The Narrow Path

Steve Gregg: Good afternoon and welcome to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we're live each weekday at this time for an hour to take your calls. That's why we're live so you can call in during the program. You can call if you have questions about the Bible or the Christian faith that you'd like for us to discuss on the air. If you have a disagreement with the host or even with the Christian faith itself or with the Bible, I'd be glad to talk to you about any of those things. Feel free to give me a call.

I'm going to give a phone number although at the moment our lines are full, but that only means they're full right now. They won't be through the entire program. In fact, probably in a few minutes a line will open up. So if you want to try a little later, do, and we can very probably get you in during the hour at some point. The number to call is 844-484-5737. That's 844-484-5737. And we might as well just go to the phones now and talk to Joe in Los Angeles, California. Hi Joe, welcome to the Narrow Path.

Joe (Guest): Hello Steve, thank you for taking my call. Two quick questions. In Luke 15 at the end of the chapter, it says it was right that we should make merry and be glad, for your brother was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found. Would you say this is a picture or a reference to someone who walks away from Christ but then regains his or her salvation once again? And one other question: who are—I was asked by a friend recently, who are the two witnesses of the book of Revelation?

Steve Gregg: All right. Well, let me just say about the two witnesses then I'll get back to Luke 15. The two witnesses are mentioned in Revelation chapter 11. They are spoken of as prophesying for three and a half years. They have miraculous things they can do which resemble the miracles of Moses who struck the earth with plagues and who turned water into blood. It says they do those two things. And their miracles also resemble the miracles of Elijah who stopped the rain for three and a half years and also called fire on his enemies. They do that too. So they have things about them that are reminiscent of Moses and Elijah.

Because of that, some people think that they are Moses or Elijah and that they'll come back at the end of time and for three and a half years in the latter part or maybe the early part of a seven-year tribulation they'll prophesy in Jerusalem. This is how many futurists take it, probably the most popular view among evangelicals who kind of just believe what their pastors tell them. And those who study too, often come to this view, but most people believe it only because their pastors told them that this is about the future. Many people who study it for themselves reach other conclusions.

In my opinion, there are several different ways of looking at Revelation and at the two witnesses. So in speaking of them, I'm going to simply say I believe they're symbolic. I believe they represent the witness of the church throughout the present age. Now I'm not just grasping at whatever comes to my mind. This is a conclusion I've reached from my analysis of the whole book of Revelation and of the specifics of this chapter and by comparing the things in this chapter with things elsewhere in scripture that are relevant. But not everyone would make that comparison the same as I do or reach the same conclusions I do.

So I don't think it really matters much what conclusions people reach because if you never had any opinion about the book of Revelation you can still follow Christ just as well as if you had the exact proper opinion of Revelation. In many cases your opinion about Revelation is one of the few things that matters very little to your Christian life. But I do have an opinion, it's as I shared. But if you'd like to consider other opinions about Revelation and the two witnesses and everything else, I did write a book a long time ago called Revelation: Four Views, A Parallel Commentary. And it does compare a wide variety of views about this, but you asked mine and that's the one I gave you.

Now as far as your first question, when at the end there of the Prodigal Son story, the father of the son says to the other brother that he ought to be merry, he ought to rejoice because his brother was dead and is now alive, was lost is now found. You asked, is this a picture of a Christian who's fallen away coming back to Christ later in life? That's not the primary meaning. Now it might have some secondary or tertiary application to that, but in the context Jesus gives three parables. This is the third one.

The chapter has three parables. One is about a lost sheep that the shepherd goes out and finds it and rejoices that he found it. The second parable is about a lost coin that a woman has lost but she searches for and finds and then she rejoices that she found it. And the third parable is about a lost son and the father rejoices when his son is recovered. These parables were all given for a particular point and it's because it says in Luke 15:1, "Then all the tax collectors and sinners drew near to Him to hear Him and the Pharisees and scribes murmured saying, 'This man receives sinners and eats with them.'"

So Jesus then gives these three parables about something of value that is lost to somebody and recovered and the rejoicing that is due for the recovery. Now Jesus is essentially saying these tax collectors and sinners who are coming to me, they're like lost sheep who've been found. They're like a lost coin that has been recovered. They're like a son that went astray and came back. And this is a cause for rejoicing, not grumbling. The older son in the parable of the Prodigal is like the Pharisees. He's grumbling because the father is happily receiving his son back and the Pharisees are grumbling because God is receiving these strayed sons back.

