December 20, 2016 Show with Tim J. R. Trumper on “When History Teaches Us Nothing: The Recent Reformed Sonship Debate in Context”

Iron Sharpens Iron and the Iron Sharpens Iron Principle

Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors, Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another. Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions. Now here's our host.

Good afternoon Cumberland County, Pennsylvania and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming. This is Chris Arnson, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this 20th day of December 2016.

And before I introduce my guest and topic for the day, I want to remind you about the upcoming Roman Catholic versus Protestant debate to be held, God willing, Friday, January 13th, 7 p .m. at the historic Carlisle Theater, the 900 seat Carlisle Theater dating back to the 20th century which has been restored to its original beauty and grandeur.

This theater will be the home of the first annual, God willing, great debate here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, picking up on a series of debates I began in New York back in 1996. And the very first debate that I held in Long Island, New York in 1996 had an identical topic as the one that we are launching here in Carlisle, Mary, Sinless Queen of Heaven or Sinner Saved by Grace.

The debaters are Roman Catholic apologist Robertson Jennis who is the founder of Catholic Apologetics International and former television host on EWTN. And the Reformed Baptist opponent that he will be debating at this event is Dr. Tony Costa who is Professor of Apologetics at Toronto Baptist Seminary in Canada.

And the tickets to this event are $5 and that's just because we have a lot of costs that need to be covered. And if you want more details on this event, please email me at thegreatdebatecarlisle at gmail .com.

That's thegreatdebatecarlisle, C-A-R-L-I-S-L-E, at gmail .com. You can also email me at the email address that we normally use for our questions from our audience for our guests during the live broadcasts.

That's chrisarnsen at gmail .com, chrisarnsen at gmail .com. And please put the word debate in the subject line. And of course you could also use that today for questions for our guests. And also the day before that event, Thursday, January 12th, 11 a .m. to 2 p .m., we're having the next Iron Sharpens Iron Pastor's Luncheon.

This is for men in the ministry only. You don't necessarily have to be a pastor, you could be a deacon, an elder, or a leader in a parachurch organization. And we cannot accommodate the wives at this event.

This is a men's luncheon absolutely free of charge at the historic Carlisle Vault, also in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. And a bank dating back to the early 20th century that has been transformed into a gorgeous catering hall here in town.

And this is going to include a sumptuous gourmet meal. And every pastor is going to be getting a heavy sack filled with books, brand new books, donated from nearly every single major Christian publisher in the United States and the United Kingdom.

They do this every year. So each pastor leaves with close to 40 books, between 30 and 40 books. Each of these publishers donate 100 copies of a specific title that I select for the pastors. And this is all, I keep reminding you, free of charge.

If you're interested in that, please email me at chrisarnsen at gmail .com, chrisarnsen at gmail .com, and put luncheon in the subject line. So we hope that you join us for those events. But today I'm so delighted to have on the program for the very first time, Dr. Tim J .R. Trumper, Senior Minister of the historic Seventh Reform Church of Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Many folks listening may recall a previous pastor there, Dr. John R. DeWitt, also known as Dick DeWitt. Well, I am delighted to have the current pastor there on the program today. And he is also a blogger at fromhisfullness .com.

That's fromhisfullness .com. And we are going to be discussing a very controversial issue that is raging in theologically reformed and Calvinistic circles these days. The title of our theme of our program today, which is also the title of a book by Dr. Trumper, is When History Teaches Us Nothing, the Recent Reformed Sonship Debate in Context.

And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron, Dr. Tim J .R. Trumper.

Oh, thank you, Chris. Thank you very much for the welcome and the invitation to speak with you this afternoon. It's an important subject and I look forward to the time with you.

Yes, and I have had folks from both sides of this debate on the program, although I have not done a two-hour treatment of this subject. So I'm looking forward to this interview today. But before we even go into that subject, I want to know more about you, about your upbringing as a young man, as a child even, in your home in Wales, and what kind of religious background that was, if any, and what providential things the Lord brought about in your life that drew you to himself and saved you.

