Albert Mohler - Ask Anything Tour | Western Kentucky University

well good evening thank you it's wonderful to be here with you wonderful to be at Western Kentucky University and I am sporting my Hilltopper bow tie in honor of being here in Bowling Green and I want to thank Dylan Sidebottom and crew for an outstanding job and for all of you for attending here I know the gift of time is an incredible gift and here on a on a Thursday night a full room and that's very encouraging to me my wife and I kind of think of Bowling Green is our second home because we have a we have a home at Baron River Lake so we are we're here a lot especially during the summer and love Bowling Green and feel very much at home here but especially tonight here at Western Kentucky University we're just we're just thrilled I'm just thrilled to be here God made us as creatures who asked questions we can't ask questions we even asked questions about why we ask questions and it is impossible to be a thinking human being and and and not to ask questions and you see this so early in life just think of that incessant question of the toddler why it will drive them crazy why why why why but that's actually a sign of incredible intelligence to Christians it's a sign of what it means to be made in the image of God God made us to ask questions and part of why we're made to ask questions is because those questions press us back to ultimate issues we have questions out on the periphery that bring us closer and closer to questions right at the center so tonight it's fair game we'll talk about whatever is on your mind and I don't presume to be able to answer all the questions I'd be quite arrogant but I do know that the Christian worldview the Christian way of understanding the world and everything in it the meaning of the cosmos and the meaning of my life it's it's based on the fundamental assumption that there are answers that there is an answer in Christ and and furthermore that a part of a Christian responsibility is to learn how to ask the right questions and even clarify the right questions and sometimes Christians just need to say on the basis of of what Christians believe what the Bible teaches we're gonna have to work at answering that question that's fair - I realized that any kind of question can be asking just about any kind of context we have two children and the younger of them is now it is late 20s a son named Christopher and Christopher was the most inquisitive child I've ever known in my entire lifetime not only of my children but of all the world's children and he knew when he was about nine years old that that I had to be stationary when I was shaving and that that was fair game to come and ask questions so every morning I knew when I was shaving that the Grand Inquisitor was on his way he'd hear the water go in the sink and boom he was there ready to ask a question and I will tell you that that's just one of the best memories I have of Christopher is a little boy but I still remember one morning and this tells you how the mind of a nine-year-old boy works he came in and the previous night we've been talking about dangerous man eating animals and Alaska and I was smart enough to figure out that in the morning 2+2 was gonna be added together and sure enough he shows up and he says dad what is the most dangerous animal to humans in Alaska now felt this one coming so I looked it up this is not something that I has walked around with with resident knowledge but I I anticipated it so I looked it up and I said Christopher what do you think it might be and he said killer whale I said no the best is understood killer whales never target human beings they kind of like a great white shark if they kill you you're dead but they thought you were a seal and probably spit you out it's a bad way to go a Miss order on the menu but then he say no is it this or is it that so eventually he said a polar bear and I said yes yes the most dangerous animal in Alaska to human beings is a polar bear and then Christopher ever the little nine-year-old theologian turns and asked me he says dad if you go to Alaska and you get killed by a polar bear can you still go to heaven and knew the answer to that I said yes you know the Bible says on the day of resurrection there were people whose bodies had dissolved there be people whose bodies were burned up that's not going to be a problem a sovereign God will bring about resurrection their guard 'less of how it is we died but he thought he had stumped me still he goes dad this is the mind of a nine-year-old boy watch out he said dad if you go to Alaska and you're killed by a polar bear and you're eaten by a polar bear then you're gonna be polar bear you got it done you're gonna be polar bear poop dad and kin polar bear poop go to heaven and so filled with all the confidence of theology based upon the Bible I declared what I believe no Christian theologian has ever had to declare in private or in public before I said son if you know the Lord Jesus Christ is Savior then you're gonna go to heaven even if on the way you're polar bear poop he was onto something else after that in the next morning it was another 155 questions but at least tonight we've accomplished that much that questions been asked no one needs to ask it tonight if anyway if anyone came with a burning curiosity about polar bear it fluent that has been answered but you know to be a human being made in the image of God we understand that as inquisitive beings there are at least four questions that every single human being has to think about and and has to answer to some extent because life isn't possible just the operational life isn't possible without thinking about four questions and operating on the assumption of four answers at least for the first question is why is there something rather than nothing that's the first question every thinking person has to operate on the basis of an answer to that question why is there something rather than nothing and right now we're looking at two fundamentally opposed answers one of them says that the cosmos is just the product of what amounts to chance there's no purpose in it then that means there's no essential meaning in it and so meaning is whatever we're now going to put into something because there's no inherent meaning in it because everything is basically cosmologically an accident and then the other worldview says no and of course is where the Bible begins in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth and thus there is a purpose there is a beginning and a middle and an end and and the purpose is not something the meaning is not something we have to put into something rather it's it's it's what's there because the Creator put it there the second question is what's gone wrong every thinking person has to recognize something gone horribly wrong with the world GK Chesterton the the famous British writer said in early 20th century when he was asked a question by a newspaper what's gone wrong with the world he answers simply and perfectly I have and and because we have to answer that question we have to think about it into two different levels one is what's gone wrong in the whole world and the whole cosmos is broken in some sense and society's got systemic evil from racism and injustice and unrighteousness it's just there's something wrong with society but the problem is it's not just society like Chesterton understood it's it's that there's that question we have to ask when you look in the mirror or when we close our eyes at night eventually no there's a brokenness in us then again there are basically different answers to this but they come down to to two basic alternatives and and you might have a secular worldview that will say whatever's happened to us is something that was outside of us that affected us then you could say it's economic oppression or it's it's some kind of psychological trauma or some kind of economic deprivation you you can come up with all kinds of things in just about every one of those diagnoses is right about something that's wrong in the world in other words they're not wrong that the world's broken but the Christian answer is first of all what's gone along with the world is as me is broken in me and I have to have an answer for that brokenness in it it's not just something outside that happened to me the problem I really know inside is inside I really know the problem is in here before it's out there the third question is is there any hope now here you have a huge problem in that we're surrounded by a lot of people who basically give it up on hope there may be even some people in this room tonight who say I'm not sure how or why or in why or in whom to have any hope you know we don't operate well as hopeless people we're looking at all kinds of symptoms of hopelessness and society from the opioid epidemic - you just name it to people trying to fill their lives with this or with that trying to find some basis for hope again it comes down to several alternatives but they're mainly two and one is that hope is something in what we can achieve it's a hopes in my job or in my profession or or hopes and some kind of hope for the future some kind of experience and kind of status or hope is in some kind of social movement some kind of revolution or transformation or hope isn't some kind of therapy or hopes and in some kind of bottle and the Christian answer is no hope hope is not actually in us at all the there's no hope looking inside and and there's no hope looking at all of us corporately as much as we love and care for one another the only hope has to be a rescue from outside of us and that's where Christians answer with the gospel of Jesus Christ the simplest most memorable verse in the Bible for God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life what what we cannot do in achieving the solution to that problem that it's wrong with the world in with me what we cannot do and could not do God did that that problem we understand and the biblical worldview is called sin and that problem is that we have violated God's law and we have we've destroyed our relationship with him and and the rescue is Christ who came to save us from our sins and promises full salvation and forgiveness of sins as well as life everlasting to those who believe in him but that fourth question is where's history headed we all have to operate on some basis and knowing where's history headed we can't there's no reason to go to class tomorrow now don't tweak that word don't stop there there's no reason to go to class tomorrow if you don't have any hope for the future why why do anything if you have no hope for the future but if you're looking to the and and and and we understand where hope is we found we have to we have to deal with where's history headed is headed to something and again if you're talking to a Marxist they would say it's headed towards the eventual alignment of society with Marxist dogma and theory bringing about utopia or you could you could talk to someone operating out of a different kind of secular worldview and they would say well eventually we can we can hope that there will be full integration of the self that's where history's headed to full integration of the self and and we will finally be who we were called to be the problem is that that's not that's not a very confident way for history to be headed because that's never going to arrive and the Christian worldview says oh yes history is important the time is important right now is important because life is lived in past present and future and the the president makes sense because of the past and in light of the future and the future is coming and the future again is it's better than we could imagine that if the future means that God will judge righteously and justly and we long for righteousness and justice we long for that all around us on campuses is and and all around us in the political conversation is hope for justice and righteousness and Christians believe that's actually going to come we work for it in this life we work for it in this kingdom but ultimately it will come about in the kingdom of Christ which is coming and as the Bible says in in that kingdom and on that day every eye will be dry and every tear will be wiped away now as Christians we try to wipe as many tears as we can that's good that's God honoring we pray for dry eyes and not wet eyes but ultimately we know that in this life there are going to be wet eyes and tears until that world that is to come in which everything is made right so