What More SBC Issues with Justin Peters

Welcome to The Wrap Report with your host, Andrew Rapoport, where we provide biblical interpretation and application.

This is a ministry of striving for eternity in the Christian podcast community. For more content or to request a speaker for your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.

All right, well, welcome to another edition of The Wrap Report. I'm your host, Andrew Rapoport, here with my trusty sidekick,

Bud the Wiser. How you doing, Bud? I'm good, sir. How are you? Good.

Hey, today we're going to talk about something that nobody else has been talking about in Christianity. I know.

Let's talk about what's going on with the SPC. We've got a scoop. You got a scoop. No one else is talking about this.

So to do that, we brought in some big guns, didn't we? Oh, yes. Yeah. We brought the man who sits on a throne of pride.

No, literally, because the name of his scooter is from a company called Pride. So the one and only

Justin Peters. How are you, sir? Hey, Andrew. Doing well, brother. Doing well. Guilty as charged.

I do sit. Not only do I sit, I ride on a throne of pride. You know,

I don't know how many people have seen you on your scooter riding around and nobody picked up.

I remember when I picked up on it when we were at a Shepherds Conference and someone was asking me to take a photo.

And as I'm sitting there waiting for them, I just happened to notice Pride right there on the handlebar.

And I went, wait a minute. And you leaned forward and I went, oh, it even says it on the back of the seat. Yeah. And nowadays, you know, that term pride, that conjures up a whole other set of issues.

Hey, you know, this is your month. I need to take that handlebar down. Oh, no. We're past that month now. That was last month.

That was last month. Okay. I'm safe. Yeah. So now you're safe for a whole nother year. Yeah. Don't ride around wearing bright colors,

Justin. No kidding. Yeah. I'm sending the wrong message. Yeah. Don't put a rainbow sticker on the back of my scooter.

You know what? If we put a rainbow sticker on the back of his scooter, he wouldn't even be able to see it. So we can do that, bud.

We can do that. So, so, you know, we, we scheduled to talk about the SBC and I forget,

Justin, if it was you or bud, when we said, well, let's, let's, we couldn't figure out the timing. We'll record a little bit later.

And one of you were like, well, there's probably going to be more to talk about. This stuff keeps breaking.

Like, I mean, we're going to, we'll air this in a couple of days. And yet maybe by the time we air this, everything we say,

I'll be old hat because something new will be happening within the SBC. But we've, we've, we've talked with bud and I, we did a podcast on this.

You just recently, Justin had your previous pastor, Jim Osmond on, on your podcast and on your

YouTube channel. And you did an episode on the SBC. Bud has been like cranking out article after article.

The one that has gotten the most traction, you know, well, at least before the one that got the most traction was a satire one on from Lifeway selling sermons.

That was pretty funny. And the one he just recently wrote is getting a lot of traction.

We, we had, all of us were on Apologetics Live and we were doing, we're again, talking about some of these things. So we were addressing this again.

We're going to take a couple of new things that we want to look at and, and address some of the things that that's going on.

But folks, this is important. And you say, well, Hey, I'm not SBC. Why is this important?

This is important because one, you know, the SBC is, and maybe you guys know different, but it's the only denomination that I know that started to go toward a liberal bent that at least had a conservative resurgence for a period of time.

Though it looks like that resurgence is over. And this being right now, the most conservative and largest denomination, a

Protestant denomination, this is going to say how a lot of churches are going to go. If the, the, was it, there's six major seminaries from SBC, right,

Justin? Right. Six of them. Okay. So if they all go woke and go liberal, it tells you where these churches are going to go.

There's 44 ,000 churches represented by the SBC. So is that about right?

Somewhere in there. I mean, they, they claim, yeah, 40 something thousand, they claim 16 to 18 million members, but I guarantee you the

FBI couldn't find about 15 million of those. But they're way inflated numbers.

But it doesn't matter. Massively inflated numbers. There's nowhere near that many SBC. Well, they count baptisms, right?

Not even that, they count. Oh, they count. Look, they, they, they'd make the, they'd make the

DNC blush with shame because they count people that are dead. They count people that have been on church membership roles that haven't been to that church in half a century.

I know, I mean, my, the church that I was reared in, First Baptist Church Vicksburg, there was an article a few years ago in the local

Vicksburg, Mississippi paper about First Baptist Church Vicksburg. And the article said that there are 3 ,000 members of First Baptist Church Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Well, that's the church I was raised in on a good Sunday, on a good Sunday. There's 300 people there on a good one.

And yet it boasts 3 ,000 members. So, and that's typical of the SBC. So that's why I say these numbers are massively inflated.

Yeah, but I think the concern we have is that this is, this is the influence that a lot of these future pastors, future church planters are having.

And this is going to affect even the churches outside of the SBC. This is going to be what people think of with Christianity going forward.

And I think that's why this is so important. I think that's why it is important for us to address yet again what's going on.

And so, Justin, let me start off with, we'll start off with what we discussed at Apologetics Live, and then what you and Jim talked on your podcast.

Some of the issues of concern, just in case this is the first episode people are listening to, bring people up to speed with, what's the concern that's going on right now with Ed Litton, the president of the

SBC? Why is it a concern? And then, you know, we do want to tap in from there.

I want to tap into this SBC Voices article that we have. And then we'll wrap up with some of the stuff that Bud has brought out in his latest article.

So, Justin, why don't you start us off? Sure. So, Ed Litton is the newly elected president of the

SBC. And a couple of weeks ago, someone found a sermon that he preached on Romans 1 and realized, wow, this sounds a lot like a sermon that J .D.

Greer, the former president of the SBC, preached on Romans 1. He found it and watched both of them and did a mashup,

I guess you'd call it, when you take clips of each sermon, you put them together. And Ed Litton plagiarized large, large portions of J .D.

Greer's sermon. Not only the general outline, not only the major points, not only the sub points, but the phraseology, the jokes, and even personal illustrations.

