The Communicator's Calling with Dr. John Oswalt
June 2, 2022
What a privilege it was to have Dr. John Oswalt on the podcast with me! We talked through his career as a preacher, scholar, leader, and teacher. He synthesizes these functions as a call to be a communicator. We also discuss his editorial work with the New Living Translation, his subtle critique of recent scholarship about the historical Adam, his decades-long study of Isaiah, and his thoughts about the future of the holiness tradition.
YouTube - https://youtu.be/7k3cPdy1dIc
Audio - https://andymilleriii.com/media/podcast
Apple - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/more-to-the-story-with-dr-andy-miller/id1569988895?uo=4
Dr. Oswalt’s Website: https://calledtobetransformed.net
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Transcript
Andy
Well, we have made it to this second year of the more to the story podcast and you just heard the music that came to us from Phil Legger who wrote that.
Andy
Piece, the intro and the outro.
Andy
For this podcast you can hear him singing more to his story there in several of you have got in touch with me who have who have enjoyed that music and some of you picked up that he's quoting in a him in there.
Andy
Maybe you can pick it out.
Andy
Let me know if.
Andy
You get if you find it.
Andy
It's a kind of a fun thing.
Andy
Also just so thankful.
Andy
For the opportunities we have to have folks.
Andy
Who have?
Andy
Written in kind of video testimonies where they've talked about what the podcast is meant to them, and they'll this past year and so I have a few more of those at the beginning of the podcast for next few weeks.
Andy
My friend Edward Williams, a former student here at Wesley Biblical Seminary, shares kind of some of his thoughts on on the podcast, and I'm so thankful to him and his witness and the way God using him.
Andy
Also coming out soon in July will be this course that I've developed, called contender.
Andy
It's a deep look at the little book of Jude, now just be on the lookout for this.
Andy
I'm really excited about this content and this, as Michael Green says, this burningly relevant book for our time.
Andy
So be on the lookout for this study coming.
Andy
On Jude, but now here my friend Edward.
Edward
Good evening, my name is Edward Williams and I am a proud graduate of the Wesley Biblical Seminary in Richland, Ms.
Edward
But I also happen to be a subscribed follower of Doctor Andy Miller. More to the story podcast. Now I wanted to hop on for just a few moments 'cause I've tried this video like 100 times, but I wanted to talk about one of my.
Edward
Favorite episodes that Doctor Miller posted for us.
Edward
I'm not pulling away from any of the videos that came before or after this one, but as a seminary student, this particular episode spoke volumes into my life.
Edward
It was called the scripture story with Doctor Joy more now as they come.
Edward
Now graduate student of Doctor Miller preaching class doctor more.
Edward
I'm able to meet her in Washington DC this past January with some of my WBS classmates and the same person that I saw on this podcast was the exact same person that we were able to meet in person.
Edward
What I loved about this.
Edward
About this episode.
Edward
As Doctor Miller asked doctor more questions about how she got into preaching some of her preaching methods, how how she developed as a preacher, and what I love that Doctor Moore did was she emphasized the Bible as one?
Edward
A biblical narrative and I love the way that she went into her personal bag and pulled out the movie Hunger Games.
Edward
Yes, Hunger Games and she made a cross reference between the capital in that movie with Daniel and the three Hebrew boys in the Old Testament of the Bible, and I loved that because she began to show how movies attract us.
Edward
About the language, how the imagery in a sense pulls out the beauty and science of preaching.
Edward
And as a student of preaching, what better method to learn than by looking at the things that we love to watch most?
Andy
Welcome to the more to the story podcast.
Andy
We have a great episode for you today with Doctor John Oswalt that just hold on.
Andy
We're going to get there in just a second. This podcast is brought to you by Wesley Biblical Seminary, dub.edu, where we are training trusted leaders for faithful.
Andy
Churches and trusted leaders means pastoral leaders, but also people who are actively involved in their churches by teaching Sunday school or just being strong leaders in their congregations.
Andy
And we think there's something important to say that we are training trusted leaders that churches who are on the receiving end of the seminary work can trust the people who are being sent.
Andy
From Wesley Biblical Seminary, as they are faithfully serving in their commune.
Andy
These also we have available a program coming this fall which I want people to know about. It's called the Wesley Institute where for nine months we walk through every book of the Bible so you can check that out at dub.edu.
Andy
Also, this podcast is brought to you by an anonymous donor and we are so glad today to be able to have.
Andy
On with the on with us Doctor John Oswalt.
Andy
Who is the.
Andy
Preacher, a scholar, an administrator, a well known person in the circles that my podcast serves, so Doctor Oswalt, we are so glad to have you with us.
Dr. Oswalt
Thank you glad to be with you.
Andy
So doctor, well what I wanted to do today is I wanted to walk through.
Andy
We often when people hear from you and I heard from you as a boy.
Andy
You weren't, you weren't even aware of it, but I remember you.
Andy
You preaching at a Salvation Army event and you're one of the very first people that I came in contact.
Andy
With who was a?
Andy
Scholar preacher.
Andy
Now a lot of times there's preachers and their scholars, but people don't blend those disciplines.
Andy
But it was such a blessing to me and you were friends with my grandfather and then it interacted with you through main in through your writing until just recently.
Andy
So it's really an honor to have you on the podcast today.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, it's an honor to.
Andy
Be with you so a lot of times what happens is we'll maybe look at one of the areas of your scholarly folk.
Andy
Yes, and that's that's a helpful thing, but I haven't heard too much where people just talk about your story, and this is the more to the story podcast, and I want to get a little bit more of that story, and then maybe we'll touch some of the scholarly and kind of like theological emphasis that you've had through the years.
Andy
But how did you feel led to become a scholar and a preacher?
Dr. Oswalt
Well, you don't have enough time.
Andy
Probably not, yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
I grew up in a farm in Ohio and my sister, who was ten years older than I, brought home with her, a preacher from Asbury College in those days.
Speaker 5
Hey guys.
Dr. Oswalt
And when I heard that guy preach, I thought to myself, boy, if I could preach like that.
Dr. Oswalt
I think.
Dr. Oswalt
I might like to be a preacher.
Dr. Oswalt
And so I preached our cows into the Kingdom pretty regularly as I took them back and forth to the field before and after milking.
Speaker 1
Ha ha ha ha.
Dr. Oswalt
That was OK when I was ten 11/12/13, but by the time I was 16 it.
Dr. Oswalt
Was not OK.
Dr. Oswalt
OK, I did not want to be a preacher and so I went to Taylor University, ostensibly to play football OK?
Andy
Uh, now what position did you play guard?
Dr. Oswalt
Did you?
Andy
Really OK watch out OK keep going.
Dr. Oswalt
Uh, and.
Dr. Oswalt
I went there only knowing what I would not be wow so I I enrolled in a.
Dr. Oswalt
Pre law course.
Dr. Oswalt
And one of my one of my ladies in the church where I grew up said to me once, Johnny.
Dr. Oswalt
I think you might make a good lawyer.
