The following is a presentation of Edgewood Reformed Baptist Church, West Monroe, Louisiana. Father, we again thank you and praise you, Lord, for this day, for what you've given to us. Father, thank you for the rest over this last month that you've given to us. Thank you for the studies that you've allowed us to undertake this past spring and summer. Lord, just pray that we would continue to build our knowledge and being in your presence just one brick upon another, one precept upon another. Lord, I just pray that as we enter into the study of Ephesians that you would quicken our minds and our hearts and our spirits, that you would draw us into your presence, that you would grow us and conform us into the image of your Son, your Father, that we'd be pleasing to you in all that we do. Father, we love you, thank you, we praise you, we ask all these things in your name. Amen. Well, today we're not going to go through a whole lot because y'all haven't really had a chance to do your overview. You haven't had a chance to look at the text, so I don't want to get in the way of that. I always want you guys to be discovering things for yourself. That's part of the inductive state. So, as we go through the book of Ephesians, I'm going to be giving you insights and other things that are going to kind of be outside the homework to a certain extent but for y'all really to gain the benefit of this book as always you're going to have to kind of dig into it yourself and so that's my purpose here and trying to teach y'all and lead y'all how to do the mechanics of it and we've done some of that I think y'all most everybody here is used to that and so we're just expectedly look forward to the journey that the Lord has for us as we study this book. Yes. Yes. I actually go one step further than that. I keep a clean copy of the study all the time. In the office I've got clean copies of every study we've done. I make a photocopy of the study and I actually do my homework and everything on the photocopy, not the original copy. So I keep an original clean copy all the time. that's not a bad idea. Making two copies, taking notes on one and doing your marking and studying on the other. Because it does, at the end of the study it gets all jumbled up and you've got stuff everywhere. That's why I use colors, so I can see all the different colors, but then the colors run together and I spill coffee on it or something. Okay. Well, I want to just share with y'all Just real briefly this morning. Something, I guess. Now, you guys have been with me. We've been doing these studies for over two years now here at Edgewood. So y'all have gotten used to kind of how the program works. And y'all have gotten used to some of the things that I've pointed out to y'all. And that looks pretty fuzzy to me. And so I just want to, I don't mind having a discussion like what we're going to have today, whereas we're going to look at, and these are not inconsistencies, okay? Let me just say that up front. What we're going to talk about today is not, it doesn't make your Bible wrong, it doesn't somehow diminish the authority of the scriptures, But I think we need to realize that there are components or there are things about the scriptures that we read, our translations that we have, that we need to be aware of. I guess that's what I'm trying to say. Last night when I was talking about in our message that we need to be in the world you know, and not isolated. And we need to be wise as serpents, but harmless as doves. This kind of falls in that category. Here's why I'm saying this. You know, for most of us sitting in this room today, if there's a conversation about what we should do or what we shouldn't do, we can run to the Scriptures very quickly and say, you know what, the Word of God says that we are to do this or we're to not do that. And most everybody in this room today, if not everybody in this room today, would say, Okay, alright, the Bible says I need to do it, I do it, right? Y'all follow me? We understand the authority of the scriptures and we subscribe to the authority of the scriptures. I hope everybody here subscribes to the authority of the scriptures. Well, we live in a world that not everybody does that. There are some people that if you go and talk to them and say, look, cohabitation is wrong. And they'd say, well, why is it wrong? That's just your opinion. And he'd say, no, the scriptures clearly tell us that intimacy in a relationship between a man and a woman is reserved exclusively for marriage. And they would say, why would you say that? Well, the Bible says that. Well, so what? Why do I have to follow what the Bible says? The Bible has got inconsistencies. It's got errors in it. It says one thing here, one thing there. It doesn't jihad. It doesn't go together. So how are you going to answer that question? A lot of Christians in our world today don't know how to answer that question. And if somebody says the scriptures have inconsistencies in them, and it's incomplete, or it tells you two different things, we're really ignorant on that. Number one, because we haven't read it all. And so we wonder, well, are they right? Are they wrong? Or if we have read the majority of scriptures, and we probably have never been exposed to things like, well, there are certain parts that As I'll show you today, there's a little phrase in verse 1 that of three of the major manuscripts, the phrase doesn't appear in that particular, in those manuscripts. And I'll explain that in just a minute. And we're confronted with this question of, well, does the Bible really have errors in it? Does the Bible really have things in it that are inconsistent? Does one writer say one thing and one writer say something else? I mean, even for a split second, that doubt comes into our mind. And we go, OK, well, maybe they're right. Well, first of all, no, they're not right. Scripture is amazingly consistent from beginning to end. And that's not just a worldview. I mean, that's actually proven in the Scriptures. But the reason I'm saying all this is I'm going to show you stuff today in this group that we're in that it doesn't change what the scripture says. It doesn't change the meaning of what we read in our English translations. It actually, I think, helps to clarify what our English translations say. And it helps us to understand, and going through verse 1 and 2 today, or actually just verse 1, is going to set the tone for the whole rest of Ephesians. Paul in verse 1 gives us a glimpse of the tone of the whole book of Ephesians. So I just want to share some things with you. I don't want to muddy the waters. I don't want to confuse you. But we've been together long enough to kind of be able to investigate some of these things because I think our foundation is strong enough to investigate some of the stuff I'm going to talk about today. So those are just kind of introductory remarks. Ephesians chapter 1 verse 1. That's the only verse we're going to look at in our time today And I promise we will not be here the whole time, okay It says Paul an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God to the Saints who are at Ephesus who are faithful in Christ Jesus Okay, that's verse 1 simply right out of the New American Standard I Need to start again Verse 1, just a straight forward English rendering of the text. Now let me just ask this question. As we're reading this, what would be some of the things that we would get out of verse 1? If we were just going to list some things in verse 1, what could we list? What would be some things that we would say verse 1 is telling us? Okay. Alright. So, one of the first things that we see is that Paul is an apostle. Okay. And we've talked about apostleship and what that means. A delegate, an ambassador, an emissary, somebody that's bringing a message of somebody else. Who's the apostle of? Okay. Alright. So, he would be bringing the message of Christ. Okay. What else can we learn from verse 1? okay all right this little phrase here by the God of the will of God okay so that would be number one Paul an apostle and will of God would be number two who are listed those okay what else do we learn okay it's it's sending to the Ephesians now that's not sorry say that again okay Paul okay okay okay so you're you're reading the second half of verse one is to the saints at Ephesus is that what you're saying okay so we're taking this little phrase right here to the saints who are at Ephesus okay all right That would be number three. And what else can we learn? Or what else are we picking up off of verse one? Okay. Alright. So those who are faithful. Now you said two Jesus Christ? Is that what you said? Okay. Faithful in. Is there a difference between faithful