And so when someone found that, then others started looking. And sure enough, it wasn't just that sermon.

It was sermon after sermon after sermon after sermon after sermon. And now, I mean, I've lost track of how many examples of plagiarism that have been found by others.

I found a couple myself. And it's not just that he's,

I mean, he's actually taking personal stories that J .D. Greer said happened to him and claiming those stories as his own.

He literally looks his congregation in the eye and straight up lies to them, telling them this illustration, this anecdote that he supposedly experienced himself, and he didn't.

He's stealing it from other people. Well, wait a minute. I guess the first question is, are they actually original with J .D.

Greer? Because we do know that one of those stories, he comes from Ted Tripp. And that J .D.

Greer says is his own personal story. But as you pointed out on a previous episode on Didache, you pointed out that, yeah,

J .D. Greer doesn't remember where he saw that temple, but you remember where you saw yours.

Ted Tripp remembers where he saw his. So there's things there that do indicate that maybe even the personal stories of J .D.

Greer are not personal stories of J .D. Greer, but ones he's getting from somebody. But let me give you the challenge.

The challenge that Ed Litton is saying is that he's not lying to his congregation. He's not plagiarizing, because he had permission beforehand from J .D.

Greer to use the sermon. So is that really plagiarism, Justin? Yes, it is plagiarism.

And he is lying. Let me say that real quick, because J .D. Greer gives the illustration of being in driver's ed, and the driver's ed instructor had this break and all that.

And Ed Litton takes that exact same story and claims it as his own. So that is straight up, flat out lying.

Now, specifically to your question, is it plagiarism if you have permission from the original source to use his material and then you present it?

As long as you have permission, some are saying, well, then it's no longer plagiarism. Well, yes, it is.

Plagiarism is plagiarism, irrespective of whether or not you have the permission of the original source for example, if I had been, ironically, the same seminary that Ed Litton went to,

I went to Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. I was there probably about 10 years after he was.

So we weren't there at the same time. But as a seminary student, if I had gone to one of my friends, you know, down the hall in the men's dorm,

Fort Worth Hall, and said, hey, Lance, this is a friend of mine from seminary. Hey, Lance, I got this paper coming up and I know you've already written it.

I've written a paper on this. Hey, I'm really in a bind. Can I use your material? And he said, yeah, okay, sure.

Which Lance would never have done that. But if he said, yeah, sure, you can use my material. And so I took his material and basically copied and pasted it.

Maybe changed a phraseology here and there, but it's basically Lance's paper and I turned it in with my name on it.

Is that plagiarism? Absolutely, it's plagiarism. It doesn't matter if I had

Lance's permission. If I had been discovered doing that, I would have been,

I would have not only been given a zero on my paper, I would have probably been kicked out of Southwestern Seminary.

So yes, it is still plagiarism, even if you have the permission of the original source.

Absolutely. And just to note, and you pointed this out with your video with Jim, this kind of behavior, since the world is watching, would not even be tolerated in a secular university.

No. So don't lose sight of that fact. Right. Yeah, think of the irony here.

I did my undergraduate. When I left high school and I graduated high school,

I went to, well, I went to junior college for a year, but then I went to Mississippi State University and I got a degree in economics from Mississippi State.

If I had done 1 % of the amount of plagiarism that just that we know about and forget being kicked out of a theological institution,

I would have been kicked out of a secular, godless institution. Mississippi State University, I would have been kicked out.

I would have been kicked out of the university. I would have been kicked out of seminary.

Well, And yet Ed Litton is the president of the

SBC. How does that work? Let me bring this in because let's talk about how he became president because this is one of the things

I kind of think interesting. Everyone's kind of forgotten about that now, but just before the elections, they were doing some things that were, basically, it came down to a runoff between Stone and Litton.

Mueller didn't even make the cut. So I was wrong.

I actually thought Mueller was going to be the president, but they were doing some things before the vote to Stone with women crying and telling stories.

And this is what brought out the world is watching comment. So could you go over that because I think when we say,

Bud said the world is watching. When we look at what they did to try to make sure that Stone didn't get the votes and now we look at how they're handling this,

I think we see hypocrisy here because especially with what we're going to say later about how these things came to light.

Could you go over kind of what brought about what was the shenanigans that were being played before the election?

But I know you were watching all this too. The woman crying and all this.

Well, no, no. Actually, I was going to say I kind of know the basics of that, but Bud would be better to speak to that than I.

Well, the thing I would just want to add to your emphasis on what the big scandal is right now is with the plagiarism.

My observation, if you back up from this, is what we're seeing is sort of a, and I don't mean, well, it is kind of a pun, a litany of problems because it started out before the convention occurred, discovering that Lytton co -preaches with his wife.

Yeah, that's right. That's kind of a problem. And at the moment, the convention is ongoing. Now, it's subsequent to the first election where it turned out to be a runoff.

There was an issue with his doctrinal statement regarding the Trinity on his church website, and it was heresy.

It was partialism to be specific. In the course of the runoff vote, you have that being wiped off the church website because a messenger came up to the microphone and asked a question, actually, of Al Mohler where Lytton had gotten his doctorate degree.

Asked Mohler, what are they teaching about the Trinity because Lytton's website has this heresy on it.

Mohler deferred to Lytton who did not address it but just sort of in an ex cathedra kind of papal move had it wiped off the website.

So you've got issues with the egalitarianism with his wife preaching. Now we've got issues of we're not really that focused on doctrine.

It's okay. We just had a statement. We put it up there. Who cares? Well, there are people that do care.

The Lord cares. The world may be watching and they don't care but the faithful believers do.

So you've got the co -preaching with his wife. You've got the heresy statement on the website.

Well, now this is just the continuing fruit of what I would argue is unfaithfulness to the word.

You just kind of see this. I think it's going to progress. I want to see repentance. I want to see him do the faithful thing, repent and bear fruit consistent with that repentance.