Dr. Oswalt
I I think I've been arguing about something, but.
Ha ha ha ha.
Dr. Oswalt
My I'm I met there really for the first time.
Dr. Oswalt
Sharp, gifted committed Christian kids.
Speaker 5
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
And they impressed me greatly because I'd gone to church all my life. I'd been in church. My parents were deeply committed Christians, and so I just wanted my way in God's way. That's all OK and.
Dr. Oswalt
I began to read the Scriptures seriously for the first time in my life.
Dr. Oswalt
Then in the summer of my freshman year, I went to a Bible conference in Michigan.
Dr. Oswalt
Where I was a dishwasher OK?
Dr. Oswalt
And met a young woman who was a waitress and have been meeting her ever since.
Speaker 5
Hey man hey man.
Dr. Oswalt
For 60 years.
Dr. Oswalt
Again, every week, a great evangelist, a great missionary speaker, music that impressed me that fall back at Taylor, a man named Dennis Kinlaw came to preach the fall.
Dr. Oswalt
Spiritual emphasis week.
Speaker 5
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
And I remember saying to a girl that I took to an evening meeting on a date.
Dr. Oswalt
Wow, when I hear that guy preach.
Dr. Oswalt
I'm not even sure I'm a Christian.
Dr. Oswalt
Thursday of that week.
Dr. Oswalt
I went to talk to him.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, he didn't take 10 minutes to determine whether I was a Christian or not.
Dr. Oswalt
He said, John, I know what your problem is and I said, oh.
Speaker 5
What's that?
Dr. Oswalt
He said he drew a little diagram.
Dr. Oswalt
I don't know whether he had gotten it from Campus Crusade or whether they got it from him.
Dr. Oswalt
A circle and in the center of the circle was a chair, and on the chair was a.
Dr. Oswalt
Big capital I.
Dr. Oswalt
And around the circle were little crosses.
Dr. Oswalt
He said, John, you're on the throne of.
Dr. Oswalt
Your life wow.
Dr. Oswalt
And you will never never be satisfied until Jesus is on the throne.
Dr. Oswalt
Wow, would you like that to happen?
Dr. Oswalt
And I said.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, those who knew Doctor Ken law know that he had a habit when he was intense.
Dr. Oswalt
He got right up in your face.
Speaker 5
Right?
Dr. Oswalt
And we were sitting on 2 chairs facing each other.
Dr. Oswalt
He scooted out to the edge of his chair and he looked at me.
Dr. Oswalt
He said, John.
Dr. Oswalt
What is there you won't do?
Dr. Oswalt
I just blurted it out.
Dr. Oswalt
I won't be a preacher.
Andy
Ah, sure you knew it, yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
And he said, well, I guess that's the end of our conversation then isn't and I said well.
Dr. Oswalt
Oh I I want Jesus.
Andy
Let's talk through this.
Dr. Oswalt
I want Jesus he said how can he be on the throne of your life if there's something he wants you to do and you won't do it?
Dr. Oswalt
So I said OK.
Dr. Oswalt
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
And you know you you.
Dr. Oswalt
Hear people say it, but it's true.
Dr. Oswalt
That made all the difference, didn't it?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, there were no flashing lights.
Dr. Oswalt
There was no Thunder, there were no lightning.
Dr. Oswalt
Uh, but as I went out of that room, I said to myself, I don't feel any different.
Dr. Oswalt
But everything is going to be different.
Dr. Oswalt
And it was.
Speaker 5
Hey man.
Dr. Oswalt
And that really then made all the difference the brightest, sharpest kids were headed toward missionary service.
Dr. Oswalt
And I had bought the idea that if you're not called to stay home, you better plan to go.
Dr. Oswalt
OK, so I never felt a particular missionary call, but.
Dr. Oswalt
That's where I'm headed my senior year at Taylor.
Dr. Oswalt
I was in an English course.
Dr. Oswalt
I was a I was a minor in English literature and the professor.
Dr. Oswalt
Wonderful woman said to me, John.
Dr. Oswalt
I'd like to talk to you after class.
Dr. Oswalt
Sure, she said John.
Dr. Oswalt
Have you ever considered becoming a teacher?
Dr. Oswalt
You have a gift.
Dr. Oswalt
I said no.
Dr. Oswalt
I'm going to be.
Dr. Oswalt
Missionary, that's right.
Andy
Yeah, I worked this out with Doctor Kimmel, yeah?
Dr. Oswalt
About 30 years later, I was back at Taylor and met her and she looked at me and smiled and she said, do you remember a conversation we had?
Dr. Oswalt
Oh yes Oh yes.
Dr. Oswalt
So I went to Asbury Seminary.
Dr. Oswalt
And my second year at Asbury, I was taking Hebrew and loving it.
Dr. Oswalt
I had really started reading through the Old Testament slowly and back there at Taylor and it was just opening windows and doors.
Dr. Oswalt
I was saying OK, OK, I see what's going on here.
Dr. Oswalt
So the end of my second year in seminary.
Dr. Oswalt
First year we were married.
Dr. Oswalt
I felt a very clear call into teaching OK, and I thought well, what?
Dr. Oswalt
Do I teach?
Dr. Oswalt
Old Testament.
Dr. Oswalt
And that's been the story I we continued to pursue missionary service.
Dr. Oswalt
But at that point, the missions had no place for teachers.
Dr. Oswalt
It was you join us and we'll tell you what to do.
Andy
Right, it sounds like salvage Sherman.
Andy
So yeah, it's.
Dr. Oswalt
And I I'd my call into teaching was just so strong that I said no.
Dr. Oswalt
I I gotta do that better view that.
Dr. Oswalt
That's where.
Andy
It was all so so that was a sense of like not only just teaching, but in order to be a teacher.
Andy
You could have gone and been a a middle school teacher which would high vocation right?
Andy
But yeah, it still was a call to scholarship a skull to be to be a scholar world and that and then incorporated preaching at some point too.
Andy
So obviously working through.
Andy
Memory working then you when you went to Asbury Seminary or with Doctor Dennis Kinlaw there who had influenced you at Taylor and he to his Old Testament.
Andy
So you went on this trajectory towards Old Testament scholarship and that that took you to Brandeis?
Andy
Is that where you did your PhD?
Dr. Oswalt
Yes, yes.
Andy
So again then so this then starts to come into focus.
Andy
Now tell me a little bit along the way.
Andy
I'm sure you started preaching.
Andy
Still, what while teaching?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, I.
Dr. Oswalt
And I need to say.
Dr. Oswalt
There are scholars OK?
Dr. Oswalt
Scholars love to learn they they cannot get enough.
Dr. Oswalt
They can't go deep enough, cannot go broad enough.
Dr. Oswalt
And then there are teachers.
Andy
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
People who love to communicate what they've learned, OK?
Dr. Oswalt
I'm the latter.
This is how I thought.
Dr. Oswalt
I am not.
Dr. Oswalt
I am not a scholar in that full sense.
Dr. Oswalt
I hope I hope that indeed I study deeply.
