Latest / The Speak Life Podcast / The MAGIC of Alex O'Connor — His Three Tricks vs David Wood || SLP580

Transcript

The MAGIC of Alex O'Connor — His Three Tricks vs David Wood || SLP580 · The Speak Life Podcast

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome back to the Speak Life podcast.
0:02
SPEAKER_00: My name is Thomas Thurrogood, Media Producer at Speak Life.
0:06
SPEAKER_00: And in this episode, you are gonna hear Glenn Scrivener's reaction to the remainder of Alex O'Connor's debate with David Wood on the topic Did Jesus claim to be God?
0:19
SPEAKER_00: If you'd like to hear the first part, that was episode 578 of the Speak Life podcast.
0:26
SPEAKER_00: We did do another video about this actually on our YouTube channel, the Speak Life YouTube channel, where Glenn goes into detail about the figure of the angel of the Lord who appears throughout the Old Testament.
0:40
SPEAKER_00: And we haven't put that out via the Speak Life podcast because it has so many scripture references in it that appear on the screen.
0:48
SPEAKER_00: So it wouldn't really work as just audio, but do go and check that out if if you'd like to on the Speak Life YouTube channel.
0:56
SPEAKER_00: Just like to draw your attention once again to the brand new 321 podcast.
1:01
SPEAKER_00: Episode one has gone out, and you can listen wherever you get your podcasts.
1:07
SPEAKER_00: A fresh look at life by taking a fresh look at Jesus.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: And it's been really encouraging to hear some of the feedback for that podcast.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: And we pray that it will be a blessing to you and hopefully something that you can share with friends and family members who are seeking.
1:24
SPEAKER_00: So yes, you can get that wherever you get your podcasts, the three to one podcasts.
1:30
SPEAKER_00: But even better, if you go to 321course.com right now and create an account there if you haven't done so already, you can get access to all eight episodes of the 321 podcasts.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: So you can get early access to everything uh before it comes out on the podcast streams.
1:50
SPEAKER_00: And you can even watch the episodes as videos on that platform as well.
1:54
SPEAKER_00: We shot them in high quality at the Hailsham Pavilion Cinema.
1:58
SPEAKER_00: So there we go, the 321 podcast.
2:01
SPEAKER_00: And I'd like to wish you all listeners a very happy Easter.
2:05
SPEAKER_00: And I will hand over to Klein Scrivener.
2:08
SPEAKER_02: The magic of Alex O'Connor is something to behold, and it was on show at the Blessed God Summit where Alex O'Connor took on David Wood in the debate, did Jesus claim to be God?
2:19
SPEAKER_02: Now Alex was on a hiding to nothing because as I've already shown in our first video about the debate, it is abundantly clear that Jesus is God once we understand who the Christian God is.
2:30
SPEAKER_02: Once we have a Trinitarian framework for figuring out God, then it is very clear that the Christ, the Son of the Living God, is Himself God.
2:39
SPEAKER_02: And David Wood did a brilliant job in his opening statement of setting out a biblical doctrine of God.
2:44
SPEAKER_02: Jesus did not come into the world claiming to be Allah.
2:48
SPEAKER_02: He did not come into the world claiming to be some kind of Unitarian God.
2:51
SPEAKER_02: How could he?
2:52
SPEAKER_02: He came into the world claiming to be the Son of the Father filled with the Spirit.
2:56
SPEAKER_02: He is God from God, light from light, very God from very God, because that doctrine of God is laid out in Scripture from Genesis onwards.
3:03
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is speaking and acting, assuming a biblical framework.
3:07
SPEAKER_02: And the biblical framework is not unitarian and it never has been.
3:12
SPEAKER_02: But Jesus has been in on the Father, Son, love by the joy of the Spirit from all eternity.
3:18
SPEAKER_02: He has always been the blessed one, he has always been the chosen one, he has always been the voice of the Lord, the word of the Lord, the glory of the Lord, the Son of God.
3:26
SPEAKER_02: He has always been that person.
3:28
SPEAKER_02: And he was sent into the world in incarnation.
3:32
SPEAKER_02: Sent from the Father.
3:34
SPEAKER_02: He was not born in Bethlehem so much as sent from heaven.
3:38
SPEAKER_02: That's the kind of language that he uses in the Gospels.
3:41
SPEAKER_02: He is God from God, light from light, very God from very God.
3:44
SPEAKER_02: Alex though takes the opposing view.
3:46
SPEAKER_02: He wants to deny that Jesus claimed to be God, and he did as well as it's possible to do when you take that kind of view.
3:54
SPEAKER_02: I don't think that is the correct view to take.
3:56
SPEAKER_02: But the magic of Alex O'Connor was on show because he kind of carried it off.
4:02
SPEAKER_02: He was wrong in this debate, really, really wrong at times.
4:06
SPEAKER_02: But my goodness, wasn't there magic and sparkle in the way that Alex debated?
4:11
SPEAKER_02: And I want to press into the nature of that magic.
4:14
SPEAKER_02: I'm going to talk about three things his showmanship, his storytelling, and his misdirection.
4:20
SPEAKER_02: Let's figure out his showmanship.
4:22
SPEAKER_02: And it's so interesting to compare David Wood bringing a very American energy.
4:26
SPEAKER_02: As David works the crowd, he works the crowd like an American stand-up.
4:31
SPEAKER_01: Good evening.
4:33
SPEAKER_01: What a beautiful audience.
4:37
SPEAKER_01: You're all breathtaking.
4:38
SPEAKER_01: This is how you uh charm a crowd in America, son.
4:43
SPEAKER_01: I'd like to thank uh Ruslan for arranging this conference and this debate, one of many awesome debates taking place in 2025, pitting heroes against villains.
4:58
SPEAKER_02: And he kicks things off with some brash name-calling.
5:00
SPEAKER_01: I won't say who the villain is in this debate.
5:03
SPEAKER_01: I'll let all you lovely Christians judge that for yourselves.
5:07
SPEAKER_01: Based entirely on our accents.
5:11
SPEAKER_01: And speaking of British accents, I'd like to thank Alex for finally showing up.
5:23
SPEAKER_01: You gotta give me some wiggle room on time, Rosalind.
5:31
SPEAKER_01: Or you can all quit cheering for Alex.
5:33
SPEAKER_01: Alright.
5:34
SPEAKER_01: Well, I'd like to thank Alex for finally showing up.
5:36
SPEAKER_01: I was a month and a half late, but he finally showed up.
5:39
SPEAKER_01: I'm teasing, by the way.
5:40
SPEAKER_01: Uh people have no clue how dangerous debate con is actually with the lineup they had and the number uh and the volume of death threats against uh multiple speakers.
5:50
SPEAKER_01: So uh plus he lives in what is rapidly becoming the sharia compliant hell hole of the universe.
5:55
SPEAKER_01: So good to take precautions.
5:57
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to lose Alex.
5:59
SPEAKER_02: Alex meets American brashness with English gentlemanliness.
6:03
SPEAKER_02: Listen to this.
6:04
SPEAKER_03: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.
6:07
SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
6:08
SPEAKER_03: Or as we say in England, as a lam.
6:34
SPEAKER_02: That was magic, right?
6:35
SPEAKER_02: Showmanship.
6:36
SPEAKER_02: Later on, David will characterize Alex's view of Jesus as just some dude.
6:42
SPEAKER_01: Uh this is not, and I have no idea how you would ever read the Gospel of John like this, let alone anything else Jesus said.
6:50
SPEAKER_01: This is not Jesus saying, What?
6:51
SPEAKER_01: You're misunderstanding.
6:52
SPEAKER_01: I'm just a regular dude.
6:55
SPEAKER_01: I again if you if if this were the only verse in there, maybe you could say if it given the rest of what we read in the Gospel of John and the rest of the Gospels, Jesus is not claiming to be a regular guy.
7:05
SPEAKER_02: A very American way of phrasing things.
7:07
SPEAKER_02: And so what does Alex do as a ripost?
7:10
SPEAKER_03: David's rebuttal there seemed to suggest that I was under the impression that Jesus is just some dude.
7:17
SPEAKER_03: That is far, far from the case, especially in John's Gospel.
7:21
SPEAKER_02: That's part of the magic of the Alex debating persona.
7:26
SPEAKER_02: There are other personas on offer, and and I think he's much more genuinely himself when he's just in personal conversation, but the debating persona is the pained condescension, and when it works, it really works.
7:38
SPEAKER_02: Um and it can make you forget that some of the things he says are not great.
7:45
SPEAKER_02: Like when Alex says, Oh, he's not some dude, he then goes on to call him this.
7:50
SPEAKER_03: Especially in John's Gospel, where Jesus seems to posit himself as something of a model of faith for his disciples, and for what it's worth.
7:58
SPEAKER_03: This is kind of the image that I get of Jesus reading through the Gospels.
8:01
SPEAKER_03: What is he supposed to be?
8:03
SPEAKER_03: Something like an idyllic, faithful servant of God, and certainly in a special position.
8:09
SPEAKER_03: If you include the the epistles in particular, then Jesus is of course exalted.
8:14
SPEAKER_02: I don't think he's some dude, I think he's an idyllic human being.
8:18
SPEAKER_02: Like, okay, but really, kinda some dude.
8:21
SPEAKER_02: Um some impressive dude.
8:23
SPEAKER_02: And you might think that the dude abides, but an idyllic human being is basically a dude on David Wood's terms.
8:30
SPEAKER_02: Um but he's so sidestepped it.
8:32
SPEAKER_02: Alex is so sidestepped it because of the withering disdain, because of the the vibe, the showmanship, the chutzpah.
8:40
SPEAKER_02: It's it's it's magical.
8:42
SPEAKER_02: And it carries people along.
8:44
SPEAKER_02: So the showmanship is very enjoyable, and Alex speaks with that real crispness, and uh it makes for a great debate, but when he speaks beyond his area of expertise, I think he comes a crop a little bit.
8:56
SPEAKER_02: Like when he mentions about language.
8:58
SPEAKER_02: For instance, he makes uh a very big deal out of the word cathos in the New Testament.
9:04
SPEAKER_03: Father, just as you are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us.
9:11
SPEAKER_03: This is crucial, this is pivotal.
9:12
SPEAKER_03: When Jesus is asked to clarify his Christological status, what is his relationship to the Father?
9:17
SPEAKER_03: He says, I'm in the Father and the Father's in me.
9:19
SPEAKER_03: He then later prays that all of us will one day be in God in the same way, just as kathos in the Greek, which doesn't just mean as, it means in the same way as, just as.
9:29
SPEAKER_02: This is crucial, this is vital, uh, says Alex, and he goes on to talk about this word kathos, which uh in the Greek is really just the fusion of two words, kata and hos.
9:37
SPEAKER_02: Hos means as, kata means according to.
9:40
SPEAKER_02: So it's it's accordingly as.
9:42
SPEAKER_02: It is an intensification of the word hos.
9:45
SPEAKER_02: Um, but the accordingly as does not really mean um just as, as though this is some kind of logical symbol.
9:52
SPEAKER_02: As though these words are atoms of meaning that have the same meaning, whether they are plugged into this sentence or transferred across to that sentence over there.
10:01
SPEAKER_02: Language doesn't really work like that.
10:02
SPEAKER_02: Logical symbols do, and Alex's training is far more in philosophy of religion and philosophy itself, rather than in linguistics.
10:10
SPEAKER_02: Um I don't know that he has any New Testament Greek.
10:13
SPEAKER_02: I I think he can read New Testament Greek.
10:15
SPEAKER_02: Let's just put it this way.
10:16
SPEAKER_02: I think a first-year Greek tutor would sort of slap him over the wrist for the kinds of things that he's saying here, because you can't just treat a word like it's a logical symbol that when it's plugged into one sentence means exactly the same thing when it's plugged into another sentence.
10:30
SPEAKER_02: Kathos means accordingly as.
10:33
SPEAKER_02: And for instance, in John chapter 20, Jesus says, just as cathos, the Father has sent me, so I am sending you.
10:39
SPEAKER_02: That doesn't mean that he's sending the disciples into the world as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
10:44
SPEAKER_02: Just as the Father has sent the Son, so the Son is sending the disciples out into the world.
10:48
SPEAKER_02: No, cathos does not mean identical, it just means accordingly as.
10:52
SPEAKER_02: There is an appropriateness to the way in which the Father has sent the Son that transfers from the Son sending the church into the world.
10:59
SPEAKER_02: But there are many differences between the way the Father sends the Son and the way the Son sends the Church.
11:03
SPEAKER_02: But Alex insists on using some of these Greek words as though they are logical symbols and it doesn't really work.