I don't know that we'll see that but that's kind of the summary I would add to what your observations were.

So then bring us up to speed with this whole claims that they had with, you know, mishandling themselves sexually with this woman who is crying and all that because there were shenanigans that they were playing, covering stuff up and trying to make

Stone look bad, right? Yeah, and a lot of that ties to these apparently positionally leaked letters that came from Russell Moore and my goodness, that's a two -hour show to kind of exegete all that nonsense.

But yeah, all of this was being positioned so that Mike Stone was implicated in a cover -up of the ongoing sexual abuse scandal and that doesn't carry any weight.

I mean, just on the surface, what he did as president, he had been president of the executive committee, they're responding to investigations that had been brought to them and he was overseeing that and the

EC was responsible for adjudicating that in some way consistent both with scripture and with the

SBC's polity. And so for folks who may not be completely up to speed with SBC and the politics there, so Russell Moore was part of an ethics group of the

SBC and he was president. He steps down just before this convention, he steps down and somehow leaks letters and emails implicating

Stone in having known about for like 20 years, I think it was, knowing about some sexual cover -up of a sexual sin.

And they end up having some poor girl up there crying about how this abuse hurt her.

One of the interesting things Stone had said about it was, so if this was like 20 years ago, why did Russell Moore do nothing?

These leaked letters and emails from Russell Moore seem to indicate that Russell Moore knew, he's claiming he knew about it for like 20 years, right?

So Stone's argument was, well, why didn't he do anything? He's saying that Stone knew but Stone's saying he doesn't but clearly

Russell Moore would have. If he's the head of, if he's the president of the ethics committee, why did he do nothing?

And this is what you end up seeing, they shifted all to Stone. Now this is going to come into play for this reason,

I think, because the whole thing against Stone was these leaked letters that were from Russell Moore and no one knows how it got into the public, how it got to media, just kind of leaked out there.

Okay. And I think that's going to be different when we look at the argument that people are making for Ed Linton.

Here what he did was out in public. You know, I mean, one of the things we know is these

YouTube videos from J .D. Greer and Ed Linton, they were public.

Well, up until a few weeks ago, right, Justin? When 140 of them went, right. 140, some of them disappeared and some came back.

Yeah. Yeah, he took down 143 videos, I think. Yeah. And so this is public information.

So this isn't like something that is private that's being leaked. This is someone who is noticing the videos, noticing these same lines.

In fact, Justin, on one of your previous Dedicate podcast, when you were dealing with this, you even pointed out where you wanted to go see whether Ed Linton was going to address that in his most recent sermon.

So you listened to his sermon and he made some comment about, well, you know,

Jesus being a crutch, Jesus is my iron lung. And you went, oh, that's kind of strange. Where did you find that when you went and searched for that?

Yeah. So the plagiarism thing really kind of blew up Saturday a week ago.

So whatever that date was, I can't do it in my head right now. So a week ago this past Saturday and people were really talking about it.

Well, literally the very next day, Sunday morning, Ed Linton got up in his sermon and had this line where he said he was talking about having conversation with a friend of his and his friend said, well,

Jesus is just a crutch for you. And Ed Linton said, I told my friend, though, that Jesus isn't my crutch.

He's my iron lung. And I thought, well, that's a pretty catchy thing to say.

You know, that's pretty neat. I've never heard that before. And so I just given the plagiarism that people were finding,

I just Googled it. Sure enough, it's a line out of a book by a lady named Nancy Linton.

speaker on it, has written a couple of books, kind of like a Beth Moore type, best

I can tell. But so, I mean, literally the very next day after everybody was talking about his plagiarism, he plagiarizes again.

So he's pathological. He is absolutely pathological.

There had been, I mean, there's dozens and dozens of examples now. Dozens. But wait, we should have to cut him a break because we can't say he's the one pathological because he explained this.

He's not the one writing his sermons. Yeah, he's got an eight member team that gets together and they all do a little bit of research and they somehow cobble together a sermon.

And that's what he does. And he even admits this is how he does each of his sermons. He doesn't write his sermons by his own admission.

He doesn't write them. I mean, that is stunning to me. That is he is so seared in this.

It's so normal for him that he doesn't even have the thought in his head.

You know, I probably shouldn't tell the whole world that I've got an eight member team that helps me write my sermons.

It's perfectly normal for him. And so he just does it. That is, as I told

Jim Osmond, y 'all heard me say this before, when I sit under a man who's preaching, I want to know that that man has been in the word, that he has done the work, that he has studied to show himself approved, that he has wrestled with the text, that he's gotten the meaning right, and that that has impacted him.

The word of God, the word of Christ dwells richly within him, per Colossians 3, that his heart and mind is saturated with the word of God.

It's impacted him. Then and only then do I want to hear what that man has to say about the text.

So now I'm curious with this. This is going to be out of left field a little bit. So when we look at a guy like Ed Litton, who is paid to be a pastor of a church, who isn't working on his own sermons, he's got eight people writing the sermons, either they or him are plagiarizing these sermons even after getting caught, now making excuses for it.

Who do you think is more dangerous to the Christian community? Someone like an

Ed Litton or someone like a Benny Hinn, who is upfront about what he believes. He tells you he believes in word of faith and little

God's doctrine. He doesn't hide it. He doesn't try to cover it up. Right. Ed Litton was on his website having heresy there up until he got caught with it.

I don't know if you'd be ready to answer this to think through it, but I'd be curious with your background in studying word of faith, who do you think is actually more dangerous to the...

Because I know we've talked about this in the past, Justin, about when you look at the Muslims or you look at word of faith and, you know, that word of faith is more dangerous because they're praying on Christians.

But here you got someone that is really within the more conservative Christian community versus someone that is kind of on, you know, seen as not in the

Christian community by most Christians. Which do you see would be more dangerous to the Christian community then? An Ed Litton or Benny Hinn?

