July 6, 2017 Show with Don Currin on “For the Love of Church History”

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Now here's our host, Chris Arntzen. Good afternoon,

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet

Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com. This is

Chris Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Thursday on the sixth day of July 2017, and in studio with me after a long absence, enjoying a vacation with his family in Maine and Massachusetts, we have returning to the studio today the

Reverend Buzz Taylor. Well, hello. It's good to be back. And it's good to have you back, Buzz, and I'm sure you had a wonderful time with your children.

I sure did. Thank you. And we have the privilege of interviewing today for the very first time ever on Iron Sharpens Iron, Don Curran.

He is from Don Curran Ministries, and he is involved in multiple ministries, including itinerant ministries, serving as Eastern European Coordinator with HeartCry Missionary Society in Radford, Virginia, and caring for the

Providence Gospel Church in Tuscumbia, Alabama, as their interim pastor.

Today, Don Curran is discussing For the Love of Church History, and he's also going to be talking about a conference where he's speaking, coming up very soon,

August 3rd through the 5th in Portland, Maine, and that's the Fellowship Conference New England. And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time to Iron Sharpens Iron, Don Curran.

Thank you very much, Chris. It's a pleasure to be with you. And I'm going to give our listeners our email address.

If you would like to join us on the air with a question for Don Curran, 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, at least, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. Well, first of all, Don, I usually do this when I have a guest on for the first time.

I would appreciate it if you could give our listeners a bit of a description of your youth, your upbringing, what religion, if any, you were raised in, and how our sovereign

Lord, eventually, by his grace and providence, drew you to himself and saved you.

Yes, thank you for the question. I was raised a Baptist, a mother, of course, searching.

We went to various churches, Presbyterian and Methodist, initially, and then, of course, wound up in the

Baptist church, raised predominantly Southern Baptist, and then, of course, went into the

Independent Baptist movement for a while, went to an Independent Baptist school. There, I was converted, and, of course, called to preach, met my wife, but while I was there at the

Independent Baptist school, the first year I was there, once again, there was just an unrest in my spirit.

God was dealing with me. I had made multiple professions of faith, and there, three weeks after I was in the institution, they had an evangelist come to town who did an eight -day crusade, and that night,

Tuesday evening in October, God arrested my heart.

There was a definite supernatural work where God opened my heart and granted repentance in faith as I looked to Christ and Christ alone and was gloriously converted.

Praise God. And just out of curiosity, can you tell us the school that was?

My co -host, the Rev. Buzz Taylor, is a graduate of Bob Jones University. Yes, it was, at the time,

Liberty Baptist College, which I think the transition was right before I got there.

It was Lynchburg Baptist College. Oh, yes, yes. It was Jerry Falwell was the founder, and so I, of course, enrolled in school there in 1974, and there, in the fall, was converted.

Huh. Yeah, my very first girlfriend as a

Christian was a student at Liberty Baptist University and later taught at Jerry Falwell's elementary school that was associated with Thomas Road Baptist Church.

Yes. And I visited the campus there, and that's been a long time, but I'm sure it's a lot better now.

I'm sure it's a lot bigger and more modern and so on. Who was the evangelist that spoke, if I may answer?

Well, it was a gentleman that was probably more modified Southern Baptist at the time, very prophetic in his preaching.

His name was James Robison, and of course now James is more of a talk show host.

Right, yeah. But yeah, I was converted under his ministry during those days.

Well, you were there at the same time I was at Bob Jones, so I can tell you right now that, at least from what

I heard at that time, you went to the rival school. Yeah, James Robison, and he is now very much in the extreme of the charismatic movement, is he not?

That's correct. Yeah. Well, what were the circumstances involved where you believed that God had placed a call upon your heart to be a minister?

Well, about a year later, it all culminated. I'll be honest with you,

Chris, probably since I was just a small lad, intuitively, there was always this lingering sense that one day

I would be set apart, you know, to preach the gospel. Some people might have a problem with that, but I think of Jeremiah, I think of the

Apostle Paul who, of course, said that the Lord had separated them from their mother's womb to preach.

There was always that sense ongoing. It wasn't something I wanted. I had really a contempt for it, but it would ebb and flow and sometimes very strong, even long before I was converted.

But after my salvation at age 20, there at that Bible school, for the next few months, it was as if the

Lord was preparing me. The sense became more intense, the call seemed to be more evident, and of all things,

I'm sitting in a service one night where it all comes together. It just seems to culminate listening to a lady share a testimony that Dr.

Falwell had come in and share on a Sunday night, and her name was Helen Rosevear, and she was talking about brokenness and what she had gone through in the

Congo during the revolution, and just the lessons that she learned.