in and faithful to? Okay, so there is a difference in the word in, I-N, and the word to, T-O, even in our English language. Are y'all with me? Y'all follow? Okay, good. So we got just basically four things here that we've identified in verse one. Okay. Now right there, before we do anything else, we've differentiated ourselves from about 99.99% of the people who have ever read Ephesians. in that we've stopped to look at verse one, the opening volume. I mean, this is the first sorting into Ephesians. And we've identified four things in verse one. We've stopped to look and to see what verse one tells us. Most people, when they read Ephesians, are so interested in getting to the deep, the deep, amazing theological truths contained in this book. And there are. There's a lot of theological truths in these first three chapters that they have run. right past verse 1 and didn't even stop to consider what verse 1 is telling us. But I want to take it a step further. I want to show you something. This first phrase, Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, this one right here, this is a phrase that we're used to seeing. Paul in a lot of his letters will open his letter this way We've said before that this is a declaration of authority, of Paul's authority to say the things that he's about to say in the letter, that it's not his authority per se, that it's in and of itself, that he is saying and operating under the authority of Christ, okay? Now, I'm pre-empting a little bit of what you're going to be doing in your first week's lesson. in terms of learning about Paul. But this is an idea and a concept that we've talked about before. We saw it in Corinthians. We saw it implicitly in Jude. Jude had a similar formula where he's talking about his authority to say things. So we've seen it before. This is not necessarily new. So we're not going to talk a lot about that. I'm just going to leave that for your homework. and let you flesh out your understanding of Paul on your own. But I do want to start at the second phrase of verse 1. Now look, the simple idea that we're doing here, this is what's called syntax. S-Y-N-T-A-X. Syntax. There's your big word for the day. Syntax. And y'all have heard me mention grammar before, right? In our teaching and sermons and stuff this past Sunday we talked about participables, we talked about perfect tense, imperfect tense, passive versus active. Y'all are kind of getting to the point where when I just mention those kind of things you've been exposed to it enough that you know what those things mean. That's grammar. Well, another important part of biblical understanding is called syntax. And what syntax is, It's just simply phrases, clauses. It's clausal structures. Clauses are identified by commas or any kind of punctuation, whether it be a comma or a period, a semicolon. Here's a colon right here. Now depending on what the punctuation is, tells us different things. A colon is different than a period, right? And a period is different than a semicolon, and a semicolon is different than a comma. Right? Right? Now, the punctuation, there are punctuation marks in the original Greek text. Okay? So, some of them were there originally, some of them have been added or amended according to English style. But syntax deals with clausal structures, and one of the easiest ways to see clauses is by punctuation. Where are the commas? Primarily, where are the commas? But syntax, clausal structure, also is keyed off of things like relative pronouns, prepositions, infinitives, participles, I mean there's just a whole host of stuff. So we see syntax being, or causal structure, being governed by words like by, okay, by, by, that's a preposition, relative pronouns like to, words like at, coordinating conjunctions like and, or, and the, other relative pronouns like who, Okay? So that's, that's, I'll just give, this is just background. This, I'm just kind of, I'm expanding your, your horizons. That's what I'm doing. Okay? I want y'all to be well-educated laypeople. Um, and so these are all kind of indicators of clausal structure. Now, you may be asking yourself the question, uh, so what? Well, the so what to clauses is, is that's exactly how we identified the four things in verse one that we said were important. We just identified the different clauses of that verse, and each clause brings meaning with it. Now, the relationship of clauses, independent clauses to dependent clauses, is part of syntax too. There's a governing idea that all the other clauses become subordinate to, and we're not going to go into all that today. I'll just let you know that. The meaning of verse one is found in the clauses. The clause is just the simplest basic unit of meaning in any given particular text. A clause is just the simplest basic unit of meaning in any text. Sometimes clauses can be as short as two words. Jesus wept, that was a clause, has meaning. Clauses sometimes can be very lengthy. taking up half a page. So there's no rhyme or reason to the length or the size, it's governed by meaning. Well, we're going to begin to look at some of these clauses, this clausal structure in syntax to help break apart the meaning of what this verse is telling us. Now I'm going to erase this number 1, because like I said, we've already dealt with that, we know what that's all about, so I'm just going to erase that for clarity. But we're going to start with the second clause in verse 1. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, what? By the will of God. Now, the word by B-Y in the English. When we see that word, typically what do we think of? What does the word by mean? Related to? Okay. Because of? Yeah, that's very good. That's exactly right. Sir? Authority? Okay. Would authority still kind of be a cause and effect relationship? Something happens because of the authority? of somebody or something else. Does that make sense? Yes? Okay. Well, and that would be exactly right. Yeah. The word by, a lot of times in English, not exclusively, but in a lot of times, it sets up what's called a cause and effect relationship. cause and effect relationship. Something causes the result. Or you might call it reason result. That's another way of saying it. What is the reason? What is the result? This is the reason it happened. This is the result of whatever happened. So Paul says here in verse 1 that he's an apostle, okay, an apostle of Jesus Christ, or Christ Jesus, to be specific. by the will of God. And so having said that, what we're understanding, what we're hearing in Paul is that it was the will of God that caused him to be an apostle. Does that make sense? Yeah, okay. What's interesting, and we've just done that just in the simple English translation, just in the simple English text. We haven't looked at Greek. We haven't done anything like that. We've just analyzed the English, but to augment that, to help us understand, I want to point out something to you here. Here is the Greek preposition, which is translated over here in the English by the word by. Okay, this is the Greek word that was used to give us by. Over there is the word dia, D-I-A, dia. and it's a preposition, it's a Greek preposition and it most frequently is translated through through okay now the word by has a similar idea but it's not exactly the same idea as the word through right? I went by the house on my way to the church right? is quite different than I went through the house on my way to church. Through just kind of highlights a little bit more of the process, I guess, or a little bit more detail. It's a little more far-reaching than just the simple word by. Now, the end result is the same, okay? If I went by the house on the way to the church or I went through the house on the way to the church, we know that In the sequence of time, I was somewhere, I stopped at my house for a period of time, and then I moved on to the church. Right? Yeah. Well, yeah, exactly. That's right. And then that's more involved for a greater level of detail. You're exactly right. It gives more weight. or weightiness to the phrase. Because if I say I went by the house on the way to the church, I may have been just driving down the street past my house and just looked and said, yeah, everything's okay, just kept right on going. Yeah, I got somebody inside the house stealing all my stuff. But if I go through the house on my way to the church, well, then we have to ask the question, what do you mean by through? Did you stop? Did you actually go in? Were you looking for something and you just you know you just overturned everything looking for whatever it was or was it that you weren't paying attention talking on your cell phone you literally drove through your house you have to ask