Now these strayed ones, these lost sheep, these lost Prodigal sons are not specifically Christians. I mean, I guess they're becoming Christians by coming to Christ, but they're seen as Jews who departed from the God of Israel by going against the law. The Jews were supposed to be faithful to God and keep the law. These are people who had renounced the law, at least in their lives. This included prostitutes and people who robbed and drank and did all kinds of things that were ungodly, and they were like children of God who've gone astray.

Now the Pharisees were Jews who had not done those things and there were also additional Jews who probably were not Pharisees and also didn't do those things, but this is specifically about the Jews who have strayed from the covenant that God made with them. They're now returning to God or He's finding them again by their coming to Christ. This is not really referring to Christians who've backslidden. It's about people who were disobedient Jews who came to obedience through coming to Christ. Jesus had not yet preached to any Gentiles. There were no Gentiles in the picture at this point in Jesus' life.

So he's only talking about the people who are coming to him who've sinned and they all happen to be Jews, but Jews are not supposed to be sinners. Jews had the law and so they were like stray sons or stray sheep. You know, it says about the Jews in Isaiah 53:6, "All we like sheep have gone astray. We've turned everyone to his own way." Israel had wandered away from God. These tax collectors and prostitutes and sinners and so forth had particularly done so in an obvious way, but now they were very notoriously coming back to God by following Christ. And that's what he said should be a cause for rejoicing.

Now you were wondering if it had application to Christians falling away and coming back. I believe it would. I think it simply just applies to the principle which is no different whether it's a Jew or Gentile. God doesn't make a distinction between Jews and Gentiles. It's just that at that point when Jesus was telling the story, the Jewish nation had a covenantal background with God and yet had violated that covenant. And these ones who were coming to Christ were coming back to where they should have been. It's no longer the case that the Jews specifically have a special covenant with God, but anyone can be in covenant with God if they come to Christ.

And so yeah, if a believer has fallen away, if they repent truly and become true followers of Christ and faithful to him, it's going to be the same thing. God's always happy to see a sinner return. So the parable would apply in principle, but its primary meaning is about these tax collectors and sinners among the Jews who should have been better because they had the law and they were Jews and they had a covenant with God but they were in violation of it. But now they're returning.

It's like a parable that Jesus told in Matthew where he said a man had two sons and he told each of them to go and work in his field and one of them said, "I go, sir," but never went. The other said, "No, I won't go," and then later he repented and did go. Jesus said, "Well which of these sons actually did the will of his father?" Obviously the one who said he was obedient but wasn't is not the one who did the will of the father, but the one who rejected the command and rebelled but then repented and came back, that's the one who did the will of the father.

He's comparing these tax collectors and sinners to children of God who have rebelled and gone the wrong way but have repented, whereas the older brother is like the son who says, "I go, sir," but really doesn't do it. Jesus pointed out that they didn't. In fact, it was the will of the older son's father that the older son should celebrate the return of his brother from a far country. And by not doing so, the older brother who claimed to be so obedient was actually disobeying in that very act. His father's saying, "Come on, come and celebrate," and he said, "No, I don't think he's worth it." Okay well then you're not doing your father's will, are you? You're being outwardly obedient to the rules but you're simply not caring about what your father wants. That's what that's about. But the same would be true of any sinner, whether a Gentile sinner or a former Christian who's fallen away and comes back to Christ. God's always happy to see a sinner return.

Steve Gregg: All right, let's talk to Yosef in Knoxville, Tennessee. Yosef, welcome.

Yosef (Guest): Hey Steve, thank you. I was going to ask if you could just put some scripture or some verses to this idea that I've always had and that is that because people, men in general, are made in the image of God, that whatever we do to them, either love them or how we treat them, we in a sense do it unto God. I know this is true in the context of Matthew 25, "Whatever you do to the least of these," and 1 Corinthians 11. I know this is true in the context of the body, but I can't seem to see that amongst also just our neighbors in general or amongst unbelievers, that concept of how we love others and treat others, that's a reflection of whatever we do unto the Lord. So I was just wondering about that.