11:09
SPEAKER_02: I think his lack of understanding linguistically is also shown when he reacts to David Wood on Luke chapter six.
11:17
SPEAKER_02: In Luke chapter six, Jesus is called Lord Lord.
11:20
SPEAKER_02: And David Wood says, Well, if we're able to go back into the Old Testament and have a look at Proscanimo in the Greek Old Testament, then let's go back into the Old Testament with some other Greek words and see the way that they are used.
11:32
SPEAKER_02: Jesus in Luke chapter six is called Lord Lord.
11:34
SPEAKER_02: Well, guess what?
11:35
SPEAKER_02: In the Old Testament, a number of times, it is the Lord God, the Lord Almighty, who is called Lord Lord.
11:42
SPEAKER_02: In Deuteronomy, in One Kings, in the Psalms, in Ezekiel, in Amos.
11:46
SPEAKER_02: Lord, Lord is actually a title only ever given to God in the Bible.
11:50
SPEAKER_02: And it's given to Jesus in the Bible.
11:53
SPEAKER_02: David makes that perfectly valid point.
11:55
SPEAKER_02: Uh Alex misunderstands the whole thing.
11:57
SPEAKER_03: Also, this Luke chapter 6, verse 46 thing that David put up, I want to make sure I'm understanding this correctly.
12:02
SPEAKER_03: As far as I understand, in Luke chapter 6, verse 46, when it when it quotes Lord, Lord, you know.
12:08
SPEAKER_03: And as far as I understand, David was saying that in the Hebrew, this is presumably Yahweh Adonai, right?
12:14
SPEAKER_03: Is that right, David?
12:18
SPEAKER_03: Yahweh Adonai in the Hebrew.
12:20
SPEAKER_03: Perhaps he'll address it in his second rebuttal.
12:22
SPEAKER_03: And then said, ah, but you know, in the Greek Septuagint, this is translated as Kyrios Kyrios, because it's Lord twice.
12:28
SPEAKER_03: Which translation of the Old Testament are the New Testament writers using?
12:31
SPEAKER_03: The Septuagint.
12:33
SPEAKER_03: So the passage that they read will have said Kyrgios Kurios.
12:36
SPEAKER_03: Lord twice.
12:37
SPEAKER_03: It wouldn't have said Yahweh and then Adonite, or rather the other way around, I think it is.
12:41
SPEAKER_03: It would have said Kyrios Kyrios.
12:42
SPEAKER_03: So of course they're willing to use this in Luke's Gospel.
12:45
SPEAKER_02: Yes, they would have used the Septuagint, but the Septuagint would have translated things like Hosea twelve and Zechariah as Lord Lord, which in the Hebrew is this divine title, Yahweh Adonai, the Lord Almighty.
12:58
SPEAKER_02: Lord Lord is a divine title in the Greek.
13:01
SPEAKER_02: It's in the divine title in the Greek Old Testament.
13:04
SPEAKER_02: Why would it not be a divine title in the Greek New Testament?
13:08
SPEAKER_02: That's what David is bringing.
13:09
SPEAKER_02: So Alex doesn't really understand, and what I'm really referring to here is his showmanship.
13:14
SPEAKER_02: It's the pain condescension, it's the withering superiority that when it gets married to his non-understanding of an issue, it's just very unfortunate.
13:22
SPEAKER_02: And perhaps the moment where Alex shows least understanding was uh during the final question of the night.
13:29
SPEAKER_02: Someone lines up and tries to explain to Alex that the rabbis were debating about what the thrones set up in heaven in Daniel 7 were all about.
13:37
SPEAKER_02: And the questioner has to explain it a couple of times.
13:39
SPEAKER_02: He then gets invited back to explain it a third time.
13:42
SPEAKER_02: David Wood tries to explain it, everybody in the room is trying to explain it to him.
13:45
SPEAKER_03: Which is the Father and which is Jesus?
13:47
SPEAKER_03: Justice or mercy?
13:48
SPEAKER_03: Which is which?
13:49
SPEAKER_03: I'm simply asking, and so the Son of Man in this instance is mercy and God is justice, or is it the other way around?
13:55
SPEAKER_03: The ancient of days is justice and the son of man is mercy, or let me be careful.
14:01
SPEAKER_03: So the the point the point is when it talks about when it talks about the two thrones, after saying that, the explanation is that the two thrones, one is for justice, one is for mercy, which you described described as God's attributes.
14:11
SPEAKER_04: Oh, sorry.
14:12
SPEAKER_04: I didn't think of my So if I have been brought back up to clarify my question.
14:20
SPEAKER_04: I've been brought back up to clarify my question.
14:23
SPEAKER_04: So Alex, what I'm asking is, so which figure is justice and which one is mercy was not is not really uh it doesn't really it's not really relevant here.
14:33
SPEAKER_04: I mean I'm just saying uh it's it's rather that this is showing that rabbis after the advent of Christianity were recognizing the Son of Man in Daniel 7 as an explicitly divine figure.
14:46
SPEAKER_04: Because when Rabbi Akiva says, Oh, it's the Messiah, he says, no, no, no, both figures, the two distinct figures, are God.
14:53
SPEAKER_03: Oh, sorry.
14:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, okay.
14:54
SPEAKER_03: So wait, so after the advent of Christianity.
14:57
SPEAKER_03: So when are you talking about?
14:58
SPEAKER_03: You said after the advent of Christianity, when you talk about it.
15:07
SPEAKER_01: The point is, there are rabbis who interpreted the Son of Man as God.
15:12
SPEAKER_05: Okay, okay.
15:13
SPEAKER_05: Look.
15:16
SPEAKER_05: I I for for fear of uh because you said it was implausible.
15:21
SPEAKER_05: That's what he was responding to.
15:22
SPEAKER_05: Earlier he said it was implausible.
15:25
SPEAKER_02: Everybody is trying to explain this to Alex.
15:27
SPEAKER_02: Um, like Roslan, look at Roslan's face.
15:29
SPEAKER_02: And David has a go at explaining it.
15:32
SPEAKER_02: The guy, they have to bring the guy back up to explain it to Alex again and again.
15:35
SPEAKER_02: And look, I get it.
15:36
SPEAKER_02: Um, it's been well over two hours in this debate.
15:39
SPEAKER_02: Blood sugar levels will be going through the floor, he's tired.
15:42
SPEAKER_02: I completely get that he he wouldn't understand that.
15:44
SPEAKER_02: But what's interesting to me is that Alex then switches out of beast mode debater and back into I I think regular Alex, affable Alex, and he makes a great joke at the end, which rounds out the whole evening.
15:57
SPEAKER_02: Let's check it out.
15:58
SPEAKER_03: For for for fear of further misunderstanding and further groans from the audience, I fear I would want to read that passage on paper in front of me, which maybe where's he gone?
16:09
SPEAKER_03: There you are.
16:11
SPEAKER_03: Can you speak to me after class?
16:17
SPEAKER_05: Let's give them a rather obvious job.
16:19
SPEAKER_05: Oh my god.
16:20
SPEAKER_02: All right.
16:22
SPEAKER_02: Which is great, which is great, but I think that's far more the real Alex than the beast mode debater that we get.
16:27
SPEAKER_02: But either way, whether we get the kind of Alex that that shows up in conversation with people who is um very affable, great sense of humor, or where we get the sort of the Christopher Hitchens, you know, incisive, withering, sardonic debater.
16:43
SPEAKER_02: Either way, we've got a person with incredible charisma and incredible showmanship.
16:49
SPEAKER_02: Um this is part of the magic of Alex O'Connor.
16:52
SPEAKER_02: But let's move on to the second point.
16:54
SPEAKER_02: Uh, a magician doesn't only need showmanship, a magician needs to be a storyteller and needs to sort of weave this tale and invite the audience into the world so that they can do their magic.
17:06
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
17:07
SPEAKER_02: And uh Alex has a story to tell in this debate, and here is the story in brief.
17:13
SPEAKER_03: And there is a tradition in early Jewish texts, or at least texts of around the contemporary time to the Gospels of endowing beings who are not Yahweh with Yahweh's name, and thereby enabling them to exert his authority as his representative on earth.
17:34
SPEAKER_02: There are beings who are not God who are endowed with God's name and they act on God's behalf.
17:38
SPEAKER_02: And then Alex gives an example of that happening with Alexander the Great.
17:43
SPEAKER_03: One slightly less biblical example is a story recorded by Josephus, which came to mind when David was speaking.
17:49
SPEAKER_03: When Alexander the Great approaches Jerusalem in an attempt to conquer it, the crisis is averted.
17:56
SPEAKER_03: When a priest whose mitre bears the tetragrammaton, Yahweh, bears the name of God, comes out, and what does Alexander do?
18:03
SPEAKER_03: He bows down before the priest.
18:06
SPEAKER_03: Was Alexander bowing down before the priest?
18:09
SPEAKER_03: Or was he bowing down to the divine name that was in him?
18:12
SPEAKER_03: When every knee will bow to Jesus, what is the context?
18:16
SPEAKER_03: Jesus has been given the name that is above all other names.
18:22
SPEAKER_03: Given it.
18:23
SPEAKER_03: This is a common theme.
18:24
SPEAKER_03: And so David's right that we need to understand what uh how the early Jews were interpreting the various verses that we were reading, but I don't think it lends too nicely to his interpretation.
18:34
SPEAKER_02: So that's the story that Alex wants to tell.
18:36
SPEAKER_02: He wants to say that around the time of Jesus, around the time of the first century, within Judaism, it wasn't uncommon to think of God's name being invested in beings who are not God, and they act on his behalf.
18:49
SPEAKER_02: And that is how we are to understand who Jesus is.
18:51
SPEAKER_02: He is an idyllic human being in whom dwells the name of God, but he is not himself God.
18:58
SPEAKER_02: That's the story that he wants to tell, and it explains well the second of three points that the Gospels are continually affirming.
19:06
SPEAKER_02: Here are three truths that the Gospel makes very clear, and any story we tell about the Gospels needs to account for these three truths.
19:14
SPEAKER_02: Truth number one, Jesus is God.
19:16
SPEAKER_02: Truth number two, Jesus mediates God.
19:19
SPEAKER_02: Truth number three, Jesus mediates God to us.
19:23
SPEAKER_02: You could put it another way.
19:24
SPEAKER_02: Truth number one, Jesus is God.
19:26
SPEAKER_02: Truth number two, Jesus is God from God.
19:30
SPEAKER_02: Truth number three, Jesus is God from God for us.
19:34
SPEAKER_02: These three truths are very plainly taught throughout the Bible, and particularly in the Gospels.
19:40
SPEAKER_02: These three truths are taught very clearly in all the Bible, especially in the Gospels, and any story that we tell about the Gospels needs to be able to accommodate all three truths.
19:51
SPEAKER_02: Alex has a divine name-bearing story to tell, in which beings who are not God can act on God's behalf.
19:58
SPEAKER_02: And that will help him to handle verses that speak of the second kind of truth, that Jesus mediates God.
20:05
SPEAKER_02: But because that's the story he wants to tell, he can never take seriously the truths that say that he is God, as well as mediates God, as well as mediates God for us.
20:15
SPEAKER_02: And what happens throughout the debate is that some very clear verses of scripture come proclaiming Jesus to be God.
20:21
SPEAKER_02: And what Alex then does is he says, Well, it might say that, but actually I want to move over to truth number two, that he is God from God.
20:30
SPEAKER_02: But again and again in this debate, verses that proclaim the divinity of Jesus are set aside in favor of verses that say he mediates the business of God while not himself being God.
20:43
SPEAKER_02: In other words, Alex has a theory that accounts for the from God bits, but not a theory that accounts for the many ways in which Jesus is proclaimed as God from God.
20:53
SPEAKER_02: So John's gospel begins by taking you through those three truths.
20:57
SPEAKER_02: In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.
21:01
SPEAKER_02: He was with God in the beginning.
21:03
SPEAKER_02: John begins by asserting the divinity of Christ and by saying he is God with God.
21:10
SPEAKER_02: God from God.
21:12
SPEAKER_02: In chapter 1, verse 18, he uses this phrase about he is in the bosom of the Father.
21:17
SPEAKER_02: The Son is in the bosom of the Father.
21:18
SPEAKER_02: That's the old King James translation.
21:20
SPEAKER_02: Or in the old NIV translation, I quite like that one when it says, He is at the Father's side.
21:26
SPEAKER_02: So from the beginning, there has always been God with his one and only Son, as verse 14 calls Jesus.
21:33
SPEAKER_02: So Jesus is God, and he's also God from God, the Son in the embrace of the Father.
