Patrick still does not acknowledge that when a writer paraphrases a statement or a thought, he doesn’t use quotes, whereas, when he quotes a particular thing, the word, phrase, or sentence is bracketed in quote marks. Aside from this fact, Patrick has spent way—WAY—too much time on a couple of paraphrasings in my opening remarks, and very little time on my arguments. This is very telling as it exposes his inability to deal with these exegetical arguments which refute his paradigm, which as I have demonstrated several times now, some are even based on his own admissions. Please notice that he never offered one keystroke of evidence, but only mockery in response to the several times I have demonstrated that he himself proved my proposition for me.
As in his previous Negative, he continues to increase his verbal insults, denigration and ridicule of me as he faces further impedance from my arguments. Forgive the redundancy when I reiterate that this is the typical modus operandi of Futurists when they are forced to deal with contextual / exegetical arguments and questions based on what the texts say.
When I pointed out that Patrick is not paying attention to what he reads as he cites 1Th 1:16 which is a non-existent verse, he responds by saying I “need to follow Alice down i the Rabbit Hole and have her give you one of those pills that makes you grow up. Are you seriously contending with a typo? Are you so unfamiliar with God’s word that you are not aware of what 1 and 2 Thessalonians are teaching? You either don’t know what the Bible teaches or you’re just strutting around with your feathers fanned out because you found a typo.”
Note again the blatant arrogance and frustration seething from his statement as he emasculates me, strongly suggests that I’m ignorant of God’s word, and/or, prating about a typo. Patrick obviously is unaware of his responsibility in formal debate to be accurate, and that it’s not his opponent’s place to guess at what he might be referring to, out of two entire Pauline epistles; AND, he still didn’t point out the verse(s) to which he was referring as 2 Thessalonians 1:16 is also a non-existent verse! This is further evidence of his flustered inability to deal with my arguments as he is smothered in his own confusion.
What is a stunning inconsistency is the fact that after Patrick accuses me of misquoting Acts 13:26f, as he quotes only verse 27, apparently not realizing that the “ f ” means “and [verse] following,” he suggests that I am “so unfamiliar with God’s word that [I am] not aware of what 1 and 2 Thessalonians are teaching,” while he himself tries to further negate my paraphrasing of John 5:46f by suggesting that Jesus is not speaking to Pharisees, because the term “Pharisees” is not in the text. This is a terrible hermeneutic, and the Logical Fallacy of The Appeal To Ignorance, which is all too typical of the Futurists as they are thrashed with the truth and have nowhere to turn!
“There is another that beareth witness of me; and I know that the witness which he witnesseth of me is true. Ye sent unto John, and he bare witness unto the truth,” (Joh 5:33);
“And this is the record of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, Who art thou? He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias. And they which were sent were from the Pharisees,” (Joh 1:19-24).
You see Patrick, you can’t just make up wild—WILD—knee-jerk assertions in a formal debate. I am not assuming that Pharisees are in the context; the context proves it for me straight from the lips of Jesus.
Then, after I pointed out Acts 13:27 where Paul is speaking of the very people Jesus was talking to, and demonstrated by the definition of Holy Spirit’s terminology, that He defined “not understanding” specifically, Patrick said that I “wrote...a bucket of flapdoodle.” Some synonyms for flapdoodle are “insanity” “stupidity” and “idiocy.” The unequivocal petulance of such statements from an adult in a public setting is astounding! Such conduct is wholly unprofessional and unbecoming of a Christian! But, since Patrick has no answers for my arguments, that is where he turns hoping you will fall for it.
Reconsidering Patrick’s original statement from his second Negative, commenting on Acts 13:27, he said, “My worthy opponent makes the same mistake again. He is equating, ‘they knew Him not’, with, ‘they didn’t understand Him’ Jesus and Paul are talking about ‘Hearing, Believing’ and ‘Knowing’, not ‘Misunderstanding’. I believe that people who CAN’T understand the Word of God will make it to heaven because they CAN’T understand it,” (bolds mine, RR); then he quotes Strong’s definition, suggesting that I didn’t quote all of it. Either Patrick is not reading my Affirmatives, or he is attempting to deceive you hoping that you haven’t read them. In either case, such actions are certainly unbecoming of a Christian.
In his third Negative, Patrick attempts to mitigate his blunder with equivocation: “I was not talking about someone who chooses to not understand; I was speaking of those who CAN NOT UNDERSTAND, people such as infants or someone who can never comprehend what the scriptures teach. I don’t know how you drew your conclusion.” (bolds mine, RR)
How does an infant or mentally handicapped person choose to not understand??? Jesus and Paul were not talking to infants nor the mentally challenged about hearing, believing, and knowing; they were talking to and about the Pharisees, and knowing = understanding, and not knowing = not understanding! NOT understanding is MIS-understanding, and brother, the Pharisees were not infants and they were a far cry from being mentally handicapped! Infants and the mentally challenged are not in the context!! This is another demonstration of desperation at having no rebuttal!