Steve Gregg: Okay well, as you mentioned most of the verses that make that point are talking about dealing with Christians though not all. You mentioned Matthew 25 where it's the sheep and the goats and Jesus said, "Whatever you've done to these my brethren, you've done to me." Obviously his brethren are his disciples. Paul also said in 1 Corinthians 8, he's talking about eating meat sacrificed to idols and he said when you do that, when you stumble your brother, you're not just sinning against a brother, you're sinning against Christ. And that's in 1 Corinthians 8:12. In 1 Corinthians 11 you mentioned it, when you neglect the needs of your brother at the table and food is to be shared and you take more than your share and he goes away hungry, you're not discerning the body of Christ. That man is the body of Christ. He's part of the body of Christ and you're acting as if he's not and so you're doing that to Christ.

But the one place I know of that would really point out that the image of God is in every man, even non-Christians, and therefore that makes it inappropriate for us to treat them the way we would not wish to treat God is James chapter 3 verse 8 and 9. It says, "But no man can tame the tongue, it's an unruly evil full of deadly poison. With it, that is with our tongue, we bless our God and Father, and with it, that is the same tongue, we curse men who have been made in the similitude of God." And in verse 10 he says, "Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing, they should not be." So he's saying it's inappropriate for us to curse men when they are in fact made in the image of God. The same mouth that blesses God should never be cursing men who are made in the image of God.

The way you treat a person even if he's not a Christian, because a person does bear the image of God, is a sign of disrespect to God who made him. It's like if you had a rebellious son and you heard some noise in his bedroom like something was hitting the wall and you walked in there and saw he had a picture of you on the closet door and he's throwing darts at it. And you said, "Hey, that's disrespectful. You're supposed to honor your father and your mother." And he said, "Well it's not you, it's just a picture of you, I'm not disrespecting you." Well sure you are. Using your image as a target for darts, it certainly is your image that's being disrespected and clearly it's intended as disrespect to you. And so when you treat a person wrong, well they're the image of God and therefore it's disrespectful to God, that's what James is saying.

In the Proverbs there's a statement that says something like, "He that curses the poor curses his maker." Definitely in the Proverbs there's that statement that if you disregard the poor or if you despise the poor then you're despising his maker, which is just simply saying that because the poor is a human and he's a human made in God's image is what's clearly behind that. So there are scriptures for that, mostly applied to how you treat Christians because Christians are the actual body of Christ and whatever you do to a Christian you actually do to him. But a non-Christian is not part of the body of Christ and what you do to that person may not be in the same sense directly done to God, but it is as if you're doing it to God because a person is in the likeness of God and you're supposed to recognize that.

Yosef (Guest): Thank you. Yeah, that clarifies it. Thank you so much.

Steve Gregg: Yosef, thanks for your call. All right, Jericho from Laguna Beach, California. Glad you called. Welcome.

Jericho (Guest): Hey Steve. Yeah, thank you for taking my call. I wanted to just bounce a certain biblical interpretation off of you, but it might take like two minutes to build the case. Is that okay?

Steve Gregg: Okay.

Jericho (Guest): All right, here goes. So this is in reference to Mark 13:32 when Jesus says that no one knows the day or the hour, not even the angels nor the son, but only the father. I know it's typically taken to mean that Jesus in some sense did not know the timing of his return, but I'm wondering if there is a stronger biblical case that when Jesus says that he does not know the day or the hour, he's using that word in the sense of he does not disclose or he does not make known instead of Jesus saying that he's ignorant. A couple reasons why I'm wondering this is because scripture repeatedly says that Jesus knows all things. He says that all the father has is his and that the father shows the son all that he himself is doing. And so it seems difficult to say that the father has some divine knowledge that the son somehow lacks.

Two more points about this is that in Acts 1:7 when the disciples ask Jesus about the timing of the kingdom, he says it's not for them to know the times that the father has fixed by his own authority. What he's not saying is it's not for us to know, so that would also seem to me like the issue isn't necessarily about Jesus lacking information but more about how he's highlighting the father's role and his authority to appoint and disclose the timing. And last I think if you take the surface level reading of Mark 13:32 you can run into other issues like where in Revelation 19 it says that Christ has a name written that no one but himself knows. If you were to apply the same surface level reading to that, it would seem clunky to say that Jesus has something that the father doesn't know. So I want to just make sure I harmonize all of this with scripture correctly. I just wanted to get your thoughts on that and if that's a valid interpretation or not.