21:39
SPEAKER_02: He is the one and only.
21:40
SPEAKER_02: And there has been an eternal relationship of Father and Son in the spirits.
21:45
SPEAKER_02: He is God from God, light from light, very God from very God.
21:49
SPEAKER_02: But wonderfully, in John chapter 1, verse 12, it says, To all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave them the right to become children of God.
21:58
SPEAKER_02: And you've got the one.
22:00
SPEAKER_02: Wonderful one and only Son who has always enjoyed the Father's love, sharing that love with us, and we are his children.
22:08
SPEAKER_02: And now in Jesus, we get his Father as our Father and His Spirit as our Spirit.
22:13
SPEAKER_02: We're adopted into the family.
22:15
SPEAKER_02: Now we are not the same as the one and only.
22:17
SPEAKER_02: You can never be the one and only Son.
22:20
SPEAKER_02: There's only one, one and only.
22:21
SPEAKER_02: But the good news is that the one and only came to invite the worlds into his standing, into his status, into his love.
22:31
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is God.
22:33
SPEAKER_02: He mediates God as the Son of the Father, and he mediates God to us to make us children of the same Heavenly Father.
22:42
SPEAKER_02: That is the biblical story that actually accounts for all the data that we have.
22:46
SPEAKER_02: Alex has his story.
22:48
SPEAKER_02: It's an attenuated story.
22:50
SPEAKER_02: It's the margarine of stories.
22:52
SPEAKER_02: It's a decaffeinated, deracinated story in which Jesus is just some guy, some being, who is infused with the divine name, but not God from God.
23:04
SPEAKER_02: And one of the problems is that this story doesn't really allow you to believe in the third truth that the gospels teach.
23:11
SPEAKER_02: Not only that Jesus is God, not only that Jesus mediates God, but Jesus mediates God to us.
23:16
SPEAKER_02: Because if Jesus isn't the one and only, if he is not in on that father-son love from before the foundation of the world, then he can't really invite me into that thing.
23:28
SPEAKER_02: If there isn't an original father-son love, if Jesus isn't the one and only who is in the bosom of the Father, who is at the Father's side, if he is not uniquely and eternally receiving that spirit, then what is he then sharing with me?
23:43
SPEAKER_02: If he's just like the scepter on whom the name of God is written, then we're left with a very impersonal vision of things.
23:49
SPEAKER_02: But the Christian Trinitarian vision of things is that in the beginning there was love.
23:54
SPEAKER_02: If Alex's story is true, then in the beginning there was not love.
23:58
SPEAKER_02: In the beginning there was just God, and then God chooses to work through others, which means that God uses creatures in order to have his will done.
24:10
SPEAKER_02: The actual biblical story is that the Father loves the Son, sends the Son into the world, not to use the Son for any other purpose, but to share the original love that was there before the foundation of the world with us.
24:24
SPEAKER_02: On Alex's story, that which can be shared with the creature is not really love.
24:30
SPEAKER_02: It might be will, it might be power, it might be authority.
24:35
SPEAKER_02: But with the true biblical Trinitarian story, that which Jesus can share with us is an original and glorious love.
24:44
SPEAKER_02: And so Alex might have the showmanship.
24:46
SPEAKER_02: He is a great storyteller.
24:48
SPEAKER_02: It's just a shame that the story he's telling ain't that great.
24:51
SPEAKER_02: So we've thought about his showmanship, we've thought about his storytelling.
24:55
SPEAKER_02: Let's thirdly think about a key part of the magician's arsenal, misdirection.
25:01
SPEAKER_02: And really, here, what I want to do is show all the ways that Alex distracts us from where our attention should really be.
25:11
SPEAKER_02: You know what a magician does?
25:13
SPEAKER_02: A magician will get your attention over here so they can steal your watch, okay?
25:17
SPEAKER_02: But what Alex does is he marches right into the heart of Christological passages in the Bible, and he he goes right to the places where his opponents think they are untouchable, right?
25:29
SPEAKER_02: And it's like he's marched into our carefully laid snares and traps and minefields.
25:34
SPEAKER_02: And he gives the impression of dancing through the minefield unscathed, and he comes back out again, and we're left thinking, oh gosh, I I guess those passages of scripture aren't as Christological as I had thought.
25:50
SPEAKER_02: They don't have a as highly exalted a view of Christ as I had thought, because Alex seems to have marched straight into that territory and left without nicking any of the tripwires.
26:01
SPEAKER_02: How does he do it?
26:02
SPEAKER_02: He does it through misdirection.
26:04
SPEAKER_02: He will take you to John 10 ostensibly and then distract you with X, Y, and Z.
26:08
SPEAKER_02: He will take you to John 17 and then distract you with X, Y, and Z.
26:11
SPEAKER_02: Now, maybe from Alex's point of view, our attention has been focused on the wrong thing, and he is bringing out the more obvious meaning that we should all have been aware of.
26:21
SPEAKER_02: Maybe that's the case.
26:22
SPEAKER_02: Maybe he is redirecting us to what we should have always understood about these passages.
26:28
SPEAKER_02: I highly doubt that.
26:29
SPEAKER_02: But I'm going to take you to ten places that Alex takes us to.
26:33
SPEAKER_02: And I want to show you how Alex attempts misdirection, but if we just pay attention to what is front and center in any of these ten places, then Alex's position, however entertaining, uh becomes untenable.
26:45
SPEAKER_02: Let's have a look at ten places that Alex takes us to, and I'm very glad that he takes us to these ten places.
26:51
SPEAKER_02: So Alex first takes us to John chapter 10, where Jesus calls himself the Good Shepherd.
26:56
SPEAKER_02: And we know who the Good Shepherd is from the Old Testament, Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd.
27:02
SPEAKER_02: Jesus comes and he says, He is the good shepherd.
27:04
SPEAKER_02: His sheep listen to his voice, he says, Verse 27.
27:07
SPEAKER_02: I know them and they follow me.
27:09
SPEAKER_02: I give them eternal life and they shall never perish.
27:11
SPEAKER_02: No one will snatch them out of my hand.
27:13
SPEAKER_02: My father who has given them to me is greater than all.
27:15
SPEAKER_02: No one can snatch them out of my father's hand.
27:17
SPEAKER_02: I and the Father are one.
27:19
SPEAKER_02: Again, his Jewish opponents picked up stones to stone him.
27:22
SPEAKER_02: Why?
27:23
SPEAKER_02: Verse 33, for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.
27:27
SPEAKER_02: Surely this is a divine claim?
27:29
SPEAKER_02: Here's what Alex says.
27:30
SPEAKER_03: And there was no confusion about this.
27:32
SPEAKER_03: The Jewish opponents picked up stones to stone him to death for making this claim.
27:36
SPEAKER_03: Now, how does how does Jesus respond?
27:38
SPEAKER_03: Does he agree with them?
27:39
SPEAKER_03: Or does he correct them?
27:41
SPEAKER_03: He says, in response to the Jews, Is it not written in your law, I have said you are gods?
27:49
SPEAKER_03: Quoting, as you'll probably realize, the psalm that I just quoted and explained briefly a moment ago.
27:54
SPEAKER_03: So directly asked about his Christological status, Jesus decides to quote a psalm which is explicitly talking about beings who are not in fact Yahweh and yet are called gods.
28:05
SPEAKER_02: Because in Psalm 82 it's referring to the divine council who are called gods, gods with a little g.
28:11
SPEAKER_03: Why would he pick that psalm if the message he wanted to convey was that he is in fact in some sense God, that is, identical to Yahweh?
28:19
SPEAKER_03: Jesus continues, if he called them gods, why wouldn't he call me God?
28:23
SPEAKER_03: The one who the Father has sent and set aside.
28:26
SPEAKER_03: So why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said I am God's son?
28:30
SPEAKER_03: Like in the divine council, you shall be called gods, that is, sons of the most high.
28:36
SPEAKER_03: So it's a misunderstanding.
28:38
SPEAKER_02: Because, as I said in our previous video, he's boxing clever because he needs not to be stoned right now, he needs to get crucified later on, so he needs to avoid this particular stoning.
28:46
SPEAKER_02: So Alex is right, Jesus is correcting them, but check out the misdirection here.
28:51
SPEAKER_02: He is not correcting them and saying, I am less than the gods of Psalm 82.
28:57
SPEAKER_02: He is saying, I am far greater than the gods of Psalm 82.
29:00
SPEAKER_02: Look how the verse goes on.
29:02
SPEAKER_02: Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I have said you are gods?
29:05
SPEAKER_02: If he called them gods with the little g to whom the word of God came, and scripture cannot be set aside, what about the one whom the father set apart as his very own and sent into the world?
29:18
SPEAKER_02: Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said I am God's son?
29:22
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is not saying he is less than the little g gods of Psalm 82.
29:27
SPEAKER_02: He is saying, I am a whole lot more.
29:29
SPEAKER_02: I am the one the Father has set apart and sent into the world.
29:33
SPEAKER_02: I'm not born and raised in Bethlehem, right?
29:36
SPEAKER_02: I am the one sent from heaven.
29:39
SPEAKER_02: So right here, he is naming an original and eternal relationship with his father.
29:44
SPEAKER_02: He is God from God.
29:45
SPEAKER_02: Yes, he's from God.
29:46
SPEAKER_02: But he's God from God.
29:48
SPEAKER_02: Alex keeps reading in John 10.
29:50
SPEAKER_03: Jesus immediately afterwards clarifies further and says, Believe the works, that is the works of my Father through me, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I am in the Father.
30:02
SPEAKER_03: Another pretty intense Christological claim.
30:05
SPEAKER_03: What does it mean?
30:07
SPEAKER_03: Let's turn to the most important Christological chapter in John's Gospel, which is, of course, chapter 17.
30:12
SPEAKER_03: Jesus is praying first for his disciples, then for all of his believers.
30:17
SPEAKER_02: So here is the second place that Alex goes, and let's follow him into the minefield.
30:21
SPEAKER_02: And you think, my goodness, he's going into the very highest of high Christologies.
30:25
SPEAKER_02: And John 17 is this high priestly prayer.
30:27
SPEAKER_02: He first prays for himself, then he prays for his disciples, then he prays for the church in the world.
30:32
SPEAKER_02: Um, but look, 17, verse 5, and now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began.
30:40
SPEAKER_02: Okay, Jesus is pre-existent, he's been sharing this glory, he is God from God, and he has always been God from God.
30:48
SPEAKER_02: That is what John 17 begins with.
30:51
SPEAKER_02: Where does Alex want to take us?
30:52
SPEAKER_03: John chapter 17, verse 20, onwards.
30:55
SPEAKER_03: My prayer is not for them alone, the disciples.
30:58
SPEAKER_03: I pray also for those who believe in me through their message, that is, all of you.
31:02
SPEAKER_03: That all of them may be one.
31:04
SPEAKER_03: Hen, H-E-N, the same Greek word used in John 10.
31:07
SPEAKER_03: Father, just as you are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us.
31:15
SPEAKER_03: This is crucial, this is pivotal.
31:16
SPEAKER_03: When Jesus is asked to clarify his Christological status, what is his relationship to the Father?
31:21
SPEAKER_03: He says, I'm in the Father and the Father's in me.
31:23
SPEAKER_03: He then later prays that all of us will one day be in God in the same way, just as kathos in the Greek, which doesn't just mean as, it means in the same way as, just as.
31:33
SPEAKER_03: If this is supposed to indicate that Jesus is claiming to be identical to Yahweh, what does that make the rest of us?
31:39
SPEAKER_02: Children of God.
31:40
SPEAKER_03: And how I'm interested in knowing is David going to interpret these verses where Jesus is specifically asked to clarify his relationship to the Father and tells us that he is only in relationship with him in such a way that everybody else can be in relationship with them too.
31:55
SPEAKER_02: No, John 17 is just teaching us those three truths.
31:58
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is God, Jesus mediates God, Jesus mediates God to you.
32:02
SPEAKER_02: That is the flow.
32:03
SPEAKER_02: That is what the Bible is teaching all the way through.
32:06
SPEAKER_02: And Christians have a Trinitarian story that understands that.
32:09
SPEAKER_02: Alex does not have a story that understands that.
32:11
SPEAKER_02: I can never be in the Son the way the Father is in the Son, because the Father is in the Son eternally and by nature.
32:18
SPEAKER_02: I come into the Son in time and by grace.
32:22
SPEAKER_02: So there will forever be a distinction between the way in which I am in Christ and the way in which the Father is in Christ.
