Dr. Sean McDowell is a gifted communicator with a passion for equipping the church, and in particular young people, to make the case for the Christian faith. Sean is an Associate Professor in the Christian Apologetics program at Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. On this channel he tackles some of the biggest questions about God, morality, and contemporary culture. Visit www.seanmcdowell.org for more posts and info.
Giants. A divine council. Demons and the Nephilim. Michael Heiser made the Bible's strangest passages impossible to ignore and sold hundreds of thousands of books doing it. So what does one of the world's leading spiritual-warfare scholars actually think of his work? Dr. Clint Arnold joins me today to say where Heiser gets it right, and where he pushes back. CHECK OUT: Logos Bible 60 Day Free Trial (https://logos.com/mcdowell) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org CHAPTERS 00:00 – Why Heiser captivated so many 00:35 – Who is Michael Heiser? Who is Clint Arnold? 02:45 – What makes Heiser's work unique 05:59 – Where Arnold agrees with Heiser 09:35 – The premise of The Unseen Realm: recovering a supernatural worldview 11:12 – Psalm 82, Job 38, and the divine council 14:01 – What "Elohim" actually means 15:21 – Isn't this just polytheism? 18:33 – Genesis 1:26 — "Let us make man" 21:47 – The Deuteronomy 32 worldview and cosmic geography 24:01 – David, Goliath, and the gods behind the idols 26:24 – Bashan, Caesarea Philippi, and "portals" 28:58 – Paul's theology of the unseen world (Ephesians 6) 32:14 – Does this change our spiritual warfare today? 32:32 – Peter Wagner and "strategic-level" spiritual warfare 34:12 – Why Arnold rejects targeting territorial spirits 38:24 – Command vs. prayer — and reprisal in the spirit realm 40:53 – The big disagreement: where do demons come from? 42:46 – The traditional view: a primordial angelic fall 45:59 – Genesis 6 and the sons of God 48:05 – How much weight should 1 Enoch carry? 50:53 – No exorcism in the Old Testament? 53:33 – Luke 10 and "I saw Satan fall like lightning" 56:14 – Arnold's one big addition to Heiser 58:16 – Should you read Heiser? 59:04 – Spiritual warfare at Talbot Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
Talbot New Testament scholar Dr. Alan Hultberg joins Sean McDowell to sort out what Scripture says, walk through the three major views, and ask the question everyone wants answered: are we close? Hultberg starts by clearing away the "Left Behind" imagery most of us absorbed from movies and kids' Bible storybooks, then lays out the three positions evangelicals actually debate explaining what separates them, how each handles the tribulation, Israel, and the timing of Christ's return. CHECK OUT: Logos Bible 60 Day Free Trial (https://logos.com/mcdowell) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) CHAPTERS 00:00 – The pop-culture rapture vs. the Bible 00:45 – Meet Dr. Alan Hultberg 01:06 – What is the rapture? (1 Thessalonians 4) 02:08 – Common misconceptions 04:15 – Is there even a debate that a rapture happens? 06:20 – View 1: Pre-tribulation 09:37 – Pre-trib, dispensationalism, and Israel 11:18 – Whatever happened to mid-tribulation? 11:41 – View 2: Pre-wrath 16:13 – Imminence: can there be signs? 18:32 – View 3: Post-tribulation 20:38 – How each view handles Israel 23:55 – The view Hultberg holds — and why 30:19 – The rapture through church history 33:48 – Where scholars land today 35:06 – Piecing together the whole end-times sequence 46:03 – "Newspaper in one hand, Bible in the other"? 48:33 – Signs and imminence, together 51:02 – Where to go deeper 52:42 – Closing thoughts FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
Can we actually know Jesus is coming back or is this just a matter of blind faith? In this conversation, bestselling author and pastor John Bevere joins me to talk about his new book The King Is Coming. John makes for why Christians can have confidence that Jesus is returning, why he sees Israel's reestablishment in 1948 and the recapture of Jerusalem in 1967 as escatologically significant, his reading of the Hosea 6 timeline, his view on the rapture and the tribulation, and why he believes we're living in the generation that may see Christ's return. 00:00 Intro and the central question 01:51 Why John avoided this topic for four decades 06:33 How could a modern person believe Jesus returns in the clouds? 12:09 Have previous generations been wrong, and what makes this one different? 19:23 The biblical framework for John's view on the season of Christ's return 25:13 What the end-times sequence looks like — apostasy, revival, rapture, tribulation 28:30 The case for the pre-tribulation rapture 35:18 Why John waited 42 years to teach on this 41:42 Pastoral application — the wedding garment and being ready 49:48 Speculation on AI and end-times scenarios (conjecture) 55:21 Why the book has resonated with so many leaders CHECK OUT: Logos Bible 60 Day Free Trial (https://logos.com/mcdowell) READ: The King Is Coming: It's Time to Prepare for the Return of Christ by John Bevere (https://amzn.to/4vuexXk) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
Children who have near-death experiences make for unusually strong evidence and almost nobody has studied them. In this conversation, near-death experience researcher Dr. Steve Miller returns to walk through what we actually know about children and NDEs. We get into the case from Dr. Melvin Morse's peer-reviewed work (the drowned girl who came back describing exactly what her family was wearing and doing at home), the documented patterns from Dr. Elizabeth Kübler-Ross's cross-cultural research, the children Dr. Diane Komp watched die at Yale that turned her from atheism to faith, and a few accounts from Steve's own circle of people he knows and trusts. *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
