DIALOGUE: Does Sola Scriptura Make Sense?

In this episode, Trent sits down with Protestant apologist Kelly Powers to discuss the coherence of Sola Scriptura.

Transcription:

Trent:

I was recently invited onto Kelly Powers this channel Berean perspective. He’s a Protestant apologist, and we had a really great discussion on the nature of Solas scriptura, and in particular my concerns that Solas Scriptura is an incoherent doctrine and ultimately an unworkable one for Protestantism. As I said, we had a great discussion and if you want to help us here on this channel at the Council of Trent to host similar discussions in person here in the studio, please consider supporting us@trenthornpodcast.com. So without further ado, here’s my discussion with Kelly Powers on solo scriptura.

Kelly:

This topic, I’ve been a Christian since the age of six. I was born again in 1977, so I’m hitting 53 this year. I don’t know how old you are. How were you at Trent? Where are you at your age?

Trent:

Whenever he asks me my age, I always ask them, how old do you think I am?

Kelly:

Well, you look younger than me. How’s that?

Trent:

Well, in a few months I’ll be 40.

Kelly:

Oh, really? Okay. Well, I’m glad I didn’t see you look colder.

Trent:

That’s okay. Yes. I’m always happy if somebody can pitch me as younger still, if I can still keep up with that.

Kelly:

Cool. Yeah, well, so the reason why I was sharing that is because when I became a Christian at a young age, both my parents were not Christians when I was born and they became Christians just a little after I was born a few years. And then when I was growing up in my teenage years, it really wasn’t a churchgoer, but I was a believer in Jesus Christ. And it wasn’t until after high school, I grew up in Las Vegas during my high school years, and I didn’t realize when I was a believer that a lot of my friends were either Muslims, Jehovah’s Witnesses or Mormons or even Catholics. But a lot of us back in those days, we were what we were, but we weren’t always living it out. You kind of know what I mean by that. And so I had a friend of mine who I thought became a Christian just after high school, roughly 1991.

I graduated in 90, but he told me he became a Christian. We started going to going to church back in Las Vegas days and we’re both living on our own and within a few months he’s dating a girl. Didn’t know much about it. This is the short condensed version. We want to glory to death here. But all of a sudden he tells me one day on the phone, he says, Kelly, I became a Mormon. I was like, whoa, what happened here? He starts explaining to me about this book of Morman stuff. Joseph and I knew nothing. I mean, I knew basics of Christianity. I knew enough. We knew about the gospel, I knew enough about scripture and things like that, but I didn’t know much about other beliefs at that time, even though I heard the names. So long story short, met his girlfriend. She was like a fifth generation Mormon actually, who was in her heritage, actually went back to Brigham Young, and it was an interesting story.

So if I would’ve had that kind of opportunity today, it’d be even more interesting. But when I met her, nice girl, nice girl, but she started talking about praying and having the Holy Spirit confirm this and Holy Spirit confirmed that. But then we went to scripture as I’m sure me and you would definitely agree here, the things you were sharing definitely were not lining up with what we knew about the gospel and about the teachings of Jesus. And so long story short, that’s kind of where my journey kind of began with apologetics and learning about other groups and other beliefs and trying to ask people firsthand first questions, talk to them, get their sources. And so a lot of even my early nineties of my discipleship, I was part of Caver Chapel. I’m assuming you probably know a bit about Caver Chapel and people like Chuck Smith.

So that’s my heritage. And so I’ve always been kind of a guy that likes to really test things by scripture and examine it. So with what you said a minute ago, I’ve talked to people who are Catholics, Muslims, Mormons, other groups, and sometimes they’ll say things that they’ll say that God is leading them or teaching ’em such and such, but then it doesn’t line up with the word of God. So I’ll just kind of finish my statement here. For me as a Protestant, I’m open to learning from others and being eager to check things out. But when I say God’s word, like my final authority, what I’m saying is if it goes either against the word of God or doesn’t line up with the word of God, it for me causes a red flag. Now, I believe in tradition. There’s times that scripture talks about tradition. It can be a good thing. I’m not against tradition. I think my objection would be is if there’s things that are being taught that weren’t established or taught early on by say either Jesus or the Apostles, then that’s kind of where my red flag pops up.

Trent:

Okay. Well, I think that I’ve heard this before that scripture, for someone who believes in soul s scriptura, it is the final authority. And so I can see where you’re coming from a little bit here, especially in your experience with a friend who becomes Mormon. Because if you use, because Mormons don’t believe in solo scriptura either obviously, but there are other heretical groups that do. So I see the desire like, oh, well if you believe in soul scriptura, then you wouldn’t embrace Mormonism, for example, and all the extra things that it adds though at the same time, like I said before, there are others like the Jehovah’s Witnesses for example, I would say they practice sola scriptura because they do not. The Watchtower Bible and tracked society is infallible because the society has made so many failed predictions of the end of the world. Other things like that, they say it’s a guiding light, but it can be an error.

They would only say that for scripture. Same with Seventh Day Adventists. They say, Ellen White is not infallible, only scripture is. So even if you only treat scriptures infallible, you can end up in all different kinds of areas. So one thing I could agree with you on is if something goes against scripture, yeah, you shouldn’t believe that you shouldn’t believe something if it contradicts scripture. But you used a phrase when you were discussing and maybe you could unpack it more, you said, doesn’t line up to me if that’s different than goes against. That’s another way of saying I’m not going to believe in something that is not explicitly found in scripture. That is where I would have a host of problems with sola scriptura. But am I understanding you correctly? Maybe you going to unpack what you meant by the phrase doesn’t line up.

Kelly:

Yeah, sure. Just a quick note though, on just what you shared about say Jehovah Witnesses or seven-Day Adventist. So you’re correct when it comes to Jehovah Witnesses that they would look to God’s word as that authority, but they also look to the watchtower as their final authority as well, because the watchtower actually teaches that nobody can actually properly study or interpret the Bible without their guidance. So on the surface it has that appearance that yeah, they’ll be scripture alone or final authority if you will. But in their teachings and their books and their magazines, they actually teach that they are like the mother organization. And so you’re supposed to obey Jehovah’s the father and the mother organization. Same thing with the SDA. They would also adhere to scripture as well, but there’s also teachings of LNG White where she claims her teachings and writings are actually inspired just as much as scripture. So there will be people who from both groups will maybe go the extra step and go to scripture, but there will also be others who will be because of that fear, they’ll be in that control aspect. You know what I’m saying there,

Trent:

You could find another example would be one, I would say oneness. Pentecostals tend to hold solas scriptura, but they have a mistaken interpretation of scripture.

Kelly:

Yeah, that would be one I could definitely see with you or even say Church of Christ or other groups out there. Yeah, they’ll adhere to God’s word for sure that way. But there are many groups out there who claim to be Christians, but they adhere to additional sources for authority. Right? Sure. So to answer your question in regards to, you wrote it down, what did I say? You

Trent:

Said it doesn’t line up. Doesn’t line up. I hear what you mean by that.

Kelly:

Say for example, somebody is say King James only. Okay, there’s people, king James only. Now I may not agree with them on King James only, and I have friends who are King James people, but now if they’re King James, only to where say it doesn’t actually where it’s a salvation issue, they’re making it. There are people who claim, I’m sure you know this, that if you read a different version other than the King James Bible, you actually aren’t saved. I’ve talked to these kind of people before, so that obviously doesn’t line up with God’s word. Now they’re not claiming to be of a certain organization. There’s no prophet or prophetess, but this is a teaching that doesn’t line up with God’s word. So for me that would be an example.

Trent:

Okay. By lineup, do you just mean it’s not found in God’s word?

Kelly:

Well, so there are things that say traditions like we talked about this a minute ago, or at least briefly. I’m not against a tradition as long as it’s lining up with what we’d see at least guidance in scripture. As you said a minute ago, if it’s something that would go against something contrary, then for me that would definitely be a red flag. Does that make more sense?

Trent:

So I mean I could give different examples here. I’ve known Protestants, for example, who don’t celebrate Christmas because they would say that it doesn’t line up with scripture, not in the sense that it contradicts scripture, but scripture never says to do this. The early church didn’t celebrate Christmas for a very, very long time. And so they just don’t celebrate it. They don’t see it lining up a scripture. But I don’t think you would’ve a problem with

Kelly:

Celebrate. No. So that would be their belief, their tradition if you will, something they’re had hearing to If they went say a step farther though, and they said, well, now anyone who say celebrates Christmas is like disobedient, disobedient to God sinning or something like that, then that would probably go to where you’ve got caution and then you’ve got danger Will Robinson, if you know what I mean by that.

Trent:

Well, the difference there is permission to believe something and obliging someone to believe something. And when I’ve discussed this with other people, Gavin Orland and others, I think you might have a different standard of, I guess what if we put it this way that a person is free to believe something as long as it doesn’t contradict scripture, but they cannot impose an obligation on someone unless it is found in scripture.

Kelly:

That’s a pretty good statement.