Dr. Oswalt
I hope that I learn deeply, but that's not what drives me.
Dr. Oswalt
OK, what drives me is communicating.
Andy
I love this OK?
Dr. Oswalt
And that really that goes back.
Dr. Oswalt
Almost to my childhood.
Dr. Oswalt
Uh, I was in speech contest in high school was a finalist in a state speech contest in Ohio and and was a speech and drama major at Taylor I I was I was preaching while I was at Taylor and and so.
Speaker 5
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
So you you you can't stop me.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah I look.
Andy
These are interesting distinctions.
Andy
I had another person who's who I I called and I said you've been an intellectual within this particular discipline for 50 years and I just love it and he he stopped me and he said, well, there's intellectuals and there are academics.
Andy
He says I don't like.
Andy
All of the all that comes along with the idea of being intellectual.
Andy
I've been in academic and I love this distinction.
Andy
You're saying between being a scholar and being a teacher and a communicator like that's been the primary motivation you want.
Andy
Do you have a truth that you want to convey?
Andy
So I loved.
Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah.
Andy
So even your scholarly work.
Andy
Are you thinking as you are deep in original manuscripts and or not?
Andy
Our manuscripts dealing with them.
Andy
How am I communicating this is that?
Andy
What's on your mind?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, and and how can I share this right isn't this exciting?
Dr. Oswalt
This ancient dead language.
Dr. Oswalt
So you know I I love to teach Hebrew.
Dr. Oswalt
Again, though, part of it simply for.
Dr. Oswalt
The people say to me, why do you teach and I say to watch the lights come on behind their eyes.
Speaker 5
Hey man hey man.
Andy
And you suppose that's why you preach?
Dr. Oswalt
To yes yes yes I mean.
Dr. Oswalt
I depend very heavily on audience feedback.
Dr. Oswalt
Umm, uh, now I'm I'm I'm not uncomfortable doing media stuff, but typically I'm really thinking as I look at that lens.
Dr. Oswalt
I'm thinking there's a person in there that I'm talking to.
Dr. Oswalt
And and.
Dr. Oswalt
So, so audience feedback means an awful lot to me am I?
Dr. Oswalt
Am I getting through to them?
Dr. Oswalt
Are they responding?
Dr. Oswalt
Are they saying yes?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, so that.
Dr. Oswalt
This is this is what drives me.
Andy
Yeah, it's when I went when I was coming to see me.
Andy
I left Asbury University and I was going to go to seminary.
Andy
The reason I went to Asbury theological seminaries, my wife had a year and a half left at Asbury University.
Andy
Why we stayed there but my grandfather was in some ways not happy with me because he wanted me to come to Wesley Biblical Seminary.
Andy
Why because?
Andy
Of you and and he thought I I try.
Speaker 1
Ha ha.
Andy
John owes Walt.
Andy
I love John Oswalt.
Andy
Just you.
Andy
Know you just.
Andy
Watch what you're learning, Andy and he kind of like and I had a great experience as very similar, so I don't discount that.
Andy
But when I got to Asbury Seminary, here's what I heard.
Andy
People you were still like, kind of talked about, kind of almost myths in the hall of your teaching.
Dr. Oswalt
Probably better.
Andy
And like there were people who said, and who had been with you, what made that time when you had finished at Asbury Summer, you had been there maybe five or six years before they said there we gave John Oswalt standing ovations after lectures.
Andy
Now is that true?
Andy
Once, once, OK, well they I heard.
Andy
Ovation so it did become a bit of.
Andy
A myth so, but you prepare for those lectures and what what?
Andy
Wait to see those lights come on.
Andy
I think that that's kind of the integrating idea behind your work in in your influence and its influence, not just, uh, holiness movement, but all whole groups of pastors through the years.
Andy
Now I want to get in a little bit.
Andy
You went to Brandeis and you came back and talked to Asbury Seminary and imagine in there your writing ministry started and one of the first ways of prime ways people might know you.
Andy
Pastors might know you through your work on Isaiah, so tell us about that.
Andy
Like what was that?
Andy
Some of your doctoral work and and you have one of the most established commentaries on that in the new international commentary Old Testament.
Andy
Then you've done other work on Isaiah, the new International Commentary series as well, so I'd love to hear a little bit about your Isaiah work.
Dr. Oswalt
I have never been able to put myself forward.
Dr. Oswalt
I I I, I know colleagues, students who are planning.
Dr. Oswalt
OK if I make this connection, I meet that this will happen and I've never been able to do that.
Dr. Oswalt
I don't see that.
Dr. Oswalt
As a particular grace, but it's just, it's just who I am.
Dr. Oswalt
I can't do it.
Dr. Oswalt
So these things have come to me.
Dr. Oswalt
By God's grace, OK, simply.
Speaker 5
Hey Amen.
Dr. Oswalt
In in.
Dr. Oswalt
The summer of 1972 I've been teaching just two years back at Asbury. I got an opportunity and I'm not.
Dr. Oswalt
I think it may have been through Doctor Kendall.
Dr. Oswalt
I don't know, but I got an opportunity to write a large article in the revised.
Dr. Oswalt
International Standard Bible encyclopedia. About 15,000 words and I I wrote it.
Dr. Oswalt
And got it in on time, which I know now from my editor experience is very unusual.
Speaker 1
Ha ha ha ha ha.
Dr. Oswalt
And I honestly think that may have been part of what happened, but I.
Dr. Oswalt
We were at supper.
Dr. Oswalt
In October of 1973, and the phone rang.
Dr. Oswalt
And it was RK Harrison, a professor at Toronto.
Dr. Oswalt
University of Toronto and he said, John, I need someone to write a two volume commentary on Isaiah.
Andy
Not a small task.
Dr. Oswalt
And he said I need it in five years and I said, I'm sorry I can't do that.
Andy
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
I I said I would have to have at least 10.
Dr. Oswalt
He said, well, let's compromise on 8.
Speaker 5
OK, wow eight years.
Dr. Oswalt
So there it.
Dr. Oswalt
Was just out of the blue out.
Dr. Oswalt
Of the blue so.
Dr. Oswalt
It took me.
Dr. Oswalt
Nine years to get him the first volume.
Dr. Oswalt
OK wow.
Dr. Oswalt
Again, he thought I was going to meet the schedule.
Dr. Oswalt
But he was.
Dr. Oswalt
Very, very kind about the first volume and he said, John, you take as long as you need for the second column, second volume.
Speaker 5
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
He died waiting for this Oh no.
Speaker 1
Second half.
Dr. Oswalt
It took me another well to write it.
Dr. Oswalt
It took me another 11 years and then the the publisher was fairly slow.
Dr. Oswalt
I think maybe they had maybe a number of volumes for the set came in at the same time, so it was from the.
Dr. Oswalt
Time I got the contract in 73 it was 25 years until the second volume appeared in 1998.
Dr. Oswalt
But there it was.
Dr. Oswalt
It was and and so.
Dr. Oswalt
It was a gift from God.
