John MacArthur's Lavish Lifestyle? An Interview With Phil Johnson

Justin Peters

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Hello, ladies and gentlemen, my name is Justin Peters. I hope that you and your family are doing well today

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I want to thank you very much for watching this video and I do apologize for the rather drab surroundings here

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But I'm recording this in a hotel room in Columbia, South Carolina I'm preaching at Covenant Baptist Church just outside of Columbia pastored by Charles Swan if you happen to be living in this neck of the woods and Are looking for a good doctrinally sound

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Church to call your church home I would highly commend it to you. Very very good church.

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Very doctrinally sound and Pastor Charles It's just a wonderful great great guy So on to the subject matter at hand in the last several weeks there has been a lot of discussion online

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About John MacArthur's wealth and this is largely Resultant from a from an article that Julie Royce wrote and in this article she portrays

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John MacArthur's lifestyle as one of opulence and she said it's really no different between there's no difference between John MacArthur's lifestyle and the lifestyle of the prosperity preachers whom he

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Criticizes and other well -known and vocal critics of John MacArthur have taken this and run with it and they're plastering it all over social media and calling

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John MacArthur a Hypocrite and all of that kind of stuff. And and so I saw all this and I thought, you know

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I'm just gonna I'm gonna contact Phil Johnson and see if he would like to discuss some of these things

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And so I did and he was he was actually very eager to do so He said yeah, absolutely.

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And so I'm gonna ask him about all this stuff in the article I'm gonna ask him if these things are true or if they are

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Distortions and I tell you I learned a lot just in doing this interview with Phil I did not have any question about John MacArthur's character or integrity

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But I think when when by the end of this interview, I really want

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Proverbs 1817 to ring loudly in your mind in your heart in your mind the first to plead his case seems right until Another comes along and examines him

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So Phil's gonna shed a lot of light on these issues and we're not only gonna talk about, you know,

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John MacArthur's supposed lavish lifestyle and Nepotism and board members, you know, his board is stacked with family members and all that kind of stuff

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I'm also gonna ask him about the mark of the beast that's a another thing that I get frequently asked about and and also the

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Issue over whether or not he was really in Memphis, Tennessee when

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Martin Luther King was assassinated and that Controversy that sprung up a couple years ago now and so so we're gonna cover a lot of territory here

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And I think you will find this interview very helpful. So I know that I did Alright dear ones without any further delay.

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Here is Phil Johnson Phil brother thank you so very much for joining me for this interview and I really appreciate you taking your time and I'm doing this just to to give you an opportunity to answer some of these questions that have been floating out there that largely come from a recent article by Julie Roy's in which she alleges that MacArthur John MacArthur is paid this exorbitant salary

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Because from his part -time work at GTY and then that's in addition to What he earns from the church or the

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Master's Seminary, of course, he's not in the he's no longer the president that but And the gist of our article is that even though John MacArthur undeniably?

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teaches against the prosperity message that his lifestyle is pretty much one in the same with the prosperity preachers, so You know this article has been picked up by a number of John's Critics and things like that.

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So take it away Phil. What would you have to say some to some of what she alleges? yeah, first of all,

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I have deliberately not answered these questions online because I don't want to drag out a

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Bunch of questions that actually better would have been directed specifically to our ministry by individuals who who really have a legitimate reason for asking when when these questions came in from someone, you know pretending to be a

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Investigative reporter who already had a long track record of trying to torpedo

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John MacArthur's reputation I refuse to answer him and I'm not gonna give her publicity

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By responding to you know people who who are championing her cause or going along with that or whatever

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I'm happy to answer the questions and for you. I'll even answer them on a podcast So I appreciate but as to the as to the question you raised about John MacArthur's lifestyle

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I think it's significant and notable that no one who actually knows him and no one who has ever been to his house or or Spent time with him on any significant level.

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No one has ever accused him of living a lavish millionaires lifestyle I think that was one of the criticisms that came from a

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Video that that you had Encouraged me to watch just because he is so bizarre and over -the -top.

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This guy was exaggerating everything he'd read in Some of the online articles and and that was the terminology.

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He used at John MacArthur lives a lavish millionaires lifestyle And just for fun if you don't mind

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Phil tell me what you tell us what you just told me about What he said about Austin Duncan How about he's trying to prove that That nepotism is a rife problem at Grace Church that all you know, lots of people

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Hire their kids on the staff at Grace Church Here's where it starts getting interesting pay attention a family affair the nepotism you need to understand in the mega church world is

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It's almost unheard of That there isn't nepotism. Let's put it that way The pastor's children are employed by the church and they're usually in a

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Prominent position. They're usually waiting to take over the reins It happens at Grace Community Church, not only with John MacArthur sons, but with friends of his

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Every word of what you just said was wrong

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The truth is not one of John MacArthur's kids is on staff at Grace Church not one

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The truth is not one of John MacArthur's kids is on staff at Grace Church.

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Not one and The example he gave was that Another example, he gave

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John even hires his friends kids Austin Duncan is the son of Ligon Duncan I believe

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Austin Duncan is an elder there and his father is Ligon Duncan a longtime friend of John MacArthur It's a family affair and it's a if you're friends, you're gonna be

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Promoted and Into some high position. Well, that's that's the most bizarre accusation

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I've ever heard as far as I know Austin Duncan is not at all related to Ligon Duncan I know

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Ligon Duncan well enough to know that if anybody accused him of that he would he would disown Austin Yeah, I'm kidding about that of course, but they're not related yeah

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Well, yeah, it goes to some of the shoddy Reporting and just carelessness with with these facts.

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So yeah, yeah, there's a it seems to be a motive to exaggerate and make it sound as bad as possible this guy listed a bunch of my misdeeds and and Each time he he mentioned it he would say and there may be even more

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I don't know, you know, or maybe he's done something illegal In fact, he seemed to have this was a stained theme in his video that he he seemed to believe that I'm guilty of some felony and that The the feds are on my tail

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It's only a matter of time till I get arrested for some crime or corruption that I'm guilty of It's that sort of rhetoric that I don't need to answer and I actually literally have a policy of Generally not paying attention to it sometimes

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You know my flesh gets the better of me and I'll fire off a Tweet in response and it always reminds me not to do that because then all the all these angry critics crawl out like little cockroaches and and see what they can do the other night they were

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They there was this sustained campaign of about I don't know eight or nine people

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Who were wanting to say that Grace Church is trying to cover something up Because no announcement about the postponement of our

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Shepherds conference was made on the on last year's Shepherds conference

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Twitter feed. It's a Twitter feed that I think has had three posts made to it since last year's conference was over Nobody's keeping it up But because the announcement of the cancellation which went viral on Friday But it wasn't it wasn't noted on that one

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Twitter account And when I point it out, that's a dead Twitter account hasn't been posted on, you know since last

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October, I think All these people angrily said no you're trying to cover something up and they were just certain that something

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Untoward is going on and it's that sort of Cynical purposeful skepticism that I just refused to Keep answering acknowledging and whatever.

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I'm happy to point it out for you But I'm not gonna I'm not gonna play

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Ping -pong back and forth with people who have that kind of motive so right.

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Yeah One of the points in the article Phil was that And I've heard you address this but so all of our listeners can see it and viewers this first edition

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King James Bible that was given to MacArthur and this you know valued at I don't even know how much couple hundred thousand dollars or Something like that and that's evidence of John MacArthur's greed and lavish lifestyle.