those kind of questions but do you see the difference between through and by? yeah so if we said that Paul said if we amended for just a moment if we amended the English text to say Paul an apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of God. Right? That at least would cause us to ask a few more questions about what did Paul mean when he said through? What was involved with going through the will of God? Does that make sense? You all with me? Okay. Alright. As long as the wheels are turning and the wheels turning right now is good. But this word dia in the Greek means through. So, a little more weightiness, a little more involved, gives us an indication that, I mean, it's not quite as casual. The word by is kind of casual, not really a big deal, by the will of God, okay. I understand that, but there really aren't any questions, I guess, that are sparked out of that. But the word through should spark questions. What would be a question that you would have by saying that Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, threw the will of God? What would be a question that you would ask? What question comes to mind? How did Paul know? Okay. Good question. I'm just going to kind of write these over here somewhere on the side. Okay. How do you know? How do you know it was the will of God? Is that what you're saying? Okay. What would be another question? about what was involved through the will of God. Does that mean just passing by and waving at the house as you go by? Does that mean actually driving your car through the house? Or does that mean you stopped and were looking for something? What was the process? I'm just going to say, I'm just going to say what process? Yes, the through, through being more intimate, is that what you're saying? Yeah. Well, because you're right. So there's an idea of intimacy here, or personalness, can we say that, personal? Intimacy, personal, is a one-on-one kind of feeling here, not just a one-size-fits-all, but a kind of almost a tailored Uh, idea? Is that kind of what you were thinking, Mr. Don? Okay. Alright. I'm listening. Okay, to what degree did God lead Paul through that process? I'm just kind of synthesizing what you're saying. Is that kind of what you're thinking, or? Okay. Fine. More closely related. Oh, okay. More personal. Okay. Alright. Alright. So you see, And there are other questions we could ask, other things that come to mind, but do you see how we've begun to interrogate the text, really start to flesh out what that phrase means, through the will of God? Now you may ask yourself, well Rusty, how would I ever know that I needed to ask that question? that just comes by having an inquisitive mind about the text. And I'm just pointing out that sometimes the English words that are used, they're not wrong. I'm not saying that it's wrong. I mean, it's not wrong to say an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God. There's nothing wrong with that. But I'm trying to show y'all that if we have an inquisitive mind, We're just doing the five W's and the H's. Who, what, when, where, why, and how. That's all we're doing. When we see something like by the will of God, well the phrase itself, by the will of God, seems to be important, right? Because it tells us how Paul became an apostle. Yeah. Yeah. And that would be the fruit of That's right. And not only are we coming up with those ideas and understanding that if it wasn't by the will of God that Paul couldn't have done it, then we've got the mechanics behind it to explain it to somebody else when they say, well, so what? Well, so what? Well, here's the so what. And we can begin to show them the mechanics. Yeah. How do you know? Well, it predisposes a personal relationship, not just a one-time event, but a continual lifestyle walking with the Lord to know that it's His will. And we're coming to that. Let's kind of go on beyond this because I promised I wouldn't take the whole time. I will stay true to my word. For this glorious sake. through the will of God. Now, the next question here in this phrase is, well, what is the will of God? We've got some ideas about through as opposed to by, how do you know, what's the process, to what degree, how personal is it? Well, all those are geared towards the will of God. Well, what is the will of God? Well, y'all have done word studies before. You know what word studies are all about. And that word will right there, the will of God, comes from This Greek word right here, Thelema, want. Now, one of the basic roots of Theloma is to burn. Isn't that weird? To burn. And it brings the idea of desire or passion. Now, let's not run too quickly to the area of physical desire or sexual desire or anything like that, although that has some bearing. We know what burning passion is all about, that we're passionate about things. Well, Theloma has that burning passion kind of idea behind it, but it's more than that. The definition, one of the definitions of Saloma, let me go here and pull it up so we can see it, is to will, of course we wrote over it so I can't see what it says, to will indicates that it is the result of the will, will not to be conceived as a demand but an expression or an inclination of pleasure towards that which is liked, that which pleases, or that which creates joy. When it denotes God's will, what it's denoting, what that word denotes is God's good pleasure towards somebody, okay, or something. All right, y'all follow me? You ever heard the phrase, a strong-willed child? Does anybody know any strong-willed children? Even if you don't think you do, you do. You do know some strong-willed children. You know at least one. Well, we don't mean will as in terms of a strong-willed child. What we mean, what that word means is good pleasure, what brings joy, what brings favor. It was God's good favor. It was God's pleasure. Now, that opens up a whole different understanding of what Paul says. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the good pleasure or through the good pleasure, the good favor of God. Does that make sense? Just real quickly on the surface, what would be the difference between the phrase, an apostle by the will of God and an apostle through the good favor or the good pleasure of God? What's the difference between those two phrases? A closeness, a personal component. That intimacy again. Yeah. Yeah. In that personalness, Mr. Don, who initiated that personalness? God did. Very much so. What else can we gather out of this? The difference between an apostle by the will of God and an apostle through the good favor or the good pleasure of God. What is the difference between the two phrases, the first phrase being an apostle by the will of God, what's the difference between that and an apostle through the good pleasure of God? Yeah, the focus seems to be squarely on God. That Paul, as Dawn mentioned a minute ago, she was saying that Paul is in essence saying that without God, apart from God, I couldn't do the things that I'm doing. And you're exactly right. That statement was exactly right. But how do we demonstrate the truth of that statement that we just made from the text? Well, this is how we're doing it. breaking apart a clause that says, look, it's not just by the will of God, but it's actually through, it's more closely rendered to the original text through the good pleasure of God. It was God's good pleasure, it was God's favor that Paul was an apostle. Does that make sense? Kind of, sort of? So, what I've just shown you, and this doesn't just apply here, this applies with every biblical text. It's the mechanics behind what's being said, so that if somebody goes, well, who cares what the Bible says? Then you can break it down and you can show them. I mean, you could take them right here to Ephesians 1.1. That's simple, that's easy. We're about 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, we're seven words into the verse, seven or eight words into the verse. If we can already show them through just a very straightforward understanding, this is not hocus pocus, this is not magic. All we're doing is going, okay, the English says this, but it's more closely related, the Greek is more closely related to this. It's not by the will of God, it's through the good favor of God, through the pleasure of God. which indicates God's sovereignty, and anybody who is a rational, reasoned being, who's being honest, would agree that, yeah, that seems to be more God-centered than man-centered. See? It's not so much that God forced Paul to be an apostle. Strong-willed child, you know, strong-willed child forces things, right? They want their way. and they'll do anything they can to get their way. It wasn't so much that God forced Paul to do it, but