Discussing more theological questions we should all be thinking about – Millard Erickson

0:00Hi, I'm Bill Arnold. Thank you for listening to this podcast. There are many more podcasts available at myfaithradio.com. Your support makes this possible. Thank you. And now the show that's only half the price of those brand name shows. Oh, don't you know it's the Bill Arnold show. It's Bill. And a warm welcome to the Bill Arnold show. Thank you for joining me today. If you missed any of last hour, I had Jay Warner Wallace on. It was a great hour. We talked about the church and how first century churches would be properly confused as to what churches look like today. It's kind of a different,

1:00different model. But today we're going to talk to Dr. Millard Erickson. Here with me in studio, he is not only a retired theological seminary professor. He's authored over 25 books and tons of articles. And he's nice enough to join me today. Millard, so nice to have you back. Thank you, Bill. Good to be back. Yeah. And I want to make you available to all listeners. If you have questions for Dr. Erickson, I'd love to ask them on your behalf. So the text line to be open for you, 877-933-2484, you can ask him just about anything. Does that sound fair, Miller? Sure. And if I don't know the answer, Bill will answer. I don't think that's going to happen. So I've got a bunch of questions myself just to get things started. Sure. Because when I look at the passage in 2 Corinthians 12, 2, and it says, I know a man in Christ who 14 years ago was caught up to the 3rd heaven, whether it was in the body

2:01or out of the body. I don't know. God knows. But this 3rd heaven, the dwelling place of God, the highest heaven, what do you think Paul is talking about? Was he was it a vision? Was he there himself? And why was he told that he cannot say anything? Yeah. And I've usually, with that passage, I've moved on to the part about when I am weak and I'm strong. So I haven't paid as much attention to that particular issue that you're talking about. I don't know that much about the geography heaven. I haven't been there. I hope to really check it out when I get there. Fascinating, isn't it? And there's figures of speech being used there and how literally to apply them, who knows. And in a sense, one doesn't really have to have that worked out at this point when we get there, it'll all work out. He's giving expression to, you know, by that there, apparently, are degrees of experience of it. But what those are, I don't really know. Yeah.

3:06And then when he said that or he saw or heard things too sacred to describe, I thought, well, that's not what you hear with other people that have what they call a near death experiences. And they come back and they've got all kinds of stories. Yeah. And they're quite similar. This light that they enter into and so on. Mm-hmm. So Millard, I'm also curious about discipleship. I know that God calls us to make disciples. But when, if I'm a young Jewish man in the first century, I shop for rabbis, don't I? Don't I? Look for someone that I want to learn under? Sure. And doesn't Jesus flip the script and he goes and chooses his. He does. And I'm sure that there are people who thought, boy, this is great. And then at some point, whoa, wait a minute. Yeah, it's bargain on this. And to that person who's been quite enamored to what he's heard, he probably thinks, oh, this guy is off at some point. And that was Saul experiencing that kind of thing.

4:13So, but as a disciple, you wanted to not only learn everything the rabbi could teach you, but you really wanted to become like who the rabbi was. Yeah. But decycling isn't just learning information. It's putting it to practice. And that's that was the intention. And of course, if you've got a good teacher, there's far more than there and you can possibly assimilate. But how would we how would we apply that to discipleship today? Because I don't know if I see people saying I want to be every bit like this pastor or teacher or I don't see it the same way. And it shouldn't be. The aim isn't to be the disciple of some teacher, right? And I remember years ago, after I'd been to Russia the first time and people said, oh, we got all sorts of little millards over here now. Oh, I thought. But it's a temptation and it's a natural kind of thing.