Trent:

Alright. So for example, for me as a Catholic, based on how I read scripture in the church, fathers like Revelation 12, for example, under Solas script Torah, would I be permitted to believe Mary was assumed bodily into heaven? Because that idea doesn’t contradict anything in scripture. Even though other people might disagree about whether it’s found in scripture or church history, would I at least be under? So s scriptura permitted to believe that

Kelly:

From Revelation 12

Trent:

Or a host of other doctrines, but yeah, just that I believe Mary was assumed bodily into heaven based on Revelation 12 and early Christian history. I’m not saying other people have to believe it, but I’m saying that I choose to believe it is that permitted under sola scriptura. I’m not aware of anything in scripture that would contradict that belief.

Kelly:

Now we’re talking, just to be clear and clarification words, when you’re talking about ascended to heaven, we’re talking about the bodily assumption of memory, correct? Correct. Now that’s also considered a dogma in the Catholic church as well, right?

Trent:

But I’m bracketing it from just being a dogma from obliging it. I’m just saying if someone were to choose to believe it, so Eastern Orthodox for example, it’s not a dogma, but it’s a widespread belief that they call the dorm mission of Mary.

Kelly:

Correct? I gotcha. Yeah. Obviously my perspective looking at Revelation 12 or other scriptures on what’s called the assumption of Mary, I don’t find that with any biblical support, and even if you look at early church fathers the first few centuries, there’s no support of that as well. I know that came later, but I would say if someone had that view, I wouldn’t necessarily be opposed to it. What I would be opposed to is there are the dogmas of the Catholic church, which if I’m correct, wasn’t it in 1950 that was made an actual dogma of the Catholic church, that one must actually believe in that.

Trent:

Yes.

Kelly:

And if I remember reading it, oh, go ahead. Go ahead.

Trent:

Yeah, so that is a dogma. It must be believed with divine and Catholic faith. It’s something that has been divinely revealed. Yeah.

Kelly:

And so if I remember reading it correctly, it actually even says if one has been properly informed and schooled and taught on this by people who are qualified and one rejects that they act or receive the wrath of God, correct?

Trent:

Right. It is a dogma of the faith that must be accepted just like Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist, Christ’s ascension into heaven, for example. So you’re correct, but I think it’s helpful to separate two things here, that the permission to believe things. I think that opens up a very wide field because I think in practice many Protestants will their objections to not just doctrine, but even to other people practicing it. So I’ve tried to pick examples where I think it’s very clear there’s no contrary evidence in scripture like Mary’s assumption into heaven or another

Kelly:

Example. Can I ask question before you just go too far? Just on the same example. So here’s where I think this is where what I shared earlier would be my objection because if someone said to me they believed that maybe because the Bible talks about John doesn’t really record, it actually says that he may have lived longer, and even the Mormons actually believed that he actually never Lily died. He believed that he was one who lived on as well. Having that view, I wouldn’t say that’s a salvation issue. I wouldn’t say that’s something that in scripture would say, Ooh, if someone believed that John never died anathema. But within the Catholic church, and again just kindly saying it, you brought it up, the assumption of Mary is kind of a big one when it comes to Catholicism and I have lots of family that’s Roman Catholic. And so I’ve grown up around this and being told because I actually reject that, I’ve actually been told I’m not a Christian, I’ve been told that I’m going to receive the wrath of God because I actually reject that. So my question to you on this topic is, well, why would I be concerned about the wrath of God as a salvation type issue when Jesus nor the apostles ever taught that?

Trent:

What I would say is that this gets back to a larger issue that will come up with sola scriptura, and that would be this question who decides which doctrines are obligatory for Christians and which are not? And I believe that sola scriptura cannot answer that question. So when it comes to the assumption of Mary, for example, I would say the strongest reason I have to believe Mary was assumed bodily into heaven is actually not scripture or early church history. Though I do believe they do provide evidence for the doctrine, for the dogma, rather the fact that the Catholic church is the church Jesus Christ established and it authoritatively teaches that this happened.

I have sufficient warrant to believe that it happened because of the church’s divine authority. And I would say that Christians do something similar with other historical beliefs. So I think many Christians would say, for example, even if there isn’t sufficient historical non-biblical historical evidence to prove the exodus happened, they would say, because the Bible has divine authority, I believe that it happened and that’s enough. Or that we all descended from Adam and Eve, even if geneticists pour mountains of evidence and old Earth and all this other stuff. I think a Christian doesn’t even have to get into that evidence. They could say, well, the Bible has divine authority. It says this happened. There was Adam and Eve and there was the fall and we came from them. So I’m going to believe that. And so I think a similar principle applies to the assumption of Mary. It’s going to take us back to more of a bedrock question. Who gets to decide which doctrines are obligatory or as you put it, a salvation issue and which are not? Is infant baptism Calvinism, young Earth creationism the Trinity Panel substitution? The problem I see is that scripture does not provide a mechanism to determine that scripture is silent about the difference between essential and secondary or obligatory and permissible doctrine. So that’s how I would approach the issue.

Kelly:

Yeah, I can hear where you’re coming from. So say we’re talking about, say Adam and Eve. Well, we know more than just Moses talks about this. Jesus talks about Adam and Eve. Paul talks about Adam and Eve. So it gives us confirmation of these types of things. Same thing with the Exodus. We see things that are written in the Psalms that point back to the things of the Exodus. And so even Paul in his writings points back to things during the time of Moses in one Corinthians 10 about things of the Exodus as well of them being delivered that Christ was the rock that was with them. So I would see scripture confirming scripture on those types of stories for sure. But isn’t

Trent:

That because that’s because scripture has divine authority behind it,

Kelly:

But you were just making the comment earlier, well, if we don’t have any say, unless I heard you wrong, some type of tangible evidence pertaining back to the Exodus, all that we have is divine scripture. Well, we have of course the rights of Moses, which we would both agree to be inspired. And then if it was only found, then sometimes there are some examples in scripture where it’s only found, say in one place. So that’s of course a step of faith. But if we’re on the same page adhering to scripture and it’s recorded, then that’s something that at least we can put our faith into and believe in. Back to what you mentioned a minute ago just to, I don’t want to beat a dead horse, whatever that saying is, but the issue of Mary is the doctrine of the immaculate conception, even back in the 18 54, 19 50, the assumption these are like 18, 19 centuries later, and I know church fathers better than I do, so I’m not even going to try to act like I do, but I’ve done enough research to look at least the apostolic fathers the first few centuries, and these doctrines were not taught early on.

So this is something that evolved over time. So my question is, when you’re asking me who decides? Well, Paul said in Ephesians two 20 that we are built upon the apostles and the prophets, Christ Jesus being the cornerstone. So if I’m looking to a doctrine essentially on say, the gospel of our eternal destination, I want to know what did Jesus teach on this topic, this exact doctrine? What did Paul or John or Peter, what did they teach right? Say you talked about the Trinity. Well, we know that Jesus said, unless you believe I am, you will die in your sins. He said, he’s the way, the truth in life. No one comes to the Father. We see he claims to be God. He talks about the trinity of the distinction of persons father, son, holy Spirit, John 14, 15 and 16. So we can at least establish, which again me and you have this agreement, the doctrine, the Trinity, even within the first few centuries, apostolic fathers way before any councils, way before any creeds taught the Trinity as well. So these are things can at least be collaborated. So that’s kind of what I would want to look to.

Trent:

Well, I think there’s two different standards here that are sort of opposed to each other. So for example, one might say, well, why should we, you’re saying, why do we trust the first sources on the assumption were let’s say four or 500 years later? Well, Jesus and Paul are speaking 1400 years after the Exodus, but I think you’re going to allow them because the writings that quote them have divine authority. So for example, let’s say so is it just because Jesus and Paul say this? Or is it because you already believe that scripture is inert and so it’s without error and we can trust what it says?

Kelly:

Well, both in a way. So when I became a Christian, like I mentioned earlier, when I became a Christian at age of six, I didn’t know all the ins and outs of the Trinity. I didn’t know all the outs of how we got the Bible. I didn’t know. I’ve grown in my faith over time through studying the word of God, of course being mentor. But as you can tell by my channel name Berea in perspective, like I mentioned just after high school, my way of perspective has been that of Act 17, 10, 11, where it says that those are in Berea, which I know this, I’m just saying it out loud. They were listening and they were eagerly hearing Paul teach. They were eager to hear, but they also went to the scriptures to see whether or not what was being stated or taught was true. So kind of like for a groundwork for me is that, look, I’m open to listening to anyone, whether they be Muslim, a Catholic, whoever, but as a believer in Jesus Christ, I’m going to go to the scriptures as Paul says, study, they show their self approved these scriptures.

I know that. And so if it lines up at least has something that’s tangible, something that I can grab onto something that has some of these pieces of the puzzle to work together. Then at leads to something I can hold onto where if someone says to me like going back originally to what I was sharing with you, even just with Mormons, not only do they reject solo script Torah, but their claim to fame that the whole thing of the premise of Joseph Smith is built upon his testimony that he actually experienced God the father, and Jesus Christ appeared in him when he was 14 in 1820 when he goes out in the woods to pray, and then he goes out and is now told that he was told they’re all wrong. They all teach an abomination of God. You are now this restored prophet, and then he has these angelic experiences. And yet what did Paul warn about? In Galatians chapter one? He says, if we or an angel from heaven come and preach to you a gospel contrary to what you’ve received, it’s a good thing. No, he said it’s let them be anathema. So what I just say is, look, if someone comes along and is teaching something that may not completely line up with scripture, okay, there’s room for that. There’s room. But when it gets to the issue of dogmas or salvation issues, that’s where the red flags come up.