it was God's good pleasure. It pleased God. Paul found favor with God through his apostleship. It's a want to. I want to do it. I want to please you. I want to please God. That's kind of important. Just as a little side note, that's kind of important when we're dealing with the sovereignty of God. Because people, when they hear the word sovereignty of God, will immediately run to this idea that God forces people to be Christians and he forces people to be lost. That the whole sovereignty of God with election and the elect, people will run to that. You may have experienced that already as you're talking to people. People will say things like, well I just can't believe that God would deny somebody for being a Christian if they wanted to be a Christian. people will say that. They somehow think that God has elected a certain group of people, and there are other people out here who want to be Christians, but God says, oh no, you're not going to be a Christian. I don't want you to be a Christian because you're not elect. Have you ever talked to anybody who has said that? If you haven't, you will probably. Well, that's not the idea at all. God is not imposing his will on people. The word will doesn't mean that God said, okay Gloria, you're a Christian and okay Tom you're not but Tom is going well but wait a minute I want to be I want to be I want to follow you and God says no Tom you can't because you're not elect that's not God's will that doesn't that doesn't follow with the understanding that what is being what is meant by the will of God really is through the good pleasure of God If it wasn't God's good pleasure, Tom would not be seeking Him. That's where people miss the sovereignty of God. That's right. Right. And that's the correct response. Yeah, but I would argue that the only way that they're coming to belief and wanting a chance that God's drawing I wouldn't go that direction But you know that's that's the That's the rub that we see in that idea a lot. Yeah. He's not going to draw. He's not drawing. Yeah. Yeah. Now, there's still the responsibility for everybody to seek the Lord while He's near. There's responsibility on all our parts to repent and believe the gospel. That's the call that goes out. But those who the Father draws, those that God calls, will come to Him. And we can talk about that. That goes a little beyond what we're talking about today. In this discussion called the Well, it's called the efficacy of grace, the efficiency of grace, that when God calls somebody, they will come. In the TULIP model, it's an irresistible grace. It's the I of TULIP, T-U-L-I-P, irresistible grace. That those that God calls will respond. And those that don't respond, those that aren't coming to God, He hasn't called them. And like I said, that's a whole other discussion for another day. point that we want to highlight here in terms of the will of God is not this mean, ogre, making people do things to fit my will. No, it's the good pleasure of God. It pleased God for Paul to be an apostle. Let's move on for time. I don't want to get long winded here. Paul an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God. So we've kind of broken that apart and looked at that and We may have prompted more questions than we have answers at this point, but that's good. That's good. We're breaking apart. We're really being inquisitive about what the text says. But then he goes on to say in the second half of verse one, to the saints who are at Ephesus and who are faithful in Christ Jesus. Now I just read that straight off of the English text. Okay. Right. I didn't read any Greek. I didn't give you any grammar. I haven't given you any syntax. I just read that straight off of the page. OK? Now having read it straight off the page, what we said is to the saints, but what do we learn about the saints here? They're faithful. OK? What else do we learn about the saints? They're in Christ. Okay. Faithful in Christ. Why is everybody avoiding the first half of that clause? That's a good question. Paul seems to be emphasizing that there is sainthood. Could be. Could be. That's a question that we would need to kind of maybe write down and keep in the back of our minds. Maybe. I don't know. What do you mean, Mr. Dodds? I ain't sure elsewhere. Oh. Okay. So, so how would we, how would we define, I mean, how would we interpret, I guess, or what would we say that this first part from, from the beginning of this, the word to, T-O, to the word and, which is a coordinating conjunction which would introduce another clause. How would we, I mean this first clause, to the saints who are at Ephesus, how would we explain that? What is that first clause telling us? What do you mean, somebody else too? Okay. All right, so what we're doing, and finally y'all said it because I'm trying to lead y'all without leading y'all. What Miss Virginia said is she's equated these three words, the saints, who are at emphasis, this little phrase right here, who are at emphasis, she has taken that as being an indication of locality. an indication of locality. Which Saints? The Saints at Ephesus. You follow that? That makes sense. We see that all the time. Which football team? The football team which is at West Monroe. Which parking lot? The parking lot which is at Edgewood Baptist Church. Edgewood Reformed Baptist Church. Locality. But let me just highlight something for you here. Let me erase some stuff to make it a little clearer Okay, I want to erase this so that we can see I want to erase that because we're done with this Okay, and this coordinate conjunction. I'm going to erase that This will come back to it here just a second, and I want to erase this word at okay Now I realize that you're you're Observation worksheets don't have the sidebar notes, okay? So your observation worksheets are not going to have that little number 3 after the word R. But your text, your Bible will have it. Most Bibles, your New American Standard I know will have it. ESV has it. Some of the other translations have it. But you notice on the screen that after the word R, the word R, there's a little number 3. Okay? As y'all have read your Bibles before, have you noticed that there are little numbers and letters that are superscript? Okay. Have you ever paid attention to those? You should. Because those are little notes that tell you about some of the intricacies and the uniqueness of the texts. And it helps to flesh out the meaning of the text. Now this little number three, right here, I'm just going to put my cursor over it because that's what the software does. I love the software. It says three, and this is abbreviation, MSS is just manuscripts. Three early manuscripts do not contain the phrase at Ephesus. Okay. All we've done is we've just taken the English rendering of the text. We've noticed that there's a little numerical note there. And we've looked at that little numerical note. In your Bibles it would just be in the margin. or along the side somewhere, maybe down at the bottom of the page, it just says, three early manuscripts do not contain the words at Ephesus. Does that make any difference at all? You bet it does! Yeah, that's exactly right, Dot, the saints who are. It's not about locality. Paul was not necessarily highlighting the church that was at Ephesus. He's highlighting something else about them. Now, we have to kind of be careful with these little notes. This note doesn't tell us which one of the manuscripts. Now, what's interesting about New American Standard and ESV and some of the more literal King James Revised Standard, but I'm going to highlight New American Standard and ESV here. When they put these notes in here, even though they may not name the manuscripts, It's probably three of the more prominent or well-accepted manuscripts. Here's what this note means. There are no surviving copies of the original letters of the New Testament anywhere. The letter that Paul wrote, the original letter that Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus, that original letter does not exists. We don't have it. And not only do we not have the original letter to Ephesus, we don't have the original letters to Corinth, we don't have the original letters to Rome, we don't have the original letters to Thessalonica, Colossae, Laodicea, Philippi, we don't have any of the original Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John, We don't have any of the original Old Testament texts like Isaiah, Hosea, Zechariah, Zephaniah, Amos, Genesis, Deuteronomy. We don't have any original letters. The original letter written by people like Paul. So, if somebody comes at you with this idea, how do you know the Bible is true? You don't have any of the original letters. We answer the