National Divorce, SBC on Saddleback & Abuse, ACBC Responds

Conversations That Matter

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Welcome to the conversations that matter podcast. I'm your host John Harris for those who normally watch

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You know that my background doesn't usually look like this and that's because I'm traveling I'm actually doing some interviews for the 1607 project this week.

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And so right now I'm at an Airbnb where I'm doing some filming and it doesn't have any internet

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So I have to record this remotely and then upload it later today Lord willing But I want to talk about a few things that have happened this week as I've been traveling

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That I would normally probably dedicate an episode to but because of time constraints while traveling

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I'll try to just be short and summarize as much as I can the three things are first federalism and secession nullifications less government decentralization localism that whole issue

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Because there's a tweet that Marjorie Taylor green a congresswoman from Georgia put out there that stirred up a lot of controversy a

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Few days ago and last night Jesse Kelly a talk show host that's conservative sparked some more controversy by supporting basically what

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Marjorie Taylor green was saying and so Her tweet says this We need a national divorce.

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We need to separate by red states and blue states and shrink the federal government Everyone I talked to says this from the sick and disgusting woke culture issues shoved down our throats to the

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Democrats traitorous America last policies We are done. So that's an issue one issue two is going to be the

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Southern Baptist Convention and People have asked me what do you make of them kicking? Rick Warren's church out of the convention at the executive committee level and I will tell you what

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I think I'll give you maybe a broader perspective on that as well. And then we're gonna end the plane land the plane on ACBC the

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Association of Biblical counselors has issued a statement Concerning the

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Christianity Today article against John MacArthur, and I think probably they didn't say this but it has to do I would think with also

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Rachel Denhollander going after ACBC specifically by name and their method of biblical counseling because she thinks that Abuse is the result of that somehow that they don't have the proper tools to handle abuse

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So we're gonna talk about all those things. Let's start with this whole national divorce issue though What Marjorie Taylor green said is?

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so American in my mind as far as we wouldn't have the

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United States unless there was a secession effort among the colonies and the idea that Local government is better during that time

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It was the committees of correspondence that formed somewhat of a shadow government but it was a more legitimate government than the royal governor was and That's in some of these states and legislatures and that's part of the reason that The Revolution or the

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American War for Independence had legitimacy today. We call this sometimes the doctrine of the lesser magistrate

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I'm not a big fan of that term, but that's the Christian notion there, and you don't get this without some kind of a reformed

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Protestantism that has to be in in the ground before you can plant something like this

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And so I've been interviewing some experts on American history over the last few days, and I've just become so convinced that That And I was convinced before I'm just more convinced now that the

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Fundamentally American thing is to value federalism smaller government less government local government self -government and That's what the founders were fighting for more than anything else on a political level.

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I should say Was the ability to govern themselves to see to their own affairs because they recognized that Parliament wasn't doing it they were abrogating the responsibility making war on the colonies if you read the

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Declaration of Independence and One of the problems today the reason we don't see this and the reason that Jesse Kelly was getting in hot water even with people who are broadly against social justice on our side is of that issue is because There is on the now political conservative side didn't used to be as much but now it is and certainly on the left this notion that America is

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Fundamentally a proposition nation and that proposition is that all men are created equal and sometimes

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Conservatives will use the term Liberty, but the left of course loves to use the word equality or equity today and This gets used to justify all kinds of different things whether it's a war or whether it's

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A health care measure or whether it's extending the civil benefits of marriage to same -sex couples there's all kinds of things that get and justified because well, it's freedom or it's

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Liberty or it's equality and That notion that that's what the United States is is a foreign notion.

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It would have been foreign to our founders It's not that they weren't for Liberty they were but they had a specific conception of what

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Liberty was It today let's give a very practical example of this in Auburn, Alabama someone if you ask someone

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What's Liberty? They would have a very different answer than someone. Let's say in Portland, Oregon wouldn't they were they not? Even on something as basic as marriage that they would have a very different notion of Liberty or equality either one and so, how do you govern a country from a centralized location when either

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Auburn, Alabama holds sway their president gets in their Congress Congress is composed of people that think like them or Conversely sometimes it's

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Portland, Oregon and it's their president. It's people who think like them and one exerts dominance over the other How do you govern in a country like that?

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That's not enough glue to stick together to say well, we're both about freedom or both about equality or something. Well But you have different notions of it and that's part of the problem that we're seeing today and the founders when they seceded from Great Britain They were very self -conscious of the fact that they were

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British citizens who were denied their rights as British men as the body politic they were denied what the

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Government of Great Britain extended to their own citizens They did not extend to those who they called their citizens and expected taxes from in the new world

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And that's part of the problem that they had as a that's most of it And and so they recognized that you're not treating us the way that we are we were supposed to be treated you're abrogating a responsibility

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It's like in a divorce situation. You're cheating on us. You're violating the understanding that we had

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And so we have local governments that are also legitimate and we and they are our barrier to protect us from you and This idea of localism has just been in there from the beginning, but they recognized they were

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British They were even George Washington who was a nationalist by the end of his presidency. He in his farewell address.