Trent:

Well, what’s interesting there with Mormonism, I think Solas Scriptura has a problem where, for example, Mormons would say there are living apostles. They believe their church actually has apostles who have teaching authority. But I would say Christians are obliged to believe that the office of Apostle no longer exists in the church, that there are no more living apostles. But I would say that that obligatory belief is not found in scripture that the office of Apostle has ceased.

Kelly:

I would actually agree with you. There’s no scripture that actually states that you’re correct.

Trent:

Okay. So I think that would give, so what I would see is I agree with you that when you’re going to oblige people to something, you have to be careful that and that you have proper authority to do so. But I think that there’s many, many beliefs that are obligatory for Christians, doctrinally and morally that are not found in scripture. So if sos scriptura is an obligatory belief, I think that would create some problems. There’s a few other ones here. I’d like to get your take because Protestants answer the questions kind of differently. Do you think it’s obligatory for a Christian to attend a church weekly to regularly attend a local church?

Kelly:

Do you think it’s obliged to do this?

Trent:

Yeah, I remember when I was in college, I remember a guy who was Christian, but he said he didn’t go to church. He just would study the Bible at home and he would meet with friends every now and then to talk about it, but he didn’t belong to a local church.

Kelly:

Okay, well, so I’m going to answer your question with scripture. So when we see Acts 2 42, it says that they met regularly daily, and they broke bread. So they had meals together, they had time of fellowship, and it says that they were adhering to the apostles teachings. We see in Act 20 verse seven, it talks about they met on the first day of the week. We see in one Corinthians 16, one and two, Paul talks about when they come together for fellowship and worship, for the gathering for donations or support, Paul talks about other things about regards to the Sabbath. One person regards another day higher than the other. So how I would word is look, there’s no scripture that says you have to go at least once a week, but scripture does talk about the forsaking, Hebrews chapter 10, verse 25, and on about those who they were in the faith, but then they were forsaking and actually departing from the faith.

So that was an actual departure, not just a weekly attendance. So a different type of connotation there. But for myself as Christian, I think if you have the ability, the opportunity, I think it is mature for Christians to meet weekly and maybe even more than once. I think actually just a Sunday morning Christian, I think is actually quite not healthy. I think if you have the opportunity at a fellowship, whatever type of church it may be, if you can have a home group during the week, say a Bible study or a place where men and women can have a time of getting together and have a snack and dig in the word of God and kind of build each other up and pray for each other, I think that’s so good because we’re so lacking today, and I think you would agree with me on this Christian fellowship, Christian accountability, Christian discipleship. You look at the YouTube world like you talked a minute ago, there are a gazillion people who are calling themselves apostles and prophets, and they are their own authorities, and that can be quite dangerous when you don’t have accountability or under a bishop or under a pastor or under elders like the Bible talks about. So yeah, I definitely think that we should be doing it, but there’s no verse that says you have to do it. I think that what you’re asking, right?

Trent:

Yeah, because I think you might also say that, well, I think people would say, scripture says you ought to be a Calvinist or you ought to be an Armenian and hold those views, but you can still be a Christian even if you don’t hold those views.

Kelly:

The good thing is I make Calvinists in both Armenians, Matt, neither of both sides. I’m kind of a mixture of both. I make the joke. I say, it depends on what side of the bed. If I wake up on maybe the left side, I’m an aist. If I wake up on the right side, I’m a Cal Minan. That’s my own little personal joke there. But no, I get what you’re saying, and I think this really comes down to, I think humility, a humbleness to want to really appreciate God’s word and its fullness of what God has given us. I believe it’s not just pieces of paper and not just ink in a book. I think it’s God’s living word that is for us today, for yesterday, and for the future, which gives us guidance, instruction, and wisdom. Yet many of us don’t take the time to truly actually feed on God’s word.

Trent:

Well, I think the problem here though is that there’s many people who do, but they reach different conclusions about issues that I would say are very essential. Should I baptize my baby, for example, or is it, so two examples. One would be like infant baptism. How do I get my baby to heaven? Do I baptize him or do I have some other belief that babies automatically go to heaven or I’m not sure How does God want me to get my baby to heaven? I think that’s a huge question that Protestant Christians disagree on. Another one would be this, can I be a Christian and still commit grave? Can I remain a Christian even if I commit gravely immoral acts including apostasy? And there are free grace theologians, Charles Stanley, late Charles Stanley is an example of that who would say yes, because your salvation has nothing to do with works. If you make an act of faith in God, you’ll be saved. You might lose heavenly rewards, but you’ll be saved. And there’s many people, I mean James White has a great debate with the free grace theologian, Bob Wilkins on that taking Wilkins task on this. But both are using solo script Torah and not just on tertiary issues. I would say that is core and essential, and yet scripture doesn’t give us clear answers on those things. That’s something I find really concerning.

Kelly:

Yeah, well, the first thing you bring up the issue of children like infants, I mean, as you said, that’s a hard topic for a lot of people. It’s emotional topic because people, I know people who’ve lost their children, and that can be very emotional for many people out there. The New Testament is pretty silent, that topic right there for sure. I do think that there is at least an allusion to something, at least a grasp with David in the Old Testament talks about that his child that was killed that died, he said that his child wouldn’t come to him, but he would go to be with his child talking that. So that would give at least comfort, I believe. I also believe when you think about say, children or infants, scripture talks about accountability for us knowing sin and right and wrong. So I don’t think this is where I would lean towards certain scriptures about the mercy and the grace of God, and those were talked about. Those who have rejected the gospel haven’t come to trusting Christ. Well, infants don’t have that. They never had that choice. They didn’t have that choice to come in the world and have the ability.

Trent:

But I do want to interject. I want to interject on that because I do hear people often bring up the age of accountability, and that is something I also think is absent from scripture.

Kelly:

You don’t find a verse on that directly. You’re correct.

Trent:

But you have things like Psalm 51, 5 when David says, I was born in sin. My mother conceived me in iniquity. So I think it creates a very unclear picture about the Sal VI status and what we ought to do with baptizing children. I think the tradition here, like origin says that the apostles taught infant baptism. RC Sproul also defends its early historicity, not to debate infant baptism. My point is just that I do think you’re right. There’s verses that can go back and forth that it creates that ambiguity. And then the question of free grace theology, that’s a huge salvation issue. Somebody thinks like, oh, I could end up becoming an apostate and I’ll still go to heaven. I’m the heck out of them.

Kelly:

That’s a very dangerous doctrine. I would agree with you. I’ve had my own encounters with some free gration. I didn’t know Charles Stanley was actually labeled a free grr. That’s news to me, even though I know if he was

Trent:

Labeled it.

Kelly:

I know Security book. Yeah, I don’t think you’d go under the umbrella of Free grace though. But Bob Wilkins, yes. I’ve actually even heard in some of his videos, Bob Wilkins actually state about as long as someone believed at some point in the past and they actually apostatized became a Muslim or became a Satanist and died in that state, that they would still be saved because of their profession. How many every years ago? For me, that is quite dangerous because that actually when it comes, comes

Trent:

To Stanley, sorry, when it comes to Stanley, he said this, he said even those who walk away from the faith have not the slightest chance of slipping from his hand, from his book Eternal. So I do think his view is

Kelly:

More walking away being completely apostatized or just falling away.

Trent:

I would say that that would, he’s talking about apostasy there,

Kelly:

Is he? I haven’t read what you’re reading, so I have to go off what you’re telling me now.

Trent:

Yeah, if I’m mistaken on that, I’ll go back and check. I used

Kelly:

To listen quite a bit, and actually I’ve never heard him say if someone completely apostatized, they were still saved. So well, he

Trent:

Says, oh, that was, let’s see my quote here. Anyways, but the point is there’s lots of s, whoever it, but what

Kelly:

You’re saying, free grace though, this is where me and you would for sure agree. I find that movement to be quite dangerous because it gives this appearance, which again, I believe in justification by faith, and of course I’m assuming you would know that. I know you’ve done debates on that as well, and I’ve enjoyed those type of debates. But the free grace goes a little bit farther than that because what they do, I don’t think they mean to do this. I don’t think they’re intentionally trying to be deceived, but they’re deceiving themselves where they’re thinking as long as they believed it does not matter what they do. And I’m of the view, like I mentioned earlier, I have caver chapel roots, and so I do understand the cost of discipleship, the cost of what it means to be a follower of Christ. I mean, Jesus says, why do you call me Lord? Not do what I say. There are many warnings Paul warns about walking in the flesh in Galatians five versus walking in the Spirit. There’s warnings about now how I would word this might be different than you.

There’s warnings about genuine faith verse counterfeit faith. Paul says in one Corinthians 15, he says, I delivered to you first of first most importance to gospel by which you are saved by which you stand unless you believed in vain. So I’ve actually seen people, Trent, where I’ve led people to the Lord I believed anyway, sharing the gospel with them, and then years later they actually completely left the faith, and that’s pretty heartbreaking. Right? Very heartbreaking. So some of them have told me that they just didn’t really believe in the beginning. Some got converted to another religion believing that’s Christian. Right. But I agree with you in this regard for sure. I’m not saying people who are, everyone who would be of the free grace movement is not a Christian though. But I think the doctrine that they espouse to and they try to defend so much is dangerous because there are people believing they can do whatever they want live however they want, and there’s no worry about their eternal consequences.