Dr. Oswalt
Wow, it was it was not anything that I.
Dr. Oswalt
Finagle for or designed for it was it was out of the blue, and so you know, I just.
Dr. Oswalt
To have spent much of my professional career studying that book.
Dr. Oswalt
Has been.
Dr. Oswalt
Just an unbelievable gift.
Dr. Oswalt
An unbelievable.
Andy
And a gift to the church too.
Andy
And to me personally.
Andy
Just last week I was asked to go to a weekend conference and present on the armor of God.
Andy
And so as I'm doing this, you know, realize very quickly that Paul is most likely quoting Isaiah 59, right? God puts on the helmet of salvation.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, yeah.
Andy
Righteousness well who would?
Andy
I go to, I mean two and then.
Andy
On top of.
Andy
That and let me just say the new International commentary series.
Andy
Those you can't always say like that one series is always the best, right?
Andy
There's depending on the author, nevertheless, that the expectation in that series to me when I read it, is that this is going to have a comprehensive look looking at all of this.
Andy
Sources, all of the arguments that when you look at one chapter in Isaiah, this is a definitive piece on that that chapter, its form, its structure, its pastoral implications. So that's why this is a 25 year process, isn't it?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, yeah.
Andy
Yeah, so anyways.
Andy
It's such a in in the new international version.
Andy
Commentary yes, this also has a little bit different shift.
Dr. Oswalt
Yes, yes it it is.
Dr. Oswalt
They told us when they gave us the assignment.
Dr. Oswalt
Each paragraph that you choose, you look at it three ways.
Dr. Oswalt
What does it mean?
Dr. Oswalt
What does it say?
Dr. Oswalt
Say it, I should back up and say what does it say that's just the grammar, that sort of thing.
Speaker 5
Yeah, yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
What does it mean?
Dr. Oswalt
What's its theological teaching?
Dr. Oswalt
And then how does that apply right?
Dr. Oswalt
Right now I think that may date it because applications change overtime, but pastors?
Dr. Oswalt
Say to me that's the one I go to because it helps me to say OK, so yes, yeah, that's what it means.
Dr. Oswalt
Things I get.
Dr. Oswalt
I get very concerned about seminary students who in fact are not preachers.
Dr. Oswalt
They're Bible lecturers.
Dr. Oswalt
And and that's there isn't a watershed difference between those two if you simply tell your people that's what it says.
Dr. Oswalt
So what?
Dr. Oswalt
The question is what does?
Dr. Oswalt
That mean for your life, right, right?
Dr. Oswalt
A sermon has to address people.
Dr. Oswalt
It has to challenge people.
Dr. Oswalt
It has to move them a lecture.
Dr. Oswalt
You want to inform them you hope to inspire them.
Dr. Oswalt
But a sermon no.
Dr. Oswalt
No, you gotta move him.
Andy
I love that, and here's this is a little commercial time for me.
Speaker 1
Ha ha ha.
Andy
So if anybody is interested in what Doctor Oswalt saying, if you sign up for my email list, I will send you a five steps to deeper teaching and preaching. This is a little a document I've done with a 45 minute.
Andy
Teaching, but likely some of the imagine that you studied with Doctor Traina as well, and I take his method inductive Bible study method and I use that in a way that's wine to help people think while they're in the IBS.
Andy
Method how do they make a step toward proclamation and creatively thinking how I connect with the audience so you can get that at my website and there's a link probably in the show notes here.
Andy
Now I wanna.
Andy
Ask one more question about Isaiah, what is it when people think about that 25?
Andy
Year Labor of love that you did.
Andy
In that text, what is the kind of?
Andy
Big contribution that distinguishes your work in Isaiah.
Andy
Is I know there's probably every verse there's something like that and truly, but I mean what distinguishes what you've done.
Dr. Oswalt
One of the rewarding.
Dr. Oswalt
Features of my life has been for the past now.
Dr. Oswalt
Almost 40 years.
Dr. Oswalt
At one time it was probably one a month I was getting email email from a pastor saying I'm preaching through Isaiah and your book is the one that is helping me to understand what he means.
Andy
Wow wow yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
And I write back and say you're the guy.
Dr. Oswalt
I wrote it for.
Speaker 5
Amen, Amen.
Dr. Oswalt
To me.
Dr. Oswalt
To me, the Book of Isaiah is the most comprehensive statement of Old Testament theology. Excuse me of biblical theology in the Bible, I say to students if somebody comes to you and says, I'm going to take away 65 of your books and leave you one, keep Isaiah because.
Dr. Oswalt
There's more of the New Testament in Isaiah than any other Old Testament book, and Isaiah is the essential foundation for Christian truth.
Dr. Oswalt
And so it's that.
Dr. Oswalt
The the wonder of God's absolute transcendence. He's the holy one. You see him, you fall on your face saying it's over, I'm done and he's also the God who opens his arms to us and invites us in.
Speaker 5
Umm wow, I love that.
Dr. Oswalt
That completeness, which I had no idea of when I really started on this thing.
Dr. Oswalt
You know, I was.
Dr. Oswalt
I was as green as grass.
Dr. Oswalt
I was a child and but but just the deeper into it, the more.
Dr. Oswalt
Oh my, there's more about creation in Isaiah than there is in Genesis.
Speaker 5
Right?
Andy
Wow, interesting, now we have to look into that and also new creation.
Andy
For that matter too yeah yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
Exactly exactly, exactly, and and Isaiah's purpose there is to say the gods didn't.
Dr. Oswalt
Create the world.
Dr. Oswalt
So they can't deliver you from the world, but the creator, the one who stands outside of time and space he can reach in.
Dr. Oswalt
And touch you and lift you out of the tragedies in which you're facing and transform you.
Andy
Amen, oh, I love it now.
Andy
You also promote in that book the view of a single Isaiah authorship.
Andy
I do so.
Andy
Is that something you still hold to?
Andy
I do OK, you want to give us 30 seconds on that which deserves 3 hours.
Dr. Oswalt
Or 30 I guess sure.
Dr. Oswalt
The book claims to be written by Isaiah, exactly no other author is mentioned.
Dr. Oswalt
We also have no.
Dr. Oswalt
Extent, example of anything but the whole book as it stands.
Dr. Oswalt
So when people talk about second Isaiah or third Isaiah, they're talking about a scholarly hypothesis for which we have no objective evidence.
Dr. Oswalt
So I think the default position.
Dr. Oswalt
Is one guy wrote this?
Dr. Oswalt
But whatever you say there it is, I think, unquestionable.
Dr. Oswalt
That the Holy Spirit means us to read this thing together.
Dr. Oswalt
It's a unity.
Dr. Oswalt
It's a whole and to say, well, let's talk about the theology of First Isaiah and let's talk about the theology of third.
Dr. Oswalt
Isaiah no, let's talk about the theology of Isaiah.
Andy
Yes yes yes.
Dr. Oswalt
56 to 66 has to be read in the context of 1 to 6 and then.