question by saying, yes, you're exactly right. We do not have any. None. There is not one original writing in existence upon which the Bible is based. Not one. But what we do have are copies. Okay? Manuscripts. Sir? In terms of time, yes. The closest that we have is the New Testament. A manuscript is simply this. What they did, when Paul wrote this letter to Ephesus, and even though he didn't specifically say, pass this letter around like you did in Colossians, you remember when we were studying Colossians at the end of Colossians? Paul said, and send this letter over to Laodicea, and the letter that was written to Laodicea, make sure that it's read in Colossae. Well, these churches, this is the only authoritative text that they had. And so they weren't about to send their letter off somewhere else without making a copy of it. Right? We do the same thing. If I've got an important document and Gloria says, or Ms. Dot, Ms. Dot says, here, let me see your document. I'll file it, or I'll mail it, or I'll do something with it. And I say, OK, no problem. But what do we do before we mail a letter out? We make a copy of it. We keep a copy. We send that copy out. Right? They did the same thing. Kevin, I'm sure I'm following the question. Well, there's nothing within your English translation that tells you that. Okay, that has come to us through a discipline called text critical, text criticism, and archaeologists and historians, biblical historians, and the people that have excavated places like Ephesus, we have never found any of the original letters. The way we know they're manuscripts is, and it's complicated, but let me just try to give it to you simply. There are several major manuscripts, like the Byzantine manuscript, the Alexandrian manuscript, and what those are, those are two major ones. What those were, those were, for lack of a better word, universities of the day that would have collected those letters and copied them. They were publishers. When these letters became authoritative and the churches started using them to govern what they did, they would have professional copiers, like Kinkos of their day, that would take those letters, or take a copy of that letter, and they would hand-copy, hand-write those letters out. And what happened over time is there were some major places, major schools of thought, major educated scribes, for lack of a better word, that were doing that, and they became known for doing that, and they copied the Przak, exactly. Whatever was on the letter was what was copied exactly. And so, we know when their manuscripts When the manuscript, at the beginning of the manuscript somehow at the bottom or at the top says this was transcribed by the Alexandrian scribes. We know that's a manuscript because it says this was transcribed by the Alexandrians. Does that make sense? So the copyist would put a note on that document that they had copied it. Maybe a form of commerce, maybe a form of bragging rights, who knows. That's how we would know they're manuscripts. The other thing that complicates this is that some of those manuscripts, we don't have the whole manuscript. We're talking about letters that are, well, right at 2,000 years old now. Now, let me ask you a question. You take a piece of paper, say you take your schedule here, and you take it home, and you fold it, and you put it in a dresser drawer somewhere, or you put it on a shelf, or you put it in a book, and you set it up somewhere. And you come back two or three years later, in what condition is that piece of paper in when you come back two years later? As you opened them, the fibers became so brutal they broke. And they crumbled. And the ink fades. Yeah. Well, and this is modern-day paper, which is engineered to last. There's not just paper fibers in here. There's some synthetics in here. glues and resins to help keep the paper together. There's all kinds of additives in the paper that help it last. We're talking about paper that was written on papyri or on vellum, animal skins, you know. And after 2,000 years, they become brittle and they break. Not to mention the fact that just like our day, they had fires, they had rainstorms, they got left out on the table in the middle of a rain. you know, you've got all kinds of stuff that happens. So we don't have all of the complete manuscripts. But you want to know what's interesting? People will tell you, well, you don't have any of the original letters of the Bible, and you're exactly right. But there are literally tens of thousands of fragments and partial manuscripts for the New Testament alone. And when you compare those tens of thousands of manuscripts They are uniformly consistent. What one says is, for the most part, what the other one says. With the exception of, you have some commas in the wrong places, you have some I's that are not dotted, and some T's, literally some T's that are not crossed. But if you look at the flow of the text, and what the meaning of the text is, across tens of thousands of manuscripts, they are consistent. They all say the same thing. There are works like Homer, Homer's Iliad, Dante and the Inferno, Inferno, Inferno, the works of antiquity, Greek antiquity, there are only one or two manuscripts of those works left, okay, and people hold Dante as being authoritative off of one or two manuscripts. The Bible in the New Testament has tens of thousands of manuscripts that all say the same thing. And so, in terms of a historical argument, that is more weighty. The more manuscripts you have, the better attested the word is attested, the better attested it is. Well, all this note is telling us is that in three of the perhaps major manuscripts, the ones that scholars have used over the years to make sure that the biblical texts are accurate, three of those don't contain the word at-emphasis okay the words at-emphasis which we've already said is important because if you take at-emphasis out that what it says to the saints who are okay are what well yes yes Let me point out something else to you, and it's easy on the screen. I wish Bibles would do this. Some of them do, but most of them don't. What is this? It's the word R. A-R-E. Does it look different than the rest of the words in this? Okay, how is it highlighted? Can you see it? red-yellow and on my computer screen words that are red-yellow does anybody know what those are? uh-uh what do I talk about all the time? participles I've got my computer set up to where all the participles are done in a particular font they're done in a red-yellow font makes it look like they're on fire on my computer screen. They stand out. The word are is a participle. It's the word amy. And I mentioned this last night. The word be. It's a stated verb. It's an equated verb. It gives us a state of being. It's a participle. To the saints who are. And the word are, amy, is a participle. It's a present active participle. To the being ones. to the areing ones, I guess you could say, if you wanted. So, if we back up slightly, okay? Saints who are. Okay, this is the little phrase that we're considering. We're saying, just for a second, that at emphasis, we're just going to take the manuscript side of things for a second. If nothing else, we see that these two phrases, these two clauses, are detached. They're not... that emphasis is not giving us added information pertinent to the first clause. It's telling us that it's the church in emphasis, okay, no argument. But the at-emphasis, are-at-emphasis, those are not related ideas. He is saying to the saints who are, to the saints who have a particular nature, in the greek it says to the holy ones literally rendered in the greek text right here erase this literally in the greek which one? what word do you want to spell? holy ones the ones being literally in the Greek y'all catch that? holy ones choice is just a definite article the but when it's compared to or attached to a participle it can be rendered holy ones the ones we might insert the word ones being being what? being holy ones being saints Right here on the right, this is the phrase in Ephesus. This is the phrase right here that certain manuscripts don't have. So we've set it aside for just a second. Over there. Okay, well we've set that one aside for just a second. I'll address that in just a minute, but the point I want to show us is that in the English translation as we were originally reading it, we equated this whole phrase, Saints who are at Ephesus, and we took it as a form of locality. In essence, what we did is we said that these two phrases, the Saints who are, and then the phrase at Ephesus are connected. at Ephesus is telling us something about the saints and what it's telling us is that it's a location that that whole phrase was