we're longing for that we're longing for the answers to these questions and we have to operate in this life with the presumption that we actually are assuming some answer to those questions what we thought about it rationally or not we're operating on the basis of some assumption as to how we got here and what it means we're operating on the basis of some assumption about what's gone wrong in the world and in ourselves we're operating on the basis as some assumption as to whether there's any hope and what that hope would be and we're operating on some assumption about where history's head and that means where we are headed and what not only the future of the world is but the future of me and those I love so there are a lot of questions but they really all emerge from those four questions and God made us question asking people and we're about to have a demonstration of that and this also leads to something else that Christians understand two things very quickly two essential Christian affirmations one is it is a sign of Christian faithfulness to run into questions and not away from them that's really important it's it's it's it's an act of Christian faithfulness to run into the questions and not away from them that's that's very important and and the second affirmation is is that as we ask questions we help other people who may not have yet articulated the question that way but they're greatly helped by how you will articulate the question so when you ask tonight just understand it's a gift that you ask a question it's a gift to me to be able to think about what you're gonna ask about it's also a gift to everyone here to help frame our thinking together about how to ask the right questions and then how to find the right answers so the technology is pretty self-explanatory there are two microphones and as you see those microphones and and on either side of the room we're gonna ask you to go to those microphones and I'm going to try to go back and forth between those microphones but I think first I'm going to turn to Dylan I think you got the first question all right yeah so just like dr. Muller said we're gonna go into about an hour long of you guys asking questions and then at the very end we're going to a lightning round I believe three minutes and so but yeah go ahead if you have your questions go ahead and get up and start moving accordingly and so we're gonna circle along that way and then if you go into questions over here go ahead and go over there but while everybody is moving I'll go ahead and throw out the first question all right all right dr. Mohler were there any particular intellectual barriers you had to overcome before becoming a follower of Jesus yes and no so I honestly believe that I came to know Christ when I was 9 and I came to know Christ I was raised by Christian parents and and was at church all the time and I'd heard the gospel but for the first time on that particular day I heard what I hadn't heard before and that was I knew that I sinned but what I was told that day was that I am a sinner and that made all the difference in the world because I realize all of a sudden that if the problem is me and I'm a sinner that I can't do anything to save myself and that's when I just grabbed a hold of Christ I didn't have huge intellectual questions that I had to get over at 9 but they came pretty quickly right and so I went when I was a teenager especially in those just freshmen and sophomore in high school I started being bombarded with questions and so I can tell you what those the biggest of those two questions were no forth how do I know that God really exists you know because III prove the existence of other objects by other means well how do I know that God exists but the second one was more terrifying to me and it was how do I know that he speaks because I was not a sophisticated theologian but I was able to reason that if he existed I wasn't gonna be able to figure him out he was gonna have to show me who he is and so those are the two big questions and in one sense those are the two big questions that have driven me all my all my life since then and I've often spoken to my dependence upon a man who entered my life at that time through his books and I did get to meet him but it was through his books his name was Francis Schaeffer and he wrote a book entitled he is there and he is not silent and when I first held that book I was probably like 16 years old and I'll admit I did not understand everything that was in it but I was hanging on that title he is there and he is not silent and really the rest of my life has been I had no idea we're gonna raise but the rest of my life is trying to live out and learn more about what it means that he is there and he is not silent that's awesome that's awesome well thank you for answering that and we are gonna go ahead and turn to the left side my left side and cue the first question yeah hi my name is Oliver my question is does the existence of multiple religions not deny the validity of any one religion and to kind of elaborate on that if all these belief systems operate on faith what makes Christianity is more present and real Oliver a great question thank you and what you speak of first is this the reality that there are various worldviews and there are even multiple world religions as we might call them and and and so it's natural to ask the question that how do you know that any one of them is true how do you know which one of them is true and if it is all based upon just faith as an act of say intellectual assent we just give ourselves to it then how do you say I'm right and any other belief system is wrong so let me work backwards from that the most interesting thing is that if you look at all the different religious faiths if you talk to kind of a mushy minded person who just kind of knows they exist and kind of maybe a National Geographic or PBS kind of knowledge then they'll say well they're all basically alike they're just different ways again to the same thing though that's where if you really look at it honestly they're not really all like all trying to get to the same place they're actually not even in many ways answering the same questions so that that's one of the first things for instance if you talk about Buddhism but Buddhists aren't trying to get to heaven not at any Christian understanding and if you look at at the the traditional worldview on which Buddhism is is based it's a cyclical understanding of history in which it's not so much past present and future but an unfolding of history and repetitive cycles and so that that's where you say well okay so they really are more different the closer you look but then the question is well is it just a matter of faith is intellectual assent I want you to hear me say is a Christian it's not simply a matter of intellectual assent god made us rational creatures he wants us to ask questions you know what what is true which which proposition is more true which which worldview is more consistent which one corresponds to reality best defines that reality and which one which one is most coherent holding together and so I just want to tell you as a Christian that I I don't believe in Christianity as a matter of preference over other rival belief systems I and and I want to say that with respect to those other rival belief systems and I want to affirm there are people who sincerely hold those belief systems and one of the great privileges of my life is regularly to talk to and and communicate with believers in other systems and and those who hold to other worldviews but I believe there are good rational intellectual reasons why I understand more than anything else that the biblical definition of reality actually corresponds to reality the the biblical understanding of how the world exists and what it means is what I think corresponds to reality and by the way reality is not a strange word to use there because the Christian worldview privileges reality and grounds it in the fact that God who is real has made a cosmos that is real and thus we can we can have real knowledge of it but more than anything else I'm a Christian simply because of Jesus Christ because I believe he is who he said he is based on the evidence of that history doesn't make sense if he's not who he says he is and if he says who he says he is then he was God in human flesh and the one who was sent to come to die and then to race on the dead to take away our sins so the thing I want to say to you is that that's a brilliant question and it's exactly the kind of question that is a good place for us to start tonight and it's the kind of question we need to run into not away from and I really have confidence I don't say this is a Christian chauvinist because that won't get you very far I really do have confidence that the closer you look at the truth claims of Christianity the truer Christianity is revealed to be and so that's just that's just where I have to start and I appreciate the fact you asked that question is a good place to start but even just even looking at the date of the for us saying one of these different belief systems really believe what what are they really believing is the answer those even those four questions I mentioned what you learn is that they answer them more differently than more the same and and then I believe God gave us our reason to try to help figure those things out thanks Oliver appreciate that and we'll go back and forth yes hi my name's Matthew thank you so much for coming I'm a fundamentalist Southern Baptist and my question is in Revelations it talks about like God is as a depiction of the life during the end times yeah so there's three different interpretations that he gives this postmillennialism premillennialism in a millennia ism which one is most valid and why Wow okay so now we've jumped into the deep end of the pool remind me of your name again Matthew Matthew great thank you yeah no it's a good question so and it gets to that last question where's history headed so that this is exactly the kind of fun question to think about where's history headed and and Christians in our world have kind of come up with three different answers about the about and all affirm that Jesus is the sovereign Lord of the universe the Savior and that he is coming to establish his kingdom and to rule and to reign so whether you meet an amillennialist or a pre molinos or post millennialist they they all actually believe that but what are we talking about well the Bible talks about a millennium which is a thousand-year reign of Christ on earth so that's a limited amount of time his reign is eternal but it's this thousand-year reign on earth so the question is when does Christ come that's the key question when does Christ come and and so the first thing we need to say is Christ is coming and so you get those three guys you get mr. om Elias and and and and missus you know premillennialists and and and and you probably have a lot more premillennialists in the United States so you can probably have several people representing that and then post millennialist they're all going to agree Jesus is coming there's an important thing but when okay so the amillennialist says when he comes the millennium is a metaphor of his perfect reign and so there's not a thousand-year reign so when he comes then his heavenly kingdom immediately begins and life on Earth is over okay I don't find that in Scripture because I think scripture speaks in space time and history of that thousand year reign so then I have to be either a pre millennialist or post millennialist and amillennialist by the way is some of you'll know if you put a in front of something just go back to the Greek if you've been a in front of it means not that so if you take the word theist and put alpha in front of it it means non-theist so you think millennial you but alpha in front of that means no millennium okay so that's okay I've got friends who are all moneyless and I'm happy for them to be wrong and surprised and I say that with humility I agree yeah and then their post millennialist and post millennialism says that christ is going to come after his saints after the believers have made the world ready for him to come back okay so that was very attractive to a lot of Christians at the end of the 19th century because just think what happened in the 19th century had the Scientific Revolution in full bloom you had the Industrial Revolution you had the rise of more democratic systems of government and more democracies you had the longest period of European