Steve Gregg: Well, I don't see it that way and I'll give you my case about each of those things. My understanding of course is that when Jesus became a human, he became a real human and that means a baby initially and then a little child and then an older child then an adolescent and then a man and so forth. It seems clear to me that Jesus became a real baby and therefore he did not know how to read because babies don't know how to read, didn't know how to talk, didn't even know how to understand people's talk around him much less read their minds. He was a real baby.

The suggestion that it is otherwise would seem to go against what it says in Luke chapter 2 at the end of the chapter where it says that after the events when Jesus was 12 years old when his parents lost track of him and then found him again at the temple, it says in verse 52, "And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men." That seems like it means he developed intellectually and physically just like people do, like boys do. If he increased in wisdom, then his knowledge base at the beginning was not as much as God's because there'd be no room for increase for improvement. I believe we're being told that Jesus grew like any boy. He grew bigger in stature, he grew wiser, he grew spiritually and socially and so forth.

So it does seem like Jesus at least in his youth didn't know everything and we don't know that he knew everything even in his adult life, though he knew whatever God wanted him to know. When Jesus said that all that the father has he's given him and so forth and therefore the suggestion is that God has revealed to Jesus everything that God knows—well there's a similar statement that Jesus said about him and his disciples in John 15:15: "No longer do I call you servants for a servant does not know what his master is doing, but I have called you friends for all things that I have heard from my father I have made known to you."

Now if God made known to Jesus all things that God the father knew, then Jesus knew everything. But if that "all things" literally means he had total knowledge of literally everything, then we'd have to say the same thing about the disciples because all things that the father revealed to Jesus he said he's now revealed to his disciples. I think what we'd have to say is that all things that God wished to reveal to Jesus were made known to Jesus and all things that Jesus wished to reveal to the disciples he has done so. There are of course things that Jesus knew that the disciples never knew.

One of which is what you're suggesting. You're suggesting that Jesus might have known the second coming time but his disciples didn't and it wasn't given to them. And yet he says, "All things that the father has commanded me or revealed to me I've made known to you." So the statement about all things that the father knew were made known to Jesus would not necessarily have to be more literal than what he said about his disciples. What it would mean is that if God wants people to know something, he reveals it to them and I believe that Jesus did receive revelation from God on many occasions but perhaps not every occasion.

Jesus spoke many times as if there were things he didn't know. Now that could have just been a manner of speaking, for example when the woman touched the hem of his garment in the crowd and he said, "Who touched me?" I don't think he was just doing that theatrically because Peter said, "Well, everyone's jostling you Jesus," and he said, "Well no, I felt something go out of me, somebody touched me, who did that?" And the woman came forward and revealed that she was the one. It really seems like Jesus was seeking information. Now again, he could have been acting a role as if he didn't know, but I'm not sure what the value of that would be.

I think that Jesus as a man depended on revelation from his father just as men do. Now Jesus received it in greater measure than anybody else has, but I don't think that the fact that when he said, "All things that the father has are mine," means that he knew all the things God knew, any more than when he said, "All that I've heard from my father I've revealed to you," means that the disciples knew as much as Jesus knew about everything. Now as far as Acts chapter 1 when Jesus said, "It's not for you to know the times or the seasons that the father has put in his own power," you're saying well he didn't say it's not for us to know, so that Jesus perhaps is saying that he did know and that they did not.

I would respond this way, that first of all this was after Jesus rose from the dead. It is very possible, remember when Jesus was praying in his priestly prayer, he said, "Father, restore to me the glory that I had with you before." I think that when Jesus rose from the dead, he did have that and he probably did know all things at that time, including the time of his coming. But he might not have. The statement he made to his disciples doesn't commit one way or the other. They wanted to know, he said, "It's not for you to know." It may have been not for him to know at that point either, but I think he may have known because he was now glorified.

Let me just take a break here because I have to, and I'm going to hold you over and just finish talking with you afterwards because I don't want to just cut you off too quickly. So hang in there, okay? I'll be back with you in just a moment. You're listening to the Narrow Path. Our website is thenarrowpath.com. Everything there is free, though you can donate there if you wish. We are listener supported. Thenarrowpath.com is the site. I'll be back in 30 seconds. We have another half hour, so don't go away.