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What would you what would you say to that point? Well, he's not very he's not a very good Miser if greed is his motive motivation because he turned around and gave it away.

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He put it in the seminary's rare book collection and Somebody somebody saw that and said yeah, but he took a tax deduction for that.

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Yeah Well, he deducted the amount that he was charged for the gift in the first place Because that's right you give someone a gift like that.

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They have to report it on their taxes So it was a wash. Nobody made any money on it, but it adds a rare an important Bible to the seminary's collection, so Now the people who actually donated the money for it.

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I had no complaint about it. That's that's what they wanted to do. So so you did it and you know that shows up on a on the 990 for that year and Muckrakers pull that out and try to make it sound like something really awful is going on, but I'd like to point out that you know every five years or so.

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We we have some kind of celebration for the For the milestone that John MacArthur has reached.

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He's been at Grace Church for 52 years and that is extremely rare these days, and I don't know of another pastor in the past 200 years that has

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Been at the same pulpit for that long and preached through every single verse in the New Testament produced a commentary on every single verse in the

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New Testament and We don't send him on luxury vacations or or you know buy him the luxury items or anything like that give him a rare Bible, and he gives it away and People treat that as if that's proof that he is a greed monger

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I just think that the fact that someone wants to make that into an evil deed

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Just shows that their motives can't possibly be pure what what possible good could come out of trying to trying to basically ruin the reputation and disqualify someone who's been faithfully in the same ministry for 52 years has never had a taint of Scandal attached to his name, and now you have to drum up an artificial scandal

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Why so that some woman can feel like she's you know bumped off her next victim

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Yeah It's it's irritating. Yeah no doubt and I'm often accused of being

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I think to use This gentleman's name which I won't name him because I don't want to drive any traffic to him

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But the same one that said that Austin Duncan is Ligon Duncan's son You know he often calls me a sycophant for for John MacArthur And there's a big difference between being a sycophant and in being appreciative

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Of a man's ministry who and Phil I've told you this before, but I've by God's grace

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I've preached all around the world And I have yet to go anywhere where I do not see the impact of the good fruit that is being born from MacArthur's ministry and grace to you and grace community church in general

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Yeah, I think most people know that Justin's another reason I don't feel compelled to answer every single nasty tweet that people at me with Right, I think you know scriptures pretty clear that you know a teacher by his fruits

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And I don't see how anyone can gain say the actual fruit of John MacArthur's ministry

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So or why they would want to even but right you there you have it

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And I would encourage anybody to look at the fruit. That's born from John MacArthur's ministry and compare that to the

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Fruit or lack thereof to a lot of his critics, and there's no comparison not at all yeah but speaking of scandal some of these folks that are attacking

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MacArthur have tried to draw comparisons between The board at grace to you and the board of Ravi Zacharias international ministries and so Speak to that for us.

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What would you yeah? I mean, that's a really unsavory thing to do while Ravi's ministry is in in the news for Apparently a lot of secret sexual sins that have come out

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I I've commented on Ravi before mainly to say I don't follow his ministry I didn't

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I didn't particularly appreciate his approach to apologetics I always thought he was Too heavy on philosophy and and not into the word enough in the way.

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He did apologetics, so We never had any kind of partnership with him as far as I know

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John MacArthur never Endorsed any of his books or anything about it. There was no hostility there, but we just didn't intersect because We are philosophies of ministry really pointed in different directions but as these charges against him come out and and and it seems like they are more than charges that there's ample evidence there at least to say he's not above reproach and in an area that It involves you know these sexual abuse of women and all of that to try to draw some tenuous connection between that and John MacArthur because of the fact that one of John's sons is on our board again

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That's that's somebody reaching for a scandal that frankly isn't there and it's the sort of thing that Really people ought to be ashamed to even pay any heed to the facts of our board are there is one family member on the greatest you board

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John's eldest son and and John himself And we want to keep it that way for the simple fact that John at age 80 is probably not going to be here in 30 years and So we want the future of grace to you, which is uniquely

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The ministry of John MacArthur it's we exist in our purpose statement it even says this exists to expand the scope of John MacArthur's teaching ministry through various means of mass media and John's teaching because of how it is

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He doesn't exegete pop culture or or make references to current news events things like that He just opens the word and teaches and because of that his ministry is timeless in the sense that you can listen to a

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John MacArthur tape from 1973 and it's just as relevant today as it was then which means in all likelihood

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It's going to be just as powerful and just as relevant in another 40 years so We expect to continue to broadcast and distribute

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John MacArthur's teaching long after I'm gone from the scene And we want to make sure that someone in John's family who has the family's best interests at heart

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Still has a hand in the ministry. I think the worst thing it could happen would be What has happened to other?

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Legacy ministries ministries that were on the radio for 40 50 years But when their key figure passed on and they replaced him with somebody else

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The new people changed the whole character and thrust of the ministry and we don't want that to happen with grace to you

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So we have we have made it a point to keep at least one member of John's family on the board at all times at one point two of his sons were on the board mark and Matt right now.

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It's Matt and We tend to keep it that way. We are our board is consists of mostly disinterested parties meaning not that they're uninterested, but they have no

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Personal interest in any of the finances or whatever at grace to you I'm not a disinterested person because I'm an employee

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Matt's not a disinterested person because he's related to John, but the rest of our board members are

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Businessmen and church leaders from elsewhere or who have no vested interest in Grace to you and and they make the financial decisions that govern things like my salary

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I have a son who works here and they even set his salary. I don't have a voice in that The same thing is true with anyone who's related to John So we follow all of those guidelines that are set up by the

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ECFA and we follow them faithfully all the way down so We're as accountable as we can reasonably be

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I'm not going to send out a list of all of our employees salaries So but other than that our financial reports are available to any donor who asks for them

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I'm not going to put them on Twitter and I'm not going to give them to an investigative reporter but if a person is a has a legitimate interest in Seeing the financial reports of Grace to you they can write to us and we'll send it to them, but I should say also

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I think common sense ought to tell people that That is the appropriate way to ask these sorts of questions

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If you have even a even a nagging concern, maybe it's really even none of your business

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But okay You you wonder or you're thinking of donating to a ministry and you want to find out

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The character of the ministry the proper way to ask that question is to write to them for their information

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Right and see what they send you and if it's if it's trustworthy and reliable questions answered stirring up a controversy with innuendo and Suppositions on Twitter or in a so -called investigative news article that that's making

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Speculations about people's salaries and things like that. That's totally inappropriate and and you know

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The reason I refuse to respond to it is I don't think it deserves the sort of respect that would get a response

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Right indeed. I was really glad you said that about John's oldest son on the board and his his role there

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I think that's very very helpful and and makes perfect sense. And so just in listening to you

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This is really a Proverbs 18 17 kind of a thing. Yeah Let me say one other thing about that too

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Because if you look at the list of our officers He's the treasurer and has been for a while is a simple reason for that and it has to do with geography

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He's the one who's close by who can sign checks and do things like that when it needs to be done and so he serves as a treasurer, which would be a

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Logistical nightmare if one of our board members from say Atlanta was our treasurer

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Getting things signed in a timely way would be a pretty difficult thing. So but nothing is done secretly nothing nothing people in the office do is hidden from the board and nothing the board does that needs to be made public is

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Secret even from our donors. So yeah And the same kind of dynamic is at work with Corey Welch because I know that was another point in the article

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Corey is John's son -in -law That's right. I should address that too because that comes up a lot. He he has a video production company located not far from here

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I've never actually been to his office. So I don't know exactly how far away is but he's in the neighborhood here

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And of course, he's John's son -in -law. And so he was one of the people who bid we took bids on And we we review these on a semi regular basis not every year

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But frequently we'll review the costs and take bids for the video work that we do

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Television is a sort of recent addition to our ministry. We decided to go on television because NRB TV Started a channel on DirecTV and offered us time at no cost and it was

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Ligon Duncan's brother actually who worked for Ligonier at the time Who came out to meet with me and said you you need to be on television grace to you needs to be on television

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I said, you know, we don't even videotape John and he was like shame on you, you know And I know what he meant because it has always irritated me that nobody thought to ever

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To record Charles Spurgeon's voice We don't have a single recording of what

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Spurgeon sounded like because nobody thought to do it although the technology existed there are tapes of There's a there's a famous recording of DL Moody reading the

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Beatitudes. It's fascinating to listen to it's full of static and stuff like that but nobody did that with Spurgeon and what a loss to history and and I thought you know people are gonna be cursing me in Perpetuity if we don't get as much of John on video as possible.

