when I entered college in the fall of 1979 my intent was to become a professional musician
I played tenor saxophone and really enjoyed it that's all I wanted to do was to play saxophone
but I was growing a lot spiritually during my undergrad studies even though I was in music
I just developed a love for reading the Bible and praying my last semester I wanted to learn
some Greek so I took an introductory course for Greek one-third of the courses needed to get what
was called baby Greek or first-year Greek and I took that with a professor named Ron Sauer now
dr. Sauer would become a major influence in my life because he was so passionate about Greek in
the Greek New Testament and he instilled that passion and many of the students I was one of
those students and so by the end of that course it was a life changing a course correction of
course for me because I decided I'd no longer wanted to be a professional musician I wanted
to teach the Bible I wanted to learn how to read the New Testament in its original language and so
I applied for grad school and I had to take some courses over the summer in order to qualify to
get in but then I took as many Greek courses as I could in the Master of Arts in New Testament
studies program there so I took intermediate Greek grammar advanced Greek grammar Septuagint Greek
rapid Greek reading several exegesis courses textual criticism I took as many Greek courses
as I could and I took as many of them with Ron sours I could he was just an amazing guy and
like I said a tremendous influence in my life well I pretty much lost contact with dr. Sauer
after grad school he moved on to teach at Moody Bible Institute but I was certainly blessed to
have him as a professor while I was doing my at work at liberty 34 years later it's October of
2019 and I got an email from him and he said he was in my neck of the woods in the Atlanta metro
area and he was speaking at a local church that evening and would be for the following two nights
and he asked if I'd come out and meet him and of course so it's like wow this is the first time
I'm going to see dr. Sauer in 34 years and I just couldn't wait to see him and so I got there and
I asked if I told him about the fly-on-the-wall series and asked if I could have a dialogue with
him that we could record he graciously accepted I was really excited about that and I'm very excited
about sharing these discussions with you well dr. Sauer it's so good to see you again well it's good
to see you Mike after 34 years 34 years it's just amazing wow are you still looking great thank you
he looked like he kept in shape you're a marine weren't you I was and I've been in the habit for
51 years of going out and running five six seven miles every other day coming in doing exercises
we lifted weights and so even though today I'm 73 years old I feel so good I felt like I'm 23 years
old and you're still working five to seven mile walking or running five to seven miles several
days of which I am I am wow that's amazing well I remember meeting you 19 I think it was 1982 met
you heard you speak at Liberty when I was there and you are the guy to take Greek from and my
first Greek class was in the spring of 1983 was my last semester in college and it's probably my
favorite course of all my college courses for undergrad and I just learned so much from you
and you instilled a passion in me to learn Greek so that I can read the Greek New Testament you'd
come into class and you'd say fellas make it your ambition to master the Greek New Testament it's a
spiritual gold ideas and then someone would say well what about the Hebrew Old Testament and
well that's a spiritual silver mine and I still believe that do you still say it that way I do I
do I've studied every word every phrase every clause every verse in Greek New Testament and
now I'm on with the Hebrew Old Testament exegete in my way through the Hebrew text I've got about
17 books of the Old Testament down I've got a lot more to go now when I was a student there
at Liberty I think I remember you saying you got up every morning around 3:00 or 3:30 to read and
if I had an 8 o'clock class with you you'd already been in scripture study and x-gene
for three hours there's the juice do you still keep up with that I get up every morning now at
2:00 a.m. I pop up like toast I'm ready to go and the first thing I do is I study I had my
quiet time so the Lord I just feed nourish my soul on this word and then I spent some time in
prayer of the Lord that quite time with God is the single most important part of my day most
important thing I do every day is not spending time with my wife preaching on Sunday preparing
lectures teaching students in class counseling students in my office the most important thing
I do every day is my time with the Lord after that everything is downhill in significance I
am not fit to walk into a class and deal with students until I have spent some time with the
Lord Wow so to answer your question I still do that yes how many hours a day you think you study
Scripture then probably about four maybe five but that's my job that's what I do but it's my
passion as well well it's pretty cool when you can do what your passion is correct so you did
your doctorate over at Manchester I did and F F Bruce was your supervisor right he was and if
I remember correctly you were his last his final doctorís to what was it like studying what was he
like well F F Bruce was considered then today just about the top evangelical New Testament scholar in
the world and he was a man who of course he was he was unique he was really strong in New Testament
and really strong an Old Testament most scholars go one way or the other he did both and he was a