Oh, well, thank you. It's wonderful to get the more of the need of that grace. I grew up in Wales, in the southwest corner of Wales, a beautiful county called Pembrokeshire. It's known as Little England.

The people there speak English rather than Welsh. My father was Peter Trumper, and he was a minister. Prior to that, he'd been a professional actor. The Lord wonderfully saved him out of his atheism, and he left the acting profession.

He'd made a few films by that time, and he felt called because my mother stood by him. I did so because of what the Bible means when it talks about belief. I thought, well, I believe everything in the Bible, so I had the knowledge, but I was in my teenage years, and so the knowledge of Jesus Christ at the age of...

I remember very well my father coming to me after one Sunday morning. Well, I praise God that I know the Lord, but I have to say I, of course, was the 25%. I have my doubts, and I saw that as of the Lord to say, well, actually, I'm not a believer.

And that freed me then to go on to seek the Lord and to come through to that age. And was the church that you were saved in by God's grace a.

Theologically Reformed congregation, or was it... A lot of people I know are saved in other atmospheres theologically, but eventually come to the Reformed faith, but what was the case with you? Well,.

Actually, my father was very evangelical, very Reformed, but he was the first congregation for 90 years. And so he wrote a book about between 1962 through 1970 called As Far As the Bethany, and he was the first in that denomination.

And Martin Lloyd-Jones, on one occasion, repeated his accent, but he said, well, there's a man by the name of Trump. He sent his congregants to my father, and my father had him preached by Lloyd-Jones, so my father was very much of his.

Life. Now, you are currently... Well, first, before I go into the Seventh Reformed Church, which has a very fascinating background itself, but how did you know that you were receiving a call from God to enter into the pastoral ministry, and what eventually led you to come to America?

Well, I can assure you that wanting to be a minister, I received no pressure. I remember on one occasion during my teenage years, my father saying to me that he believed the Lord would eventually call me into the ministry.

But frankly, I didn't want to be, let me say this, socially outstanding there in Britain. And so I went, while I was in the lecture halls of the university, listening to all the views of... and I thought, well, this is rather futile, because the next generation is going to really... and I compared what I was hearing in the wonderful church.

I went to... called Ebenezer the minister, and I was just... the wonderful truths of John's gospel, and felt my heart yearn to the end of the degree, and I was studying for my finals. I really wanted people to be saved, and I would read people like Spurgeon, who would say, well, unless you've led, you know, two souls to the Lord or whatever, you're not being called to the ministry.

In that conviction, I left university, went back to North Wales, where my father had then gone, previously gone as a minister from South Wales. And I was, before too long, asked to... that I was going to be... because I said... as I walked down, I went to preach on with the Lord, and I came home to me and my father, by that time, was sort of white and pale.

He... of that. And then the next morning, standing next to his desk, he was at his desk, and I was standing next to him. He dressed me down in a very blunt way, again. And I thought, well, I've... as a little boy, I stood at that... been dressed down for this or that, but never, because my father knew me well, and he knew that I needed that to go forward with... and I never looked back... me throughout, and I praise God for that.

Just out of curiosity, do you know the man that was my pastor until very recently returning to the UK,.

David Campbell? Yes, I know David. Yes, David was in the Free Church of Scotland. Yes. Before me.

Right, in the seminary, yeah. Yeah. And eventually, he had a certain conviction of Reformed Baptist theology and ecclesiology. But now, what was it that brought you here to the United States? Was it a direct call from Seventh Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, or was it something.

Before that? No, I was invited to teach at Westminster in the life of the congregation, and in 2006, I was... 2007. Now, that church, that congregation, has a very interesting history,.

Because it was one of the last holdouts to remain in the Reformed Church in America that was very strongly conservative and strongly Calvinist and confessionally Reformed in a real way, in practice, more than just on paper.