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So about a decade ago I don't remember the exact year, but it's been probably more than a decade.

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Maybe even as much as 15 years ago. We started videotaping every time John spoke at Grace Church and at first we tried to do it in -house we bought

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Equipment and Corey was the one we hired at the time He was a salaried employee on our staff to do video after a year or two.

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We we decided no, we're gonna bid the Contract out and use an outside company and Corey had started a video production doing it on the side so he said can

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I bid for the contract as well and we said of course so he did and his bid was competitive and The added value.

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I mean he does great work and the video quality of things we produce you can see for yourself but The great advantage to using

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Corey is he can get John to videotape special things

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At a drop of a hat whereas John, you know He's gonna say no if some Hollywood producer calls him up and say

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I need you to come down here and sit for a three -hour video thing video is very frustrating to do as you know, you have to a lot of setup and lighting and right stuff like that and It's it can be a waste of time but if Corey calls

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John and says, yeah, we need this special video Because he's a son -in -law He has a lot more pull with John even than I would getting him to do a lot of bit

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So it's much more convenient. The quality is good and so on so we pay Corey's company do it now

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He has a lot of overhead with equipment and personnel. He doesn't videotape and edit everything himself

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He has a staff to pay so the the amount of the contract does sound

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Exorbitant if you think that's a salary that we pay directly to Corey, but it isn't it's a it's a fee paid to his company

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And then he has to support his overhead and we we review that frequently. We've we've done analyses over the years

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It's cheaper for us to contract that out to a company than it would be to try to maintain our own staff and video equipment in -house

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Yeah, he can do work on the side which evens out the cost of his Overhead whereas all we're gonna do is

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John MacArthur and it makes everything we do if we do it in -house that much more expensive

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So that's the reason for all of that. All of that is a matter of public record The board approves that contract

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John MacArthur himself is not Involved in the setting of the price or the even the approval of whose contract we take

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Yeah, so when we bid it out, you know, we could conceivably Choose another company, but I don't foresee us doing that because what we're doing right now is economical and it works well

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So that's why we do what we do. Yeah, I mean there's a lot of intrinsic value just in having that real close relationship between Corey and John and in convenience and all of that.

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So it's right and an aside to that Corey He's a very blessed man.

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He married The most creative member of the MacArthur family and his wife does a lot of the artwork for us as well

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So, okay. So it's all yeah, it's all in the family and it's all in -house, but we get a good product

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I mean if anybody wants to Complain about it then point out what's wrong with the product point, you know, try to prove that we're not getting our money's worth

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And I dare you to do that and it's it's just not the fact So to try to make that into something

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Unsavory is it to my view just reflects a motive that is totally evil and probably rooted in bitterness and particularly when it comes from someone who has a very long record of Trying to discredit

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John MacArthur's reputation. Yeah, right. I don't feel we owe a person like that Answers No hard to blame you hard to blame you on that Just a minute ago

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Phil you mentioned briefly the Evangelical Council of Financial Accountability Accountability, that's the

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ECFA and that's something with which I'm familiar because it's it's a it's an organization that Bears some provide some accountability for Evangelical ministries of various stripes and rather famously back in 2008 -2009

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There were some investigations Congressional investigations into some of these more prominent prosperity preachers like Paula White and Kenneth Copeland and Creflo Dollar undoubtedly most aptly named of the prosperity preachers

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Creflo Dollar, but Famously, they are not members of the ECFA and much was made in Miss Roy's article about how grace to you has withdrawn from the

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ECFA as well. And so Prosperity preachers aren't a part of it grace to use not a part of it.

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So there's got to be some a common thread there Right. Yeah, actually that's wrong.

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Grace to you is a member of ECFA. It was the church that withdrew their membership Oh the church and we are we are separate organizations

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I I felt like the article that she wrote deliberately tried to blur the

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Distinctions between the organizations involved. We're not the same as the Masters University and seminary.

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We're totally different organization Right and the church is a totally different organization as well. Grace to you wasn't always separate from the church

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But in the mid 1980s, we spun off and became a separate organization That confused her in that article as well too because I had made the comment that for the first 30 years of this ministry

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John MacArthur got paid nothing and She wanted to dispute the actually she accused me of not telling the truth because she found the year

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We incorporated as a separate organization and she wants to count that as the beginning of our ministry But actually the ministry began the first year

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John was at Grace Community Church 1969 when volunteers began making copies and distributing

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John's tapes and And they elders decided to sell the tapes so that they weren't losing money on the proposition they sold the tapes

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I wasn't here at the time So I'm operating from memory, but I think it was about a dollar a cassette Actually, I think at first they set the price higher and realized they were making money

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And so they dropped it to a dollar and when I came to Grace to you in 1983

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The price of tapes was about a dollar one dollar per cassette and in the in the original

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Decision to charge for those tapes when the ministry was part of the church Some of the elders wanted to pay

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John a royalty for the tapes that they sold ten cents a tape or something like that and That's that's the amount

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I've heard ten cents a tape which sounds like not much But when you're selling, you know, ten million tapes

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That's a million dollars. Yeah that he he for he he decided to forego right away

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He said I don't need money for my tapes. Y 'all pay me a salary I don't want it. You just distribute the tapes and keep them as cheap as possible and they did that And he didn't get any money from the sale of his tapes or the work of Grace to you either when we were a division of the church or when we became a separate organization and That went on for 30 years

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Millions of tapes and he used to laughingly make the comment that maybe he should revisit that decision but And he could have but never did yeah, not and I mean that his goal is to to get the sermons out there and Nothing ever made him happier

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Than when we the staff here at Grace to you without without his consent actually made the decision to To make when we'd gone to mp3s and people could download them over the

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Internet in in 19 Wait a minute. No in 2008.

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It was it was the year of Obama's first election I remember because it was the day after election day when

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Obama was Chosen as the president That's when we said look we're gonna stop charging for mp3 downloads

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You can download any of these as many of them as you want for free. Hmm. Nothing We ever did made

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John happier than that and now we distribute, you know millions every month

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He was still getting a dime off every download, you know, he would be He would he would have more money than either you or I could figure out what to do with but whatever

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So anyway, he had gone for years without being paid at all for grace to you and The church paid him a salary there.

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There's a famous story about when John had been here about a decade the elders decided to raise his salary as pastor and he said

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I don't need a raise I don't I don't want to raise forget it spend it on missions or whatever the elders consulted amongst themselves and said

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No, the workman is worthy of his hire and we don't think you're paid enough if you don't want this money fine

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We're gonna give it to you anyway, and then we'll watch what you do with it. You want to see what you do with it?