Trent:

Right. But I think just going back to my concern with Sola scriptura is that when it comes to eternal security, you could have three different Protestant interpretations that come from scripture. One, that you can be a Christian, even if you commit grave unrepentant sin. No true Christian will ever commit grave unrepentant sin, which is maybe the position you’re endorsing or the view Luther and other classical Protestants held, which is that true Christians can fall away. It can happen. But I would say that all three groups are using so script and they arrive at radically different conclusions on that matter.

Kelly:

Lemme ask you a fun question.

Trent:

Sure.

Kelly:

So when we’re talking about the issue of the gospel here, who’s the authority? Is it what Jesus taught, what the apostles taught? Or is it what some church teaches? Who’s your authority in this area?

Trent:

Well, that makes it very interesting because the Bible never explicitly, well, the closest the Bible comes to explicitly describing the gospel is in one Corinthians 15 when it connects. Because what I would say the gospel is that the gospel is the good news of salvation that is found in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. So if that’s what you mean by gospel, I think you do find that in one Corinthians 15, but many people have a much broader understanding of what the gospel is. Many of them will connect the gospel to justification by faith alone, for example. But ironically, the Bible never actually does that. So the Bible doesn’t contain an explicit description of what the, it refers to the gospel, but never explicitly defines what the gospel is.

Kelly:

See, I would disagree with you there for sure. I mean, one Corinthians 15 is pretty explicit, which goes back to what Jesus taught in Luke 24, verses 44 through 47. There is crucifixion, resurrection, those who would repent and turn and trust in him. We see Paul, you bring up Paul, I mean, Paul talks about the contrast of what it means to be still in your sins, Romans three, and how we then get justified in Romans four At the same time, James also talks about a said faith verse, a living faith in James chapter two. But when we’re talking about the gospel, what the gospel is simply, I’ll just use my own type of explanation here, going from scripture is when we see justification, what are we justified from? What are we forgiven from? What are we reconciled from? We see Paul Galatians, Colossians, Ephesians, his different epistles explaining how we are saved by what we are saved from it’s crucifixion, it’s resurrection.

It says atonement, going back to say Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, Psalm 16, many scripture in the Old Testament that would be confirmed. We see in the New Testament even Paul says that Christ became sin for us. He who knew no sin became sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of Christ, two Corinthians 5 21. So the gospel, I believe, is clearly what we see laid out of how Christ was crucified, resurrected, and those who believe inwardly, right? As Paul says in Romans 10, nine through 13, that if you believe in your heart, right, that Jesus has been resurrected, you confess with the ellipses Lord, and you call on him, he says, you’re saved. Right? So I believe there’s a lot of strength in this area for the Protestant, if you want to put it in those terms, on what the gospel is laid out throughout the epistles of the different apostles of what scripture teaches how to be saved, what it means to be saved, and the dangers of those who teach a different gospel.

Trent:

But I think what you’re doing here is you’re just saying, well, scripture teaches this and scripture teaches that, and scripture teaches this. And then you say, and all of this is the gospel, but you haven’t pointed to a scripture verse that says, the gospel is this. The closest, like I said, is here in one Corinthians 15, but it doesn’t say, for example, that it says, you are to believe. Let’s see, brethren preach the gospel, which you received, fold it fast unless you believed in vain. It talks about believing in the gospel, but not that a part of the gospel is. If you believe in Christ, you will be saved. That is in Romans nine. But what I’m looking for is Romans

Kelly:

10. Romans

Trent:

10, right, Roman, sorry, Romans 10, nine. You got it. Yes. So what I would look for rather is for you, if you could just give me just your definition. It was similar to mine, it just added and believe in Christ and you’ll be saved. But there’s nowhere that connects the word Gelian gospel with that particular prescription. I do believe faith in Christ is necessary for salvation, for those who are capable of having faith. But my concern here is, yeah, you’re just, this is what scripture teaches. Therefore, it is the gospel. The scripture doesn’t use the word gelian to connect all of that.

Kelly:

Well, let me ask you a question. If all you had, this is a hypothetical, all you had was say Paul’s letters, just Paul’s letters, 13. Some people debate whether Hebrews or not, right? If all you had was Paul’s letters, and I asked you a question, Trent Horn, I want to know the gospel. How can I know I can be saved? Where would you go

Trent:

If I only had Paul’s letters?

Kelly:

Yeah, just reading through Paul’s letters. I asked you, how can I I be saved? How can I be set free from my sins? Trent Horn, where would you go?

Trent:

Well, I guess in that example, the most data that I would have is I would look to find salvation. I would look to the authority structures that Paul refers to. So he refers to the Church of the Living God, which is the pillar and foundation of truth. Letter to the Hebrews, he says, to submit to the elders who are charged with guarding over you. So I would look to the church authorities that Paul had instituted to derive that answer. I would say, if I’m reading through here, I wouldn’t think, oh, well, the answers are all in here because how do I know that all of the answers are found in here? Paul never says all of them will be found in here. Now, one could create a hypothetical where this is all the data you have, could you reach this conclusion? But I would end up at a false conclusion, just like if I said to you, if you only had the letter of James and the third letter of John in Philamon, how would you find salvation, which are parts of Scripture that barely or even don’t actually refer to Christ. Christ is referred to once by name at the beginning of the letter of James. But I don’t think that we can create all these different hypotheticals about possible evidence. I think it’s just better to deal with the actual evidence that we do have.

Kelly:

Okay. So just to kind of push back on you a little bit here, so if I was to go to Corinthians R Day, we know one Corinthians 15 explains what the gospel is. He opens up in the chapter that Christ died for us, and those who believe in him will have the gift of eternal life. One Corinthians one 18 and on, he talks about that he didn’t want anything other than where’s

Trent:

To say, those who believe in Christ, believe in Christ will have eternal life.

Kelly:

Well, what I was talking about, let me just quote it here. For example, the exact word here, my apology here. So first Corinthians one 18, I was saying for the word,

Trent:

Oh, sorry, I was looking. First Corinthians 15, sorry.

Kelly:

Yeah, sorry, what I was saying, if I was saying, I just had say just one Corinthians, one Corinthians, just the whole book, the letter, the letter. So if I’m going through that letter, because back in those days, as you would know, it was just like a letter. They would read it. There was no chapters, there was no verse numbers. They just reading the letter, right? But Paul says, for the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who are being saved, it’s the power of God. Then he goes on explaining what the wisdom of what God was doing. And then chapter two, Paul talks about, he says, I don’t want to know anything except for Christ crucified and that kind of stuff. So he’s leading all this information. Then when he gets to the gospel in one Corinthians 15, he talks about, this is the gospel.

This is what saves you. Right? If I was to go to Romans, Romans one talks about God’s revealed himself through creation. Romans three talks about, for all of sin falls short to the glory of God. Romans 6 23 says, for the way of sin, his death. But then we get to Romans 10, then he gives us how to be saved. Before he would read Galatians Eure, Galatians two and three, Paul makes it very clear about what it means to be justified or IE saved apart from the work, the law. And so all I’m saying is that we could get enough data from these different epistles of what it means to know the gospel. Even though, as you mentioned, the word gospel is not directly in all that exact places in the Greek, but we get the teachings, we get the doctrine. We get how to be saved. Like Paul says, for by grace, you are saved through faith. It’s the gift of God. Lemme just post a statement.

Trent:

I do have a question for you.

Kelly:

We only have last Trent. Sorry, go ahead. My point of what I asked you, the question was this. If I was reading through Paul’s epistles how to be saved, there is a lot of information in there of what it means of how to get eternal life and how to be saved. Even though we don’t have that Greek word in the gospel, I can’t remember off the top of my head right now. I yeah, I always pronounce that one wrong, but I get what you’re saying. But we could still get the teachings of how to be saved from Paul’s teachings.

Trent:

If we only had Paul’s letters, would we know how to validly baptize someone?

Kelly:

Well, we would have Roman six. Roman six does give us information about what baptism represents about being buried, going under, being identified into his death, and then coming up expressing this newness of life. So if we were getting all that information from, say, Romans wouldn’t be, or from Paul’s letters, it wouldn’t all be there explicitly like how we today anyway, we have many different types of versions, whether it’s sprinkling, full immersion or someone uses a water hose and bla you. But we get what baptism represents, and I don’t know how much you may or may not know about this, but prior to Jesus coming or prior to John the Baptist, Jewish people practiced what’s called a mikva. It’s a Jewish custom belief where in Hebrew it’s called Teah, which means immersion, and they would actually represent what goes into the water. This is a Jewish custom still practice today. Not saying agree with everything, just saying it’s what would be common. Then you go into the water and it actually represents dying to your old way of life. And then when you would come up, it actually represented a freshness or a newest life. And Jewish people actually call that a new birth, even though it’s not the same as we would understand as Christians.

Trent:

Right. But let me ask you this question. In order for a baptism to be valid, do you have to say, I baptize you in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit?

Kelly:

Those exact words?

