we should always be ready to make a defense for the hope that we have, as you all know, and that Greek word, defense, is the Greek word apologia for those who may not be familiar with that.
• 14:37
  Allen Parr: And so from that came a branch of study in Christian Christianity called apologetics, or the study of how to defend what you believe and why you believe it.
• 14:46
  Allen Parr: And it's really, really important, because I always say that apologetics has a two fold benefit.
• 14:52
  Allen Parr: First and foremost, it strengthens the belief of the individual Christian.
• 14:57
  Allen Parr: So if you're a Christian, you grew up in church, but you still have questions in your mind about what is true, should I believe this?
• 15:04
  Allen Parr: Did Jesus really rise from the dead?
• 15:06
  Allen Parr: Is the Bible truly written, you know, by man and inspired by God?
• 15:10
  Allen Parr: You can be a Christian for many, many years and still have these questions.
• 15:13
  Allen Parr: Well, apologetics will help you get stronger in your understanding of what you believe and why you believe it.
• 15:19
  Allen Parr: But then the external benefit is that it prepares you to be able to defend your belief to other people, skeptics, other religions that might not believe what you believe and it just gives you that confidence to be able to speak about your faith.
• 15:35
  Oscar Navarro: Ellen, a quick question for you in regards to that.
• 15:37
  Oscar Navarro: How has our approach, if it has changed over the years, to apologize, in other words, the way I approach apologize?
• 15:44
  Oscar Navarro: Is it the same as the way someone did in the 80s and 90s and it is today?
• 15:47
  Oscar Navarro: Or because of the cultural shifts to the questions and answers?
• 15:52
  Oscar Navarro: You know, the gospel always stays the same, but how does apologetics and the way approach it shift, based on the direction of the culture?
• 16:00
  Allen Parr: Well, I'll say this that the culture is definitely changing, because even within Christianity let's just stay within Christianity for just a moment because there is a lot of things that we were all growing up that we just accepted to be true, we didn't question it.
• 16:11
  Allen Parr: But now we're living in a time where even Christians are questioning what they believe and why they believe it, and that's led to, as what we all know, this mass craze of people deconstructing their faith and breaking it down and sometimes even leaving the faith, and so, now more than ever, we need to be equipped to be able to know what we believe.
• 16:28
  Allen Parr: So I think it's changed.
• 16:29
  Allen Parr: I think one of the things that we need to do now more than ever, is, instead of feeling this pressure to have an answer for every single question that people have because that can be a lot of pressure for Christians right Is to kind of take a different approach.
• 16:43
  Allen Parr: I love Greg Cookeles book tactics.
• 16:45
  Allen Parr: It really encourages us to ask questions.
• 16:49
  Allen Parr: Yeah, what do you mean by that?
• 16:50
  Allen Parr: right, yeah, these are questions exactly and that get put the burden of proof on other people to explain what they believe, yeah, why they believe it.
• 16:59
  Oscar Navarro: You just used a word deconstruction.
• 17:01
  Oscar Navarro: For those listening that may have heard that, I mean, I'm sure if you've been listening to any podcast and YouTube channel, reading any articles, you've probably come across that word before, but not many people stop and actually define it.
• 17:10
  Oscar Navarro: What does it mean?
• 17:13
  Oscar Navarro: To deconstruct?
• 17:14
  Oscar Navarro: And essentially the process of deconstruction is starting with one place.
• 17:18
  Oscar Navarro: Somebody would start and say I'm a Christian but I have questions and they begin to question one aspect of their faith.
• 17:23
  Oscar Navarro: Maybe it's questioning the stance the scriptures take on on gender and sexuality.
• 17:29
  Oscar Navarro: Maybe they start there and maybe they move on to the inerrancy of scripture and maybe they move on to the deity of Christ and the Trinity and maybe they move on to the substitutionary atonement and before you know it, they've deconstructed, they've pulled out a thread and unwound everything.
• 17:44
  Oscar Navarro: It is about their faith.
• 17:45
  Oscar Navarro: So most people, when we talk about deconstruction, we talk about people who start from a place of assuming that they are Christian.
• 17:51
  Oscar Navarro: Maybe they grew up in the church and they begin to deconstruct.
• 17:55
  Oscar Navarro: They start one step at a time and remove themselves from orthodox, traditional Christianity easy.
• 18:01
  Oscar Navarro: What do does somebody need because it's one thing to to exploring, question one aspect of our faith.
• 18:09
  Oscar Navarro: What is a way in which we can do that that will draw us closer to the glory of God.
• 18:13
  Oscar Navarro: And what are ways that we can do that?
• 18:15
  Oscar Navarro: Well, they will end up pulling us further and further away from the truth.
• 18:18
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, I think, you know, motive is really at the heart of it.
• 18:21
  Emeal Zwayne: Why is it that I'm really probing this?
• 18:23
  Emeal Zwayne: I think one of the real downsides of those who are in the faith today, want to appear sincere, is that they don't find answers to their questions and they don't go to the right sources.
• 18:38
  Emeal Zwayne: You know, it's like no one wants to appear to not be in league Right.
• 18:43
  Emeal Zwayne: It's a whole peer pressure thing with the rest of the church will fight asses question what are people gonna think?
• 18:47
  Emeal Zwayne: I think that I really don't love the Lord or I'm, you know.
• 18:50
  Emeal Zwayne: But there's a balance between hey, you know, I came across this verse here.
• 18:55
  Emeal Zwayne: It just kind of troubled me a little bit.