5:18I think if you're effective in your teaching, you have to constantly work at, you know, holding the person off and directing them to the Lord rather than it's easier because they see the teacher right in front of them. And I can recall back as a college student, we had one student who is quite enamored with one of the professors. And he went to speak somewhere and I won't give the name of the person, but the evaluation was sent back. If we want Dr. Sohn, so I will ask for Dr. Sohn. So it was, if they're going to have that, they want the real thing rather than imitation of it. But that's a temptation. We think that mannerisms and there were people that would follow this particular professor and they lay their Bible in the pulpit just the way he did it. Oh, wow. Yeah. So millard, would Jewish teachers or

6:24rabbis, would they use the word yoke in them describing their interpretation of the law? Would you, would someone say that that their yoke was meant as their way of interpreting scripture? I'm trying to piece this together because, you know, Jesus says, my yoke is easy and my burden is and I wondered if the yoke of some of the other rabbis and teachers weren't so heavy that, you know, everyone just felt overwhelmed. Yeah, there were things that they were added to it. Yes. Things that were part of the personality of the the rabbi doing the teaching. And that's, that's a temptation. So if you have a question for Dr. Erickson, please text it over 877-933-2484. So the period of

7:27the times when the apocrypha, the the additional books came out, were those books they were written during the silent years and were they were they used a lot and read and studied? Well, that varied and you have me on a subject that I haven't really done that much work on. One criticism of the Christian theology book was doesn't really deal with the matter of the the compilation and the inclusion of the books and the reason was there was that was taught in a different course. So I never really dealt with the question of the canon and canonization. Okay. But yeah, there were a lot of of gospels floating around and of course if you watch public television, you you get some of these presented this sort of an all equal alternative to the

8:32gospels. It wasn't well time as a way of shaking out the the quality of those claims. Dr. Miller and Erickson is my guest. So we got a couple of weeks away from from Easter, the Resurrection Sunday and when you think of that event, where how would you encourage people to share this great news with our friends, our neighbors because the resurrection, you know, we talk about the cross a lot but we don't talk about the resurrection quite as much. Yeah, and the Resurrection Easter has the same problem as with Christmas. There's all this cultural attachment and you don't have it now as used to be years ago where people really dressed up on

9:33Easter and so on. I remember that. Yeah, but it's still a it's a celebration and there's always food attached to these things. It's all part of the package and you get the Easter bunnies and those kinds of things. How to how to emphasize the biblical part without putting down the people who maybe don't know any better, who think that the Easter bunny is somewhere in the Bible or something like that. So as we talk about Easter and the Resurrection Sunday and the celebration of life that we have in Christ because if he had not risen from the dead, our faith would all be in vain. That's what Paul says. That's what Paul says. So as we start to get our hearts and minds ready for this celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, there are people

10:37listening right now, Miller, that that feel like they're stuck. They're they're a little bit stalled out in their in their faith life and they're they're wondering how can I get myself refocused, get recalibrated because what's ahead in the next couple of weeks is such an important part of the Christian calendar that I want to encourage people. So what would be your encouragement? And there's plenty of things to be discouraged about. I agree. Anytime recently, but particularly right now and this this growing confrontation between differing groups, we there was a time and I'm old enough to remember that when people held different views and they could discuss them and differ and say, okay, that's where you are and that's where I am and we can go our own way. But now you have to be kind of mean about it, it seems. It's tough to avoid that.

11:37I think to find those positive things, the piece that there is, the positive things to dwell on in the midst of all of the well, all of the trash that we hear. I'm just astounded at the things that that appear on the news and we're only getting a portion of it, but bad news seems to be what sells. So I was thinking of the confrontation that Satan had, not only in the garden, but when he had that conversation with God about Job and I was thinking that Satan is his name means accuser, doesn't it? It does. So is he more interested in accusing us or tempting us or doesn't he need to tempt us because we got, well, a bad rap sheet and all he has to do is accuse us. All of the above.

12:40Well, he, he would like to discourage us. He would like to make us angry with ourselves. Yeah. And he can do that by pointing out some things and he is not necessarily the most honest kind of person. You know, the accusations that he brings, many of them are made up. So to, to no scripture and what it says about the Christian life and about Christianity, it's extremely important to sort that out and you notice how Jesus responded to him in each of those temptations. Yes, this would be great to turn the stone in the bread, but that's not what God intends here. But he didn't have anything on Jesus because he was sinless. That's right. And if Satan comes to us, there's plenty of stuff in our lives. And if he, all he has to do is accuse us, that's all he needs, I guess that's all he needs to do. And I don't know if others have this

