SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome to Lambs and Company, a podcast about life. We will feature guests and friends on the podcast to have quality conversations and wonderful fellowship. We hope you will join us. It's a life worth living and it's a life worth giving.

SPEAKER_04 0:25

Welcome to a lambs and company today. And we have with us Audrey Hall and also Sam Fryer. And we got Sam on for this one because Sam is really an instigator on this whole thing for what we're talking about. And Artie and I addressed this last uh on our last podcast. And so this is a continuation. But actually it's fun and it's really beneficial, I think, to people. So just remember a life worth living is a life worth giving. So how are you guys doing today?

SPEAKER_01 1:03

Pretty good. How are you doing?

SPEAKER_04 1:04

Good. Well, yeah. Artie, you want to start us back out kind of where we landed last week and we'll jump off the cliff again?

SPEAKER_03 1:13

Yeah, I I I really want to kind of talk about this in a way that uh you can get in the weeds with this really fast, and it it can it can be really confusing. So I've I've had to think through and think, well, okay, well, how can I break this down for normal people who never think about this? Yeah. And and uh so we're gonna try. Last week we talked about translation technique, you know, the the dynamic equivalency, the formal equivalency, the paraphrase, all of that that that does impact translations. But sometimes the underlying text itself, the Hebrew text or the Greek text, has a big effect on what comes out in the in the English for us, the English translations that are there. And there you generally is an approach or a philosophy of the of the committee, normally it would be a committee, or maybe a person that would make a translation of how they choose the best text. So let's talk about that a little bit. The uh the oldest Hebrew text we have goes back to around the year a thousand. It's the Leningrad Codex. Uh, there's an Aleppo Codex, it's slightly older. Um, that's a complete Old Testament. So that's not very old when you think in terms of some of these texts that are there. There are some Dead Sea fragments of Hebrew text. They're they're fragments, and they are um uh one complete text, the Isaiah text, is a complete text, and uh it's one that that probably does reflect the textual family, but there are others, and some of them are Greek translations of the Hebrew, some of them the Hebrew text, and uh just all this there. And that's run runs from around 200 BC to 100 uh AD or so. And and the tradition for the Septuagint, the Greek translation is 250, 275, 250 BC or so. Generally goes back to that. Uh, the Isaiah scroll dates to about 150 BC. The reason that that folks put such faith in the Masoretic text, which is what the Leningrad Codex is based, is the Masoretic text is at, more than likely, is that from 150 BC to 1000 AD, uh the Isaiah text, the Masoretic text, those Isaiah books are almost identical. I mean, literally almost identical. So you've got a really faithful uh textual transmission that took place in that. So that's why the scholarship has a tendency to go with that, with that text, that Hebrew text, thinking it must and the Hebrew scholars were very careful. The the scribes wrote down the number of words, number of letters. They measured from the beginning of the text to the end of the text. They counted the words, counted the letters. If they were off by one word, one letter, they'd redo the whole thing. I mean, they they were very meticulous. The Greek scribes is that's another story. They were not like that at all. And that's why we end up that was almost like that. Pass the wine. There was some wine in the monastery going on when they were writing some of that down. It's just a very different story. So that's one of the reasons that the this the Masoretic tradition is so strong. So that's the Old Testament. Well, what about the New Testament? Uh the oldest Greek, um that that in fact, the oldest entire Bible translated in Greek is the Codex Siniticus. It was a fellow named Tischendorf founded in the trash can. He looked, he was at he was at uh the Mount Sinai Monastery there, St. Catharines, and he's looking around in the library and and the and and he said, You got it, you got any copies of the Greek? And and you know, the monk said, Oh, yeah, we got this over here. And then he looked over and literally it's in the trash can. They've been using this thing for notes or something, and he finds this Greek text. And he said, Where'd this come from? He said, Oh, that's a page out of this old book over here. You know, so Tissendorf goes over and finds this complete Greek translation of both the old and new testaments and uh the codex Synodicus, and it and it dated, and they dated it, it goes back to uh pretty old.