intended to give us locality give us location and what I pointed out to you is because of the note here that says that there are three possibly major manuscripts that don't include the word Ephesus and oh by the way over here on the Greek text you see right here this little bar right there and this little bar right here that surrounds the phrase in emphasis, that tells us that that is something that may not have been in the original letter, the original text. The Greek text is telling us that, and that's where that note comes from, this dot, because the Greek text is showing it that it was an original. It's in the critical apparatus, and that's a little more complicated than what I want to get into. Beep. Yeah, there's a principle in hermeneutics. Hermeneutics is just the study of meaning and interpretation. But there's a principle in hermeneutics that says the more difficult reading is the original reading. Because what happens is, over the years, as the professional scribes would be copying this letter, there would be questions about, okay, well how do they know who this letter is to? We know it was to Ephesus. We know the letter went to Ephesus. But how do people who weren't there, how do they know that it went to Ephesus? And scribes would insert marginal notes. They would insert in brackets phrases like at Ephesus. It was just a scribal notation that helped clarify the text. It doesn't change the meaning of the text. It just helps to clarify the text. And so what we've done in scholarship and studying all of that have identified Something that in our English translation that we would take, just reading this English, we would take that as being original. And we would probably go to the mat and fight with somebody. No, by golly, that's original. It was that emphasis and that's what it said. Well, not really. Not really. Now again, that changed the meaning. As a matter of fact, it actually augments the meaning when we understand the construction of the text and what Paul was saying. It helps us understand at a greater understanding what the text is saying, what it means, okay? And what it's meaning, what Paul is highlighting here, this is what I want us to see, and I don't want to belabor it, but what Paul is highlighting to us is this. He is where he is by the good favor of God, through the good favor of God. We should go through looking at that. They are where they are, not at Ephesus, but in their right standing with the Lord, holy ones, because that's a nature that God has given to them. They are where they are because of the good favor of God. Now that begins to open up what Paul says in the whole rest of the letter. Who is he writing it to? And we can answer that question really easy. Who are the recipients of the letter? The church deficits. Okay, all right, I'll buy that. I'll buy that all day long. But it gives us a greater meaning when we say, who is this letter written to? It's to the holy ones who are by nature holy ones. Why are they by nature holy ones? Because like Paul, they are recipients of the good favor of God. And then some of y'all have mentioned who are faithful in Christ Jesus. In your English translations, a lot of times you'll see this, you see, I don't know if you can tell or not on the screen, but those words, and in your observation worksheets, those words ought to be in italics. Right? Y'all see that? They're in italics. In the New American Standard, I know for sure. In the ESV, I know for sure. In your observation worksheets, I know for sure. If those words are in italics, what that tells us is they're not original to the Greek text. The words, who are, are not in the Greek text. Look, it's right here. Reading it from the Greek side, starting right here, holy ones, holy ones, the being. Now that's difficult to understand. Holy ones, the ones being. in Ephesus. We've already talked about that that is suspect, whether it was in the original text or not. And, trustful ones in Christ. That's what it says. And trustful ones, or faithful ones, in Christ. What's happened here is because the translators of the New American Standard have written this first phrase as as locality, the saints who are at Ephesus, and we've already said that it doesn't appear from a manuscript that that's correct, that at Ephesus there's nothing wrong with it, but it's not the ones who are at Ephesus, okay? The ones who are, are their saints, their nature is being a saint, and their collection of saints who are at Ephesus, okay, we agree, they had to put who are faithful in here in the English text to make sense of it and help it read smoothly this whole thing could go away if we just took that emphasis out to the saints who are and faithful in Christ to the saints who by nature they're saints by nature and they're faithful in Christ see how that's more of a more difficult reading It takes a little brain power in it and you have to stop and think about it to really understand what it's saying. Well, that really argues for the original writing, the original text. And what Paul is highlighting here is not their locality in terms of being at Ephesus, but their position in God, in Christ. That's what Paul is highlighting. Paul is saying here, I am who I am because of God's good favor. and you are who you are because of God's good favor. From the very get go, verse 1, Paul is hammering out the point that we are gods because of God's good favor. See, so I'm not as far out left field as what everybody thinks I am. Yeah. Yeah. You see, this is why I have this discussion with people, you know, about the sovereignty of God, and why God is active, and why I can say things that are hard, and why I believe things that I find them just as hard as you do. You know, I'd like for people to be saved. It's my whole heart and prayer that people are saved. But the reality of it is that not everybody is saved. And if I believe that God is sovereign, which I believe God is sovereign, then I have to accept the fact that people are saved for a particular reason, and people are not saved for a particular reason, and those reasons have to lie with God, that He has elected and He has not elected. And again, I don't want to go back into, because, you know, I feel sorry, I have sympathy and apathy for people who don't get it, I wish they did get it, but they don't get it. And I'd like to say everybody has a chance, but that's just not what the biblical texts tell us. Everybody has a knowledge of God, and if you want to call that a chance, okay, I'll buy that. But not everybody is called unto the presence of God. And texts like this help us to understand that because, again, Paul is where he is by the good favor of God, and the saints who he's writing to are where they are. because of God's good faith. This whole verse, this whole phrase is connected together. These are not two distinct ideas. We cannot put a period right here after God and say, okay, the sentence is over and we start a brand new sentence there. You can't do that. Because Paul has given us an idea, one consistent, cohesive idea in verse one. And the idea is simply this, and I'm going to say it for the third time. Paul is saying, I am where I am because God has placed me there. It was God's good favor that I be there. And you are where you are because of the same thing. God has placed you there because of his good favor. And not because of your feelings. Let me just graphically put it a different way. Here is the focus. This is the primary focus of verse 1 right here. The will of God. Okay? How Paul relates to the will of God is what he says at first. How the saints or the believers who happen to live in Ephesus relate to the will of God is what he says afterwards. But the focal point of verse 1 is the will of God. And because Paul puts the will of God as the focal point of verse 1, what do you think the focal point of the rest of the book is going to be? The will of God. Now Paul says it in a lot of different ways. He says the sovereignty of God, the grace of God. He talks about the two halves, or the two different kinds of people, Jews and Gentiles, separated by a barrier wall, but then Christ broke that wall down in his flesh. You know, even talking about put on the full armor of God, all of that is surrounding the will of God. And if we had just read right through verse 1, like so many of us do, like we've done probably so many times, we would miss the fact that Paul basically has given us Maybe not the thesis statement, although you might make an argument that this is the thesis statement for the letter to the Ephesians. He has certainly tipped his hand in telling us what's on his mind in verse 1. But we just gotta stop and look at it. Right? Has anybody ever run a stop