Well, that was the very thing in that context that God used to just confirm in my heart that he wanted me into the gospel ministry in declaring the truths of the good news.

So that's where I go back to, that it seemed like it all solidified in the way of a call, was listening to, of all things, a lady who was not preaching, she was not exhorting, but she was sharing her account of how

God dealt with her in the context of that Congo revolution. Wow, praise

God. Well, now tell us something about Don Curran Ministries. Okay, well, it was back in 1981 that we became non -profit.

Of course, I had been involved in that ministry for about a year and a half before that.

God began to burden my heart, particularly for revival or spiritual awakening. I was able to be around people like Vance Havner, knew of his writings, was able to interact a little bit with him.

Of course, was greatly impacted by Leonard Ravenhill, read his books, was able to meet with him as well, and of course began to pick up a plethora of different books concerning revival and spiritual awakening, and the burden for revival intensified.

Well, here I am, I'm preaching to the church, my message primarily is an evangelistic message to the church at large, because I was convinced more and more that there were so many people in churches across the land that were unconverted, and along the way,

God began to give me this secondary burden, and that was, you know, for revival and outpouring of the

Holy Spirit in our country. So my message was twofold when I went into churches.

The nature of our ministry was more inner life, but we would deal specifically and probably more consistently with unregenerate church members, and then also preach on the great need for revival in the local church and across the land.

And tell us why you are specifically the Eastern European coordinator with HeartCry Missionary Society, which is an organization founded by Paul Washer.

Tell us why specifically you had a burden for Eastern Europe, and why you are the coordinator for that area of the world for HeartCry.

Well, Chris, it's a tribute to the providence of God. And Paul did not create any expectations in me when we decided to relocate from the

Atlanta area to Muscle Shoals, Alabama, to become a part of HeartCry.

All I desired and my wife desired to do was to serve any way we could while we continued our itinerant ministry.

Came here, of course, I knew Dr. Nathan Berry, who's on the executive board for HeartCry, knew

Paul fairly well. We had had him for a men's conference in Atlanta. So when we moved here, just to be up close and personal with the ministry and to pray with the guys and be involved as best we could with the outreach of HeartCry, God began to confirm and, of course, open an effectual door for me to become the coordinator in Eastern Europe for HeartCry Missionary Society.

So, you know, it was just interesting that the whole world,

HeartCry was very sensitive, very open to God opening doors for us to come along and support indigenous missionaries.

But in that particular day, in the context, that seemed to be the great need, and it was confirmed through the leadership of HeartCry, as well as by the

Paul, that this is what they wanted to give me the opportunity to be a part of. So I've been working with HeartCry and specifically with Eastern Europe for the last 10 years.

Well, praise God. And give us some idea about certain specific things that HeartCry is involved in.

Well, obviously, you know, the thing that is unique about HeartCry is we support indigenous missionaries, which we want to come alongside.

We're not there necessarily to oversee or to legislate for them, but rather we want to come alongside and cooperate or partner with them in regard to just reaching their own people.

So the uniqueness, I would say, would be indigenous missions. A missionary does not have to necessarily embrace every minute tenet of the

Reformed faith, but they must get the gospel right. And so we want to make sure that they understand the nature of the gospel, what are the essential ingredients of the gospel, and what we could come away with a clear conscience in knowing that they've preached a clear gospel by their own testimony.

So this is, I would say, what we're doing with HeartCry right now is we're investing what

God gives us in the way of the financial resources, in theological training, in also helping these guys reach their community for Christ.

It seems like these days we're more involved in investing in men that really have a vision for church planning.

So at present, we're supporting approximately 241 missionaries in 41 countries around the world.

Now, just out of curiosity, Eastern Europe would include countries like Russia and Belarus and Ukraine and Romania and Bulgaria and Serbia.

And Bosnia and other countries. Do you speak any of these languages? No, I do not.

I do not. When I go over to speak in these various nations, I mean, it's basically through a translator every time.

Well, we praise God for those gifted men and women who have the ability and the talent to do that translation work, because it enables the gospel to spread much more effectively and faster if there are not indigenous people who are as gifted in evangelizing and preaching.

When we have somebody like you go over there, it's a blessing to know that those folks are available.

And last but not least, before we go into our topic, tell us about Providence Chapel Church in Tuscumbia, Alabama, where you are currently an interim pastor.

Well, it's Providence Gospel Church. I know oftentimes when you hear the word gospel in a church name,

I know in the past people have associated that with something charismatic. That's right. We are not charismatic at all.

We are not full gospel. The reason we put that in the title, which it was voted on by our people, was we wanted to be gospel -driven.