As Patrick tries to resuscitate his rebuttal of the church being born fully functional, his denigrating slurs continue, hoping his followers still have not recognized his Straw Man. My original question was, “Furthermore I would ask Patrick how the kingdom was born fully grown?" See the difference? Patrick created his Straw Man of the church being born fully functional, which was not my question. I will remind the readers that in his previous Negative, he admitted that the kingdom grew for at least 40 years with the analogy of the Mustard Tree, which defeated his entire objection, Straw Man and all!
Patrick quotes my question: "This is another misunderstanding! Tell us Patrick, when a baby is born, does its body fully function?" Notice that Patrick does not finish the quote which demonstrates my point that the infant can't dress itself nor eat "footlong hotdogs and milkshakes"; nor can it walk and talk; it must take mother's milk and grow to maturity.
Patrick attempts to evade the force of my argument that Jesus, in John 5:28-29 is citing and interpreting Daniel 12:2 which is the only prophecy of “A” resurrection of both the just and the unjust (RJUJ) by saying, “They are not referring to the same event. The first is figurative and the second is literal.”
Based on what, brother?!! Where is there a prediction of a second RJUJ? This is a formal debate, and you can’t just make WILD assertions and say, “I do not have to prove something to you that I don’t believe myself.” Well, yes, yes you do! This is the purpose of a debate! Do NOT ignore my arguments! That is why you are in the Negative.
Patrick goes on to say, “You have Jesus, “The Word”, interpreting “The Word”. This is the most ridiculous statement I’ve read to date,” and thus he adds an insult to yet another Straw Man.
Notice folks, that Patrick never breathed on my point that Paul’s eschatology was nothing but what Moses and the prophets predicted (Acts 26:22-23), and Paul said:
“And I confess this to thee, that, according to the way that they call a sect, so serve I the God of the fathers, believing all things that in the law and the prophets have been written, having hope toward God, which they themselves also wait for, that there is about to be a rising again of the dead, both of righteous and unrighteous,” (Acts 24:14-15).
Patrick is this RJUJ, which Paul said was about to occur, the same RJUJ of Daniel 12:2? Realize dear brother, that Jesus nor Paul had the New Testament from which to quote; therefore, Paul was not quoting from the NT; Paul was quoting his predictions from the law of Moses and the prophets; therefore, since you admit that “the first is figurative,” and “figurative” categorically can’t mean a biological-bodily resurrection, then not only is the only prophecy of “A” RJUJ not a biological resurrection, Paul’s quotation of this one-and-only Danielic source-text for resurrection as imminent destroys your paradigm of a future-to-us RJUJ! In other words, you just surrendered your entire futurist paradigm again along with this debate! Both Jesus and Paul are quoting Daniel 12:1f, and it is Jesus’ Divine interpretation and quotation of that one-and-only source-text that leaves you with no scriptural, linguistic nor exegetical basis for your presuppositional assumption for a future-to-us literal-physical-biological-bodily resurrection.
- Now, recall that you answered “Yes” to my second question, “Was the great tribulation (Mat 24:21) fulfilled in the first century?”
- Since it is the case that Daniel inextricably tied the RJUJ to the time frame of the Great Tribulation;
- Since it is the case that Jesus posits the Great Tribulation during His generation;
- Since you admit that the Great Tribulation (inextricably linked to the RJUJ) was fulfilled in the first century;
- Then you have no source-text for a second literal-physical-biological RJUJ. Since Paul’s eschatology is based solely on Moses and the prophets, then his dissertations on resurrection must be interpreted within that frame work. This is fundamental hermeneutics.
In further confirmation of my opening remarks, Patrick builds yet another Straw Man as he chooses to not listen. When I pointed out Jesus’ words in Matthew 23 where Jesus posited the imminent day of the Lord judgment coming on the generation of vipers, and that this would be the vindication of all the righteous bloodshed upon the earth all the way back to Able, I asked, “See that Patrick? Jesus, retroactively tied Able to the administration of Moses!” I had just quoted, “Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? ...That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. Verily I say unto you, ALL THESE THINGS shall come upon this generation,” (Mat 23:33-36).
Then I said, "Patrick, please note the statement, '...from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar...' See that Patrick? Jesus, retroactively tied Able to the administration of Moses!"
Choosing to not listen to Jesus' words, he built his Straw Man by alleging that I said Adam and Abraham lived under the law of Moses. It's stunningly bad conduct of Patrick to disparaging me saying, "Were you on some kind of medication when you saw it? You ought to write a children’s book and call it;'Runyon’s Fairy Tales'. You just made that up," after I had quoted the words of Jesus in Matthew 23. It's a blatant expression of desperation for Patrick to totally ignore the focal point of my argument where I said very clearly, "The Abrahamic covenant was subsumed in the law of Moses, and the promises made to Abraham were fulfilled through the LOM with the salvation of The Remnant, inclusive of the Gentiles (Gal 3-4)." It is likewise an embarrassingly bad exposé of Patrick's failure to understand and/or acknowledge that the first five books of the OT (Torah) are consider by all to be "the law of Moses"!