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Let's see what your stewardship is like you you can give it to missions if you want and that's pretty much what's happened over the

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Years John is and And here's where it becomes very difficult because I can't give you details that I know about John's giving

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I don't want to rob him of his Heavenly reward. He's not gonna blow a trumpet before him when he gives but he is as many people have

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Already said in response to that hit piece that was published John is the most generous man of his stature that I've ever met or known or encountered and It's true that he gets multiple salaries because he's involved with the church grace to you and sure until recently the

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University I don't I don't know if they still pay him a salary or not over there. I just don't know they might

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But I and the only one I know because I work here is grace to you But I also happen to know what he does with that.

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Yeah, and That does not that does not line his personal pockets. That's really all

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I want to say about it, but yeah he uses that for the Lord's work and You know

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As I've said repeatedly and in fact, I I had a document where I had answered many of the questions that were sent to us that was available to the reporter who wrote the hit piece and she selectively quoted what helped her narrative and ignored the facts that didn't and one of the facts that Absolutely doesn't help that narrative that I've made over and over again that you don't evaluate a person's

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Stewardship based on how much money they make what size their salary is you evaluate?

34:59

whether they're a lover of money or not by looking at their lifestyle and I dare anybody to look at John MacArthur's lifestyle and accuse him of extravagant living yeah, he he's just not an extravagant man, but he's an extremely generous man and You know, that's really all anybody needs to know if somebody had actual facts that proved otherwise

35:22

Mm -hmm. Go ahead and publish it, but there are no facts like that. Right, right

35:28

You know I've been around John some and I've had a couple of opportunities to see his

35:33

Humility and some very unscripted things and things that have really impressed me that I've shared with you before But I don't know him all that well, not nearly as well as do you and others there but I know people who know him well and Everyone who knows him well has said exactly what you just did that.

35:53

He is a very very generous man with what right and let me also follow up on that because the gist of of that article and some of the subsequent discussion is well the proof that he's a lover of money is in the

36:07

Fact that he has three houses and and collectively they're worth Millions people keep saying

36:14

I I don't actually know The value of all of all three of his houses, but here's the story his house where he lives

36:23

Is at the other end of this valley. He has lived in that house for 40 years man, who's a lover of money and who makes

36:31

Millions as John has on book royalties Doesn't live in the same house for 40 years.

36:37

He builds a bigger one or whatever, right? John has lived in the exact same house for 40 years

36:42

That's on a piece of property that as I understand it was given to him because when he lived down in the

36:48

San Fernando Valley the most populated part of northern half of Los Angeles County Because of his profile as pastor of Grace Church There was a stalker who was threatening one of his children one of his daughters

37:03

And so someone gave him this property in a remote area There were no other houses around at the time and he built that house

37:09

I don't know how much it cost but given the fact that it was built in the late 1970s and On property that was donated to him.

37:20

I'd be very surprised if he spent much more than a hundred thousand on it So the real estate listings say it's worth a million and a half right now

37:28

I call that a good investment. It's certainly not it wasn't an extravagant expense on his part What's he supposed to do look at the value of his house and say no,

37:37

I better move into a smaller cottage Yeah, I you know, he's living the same place for 40 years.

37:42

That says something. Yeah He's preached the same church for 52 years. This is not a man who's shopping around for a more extravagant lifestyle

37:52

Yeah, the other the second house that I know that's not far from here is a sort of getaway that John goes to when he needs to be alone to Study when he needs to get away from the phone in the office and those of us who constantly are asking him to videotape and stuff

38:07

Like that for writing projects and stuff like that. He's it's I would guess 50 miles from the grace to you office

38:15

Towards Ventura another that's the next the next sizable town north of LA And that's the one that this article says it's only 11 miles from the beach

38:28

You know, I can show you homeless people that live closer to the beach than that That's that's that's not a short walk to the beach, you know

38:36

All right, and it could easily say it's a half mile from a strip mall in a 7 -eleven. It's it's

38:42

This is not a mansion. It's a in fact, I think the real estate listings on it again

38:48

I'm going from memory. So so but it's something like three bedrooms and two bathrooms. This is not This is not a luxury home, right?

38:56

in fact, I think it's a condominium, but I am not even sure about that the third one is a

39:03

Basically a cabin in the woods. It's a it's a nice cabin It's a it's got several bedrooms because John built it so that his entire family can use it as a vacation

39:13

Getaway on some property that again was given to him two acres In Colorado, and I've not been there.

39:21

I haven't seen it. I don't know I'm told that the picture that was published with the hit piece is Not a picture of the actual place.

39:28

That's not the right home the the house that shown in that picture is not John's Cabin, they keep referring to it as his ranch because I think the ownership of it is something like Circle M ranch or some

39:43

Something like that that signifies Carther family and my understanding is that it's jointly owned or or Set up so that the ownership of it will pass to jointly to his four children

39:57

And so it's it's part of his inheritance to his children. It's not again.

40:03

Not a luxury place It's a it's a once -a -year getaway and that's where John goes in the summer when he needs to get out of the state and away from Again, those of us who demand his time.

40:14

He usually spends. I don't know five to six weeks during the summer there where he catches up on his reading and and It tries to relax and spend time with his wife.

40:26

It's not an unreasonable expense and it certainly isn't a Extravagant thing.

40:32

I don't know what he makes on Book royalties. It's not as much as he's worth

40:37

Certainly, I wouldn't sure that money in exchange for him And he doesn't use it to to spend lavishly on himself

40:47

But if he wants to have a place to be able to get away get out of state with his whole family with a bedroom enough for everybody in the family then

40:56

I don't begrudge him that and I don't think it's an extravagance and To try to make it sound like he's you know shopping around for bigger mansions all the time

41:06

Is to totally misrepresent John MacArthur It's been completely unfair to him and those who follow his teaching.

41:13

I think generally know is another reason that I haven't felt obliged to answer every question that's thrown at me on Twitter, but because I think people who

41:24

Listen to John teach and have listened for years in many cases that they know how deeply he gets into scripture

41:30

They know that this is not a man who's spending his spare time only on leisure or Living an extravagant lifestyle because he's in it for himself

41:42

That's as far from John MacArthur as anything. I know Yeah, indeed indeed

41:48

Thank you for that Phil that's that's really helpful That sheds a lot of light and it's again

41:54

Proverbs 18 17 the first to plead his case seems, right I mean the way this all of this has been presented boys makes it makes a really compelling argument the first to plead his

42:04

I don't know I said, I don't answer the tweets, but I do read some of them and the one that's

42:10

Stuck out at me is the the most hypocritical Was a guy who

42:16

I don't know and I've never interacted with him on Twitter But his his little picture is a picture of his own

42:23

Recreational boat. It's a very expensive Chris Chris craft and You know, he he in his profile

42:31

It says something about his boating hobby and all of that and he's he's scolding John MacArthur for his extravagance

42:38

And I'm thinking you know as far as I know John doesn't own But I think the only recreational

42:44

Vehicle he has is a push mower And this guy this guy with an expensive wooden boat is scolding

42:53

John for his lavish lifestyle It's just so full of hypocrisy. Not only that the woman who who wrote the hit piece

43:01

If you if you do the math on her house, look it up on the real estate figures.

