There are such things as formal and more literal translations!Van is stuck. He is forced to be non-committal. He is confounded. If he concedes that he agrees with Mr. Wu, then Van has no argument. If he disagrees, then he goes full-bore into irrationality.
My guess is that Van will double down because his ego will not allow him to demonstrate any integrity.
But the fact remains --there is no such thing as "exact lexical equivalence" when it comes to Bible translations. It can't even be done in secular translations of one language to another.
The fact also remains that a "sense-based translation" is what most Bible versions depend upon most of the time.
Facts are inconvenient obstructions to Van's agenda. That's why he relies on fiction to further his ill-fated cause.