Trent:

Yes.

Kelly:

Yeah. We don’t see those exact words. I know we’d be going with that in the book of Acts. I got that. I’ve done a debate on this one before. So I’m familiar with Oma. So the authority of right, the name of, so when we read Matthew 28, 19 and 20, when Jesus giving the great commission to go and baptize the name of the Father son, holy Spirit, this was something that would be recognized even you would agree, even early Apostolic fathers taught that exact thing. But when we read the book of Acts, it says they were baptized in the name of Jesus. So what does the name of Jesus represent? Well, that represents his teachings and his authority, knowing what that word, name of means. But we don’t see those exact words laid out in the book of Acts.

Trent:

Right. But it is really important because if someone is not baptized in those words, they have not. You would say, for example, Christians, would you say that Christians have a duty to be baptized?

Kelly:

Oh, yes, I was baptized, absolutely.

Trent:

Sure. But now we have to know, okay, what counts as a baptism? If you go to a pastor and he says, I baptize you in the name of Jesus, does that count?

Kelly:

Well, that’s hard to say. I would probably lean towards no at first unless I understood where they were coming from. Right. If I don’t know all the information now that’s a oneness, which I’m assuming you alluded to it earlier. One is Pentecost is they teach Jesus name only, and that’s where they try to get their teaching and doctrines from, say, the book of Acts. This is where a lot of us back in those days, which again, this, they didn’t have what we have today. We have so much data and information that we can go off. Back in those days, they didn’t have what we have today. I know that. But what we don’t have that they had is they had culture. They had culture back in those days. Many of us are not Jewish. We don’t live in Israel. So we don’t understand how some things would be done.

That’s why I was alluding to what was called a mikva. They knew exactly what immersion or baptism signified back in those days. We, many of us today, anyway, not all of us, but many of us don’t understand a lot of that Jewishness of the Christian faith. So as you’re saying, if someone said, I was only baptized in the name of Jesus, I’d be why? Only in Jesus? I would ask them, I’d ask them these questions. Acts 19, they said, who are you baptizing? He said, well, in John’s Bap, he says, well, okay, that was good for that, but you need to be baptized in the name of Jesus. So that signified, they were followers, but they were only followers of John at the time. But now they’re being followers of Jesus Christ.

Trent:

So the point I’m making here is that this isn’t very important. This is very important for the Christian life. And in the hypothetical example, you gave Paul’s letters would not sufficiently answer the question. Even if you included acts, you could be misled in thinking the Jesus name formula was valid. When one requires that the Great Commission formula Matthew 28, of course you would still have questions. Does it have to be immersion? And the New Testament does not answer that question, but the diday, an early extra biblical source, does reveal a sacred tradition going back to the earliest church that it can be immersion or it can be pouring, or it can be sprinkling. It can be different type of water that can be valid. So that’s what I was getting at there, but I have another one little on that then I’ll let you finish and then I have a question. Yeah,

Kelly:

One little nugget on that though I was mentioning, you’re correct, there’s no formula in Paul’s epistle. You’re correct. The good news for us today is we have all that. Now we have scripture to go to. We know Matthew, we know when we’re looking at different scriptures what these would point to. So early on, if you had the culture, like I was mentioning before, they would’ve known in the name of what that signified in the Jewish culture back then as being a follower of Christ. And like I briefly said before, there was the Jewish understanding and still to this day of what a mikvah is, of what a baptism represented. And for them then it was fully immersion back in those days. So they did have something to go off back in those days.

Trent:

When it comes to obligating people, something I worry about when it comes to using solo scriptura is that doctrine comes up a lot. We talk about the Trinity, we talk about believing doctrine, but I think also moral theology is really important. Knowing what is sinful or not sinful to engage in or to omit, that’s very, very important in the life of a Christian. And so one would expect that scripture would equip the man of God when it comes to these obligatory moral beliefs. But I think one problem we have here is that we’ve got a lot of moral issues that come up that are very novel. And it’s interesting to say scripture is a living word. I don’t know if I would use that term. Describe, I know you’re probably referencing, I dunno, if you were referring to Hebrews, and it refers to the living word as a double-edged sword. I didn’t know if that’s what you were,

Kelly:

That one or two Timothy three, 16 and 17. I mean, God’s word even says in the Old Testament, God’s word is magnified even above his name. And so God’s word is living, even like Jesus said, man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. So when I look at scripture, I look at it as the God’s living word for our daily lives.

Trent:

What I would say there is the living word of God is Jesus Christ, but the word of God exists

Kelly:

A person. Right.

Trent:

But the word of God in scripture, and I’m doing research on this, that phrase word of God is never applied only to a written document. Correct, yeah. It’s always applied to God speaking a prophet speaking it is a quality of

Kelly:

Even at times, even the word lords, even a person back in the Old Testament, the Lagos. Correct.

Trent:

Yeah. But so going back to the moral issues there, for example, I think it is obligatory on Christians that they not participate in vitro fertilization or gestational surrogacy, even if it can be done without destroying human embryos. I would say that it’s a radical perversion of what God intended for the human family and for reproduction, that it is sinful. Even if there’s no destruction of embryos IVF or hiring a gestational surrogate or acquiring egg and sperm donors and a gestational surrogate and adopting a child that way, I would say that’s disordered. It’s sinful. Christians must oppose that. But that’s a technology that was invented 2000 years later. Now you might say, well, scripture gives us implicit principles to show this as wrong. But I feel like people could argue. So for 1,930 years, Christians believed that the Bible gave implicit principles that barrier contraceptives are wrong. And now many Protestants would say it’s a personal choice. It’s not obligatory. The fact that Protestants could embrace barrier contraception, not all, but many in the 1930s going forward, I don’t see what would stop them from these other more radical novel kind of sins. That’s the worry I

Kelly:

Have. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, we live in an age today, which mean, and you would agree, people do what’s right in their own eyes, right? Judge is

Trent:

21, 25.

Kelly:

Yeah, that’s right. That’s something that I’ve learned quite a lot over the years, even among fellow Christians. And so it is an interesting thing, and I mean, we all at some point justify certain things in our own lives, and we want to make something like Isaiah five says, woe to those who call evil good and woe to those who call good evil. It comes down to what has God given us in his word about principles and morals, like you said. And even what Paul says in Romans two, he talks about the Gentiles who didn’t have the written law, but they had the law written in their hearts. God gave them a conscience. God gives us a conscience. So I believe even though we may not sometimes have a physical copy, and someone could even be not even a believer yet, but God has given us that conscience. So I think are things that people do today that they want to validate or justify for their own reasons, even more than what you just talked about, that topic, that can be quite dangerous, quite contrary to what God’s design was for the man and the woman for a family. Yeah. So I would definitely lean a lot to you, but again, I think this would go again back to just what does scripture teach on morals and principles and what God instituted as procreation, that kind of stuff.

Trent:

Well, do you think that the use of condoms by a married couple as a contraceptive is sinful?

Kelly:

That is a rough question, Trent. I’ve never been asked that question before. I might have to go Give us a thought. Go get a plumb line on that one. Sure. Yeah. Would I say it’s sinful? I would say it’s probably not going with God’s word. It would be going against what God has called us to do. But would I say there’s anything directly that would say it’s a sin or not a sin? I can’t say per se in myself on that one.

Trent:

What do you think about using egg and sperm donors and a gestational surrogate to adopt, create life to create and adopt a child?

Kelly:

Now, that’s a good question because sometimes maybe a female can’t give birth, say physically they can’t give birth. Right. Again, some of these things you’re going outside the Bible now, so this is not my zone, so now I’m in trouble.

Trent:

That’s why don’t you just give your example, your thoughts, but

Kelly:

I know of people who couldn’t physically have a child, and so if it’s possible for something like that to be to which they could have a child or at least adopt, I wouldn’t say unquote, that would be sinful. I just don’t find anything against it or for it directly in scripture.

Trent:

One last one. I did a video a while back. It was about Dennis Prager and pornography and stuff like that. Although I was looking at what Christians were saying, nearly all Christians I know who are solid people are against pornography. If I talk to a conservative Christian, they say, yeah, sinful. Because they take Jesus as word when he says lust is as bad as adultery. It’s very clear. Sermon on the

Kelly:

Mountain. Yeah. Matthew chapter five, right? Yep.

Trent:

Yeah. But then in the video, I have a lot of different conservative Protestants like Mike Winger, Alan Parr, Sean McDowell, James Dobson, saying that it is even the gentleman who used to blog at try a blog until he passed away a few years ago, I think Steve Hayes talking about this, that non lustful masturbation isn’t sinful. That if you’re just seeking sexual release apart from lustful thoughts, that is not sinful for an unmarried person can do it by themselves

Kelly:

As a man. I know. I know. It’s, I will openly confess my sins. I have done that in the past as a man. I can never think of a time when that happened when I wasn’t having a lustful thought. So if that was possible for a man to do that, that’s pretty amazing. I don’t know how you could do that by not having a lustful thought

Trent:

Or for a married couple to do that to one another as an alternative to intercourse, for example.