43:06

It is public knowledge Her house is is within a hundred square feet at the same size as John's same numbers same number of bedrooms and bathrooms as John's house

43:20

So, I don't I don't really know what the burr under her saddle is about but yeah go yeah and and speaking of that with her house being within a hundred square feet and public knowledge that Did you docks her docks is not even a term.

43:37

I even knew the meaning of until about a year ago, but did What's the skinny on that? Yeah, apparently

43:43

I did. I mean and I'm sorry for that clumsiness or whatever, but I It's a kind of a long story she had written me she had actually written someone in our ministry a list of questions about a year ago and He passed it on to me because he was too busy to do it.

43:58

And so I began to answer her questions They were questions about finances and grace to you and stuff like that I actually have the written sheet that I've written all her answers and then she sent another

44:10

Sort of accusatory one of her one of her hallmarks is she'll send a list of questions and say

44:17

I need your answers By, you know noon tomorrow because I'm gonna go to print with this with this story which

44:24

I don't respond well to blackmail and that's when I Wrote back to her and said look

44:29

I had prepared an answer to all your questions But now I've looked you up online

44:35

I see that all you've ever written about John MacArthur has been an attempt to discredit him And so I'm not going to answer your questions and furthermore

44:42

Nobody else from our ministry is ever going to answer any questions. You have don't bother sending questions like these again

44:48

You're gonna write a story you just go ahead and do it but if you're a real investigative reporter, you ought to know that some of these facts are available online and So that was the letter.

44:59

I wrote her originally You know, I had answered her questions and I wrote her this other letter and I decided finally

45:07

Just gonna email it off to her So I emailed it off to her, but I still have a copy of the letter that I That was it was verbatim what

45:15

I sent her in the email. Yeah, so I scanned it put it online and Yeah, it had her address

45:21

Which you can find just about anybody's address Yeah, well, you know, she'd spent all this time

45:28

Criticizing John and putting pictures of his house and the location. She doxed him as well

45:34

So, you know, I figure Her address is public information. I it didn't occur to me to take it down But as soon as she complained,

45:42

I mean the minute she complained which was like 10 minutes after I put it up there I think

45:47

I blurred it out. So it's it's blurred You can't you can't read her address now, but she has not let go of the fact that she was doxed she's she's gonna milk it for victimhood and That has been the thing even though what

46:04

I actually posted proved that she had facts that did not support her narrative

46:10

And she published anyway She's shoved all that aside to spend the last two weeks

46:16

Complaining that she got doxed after she had doxed John MacArthur. So yeah,

46:22

I mean it's not it's not you shouldn't dox people but I've I'd always

46:29

Considered doxing being the release of private information and stuff and her address is public

46:35

You do a search Google search for her name even now and her address comes up on the first page. So yeah

46:41

So yeah, yeah, okay. All right. So sorry to have created the problem

46:47

I'm mostly sorry that I gave her an excuse to divert from the actual point Which is that her hit piece wasn't even honest because she didn't deal with all the facts that she had.

46:59

Yeah You know in John MacArthur's house being worth whatever it said 1 .5 million. I'm surprised

47:04

It's not worth more than that if it was built in the 1970s. I mean my goodness Yeah, honestly and in the neighborhood it's in it which used to be a remote area

47:12

But now there are there are some some very impressive mansions out there the neighborhood alone probably raises the the property value, but Yeah, I was

47:24

I was surprised as well I would have guessed that it's worth more than that You know, she went after me for my house as well and for my salary and she's complaining that You know that I'm making a killing off Whatever you've seen my lifestyle.

47:40

So, you know this I don't know that you've ever been to my house, but my house is 1900 square feet it is it is not a mansion and although if you look it up you can find my address on On Google as well.

47:55

Yeah, it's pretty easy to find out where I live. You look it up It says it's a four -bedroom house Actually, we have three bedrooms and a loft that could be used as a bedroom if you put a hammock in there

48:06

But our bedrooms are so small that if you have anything other than a twin sized bed You can't get any other foot furniture in the room

48:13

So so this is not luxury living where I'm at. This is, California and I was in,

48:18

California for Let's see 20 years before I was even able to put a down payment on a condominium

48:27

Wow, and and so I raised my kids in a in a 1 ,300 foot condominium and about the time

48:38

My eldest graduated from high school We were able to put a down payment on a house and that's when we moved to where we're at now at the time grace to you because I'd been there for 20 years and Intend intended to stay another 20, which

48:55

I have done So I've been here nearly 40 years When it was obvious look this is my career

49:04

This is my life and I live in a tiny condominium the board graciously said look we want to help you get into a real house and So they gave me a loan that was

49:16

Forgivable over time they said if you really stay the next five years, we will forgive this loan 1 -5th at a time over the next five years and so They keep making a lot of noise of the fact that I got a fifty thousand dollar loan from the board

49:32

That was forgivable and and they did forgive it because I I stayed all those years and I'm grateful for that but I see that as You know,

49:42

I'm very grateful for that. It's not the kind of thing I would announce to the public But but since it is public

49:50

I Just want to say I'm very grateful for that I see that as a token of the

49:56

Lord's blessing to me and my family. Yeah, and I Shame on anybody who would see it any other way yeah, and if you own a business and you have somebody who's working for you and devoted their life to you and You have the means to help them out like that and you don't do it then shame on you for that as well

50:18

Absolutely. It's not an extravagance Amen, amen to that. Absolutely Well Phil if we could

50:26

Turn corners here just a little bit change direction. Yes. Let's do I'm tired of talking about money

50:31

No kidding. No kidding so another Controversy that's a couple years old now, but I figured since I had this opportunity with you

50:43

You know back in 2019 much was made of This article that came out.

50:49

I don't remember the name of the person who wrote it, but Anyway said that John MacArthur's claim of being with Charles Evers Who was the brother of Medgar Evers who had been killed

51:01

I think back in 63, but in anyway 1968 John says that he was with Charles Evers in Jackson, Mississippi not far from where I'm from and the night that Martin Luther King jr.

51:13

Was assassinated and did then they they drove up from Jackson to Memphis which was about a three three and a half hour drive and and within a so within a few hours

51:23

John said he was there at the Lorraine Motel and Saw even where James Earl Ray shot

51:29

Martin Luther King jr. And So anyway, it's a story that he's told and and some people have tried to discredit that so is there anything regarding that?

51:39

Yeah, yeah, I'm glad you asked me about that as well because I think this doesn't get enough publicity That's a story

51:45

John has been telling for years That's not something he made up in 2019 and you know suddenly that became part of his life's tale

51:52

I've heard that going back years. I don't know how public he's been with it. But but I knew about that for For years.

52:00

He he was ministering at the time with John Perkins Who is a black civil rights leader?

52:06

But more than that a minister a gospel minister who ministers in black community

52:13

And John Perkins was led to Christ by John's father and so John spent a couple of summers

52:19

I I Don't I don't actually know every fact related to this.

52:25

I don't know if it was more than one summer, but I know he spent time going through the South preaching the gospel in black communities with John Perkins and They were he was there.

52:35

He was in Mississippi when the Martin Luther King assassination took place they did drive up to Memphis and stand on the balcony and At the

52:45

Lorraine Hotel where where King was assassinated The only thing I'm not sure about and and you know,

52:51

I don't trust my own memory of what happened in 1968 I in fact was recently

52:57

I was in a marching band that did these contests and stuff that we traveled all around and I had this vague

53:04

I had this what I thought was a vivid memory of of a thing we did in 1968 or 69 in Winnipeg, Canada And I recently had the means to look up the facts on it from some newspaper archives and and discovered in reading rereading the news accounts of that day that I had compressed some things in my mind that weren't right and I Think it's possible.