And I know that there was a point in time when the Seventh Reformed Church parted company with the RCA. If you could.

Tell us about that. Well, we're of age now, and we centennial the 125th anniversary, we published a book called Gathered at the Cross, 1890 through 2015. And it depends who you ask. Some would say that the denomination and others would say they left, but wrote one of the chapters for that book, and he felt he owed it to the congregation to give an explanation of what had happened, and I'm not an authority on what had happened.

I don't think circumstances since 1995 have enticed the church to try and rejoin the Reformed Church in America. So we've carried on, and the denominational question of time, but we've not been able to resolve that, remained very loyal to the theology of the Continental Reformed Faith, in some ways, is the Church in America.

Yes, that is very true. And of course, I do know some RCA men, and I'm sure there are a lot more than I know, who are biblically faithful and who are confessionally Reformed and really mean it. In fact, a friend of mine, Pastor Y .C. Tan on Long Island, I don't know if you know him, he is a pastor of the New Hope Reformed Church in New Hyde Park, Long Island, New York, which is an RCA church, and there are, I'm sure, others, but it is not known denominationally as something, as a denomination that is firmly committed to Calvinism anymore, but it did have its roots in the Dutch Reformed Church that has a very rich history of strong commitment to the Bible and also the Reformed confessions of history, the three forms of unity,.

And so on. Yes, and remain in the denomination. We've got our hands full trying to reach the.

Reformed Church in America. Well, I'm going to give our email address again for anyone who would like to join us on the air with a question for Dr. Trumper. It is chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the USA, and please only remain anonymous if it's about a personal and private matter, such as if your own pastor has a belief that you disagree with or something like that.

We would obviously want you to remain anonymous in such cases, but when it comes to this Sonship debate, what is the background of this debate, and why is it arisen.

Amongst Reformed brothers in Christ? Well, I'm not surprised that this some sense has come up again. Way back now in 2008 when history teaches us nothing but stuff of the research that I've been involved with for 25 years, and so if I may say a little bit about the historical background.

If you look at the Reformed tradition more than, now that's not necessarily to say too much, because the doctrine has been neglected in the history of the church, and I've tried to outline some of that in articles and different places, but if you think of the Reformed tradition or sources to which we can go with regard to the doctrine, and what's written within his writings, but I've worked hard with regard to an outline of what he's written on the doctrine, and that is found in the PhD and historical study of the Doctrine of Adoption in the Calvinistic tradition.

So that's one source, Calvin, and then the other source, historical source, main source, is the Westminster Standards which are on the Doctrine of Adoption. Maybe not the first, 1581 also has some. I think the Reformation, of course, the two great debates were on the Doctrine of Adoption, according to the lighter script, and on Safe Reformation.

Adoption, more than they did, we can come back to that, because the tradition on the back, the weariness with the intent, and then develop philosophy and an emphasis on the natural, and then there was the evangelical revivals of the 18th century, denials of the day, Arminianism, Arminian on the one hand, and Richard Baxter, Neonomian on the other.

The late 18th century, the Enlightenment, and Romanticism with its emphasis on experience, and then the whole, up to the early, the Reformed phase. Every day, Chapter 12 of Adoption, in the larger catechism, you've got Question 74 of Adoption, and in the shorter catechism, it really seemed, 50 say to 1830, to have fallen off.

By the time you get to the early 19th century, you've got men like Thomas Erskine of Linn-Layson in Scotland, who begin protein, might call paternal grace, went from being a Calvinist to a Universalist within about 17 years, as he put the hood of God more and more in that direction.

And McLeod Campbell was deposed in 1831, and then went on in 1856 to write a book. That spawned the whole movement, the everyday, the Reformed phase of Linn-Layson, because this defensive mindset had developed, and they could not see beyond that.

So then when this saw in that debate, really, again, commonalities, Jack Miller was trying to do through World Harvest Mission.