13:45problem. I have a tendency sometimes to, to rethink, especially in the middle of the night, that's a bad time. Something that was not the strongest experience in my life. And I can recall bringing it to the Lord. Lord said, what's in? I don't think he literally forgets. He does know everything that happened, but to him, it doesn't matter anymore. That an interesting question from a listener alert about the, the parable of the unjust manager. And you know, maybe one of Jesus is more puzzling teachings. Can you help make that more clear? Yeah, again, these are questions to be asked of the parables specialists. But yeah, it was a reminder of how you deal with those kinds of situations and how you manage those things. And

14:51and running through a lot of Jesus teachings is the contrast with how the non-Christian is, is wiser in some ways and sharper and more efficient. And I think that's part of what he was dealing with there. It's, it's a temptation. You know, we, we see success. Some people are really good at doing the wrong thing. And I think he's encouraging us to distinguish what is being proposed. And how we handle money, wealth, loyalty. And of course, money just, it's a tool, isn't it? Yeah. And when it becomes a master, that's when we're in trouble. Yeah. Dr. Miller Erickson is my guest. We're going to continue our conversation. If you have a question of any kind, you can text it over 877-933-2484. We'll be right back.

16:04It is my deepest desire that you take the very first step of faith by placing your faith and trust in Jesus Christ. If you've got questions about what it means to begin a relationship with Jesus, text the word faith to 4122-4. I'm back with Dr. Miller Erickson. And Miller was written 25 books. One is called Christian theology and it's third edition. And so I want to talk about Christology. Seems how we're on this topic. And Miller, maybe you, maybe describe or give us an understanding of what Christology is. Well, Christology is the doctrine of Christ. It's who he was and what he was. And somebody has said there's only what for five or six jokes and all jokes are variations of those. Well, I don't know about that, but there really was basically six errors regarding the person of Jesus Christ. And they discovered them all in the first couple

17:08of centuries and we've gotten variations of those all the way down. But Christology is Jesus was fully human. We don't emphasize that as maybe. He was fully God. He was one person. He was not a split individual. He was a God man. And he was fully God and fully man, not partially so. One of the heresies was that he was he was like God, but he really wasn't the same as God. And what it's saying is Jesus was the perfect version of what we are human. But he also was what we are not, namely fully God. And that then becomes what are the implications of that. So Jesus claimed to be able to forgive sins. So everyone would have said no one can do that except

18:16God. But he never uttered the words I am God, did he? The closest thing to it was when he was asked and he and if it said you said it, you have spoken that. But he didn't really make the claim very often. And he made the statements and you let you draw the implications of that. If you really listen, you know, someone who, and that was what angered the Pharisees. So someone who claims to be able to forgive sin has got to be the person who himself does not sin and cannot sin. But as he let people draw the implications as they went along, you know, if Jesus had just stepped right up the first time he spoke and said, I am the son of God, I am fully equal to the father and so on. He wouldn't have gotten very far.

19:20True. He started out. And you know, even that first miracle of turning the water into wine, people then have to draw the implications. Well, who can do this kind of thing? And that was how he proceeded there. And in a sense, you think of the Pharisees, how they could listen to him all that time. And they really gave close attention to what he said and not draw the right conclusion because their minds were said, it cannot possibly be. And of course, there are people that have that ability to think that way in our day as well. Miller, why was the virgin birth so important? Well, you need to use the terminology carefully there because what we're talking about in Protestant circles is the virginal conception.