Dr. Oswalt
That's even more than the technical issue of authorship.
Dr. Oswalt
The unity of the book is what I want to drive, and in my mind you cannot explain the unity without single authorship.
Andy
Awesome, that is so helpful.
Andy
And what is the text asking us to do?
Andy
I think that's like this is what in the same thing throughout the Pentateuch and we could go through like the text.
Dr. Oswalt
Exactly exactly.
Andy
The text is asking this of us.
Andy
Of course, we recognize that indepen.
Andy
It took Moses couldn't have written about his own death, right?
Andy
And like there's probably some editorial considerations to be given to Isaiah as well.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah.
Andy
So OK, thank you for giving me 30 seconds on that when it deserves 30 hours, so I know that that that needs so much more time and that that represents again, you were within Isaiah for 25 years, producing that 1/2 volume.
Andy
Commentary so that that's unique.
Andy
OK, I want to get into another one, and I also want to hand some if we can get there on some of the other things you've done in your ministry.
Andy
But the Bible.
Andy
Among cements myths, 22,009 really important book that came out and what tell us a little bit about what led you to write that book and why it's so important.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, here comes Dennis Kinlaw again.
Andy
OK, I I had I sense a theme and that people who listen to this podcast are very used to hearing.
Speaker 5
Dennis Kim last name.
Dr. Oswalt
I'm very grateful that I felt the call into teaching and teaching Old Testament the year before Dennis Kinlaw came to Asbury Seminary to.
Dr. Oswalt
Teach OK, otherwise I might have thought.
Speaker 5
Hey OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Well I just got sucked into that, but no, it was there before, but I'm then very grateful.
Dr. Oswalt
That the next year.
Dr. Oswalt
He did come to teach one of the courses he taught was entitled Literature of the ancient Near East.
Dr. Oswalt
And in it.
Dr. Oswalt
He introduced us to a book called The Religion of Ancient Israel, which is a one volume condensation of A7 volume original written in Israeli.
Speaker 5
Oh wow.
Dr. Oswalt
A man named Ya Heskel Kaufman.
Dr. Oswalt
A Jewish man.
Dr. Oswalt
And he.
Dr. Oswalt
Called attention to two worldviews.
Dr. Oswalt
There is a worldview that says this world is all there is.
Dr. Oswalt
There is nothing outside of it in this cosmos and in this cosmos.
Dr. Oswalt
Everything in it is continuous with everything else.
Andy
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
So if I do something to this soil, I've done something to all soils.
Dr. Oswalt
It's what lies behind voodoo.
Andy
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Make an image.
Dr. Oswalt
DeVos Walt, stick it with a pin and you've stucco swell with a pin because the image and Oswald are continuous.
Dr. Oswalt
That understanding that really there are only two worldviews.
Speaker 1
2 worldviews.
Dr. Oswalt
The biblical one and the other.
Dr. Oswalt
One OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Because the biblical one says no, God is not this world.
Dr. Oswalt
There is something outside of this cosmos.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, how many?
Dr. Oswalt
Religions believe that.
Dr. Oswalt
Christianity, Judaism, Islam and I don't have a Bible.
Dr. Oswalt
The wave, they all got it from one place, one single source in the history of human thought says.
Dr. Oswalt
There is something outside of this cosmos, right?
Dr. Oswalt
So that understanding there is transcendence, which is the biblical view and continuity, which is the Pagan view.
Dr. Oswalt
That shapes everything.
Dr. Oswalt
That shapes everything. This is again, as they said a moment ago. This is what shapes Isaiah's understanding of creation because there is a transcendent creator.
Dr. Oswalt
Yes, there is the possibility of salvation.
Dr. Oswalt
There is the possibility of deliverance if there is no transcendent creator.
Dr. Oswalt
Then baby you are what you are and you're never going to be different.
Dr. Oswalt
Wow salvation becomes self realization.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, so that that understanding of two worldviews really then has shaped my teaching and my thinking ever since that would have been in the fall of nine.
Dr. Oswalt
1864 so ever since then and and so that book really is a distillation of my thinking.
Dr. Oswalt
That what we've got in the Bible and and and the points that I make there is are there a lot of similarities between the Bible and Ancient near Eastern literature? Sure, yeah. God's very economical. Anything that he can use.
Speaker 1
Ha ha.
Dr. Oswalt
He will use yeah, sure.
Dr. Oswalt
But that's not what defines the Bible.
Dr. Oswalt
What defines the Bible is its differences from that point of view.
Dr. Oswalt
Did they offer sacrifices?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, did the Pagans offer sacrifices?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, so they're doing the same thing.
Dr. Oswalt
No, they're not.
Andy
Do they have creation stories?
Andy
Yes, but what what?
Dr. Oswalt
They're not the same.
Andy
Them yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
The creation stories.
Dr. Oswalt
In the beginning was chaotic matter, which has always existed and will always exist.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, look at the world, yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
That stuff that's permanent?
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, this stuff.
Dr. Oswalt
This rots away and disappears but that stuff.
Dr. Oswalt
Ah, so yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
And we know from experience that matter hates being organized.
Speaker 1
Right?
Dr. Oswalt
Chaotic matter is the basis of everything.
Dr. Oswalt
And here's the Bible that says in the beginning God wow.
Dr. Oswalt
With sacrifices.
Dr. Oswalt
OK, the gods are mad at me, so let's do a ritual and I will become this sheep and we'll kill the sheep and the gods will say, oh, Oswald is dead.
Dr. Oswalt
It's OK.
Dr. Oswalt
And the prophets say, don't you, dare you sacrifice that way?
Dr. Oswalt
Don't you dare think that you can manipulate God by giving me a sheep.
Dr. Oswalt
Wow, well, what are we doing then?
Dr. Oswalt
You are representing the character of your heart.
Dr. Oswalt
How much do I love God?
Dr. Oswalt
Here's my very best lamb.
Dr. Oswalt
How much do I hate sin?
Dr. Oswalt
At the cost of life itself.
Dr. Oswalt
So they're doing the same thing, but they're not doing the same thing.
Dr. Oswalt
Same thing with the temple.
Dr. Oswalt
Canaanite temples 3 parts.
Dr. Oswalt
A front porch, a holy room and an inner cell.
Dr. Oswalt
Temple front porch holy Place, Holy of holies.
Dr. Oswalt
Ah, but in that inner cell is an idol.
Dr. Oswalt
Is a God that you can manipulate by giving him sacrifices by putting nice clothes on him.
Dr. Oswalt
In the temple.
Dr. Oswalt
Is a pretty gold box.
Dr. Oswalt
Wow, how do you worship a box you don't?
Speaker 5
Right?
Dr. Oswalt
You worship the one who is above that box and whose character is represented by what's in the box.
Dr. Oswalt
Yes, wow.
Dr. Oswalt
Thing no, no.
Dr. Oswalt
I like to say there are a lot of similarities between me and my dog.
Dr. Oswalt
We have two nostrils.
Dr. Oswalt
We have two eyes.
Dr. Oswalt
We have two ears.