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He says You're connected all regions of the country because of shared traditions values.

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He doesn't actually say values shared. I think he says traditions he talks about religion I believe and Language and these are things that bind the colonies together and I think even he was realizing that in the future if There may be a war or something

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I mean these regions are different the south and the north are different and part of that is Different regions of England settled in those different areas.

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You can read David Hackett Fisher's book Albion seed. He talks a lot about this well The things that make the

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United States though unique or make the United States the United States on a political level most if you're thinking of novel things is this idea of Separation independence localism and self -government

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Federalism is the word that we use to describe this this notion of separation between the states and the central government

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The central government was only intended to really do two things primarily and that is to regulate trade and to make treaties so for self -defense purposes and for the purposes of Making sure that trade is regulated.

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And other than that there really was not a Purpose or a reason to have a central authority these states took care of the other things

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And you could have diversity in the states even there was religious diversity at the founding period so This is just part of what

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America was and this was common sense but now what happens is modern conservatives even so -called are reading the

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Constitution through the lens of the Declaration of Independence and not even the whole document just the preamble and they're reading the preamble through the lens of the

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Gettysburg Address and That's where everything goes off the rails because the Gettysburg Address Lincoln was not there first of all for the

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Declaration of Independence and his interpretation of it that it's that the reason that our forefathers came together was to Enshrine the proposition that all men are created equal is just not the case and it's not this egalitarian notion of equality

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It's not a notion of changing all the social Social arrangements around for Jefferson if you read the document and the way that it was commonly understood was that the

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Independence was of the body politic Against Great Britain because they had been denied the rights of Englishmen and an inalienable right for those who don't know

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This is another thing that a lot of Conservatives even so -called today get wrong and in the left that surely gets this wrong is an inalienable right and what that is an

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Inalienable right is a right that you are responsible to defend. You should not give it up There's a responsibility attached to it in Great Britain It's still used that way today in the

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United States that we think of it as well It's just what the government can't do to you. That's not true. If that's not fully what it is

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The responsibility that you have and so Jefferson when he said all men are created equal he's talking about What we would consider perhaps at his time what they would have considered to be natural rights, but it wasn't

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So it wasn't civil rights is the point You have a situation at that time even in that same document.

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He's complaining about things like How the British have instigated I think he even uses the word savages but Native Americans Indians to go and make war on them and He I mean not a very egalitarian thing to say he complains about all kinds of things they're

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One of the the big issues between the colonists and the British was the fact that the

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British Were attempting to free slaves in fact, New York was one of the main places slaves would go there and they gained sanction

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And when the commander there left George Washington wrote a letter and he's angry that the property was taken their property and and so this was an issue throughout the war, but Jefferson complains about this as well that You can't do that.

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You can't take our slaves And so how do you square that right with all men are created equal and of course the conservatives neo -conservatives today?

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Well, it was this proposition that later on would flower and bloom into full -grown

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Emancipation, but it just hadn't gone there yet, and they lived in this tension Not they didn't live in that tension as much as you think they did

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They didn't live in the tension of women couldn't vote as much as much as you think they did It wasn't even a thought in their mind

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They lived at a time when these were the social arrangements and when they're talking about men being created equal

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It's you have to read it in the context of this is in the context of a political arrangement with Great Britain where they're not being treated equal and That there are certain things that they are required to defend because of the responsibilities they have and as a body politic

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Now it's turned into this individual notion of autonomous rights of some kind of civil rights autonomous rights

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That's not what the founders meant by it And so more will be coming out when I have the 1607 project interviews all uploaded

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I'll probably put out some more material on this particular issue But it's embarrassing to be quite frank the ignorance that so many have on this subject what

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Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted out there's this is This is her encouraging this this national divorce, but honestly it's happening whether you encourage or not

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Jesse Kelly last night talk show radio host was getting a lot of flack from people even on our side of the in general of the

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Social justice debate because he was supporting this and he was making observations more than anything else

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This is just happening people are moving to red states where they feel more safe And they feel that they have a shared culture, and there's a million reasons for this

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There's a million things like culture is so complex but there's secession movements already in the

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Pacific Northwest underway to divide states up and this is happening whether you want it to or not people are going to do what's in their best interest and They're starting to now conservatives come together and align with each other and form new companies

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Etc because they want to do business. They don't want to give money to Amazon anymore if they can avoid that So I wanted to just say a few words on that and just say look

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There may be people who are well versed on theory well versed on theology, but they're unfortunately

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I don't know that they're well versed on history, and they're weighing in on these things saying things that frankly just aren't true

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They're just not true. It's not true that the United States Is the first nation in the history of the world to be founded on an idea of equality or liberty?