• 18:56
  Emeal Zwayne: What, what does that mean?
• 18:57
  Emeal Zwayne: Or I was talking to a Jehovah's Witness and they brought up the deity of Christ and they showed me some verses that the father's greater than I.
• 19:04
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, what's that mean?
• 19:05
  Emeal Zwayne: You know, and I love that.
• 19:07
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, if we don't do that, we're not gonna grow as Christians, right, but but oftentimes I think many who go down the pathway of deconstruction have some kind of compromise going on in their lives as supposed believers, yeah, and.
• 19:23
  Emeal Zwayne: And then the motive becomes oh, maybe I can untangle myself from Accountability to this God I've claimed to believe in, and see what happens.
• 19:32
  Emeal Zwayne: Alan, you know one of the things that I love that you talk about in your book, is it not?
• 19:36
  Emeal Zwayne: Everyone who professes to be a Christian is a Christian.
• 19:39
  Emeal Zwayne: Talk about that a little bit.
• 19:40
  Allen Parr: This is a difficult one because people have different views on this, and my personal view is that not every single person I think Jesus even confirms this in Matthew, chapter 7, you know, not every single person who, let's just say, you're nine years old or you're ten years old, you go to church and you go to Sunday school and they scare you into going to hell and you're like, oh, I don't want to get burned, you know?
• 20:03
  Allen Parr: so I'm gonna okay, I'll get saved.
• 20:05
  Allen Parr: You know, tell me what I have to do, tell me what I have to say.
• 20:07
  Allen Parr: And you repeat some words and you go through your life and you think, okay, that just means I'm a Christian because I repeated some words in a prayer Whenever I was ten years old.
• 20:15
  Allen Parr: Yeah, but then there's no type of fruit in your life, there's no conversion, there's no clear Demonstration that you are walking in the things of God.
• 20:25
  Allen Parr: You know that person.
• 20:27
  Allen Parr: There's no desire to study the word, there's no desire to have Christian community, there's no desire to worship, there's no desire for church, there's no desire for any of these things.
• 20:35
  Allen Parr: I'm saying that that person Could very well be in a position where they think that they're saved yeah, simply because of what they may have said.
• 20:43
  Allen Parr: But there's no relationship and I think that's what Jesus was saying in Matthew 70 says hey, depart from me, because I never knew you yeah, right we never had a relationship.
• 20:52
  Allen Parr: That's what it means to be saved is we need to have a relationship, and that relationship obviously comes through faith alone, through Christ alone.
• 20:59
  Allen Parr: And so you know, there are many who are Sadly professing to be Christians, but they're showing absolutely no fruit of being a Christian.
• 21:07
  Oscar Navarro: Yeah, and by bringing that up, you know there might be somebody listening going oh man, well, how do I know that I'm a Christian?
• 21:13
  Oscar Navarro: And let me start by saying you cannot know.
• 21:17
  Oscar Navarro: You cannot be affirmed in your faith by hopping online and watching YouTube channels, following Twitter accounts, listening to podcast.
• 21:24
  Oscar Navarro: The only way, biblically, that you can affirm that you are in Christ is through the context of a local church, to be known and loved by and cared for for pastors and elders and Other members of the church, for them to know your life, to see your life and affirm the fruits in your life.
• 21:41
  Oscar Navarro: That is the the paramount way that Christ gives us to know whether we are Christian or not.
• 21:48
  Oscar Navarro: If you are trying to live this life as a Christian on your own, autonomously, just online or going to a church but not actually being involved, just being another button, the seat, there's no way for you to know in that kind of a context.
• 22:02
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, yeah.
• 22:03
  Emeal Zwayne: And now it really is not a popular message today to Challenge people on where they're at spiritually, whether or not they're safe.
• 22:10
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean and scriptures clear on that make your calling an election shirt examine yourself to see if you're in the faith.
• 22:14
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, first, john is really the go-to book to examine yourself.
• 22:19
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean by this we know we've come to know him if we keep his commandments.
• 22:22
  Emeal Zwayne: The one who says I've come to know him doesn't keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him.
• 22:25
  Emeal Zwayne: Right, god is light and then there's no darkness at all.
• 22:27
  Emeal Zwayne: If we say we have fellowship with him but walk in darkness, we line, don't practice the truth, right?
• 22:31
  Emeal Zwayne: Titus 1 16 they profess to know God but by their deeds they deny him.
• 22:34
  Emeal Zwayne: And we're not doing the world a service by just saying, hey, you said that prayer you're in.
• 22:40
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, we got to confront them with with truth and say, hey, here's what scripture says.
• 22:44
  Emeal Zwayne: Do you align?
• 22:45
  Emeal Zwayne: You know with that exactly, and so I'm glad you do that in the book.
• 22:48
  Emeal Zwayne: So let's jump into discussing the book a little bit.
• 22:51
  Emeal Zwayne: What?
• 22:51
  Mark Spence: gave you the idea.
• 22:52
  Emeal Zwayne: Oh, there you go.
• 22:56
  Allen Parr: Yeah, yeah.
• 22:56
  Allen Parr: So really the inspiration behind the book really came from three different places.
• 23:01
  Allen Parr: First and foremost, for my personal experience.
• 23:03
  Allen Parr: So whenever I was in college I was a part of a church that was an unhealthy church.
• 23:09
  Allen Parr: It was a toxic environment and I didn't know at the time, but they were teaching a lot of false doctrines.