We believe that the gospel should fuel everything, and the same gospel that's the power of God and salvation to all who believe is the gospel that's the power of God and the sanctification in every area of life.

So it drives marriage. It drives missions. It drives mortification.

It drives everything in life, whether it's forgiving a brother in Christ or whether it's even dealing with such issues as moral impurity.

We believe that in the Pauline epistles particularly, you see the gospel is at the center of all consecration and relational situations.

And getting back to the church, Chris, that's why we wanted to put the word in the title of our church, is we wanted everything to be gospel -centered and gospel -driven.

And the Rev. Buzz Taylor has something to say. I find it interesting, a couple things you said that kind of fit together here.

You mentioned that your ministry is largely too unconverted in the churches, and you mentioned that through HeartCry Ministries that you try to make sure that they understand that the gospel presentation is accurate, and I don't want to say full gospel, but full enough to actually save people, shall we say.

But thinking those two thoughts together, do you see primarily the problem with unconverted people in the church is because of the gospel message that has been prevalent?

Absolutely, brother. I think that we need to take a step back and biblically define the gospels that are coming down the pike in the name of Christianity or evangelicalism today.

I think because there's such a large amount of people that are unconverted in our churches, it goes back to the fact that the gospel that's being preached is not a clear biblical gospel.

I agree, yes. And today, as most of you know if you heard the program from the outset, our topic is for the love of church history, and tell us about why you have such a love for church history or knowing it, and why it's so important for Christians to be knowledgeable to some extent of church history.

Well, once again, I think it goes back to the call in those early days of my own walk with God, being subjected in God's providence to so many good books and so many good men whose heartbeat, heartthrob, was for revival.

So it sent me on a pilgrimage where I began to study, read, research, glean from the lives of men who did have that great vision of outpouring to the

Holy Spirit. And the result of that has been that I've had just such a great love.

My wife and I, as we travel around the world and speak in various venues, we will ask missionaries or preachers, you know, if we're not already abreast of the fact that we have read it in a book or an article that they ministered in that locale, we will ask these missionaries or preachers, is there anything significant that relates to church history there in your context of ministry?

And it's amazing. I mean, you know, being in Cairo, Egypt, for example, going to the cemetery and seeing the grave of Oswald Chambers.

Or, you know, we might be in England, and just last year I was able to take in the church and all the history of Richard Baxter.

So just traveling around the world gives us access. Another example would be in Italy, going and seeing many of the

Waldensian caves where these people suffered under Roman Catholic tyranny for their faith.

It's always an inspiring moment for us. It brings tears to our eyes when we reflect upon the specific details of what many of these people endured for the gospel.

Well, praise God. And Edmund Burke was famous for saying,

Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it. Don't you think this is very applicable, perhaps especially applicable, with Christianity because of the resurrection of old heresies that come about in new packaging today?

Absolutely. Absolutely. And, you know, Chris, it's interesting,

I mean, how even this interview dovetails with some things that we've had to deal with and encounter globally in recent days.

I feel like that there needs to be a revival of interest in church history, because as you go back and you read these men's lives, for example, just in the last year,

I've made my way through very slowly the ministry and, of course, life of Martin Lloyd -Jones,

J .C. Ryle, and now I'm just about finished Spurgeon's autobiography. This is what these men battle continuously is just a plethora of false gospels.

Well, perhaps you could go through some of those resurrected false gospels that we should be aware of today and how some people are preaching things they think are novel and new insights into the scriptures, but they don't even realize that they're regurgitating things that men and women were condemned for believing in the past.

Yes. Well, brother, I think obviously probably one of the leading ones would be decisional regeneration, that we've taken the supernatural element out of the gospel and God's dealing with man.

The issue is not what we can do for God, but rather what

God can do for us, and I think even today I was listening to Martin Lloyd -Jones, his classic message on but God, and the thing that he continued to underscore in the message was we have really stripped the gospel of its supernaturalness.

God must take the initiative. God must open the heart. He is the one that gives repentance and faith.

That's not to minimize at all the importance of a man flying to Christ by being willing to embrace

Christ in Christ alone, but yet what it is is we have dumbed down the gospel and we've made it very simplistic and we've put more emphasis on what man can do by praying the right prayer and expressing the right measure of emotion, and that guarantees him that he's passed from death to life and that he's in the kingdom.

When I think that the responsibility falls back on the importance of understanding properly the gospel and then preaching it accordingly.

This is what I believe God has chosen and takes pleasure in using to bring about true regeneration in the hearts of unredeemed men.

