Latest / WOAY Podcasts / Bible Answer Man Podcast with Hank Hanegraaff - Q&A: Noah’s Flood, Evidence for the Exodus, and the Man of Lawlessness

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Bible Answer Man Podcast with Hank Hanegraaff - Q&A: Noah’s Flood, Evidence for the Exodus, and the Man of Lawlessness · WOAY Podcasts

• 0:07
  Speaker 1: You're just in time for the Bible Answer Man broadcast
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: with Hank Hanegraaff, the radio outreach of the Christian Research Institute.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Our purpose here at CRI is to equip Christians to
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: provide biblical answers to life's most important questions, to read
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: the Bible for all its worth, and counter the teachings
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: of cults and world religions that deviate from the plumb
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: line of God's Word because life and truth matter. For
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: more information, to order resources or donate, call 888-7000-CRI or
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: go online to equip.org. That's equip.org. The following program was pre-recorded.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Now here's the president of the Christian Research Institute, Hank Hanegraaff.
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Randy. A lot of you hanging on.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: Let's go to our first caller, Jonathan. Jonathan is listening
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: in Decatur, Nebraska. Hi, Jonathan.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: Hello.
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I have a question about Noah's Flood. And I
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: think I've heard you comment on it before about the
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: fact that... Do you think it was a localized flood,
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: or do you think it was a worldwide flood?
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: Well, all I've ever said is that the biblical text
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: isn't designed to communicate whether the flood was global with
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: respect to the earth, or whether it was universal with
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: respect to humanity. I say that that debate is ultimately
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: settled by a proper reading of the book of nature.
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: And since civilization was largely confined to the Fertile Crescent,
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: I don't think you have to automatically presume that the
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: floodwaters covered the globe. For example, when the Bible tells
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: you that the whole world sought audience with Solomon to
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: hear the wisdom God had put in his heart, only
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: the most ardent fundamentalist supposes that this includes Aborigines from Australia.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: or indigenous peoples of the Americas. So you got to
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: be very careful because you don't want to have a
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: spiritualized interpretation that empties the scripture of all objective meaning
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: on the one hand, or a literalistic proclivity that wreaks
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: havoc on the biblical text on the other side of
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  Speaker 2: the equation. Of one thing you can be certain, the
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: text of scripture, both old and new, communicate the reality
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: of a primordial deluge in which only a few people
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: and that number is given to us specifically, eight in
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: all were saved. That's what we know for certain from
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: the biblical text.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: What do you think about like Oven and Can-Am series
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: on the age of the earth to 6,000?
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Well, I think, again, what you have to do is
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: you have to look at this notion of 6,000 year
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: old earth in light of what God has revealed to us.
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: I don't think that the timing is given to us
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: in the Bible, but I do think that there are
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: a lot of clues in the book of nature. So
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: as a result of those clues, a lot of people
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: who held to really bad biblical interpretations have had to
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: change them. If you look back a number of years ago,
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: you will find a lot of people who believed in geocentrism.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: In fact, there still are some people that hold to geocentrism.
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: But God has placed us in a universe in which
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: we can discover things about the universe, and we have
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: discovered that, no, everything does not revolve around the earth.
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: We live in a heliocentric universe. So if I were
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: to tell you today, based on a biblical interpretation, that
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: we live in a geocentric universe, you would probably laugh
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: me out of school. The reason is, is all the
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: evidence points in a completely different direction. And I think
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: we have to take that evidence seriously as Christians. which
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: is to say we are not permitted to communicate scriptural heresy,
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: nor are we permitted to communicate scientific heresy. So we
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: need to be very careful that we read the Bible
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  Speaker 2: for all it's worth, and that we mine the book
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  Speaker 2: of nature for all it's worth as well.
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: How old do you think the earth is?
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: Well, I think you have to look at all the
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: evidence that we see around us. I mean, if you
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: drill into ice cores in Antarctica or Greenland, the evidence
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: seems to point not to thousands of years as in 6,000 years,
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: but at least hundreds of thousands of years. If you
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: look at star life, and this is not something that
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: is subject to conjecture. You can look at a star
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: in its infancy. You can see a star in midlife.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: You can see a white dwarf star. you can, on
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  Speaker 2: the basis of observation, come up with a credible case
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  Speaker 2: for how long it takes for a star to burn out,
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  Speaker 2: given the size of the star. And that gives you
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  Speaker 2: some kind of age indicator. You can also look at
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  Speaker 2: the speed of light. There are many different various factors
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  Speaker 2: that you want to consider in making that kind of
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  Speaker 2: a call. But the Bible simply doesn't answer that question.