20:25The Catholic view of the virgin birth is that Mary was a virgin up to and through the time of giving birth to Jesus and throughout the rest of her life. That's not the Protestant version. The Protestant version is that she was fully virgin but giving birth into the virginity and that she presumably had sexual relations with Joseph so that there were siblings of Jesus. In the Catholic view of those, we're not other children of Mary. So we're talking about the virginal conception that she was with child but not in the normal fashion. In other words, no human male contributed to that, what ordinarily happens in a conception. That marked Jesus as different. Now he could have

21:32been born as a fully God and fully man with two parents, no parent, one parent. This is how God chose to do it and it was a miraculous sign but it was not essential. Now someone will say, oh, how can he say that? But God could have worked in other ways. I really don't know all the ways that God could have worked. This is how He chose to work and it was a wonderful test of one you did that. Miller, what does it mean that Jesus is the son of man and that He is the son of God? Yeah. I always wondered about that distinction. I think a lot of people say, why did why did you go back and forth? Yeah and the son of man expression had had deity connotations to it. It's

22:33not as simple as, well, the one is the humanity and the other is the deity but it is relating both ways both to God and to humanity that He was fully human and was fully divine. In John 14, Jesus says that the father is greater than I. John 14, 28. I think that was often confusing to his disciples, wasn't it? Yes and this has been the topic of one of the more reason debates in evangelical circles. Whether Jesus was, as far as authority, was subject to the father's authority during the time of his life here on earth or whether he is eternally subordinate to the father in terms of authority. I happen to hold the former one and have debated that with

23:35some other evangelical theologians but that's been a matter of debate in recent years. You may want to follow up on that. What does that mean? Well, you may want to probe that more fully. I'm not going to elaborate that but to me the expressions of the subordination of the father and obedience of the father were all spoken by Jesus during the time that he was in the incarnation here on earth. Now, whether he was subordinate eternally, it's an interesting thing that in the, and I struck me while listening to the Messiah, everlasting father. That's one of the

24:38titles for the son everlasting father. Isn't that interesting? That is fascinating. How does that fit with the idea that he is eternally subordinate or secondary in authority to the father? Isn't it interesting that at the judgment it is the son doing the judging? That seems to me rather full authority but that's another, well that is, was a book that in fact sort of the last one that was inspired to work on. What is systematic theology? Well, systematic theology is taking the teachings on the various doctoral issues and trying to relate them one another. Biblical theology may study the theological teachings of, say, Mark, or the theological teachings of the book of Galatians. Systematic theology

25:42try to seek all of those and say, okay, we don't have five different theologies here. There was one incarnate son. How do all of these combine all of these together? It's an on evangelicals don't necessarily feel that they should harmonize and they like to, well, I shouldn't say like to, but they do find conflict between the teachings. I look to harmonize those, which I think they do. Your book Christian theology, and it's third edition, when did you write that one? I wrote that 1982. I had a sabbatical leave for two quarters out of the year. I started January or June 1st and I worked from seven in the

26:45morning to six in the evening. I'd pick up my daughter from work at six o'clock, and Bundy threw Friday and I wrote a chapter a week, including writing a chapter nine of the ten weeks that I taught full time in the winter quarter. I was going to write the two volumes in, I was going to write the second and third volumes in rough form. I thought, well, no, I should try to get this in finished form. Then my cousin, who was pastoring what's an alternative aptist church in St. Paul and was four years younger than I was, had a heart attack. He survived it and he went on to pastor in California and then had a fatal heart attack. But without being more, but I thought, well, you know, if something happens to me, so I can't finish that third volume. Nobody can do that one. But if I do the second, the third volumes in rough form,

27:52I can think of some people could take my notes and put it in the final form, such as Dr. Arnie Houston, who did the condensing of the Christian theology into a college level thing, taught at Crown College for many years. So someone like that could have done that. So I roughed out the second and third volumes and then the next year repaired it. And the interesting thing somehow, the board of reading just got the idea that since there was an opening as dean of the seminary, maybe I should be that. So it was good thing that I got that finish before that because I have never used Christian theology. I've never used the second half of it as a text. But wow, I've never taught from that. When I taught it on a fort worth, I'd always teach fall semester. So I taught that. So there are people that know quite a lot more about what's in the second half of Christian theology than I do.

28:58In Christian theology, you talk about what God is like and you talk about the goodness of God. Can you give us a little little on that? Well, the goodness of God is simply that well, there's two dimensions. In in South, there is no evil. There is no shortcoming. There is nothing to which we would apply a negative terminology. But then there's the relational part in how he relates to us. In other words, the goodness of God as he is in and of himself. And the goodness of God in how he acts towards and relates to us. We're going to take a break and come back, Dr. Miller Erickson is my guest. If you have a question or comment, the text line is open 877-933-2484.