Amen, and just to give our listeners a clarification or summary of decisional regeneration, and by the way,

I strongly recommend a booklet, and I'm wondering if you do as well,

Don, a booklet by James Adams called Decisional Regeneration that is published by Chapel Library, but he decries this heretical idea that is basically most commonly manifest in your modern day altar call where someone will, a preacher or evangelist or a pastor will call upon those in the congregation who believe that they are lost, who believe they need a savior to come forward, and these people come forward and the minister or the evangelist prays a prayer with them.

He typically will recite a prayer that they are to mimic or repeat, and then when the prayer is completed, very often this evangelist or minister will declare that everybody standing there who recited that prayer are with certainty born again, saved, and have eternal life, and very often, depending upon the theology of the congregation, very often they'll be told, and you will never be lost, and don't let anybody trick you into thinking that you're lost, and the devil may even try to convince you that this really didn't happen to you today, and you have nothing to fear about losing your salvation.

Now, obviously, you and I being believers in sovereign grace don't believe a true Christian can lose his or her salvation, but there's an entirely different thing between that and somebody who thinks that they are born again and is being told that that will never change.

And there are subsequent heresies, brother, to that as well. I mean, for example, the carnal

Christian heresy that, you know, I've got to junk start my spiritual life, the spiritual aspect of man can lie dormant, and he doesn't produce any fruit even though he's prayed the prayer.

He's made a decision for Christ, so he goes for years and years, and there's absolutely no fruit whatsoever, and so you have ministers come along, or Christians, well -meaning

Christians say, well, have you ever made Jesus as Lord? And if you make him as Lord, this is what you'll start doing.

You'll start doing. And so they make Christ as Lord, then they begin to take on the evidence, which is more self -induced than spirit birth.

It's self -induced, and that is that they start praying, they start reading their

Bible, and so they've been a carnal Christian. They've been born again, but they've not really surrendered their life to Christ.

So I think that's one of the heresies that comes out of it. Another thing is there is this overemphasis on discipleship, when

I believe that true discipleship naturally flows out of a genuinely born -again believer.

Not perfect. I'm not saying people don't need instruction. I'm not saying that they don't need to be discipled, but it's amazing how that you see some of the great spiritual awakenings, they didn't have the best resources.

Matter of fact, some of them didn't have really any resources other than the Bible. They didn't have a lot of people to come alongside and help these people that had come into the kingdom of God, but God discipled the people.

God enabled them to stand and be steadfast in the faith, and that's the difference between decisional regeneration and something that is spiritually regenerated by the work of the

Spirit. Yes. In fact, some who would be believers in decisional regeneration, even if they don't use that phrase for themselves, they would dare to say that man is the determiner of his eternal destiny, that he is the one that decides where he will spend eternity, and it is because of his choice that forces

God's hand to either welcome him into heaven or to cast him into hell, and that this is in the power of each individual.

In fact, I can remember even as an unbeliever during a period in my life when

I was being drawn, I can remember hearing a very famous Word of Faith Pentecostal preaching on the radio, and he said that God has done everything that he can do.

Now it's all up to you, and I remember even as an unbeliever thinking that doesn't seem to make sense.

If God is supposed to be the almighty, all -powerful, omnipresent God, how on earth can the eternal destiny of us all be in our hands for us to flick the final switch or something?

That seems to be entirely backwards to me. Right, absolutely. And I think the nature of grace, if it's real grace, is sovereign.

God is in control. God is the one that opens the heart. He is the only one that can produce what we would call biblical salvation, but I think there's this heretical overemphasis on what man can do.

I mean, for example, Chris, just to use an old illustration, there was a gentleman,

Kermit Zarley, who played on the professional golfing circuit. He made just enough money and could compete just well enough, seemingly, to maintain his

PGA card. Well, he was quite a sole winner, and somebody asked him one time, said, wouldn't it be a wonderful thing if Jack Nicklaus got saved?

And Kermit said, it sure would. And the guy says, can you imagine what Jack Nicklaus could do for God?

And Kermit Zarley looked at the man and says, mister, can you imagine what my God could do for Jack Nicklaus?

It's just that whole emphasis, you know, of what man can do for himself and what we can do for others rather than what

God can do. God must come. He must take the field and do his work.

I think we've been plagued, though. This is Reverend Buzz Taylor has something to say. I think we've been plagued, particularly as Americans, in the

American ingenuity that I can do it. And there's,

I believe, a thinking in evangelicalism that previous to modern evangelism, if you will, that the system was somehow broken because they didn't have these massive conversions like you see today.

What do you think about that? Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, reading

Martin Louis Jones, I mean, this is why he could not for conscience sake, one of the major reasons why it's not for conscience sake support, you know, the

Billy Graham campaigns. Once again, I think they really felt like the church was fumbling the ball.