SPEAKER_04 5:34

How are you pronouncing out Synodicus?

SPEAKER_03 5:37

And and uh so that that goes back to that. It's about 350 AD or so. So that's one of the earliest things you have. There's a Vatican text, there's a Greek text of the New Testament in the Vatican Library, there's an Eliasandrian codex that goes, and all these go back to the 350 AD, 400 AD, those years right in there, as far as a complete thing of the Bible. There are fragments that date much earlier. The the Bodimer papyrus, there's the Chester Beatty papyrus, there's a papyrus out of Washington, they're just some older ones, and they all have they have a little P in a number when you're looking at textual criticism. They're all there, and they are um minuscules. There, the the Greek text itself, they're unseals, which were all capital letters, all written together, and most of the codecs are those. And there's minuscules with that is smaller letters, they were little letters, big letters in Greek text. That was it, it was invented a little later. So you just have all of that going on. But here's the deal. And in trying to put together the best Hebrew text, the best Greek text. That's that's always been the that's just been the thing everybody's trying to seek after. You know, the holy grail. We're just gonna have this text that's there. Uh there are a lot of ideas on how to do that, but there are over 5,686 Greek texts out there. Some of them fragments, some of them complete, some of them others. That's a lot of evidence, a lot of textual evidence. That is way more textual evidence than, for instance, the uh the um Iliad, copy of the Iliad. There's 643 manuscripts for the Iliad. There are only seven manuscripts available for Plato. And nobody doubts Plato, nobody doubts the Iliad. You know, all this going on with that. So, so it's is people can can can relax. We've got what we need. The differences come in on how you pick them. And here's the basic difference, okay? This is this is this is what you'll find. Prior to uh the Protestant Reformation, the only Bible available for people was Latin. Jerome, in around the fourth century, third, fourth century, translated from a Hebrew text and a Greek text, the Bible to Latin, the Vulgate. That was it for about a thousand years. That's it. And the argument is what text did he use? Well, you know what the answer to that is? We don't know. But nobody wants to say that. He didn't put that in his footnote. You know, and and there was a couple of other the early church fathers that were into figuring out all that stuff, and we don't have too much of that stuff either. Because when you remember our our Muslim section, we're talking about Islam, they burned all that. All of that, a lot of that stuff got lost through through the past when they would go and burn these libraries, anyway. So Protestant Reformation comes around. Christians did not know Hebrew because the rabbis would not teach them. Some Protestant guy, right after Martin Luther, talked a Jewish guy into teaching him Hebrew. And at that point, that became the beginning of Hebrew scholarship in the Protestant world. You know, Greek had been around for a little longer. And and uh so at that point the Bible started being translated into different languages. German first with Martin Luther. There was a couple of English versions, there's a French version, they're just people because all of a sudden the Protestants said ordinary people ought to be able to read the Bible, and it shouldn't just be in Latin. So that was the beginning of this whole argument. So that didn't happen until the 1600s, late 1500s, early 1600s. So what are the schools of thought on how to uh reassemble a Greek text, Hebrew text to use for translation? Because obviously your base text is very important when you're translating. The predominant view up until Tischendorf found that thing in a trash can, which was the late 1800s, was sort of to take what would be known what we would call the Byzantine tradition of text. Okay. Byzantine meaning the eastern part of the Christian world, Constantinople, the Eastern Roman Empire, the Byzantine text. There were lots of them, but I mean lots of them everywhere, all over the place. Uh Greek text of the Bible. And because they'd been copied through the monasteries and all that was there. All these are all the Byzantine text family. And out of that came what would ultimately be called the Textus Receptus. It's the Greek text that received text that was used as the basis of the King James Version. So that was sort of the tradition that goes in that direction. And there are a couple other issues involved in that, but that's generally the idea. Nobody worried about too much other stuff until Tischendorf found that stuff in the trash can. When he did, boy, it just changed everything. Because then there was the Vatican text in the Vatican Library, that's supposed to be really old. Protestants is like that because it's Catholic. So they didn't, it was doubtful. It's them Catholics, they changed stuff. And so you didn't want to do that. And and and then there was there was the Vatican text, Alexandrian text, they found another one in Alexandria, near that area, a complete text. Same place, really. And and uh this this uh uh the the Sinai text. So those became the three oldest texts. So at that point, English scholarship and a couple other European guys decided this is the way you decide to to the Greek text. You don't just take the text that everybody's used for the last thousand years, you just ignore that.

unknown 11:55

Forget that.

