Preaching Christ

Welcome to no content radio. My name is Mike Gabendroth in the studio with Steve Cooley Hi No compromise radio here

We Steve are on a couple radio stations one in Alaska one in Wyoming and I want to know why we're not in any big cities,

I Mean we're out there in the tundra. I mean next next we'll expand to like Montana or something.

I People should be like, you know, I could really go for some no content radio right now

Steve I can't you know I guess our listeners are gonna have to give a little bit more because it's only 600 ,000 a year to be on daily on KKLA 99 .5

for a half hour. That's it. That's it. That's nothing. That's a nothing burger Well, let me just do the math because we really need three hours a day in Los Angeles Yeah, well

All all it takes is one big giver. Yeah, you know in the old days I'd say no compromise radio.

Don't give to us Just tell your millionaire friends to give to us. That's no millionaire.

Let's go for the billionaire. What about that, dude from? Nebraska Omaha Pat Abendrock, no, no.

No Oh Buffett. Yeah, Warren Buffett Why doesn't he underwrite the show? I think Pat still has the keys to Buffett's house when we used to go over there and and Help the

Buffett's out and you know what we you know, if Warren Buffett wants to underwrite our show I think when we get on the air in Los Angeles, we should just call the show like walking in LA or something

Nobody walks we're just some nobody's walking in LA. I Do remember that song?

I Also remember I love LA. So I'm not Randy Newman. I kind of thought he's pretty sharp Right the

Toy Story Very clever songwriter can't sing a lick but but but that's interesting.

He's so he He's so good with lyrics That what he says kind of overrides his homiletic

Yeah, well, I mean, it's kind of like Bob Dylan, you know, I mean, come on Name all the songs where Bob Dylan sounds like he has a good voice and I'll just go

To knocking on heaven's door and lay lady like everything else is like come on, dude, you can't sing

Well, come on the saved album. Wasn't he a Christian for this? Oh, yeah. Well, that's different.

I'm a slow slow train coming Steve I was looking at the book of acts

ACTS not ax that's correct. And do you think it's kind of like the acts of the Holy Spirit?

Would that be a good way to? Phrase it. Maybe it's certainly a way. Yes What is he?

What are we supposed to say acts of the Apostles or something? Yeah, but I mean really you're you're looking at the the whole the entry or the the starting point is basically the

Holy Spirit And it's just kind of a continuing Amazement at the work of the Holy Spirit.

Yes So it's it's the sequel to the book of Luke Right and Luke writes Luke and acts and he wrote more of the

New Testament than anybody else. Did you know that? Yes, I did Okay, because I'm teaching Luke's you're teaching acts because I mean

I read those things too, you know And at the end of acts it says when they had appointed a day for him

They came to him it is a lodging and in greater numbers from morning till evening

Paul expounded to them testifying to the kingdom of God and trying to convince them about Jesus both from the law of Moses and from the prophets some were convinced others disbelieved

See if today I want to talk a little bit about the importance of talking about the Lord Jesus From Moses from the prophets and from acts and from Luke and from the rest of the books of the

Bible Seems like a wise thing for pastors to do Would you rather be known for someone that talks about Jesus?

a lot or too much or not enough if you if you had to pick one of the Sides of that I would like people to to say

I mean if they're gonna complain, you know, here's a Google review I'd like to read, you know the problem with those guys.

They talk so much about Jesus and the gospel I just couldn't take it anymore. Steve.

Don't we all love the story about the man who? Who's older he he's he's frail and feeble and he walks up to the pulpit with his notes in the

Bible to preach on the Lord's Day and he sees little note that's carved into the pulpit.

We would see Christ, you know, we'd love to talk about that Yeah, but then in practical application sometimes maybe someone's in Ezra or Esther or someplace else and it's like where's

Jesus in the sermon Job? Psalms Uh -huh, so I think just in general wouldn't we say to start off it's good to talk about Jesus If you're a pastor or a

Bible teacher or you lead your family in worship Well, I mean we like to call ourselves Christians, right? We're Christian pastors.

It would you know, let's just put it another way a little no -co style if you if you will if a rabbi an

Imam a Bishop from a you know local Mormon Church somebody from the

Watchtower Society Wanders in on a Sunday and they hear the message and they greet you at the door and they say

Well, that was very helpful pastor. Thank you or they say

I really enjoyed that and And you know, then you want to say what part was it?