Kelly:

Well, that’s still between the husband and the wife that’s still a union of that. What’s in the bed between the husband and wife that is still union together, however that’s going on. But if we’re talking about just in general masturbation, I don’t know how any of those guys you listed, if that’s what they’ve all said, that you could do masturbation and it wouldn’t be sinful if you’re not lusting. I don’t know how in the world could you do that without lusting. I don’t know how that’s possible.

Trent:

So your objection would be more so I would

Kelly:

Be saying I don’t think they’re right. I don’t think that’s possible. I think maybe they’re trying to justify it. It’s a weird thought for me. I don’t know how that could be possible.

Trent:

Yeah, even I’ll have to send you the links, but try a blog, which is I always enjoy their critiques. They have a lot of thoughtful critiques on Catholicism there, but Hayes himself defended masturbation in articles because scripture is rather oblique on that. The closest reference might be if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. But I can send you a link of these other Protestants saying that. But when it comes to married couples, I’m saying I wouldn’t consider that union just if a wife causes her husband to have release, but it’s not in the act of intercourse. I would say that that’s just mutual

Kelly:

Masturbation. There could be factors, there could be more information if they’re just doing it just to do it maybe, but we don’t always know what’s always going on between a husband and wife. So I wouldn’t be so quick to judge on that one.

Trent:

Yeah, and that’s just what I bring up is that it is just a point. I don’t mean to get into too sensitive of subjects or anything like that, but when we see scripture saying, well, scripture is our guide, it is what God has given us for me, I say, okay, well, I’m going to put the guide to the test. Then here are the pressing questions we have, and I’ll probably have to go here in a second. Actually, hopefully. Can

Kelly:

I ask you one question before you go though?

Trent:

Yeah. So can we put the guide to the test? I see it coming up short a lot, but I’ll let you have a last question at me.

Kelly:

So on this topic, and this might be a couple minutes, so if you got to give me a short answer, maybe we could have another discussion. Do you do live streams on your channel? We invite guests on

Trent:

Sometimes. I’m actually looking to try to do in-person interviews only. I’m trying to get this whole studio

Kelly:

Set. Oh, you’re going to come to Canada? Well, then I welcome that.

Trent:

Well, I would love in, so you say Vancouver Island? That’s like Vancouver,

Kelly:

Right? Yeah, just above Washington.

Trent:

I loved Victoria, the garden.

Kelly:

That’s where I live right now. That’s where I live right now. Oh,

Trent:

I fly out there to interview you. That place is a bomb.

Kelly:

Well, then it’s a date. Everyone heard it? Okay.

But yeah, no. Well anyway, we could have another discussion at some point, whether on your channel or on mine or whatever. Here’s my question. This is a good topic and I really just want to say thank you for coming on to take the time to be here. I know you’re a busy guy and I mean that with all my heart, and I’ve really enjoyed your questions. I hope that things that I’ve shared have also been some good things to back and forth for you. I’m going to quote something from the catechism on this topic. This is a quote from 100 and it says this, the task of interpreting the word of God, authentically, I always pronounce that word wrong, authentically, has been entrusted solely to the magisterium of the church. That is to the pope and to the bishops in communion with him. Now, I’ve talked about this before with different Catholics, and you’re obviously the top Catholic I’ve ever got to talk to on this one.

So this is really an honor for me to ask you this question. I do mean that like I mentioned earlier, I have family in my past that is Roman Catholic. They’re very Sicilian. If there would be a Godmother movie, my former stepmom who was Italian, she would’ve been fitting in that role quite well. So I’m very familiar with growing up with stuff, friends, this and that. So my question to you, Trent, and I don’t mean this in any disrespect, but the catechism says the sole responsibility of interpretation is for the magisterium. How can anybody who’s not technically a part of the magisterium or that authority, how do any of you guys actually have the ability to actually study the Bible for yourselves?

Trent:

Sure. Well, what you’re reading, there is a summary that’s a summary paragraph of what the catechism is discussing related to divine revelation, and I believe that that should be a word for word quote from the second Vatican Council’s dogmatic constitution on divine revelation called Dave Verbum. And you’re correct. It’s discussing who has the role of interpreting scripture. Now, when the church interprets scripture, it puts forward teachings at various levels of authority. So we’ll often put forward things maybe at a level that would require religious ascent, but it’s not infallible. The church has only, the church has only infallibly defined a handful of biblical passages. So when we look at what the church teaches, we have to look also how does the church practice? The church works in cooperation with Catholic biblical scholars, theologians, the church gives imprimatur, for example, bishops will give imprimatur to biblical translations and biblical commentaries composed by laypeople.

The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible by Scott Hahn and Curtis Mitch, for example, is a great example of that. They’re interpreting scripture and they’re allowed to do that. Though the church actually does have Canon law related to producing translations of scripture, you need the church’s approval to do that because some people like Jehovah’s Witnesses, their new world translation, they come up with their own translation. It can get a little bit dicey, but Catholics are certainly free to read the Bible and to interpret it. The Magister’s role in interpreting scripture is not so much to say, here’s what all the biblical passages mean. It’s only done that, like I said, for a handful of passages like John three, five is referring to water baptism. James chapter five is referring to priests giving ointment to this anointing of the sick. You can’t contradict that. But in a lot of other cases, the church has

Kelly:

Not weigh and just those are official teachings from the Catholic church. You’re talking about that, right?

Trent:

Yeah. So John three five is referenced in one of the infallible cannons of the Council of Trent after the reformation that this refers to water baptism. The church fathers also universally believe that verse referred to water baptism, at least prior to the Council of iia. So the church doesn’t give, they say, oh, all the biohazards mean this. It’s only in Foully defined a handful of them. Rather, I think that what the role of the magisterium is that it provides these guardrails up so that when you are doing your interpretation, you do not stray that a Bible passage like the Father is greater than I. What does that mean? It could mean this. It could mean that it definitely doesn’t mean that Jesus lacks the divine nature or is not as divine as the Father, something like that. And I think Protestants can appreciate that because I’ve seen a meme comparing solo scriptura to solo scriptura and the solo script is just the Bible and people go off in different directions.

And so law scriptura has the little guardrails of the creeds, the early confessions, the early Christians to keep people with an orthodoxy. That’s why the Southern Baptist Convention recently had that debate about adding the ene creed to their year 2000 articles of their 2000 statement of faith saying one of the Baptists arguing for was saying, we need these orthodox guardrails. So the magisterium acts in that way that it allows Catholics to read, study scripture to interpret it, but to have the final authority to say, this is how scripture relates to a dogma that has been infallibly taught as a central element of the faith that belongs to those who have been entrusted the scriptures. And that would be the successors of the apostles. So for me, when I look at the early Christians, you have saving nations of Antioch in the year 1 0 7, he doesn’t say follow the Bible. It had all been written by then, but he says, follow the bishop as Jesus Christ says, follow the Father. So that’s probably how I would look at it.

Kelly:

Well, that’s interesting because, and thank you for your answer. I want to just give a comment that maybe a quote you just referenced, Ignatius, that I have a quote I’d like to maybe bounce off you quickly too, but so you bring up John three five, and that’s a pretty good discussion. I would definitely disagree even from within its own context of John three, much less the whole gospel of John. But let’s say hypothetically, say you’re raised, say this is a real situation. Someone’s a Catholic and they’re raised in the Catholic church and they’ve done the confirmation, they’ve done all the stuff, different sacraments, but then they start believing that John three five really isn’t actually water baptism. It’s actually talking about a physical birth that which is born of water talking about a fleshes flesh, and that was born of spirit of spirit talking about a spiritual birth. And then he goes to see that how Jesus talking to Nicodemus says, just like when Moses lifted up the serpent, so must the son of lift up that who believe in him will have eternal life. What if one comes to that conclusion by reading those verses that it’s actually not teaching about water baptism, but actually talking about this new birth trust in the Jesus Christ and they don’t believe and adhere to the magisterium? What would happen to that person?

Trent:

Well, if that person it sounds like very quickly it would go from John three five to them rejecting the doctrine of baptismal regeneration itself. And unless they become a Protestant who believes infant baptism is for covenantal purposes, they’d probably up projecting like infant baptism. The same would happen for someone who reads scripture and says, I know it talks about the Father, son and the Holy Spirit, but I cannot wrap my head around with philosophically that the doctrine of the Trinity, Steve Neish for example, was a Protestant philosopher who debated Catholics quite recently and he had a lot of anti-Catholic polemic to argue against the faith. And so he gave reasons why he wasn’t Catholic. He now denies the doctrine of the Trinity for these reasons and also doesn’t believe scripture supports it. So what you’re asking is what would happen if, if the ultimate divine authority, well, lemme finish. What would happen if somebody denied if the ultimate divine authority says you must believe this and you don’t believe it, they would commit the sin of heresy. That is true. Whether the church says you have to believe it or from your perspective, the Bible says you have to believe it. But the problem is the Bible never clearly demarcates between what you have to believe, what you don’t have to believe.

Kelly:

Well, the ironic thing is when you’re reading in John three, it doesn’t explicitly teach water baptism there and it doesn’t teach it. That’s a salvation issue there. So that’s what we, we talked about earlier red flag. So if there’s a dogma or the magisterium is saying this is something you must adhere to, but that’s not stated directly in that passage that would cause me some concern. Even like what we talked earlier about say the doctrine of Mary,

Trent:

Do you think that someone has to believe that Jesus Christ had two wills, a divine will and a human will?