• 23:15
  Allen Parr: That I just wasn't aware because I was a younger Christian.
• 23:18
  Allen Parr: I just started my walk with God when I was, you know, 19, 20 years old, didn't know how to discern truth from air, and so I was in An environment where I was being fed all of these different false teachings and I had no idea.
• 23:29
  Allen Parr: And then finally, whenever I realized it, I tried to get out.
• 23:32
  Allen Parr: But I was just.
• 23:33
  Allen Parr: I was told that you know, hey, you're gonna, you're not gonna wear your spiritual covering and just using a lot of spiritual manipulation Tactics to kind of keep me bound, kind of like a user would keep somebody.
• 23:44
  Allen Parr: Yeah, I'm taught unhealthy relationship, so thankfully I was able to get out of that.
• 23:48
  Allen Parr: But then, not only that, I would say.
• 23:51
  Allen Parr: Another thing that motivated me was I've got a lot of friends who have Unfortunately been deceived by a lot of false teachings over the years, and I've seen how them their lives have been derailed Because they have been following teachings that are not consistent with the scriptures and some of them, unfortunately, have never really returned to a Church.
• 24:14
  Allen Parr: Some of them have never turned to their relationship with Jesus Christ.
• 24:16
  Allen Parr: Yeah, and then the final thing that motivated me was as I'm sure you all can relate to.
• 24:21
  Allen Parr: This is looking at how People respond my YouTube channel, the comments when I put a video out that I believe is sound doctrine, and I see people commenting and saying, oh, when my church teaches this, my church teaches that or this is what I believe.
• 24:34
  Allen Parr: And I see them taking scriptures out of context and not understanding how to properly interpret the Bible.
• 24:39
  Allen Parr: My heart just weeped for them, and so I wanted to write a book that Cleared up a lot of confusion about what I believe are the seven most destructive false teachings today.
• 24:49
  Allen Parr: How?
• 24:49
  Oscar Navarro: important is Theology in the midst apologetics, because we just talked about apologetics which might sound like it's simply world-facing, but now we're shifting and you know the subtitle of your book is a seven lies of the distort the gospel, and so that sounds more church-facing.
• 25:05
  Ray Comfort: Yes, right.
• 25:05
  Oscar Navarro: But how important is it to have a right understanding of theology alongside our apologetics?
• 25:11
  Allen Parr: Yeah, I call theology the guardrails of your faith, right.
• 25:14
  Allen Parr: I mean there are certain Theological principles that should guard you.
• 25:19
  Allen Parr: We call them the core tenets of the Christian faith the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, the deity of Christ, the hypostatic union which is a fancy word for Jesus being fully God and fully man, 100% fully God, 100% fully man.
• 25:30
  Allen Parr: The eternal state of the dead, the inerrancy of scripture, all of these things.
• 25:35
  Allen Parr: So the theology I call it's kind of like vegetables, right?
• 25:38
  Allen Parr: It's like we don't want to eat our vegetables whenever kids, but we need them right.
• 25:42
  Oscar Navarro: Theology is not lost, eddie, when you said vegetables 47 years old.
• 25:48
  Allen Parr: I eat them all the time.
• 25:49
  Allen Parr: I'm trying to stay healthy, but it's one of those things where it's like it's not the most fun thing for us to study.
• 25:55
  Allen Parr: But we need that because a good, solid theological understanding will guard us against some of these false, destructive doctrines that are coming in to lead us astray.
• 26:08
  Oscar Navarro: Let me Give you a gentle pushback, because you said not a fun thing to study.
• 26:13
  Oscar Navarro: I actually think, well, I know you agree with fun for me.
• 26:16
  Ray Comfort: I know exactly that's exactly.
• 26:18
  Oscar Navarro: I know you were gonna say that, which is to some people.
• 26:20
  Oscar Navarro: They might think well, theology is just stuff for my pastor or stuff for you know, the professor.
• 26:26
  Oscar Navarro: That doesn't sound fun.
• 26:27
  Oscar Navarro: Listen, when your love for Christ increases, your desire to know him will increase along with it, because, ultimately, theology is just the knowledge of God, right?
• 26:41
  Oscar Navarro: And so, in that same way, you know, when you first meet your spouse, you start to have an affection for them.
• 26:46
  Oscar Navarro: What do you do?
• 26:46
  Oscar Navarro: You take them out to dinner and you want to know who they are.
• 26:48
  Oscar Navarro: Tell me about your family, tell me about your friends, your hobbies.
• 26:51
  Oscar Navarro: You're investing your knowledge into the thing that you adore, and so the more that you adore God, the more that theology is just gonna become a natural next step in your adoration of the one who saved you.
• 27:06
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, you know, I think, like Paul David Tripp says, value impacts behavior.
• 27:10
  Emeal Zwayne: I know that there are a lot of people listening to us who would say, man, that's not my natural inclination.
• 27:16
  Emeal Zwayne: I'd rather read a novel, you know, I'd rather read something that's aligned with, maybe, my hobby or whatever my personal interests are.
• 27:24
  Emeal Zwayne: How much we value something will impact our behavior.
• 27:27
  Emeal Zwayne: Do we value souls?
• 27:28
  Emeal Zwayne: Because, again, what's the end goal right of apologetics Is to reach souls, and sometimes we do have to do things that we don't find pleasurable.
• 27:36
  Emeal Zwayne: I love the saying that says lead with your will and let your emotions follow.
• 27:40
  Emeal Zwayne: I love that If they do right, they might.
