Okay. All right. Welcome all of you here for the examination for eldership for James. I've never seen a group of people more excited about an examination in my life. I'm not sure if you're like that when you get tested. But anyway, so I wanted to share a short devotion of what we're doing and why we're doing it in this manner before we get started.

We are an elder-run church. We believe that it is the most biblical model that we see in scripture. And I know that it's not the only model that the churches use. But we've come to the conviction that that's the model that we see in scripture. And that's the model that we've been practicing for many, many years.

And we have no intentions of changing that. Because it is an elder-run church, we have to make sure that the people who are in leadership are people that understand the weightiness of what it means to be an elder. And so not only do we want the elders in the church to understand that, we want to make sure that the church understands that.

So we want to make sure that the testing, again, you know, we were kind of going back and forth of whether we should do this publicly or not. When we did it the first time with the, you know, elders that we have, we did it publicly because our church was very small.

And we wanted the, for the same reason. And I was the one who tested the three of them. And so they were three. And it was in a small room. And how many of you were here for the first time when we did that? So it's only a handful of you, probably less than 15 of you, less than 10, 15 of you.

So majority were not there. So they also went through the same thing. Except this time it's just James by himself. So we thought it would be too much pressure. And, but again, he was up for it. So if he's up for it, let's do it. You know? And so initially we were thinking about doing it just kind of, it's just a small group upstairs.

Maybe we're thinking 40, 50 people. And then the number started growing to 90. And then people were asking. So I said, okay, we're not going to fit up there. So we chose to do it down here. I want to share in Titus chapter 1, 5 through 10. It says, "For this reason I left you in Crete, that you would set in order what remains and appoint elders in every city as I directed you." If you notice in verse 5, he says, Paul is sending Timothy back to Crete.

And he says, "To set in order what remains." What remains, meaning unfinished business. So Apostle Paul went and he preached the gospel. And there were Christians already there. But he said the work is not finished. And so in order to finish the work, he says, "I appoint, go back and appoint elders in every city as I directed you." In other words, the church is not established until the elders are established.

So Paul's intent in every city that he goes is to establish the church. And the church wasn't complete until they had proper elders there to be able to govern the shepherd and to teach the group. And if you notice, he uses the elders in plural. He doesn't say establish an elder, but establish elders in the church.

And so that's what we do in the church. We establish elders. And as our church grows, you know, people ask, "We have such a big church. How come we only have so many elders?" Because eldership isn't something you appoint out of necessity. You know, we don't establish elders because we have 500, so we need 15.

So let's get the next 14 people in here and we plug them in. Because you make a mistake in eldership, it unravels the church. So it's better to have less elders than to have elders that we are not confident in. And so that's part of the reason why we've been very, very, very slow in establishing elders.

So we want to make sure that we are taking that seriously. In verse 7, you know, there's a bunch of qualifications that we can look at, right? And the point of that this afternoon is not to go through every single one. But he says in verse 7 that this man, obviously above reproach, but not self-willed nor quick-tempered.

And I just want to highlight quickly. When he says not self-willed, self-willed meaning that you don't become an elder because you desire and you look for and you shoot for it. And you've done certain things and maneuvered and then so you got noticed. And how come I'm not an elder?

And so the elder must not be self-willed. This is not something that he wants for worldly or selfish reasons. Also, he must not be quick-tempered. Quick-tempered meaning that in the context, because it's plurality of elders, it's meant to have discussions, right? It's meant to have conversations back and forth.

We are not going to have same opinions. We're going to have different opinions about certain things that we look at. Sometimes it's going to be strong, you know, opinions. And so the church is meant to be discussed among the elders. So if a man is quick-tempered and he doesn't know how to explain himself, he doesn't know how to have discussions of strong opposition without losing his temper.

And if you don't do it my way, you guys are all dummies and then you explode the group. It could ruin the church. So this man must be able to speak his mind, to have strong opinions, and yet learn how to be able to be gracious in the context of difference of opinions.

He says he, this man in verse 9, needs to be able to hold fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teachings so that he will be able to both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict. So the part of this testing is, the purpose of it is to make sure that every elder in our church is able to handle the Word of God accurately so that the opinions and the discussions that we have are not, well, this is what I think.

Well, I'm older than you. Well, I have this degree, you know, or I have that. And we don't want that to be the main reason why we have discussion. When we have differences of opinion, it has to be because of what we see in Scripture. So we need to make sure that every elder in the church is able to argue in the context of interpreting Scripture.

So they need to know, right? They need to know and be able to handle from Genesis to Revelation. They need to be able to recognize false doctrine and not only to recognize it and say, "Hey, Pastor Peter, there's something bad going on in there. Why don't you talk to them?" Every elder needs to be able to sit that person down and say, "These are what's wrong," and go through the Scripture and rebuke and refute them to protect the church.

So the elder is not only to govern the church, to shepherd the church, but also to protect the church. And so, again, more elders who are able to handle the Word of God and who understand what the Word of God says, it will add to ultimately what we're trying to establish in the church, what God is trying to establish in the church.

To exhort, to be able to teach sound doctrine, to refute those who contradict what we know. So let me just give you a broad outline of what we asked him to do. So beginning of last year, we asked to confirm if there was any strong opposition in the church to establish, you know, possibly add him as a candidate as eldership in the church.

We had basically 99% approval in the church and with some concerns of certain things. And so, again, we've scrutinized, we've talked to him in a lot of details, and I'm going to go over that in the part of the testing. And so we've dealt with certain things that came up, certain things that we already knew.

Certain things that we wanted to bring to light to see, make sure that he understand to what degree. And again, some of that is going to come up in the discussion because the testing isn't simply about knowledge. The majority of it is about can he handle the Word of God.

But also, we want them to be aware, and we want you to know that we weren't just dealing with knowledge. If the position of eldership is important to this degree that we would test a man publicly to know the Word of God to this degree, we also want you to understand that his character and certain things that we may have had concerns, certain things that you may have noticed, that we took that very, very seriously, right?

If for any reason there was a blind spot, we wanted to make sure. And so we've dealt with how he deals with people, dealing with money, both his public and private life at home. And so there are a lot of things that we've kind of walked through with James in the past year.

And even in the last year, I can honestly say just from personally meeting with him that he's examined himself carefully. And even in the last year, there's been -- that we've noticed progress, you know. And there's been times I've sat in front of James literally in tears, just broken over his sins, broken over his mistakes, that he really wants to improve and recognizing what it means to be an elder in the church.

And so I want you to be aware of that. It says in 1 Timothy 3, 6 that he must not be a new convert or else he falls into the temptation of the devil. Again, we don't take this lightly because becoming a leader makes it difficult to serve the church.

It doesn't help because when the spotlight is on that person, there is that temptation to be concerned about what people think, right, naturally, because there's more people looking at that person. So if a brand new convert or somebody who's young who can't handle that can easily get to their head, either become overly concerned about criticism or overly concerned about praise.

And so all of these things have been considered in the context of preparing and getting him ready, okay. So we're going to get into the testing portion of it, but I want you to know that because of time constraint, obviously, we're not going to be able to answer, ask every question that we ask him to prepare.