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  Speaker 2: And people that are trying to come up with a
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  Speaker 2: chronology from the Bible make all kinds of hermeneutical errors
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  Speaker 2: in the process.
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  Speaker 3: What do you think about the different evidences that point
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: to a young Earth as far as the Earth slowing
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  Speaker 3: down on its orbit and moving farther away from the
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: sun and the sun shrinking and just different things like
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: that that they use?
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  Speaker 2: Well, I think that you want to take each one
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  Speaker 2: of them on its own merits and analyze the argument
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  Speaker 2: clearly and carefully. based on its merits. I mean, that's
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  Speaker 2: the thing I'm calling for you to do. I'm saying
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: that when someone makes an argument, you don't simply swallow
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: it as when you have fundamentalists from the left who
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: are making arguments about the Bible such that the Bible
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: teaches slavery or the Bible teaches that eating shellfish is
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  Speaker 2: an abomination or the Bible teaches you to stone your
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  Speaker 2: child if they stray from the faith. You've got to
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  Speaker 2: not simply swallow that when someone gives you that kind
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: of information. You want to carefully read the Bible to
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: see if these things are so. The same thing is
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: true when people point you to scientific data. They tell you,
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: for example, of canopy theory. You want to look very
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: critically at the canopy theory and say, is it really
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  Speaker 2: possible for humans to live in the kind of heat
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: that they would have been exposed to had there been
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: a canopy? And if, in fact, the canopy theory was
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  Speaker 2: a credible theory. These are things that you have to
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: look at. You've got to take them case-by-case basis and say, if,
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  Speaker 2: in fact, this is credible science. And that's the whole point.
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: The point is we can't commit either scientific heresy or
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: scriptural heresy. I want to go back to the phone lines.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: Talk to Dan in Ohio. Hi, Dan.
• 7:07
  Speaker 4: Hi, Hank.
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  Speaker 5: How are you today?
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: I'm good. Good talking to you.
• 7:10
  Speaker 4: You too.
• 7:11
  Speaker 5: I'd like to start off by thanking you for something
• 7:13
  Speaker 5: that happened 12 years ago, as I recall. I used
• 7:17
  Speaker 5: to listen to your program on Christian Station in Columbus, Ohio, and.
• 7:23
  Speaker 5: I was going through a very difficult time in my life.
• 7:26
  Speaker 5: I was trying to break free from an addiction to alcohol.
• 7:29
  Speaker 5: I had gone through a divorce, and I had lost everything.
• 7:32
  Speaker 5: And I called your program looking for answers and help,
• 7:35
  Speaker 5: and you gave me some good counsel, and at that
• 7:38
  Speaker 5: time you prayed for me that the Lord would deliver
• 7:43
  Speaker 5: me from that and make me a strong Christian man
• 7:45
  Speaker 5: and restore what the canker worm had eaten. Well, I
• 7:50
  Speaker 5: want to thank you for that. Here, it'll be... coming
• 7:53
  Speaker 5: up on a 10-year anniversary of that, when the Lord
• 7:56
  Speaker 5: set me free from alcohol.
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: Bless the Lord.
• 7:59
  Speaker 5: And since then, I've remarried. I have a wonderful Christian wife.
• 8:04
  Speaker 5: We've moved to have a nice home. We are totally
• 8:07
  Speaker 5: out of debt. And so the Lord indeed answered the
• 8:11
  Speaker 5: prayer that you prayed. It was a long, hard road,
• 8:14
  Speaker 5: but by the grace of God and perseverance, I'm a
• 8:18
  Speaker 5: totally changed person. And I just want to thank you
• 8:21
  Speaker 5: for your ministry and thank you for praying for me.
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: Well, you got it. And you not only made my day,
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: you made my year. Thank you so much for that testimony.