peace that had existed for a millennium or more and so people were saying what things are getting better and better better better better and so things are gonna get so much better that Jesus is gonna say hey things are good enough for me to come back now then came World War one and World War one was the most horrifying experience that that Europe had until World War two they couldn't even imagine in World War two that's why they called the first world war the Great War meaning the horrible war and the problem was that the very people who thought they represented the most civilized nations on earth went to war against one another with the most uncivilized Barbaria shmurda swore the humans could imagine so postmillennialism really took a hard hit I think it also takes a hard hit when you look at the world or the church at any given moment I don't think we're making the world better for Jesus to be satisfied to come back it doesn't mean we don't have to work for righteousness and justice in the world is to say the world's too broken for us to fix it before Jesus comes back I'm a premillennialists the the most American evangelicals are Prima littlest and that means that Christ is coming back suddenly then that when he comes back he's going to judge and he's going to reign on earth for a thousand years fulfilling all the promises given in the Old Testament and fulfilling every one of those promises and then at the end of that thousand years he'll inaugurate his heavenly kingdom but so why would he why if he's going to rule eternally in heaven why would he rule for a thousand years on earth well it is because if you go back to the Garden of Eden you have to ask the question what would it have been like if sin hadn't happened wouldn't you like to know what life on Earth would have been like before sin happened and everything went wrong well in the Millennium of Christ we're gonna find out not just what it would have been like on earth that sin never happened but what it's like on earth on the other side of Jesus establishing a perfection that's even greater than what a bit would have been in the Garden of Eden and so I'm longing for that so that's the Armonia list the post millennialist and the premillennialists and I'm a pre millennialist and glad to answer that question but it goes back to that last question where's history headed and it just shows you you've got to answer that question one way or another and it's gonna determine how you live life thank you this side hello my name is hunter I'm a Catholic and I wanted to ask about the Apocrypha and why is it that Catholic Bibles have books like Maccabees in Tobit but Protestant Bibles do not yeah it's a great question and hunter right yeah appreciate you being here and appreciate the the the fact you identified yourself and asked a very very good question so if you look at a Protestant Bible at least most Protestant Bibles we're lacking those books that are rightly called the Apocrypha and so yes good question why well first we better ask the question what what's the Apocrypha so the Apocrypha is a collection of books and they're mostly historical books and they come from the period between the Old Testament and the New Testament so that's important and by the way evangelical Christians don't believe that there is no truth in the Apocrypha we don't believe that there are no interesting accounts in the Apocrypha we certainly don't believe there's no interesting material in the Apocrypha there's a lot of morally important teaching in the Apocrypha there's a lot of fascinating history in the Apocrypha it's just that we don't believe that it belongs in the Canon of Scripture as the Old Testament and the New Testament now importantly the Roman Catholic Church officially does not believe that the Apocrypha is on exactly the same plane as the old and the New Testament they say it's a part of Sacred Scripture which of angelical don't accept with that language but but even the Roman Catholic Church has historically said it's not the same thing exactly as the Old and New Testament so the Reformation answer to that is then don't put it in the same volume because that would be misleading so and and and the other thing is it says that in the main the Christian Church has based no important theological teachings on the Apocrypha and so that's just to answer the question if you look at the history of the Christian Church you're even going to find where the Reformers had Bibles they had the Apocrypha in it and they didn't rip it out but when they published a Bible such as Luther's Bible published in the 16th century they put in the Old Testament in the New Testament the sixty-six books that have been recognized by the church universally by the time you get to the early church as the sacred scripture of the Old and New Testaments so great question thank you thanks for being here tonight I saw you out in the hallway my name is Jake if you perhaps forgot good to see you again Jake dr. Miller do you believe that there are first-order issues of Christian doctrine that American Christians tend to neglect and on that same token do you believe that there are 2nd or 3rd order issues of Christian doctrine that American Christians tend to overemphasize you know I am glad to find almost anyone who emphasizes theological truth anywhere that's Christian truth in other words I'm I'm I'm afraid the bigger problem is nobody takes theology very seriously including a lot of Christians who ought to know better so I kind of operate from the opposite diagnosis of the problem but you ask a good problem and I published an article years ago is probably the most cited thing I've ever written I didn't know that when I wrote it entitled a call for theological triage and the reason I entitled of that was because my mother is a nurse and then it was from her that I learned the the category of triage which was developed no real surprise here by the French during the Crimean War as a way of deciding which injuries in war were most life-threatening so which patient gets treated first so you have critically wounded patients and then you have badly wounded patients and then you have superficially wounded patients so you want to go to an emergency room you're having a heart attack or you have a gunshot wound you want the you want to go to a hospital that thinks that's more important than a skinned knee and so triage is it's kind of fascinating that they didn't have that category till the 19th century it's kind of scary but then again they didn't have germ theory letting wash their hands between surgeries so there are lots of things they didn't have I'm thankful they have now I'm all for anesthesia and antibiotics count me in but as you as you look at that you realize the first order issues are the issues that are central and essential to the Christian faith and so that would be like Christology who Christ is and and what he did the person who work of Christ it will be the doctrine of the Trinity making very clear what what we mean when we say God is one and then we say the Father is God the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God getting that right is just very important and that's where I think most American Christians don't give the knowledge of God as revealed in Scripture in the Trinity with adequate attention I think and for that I think it leaves a lot of American Christians susceptible to all kinds of almost getting it right which is wrong so that's to answer your first question and the second part of it second order issues are issues that are important to establishing a church but if there's a disagreement on this issue you don't on that basis say that someone's not a Christian you just say they're not a member of my church and and so and that should not be an unfriendly thing and so for instance if you if you tell me I don't believe that Jesus is the very son of God I've got to tell you I don't believe based upon the Bible you're a Christian but I'm a Baptist and if you tell me you believe that your church is right baptizing babies I'm gonna say I think you're wrong but if you preach the gospel and hold to the essential doctrines of the Christian faith I'm sure not gonna say you're not a Christian so that's a different level this you all together I'm gonna say you're my brother in Christ you're my sister in Christ I love you but I'm a member of the Baptist Church and you remember the Presbyterian Church and we can preach the gospel to our neighbors together and and we recognize each other as Christians we don't question each other's Christian faithfulness but my Presbyterian friends do things with babies I would not do babies in water that's just I I'm a Baptist I believe in believers baptism I believe that it is baptism that follows conversion and and is a picture of dying with Christ and being raised to the newness of life so I'm gonna contend for that and I'm president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and that's just truth in advertising but I'm glad to be a dear dear friend as I one of my best friends in the world is ligand Duncan who's the the head of the big Presbyterian seminary and we preached together we preach with each other we preach for each other third order issues or issues in which you can disagree and be in the same Bible study in the same church and trust each other completely that's like the eschatological questions that I was just answering you if you disagree on that issue you're not gonna say heretic you're gonna say I don't think you're reading the book of Revelation correctly that's a different issue and so well it's very important you ask the question that's really good their first second and third-order issues and if you if you're if America has got a big problem in the first order issues I think it really is understanding the doctrine of the Trinity is making sure we get that right okay so the other issues we continue to have debate and that's why by the way in the kingdom of Christ there aren't going to be no Baptists and no Presbyterians and no Lutheran's there aren't gonna be any brand names because we're all just gonna be Christ and will no longer see through a glass darkly we'll see him face to face and all our doctrine will be corrected there's not gonna be a Baptist section pray there a lot of Baptist there yes yes on this side I my name is Holden yeah question so the Great Commission to make disciples of all the nations no I've heard an argument before that there are religions that are so entrenched in the cultures of certain countries or regions yeah that it's almost unfair or unjust of us to send missionaries to those places to introduce Christianity which could essentially be uprooting and trampling the culture that's been there for thousands of years yeah so I was just wondering what can be said in response to this argument remind me your first name again Holden Holden thank you man that is that's the first time I've been asked that question on to these there's another brilliant question so here we have to recognize that Christianity is very disruptive it's really really really disruptive Tom Holland is a historian he's recently wrote a book I picked it up when I was in England a few weeks ago it's entitled Dominion and it's now out in the United States and and he's not pressing a Christian point he's not but the first chapter of that book is one of the most moving chapters I've ever read because what Tom Holland the historian says is that when Christianity came to the Roman Empire it turned everything upside down it turned the entire moral system upside down it eventually transformed all of society and so let's just admit and say that this is not an accident that Christianity is incredibly disruptive there is no more counter cultural moral principle on earth than we are to love our neighbor as ourselves and that everyone is our neighbor and say there are other belief systems that are said to you to love your neighbor as yourself but Christianity Christ said there's no one who's not our neighbor now that that's very disruptive and Christianity is a belief system it disrupts all levels of society so that was never considered a problem until recently and this is interesting so let's just think about the history of ideas and how culture shape there are many in society today who say that these cultures are to be respected exactly as they are and it's wrong to disrupt them now I can understand that argument I don't think anyone who says it really means it I really don't and it is because there is something in every culture