Searches every word across every teaching, article, and Q&A on the site.
Searches every word across every teaching, article, and Q&A on the site.
Teacher: Pastor Paul LeBoutillier Pastor Paul: We are back with another episode of Bible Questions and Answers. Glad you could join us today, we've got some good questions. Sue: Yes, we do. Pastor Paul: Let's go for it. Sue: All right. Our first question is from Yolandi and she says, “I'm currently working through Leviticus. May I ask why you're convinced Christmas doesn't stem from Pagan origins?” Pastor Paul: I have kind of a two-fold answer to this question. The first thing that I want to say is I have a good friend who wrote a book which is entitled The Truth Behind Christmas. I'll put a link for this in the info section. This is written by Pastor Joe Hoff. He is a Calvary Chapel pastor in southern Washington. He did a tremendous amount of research on the issue, he calls it exploring the historical roots of the Christian holiday of Christmas. And I would encourage people to get a copy of that because he really did a lot of research. The second reason, though, that I am convinced, let's give the whole argument away for just a moment. Let's say that Christmas does in fact stem from Pagan roots. Now here's the question that has to be asked. As a Christian, does that matter to me? Because as a believer, I've learned something as I've studied through the Word of God, and that is that God looks to the heart, always to the heart. When we talk about celebrations, when we talk about worship, it all stems from the heart. It's not about actions, it's not about days of the year. It's not about how we position our body. All these things are heart issues. So as a believer, if I simply choose a day of the year and I say on this day I'm going to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, now it could be December 25th, it could be November 3rd, it could be June 22nd. It doesn't matter. What matters is my heart condition related to my celebration, my determination to celebrate the greatest gift that's ever been given to mankind, which is truly the Son of God being born as a man. So it's a hard issue. This is something God told Samuel way back in the book of 1 Samuel when he was looking at all the sons of Jesse and to pick out the next king of Israel, and he looked at the oldest son of Jesse. Oh, surely this is the one. He's tall and strong and strapping and handsome and so forth. And the Lord rebuked him. He said, “No, I've rejected him”. He said, “Man looks at the outside, God looks at the heart.” And so when it comes to something like Christmas, which is the celebration of the birth of Jesus, again, I want to say I don't care what day of the year you choose to celebrate Christmas. I don't care. And I don't care if that day was ever anything to a Pagan because I'm not a Pagan. I'm a Christian. And as a Christian, as a follower of Jesus Christ, as a child of God, I can't celebrate a Pagan holiday. It's impossible for me to do that because I'm not a Pagan. I don't believe in a multiplicity of gods. I believe there is one God and he sent his son to be born as a man and I celebrate that. And there's nothing wrong with that. And I don't care whatever happened on that day. Pagans don't trump God, you know what I mean? There are a lot of Pagan influences in our culture. Even the days of the week are named after Pagan gods. I don't see anybody protesting Thursday or Saturday, but those have real Pagan roots. But you know what, as a Christian, it doesn't matter to me because I can't do Pagan things as a Christian because my heart longs to worship the Lord my God. There you go. Sue: So bring it on, bring on Christmas. Pastor Paul: Bring it on. Sue: All right. Michelle says, “Hi Pastor Paul, I hope that you and your wife Sue are well. I have a question. I've been re-watching your lectures on Zechariah chapter 8, and you said that during the Millennial Kingdom believers will have their resurrected bodies. My question is: Because believers will have resurrected bodies and are still among those who don't, will or can they/we still have the ability to sin and lose our salvation?” Pastor Paul: You have to remember, Michelle, and anyone else who's wondering about this question, that when we die or when we are transformed, when the Lord comes back for the church, either one, we are separated from our sinful nature, the sinful flesh, at that time, that separation is complete. So if you die before the Lord comes, or if the Lord comes and you are transformed, as Paul says, in the twinkling of an eye that is the time when you will be separated from your sinful flesh. And there's no sin and there's no falling away after that point because that transformation has taken place. Sue: That is such a clear way to put it. I like that a lot. I think that that'll help people really understand. Pastor Paul: I hope so. Sue: Our next question is from Fábio, who says, “In Zechariah 1:15 it says, “but the