In fact, this is a perfect time to go to a break, and we'll pick up where you left off. And in fact, we already have Tyler in Mastic Beach, Long Island, waiting to have a question, his question asked and answered by you.

Thank you, Tyler, for being patient. We'll get to you as soon as possible when we return from the break, God willing. If anybody would like to join Tyler from Mastic Beach, Long Island, New York with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Don't go away, we are going to be right back after these messages. Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko,.

Inviting you to tune into A Visit to the Pastor's Study every Saturday from 12 noon to 1 pm eastern time on WLIE Radio, www .wlie540am .com. We bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you, and we invite you to visit the Pastor's Study by calling in with your questions.

Our time will be lively, useful, and I assure you, never dull. Join us this Saturday at 12 noon eastern time for a visit to the Pastor's Study, because everyone needs a pastor.

Chris Arnson here, and I can't wait to head down to Atlanta, Georgia, and here's my friend Dr. James White to tell you why. Hi, I'm James White of Alpha Omega Ministries.

I hope you join me at the G3 Conference hosted by Pastor Josh Weiss and Praise Mill Baptist Church at the Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta, January 19th through the 21st in celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.

I'll be joined by Paul Washer, Steve Lawson, D .A. Carson, Vody Balcom, Conrad M. Bayway, Phil Johnson, Rosaria Butterfield, Todd Friel, and a host of other speakers who are dedicated to the pillars of what G3 stands for, gospel, grace, and glory.

For more details, go to g3conference .com. That's g3conference .com.

Thanks, James. Make sure you greet me at the Iron Sharpens Iron exhibit booth while you're there.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said,.

Give yourself unto reading. The man who never reads will never be read. He who never quotes will never be quoted. He who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has.

No brains of his own. You need to read. Solid Ground Christian Books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the Prince of Preachers to heart. The mission of Solid Ground Christian Books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to Christians in the present and future, and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world.

Since its beginning in 2001, Solid Ground has been committed to publish God-centered, Christ-exalting books for all ages. We invite you to go treasure hunting at solid-ground-books .com. That's solid-ground-books .com and see what priceless literary gems from the past or present you can unearth from Solid Ground.

Solid Ground Christian Books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

I am Chris Arnsen, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, here to tell you about an exciting offer from World Magazine, my trusted source for news from a Christian perspective. Try World at no charge for 90 days and get a free copy of R .C. Sproul's book, Relationship Between Church and State.

I rely on World because I trust the reporting, I gain insight from the analysis, and World provides clarity to the news stories that really matter. I believe you'll also find World to be an invaluable resource to better understand critical topics with a depth that's simply not found in other media outlets.

Armed with this coverage, World can help you to be a voice of wisdom in your family and your community. This trial includes bi-weekly issues of World Magazine, on-scene reporting from World Radio, and the fully shareable content of World Digital.

Simply visit wmg .org forward slash iron sharpens to get your World trial and Dr. Sproul's book all free, no obligation with no credit card required. Visit World News Group at wmg .org forward slash iron sharpens today.

Welcome back, this is Chris Arns, and if you just tuned us in, our guest today for the full two hours is Dr. Tim J .R. Trumper, senior minister of Seventh Reform Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and a blogger at fromhisfullness .com.

We are discussing his book, When History Teaches Us Nothing, the recent reformed sonship debate in context. If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Chrisarnson at gmail .com. And by the way, I forgot to ask you, since you are from Wales, originally Dr. Trumper, I had on my program very recently Mark Johnston, minister of the Bethel Presbyterian Church in Cardiff, Wales.

Are you familiar with Mark Johnston? Oh yes, yeah, very much so. Oh great, I just wanted to check with you on that. I really had a nice time interviewing him. Good. We have Tyler in Mastic Beach, Long Island, New York, who is asking something that you already touched on.

He says, is it true that Miller's view of sonship is often associated with antinomianism? And perhaps you could even define antinomianism. I know that it means anti-law. And I know that Christians use that term differently at times, and sometimes I think that they misuse it.

