The Protestant problem! Sam Shamoun

But if you could, uh, steal man the Protestant position for us, to get into the mindset of someone who has the Protestant mindset, what would be their position?

Yeah, well, for see, from my Protestant background, as a former Protestant, now Protestants may think, well, I was never that well educated. The two main principles that convinced me that the Protestant movement was a movement of God were Sola fide, Solas scriptura, primarily Solas scriptura. Now let me define that because I'm going to do my best to accurately represent what I was taught and what I believed. Solas scriptura, if you literally translate Solas scriptura, it's two Latin terms. Right now, for those of you who may be wondering why would we use Latin terms? Because in the Western church, we we start with Greek being the fancy term Lingua franca, right? So I want to sound educated, even though I'm not. Because when Alexander the Great conquered the then-known world, he Hellenized the world; people had to speak Greek. Then Latin took over in the in the West, so many of our words in English come from Greek through Latin or directly from Latin. And if I can just give one example, the term Bible, that's a Latin term. It's from the Latin Biblia, which itself is derived from the Greek Biblia. Biblos in Greek is plural; it means books. Biblos in Latin means book. So the term Bible, for those of you who don't know, comes from the Latin term Biblia, and many of our terms are like that.

Sola scriptura, why? Because the reformers are from the western part of the church and they studied Theology, and they'd had to know Latin. Latin was the language of Theology and philosophy in the West, so they had to know Latin, and they would have to study and so on. So Solas scriptura literally means Sola, only scripture. But it's not simply just follow the Bible. Solas scriptura, if you try to steal man the position, means that the Bible is the only infallible rule of faith because it is God-breathed scripture. God breathed out the words that were written down by human authors as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. And the the passages that I'm referring to, 2 Timothy 3:14-17, specifically, 2 Timothy 3:16, sorry guys, I keep getting distracted. May the Lord Jesus rebuke all distractions. That's what happens. St. want to try to distract us. So Second Timothy 3:16 is where it says all scripture is God-breathed, breathed out by God, Theos, or the pneuma, anyway. And then in 2 Peter 1:20-21, 2 Peter 1:20-21, speaking of the Old Testament writings written by the prophets, it says these prophets were borne along, carried along by the Holy Spirit. So Solas scriptura teaches that the only infallible rule of faith that the church has is the Bible. Since this is the only infallible rule, every other rule is subject to scripture. So there are authorities, but every authority is subject to the ultimate authority of scripture. So even the church is subject to scripture; councils are subject to scripture; Bishops and Priests, all subject to scripture, because none of them are infallible except scripture.

So if you have this mindset, it doesn't matter really what councils convene and concluded, because those councils consisted of uninspired men, were not necessarily guided by the Spirit. So their conclusions can be tested and challenged in light of scripture. That's what it means to be a Protestant. So this is why you'll have Protestant scholars and philosophers who will call into question the Christology of the Council of Nicaea, who will call into question the Trinitarian understanding hammered more fully in the Council of Constantinople, why? Because these men were not inspired; they were not infallible, and they could be mistaken. So this is what it means to be a Protestant. So from that mindset, in the beginning, when I came to the Christian faith by the grace of God's Spirit, I didn't really care what the early church said; I was ignorant of the early church, but I really didn't care. What mattered to me was what you can show me and prove to me from the scripture. Give me conclusive, solid, contextual arguments from the scripture that what you're telling me is true. See, that's what mattered. This is why a lot of Protestants, when you mention fathers, okay, so what? They were men of God, but they were mistaken. God had mercy on them; they didn't have perfect theology; they're in heaven. Okay, and chapter and verse. This is what I used to say; that was this was my slogan, chapter and verse, chapter and verse. So this is the Protestant position. So if you want me to just stop there, if you want to ask me, or if you want me to continue, I can, because I can't go on for hours. So you want to make sure this is the main point, Solas scriptura. This is the point that you got to show Protestants that their definition of Solas scriptura is not just unhistorical, but it's not even biblical, without coming off as denigrating the scripture. Was that clear, by the way?