nations inflicted harm on them far beyond my intentions.” How is that possible? Isn't God sovereign?” Pastor Paul: Yes, God is sovereign, but within His sovereignty He has given mankind free will, free choice. So God raised up nations over the years as a disciplinary measure against the nation of Israel. But many times those nations went beyond what the Lord intended in terms of the discipline that they were going to inflict on Israel. And therefore God came back and said, I'm now going to judge you because you're cruelty went beyond what my intention was. So we have to remember something. God's sovereignty does not violate the free will of mankind. And the reason is because God has given free will. Here's the deal. If God were not sovereign, man could not have free will. The only way that we can possess the freedom to choose is if God gives us that freedom. And he's the only sovereign being who can extend that. And he has extended that to mankind. So what that means is we have the freedom to choose our path. However, we also will deal with the consequences of that free will when it violates the will of God. Sue: All right. Our next question is from Denzel, “In Deuteronomy chapters 9 or 10 how many times did Moses do a forty day and forty night fast – 2 or 3 times?” Pastor Paul: Yes, it was two or three times. I don't remember exactly. I mean, he was forty days with the Lord, receiving the 10 commandments. The first time he came down, broke them, went back up and spent another forty days with the Lord receiving the law. And he might have done it again another time, but I can't remember exactly. It was a lot. And there was obviously some kind of a supernatural thing going on to sustain him during that time because, forty days, goodness gracious, without food or we assume without even water. The human body really can't do that. Sue: And then back-to-back. Pastor Paul: And then back-to-back without the Lord sustaining someone. So those are supernatural fastings. Sue: For sure. All right. Here's a YouTube comment, “Pastor, what are your thoughts on church covenants that use passages that create “agreements” between church leaders and members for the purpose of exercising discipline? Thank you for this teaching.” Pastor Paul: I understand that these sorts of things can kind of easily get heavy- handed when church leaders are trying to establish an understanding with the body related to church discipline. It can easily go off the rails. Here's the deal. Church discipline is a reality. We see it happening in the New Testament. Paul talks about actions that needed to be taken against an individual in the Church of Corinth who was involved in sinful activity and apparently was unrepentant about it. So Paul wrote to the church and encouraged them to take certain actions against that individual. And of course, the purpose behind it was always restoration that the person might come to a real place of repentance and get back with the Lord. But that sort of relationship between leadership and the members of the body of Christ is one that really needs to be an act of the will. In other words, what I mean by that is that people need to be willing to say to a pastor, you're my pastor and I submit myself to you in so far as I give you the permission to speak into my life and even bring correction if I get off track. But that is something that people give to a pastor willingly. It's not something that pastors and leaders go to the people and say you need to submit to me, I'm your pastor and you better do what I say. That's not the way that sort of relationship should be put together. It is always an act of the will on the part of the church member. And I'll just tell you as a pastor, church discipline is extremely difficult these days. If somebody is attending a church and they begin to walk in some sort of sinful activity and they're confronted about it, it's just so easy for people today just to say, I'm not going to go to that church anymore. I'll go down the street and attend that church and I just won't tell them what I'm doing. And if they get in my face, I'll leave and go to another church. And you know that wasn't the way it was in Paul's day. There often was one church for an area. There might have been more because they did meet in homes, but it would have been extremely difficult back in those days for somebody to leave one home church and go to another just because they've been confronted about sin. So church discipline is extremely challenging, but it needs to always be an act of willing submission and subordination to the leadership, not something that church leaders demand. Sue: All right. Our last question is from Ruvim. I'm suspicious that maybe the ‘v’ is not pronounced in whatever. Pastor Paul: That's quite possible. Sue: Anyway the question says, “Greetings Pastor Paul. I had this conversation with my coworker today and would love to hear your thoughts. He is (Christian) and a smoker and asked me if it's a sin