Speaker 1
Right?
Dr. Oswalt
We have the same circulatory system.
Speaker 5
Right?
Dr. Oswalt
We have the same respiratory system.
Dr. Oswalt
We have the same gastrointestinal system, so the dog and I are the same thing.
Dr. Oswalt
No, right, it's not the similarities that define us, it's the differences.
Speaker 5
Yes, oh I love.
Andy
That thank you for distilling that down.
Andy
Just in a couple of minutes for us, I want to bring up one thing connected to this and this is at the request of our my President, doctor Madares, but also my interest to in the last year.
Andy
William Lane.
Andy
Craig Dr.
Andy
William Lane Craig has come out with his book on the historical Adam and he draws upon the work of, you know, one of your students and my one of my professors.
Andy
So I guess I'm like your grandson student.
Andy
That Bill Arnold in in his commentary.
Andy
His Cambridge commentary on Genesis talking about Mytho history.
Andy
So how does that interact with?
Andy
That with your concepts that you're talking about, even here with and and in the Bible and the myths.
Andy
I know this deserves again 30 hours.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, yeah.
Andy
I just acknowledge that.
Dr. Oswalt
And I hesitate to criticize a friend and former student.
Sure, sure.
Dr. Oswalt
It's wrong.
Dr. Oswalt
Genesis is not Mytho history.
Dr. Oswalt
OK it is not mythicized history which is really where Craig is taking it that well.
Dr. Oswalt
Goodness gracious, look at the difference between one to Genesis 1 to 11 and Genesis 12.
Dr. Oswalt
And following you've got all this fantastic stuff in Genesis 1 to 11.
Dr. Oswalt
Clearly that's not historical.
Dr. Oswalt
You don't have any fantastic stuff in Genesis 12 following.
Dr. Oswalt
About God showing up and having supper with Abraham.
Dr. Oswalt
Right right?
Dr. Oswalt
No, the different Genesis 1 to 11 is the broad long distance a telephoto lens of 10s of thousands of years.
Dr. Oswalt
But it's not fundamentally different from what follows in Genesis 1 to 12.
Dr. Oswalt
Does it?
Dr. Oswalt
Does it describe history using poetic language?
Dr. Oswalt
Does it describe history using grand images?
Dr. Oswalt
Does it condense long sweeps of history into a single episode?
Dr. Oswalt
Yes, but that doesn't mean it's not historical.
Andy
OK, interesting, so like just the fact that it's supernatural kind of moves it beyond the idea of seeing like it could.
Andy
Anything could be historical 'cause there's supernatural claims.
Andy
Genesis 12 and following Abraham School for that matter so, but I I mean, I've I've found myself kind of wondering about William Lane Craig analysis and and in some ways appreciating the fact that he wants to at least have a connection to a singular Adam and Eve.
Dr. Oswalt
Yes, I'm yes.
Andy
Like that's something that's that's helpful to me.
Andy
But he puts it in the idea of this idea of there being a certain form of literature, and that that the first you know primeval history is as that literature.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, yeah.
Andy
So you're saying that that challenge moves beyond, maybe in the supernatural claims and OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Absolutely, absolutely and.
Dr. Oswalt
Throughout the Bible.
Dr. Oswalt
Theology is rooted in real human historical experience in real time and space.
Dr. Oswalt
To say that that only starts at Genesis 12 and that Genesis 1 to 11 is not rooted in real events in time and space.
Dr. Oswalt
Is to miss.
Andy
It gotcha, thank you for I know that that deserves more time, so anybody who's listening to this and is feeling like Oh well, just no.
Dr. Oswalt
Miss it bad.
Andy
I'm just trying to get a little taste of some of the things that doctor old salty and honestly, is my curiosity too.
Andy
I wanted to hear just a brief and maybe we'll talk more about it.
Andy
Later too OK, so one other great things that happen in your career as a communicator was that you were a part of the translating committee, not just doing one book, but you were the editor for the minor prophets for the new living translation.
Dr. Oswalt
All the profits.
Andy
All the prophets excuse me.
Andy
So for the new living translation.
Andy
So tell me about that.
Andy
And what was that process like?
Dr. Oswalt
I think well.
Dr. Oswalt
There was a committee of 12 persons.
Dr. Oswalt
Six of us who were biblical scholars, Daniel Block, was in charge of Pentateuch.
Dr. Oswalt
Barry Beitzel was in charge of historical books Tremper Longman in charge of poetry.
Dr. Oswalt
I was in charge of profits.
Dr. Oswalt
Grant Osborne was in charge of the.
Speaker 5
Yeah, yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
Epistles and acts, and I'm not going to remember the name of the sixth one who is in charge of epistles and revelation.
Dr. Oswalt
So there were six of us.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, then there was an English stylist.
Andy
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Dan Taylor, who taught for many years at Bethel and then there were four representatives from Tynedale, the publisher, a New Testament coordinator and Old Testament coordinator.
Dr. Oswalt
Doctor Ken Taylor, who did the living Bible and his son Mark Taylor, who was president of Tyndale House at that point.
Dr. Oswalt
So there were twelve of us on this committee, and we spent six years Wow and all of us.
Dr. Oswalt
Particularly, all of us biblical scholars or teachers or whatever.
Dr. Oswalt
Will tell you.
Dr. Oswalt
That was the high point of our professional lives.
Dr. Oswalt
To sit around the table for 8 hours discussing what does the Bible say?
Dr. Oswalt
What does it mean?
Dr. Oswalt
And we all we all laugh at some of the things that we got to know each other very very well.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, we.
Dr. Oswalt
In the idea in the beginning was the living Bible.
Dr. Oswalt
Has sold 40 million copies.
Dr. Oswalt
It has been used by God in tremendous ways, but it always gets dismissed as a paraphrase.
Speaker 5
Right, right, right.
Dr. Oswalt
Is it possible to keep the same energy, the same readability and make it a translation?
Dr. Oswalt
So that's where we started.
Dr. Oswalt
The language was if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Dr. Oswalt
If the living Bible captures what the Greek or the Hebrew says, keep.
Dr. Oswalt
It if it doesn't, hey change it.
Dr. Oswalt
So that was the whole.
Dr. Oswalt
Idea and so we would we would.
Dr. Oswalt
Sit around that table and oftentimes.
Dr. Oswalt
It would end up an 11 to one vote.
Dr. Oswalt
And the one vote would be Kenneth Taylor.
Andy
OK, Kenna Taylor to original newly OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Here we are tearing limbs and arms off his baby yes, and and he would argue he'd argue strongly for his position.
Andy
Bless his heart.
Dr. Oswalt
But once the vote was taken it was over Wow and all of us have test kits.
Speaker 5
Even his son would go get OK.
Dr. Oswalt
All of us have testified again and again to the example of grace.
Dr. Oswalt
He never, once it was over, it was over.
Dr. Oswalt
He never pouted, he never sulked, it was always.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, if that's what you think, and so that's one of the things that impressed all of us.