30:06I guess today is Dr. Miller Erickson here with me in studio such a delight always when he makes time to come and be on the program. So in Christian theology, Miller, I want to ask you this. I would love for you to talk about the nature of sin because we don't talk about sin very much. We do here at faith radio, but you know, I'll go to a church and I won't hear the word sin for six months. This is true because it's not an attractive thing. It's not a thing that makes somebody feel good. And if the aim of the church is to attract as many people as possible, then that's not a good thing to emphasize. Now it has to be said, but I think there are different ways to convey it and to express it. And I recall one time listening to a pastor whom I will not identify and he came

31:18with a story about how he said, if you had a heart, you needed a heart transplant. And there was no other way without that you would not survive. And I had a son, a young healthy son, and I said, I will have my son sacrifice his life so that you can receive his healthy heart. He was talking about sin, but using the analogy of physical health. And I, in these kinds of situations, I think as a theologian, I see the issue coming before the average listener does, but I thought he has has beautifully expressed what what sin is, what the need is, and how it is responded to that situation. How you tell someone they're a sinner without making them feel beaten

32:27down. The natural reaction is, I'm not such a bad person. And that's true. They're probably not such a bad person, but that's not what sin is really saying. It's saying you are not a perfect person. Therefore, you need the atoning death of Christ. So to find ways to convey that, that's not easy to do. When you talked about the church and you don't want to talk about sin very much, because it's not pleasant, because you want to try to draw as many people as you can, is part of that the evangelistic outreach of church, or what is the church designed for? Isn't the church designed to be the gathering of the believers? It is. And believers that continue to grow more and more like Christ. Right. Yeah. I had a man in my church in Ravensdale who came to me once and said,

33:27and he was a leader in the church. He said, you shouldn't talk about the sins of Christians. I said, why is that? Why is this Christians don't sin? Well, I said, what do you call it? The spiritual mistakes. I said, spiritual mistakes. Yeah. That's what we call sin. Exactly. I found out that he had been in another church, and he went to the pastor and said, this church isn't big enough for the two of us. And the pastor said, well, you better leave then, because I'm not leaving. So I adhered to it then instead, it would have been interesting to have known that incident at the time. But that's, it's hard to, you know, if you can, can picture or use terminology that makes it sound, you know, a mistake. Well, we all make mistakes, don't we? I made something today. I know you're going to find this hard to believe. Yeah. I do find it hard to believe. Yeah. Well, I did. But how to convey that,

34:29how to take ordinary experiences and enable people to have a dawn on them. This is what sin is. This is a pain to God. And the reason it's a pain to God isn't that he's angry with us. It is that he wants us to be perfect as he is. It isn't out of disregard for us, but out of one of the very best for us, that he does emphasize sin. And a pastor who doesn't talk about sin is really not doing people a favor. I agree. I agree. A couple of questions on the text line, Miller, Dr. Erickson, the son can do nothing apart from the father. The son does only what he sees the father doing. Can you elaborate on this? Yes. And then I would ask that person. And when was that said? Well, that was said while Jesus was incarnate in the flesh here. Now the one

35:39school of thought says, well, and that's true of before he came and after he came little evidence, please, I would say. In other words, I can't extrapolate from what he said during his time here with the limitations that did go with the incarnation and say, now that was true of all time. All right. Another question asked Dr. Erickson if he believes the pre-trib rapture as the correct biblical view and why or why not? Okay. Start with a story. I had a couple, someone older couple started attending my church in Chicago. Their church had moved out and they started attending the church. And she was the more expressive person. I don't know if she was necessarily more studious, but she would come into me and talk to me about more serious theological issues. One day she said, why do you never talk about the rapture? Like other preachers do. I said,