that morally we would feel needs to be disrupted so for instance I was in a conversation with someone on an academic campus not long ago and they said I don't believe you should ever export coercively any moral principle to any other culture and I said you just wrote an article saying that female genital mutilation is wrong and must be ended globally you can't say both of those things simultaneously that's a cultural artifact deeply rooted in a belief system and so I'm just saying I don't think anyone actually believes that cultures are are just to be left alone and not disrupted I think every everyone believes that every culture needs to be disrupted including ours so Christianity is disruptive I understand that but we also believe as Christians it's not just that we've been given the Great Commission which we have go into all the nations and make disciples teaching them to obey all that I've commanded and lo I am with you always Christ said it's also that we believe salvation is found in Christ and in Christ alone and we have an obligation a glad happy obligation to share Christ is that going to disrupt that culture to some extent yes however Christianity also a biblical worldview privileges culture the book of Genesis actually says that God did not want a monoculture in human beings in human society he actually distributed us in Genesis there's even a table of the nation's where he sent peoples into all these different parts of the world to establish different languages and different cultures and the Bible's worldview takes culture as so important and respects it to such an extent than in the kingdom of Christ we are told there will be men and women every tongue and tribe and people and nation and that will be to God's glory and I think that's fantastic the Christian worldviews transformative the gospel of Jesus Christ is revolutionary it will bring change wherever it comes but it doesn't eradicate culture and God wants to be glorified in every language known in every language he wants hymns in every language he privileges culture so much he's arranged for our cultures to be present in heaven that's even better than public television and I mean that to the glory of God what a great question thank you holding hi my name is Anne there's a lot of examples of angels in the old and new Testament yeah I want to ask you how do you see angels working today for the everyday Christian remind me your first name again Ian Ian thank you so much what happens is I start I hear the name I start listening the question I think that's a really great question oops what was the name Thank You Ian okay so angels I find this a particularly frustrating thing in the United States because there's a great sociologist whose name was Peter Berger and he says that what we in America do he said the entire West but what we do we domesticate transcendence which means we take heaven sighs infinite realities and reduce them to little cartoon characters which is exactly what we've done with angels you know you've got angels on greeting cards you've got angels on plaques that people put in their bathrooms you know and and the angels that people put on the little plaques to put in the bathroom saying you know thanks for flushing or whatever they're actually kind of there they're derivative of what are called Italian pooty pooty pooty they're these little kind of angelic babies that was just by the way the Italians did not mean that's what all angels were like they just drew them and Americans go that's an angel I'm putting that on a bathroom side you know and they're these little naked boys with their you know little wings and they're just little babies and they look so innocent well that doesn't fit the Bible it doesn't fit the Bible and when it speaks of angels in the Old Testament or in the New Testament and so I know this shocks people and it certainly shocks people who aren't used to being talked to this way in church but I say look in the Bible when an angel shows up nobody's tempted to say isn't that cute instead they all wet their pants simultaneously that's what happened is oh remember on the night Jesus was born and the angelic host appears to the Shepherd's the Shepherd's that goat isn't that cute in fact they just about died which is why the angels had to say fear not don't die don't die we bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be known to all people you hear us don't die okay because they are warriors they are showing up as the messengers of God you look at the Old Testament when an angel shows up he means business and in the in the New Testament an angel shows up that angel means business but the New Testament also gives us another side of the Angels actually several things that are shocking for one thing in the New Testament we are told that the angels are jealous of us because they are the messengers of God but we're actually God's children and so even we talk about the gospel you know we're told that these are truths to which angels long to look we're also told that angels are active in the world and the Bible does not say every one of us have a guardian angel okay it doesn't it doesn't we have Christ we don't need a guardian angel in that sense but the bible does tell us that angels are active in the world as ambassadors of God even to the extent that as with Abraham in the book of Genesis we are to be very careful when we're talking to someone lest they are an angel and were unaware of it now that's not to be spooky it's not to be spooky so you look your roommate and go not thinking so but it is to say we are to assume that that God is working in the world around us in such a way that there are there are angels that are amongst us it isn't to be a spooky reality like we're supposed to go using an angel ometer or calling ghostbusters it's just that we are aware is the Bible in the Old Testament but especially in the New Testament makes clear there are spiritual realities all around us because God made the cosmos the spiritual cosmos and so now I really thank you for the question but and you know it's different if I were speaking in another culture about angels people would probably have a scary image in the United States it's a ridiculous opposite so that was fun to talk about and thank you so much for your question yes hello dr. Mohler thank you for your time tonight so yeah so in Romans 6:23 it says for the wages of sin is death yea but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord but it says for the wages of sin is death but then over in in 1st John 5 verse 17 it says that all wrongdoing is sin but there is sin that does not lead to death how do you personally interpret this question yeah well great question I love a man who reads the Bible and can even scroll it I do that from time to time but I'm pretty much old school I'm still turning a page-turner but I will tell you I love the fact that I can call up the scripture anywhere and everywhere and the the Bible study tools just with the digital editions of the Bible are fantastic you can put in a word like sin and you can almost instantaneously look at every reference so in in Romans 3 consistent with all the other teaching of Scripture the wages of sin is death so that means that there are no little sins and big sins in that respect sin itself is is what leads to death that was what that's what Adam and Eve were told in the garden they weren't to eat of the fruit of this tree lest they eat of it and die and then Paul by the way in that very passage in Romans is making very clear that we died in Adam we sinned in Adam and the wages of sin is death that's right so sin equals death fall equals mortality and then you're dealing there in first John with the sin that you say there's a sin or there are sins that doesn't lead to death it's in the context of saying there is one sin that leads to death so well that sounds contradictory until you look at the context when in in John he's not writing to unbelievers he's writing only to believers and he's talking about what we might call and you often hear is the unpardonable sin so in that passage is talking about eternal death which means there's a sin that can't be forgiven all other sins can be forgiven in Christ but there's one sin that can't be forgiven it is what John makes very clear there by the Holy Spirit there is one sin that leads to death to eternal death and it cannot and will not be forgiven now that's a horrifying question then what in the world is that sin well you may remember the King James calls it blasphemy against the Holy Spirit what what what is the most important thing to recognize it is persistent unbelief it's refusing Christ it is rejecting Christ is refusing to believe in Christ that sin and that's the sin that can't be forgiven but every other sin can be forgiven because anyone who comes to believe in Christ well John tells us in the very same book if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness there will be heaven will be filled with those who sinned every single human being saved by the blood of the Lamb but no one will be in heaven who committed the sin against the Holy Spirit the sin that leads to death that is eternal death which was refusing to believe in Christ that will be hell so thank you for reading a Bible carefully thank you for following the two words sin and death and test what I say and go to first John and see if it's not exactly what I said the context there is the one sin that can't be forgiven because it's the sin that is represented by the refusal to come to Jesus for the forgiveness of sins then that's clarifying very helpful to us thank you thank you hey my name is brynan bill I've got a little scared because I thought he was gonna ask my question but mom's just a little different my question comes from Hebrew Hebrews chapter 10 26 and 27 yeah it says for if we deliberately go on sinning after receiving the knowledge of the truth there's no longer there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins yeah but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire about the cons about to consume the adversary' so my question is exactly as you said just a minute ago we all have sin and I'm sure most of us know the Ten Commandments we know the truth but yet as humans we still sin does that mean that when we sin after knowing the truth that we will not make it to heaven maybe not what you expected me to say so that that is a very interesting question and I am just thrilled to get a question from the book of Hebrews god bless you is one of the most neglected books in the New Testament I wrote a commentary on it it was published just a few years ago because I believe someone to the book of Hebrews I think without the book of Hebrews we don't understand a lot of what we need to understand and by the way it gets right to the question you're right your two questions are very much linked so how do we understand that well the book of Hebrews is actually dealing with that look at chapter four the end of chapter five and look at chapter six it's dealing with that so how do you explain people who cognitively understand the gospel and may even have given the appearance of being Christians but they live in persistent sin and they do not turn to Christ for the goodness ascends the picture you have there in Hebrews chapter 10 as if someone who knows he or she is sinning and claims to be a Christian and just persists in this in now Christians continue to send that's why John had to write if we confess our sins he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness and that's why John wrote to Christians if we say we have no sin we lie okay so here's the difference the mark of the true Christian who's going to heaven is that though we sin we confess our sins and turn to Christ for the assured mercy that he gives to sinners it doesn't say he might forgive our sins he's faithful and just that's what's tremendous in other words he doesn't do this just by saying your sin doesn't matter he paid the penalty for sin so he can justly say your sin is forgiven but if we go to Christ and we say I know you say that sin but I'm going to refuse to confess that sin I'm going to continue to persist in that sin the Bible doesn't say Hebrews doesn't say you were a Christian and now you're not it says you had a head knowledge of Christ but Christ did not own your heart you hadn't experienced the new birth you haven't been regenerated you're not really a Christian and you would say that's hard to understand and it is hard to understand except Jesus makes