Was it the part where I really, you know hammered on the gospel or did you know? was it because I had my exegetical ducks all in a row and I explained the text the way they understand the text and we both agree that God's law is wonderful Well, we did a couple word studies too.

Yeah, and this word is only used one time in all the Old Testament It's a hot pox leg on my leg on my now.

Can you have hot pox leg on my nose in the Old Testament though? That's okay. Well, you know with my new diet.

I'm not allowed to have leg on my nonce It's it's kind of like under the legumes. Okay, and all that stuff kind of high in carbs

Paul I think did say in chapter 1 of Colossians verse 28 him

We proclaim warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom that we might present everyone mature in Christ for this

I toil struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me. I mean

Paul is struggling There's toil Energy all given by God for the proclamation of Christ Jesus Well, you know what that means though.

That means he was really struggling and working To figure out what parts of the

Old Testament to skip over so that he wouldn't be embarrassed by not talking about Christ Oh, well,

I think it took took Paul like three years to teach through all the Old Testament at Ephesus if I'm Thinking properly and so I thought it'd be kind of easy because all

I needed to do is go to Genesis 3 Psalm 22 Psalm 2

Psalm 110 and the servant songs and Isaiah and then he's done just You know just to kind of brush the dust off of his hand and move on So Steve some people say to be faithful to the text

Would mean that we're not going to look at later revelation and somehow interpret earlier revelation

We had we just have to stay where we are If in fact with Esther though, there's nothing about God even

How faithful is a pastor if he doesn't mention God in Esther let alone the second person of the

Godhead the Eternal Son. I Again, you know,

I if we were meeting as a and I assume we are as a Christian Church and we come in and we preach

Esther and We don't hear about Christ, I don't know

You know, are we? What are we doing on Sunday morning? We're here to worship the triune

God, but we can't really squeeze all of his Trinity into You know one

Message so just gonna have to move on Steve you're preaching through the book of Acts and Talk to us a little bit about well, you've got

Peter then you've got Paul and of course the New Testament isn't written in total yet who knows what's written if anything and They're both preaching

Christ over and over and over every time Paul talks about the Damascus Road experience and Peter's getting up preaching

It's all Old Testament Proclamation of Christ, why can't we follow their lead?

Well, I mean, that's that's what they would have had to do, right? I mean, they wouldn't have they wouldn't go open your

Bibles to Ephesians chapter Because they wouldn't have those books and they would only have the

Old Testament. So yeah, I and you know, I think the flip side is some people will then accuse you of you know, maybe trying to squeeze the

The Jesus into every text of the Old Testament and what I say to them is

While I do dumb things first of all prove it in my sermons Second of all,

I don't need to jam him in places that he doesn't belong Because I can use other options to talk about Jesus for instance.

I could say the SOS Johnson approach everything in this passage Reminds me of the Lord Jesus and I'm thankful in light of the sin that I see in Jacob's life the sin that I then see in my own life to have a

God who would even call himself the God of Jacob and That triune God and then I off I go into talking about the father sending the son, etc, etc

It doesn't have to be in the text or the other illustration I use Steve is a dog returns to its own vomit and the

Proverbs is Jesus in that text No, but can't I say I'm so thankful for the

Lord Jesus that if it wasn't for his grace and the father sending him to Rescue me I to to this very day at 62 years old would be running back to my own vomit of sin

Did I put him in the text? No, was he in the text? No Can I preach him?

From the text or in my sermon? Yes. Well, is there you know, and and here's here's where maybe things hinge a little bit

What's the necessary? Implication of the text perfect, right?

So when you're a dad teaching Bible, you know to the children at the worship time at the dinner table

You're a mom teaching your little ones some Proverbs. It's all couched in Who's giving us the law?

What's our relationship to the lawgiver? Who's Jesus? What has he done? Any any any thoughts quotes from people

Ideas that people talk about that would run contrary to this idea

Well, I mean there, you know, what would you say about the idea, you know that there are several books

More than a dozen books in the Old Testament that are not quoted in the

New Testament Old Testament books not quoted in the New Testament Therefore, how can you wedge

Jesus in if the Apostles didn't oh Well, that's interesting. I Learned something new every day.