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: God moves in mysterious and wonderful ways. And it is
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: so great that God has indeed in your life restored
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: the years that the locusts have eaten.
• 8:39
  Speaker 5: Well, I have to tell you, when I heard the
• 8:40
  Speaker 5: music come on my telephone, I got a big smile
• 8:44
  Speaker 5: on my face because I used to listen to your program.
• 8:47
  Speaker 5: Every time you were on the air, always looking for hope,
• 8:49
  Speaker 5: looking for answers. You were just always real and always
• 8:53
  Speaker 5: took time to answer people's questions. And as biblically yet,
• 8:57
  Speaker 5: you were thorough but yet compassionate with where people walked.
• 9:01
  Speaker 5: And I appreciate that about you, Hank.
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: Well, bless you.
• 9:06
  Speaker 5: My question is, our Sunday school class brought in a
• 9:08
  Speaker 5: book written by Joyce Myers about dealing with feelings. And boy,
• 9:14
  Speaker 5: I got a real bad sense about it, so I
• 9:16
  Speaker 5: did some research on Joyce Meyer, and I'm not very
• 9:20
  Speaker 5: happy with what I read about her. And I'm going
• 9:24
  Speaker 5: to bring the information to the Sunday School class this
• 9:28
  Speaker 5: coming Sunday. Basically, this woman, from everything I can read,
• 9:33
  Speaker 5: is teaching heresy.
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, unfortunately, you're right, and I actually feature her in
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: part in my book, Christianity in Crisis, 21st Century, under
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: a cast of characters where I point to her very
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: heretical and discordant kinds of teachings, where she abuses the
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: Word of God to teach her Word of Faith heresies.
• 9:56
  Speaker 5: Yes, well that's what I saw when she said that
• 9:59
  Speaker 5: I don't think she realizes the ramifications of saying that
• 10:02
  Speaker 5: Christ died spiritually on the cross. If that's true, then
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  Speaker 5: none of us could be saved because only a spotless lamb,
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  Speaker 5: the sacrifice of a pure spotless lamb, could atone for
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  Speaker 5: our sins.
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you're absolutely right. And that's one of the big
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  Speaker 2: heresies of the Word of Faith movement. It is that
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: Jesus Christ on the cross became a satanic being, and
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: therefore he had to go to hell and became the
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: first of those who were born again. So he was
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: the first born-again man. And if we do what Christ did,
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: we can have what Christ had. It is a pernicious error, unfortunately,
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: being taught by many of the Word of Faith teachers today.
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much for your testimony. God bless you
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: as you continue to grow in grace. We'll be right back.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: In The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien's character Faramir voices
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: the thoughts of countless soldiers throughout history. War must be,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: devour all. But I do not love the bright sword
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: the warrior for his glory. I love only that which
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: they defend. If you too love what together we defend,
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: our faith, biblical truth, and our freedoms, become a member
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: of CRI's support team today by calling 888-7000-CRI. And as
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: our thanks, Hank Hanegraaff will personalize to you a copy
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: of his complete Bible answer book, Collector's Edition, revised and expanded.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Call 888-7000-CRI or visit our website at equip.org. That's 888-7000-CRI
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: or simply visit our website at equip.org. Hank Hanegraaff will
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: be back right after the break. But the angel said
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: to them, do not be afraid. I bring you good
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today,
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: in the town of David, a Savior has been born
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: to you. He is Christ the Lord. This will be
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: in cloths and lying in a manger. Luke chapter 2,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: verses 10 through 12. While many of you will soon
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: enter the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, Hank
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: Hanegraaff has penned The Heart of Christmas, a devotional for
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: the season to ensure that just as you prepare your
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: home for Christmas, you likewise prepare your heart. Order The
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: Heart of Christmas, a devotional for the season by calling
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: 888-7274 or by going online to www.equip.org. Also available is
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: The Heart of Christmas audiobook, dramatically read by Hank Hanegraaff.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: Bertrand Russell famously said, Most people would rather die than think,
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: and many of them do. Not so with CRI support
• 13:10
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• 13:18
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• 13:22
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• 13:25
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• 13:28
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• 13:33
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• 13:38
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• 13:43
  Speaker 1: at home and abroad to stand for life and truth,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: check out the benefits of membership at equip.org. Once again,
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: that's equip.org. Has God spoken? Are the words of Scripture
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: merely human in origin, or are they in fact the
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: very words of God Himself? Three years in the making,
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: and based on two decades of research and reflection, Hank
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: Hanegraaff's monumental book, Has God Spoken?, answers what is surely
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: the most important question facing our world. In Has God Spoken?