That was, no, that was a very clear. I think a lot of people who hear you speak like this like really understand the mindset of of someone who holds to that position. Yeah. So one thing I heard a a Protestant one time say, like imagine that you have a flashlight, a flashlight obviously gives light, right? So within that light you can derive doctrines; there are a lot of stuff are clear, but then a particular moment the light just cuts off and gets more in the dark and then becomes speculation. So scripture gives light to particular sets, amount of doctrines and teachings, and everything outside of that, like tradition, shift, like sent, etc. So for the past couple of years, I've seen you shift from the one position a bit more towards the other, like your heart has been softened, but what is your reasoning of yeah, of the Traditions being God-breathed as well, if you could say that?

Yes. So let me give you a very, not a complicated answer, but a lengthy response, because you're asking about my journey. And to begin with, even though I did not want to accept this argument, now I have to be honest and say it was a good argument, even though I wasn't willing to accept it. What's the argument, though? We all say Solas scriptura; this is a fact, and this is not just true of Protestantism; this is true of all of the churches. When someone says chapter and verse and you have to prove it from scripture, what it really comes down to is one's interpretation. So even if someone were to point to a passage of scripture to try to prove that his position, her position is scriptural, or at least consistent with scripture, that still will not convince someone because they can come and question your interpretation. So this is the first problem, because it comes down to who is correctly interpreting scripture, who's correctly handling scripture, who's correctly understanding scripture. So even if I say chapter and verse, let's say you give me verses to show infant baptism is scriptural, but then you have what's known as Credo-Baptists, typically called Baptists, and you even have Calvinists or Reformed Christians who are Reformed Baptists, and we know some of them, right? And they'll tell you, no, those passages do not support your contention for what's known as pedobaptism. Even though pedobaptism, the practice of baptizing infants, was very early and widespread and became virtually the unanimous position of the church from at least as far as record evidence is concerned from the later part of the second century, became the unanimous view of the church even up until the time of the reformers, because even Martin Luther himself believed in infant baptism, and he believed in water baptismal regeneration. John Calvin believed in infant baptism, though he denied that water baptism was the means by which the Holy Spirit regenerated you. So even Solas scriptura doesn't solve the issues because it then comes down to a person's understanding of the text. And so then, at the end of the day, if you really look at it objectively, Solas scriptura ends up with the view that everyone becomes his or her own Pope, and they pontificate over against the other view. It's it's a fact, and I'm not trying to use an argument that when I was anti-, let's say Catholic or anti-Orthodox, I used to hate when the Catholic, Orthodox would use against me, but now that I'm being honest to God and more open to the Spirit, I can see that argument was valid to say that well, to appeal to scripture is basically a canard, what I call it; it's what we call a ruse, because everyone is appealing to scripture, but no one can agree over the meaning of scripture when it comes to these core doctrines, like the issue of baptism, just a basic one, even among Protestants. I can bring you the Church of Christ that believe in water baptism and regeneration, but they believe in what they call Credo-baptism; you have to believe and repent to be baptized, right? Or I can bring you Baptists who believe in believers' baptism but don't believe that water baptism regenerates. So you have two groups, both appealing to Solas scriptura, both saying that only believers should be baptized, but both contradicting the other regarding the purpose of baptism. One says it's simply symbolic; the other says, no, it's the means by which the Spirit comes upon you and regenerates you. Or let's take within Protestantism, pedobaptism. Now you have the Lutherans who do believe in infant baptism, called pedobaptism, and then you have the Presbyterians who follow John Calvin; they believe in infant baptism, what they call paedobaptism, but now they contradict one another regarding whether that act of baptism is symbolic or the means by which that infant is now made alive by the Spirit and united to Christ. So you see, Solas scriptura doesn't really solve the problems that those who affirm it think it does; it actually creates more problems than it solves, and it's not because scripture is imperfect; scripture is perfect. And this is what I try to hammer the most: a perfect system, when placed in the hands of imperfect sinners, will become imperfect and corrupt, not because the system is not perfect, because you can't have imperfect, fallible, uninspired human sinners implementing a perfect system. And you find that, for example, in the Old Testament theocracy. And I'm sorry, I've belaboring the point, but this is very necessary for me to go into the background so people understand when someone says chapter and verse, that's not as simple or as easy. God established the perfect form of government on Earth, his theocracy, when he formed Israel to be his people on Earth. Israel was supposed to be a theocratic kingdom where God would rule on Earth through his people Israel, but now read Old Testament history, how the Israelites miserably failed, from the judges to the kings, to implement God's theocratic program. Now does that mean God's kingdom is imperfect? God forbid. God's kingdom is perfect, but when you entrust it to the hands of imperfect humans, guess what? They're going to mess it up. Same with the perfection of scripture; the Bible is God's perfect word; it is his voice, historically accurate, perfectly preserved, but when you have imperfect humans trying to then understand and interpret this perfect voice, you're going to have problems. So that became clear; appealing to Solas scriptura did not solve problems and introduced additional ones.