Many Christians dismiss the evidence from near-death experiences on biblical or theological grounds by quoting Hebrews 9:27, citing soul sleep, worrying about new age associations, or treating any extra-biblical vision as automatically suspect. But are those objections actually warranted by Scripture? Dr. Steve Miller returns to walk through twelve of the most common biblical and theological objections Christians raise against NDEs. CHECK OUT: Logos Bible 60 Day Free Trial (https://logos.com/mcdowell) 00:00 Intro 01:10 How should Christians approach NDE and deathbed accounts? 10:13 The Billy Graham and Dr. Randy Steer accounts 17:46 Objection #1 — Some NDEs report false doctrines 21:40 Objection #2 — NDEs lead people to new age teachings 28:23 Objection #3 — Hebrews teaches we die only once 34:15 Objection #4 — Unbelievers should experience judgment, not love 39:35 Objection #5 — NDEs are more consistent with new age than Christianity 45:00 Objection #6 — Visions are no longer needed after the New Testament 47:47 Objection #7 — Experiencers see their own gods 49:51 Objection #8 — The Bible teaches soul sleep 59:42 Objection #9 — Faith should come only from Scripture 57:00 Objection #10 — No one can go to heaven before death 59:36 Objection #11 — Experiencers may be demonically deceived 1:01:01 Objection #12 — There's no biblical precedent for NDEs 1:02:04 Common theological assumptions worth re-examining *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
What are the strongest Old Testament prophecies that point to Jesus as the Messiah? My guest is Jeff Morgan, a former secular Jew who does street evangelism with Jewish people in Israel. He hears the objections every day, in Hebrew, from people who grew up reading these texts. Jeff and I walk through 10 prophecies and address the common Jewish objections to each passage and shows where rabbinic sources themselves (Rashi, the Talmud, Targum Jonathan) connect these texts to a messianic figure. CHECK OUT: Logos Bible 60 Day Free Trial (https://logos.com/mcdowell) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
In this conversation, Carl Trueman joins me and Scott Rae for one of the most wide-ranging episodes we've recorded. We get into CS Lewis, Nietzsche's madman, the anthropological question at the heart of every cultural debate, the sexual revolution, pornography, contraception (where Trueman calls himself "a work in progress"), IVF, surrogacy, end-of-life decisions, and how Christians sometimes mirror the secular world's trivialization of death. READ: The Desecration of Man: How the Rejection of God Degrades Our Humanity by Carl Trueman (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DW3LVXQW?ref_=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_HNU2TW9LP6RXFBSTXY5M) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
Dr. John Lennox has lived one of the most remarkable lives in modern Christian thought. From sitting in on CS Lewis's final lectures at Cambridge in 1962, earning his PhD and teaching at Oxford as Emeritus Professor of Mathematics, debating Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, and authoring best-selling books on faith, science, suffering, AI, and Revelation. In this conversation, Dr. Lennox joins me to discuss his new autobiography, My Story. We talk about his encounter with CS Lewis, what he considers the hardest objection to Christianity (suffering and evil), and how his mind is increasingly filled with the hope of heaven. READ: My Story: A spiritual and intellectual autobiography by John C. Lennox (https://a.co/d/0acz3D0D) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
The Michael Jackson hit is one of the most recognizable songs in pop history. What most people don't know is that the woman behind the song was a real person with a real family. La Nej is a chaplain, an apologetics teacher, a Biola grad, and someone I've known since the mid-90s. She's also the daughter of the woman the world remembers as Billy Jean. In this conversation La Nej walks through her childhood: being told Michael Jackson was her father, camping outside his Encino gate at age seven, getting abandoned in a taxi the next morning, the years in and out of foster care, the abuse, and the aunt who adopted her at twelve. *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en I nstagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
Does the science actually point to a beginning of the universe or can clever cosmological modeling get around it? Sir Roger Penrose's Conformal Cyclic Cosmology (CCC) is one of the most serious modern attempts to model an infinite, beginning-less universe This is Part 2 of the conversation. (If you missed Part 1, watch that first! In this deep dive, Dr. Stephen Meyer walks through Penrose's CCC model in six steps, explains where he believes it works mathematically but fails physically, and shows why every infinite-universe model he and his colleagues have examined comes at what he calls a "high epistemic cost." *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.
Sean McDowell is a professor of Apologetics at Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. He has earned two Master's degrees in philosophy and theology and his Ph.D. in Apologetics and Worldview Studies. He is the author, editor, or co-author of more than 20 books, including "More Than A Carpenter," "Chasing Love," "End the Stalemate," and "The Fate of the Apostles." Sean has one of the top apologetics YouTube channels with over 340k subscribers. He is an internationally renowned speaker and he is on the teaching team at his home church in southern California.