What one of the things I would say is These days there's especially a renewal in scholastic and in academic circles

About not just how the Bible is quoted in the New Testament the Old Testament quoted in the new but how the

Old Testament itself quotes the Old Testament and Furthermore not direct quotations, but allusions or echoes or Resemblances or something like that.

You look at the book of Revelation and it's basically This is what the Old Testament teaches about the soon return of Christ But it hardly ever quotes anything from the

Old Testament because it's all illusions It's all these people understood the Bible so well, it just kind of comes out of them without chapter and verse

So if somebody said to me with a question again, don't ask me the question again one more time so I can be precise

Okay, what would we say to somebody who says, you know, there are more than a dozen books of the

Old Testament That are not quoted in the New Testament So, you know, in other words, how can you then?

Teach the Bible when the Apostles and their close associates didn't it seems like to me

That's a bad argument because well when the Apostles did quote the Old Testament Here's how they did it and here's their model and there's newer revelation progressive revelation a fulfillment of Revelation And and if it's not quoted, well that that doesn't make me change.

So what's my other option? Well now I have to when I'm preaching these books of the Bible that's not quoted in the

New Testament I have to read like a Jew and there's no fulfillment. There's no resurrection. There's no

Jesus who's coming back. Is that what they want me to do? To me it's like though that's it.

You know what I want to say. That's a dumb argument What about the books that aren't quoted in the New Testament? Well, okay.

Did Jesus say by the way, those books aren't in the canon and they don't speak of me Did Paul say those books are not in the canon.

They don't speak about the Lord Jesus What about the Emmaus Road? No, no, everything is good to go except those 15 books that aren't explicitly quoted with quotation marks around them from the

Septuagint I just think it's a bad argument. What would you say to somebody who says well, why would you even

You know teach from the Old Testament Especially places where it's not clear that Jesus is being referred to when you can just go to the

New Testament and preach You know, what's clearly Christian? So, you know Do you maybe spend too much time trying to trying to Wedge yeah, or well or even extract

Jesus from the Old Testament when he's so plain and evident in the new Good question.

I would say that for most of the ministry that the Lord has given me. I've taught from the New Testament I have taught from the

Old Testament. I've taught through Genesis Exodus Esther Daniel I think it took me 70 weeks Steve to teach you

Daniel Wow There's something biblical I had to stretch that last one into two parts what was there a missing week

Well, I didn't want to end on the 69th week. That would be bad form very bad

And and so what do what I do about teaching the Old Testament and wedging in I? Don't have to wedge in the the

Old Testament is a Christian book and it's inspired by God and it's profitable for teaching and it's profitable for reproof and I am to preach the word and when

Paul says to Timothy and 2nd Timothy chapter 4 verse 2 preach the word

What does that entail? Does it preach the word of good news? It didn't preach preach just these were these words authorial intent.

What does he mean there? I think it's a little more expansive than we might know So I think if people want to argue with me

What about preaching you know Jesus from the Old Testament and wedging him in my flipside argument would be

I want to teach the Old Testament But I'm not gonna read him out of the text you want to you don't want me to read him into the text

But I'm not gonna read him out of the text because when I see the word Lord That's a triune Lord when I see the word God Elohim That's a triune

Elohim when I see the word Adonai, that's a triune Adonai So, how could I from the very get -go knowing what

I know later revelation? We're talking about the Father the Son and the Spirit when I say the word

God. I Have had a you know, very interesting You know teaching just the early stages of acts

But every time where they the Apostles Peter is where I am, but When they make it clear that Jesus Christ is

God The people who come to faith don't start asking questions about the

Trinity. It's like Somehow by the power of the Holy Spirit, you know

The pieces of the puzzle just snap in a place for the for believers. So they go. Oh so Jesus is

God, but he's the Son of God He's the second person in the Trinity the Father's God and the

Holy Spirit of which of whom we heard so much about In the Old Testament, but we didn't really understand.

Well, wait a minute. Is this a different God or you know, or is this just a power of God?

Who is the Holy Spirit, you know, and and and now it all just kind of comes into focus and they understand this and I just I just think you know, the

The Old Testament Saints when they when they get when they're taught

They there aren't you know, the the questions all just kind of evaporate they get it.