Dr. Oswalt
Again, I say we got to know each other very, very well and sometimes we would say, well, that's the word of God by a six to five vote.
Andy
Haha sounds like Supreme Court or something.
Yeah, yeah, it's interesting.
Dr. Oswalt
And one one time we'd had a long, long discussion and finally had taken the vote, and it was over.
Dr. Oswalt
And I was sitting next to Mark Taylor, who was who functioned as the chairman.
Dr. Oswalt
His Ken Taylor son, because he was president of the.
Speaker 5
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Company he looked at me and said, John, what's the matter?
Dr. Oswalt
I said I didn't say anything.
Dr. Oswalt
He said no, but you sighed.
Oh, I see.
Andy
I've heard that sign before.
Dr. Oswalt
So it was.
Dr. Oswalt
It was simply.
Dr. Oswalt
It was simply a glorious experience, the process.
Dr. Oswalt
Was interestingly, each of the sections divides into fives.
Dr. Oswalt
The Pentateuch, of course five books, yeah, but the historical books can be divided into 5.
Dr. Oswalt
The poetry if you take Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel.
Dr. Oswalt
Excuse me, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, and the.
Speaker 5
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
12 OK God, there's five.
Andy
Oh gotcha sure, interesting.
Dr. Oswalt
So in each case.
Dr. Oswalt
We then invited three persons to go through each one of those units.
Dr. Oswalt
And offered their suggestions as to OK.
Dr. Oswalt
How can we correct the living Bible?
Andy
Here OK.
Dr. Oswalt
Those would then for instance with Jeremiah and Lamentations.
Dr. Oswalt
Those suggestions?
Dr. Oswalt
Came to me.
Dr. Oswalt
I then collated them, put them together and prepared a.
Dr. Oswalt
This is what it is.
Dr. Oswalt
That was then sent to all the members of the committee.
Dr. Oswalt
And we would then meet gotcha originally.
Dr. Oswalt
Tyndale House naively thought we could do this in a few long weekends, but after the first two weekends it was obvious that's not going.
Speaker 5
Oh wow.
Dr. Oswalt
To work, let's get.
Andy
In five more years.
Dr. Oswalt
So they said.
Dr. Oswalt
To us well, suppose we take you someplace for three weeks each summer.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, we all had young children at that point and we said, Umm, that won't work.
Dr. Oswalt
They said suppose we take you to someplace nice and bring your family with you.
Andy
Well, there you go.
Dr. Oswalt
And we'll start work at 6:30 in the morning and finish at 3:30, and you'll have the rest of the afternoon and evening with you, we said Yep.
Andy
Deal so.
Dr. Oswalt
We would meet typically the first three weeks in June, and for most resorts that's downtime.
Dr. Oswalt
So we went to Aspen.
Dr. Oswalt
We went to Beaver Creek.
Dr. Oswalt
We went to Charleston.
Dr. Oswalt
And I I was looking at in one case at the thing on the back of the door of my room and it said.
Dr. Oswalt
The normal price.
Dr. Oswalt
For this room was, I think, $485.
Dr. Oswalt
I think they Tindale probably got it for under 100.
Speaker 5
That's great.
Dr. Oswalt
So it was it was.
Dr. Oswalt
We our kids grew up together and it was simply.
Dr. Oswalt
It was simply a marvelous.
Andy
Experience so I love.
Andy
I've never heard that story or anything, but I've just been one who's benefited from the NLT.
Andy
And I use it often in my kind of daily morning.
Andy
Read through the Bible, OK?
Dr. Oswalt
Oh, I do I do.
Dr. Oswalt
All the time.
Andy
Well, it's nice to know I'm in good company.
Dr. Oswalt
Yes you are.
Andy
So did you do the work?
Andy
Isaiah yourself for that one OK?
Andy
And because then you assign the other ones out.
Dr. Oswalt
No, no there were.
Dr. Oswalt
There were.
Dr. Oswalt
I was.
Dr. Oswalt
One of the three.
Andy
OK, gotcha.
Dr. Oswalt
For Isaiah and then that was a little bit warped, because then I got.
Dr. Oswalt
To make finals just what it?
Andy
Would be overruled.
Andy
Overruled the editor has spoke.
Andy
Yeah, that's great.
Andy
OK, now I want to transition one other question and some people will know that you served as the interim President here at Wesley Biblical Seminary for three or four years as the President.
Dr. Oswalt
No, no no no, only a year.
Andy
Only year, although here I mean then.
Andy
Also as President of Asbury University for was it 3 three and a half years there.
Dr. Oswalt
And a half years.
Andy
And then you know you've served in leadership roles within the Wesleyan Holiness movement as a whole.
Andy
And Asbury University and Seminary Wesley.
Andy
Biblical seminary denominations like your denomination and free Methodist Church, the Salvation Army, etc.
Andy
Are part of this broader movement and I'd love to just get your thoughts on where that movement is as a whole, and what you see kind of happening in that world.
Andy
I I I can, I think I can speak authoritatively.
Andy
On this is that we see you as one of the key communicators and.
Andy
Leaders in that movement, and we're so thankful for your homiletical direction writing direction.
Andy
But you know you have a vantage point that's unique 'cause you're connected to people like Doctor Dennis Kinlaw scholars from other generations interact in the evangelical community as a whole.
Andy
So there I'm buttering you up a little bit I.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, yeah, pretty thick.
Andy
Don't mean but it.
Andy
Really is it's true.
Andy
And that's why I'm so honored to have you on.
Andy
But tell us a little bit about your thoughts about where the Wesleyan Holiness movement is and where it should be going.
Dr. Oswalt
Well, it is in deep trouble.
Dr. Oswalt
OK it is in deep trouble.
Dr. Oswalt
The second law of thermodynamics says that things tend toward inertia.
Dr. Oswalt
And and that's what has been happening in the Holiness movement, really.
Dr. Oswalt
For the past 50 or 60 years.
Dr. Oswalt
One famous writer, very public announced the Holiness movement is dead, right?
Speaker 5
Yeah, Yep, jewelry.
Dr. Oswalt
And and he said, and I think correctly, a movement is something that has an inner cohesiveness that drives it forward, and to which people can.
Dr. Oswalt
Uh, uh.
Dr. Oswalt
They can join it without ever actually signing things.
Dr. Oswalt
That's no longer the case.
Dr. Oswalt
There's no longer a cohesiveness about this quote movement, and there's no longer a sense of forward movement and, and that's sad.
Dr. Oswalt
We see and and I'll.
Dr. Oswalt
I'll simply say it.
Dr. Oswalt
We see a denomination like the Nazarene church which was built on the doctrine of Second blessing holiness, now large.
Dr. Oswalt
Really, largely discarding it.
Dr. Oswalt
I talked to Nazarene pastors who are grieved over what is happening on the higher levels in terms of simply abandoning the idea.
Dr. Oswalt
That's tragic because.
Dr. Oswalt
Holiness is what the Bible is about.
Speaker 5
Amen, yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
And it is not tragically.