36:42what rapture? Well, the one in the Bible. I said, where Susanna? Well, I'll study and I'll come next week. She came in the door. She didn't say good morning. She didn't say hello. She said, how could they have so misled me at Moody Bible Institute? The word isn't in the Bible. I know it isn't because there isn't a rapture as such. The word that usually is rendered that or is identified with it appears four times in the New Testament. One time it's not a theological reference. It can't be related that. But one is where the group went out to three taverns. I wish they hadn't met there, but that's where the welcoming group went and met and turned around and accompanied the group that was coming accompanied them back. The other one is where I'm trying to

37:49recall the specific reference, but it also is a situation where a welcoming group meets someone and turns around and comes back with them. The rapture is a claim that the the Lord comes and takes people out of the world. It seems to me that the word, at least it appears in those other instances, is that we are caught up to meet the Lord and then we turn around and come back with the Lord to the earth rather than being caught away from there. And the word rapture doesn't appear. That doesn't settle that, of course, because there are certainly concepts in Scripture where the word that the concept refers to isn't used. But frankly, I don't find it there. Now I grew up in a church that didn't, we never had those charts up on the wall on the

38:50saw on. And we had an evangelist who on one Sunday afternoon, he took the number 666 and he explained how that related to probably Mussolini. That was the part where I thought, wow, this is impressive. I was convinced. And then he took the word and applied it to somebody else. And I thought, hey, how can this be? And he went through and showed about three of those. That made me from that point really cautious about two definitely identifying these kinds of things that are not spoken of exhaustively in Scripture. And that church was not one that that went a lot into that kind of thing. I did an interim down in Milwaukee. And I had a man there that came to me one Sunday

39:52night. He said, you know, could you preach some time about the rapture? Because he said, at the church, I attended back in Philadelphia, our pastor spoke on that for 20 years every Sunday night. And I said, well, I'm only here for a few months. Anything I'd say would be hopelessly superficial. I don't know how you could could find that kind of material. There must be a lot of reading in to find that. Some things that sound like a hint of that. But the clear teaching that the Lord will come and snatch us away and take us and then come back for a second time, which is really what the issue is. It's a split. I'm going to come in. I don't find that clearly taught in Scripture. Okay. We're going to take a break and come back, Dr. Millard Erickson is our guest. His probably is most notable book is called Christian theology. And appreciate the questions that have come in. We'll be right back.

41:05We carry each other's burdens. Please know you can bring us your prayer concerns and we will pray. Share your prayer requests with the faith radio team by texting or calling 877-933-2484 or share your prayer requests with the faith radio staff and listeners at MyFaithRadio.com. I guess today it's Dr. Millard Erickson and I'm talking a little bit about anything and everything. He's written a book called Christian theology. And so, Millard, would you talk about the central theme of the atonement? Well, the interesting thing is there have been, excuse me, contrasting theories of the atonement, some of which have been debated rather vigorously. I would say that all of them in a sense are true because the atonement is such a rich and inclusive kind of

42:11concept. I would say that to oversimplify, which is what we have to do in these short answers, that the central theme is that Christ takes our sin upon himself and transfers our or the father transfers Christ's righteousness to us. But there are many other things involved in it as well. So, because we're a couple of weeks away from Resurrection Sunday, I just want to stress how critical I believe salvation is in your life. And if you are tuning into faith radio and you are kind of kicking the tires and you may have not placed your faith in Jesus Christ, I want to say the the opportunity and the time might be today. So, Millard, maybe you would just talk about the

43:12the significance and the importance of salvation. Well, all of us, and by nature, we just naturally know how to do the wrong thing. I'd like we not do it 100% of the time or to the greatest extent. But, you know, it just comes naturally. That's because of a original sin. And that's another whole set of documents we'd have to go into. But it comes naturally to us. And sin in its nature separates us from God, because God is perfectly holy. He cannot allow in heaven, which is what we call sin. So that they're really, you know, there is a American popular religion or something like this. You'll live the best life you can and God grades on the curve. And if you've done more good than bad, you'll go to heaven. That's not the biblical picture of it. The biblical picture is nobody gets to have an