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other in contrast to every other nation which is Founded or exists because of things like culture religion even shared cuisine lineage

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I mean these are all the things that actually do confer identity and What you think of when you think of France or you think of Italy or you think of Angola or you think of China you

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Think of all these things, but when you think of the United States you think of equality well. That's not true That's not even what people go and fight in our wars to defend

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They're not going there because of some abstract notion of equality and extending democracy or something They're going because they're fighting for the folks back home because we were attacked because They want to protect their mothers and children and all of that Their buddies in the foxhole

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I mean, it's that's why people fight is for these tangible things that they have experience with it's not for some abstract notion in their head

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But that's the theory that unfortunately even most neocon or modern political conservatives seem to be under it's a spell and hopefully 1607 project will dispel that spell so I want to talk about that.

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I wanted to also talk about what's happening the Southern Baptist Convention apparently According to Baptist Press chairman

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Marshall Blalock of the The task force for abuse reform implementation said that their ministry check website is going to cost as much as two million dollars

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Yeah, two million dollars If you wonder whether or not the vultures are swarming and with bated breath looking to liquidize assets of the

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Southern Baptist Convention To line their own pockets. I don't know that you have to look much further than this two million dollars for a website

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Really? I can't think of any reason in the world why I would take that much money to build a website but apparently that's what it takes and the

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Southern Baptist Convention's executive committee met and They there were two things that were significant in regards to this whole abuse issues me to issue.

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I should say One is Mike law a lawyer issued a statement that basically sought seeks to uphold the

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Baptist faith and message 2000 with a clear biblical teaching that pastor should only be biblically qualified men so he

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Presents this amendment It was not taken up in the meeting there's a subcommittee that will continue to discuss the motion and they'll make a recommendation in June to the

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General the convention when they meet the annual during the annual meeting now This is interesting though.

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I don't think a lot of people realize that because at the same meeting Rick Warren's Church Saddleback was disfellowshipped because of having women pastors

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Which is in violation of the Baptist faith and message now Rick Warren's Church isn't the only church There's a number of churches out there that have this issue.

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So There's a curiosity about this. How come they don't take up this amendment right away?

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But they have the guts to kick out Rick Warren's Church Rick Warren's Church was an obvious thing. It was obvious That's what some people are saying

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It's the end of the convention when you have a document that says you can't have women pastors and then you have a church that Does and they're in friendly cooperation the resolutions committee can't seem to do anything about it.

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They can't even address it You know, they have to defend the church And you know people are giving

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Rick Warren a standing ovation I don't know if it was standing but they gave the clap for him when he spoke and gave him more time than anyone else

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It seemed and this is the problem. This is a huge huge huge huge problem And this is bigger than in some ways in Resolution 9 because this is about whether or not you can be in cooperation

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It's kind of like what I just was talking about it's not unrelated in some ways from whether or not you can be in a compact a

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Constitution an arrangement with someone in another state who has violated that If you're in a marriage and someone is violating the marriage marital vows over and over and over cheating on you, right?

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Do you should you stay in that arrangement? Well if someone is on a

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National level if you have a state that's Violating or a political party that's violating

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The Constitution that's the document a shared document that should serve as a kind of glue a shared

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It doesn't and because we're a federal republic. That's not all that's in a nation You have the flexibility of having actually even different nations joined together at by this federal republic but you have to have that some kind of a baseline for Having trust building trust with one another if you don't have trust you don't have a market you can't trade you can't defend yourself

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And that's what we see Completely eroding as public trust and it's not just on the national level.

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It's on the local level and it's in denominations and so this is what's happening right now trust is being eroded and When the convention fails to uphold its own standards trust is eroded a lot and I think that's why that made a big splash in ways that maybe even

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Resolution 9 did not make because that was an indirect challenge to the Baptist faith and message not direct So is this a positive thing?

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Well, yeah, I think so, but I will temper it with this You have to also understand I've been watching these people for a few years and the upper echelons of the

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SBC and they seem to operate more according to politics than they do principle and So it wouldn't surprise me because oftentimes social justice advocates will do this and I've seen this in the

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SBC They will try to convince their donors that they are still conservative. You should still give money to them because look we're pro -life

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We're against gay marriage. We just think racial justice is important. We think abuse is a problem, right? They'll say things like this

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So give me two conservative views and I'll give you one liberal view and that means I'm a conservative I guess and then you look into their pro -life view and it's this holistic womb -to -tomb pro -life view that's not really even a

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Traditional pro -life view and they're not they're social justice warriors. They're not, you know conservative

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Christians but they market it that way and one of the things that I'm concerned about this is when the when you have a

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Situation where the executive committee is met they have recommendations from this task force of a two million dollar website

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They have spent according to the Tennessean Six million dollars last year just on this abuse issue and they're now looking at possibly liquidating assets

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They haven't even started the website yet for intaking these complaints When you have that going on this embrace of the me too stuff

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What kind of bone are you gonna throw to the people to convince them that it's still worth it to stay in the convention?