32:28
SPEAKER_02: But there is also an eternal glory in the Son sharing with me everything that he's enjoyed with the Father, everything that he is eternally and by nature.
32:36
SPEAKER_02: He shares with me in time and by grace.
32:39
SPEAKER_02: How beautiful.
32:40
SPEAKER_02: That's what John 17 is teaching.
32:42
SPEAKER_02: It's not teaching Alex's thing.
32:44
SPEAKER_02: And I notice that he doesn't go anywhere near verse 5, which talks about Jesus' pre-existence, or verse 24.
32:49
SPEAKER_02: Verse 24, Father, I want those you've given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory, the glory you've given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
32:58
SPEAKER_02: There's something unique and eternal.
32:59
SPEAKER_02: There's something singular about Jesus, the one and only.
33:03
SPEAKER_02: But he wants to share his relationship with the Father, with the world.
33:07
SPEAKER_02: That's the truth laid out in John 17.
33:09
SPEAKER_02: Never mind the misdirection that Alex is attempting here.
33:12
SPEAKER_02: He misdirects in John 10, he misdirects in John 17.
33:16
SPEAKER_02: Next, he's gonna take us to John 14.
33:18
SPEAKER_02: The same thing is true of another important quote from John's Gospel.
33:22
SPEAKER_03: Which is when Philip asks Jesus to show him the Father.
33:26
SPEAKER_03: What does Jesus say?
33:28
SPEAKER_03: Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.
33:31
SPEAKER_03: Another intense Christological claim.
33:33
SPEAKER_02: You gotta admire Alex for going straight to this very high Christological claim.
33:38
SPEAKER_02: Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.
33:39
SPEAKER_02: If I said that, if Alex said that, we would be blasphemers.
33:43
SPEAKER_02: Jesus very boldly, very confidently says that.
33:45
SPEAKER_02: And notice it seems to be a claim to be, I am God from God.
33:50
SPEAKER_02: It is a claim that unites truths one and two, that Jesus is God and Jesus mediates God.
33:56
SPEAKER_02: That's who he is.
33:57
SPEAKER_02: He's the face of the Father.
33:59
SPEAKER_02: What's Alex going to do about this?
34:01
SPEAKER_03: He then follows up by saying, How can you say, show us the Father?
34:04
SPEAKER_03: Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?
34:07
SPEAKER_03: The words I say to you, I do not speak on my own authority.
34:10
SPEAKER_03: Rather, it is the Father living in me who is doing his work.
34:14
SPEAKER_03: So again, Jesus clarifies his relationship to the Father, this time saying that he doesn't speak on his own authority.
34:19
SPEAKER_03: But there's more.
34:20
SPEAKER_03: In the same chapter this time, chapter 14, just a few verses later, he says to those same disciples who he's just told, I that if you've seen me, you've seen the Father, because the Father is in me, and I'm in the Father.
34:32
SPEAKER_03: He speaks of a future day past his crucifixion and says, On that day, verse 20, on that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.
34:44
SPEAKER_03: So to recap, Jesus is directly asked to clarify his relationship and his Christology to the Father.
34:48
SPEAKER_03: And he says that I'm in the Father, and the Father's in me, and guess what?
34:51
SPEAKER_03: You'll all be one with us too, one day.
34:54
SPEAKER_03: If this is a claim to be Yahweh, then well, lucky us, I suppose.
34:58
SPEAKER_02: Yes, lucky us, lucky us, very, very lucky us.
35:01
SPEAKER_02: Um and this is where the sort of the withering disdain um I know, I just have to chuckle at it because what Alex is saying with withering disdain is actually the greatest truth known to humanity.
35:14
SPEAKER_02: The greatest truth known to humanity is that the one and only has come to share his love with the world.
35:20
SPEAKER_02: And who he is, eternally and by nature, we can become in time and by grace, lucky us, very lucky us.
35:25
SPEAKER_02: And notice he's gone to John 14, and he has not refuted the fact that Jesus says, if you see me, you've seen the Father.
35:32
SPEAKER_02: He's not refuting truth number one, that Jesus is God.
35:35
SPEAKER_02: He's just trying to distract us with truth number two, he comes to mediate God, and he comes to mediate God to us.
35:42
SPEAKER_02: None of that takes away from the fact that he is originally and eternally the Son of the Father.
35:46
SPEAKER_02: In fact, in John chapter six, Jesus says that he uniquely has seen the Father.
35:52
SPEAKER_02: He is in that one and only position that nobody can occupy.
35:55
SPEAKER_02: But then by grace, he comes and offers his sonship to you and I, so that we can be brought into his sonship.
36:01
SPEAKER_02: We will never be God with a capital G.
36:04
SPEAKER_02: We will never be eternal, and we can never be children by nature.
36:07
SPEAKER_02: We are always children by grace.
36:09
SPEAKER_02: There's always a distinction between God and us, and yet, God from God has offered his love to the world.
36:16
SPEAKER_02: This is the good news.
36:17
SPEAKER_02: It's the good news that so unfortunately Alex wants to deny and direct us away from.
36:23
SPEAKER_02: But if we just pay attention to the very verses that Alex cites, we will hear such good news.
36:28
SPEAKER_02: Where else does Alex go?
36:30
SPEAKER_03: Of course, famously, in chapter 8, Jesus is talking about eternal life, and his Jewish opponents say to him, they challenge him and say, Well, our father Abraham, he died.
36:40
SPEAKER_03: Are you saying you're greater than him?
36:42
SPEAKER_03: And Jesus replies, If I glorify myself, I glorify it my glory means nothing.
36:47
SPEAKER_03: Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day, and he was glad.
36:52
SPEAKER_03: And they say, What you're not even fifty years old, and Abraham has seen you?
36:56
SPEAKER_03: And he says, Truly I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.
37:02
SPEAKER_03: Why is that important?
37:03
SPEAKER_03: Two reasons.
37:03
SPEAKER_03: Firstly, he seems to claim pre-existence to Abraham, which is pretty significant.
37:08
SPEAKER_02: Yes, he does seem to claim pre-existence, and not only does he say he was back there 2,000 years ago, but that Abraham saw him and was glad.
37:17
SPEAKER_02: It's not just that Jesus is looking back at Abraham, it's that Abraham was looking to Jesus and was really glad about it.
37:26
SPEAKER_02: And that claim is definitely understood by his hearers to mean that he is at least 2,000 years old.
37:32
SPEAKER_02: They say, You're not yet 50 years old, you've seen Abraham, Jesus says, before Abraham was, I am.
37:38
SPEAKER_02: When the crowd understand Jesus to be claiming pre-existence, he does not correct them.
37:42
SPEAKER_02: He turns up the intensity of his divine claim before Abraham was I am.
37:47
SPEAKER_02: What's Alex gonna do about that?
37:49
SPEAKER_03: But also his invocation of the word I am in Greek, ego ami, which many people think is a callback to the divine uh name of God given to Moses in Exodus chapter 3, 14.
38:01
SPEAKER_03: In Exodus chapter 3, Moses asks God, who shall I tell them has sent me?
38:06
SPEAKER_03: And God says, Aesha, Asha, Aesha, which means I am that I am, I am who I am.
38:12
SPEAKER_03: So go and tell them that I am has sent you.
38:15
SPEAKER_03: It's interesting.
38:16
SPEAKER_03: This seems all very plain, but watch for the misdirection.
38:19
SPEAKER_03: See if you can spot any misdirection here.
38:21
SPEAKER_03: But of course, the New Testament is not written in Hebrew, it's written in Greek.
38:24
SPEAKER_03: And it's well known that the authors of the New Testament were using a Greek translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint.
38:31
SPEAKER_03: This is something that was pointed out by J.R.
38:33
SPEAKER_03: Daniel Kirk, so I'm indebted to him for this, but if you read the Septuagint that the New Testament writers were using, and we have very good evidence to suggest that John as well is using the Septuagint, how is this verse rendered?
38:44
SPEAKER_03: Exodus chapter 3.
38:46
SPEAKER_03: God says to Moses, Ego Ami, ha-on.
38:50
SPEAKER_03: Which means something like, I am the one who is.
38:53
SPEAKER_03: So go and tell them Ho On has sent you.
38:58
SPEAKER_03: In other words, in the Greek version, Ego Ami is just as it is typically used in Greek, a way of saying, I am.
39:04
SPEAKER_03: And it's used commonly like this.
39:05
SPEAKER_03: In John chapter 9, the blind man is healed by Jesus.
39:08
SPEAKER_03: He runs into town, they say, Is this not the man who was born blind?
39:11
SPEAKER_03: And he says, Ego Amy.
39:13
SPEAKER_03: It's me.
39:14
SPEAKER_03: When Jesus is asked by the woman at the well, the woman at the well says, I'm expecting the Messiah to come.
39:20
SPEAKER_03: Jesus says, I am he.
39:22
SPEAKER_03: Ego Amy, once again.
39:25
SPEAKER_03: That is how it is often used.
39:28
SPEAKER_03: So in the Greek Septuagint, we have, I am Ha-on, I am the one who is.
39:32
SPEAKER_03: Go and tell them that Ha-on has sent you.
39:34
SPEAKER_03: In the Greek Septuagint, in other words, the abbreviation of the divine name is not Ego Amy, it's Ha-on.
39:40
SPEAKER_03: And it's Ego Amy that Jesus says.
39:42
SPEAKER_03: And in fact, Jesus says the words ego Amy six times in chapter eight of John's Gospel.
39:47
SPEAKER_03: And yet this is the only time it seems to annoy anybody.
39:49
SPEAKER_03: Why is that?
39:50
SPEAKER_03: Or maybe because it's got more to do with the fact that Jesus seems to be claiming eternality.
39:54
SPEAKER_02: So Jesus is claiming eternality then?
39:56
SPEAKER_02: He's he's claiming to be the God of Abraham.
39:59
SPEAKER_02: He's claiming to be the one Abraham rejoiced in.
40:02
SPEAKER_02: Now forget the Burning Bush stuff if you want to.
40:04
SPEAKER_02: I happen to think he is referencing Exodus 3.
40:06
SPEAKER_02: But even that aside, what Jesus is claiming here, that eternality, is he is the God of Abraham.
40:13
SPEAKER_02: He is the one Abraham rejoiced in.
40:15
SPEAKER_02: The question, who is the God of Abraham, is the most massive geopolitical question, even now in the 21st century.
40:22
SPEAKER_02: And Jesus is like, yeah, I am the God of Abraham.
40:24
SPEAKER_02: Okay, that is Jesus' claim.
40:26
SPEAKER_02: Even if you take away all the ego ME stuff, he's claiming eternality.
40:31
SPEAKER_02: Well, how is Alex going to deal with that?
40:32
SPEAKER_03: But supposing for a moment that this really were an invocation of the divine name, I'm just willing to grant it.
40:38
SPEAKER_03: Let's say, okay, he was meaning to evoke this imagery of Exodus 3 by saying, I am.
40:43
SPEAKER_03: Here we have to understand, as David is quite right to point out, the cultural context of early Judaism.
40:49
SPEAKER_03: And there is a tradition in early Jewish texts, or at least texts of around the contemporary time to the Gospels, of endowing beings who are not Yahweh with Yahweh's name, and thereby enabling them to exert his authority as his representative on earth.
41:10
SPEAKER_02: Well, that's interesting, but how is God going to confer on anybody his eternality?
41:14
SPEAKER_02: Because that's the claim that Jesus just made.
41:17
SPEAKER_02: The claim that Jesus has just made is pre-existence, eternality.
41:20
SPEAKER_02: How is God going to confer pre-existence or eternality onto some guy in the first century?
41:26
SPEAKER_02: It's not just divine authority that Jesus is claiming here.
41:29
SPEAKER_02: He is claiming pre-existence.
41:31
SPEAKER_02: He is claiming to have been rejoiced in by Abraham.
41:34
SPEAKER_02: He's claiming to be the God of Abraham, and he's not in that divine name trying to do anything else.
41:39
SPEAKER_02: He's just saying it as a fact.
41:41
SPEAKER_02: What Alex here brings up about divine name-bearing, not only is it an anemic story that can't account for the breadth of the material of John's gospel, it's also entirely beside the point.
41:52
SPEAKER_02: This is misdirection, pure and simple.
41:55
SPEAKER_02: From here, Alex wants to pick up on some things that David Wood said about the angel of the Lord.
41:59
SPEAKER_02: Now we have just done a video on the angel of the Lord, so you should all be up to speed on this divine God from God.
42:07
SPEAKER_02: But here's how Alex wants to think about the angel of the Lord.
42:10
SPEAKER_03: David has already talked about the angel of Yahweh.