Well, I suppose it would be the parameters that you put on the Christian community because of professing

Christian community at large globally, I would say Benny Hinn. I would say

Kenneth Copeland, Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer, and that group. Now, if you narrow that down to the

SBC, then I would say Ed Litton because most

SBC people are not listening to Benny Hinn. A few would be, but most are not.

Now that number becomes exponentially greater when you broaden those, when you go outside of those

SBC parameters and you open it up to, you know, all the charismatics, all that kind of stuff. So, but specifically

SBC, yeah, I would say Ed Litton. And because of the horrific example that it that he's giving right now, and aside from that, not only the horrific example, the horrific theology in these sermons.

I mean, people have pointed out if you're going to, if you're going to plagiarize somebody, at least plagiarize somebody that knows what they're talking about.

But in this, in this sermon, he actually said that, and this is plagiarized from Tim Keller, who's no bastion of doctrinal soundness, but he said, he said, homosexuality does not send you to hell.

Do you know how I know that? Because heterosexuality doesn't send you to heaven. That is one of the most mind -numbingly dumb theological statements

I have ever heard outside of Word of Faith. I mean, that is just, I mean, that is, that is

Theology 101 bad. You would have flunked out of Theology 101 class in vacation

Bible school, you would have flunked out. Just unbelievably bad. And then he, to make matters worse, he said, the

Bible does not even have a word for homosexuality. I'm like, man, what are you talking about?

The Bible doesn't have a word for it. Arsenicoitai, there's your word. First Corinthians six, verse nine.

That's, that, there's your word. It literally means men betting men. I don't know.

What do you think that describes? Sounds like homosexuality to me. I mean, and this is a guy who's president of the

SBC and claims in his interview that he does the work in the languages. Are you kidding me?

Well, maybe he never heard of the word, maybe he never heard of the word Sodomite or read about, you know,

Sodom. We're going to say, well, I was going to say, but this is the problem. The theology that they have is not biblical, it's cultural.

And so as those winds change, we've, we've got to, well, we got to keep the people in the pews happy to hear something that's nuanced, but also we're concerned about the world watching and what the culture is doing.

It's crazy. I mean, the problem that just, I just can't get past is those people sitting in that pew under Ed Linton, they have no idea.

The best they know is not who produced the sermon they're hearing, just who's performing it.

Unbelievable. It's just crazy. And, Bud, to that point,

I would also say, okay, if, if, if my pastor or your pastor or Andrew, if you had gotten up folks that, that are coming to your fellowship, that any of us who go to a doctrinally sound church, if our pastor had gotten up and said what

J .D. Greer said and Ed Linton plagiarized J .D. Greer's essay and made it his own, but if they had said anything like that, every member in our churches would have been lined up outside the pastor's door.

No, they wouldn't. I'll, I'll tell you what would happen, Justin, if I was preaching something like that and you were there, I'll tell you exactly what would happen.

If I was up at a pulpit and preached that, you'd ride right up in your scooter while I'm still preaching and you'd stick your finger in my face and say, yeah, that's wrong.

Yeah. Yeah. Every, I wouldn't even wait until I got to my door. That's, yeah, that's basic stuff.

I mean, the vast majority of everybody in the churches that we attend would have recognized that as heresy and the fact that J .D.

Greer preached this sermon in January of 2019. And, and Ed Litton took some flak for it at that time.

Yeah, took some flak for it, rightly so at that time from some others, apparently nobody in his church.

But then, then Ed Litton a year later plagiarized the same sermon.

Having known that there was some flak on it, right? I mean, like, oh my goodness. So, instead of correcting

J .D. Greer, he goes, that's brilliant. Can I steal it? I mean, borrow it. It's just unbelievable.

It's a, so, so, but let me ask you, you brought this up earlier. Does, do, do you really believe that the

SBC really cares that the world is watching? I mean, in Justin's, in what Justin had done on his video and one of the articles you did,

Newsweek, is Newsweek that's pointing out that he's not only plagiarizing, but getting rid of videos and things like that.

Do you think the SBC really cares that the world is watching? Or do you believe more that that's just a line they used to try to silence

Stone so that they can get who they wanted elected? No, I think in the context of that specific convention that occurred on two days,

I, I think that line was used as a political ploy and sort of a cliche to minimize any dissent against any of the resolutions that they were going to be facing that were being brought to the floor.

Minimize any dissent. Emphasize, you know, we're all in this together kind of thing and unity, unity, unity, without regard for doctrine, without regard for truth.

and the world is watching means, oh, we've got to do something that is going to be favorable in the eyes of the world.

Oh, well, good job. Look what you've just produced. I mean, you produced a guy who preaches with his wife who has heresy on his website and now is stealing his sermons.

Well, the world is watching. Um, but I, I don't know, you know, if, if repentance is going to be forthcoming, uh,

I think you've seen, uh, Lytton's church sort of close ranks around him to protect him from further scrutiny.

And I think that you've seen the SBC elite, um, not, not wholesale, but a number of well -positioned

SBCers come out in support of him. Um, I mean, Danny Akin, you know, he's essentially redefining what, um, integrity and transparency and humility means.

It's what Lytton has just done in light of this scandal. No, that's not right. Yeah. And, and I want to get to that just right after we explained to Justin how he can get a better night's sleep because he looks like he needs a better night's sleep.

Look at him. He, he looks like he hasn't gotten enough sleep, right bud? I think what the reason he hasn't gotten a good enough sleep is he needs a

MyPillow mattress topper. That's what I think he needs, right? Justin, you'd love it because it's made right here in the

United States. You like that? America. Yeah.

I mean, so we're, they're a sponsor here at, with, uh, The Wrap Report and with Apologetics Live. And so not only could you get yourself a good night of sleep, you'd be supporting this program as well.

Uh, but I will admit I, I've, I was willing to, to have them as a sponsor because I absolutely love their products.