Now this led to a second point: if I'm saying chapter and verse and I'm calling into question, let's say, what the church believed early on, because I don't submit to their interpretation, but I rather submit to this particular understanding, interpretation, well, here's the problem: those same Christians were studying the scriptures, trying to understand the scriptures, try to explain the scriptures, and implement the scriptures in a manner pleasing to God. So why would I want to ignore how they understood scripture, how they explained scripture, and how they implemented and lived out scripture, unless I want to go the route of assuming they became so corrupt so early on that none of them could be trusted in handling scripture? And that led to a third problem for me: this ends up blaspheming the Lord Jesus. And if you want, I can expound why; just give me a moment.

Okay, no, absolutely. Let me tell you why. If I say that the early church's understanding of the scriptures and the doctrines that they codified, because this is one fact, even the most anti-Catholic, anti-Orthodox apologist, if he knows history, will admit this as a fact: you will not find any source, any extant writing of any Christian, whether Orthodox or heterodox, denying water baptismal regeneration. This is a fact, as far back as you can read in the church, all the documents and the these are writings that God has preserved from men like Irenaeus. Even you have statements in the Epistle of Barnabas, which some would place in the latter part of the first century as an Apostolic writing, what what they would call the writings of the Apostolic Fathers. And just to explain to people, when people are looking at church history, they break it down into certain time periods. You have what's known as the Apostolic Fathers, then you have the second-century apologists, right? And that would fall under the category of the ante-Nicene, before Nicene fathers, and then you have the Nicene fathers and the post-Nicene fathers. Well, the Apostolic Fathers would refer to those individuals who were contemporaries with the apostles who either knew the apostles and were Bishops appointed by them or at least were companions of the account, companions of the Apostles. And we have writings from that period called the Apostolic Fathers, such as the letters of Ignatius; that's considered writings from an Apostolic Father. So he's one of the Apostolic Fathers. Clement of Rome; that's another writing that we would put under the period of Apostolic Fathers, right? Epistle of Barnabas, Didache; these are the documents that would be classified as the writings of the Apostolic Fathers. Why Apostolic Fathers? The fathers of the church who were either disciples of the Apostles, eyewitnesses to them and appointed by them, or at least knew the companions who knew the apostles. So this is just want to be clear. So Epistle of Barnabas is considered a writing from the Apostolic Fathers, from the period known as the Apostolic Fathers. So again, what would these writings be? Epistle of Barnabas, Clement of Rome, Ignatius, and the Didache, just to name four, because it comes from the middle or the latter part of the first century and either written by eyewitnesses, the apostles, or those who were discipled by the eyewitnesses of the Apostles. Is that clear? You want that? Is that clear? Okay. So Epistle of Barnabas, Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, all the way up until the Reformation, you will not find any Bishop, priest, Orthodox Church Father, writer denying that water baptism regenerates, not one. This was a universal teaching; it's even codified in the Nicene Creed. Even Protestants have, if they have a Protestant hymnal or if they belong to, let's say, a Lutheran Church or an Anglican church, and they recite the Apostles' Creed, I'm sorry, that they recite the Nicene Creed, in the Nicene Creed there's a statement that says I believe in one baptism for the forgiveness of sins, one baptism for remission of sins. Well, guess what? That means that means if you're a true Christian and you're part of the true church, the apostolic church, the church, Church established by the apostles and preserved by the Spirit through the Bishops, you could not deny that baptism was the means by which God forgave you of your sins, and they meant water baptism. That once you are immersed in water in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, by the authority of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, that's when the Spirit comes upon you, makes you alive, unites you to Christ, to become part of his spiritual body, and you're forgiven of your sins. Now here's the problem: when I became aware of that, I was a Credo-Baptist, and I was at one time a Reformed Baptist, meaning my belief was water baptism is symbolic; it's symbolic of my union with Christ, that when I was regenerated by the Spirit and I trusted the Lord and turned to him, I was united to Christ by the Spirit, becoming part of the spiritual body, and the act of baptism merely symbolized that union. It didn't bring about the reality of that union. You with me, right?