• 27:42
  Emeal Zwayne: They might not.
• 27:43
  Emeal Zwayne: But hey, I don't really feel like taking care of my kids today.
• 27:45
  Emeal Zwayne: That's a good principle for marriage.
• 27:47
  Allen Parr: Yeah right, I'm always going to feel it.
• 27:48
  Allen Parr: Yeah, exactly.
• 27:50
  Emeal Zwayne: But you do what you know is right, despite what you feel, what you think or even what your emotions and circumstances are influencing you to do.
• 27:56
  Emeal Zwayne: You know.
• 27:58
  Oscar Navarro: Yeah, and just to add to that easy, there are so many people out there that would be like, well, my mind's not really built that way, or I don't really think that way.
• 28:02
  Oscar Navarro: But then that same person.
• 28:04
  Oscar Navarro: Often it's like they're the top of their fantasy league, right, They've got every quarterback wide receiver and running back down.
• 28:12
  Oscar Navarro: They invest the time, energy and attention into their fantasy football, but they're not willing to invest that same time, energy and attention into God's word, which is the point that you're making.
• 28:22
  Oscar Navarro: Where do you put your values?
• 28:24
  Emeal Zwayne: Exactly, yeah, invest for the sake of souls and be eternally minded.
• 28:28
  Emeal Zwayne: So, alan, let me ask you this Obviously, error in the church is not something new.
• 28:34
  Emeal Zwayne: There have been lies circulating since the very beginning.
• 28:36
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, most of the epistles were dealing with how to deal with certain Pharisees that were floating around in the church.
• 28:43
  Emeal Zwayne: But let me ask you this how do Christians recognize what error is Especially when we see so many half truths floating around, right, I mean, hey, that looks right.
• 28:53
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean we're listening to a famous televangelist, maybe, but he was saying good stuff, but there's mixture in there.
• 28:59
  Emeal Zwayne: So how do we discern and recognize it?
• 29:01
  Allen Parr: Yeah, yeah.
• 29:02
  Allen Parr: Well, first and foremost, I would say to kind of piggyback off what Oscar had mentioned a moment ago is just getting into a good Bible-based church.
• 29:10
  Allen Parr: That can be very subjective, because many people who are in these churches that are teaching false doctrine might think that they're in a Bible-based church, right, but I'm talking about a church that is, you know, that is pastored by somebody who has been trained theologically, somebody who understands proper hermeneutical principles for how to interpret the Word of God, somebody who, preferably, has come from a reputable seminary.
• 29:36
  Allen Parr: You know, just that's going to help right there.
• 29:40
  Allen Parr: But I would say, if you're just on a kind of a solo, you're trying to figure it out on your own.
• 29:44
  Allen Parr: I typically give people three principles right, context, I mean just simple context, right, when we talk about, let's just say, philippians 413.
• 29:53
  Allen Parr: If I'm at a football game and I see somebody holding up a sign and we're down like 50 to zero and I see somebody Philippians 413, we can do all things to Christ, who gives me strength.
• 30:01
  Allen Parr: There's a lot of Christians who will be out there holding that sign or maybe they'll quote it to themselves as they're getting ready to speak in front of a large audience.
• 30:09
  Allen Parr: Well, I can do all things to Christ, who gives me strength.
• 30:10
  Allen Parr: I'm nervous, but I don't.
• 30:11
  Allen Parr: But you have to go back.
• 30:13
  Allen Parr: Okay, was Paul talking about?
• 30:14
  Allen Parr: Do you think Paul had in mind like football whenever he was writing this, from prison to the church of Philippi?
• 30:20
  Oscar Navarro: After being church-tracked, and right Exactly.
• 30:23
  Allen Parr: I mean you look at the context and, without going all the details, he's clearly talking about the ability to be content in whatever circumstance he's in, whether a base, or a bound whether to be full or to be hungry, whether they have a lot or a little.
• 30:34
  Allen Parr: He's saying the secret that I've been able to discover Paul in prison, sitting here, is that I'm able to be content in whatever state that I'm in, because Christ will give me the strength to do anything, to be content in all circumstances.
• 30:45
  Allen Parr: So simple looking at context before and after will help us guard against these false teachings.
• 30:52
  Allen Parr: The second thing is just cross references, because there's a lot of verses in the Bible that we can twist and make it say what we want it to say.
• 31:00
  Allen Parr: Many of them are not easy to understand, but because we know the Bible doesn't contradict itself, we say, okay, this verse over here is somewhat unclear.
• 31:08
  Allen Parr: I don't know what it means.
• 31:10
  Allen Parr: These 30 verses over here are very, very clear about what it says about salvation or about this, that and the other.
• 31:15
  Allen Parr: I'll let these clear verses shed light on this one over here.
• 31:19
  Allen Parr: And then the last one I'll give is consultation Go get some commentaries, get a Bible dictionary, get some encyclopedias, get some tools to check what you think or your pastor is saying that this means against other reputable scholars who have done the research so good.
• 31:35
  Emeal Zwayne: You know, you really summarized for us really the kind of core, foundational principles of hermeneutics.
• 31:41
  Emeal Zwayne: You used that word hermeneutical earlier.
• 31:42
  Emeal Zwayne: It's a big fancy word to a lot of people.
• 31:44
  Emeal Zwayne: A good friend, Todd Freel, had a series out that was called Hermon who because hermeneutics what in the world is that?
• 31:50
  Emeal Zwayne: But, Alan, it really is a foundational thing, isn't it?