Justin knows I travel with my MyPillow, uh, when I go, when we travel all over the place,

I have my pillow that I travel with because it is that comfortable. But I'll tell you the mattress topper that they have,

I got it recently and that I'm absolutely loving. That is, that is, and I've said this before, folks, other than getting my sleep number bed, that mattress topper has probably been the best thing for my sleep, uh, that I've had.

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And maybe then we would see Justin looking like he had a good night of sleep. You know, he's, he looks a little groggy there.

I don't know. He, he, he was too much celebrating for 4th of July.

You know, he lives up there in the land of the free where they probably were allowed to do fireworks and things like that.

You know, I don't know about that. It was like the Western world. I mean, I was in front at my house last night. It was crazy.

All the dogs, it was good because the dogs were all scared and they were under the bed. So they left me alone, but never mind. Well, you know,

I will admit that moving from New Jersey to Pennsylvania, you know, New Jersey fireworks are not allowed.

I moved out here and man, everyone and their brother was setting off fireworks. I, I didn't get to see any of them, but I heard them from every direction.

Yeah. See, Justin wasn't having that up in Montana because it's like, what's your nearest neighbor, like 10 miles away? You know,

I don't know. We live in a, we live in a neighborhood. So my nearest neighbor is less than 10 feet away.

Oh, well then be careful with those fireworks you were setting off. Yeah. So, so, but there was an article you sent to us, to Justin and I from SBC Voices.

How should Ad Litton's borrowing sermons situation be handled? Now, Justin, just with that title, it kind of gives away the position that, that the, the author here,

Adam Blosser has. I think we've already made this clear, but we just want to emphasize this.

Do you think this was borrowing a sermon? No, no, it was, it was stealing a sermon.

I mean, I mean, he, and people say, well, he had permission, but again, you're, you're getting up in front of your people and you're preaching that material as though it was your own and it's not, it's not.

In fact, when you look at these mashup videos, it's almost cringeworthy, embarrassing, how bad

Ad Litton's delivery is. It's so artificial and wooden. Now, you know why it is because he's just, he's just reading a script.

That's all he's doing. I mean, you can, you get a, a, a trained monkey to get up and do that.

I mean, hire some, you know, I could get up and I could read, I don't know.

I could read a book on, uh, brain surgery and I could probably read it really well and it might look like I know what

I'm talking about. I have no idea what I'm talking about. I mean, anybody can get up and read something.

It is just, it's so fake. Both, both Greer and Litton are reading it. I pointed that out on the podcast we did a couple of weeks ago on this.

They're both, which tells me both of them are borrowing it from someone else, stealing it from someone else, paying for it.

To what extent Greer's doing that? I know he's doing it some and how much, I don't know, but.

We don't know, but the thing is at least what you're, you're pointing out, at least when Greer does it, he's got his note, notebook in his hand.

He's reading it, but he at least seems to read ahead and then, you know, kind of be a little bit more dramatic in his explanation where Ed just kind of is looking down, reading it and talking about it and it's like when you compare the two, you really see that not only, not only is it a bad sermon, not only is it not an original sermon, but Ed Litton can't even do a good delivery or at least

J .D. Greer can do that. Yeah. Let me, let me just insert this. This was too hilarious.

You guys will know Don Green from his association with John MacArthur, but Don Green early this morning posted this and here's the quote.

It says, I have a small favor to ask from the seminaries of the Southern Baptist Convention if they continue to support

Ed Litton and his plagiarism scandal and here's what Green asks. He said, could you at least change the name of your institution from theological seminary to school of the performing arts?

That is gold. Oh, I know. Mic drop.

There you go. There you go. So this article goes, you know, let me read a little some historically.

Adam puts it this way. Adam Blosser says, I don't like the way the concerns first came to light.

None of us should be prowling the internet seeking someone to devour. I've been guilty of doing that before.

It wasn't right. It isn't right now. We've already have an adversary who seeks to steal, steal.

That's for clean mentions to steal, kill, and destroy when Christians seek to devour one another.

They imagined they are they image the devil, not Jesus, but legitimate concerns shouldn't be ignored just because they came to light by illegitimate means.

I want to address that part of it. Actually, I should read the rest of that paragraph because he says, that's the same argument

I made to friends regarding the Russell Moore letters. You don't have to like the leaked letters to read the letters and be concerned in the same way you can be concerned about a pastor misusing someone else's sermon material without affirming that the person who said it out to destroy him.

Now, here's the thing that I find interesting. The Russell Moore letters that he references were designed to attack and devour a person.

Right? Yeah. Right? There was a political maneuvering behind that.

That wasn't to call people to repentance. That was purposeful and it was underhanded.

That's not, you know, when you have here someone that notices, hey, here's two guys preaching the same sermon and they both were and are the

SBC presidents. Hey, it's a concern here and people are saying, and Bud, you just said this earlier in this show.

You want repentance and you said this before we aired but repentance for Ed Layton would look like resignation as well.

Yeah. But the thing is the assumption here is what, you know, that this somehow came to light in illegitimate means.

But you know what I don't see in here? What's the illegitimate means? I mean, the illegitimate means with Russell Moore's letters?

Well, yes, we could say that's illegitimate means. Private communications or communications that were in, that may never actually been communicated to people that were somehow written and said that they were communicated but there's no trace of it and then it leaks to the public.

That's different than something that's in the public. These videos, these sermons were public information.

The fact that there's not just one but as Justin said several sermons where you can see this where even illustrations, personal illustrations are being retold.

That's public information. I don't see what's illegitimate about this that they could say that he doesn't like the concern, the way it came to light because the interesting thing is they supported the

Russell Moore letters. Oh, well, we don't like how it came to light but it's the content. However, here he's focusing not on the content but oh, well, it's the way it came to, it came about illegitimately.

Yeah, I don't think there was any point for him to make those, to make that an issue, illegitimate means.