Welcome back to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we're taking calls. Our phone lines are still full, but there will be open lines coming up in the course of the next half hour. If you want to try to get through, the number is 844-484-5737. I should mention that this Wednesday is the first Wednesday of the month and that means that's the day we have our Zoom meeting. The first Wednesday of every month we have a Zoom meeting. You can be part of it, you can log in. At our website, it tells how to log in at thenarrowpath.com under announcements. It's a Q&A we do once a month and that's this month. It's at 7:00 PM Pacific Time and you're certainly welcome to join us there.

Now we were talking to Jericho before the break and he was talking about did Jesus know everything during his lifetime when he was on earth? I have said no and most people would agree with me because Jesus said, "No man knows the day or the hour, not even the angels nor even the son," meaning himself, "but only the father knows that." So it sounds like Jesus is saying that's privileged information. Jericho is saying the word "know" can be used different ways and it certainly is true. The word "know" in both the Old and the New Testament has a variety of meanings. Among them can be the idea to disclose or to make known something. He could be saying it's just not anyone's privilege to make that known, not even my privilege to make it known, but not necessarily saying that Jesus didn't know.

I think that's probably how I got your meaning there. So some scriptures were given, which we've been talking about in the first half hour. You also had one more scripture, which is Revelation 19:12 where it says that Jesus when he's seen coming on a white horse with a sword out of his mouth, it said he had a name written on him which no one knew but himself. I don't know that that helps the particular case you're making because there certainly are things Jesus knows that no one else does. And this is not describing him in his earthly ministry. Even when he was here in his earthly ministry he knew things that no one else knew, but that's not answering the question of did he know all things.

There can be no doubt that a believer in Christ would say Jesus knew a ton of stuff that nobody else knew. But that's not necessarily resulting in the belief that he was omniscient when he was on earth and I believe much in the Bible suggests he was not because of his true incarnation as a man with the limitations of a man. But I would say this too, that in one of the letters to the seven churches he said that to him who overcomes he'll have a white stone and he'll have a new name which no one knows except him that receives it.

Jesus has a name in Revelation 19 that no one knows but him, but then all the Christians are eventually to have a new name that no one knows except them too. So the idea that a bit of information is known only by one person, in some cases Jesus is that person, in some cases it's even his followers, does not answer the question of omniscience. A person can know something that other people don't know but it does not translate into a doctrine of omniscience for that person.

Jericho (Guest): Just as a clarification, my point with that was that I don't think it would make sense to say that Jesus has a name that the father doesn't know, right? You could probably conclude that by a surface level reading of saying, "Well Jesus said that nobody knows," which would mean that the father doesn't know. I think that would kind of be a theological issue there about the father not knowing something that Jesus knows.

Steve Gregg: Well right. I mean God knows everything and he certainly knows everything that Jesus knows. And also when each believer receives a white stone with a name on it that no one knows except him, by saying "no one knows" it doesn't mean God doesn't know. It just means obviously no person knows. It says in Psalm 8 that God has put all things under the feet of men. The writer of Hebrews quotes that in Hebrews chapter 2 and he points out that in saying that all things are put under him it certainly does not mean he who put them under him is under them. The point he's making is that when it says God put all things under man's feet, he doesn't mean that God put himself under. So to say no one knows or all things, this is talking within the sphere of created things. We're not talking about God being included in that excluded knowledge.

Jericho (Guest): Yeah, thank you. I'll keep looking into it. It's a really interesting thing. There's an argument to be made too about when he says that it's neither the—like nobody including the angels, there's a case to be made there about how he's talking about just creation doesn't know, which would harmonize with what you're saying about Jesus being a God-man. You know, there are human limitations that he has, but I'll leave it there for now. Thank you so much for the response.

Steve Gregg: All right, I'm glad you called. God bless you. Likewise. We'll talk to you again. God bless. Bye now. Okay, Paul in Buena Vista, Colorado. Welcome to the Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.

Paul (Guest): Hey Steve, I just had on the marriage question. Can you hear me okay?

Steve Gregg: Mhm.

Paul (Guest): Okay, when a couple get married and somebody commits adultery and then they wind up divorcing because of the adultery, is that something where both of them can remarry? If let's say the husband was the perpetrator and he repented and got his life back in order and got into another church and got to working on his walk with the Lord, would it be all right for them to both be remarried or is there a prohibition on remarriage?

Steve Gregg: You mean for them to remarry each other? You mean for them to marry different people?