But basically know this, we basically asked him that from Genesis to Revelation, if we pick any chapter in the Bible that he needs to be able to give us an outline, tell us what's in there. He needs to be able to know the chronological order of all the events in the Old Testament and the New Testament.

He needs to be able to refute any doctrine that we hold and any false doctrines that may be going around, and so we need to prepare for all of that. So basically, the parameters, there were probably no parameters, right. So basically, when he asked what should I study, basically, we said everything.

And then as he was studying, we kind of narrowed it down, saying like, okay, now you can narrow it down to this, and then we gave him, you know, three months out, you know, focus on this, and then three weeks out, we tell him to focus on this, and so that's how we got here, right.

So we're going to choose different parts of it, and it's going to take about an hour, okay, or we're thinking it's going to take an hour, or a little bit less than that, and we hope that's what we're shooting for. So the format of what we're going to do is we're going to have the Old Testament portion, New Testament portion, and the theological portion, right.

And so Elder Joe is going to handle the Old Testament portion. He's going to be asking the question. Elder Philip is going to be asking the New Testament questions, and I will be asking him the theological questions, okay. So my portion of it is going to be a certain point, and then at the very end, I'm going to ask him some personal stuff, okay, that he could not prepare for, right.

So, and I told him that. There's going to be part of the examination where there's no preparation he's going to get ready for it, okay. So just in case it wasn't tough enough, we made it a little bit tougher, okay. So I'm going to ask James to come up.

I'm going to ask the elders to come up, and we're going to get started. All right. What he has up there is not cheat sheets. It's a blank piece of paper, okay. Just in case. Is that on? >> Good evening, Brother James. So we'll kind of jump right into it.

So as you well know, I'm going to be asking you questions about the Old Testament. So with that, we'll start from the beginning. Can you go ahead and outline the major storylines in the book of Genesis, highlighting the specific chapters that they encompass? So that might be a drawn-out question, but if you need more details, you can ask me.

>> With respect to Genesis in chapters one and two, you have creation, God taking disorder. >> Can you talk into the mic? >> Thank you. >> Am I not using it? >> Yeah. >> Can you guys hear me? >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> With respect to the book of Genesis, you have God creating disorder from disorder.

He goes through the creation of all and then into mankind, and then you see the fall. After the fall, excuse me, and then in chapter three, that's one and two, and then in chapter three, you have the fall. You have Satan come in the form of a serpent. He deceives first Eve and then Adam, and after that, you see the results of the fall.

Man is at that point going to work from the sweat of his brow. There will be enmity between Adam and Eve and from henceforth, man and woman. Eve would experience pain through childbirth. However, in Genesis 3.15, you have the proto-evangelion. You have God promising that he would one day crush Satan, but that he would also inflict damage by striking the heel.

>> James, James. >> All right. For the sake of time. >> Okay. >> Okay. Yeah. That would, it's going to take forever. >> Okay. >> So give us a. >> I can go quicker. >> Yeah. >> I can go quicker. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Yeah, okay. All right.

>> Okay. One and two, three, we have the fall, and then four, you have Abel came and then Telemach. Then you have from, and then in six, you have the Nephilim, six to nine, you have the flood. Chapter nine through 11, you see the rise of Babylon, the fall.

Chapter 12, you have the hinge story of Abraham. From 12 to 25, you have the journeys of Abraham with respect to 15 and 17, credited as righteousness. Respect to 12 and 20, his falling. Chapter 16, you have him going into Hagar. After that, from 25 to 36, you have the story of Isaac and Jacob.

Most pronounced in that is in chapter 27, you have Jacob deceiving. From 29 to 31, you have Jacob being deceived by Laban. And then in 32, you have Jacob wrestling with God. From 37 to 50, you see the story of Joseph and his brothers. In chapter 37, he has a dream.

He unknowingly prophesizes. He is imprisoned. And after that, from 39 to 41, he's imprisoned. 41 to 46, you see him elevated. In Genesis 49, you see Jacob giving the prophecy that the star would come from the tribe of Judah. The Messiah would come from the tribe of Judah. I can't go into more detail, but you're asking for a broad outline, so.

>> Hi, James. >> Hi. >> All right. Let's go straight into it. Give me the outline of the book of Acts with in mind Acts 1-8 and how. Can you describe how it is fulfilled in the book of Acts as it progresses? >> I'm sorry. You said give you an outline of the book of Acts and you said something about 1-8?

>> Yeah, Acts 1-8 and how that is fulfilled throughout the book of Acts. >> 1 through 8? >> No, no, no. Acts chapter 1, verse 8. >> Yeah, as Jesus is ascending, he said, you know, go there. >> Oh, okay, okay. >> Yeah, don't. >> Okay, so you want, if I understand this correctly, you want the progression, correct?

The progression of the main characters through the book of Acts? >> Spreading of the gospel in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria to the remotest part of the world, outlined in the book of Acts. >> Okay, so in the book of Acts, you start off with Christ being described as being on earth for 40 days and then he ascends.

So you see this picture of anticipation of the Holy Spirit coming. Matthias is chosen in the end of chapter 1. In chapter 2, you have the Holy Spirit actually coming in power. There's wind, there's fire, and they're speaking of different languages. Once that happens, Peter gives an explanation and sermon pursuant to the Holy Spirit coming.

He explains the purpose of the Holy Spirit coming. He invites baptism and repentance and then baptism. And then after that in chapter 3, you have Peter healing a lame man. And then he gives a second sermon in Solomon's portico. In chapter 4, Peter and John are arrested, told to no longer speak in his name.

And then afterwards, the church is told of this. They pray for boldness. They share everything. In chapter 5, you have Ananias and Sapphira lying to the Holy Spirit and because of that being judged. And once again, the apostles are arrested. They're freed by an angel. They're told to go back again to the very people that they were freed from.

And because they were ordered not to speak in his name, they were going to be executed, but Gamaliel stays the execution. And then in chapter 5, in chapter 6, you have Stephen being chosen as one of the seven deacons. And after that, the later part of Acts chapter 6 is devoted to Stephen and his wisdom and his miracles.

And it specifically says that due to his wisdom and his miracles, he was seized. In chapter 7, he gives a response to that, right? And he goes from Abraham to Solomon. The content of his sermon is from Abraham to Solomon. And the point of his sermon is that the prior, your fathers were stiff-necked and so you are also stiff-necked.

And he has a heart and then he is martyred. There's a little footnote, not a footnote, but there's a verse at the end where it says that Saul approved of this. In chapter 8, you see Saul ravaging the church. His persecution is continuing. Despite that, you see the church thriving because you see Philip going to Samaria.

And there's a parenthesis portion where you see Simon the magician, he believes, but then he wants it for gain. And so because of that, he asks to pay to have the power of the spirit. He's... >> Yeah, a little bit broader. >> Okay, a little bit broader. Okay. All right, a little bit broader.