I Don't know what kind of puzzle it would be It's not Tetris, but everything just kind of goes perfectly into into the into the outline, right?

You had the outline in the Old Testament the shadow and then it just fits and they go Oh, that's the obvious fulfillment of what's been talked about.

Yes. See if I think what did it for me? to put the lid on Christ Center preaching

In terms of to do it is when I was going through Hebrews and Hebrews chapter 1 quoting all those

Old Testament Testament verses speaking about the deity of Jesus Certainly Psalm 110 they'd say is messianic

Psalm 2 is messianic But then the writer Paul or whomever it is Has all these quotes

Psalm 102 and Psalm 45 places that aren't messianic in our minds He says, you know what?

Here's here's the deity of Jesus, right? And so when I look at Saul Hebrews 1, I think how does this

Jewish person proclaiming Christ Jesus the priest? What does he think of the Old Testament and he says here's a little sampling

Jesus is truly divine and I'll just sample the Old Testament in places

We normally wouldn't go to so that kind of sealed the deal for me. Hmm Well, let me let me ask you another question along the same line

If you think about Old Testament and you're going to teach Jesus at the Old Testament Are there?

things in the Old Testament that kind of Help Help the listener understand

Jesus better than things in the New Testament or shouldn't again Should we just focus on the New Testament?

Almost to the exclusion of the Old Testament or are there really valuable truths? About Jesus in the

Old Testament that we need to bring forth to our hearers It's almost like well

Let's look at only the New Testament to learn about Jesus because if we looked at the Old Testament Maybe we're gonna make some links that are improper.

So we better keep our distance. So we stay on the safe side but to your point and question then what do we do with the servant songs and Isaiah 42 that of course

Jesus quotes as we have it recorded in Luke 4 What do we do with some of these passages about the character of God and the nature of God?

And what do we do about? Theophanies yay. Yes and amen. What about Christophanies where we think?

Okay, what's going on when Jesus the Eternal Son? Pre -incarnate shows up in Abraham's tent.

What can we learn about him? What can we learn about? Well last times I checked God as a spirit.

He doesn't have a body and so who's walking in the garden when Adam and Eve fell spirits walking

Fathers walking we have the pre -incarnate Eternal Son Walking in the garden because any kind of body or flesh or corporeal

Substance is not gonna be the father of the spirit It's gonna be the pre -incarnate Son. And so why would I why would

I say no to all that in the Old Testament? I I'm not a functional Christotelic Marcionite well, and and you know some of it some of what you just said,

I mean we We would be robbing our people of the really the wonder of you know

They the shadows are fascinating that that are given to us in the Old Testament And so, you know, it's almost like for us

You know, it is the prequel a waste of time Right answer is no because we see a lot of clues

I mean what I think what happens a lot of times when we teach the Old Testament We just find ourselves thinking again and again and again

How could the Israelites be so dumb and then we go? Yeah. Well, we're pretty dumb too, right? Well, we'll see a big picture or what's the

Lord teaching us in the Old Testament? Well many things. Here's one priest pray and priest offer sacrifices

Wages of sin is death sacrifice either you die or a sacrifice and so we have

Leviticus for instance and other books of the Bible to teach us about priests and all pointing to and leading up to and the concept of Forgiveness and wouldn't it be nice not to have to do this every day every year every

Yom Kippur every Passover Slay the animal slay the animals blood everywhere fives everywhere and all of a sudden we come to the ultimate priest and He himself is a sacrifice and he himself prays and now when

I read the Old Testament about sacrifices Passover Yom Kippur Don't I in fact think about Jesus the final and ultimate sacrifice that everything was pointing to?

Well, I should sure hope so. I mean, you're not gonna be thinking about Oh good old naydab and a by who?

No, I only think of them and like if it wasn't for Jesus I'd be burnt to a crisp.

Yes. Yes Therefore even with the types and shadows and the things pointing to a

Colossians chapter two talks about the outlines or the the the shadows the shadows speak of Christ and And I think it was

BB Warfield who said when you look at the Old Testament It's like there's furniture in a room, but the lights are really low.