Paul (Guest): Marry different people.

Steve Gregg: Okay well, here's how I understand it. Jesus said if a man divorces his wife for causes other than fornication, he causes her to commit adultery. That's assuming I guess that she remarries and then whoever remarries her commits adultery too. This is a very brief and succinct statement about a whole class of situations where people get divorced for different reasons. He said if the reason was not fornication, then certain things pertain.

Now people do get divorced for lots of things besides fornication. Obviously they just get divorced because they're unfaithful to their vows. They feel unhappy, they feel they're abused, they feel it's better for the children, there's too many arguments. Now those are not good reasons for divorce. Only fornication is. Now Jesus just summarizes because he's making a general point that the Jews had a teaching that you could divorce your wife for any reason. And Jesus is saying well frankly most of you who are divorcing your wives are causing your wives to commit adultery and it's a bad thing. You should only if she's unfaithful can you do that without making her an adulteress, and that's because she made herself an adulteress if she's unfaithful.

But now the point of divorce being objectionable and God does hate divorce, it says in Malachi and I believe the New Testament affirms that, that divorce is unfaithfulness. Divorce is violation of a vow that was made before God and man. And God has no pleasure in fools, it says in Ecclesiastes 5. It says when you make a vow to the Lord, you keep it. It's better to not vow at all than to make a vow and don't keep it. So don't hastily make a vow because God has no pleasure in fools. Apparently one who makes a hasty vow and doesn't keep it is a fool.

When people do promise to be faithful to each other, they have the right to expect both parties to keep that vow. If one goes off and commits adultery and leaves the marriage, that person whether it's the husband or the wife has violated the covenant. Paul and Jesus I believe both suggest and I think the Old Testament certainly does, that in such a case the party that was still faithful to the vows, the one who did not commit adultery, can consider themselves free if they wish. The covenant's been broken, not by them, by the other person. And therefore divorce is okay for them.

It can be permitted and that person who is the innocent victim of the adultery, that is the person who was not the adulterer, that person is not under covenant anymore. That covenant's been broken by their partner and if they're not under a covenant they're a single person, and single people are allowed to marry. The only person who's not allowed to remarry is one who already has an existing intact covenant with their first spouse or with their earlier spouse. So if there's been a divorce but there's been no grounds for divorce in God's sight, then both parties are still under obligation to keep the marriage vows.

If they remarry, they're entering into an adulterous relationship because they've already got a vow, they already have a covenant they're involved in. But if there's been fornication, then that covenant's been essentially shattered. The innocent party, the victim in that case, could certainly wait and pray and ask God to bring their spouse back and stay faithful. And if they do, then that spouse if they ever repent before God has to come back because when you repent you have to go back to the spot where you departed from obedience. And obedience means keeping your vows.

So if a person wrongly divorced a spouse and that spouse is still faithful, then you got to go back if you repent. Now here's another situation. Suppose a man has committed adultery against his wife and he's gone and married another woman. Well the question then is what has his wife done in the meantime, his original wife? If she is still waiting for him to come home, she has a claim on him. There's a covenant there. There's a contract there they made. He has to be faithful to her for life. The fact that he hasn't done it doesn't free him. Breaking your promise or breaking contract doesn't mean you're not obligated to still keep it once you decide to stop being a lawbreaker.

Obviously if the woman in this scenario still wants her husband back even though he cheated, then whenever he gets right with God he's got to go back or at least he's got to offer to and he's got to make it good because he's got unfinished business there. The unfinished business is he's got to finish out his lifetime with his wife like he promised. Now of course if she dies, that's a different story. Or if she moves on. If she moves on and finds another man and she's now married to somebody else, she did so legitimately because she didn't do anything wrong. Her husband cheated and so she's free. She can go marry again someone else.

Can he? Well, I believe that once she has legitimately remarried, all hope of him ever coming back to her is gone. She's now with somebody else legitimately. He can't take her back again. And so I believe he is then free to marry too, but he should still repent of the adultery that he committed against his first marriage. Once he is truly repentant, I don't think that he has to go back to a wife who has moved on and she's now with another man. And therefore I think he's free to marry somebody else. But this is if he's repentant. It means he truly truly wishes he had not done the thing he did.