So then in chapter... A little bit broader than that. Okay. Sorry. Okay. In chapter 10, you have the vision of Peter having a vision, neck coming down, and it happening three times where he's told to eat because God has now made a queen. Then he goes, visits Cornelius' house.

Cornelius' house receives the Holy Spirit. And after that, you see Peter right after that in chapter 11 telling the circumcision. He's telling the circumcision, "Hey, look, the Holy Spirit came upon this family. They received the Holy Spirit just like we received the Holy Spirit." Now, what's noteworthy is that in Acts 2, when the Holy Spirit came upon different individuals, they were men from different lands.

However, they were God-fearing Jews because they had came for the festival, right? They came for Pentecost, so they were already God-fearing. This is different, right? This is different, right? They were not proselytized into the Jewish faith. Cornelius and his family, although they are God-fearing believers, they weren't on the same level as these Jewish proselytes, but the Holy Spirit comes on them.

So right after that, Peter has to explain to them, "Hey, look, the Holy Spirit fell on them," right? And then after that in chapter 12, chapter 13 to 15, you have the missionary, first missionary journey of Paul, Paul and Barnabas. And then the second missionary journey occurs in 15 to 18, the third in 18 to 21.

What's noteworthy is that with respect to Acts 15, you have the Jerusalem Council. And then up to that point, right before Acts 15, right, you have Acts chapter 8, where Philip is going to Samaria and preaches to the Ethiopian eunuch. You have Acts chapter 10 and 11, like I just described, where the Holy Spirit fell on Cornelius and his family.

And so you have a Jewish sect coming in, and they're saying, "They must first be circumcised according to the custom of Moses." And so the question arose, "Do you first need to become Jewish to be a Christian?" And on top of that, "If you're Christian, do you need to conform to the custom of Moses?" And that's dealt with in Acts chapter 15, right?

In Acts chapter 15, what happens is Peter explains what happened with respect to Acts chapter 10 and 11, that he saw the Holy Spirit. And then James, the Lord's brother, also says, "They should not bear a yoke that our fathers could not bear." A little bit broader. So following the outline of Jerusalem, right?

And so you've explained how that has transitioned into the Gentiles and then Samaria. So if you can just give us a broad outline, because we want to get to the other questions too, about how the progression of the gospel. Sure. And then I'll skip to, I think what's noteworthy are the missionary journeys.

You see Paul going to, depending on which missionary journey, first Lystra, Pergamum, Antioch, Iconium, Cyprus, and the last is Lystra. And after that, with respect to a second missionary journey, you see Paul going back to Derbe and Lystra, Philippi in Macedonia. And then you see him go to Thessalonica, Berea, and then what's noteworthy is Athens, right?

Because in Athens, he's preaching to the philosophers in the marketplace. And so now, in the first missionary, Paul said, "You know what? I'm going to give up. I'm going to go to the Gentiles." He already said that, but he was still going to the synagogues. Here, you see him actually going to a predominantly Gentile city that was the epicenter of Gentile influence, specifically Greek and Roman, well, Greek philosophy at the time.

I'm not sure if that's what you're looking for, but okay. Alright, here's a theological question. What is the primary distinction between covenant theology and dispensational theology, and why is this important for the average Christian? I think to explain the primary difference, one needs to understand, at least with respect to its definition, right?

Both are gridlocks, grids to view the Bible. One views the Bible a certain way. Covenant theology views the Bible a certain way. Dispensational theology views the Bible a different way. Covenant views it based on a major covenant, and then subordinate covenants under that. Dispensational theology views the Bible as God working progressively and through different ways throughout times.

Generally speaking, there's different levels. There's classical, and there's progressive. And even within covenant theology, they might differ on certain fine points. But generally, that's how they kind of view each other. So, the bottom line difference, because you're viewing one pursuant to a covenant, and one pursuant to God working, for the most part, in different ways throughout different times, the primary difference becomes a hermeneutic.

Because you're looking at something specifically through a covenant, God is working this way, and one, you're not. He's just working, right? So what ends up happening is, with covenant theologians, I'll fast forward a little bit. With covenant theologians, what they will say is, "All the promises to national Israel have now been disinherited and are now fulfilled in Christ." And they say that because of their framework.

Dispensational theologians will not say that. They'll say, "The promises with respect to the nation of Israel are still binding, and they will occur." So, you have in Isaiah 49, for example, where God says, "You're the new Israel." Peter says the same thing, "We are the new Israel." And so they take those verses and say, "Therefore, we're the new Israel." And covenant theologians, the other argument is, throughout time, God has, in essence, at many times, disinherited a majority of the population, hence the term "remnant." He always says "remnant." But where that fails, in my opinion at least, I'm sorry there isn't a covenant theologian here, but I'm trying to be objective here.

The portion where that fails is that the promises were specifically to the nation of Israel. And so, if you want to talk about some of the promises, right? Isaiah 49 to 55, with respect to the coming of the Messiah, and then at the end, with respect to the second coming.

You want to talk about Hosea 3 and Hosea 14. You want to talk about Joel 3. You want to talk about Malachi 4. You want to talk about Obadiah, the last verses of Obadiah. You want to talk about Amos 9. These are all promises, Zechariah 12 to 14. These are all promises to the nation of Israel that a physical kingdom will be set up.

So if you're a covenant theologian, your thinking is, because the nation of Israel has been disinherited, now we have Jesus. The promises are fulfilled in him. So if we skip to Revelation 20, and this is where the biggest difference is. If you skip to Revelation 20, the millennial kingdom is happening now.

That's what they typically say. If you're a covenant theologian, a faithful one, you're going to say, "I'm either amillennial or postmillennial." Postmillennialism has kind of fallen out the wayside, but you're an amillennial. So the kingdom is here, and it's now, and we can bring it in, and Jesus is reigning.

The dispensational theologist will say, "It's already, but not yet." He's reigning in one sense, but he will reign another sense in a physical way. So I want you to now speak to a college student who's sitting there. What does that mean to me? Why is it important to them?

To the college student? And explain it to a college student. All right. Not that you guys, you know what I mean. I need to look at a college student. Caleb, all right. So I'm looking at you, Caleb. So, Caleb, the reason it's important is because-- The reason it's important is because when you come to the Word of God, right, you want to have a high view of the Word of God.

And one of the prerequisites to having a high view of the Word of God is the following. Do I believe God said this? Do I believe God said this? In my opinion, when you hear God saying certain promises to the nation of Israel and you say that they are inherited, they're fulfilled in Christ, then essentially what you're saying is, "Well, I guess he didn't really say that.

I guess he didn't really say that." And then you have this overflow. If he didn't really mean that, if he didn't really say that, what does that say for your salvation? He saved you no matter what you did. But if you're really bad like Israel, he might disinherit you if you're really bad.

That's what it essentially means because if you're saying because of their disobedience that Israel was disinherited, then why can't I be disinherited? That's Romans 11. Romans 11 says, "Hey, look, don't get--" I'm speaking to a college student. "Don't get uppity." Right? Romans 11 says, "Don't get uppity." Right? Because if the natural branches weren't saved, why are you going to be saved?