You can barely see the couch You can barely see the chair. And then when you go to the New Testament the light turns on Nothing new

Steve was put in that room. No new chairs. No new furniture. It's just we see with brilliance

Oh, I I understand now the fulfillment found in the New Testament Well, let me see this, you know in the

Old Testament if you're really trying to Take a Christ centered approach Aren't you in effect are going to be demoting the

Father and the Holy Spirit in terms of their importance? Just you should see Steve's face

With Gregory which Gregory I can't remember and Steve Meister would correct me if I was if he was here he would know

When we say God our minds should think of three right when we think of the one we think of the three

God is one three persons when we think of one person we should think of the three so when

I say Jesus Died on a cross our mind should be filling in the blanks the father sent him to do that very thing

Yeah out of love for people and out of love for the you know Love in the triune Godhead. The father sent the son and The father and the son then send the spirit and so when

I think of the son I always think of the sent son and if you start reading the Bible and you read

John for instance you preach through John How many times does it say? Quoting Jesus the father sent me right innumerable and therefore

It is you see it in the acts of the of the Apostles in the Holy Spirit We've said in the past the

Holy Spirit loves to put the spotlight on the Sun because when the Sun is glorified

He to the Spirit is glorified and so too is the father you can't glorify one person without glorifying

God because the person is God and therefore when we say the Holy Ghost filled

Pentecostal churches that don't talk about Jesus aren't as fully ghost filled as we think because Holy ghosts filled churches point to the

Lord Jesus and the Lord Jesus on earth pointed to his father and so when you think of the one you think of the three you think of the three you think of the one if Somebody says we don't talk about the father enough and the spirit enough.

I just think that's a pretty dumb argument Well, and and you know, and I wrote this question for Steve Meister and you didn't use it but it didn't hurt my feelings, but Steve needs to go back to the leadership thing about grudges.

Don't hold grudges but you know when when Jesus is going to be

Out in the wilderness to be tempted by Satan Scripture tells us Matthew 4 maybe

You know that the Holy Spirit impels him but by virtue of inseparable operations

Meaning inseparable operations meaning that anything that one person of the Trinity does they all do right?

So Jesus impelled himself out into the wilderness, you know, you want to you want to talk about kind of That that Jesus in his

Divinity drove the man Jesus out into the wilderness trying to think if you just said the heresy there

See it's hard It's very hard Well with inseparable operations, it's easier if we think about baptism all three there.

Yeah, we think about the resurrection But you'll see, you know for the sake of argument economic terms with the father is the one who elects the son dies for the spirit

He you know makes alive and seals to their day of redemption. I like it Steve that you brought up the temptation account because We should automatically realize

This is has nothing to do with us. We pray lead us not into temptation and here now the

Holy Spirit leads Jesus into temptation I don't know technically if what you said is true, but I'm gonna get

I'm getting your point But but but it's well because here's the thing about the Trinity. It's hard It's hard for us to wrap our arms around it and to think and you know, like you said the father elects

Jesus said what to his disciples you didn't choose me, but I Chose you.

Okay. Now we could say well, he only chose because the father chose Okay, so what there was a difference of wills

Jesus kind of No Well, once we hit the incarnation then it gets doubly.

Yes So that's why we confess in first Timothy chapter 3 great is the mystery of godliness that we confess

There is that mystery there Steve for me in my house, and I know it's for you as well

I don't think there's anything wrong with preaching sermons about Jesus if you've explained what

Ecclesiastes 5 says It means and then you talk about the fear of the Lord and aren't you glad you don't have to fear

God like a cringing Guilty person would before an absolute judge now because the

Lord Jesus we fear the father with a son's type of fear wanting to honor and See our father highly exalted.

There's a zero wrong with that because I'm not shaving off the contours of Ecclesiastes I'm teaching it and then

I'm adding The fact that oh, I think Jesus was raised. That's kind of a key figure in all this is

Jesus raised or not He's definitely raised So do we have any fun little facts before we close the show?

do we Do what do we do? Oh Steve Meister's conference is is Bethlehem Bible Church BBC church org or you can go to the

YouTube site That'd be good to watch again. It'd be very good to watch. I learned a lot. Yeah, watch a couple times.

Yeah, I Think Steve Meister probably knows a thing or two, but now with his you know with his

Associations now we have the same associations that he does. Are we gonna like?

Feel so you're gonna feel the backlash for being associated with no compromise radio. He might be And then he could be in a tough spot.