SPEAKER_03 11:56

You don't want to mess with that. You do this is new and improved. Okay. And the new and improved thing won the day. So this is their philosophy in the text because it reflects how these texts are. The Alexandrian text, Vatican text, Sinai text, they are all older. So that became the first thing. You want to take the oldest text, the oldest one. It's closer there, just less chance for any kind of, but the older is better. And then you take the more difficult reading, meaning if something is misspelled or something looks grammatically different, or if it's something that's you know, all that, then you're gonna take that. That's the best text. So you're gonna put that in there. And then the third thing is you take the shorter reading. Because they the thing the philosophy in that is that that the shorter reading would reflect the original because you'd have a tendency to add things, not take things out if you're copying. And indeed, there were some marginal things, if you look at some of these manuscripts, marginal things, and if somebody was copying that manuscript, they looked at the marginal stuff and they just put it in a text because they weren't sure what to do with that. That shouldn't make you nervous, but they would do that. And and and it's obvious if you look at the original, you figure it out. Uh, so don't panic. So the Byzantine text family has a tendency to be longer and more consistent, more grammatically correct. The shorter text, the shorter text, older text, more difficult text, that became the criterion. That text, the Alexandrian family of text became the base text with a guy named Everhard Nestle, Tischendorf and Everhard Nestle, and uh Westcott and Hort in England, and just some other guys. They all went that direction. And and uh the virtually all of the modern translations, with a few exceptions, go in that direction. And a scholarship went in that direction. And that became the Nestle text, the Nestle Greek text, the the 24th edition of that thing. It was this little blue book that everybody used to have. It was almost like Chairman Mao's little red book. It was a little blue book all the seminary guys had. That's the text, man. That's that's it. You gotta go with the text. What's it? And if you had any arguments about a translation or anything going on, Mr. Text, this is it. You know, and and I mean, people are just adamant about all that. Okay. Comes along two dudes from Dallas Theological Seminary. They were real flamethrowers. They tossed a Molotov cocktail in this whole argument, a fellow named Zane Hodges and Arthur Farsted. I think they have both since passed on, uh, but they were textual critics, and they said, Hey, wait a minute. What if the Byzantine text family that people used for years? There's nothing wrong with it. Maybe some of those texts are a little longer, they're all of that, but the church, the community of faith received that text along with the Septuagint tradition for a long, long time. So their philosophy, they changed. What they said is, why don't we do this? When we put together the best Greek text, particularly for the New Testament, or even the best text for the Old Testament, why don't we use the majority of the text? In other words, those texts that had been used the most times in the most places by most people in the church. And everybody said, Well, that can't be right. You know, I mean they they really rejected that. And these guys would stand alone in the academic arguments, and they they got called names and they were fools and whatever, you know. And but you know, I I I when I was in the middle of all this, uh, and I I kind of got won over to that thinking a long time ago, going, well, you know, they got a real point here, and we ought to hold this a little looser than our little blue book that we were all screaming about, you know, and and uh because it gets revised, and you know, you know, my United Bible society, all that, all that stuff. And a lot of those folks that are messing with the text over there, I'm not even sure they're Christians. So they'll be honest with you. So that makes me, okay, at least I can use Ayn Hodges, Arthur Farst, dad, they were saved because they're at Dallas Theological Seminary, and you can't do that. There's a trapdoor to hell there. If you're not saved, you'll just fall right through. You know, and so you're in in serious shape. So they they came out with a revision of the old King James Version, which was built on this Byzantine text family, the Texas Receptus and some of the others. And they put together a new Greek text and and they started this project. And what they did, as as you have 5,686 manuscripts, they started looking at that evidence. And through the years, a lot of these guys, these faithful guys, textual critics, have accumulated this stuff. They've