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Memorable Proofs of the Bible's Divine Inspiration, Hank counters the
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: contentions of the Bible attackers and clearly shows that belief
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: in the Holy Scriptures is not a guess or wishful thinking.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: It is the only logical conclusion after an honest examination
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: of overwhelming evidence. Order Has God Spoken from the Christian
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: Research Institute by calling 888-7000-CRI or go online to equip.org, equip.org.
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: Now back to the Bible Answer Man broadcast and your host,
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: Hank Hanegraaff.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Randy. Let's go right back to
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: our phone callers. Chris listening in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Hi, Chris.
• 15:19
  Speaker 6: Hi, Hank. My question is in regards to the Exodus.
• 15:24
  Speaker 6: I've heard it on TV shows and such that Egyptians
• 15:27
  Speaker 6: kept meticulous historical records and the Exodus wasn't mentioned in
• 15:32
  Speaker 6: that history, and also that there was no archaeological evidence
• 15:37
  Speaker 6: that that many Israelites could have spent 40 years wandering
• 15:41
  Speaker 6: the desert. So I was just wondering your response to that.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Well, first of all, I think it's greatly overstating the case.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: I mean, no nation would be likely to invent and
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: then transmit century after century and millennium after millennium an
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: inglorious and inconvenient tradition unless it had an authentic historical core.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: And therefore, I would say it is unlikely that the
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: Jews invented the Exodus just as it is unlikely that
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: they invented the Holocaust. And secondly, I would say this,
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: that archaeology actually provides a plausible framework for Jewish contentions
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: regarding the slavery and emancipation of the Israelites. First of all,
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: there's this Exodus account of Egyptian slave masters using the
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: children of Israel as forced labor tools in producing mud bricks.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: And archaeologists to that point have actually uncovered a tomb
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: and a schematic in the tomb showing Semitic slaves making
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: mud bricks at the Egyptian city of Thebes on the Nile.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: And the practice of using forced labor for building projects
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: is documented for a period of 1450 to 1200, the
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: very time that most historians actually placed the Israelites in Egypt.
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  Speaker 2: So that's cooperating evidence at least. And then there's also
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: the mixed multitude ascribed as being liberated from Egypt in
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: Exodus 12, which accords with archaeology. There's a papyrus, it's
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: I believe 348, that provides contextual evidence for a mixed
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: multitude of Semitic people who are described as being liberated
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  Speaker 2: from bondage in Exodus 1238. There's many other things that
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: tangentially point to the reality of the Exodus, But I
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: think one of the most significant is what's called the
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: Merneptah Stele. It is a formidable challenge in my view
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: to Exodus deniers. It's a seven and a half foot
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  Speaker 2: tall black granite slab. It's inscribed in Egyptian hieroglyphics, and
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: it actually boasts of a military conquest of several pharaohs,
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: Merneptah and Ramses II. But Merneptah actually in the penultimate
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: line boasts that Israel is wasted, bare of seed, which
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: was a metaphor that implied that Israel's store of grain
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: was destroyed and they no longer posed a significant military threat.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: This Merneptah steel we know was inscribed shortly before 1200
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: BC and demonstrates that as of 1230 BC, Israel was
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: already in the land as a significant socioeconomic entity that
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: actually merited the attention of an Egyptian pharaoh. So I
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: think all of these provide at least a framework of
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: plausibility for the Exodus. Beyond that, I would look at
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: the more general point, and that is, archaeology actually has
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: been a friend of the Bible in corresponding the biblical
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: text to what you find in the soil, in general.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: So the people, the places, and the particulars that the
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: Bible describes have actually had basis in the soil and
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: in archaeological discoveries. So archaeology has been a friend of
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: Scripture as opposed to some other religious works like the
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: Book of Mormon, which has been utterly discredited as a
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: result of archaeology.