it very very easy to understand and for that I'm very thankful look at Matthew chapter 13 if you ever get hung up in hebrews hebrews chapter 6 or hebrews after 10 just go read Matthew chapter 13 Jesus tells the parable of the sower and the soils and Wow was that helpful because Jesus talks about the sower he sews and as he sews some falls on the the hard path and it never penetrates it all and you see that in evangelism you share the gospel with someone and they say I don't want to hear it I don't want to listen to this I don't want anything of Christ I don't want anything of your Christianity just go away well that happens that happens we understand that we see that pattern but the second pattern is the seed that falls in the shallow soil and it shows immediate signs of growth but when the full Sun comes out it withers and it dies because it had no root okay bingo Hebrews 6 Hebrews 10 that's exactly and then the third soil is again even more Hebrews 10 this the seed that falls in the thorny soil and again it shows signs of life but the thorns which Jesus makes very clear as sin chokes out the plant from the seed and then of course let's remember that fourth soil the seed that falls in good soil and it bears a harvest some thirtyfold some sixty some some 90 he who has ears to hear even a hundredfold let him hear so that really helps me so that tells me that what's going on in Hebrews is that there's that the writer the book of Hebrews inspired by the Holy Spirit is saying look we have to explain in the church why there are some who appear to be Christians but then they disappear they fall away they fall into persistent sin and the Bible doesn't say there were Christians and now they're not it says they were Christians may even thought they were Christians you may have thought they were Christians because they showed immediate signs of life but they fell away I'm thankful Jesus explained that because otherwise I ministry would be a huge question mark for me and by the way any Christian who shares the gospel is brokenhearted when either those first three soils show up and sometimes it takes time to find out but the great encouragement is there is that fourth soil and it's in it it's so receptive at the gospel and we believe ask the Holy Spirit's work it's so receptive of the gospel that it seizes upon and you can begin to see and we grow in grace we don't believe that the believer once saved is instantly no longer a sinner in fact we believe we're gonna struggle with sin until we die and we're yearning for Jesus to free us from that in our what we call glorification so you're asking a great question and that's where we one of the great principles of church history with the Bible then the Reformation was big on this was that we interpret scripture by scripture so if if we're unclear here then let's read more of the Bible because it's likely to get clarified with another text that's just extremely helpful so thanks again for reading the Bible I love questions and people to read the Bible and from Hebrews god bless you yes hello dr. Mohler my name is coding there are currently a lot of leaders within the Southern Baptist Convention that are making a distinction between the act of preaching and the role of pastor or elder yeah so as to defend women preaching to a Kuwait congregation on the Lord's Day do you believe this is a biblically defensible argument to make why or why not yeah I did a video on this I'm not gonna I'm not dodging the question but the videos there where I could answer it more fully than given the time here but and there are some denominations that recognize a distinction between office and function so even my presbyterian friends would have more of a distinction between office and function they have a theology of ordination in which you've got a very clear question ordained people do that and ordained people don't do that more importantly none ordained people don't do that okay but I'm a Baptist and so I see no distinction between office and function and in other words I would say that the preacher is guess what the one preaching and and we and Baptist we don't have any big theology of ordination whatsoever you can be pastor of the First Baptist Church and not be ordained to the ministry but just called to be pastor by the church because we as Baptists nobody there's any special class of people we don't believe there's a class of people who've been ordained and thus are set apart and so I cringe a little bit whenever I hear some Baptists described as an ordained ministers if they're a special class easier [Music] we don't we don't believe that and and again we have respect for churches that do believe that but we don't believe that and so I believe that the biblical teaching of order in the church and by the way the biblical teaching order in the home is in parallel but the biblical order of the church is that men are to fulfill the teaching office and the teaching function in the church now that means for the congregation so it may be clear that means for the congregation so to put it in black and white that means on Sunday morning when the church is gathered for worship or wherever the church is gathered for worship that's the pattern that should prevail but the New Testament also makes very clear that women are to teach and My heavens I want them to teach the Bible the question is to whom and where and in what context and so I think the rightly ordered church that wants to be faithful to the Word of God will understand that women are called of God and assigned the task of teaching and yes of teaching the Bible Titus 2 makes very clear that one of the most important roles is women teaching women and and of course you just if you take women away from the church we we've got a huge huge problem that's an understatement but and why does God do it this way I'm not really sure I do believe I preached a massive message on this just a few weeks ago in chapel at Southern Seminary it's entitled male and female created he them and when I say it's a massive message do I mean I dealt with massive issues yes I do but I also mean it's a massive message it is 72 minutes long that's what I can't do here but I try to do there in 72 minutes and a few seconds extra I try to lay that out in one message so again I'm a Baptist I don't believe in a distinction between function and office and I believe the Bible's teaching concerning the office is the same as the Bible's teaching concerning function and I'm thankful for every woman who within biblical parameters teaches on behalf of the church and within biblical parameters teaches the Word of God thank you yes thank you oh sorry hi my name is Steven and my question is that the Gospels teach that Jesus died in order to come to take away the brokenness and sin of the world right but was that not within of itself give a selfish motivation for following Christ and if so doesn't matter your first name again Stephen Stephen what an honest question the answer is you are not to feel reluctant to turn to Christ for your salvation and the gift of the forgiveness of sins and everlasting life is that selfish it is self referenced because you are concerned for yourself but that's consistent with the Bible doesn't ever say don't do what is in your eternal best interest it doesn't it says you were made for this we got God created you for his glory he made you in His image and and even as you sinned against him and there's nothing you can do to repair that breach as the Bible says what we were helpless to do in our sin God did in Christ and so when I preach Christ what I preach the gospel I tell people you should even love yourself enough because I don't worry about that being selfish in that sense because God made us in His image he's the one who made us to want him and so it's actually the greatest expression of my understanding of how God made me as a human being to want to be made right with him there's an urge within me to want to be made right with him and do I want that yes I do but I believe he made me want that because he made me want him Agustin the great theologian of the early church put it this way he said our hearts are restless until they find till we find our rest in thee and I think that's just really great God gave us restless hearts and so we are to yearn for him we're to look for him and we are when Christ is preached to us we are to desire him and that's actually a good new test motive but it's it's ultimately about the glory of God God saving us saves us that's magnificent God in telling us to share the gospel so that others will hear the gospel and believe and be saved that's magnificent but at the same time the greatest impact through eternity is the glory of God in his act of saving us so even as he makes us want him he glorifies himself any the fact he made us to want him he made the provision as to how we can know him and he is glorified and ultimately that is the biggest thing he's satisfied when those whom he made in his image and sinned against him hear the gospel and cling to his son then come to have that relationship restored so is that self ich no not in the sense that it's all about you but is it self referenced and the fact that it's you who desires to be saved and you to whom the gospel has been preached and you who clings to Christ for all the benefits Christ yes yes so sees him because he invites you to do so by the way selfish means that you derive the great satisfaction concerned with no one else's satisfaction here's the best news of the gospel God makes you want to be satisfied in him so that he has even were infinitely satisfied in you desiring him thank you yes my name is Julia my question is women are very important in the Bible there's no question about that right but my main question is do you think that Mary Magdalene would be considered a disciple and like what would your definition of the site bow be yeah boy what a great question remind me again Julia Julia thank you thank you so was Mary Magdalene a disciple yes the New Testament uses three different expressions that we just have to clarify so one was the twelve and so and in the Gospels you'll see the twelve and so you know who the twelve are they're 12 men who got called as we call them the disciples the 12 disciples and so the 12 we know who the 12 are and then the other word in the New Testament is apostle and so most of the disciples indeed 11 of them became apostles and that means that the God spoke through them to the church and so those two words are there but disciples is used even and say the Gospel of Matthew in a way in which you come to understand there were many disciples and in fact over here you have 70 disciples and and over here in the book of Acts you have all these people coming to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and so what is the new testament definition of a disciple it is the one who is taught and and that's why every single Christian who comes to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is to be a disciple of Christ that's what we call even as we're talking about growing in grace in and growing into Christ we talked about his discipleship so was Mary Magdalene a disciple you bet and boy did she demonstrate it and not only that look at the other Mary the sister of Martha and then look at Martha and then look to who was at the cross when Jesus died and then look at who was first to the tomb as witnesses of the Resurrection and there you come to understand where women disciples yes from the first and jesus said often to rebuke the even the twelve he would speak of the act of faithfulness obedience of a woman disciple and I will say shame them so just this past Sunday I was teaching from John chapter 10 and chapter 11 and the interesting thing is is that in chapter 10 Mary the sister of Martha is mentioned and then John says this is the Mary his heart may not get emotional here is so sweet John writes to the church saying this is the Mary who washed Jesus's feet and dried his feet with her hair oh my goodness can you imagine being remembered throughout the entire history the Christian Church and everyone who reads the Gospel of John as the disciple who loved Jesus so much she washed his feet and dried his feet with her hair there is no new testament as we know it without those models of faithfulness of the women who were the disciples of Jesus thank you so much Julia thank you yes hey dr. Moreau how's it going it's going great it's good it goes fast you're doing great so I was just wondering so we always say