• 31:53
  Emeal Zwayne: Because when you get to the root of why error springs up in the first place, it really comes down to a proper interpretation of Scripture, and that's pretty much hermeneutics, yeah.
• 32:05
  Allen Parr: Yeah, I mean, that's where a lot of it comes from Somebody taking a verse.
• 32:08
  Allen Parr: And I would add one other thing too is obviously there is a place in church for topical sermons.
• 32:15
  Allen Parr: I've done them before and that's great, but I would encourage people who are listening to find a church that teaches expository.
• 32:23
  Allen Parr: And then, for those who don't know what that means, that means like looking at a passage of Scripture where the pastor actually gives you the context, the background, and he does a verse by verse breakdown of that passage, and that way you can be assured that you're not being led astray or the scripture will take it out of context, because it's not just I've got 30 scriptures for you in this sermon, I'm just throwing them all out there and you don't even know if what the pastor is saying is in context.
• 32:49
  Allen Parr: Yeah, that's good.
• 32:50
  Oscar Navarro: You know, ultimately what we're talking about here is biblical literacy and we're actually doing a podcast very soon here on biblical literacy in which we're going to break that down and talk about the importance of that and ultimately, the lack of that in a local church.
• 33:04
  Oscar Navarro: But I think in the context of immediacy, if somebody is right now listening and going and I do lack in biblical literacy, I don't know if my church is a good church, easy, what are just like a quick way for somebody to know if they're a church or find a church that cares about things like this.
• 33:21
  Oscar Navarro: Is there quick shortcuts to get started?
• 33:23
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, I think when you're looking for a healthy, sound church, what you want to do is look for a church that elevates God's word within the service.
• 33:32
  Emeal Zwayne: It's crazy how so little time God's word is given in services anymore.
• 33:37
  Emeal Zwayne: Church services have become a concert.
• 33:39
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, you've got some churches that are you know they're doing the fog machines and the crazy lighting and that it's all about the performance.
• 33:47
  Oscar Navarro: I actually brought my fog machine for this podcast.
• 33:49
  Oscar Navarro: I knew you did Cars on stage, but you know what I mean.
• 33:53
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean pastors zip lining in.
• 33:54
  Emeal Zwayne: You hear about this.
• 33:56
  Emeal Zwayne: You think no one does that.
• 33:57
  Emeal Zwayne: You go on YouTube just look some stuff up.
• 33:59
  Oscar Navarro: I just saw somebody climbing a pink ladder the other day in the middle of a sermon.
• 34:03
  Oscar Navarro: I was like what is happening right now?
• 34:05
  Emeal Zwayne: You think you've seen it all, and then something else pops up.
• 34:07
  Emeal Zwayne: But elevating scripture.
• 34:10
  Emeal Zwayne: That's going to be evident in what's happening in the service.
• 34:13
  Emeal Zwayne: What is their ecclesiology?
• 34:14
  Emeal Zwayne: How do they function in their leadership?
• 34:16
  Emeal Zwayne: What kind of accountability exists with the leaders?
• 34:19
  Emeal Zwayne: Do they observe the ordinances that Christ gave us?
• 34:22
  Emeal Zwayne: Are they baptizing people?
• 34:23
  Emeal Zwayne: Are they?
• 34:24
  Emeal Zwayne: Are they yeah, are they acknowledging the Lord's Supper?
• 34:27
  Emeal Zwayne: These things are so key and essential.
• 34:29
  Emeal Zwayne: Are they evangelistic?
• 34:31
  Ray Comfort: Do they care?
• 34:31
  Emeal Zwayne: about souls, I would evaluate.
• 34:33
  Emeal Zwayne: Are they a politically correct church?
• 34:36
  Emeal Zwayne: They're afraid to talk about the current topics of our day.
• 34:38
  Emeal Zwayne: And, alan, that leads me to my next question to you.
• 34:41
  Emeal Zwayne: We've all heard about progressivism within politics.
• 34:45
  Emeal Zwayne: Oh, they're progressive, he's progressive, she's progressive, but that's crept into the church.
• 34:50
  Emeal Zwayne: What are the roots to progressivism within Christianity and how do we identify that and combat it?
• 34:55
  Allen Parr: Yeah.
• 34:56
  Allen Parr: So first and foremost, I want to kind of make sure that our listeners are understanding kind of what that term actually means.
• 35:02
  Allen Parr: So when we talk about a progressive church or someone who says they are a progressive Christian, it's this concept that as the culture has progressed on its views on certain things let's just say moral issues then Christians need to get on board.
• 35:18
  Allen Parr: We need to kind of get in line because we need to progress as well.
• 35:21
  Allen Parr: So perfect example is three or 400 years ago, or even 100 years ago, if you asked Christians or non-Christians is it okay for same-sex couples to get married?
• 35:31
  Allen Parr: I mean, christians or non-Christians would probably agree and say no, we would never get sanctioned a same-sex marriage.
• 35:40
  Allen Parr: But because the culture has progressed on these issues, such as a woman's right to her child, then therefore the church needs to get on board and progress, because God's view has progressed on these things as well.
• 35:51
  Allen Parr: And so there's a lot of churches and subsequently a lot of Christians who consider themselves Christians and they consider themselves progressive Christians.
• 36:00
  Allen Parr: So if you're looking at a church and you look at their website, that's the first thing you should do before you start thinking about visiting a church.
• 36:05
  Allen Parr: And if you see the word.
• 36:07
  Allen Parr: We are a progressive church, inclusive of all people from all walks of life and things like that.