That's Romans 11. Right? And so when you hear that, subconsciously in your mind, the promises of God are there, but they're not really there. Right? "Oh, he can save me no matter what I do." He can't really save me from what I did. But if you don't take that view, if you take the view that God did say what he actually said, then the realm of salvation becomes a little bit more multidimensional.

You do need to be holy, right? And you are going to fail, but at the same time, the Holy Spirit inside you, that seal, is a deposit guaranteeing your inheritance. I think if you're a covenant theologian, I don't think you can consistently advocate that point of view because if you say that Israel was disinherited, then I'm no different.

And that's Romans 11. Okay, thank you. Now you got it? Okay. Okay, we won't go through a long list of a whole book. We'll talk about the cities of refuge in numbers. Can you name all of the cities and the requirements given in numbers, what chapters, regarding the rules and regulations regarding the cities of refuge?

Okay. The cities of refuge are six cities that are equal distance from the various other cities, and they're cut in half, east and west, from the Sea of Jordan. You have Kadesh, Ramoth, Gilead-- Hold on. Shechem, Bezir, Hebron, Kadesh, Ramoth, Gilead-- I forgot one. It's Golan. Golan, yeah, Golan.

Golan, Ramoth, Gilead, and Bezir are east of the Jordan. Kadesh, Shechem, and Hebron are west of the Jordan. Sorry, I just want to make sure I got that right. Never each heard of each. East and west of the Jordan. They were equal distances from the Levitical cities. They were primarily designed for safety.

If there was an unintentional killing, a killing without malice aforethought, right? Involuntary manslaughter. You're chopping wood in the forest, you've got your axe, and then your blade falls off and you kill some dude. You didn't mean to do it, right? Now, that doesn't mean a lot to the daughter, to the son, or to the husband.

It doesn't mean anything, right? So the avenger of blood, he's going to come after you, like pretty much anyone else would do. So because there was no malice aforethought, God viewed that differently from murder with malice aforethought. So you can go to these cities that were set on a hill.

You would come there. There would be a trial put on by an elder. Depending on the result of the trial, let's say you stay in, you can stay there until the death of the high priest. Now, you had to stay there. If you left before the death of the high priest, the avenger of blood can come and get you.

But once the high priest has passed away, you can then go down and you can live your life again. That's in Numbers 35. So what is the significance of that in the New Testament? You think about the equal distance from the city, right? We all have access to Christ now, all of us, regardless of race, religion, age, or creed, we all have access to him.

It was a city on a hill. Everybody could see it. This wasn't, you know, Lothlorien and Misty Wood. I mean, like, you know, you didn't have to, like, get out a map and go look for it. You knew, everyone knew where they were because they were a city on a hill, right?

On top of that, you committed a sin that you didn't even know you committed. You're chopping wood and axing and flies off, kills some dude. You didn't know. But now you're made aware of it. I mean, it's a big deal, don't get me wrong, right? But now you're made aware of it.

Now you're unnoticed of it, right? There's refuge for you. You humbly admit your sin. You sinned. You might not have meant to kill them, but you still killed them, right? You could have used a different ax. You could have done something, right? But you chose to use that ax.

You were negligent, but there's still hope for you. There's still hope for you. What's interesting is that your life is intertwined with the high priest, right? So you go down before the death of the high priest, you're on your own, right? And that's a clear picture of Christ. You go outside of Christ, you're on your own.

You're on your own. The death of the high priest, obviously Jesus doesn't die. That was a pragmatic thing, but with respect to the symbolism involved. Can you mention something about the roads that led to the cities of refuge? Oh, sorry. They were clear and they were paved. They were clear and they were paved.

They were equal distance. Everyone could see it. Nothing else has gone on my mind. So all the best roads in Israel were the roads that led to the cities of refuge. Yes. All pointing to our way to Christ. Right. So in order to speed it up, let's try to give a condensed version.

Okay. I'll truncate my answers. Okay. Give us a chronological order of the letters written in the New Testament to the best of your ability, understanding that there are some controversies as to some of the books, but to the best of your ability as you understand it, a chronological order of how the books were written.

New Testament. Okay. Can you give them a little bit more condensed? Just the Paul's epistles. You want me to write it all off? Yeah. I can write all of it off. Let's go. For the sake of time. Yeah, let's just limit it to the Paul's epistles. Can you do that?

Sure. Is that a little bit harder? I still need to write it in my head. Okay. It will take the same amount of time, but 1 and 2 Thessalonians, Galatians, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Romans, Philippians, Colossians, Philemon, Ephesians, 1 Timothy, Titus, and then 2 Timothy. That's it. That's it.

Yeah. That's it. He didn't write John. All right. Okay. Good. What is the role of the law in the Christian life in the new covenant? And why is this important to the college student? Do you want me to answer as I'm speaking to college students, Pastor Peter? Yes. Okay.

Caleb, where are you at? I think it's tempting as a Christian because tempting to think of the law as less important than, let's say, the Gospels or the epistles of Paul. And the reason it's tempting to do that is because in our minds, well, it's fulfilled. Why would I want and why would I need to know something that's already been fulfilled?

The first thing I would say to that is the law is scripture. The law is scripture. And all scripture is profitable for correcting, reproof, teaching, training, and righteousness. It might not be in that order, but all scripture is profitable for that. Psalm 19, David says, "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul or reviving the soul, depending on which version you're using." But before the New Testament is written, the psalmist is saying, "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting or reviving the soul." Now, we might not normally think of the Ten Commandments as reviving my soul.

But in 1 Peter 1, we're called to live holy. Also in Leviticus, obviously, but we're called to live holy. Well, what does that mean? What does that exactly mean? And you can see in the Book of Liberty. You can see that in the Book of Leviticus. You want to know about God's care for the—as we learned about today— God's care for the widow, the orphan, the immigrant, the poor.

Read Leviticus, but also read Deuteronomy. Read Deuteronomy 16 to 19 specifically. 19 to 26 as well. Also 16 to 19 specifically. You want to know about God's care for the temple, the church? Read 12 to 16. You want to know how God's people should live. How important it is that the symbolism that we take to the rest of the world as Christians is highly regarded, something by us should be highly regarded, because God values that.

Read Deuteronomy. Leviticus as well. But study the Old Testament, and you'll see a picture of that. It doesn't mean much to say, "Well, live holy," but you have no idea what that means. Say, "Well, live holy." Okay. I'll give an example here. In India, the pastors, after they're converted, some of them continue to beat their wives.

And now you and I might be like, "That's crazy. Why would you continue to beat your wife?" That's not even the realm of thinking here. But because their culture is so steeped in that, in order to put their women in their place, in order to teach them, they beat them.

Now, obviously, once you come to Christ, even before that, objectively you can't do that. But especially as a Christian, that's not something you can do. And instead of judging them, if you want to see God's care for all people, you study the law. If you want to see what God means by being holy, then you'll see it right there.