42:12
SPEAKER_03: And there is the suggestion that the angel of Yahweh is Jesus.
42:18
SPEAKER_03: That doesn't seem to make much sense to me.
42:20
SPEAKER_03: For a start, if you turn to Hebrews chapter 1, the very first verse says, In the past, God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his son.
42:34
SPEAKER_03: In these last days.
42:35
SPEAKER_03: If Jesus is the angel of the Lord, way back in Exodus, the story of the Exodus, why is it that Hebrews says he's only spoken to us through the Son in the last few days?
42:44
SPEAKER_02: Well, the very first question in the QA actually addresses this.
42:47
SPEAKER_02: God logic brings up Hebrews chapter 11.
42:50
SPEAKER_02: And Moses is said to endure all that he goes through for the sake of the reproach of Christ, choosing to be mistreated with God's people rather than the glories of Egypt.
42:59
SPEAKER_02: Moses is motivated by Christ.
43:02
SPEAKER_02: Just as Abraham rejoiced in Christ.
43:05
SPEAKER_02: Now you can't retrospectively award to Abraham a Christ-centered joy, and you can't retrospectively award to Moses a Christ-centered motivation.
43:15
SPEAKER_02: You can't say that Moses was motivated by Christ unless he was actually motivated by Christ.
43:21
SPEAKER_02: So Moses seems to assume the pre-existence of Christ.
43:23
SPEAKER_02: What then do we do with Hebrews chapter 1, verses 1 and 2?
43:26
SPEAKER_02: Well, in the past, God did speak through the prophets.
43:29
SPEAKER_02: The angel of the Lord, the pre-incarnate Christ, was always giving his words to the prophets so that the prophets would speak to the nation.
43:37
SPEAKER_02: The Lord commissions Isaiah and gives him those words, and then Isaiah goes and takes the word of the Lord to Israel.
43:44
SPEAKER_02: The word of the Lord commissions Jeremiah and sets him on his feet so that Jeremiah will be the prophet to the people.
43:51
SPEAKER_02: What happens in the New Testament is that the word of the Lord takes flesh to be his own prophet.
43:57
SPEAKER_02: He becomes the prophet par excellence, and he speaks.
44:00
SPEAKER_02: To the Israelites as an Israelite.
44:02
SPEAKER_02: That's what characterizes these last days.
44:04
SPEAKER_02: In the past, God's business was always mediated through Christ, and Abraham knew Christ and Moses knew Christ.
44:09
SPEAKER_02: Sure.
44:10
SPEAKER_02: But the angel of the Lord in Exodus chapter 3 commissions Moses so that Moses and Aaron will go into Pharaoh and speak.
44:17
SPEAKER_02: It's not the angel of the Lord who speaks in his name in that moment in the New Testament, in the incarnation, Christ comes as his own prophet.
44:24
SPEAKER_02: That's what's going on in Hebrews chapter 1.
44:26
SPEAKER_02: But Alex has problems with identifying Christ as the angel of the Lord.
44:29
SPEAKER_03: Likewise in Acts chapter 6, Stephen is recounting a history of the Jews.
44:35
SPEAKER_03: And in it he says that an angel spoke to Moses through the burning bush.
44:40
SPEAKER_03: Not Jesus, but a messenger of Yahweh.
44:43
SPEAKER_02: That's a very Hebraic way of telling the Old Testament story.
44:45
SPEAKER_02: It happens in Exodus as well.
44:47
SPEAKER_02: At points, Moses is uncertain whether the Lord is promising an angel or whether he is promising the divine angel.
44:54
SPEAKER_02: And so it's appropriate to tell the story sometimes as what is going on here?
44:58
SPEAKER_02: Nobody kind of knows.
45:00
SPEAKER_02: And then it develops into the higher Christology of the angel of the Lord later.
45:05
SPEAKER_02: And Stephen seems to be mirroring that uh as he tells his story in Acts chapter six.
45:09
SPEAKER_02: But get what Alex says next, because I think this is a massive own goal.
45:13
SPEAKER_03: It's a little bit strange.
45:14
SPEAKER_03: But suppose we just accept that the angel of Yahweh is a bit difficult to unpack.
45:18
SPEAKER_03: Augustine himself, by the way, said that the angel is correctly termed an angel if we consider him himself, but equally correct, he is termed the Lord because God dwells in him.
45:28
SPEAKER_03: What does that mean?
45:30
SPEAKER_03: I think it's an indication of the divine name.
45:33
SPEAKER_02: Augustine, I believe, is the first theologian in church history to not straight out identify the angel of the Lord as Christ.
45:41
SPEAKER_02: That was a lot to do with the Trinitarian debates that he was engaged with in his own day.
45:46
SPEAKER_02: And he didn't want to give quarter to certain people who might identify the angel of the Lord as Christ, but actually just say he is a created angel and so is Jesus.
45:55
SPEAKER_02: And so that I think is motivating Augustine's exegesis at that point.
45:58
SPEAKER_02: But yes, he's right that the divine name does dwell in the angel.
46:02
SPEAKER_02: You've then just got to ask that question, um, who is this particular angel?
46:06
SPEAKER_02: But here's where Alex gets himself into some trouble here, if you ask me.
46:10
SPEAKER_03: This is most elucidated for me when we turn to non-scriptural Jewish writings of around the same period.
46:16
SPEAKER_03: For example, in well, actually in 3rd Enoch, Metatron is called the Little Yahweh.
46:24
SPEAKER_02: Written perhaps between the 3rd century and the first century BC, Metatron, the angel of the Lord, is called the Little Yahweh.
46:32
SPEAKER_02: Now that's not the way that I would describe who the angel of the Lord is, but here are people looking at the scriptural data of the Old Testament and coming up with the angel of the Lord seems to be God from God, right?
46:45
SPEAKER_02: Why is Alex phrasing this?
46:47
SPEAKER_02: Um, this this seems to totally undercut his story, and it seems to totally support David Wood's story that the angel of the Lord was understood as a divine-sent one, the Lord from the Lord.
47:01
SPEAKER_03: Invoking the divine name, and in fact, to the extent that the Talmud warns Jews not to confuse Metatron with Yahweh, because that seems to be the implication of what he's saying.
47:10
SPEAKER_03: But he is, in fact, just invoking the name.
47:12
SPEAKER_02: That really is evidence that goes towards the two powers in heaven thesis that David Wood brought.
47:17
SPEAKER_02: Uh, if you want to go back to our first video on this, you want to go back to the original debate, David Wood is saying that the Old Testament scriptures seem to present God as being multiple persons who can be called Lords.
47:31
SPEAKER_02: And it it seems like in the intertestamental period people were saying that, and it seems like Talmudic scholars are trying to say, Oh gosh, I know that a lot of people have been saying that Metatron is the little Lord.
47:45
SPEAKER_02: We better not do that anymore.
47:47
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
47:47
SPEAKER_02: And there might be all sorts of reasons why they're clamping down on this idea of a divine messiah, uh, a sent one who is himself the Lord.
47:56
SPEAKER_02: A lot of those reasons are because they are rejecting and denying Christian claims.
48:01
SPEAKER_02: But the scriptures seem to have this category of God from God.
48:04
SPEAKER_03: Let's keep going.
48:05
SPEAKER_03: The most important example of this for me is the Apocalypse of Abraham, written around the same time as the Gospels.
48:11
SPEAKER_03: A Jewish text which tells the story of Abraham, who hears the voice of God, and he's terrified and he hits the ground.
48:18
SPEAKER_03: And God he hears the voice of God speaking to an angel.
48:23
SPEAKER_03: And he speaks to an angel, saying, Go, Yahweh, that's the name of the angel, of the same name, through the mediation of my ineffable name, consecrate this man for me and strengthen him against his trembling.
48:35
SPEAKER_03: Through the mediation of my divine name, which he's given to the angel Yahel.
48:38
SPEAKER_03: Yahuel, by the way, Yah and El.
48:42
SPEAKER_03: It is a substitute for the ineffable name of Yahweh, the writing of which is forbidden.
48:47
SPEAKER_03: And that's why he's called Yahweh.
48:48
SPEAKER_03: And in fact, at one point God is himself addressed as Yahuel in this text.
48:52
SPEAKER_03: Why is Alex going here?
48:53
SPEAKER_02: Like, like this seems to be a massive own goal.
48:56
SPEAKER_02: If if you're on Team Alex at this point, why why are you not screaming at the screen?
49:01
SPEAKER_02: Like, Alex, don't do it.
49:03
SPEAKER_02: Don't talk about this.
49:04
SPEAKER_02: He's literally saying that pre-Christian material is identifying the angel of the Lord as the one who bears the name of God.
49:11
SPEAKER_02: And this angel kind of takes Abraham on a tour of the cosmos, and he seems to be the great high priest of all creation, and he brings the name and presence of God.
49:20
SPEAKER_02: Um this seems to be completely in continuity with the kind of angel of the Lord um type theology that David Wood was bringing.
49:30
SPEAKER_02: Now I'm not saying that I agree with the theology of the apocalypse of Abraham, but I am saying that here are people who, completely divorced from Christian scripture, are looking at the Hebrew scriptures and they are coming up with a theology that is at least open to the idea of God from God.
49:45
SPEAKER_02: Light from light, very God from very God.
49:47
SPEAKER_02: I don't know why Alex is going here, but I I think it's an own goal.
49:50
SPEAKER_02: What do you think?
49:51
SPEAKER_03: Abraham is told by this angel Yahooel, Stand up, Abraham, go without fear.
49:56
SPEAKER_03: Be right glad and rejoice, for I am with you.
50:00
SPEAKER_03: For eternal honor has been prepared for you by the eternal one.
50:02
SPEAKER_03: I have appointed to be with you, and the generation prepared for you.
50:06
SPEAKER_03: So the angel, invoking the divine name, by the way, says to Abraham, Rejoice, for I am preparing for you essentially redemption, and it will come from your generation.
50:16
SPEAKER_03: By the way, when Yahoel, when A Abraham finally stands up, one of the descriptions of Yahel's appearance is that his hair is white like snow.
50:23
SPEAKER_03: Where have we heard that before?
50:24
SPEAKER_02: We've heard that in Daniel chapter seven.
50:26
SPEAKER_02: So the ancient of days is like that, and the Son of Man is brought towards him.
50:31
SPEAKER_02: And so it it seems like God most high and Yahooel, um, or the Ancient of Days and the Son of Man, we seem to be in the same ballpark.
50:39
SPEAKER_02: Are we describing the same father-son relationship?
50:42
SPEAKER_02: That's that's what Christians say, and that theory seems to account for this data that Alex is bringing.
50:47
SPEAKER_02: I don't know where he's going with this.
50:49
SPEAKER_03: But interesting, isn't it?
50:50
SPEAKER_03: Let's think about the context of John 8.58.
50:52
SPEAKER_03: A lot of people forget that we're talking about Abraham.
50:54
SPEAKER_03: Why are we talking about Abraham?
50:56
SPEAKER_03: Why is it here that Jesus says before Abraham was I am?
50:59
SPEAKER_03: Well, if I'm right that he is just identifying himself, and the thing that's important is the Abraham claim.
51:04
SPEAKER_03: Could this stem from a similar tradition?
51:06
SPEAKER_03: This is what Andrew Perryman has suggested recently, that when he says, I mean, this whole thing gets kicked off because Jesus says Abraham rejoiced to see my day.
51:17
SPEAKER_03: Hold on a second.
51:17
SPEAKER_03: In the Apocalypse of Abraham, the angel Yahooel says to Abraham, Rejoice, for from your generation will will come one who will redeem you.
51:27
SPEAKER_03: So is it possible that a common tradition has Jesus referring to the fact that Abraham rejoiced to see his day because he was promised this redemption from the beginning of time?
51:38
SPEAKER_03: It's possible.
51:39
SPEAKER_03: It's a suggestion.
51:41
SPEAKER_03: I think it's quite an interesting one.
51:43
SPEAKER_02: Abraham rejoiced in God from God, and Jesus seems to claim to be the one in whom Abraham rejoices.
51:50
SPEAKER_02: Do you see the misdirection here?
51:51
SPEAKER_02: I mean, it it seems to me very obvious that Jesus is claiming eternality, he's claiming pre-existence, he's claiming to be the God of Abraham.
51:59
SPEAKER_02: But I feel like Alex is trying to distract us from just the plain meaning of John chapter 8.
52:04
SPEAKER_02: But having considered the apocalypse of Abraham and this figure, Yahooel, um, this angel of the Lord in whom the Lord's name dwells, um, Alex in his first rebuttal then quotes Exodus 23, which I think must have been in the mind of whoever authored the Apocalypse of Abraham, because that is all about the angel of the Lord in whom the Lord's name uh dwells.