looked at all these texts. The Duke, um, Duke University has a digital library now. All if you want to look at all this stuff, you can. All these texts have been have been digitized, photographed. You can look at them online, you can stare at those texts, and you can just you just make yourself crazy if you want to. So all of that is available in what you can do. But Arthur Farrstead, Zane Hodges, and a team of some other people, probably a bunch of grad students who were trying to get a PhD and wanted to behave themselves, got got put it locked in a room and they had to go deal with all this, and they put to put together what was known as the majority text. This is a Greek text based on the majority of what's out there, the evidence that's there. That makes sense to me, plus the basis of uh base, some of it on the Septuagint version. So then they produced a new English translation, committee translation, new English translation that's known as the New King James Translation. This is one of the reasons I use that. It's based on this text family. I think they over a little more relied on the Septuagint version, the Greek version in the Old Testament than they should have in some things, but that's kind of where they would go. And they put together that. So the New King James Version, I think the modern English version might be one that uses the majority text. There are not many. Almost all of these other ones, the New American Standard, the New Living Translation, the all of these things, all of these modern things, they use this Eberhard Nestle, they use this Alexandrian text family. The shorter, the more difficult, the all of that. This text family, and there are a few of them true translations like that. The old King James Version does, the New King James Version, and I think, I think that MEV, the modern English version, and maybe a couple others. And and uh so which one do you pick? Anyone you want. Because you need you need to relax. We we have got the Church of Jesus Christ, the Lord Jesus, get gave us the Holy Spirit who has guided all of this. We got what we need. We have the text we need, we got the Bible we need. But the thing you need to understand is just because there might be some textual difference somewhere, don't panic. That doesn't mean much. Because most of all of that's just not that different. And and when you've got and folks don't understand the vast difference between the evidence, physical evidence of the Bible text and Plato. There are seven, seven physical texts for Plato, all the stuff Plato wrote. That's it. Over 5,000, almost six, almost six thousand texts for the New Testament. You know, so there's no comparison. There's a nothing, we don't know squat about the ancient world, really. But we know more about that than we do anything else. And we really need to relax with that. So I hope this just the thing I don't want this to do is make people wonder is my Bible right? Is my text right? Is this one? Don't panic, don't panic. That the Lord took care of this. And and if you're a Christian and you're saved, you understand that and you trust that. And most of the people that have been involved in this academic stuff through the years were Christians. They were saved, they were honest, sincere people, just trying to do the best job they could. There are always a few out there, you know, sons of Belial, who are running around out there and just, you know, doing stuff, trying to trying to stir up issues. And then what'll happen is you go to the internet, the all-knowing, all-powerful internet, and you ask a question. And it'll come up and tell you all this stuff, and then Sammy gets confused. Because he and then he and then he starts trying to figure all this stuff, and he's really done a good job, by the way. Absolutely. In in uh in in sorting a lot of this stuff out. But in fact, one of the reasons we're having this this whole discussion is it, you know, this when he would talk to people, particularly in apologetics, that sort of thing, a lot of this stuff would come up. And and uh I and you just you see those TV shows, mysteries of the Bible, it just I and a lot of that stuff's just nonsense. And and uh I we need to relax, we just don't need to pay.

SPEAKER_04 22:01

You know, and I know this this is just I'm hardwired and and I'm oversimplify things and you both you guys do a great job of thinking things through and processing and but you know I've always felt like the best translation is the one you'll read. You won't I don't care which translation you argue over and fight over and if you don't read it it's no it's no benefit.

SPEAKER_03 22:28

You know, they all say Jesus raised from the dead. Yeah, they all say he's the Lord. They they all that they they all have the Ten Commandments. Don't kill people. You know, all of that's the same in all of it.