But if you could explain exactly what that means, and also answer.

Tyler's question, of course. Well, I guess antinomianism can take on different forms, depending on viewpoint, sided view, Christian life, grace. I think what we want to say is the law does have sin, not a freedom to sin.

Regular conversations, why I wrote all the evened out case as to whether Jack, those more inclined to make, could be held. Well, guess what, Tyler,.

You have won a free copy of our guest's book, When History Teaches Us Nothing, the recent reformed sonship debate in context. That's compliments of our guest, Dr. Tim J .R. Trumper and Seventh Reformed Church of Grand Rapids, Michigan.

And also, that will be shipped to you absolutely free of charge by Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, CVBBS .com. And they sponsor our program and have been faithfully shipping out the winners in our audience, all the Bibles and books and DVDs and CDs, that they win by submitting questions to our guests.

So, thank you very much for contributing to today's program, Tyler in Mastic Beach, New York.

Yeah, if I may just jump in there a minute, Chris, and just say that, yeah, the third chapter, the rejection of sonship goes into more detail with the questions.

Okay, great. And we have C .J. from Lyndonhurst, Long Island, New York, who wants to know if this sonship debate you are referring to has any connection at all with the current trinity debate that is swirling amongst reformed Christians that involves economic subordinationism, a view of the father-son relationship in the trinity that seems to have sparked some heat amongst fellow Calvinists.

Not that I know of. The other very much concerns the Christian life and what it means to be sanctified, whether we're sanctified by faith. So, I see those debates from the one debate, and it's no theology, and above all, it helps.

And with so many of our reformed, a less heat might actually give us a little more light.

Yeah, and being sinners that we are, that is something that is easier said than done.

Yeah, yeah, sure.

One of the things that I have said to folks when they, sometimes in a mocking fashion, will condemn the reformed community for our constant infighting, let alone the condemnation they see us pronouncing upon people outside of our community, but they will often say that we are more involved in that kind of thing than anybody else.

I don't think that that is necessarily true, but what I have said is, since reformed people have a reputation, I think a very well deserved reputation, in a good sense for being meticulous about truth, about doctrine, about what our Lord has breathed out in his inerrant word, that reformed people have a tendency to be more careful and meticulous about these things, and that combined with the fact that we are sinners, saved by grace, that means that very often, more often than we care to admit or like, we will take that meticulous nature and abuse it at times.

Wouldn't you say that that's true?

Yeah, I'm not arguing that we be less meticulous about the truth, but generous with all of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. If he's our model, then we ought, one of my professors once said to me, a journey was unfolding, that I care more about love.

Amen. And thank you very much, C .J. from Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York. Please give us your full mailing address so we can have a free copy of this book, When History Teaches Us Nothing, by Dr. Tim J .R. Trumper, that you should, God willing, receive in the mail, probably shortly after Christmas sometime.

Chris, may I just come up.

In light of what we just said? Oh yeah, definitely. Well, my former colleague, Claire Davis, who's been very complimentary about the book, is down in writing somewhere saying that Claire has a way with words, but I ought to excuse us nothing.

I'm not thinking of individuals knowing nothing about history. But you will find on the frontispiece of the book, a quote from Martin Lloyd-Jones, in which he talks about the German Hegel coming up as of nothing.

And Lloyd-Jones, in a certain lecture that he gave, titled, Can We Learn from History? He says, my contention is that the Christian should learn, but because he is a Christian, it is his duty to do so.

I just want to say, the title's not meant to be caustic, it's.

Tim Lloyd-Jones. Yes, when it comes to weird titles, I think that perhaps that one is neck and neck with Peter Jones's book, One or Two, which is... It took a long time to think that one up. But a very good book, I might add, by Peter Jones.