Kelly:

They have to believe that.

Trent:

Yeah,

Kelly:

I don’t see any verse that says they have to believe that, but I do believe scripture teaches that when a person accepts the gospel, there’s a progression. Like I mentioned earlier, when I became a Christian at the age of six, I didn’t understand everything about the deity of Christ. I didn’t understand everything about the Trinity. I didn’t know much about a lot of things back in those days. And I still consider myself even to this day still a student of God’s word. I’m still learning new things at times. So I would say it depends on the situation. Now, if you’ve got somebody who claims to have been a Christian for say 30, 40 a long time, and then they’re actually denying both his humanity and his deity at the same time, there would be a problem for me. There would be definitely a question mark on that.

Right. But it depends on the situation. But now there’s no verse that says that is directly a salvation issue though, right? That’s the question in hand. So going off what I said a second ago when you brought up again John three, and I am showing you respect, you brought it up, but I would have a problem with what you just said. If I was a Catholic directly and I have never been a Catholic, just so you know, even though my family, a lot of what they are and were, it was my dad’s former marriage, he was married a second time married after that. So anyway, more than once, actually, my dad sadly married a few times, but my dad was remarried for a while with a Sicilian lady, like I said. So just a clarification, but point is if scripture talks about what we must believe to be saved, but then say in this example, if someone denies that you said they would be considered a heretic and then you alluded to, well, there’d be all these other things they might now reject as well.

That’s a lot of assumptions there to me. I want to just bring it back to what you brought up originally and say back to Mary because this has been a big thing for me, friends, family, and not trying to pick on Mary. I have tons of respect for Mary, so don’t take anything I say wrongly here, but this is one of my biggest problems with Catholicism is the Maryology doctrines because of the immaculate conception and the assumption of Mary that you talked about as being salvific doctrines. And so the question comes back to is, well, where does scripture teach these things? Where does scripture, where did Jesus teach that this is a salvation issue on this issue here on maryology or marrying doctrines? Where did Paul teach us? Where did John teach us? Where did any of these guys in the first, what we hear in the testament, much less even the first few centuries, we don’t see that type of stress of teachings. So this would cause me concern. And again, I say that with all due respect, and so that’s why what I said originally is my channel called bere in perspective for a good reason. I believe what we can learn, things like you can learn from me and I can learn from you as well, but at the end of the day, when it’s all said and done, God has given us a scripture and that’s what we want to go, to have that final authority to know truth from merit, to know right from wrong.

Trent:

What I would say though is that the way that we know that certain written documents are divinely inspired, scripture doesn’t come from scripture because scripture doesn’t even give us guidelines to know what is and isn’t scripture that Christ gave us. God’s word is given to us and written in an unwritten form, and Christ established one church and through that divine revelation has been propagated through the teaching of that one church. So this will get us into, we could be here all night and it would be a lot of fun to do that. But I think ultimately

Kelly:

What’s getting back to, we could maybe table it for another time,

Trent:

But I think it’s going to come back to who has the authority to determine what is divine revelation and what these body of documents and sources and knowledge, what constitutes different levels of doctrine that we are obliged to believe today. And even just, I see what you were saying, I just want to see where did Jesus teach us? Where did Paul teach us? Where did John say that? That’s the same argument the mono phite heretics gave about denying Christ’s human will. The Apol gave to deny Christ’s human mind. The Aryans gave against Homoousios to describe the father and son instead of homoousios. These have been the same arguments that have been made. Saint EU in the second century said that heretics could take scripture and rearrange it to look something else in the same way that a vandal could take an image of a king, a mosaic, and rearrange the stones to make it look like a fox or something else. And St. Jerome said that the essence of scripture is not the letter but the meaning. And that’s what we’ve been as Catholics of Protestants we’re still arguing about to this day.

Kelly:

Well, let me give you, before you leave, a couple of references that we could maybe chew on. Sure. Aaron Aus of lions against heresies 3.1 0.1 states, we have learned from none others the plan of our salvation then from those through whom the gospel has come down to us, which they did at one time proclaim in public and in a later period by the will of God handed down to us in the scriptures to be the ground and pillar of our faith. Gregory Ofia quoted from dogmatic treaties book 12 states here, it’s a bigger quote, but I’m just going to get towards the end of this quote. It says, let the inspired scripture then be our umpire. The vote of truth will surely be given to those whose dogmas are found to agree with divine words. And one more quote, this is from, is it pronounced Cy of Jerusalem?

Trent:

Cyril?

Kelly:

Yeah. This is from the Cataly lectures four point 17. Have thou ever in your mind this seal, which for the present has been lightly touched in my discords by way of summary, but shall be stated, should the Lord permit to the best of my power with proof from the scriptures for concerning the divine and holy mysteries of the faith, not even a casual statement must be delivered without the holy scriptures. Nor must we be drawn aside by mere plausibility and artificial of speech, even to me, who to tell you these things give not absolute credence unless thou receive the proof of the things which I announce from the divine scriptures for this salvation, which we believe depends not on ingenuous reasoning, but on the demonstration of the holy scriptures. So Trent, I know you’ve had these debates on this and there are church fathers that can kind of, well,

Trent:

I only have one

Kelly:

Question. Lemme just finish my last statement. Go ahead. I understand there’s a debate on both sides, don’t get me wrong, but those are three, and I have more that what I read. There definitely was a view early on that looked to scripture as unquote that final authority to know truth for error. So it’s not just a thing that came early or later with a reformation. This was something that was early on based on, like I shared earlier with Acts 17, that we go to the scriptures to know what is actually being stated right or wrong.

Trent:

Do you think those fourth century, late fourth century church fathers practiced sola scriptura?

Kelly:

Some of them did.

Trent:

Like the ones you quoted.

Kelly:

Yeah. And some were before, some were early on as well.

Trent:

So did they practice sola scriptura while also believing in infant baptism, the propitiatory sacrifice of the mass, the priesthood, confessing sins to a priest, all things that are fairly well documented by the fourth century. So did these fathers then see no conflict between the Bible as the ultimate rule and these distinctly Catholic doctrines then?

Kelly:

Well, some of those doctrines I would actually have some agreement with even to this day. Not all the whole list that you just gave there though, but again, the commonality that we would have, at least that I would have with them is that they went to scripture. Now whether what they taught was right or wrong, that goes back to what does the scriptures teach, right? But what I’m just appealing to just at least you understand, is that there are those that did have a view that they went to scripture to know if you’re going to have a dogma, you’re going to have a certain belief. It must line up with the scriptures, with God’s word. So all that I’ve been saying and sharing with you the whole night and where I’m at in my view is I’m open to truth. I’m open to learning, but I do want to be grounded on the apostles teachings. On the prophets and what Jesus taught because that’s what we at least know for sure is truth from error.

Trent:

But you would agree that these fourth century fathers, they practiced sola scriptura, but they saw that one could have the Bible as an ultimate authority and the Bible did not. Their universal views on baptismal regeneration, a priest making the mass a propitiatory sacrifice on an altar or confessing sins to a priest.

Kelly:

I’m not,

Trent:

I know

Kelly:

You don’t agree with. I agree with, yeah, sorry. I’m just saying they would go to scripture, that’s what they would be on, and

Trent:

They would see these things as totally biblical.

Kelly:

They weren’t basing it on their own authority. They went to scripture to believe what they were teaching. That’s what I’m trying to say, whether right or whether right or wrong, they still went to scripture for their authority.

Trent:

But you would say infant baptism, batory sacrifice of the mass and confessing sins to a priest, you would say those are not biblical.

Kelly:

I think confessing sins to an elder is biblical, but it’s not in the same sense of what the Catholic church has taught over the years. I don’t agree with that. But you have biblical mandate where in the Old Testament, they would go to priests, they would talk to priests. You see in the New Testament elders, they would go to elders confess their sins to elders just like you. I’ve been an elder, I’ve been a pastor before. I’ve been in roles of priests

Trent:

Like Saint Ambrose believes that just as your sins are forgiven in the baptismal font, they’re forgiven in the confessional. You don’t believe that?

Kelly:

Well, no. But again, not all of these church fathers, all these church leaders, of course not all of ’em are going to adhere to Sory Torah. Right. So my point of what I’ve shared was just to say that there are those early on, this is my whole point. This is what I’m trying to say. Even like what you referenced, Aryans and other groups that were considered heretics. Yeah, they lean into scripture, but they still were wrong. Paul Peter says in second Peter three that people were twisting Paul’s teachings, right? The twisting God’s twisting the scriptures, twisting what Paul taught. That’s why it’s so important as Paul instructed study to show their self a fruit accurately hand on the word of God. So how do we know truth, Mary? Well, it’s contained in God’s word. We need to study. So if a pastor or a priest or someone comes along and says, this is a dog or something you must believe to be saved, but it doesn’t line up with God’s word, well then I’m going to hold the view that we are to reject that

Trent:

If it doesn’t line up with your understanding of God’s word.

Kelly:

Well, I’m talking like with God’s word. If scripture doesn’t teach it, say IE maryology, there is no maryology Marion doctrines taught by any of the apostles as S for salvation. You can’t find a single reference.