It has come to light. I'd be very cautious about critiquing the Lord's providence. The content in this revelation of this behavior is just as valid to look at maybe as as Russell Moore's is.

I don't have a problem with either one. What I have a problem with is not recognizing that truth never fears the darkness.

Truth never fears the light and integrity never fears scrutiny. So the scrutiny that's going on here is not only in light of the of the plagiarism, it's also in light of you know, the egalitarianism and the heresy on a website.

It's in light of all these things. It bears scrutiny. Now, if there's integrity there, then why would you worry?

the scrutiny is not a fearful thing. When you're the president or president of the the

SBC and you're you're representing pastors across the land, integrity matters.

When you're when you're up there saying the world is watching, then integrity matters. You know, yeah,

I mean, it's it's it's back to what we said, but on our show, you know, the problem right now with the

SBC is they don't have a thing of integrity matters. They don't have a thing of truth matters. They don't have a thing of of theology matters.

They're they're they're, you know, tagline right now is, you know, the narrative matters.

And I mean, here in this article from Boister, he's saying, I want to be clear. Pastors should prepare their own sermons.

But as Justin said, Lytton doesn't do that. He doesn't do that. He's on a mission. He doesn't do that.

And I might point out, not that this is the primary issue here, but but his article when he talked about he quoted

John 10, 10 and ascribed that to Satan. You know, we have an enemy that Satan comes to destroy.

You know, that's in context. That's that is not talking about Satan. It's talking about false teachers and hirelings.

But whatever. Anyway, I digress. But so never let that never let the

Bible get in the way of theology. Well, maybe I'll go ahead, but no, I was going to say

I'm thankful that what what Blosser has written here, you know, not in a vigorous way, but he he admits that pastors should be preparing their own sermons.

So he acknowledges that now he calls what Lytton did borrowing, not plagiarizing.

So we're softening sin there. I mean, it's sin. There's no question. And yet he says it's the adversary who seeks to steal.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, but but, you know,

I mean, maybe maybe, you know, Justin, what these guys need is is they need to get a good

Logos Bible software. That's that's what they need. They need to start studying the

Bible instead of the culture and they do better. And so maybe what we'll do is, hey,

Ed Lytton, if you're listening, instead of getting other guys to write your sermons, go to to bit .ly

slash SFE Logos and upgrade your Logos or get a Logos and get free books from Striving for Eternity along with the discounts that you can get there and you'd help us as we're trying to help you,

Ed Lytton, to improve your Bible knowledge. And can

I throw something else in here too? Not to pile on, but but actually this is a something we need to discuss in a way in a way

I feel a little bad badly to be grammatically correct for Ed Lytton because he's the one that's taking all of the the heat and the scrutiny right now.

But here's the thing. Plagiarism is a cottage industry in the

Southern Baptist Convention. Yeah, it is. It is rampant. Not only is it rampant, it is not only is it overlooked, it's promoted in the

SBC. Go to Rick Warren's website right now. What is it like to be a

He has all of his sermons available, complete with outline,

PowerPoint slides, full manuscript that you can get. He encourages pastors to preach his stuff.

And you can get them for, I don't know, five, ten whatever dollars per sermon download.

Same thing with Ed Young Jr. Go to his website right now. Same thing there.

Same thing with James Merritt, former president of SBC. Here you have some of the largest churches in the

SBC. And they are openly promoting this.

Thousands upon thousands of pastors, SBC and otherwise, are going to these websites, paying for these sermons, downloading them, printing out the outline and manuscript and getting up on Sunday morning and doing exactly what

Ed Linton does. I feel badly for Ed Linton because he's taking all the heat. The fact of the matter is this is the worst kept secret in the

SBC. And this unfortunately is very common. Bud and I addressed that as well on the previous podcast we dealt with the

SBC. In the little bit of time we have left, I would like to talk about this article that Bud has written.

Bud has an interesting take. I think this is something that is very interesting.

For folks who haven't gone out and read it yet, it's called the

SBC's wrong brand of black man. I will have that linked in the show notes as well.

The reason this is so interesting is the fact that let's set up the scenario. We were talking about this before we started recording.

I know you used to be in SBC. I never have been. Is there a way to get rid of a president?

I don't know of that. I don't think any of us here did. There is a scenario of who takes over.

If Ed Lytton was to step down, who would take over? You were looking at the bylaws on this.

If Ed Lytton steps down, who takes over? They elect a first and second vice president.

If the president has to go away or resigns, the first moves up to the presidency.

I don't know if they replace those two until the next convention. There is a succession in there.

If Ed Lytton was to step down, who would take his place?

A gentleman named Dr. Lee Brand, who is a dean and vice president of mid -America theological seminary in Memphis and a former pastor.

I think he has been a pastor for 18 years. Lee Brand. Let's follow some trends you have in your article.

There are some in the SBC, those that would be what we call woke. They are asleep.

They haven't woken up to the truth of the Bible yet. You have a video of one said individual that says that we should, if we are going to be properly woke, we should be looking to have people of color taking over positions that would be, you know, where blacks should get that position.

Let's play that clip real quick. Let me just play that. Here it is.

White Christians need to learn, above all things, I think, to be good listeners.

Over the last several years, I have tried to help build a culture for racial reconciliation and kingdom diversity, which is a core value of Southeastern Seminary.

I have come to understand more and more that my perspective is not the perspective of my

African American brothers and sisters or my Hispanic brothers and sisters, my Asian brothers and sisters.

They really do see life differently. They are operating out of a different paradigm, a different context that is very different than mine.

I didn't realize that until I stopped talking and began to listen.

One of the things that white evangelicals have to do is become better listeners. In addition to that, we have to be willing to surrender power, which is, again, not indigenous to our nature.

As I often say, not only do we need to invite ethnic minorities into our room and to have a seat at the table, we even need to be willing to surrender leadership at the table if we're really going to make progress and really help our brothers and sisters understand we see them on an equal playing with ourselves.