53:31

We all do John John has compressed the timeline of those events in his mind But he absolutely did go with John Perkins and this team to Memphis and stand on the on the balcony of the

53:43

Lorraine Hotel He says within hours. I think it might have actually been within 48 hours or 72 hours

53:50

After the assassination it was right afterwards and John describes how the bloodstains were still on the balcony

53:57

And that's a that's a matter of historical fact. In fact, I read one story that that I'm eager to sort of find the facts on this one, but that in order to preserve some of the

54:10

Stuff people in the area had actually cut that piece of concrete with the bloodstain out and moved it removed it

54:16

And it's been replaced Where it originally was at the Lorraine Hotel and covered up with plexiglass so that you can see the bloodstain apparently even till today

54:26

There's an article online that's titled something like the again This is from memory

54:31

But it's something like the bloodstain that won't go away or something like that that you can read about the facts of that But anyway,

54:38

John describes that he describes how he was in the room where James Earl Ray Shot the fatal bullet.

54:47

Here's how I know John's memory on it isn't Isn't you know exactly precise in every detail because he says he stood on the toilet from where?

54:57

Or he was in the room where the toilet was that James Earl Ray stood on when he shot

55:02

Martin Luther King the fact is he was standing in the bathtub There is a toilet right next to it, but he was he was standing in the bathroom little facts like that that I think

55:12

John misremembers, but the fact is he was there and there are other eyewitnesses who will verify that one of them is the

55:20

President of Shasta, I think it's called Shasta Bible College Okay, so let me let me read this.

55:27

This is The president of Shasta Bible College. His name is David Nicholas.

55:33

He was part of that team that that John was with when he was

55:40

When all of that happened and he's written a fairly Thorough account of that summer with John Perkins.

55:48

I say fairly thorough. It's a letter He wrote a lengthy letter to his constituents

55:55

And described some of the same Events that John described when I saw this letter I took it to John and said you remember this guy and John goes.

56:02

Oh, yeah, I remember we went to college together So and he mentions that he was there

56:08

John was there. They went to the Assassination site and all that so he tells the same story

56:13

John does Confirming eyewitness testimony, which I have sent to some of these people who are insistent on You know calling

56:22

John a liar and all that is this Brett Detweiler guy who put stuff out all the time and You know, they they simply ignore any testimony that would corroborate

56:33

John MacArthur's account And cite the testimony of people who say they don't remember John being there as if somehow that's proof that John MacArthur's lying about this

56:42

Right. It's not a lie. He may have he may have some incidental details wrong

56:48

But I think we all have fuzzy The details of our memories from 50 years ago are tend to be a little bit fuzzy

56:58

Yeah, that's more than 50 years ago, isn't it? That's it's 53 now 53 years ago.

57:04

Yeah So yeah before I was even born. I mean, so that's a long time ago

57:09

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I remember that. I remember the event and I remember that week what

57:15

I was doing, but You know how How detailed

57:21

I could be with regard to the specifics is pretty questionable. Yeah, and it's perfectly understandable

57:27

Yeah, so if you wanted to if you wanted to pick apart John's story and say nah it this couldn't have been hours later

57:35

Well, it depends on what you count by hours if it was 72 hours later. It actually yeah, it's credible

57:42

And in fact their photographs of the balcony of the Lorraine Hotel within days after the assassination loaded with people looking and seeing and Wanting to visit the event putting up plaques and flowers and stuff like that.

57:58

I've got a ton of those pictures. Yeah So, yeah And you know,

58:04

I find it so ironic that that some of these folks that are so going after some of them not all but some of them are are to varying degrees influenced by the social justice movement and and They're they're far more concerned about the minutiae of the details of John's account that night

58:19

With that event than they are with the fact that he was in the

58:24

Deep South in the 1960s Purposefully preaching the gospel to black people

58:31

I mean that like I'd say that's a tad more significant than the minutiae of the details of What happened that night?

58:41

Yeah, I agree. He was arrested for it, right? Well, yeah arrested In fact this letter.

58:49

I'll put the letter from this president of Shasta Bible College online

58:55

So that you can link to it and your people can read it because he talks about the fact that they were stopped by this sheriff in Mendenhall, Mississippi who arrested him and And John was apparently driving the car.

59:08

These are details. John doesn't tell in his version of it that he was driving the car That's why he was the one arrested

59:15

And but the sheriff that the sheriff's beef was the fact that there's these white guys running around with you know

59:21

Black civil rights leaders preaching in churches and stuff like that and it wasn't that John broke any traffic laws

59:27

But he happened to be driving without his wallet so he didn't have his driver's license on him apparently and so they threw him in the clink for the night and John says that he did have money in his pocket and the sheriff just kept all that That'll be your fine.

59:43

I'll just I just take whatever you got. Yeah It sounds like one of those old movies, you know in the night and you could see this guy sort of Thumping his hand with a with a nightstick and threatening

59:56

John It's interesting story. I wrote about it maybe 15 years ago on my blog because John had told this story and Ligon Duncan picked it up somewhere and repeated it and So I wrote about it and the headline on my blog

01:00:12

I just put John MacArthur arrested in Mississippi and apparently that headline gave everybody heart attacks

01:00:20

Yeah, but whatever yeah, yeah That's awesome Well turning yet another corner for another and this is a much older Controversy, but I feel

01:00:31

I get I get emails pretty regularly and I see comments from people John MacArthur teaches that you can take the mark of the beast and still be saved and then you know

01:00:40

That is definitive proof that he is a heretic and leading Millions of people down the primrose path to hell.

01:00:48

So since we have you here I'm becoming very experienced in answering this question because it comes up a lot not to interrupt you

01:00:58

I have a document actually that I've made with your article and Fred Butler's article and I've put that in a document whenever anytime

01:01:06

I get an email like that I'll just attach that document and send it off like here you go read this Fred Fred probably has a better answer even than mine more thorough and stuff.

01:01:14

But basically here's the story years ago years ago I think this is the 1970s.

01:01:19

It was a long time ago in a Q &A Someone asked John if if someone during the

01:01:26

Great Tribulation Takes the mark of the beast and then later repents of it. Is that a forgivable sin and John said yeah, because Jesus says in Matthew 12 all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven men except the blasphemy against the

01:01:44

Holy Spirit and he sees he's actually pointing at some Pharisees who had just accused him of doing miracles and the power of of the devil

01:01:52

That was the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. And if all other sins and blasphemies are forgivable

01:01:57

Then yeah, if you repent after having taken the be genuinely repent after having you know

01:02:04

Somebody who takes the mark in ignorance and then repents Theoretically could be forgiven.

01:02:11

It's a hypothetical that you know Frankly if I were John and probably John in his in his older years would would say

01:02:19

It's a hypothetical. I don't know. I'm not gonna answer You know based on what Jesus said that all manner of sin and blasphemy is forgivable

01:02:27

The answer is yeah, if you genuinely repent of that, it's not an unpardonable sin I don't know that anyone who takes the mark of the beast will repent because it does seem to me that there's a deliberate act of renouncing

01:02:42

God and worshipping the beast Involved in take but I don't know

01:02:48

I don't even know what the mark of the beast is a lot of people today assume that it's an

01:02:53

RFID chip That's going to be injected into you through a kovat 19 Inoculation right?