44:16other own. It has to be a gift. It's not an accomplishment. It's something that has been done for us by Jesus Christ. And the fact that it has been achieved is demonstrated to the resurrection. I mean, that was the destruction of the power of sin. Sin did the worst. It could do Jesus. It put him to death and it couldn't hold him beyond Sunday morning. And to the extent that we have accepted that, the same happens. We have new life. When people from the Jewish community, and I have friends who are Jewish and they'll say to me, what's important is just doing good in life and being a person who cares. And I know that's all it takes for me on judgment day to be accepted into heaven. And there are different kinds of Judaism from the basic

45:17types and the more conservative version does see the shortcomings. But I think, well, it's hard to point out to people sin in their lives because we're all defensive. We don't like to be told that. But if you could have enough time with that person and say, what about this and what about this and what about this? Hopefully, they would see that it's going to have to be on a different basis than their own goodness there. And going through scripture and pointing out how high the standard is that God sets and how none is righteous. The old Romans, Roman road, you know, for all of sin then comes from the glory of God, that type of thing. What about all the evil in the world

46:22right now? Oh, and there's plenty of it. And it, well, I don't know what to say at this point. It's overwhelming. And it's of types, you know, and you see what people do to children, it just how can they do that? You know, but I have to realize that we may have our own much more acceptable, socially acceptable version, but anything that falls short of the perfect standard of God. But evil in the world is the result of sin. It may not always be the direct result, but it all began back there in the garden of Eden. And evil is growing and it's becoming bolder, and people don't try to hide it anymore. It's, it's just astounding. I listen to the news sometimes on it. It's just amazing. I don't think it was just that we didn't use to hear

47:28these things when I was young. I don't think people did some of the things back then. I agree. Doing being done now. And of course, selfishness, there will always be wars because people get into positions of power and they want more power. And that means taking it away from somebody else, and that's war. No, I think I've time for one more question. And this came in on the text line, how would you explain when Jesus says, take up your cross and follow me? That means Obey Christ, the matter of what? Because if you try to do that, it's going to, it's going to involve you and having to do things that are contrary to the way the world would like done. And it's, it's interesting that, that you don't have to accuse people of things. If you live in a certain way and they see the contrast, that will, there will be reaction. I

48:30can remember being at a, a faculty party for my wife's school party and, and the man across the, the table, husband or one of the other teachers said, you know, why aren't you drinking? Well, I don't drink, but he took that as an accusation of himself and he had been drinking too much and his wife was just terribly embarrassed. I hadn't said anything to him about you're doing anything wrong. The fact that I wasn't doing what he was doing that made him angry. And I think that's kind of a parable of what is going to happen if you, if you try to live for Jesus, you will, you're going to run into trouble. Mm-hmm. Miller, thank you so much for doing the show. You're welcome to see you. Yeah. Thanks for helping me. Yeah. Yeah. And God wants you to be connected. So there's always, he's always available through prayer. That's the good news. And you can also share your requests and, and pray for others on the prayer tab at myfaithradio.com. And I hope you do. That's our show for the day. I want to thanks again to Jay Warner-Walls for my guest,

49:33an hour one, and Dr. Miller Erickson in hour two. It's been a great day. I've loved being with you. I hope you have a great night. I'll see you tomorrow. Thanks for listening. Programming like this is made available through your support. Information available at myfaithradio.com. Coming this Easter, an epic four-part audio podcast series, The Christ. My hour has not yet come. My son, your hour was written before time. Starring David O'Yellowow, who claims to be a king, Tom Pelfrey. My kingdom is not of this world. Paul Walter Hauser. He is the light, the true light. With narration from John Rees, Davies, and Patricia Heaton, The Christ,

50:33wherever you listen to podcasts. Bart Miller, lead singer of Mercy Me, says there was a season when his faith felt anything but strong. Literally, I was hanging by a thread. Like, even the stuff as simple as God is good all the time. All the time God was good. Like, saying these things. You know, I didn't believe that. That's what would get the biggest amen if I said it from a crowd. So if I did the right things on the outside, no one would interfere with the inside. In one of the hardest times, Bart learned God's love is secure. And so is his identity in Christ. Here, Bart Miller's story on this week's episode of The Unfolding, on Apple and Spotify. And at myfaithpodcasts.com.