So you're just not in your like, man, keep going. I muted myself. I'm with you, Sam. Go ahead.

No, I'm just saying you're like saying, please, Sam, keep talking, man. I love when... so it is. Yeah, here, here I am. Someone who's... water baptism does not regenerate you; water baptism is not used by the Spirit to unite you to Christ and bring about forgiveness, and now I'm discovering for the first time that this was the unanimous view of the early Christians. So now I'm forced to one of two conclusions: these are the same people who knew the apostles or appointed by the sex successors of the Apostles; they're reading the same Bible; they're reading the same verses; and many of them, their mother tongue was Greek. The Greek fathers, when they read the New Testament, they didn't read in translation; I have to read it in translation; you may have to read in translation; they were reading the New Testament in the language it was written in, because these people slept in Greek, dreamt in Greek, ate in Greek; their mother tongue was Greek. But but but Sam, but but we have Logos Bible Software; we now know better than they do.

Yeah, man, see now you stump me. Now I'm gonna go back to being a Protestant. You got me there, man. That's... we now know that on is a predicate, accusative, nominative. Son, don't you know? Yeah, but what about, what if it's an adverbial praeposition phrase and a paraphrastic... any... okay, so you get my point, right?

Yeah. So now I'm confronting, this is where my journey, this is where the Holy Spirit is putting me on a journey where I'm coming under conviction, and the Spirit will not leave me alone; he's causing me to be restless. Now I'm confronting one or two facts: that means the church, right after the death of the last Apostle, became completely corrupt and did not know what the gospel was, or I'd have to argue—I tried to, because I didn't want to give up on my Protestant tradition—that though they were wrong about baptism and that the Spirit worked through baptism to regenerate you and to unite you to Christ and bring about forgiveness, they were still not condemned because this was not a damnable heresy, and God still had mercy on them and saved them the right way, which was Luther's way. So even though they didn't know, solid as defined by Luther, but God still saved them through that means, justification by faith in Christ alone, though they didn't know that's how they're being saved, and he overlooked that mistake and pardoned them until the gospel was rediscovered by the reformers. See, that's that's how I start thinking, or maybe my Protestantism is wrong. So it's actually three positions, right? But at the end of the day, it's really one position; it's not three, but for me and my wrestling. So even though I said there was two conclusions, I came up with a third one because I could not go the route that these men were all heretics, false teachers who are not saved, and they're they're in hell. Why? Because these are the men defending the true church; these are the men defending the true faith; these are the men preserving the scriptures; and these are the men who are dying for the preservation of scriptures and their correct interpretation, and they're the ones who are protecting the flock from the heretics. So if these men were wrong, then that means the restoration movement of the 19th century, 1800s, they were right, because in the 19th century you had these cults that sprung up saying the church was lost by the second century and God had to then restore the church, and he waited till the 1800s when he raised up either the Millerites, which became the Adventist movement, and then their false prophet is Ellen G. White, or Charles Taze Russell, who is the the founder of the Jehovah's Witnesses, and on and on it goes. But to say that that the church was corrupt and lost and they needed to be restored, the restoration movement of the 19th century means Jesus failed and the Holy Spirit failed, which means we just insulted and blasphemed the Lord, because the Lord in the Bible... see now the Bible, there we have it.

Say it again. There we have it exactly.