• 36:13
  Allen Parr: That's the first sign that you're going to be a part of a progressive church.
• 36:17
  Allen Parr: So you ask one of the things that kind of highlight them.
• 36:19
  Allen Parr: There's several that I talk about in the book, but one of them is a relaxed view of moral issues, as we kind of talked about.
• 36:26
  Allen Parr: It's okay for you to come as you are and stay as you are.
• 36:29
  Allen Parr: It's okay for you to live an alternative lifestyle, and we'll even affirm you, we will even ordain you and allow you to serve in any capacity in our church, and there's no encouragement for you to change your lifestyle.
• 36:44
  Oscar Navarro: Yeah, let me just add to that.
• 36:46
  Oscar Navarro: Not all churches will have a big red flag that says progressive on their website, right?
• 36:50
  Oscar Navarro: Sometimes it's a little more subtle than that, and I think it also can start with a lack of care for orthodox, historic Christianity.
• 37:01
  Oscar Navarro: They will look at all of the things that our forefathers have done before us the catechisms and whatnot historic Christianity and they'll have a diminished view of that.
• 37:12
  Oscar Navarro: And they will have a diminished view of that because, from their perspective, their heart is to meet people where they're at, and so it'll feel evangelistic in nature because it feels like they want to reach the lost, reach the unchurch, which again here's you know, you said it earlier which is half truths, right?
• 37:31
  Oscar Navarro: J F Packer has this quote, which is something like a half truth.
• 37:34
  Oscar Navarro: What is it?
• 37:35
  Oscar Navarro: A half truth masquerading as a whole truth is a complete untruth.
• 37:40
  Oscar Navarro: I think that's how J F Packer puts it, which is a really valuable thing to consider when we approach churches that feel evangelistic but are willing to abandon historic orthodox Christianity for the sake of the lost.
• 37:52
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, yeah, and you know, Oscar, one.
• 37:55
  Emeal Zwayne: One other thing came to mind when you were asking about how does someone find the right church.
• 37:58
  Emeal Zwayne: Alan, wouldn't you agree?
• 37:59
  Emeal Zwayne: Check out their statement of faith.
• 38:01
  Allen Parr: That's a good starting point, right.
• 38:03
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, that's going to really kind of unveil where are they at theologically.
• 38:07
  Allen Parr: But I'll say this sometimes sometimes that is can also be a little bit misleading, because there's a lot of churches out here that have a real solid statement of faith, because I think they know that if they put something in their statement of faith that's a little kind of questionable, that people might not come.
• 38:25
  Allen Parr: But when you look at the preaching, when you pay attention to what they're saying from the pulpit, they are more, you know, prosperity theology or more prosperity driven.
• 38:34
  Allen Parr: But their website might not necessarily reflect that.
• 38:37
  Allen Parr: But that is a good first step.
• 38:39
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, because yeah, and I think you know, sometimes you can quickly weed out a church because it's immediate, right From there.
• 38:46
  Emeal Zwayne: It's immediately evident from their statement of faith.
• 38:48
  Emeal Zwayne: You know, it's just fluff and there's no substance to it.
• 38:51
  Emeal Zwayne: You know, when I go on some church websites and I see a robust statement of faith, like I mean they're getting deep and they're they're including scripture in there, it's evident that, okay, you know, there seems to be some foundation here, yeah, but then you got to follow it up and say, well, does the preaching match what's?
• 39:06
  Ray Comfort: in the statement of faith.
• 39:08
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, I want to ask you this.
• 39:09
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean, in the book you talk about some heavy things, so maybe you could highlight a few for us here as we begin to draw to a close.
• 39:14
  Emeal Zwayne: You talk about speaking in tongues in order to be saved, though you know the whole health and wealth type of thing, and these are some of the errors that we need to look out for.
• 39:23
  Emeal Zwayne: Speaking things into existence, prophets, prophecy and healing progressive Christianity, losing your salvation cheap grace those are all things you highlight in the book, so you want to give us kind of a quick overview of some of those.
• 39:35
  Allen Parr: Yeah, sure, so the first chapter.
• 39:37
  Allen Parr: First of all, let me just say the first chapter.
• 39:38
  Allen Parr: When we talk about speaking in tongues, the purpose of that is not to suggest that this gift does not exist anymore.
• 39:45
  Allen Parr: I personally am not a cessationist, although I'd respect those who, who, who may be but the purpose is more so to focus on how this gift is being misused in the church and in the body of Christ.
• 39:58
  Allen Parr: Yeah, Like you have to speak in tongues to be saved right, yeah, you don't speak in tongues, you're not saved.
• 40:02
  Allen Parr: Or if you don't speak in tongues, you don't have the Holy Spirit, or if you don't speak in tongues, then you have.
• 40:08
  Allen Parr: You're a JV Christian.
• 40:09
  Allen Parr: You don't have as much power as those who do?
• 40:12
  Allen Parr: Because we have the ability to speak in tongues and pray in a language that only God can understand and you're limited if you don't do that.
• 40:18
  Allen Parr: So I kind of talk about those types of things and how it's being misused.
• 40:22
  Allen Parr: People are speaking in tongues in church without any interpretation at all, which is a clear violation of 1 Corinthians, chapter 14, where Paul says that unbelievers come in, they're going to think you're crazy, they're going to leave.
• 40:31
  Allen Parr: So I talk about all those things in the first chapter.