Okay, so according to that, we would rightfully say that, you know, hey, here you have, as I think you put in your article, kill two birds with one stone, right?

They could appeal to the conservatives saying we're going to take plagiarism serious and they could appeal to the woke and say we're putting a black man into the position as president.

Now, I don't know if they've ever had a black SBC president before. But according to Danny Akin, this would be something he should be praising because this would be stepping down and giving that position to a black man.

Why are they not doing that? Why do you think, bud? Well, this particular black man is not woke.

This guy is anti -CRT. So he does not fit the narrative. So he's not really black.

He must be a white supremacist. That's how they define white supremacy, right?

If you're not woke. Yeah. So, yeah. And that's what I kind of postulated in this article is, look, you've got an opportunity to be biblically obedient.

You've got an admitted morally compromised man in Ed Litton who is admitted to plagiarism and lying and fabric.

There's just a multitude of resources out there about what this guy's done. But he's morally compromised. Okay, we've got to get rid of him.

We can do the biblically obedient thing and discipline him in whatever mechanism the SBC could do it. And in his place, bring, oh, wow, a black man.

It's like a perfect storm. It's like God could have arranged this or something. And yet they won't do either one of those things because the black man in question who would be in succession is not woke.

He's not playing the game that they're playing with the racism card. In fact, what

I've been seeing from some of those that are supporting Litton through this is they're arguing that the only reason that conservatives are really going after Litton is because they're trying to get a more conservative guy to take

Litton's place. They're trying to get rid of Litton to get the conservative guy in there. I've always said this.

People will tell you how they think, and these supporters of Litton are telling you exactly how they think. It's exactly what they did with these

Russell Moore letters that were leaked. It was a game of gamesmanship to try to get Stone out.

That's the game they play. That's why they think everyone else is going to play the same game they play. This guy was endorsed by the conservative

Baptist network. That's another strike against him, his anti -CRT, and he was on the conservative side.

That network endorsed him. Yeah. This is where I do think it shows that the woke aren't really woke.

Woke is not about the color of the skin or what they claim they're about. They're about the political agenda.

Justin, you and Jim Osmond on your show and when we were on Apologetics Live had some strong views about churches in the

SBC. This is the thing that I see is that it really almost doesn't matter who is the president because it seems like there's so much rot in the

SBC throughout. Kofi had said this on Apologetics Live that we had done with him and he asked this question.

I think it's an excellent question. What are you going to spend your time on? If you listened to the last episode,

I hope you shared that with a lot of people. You have to know that this government that we now have is targeting us as Christians.

I have to say to pastors out there, where are you going to spend your time? Are you going to spend your time fighting for the people in your congregation that they're well -equipped and prepared for the persecution to come?

They're out evangelizing the lost in this world where everybody is in a fear.

They're in great fear of a virus that won't kill them or they're in great fear of socialism taking over and we're the only ones with an answer.

The Bible has an answer to this. Are we going to spend the time trying to save a losing battle?

Are we going to try to save the SBC and spend how much time and energy to turn that ship?

Justin, you and Jim had an excellent idea for a strategy of making a statement for churches if they're going to leave the

SBC in such a way to make a clear statement rather than just leaving one by one.

Yeah. Yeah. And I'm sorry. Did I interrupt you? Go for it. I want you to go over that.

Okay. So Jim and I were talking and he said what needs to happen is not just a slow church by church here and there trickle out of the

SBC. By the way, that is already happening. I just preached a couple weeks ago at a church that is leaving the

SBC after this past convention they're discussing. That was before all the plagiarism came out. He said all the churches that have had enough and it is a matter of conscience that they have now realized the time has come to get out of the

SBC. They need to get together and write a formal declaration of independence and choose a date that the

SBC came into existence which I think was May the 12th, 1845.

So pick that date for next year and say this is going to be our exit. This is going to be the

Brexit, if you will, the baddest exit. The Brexit. Or Begxit or however you want to call it.

Spezic. Spexit. And just so I have this well -crafted document manifesto and all at once on that date next year, all at once, all these churches, maybe hundreds if not thousands of them, leave.

And that would make a huge, huge statement. Yeah, I think that that would be a thing, especially if they're saying on this date, that way, hey, like we realized we're going to lose a lot of the

Southern Baptists and the churches and all that money. And the reality,

I don't think they would care. I think the SBC elite would say, good riddance, now we have control.

Now we don't have to deal with it. I think your rank and file

SBC person sitting in the pew, they're not woke. I don't think most of them are, but certainly the powers that be are, the leadership is, all the seminaries are.

Yeah, and it's, I think it's, I think what we're seeing, honestly, and I say this as someone who used to be

SBC, please understand, I'm not now, but I used to be. I think it is painfully obvious that the

SBC is not headed for the judgment of God. It is already underneath the judgment of God.

God is judging the SBC. The ship is going down and God is the one who's sinking it.

I really believe that. And I take no joy in that. I'm not gloating here. I don't have a dog in the fight.

You know, I'm not SBC. I'm not going to the conventions, but I mean, just in looking at it and what you see going on with the top of the top echelon in the

SBC, engaging in plagiarism, espousing horrific theology that a first year

Bible college student would be able to rip apart in his sleep. Uh, you're seeing, uh, female preachers and all of this stuff and softening on homosexuality it's under the judgment of God and God is sinking the ship.

So why I know there's good guys in the SBC. There are, there's good churches in the SBC summit, good pastors.

And some of them are my personal friends, but why hold on to a ship that God himself is sinking?

Don't, don't be drugged down with it. Let it go. That's, that's where I am on it.

Yeah. And I mean, I understand the argument some have for trying to, trying to right the ship, but I would rather see everyone just say,

Hey, let's, let's pull all these guys out of these seminaries and put them into conservative ones and just why, why bother with the battle, just start training them.