52:27
SPEAKER_02: Let's have a look at Alex citing Exodus 23.
52:31
SPEAKER_03: I've suggested the divine name-bearing model as opposed to the two powers in heaven.
52:37
SPEAKER_03: And when I look at passages such as Exodus 23, verses 20 to 21, see I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way.
52:45
SPEAKER_03: Pay attention to him and listen to what he says.
52:47
SPEAKER_03: Do not rebel against him.
52:48
SPEAKER_03: He will not forgive your rebellion, since my name is in him.
52:52
SPEAKER_03: I just ask which interpretation lends itself more nicely to the passages.
52:57
SPEAKER_02: Uh this is a starting passage of the angel of the Lord is the one who delivers the people, the one who forgives your sins.
53:05
SPEAKER_02: Who can forgive sin but God alone?
53:07
SPEAKER_02: Well, apparently the angel of the Lord does so, because the name of the Lord dwells in him.
53:12
SPEAKER_02: And people like Jonathan Edwards down through church history have thought this is a wonderfully Trinitarian verse.
53:18
SPEAKER_02: Not only do you have the the Malach Adonai, the the angel of the Lord, you also have the Shem Adonai, the name of the Lord.
53:26
SPEAKER_02: And the Father, through his sent one, the messenger of the Lord, forgives people because the name, the Spirit of the Lord, is within him.
53:35
SPEAKER_02: If you just applied the C.S.
53:37
SPEAKER_02: Lewis trilemma to the angel of the Lord just in Exodus 23, you'd have to ask, is this angel who is claiming to be able to forgive sins, is he mad, is he bad, or is he God?
53:47
SPEAKER_02: I think Exodus 23 is in the background of the apocalypse of Abraham, and that's that's why Yahuel is said to be able to do the sorts of things that Yahuel does.
53:57
SPEAKER_02: Other intertestamental authors like Philo make a big deal out of Exodus 23, this very passage.
54:04
SPEAKER_02: And Philo thinks that the high priest of all creation, the second God, the Deuteros Theos, the Word of God is the one from Exodus 23.
54:12
SPEAKER_02: Here's Philo.
54:13
SPEAKER_02: For God, like a shepherd and a king, governs the earth, and then he goes on and describes all the things that God governs.
54:21
SPEAKER_02: How does he govern them?
54:23
SPEAKER_02: Appointing as their immediate superintendent his own right reason, his logos, his firstborn son, who is to receive the charge of this sacred company as the lieutenant of the great king, for it is said somewhere, Behold, I am he, I will send my messenger before thy face, who shall keep thee in the road.
54:41
SPEAKER_02: That's Exodus 23, okay?
54:44
SPEAKER_02: And people utterly divorced from Christian scripture, quite apart from, quite before Christian Scripture, are thinking that the angel of the Lord is the Logos, he is the firstborn son, he is the lieutenant of the great king.
54:58
SPEAKER_02: That's who the messenger of the Lord is.
55:01
SPEAKER_02: I don't know why Alex brings up Exodus 23.
55:03
SPEAKER_02: I don't I don't think it supports his side at all.
55:06
SPEAKER_02: Let's skip on to the open dialogue where Alex really takes control from this point onwards.
55:11
SPEAKER_02: I think Nate Salah made a great point when he said that uh David starts on high and kind of peters out by the end of this debate.
55:19
SPEAKER_02: Alex does not start out so well, but basically he finishes strong.
55:23
SPEAKER_02: And I think in the open dialogue portion of the debate, Alex kind of takes charge and uh starts asking all the questions.
55:31
SPEAKER_02: And one thing he really wants to know is in John 11, why does Jesus pray?
55:36
SPEAKER_03: Uh well, I have some questions, perhaps, to ask David about his position on Jesus' relationship to the Father, with particular regards to the authority that he derives from the the Father.
55:48
SPEAKER_03: So, one question, for example.
55:50
SPEAKER_03: Why do you think that Jesus prays before raising Lazarus from the dead?
55:57
SPEAKER_02: Here's how Jesus answers that question in John 11, verse 41.
56:00
SPEAKER_02: Then Jesus looked up and said, Father, I thank you that you have heard me.
56:04
SPEAKER_02: I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you have sent me.
56:12
SPEAKER_02: And then he says, Please, Father, will you raise Lazarus?
56:15
SPEAKER_02: Because I can't do it, please.
56:17
SPEAKER_02: No, that's not what he says.
56:19
SPEAKER_02: Like when he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, Lazarus, come out, and the dead man came out.
56:25
SPEAKER_02: This prayer is declarative.
56:27
SPEAKER_02: This prayer is for the sake of those who are standing there with him, and this prayer nowhere asks God the Father to do something that the Son can't do.
56:36
SPEAKER_02: Jesus on his own authority says, Lazarus, come out.
56:39
SPEAKER_02: Of course he does, because verse 25, I am the resurrection and the life the one who believes in me will live even though they die.
56:45
SPEAKER_02: And whoever lives by believing in me will never die.
56:48
SPEAKER_02: Do you believe this?
56:50
SPEAKER_02: He is the Lord of life.
56:52
SPEAKER_02: Now, why does he pray?
56:53
SPEAKER_02: Well, in the background, there is John chapter 5, which is fascinating because as I've already noted, when Jesus claims equality with the Father, the Jews pick up stones to stone him because he is claiming to be equal with God.
57:07
SPEAKER_02: You see chapter 5, verse 18, he was even calling God his own father, making himself equal with God.
57:12
SPEAKER_02: What do the enemies of Christ?
57:14
SPEAKER_02: Even the enemies of Christ know enough to know that to say that you are the unique son of the Father, who is always doing the Father's business, is to claim equality with God.
57:25
SPEAKER_02: Even the enemies of Christ know that.
57:28
SPEAKER_02: Jesus goes on to talk about this father-son relationship that he has.
57:32
SPEAKER_02: Verse 19 Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself, he can only do what he sees his father doing.
57:37
SPEAKER_02: Because whatever the father does, the son also does.
57:40
SPEAKER_02: Whatever the father does, the son does.
57:43
SPEAKER_02: The father is always acting through his son.
57:46
SPEAKER_02: Always.
57:46
SPEAKER_02: For the father loves the son and shows him all that he does.
57:49
SPEAKER_02: Yes, and he will show him even greater works than these, so that you will be amazed.
57:53
SPEAKER_02: For just as the father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom he is pleased to give it.
57:58
SPEAKER_02: Moreover, the Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son.
58:03
SPEAKER_02: The Father judges no one.
58:05
SPEAKER_02: He has entrusted all judgment to the Son.
58:08
SPEAKER_02: The Father does not and will not work outside of Christ.
58:12
SPEAKER_02: Everything is from the Father through the Son, and we might add through the Spirit.
58:16
SPEAKER_02: But this is why Jesus is praying, because do you notice that the Father has entrusted all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father.
58:25
SPEAKER_02: Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.
58:28
SPEAKER_02: Very truly I tell you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be judged, but has crossed over from death to life.
58:35
SPEAKER_02: Very truly I tell you, a time is coming and has now come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.
58:44
SPEAKER_02: A time is coming, judgment day, and has now come, right here and now, in Jesus' time, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and live.
58:52
SPEAKER_02: That's the background to the raising of Lazarus.
58:55
SPEAKER_02: Here is a portent of final judgment, where it's the voice of the Son of God that raises the dead, so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father.
59:05
SPEAKER_02: Verse 26, for as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself.
59:11
SPEAKER_02: This is why Jesus can simply say, Lazarus come out.
59:26
SPEAKER_02: It's not that there is a God of resurrection in the abstract who occasionally chooses to use this person, Jesus, to get the job done.
59:35
SPEAKER_02: It's that there is a father who always works through his son, a son who always works on the initiative of the father.
59:42
SPEAKER_02: There has always been that father-son relationship, and Jesus is that son.
59:46
SPEAKER_02: Alex again goes to a place that has a very high Christology, and he wants to bring to bear his divine name-bearer hypothesis.
59:54
SPEAKER_02: But Jesus does not act like the divine name-bearer does in his divine name-bearer hypothesis.
1:00:00
SPEAKER_02: Because Jesus is not asking the Father, please will you raise Lazarus for me?
1:00:05
SPEAKER_02: The prayer does not say, please raise my friend.
1:00:08
SPEAKER_02: Jesus on his own authority says Lazarus.
1:00:10
SPEAKER_02: Come out.
1:00:11
SPEAKER_02: So whose hypothesis fits John 11 better?
1:00:14
SPEAKER_02: Alex's name-bearer hypothesis or just the Trinitarian doctrine that David Wood is bringing?
1:00:19
SPEAKER_02: I I think it's very obvious that uh it's the Trinitarian view that actually makes sense of John chapter 11.
1:00:26
SPEAKER_02: I mean, here's another place where Alex goes, he doesn't even have to go to the epistles.
1:00:30
SPEAKER_02: He probably shouldn't go to the epistles if he just wants to shore up his own position.
1:00:34
SPEAKER_02: But he's going to go to Philippians 2 and uh talk about the hymn of Christ.
1:00:38
SPEAKER_02: But the misdirection here is palpable.
1:00:40
SPEAKER_03: Let's let's listen.
1:00:41
SPEAKER_03: I suppose I should turn to Philippians chapter 2, which David mentions.
1:00:45
SPEAKER_03: Of course, we're not talking about Jesus' own words anymore, but it's it's still quite interesting what people came to believe.
1:00:51
SPEAKER_03: The mindset of Jesus Christ, who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God as something to be used to his own advantage, but rather made himself nothing, as I'm sure you will know.
1:01:02
SPEAKER_03: Being in very nature God, don't forget that bit, being in very nature God.
1:01:05
SPEAKER_03: That word grasped there.
1:01:07
SPEAKER_03: Harpagmon or something like that.
1:01:09
SPEAKER_03: I'm not very good at pronouncing the Greek, but it means something like to steal.
1:01:14
SPEAKER_02: To seize.
1:01:16
SPEAKER_02: This is classic misdirection.
1:01:17
SPEAKER_02: He's just said Jesus is in very nature God.
1:01:20
SPEAKER_02: But let's let's talk about the word grasped for some reason.
1:01:23
SPEAKER_02: And let's see if it's a good reason.
1:01:25
SPEAKER_03: Isn't it a bit strange that if Jesus is God, he didn't consider equality with God as something to be seized, to be stolen.
1:01:33
SPEAKER_03: That's how that word is used in the Greek language.
1:01:36
SPEAKER_03: How can he steal something that's already rightfully his?
1:01:40
SPEAKER_03: And indeed, because he then died on the cross and humbled himself even to death, therefore he was given the name that was above all other names.
1:01:51
SPEAKER_03: Therefore, so whatever exalted position Jesus is given here in Philippians 2, and by the way he is given it, he's given it because of his crucifixion.
1:02:01
SPEAKER_03: Therefore he's given the name above other names.
1:02:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's quite cool.
1:02:05
SPEAKER_02: Um therefore God exalted him to the highest place, because he's poured his life out.
1:02:09
SPEAKER_02: Well, therefore, he is the greatest expression of deity.
1:02:14
SPEAKER_02: Um, but it's not cross first and then he gets exalted.
1:02:18
SPEAKER_02: It's being in very nature God, therefore he humbled himself, right?
1:02:22
SPEAKER_02: Because he's God, therefore he pours himself out, because God is a fountain of life, so of course a fountain expends itself.
1:02:28
SPEAKER_02: And Jesus demonstrates his divine nature through his death.
1:02:32
SPEAKER_02: He doesn't take a holiday from his divine nature, he's not denying his divine nature by dying, he's demonstrating his divine nature.
1:02:38
SPEAKER_02: Being in very nature God, he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped.
1:02:42
SPEAKER_02: And so he's not going to do the Adam thing, he is the second Adam, okay?
1:02:46
SPEAKER_02: The Son of God becomes the Son of Man.
1:02:48
SPEAKER_02: The Son of God becomes the true man in order to do not what Adam did, not the grasping thing, but the serving thing, and he serves all the way down to the cross.
1:02:58
SPEAKER_02: Therefore, God exalts him back to the place where he was before, and gives him the name that is above every name that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow and tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, which is a quote from Isaiah chapter 45, which all the Targums identified as here is the memorable of the Lord, here is the word of the Lord, but it's this God from God, it's the word of the Lord to whom all creatures will bow.
1:03:19
SPEAKER_02: That's what Isaiah says, that's what Paul says, and he identifies Christ as being that God.