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Because no one wants to stay in a convention Where they are paying the lawyers fees for irresponsible churches.

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Why would you want to stay in that? You're in there for ministry well, if on top of it the other the conventions not even upholding its own statement of faith, then you really have no reason and so that's

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I think one of the one of the considerations that could be in this as well is that let's let's try to at least show that we're not as we're not going as radical left as as People think we're going so we'll throw them a bone now that's an assumption on my part, but it's an assumption that comes from some experience and watching and it's certainly a possibility you do have to admit so so is that a red pill

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I suppose but it's I Would expect if we're gonna see repentance There's gonna be retractions admission first retractions and then a wholesale repentance not this pivot

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We keep seeing from like JD Greer and Al Mohler and others where will who did I see Willie Rice the other day, too?

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Where positions that they used to hold they're now contradicting and they don't admit really where they contradicted or if they do it's it's just We changed our position slightly or we've there's no repentance.

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There's no and it's not wholesale It's not it you have to see this in the context of a

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Biden administration That's aggressively pushing the needle left and people don't like it And so you got to at least show that you're somewhat on the right you're somewhat against what's happening

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And I think that's more of an explanation than things are being reformed in the convention. I don't think that's the case

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Well, let's see. What else? That's Southern Baptist stuff. I want to talk about this Association of Biblical counselors

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ACBC ACBC's organization they put out a statement that was intended to Answer what

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Christianity today and I think they didn't say this but also Rachel Denhollander put out there She was going after ACBC specifically because she said their kind of counseling is what leads to situations of abuse and I'm glad they said something, but what they essentially said maybe

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I can pull it up here because there is actually one thing I think I wanted to read from this what they essentially said was very general

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They talk about they're preparing new documents to train people in counselors and abuse And why abuse prevention etc

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And it says any failures of ACBC counselors regarding the complex issues surrounding abuse demands that we grow in biblical wisdom and application of Christ's name etc

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It it's just very general ACBC counselors must respond with humility and repentance insofar as they have mishandled abuse situations

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This isn't gonna satisfy anyone That's the problem with this. It's not gonna satisfy anyone. It's I'm glad they issued a statement, but here's the thing

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I'm so tired of seeing from conservative organizations. They're viciously attacked Rachel Denhollander viciously attacks and blames from them for specific abuse situations and then

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Instead of calling her out taking her to task demanding an apology

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Combating the me too movement combating things like we need to operate by the preponderance of evidence instead of the

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Beyond a reasonable doubt Combating things like we should should we just believe someone because they have a story so just combating these things

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Things like someone's an abuser just because they exert power in a situation. So it's it's not adultery

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It's abuse if someone's let's say you're a professor or your pastor, even if it was consensual

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It's really not because they had a position of power over you instead of combating these things Directly in the face and Charging out there, which if they did that we would support them and I'm not saying this just about a

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CBC I'm saying this about all sorts of conservative organizations they seem to want to have a good faith discussion with people who hate them put their enemies and I would suggest to you the time for that is complete for the most part

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That's when you're viciously attacked and it falsely accused and slandered you need to defend yourself

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You need to and it's not because you're defending you that's the thing that I think is hard for people to grasp It's because you're defending the people who believe in what you're doing who have contributed who have used your biblical counseling who?

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Go to churches where they use that biblical counseling. It's all of them It's in it and it traces back to the sufficiency of the

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Word of God if you're not willing to defend yourself when you're attacked And you can't see that this attack is really on the sufficiency of Scripture Then I don't know that I can help you and it's it's it's somewhat discouraging to see that we need some aggression aggression here some biblical

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Righteous indignation, and that's what I'm seeing lacking from this, so I'm glad they issued a statement

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But I just wanted to use this as an opportunity to say if anyone's hearing my voice in there a concert in a conservative organization

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Or if it orthodox organization trying to hold on for dear life Go on the offense do not please do not do this kind of thing where you just make a general statement and it

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No one knows are exactly where you line up. It's so vague and it's just a offset criticism

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No Make a very positive declaration and take to task the people who are trying to tear you down and what you're doing down So my two cents

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God bless more coming later Appreciate your prayers as I'm traveling 1607project .com

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if you want to find out more about the project that I'm helping film for this particular week. God bless.