sign, and as soon as you ran the stop sign, you stop to go, was there a stop sign back there? Anybody ever done that? It's the same thing. Yeah. Yeah. This is the same thing. We're consumed by other things. We're preoccupied by other intentions. Those of you who know a little bit about Ephesians know there's a lot of theology in Ephesians. And there is. There is great theology. There's a lot of a lot of really weighty stuff. And because we want to run to the weighty stuff, we run right past the stop sign. And it's only after we've run through the intersection, hopefully the Lord preserves us so we don't have an accident, but it's only after we've run through the intersection that we realize, wow, there's a stop sign back there. I'm just trying to get us to stop and look at the stop signs. Okay? I've had that said to me more times than I can count. But it's pretty hard, it's pretty hard to make that argument when we're doing things like this where we're going back to the original texts. Because everybody agrees that this is the original Greek text. Not the handwritten text. Let me clarify. The Greek text that we're using over here is called the Nestle-Alan 27th And it was put together by two German scholars, I believe in the mid to late 1800s. And all they did is they just took the existing Greek manuscripts, and they compiled as many of them as they could find, and they just wrote the New Testament in the Greek language. They just copied, that's all they did, they copied the manuscripts, everything that they had, they just wrote it out in a consistent form based on all the manuscripts they had. So they took all the bits and pieces of Ephesians, maybe there was 50 manuscripts, and they compared all 50 of those manuscripts, and then they started going word by word by word. All 50 of them have this word, okay, we write that word. 35 of the 50 have this next word, so we write that word down, but we put a note that says 35 of the 50 had that word. Or maybe it was the 35 of the 50, the 15 that didn't have it were minor manuscripts. There were more major manuscripts that had it. So that's how we come up with this knowing that three of the major manuscripts didn't have it in there. Because these guys took the text and all the manuscripts and they compiled them and they wrote it out. And everybody, most everybody who is reasonable rational and honest will say yeah that's what that is so to say that's your interpretation if you go back to the original text it's hard to say that because all we're doing is we're just we're just saying what was in the text that make sense that's why the languages matter but people will say that you're right well no no i know that but i'm just I'm just showing y'all how you refute those arguments. I'm just showing you, you know, when somebody comes at you and says, you know what, if you believe in the sovereignty of God business, you're a heretic, and that's not the God I know. The God I know loves everybody and wants everybody to go to heaven. Well, that's not what it says in the original manuscript, in the original texts, in the original language. We have to go back to that. That's authoritative. You see how easily we can misread the English? It's not that the English is wrong. I will say it again. It doesn't mean your English Bible is wrong. But I think we need to be asking questions of the English text. Because there is not a direct one-to-one correlation between Greek and English. There isn't. They're just two different languages. And the English translations have done a really good job of doing the best they could. But if they were going to put all the notes and everything in there, and there are some Bibles that do that, the Net Bible is one, the ESV Study Bible is another, they literally would be like that. Can you imagine having a half to three quarter page note for every little I mean, literally, every word, every other word, maybe every third word, you'd have a half a page, you know, how big that would be. Now, there's some resources that do that, but for the average folks like ourselves, we just don't have that. I'm just trying to show y'all that if we stop and just kind of Peel back some of the layers and not make things up. We don't want to make things up, okay? We don't want to let our opinions inform what the text says. We want it the other way around. We want the text to inform our opinions. But that doesn't mean that we just take it at face value and go on. We need to be peeling back layers, especially when our English text tells us with these little notes right here that there's something going on. We didn't even look at this one. If we put our cursor over that one right there, the number two, see what it says? Holy Ones, Saints, Holy Ones, see? Over there on the Greek side, Holy Ones, Hagias, that's what it means. And this word of through or by up here, literally through, that's what the Greek word literally means, through. So we have some tools in our modern day English translations to help us. But nine times out of ten, most people don't even look at those. Nine times out of ten, most everybody's already run past verse one and tried to run down to verse thirteen and start trying to dissect the deep theology of Ephesians when the deep theology starts right here. If you don't know how to swim very well, maybe you know how to tread water, maybe you know how to swim, but you don't know how to swim very well. You're not very experienced at swimming. Are you more comfortable in the shallow end or the deep end? The shallow end. But as you become comfortable of being in that shallow end, typically what do you do? You go a little deeper, you go a little deeper, you go a little deeper. Why in the world would we ever, not being comfortable, not being real experienced in the biblical text, want to go jump in the deep end first without starting off in the shallows? We're just starting in the shallows. That's where Paul starts us. Make sense? Okay, well I hope I have whetted your appetite for this study of Ephesians. We'll be looking at what Paul has to say about the will of God. Yes, he sure was. You bet. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah, and that's where this whole ethicist thing comes about. Now, Ms. Madonna, I mentioned, I will go back to that. I'm glad I remembered. This phrase is not in emphasis, or not at emphasis like the New American Standard, it's in emphasis. And the preposition that is used is the preposition en, in. And here's the discussion about those prepositions again. There are three that show locality. There's in, there's ice, and there's ek. In being abiding or living, remaining in a particular place, which is what's used here. Ice. EIS is the preposition that means I'm moving into, I'm going from one place to another. God bless you. And ek is meaning out of. Location, locomotion, out of one place to another. And so, literally rendered from the Greek, it is those that are living in or abiding in Ephesus. That's literally what it would mean. Not at. But the English translation, for whatever reason, chose to use the preposition at. Uh-huh. At emphasis. Uh-huh. How about this one right here? Yes. It may not. Not all Bibles have it. The little notation of three, and it's just a coincidence that it's the notation three and there's three manuscripts. Those are not related. It could be notation number four. Okay? And the message would still be the same. The message is that three early manuscripts do not contain the words that emphasis. So we saw over here on the Greek side this little bracket around the word There's a little bracket around this. What that tells us on the Greek side is that those words may or may not be original. And what our note on the English side has said, that there are three manuscripts, probably significant, well-attested manuscripts, weighty manuscripts, that don't have the words at Ephesus. And so the question is, first of all, we know that the letter was written to the church at Ephesus. is written to the Ephesians. We just take that, we accept that as being without question true. And if we accept that as being without question true, then there's no need to delineate that. We can verify that this letter was written to the church in Ephesus through history, through church tradition, through other means. We don't have to have the letter say at Ephesus to know that it was written to the church in Ephesus. Jude. We studied Jude this summer. Was Jude written to Christians? Y'all remember? Yes, Jude was written to Christians. He was written to a church, and he never tells us which church. Does that somehow make it less important? No. So, having it clearly, specifically delineated at emphasis, it's nice, it helps, it's not necessary, but