Well, if you could, really, in detail, as much as you can, considering we've only got an hour and 15 minutes left, explain the two extreme opposite ends of this debate. As far as those that are within the pale of biblical Christianity, or who are considered genuinely historically reformed, and so on.

Well, like I said, my book is somewhat different in the sense that I haven't got into the nitty gritty of in an acorn, and if you take the... then people speak past each other, and this is not the only debate.

So I felt that if you put the doctrine of adoption and the theological history of the context of the debate, then whether you have gone through the sonship court or whether you have not, we have a responsibility as a community, specifically the reformed community, to look at the very least in what Jack Miller was saying.

And so Russell Paul and Jack Miller. And so obviously you've got that it wasn't doing enough justice to the law, and was in fact a lopsided presentation of grace. So almost like privilege without... we're coming near to responsibility without privilege.

The atmosphere of sonship could come and at least listen.

Now if you could, because keep in mind that we have listeners, although I believe that most of my listeners would be those who are familiar with our vocabulary and are members of reformed churches and so on, that is not always the case.

I have listeners that are Muslim on occasion. I have listeners that are Arminian evangelicals. I have listeners that are Roman Catholic. I have listeners that are agnostic and atheist, and I have listeners that are none of the above, perhaps in groups that we would call cults.

And we have listeners that just are not affiliated with any church, and perhaps are just searching and so on. But if you could explain a summary.

Of what the doctrine of adoption is. Well, it's not much about adoption by faith alone. The doctrine of adoption is really the way in which Paul uses evocations, but he uses it in such a way that it... but the real... is found in Galatians.

Paul writes in a way very... his son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who are under the law so that we might receive adoption as a father. So you're no longer a slave... John Calvin called the good news of adoption for any and for all.

Christ has come. He's been united to us in our humanity. He works out... we cannot... there he paid. So you've got... when we receive, we do nothing to work... bring our empty hands... united to the Lord Jesus Christ.

So we become sons of God in the Son. And by being in the Son, we can now call God our Father. And it is the Holy Spirit, the name Father, God's name Father, on our lips. And so Paul says, because you are no longer enslaved, through God.

So that's really the crux of it. It's receiving...

Now how would this debate differ, and on the flip side, be similar to the lordship salvation controversy that became very much a focal point of the Christian media, especially amongst Christian authors.

In the 1980s, when John MacArthur, a dispensationalist... he was not quite a full-blown Calvinist at the time, but he was heading there... when John MacArthur wrote The Gospel According to Jesus, and the many, if not most, of the Reformed community applauded and fell in love with this book, and heavily promoted it.

And you had a very negative reaction to many others who are dispensationalists. From Dallas Theological Seminary, people like Charles Ryrie and Zane Hodges, and even Charles Stanley, wrote things in opposition.

And the knee-jerk reaction of a lot of these dispensationalists was that lordship salvation was teaching a repackaged Roman Catholicism when it came to justification. And obviously, since I have read and re-read Dr. MacArthur's book, nothing could be farther from the truth.

So if you could, I don't know, since this was a controversy primarily raging here in the United States, I don't know how familiar you are with it, but if you could let us know how similar and how different this current controversy may be to that.

Well, I don't think there's any direct link... Yes, perhaps I failed to announce or explain.

To our listeners that the lordship controversy that really existed prior to the 80s, but it got a lot of attention from folks and actually split churches and so on. Because those who espoused what is called lordship salvation, which actually started that phrase as a derogatory term by dispensationalists who disagreed with Dr. MacArthur's views, but those who espoused Dr. MacArthur's views lovingly embraced the term.

Basically, Dr. MacArthur was saying that the gospel necessitates and requires repentance as a vital element, and that those who are truly born again will bear fruit. They will repent, they will bear fruit, they will not be perfect, they can never achieve sinlessness in this life, but they will certainly have lives marked by godliness and repentance.

Whereas many in the dispensationalist camp confused that with the Roman Catholic concept of meritorious works and made false charges, in my opinion, that this was, as I said earlier, repackaged Romanism.