That's, I guess, in summation what I would say. Okay. Okay, kind of a softball one here. Since we've been going through Leviticus, can you go ahead and go through the five major offerings commanded in Leviticus and their significance? Sure. We have the whole and the burnt, the grain and the meal, the Thanksgiving or the peace or the fellowship.

I'm using those as AKAs. We have the sin, and last we have the guilt, the trespass, the restitution, depending on how you say it. The sin or whole burnt offering is typically the offering that starts it up, so to speak. But the whole thing is burnt. Everything is given to the Lord.

In the grain and meal offering--and that was a bull, ram, or dove. In the grain and meal offering, it was supposed to be seasoned without leaven and with some salt. In the fellowship offering, that was given when you want to make peace with your fellow man. And so that signifies peace with God and also peace with man.

The sin offering, it was typically for unintentional sin you committed and then you made a wear off. And the restitution offering was the only offering that you could actually pay someone, and it was 1/5 or 20%. What you owe, obviously, on top of that 1/5 or 20%. So why are you certain that the 27 books of the New Testament is authoritative and final?

Answer as if you're answering a skeptic. College. Okay. This is going to take a little bit of time. I'll try to be fast. When you think about the New Testament documents, you think of documents from the ancient Near East thousands of years ago. How can they be true? There was nothing digital back then, so how can we have faith that the New Testament documents are what they exactly are?

You can have faith for various reasons. Number one, now there are over 6,000 documents with respect to the New Testament. You said the New Testament, right? Okay. With respect to the New Testament manuscripts, there were 6,000 documents that are within 99.5% corroboration. Now that 0.5% is scrivener error, meaning it's notes error that doesn't have any substantial change to the actual meaning of the text.

Now, you might look at that and say, "Cool story," right? But if I were to come to you, right, if I were to come to you, and I teach this in BCC, but if I were to come to you and ask you, "Did Homer write the Odyssey?" You would say yes.

Anyone would say yes. "Did Plato write the Republic?" Yes. "Did Homer write the Iliad?" Yes. There's never a time in high school when you read the Odyssey and the Iliad where you go, "Well, I got some scholarly concerns, AP English teacher," right? We're not sure if Homer wrote the Odyssey.

We're not sure if Homer wrote the Iliad. No one ever says that. It's accepted. It's accepted for good reason because there's copies of it, okay? So if you have 6,000 for the New Testament, in second place, you have the Iliad. The count is 497. 497, right? So if you are a person who believes in logic, if you say, "Well, I believe Homer wrote the Iliad based on the number of manuscripts," then by definition, you must believe that Matthew wrote the Gospel according to Matthew, Mark wrote the Gospel according to Mark, and so on.

Because the manuscripts are pale in comparison. The last thing I'll say is this because I want to truncate it, right? Anytime you want a myth to develop, historians will tell you, anytime you want a myth to develop, it takes about two generations. The reason it takes two generations for a myth to develop is the following.

Let's say Shantang, right? We want to create this cult, right? And in the cult, Shantang has wings, okay? Shantang has wings, and we all made a blood pact. We're going to believe this. Shantang has wings, okay? We're going to go out, and we're all going to say, "Shantang has wings," okay?

That's never going to work, right? The reason it's never going to work is because he's alive, right? And the fact that he's alive, you can go and you can corroborate. You can go to Shantang, examine his back, "Take off your shirt, bro. Do you have wings?" The dude doesn't have wings, right?

If you are removed two generations, if you are removed two generations, you make a myth about something where all the people that can verify the claims are now deceased, then a myth can develop. Then a falsity can develop. But when you look at--and that's the majority--excuse me, that's all of the other religions, right?

You go in a cave, and you found some wings. You go here, and I found some book, right? All by myself. All by myself about what happened hundreds or thousands of years ago. Christianity flourished in part because they said, "We saw the risen Christ. He was there. I ate with him.

He's walking right there. The brothers are still alive. Go ask him. Whatever you say, I'm not going to deny it because I saw him." This is the last thing I would say to a college student. If I had more time, I'd say more, but this is the last thing I'd say.

Even for something that is true, you might not die for it, let alone a lie. If something's false, you're not going to die for something that's false. Someone put a gun to my head, "Does Shantang have wings?" "No." I'm not going to die for that. But let's say, for instance, he did have wings.

Let's say it was true, and you put a gun to my head. I'm still not going to die for it because I don't want to die. That's the ultimate cross-examination. I don't want to die even if something is true. But the problem is Christianity flourished because it was true, and people were willing to die for it.

You're willing to die for something because it's true. That's the first prerequisite. You're not going to die for something that's false. It must at least be true. And if it's true, you've got to be convicted of it. Actually, as a follow-up, thanks for all that. The 27 books that we have-- Abinations and Council of Carthage?

Yeah, why the 27? Why couldn't it be more? Why couldn't it be less? Why is the 27 that we have-- are you certain that this is the final New Testament? Okay, in Ephesians 2.20, the foundation was the apostles and the prophets. Apostles and prophets--prophets not being the Old Testament prophets.

Apostles and prophets were the foundation of the New Testament. John 14, Jesus said before he leaves in the farewell discourse, he says, "I'm going to bring to mind things I told you." The Holy Spirit will tell you. John 16, he will bring to you all things regarding the truth.

All things will come. Jude 3, the faith has been delivered once and for all for the saints. Once and for all. And to a little bit more attenuated degree, Revelation 22. Don't add or detract from it. And so when you look at the formation of the canon, it was self-attesting, of course, because it was promised that it was self-attesting.

And just so, if you look at the New Testament books, every single book was written by an apostle or someone with a close association to an apostle. There's only five books that were written not by apostles, but with very close associations with them. And if we look at Athanasius' list, it's the ones we have today.

If we look at the Council of Carthage in 397, it's the ones we have today. And the councils did not happen. That list didn't happen. Well, you know, let's get together, let's figure this out. Those books were already confirmed, which is why at the Council of Carthage, they said these are the books, because that's what was known.

I can go into more detail, but I'm done. All right, that's good. Why is the doctrine of the Trinity so important? Why do we consider it heresy to believe in modalism or tritheism? The reason it's so important is because, number one, it's scripture. So let me define Trinity first.

God exists eternally as three persons, and God is one. He exists eternally as three persons, but God is one. Now, modalism and tritheism are on the opposite spectrums of that. I don't want to say in the middle, but scripture says three persons, yet one. Now, the dogma of the Trinity doesn't come because we don't like modalism or tritheism.

It comes because the scripture says so. You look at Psalm 45, "Therefore God, your God." What is he saying? Genesis 1, "Let us make man in our image," Elohim, the plural form. It doesn't mean three gods, but it's the plural, "Let us make man in our image." So already in the Old Testament, you see a picture of the Trinity, Isaiah 9.

Isaiah 9 says, "His name will be Emmanuel, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." Excuse me, "Wonderful Counselor." "Wonderful Counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." How can he be a wonderful counselor? How can he be mighty God? And how can he be the Prince of Peace? Psalm 110 says, "My Lord said to my Lord." How is my Lord speaking to my Lord?