the things happen for a reason yeah but on the same side we should say that we have free will so I feel like they kind of can't conceptually exist together and if there is both at the same time what and or when and why does God decide to intervene at certain times first name again Jake Jake thank you we'll call you Jake number two tonight that's right what a good question this is one of those questions that Christians stay up late at night thinking about and theologians rate write great big books thinking about how do we relate God's sovereignty and our what we call free will or our power of decision-making and the fact that God says we are decision-making creatures and we're accountable for the decisions we make we're accountable for the actions we take well if God's sovereign that isn't he just to blame for everything you know we just say you know so for instance if we make fun of this we think of the little old lady who fell down the stairs this is a theological illustration little lady who fell down the stairs and she just said well I'm glad that's over well that's just not a biblical worldview the people in the Bible don't say when something happens well we're glad that's over they don't say well the sovereignty of God explains this and there's no human explanation for this no look at how the Bible the entire Bible is premise tap on both affirmations the God is sovereign and that human beings are responsible that that's the best way to phrase it is God's sovereignty and human responsibility we're held responsible do we make choices yes we make choices all the time and we're accountable for those choices but here's what's also interesting our free will if we're gonna define it that way and that's not a bad way to put it because we will we experienced the will and we experience the freedom to make decision so what does it call it freewill in this sense it's pretty limited because as it turns out I had nothing to say with whether I exist or to whom I was born or when I was born so I didn't will that someone else had to will that and if someone else hadn't willed that and by the way there was a human will my parents they wanted a child I think they bought the crib before they even knew I was coming firstborn by the way that's the only way that makes sense I mean they really wanted a baby and I'm so thankful so they their will was exercised but ultimately the Bible says that's not a sufficient explanation because it turns out for me to exist God had two will that I existed and I the by that the Bible says God willed that I existed even before the creation of the world Wow even before my parents existed and he will they existed and then that their parents existed and that they wanted them to exist and existed prior to that just an endless cycle of the fact that human beings make moral decisions but ultimately God determines the entire landscape No so then how are we accountable because God has willed to create a universe of moral meaning in which he receives more glory from human creatures who actually do have the capacity to know the experience of willing and and so we do that and so let's put it this way there is no sane worldview and certainly there's no justification in scripture for not holding us accountable for our decisions there's no you can't have a society that doesn't hold people you know responsible for their decisions and their actions and the Bible is that it makes no sense I mean every page of it is God affirming that we're responsible for our decisions and our actions and and the consequences but at the end of the day that can't explain why there is a world they can't explain whether is a me it can't explain why we're all in this room at the same time together this is just a cosmic accident then it's been a fun accident and I'm glad you came but I actually don't believe this is an accident that we all exist and that I don't think it's an accident we're all in this room at this time I think this is actually a part of God's purpose and plan which means God is so sovereign he can work through our decision-making in such a way that he receives the ultimate glory and so human responsibilities there everyone who sins against God will be held accountable for that sin does that mean God's not in control no it means that he's showing his glory by creating a world in which we are decision-making responsible creatures but but ultimately the only answer to any big question is God's sovereignty because otherwise you can't explain why there's a cosmos and whether zami and why I'm here tonight thank you for your question my question is a little different what do you see as the biggest issue facing evangelical conservatives in the next 25 years Allison thank you for asking I think the biggest question is whether or not we will be faithful Christians when we have no cultural support to lean on and I think that's a very acute question for Christians in this country because we have become accustomed to being able to kind of lean on the culture as in basic agreement with us and I think we're seeing that disappear and it used to be that people would join our churches because they gained social capital by joining our churches well I think pretty quickly we're gonna discover that people will lose social capital by being a member of our church just imagine that you have say a presidential candidate who's running and he or she is a member of one of our churches the say a church in the Southern Baptists convention just imagine what how that's going to be different say in 2024 than it is right now I or certainly than it was say 20 years ago 20 years ago you say I'm a member of the First Baptist Church of any southern city then every say well that's kind of what we expect of an upstanding citizen of that southern city but now you say I'm running for president I'm a member of the First Baptist Church I was made it the name of that church if people are gonna say are you really a part of that church that believes that marriage can only be between a man and a woman are you really a part of that church do you really believe that Jesus is the only way to heaven so I think the biggest question as to whether Christians in the United States are willing to be judged by the culture rather than applauded by the culture it's a very different circumstance and and I don't know how much of evangelical Christian in America Christianity in America is a religion of comfort and convenience and how much is a living faith in Christ but we're going to find out and I say that as someone who is 60 those of you in this room you're gonna spend a lot longer than I will finding out how American Christians are going to answer that question thank you really great question thank you all right dr. Mohler thank you guys for answering that are asking those questions don't worry don't worry we're gonna be jumping into the lightning round and so dr. Muller is gonna be answering your questions within three minutes do you think you can do it yeah the problems not the question asker is the question answerer that's right all right all right so I don't know where you left off but take it away all right I'm Kiki there and my question is so I see this a lot in my life and I'm sure a lot of people in here have seen it as well it's simple but it's important how do you how oh my gosh I completely just blanked I'm so sorry it's lightening around what am i doing how do you help someone who is completely given up their hope Kiki thank you you're right that's important in that's urgent I will simply say that trying to manufacture hope doesn't work and so don't try to manufacture hope don't try to say it's not as bad as you think or yes you do have friends or whatever but instead say I'm here so that's proof that your life isn't hopeless and I am here and I'm pointing you to Christ because there is no earthly way to ground your hope that's going to be satisfying everything on earth if someone's lost hope because they're disappointed on something in earth they're disappointed in school they're disappointed in their parents they're disappointed in a girlfriend or boyfriend they're they're disappointed and in this experience they didn't get the scholarship they didn't get picked on the team we we can't say hey that really doesn't matter and we sure can't say I can fix that we can say there is no ultimate hope found and anything on earth we just have to cling to Christ and I am I am here because I'm a Christian and I'm not going to abandon you but it's not because I'm so sweet it's because Christ loves you and thus so do I and I am here to hope for you when you can't hope for yourself and I'm here to tell you there is hope and that hope isn't a principle that hope is a person that hope has a name Jesus Christ so Kiki thank you for the question god bless you yeah yes dr. Mohler thank you for coming out tonight and I apologize if you get this question often my name's hunter yeah and my question really is currently it's been throughout history but currently in these times and days there's kind of like a war metaphorically between religion and sexuality yeah and so my main question is is it possible to enter the kingdom of heaven and be a Christian while being homosexual you know that's a great question hunter right yes sir so going back to the question came earlier I don't think it's possible to gain entrance to heaven claiming some any sin and clinging to it but do I believe that virtually everyone we pray this way every human being north of puberty he's going to have to be forgiven sexual sins if not sins of the body then sins of the imagination there isn't a single human being north of puberty who has a perfectly god-honoring sex life even if that non god-honoring part takes the shape of say an idolatry of sex or an idolatry even of marriage which I was clear about marriage and the goodness of marriage but it for business idolizing marriage I think part of the problem here is that our language is that someone is a X or is a Y I think the most important thing to say is the Bible says all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God will there be people in heaven who have committed homosexual sins and come to a saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and been forgiven their sins I'm absolutely convinced to that are there going to be people in heaven too new on earth only a sexual attractiveness to someone of the same gender the same sex do I believe there will be such people in heaven absolutely well the world call them homosexuals yes in the world has all kinds of labels now I think Facebook is up like 86 different choices of this or that but I mean to dignify your question by saying I don't think that anyone's going to get to heaven saying I am X God deal with it but I think Heaven's gonna be filled with people by the grace and mercy of God have come to know wholeness in Christ and the forgiveness of sins and when I talked about the fact that our sanctification is being worked out over time I don't think the gospel of Jesus Christ is a cure-all for earthly temptations and even for earthly brokenness in relationships I mean someone comes to faith in Christ and they have they have sinned against someone and injured someone that injury doesn't you know something they have to they have to live with but there is the promise of ultimate healing and the Bible's clear about sexuality and I was promised in your question as to what sexuality God allows and mandates and what expressions of sexuality he does not but if you ask the quant to answer your question yes the way I hear your question there will be many people in heaven who on earth would have been labeled and by this is a fairly modern thing there are there many labels in human history all kinds of labels they give now and but no one who is able to say my identity is this those who are in heaven will say my identity it was Christ and my identity on earth is as a center has come to the Lord Jesus Christ and is broken who found healing in Christ and progressive healing in my life throughout and the church ought to be the safe place where someone can say to fellow brothers and sisters in Christ in the right context here is the pattern of my temptation here is here is what my life looks like but the Christian faith is the Christian Church together living out holiness and encouraging one another to faithfulness to Christ and we are all going to get to heaven with a limp which is why we come to understand that we're yearning it goes back to those four questions we're yearning for a healing and