genuine Christian he was very gracious humble you know slowed down just a little oh okay and
he was just a wonderful person to study under he he had genuine faith in Christ he loved the
Scriptures he was an authority in the Bible and he was just an ideal person to work under he
really didn't care what you believed as long as you could intellectually sustained substantiate
what you believe and so he was my first choice you know just reading a quote for him and I just
the other day just like within the last four days I was reading a quote by him and it was something
like just like what you had said to that extent he didn't really care if you believed the same thing
but you had to be able to defend it but then he said something like if my students all of
my students reflected everything that I believed that I didn't do a good job teaching something
to that extent oh yeah well that sounds just like him he encouraged us to study the Scriptures come
to our own conclusions just be able to do a good job of presenting them and justifying the beliefs
that we had swing the axe he would say and let the chips fall where they may I remember you telling
me something he said and then I I was reading out of his biography or something written by
him within the last six months and it said the same thing that he told me he said and you told
me this back in I don't know 1984-85 he told you something like don't come to scripture with your
theology draw your theology from your study of scripture that's correct he was of the conviction
that we teach students theology first and then teach them how to study the Bible he says really
the right way to do it is study the scripture and as you're doing so build your own theology
and I like that is just it takes a longer time to erect your theology when you're having to exegete
the Scriptures which has to be done slowly you know it's starting to rain we should probably
let's just turn around and yep head back so your theology when you do responsible acts of Jesus
well I'll tell you you know but the passion that you instilled in me from Greek where did you get
that from your own passion for learning the Greek I became a Christian in high school and little
books written by Kenneth s Wiese it was the Greek teacher at Moody thought Winston fellow my hands
as a high school student I started reading on and they just gave me insight in the New Testament I
didn't have I felt like with Greek I will had a window into the New Testament most people didn't
have and I just saw from his books the value of Greek and that's where I got my law for Greek you
know the problems of God I ended up replacing him as a great teacher at movie that's amazing I feel
like my being at ludia is a bit of power but the payback for what the Institute has meant to me
well I feel I'm glad you weren't at Moody in the mid 80s or their early to mid 80s because that's
when I benefited from you yes if I had gone there then with her never crossed paths at Liberty yeah
you were just you really had you've had a great and lasting influence in my life I remember one
time I mean I was really trying to be a serious student with you but I remember one time I was
working like 25 30 hours a week in addition to my studies and I had to work late into the night and
so it's going to be a an all-nighter for me and I had two midterms exams the next day and one was
with you at 8 o'clock in the morning 810 I think it was and I don't know two three o'clock in the
morning I fell asleep accidentally while studying and I woke up at like 7:00 got a shower got on my
motorcycle bolted to the school walked into your office course you'd already been in Scripture
for three hours and I told you what happened and asked if I could have an extension and you said
no how long do you need it I think I just need two margin so what'd you take what you need but that
flexibility you gave me I really appreciated it then and I extend that to my students when
I believe that they have you know extenuating circumstance a serious circumstance so that's
it my ascension you a real passion to learn I knew you were serious about it and when you told
me what happened you need extra time it wasn't an excuse to get out of it and so I was only too glad
to work with you and help you because I knew that you were serious student so back to ffs Bruce how
long were you over there at Manchester four years well that's pretty cool and you did your doctoral
dissertation on that very difficult verse in Hebrews right Hebrews five eleven through six
m-68 five 11 through six eight about those who have once enlightened and fallen away correct so
what was your conclusion with that I think that that is referring to people who profess faith in
Christ but don't possess saving faith in Christ they understood the gospel they made a previous
profession of faith in it they were baptized but at some point they deliberately and permanently
turn from what they knew to be true turn from the Savior and entered a fixed state of open
hostility to the gospel unto Christ and they went back from Christianity into Judaism they
apostatized hmm this is pretty steep hill we're climbing in it myself a little bit out of breath
but you're doing well but you do five to seven miles at a time couple times a week I could do
be I could be doing better now you know couldn't we all Wow well that's pretty neat well thank
you so much for your just all that you've done I I'll tell you I appreciate you so much and when
you contacted me sent me an email this morning saying you were in town it's like wow I got to
go see him well it's so good to see you after so many years and I appreciate you making the effort
to come over here and renew old acquaintances well thanks doc I appreciate y'all Hut thank you
you