Yeah, Matthew 16:18, on this rock I will build my church. That's one. John 16:13, 12-13, the Holy Spirit will guide the believers into all truth, and he will not speak on his own initiative; he will only speak what he hears, right? And what he hears he will then pass on to them and reveal things to come. The Holy Spirit will be guiding the church, right? And John 14:26, we're told the Holy Spirit will remind them of the things that Jesus taught. And then you go to Second Timothy 1:13 and 14, and Paul tells Timothy what he has heard from him in front of people to guard and trust by the Holy Spirit that's now in him, not just in Paul. And then in Second Timothy 2:1-2, Paul tells Timothy, now you pass it on to reliable men.

In front of many witnesses, so this is now the tradition: the apostles, by the Holy Spirit, preach the truth, interpret the church's truth, safeguard the church's truth. Then they raise up their followers, who are now filled with the same Spirit, to now preserve that doctrine and pass it on to others that the Spirit is filling.

So if the church became corrupt in the second century, either the Spirit gave up on the church, or the Lord lied about preserving the church, or men became too powerful and were able to overthrow what God wanted for the church—all of which is blasphemy, none of which I could accept. Right, so I'm stuck, ain't I? I'm in a jam, right? Yeah, you're stuck now. Your third point, that you're blaspheming, is, for me, the deal breaker. To be in all honesty, to say that God filled—but oh wait, my church right now, centuries later, like you're not drinking from the same well that Jesus established, that the apostles established.

Yeah. In fact, brother, this argument ends up proving too much. If Christ could not preserve the true core doctrines by holy men filled with the Spirit from the second century, what guarantee do you give me he's now doing it for your church? If he couldn't do it in the second century, or the third century, or the fourth century, or the fifth century, then what guarantee do you have he started doing it for any century? Why did he stop at the end of the first century, at the start of the second century with the death of the last Apostle, and stop, and then all of a sudden decide to do it in the 19th century? Well, according to the reformers, God actually started doing it in the 16th century, 1500s, right, with the Magisterial Reformers. And even they couldn't agree, and even they came to blows, and even they started killing each other. Right? Right. Too arbitrary. So, like, this is why—go ahead, brother.

I'm sorry. No, no problem. Uh, a great analogy which I have heard, like, this one a month ago, where it says that if you go to an amusement park, like Disneyland, for something, you have to be of a particular height in order to get into the attraction, into the roller coaster. Right? In the same way that if you want to be the Church of Christ, you need to be of a particular age. If your church starts at the 16th century, then by definition you put yourself out of the game. Exactly. In fact, you're actually arguing like a Restorationist Protestant. Those who follow the Magisterial Reformers are no different, no better than the 19th-century cults. And I don't say this to offend them, but I want them to think, be a little open-minded and think: you're basically saying that the core doctrines of the Christian faith were rediscovered in the 16th century. Well, how different is that from the 19th-century Restorationist movements that say the church was corrupt and lost from the time of the death of the last Apostle? They became apostate, the great falling away, the great apostasy, and these core doctrines were only rediscovered in the 19th century. So how different is that from the Reformation argument? How different is that? What's the difference? All you're doing is pushing the restoration a little earlier or later, depending on your view.

So this is why I cannot, with a clear conscience, remain faithful to my Protestant heritage. I couldn't. I'm not saying because I'm smarter than someone or holier—I'm not. God knows that I am a maggot, I am a worm without Jesus Christ. I'm capable of the most wicked sins, and that's why I cry out to the Spirit: Save me from myself. Do not give me what I deserve. Have mercy on me, mercy on me, oh Lord. The work you begun on me, complete it, so I can love Jesus Christ and glorify Jesus Christ in spite of my weaknesses and love him more and more, not less and less. So I could not go that route because—why is it blasphemy? Because you're pretty much saying God is a failure and he's not faithful to do what he says he was going to do, and you're pretty much assaulting the Bible. That's what's ironic: these people think they have the highest view of scripture, but in adopting this view they're actually denigrating scripture because they don't believe the promises of scripture. Because if the scriptures are true—and they are, they're right—Jesus did not stop building his church when the last Apostle died and allowed the church to fall away into this great apostasy. It's even called by these Restorationist cults the great falling away, the great apostasy, and waited for 1800 years—I'm sorry, 1700 years—because the second century to the 1800s—are you serious? Or waited till the 16th century. So what was the Lord doing between that time? What was he doing? Nothing? No. This is blasphemy.