more importantly at this juncture it muddies the water because what we do in our English not knowing anything that that note not being there let me let me move the cursor this note not being there at all just reading the English text straightforward without any other information we haven't had this discussion there's no there's no notes there's no marks there's no scribblies there's no nothing we just read this says to the saints who are at Ephesus by English our English tradition by the way we're hardwired in English we would take this as being Paul saying specifically the saints who are located at the city called Ephesus that's how we would take it but that's not doesn't seem to be the thrust of what Paul was saying when you look at the original Greek language Here's another nail or bullet in the gun for this argument. If he was just wanting to say the saints who live at Ephesus, the saints who live at Ephesus, why did he use a participle right here that indicates nature? Is it our nature? Do we equate nature with where we live? Do I live in West Monroe simply because it's my nature to live in West Monroe? No, I live in Western Rose simply because that's where I live. It doesn't have anything to do with my nature. Does that make sense? So, if we accept that, then why would Paul use a participle there? Well, it's not that he's highlighting their nature in Ephesus, he's highlighting their nature as a holy one. Does that make sense? Did I answer your question? Not really. Let's just suffice it to say at this point that there are instances like this throughout the scriptures where there are words that have been inserted over the years to help us understand, but they may not have necessarily been in the original manuscripts. And it doesn't make the text wrong. It doesn't somehow render null and void the authority of God, no. Whether you leave emphasis in there or not, with a correct understanding of the original text, it doesn't change the meaning. It tells us that the holy ones, the people who are holy by nature, live in Ephesus, but other than that, it doesn't change the meaning at all, as long as we're understanding what the original text is trying to tell us. yes that's right and that the translations that we have that are true to the original text we have a very high confidence level that they are telling us the true and real story you know it's interesting you know you've heard of Qumran the caverns at Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Y'all heard about those? Well, the Dead Sea Scrolls, that's all Old Testament. There was no New Testament writings in the Dead Sea Scrolls whatsoever. It was the Greek rendering of the Old Testament. And they found the most complete manuscript, I think, that they have is the Isaiah Scroll. Of all the biblical texts, the Isaiah Scroll is the most complete manuscript. It's not original. but the manuscript is the most complete that they have. And there was very little discrepancies between the English rendering, pick up an English Bible, open it up to Isaiah. There was very little difference between what our English Bibles say, Isaiah says, and this manuscript that they found at Qumran in the Dead Sea Scrolls that is, I think, 4,500 to 5,000 years old. There was very little difference between the two. that the scholars were amazed that God has preserved His Word and its purity. Even in English translations today, there's not a lot of variation between what was originally written and what our English translations say today. Where the water gets muddy is that we read the English text according to our own style, our own way of reading. And we don't realize we're doing it. It's subconscious because that's the way we've been trained. We equate certain things as being together, like to the saints who are at Ephesus, when the original text doesn't equate those things. That's where we get off track. But between the true understanding of the original language and these manuscripts, there's very little difference. I mean, you get I's that are in the wrong spot, commas that are in the wrong spot, and sometimes words get transposed. But other than that, the meaning of the text has been preserved. Well. Yeah, right. The manuscript evidence for the New Testament and the Old Testament, we're talking about the New Testament here, the manuscript evidence for the New Testament is overwhelming. If you took it to a court of law and held a trial to authenticate the veracity of the New Testament, it'd be a slam dunk, hands down, no argument. It's just by the manuscript evidence. There's so much evidence that says, this is true. The case would never come to court. It wouldn't even happen. For the most part. Nope, they don't have any originals for any book of the Bible. They're all manuscripts. Copies of the original. Don't let that trouble you. Most people have it. And that's okay. And the only reason I'm bringing it up to you now is because, you know, you're going to come across somebody that's going to say, you can't trust it because there are no originals. You don't have any of the originals. Yeah, you're right. The way you defuse that argument, yeah, you're absolutely right. We don't have one single original. Not Old Testament, not New Testament, no originals. None of them. None of the originals exist. But we got tens of thousands of copies, and all the copies say the same thing. That's right. Yeah. No. We're just attempting to pick up the pieces. and they won't sit down and look at it. That's where I would apply the teachings of Jesus, where he said, don't cast your pearls before swine. There's some people, they've made up their mind, there's not a thing you can say that will change their mind. You can show them the text, you can show them, you can go through all, you can go through everything we've just gone through for the last hour and fifty minutes and I'm going to be done because I said it wouldn't take the whole time. You could go through everything and at the end of that time they would go, I still don't believe it. Because they don't want to believe it. Not open their understanding. And change. Because more than likely, There's a lot of that in the apostolic tradition. And what they're doing is they're calling into question the inerrancy of Scripture and saying that there's extra-biblical revelation that isn't included in the canon of Scripture. And if you go that direction, then anything can be added to the scriptures as extra revelation. And so you get all these dreams, visions, interpretations, new revelations. That is the thrust behind that particular saying in the apostolic tradition. That the scriptures don't contain all of the revelation of God. God is still revealing things to us. And that opens the door for people to say anything and say, God has revealed it to me. We take a marked exception to the fact that everything that God wants us to know has already been revealed in the scriptures and the canon is closed and there are no new revelations. Now, God may open stuff up to us. He may show us from his word, you know, things like what we're seeing where we're going back to the original where our understanding has been opened and there's new revelation to me. But God had already revealed that. What we saw today, God had revealed that with Paul in this. Paul wrote this, God revealed it. Just because I don't understand it doesn't mean it's new. That make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm not encouraging us to get into arguments. That's not my point. But you know, when there are people who have honest questions, how do we answer those honest questions? I mean, how do we share the hope that lies within us with others from the Scriptures? And if somebody wants to argue, I wouldn't even argue with them. I don't. you just want an argument. I'm not here to argue. If you've got a real question, we'll sit down and talk about it. What we want to do with the scripture is not your opinion. And it's not going to be an argument. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's pray. Still, we'll get done in seven minutes, sir. Father, we just thank you again, Lord, and praise you. for all that you've given to us for this time today. Lord, I pray that you would just open our understanding and our hearts and our minds to the truth of your word and to Father that we bring you glory. May we be found in and through your favor as the Apostle Paul. May we, by nature, be holy ones and faithful ones in Christ. And may we leave this place today and live in the world in which you placed us, demonstrating all of that, glorifying you, and praising you for what you've done. Father, we love you. Thank you. We praise you. We ask all these things in your name. Amen.