How is that going on? And then when you come to the New Testament, you see something a little bit more specific. You see Jesus in the extended fire of discourse saying, "I'm going to go, and then you're going to see me." How is he going to go, and how are you going to see him again?

How is Christ in us? Colossians 1, Galatians 2.20, "I've been crucified, and Christ lives in me." How is Christ living in me if he's ascended to the Father? How can that be? Unless the doctrine of the Trinity is actually true. Acts 5, "You have not lied to men, but to God." It's talking about the Holy Spirit.

So, number one reason it's heresy is because Scripture teaches the doctrine of the Trinity. And I can go on about verses with respect to the Trinity. So, why is it so important that we get that right? Outside of the fact that Scripture teaches it. What is the ramification of getting that wrong?

Well, if you take modalism or tritheism. If you happen to believe in the doctrine of modalism, you say God appears in different forms. With respect to God appearing in different forms, at least in my mind, you have a Greek God. Someone who's fickle. Someone who just appears this way and appears a different way.

If you believe in tritheism, Deuteronomy 6.4, the Lord God is not one. He is three. The Lord God cannot be one because he is three. So, then now I'm a pantheist. Excuse me. I'm a polytheist. I'm a pantheist. I'm a polytheist now. I'm not a monotheist, right? I'm a pantheist.

But in order to avoid a fickle Greek God and a polytheistic Egyptian God, I believe in the Judeo-Christian God who is three yet one. Alright, good. What I was looking for is the way it affects how we understand the gospel. About justification, sanctification, glorification, our union with Christ. You don't need to get into all of that.

Yeah. Oh, I can talk about that. Okay, I know you can. Yeah, but don't do it right now. Alright. Joe. Can you please go through the Psalms and the Messianic chapters and verses if you know of regarding... Okay. I believe I know. Psalm 2a, God announced Christ to be his son.

Psalm 8-6, God will put all things under his feet. Psalm 16-10, will not leave his son's shoulders, he will rise from the dead. 22, 12-18, we see details of his crucifixion. 34-20, all his bones will be intact. 40, 48, Christ will come to do God's will. 41-9, Christ will be betrayed by a friend.

45-67, the throne will be eternal. 68-18, he will ascend into heaven. 109-8, the betrayer will be replaced. 110-4, priests forever according to the order of Melchizedek. And 118-26, he will come in the name of the Lord. You missed one, but it's okay. It's 69, Christ will be given vinegar and wine.

Oh yeah, 69. I'm sorry. 69-21. Good job. Are you holding up? Good. I want to die, but... Alright. I'll give you a quick one. What is the difference between the feeding of the 5,000 in all the Gospels, or not the Gospels, all the Gospels, and the feeding of the 4,000 only mentioned in Matthew and Mark?

So, in the feeding of the 5,000, and in the feeding of the, sorry, in the feeding of the 4,000, one thing of note is the location. In the feeding of the 5,000, it happens near the Sea of Galilee, the area of Bethsaida. In the feeding of the 4,000, it happens near the area of the Gerasenes, around the region of the Copolis.

In the feeding of the 5,000, you have five loaves, and after they are divided, there are 12 baskets left over. Five loaves, evocative of five books. Twelve loaves, evocative of twelve tribes. The area of Bethsaida primarily being Jewish. In the 4,000, you have seven loaves, seven basketballs left over, seven being evocative of creation, completion, that area being evocative of non-Jewish believers, or Jewish to mixed Jewish believers.

And so, you see a picture of God not only coming for the Jews, but also coming for the Gentiles. Okay, we're going to go back to the Old Testament. So, can you kind of walk us through the split of the kingdom of Israel and Judah into two, and who the kings were that were involved in that split, and can you also explain the sin of the Israelite king who initiated this split, and the after effects of his leadership, and what the Old Testament refers to as a great wrong?

So, the sin that you're referring to is the sin of Jeroboam. I'll start backwards. It's the sin of Jeroboam. Now, with respect to Rehoboam and Jeroboam, you see the split happening in 1 Kings 12. Now, before that, just to give a truncated example, there was always been Eminy, because going back to Rachel and Leah, right?

And then you see the tribe of Benjamin almost being wiped out at the latter portion of Judges. You fast forward a little bit, David had a tough time with the Benjamites, right? But he ultimately united them. That was fractured when you see Absalom take over. But once again, you have, at least prior to that, a united kingdom, Rehoboam being Solomon's son, right?

And in 1 Kings 11, Ahijah the prophet goes to Jeroboam and says, "Look, I'm going to give you the tent, right? I'm going to give you the tent, and the reason is because they were unfaithful." That's essentially the reason given in 1 Kings 11, right? So, Solomon hears about this, he tries to kill Jeroboam, he flees to Egypt, after the death of Solomon, he comes back, he goes to Rehoboam, he demands a lighter tax burden, because, like his father, he was heavily taxing the nation of Israel.

So, obviously, they weren't pleased with that. That's the political backdrop, so to speak. Obviously, we know that that's not the only thing because of 1 Kings 11. But, Jeroboam then takes ten, all the tribes besides Benjamin Judah, goes up north, sets up a system of worship in Dan and in Bethel.

And when he sets up a worship between Dan and Bethel, he sets up the golden calves, and says, "These are the gods that brought you out of Egypt." So, number one, you have a difference of location. They are no longer going to pilgrimage to Judah. Can you explain why he did that, why he set up those locations?

To consolidate power. To ultimately consolidate power. I'm not sure if that's what you're looking for. Yeah, basically, because he didn't want the people to go to Jerusalem to basically worship and then turn back to Rehoboam, correct? Right. Sorry. Yeah. I wasn't sure. Right. Okay. Yeah. Which letter has the most extensive use of the Old Testament, and why?

Okay. In the New Testament. Okay. So, I just need clarification on this. So, when you say "letter," obviously you don't mean "gospels," correct? You said "letter." Gospel. You couldn't include the gospel. Okay. So, and when you say "extensive use," I mean, quotes, allusions, I mean, you know, it becomes difficult.

So, let me just answer this question. You're guilty. All right. Revelation has maybe 240, 30, depending on how you count, the quotes are allusions, right? Romans and Hebrews obviously has anywhere between 80 and 90, depending on how you count the quotes or allusions. Matthew has somewhere between 90 and 100, depending on how you count the quotes or allusions.

The book of Matthew is primarily showing Jesus as the Messiah, so for that reason he's going to quote the Old Testament extensively. In the book of Romans, you have the backdrop of it, Jewish Christians being exiled, now they're coming back, so Paul has to speak to them, "How are you going to get together?

Let me give you an exhaustive treatment of the gospel." So, he goes through the entire gospel, right? And Romans 4 is obviously noteworthy because it explains the life of Abraham. Hebrews, obviously, because you have Jewish Christians, right, who have experienced hardship, but they want to turn back into Judaism, or tended to turn back into Judaism, right?

So, in order to have the author of Hebrews encourage these Jewish Christians not to turn back, he's using presupposed authority to teach them why they shouldn't turn back. Instead of using New Testament scripture, he's using Old Testament scripture, which they already presuppose as authority to encourage them not to turn back.