In Patrick’s first Negative, commenting on Daniel 7, he applies his circular reasoning by saying, “I believe all of these passages are saying just what they mean.” Well I’d reckon! He continues, “I cannot help that you have changed the wording of some of them to fit into your new doctrine,” for which he gives not the first keystroke of evidence as proof of his allegation! Patrick continues, “I believe that the Lord’s Kingdom, the Church was established during the days of that fourth kingdom and that it will last forever.” Thus with this admission, he affirms my proposition that “The scriptures teach that the second coming of the Son of man would occur during the first century.”
Again, this is the only Son-of-man-coming-prophecy, and Jesus quotes this one-and-only prophecy positing its fulfillment during His generation, as does Paul, stating that it was about to occur. These time statements of imminence are Patrick’s stone of stumbling which is ungetoverable as he impales himself on his own comments.
Patrick continues: “But I do not take highly figuratively visions and passages and cram them into something I want them to say. Roy that is what you have done. You’ve taken highly figurative passages and put them out there and now you got them contradicting literal passages, the way you have interpreted them,” (italics mine, RR). This sounds really impressive to the gullible, naive, and unstudied Bible student! This demonstrates that Patrick approaches the scriptures with the presuppositional bias that there is actually a text in the Bible which speaks of a literal-physical-visible coming of the Lord, and a literal-physical-visible resurrection, then Patrick does exactly what he accuses me of doing, i.e., he interprets passages and eisegetes (reads a meaning into) his presupposition into the text, and forces the text to say what he wants it to say. As I stated in my opening remarks, the Futurist paradigm cannot survive without eisegesis, and reconstructing and redefining the texts.
A classic example of this is, after he totally ignores my argument from the words of Paul which I quoted from Ephesians 2 where Paul said that the household-building of God was currently, then, in the process of being built up, he quotes Col 2:14, then asserts that the text I pointed out was “an attempt to tell us that it says what it says, but it doesn’t mean what it means.” Well, I submit that since Colossians 2:14 does not say “Blotting out the law of Moses...” that this is a glaring demonstration of Patrick not seeing the context, nor what the text says, and he forces it to mean what he thinks it means!
Let’s glance at the context where in the same breath Paul says, “So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths...” See that Patrick? There’s nothing more “law of Moses” than the Jewish feasts, right? Now, watch what Paul says next: “...which ARE a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ,” (Co 2:16-17). Tell us Patrick, why would Paul identify the LOM specifically, and say that these Jewish feasts “ARE” (present tense) “A SHADOW” of things ABOUT TO come”? How is it brother, that if you are correctly interpreting verse 14, that the LOM was fulfilled at the cross, that Paul said in the same breath that the LOM was THEN-PRESENT, currently in Paul’s NOW time, “a shadow” of good things about to come?
“Which are a shadow of things about to be; and the body of Christ,” (JST).
“...of the G3588 things about to be G3195...” (APB+)
“...which are a shadow of those things which are impending...” (CLNT).
Now, notice that Patrick has totally brushed aside my argument built on Jesus’ quotation and application of the Danielic source-text of chapter 7; Jesus cites and applies the fulfillment of that language which Patrick admits is “highly figurative,” of the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven, with His angels, at the judgment (Mat 16:27), which Patrick admits is married to His Son-of-man-coming in His kingdom, (Mat 16:28). I then demonstrated from Luke’s parallel account (Luk 9:26-27), Jesus said that when the Son of man would come in His own glory, some standing in His audience would live to see the Son of man coming in His kingdom. Then, I demonstrated that Jesus also said when the Son of man would come in His own glory would be when the Son of man would sit upon the throne of His glory for the judgment, (Mat 25:31-32) which is exactly what was predicted in the Danielic source-text which Patrick admits is “highly figurative,” language.
NOT ONE KEYSTROKE OF A RESPONSE!
I demonstrated that based on what these texts say unaltered, proves beyond debate that the Olivet Discourse is not divided.
NOT ONE SYLLABLE OF A RESPONSE AS HE CONTINUES TO “SKIP OVER” MY ARGUMENTS!
Relative to this argument, I further demonstrated that John also recorded the words of Jesus saying, “And, behold, I COME QUICKLY; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be,” (Rev 22:12); and thus, the Revelation closes with JESUS SAYING the same words that He spoke in Matthew 16:27, which JESUS SAID would be fulfilled during the lifetime of some standing in His audience.
NOT ONE KEYSTROKE OF A RESPONSE!
I asked Patrick, was the Great Tribulation (Mat 24:21) fulfilled in the first century? He said "Yes." I demonstrated that the RJUJ was inextricably linked to the Great Tribulation, which Jesus said would be fulflled during His generation, and Patrick responds that I'm wrong and he doesn't have to prove something he doesn't believe.
Please answer my third question Patrick: where is the end of time stated in the Old Testament?