• 40:34
  Allen Parr: Second chapter, I really go into detail about some of the dangers of the health and wealth false gospel.
• 40:41
  Allen Parr: I've got friends who have gotten involved in that and they were told that, hey, if you have enough faith, then your loved one is going to be healed of cancer so destructive, exactly.
• 40:50
  Allen Parr: And then these people are trusting God, they're praying, they're fasting, they're getting their church to be able to pray for these people, and then this person passes away.
• 40:58
  Allen Parr: And so not only now do they feel guilty themselves.
• 41:00
  Allen Parr: I must not have had enough faith to be able to save my mom or my sister, but now it turns to anger towards God.
• 41:07
  Allen Parr: God, you did not make good on your promise to save or, excuse me, to heal my brother or sister or whoever, and so I talk about those types of things and how oftentimes it can be a transactional relationship as well.
• 41:20
  Allen Parr: Hey, give to my ministry and God is going to bless you tenfold.
• 41:23
  Allen Parr: And once again, taking things out of context, things of that nature.
• 41:26
  Allen Parr: Chapter three is pretty much piggybacking off of that and looking at one specific aspect of the word of faith movement, which is the idea of speaking things into existence and this idea that we as Christians are little gods and we can create things.
• 41:39
  Allen Parr: Our words have power to create certain things.
• 41:41
  Allen Parr: And I'll even go into an aspect of manifesting which is becoming a new buzzword for Christians, which is coming out of the new thought, new age type of movement that we have the ability to manifest, coming from this idea of a law of attraction for the secret we can attract things to ourselves if we just think good things and think good thoughts.
• 42:01
  Allen Parr: So I talk about that.
• 42:02
  Emeal Zwayne: I mean so much of this.
• 42:03
  Emeal Zwayne: Alan is rooted in worldly philosophy and believers don't realize that.
• 42:07
  Emeal Zwayne: And so they will go with the mantras that are being spewed and they just go with that drumbeat man.
• 42:15
  Emeal Zwayne: It's destructive, yeah, it's incredible how quickly.
• 42:19
  Oscar Navarro: So many churches in America have become paganistic in nature because of the things that they believe.
• 42:24
  Oscar Navarro: Something our church does is we lead everybody, before the service starts, in a prayer of confession, and we follow that up with an assurance of grace.
• 42:31
  Oscar Navarro: You use a word positive confession.
• 42:33
  Oscar Navarro: What is positive confession and how do you compare that to actual liturgical confession?
• 42:40
  Allen Parr: Yeah, so positive confession is something that is promoted by a lot of the health and wealth prosperity word of faith movement, and it's the idea that we can essentially have what we want by speaking it into existence.
• 42:55
  Emeal Zwayne: Create your own reality.
• 42:56
  Allen Parr: Create your own reality with your words, and so that's a lot different than claiming the promises of God based on Scripture, right?
• 43:04
  Allen Parr: So, for instance, people might ask questions or affirmations unbiblical?
• 43:07
  Allen Parr: Well, no, they're not, as long as they're biblical, right?
• 43:10
  Allen Parr: Yeah, I mean, if I'm taking a Scripture and I say, you know, I'm going to speak God's grace over my life, today I'm going to speak God's provision over my life, well, yeah, the Bible says he'll provide all that we need.
• 43:20
  Allen Parr: He does say he's going to forgive us grace.
• 43:22
  Allen Parr: So I'm fine with that.
• 43:23
  Allen Parr: But when we start saying I'm going to speak, all of my debt is going to be erased over the next month, or I'm going to speak healing over my you know.
• 43:34
  Allen Parr: Yeah, we can pray for healing, we can anoint you with oil, as James says, and we can ask God, but we also have to submit that you know what, for whatever reason unknown to us, god may not choose to heal that person.
• 43:43
  Allen Parr: It's not a promise in Scripture.
• 43:45
  Allen Parr: So positive confession it's rooted in the promises of God interpreted properly in the Word of God is good.
• 43:53
  Allen Parr: But whenever we pull things out of context and we say, okay, this is what I want to happen, so God now exists to make me happy, not the other way around, and he's obligated to do what I want him to do because I can speak something into existence is where things get very dangerous.
• 44:07
  Oscar Navarro: Do you feel like repenting now, because I know you've been praying often about becoming a better basketball player than me.
• 44:12
  Emeal Zwayne: Hey, just speak it into existence.
• 44:13
  Emeal Zwayne: I've been, I've been envisioning you disappearing.
• 44:15
  Emeal Zwayne: I got to work harder.
• 44:18
  Allen Parr: I've been doing that for my golf game.
• 44:19
  Allen Parr: I'm like man, God, I'm speaking.
• 44:21
  Allen Parr: A good short game, A whole new one in my life right now.
• 44:24
  Allen Parr: I don't even care about the whole one, I just want a good short game and a straight driver without the slices man.
• 44:29
  Oscar Navarro: Right, get short game.
• 44:29
  Oscar Navarro: Ray's going to think you're talking about him by saying good, short game.
• 44:33
  Emeal Zwayne: You know, alan, you know it's crazy.
• 44:34
  Emeal Zwayne: We often say you know ideas have consequences.
• 44:36
  Emeal Zwayne: But false theology has consequences and we have to be on our guard.
• 44:41
  Emeal Zwayne: We have to contend earnestly for the faith like Jude talks about, and maybe God help us to do that.
• 44:46
  Emeal Zwayne: I'm so excited about this book, man.
• 44:48
  Emeal Zwayne: I can't wait to read it.