They were not doing their work because they were not seeing these large volumes or masses of people come to Christ.

But that's the worst thing they could have done, was to introduce a system by which man could at least give the impression that he was experiencing something from God and justify it all in the name of God without any real evidence of the power of God.

I remember, for example, there was a professor that I had in school that was very

Calvinistic and I was telling him, I said, you know, it's interesting that D .L.

Moody compared to Charles Finney saw 35 percent of his converts go with God and, you know,

Finney only saw three percent. And he said, well, let me tell you two better than that, that never saw anyone fall by the wayside because they were not decisionistic.

They didn't call for public decisions. And that was George Whitfield and Jonathan Edwards. Well, the emphasis was on the preaching of the gospel, and God was going to call who he wanted, but they didn't use this ploy of getting people to come forward to showcase how many people they had the ability to persuade to work

God. Well, we're going to break right now. And by the way, Don, I just forwarded you a very lengthy question.

It's actually a series of questions from one of our listeners, Jenny in Ben Salem, Pennsylvania.

And I thought I'd forward it to you since you could have it in front of you while I'm going to a station break and you could review it, look it over a bit.

And if anybody else would like to join us on the air, and we do have a number of you already waiting to have your questions asked and answered by Don Curran.

But if anybody else would like to join us, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. Don't go away. God willing, we'll be right back with Don Curran and the love of church history.

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I would not be a servant of Christ. Hi, I'm Mark Lukens, pastor of Providence Baptist Church. We are a

Reformed Baptist Church, and we hold to the London Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689. We are in Norfolk, Massachusetts.

We strive to reflect Paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how God views what we say and what we do than how men view these things.

That's not the best recipe for popularity, but since that wasn't the Apostle's priority, it must not be ours either.

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Welcome back, and make sure you tune in to Bill Shishko's A Visit to the Pastor's Study this

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A Visit to the Pastor's Study, which airs every Saturday, 12 noon to 1 p .m. Eastern time on wlie540am .com.

And now we are returning to our guest, Don Curran of Don Curran Ministries and Heart Cry Missionary Society, and he is addressing

For the Love of Church History, and he's also going to be speaking at the Fellowship Conference New England coming up in August.

In fact, Don, before we go to Jenny in Ben Salem, Pennsylvania's question, if you could tell us a bit about the

Fellowship Conference New England where you'll be speaking, and if you have determined a topic for your speaking engagements there yet.

I know that this is one of those rare conferences where there is no one theme at the

Fellowship Conference New England, that each pastor or speaker preaches or speaks on an area that is burdening his heart, but it doesn't necessarily have to have a thorough or clear connection with the other speakers other than the

Gospel of Jesus Christ, of course. But if you could tell us about Fellowship Conference New England. Yes, I really appreciate,

Chris, the tenor of the conference. It is something that they're seeking the face of God for something fresh, something real, and most important in this day and age, something very biblical.

You know, the brethren that have that up are just embodying the reality.

Their passion is for Christ to hold complete sway over the churches across the land, but knowing these people, knowing their families, their heart for Christ, their heart for the truth of God's Word, it makes for a delightful atmosphere, a context in which

I believe with the bent toward, you know, the type of biblical teaching that is holiness -oriented and Christ -exalting, it enhances to me the prospect of God pouring out

His Spirit and doing a work of real revival in that venue.

If anybody would like to register for the Fellowship Conference New England, go to fellowshipconferencenewengland .com.

That's fellowshipconferencenewengland .com. The dates of the conference are August 3rd through the 5th, and it is held at the

Deering Center Community Church on Brentwood Street in Portland, Maine, and I hope especially that all of my listeners in Maine make it a point to go there, but I'm sure that if those of my listeners who live not only in other parts of the country but other parts of the world, if you have the finances and the ability to jump on a train, plane, or automobile to get to Portland, Maine, I hope that you can do so.

And that is fellowshipconferencenewengland .com. And the other speakers included on that roster, in addition to Don Curran, are

Pastor Mac Tomlinson, a dear friend of mine who serves as an elder at the

Providence Chapel in Denton, Texas. He's also an author. Pastor Jesse Barrington, who was on this program not long ago.

Pastor of Grace Life Church in Dallas, Texas, which is a sister church of Grace Life Church in Lake City, Florida, who has a radio station that airs

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio every day in a pre -recorded form. And last but not least,

Pastor Nate Pikowitz, who is the author of Reviving New England, something that we interviewed

Nate on just a week or so ago. And he is pastor of Harvest Bible Church.

So that's fellowshipconferencenewengland .com, fellowshipconferencenewengland .com.