• 19:06
  Speaker 6: Okay, because I've heard upwards of a couple million or
• 19:09
  Speaker 6: so Israelites left through the Reed Sea, and there was
• 19:15
  Speaker 6: no evidence.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: No, not the Reed Sea, the Red Sea.
• 19:17
  Speaker 6: You would see all kinds of pottery and artifacts throughout
• 19:20
  Speaker 6: the desert, and that just hasn't been found as is
• 19:23
  Speaker 6: what you see on these Discovery Channel shows.
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: Right, and it's not the Reed Sea, it's the Red Sea.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: I mean, this Reed Sea is just nonsense, because people
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: that want to say it's a Reed Sea are trying
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: to point to the fact that this isn't supernatural. They
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: were crossing over a Reed Sea, and therefore they were
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: wading through ankle-deep or knee-deep water and the like. But
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: this was a supernatural exodus, an exodus that was permitted
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: by the power and province of God. He caused the
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: sea to part. And in a Christian worldview, we allow
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: for both supernatural and natural explanations. Unlike philosophical naturalists, we're
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: not closed-minded. The philosophical naturalist starts with the presupposition that
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: you have to explain everything through purely natural processes. If
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: you can't explain it that way, you can't explain it
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: at all. And we say that's closed-minded. We want to
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: allow for both supernatural explanations as well as natural explanations.
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: I mean, the universe itself demands a supernatural explanation. We
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: don't want to be lumped into the category of an
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: obscurantist that says nothing created everything.
• 20:34
  Speaker 6: All right, thanks, Hank. I appreciate your answer.
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I've written about this in detail in a book,
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: Has God Spoken?, in which I talk about archaeology, verifying
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: the people, places, and particulars that you find in Scripture.
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: Just as we don't have every detail right now for
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: the Exodus, we may at some point have overwhelming evidence
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: that just is cut and dried. The fact that we
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: haven't found it yet doesn't mean the Bible isn't true.
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: If we found counter-evidence, that would be something to take seriously.
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: But think back to the Italian Renaissance. Pretty interesting that
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: during the Italian Renaissance or the Enlightenment, people were saying
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: that Assyria was mythological because there was no evidence outside
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: the Bible of the Assyrian people. And then Layard, the
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: great Assyriologist, began digging along the Tigris River and he
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: found Nineveh, which was the crown jewel of the Assyrian
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: Empire and the golden band of the Fertile Crescent midway
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: between the Mediterranean and Caspian Seas. And they found within
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: Nineveh all kinds of things, palaces of Sargon and Sennacherib
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: and Esher-Ben-Apoll and so forth. And as a result of that,
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: they found that the people, the places, and the particulars
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: actually correspond directly to what is chronicled in the Bible. Now,
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: who has egg on their face? The one who was
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: the obscurantist as it can be, and they start with
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: a naturalistic assumption and preclude the supernatural miracles. Those people
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: have egg on their face. not the people that adhere
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: to the Scripture. Back to the phone lines. We'll talk
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: next to Richard, San Antonio, Texas. Hi, Richard.
• 22:10
  Speaker 7: Hey, Hank.
• 22:11
  Speaker 4: How are you doing, sir? I'm well. Hey, Hank, I
• 22:14
  Speaker 4: just want to thank you for taking my call, and
• 22:16
  Speaker 4: I want to thank you, brother, for... I've been listening
• 22:18
  Speaker 4: to you for a couple of months now, and my
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: mind was blown when you stood up for the real
• 22:24
  Speaker 4: Israel of God. So few preachers and teachers these days
• 22:29
  Speaker 4: are really sticking to the Word of God and pointing
• 22:33
  Speaker 4: the true Israel of God as the faithful believers in
• 22:36
  Speaker 4: Christ Jesus.
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: Yes, and it's an important point, because so many people...
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: want to make race a consideration or real estate a consideration,
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: where God is not a racist or a real estate broker.
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: From the perspective of God, everyone who calls upon the
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: name of the Lord will be saved. So God does
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: not show favoritism, as Peter found out with Cornelius.
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: Right, Hank.
• 23:02
  Speaker 4: And Hank, my main question was concerning 2 Thessalonians 2,
• 23:08
  Speaker 4: the son of perdition or the man of sin. It's
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: a twofold question. Is this the same character as the
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: little horn in Daniel 7 and the beast of Revelation 13?