SPEAKER_04 22:38

Well, you know, you you said something a minute ago, and maybe Sammy you you can get in on this too, because you uh you do a lot with it, but um I've had several people over the last eight months ask me about some of the stuff on the internet when it comes to scriptural stuff. And they said I'm because they're reading on the internet certain translations, and then they're saying, I got a hard copy, and what the hard copy says and what they're saying on the internet, but supposedly the same Bible is different. He said, What's going on there? I said, Well, I said, I'm old school, that's why I like the hard copy. Because I said, they can't change it on me. I said, you know, right now in the world that we live in, there's a lot of things that can be added to and taken from, and the average person ain't even gonna know that. And I think that's probably uh great on their part to realize that they there's there's something there um that they need to pay attention to. Um there's a couple of translations that you know that I think seem to have gotten more more criticism uh by people reading one in the new international version.

SPEAKER_03 24:07

If there have been since those things originally came out in the 70s, a lot of them did in the 60s, 70s, there have been some revisions. There's a there's a new American standard, a newer, newer, there's a new international version, there's a newer. And and honestly, some of the committee members on those newer revisions, when they look through some of those translations, when they start doing things like gender neutral language and they start doing some of this kind of stuff where you're no, no, it it God is he. It's what it takes it says he. You need to keep he. You don't need to do the being or whatever you want to do there, some nonsense. And that has become part of the problem where they've where they've taken some of the what were really good translations and they've done weirdness, you know. So that is an issue too. So I mean people maybe have to have that issue with some things.

SPEAKER_04 25:03

So Sammy, uh jump in because you've had plenty of time to sit here and let your wheels be turning over. Okay. And uh and you are one of the reasons why honestly we did last week and this week, because I I like the way you view things, I like the way that you think about things, and uh but the the thing is you actually put time into trying to research it and study it and and and you know dig it out. And there's there is a verse in Proverbs that says, you know, um that uh there they're areas that God has given to people said to kings to search automatic.

SPEAKER_01 25:45

Yeah, that's one of my favorite verses.

SPEAKER_04 25:47

And you know, um and a king is someone that obviously is in a place of responsibility or authority, and um but they don't take things for granted. They actually want to know, okay, I know this is a will, but why is the will work? You know, I know this is a well, but why is the water in it? You know, I know you know what I'm saying, it's that kind of thing. But um any thoughts or anything that with the conversation that's been happening?

SPEAKER_01 26:18

Well, just to clarify, I think there's a reason for that. I think it's a responsibility personally, this to me. But apologetics was something that I didn't care anything about for years. In fact, I was I literally said to myself, you know what Paul says, the gospel is the power of God to save man. So I mean all that stuff's irrelevant. And that I think that was an ill-advised way of thinking for me. And at some point in time, it occurred to me that where Peter says, you know, be ready to defend the faith, to give good reason for why you believe what you believe. I realized, oh, that's apologetics. That's that's what that is. And I think to your point where I mentioned where I made the comment of seeing things on the internet, it's not so much me googling stuff, it's where I read I read comments. I'm more comment reader, like I just like to I like to gauge the temperature of the society, and I think the comment sections on any post is where you can understand what people are thinking, and so I'll see the stuff pop up. It is, it's it's very concerning a lot of times, but I'll see stuff pop up on Twitter. Um, you know, so just one example, the popular thing going around as well, the such and such translation. I think it's the NIV, I don't know which one it is. They took out what you know, these types only come out with prayer and fasting. They've taken the and fasting out because the notation seems to say it might not have been an original, it seemed to be a redaction, and so it's gone. And so people are all been out of shape. And that's just an example. So I go read the comments, see what are people's understanding of this subject, and how how important is it to them? And the two things that I take away is one, when I think about this subject, it is from an apologetic standpoint, and the people that are actually my concern that have my heart in it aren't the believers, it's not it's not us, uh, it's the unbeliever because the enemy's using confusion at every turn that he can to just get people farther from where they need to be. And you just said it, you know, all of the accepted translations, they all boil down at the same point. Jesus was crucified on our behalf and was raised from the dead on the third day. And so, you know, as far as the believer goes, I hold that same slogan you said at the beginning. Just read whatever translation you'll read. Um, but if it's if it is of concern to you, then my other thing would be, and this is part of the problem, the people with the little blue book, which I didn't know about, but I think that that's the flip side of the coin that becomes an issue is when people get so bent on a particular translation. A lot of times, especially the average Joe, you you may not even be aware of how these things are composed. It's very complex. There's a lot of moving parts, it's not simple. To me, that makes it more supernatural in the reality that we have what we have. It's not it's not as simple as people would like to make it. And if you're that concerned about it, then read all of them. I I from day one, nobody told me to think this. In fact, I was told only to read the King James, if I'm being honest, but that didn't sit well with me. So I you know started there, but then pick up other translations and read them, and you may be amazed at what you find and read those little notations that are down there because they're they give explanation for those things you may be confused about. And I've told you this, but I found the uh New English translation, the net Bible a few years back, and I really like it. And the reason why I like it is because they have 66,000 plus remarks in this thing of why that committee of translators, there's there's committees per book, yeah. So there's 66, there's committees per book, and um they give you the notations of when they made a decision on a translation while they did it. Over 66,000 notations. So if you're into all of that, pick one of those up and and read it.