Revelation, because you have a ton with respect to the Messianic kingdom all throughout the prophets. Truncated version, right? Alright, so we're going to wrap up this portion of it. If you have one more question, you can ask, okay? Something that's not going to take 15 minutes. Okay? So, one question.

Yeah, I have a question that's going to take like an hour, so we'll skip that. Just can you go ahead and identify the pre-exile, exile, and post-exile prophets? Just list them out. That's probably... Sure. Pre-exile, well, Jeremiah's pre-exile, because he's kind of in, he survived both. But with respect to Jeremiah being in those both new camps, you have Isaiah, and then Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Abbaqit, Zephaniah being pre-exile.

And then post-exilic, you have everyone else, which is... Exilic first. Excuse me. Exilic first. Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and then post-exilic, Haggai, Zechariah, and then Malachi, which will cover all the prophets. One more question. Quick question. Did I not say Jonah? Yeah. Oh, yeah. What was the significance of the transfiguration?

Short answer. All right. Short answer. Moses and Elijah, you see Jesus in his glory, right? And then you say God, you hear God say, "Listen to him." So you have the representative from the law, the representative from the prophets, but Jesus is the one being glorified, and you send God saying, "Don't listen to Moses.

Don't listen to Elijah. Listen to Christ." And later on, they would find encouragement from this. John 1, we have seen his glory. 2 Peter 1, we have seen his glory. We heard it from the mountain. And it fueled them and encouraged them, but also showed Christ as God's son.

Okay. Sorry, I can go. All right. Yeah. So we can go on and on, and we know, again, the purpose of this is to kind of test him, to make sure that he did his homework, and I guess we could stay here three, four hours or more the rest of the day and to keep testing him.

But again, I think he did a great job doing that. But I want to ask some more personal questions concerning the eldership. What's a doctrinal position? Again, you don't have to go into the details of it. Just tell us, what's a doctrinal position that you changed within the last five to ten years, if there are any?

If you say you didn't, then? Okay, five to ten years. I'm trying to think how old I am. So 28 to now. Okay. It doesn't have to be precise. Yeah. It could be 11. It could be four. All right. Okay. I think the major doctrinal shift that I had that's most noteworthy to me is my shift on Romans 7.

There was a period in my time where I found the research of theological positions quite interesting, and this was when I was living with Pastor Aaron, Brandon Wong, and some other guy no one here knows. But I came to the conclusion that Romans 7 was talking about a Christian who was struggling.

Through my time in studying the last year, specifically for this elders exam, I had a chance to really take a bird's eye view of scripture. And I'm not saying therefore I'm right. That's not what I'm saying. I'm giving you my personal testimony. I had a chance to look at a bird's eye view of scripture.

And now, obviously because of the exam, I have to memorize. I'm committing things to memory. I don't think anyone would have been impressed if I came up here and said, "Hold on. Let me Google this real quick." So as I was committing things to memory, one thing I noticed about Romans 7 that I had to concede— can I explain the shift as well, Pastor Peter?

In a minute, if you can. In a minute, okay. If I believe that Romans 7 is talking about a Christian, then I have to believe that that's the only place in the scripture where a Christian is described in that way. In every other portion of scripture, the Christian and the Holy Spirit is described as victorious.

You see that when Jesus comes on the scene, and then he is making the deaf hear, the blind see, the lame walk, and he's raising Lazarus. And then in every other portion of scripture, we are commanded to obey. How can that be if Romans 7 is talking about a struggling Christian?

And right before that, right before the last part of Romans 7, he's talking about the law and the spirit. It sounds like, at least in my opinion after reading it now and studying it, it sounds like he's talking about a faithful Old Testament Jew who doesn't have the spirit.

But now we have the spirit in Romans 8. Therefore, there's no condemnation in Christ. That's the biggest major shift that I can think of, which I'm truncating. What is a doctrinal position that you have difference in with the current leaders? Not all of us or one of us or two of us.

Okay. I am currently as I stand, I am somewhere between, depending on what day you ask me, I guess, what day of the year, what day of the week you ask me. Tuesday. I am somewhere between 51, but over 50. I am somewhere between 51 and 75 percent confident that Christians will be raptured pre-tribulation.

That the tribulation will be pre and not post or mid. All right. Prove it. Okay. All right. Anything else? Besides the tribulation? Yeah. What other positions or? The only other one I could think of is infant salvation, but I'm not. I don't have a strong position on that. That's the only one that comes to my mind, but I'm not over 50 on that.

I'm like. I'm like 48 and then 52 and then 36. I'm kind of all over the place. Okay. You're very good. That's the only thing I can think of. Okay. Yeah. Maybe there. I'm 99 percent sure there's nothing else. 99 percent. So what is that one percent that you're not sure?

I can't think of anything else. Okay. All right. Okay. This is a bit more personal. What is something that you are concerned about? If we confirm you as an elder in the church, as you examine yourself, you know, in the ears and conversations that we have, what's a concern that you have of yourself becoming an elder in the church?

I think that if I am indeed confirmed, I will inevitably, and I'm using that word intentionally, I will inevitably do something or say something that I highly regret, that would be unbecoming of an elder. I don't see Joe or Phillip ever doing that. Joe or Phillip would never do something like that.

I mean, anything is possible, but Joe or Phillip would never. Joe and Phillip, they are steady. They are. They can't be shaken. My bet is that I will do something or say something that is unbecoming of an elder. I'm not talking about doctrinal truth. I am not speaking about standing up for what is right.

I am talking about the next day saying to myself, "Why did I do or why did I say that?" That is what I think will—I know that doesn't inspire a lot of confidence, but I think it's inevitable that I will do that. If you're asking an honest question, I will give you an honest answer.

Scripture also says that an elder must rule without compulsion, right? To do it because he desires to do it. He who seeks to be an elder seeks a noble task. Why do you desire to be an elder? If you had asked me, "Do I want to be an elder at the age of—what's the youngest number?

28, 30, 31 maybe, 32 even maybe?" I would have said to myself, "This is God's calling for me. I need to do this. I need to do this." As I've gotten older and I have been made more aware of the various sins in my life and the things that I am weak to, I began to value anonymity a lot more.

The reason I value anonymity is because when you're anonymous, you don't hurt people. You don't damage people. You also don't have as much responsibility. So when you serve, no one's going to say, "Well, he's serving because he's an elder," or whatever else. The reason I'm bringing this up is because there's a huge part of me that I know that if indeed I am confirmed, that I will lose that.

There was a period when I was just doing cleanup, and I would lock up. After I would lock up, I knew why I served. There was no one there looking at me. I knew that my heart was pure. I knew. I knew at that moment, "I'm doing this for God." Going forward, I don't know if I will know if everything I— a part of that will be taken from me, I feel like.

I had so cherished that, especially when I come to value that later on in life. Now, you're asking me why. It sounds like I don't want to be an officer. Yeah, that's exactly what I was going to ask you. I know, but let me answer that question. Sorry, Pastor Peter.