Now we will return to the questions from our audience, starting with Jenny in Ben Salem, Pennsylvania, who actually has a number of questions here.

She starts off saying, I see that your ministry operates under a local church leadership, which is crucial for all parachurch organizations to have accountability, which

I not only applaud and appreciate, but more importantly, it is a biblical mandate.

Lately, there have been some parachurch organizations that operate discernment ministries that have absolutely no accountability whatsoever.

They operate without a local church leadership, and in the case of one particular discernment ministry, the leader of that ministry doesn't even attend a church.

And she begins her questions, what is your studied response to this question or this situation?

Well, I believe very strongly, Chris, in the local church. I believe that this is

God's ordained agent for carrying out the Great Commission. I'm a firm advocate of the local church from the vantage point of accountability, oversight.

It's interesting that she cites this discernment ministry, which

I believe that what that movement is all about is probably discerning.

They claim to have some type of spiritual gift where they can look at a person, they can discern what's going on in their heart, what they're thinking in their mind, what they've been involved in.

I think if they were more biblically immersed, they would recognize that our source of discernment is not some subjective impression that we get from wherever, but rather it's from the truth of God's Word.

And so this is why I believe that we need the local church. We need people that can handle the

Word of God and teach us to properly discern what's coming down the pike in the name of Christianity.

I personally would be extremely, extremely leery, and I know this could open up a can of worms, but it would be hard for us as a local church, as well as for my wife and I, to support financially any organization or ministry that is not local church oriented.

I think they need to have men that are strongly committed to the local church on the board in order to provide the proper accountability and oversight that that man or men or whoever is a part of that organization needs to function to the glory of God.

And Jenny has a second question. Shouldn't leaders in the visible church privately and, if necessary, publicly rebuke these types of church organizations that have no accountability and are inherently unbiblical?

Well, obviously, I believe very strongly in a ministry of confrontation. I think that what we need to do is expose them inadvertently by preaching the truth of God's Word, what the

Scripture teaches, for those who have ears to hear. And I think it certainly behooves us at times if this heretical approach continues to go to them individually as best we can to see them on a personal level and deal with this issue accordingly.

So, yes, as far as mudslinging publicly, I don't think that that wins today.

I don't think we're going to see much reversed in regard to what they're involved in doing that.

But I think at times what we do need to do publicly is to keep reiterating, teaching, expounding the

Word of God, let God expose that, and expose it to the lives of people that are possibly being drawn to that type of movement.

But as far as personal confrontation is concerned, I think it's best that we, of course, try our best to contact them privately and then confront them.

Well, if we have time later, we'll address some of Jenny's other questions because we do have a lot of listeners waiting to have their questions asked and answered.

So thank you so much, Jenny, for taking the time to write such thoughtful questions and keep listening to Iron Sharpens Iron and spreading the

Word about the program in Ben Salem, Pennsylvania and beyond. We have a listener all the way in Slovenia, Joe, who says,

Dear Brother Chris, thank you so much for having Brother Don and his focus on missions in Eastern Europe.

Please ask Brother Don to describe what, if any, involvement HeartCry may have in Slovenia.

Would he be interested in visiting me here for the purpose of exploring volunteer mission opportunities and in church planting with a

Reformed Baptist brother? And would he be interested in coming to Slovenia to learn about Reformation church history and her like leaders like Primoz Trubar and Jurij Dalmatin, who created the written

Slovenian language, wrote the first Protestant catechism, and translated the

Bible in Slovenian? We desperately need brothers and churches of like -minded Reformed faith engaged in church planting in Slovenia.

Currently, I know none. Thank you so much for giving me this platform to address

Brother Don and brothers around the world on behalf of those here in Slovenia as yet still lost in darkness.

Well, first of all, I really appreciate this brother's heart. We certainly would be very open to listening to what the burden and vision is for that part of the world.

I would recommend that you contact HeartCry Missionary Society, their website. That way, the gentleman or gentlemen that have been designated for that region of the world would take his request, things that perhaps he needs some help in regarding someone coming over, ministering in any way, and then they could pray for it for possibly future ministry.

But we're certainly never closed. We're not deaf to anyone or any part of the world that seeks for somebody to come and pray over and, of course, come alongside of to make the gospel more effective in that particular context around the world.

So, but Brother, I mean, he's covered a lot there and what he said to you, Chris, we're very open to that.

But the best thing I could encourage him to do is to contact HeartCry Missionary Society, the website, and that way someone there in the office would respond to his request.

And Joe, the website is heartcrymissionary .com, heartcrymissionary .com.

So take up Brother Don's advice and do that as soon as possible. We're going to a break right now.