• 44:49
  Emeal Zwayne: I know it's not really out for the public yet.
• 44:52
  Emeal Zwayne: Your friend here who was with you was telling me she's got to take this copy back, which I don't want to let go of.
• 44:57
  Allen Parr: The tease.
• 44:58
  Emeal Zwayne: Yeah, ms Led.
• 44:59
  Emeal Zwayne: Seven lies that distort the gospel and how you can discern the truth.
• 45:03
  Emeal Zwayne: Alan, tell us where people will be able to get it and also how they can connect with your ministry.
• 45:07
  Emeal Zwayne: Just give us all your, all your, you know details.
• 45:09
  Allen Parr: So yeah, the easiest way to get their hands on the book is to go to a landing page that we created.
• 45:15
  Allen Parr: It's misledbookcom.
• 45:17
  Allen Parr: We made it very easy for people to remember Misledbookcom and it's from there.
• 45:21
  Allen Parr: They can click on any of the links on that page and they can get access to it from any of their favorite booksellers Christianbookcom, Barnes, Noble, Amazon.
• 45:29
  Allen Parr: We also have a free gift that we give people if they want to.
• 45:34
  Oscar Navarro: Is it a?
• 45:34
  Allen Parr: helicopter.
• 45:34
  Oscar Navarro: It's a helicopter isn't it Not a?
• 45:35
  Allen Parr: helicopter.
• 45:36
  Ray Comfort: I believe, yeah.
• 45:38
  Allen Parr: Because we don't have the money to give people helicopters, but we can give you a free course on how to study the Word of God, which is going to serve you probably a lot better than a helicopter.
• 45:46
  Allen Parr: So so people can go there.
• 45:48
  Allen Parr: They can also learn more about me at alanparcom, but probably the best way is to go to our YouTube channel, which is the beat by Alan Parr, and they can watch hundreds and hundreds of videos there.
• 45:59
  Emeal Zwayne: That's great brother.
• 45:59
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, I'm so glad we had you on today, Looking forward to getting to know you better and maybe do more things together ministry-wise.
• 46:05
  Emeal Zwayne: I started the podcast, friends, by saying here we are with Alan Parr.
• 46:09
  Emeal Zwayne: Let me end by saying we went far with Alan Parr today.
• 46:13
  Emeal Zwayne: That's a good one, man, hey man, I'm giving you good stuff today and for free.
• 46:16
  Emeal Zwayne: Maybe you've been doing some positive confession for this stuff.
• 46:19
  Emeal Zwayne: Hey, I receive it, you're good.
• 46:20
  Oscar Navarro: Receive it.
• 46:22
  Ray Comfort: I receive it.
• 46:23
  Emeal Zwayne: Hey Well, hey brother, thank you so much for being with us and may God bless you and your ministry and all you do for his glory.
• 46:28
  Emeal Zwayne: Thank you, it's been an honor.
• 46:29
  Emeal Zwayne: Thanks, alan.
• 46:30
  Emeal Zwayne: Thanks, alan.
• 46:32
  Emeal Zwayne: Parr hasn't fallen far because he's standing on the solid rock.
• 46:38
  Emeal Zwayne: That was so, so encouraging.
• 46:40
  Emeal Zwayne: He was par for the course, par for the course.
• 46:42
  Ray Comfort: Oh no, Par speak on my scale, Sorry, Alan.
• 46:45
  Emeal Zwayne: Go ahead, mark, you don't have one.
• 46:47
  Mark Spence: I got nothing.
• 46:48
  Mark Spence: Nothing silly Nothing serious.
• 46:50
  Oscar Navarro: You have nothing to partake in Mark.
• 46:51
  Mark Spence: nice Serious man.
• 46:53
  Emeal Zwayne: Well, that was encouraging and refreshing.
• 46:55
  Emeal Zwayne: We hope you all found it.
• 46:56
  Emeal Zwayne: So you heard Alan's information there.
• 46:58
  Emeal Zwayne: Make sure to check him out, especially on YouTube.
• 47:00
  Emeal Zwayne: He's killing it there.
• 47:01
  Emeal Zwayne: Like we said, he's got over a million subscribers now and we're blessed to call him friend.
• 47:05
  Emeal Zwayne: All right, don't forget friends.
• 47:07
  Emeal Zwayne: How to be born free?
• 47:08
  Emeal Zwayne: Why do I keep saying how to be born free from the fear of death?
• 47:14
  Emeal Zwayne: How to be free?
• 47:15
  Emeal Zwayne: Why do I want to say born?
• 47:17
  Emeal Zwayne: Can you tell me why, ray?
• 47:18
  Ray Comfort: Yeah, cause when you're born again, you're born free from the fear of death there it is.
• 47:21
  Emeal Zwayne: It's spiritual, how to be free from the fear of death they have in this Bible.
• 47:25
  Emeal Zwayne: Living Waters podcast mug all at livingwaterscom, comment ideas, thoughts, podcastatlivingwaterscom.
• 47:32
  Emeal Zwayne: And don't forget to give us those ratings.
• 47:35
  Emeal Zwayne: On all those wonderful platforms, you continue to make us one of the top podcasts, guys, we're so blessed.
• 47:39
  Emeal Zwayne: Thank you, we're so grateful.
• 47:41
  Emeal Zwayne: Thanks for joining us.
• 47:41
  Emeal Zwayne: We'll see you here next time on the Living Waters podcast, where we have no idea, unlike Alan Parr, what we're doing.