You're asking me a lot of questions. I struggled with that after I was approached, because that's how I felt. That's the place that I was in. That's the place that I was in. There's a couple reasons, and I'll give the straight human reason. You asked me, and I thought to myself, "Am I really going to say no to you?" That's the first thought.

"Am I really going to say no?" Because if I am going to say no, then just say no now. Secondarily, I didn't want—well, you asked me, and I'm like, "No, no, no." You asked me, "No, no, no." I'm not going to do that. I say yes, or I say no.

That's what's going to happen. The human thought I had was, "Am I really going to say no to Pastor Peter?" The second thought I had was, "Is God calling me to do this?" It was very, very bottom line. Because if He's calling me to do this, then I have to do this.

Moses saying, "I'll send someone else. I can't speak," that's not humility. That's disobedience. We might think it's humility, but it's not. I had that thought in my mind. Don't mix you wanting to be irresponsible, you wanting to be lazy, with humility. Humility is not laziness or irresponsibility. Humility is quite different.

Humility answers the call. The bottom line question I had for myself was, "Is God calling me to do this?" If He's calling me to do this, then I want to do it. I don't know if that makes any sense, but that was my thought process. Okay. All right. Thank you, James.

That's the test portion of it, and I think we are more than satisfied with the answers. Again, like you said, we can sit here and test him through all of that, and we can testify that James put more than enough time. He's been studying the whole year, and we could have waited a little bit longer, but we wanted to put him out of his misery, get him back to his wife, have a normal life.

The process now from this point on is we're going to take some time to, again, allow the church to respond. From now until early, maybe we're shooting for somewhere around February or March, before we finally confirm him and install him into the church, we're going to give the church an opportunity to respond, and not to mumble in the background, "Hey, I have this concern," or this, this, to bring it up.

If you think that we have blind spots that we are not seeing in James, that we want you to take the opportunity to come to us. Come to us in private, tell us these are our concerns, have you considered it, and we want to try to do our best to answer your questions.

So we're not presenting him blindly. We're not telling you that we know better than everybody else in the church. I've personally wanted James to be on board because I felt that he would add, and he would add to our eldership. I don't think there's any question of his passion for the Lord, his love for the church.

I've personally observed him for over a decade. We've all seen him from college and mature and married life, and again, as a DA. But one of the things that I just, this is more of a personal thing. You know, when I turned 50, you know, I started thinking about next generation.

It just, it wasn't just by choice, it was just, you know, that's just the kind of process you go through. And I'm thinking the next, you know, I don't know when, when that would happen. That may happen in my 60s, it might happen in my 70s, but at some point the elders in the church have to take charge of transition.

And as I was thinking that, we need, I felt the need for somebody who is going to be able to articulate the doctrine, articulate the position, and maybe even to a certain degree to fight for the things that we need in the church. And so, as I was thinking through these things, I mean, James, to me, you know, has been that guy already in the church for many, many years.

And so, again, the reason why I wanted him to join the eldership is because at some point, whether that's five years, ten years down the line, that, again, and I'm not saying that I have these thoughts in my mind, but at some point we don't want to wait until I'm right there and something happens and then we're not ready.

And so the elders who are installed and, you know, running the church needs to be able to be strong enough, you know, let's say even if I was not here, and to be able to transition and to be able to handle that at some point, whether that's ten years, 15, 20 years from now.

And so, James, I thought, would be a great person to have on board. And one of the things that we talked about is, it's really important to us, is we have qualifications of character, and as I've mentioned it to you already, a lot of the things that you've mentioned in the confirmation, we've talked to, James is more aware of it, nothing that you've brought up has surprised us because we knew it already.

And James is the first person to know throughout the years that I've talked with him, met with him, that was the primary thing that we've talked about all these years. And if we weren't confident that there has been progress and this is not going to be a hindrance, right, we all have flaws.

And nobody, like, perfectly above reproach. We all have flaws that, by the grace of God, covers. But, you know, we want somebody who's going to be able to not only just kind of go along with whatever we're doing, but who's going to be able to speak up and say, "Hey, I'm not sure if I see that in Scripture.

I'm not sure if that's the right thing to do. I'm not sure if that's a doctrinal position. I'm not sure if that person is the right person for that position." And so James would be a great person to add for that purpose. And so, again, along with all the other qualifications, we want to make sure that this is somebody that loves us, right, and that we love him.

And so it's in the context of where, even in disagreements, it's a disagreement between brothers. You know what I mean? I have the nastiest fights with my real brother, right? But at the end of the day, we're brothers. It's a fight between brothers. So there are often times where we're in the meeting and we'll have sharp disagreements.

And sometimes, you know, if I disagree with something, my voice naturally elevates. And so, and same thing with James, you know. Like, our voices tend to elevate. But we want to make sure that when these things happen, when we're struggling and fighting together, that it's in the context of brothers.

That we never question that we have our best interests. And secondly, we want to make sure that whoever's on leadership loves the church. That they would sacrifice their reputation before the church. And I've seen this throughout the years, where you have elders who are great, and they're doing a great job, and then they get offended, and then they just burn the church down.

You know, because they're more concerned about their reputation than they are for the church. And so, that's something that, again, I'm encouraged with James. James loves the church. He would pack up his bag and do something else before he does that. And I'm confident that he loves the church sacrificially.

And so, those are qualifications beyond what I see in scripture that we want to make sure that we have. And so, that's the reason why we started this process. And again, you know, we're trying to find wisdom in how to best involve you as a church. Where we're not just saying, "Hey, just trust us.

We're smart." You know, we prayed about it. So, again, we're going to take this time until the confirmation, until February or March, from now until then, if you really feel that these are things that I think are going to disqualify him, that's the time. That's the time to bring it up.

Otherwise, we're hoping that sometime early next year, we'll have a confirmation installation service. Okay? All right. Thanks, James. You can breathe. You can breathe. Take off your tie. Okay. Yeah. And, you know, one of the things, okay, you guys can head down. Yeah, one of the things that I asked, even before I even asked James, was, and Diane doesn't even know, but I was, I actually kind of talked to Diane.

Diane doesn't know that I was actually poking. And to see what kind of influence James was having at home. And if Diane said at that time, and Diane had no idea that I was thinking about this. If Diane said at that time, it's like, man, you know, I'm having a hard time with James at home.

I have a hard time respecting him. If he just kind of said that, you know, I probably would have pulled back and said, we're going to have to wait. But Diane's answer is like, man, like, I really respect James. And she's been, like, spiritually impacted. And, again, Esther knows, Esther, you know, when she was meeting up with Diane.

And so we can all confirm that his public life and home life is consistent. And so that's part of the reason why I felt comfortable proceeding and asking him to do that. Again, but now I'm asking you guys to take the initiative if there is something that you really feel concerned.

Because not simply because you have something against him, but because you love the church. And we want to protect the church. We want to establish the church. And we need, we're asking you if there are certain things, just take that time. Email, we'll meet with you in private. And if there are certain things that we need to hear or talk to you about, or talk to you about, we'll take some time to do that before we move on to the next part, okay?