a wholeness and the good news of the gospel is that can come to anyone regardless of what that label is thank you for the question you yes tell me your name okay let me help you may read it I will try okay okay that means Marcus one second a goal of church my question is how can I know I will go to heaven that's my question is it Marcus yes yes sir thank you for asking that question thank you for your willingness to come up and ask that question god bless you you just blessed everybody in this room by asking that question god bless you how can you be sure that you're going to heaven it is the simple Bible promise that if you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and repent of your sins you will be forgiven you will be given the gift of everlasting life and so let me put it this way let me put two sentences together salvation comes to everyone who believes in Christ I have believed in Christ therefore salvation has come to me so Marcus I will tell you right now you're surrounded by people who will tell you that if you come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ you believe in Christ you believe that he's the very son of God and that he died on the cross for your sins that God raised him from the 3rd day then you'll be saved and that will be demonstrated the fact you're going to repent of your sins and you're going to confess Christ Christ said if you confess me before men I will confess you before the father and that's got to tell you the courage that it took for you to ask that question I will tell you it demonstrates the fact to me that you that the Holy Spirit is working in your heart even right now and I'm gonna pray that if you have never before you will you will come to the Lord Jesus Christ to Savior you will claim him as your Savior you will believe in him and you'll be forgiven your sins which means you will go to heaven we don't have to get ourselves to heaven once we belong to Jesus he's gonna take us to heaven every single one of us he says in John chapter 6 all the father gives me will come to me and all that no means cast them out and then he says all the father gives me will come to me and of them I will lose nothing I love that he's not going to lose anyone you come to faith in him he's never going to you god bless you Marcus thank you for that question my name is Corbin and I've been asked this question by a lot of my friends I'd like to hear your answer so what God hold a person born in isolation from Christianity responsible for their ignorance Corbin great question and I would be completely puzzled about how to answer that question if God didn't answer it in the Bible and he answers it in Romans chapter 1 so in the very first chapter the book of Romans he tells us that God has embedded a knowledge of himself in all of creation such that there is no one who will have an excuse that's a devastating word so it tells us that there are two things Christians need to keep in mind there is no one about to be lost everybody's lost for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and the wages of sin is death so there is no one about to be lost or in danger being lost we're born lost that's why the gospel is so so much of an urgency to take to people who've never heard this is what Paul talks about so skip from Romans 1 to Romans chapter 10 and that's why Paul just affirms the gospel all who call upon the name of the Lord will be saved but then he says but who will call upon the name of the Lord and that's why I have to send preachers if we don't send preachers then they'll not hear the gospel and by preachers you know just mean preachers holding a preaching office it means those are going to take the gospel following the Great Commission of Christ he says if we don't send them that they're not going to go and if they don't go they're not going to share the gospel they don't share the gospel people won't hear and if people donors don't hear then they won't believe and if they don't believe they won't be saved and that's when he said faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ so you've asked such an important question and if I had to answer that my own wisdom I have no idea what I would do and so that's why I'm so dependent on scripture and there in Romans chapter one he says there is not one human being in all of creation who will have an excuse so yes that's why we have to take the gospel to everybody which takes us back to the question about is the gospel disruptive yeah it's disruptive it's also urgent time's running out we got to share the gospel with as many people as we can everywhere that we can as often as we can until Jesus comes thank you god bless you hey dr. Mohler I'm Dominique yeah I got two questions so where are your thoughts about the new hyper charismatic movement churches and how is it such as like elevation worship and baesell and how is it impacting to even jet evangelical churches today Wow thank you name again domine don't you got it okay so I think that's a very dangerous movement and I think it has a very devastating effect on evangelicalism because what we need an EM angelical ISM is more gospel and more truth and more Christian faithfulness unless emotivism and less weirdness and and and and less people you know jumping around and hopping around and doing this and that we need more that points to Christ with as much clarity as possible and we need less talking about some experience that someone can come and have or come and miss we just need to preach Christ and so that I love your question Dominique I want to tell you I think I think the more these churches where we gonna label the more they begin to define everything in terms of some kind of emotion and experience the more Christ recedes into the horizon I want to put Christ right up front and again the New Testament information we preach Christ if we do good job of preaching Christ people are gonna talk about our whatever so thank you thanks god bless you yes hi my name is Hudson so I just want to start by saying I believe that the entire Bible is true but I was wondering so with Jesus teaching with the method of parables in so many instances yeah with a lot of the Bible being things that seem extraordinary so that such as like the Garden of Eden I think it's completely possible that God did those things the exact way that it was written but could it also be possible that those were non-literal but still true first name again Hudson Hudson thank you so yes Jesus spoke in parables and the Bible uses metaphors and there are all kinds of literature in the Bible they're historical sections and they're they're narrative sections and they're there's poetry in the Bible there's a the book of Revelation will call apocalyptic as you know a vision of the future but when we ask the question is this communicating history we have to ask the question does the storyline of Bible depend upon this having been true in other words it is this history it's not it's not just a fairy tale or just a metaphor and so if you go back to creation and even the Garden of Eden the entire biblical story is actually dependent upon that being true in space and time and history I mean the Apostle Paul will go back and speak about Adam and about Adams fall which took place in the garden and so it just to take that Jesus will affirm you know even you know talk about Noah and clearly referenced Noah as an historical figure and so that's I think the most important test as you read the Bible does this passage have to be read as history in order for the rest of the Bible to make sense and I would say yeah you look at Genesis and you look at the Garden of Eden you look at the fall if that didn't take place in space and time in history the rest of Bible doesn't make sense you have another problem if that's not true then there was some history and evidently it's a history that isn't - the history in the Bible and that's going to be a huge problem for Christians so yeah I will simply say that Genesis I believe this historical from the very beginning which is actually the way it's written you know in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth here's how he did it and it doesn't just become historical in Chapter 11 and following its historical all along so I hope that answers your question this is the right lightening round I've tried to be lightening fast god bless you thanks for the question hi I'm Maybelline yeah I have a question it says how do you handle with an emotional abusive father while being a Christian and your first name again may be bully Mabley what a sweet name so how do you handle an emotionally abusive father number one you or anyone else who has an emotionally abusive father you need to protect yourself you may need help from other Christians and doing that but you you we are the Christian faith never says to anyone that you are to subject yourself to abuse it does say honor father and mother now in fact we're told that's the that's the only command that comes with a promise that your days may be long in the world so I even here in the question a yearning to honor father so I will say that I would not be wise enough to counsel you exactly what that would look like I if it's any one of whom that's true it's it's tragic and the Christian Church needs to respond with compassion and with protection that's where I would say there are Christians in a local church the elders of the church and the spiritual leaders of the church who should be extremely eager to help a Christian who's in any kind of threatened position and and again there are people for whom by the way family is supposed to be one of the greatest gifts to us it is one of God's greatest gifts and thankfully most families are in a fallen world every family's weird okay not just my family but every family's weird and everything is weird in its own way but glorious in its own way but the Bible is the new testament in particular also makes clear that the church becomes a new family and so lean into your new family as to how to receive guidance and help and protection and care in engaging with your biological family or anyone's biological family so it would be very reckless for me to say I know exactly to answer this question from here but I believe Christ is given his church in every congregation the wisdom to help one another to be faithful and to love one another and protect one another and so I would say that you should say to anyone or you yourself go to the leaders of the church and say I need help with this and they should want to help eagerly thank you god bless you hi I'm Elizabeth and my questions a little similar to Hudson's it's also about the truthfulness of the Bible yeah but I think about Christianity's opposition to homosexuality and I just have a hard time believing that a loving God would declare a form of love sinful knowing the suffering that it would cause do you think it's possible that the Bible was tainted by the standards of the men who recorded it it's an honest question I do not believe that it's a human misunderstanding of God's will that's led to the Bible being the way it is and the Bible's really clear teachings about homosexuality but I want to zero in on the the the smartest most important part of your question which is about a form of love and actually the entire Christian faith the entire New Testament is based upon the fact that we will mess up love and that love can only be rescued by Christ and can only be rightly defined by God and so it's not just someone of the same-sex loving someone of the same sex that we believe can actually be fueled by the wrong kind of love but by the way even any kind of love any kind of yearning any kind of relatedness is only made possible because we're made in God's image so the Christian understanding is that things that are sinful are not sinful because they are necessarily absolutely set against that which is right but they're often distorted in wrongly manifested forms of an urge and a desire including the desire for love that God has put within us so I believe the Bible is the Word of God I believe the Bible is truthful and telling us God's verdict our sin and naming it and we should be thankful for that the weird thing about the current moment is there people are saying I want the Bible to be really clear on matters of murder and matters of economic justice and matters of violence and and and matters of just justice at all but I don't want the Bible to be specific about sex that's a very old human urgency and I think it's very deadly so thank you