Right. I mean, the reality is, I think, I think that this ship sunk under the, the leadership of, you know, the

Mueller's endeavors and these guys who just, they wouldn't stand up to their own

SBC people. That's the reality. They, they, I think that's where, you know, they stood up to him when they wanted to get control.

But once they had the control, they went with the 11th commandment. Thou shall not speak against an

SBC. You know, and in fact of the matter is let's face reality. Denominations are purely a man -made construct.

Amen. There's nothing in the Bible about denominations. That is purely a man -made construct.

God does not need the SBC or any other denomination for that matter, to build his church.

This is, this denominations are foreign to scripture. They're completely man -made and as such, given enough time, they all go this direction, every single one of them.

You know, I remember talking to my seminary professor once and about this subject, because, you know, we were always independent and I asked him, you know, it seems like denominations always go that way.

Very interesting take he had. He was in light of also discussing, you know, there's some excellent commentaries that I have on my shelf, written by liberals, people that aren't saved, they do excellent work with original language and textual work.

And we're discussing this. And his answer was that pastors, real genuine pastors have a heart for people.

They want a shepherd. They want a disciple. And so their whole mindset is to study the word of God, to teach the word of God, to disciple the people of God.

That's their focus. But see, the guys that get into ministry as a career, they really don't care about the people.

So they'll get into studying languages or getting into denominations where they can rise up the political ranks and make some big money.

And so he was saying that the reason this always keeps happening is the guys that really don't care about the truth are the ones that get into the denominations a lot of times, because they're more in it for the politics of it, rather than the truth of it, where the pastor, the local church pastor is concerned about the truth and the people learning the truth.

And so I think that's a lot of that is why that plays into it. So, you're right, denominations are not biblical.

We will have some announcements of something coming up that won't be a denomination, but gives some benefits.

There are benefits of being in a denomination. I see that even as an independent person that's non -denominational.

There are benefits of a denomination in the sense that, hey, if you have a pastor there's some means of going over his head if you need to, to bring other people in to resolve issues.

Legally, I could see the issue that there's benefit if the government starts making laws against the denominations, pull together resources to kind of fight that stuff, okay,

I can see all that. But it shouldn't interfere with the fact that you got to give money to support things that go against what scripture says, which is really what's happening with the

SBC, as they're going woke, they're starting to promote things that are against the Bible. And you got to support that with your money.

And I know that there's those that are saying, well, we can support the missionaries and then still fight, and we're not supporting the general cause.

Yeah, that could be, but overall you're still giving that support. So I like the idea that you guys have come up with, give a certain day and everyone just signed on to say, we're all leaving on this day, and that's going to That was from the, that was from the mind of Jim Osmond.

I can't take credit for that. So, but, uh, Oh, you don't want to stigmatize that? Yeah, no problem.

Not especially given what we're talking about. All right.

Well, That would backfire rather quickly, wouldn't it? Justin, it's always great having you on, a lot of wisdom you have, anything you got coming up anytime recently.

I know for folks that want to, they should be downloading and following your Didache podcast, just on any podcast app, search for Justin Peters, in case you don't know how to spell

Didache. I mean, but you know, this guy is so creative with the name of his ministry.

You know, rattles ideas for a name of ministry, let's call it Justin Peters Ministries.

So he comes up with, and I said, look, you can't call this the Justin Peters podcast, you got to come up with a name.

He could have called Ed Linton's 18, you know, 18, and gotten some creative ideas, but no, it works.

But so what does he do? He says, Oh, let me come up with something that's Greek. Like how many people, you know, spell

Greek, you know? Okay. But Didache is the name of his podcast. Now, at least you won't forget it, but, uh, you can always search for Justin Peters.

It's the Didache podcast. Uh, comes, you're coming out almost weekly with, with stuff. Yeah. I should have another one up here and just, uh, possibly today, but maybe tomorrow.

Yeah. So what else is, what else you got coming up? Um, I'm headed to, uh,

Lakewood Bible chapel, which is kind of like a suburb of, uh, Denver. Uh, not this

Sunday or not this weekend, rather, but next weekend, Friday through Sunday, July, whatever that is, the, uh, what's that going to be?

I don't know. I'm not good at math, but, uh, so not this weekend, but next weekend. And, um, yeah, several, several things coming up.

My preaching schedules on my website. I'm going to have a revised edition, a second edition.

I should say of my book. Do not hinder them coming out, uh, soon Lord willing.

I should have an updated version of my clouds without water seminar coming out. So lots of stuff.

Yeah. When you said Lakewood, you got me nervous there. Although I would love to see a preacher differently. Church, I would not give for 10 minutes with a microphone at Lakewood church to Texas.

Beth Moore has one up on me there because she's actually preached at Lakewood church. So yeah, she's probably been invited back in.

I don't think you would be. So with that, uh, let me, let me just let folks know that, uh, on July 12th.

That, uh, coming, coming up that this week, uh, it'll be Monday night at seven o 'clock, uh, we have a

Logos seminar, uh, taking the Bible seriously with Andrew Rappaport is the title, but it's mostly going to be a

Logos, Logos trainer. He's going to show people how to use Logos. And even if you have

Logos, so this is for Bud and Justin, you guys have Logos, but what you need to do right now is start figuring out what things you want to buy, because if you attend the event and for some time afterwards, you can earn up to 20 % off on every sale.

And so, but you do have to register. I'll have the link in the show notes, the Everbright, uh, link, and we'll, we'll have it up on the,

I'm sure we'll have it up on the website as well. Uh, and I think that's good for a couple of days. I think like two days after the event that you can put your list together and start, uh, getting what you want to get.

So I do encourage folks to take the Bible seriously, sign up for that, uh, register for that.

And, uh, we look forward to seeing you there so you can, uh, really start to getting a better handle on your

Bible so that you don't have to be well, like Ed Litton and well,

Bud, that's a wrap. Yeah. This podcast is part of the Striving for Eternity ministry.