And if anybody else would like to join the others still waiting to have their questions asked and answered by Brother Don Curran, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Don't go away. God willing, we'll be right back after these messages with Don Curran and our subject for the love of church history.

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Welcome back, this is Chris Arns and if you just tuned us in, our guest for the full two hours with a little less than an hour to go is

Don Curran of Don Curran Ministries and HeartCry Missionary Society.

We are discussing For the Love of Church History and we're also talking about the

Fellowship Conference New England. If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own for Don, 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, city and state, and country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. And before I return to our discussion, I have a few announcements to make, including more details about that conference

I just mentioned in Portland, Maine, the Fellowship Conference New England coming up August 3rd through the 5th at the

Deering Center Community Church in Portland, Maine. And the speakers at the

Fellowship Conference New England, August 3rd through the 5th, include our guests today, Pastor Don Curran of Don Curran Ministries, HeartCry Missionary Society, and Providence Gospel Church in Tuscumbia, Alabama.

Pastor Mac Tomlinson, who is an author and pastor of Providence Chapel in Denton, Texas. Pastor Jesse Barrington, who is the pastor of Grace Life Church in Dallas, Texas.

And Pastor Nate Pikowitz, who is an author and pastor of Harvest Bible Church in Gilmanton Ironworks, New Hampshire.

If you'd like to register for this conference, go to fellowshipconferencenewengland .com,

fellowshipconferencenewengland .com. And then coming up in November from the 17th through the 18th in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, the

Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology is being held at the Grace Bible Fellowship Church in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, including such speakers as Kent Hughes, Peter Jones, Tom Nettles, Dennis Cahill, and Scott Oliphant.

The theme is, For Still Our Ancient Foe, which is a classic line from Martin Luther's hymn,

Mighty Fortress. Obviously, the conference has some sort of theme involving

Satan, I'm assuming. And if you would like to join me there,

I will have an exhibitors booth there at the Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology. Go to alliancenet .org,

alliancenet .org, then click on Events, then click on Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology.

And then after that, I am traveling out to Atlanta, Georgia in January.

From the 17th through the 20th, the G3 Conference returns to Atlanta, Georgia.

On the 17th, it is exclusively a Spanish -speaking edition of the

G3 Conference. And then from the 18th through the 20th is the English Conference, featuring such speakers as,

God willing, Paul Washer, Stephen Lawson, Vody Baucom, H .P. Charles Jr.,

Tim Chalies, Josh Bice, James White of Alpha Omega Ministries, Tom Askell of Founders Ministries, Anthony Mathenia, Michael Kruger, David Miller, Paul Tripp, Todd Friel, Derek Thomas, and Martha Peace.

The theme of the conference is, Knowing God, a Biblical Understanding of Discipleship.

If you'd like to register for the G3 Conference, go to g3conference .com, g3conference .com.

And now I have to do something that always makes me uncomfortable. I have to ask you for money. I have been urged by my advertisers on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio to make public appeals for more advertisers and more donations, as long as the

Lord enables you to do so. And I repeat this every day, and I want you to always remember,

I never want anybody siphoning money out of their regular giving to their local church where they are a member.

And if you're not a member of a local church, you should rectify that situation as soon as possible. But please never siphon money out of your giving to your church to give to Iron Sharpens Iron, and never take food off of your dinner table to help

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He does not command you to support Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. But if God has blessed you above and beyond your ability to do those things, please consider supporting

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clicking on support, and then mailing a check made out to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio for any amount, and mail it to the address that you will find there on the website,

IronSharpensIronRadio .com, and then click support. And you can advertise with us as long as what you are advertising is compatible with the theology expressed on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, whether it's your business, your corporation, your church, your parachurch ministry, your special event, whatever it may be that is compatible with what we believe here at Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

Well, send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com and put advertising in the subject line.

That's chrisarnson at gmail .com. That's also the email address that you can join us now with a question of your own for Don Curran on For the

Love of Church History. That's chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com.

And now, Don, we have some more questions from our listeners. We have

Daniel in Bakersfield, California. His question is, how do you go about convincing your congregation of the importance of knowing church history?

Okay. Well, I see the significance of designating, perhaps, even a rather lengthy series on the subject of church history, where what you could do is come up with creative titles to create an appetite for the subject.

This is an essential link. This is a prelude, I believe, to real spiritual awakening.

It's interesting that even in church history that, at times, God would move upon men to disclose what he had done in the past through great outpourings of the

Spirit, and it created such an insatiable drive in men to pursue

God, to do what only God could do. But I think that the one thing that I feel like probably needs to be at the core of anything we could do to really pique the appetite of people for church history would be to walk in personal revival ourselves, to glean from the lives of these men that God so significantly used in the context of these outpourings, and then to seek to emulate that with cooperating with the

Holy Spirit, pursuing, through the prayer of opportunity, that working of revival in your own heart.