I'm sorry, but I interrupted you because I wanted to make it clear since I didn't really explain my terms before.

Well, I'm not sure how I could explain that in terms of repentance and faith. I mean, they are distal. Right. On the occasion upon which we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, on the occasion of Paul going from house to my father's grave, and sometimes in the New Testament what you have, since it's understood, a few occasions when the two things are brought together.

I love the way we talk of, and rightly talk of, a believing repentance, and that when we trust ourselves to the Lord Jesus, we are not parceling out the Lord Jesus saying, well, in faith I take him as my savior, but because I'm not repentant, I'm not going to take him as my of the Lord Jesus Christ.

He's not only savior, but Lord. And then that has knock on it, so we live out the Christian life. And that's what I mean by these debates being tangentially connected on the one hand and on the other.

And we are going to get to Pastor Sterling.

Vanderwerker's question from Greensboro, North Carolina when we return from our next station break. If you would like to join Pastor Sterling with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C-H-R-I-S-A-R-N-Z-E-N at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the good old USA. Don't go away, we'll be right back with Dr. Tim J .R. Trumper right after these messages from our.

I'm Chris Arnzen, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and here's one of my favorite guests, Todd Friel, to tell you about a conference he and I are going to.

Hello, this is Todd Friel, host of Wretched Radio and Wretched TV and occasional guest on Chris's show Iron Criticizing Iron. I think that's what it's called. Hoping that you can join Chris and me at the G3 conference in Atlanta, my new hometown.

It is going to be a bang-up conference called the G3 conference celebrating the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation with Paul Washer, Steve Lawson, D .A. Carson, Votie Baucom, Conrad and Bayway, Phil Johnson, James White, and a bunch of other people.

We hope to see you there. Learn more at g3conference .com, g3conference .com. Thanks Todd, I think. See you at the.

Iron Sharpens Iron exhibitors booth.

Reference Bible includes contemporary topics relevant to today's issues. From compact to giant print Bibles, find an NASB that fits your needs very affordably at nasbible .com. Trust, discover, and enjoy the NASB for yourself today.

Go to nasbible .com,.

That's nasbible .com. Tired of bop store Christianity, of doing church in a warehouse with all the trappings of a rock concert? Do you long for a more traditional and reverent style of worship? And how about the preaching?

Perhaps you've begun to think that in-depth Biblical exposition has vanished from Long Island. Well, there's good news. Wading River Baptist Church exists to provide believers with a meaningful and reverent worship experience, featuring the systematic exposition of God's Word.

And this loving congregation looks forward to meeting you. Call them at 631 -929 -3512 for service times, 631 -929 -3512, or check out their website at wrbc .us. That's wrbc .us.

In business ethics. Contact me, Mike Gallagher, financial consultant, at 717 -254 -6433. Again, 717 -254 -6433 to learn more about the Thrivant Difference. Faith, finances, and generosity. That's the Thrivant Story.

Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, inviting you to tune into A Visit to the Pastors' Study every Saturday from 12 noon to 1 pm Eastern Time on WLIE Radio, www .wlie540am .com. We bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you, and we invite you to visit the Pastors' Study by calling in with your questions.

Our time will be lively, useful, and I assure you, never dull. Join us this Saturday at 12 noon Eastern Time for a visit to the Pastors' Study.

Because everyone needs a pastor. And keep in mind, wlie540am .com is not the network that Iron Sharpens Iron is broadcasting from, so please listen to Pastor Bill Shishko every Saturday, 12 noon to 1 pm Eastern Time on wlie540am .com.

And also, if you live in the New York Tri-State area, on 540 on your AM dial on the radio. And don't be surprised if you hear either Spanish programming or non-Christian programming because the station is not exclusively a Christian station.

So I just want you to keep in mind that 12 noon to 1 pm Eastern Time is the segment that you can be assured of solid biblical Christian programming from Pastor Bill Shishko of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.