1:03:25
SPEAKER_02: That's Philippians 2.
1:03:26
SPEAKER_02: Don't be misled by this misdirection.
1:03:29
SPEAKER_02: Again, which interpretation lends itself more nicely to these passages?
1:03:34
SPEAKER_02: Which interpretation fits?
1:03:35
SPEAKER_02: I tell you, the interpretation that fits is that Jesus is in very nature God.
1:03:40
SPEAKER_02: That's that's what fits.
1:03:42
SPEAKER_02: There is a claim to divinity.
1:03:44
SPEAKER_02: Debate over.
1:03:45
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
1:03:46
SPEAKER_02: Like, why would you go to Philippians 2?
1:03:49
SPEAKER_02: And and here's what's interesting is that Philippians 2 obviously is kind of earlier than the Gospel writers are writing.
1:03:55
SPEAKER_02: And so what we've got in the scriptures is in the Old Testament, there is a God from God that is very obvious.
1:04:02
SPEAKER_02: In the intertestamental period, there is a God from God that's very obvious.
1:04:05
SPEAKER_02: In the epistles, we've got this God from God.
1:04:08
SPEAKER_02: In the Gospel writers themselves, so John himself, for instance, in John chapter one, is giving this God from God kind of doctrine.
1:04:16
SPEAKER_02: Are we then to assume that Jesus is the only person in all the scriptures that doesn't think in terms of God from God?
1:04:24
SPEAKER_02: Okay, the Old Testament does, intertestament intertestamental period does, the epistles do, the evangelists themselves do, but apparently Jesus doesn't.
1:04:32
SPEAKER_02: And if the New Testament authors have such a high Christology, but they don't put that high Christology into the mouth of Jesus, I guess that speaks very highly of their journalistic integrity, doesn't it?
1:04:44
SPEAKER_02: They don't feel at liberty to put onto the lips of Jesus divine claims, even though they are very happy making divine claims.
1:04:53
SPEAKER_02: Paul calls Jesus Lord and God.
1:04:55
SPEAKER_02: Thomas calls Jesus Lord and God.
1:04:57
SPEAKER_02: John calls Jesus Lord and God.
1:04:59
SPEAKER_02: On Alex's view, do they have an immensely high Christology, but they refuse to put that Christology into the mouth of Jesus?
1:05:06
SPEAKER_02: If so, that speaks very highly of the integrity of the New Testament authors, wouldn't you say?
1:05:11
SPEAKER_02: That they that they refuse to alter a syllable of the teaching of Christ and make it more in line with their high Christology.
1:05:19
SPEAKER_02: I think Alex is in a bit of a contradictory position here, actually.
1:05:22
SPEAKER_02: Now, in open dialogue, David wants to move the conversation on to Daniel chapter 7 and the glorious son of man.
1:05:28
SPEAKER_02: Here's how things unfold.
1:05:30
SPEAKER_01: This is the exact same issue that you have in um in Daniel 7, where the uh the son of man coming with the clouds of heaven approaches the ancient of days and he is given authority, glory, and sovereign power.
1:05:45
SPEAKER_01: So it's why is he being given authority and glory and sovereign power?
1:05:49
SPEAKER_01: But even before that, it's the son of man coming with the clouds of heaven.
1:05:53
SPEAKER_01: That's how he approaches.
1:05:54
SPEAKER_01: But again, it's Yahweh who comes with the clouds.
1:05:56
SPEAKER_01: So he's Yahweh, and then something happens, and then he's
1:06:00
SPEAKER_03: He's given the Son of Man is Yahweh.
1:06:02
SPEAKER_03: Do you think that that was how Daniel 7 was interpreted by anybody before Daniel saw a vision.
1:06:07
SPEAKER_02: This is where I disagree with David Wood because he's about to say no.
1:06:10
SPEAKER_02: He's about to say nobody really understood the God from God theology that makes sense of the Son of Man as this divine figure.
1:06:19
SPEAKER_02: I think that's an inconsistent position for David to hold.
1:06:22
SPEAKER_02: And I think Alex realizes it's an inconsistent position for David to hold.
1:06:25
SPEAKER_02: And so Alex tries to iron out David's theology so that David will consistently talk about this God from God theology in the Old Testament as something that's understood.
1:06:35
SPEAKER_02: But it really was understood.
1:06:36
SPEAKER_02: Alex wants evidence for it being understood.
1:06:39
SPEAKER_02: He's already given us the best evidence for it being understood in intertestamental times.
1:06:43
SPEAKER_02: He's talked about the apocalypse of Abraham.
1:06:46
SPEAKER_02: He has talked about uh third Enoch.
1:06:48
SPEAKER_02: He could also add to that first Enoch.
1:06:50
SPEAKER_02: I mean, first Enoch talks about the Son of Man in incredibly exalted terms.
1:06:55
SPEAKER_02: And there I saw the one to whom belongs the time before time, speaking of, you know, God most high, the Father here, and his head was white like wool.
1:07:03
SPEAKER_02: With him was another being whose countenance had the appearance of a man, and his face was full of graciousness, like one of the holy angels.
1:07:10
SPEAKER_02: I asked the angel who went with me concerning that son, and who he was, and whence he was, and why he went with the one to whom belongs the time before time.
1:07:20
SPEAKER_02: He answered and said to me, This is the Son of Man, a title now, right?
1:07:25
SPEAKER_02: It's not just one like a son of man.
1:07:27
SPEAKER_02: This is the Son of Man who has righteousness, with whom dwells righteousness, and who reveals all the treasures of that which is hidden.
1:07:34
SPEAKER_02: Because the Lord of the Spirits has chosen him, he is the elect one and the righteous one, and whose lot has the preeminence before the Lord of the Spirits in uprightness forever.
1:07:43
SPEAKER_02: This Son of Man whom you have seen shall raise up the kings and the mighty from their seats, and the strong from their thrones, and shall loosen the reins of the strong and break the teeth of sinners.
1:07:52
SPEAKER_02: Where have you heard that before?
1:07:53
SPEAKER_02: Raise up the kings and the mighty from their seats and the strong from their thrones.
1:07:56
SPEAKER_02: It's the magnificat, isn't it?
1:07:58
SPEAKER_02: You know, Mary seems to be riffing on this in Luke chapter one, and it's the Son of Man who does all this.
1:08:05
SPEAKER_02: In first Enoch chapter forty eight, and at that hour that Son of Man was named in the presence of the Lord of the Spirits and His name before the one to whom belongs the time before time.
1:08:15
SPEAKER_02: Yes, before the sun and the signs were created, before the stars of the heaven were made, his name was named before the Lord of the Spirits.
1:08:21
SPEAKER_02: There seems to be an eternality to this glorious Son of Man.
1:08:26
SPEAKER_02: He shall be a staff to the righteous whereon to stay themselves and not fall, and he shall be the light of the Gentiles, and the hope of those who are troubled of heart.
1:08:34
SPEAKER_02: Who is this glorious Son of Man, this eternal, righteous, chosen judge and comforter?
1:08:41
SPEAKER_02: All who dwell on earth shall fall down and worship before him, and will praise and bless and celebrate with song the Lord of the Spirits.
1:08:48
SPEAKER_02: For this reason has he been chosen and hidden before him before the creation of the world and for evermore.
1:08:54
SPEAKER_02: The wisdom of the Lord of the Spirits has revealed him to the holy and righteous, for he has preserved the lot of the righteous, because they have hated and despised this world of unrighteousness, and have hated all its works and ways in the name of the Lord of the Spirits, for in his name they are saved, and according to his good pleasure has it been in regard to their life.
1:09:13
SPEAKER_02: And then it talks j and then it talks about judgment upon those who reject the Lord of the Spirits and the Son of Man.
1:09:19
SPEAKER_02: And then I'll skip on a paragraph and it says, They have denied the Lord of the Spirits and His Messiah.
1:09:27
SPEAKER_02: The name of the Lord of the Spirits be blessed.
1:09:29
SPEAKER_02: First Enoch spoke in these exalted terms about the Son of Man.
1:09:32
SPEAKER_02: Third Enoch spoke in these exalted terms, the Apocalypse of Abraham, Philo.
1:09:37
SPEAKER_02: Within Daniel 7 itself, it's impossible to shake the idea that the Son of Man is to be worshipped.
1:09:44
SPEAKER_02: And in intertestamental times, people did pick up this idea of the Son of Man, this glorious Son of Man who is to be worshipped and glorified.
1:09:50
SPEAKER_02: And then Jesus uses the phrase and expects people to understand what he means by it.
1:09:55
SPEAKER_02: When he is asked by Caiaphas, are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?
1:10:00
SPEAKER_02: Notice how irreducibly Trinitarian that is.
1:10:02
SPEAKER_02: The Christ, the anointed one, anointed with the Holy Spirit, Son of the Blessed One, are you that one?
1:10:08
SPEAKER_02: And Jesus says, I am, and you will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven.
1:10:13
SPEAKER_02: And with that, Caiaphas tears his robes, and it's enough for him to cry out blasphemy.
1:10:17
SPEAKER_02: Well, of course, even the enemies of God know that to claim to be the Son of the Father is to claim to be equal to God.
1:10:23
SPEAKER_02: John 5 verse 18 has laid that out.
1:10:25
SPEAKER_02: What is Caiaphas's theology?
1:10:27
SPEAKER_02: Well, you know, it might be at least as bad, or at least as good as the John 5 18 crowd.
1:10:34
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
1:10:34
SPEAKER_02: That Christ-hating mob seemed to think that to claim to be Son of the Father was claiming to be equal to God.
1:10:39
SPEAKER_02: I don't see any reason why Caiaphas wouldn't think similarly.
1:10:42
SPEAKER_02: He certainly ought to have done from the Old Testament, and plenty of people in the intertestamental period had that kind of a doctrine of God that meant claiming to be the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One, the great I Am, and the Son of Man is enough for you to tear your robes.
1:10:55
SPEAKER_02: In Mark chapter 14, it seems very obvious to me that Jesus knew what he was saying, and he knew that what he was saying would be known by Caiaphas.
1:11:03
SPEAKER_02: And it seems like Caiaphas did know what Jesus was saying and responded appropriately.
1:11:09
SPEAKER_02: Now Alex and David go back and forth about whether Caiaphas could have possibly known that the Son of Man was this divine title or not.
1:11:16
SPEAKER_02: I think if I was David, I just would have said yes, but um I'm sure he has his own reasons um for why he didn't want to go that way.
1:11:22
SPEAKER_02: He might have thought that it was a trap.
1:11:24
SPEAKER_02: But Alex wants consistency from David.
1:11:26
SPEAKER_02: It's interesting what he says.
1:11:27
SPEAKER_03: When Jesus comes for his trial and he says, and he quotes Daniel 7 and says that you'll see the Son of Man riding on the clouds of heaven.
1:11:36
SPEAKER_03: Do you think that the problem there was that Jesus was claiming to be God, and that's something that no human being can do?
1:11:43
SPEAKER_03: Because Daniel 7 is part of the Jewish scripture.
1:11:47
SPEAKER_03: They were expecting the coming of this Son of Man.
1:11:49
SPEAKER_03: So if it's obvious that the Son of Man was going to be Yahweh, then the Sanhedrin should have expected that the coming Son of Man would have been Yahweh.
1:11:55
SPEAKER_03: They might have thought that Jesus wasn't him.
1:11:57
SPEAKER_03: But do you think that the Sanhedrin were expecting whoever the rightful son of man was who was to come would be identical to Yahweh?
1:12:03
SPEAKER_03: And if not, why did they not read that into the passage as obviously as you think that they should have done?
1:12:08
SPEAKER_01: People were basically confused by these passages.
1:12:10
SPEAKER_01: That's the impression you get.
1:12:11
SPEAKER_01: They go in all sorts of different directions, and oh, this is referring to the Messiah, no, this is referring to some sort of angel, no, this is referring to this, no, that's I'm talking about what the text says.
1:12:20
SPEAKER_02: Yes, there was a lot of confusion, that's true, but I think Caiaphas knew enough to know what was being said here.
1:12:26
SPEAKER_02: And I think there were plenty of people in Second Temple Judaism who had that kind of exalted view of the Son of Man, and it it is not at all surprising that Caiaphas is one of them.
1:12:36
SPEAKER_01: The Son of Man comes with the clouds of heaven.
1:12:39
SPEAKER_01: All before that, all before that, it's always Yahweh who comes on the clouds.
1:12:43
SPEAKER_01: And so if you were looking at that and you didn't, if you if you didn't have the idea of, wait a minute, it it just can't be.