Trent:

Right? But ultimately it’s going to come down to that. When you say what the Bible teaches, I don’t know. How do we have direct access to that? Don’t we only have direct access to what we think or others think that it teaches?

Kelly:

Well, if we open the Bible like we talked about earlier, and I mentioned to you, if we say go to say, Paul, what does Paul teach about justification? What does Paul teach about the gospel? What does Paul teach about how to get eternal life and sin? At least we have enough data there. Or if we were to read certain epistles about faith, verse works, we have all these things Canadian, there’s things on the issue what baptism is, right? The big debate on is it essential for salvation or not? I know there’s three passages, mark 16, 16 Acts 2 38 and Acts 2216 that people will lean on as teaching that the physical act of water baptism is actually what saves you. Yet Paul says in one Corinthians one 17 that he was set not to baptize but to preach the gospel. He says something different. He uses the word gospel there. So this is where we get into God’s word and reason what’s actually being stated. And so if a pastor comes along and says something that You must believe this or you must do that, but it doesn’t have something at least of warrant in scripture, that’s what I’m saying. I would not accept it, but if there’s something at least to chew on, then that’s something I’ll consider and look into.

Trent:

In your reasonings, do you give any weight to let’s say the witness of Christian history that from the apostles onto the 16th century, Christians believed it was possible for a true Christian to fall away from the faith, or they believed at least in the first millennium, baptism does take away sin. Does that historical consensus that even Protestant apologists like William Webster who has a lot of those quotes that you referenced earlier in the appendix of the back of his book on the subject admits to where does that go in determining your weight of what the Bible means based on how the church has understood it for centuries?

Kelly:

Just for clarification, are you talking about, I don’t think I fully understand your question. Could you say it again?

Trent:

Sorry. The two doctrines. Does the weight of how does the weight of Christian history go factor into your understanding of what the Bible says? It would seem to me that if the apostles taught something, they would pass that on to their successors and to other Christians. And the faith has handed on, and you’ve talked about things that have historical gaps in their data, but there’s also things that have quite robust historical data like that. No prominent Christian, only some unnamed heretics believed a person it was impossible to lose your salvation or in the first millennium, everyone believed baptism is what takes away sin. How does that historic unanimous consensus factor into your understanding of what the Bible means?

Kelly:

Well, we’re talking about on the gospel doctrine, these kind of things and what it means to follow Christ. I grant that throughout history there is a vast variety of beliefs and views and that developed over time, and there’s different divisions within different groups and sometimes some even groups might even have with certain beliefs of the Catholic church, there’s going to be some things that really developed in the fourth fifth century that stuck over time. No doubt. For me, again, it’s real simple and it’s going to be saying something I’ve already said before, but it’s real simple, Trent, just like when Paul was teaching those in Berea and they’re hearing and he’s reasoning with them and it says they were eager to hear, eager to listen, but they were examining the script to see whether these things were So now, because we do have God’s word, right?

We are blessed. We have this revelation of God, we have the internet, we can examine things, look things up in Hebrew and Greek, that many of us, hundreds and maybe thousands of years ago, whatever it would be, we didn’t have that type of availability. We have a lot of data that we can look up. Now we have things that can be read online, but when we examine all these things, whatever doctrine or teaching we’re talking about, and you’ve given a good list of stuff, that definitely has some consideration. At the end of the day for me, if it’s something that’s like a doctrine or a dogma or something like that, that’s being espoused and being something that’s taught as something you got to hold onto and believe. I at least want to find something that I can grab from the word of God, whether old or New Testament, something that gives us something to go off of, right?

If it’s something that gives us something contrary, I don’t want to be sound like a broken record again, that fine, let’s say again of maryology. This is something that’s very foreign. The Marion doctrines from what we read from the apostles teachings much less even from the teachings of Jesus. So these things came and developed many, many years later. Again, I’m not saying they’re wrong just because of that. I’m just saying there’s no substance for these teachings directly in God’s word. So then if I’m told at the end of the day if I reject these doctrines and I’ve been told by people who are Catholics because I reject these things, I know about them, I’m not saved. Well, that tells me, well then what then is the gospel at the end of the day?

Trent:

Okay, but for me, my concern is that it’s not really about historical evidence for your perspective. Because if the church says, for example, you must believe in baptismal regeneration, you say, well, I’ll believe it if it’s scripture, but are there protestants who do find there are? I’m not going to ask the question. It’s a fact. Yeah, there are. I agree. Are Protestants who do find it there and you would say, well, they falsely find it there. I disagree with them, and we could have an exegetical discussion. So I don’t see the wake of history. So let’s say your theology, lemme make sure your theology would be just a part of it. Baptism is for believers in Christ, those who have true faith. Correct? And it is impossible for someone who has true faith to ever permanently fall away from the faith and lose their salvation. That’s what you believe. Correct.

Kelly:

I hold the view which is not, again, it’s not free grace movement or theologist, definitely not that perspective. I have the view that if you are truly born again in Christ, Christ, he’ll never leave us, forsake us. We cannot be plucked out of his hand. Paul says He who began a good work and you will complete it. Paul talks about Romans eight, about there’s nothing that can separate from love of Christ. So I believe that if we have the Holy Spirit truly born again a child of God, we do not become an un child of God. We don’t become unborn again, just like if you have kids, which I assume you do, there’s nothing that your kids, they’re your genuine kids. There’s nothing they could ever do to no longer be your children. I guarantee you, you say that’s impossible. I say the same thing.

If someone’s truly a child of God, born again, if they are known by Jesus, they’ll never hear these four words that Jesus says in Matthew 7 23, depart from me. I never knew you. He says, I never knew you, that word never. You can look it up in the Greek. And I know Greek never means anything other than never. It’s always never. So these people that he talks to, he says, I never knew you, but yet they thought because they did these miracles and science in Jesus’ name, they thought they were Christians. Right. So all I’m saying is look where I’m coming from anyway, and I know this is a big debated topic because people do depart from the faith. People do reject Jesus Christ who quoted or claimed to be believers. At the end of the day, only God knows the heart. I really believe that at the end of the day, right, even Jesus talks about, I don’t remember the passage right now, but about the wheat and the tears growing up going together.

Sometimes we can’t sometimes tell the difference. Even like Judas scar, Iscariot, people would’ve thought Judas was a believer the whole time. Yet Jesus called him a devil in John six 70 and 71, he says he was a devil right from the very beginning, right from the very beginning, but he looked like he was the real deal. So I know that’s a big topic and maybe we could talk more about than another time, but I do believe also as we talked about earlier, that there is a danger though for people who do a lip service and think just because they believe something, they’re automatically saved and there’s no dangers. Because Paul warns a lot of times he says in two Corinthians 13, five, examine yourselves, test yourself, see whether or not you are in faith, or do you not know that Jesus Christ is in you unless you fail the test. So I know that there are warnings from scripture for people to know if they’re truly saved or not.

Trent:

Well, the reason I ask to make sure I had it correct, your theology is that baptism is for believers, correct. It is not what saves us and a true child of God cannot become an un child of God or be

Kelly:

Dead. Correct. I believe that. Correct, yes.

Trent:

Who would you say is the earliest person in Christian history you could identify that also held to those doctrines?

Kelly:

Off the top of my head, I don’t have anybody right now directly.

Trent:

Okay.

Kelly:

Yeah. Alright,

Trent:

Very cool. Well, I think

Kelly:

Other than the earliest church fathers, which would be Paul and Peter and John,

Trent:

Very good. My wife probably went to bed, but maybe I’ll still catch her if she’s still up. But

Kelly:

Listen, you went longer,

Trent:

You kept me around longer. You reeled me

Kelly:

In. You went longer than you said because originally you were said just an hour said an

Trent:

Hour.

Kelly:

So if you ever do come out my way, I will gladly treat you and take care of you wholeheartedly. But I hope that we’ll keep in touch by email and we can set up another discussion down the road when you got some time.

Trent:

Absolutely. Sorry,

Kelly:

I was trying to find your wife told you you can go for another hour.

Trent:

No, after doing a two hour live stream, no. If I come out to see you, we will hit up boot cart gardens and down to the harbor and all that other fine and great stuff at the San Diego,

Kelly:

Wherever, out in Dallas. I also love Dallas, so I tell you what,

Trent:

We’ll do pit barbecue, we’ll see a rodeo

Kelly:

That That’d be sweet. That’d be sweet. Well, I’m going to, yeah, go ahead. I

Trent:

Was just going to say if people want more about me, check out Council of Trent. I have a book called The

Kelly:

Case for You’re, you’re tagged as well in the video. So yeah, check out Council of Trent, and like you mentioned to me earlier, feel welcome to upload this video discussion to your channel whenever you want. And just all I’d ask is just tag it or whatever, something like that. That way people know about it. But Trent, thank you. I do mean that. What a great discussion. It was very respectful and I really appreciate that about you in your debates and in discussions with different people, and I hope that more people can learn from those things as well.

Trent:

Alright, thank you much for having me, sir. Really enjoyed it. Thank you guys so much for watching. If you want to help us to have similar discussions live in person here in the studio, please consider supporting us@trhornpodcast.com. We’d also love it if you would like this video and subscribe to our channel. Thank you guys so much and I hope you have a very blessed day.