You see, I think there's sometimes people—I knew a woman who wanted out of her marriage and so she left her husband but she didn't sleep with another man. She told a woman friend of hers that she did this so that her husband would be under pressure to go out and find another woman. She said when he finds another woman, then I'll be free to divorce. In other words, she was trying to manipulate the whole thing to get her husband to be unfaithful so that she'd be free. Now God doesn't make rules in order that you can manipulate him. I believe that even if you've got technical grounds for divorce, if you're the one who caused them essentially or you manipulated them, then God knows. God knows if your heart is guilty or not.

So I would just say every person who wrongly divorced another should wish very much and truly that they could undo it, that they could turn the clock back, that they could do the right thing instead of the wrong thing. But if things have transpired in the meantime, maybe the wife has died, maybe she's now legitimately married to somebody else, well then he should still wish that he hadn't done the bad thing, but he doesn't have to be punished for it the rest of his life. I don't believe. I believe once he's truly repented and forgiven that his life can go on from there including another marriage.

I'm not God, this is how I assess the teachings I find in scripture on the subject. But there's so little said on the subject relatively that Christians have reached lots of different ideas about the application of that. Therefore not all Christians would give the same answer I do. What I can say is I'm aware of all the other answers. I'm aware of what I consider to be flaws in the other interpretations and it seems to me that what I've shared places full weight on all the data of scripture and agrees with what I think is the whole issue in the sight of God. But just know that my opinion is not the only one out there and no matter which opinion I gave there'd be a certain percentage of Christians who'd say I'm wrong because there's a whole bunch of different opinions. Anyway, hopefully that'll be good for you.

Steve Gregg: Greg in Crestline, California. Welcome to the Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.

Greg (Guest): Can you hear me Steve?

Steve Gregg: Yes sir.

Greg (Guest): First I want to thank you for your books. My question is, I've been a Christian for over 50 years and I've been called everything because I abandoned the Calvinist views and I abandoned the thought of a third temple and a heifer. But I never believed any of these people were not going to go where their outcome was not going to be where it was. My question is, I spent a lot of these years trying to walk for God instead of walking with God. And I never doubted what all the ministers I listened to and all the people on the pulpit said, that if you don't do X-Y-Z you're either not saved or you're not taking sin seriously or you're fooling yourself.

I don't understand why when people talk about other Christians or Christians that they feel are lacking or may not be Christians, instead of trying to give them water of life or trying to give them the spirit of food or all these things like you were talking about in Matthew 25, they just tell them if you don't do these things you're never going to be a vessel in honor, you might not even be a Christian. And I spent 50 years trying to do those things in my own life and never walked with God.

Steve Gregg: Is that a question? I haven't really heard your question and I've got a lot of people waiting and only a few minutes left.

Greg (Guest): My question is because I've heard you doing it and I always thought from everything I knew about you you were different. When you talk about people that you're not sure are Christians, you do nothing to build them up like everybody else.

Steve Gregg: No, I try to build them up. I try to encourage them to do the right thing. Christians are people who are followers of Christ, that's the very definition of a Christian, a follower of Christ. Jesus said, "Why do you call me Lord, Lord and you don't do what I say?" He also said, "Many will say to me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, we did these things in your name,'" but he'll say, "I never knew you." He says, "Not everyone who calls me 'Lord, Lord' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my father." In other words, Jesus makes it very clear that among those who call him Lord and think themselves Christians, there are some who aren't really. And the most loving thing I could do to help them is to help them discover that if possible before they stand before God and he reveals it to them.

It's not an unloving or uncharitable thing to say a Christian is a certain thing. And if you're that thing, then you're a Christian. If you're not that thing, well then you're not a Christian. That's not my judgment, that's the very definition of the word Christian. So a Christian is someone who's following Christ. Following Christ means you're obeying him. You're doing what he said. I can't really judge a person's heart. That's not for me to do and I attempt not to do so. But we can judge that if somebody knows what Jesus wants them to do and they don't want to do it and refuse, well then they're not obeying Christ. By their own mouth they're making it very clear they're not following Christ.

Now what I tell people is being a Christian is following Christ. Not following Christ is not being a Christian. I'm not telling any individual that they are or are not a Christian. I mean they know themselves, I don't know them. But I think I do a person a favor and I think I do build them up if I let them know that whatever you think a Christian is, if your idea of a Christian allows you to ignore the teachings of the King, the Lord, and not do them, well then your idea of a Christian isn't the same as his. So that's all. I'm not going up to anybody and saying you're not a Christian. I don't remember if I've ever told anyone they're not a Christian directly. I've just told them that from what you describe that doesn't sound like you're following Christ in this matter.