• 23:20
  Speaker 4: And if so, or if not, who is this son
• 23:24
  Speaker 4: of perdition in Thessalonians?
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: Well, it may very well be, although there are many
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: different views on this. N.T. Wright, for example, holds that
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: this may be a reference to Caligula, who was so
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: benighted that he thought he was God. and he purposed
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: to have a colossal image of himself erected in the
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: Jewish temple in Jerusalem, and only death prevented his perverted
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: ambition to be enshrined as God in the Holy of Holies.
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: There are various views, therefore, with respect to this. The
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: one thing I think we can preclude here is that
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: this is a 21st century character, because if you look
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: at the day of the Lord being described here, it
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: is not the day of the Lord as being communicated
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: by modern controversialists who are trying to say that this
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: has to do with the end of the world or
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: cataclysmic events. If those kinds of events had happened, the
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: people who were asking Paul about it wouldn't have been
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: asking Paul about it because it would have been self-evident.
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: So we don't want to place this passage in the
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: wrong historical milieu.
• 24:27
  Speaker 7: Right, Hank.
• 24:28
  Speaker 4: And I'm sure you're familiar with... you know, Calvin and
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: the Geneva Bible and several other Presbyterians, basically Matthew Henry
• 24:37
  Speaker 4: and Matthew Poole and Albert Barnes identifying the man of
• 24:40
  Speaker 4: sin as the Roman Caesar, the papacy? What's your take
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: on that?
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: Well, it could have been the Roman Caesar, but I
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: think it's unlikely that it was the Roman Caesar. As
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: I point out, there are people that did think it
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: was the Roman Caesar or the Roman Empire. So it
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: was actually the beast as opposed to That personified is
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: the woman who rides the beast. So the man of
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: lawlessness in the second view that I'm pointing out would
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: have been priests who denied that Jesus was the Messiah
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: and that the old custom of the covenant were still
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: necessary as a condition for salvation and therefore were vocal
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: opposers to the gospel. They were men of lawlessness. They
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: tempted first century Christians to return to Judaism. So the
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: high priest may well have been considered the man There
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: are a lot of different views that can be considered
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: in this realm, and I have my own views, but
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: I would simply say the operative principle here that you
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: begin with is don't take this passage and interpret it
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: in the wrong milieu, as though it has something to
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: do with the third or fourth temple.
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: Right, exactly. No, Hank, I'm exactly on board with you.
• 25:48
  Speaker 4: And I appreciate your ministry. And I'm going to keep listening.
• 25:52
  Speaker 4: And I got a couple of questions that I'll give
• 25:54
  Speaker 4: you another call some other time for. But I appreciate
• 25:56
  Speaker 4: you taking my call, Hank. And God bless you, brother.
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: You got to thank you for your call as well, Richard.
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: We'll see you next time right here with more answers
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: to your questions.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us for the Bible Answer Man broadcast
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: with Hank Hanegraaff. Our daily commitment here at CRI is
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: to defend the faith once for all delivered to the
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: saints and equip believers to become true disciples of Jesus Christ.
• 26:21
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• 26:23
  Speaker 1: broadcast online, visit our website at equip.org. That's equip.org. Or
• 26:31
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• 26:37
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• 26:42
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• 26:52
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• 27:02
  Speaker 7: To fully grasp the significance of Christ's messianic role, you
• 27:08
  Speaker 7: must drink deeply from the wellspring of Old Testament prophecy.
• 27:15
  Speaker 7: In Hebrews, as in the rest of the New Testament,
• 27:18
  Speaker 7: the Old Testament history of Israel is interpreted as a
• 27:23
  Speaker 7: succession of types that find ultimate fulfillment in the birth, death, resurrection,
• 27:32
  Speaker 7: and ascension of the Christ we celebrate at Christmas.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Hank Hanegraaff has penned The Heart of Christmas, a devotional
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: for the season to ensure that just as you prepare
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: your home for Christmas, you likewise prepare your heart. Order
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: The Heart of Christmas, a devotional for the season by
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: calling 888-7274 or by going online to www.equip.org.