SPEAKER_04 30:04

Yeah, yeah. I made a remark about the NIV, but actually, I I actually have a copy of the NIV right here in my hand. So I'm not a I'm not anti-NIV. Some people call it the nearly inspired version. But you know, again, at least it's inspired. But uh one of the things that, you know, from a scriptural standpoint, what Artie talked about, what Sammy just said, is I often think about what Jude said in the third verse. He said, Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt compelled to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to God's holy people. And, you know, there was a reason why even Jude was told in writing this because he said certain individuals whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in amongst you. And they're ungodly people who pervert the grace of God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ are our only sovereign and Lord. And you know, there's a word that is often heard, but a lot of people don't understand what that looks like, but the word is apostasy. And Jude was writing about the apostasy, and I think the reason why these translations, I and I've you know, I've got a bunch of translations, I've got too many. If you talk to my wife, she she gets after me about my library, and uh, but I've got a lot of different translations. I've just always found it fascinating to acquire translations, and I love the way that certain things are framed up so it helps my understanding. And again, you the best Bible to read is the one that you're getting something out of. And you know, if you knew something that's just lacking or it's in part, then get the parts that aren't lacking out of that and get something else that supplies and serves your life and your need to grow in Christ. But what Artie has been sharing about the last couple of weeks, and then what Sammy has just added to, you know, I I think this this is so valuable today. I think I think it's valuable, I think it's worth something. And um, you know, there's so many ways people can access things. And I mean, on my bi on my phone, I have a Bible app and I like my Bible app, but I st I don't like it enough that I'm gonna do away with my hard copy. You know, I tell people all the time, I said, I can't highlight the same way as I can with my hard copy. And people ask me about all the magic markers I carry in my Bible, and um, but but the truth is I like the hard copy, I love my Bible app. When I'm sitting in the car and something comes to me that I've read in my hard copy and I want to find that verse, I'll I'll real quickly look it up in my Bible app. And I'll mark mark that down and I'll go back and look it up in my hard copy. So there are a variety of ways, but the real valuable thing I think is a walk away and a takeaway from this, is you gotta you gotta have something you're gonna read. If you just have it and you lay it on the bed, you lay it on the bed sand table, you lay it behind, you know, on the back in the bathroom, or you lay it over here on the table beside your lazy boy or whatever, and you never open it, you never take the time to pursue and and and find value and worth in it, you're missing out on what God's intended purpose and plan for your life is. And you'd be amazed how he can speak to your heart. You'll be amazed how he can convince you with something from his word, and you're not even thinking about it, and all of a sudden the Holy Spirit, because you're genuinely born again. You know what I'm saying? Sammy said something a minute ago. He said, you know, there were a lot of things oversimplified for him when he was younger, when he first came in. And I was told the same thing. You know, the only good translation was the King James, and they used to say, if it's good enough for Paul, it's good enough for me. Well, I realized Paul didn't have the King James Version, that didn't come to the 1600s.