so I told him yes, because smoking causes harm to your body which is the temple of the Holy Spirit. He said he agreed but then asked me if it's a sin to cause harm to God's temple, then what about energy drinks and candy bars and all the junk food we all eat? What are your thoughts and how would you respond to this?” Pastor Paul: I would respond with great care. First of all, yes, our body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. Secondly, however, there is no Bible verse that I'm aware of that exhorts us about temple maintenance. That's something that we've concluded. That's something believers have concluded based on the fact that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit. That's something Paul tells us, and that's absolutely true. To say to this individual that it is a sin for you to smoke, probably that is harmful to your body. There's no question about it. But the person, the smoker in this case, had a good point. There's a lot of things we do to our physical bodies that aren't good and the junk food that we eat and all the other things. If we're going to really talk about temple maintenance, which by the way isn't a biblical term. We've just kind of come up with that. But if we're going to talk about that, then we're going to have to probably look down on a lot of things that believers do related to their physical bodies when they just simply don't take care of them the way that they should. So if I would have been this brother and he's a Christian, he's a smoker and he would have come to me and said, do you think this is a sin for me to smoke? I would have responded by saying, what's the Holy Spirit telling you? Are you asking this question because you're feeling convicted by the Lord to no longer smoke? And if so, what do you think you should do about that? I think when we put things on people immediately without giving credence to the work of the Holy Spirit in their lives, we tend to become the law in their life. Yes, smoking is a sin. So there suddenly there's this “thou shalt not smoke law” that we've added. Now we've got 11 commandments. Well, as believers, we should turn people back to the Holy Spirit as often as possible when we're talking about issues of sin and so forth. So my question would be, what do you think? What's the Holy Spirit telling you? Is the Lord convicting you about smoking? And do you think maybe you should do something about that? And then if he brought up all the other things like he did in this case that we can do to actually harm our body, I'd have to say, I think each and every believer needs to think that through and maybe even pray about it. What am I putting in my body? What am I doing here that is not good for me physically? Because we are temples of the Holy Spirit and there should be an understanding. Well, there is a biblical understanding that you are not your own. You've been bought with a price, and since we've all been bought with a price, it's something that we should think seriously about. Sue: I think often the Holy Spirit convicts us too, because our actions affect other people. And in these two situations, there’s a different effect on people around him with smoke. No one's going to smoke in a vacuum their entire life and never have their smoke effect other people around them. So there's a difference between that and eating processed food or something. But the other thing is there's so many actions that we choices that we make, all of us that the Holy Spirit may be convicting us of, because left unattended, it does have an adverse effect on other people around us. And whether it's a laziness or not, keeping our bodies in good shape, whatever. And we want to serve people around us. So the point that I'm making is that you're right, the Holy Spirit will nudge us in certain ways to pay attention to this, make some changes in this area. Pastor Paul: Absolutely. It's challenging. I try to encourage believers not to just come out with hard and fast statements about this is a sin. That's a sin. When you're dealing, first of all, with things that aren't specifically covered in the Word of God. The Bible can't cover every situation or circumstance that could potentially be wrong. It just can't. It’s okay. We don't need the Bible to do that because we have the Holy Spirit living in us. He can cover everything. And if we just turn back to him and say, Lord, what do you think about this? Lord, what would you have me to do about this habit I have of smoking? And if you want me to change, Lord, you're going to need to give me the strength to say no to this habit and to break it over my life. So it all comes down to the power and conviction of the Holy Spirit. Sue: Good. Well, we began and we ended with a heart condition, didn't we? Pastor Paul: Yes, we kind of did talking about what's in the heart. Sue: That's always a good way to begin and end. Pastor Paul: So that's all the questions for this episode. We'll see you in the next one. God bless.