for asking the question but I don't think we can measure the gospel by our luvs we have to measure our luvs by the gospel and there's not gonna be a single human being whose loves will be aligned with God's will except by obedience to Christ that's not true of those identified as sexual minorities or LGBT or those who are struggling with those particular issues it's true of every single Christian it takes Christ to align our loves to the glory of God thank you hello dr. Mohler my name is Zachary you know so kind of going off how you reference like Judas earlier kind of encouraged me to come up and talk about him he was pretty much the physical reason why Jesus was crucified and led to his crucifixion and so I just kind of was curious as well you talked about sin earlier he is pretty much the reason for the death of the our Savior and so was there any possible way that there's still a possible chance that there would have been salvation for him and kind of on top of that going back to the Old Testament with Moses freeing the Israelites how the Pharaoh's heart was hardened yeah yeah this kind of that idea yeah Zachary thanks for the question well again it goes back to the issue of God's sovereignty and human responsibility and the Bible says yes to both but God's sovereignty comes first and human responsibility comes second let's deal with Judas for a moment you know Judas didn't shop Jesus in John chapter 6 we're told that Jesus new in himself which of his disciples would betray him and and by the way what does Jesus say to Judas when Judas gets up from the table he says what you must do do quickly so that's Jesus letting Judas know I know exactly what's going on and and Judas is held responsible now the one thing I want to correct you what you said daiquiri just be clear is that Judas is not the explanation for why Jesus died yeah of course you are yep and I am even if we were the only human beings who ever lived Judas was an instrument in the historical events that led to and what the Bible is so clear and laying that blame on Judas but actually actually Judas is kind of a picture of us there except there's no reference in any of the Joe Gospel accounts to Judas ever repenting of his sins or coming to a saving knowledge of Christ instead it's a picture of despair and basically self-destruction so Judas becomes an example not of someone who send to the rest of us who didn't sin because that's not so but as someone who gave himself over to destruction rather than yielding himself to Jesus and he was with him he was one of the twelve he was with him so that's a huh it's a haunting passage and when it talks about Pharaoh the same thing Pharaoh's held responsible so even though we're told that God hardened Pharaoh's heart Pharaoh has not said well also never mind he's not responsible and said the entire Bible is predicated upon Pharaohs responsibility he becomes an archetype throughout the history of the world but particularly of Christians and of the Jewish people reading the Old Testament at the time he becomes an archetype of the one who demonstrates God's sovereignty but at the same time is held absolutely responsible Pharaoh's not gonna have any excuse he can't just say you harden my heart because the fact is that Pharaoh's heart was already sinful so there those are good questions and again these are things that are to stay up late at night as Christians talking about but at the end of the day we have to affirm both human responsibility and the fact that God is sovereign and what what unfolds in history especially seen in retrospect is the unfolding of his will and we have confidence in the end of the story that his will will be done all right dr. Mohler I'm sorry to interrupt but we have time for one final question as we wind down the night so over to the left hi dr. Muller my name is Evan yeah I have a friend very close to me since freshman year who I've talked with him multiple times on religion on his beliefs and tonight he told me during this event actually that his sins that he believes everything exists without a cost and everything just everything exists without a cause it just is yeah and I don't I did not know how to respond to that I don't know how to talk with him on dad I just wondering how you would take that question yeah thanks for the question so I this is a lightning round and I gotta be fast but I'll simply say that I even articulated in the beginning that that is a possible world view that the entire cosmos is an accident that there's no particular cause it's just the unfolding of chance and that there's a problem with that and and by the way that would mean to the world has no meaning and it would mean that we're accidents and our life has no meaning the problem is even the people who say that hedge their bets so for instance you have the people who talk about particle theory well order the particles come from in other words you are still left with the question where did that come from and and and if this is an accident is it plausible is it really plausible is it plausible to your friend to think that his or her existence out of which but his existence I think it's just an accident I mean look at the human eye that's just a series of accidents but beyond that let me just say this here's the thing if you actually believe in an accident on a universe that has no inherent meaning then it's like Sean Donahue the scientist says we have to try to create meaning okay well we're not very good at that and we can't hold on to that so the last question I always ask when I'm talking about this about plausibility is look at a mother with her child look at the love of that mother for her child look at a mother nursing a child look at a mother up in the middle of the night taking care of the child I mean you look at what a mother indoors for her child can that be explained plausibly by universe of chance or when you see that mother look into the face of her child do you see something that can only be explained by the fact that every single particle the universe must exist for a reason and we have glimpses we have glimpses like that mother looking at her child of that reason but ultimately we look in the mirror we close our eyes and we know there has to be a reason is it plausible that our experience of being watched is just some kind of evolutionary accident no we know we're being watched because we are known by someone who knew us before we existed so thank you for the question that's where one Christian apologetic is just plausibility is it really plausible that that could be all there is I don't think most people can live with that it's hard to live with that and then turn to someone who say I love you it just comes down to my particles are conveniently aligned with your particles that doesn't get you through sickness and health poverty and wealth and that certainly doesn't explain why you take care of that kid in the middle of the night thank you so much for the question and thank you for all your questions I wish we could have gotten to every question and I wish we could have spent the night on every one of the questions I want to thank you for the quality of your questions they're brilliant and I'm thankful to be amongst Christians and others who are gathered here and I hope there are many here who do not yet know the Lord Jesus Christ who are not yet Christians I hope that the questions that you may have asked tonight or you may have even heard ask tonight will will make you restless until you find your rest in Christ so what's the bottom line why have I come here tonight why are you come here tonight I want to tell you why I'm here tonight I'm here because I believe the truest truth in the entire cosmos is that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself I believe that the truest statement that I could share with you is for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son His only Son that whosoever believes and then we're not perish but have everlasting life I want to tell you that there is no Christian who has all the answers of the the Bible and the Christian faith wrapped up in a nice little package if you hear someone who says they have it all right wrapped up in a nice little package flee okay I am Telling You that he is there and he is not silent and that God exists the only plausible explanation for why we're here the only plausible explanation for I you and I exist the only plausible explanation for the consciousness that we share the only plausible explanation for why we are creatures of hope and hunger and need why we yearn for satisfaction why we are inherently unsatisfied why we're more unsatisfied with ourself than we are with anything outside of ourselves see if God is and he is not silent and that means he spoken to us first of all in his word we're so we have somewhere to turn right we don't just turn to the Bible out of habit we turn to it because we believe it's actually where God speaks and he he he loves us enough that he he speaks to us but ultimately as the book of Hebrews we had a great question from the book of Hebrews but as the book of Hebrews says God in times past spoke through the fathers and to the father's in many in various ways but in this time he has spoken to us in his son so I'm here in the name of Jesus Christ there's no reason to remember that I was ever here there's every reason to believe that Jesus Saves and so I just want to come into you tonight to consider the claims of Christ consider the gospel of Jesus Christ consider your own heart and the conversation that you have with your inner self and honestly ask yourself what it is that you really know you really need I want to tell you that you might define it in many different ways but the Bible defines it exactly right you need the forgiveness of sins you need your sins forgiven and you need your relationship with the God who loved you and created you made right and the bad news is you can't do it the good news is God did it in Christ and the great news is that everyone who believes in his name receives the salvation of sins that relationship made right and the gift of everlasting life becoming a Christian doesn't solve all our problems it just promises that one day all our problems will be solved in Christ and it tells us in this life everything is more meaningful than we knew it was and in the fellowship of other Christians we find that we are actually being conformed to the image of Christ we're becoming someone we could not make our sells to be someone we did not even know to hope ourselves one day to be and that's only a foretaste if we were going to be together in Christ so Christians here in this place god bless you be bold on your witness understand that you are loving people by sharing Christ with them and understand that once you share the gospel God does in human hearts amazing things with the gospel that you don't get to see right away but are no less real and for those of you don't know Christ there are lots of wonderful faithful Christians in this room they're just like you but they've come to know the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior and they're seeking to live as his their greatest privilege would be to talk to you about why their hope is satisfied in Christ I'm so thankful that you came on thankful for Cru I want to thank Dylan Sidebottom again for the work and pulling all this together I want to tell you that I don't mention that just casually I mean that if you're a Christian here you need to be involved and I mean if you're not a Christian nothing would make the Christians in this room including those of Cru more thrilled than to have you come and know more about Jesus the rest we trust to God then I trust this evening to God that he will bring glory to himself and encouragement to believers and hope to unbelievers and the promise of Christ to everyone within the hearing my voice god bless you thank you for being here god bless Western Kentucky University look forward to seeing you again in heaven if not on [Applause] [Music]

Channel: Southern Seminary

Views: 20,156

Rating: 4.8591547 out of 5

Keywords: Albert Mohler, Ask Anything, Theology, Bible, Questions, Salvation, Homosexuality, Gender, LGBTQ, End Times, Eschatology, Religions, Universalism, Jesus, Apologetics, Western Kentucky University, College Students, Outreach, Live, Southern Seminary, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Bowling Green

Id: GbzoxNEXlQ4

Length: 110min 44sec (6644 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 19 2019