Dr. Oswalt
It has been presented too often by those of us who would espouse it as demand.
Dr. Oswalt
You know, we love Hebrews without holiness.
Dr. Oswalt
No one will see God, so you better get with.
Dr. Oswalt
It well, it's tragic.
Dr. Oswalt
Holiness is not a demand, it's an offer.
Dr. Oswalt
You and I can share the character of God.
Dr. Oswalt
May you and I can walk with him in untroubled fellowship.
Dr. Oswalt
Yeah, uh, that's not a demand, that's an offer, and it's a wonderful offer.
Speaker 5
Hey man.
Dr. Oswalt
And that's why.
Dr. Oswalt
I I say it to you rather bluntly.
Dr. Oswalt
I don't care what happens to the movement.
Dr. Oswalt
I care about communicating this truth and and and getting others to join, right?
Speaker 5
Right, right, right.
Dr. Oswalt
This crusade, uh, that's a that's a bad word these days, but.
Speaker 5
Right, I love it this.
Andy
Is not the instant.
Andy
It's not the institutional forms that are are.
Andy
What's the the substance of?
Andy
Instead, it's the experience.
Andy
It's the doctrine.
Andy
It's the reality.
Andy
Yes, yes.
Dr. Oswalt
Years ago there used to be the Christian Holiness Association right, which started out as the National Holiness Campmeeting Association.
Dr. Oswalt
Right coming out of the great camp meetings of the late 1900s, late 1800s.
Dr. Oswalt
I was at the last.
Dr. Oswalt
Commission meeting
Dr. Oswalt
And the question was asked to these. There were probably 35 of us in the room, mostly denominational leaders. The question was asked what can the Christian Holiness Association do for you?
Dr. Oswalt
One after another they said, well, really nothing.
Dr. Oswalt
And I have thought ever since, that was absolutely the wrong question.
Dr. Oswalt
The question is, what can we as a united Group do to spread the good news?
Dr. Oswalt
Of Holiness, right, sure.
Dr. Oswalt
So that it was all.
Dr. Oswalt
Framed in terms of institutional advancement and that's.
Andy
Yes yes yes yes.
Andy
He's like what does this mean for the world?
Dr. Oswalt
That's wrong.
Dr. Oswalt
Exactly, and what can we working together do that we can't do individually?
Dr. Oswalt
Wow, so but there is.
Speaker 5
Right, right?
Dr. Oswalt
An international
Dr. Oswalt
Holiness convention.
Dr. Oswalt
Comprised largely of.
Dr. Oswalt
If I may say it.
Dr. Oswalt
Splinter Methodist denominations.
Dr. Oswalt
Which met recently and had 5000 people in attendance.
Dr. Oswalt
The interest in holiness is not dead.
Dr. Oswalt
But what was for so long described as the holiness movement?
Dr. Oswalt
I don't think exists.
Andy
That's helpful, that's a helpful distinction to make, and where else do you see some signs of hope in this?
Dr. Oswalt
Well, I think frankly.
Dr. Oswalt
The collapse of Western Civilization is an opportunity.
Speaker 5
OK.
Dr. Oswalt
For us with with people whose lives are just in absolute chaos and disaster, we.
Dr. Oswalt
Have a word.
Dr. Oswalt
We have a.
Speaker 5
Word of hope namang
Dr. Oswalt
We had a of a word of possibility and and I think that's our opportunity.
Speaker 5
Right?
Dr. Oswalt
Absolutely it is in a in a society where everything is going very, very nicely.
Dr. Oswalt
And everybody is comfortably getting fatter and richer.
Dr. Oswalt
It's hard to.
Dr. Oswalt
Here, So what about holding this?
Dr. Oswalt
Who cares about that?
Dr. Oswalt
But in a society where people are broken or they're in pieces?
Dr. Oswalt
The Holiness message is for us.
Andy
Hey man hey man and I'm thankful you know that you've still and you're still investing time.
Andy
The reason you're here today is 'cause you're here for a board meeting at Wesley Biblical Seminary and like that's where we aren't.
Speaker 5
Thank you.
Andy
Directly connected to any of the institutions of the holiness movement in the sense that we're not.
Andy
We're not dependent upon, you know, we have relationships with various denominations, but we're in non denominational school, hopeful, hoping to speak into this world.
Andy
And what's so interesting to me is that we have students who come to us not.
Andy
From any of the Holiness or Methodist circles that we've been a part of, but they come.
Andy
And what is it that they get inspired by the.
Dr. Oswalt
Message exactly exactly.
Andy
And so I'm I'm I'm I look at even the the prominence in in Asbury Seminary.
Andy
But but West Bengal said we've set topled in size and.
Andy
For years like this is a sign that something in this world that's falling apart where truth doesn't absolute where people are longing for this.
Andy
Maybe they're finding some of that.
Dr. Oswalt
Here my first message when I became interim President here at the seminary was why should Wesley Biblical Seminary exist?
Dr. Oswalt
OK, and my answer.
Dr. Oswalt
Is because there are very, very few other seminaries that are committed to two things.
Dr. Oswalt
The inerrancy of scripture, yeah.
Dr. Oswalt
And the glory of holiness.
Dr. Oswalt
Those two foundations, our hope is in the word, right, right?
Dr. Oswalt
If we lose the word, we might as well go home.
Dr. Oswalt
We might as well go find some drugs and burn our heads out, and because there's nothing if there's no word, there's nothing.
Dr. Oswalt
And what does the word tell us?
Dr. Oswalt
The word says you can share the character.
Speaker 5
Of God Amen, Amen.
Andy
OK we'll we'll finish her one last question.
Andy
It's a easy one.
Andy
I think the title of my podcast is more to the story.
Andy
Is there more to the story than typically hold of jonos?
Andy
While there's something you'd like to do, like scuba dive or found?
Dr. Oswalt
I'm a model railroader really yes in my basement is a pretty good sized model railroad layout.
Andy
OK, how long have you been doing that?
Dr. Oswalt
60 years.
Andy
Wow, so when you finish up like translating that passage in Isaiah and work in the NLT, you.
Andy
Go down and work on your railroad.
Yep, OK fun.
Andy
So do do you like to actually ride on trains?
Andy
Too, is that OK?
Dr. Oswalt
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah, I'm a I'm a trained nut.
Andy
OK, I love it well thanks.
Andy
So much for joining me on today's podcast.
Andy
It's been such a blessing to be able to spend some time with you.
Dr. Oswalt
Happy to.
Andy
Do it and thanks everybody for coming along.
Andy
If you wouldn't mind sharing a link to this liking this letting people know.
Andy
I'm sure that you've heard some of you have heard Doctor Oswalt before and you didn't know some of these things about some of his scholarship and the work that God called him to do so in if you.
Andy
If you don't mind share a link to this, this would be.
Andy
A great blessing, it helps this word get.
Andy
Out more and check out at my my website, Andy Miller third Andy Miller IE com to get that resource five steps to deeper teaching and preaching.
Andy
God bless you.