01:03:00

I mean that is that is probably the dominant view today and I actually have a a Email from a woman who wrote and said

01:03:08

I heard John MacArthur say go ahead and take the RFID chip You're gonna be okay.

01:03:14

I heard him say that she heard That that's what John said. Go ahead and take the

01:03:19

RFID chip That's how ridiculous this gets So for the record,

01:03:26

I just want to say John MacArthur does not think you should take the mark of the beast, right? If you wake up someday and find out it's on you

01:03:35

Repent. Yeah Amen. Amen. And you as you said, it's a hypothetical.

01:03:40

It was a question that he responded to in a Q &A nearly 40 years ago or whatever and and people want to brand him as a

01:03:48

Heretic for that. Yeah, they want to make it like he's teaching this doctrine Yeah, right I think he's

01:03:54

I think he's addressed that question and maybe twice in his whole ministry once when the person first asked it and a

01:03:59

Second time when I asked him is that really what you said and what's the context and he explained it to me? Other than that,

01:04:05

I doubt that it's ever crossed his mind more than three times. Yeah. Yeah, and those three times would be because Somebody wrote and asked him about it

01:04:14

You know, it's certainly not something he teaches Like That'd be the impression

01:04:21

Some of his adversaries want to give us that he's going out there saying no go ahead and take the mark of the beast It's gonna be okay

01:04:27

That's ridiculous Yeah, he's probably practically got it on a bumper sticker on his car.

01:04:32

Take the mark, right? And and you know, that's That was the answer he gave in in a

01:04:39

Q &A if you want to really know the heart of what John MacArthur says about The end times and the mark of the beast and how how we ought to Respond to or recognize the

01:04:52

Antichrist Listen to where he exegetes those passages and he's not saying or doing anything that would encourage

01:04:59

Anyone to take the mark of the beast. Yeah, go to his commentary. See what he says about it

01:05:04

Absolutely. Well Phil. Thank you brother. Thank you for your time. This has been really helpful

01:05:10

I've learned some stuff. So thank you very very much and I appreciate you appreciate your friendship your ministry

01:05:17

Thank you. You know, I'm enough of a cynic myself to know that when this gets out there It's just gonna stir up those cockroaches that love to come with negative stuff and at me on Twitter So this may cost me my

01:05:31

Twitter account I'm have to get rid of it just so I don't have to deal all that with all that stuff But thank you for asking those questions, you know with an intent of actually wanting to hear answers rather than looking for things

01:05:43

You can nitpick. I appreciate that. Yeah, absolutely Phil. Well, I appreciate you too, brother sure do and and I know you can't go into any depth here, but is it the

01:05:54

Expectation is as far as as far as you guys know out there that Shepherds conference will be reschedule it

01:06:01

Reschedule at some point later this year. Is that the hope? Yeah, all I can say is I I that is that is the hope of the people who make that decision

01:06:09

I'm not part of that people again often don't really understand the grasp of the fact that Grace Church is a separate organization

01:06:17

Embraced to you. The conference is Grace Church's conference. It's not ours I'm not involved in either the planning or discussions of any of this stuff

01:06:26

But the inklings I've gotten from the Shepherds conference team is that they are right now as you and I speak

01:06:34

It's what Tuesday right after President's Day they've spent most of the day looking for a

01:06:43

Time where they can reschedule and working out the logistics of what that will entail

01:06:49

It's difficult because in the evangelical world There's you know, a lot of big conferences and they do try not to Intrude on one another's territory.

01:06:59

We wouldn't purposely schedule a Redo of the Shepherds conference in a way that would be a threat to G3 or you know

01:07:08

Ligonier or whatever and when you take the year and squeeze it down into just six months

01:07:14

It's kind of hard to schedule all of those Conferences so whether they're going to be able to reschedule it or not

01:07:20

I don't know. I'm a little skeptical personally, but I don't have any insider knowledge other than to tell you

01:07:26

Yes, they definitely want this to be a postponement and not a cancellation And I think there will be news about When and whether they can reschedule it this year

01:07:39

Probably before you even get this Podcast posted so your question may be answered by someone other than me by the time you put this up But I honestly don't know any more than you do about the timing and logistics of it

01:07:53

Other than the fact that you definitely want to reschedule. Sure. In the meantime, I think they are offering

01:08:00

Refunds to everybody who registered. So Yeah, that's another question people keep asking they're gonna refund all those registrations and the answer is yes, obviously

01:08:10

Yeah, or if they can reschedule They'll probably give you the option To to just let it ride over to and and you'll be pre -registered for the conference whenever it is, right?

01:08:23

But again, I'm speaking as an outsider I'm not speaking with the authority of Shepard's conference itself.

01:08:30

Sure and Speaking of the conference, you know, I've been to several of those and they they always give away tons of books

01:08:38

Tons of books and and grace to you gives away a lot of its resources as well, doesn't it?

01:08:44

Yeah, that's that's something else. We should have talked about with with regard to whether John MacArthur is a greed monger or or a

01:08:54

Gracious person. Yeah, I just look at the record of grace to you If you've been on grace to use mailing list for the past 20 years

01:09:01

You probably haven't had to purchase any new books by John MacArthur because when he comes out with a new book

01:09:07

We generally buy a quantity of those and give them away and John MacArthur waves his royalty from the publisher on Any books we do that with that's one of the

01:09:17

ECFA requirements. You can't make money personally off Fundraising efforts, you know that your organization does so we couldn't if we use a book with John to to attract interest of our donors or to say thank you to them for their support or or Whatever message you want to attach to it if we are giving away a book to donors

01:09:40

He cannot make any any royalties on that. So we give away, you know, 30 ,000 copies of a book

01:09:47

I don't think you can assume he would have sold 30 ,000 copies of but there a lot of those are are given to people who otherwise would buy the book and He simply waves his royalties on it and he's never complained about that or I mean he wants to do it so that just that's become such a part of our ministry that we give everything away that we can we love doing that and we have no no intention to stop and the day

01:10:17

This month this ministry actually gets more interested in money than we are in ministry.

01:10:23

I'm out of here Hmm. Yeah, amen Amen to that. Well Phil before I let you go one other question with all that the church has been through with all the you know, the publicity and the litigation and the

01:10:40

Opposition that you've had from the city and county and state government How's John doing how's he holding up through all of this?

01:10:49

Seems pretty good to me. I mean, he's he's I think 15 years older than I am. He's in his 80s.

01:10:54

I'm 67 Is it about fit 14 or 15 years older than me? And he seems like he's 15 or 16 years younger than me.

01:11:03

He certainly has more energy than I do and It's hard to keep up with him and I don't think he's been one bit discouraged by Any of the any of the pressure that he's received because of his response to the quarantine and restrictions on churches and all that if anything it's energized him and You can see that.

01:11:28

Yeah, you can see that in the effects that your Grace Church hasn't slowed down at All in the midst of the kovat.

01:11:35

We've had to change our schedule and we only have one morning service instead of two but It's still a thriving

01:11:43

Hive of ministry and another interesting thing about that speaking of money and offerings and all that we have not actually taken up a collection

01:11:52

Since the quarantine began there and nobody's passed the plate or we actually have these bags that Get past instead of plates because if you drop it, it's not as noisy, you know, so You have the bags.

01:12:03

Okay, that makes it you've seen those huh? Yeah, so they Those bags have not been passed for almost a year now and yet the people of Grace Church have continued to support the ministry at levels that that are

01:12:21

Actually above what you would ever expect above what we budgeted for so financially the kovat stuff hasn't really been a

01:12:34

Threat to to our existence what we feel threatened by and of course we we trust the

01:12:40

Lord for Is that his power exceeds that of anyone who would try to stop us?