SPEAKER_03 34:46

You know, going back to the example, the the very verse Sammy's talking about, this kind comes forth only by prayer and fasting. The big argument comes, well, and and they'll in in the comments, they'll say, Well, well, the oldest manuscripts or the best manuscripts don't have fasting. Says who? You know, and and and but that's that same philosophy I'm talking about, where older is better, shorter in that case is better, because fasting would be longer. Whereas Arthur Farsted, Zane Hodges would look at that and say, What do the majority of the text say? That's right. And that's what you probably ought to leave in there and just leave it like that. Is there anything heretical about prayer and fasting? No, so let's just leave this alone. But no, we're gonna have a major argument on the internet about that and all of the comments that are there.

SPEAKER_04 35:44

Yeah, well, that's that's uh and you know, and the other thing too, and and you've said this a lot of times already when you've been teaching, is there are a lot of places that we have the word the Holy Spirit's able to take that and make it alive to us. But the arguments a lot of times that people argue over, nobody in the room was there.

SPEAKER_02 36:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 36:05

You know, you better go with what the word says and what the Spirit of Christ in you is trying to convince you of or correct you on or comfort you with, than actually making in an argument and taking, you know, making in a fight with everybody.

SPEAKER_03 36:24

And you know, even if if there are any academics out there that are gonna watch what I just said today, they're gonna be all upset. They're gonna think I'm a fool or that that I'm I'm making fun of things, or I'm I'm calling these people bad names, or I'm saying I'm not doing any of that. Uh what I'm just saying is it it it it you can't use this stuff as a weapon to try to destroy people. And unfortunately, there are the very people you read about in Jude there that are apostates that want to go out and keep people from getting saved, keep them from faith, keep them from believing. And they'll cast doubt on the Bible or doubt, you know, just all of that stuff happens. And uh and the bottom line, it is the simplicity and the foolishness of preaching that saves people. Jesus died for you, he loves you, he was raised from the dead, he proved he was the son of God by doing that. And if you believe in him, you can go to heaven and not go to hell. You know, I mean, it is it and and that that changes lives. So I I uh but you know, it it so if there are any academic folks out there, just don't throw rocks at me, it's okay. But they will. They just get so upset about all this. You know, I don't care. I I you know, and and I and I don't mean that in a bad way, but it's you know, I no, I Jesus loves me and I'm okay. You know.

SPEAKER_04 37:49

Well, and and listen, I know both you brethren, and as far as I'm concerned, you're both awesome guys. And um, hey Sammy, uh, would you uh have any more comments or you want to close us in prayer? No, no, close it.

SPEAKER_01 38:09

Thank you for the Bible. The Bible's a tremendous document, yes, and very well attested. I think it's uh remarkable that we have what we have, whatever translation it may be. Thank you. And there there are a variety. Just ask that you just give us wisdom and understanding to understand your word and what it's supposed to mean and what it's supposed to accomplish in our life, and that it can be applicable to all of us, that we can benefit from the richness of what it offers, because it is tremendous. So thank you for the people that you inspired to pennant throughout all the years long ago and preserve it for us to this day in all the different languages that it's there. So help us to have wisdom in how we handle all of that. Thank you for this podcast. Thank you for Pastor Lonnie and Dr. Artie and the Lamb's Chapel Ministry. Just ask that you bless this as it goes out as well in Jesus' name.

SPEAKER_04 38:58

Amen. Hey, and thank you, Michaela, for being the producer. Seriously, leave this in there too. Being the producer behind the scenes and even helping us in so many ways. We we love all you guys and thank you. A life worth living is a life worth giving. God bless, you know.