1:12:50
SPEAKER_01: It's impossible that that is referring to God because you've got the ancient of days right there.
1:12:56
SPEAKER_01: If you're not reading, I mean, and really, I I don't know, I don't even know what to do if you're saying that I'm not talking about you, I'm talking about anyone.
1:13:02
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:13:03
SPEAKER_01: If you're reading that and going, no, it doesn't seem like this is God, he comes with the clouds of heaven, but then he's worshipped by all nations with and has an ever an everlasting kingdom.
1:13:12
SPEAKER_01: If you're just reading that, if if you put it this way, if you didn't have the ancient of days in the picture and you're reading this description, comes in the cloud of heavens worshiped by all nations, obviously God.
1:13:19
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
1:13:19
SPEAKER_01: So the the the mystery comes in, the mystery comes in when it's wait a minute, we've got the ancient of days here, so this is sounding like that's right, two divine beings, and we just can't respect that.
1:13:30
SPEAKER_03: The point was or is in the Christological dispute that Jesus is accused of blasphemy at his trial, and that this is evidence that he was claiming to be God through his identification with the divine Son of Man, because that's how it's interpreted by the High Priest, because he accuses him of blasphemy.
1:13:48
SPEAKER_02: David is more interested in pressing into what Daniel 7 said than what people interpreted it to mean in the first century, but but Alex really wants to press into this point, and and I respect him for that.
1:13:58
SPEAKER_03: Does that mean that the high priest was expecting the Son of Man to be Yahweh himself?
1:14:03
SPEAKER_03: Do you think that that is the interpretation that the high priest had of the Danielic vision of the Son of Man?
1:14:08
SPEAKER_01: I would say they would obviously have interpreted the uh that that passage in Daniel or claim to be the son of man in the in that sense.
1:14:18
SPEAKER_01: If you were just if you're just saying, hey, I'm a son of man, I think they'd be fine with it.
1:14:22
SPEAKER_03: Um, yeah, of course, in in the Aramaic in which Daniel 7 is written, it's one like a son of man, one like Barnash, which just means one like a human being.
1:14:30
SPEAKER_01: So you you'd cla you'd clarify that, and that's the point.
1:14:33
SPEAKER_01: Like that like a human being, and yet he comes with the clouds of heaven.
1:14:36
SPEAKER_01: So he's he's coming with the clouds of heaven, he's Yahweh, and yet he's like a son of a man.
1:14:40
SPEAKER_01: That's right.
1:14:40
SPEAKER_01: You understand that in the history.
1:14:42
SPEAKER_01: As far as how they would interpret it, they could have a range of interpretations that we don't know what this means, but we know that the guy who built my cousin's table in Nazareth should not be making this claim.
1:14:56
SPEAKER_03: So is that enough to be so suppose that their interpretation was, say, a messianic vision of Daniel 7, this carpenter claiming to be the Messiah, would that have been enough to accuse him of blasphemy?
1:15:08
SPEAKER_01: Claiming to be the Messiah is not a decent.
1:15:12
SPEAKER_01: All kinds of people in the sense.
1:15:13
SPEAKER_03: So the reason I'm pressing this point is because when I say did the high priest believe that the Son of Man was going to be Yahweh himself, I think that's quite implausible.
1:15:21
SPEAKER_03: And I think you recognize that in saying, well, look, there are loads of ideas that they could have had, it was quite confusing.
1:15:26
SPEAKER_03: But if Jesus wouldn't be accused of blasphemy for merely claiming to be the Messiah, if you had a messianic interpretation, he wouldn't be accused of blasphemy for claiming to embody the nation of Israel, if you have the idea that the Son of Man represents Israel, which is another view, it has to be Israel comes on the clouds of it.
1:15:41
SPEAKER_01: It has to be It is worshiped by all nations?
1:15:43
SPEAKER_03: I'm not saying that's my interpretation.
1:15:44
SPEAKER_03: I'm saying that in the history of the interpretation of Daniel 7, that has been a popular interpretation.
1:15:49
SPEAKER_03: Of course, the four beasts which come before represent different nations, and the one like the Son of Man is Israel.
1:15:53
SPEAKER_03: But the question I'm asking you is surely you recognize that if the idea is that claiming to be the Messiah or something like that is not enough for a death sentence, then what Jesus has to have done in that trial in order to get a death sentence must have been to say something that the high priest immediately interpreted as him claiming to be Yahweh.
1:16:12
SPEAKER_03: That means that he has to expect that the coming Son of Man would be Yahweh himself.
1:16:18
SPEAKER_03: Is that what you think what the high priest thought of Daniel's vision?
1:16:21
SPEAKER_02: I think Alex is following the story in Mark 14 and concluding what I think anyone would conclude if they were just coming cold to Mark chapter 14, that whatever it is that Jesus said, Caiaphas understood it and understood it to be a blasphemous claim.
1:16:34
SPEAKER_02: Now, if that's true, then Alex has lost the debate because Jesus is claiming to be divine and he's intending to be understood as divine.
1:16:42
SPEAKER_02: The only loophole, the only get out for Alex is that Caiaphas couldn't possibly have understood the Son of Man in divine terms.
1:16:50
SPEAKER_02: Now that's not much of a loophole because it leaves you with a Caiaphas who is reacting bizarrely to Jesus' claims, and he's just had a brain explosion, and he just decides to tear his robes and crucify a guy, even though he doesn't understand that Son of Man is is a blasphemous claim.
1:17:07
SPEAKER_02: Um that's that's Alex's only way out of not losing the debate.
1:17:12
SPEAKER_02: If Alex acknowledges that Caiaphas in any way understood the Son of Man to be a divine term, then Alex has lost the debate because there is Jesus claiming to be the Son of Man.
1:17:22
SPEAKER_02: There he is claiming to be God and earning himself the crucifixion that he sought through this proclamation of his self-identity.
1:17:30
SPEAKER_02: Caiaphas really seems to kind of understand what Jesus is saying, and Jesus seems to understand that Caiaphas will understand what he's saying.
1:17:38
SPEAKER_02: And so Alex's position, I don't think, is tenable.
1:17:41
SPEAKER_01: That's why David says one, you're you're you you just made an awesome case for me.
1:17:47
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, Alex made an awesome point for David.
1:17:49
SPEAKER_02: In fact, I think all night Alex was making awesome points for David.
1:17:53
SPEAKER_02: I I think that's what he did all night.
1:17:56
SPEAKER_02: In in at least ten different ways.
1:17:58
SPEAKER_02: When he goes to John chapter 10, Alex is making an awesome point for David.
1:18:02
SPEAKER_02: He's saying that he is God, and he is God in a way so superior to the way that even the divine counsel of angels are gods in Psalm 82, because Jesus is the one in this unique eternal relationship with the Father and sent into the world.
1:18:16
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is God in John chapter 10.
1:18:18
SPEAKER_02: And then Alex goes to John chapter 17, and Jesus is clearly God in John chapter 17.
1:18:23
SPEAKER_02: He shares glory with the Father from before the world began.
1:18:25
SPEAKER_02: That's what John 17, verse 5 says.
1:18:27
SPEAKER_02: That's what John 17, verse 24 says.
1:18:29
SPEAKER_02: And then Alex goes to third Enoch for some reason, and and the Metatron, the angel of the Lord, is the little Yahweh, the God from God.
1:18:36
SPEAKER_02: I don't know why he goes there.
1:18:37
SPEAKER_02: It doesn't help his situation at all.
1:18:39
SPEAKER_02: Then he goes to the Apocalypse of Abraham, and again, he's got this God from God character who is incredibly exalted, the angel of the Lord, who he then describes by going to Exodus chapter 23, and clearly that person, whoever that person is, is forgiving the sins of Israel.
1:18:55
SPEAKER_02: Who can forgive sins but God alone?
1:18:57
SPEAKER_02: All these passages fit David's hypothesis, not Alex's, the plain meaning of John chapter 8.
1:19:03
SPEAKER_02: It seems to me very obvious that Jesus is claiming eternality, he's claiming pre-existence, he's claiming to be the God of Abraham.
1:19:10
SPEAKER_02: Then he goes to John chapter 11, and there Jesus is the resurrection and the life who just raises Lazarus.
1:19:15
SPEAKER_02: Yes, he prays, but he doesn't ask the Father for anything.
1:19:19
SPEAKER_02: He prays for the benefit of those in front of him, so that they know that from the Father through the Son he does all things, but he has authority to raise Lazarus because he is the resurrection and the life.
1:19:30
SPEAKER_02: Who is the Lord of life?
1:19:32
SPEAKER_02: Like it's God, right?
1:19:33
SPEAKER_02: In Philippians chapter 2, I don't know why Alex goes to Philippians chapter 2, but he goes to Philippians chapter 2, in which Paul proclaims Jesus to be in very nature God.
1:19:43
SPEAKER_02: The epistles declare Jesus to be God, the gospel writers declare Jesus to be God, the followers of Jesus seem to proclaim Jesus to be God.
1:19:51
SPEAKER_02: Even if we never heard the words of Jesus, we should probably assume that he was claiming to be God.
1:19:55
SPEAKER_02: Those who heard the words of Jesus are like in John chapter 5, and his enemies, even Christ haters, know that to claim to be Son of the Father is to claim to be equal to God, and it's a blasphemy.
1:20:06
SPEAKER_02: John 5 belongs to David, it doesn't belong to Alex.
1:20:08
SPEAKER_02: And then Daniel 7, clearly, here is this divine figure who is this son of man.
1:20:13
SPEAKER_02: I think in the context of the intertestamental period, here is a divine figure.
1:20:17
SPEAKER_02: In the context of Caiaphas's reaction, here is a divine figure, and it's what Jesus claims to be.
1:20:22
SPEAKER_02: In fact, it's his number one title for himself.
1:20:25
SPEAKER_02: Jesus claims to be God in so many different ways.
1:20:29
SPEAKER_02: Alex made an awesome point for David Wood, and he kept on making awesome, awesome points all night long.
1:20:36
SPEAKER_02: There were a lot of own goals from Alex on the night.
1:20:40
SPEAKER_02: There was an own goal from David, I think.
1:20:42
SPEAKER_02: I I I would have preferred to have heard David just own the fact that this God from God Theology from the Old Covenant was to some degree understood in the New Testament.
1:20:52
SPEAKER_02: Certainly not perfectly, but certainly enough for a Caiaphas figure to have understood it and to have put Christ to death on that blasphemy charge.
1:21:00
SPEAKER_02: So I thought that was a bit of an own goal, or at least it was something that I would not have done.
1:21:03
SPEAKER_02: I I would have preferred to have done things in a in a different way.
1:21:06
SPEAKER_02: I think I think David's energy flagged by uh the end of the debate just as as Alex was beginning to soar.
1:21:13
SPEAKER_02: But when you look at what Alex actually says, when you forget the showmanship, when you question the story and the storytelling, and you actually press into the scriptures that Alex is bringing to bear, when you ignore the misdirection, you see that again and again and again and again Jesus is claiming to be God.
1:21:34
SPEAKER_02: He's the God from God, the God who mediates God, the God who mediates God for us.
1:21:41
SPEAKER_02: That is the hypothesis that makes sense of all the scriptures.
1:21:45
SPEAKER_02: It makes sense of the Old Testament scriptures, it makes sense of the intertestamental period, it makes sense of the gospels, makes sense of the epistles.
1:21:52
SPEAKER_02: Everything comes into focus when you understand the doctrine of the Trinity.
1:21:56
SPEAKER_02: Everything does.
1:21:57
SPEAKER_02: And when you don't, you have to rely on showmanship and storytelling and misdirection.
1:22:03
SPEAKER_02: There is a magic to Alex O'Connor.
1:22:05
SPEAKER_02: There really is.
1:22:06
SPEAKER_02: I so enjoy watching and listening to Alex and will continue to do so with great benefit.
1:22:12
SPEAKER_02: I think he did as good as he could do, given that he took on the losing position from the outset.
1:22:18
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but I am ever more convinced after watching this two and a half hours that Jesus did in fact claim to be God because that's who in fact he is.
1:22:26
SPEAKER_02: Uh if you want to find out more about this Jesus, this God from God who mediates God so that you can enjoy his relationship with the Father, go and do 321.
1:22:35
SPEAKER_02: It's 321course.com.
1:22:37
SPEAKER_02: Start an account, get in there, we won't spam you.
1:22:40
SPEAKER_02: There is no fee.
1:22:41
SPEAKER_02: Go in and learn about life according to Jesus.
1:22:44
SPEAKER_02: Thanks so much.