01:12:45

But what what is threatening from a human point of view is the increased government pressure that you feel

01:12:53

They want to they want to limit what the church can do and tell you how you can meet when you can meet whether you can sing all those sorts of things and When that started

01:13:03

I think all of us said we can put up with this for two weeks or a month if it did the worst

01:13:09

But a year later, I would think most Christians would be saying wait a minute.

01:13:15

I mean How is this imminent threat to life and limb when right now? I don't know anybody who is seriously ill with the virus

01:13:23

I don't know anybody who's tested positive for the virus for several weeks And yet We are still

01:13:32

Hampered and we can't even have the Shepherds Conference. So yeah that that feels like a kind of government encroachment and Our prayer of course is that the the gospel will have full reign anyway, and Regardless of what restrictions the government might impose on us.

01:13:51

It's not going to silence the The word or the ministry of the gospel and Jesus himself said even the gates of hell aren't going to prevail against the church.

01:14:03

So as his kingdom continues to be built In an ironic way. It seems like the kovat crisis has actually

01:14:12

Furthered that and we're grateful for that. Yeah I know there's been a lot of people that I've talked to pastors all over the country and there's a lot of people who are

01:14:21

Looking for churches that have not shut down and they're looking for churches to take a stand and Preach the truth and a lot of churches have grown because of that this

01:14:30

Kovats brought a lot of new faces into a lot of different churches. I'm at one right now as a matter of fact, so Yeah, no, you get that.

01:14:37

There's so many churches Shut down around us that we have had a massive influx of new people that we're meeting saying

01:14:45

I'm coming here because our church Not only are they not meeting they're not really There's there's really no light at the end of their tunnel they're gonna stay closed

01:14:56

In perpetuity it seems. Yeah. Yeah There are there as you know, you know this as well as I there are some churches

01:15:05

Across the country that I would be happy to see closed No kidding. I know a lot of the ones that are shut down.

01:15:12

You're thinking man. That's great. They That's right. Well, I saw you I saw I watched your entire what was it a four hour video?

01:15:19

On all the failed prophecies. Did you do that whole thing? Well, I went through it start to finish

01:15:25

I came home from work one day put it on and stayed with it until you finally shut it down and and Really?

01:15:32

I just thought yeah, I mean, it's it's actually very encouraging to see that kind of hypocrisy and shenanigans

01:15:39

Exposed so clearly. I don't know how people like that can make a comeback from their own failed prophecies but they always seem to Somehow yeah, and There's a lot of gullible people out there

01:15:52

But every time there's a wave of something like this it helps it up, you know after strange fire conference

01:15:59

When has that been now almost five years ago? Oh, no, I was 2013. So it's been eight years ago.

01:16:05

Really? Yeah, yeah, October time flies. Yeah, but to this day you probably have the same experience

01:16:11

I do that to this day everywhere I go I just spoke at a conference down in San Bernardino this week and met at least six different people who told me

01:16:20

I used to Be a charismatic but strange fire helped me see the conference helped me see the the fallacy of that and and I left the movement

01:16:31

I see that everywhere and and You know, thankfully people who leave the movement because of strange fire

01:16:38

Seem to find their way into churches where the gospel is taught the Bibles believe and Then they begin to thrive spiritually and it's like they see that as another life the old life the though charismatic superstition

01:16:53

So maybe we'll have another wave of that. Yeah. Yeah, Lord willing

01:16:58

I hope so I can honestly tell you that since the strange fire conference I have never preached at a single location anywhere in the world where I have not had people come up to me

01:17:08

And tell me how much they were impacted by that conference. Yeah, it is. It is amazing.

01:17:13

Isn't it striking? Yes, I was saying that for Two two years or so. I you and I spoke at a couple of subsequent conferences

01:17:21

I probably told you that everywhere I go literally everywhere I go and to this day that has not slacked off.

01:17:28

I Cannot think of a conference. I've spoken at anywhere since strange fire where I haven't run into somebody who says

01:17:36

You know, I found you and I found this church because of strange fire We were locked away in the charismatic movement until then.

01:17:44

So I know that's still bearing fruit and You know, if anybody's watching this who hasn't seen the strange fire messages

01:17:52

You're Google search and find them and especially watch Justin's stuff. It's great well,

01:17:58

I don't know about that, but it was an honor to be a part of it and any is there any discussion at all of I'm a strange fire to us.

01:18:06

I heard someone say you need to call it. Holy smokes or something. Yeah That was my proposal, oh, is that yours?

01:18:14

Okay. Yeah, but Yes, people ask about that all the time as well

01:18:20

It's just a question of finding time with the with the Shepherds conference being Postponed and there was supposed to be a conference on Puritan Puritanism with Joel Beaky, right that also got

01:18:32

Shifted to next year, I think and So right now here at grace to you grace to you was a sponsor of strange fire

01:18:40

It's like the Shepherds conference, but different organization puts it on and all that, right? and so we're looking for an opportunity to do the next conference from grace to you and It looks to me like that's not going to be any sooner than 2023.

01:18:56

So that's still two years away Yeah, if you can hold out that long I'll be a 10 -year anniversary

01:19:04

So that's right. It will it we have to do it. We have to do it Then I hear that and in fact,

01:19:11

I've got the pastor of this church. I was sitting right next to me. He's going yeah I hear that all the time people are always asking me.

01:19:20

Is there gonna be another strange fires? They're gonna be a strange fire to people at asking me that constantly Well, there's been a lot of developments in the last eight

01:19:29

Years, and you know two years from now, there'll be even more yeah, well you covered it in that four -hour video, so That'll that that should salve people until 2023 maybe yeah

01:19:44

All right. Well, I'd love to see it happen. No, even if I'm not getting at it I would be there with bells on just to attend it.

01:19:52

No, thanks Justin. Thanks Phil. Appreciate you brother Yep, good to see you as well Well, there you go dear ones

01:20:00

I hope that this video was helpful and encouraging for you as it was for me And I want to express my appreciation again to Phil for taking a time out of his day to do this for us

01:20:10

I think it was very very helpful and and I also hope that this will serve as a sobering reminder to all of us

01:20:17

About not being so quick to believe everything that we read on the internet or to believe every rumor

01:20:25

That we hear because oftentimes what is being portrayed on the internet is quite far removed from Reality and the sad reality is is that there are a lot of people out there who simply want to make a name for themselves for going after faithful men who have some public platform and Trying to bring them down.

01:20:48

That's just the sad reality But I am very very grateful John if you happen to be watching this video

01:20:55

I want to say to you how profoundly grateful my wife Kathy and I both are For your ministry and I hope that this encourages you in some way to know

01:21:05

When you hear me say that I've been all over the world and I see the good fruit Being born by your ministry in the ministry of Grace Community Church and grace to you just see it everywhere

01:21:16

I go. I'm so very grateful for our faithful shepherds out there for you

01:21:21

John and for so many others so many countless thousands of other faithful men who are out there laboring away in the word

01:21:30

Rightly dividing God's Word of truth faithfully shepherding their own little flocks. I'm I'm an evangelist.

01:21:36

I travel and preach and teach not a pastor, but I have a tremendous amount of respect and Appreciation for all of our faithful shepherds out there and so John, thank you and dear ones

01:21:50

Thank you for watching this video and until our next time together May the grace of our