Just for a matter of information, a real Christian is a follower of Christ. You can decide if you're one or not. I can't. I don't even know you. So I don't know if you're following Christ or what degree you're attempting to or desiring to. God knows that. I'm just handing out the general information and that's how Jesus said we have to make disciples by teaching them to observe everything Jesus commanded. That's what he said himself in Matthew 28:20. So if I'm teaching you to observe everything Jesus commanded, that means I'm teaching you to obey him. Well that's what making disciples includes. There is no making of disciples without doing that.

So that's not failing to build them up. If they don't like the information and they turn on it, maybe they won't be built up. But the truth will make you free. So the real question is when I'm dealing with a person or answering a question, am I giving the truth or not? If what I'm saying is not true, I always welcome people to call and correct me. In fact every day I say if you don't agree with what I say, call and bounce comments because I'm not infallible. I think I'm telling the truth. If someone knows I'm not, let them call and point it out because I'm teachable.

But once I know the truth or believe I know the truth, it'd be very unloving for me not to share it since it's the truth that makes you free. And if people have errors that they're living by, they're more in bondage to sin than they should be. And I'd like to see them free, just like I would assume they would. So anyway, I'm not sure I understand your criticism, but I think I understand what you were trying to get at. Thank you for your call.

Steve Gregg: Matthew in New Jersey. Welcome to the Narrow Path.

Matthew (Guest): Hey Brother Steve. God bless, thanks for taking the call. Steve, my question's kind of born out of contrasting two verses and I'm sure there's maybe more and better verses for this. 2 Samuel 12:10 and Job 42:7. I'll be brief here because I know we're running out of time. I guess what I'm driving at here ultimately is the difference between a trial and being punished. The sword being over David's house seems like it's referring to a punishment versus Job 42:7, I translate as more as God pointing to what Job's going through being a trial. So I guess my question is the difference between the two things biblically.

Steve Gregg: Okay, I'm going to have to ask you for that Job passage. You said Job 42:7?

Matthew (Guest): 42:7. The way I'm translating it, I'm understanding it.

Steve Gregg: Okay, so it says, "So it was after the Lord had spoken these words to Job that the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, 'My wrath is aroused against you and your two friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right as my servant Job has.'" Okay, so God was angry at them for speaking wrongfully about God. And the statement in 2 Samuel is simply Nathan the prophet telling David that because he had sinned with Bathsheba, he says, "Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house because you've despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife." Now what is the contradiction here? I'm not seeing it.

Matthew (Guest): Not so much a contradiction but that one is kind of alluding to suffering as a form of a trial as what Job went through, and then what David's is more of a form of punishment.

Steve Gregg: Well David did experience punishment, that's the point. And the punishment was that his family didn't have peace anymore. That's what it means that the sword would never depart from his house. That he had had a peaceful family, a peaceful reign, and now he's going to have nothing but turmoil in his family. And that was true. You know, Absalom killed Amnon and Amnon had raped Tamar. Solomon eventually killed Adonijah. These are brothers and sisters harming each other. The sword and turmoil and conflict continued in David's house till the day he died and beyond.

So that is a judgment on him. His judgment should have been that he was put to death because the penalty for adultery and murder is death, but God showed mercy on him and said because you repented I'm not going to kill you, but there's still going to be repercussions in your family. Now I want to say this that to say it's a judgment on his family, it could just be a prediction. Because the things that happen in David's family that were terrible after this were in many ways could be seen to be the upshot of his own sin. That is to say not so much that God imposed it as a penalty as it was the normal outgrowth of circumstances from what he did. It led to these problems.

Now as far as Job's friends are concerned, they spoke wrongly of God and God was angry at them but I'm not really sure what you're saying about it. But if you're saying what's the difference between going through a test or going through a punishment, well a punishment definitely is a penalty for a crime or a sin that needs to be redressed. A test can be against somebody who hasn't done any crimes. They're just being tested. So that'd be a difference. Punishment only comes upon the guilty. I'm sorry I'm out of time. Sorry to be in a rush. Our website's thenarrowpath.com. God bless.