What I hope to achieve with Veritas

Full transcript

Harris's words as spoken in this episode. Tap a time to play the video from there.

0:17My name is Harris Himes, and I'd like to tell you what I hope to accomplish with Veritas. However, first, let me introduce you to the noble beast. This is Theophilus, and you will recognize the name because Luke wrote the book of Luke to Theophilus, and it means friend of God. Theo is is a dog, a rescue dog, and he's Anatolian Shepherd with probably St. Bernard mix. And he's a noble beast. And so he'll put up with us, and he's put up with me, and I hope you'll put up with us. There are various things that I'd like to accomplish with Veritas, and I'd like to work with you as we go through them. This is, as far as I'm concerned, a collaborative effort You have your input and I have my input, and I'm interested in giving my opinion You, of course, have your opinions, and you will eventually come to a verdict.

Veritas means truth, but verdict means to speak truth. That's what juries do, and that's what you ultimately will do because I can try to persuade you. I can be as eloquent, if I can be, as possible and as persuasive sometimes, and then ultimately you will make up your own minds, and I think that's the adventure of this whole thing. I had a wonderful background with Calvary Chapel in Costa Mesa. Let's start with that. I lived in Southern California and I listened to KWAVE for Calvary Chapel and I became involved with Calvary Chapel to the degree that I went on a trip to Israel. I ended up on going on several trips with Chuck to Israel.

But during that time, I ran into the director of the School of Ministry, and I always wanted to learn Greek because I was tired of people saying, well, this interpretation or this translation, this and that, and I said I'm reasonably good with the languages, so I'd like to go someplace where I can be assured that I will have a chance to learn Greek, so that I can make these kinds of decisions. Chuck was a fine example, and I will always value my relationship with Calvary Chapel in Costa Mesa. After I went through the School of Ministry and ended up doing well enough, so they invited me to teach Greek in a rudimentary Hebrew class, I discovered that there are indeed many things in Greek grammar that don't come out in translations.

3:39Greek is a wonderful language that the Holy Spirit chose to write the New Testament in because it has so many intricacies that can explain things so well, and in fact, one of the things that I would like to accomplish with you is, instead of just taking my word for what something says I'm going to endeavor to bring you various books like this one, and I even happen to save the cover for for it, and this was my textbook, my grammar book that I learned from. And so I'm going to, if I want to discuss something, I'm going to find the page or pages in this and hopefully show it to you, so that you can, you can learn something, so that you can see that I'm not simply blowing smoke.

Too many times people would like to learn something but they just don't have an opportunity, and this way I can explain to you how I came to a conclusion, and you can agree or disagree. I felt the Lord called me up to Montana, and Chuck and his board were kind enough to ordain me. I asked Chuck if he would do so. He said fine. The board ordained me and up I went to Montana. But if you have a real interest in scripture I think you will find this method interesting. Although it's not going to be fast and it's certainly not going to be easy. You've got to either decide if you want to or not.

Then I'm doing this because I'm also interested in using these concepts to compare theologies. I'm not going to use the person's name whose opinion or teaching it is because I'd rather concentrate on the concepts and not get people bogged down, well if so-and-so said it then it has to be right. I want you to feel comfortable in analyzing the differences and coming to your own conclusion without being swayed by somebody else's reputation I think, and in fact I'm sure, I'll be talking about the military, particularly since I'm a Marine. You will note in front of the desk that there are two shell casings. These are from 90 mil at 90 millimeter rounds which my M48 tank fired in Vietnam, and when I, when I commanded a company in Pendleton in 1969 and 1970.

6:42I snagged a couple of these and polished them up and here they are. But I think that our culture has, well, from the standpoint of people being in the military, the percentage of people who've joined the service and been in the service is rapidly shrinking. Far fewer people have the military experience than in my day, certainly during Vietnam. But I present this because I think there are some lessons to learn. There are some scriptural bases to discover this. I'd like to talk to people who have an interest in Vietnam. I think it's good for old as well as young people to have some familiarity with the military. The military, after all, has been the protector of the freedom of our country, whether it was fighting in World War I overseas, World War II overseas, but you never can tell when it's going to come here.

as long as we're fighting wars overseas, they're not coming here, and that is a good thing. I was in Vietnam on the DMZ during the hot years of 1967 and 68. Some of you may recall the Tet Offensive and then the siege of Khe Sanh, and I was in Operation Pegasus, which relieved the siege of And I'd also like to talk about my Marines. I served with some of the bravest, finest men possible. And I want to make sure that they're not forgotten. I think that the reunions that we go to are a great way of keeping in contact. I belong to the Vietnam Tankers Association and a couple of others, along with the American Legion, and it's nice to be able to get together.

We don't just, a lot of people think that people just go out and hit the bars and get soused, but that's not the way it is with our group. We have an excellent Vietnam Veterans of America Association here. The president is a good friend of mine. I happen to be the vice president. And I think that those kinds of things are good for the culture to know about and remember and encourage people to understand, like John F. Kennedy said, it's not what the country can do for you, but what can you do for the country? country. All too often these days, recruiters talk about what is the potential recruit going to get out of it.

9:56In my day, it was the country's at war. We go to war to protect the people at home. That attitude, I think, needs to be remembered and encouraged to be in our culture today. So we'll deal some with that. And in fact, the first episode, that's exactly what we did talk about to some degree. Current events are something else that we may discuss, along with politics. I prefer to call them God's policies because, as our second president John Adams said, that politics is a divine science. And we discover that in fact, the basic laws of our country were based on scripture and politics undergirds these laws and how they are to be carried out.

And also you'll note that I wear a coat and tie or a suit. There are reasons for that. Biblically, some of you may recall that God was very particular in how the high priest and the priests that sacrificed to him dressed. And what does that mean to us? What does that mean to me? It means that God cares about the appearance of those who serve him and represent him. In the old days, what I call, people came to church dressed because they were going to be in the presence of their Creator. Then with probably the hippie movement and to a degree Calvary Chapel and Chuck Smith developed things changed with them because it's important that everybody hear the gospel and there was a tendency for people who were so caught up in being dressed up that they weren't interested in letting people who were not as tidy as they and didn't smell as good as they should stay out.

Well, that's wrong too, but I think there comes a time in a person's experience with God that he or she is impressed and wants to please and wants to to honor the Creator and therefore will show it by the way he or she dresses when church or other activities come around. Pastor Chuck, I think, was in agreement with that. Chuck, for as long as I was going there, always was at the pulpit dressed in a coat and tie, suit, sports coats, but a tie, and he was an example to me and to me. And another thing is, as a trial attorney, you appear in court and I developed a taste for nice suits and and I'm afraid that I still have a bit of that addiction.

13:22This program will probably probably evolve. I've seen other programs and how they change. I remember Johnny Carson, he went from one approach to another. Rush Limbaugh, the same, and I expect that to be the case with us. I hope that the evolution is pleasant and appreciated and helpful as we go through it, but ultimately our purpose here is to serve the kingdom of God. As the Lord said, seek first the kingdom of God and and his righteousness, and all these other things will be added unto you. That is a primary concern I want to serve God. I want to humbly, I hope, serve you, but God always gets the glory So welcome aboard. Well, I bet the noble beast, Theo, frequently, I hope, he'll be with us, but But if this has been worthwhile to you, please subscribe and pass it on to someone who should hear it.

You can find Veritas, every episode and more, and Theo at veritas-truth.com.