I think, many times, it's the best way to motivate men toward listening to what we have to say when it comes to these things that God displayed in the way of his glory in these revivals and spiritual awakenings.

So, yes, I think dialoguing about it personally, putting books, good books, substantive books in the hands of your people, to read of the accounts, but more importantly, to subject them to the truth in knowing that God is a sovereign

God, revival is the result of a sovereign movement of God.

Things like that, oftentimes, the Spirit uses to create a thirst in your people for revival.

Well, thanks for that excellent question. And we now have Benjamin from Dublin, Ireland, who says,

Greetings from the Emerald Isle. Please could you ask Mr. Curran the following question.

I have studied church history, read books, and have also watched some useful documentaries.

As such, over time, I have come to certain doctrinal convictions. I class myself as Reformed Baptist.

I hold to the Five Solos of the Reformation, TULIP, the Regulative Principle of Worship, EP, Superlapsarianism, Amillennial Complementarianism, the 1689

London Baptist Confession of Faith, and the Baptist Catechism. My preference would be to join a

Reformed Baptist EP church. And I think he is, I don't know if he means

Evangelical Presbyterian. I'm not really sure what EP means. But sadly, there are no such churches for me to join.

EP is very important to me, as much as it makes it impossible for me to fully join into the worship of a church.

I do believe EP is a secondary issue, but it is top of my secondary issues list.

I guess I was wrong about Evangelical Presbyterianism. How can I go about setting up a Reformed Baptist EP church in Dublin, Ireland?

I do not feel called to the pulpit. Perhaps you could explain, if you do know,

Don, what is EP an abbreviation for? You know, Chris, I am not familiar with that term, so I have no idea.

Well, Benjamin, send us another email and tell us what EP stands for. But if you could, just respond to, obviously, what the core of his question is.

How do I go about setting up a Reformed Baptist church in Dublin, Ireland? Is basically what he is saying. And he's not called to the pulpit himself.

Well, Chris, I make no apology for just saying that. I know it sounds very simplistic, but pray.

I mean, and I'm sure he has prayed, but to take your prayer life to a whole different dimension, to engage in earnest prayer, the prayer of opportunity, that God, would you please draw around me or lead me to another brother or a group of believers that believe along the lines that I do.

And then from praying about it earnestly, ongoingly, you know, you seek to demonstrate that lifestyle that even beyond,

I know the terminology at times can be offensive to some, but we use it for identification, but beyond Reformed stance, what we believe to be a systematic theology that's

Christ -centered and seek to emulate with the help of the Holy Spirit, the likeness of Christ.

And in that venue, a fellowship with those brethren, seek to dwell upon those truths and those principles and those distinctive doctrines that elevate the

Lord Jesus Christ and magnify the Father. I think this is the greatest thing that we can do.

I mean, you're in a region, obviously Dublin. I'll be there this fall for a marriage conference and a church, and I know there's a great need there in Dublin, but this is what he can do if he seeks to, of course, the use of the

Lord on the ground floor of producing such a church that he sees as very important and vital, and that he's listed a different, a number of the different things that he's looking for in a church.

Also, I would say this, Chris, you know, once again, there may be some things that we have to lay aside, and that's a rather lengthy list there, and although we might appreciate most all of it, if not all of it, yet, though, there may be some things that we can afford to make concessions for, for the sake of God's glory and building a strong biblical church.

Well, Benjamin got back to us, and he clarified what EP stands for. This is going to make his task even greater.

Exclusive psalmody. So, obviously, for him to want to build a church with all of the other factors involved, including exclusive psalmody, is going to be a greater challenge ahead, but if that is his conviction, obviously, we don't want people to compromise their convictions, but he did say that that was a secondary issue, the exclusive psalmody part.

There are a couple of Reformed Baptist churches I've heard of that do practice exclusive psalmody, but that is rare for Reformed Baptists in this day and age,

I believe. Right, right. Well, thank you so much, Benjamin, in Dublin, Ireland, for your excellent question, and please keep listening to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio and spreading the word about it in Dublin, Ireland.

And by the way, when I was giggling before reading the long list of things that identify your belief system,

I wasn't making fun of that. I would agree with the vast majority of everything that you listed.

It was just the fact that we Reformed people have a tendency to be very meticulous to the point of OCD, and there's a lot of things that you listed.

Nobody's perfect. Certainly not you, Reverend Boz. But thanks a lot,

Benjamin, and I look forward to hearing from you again and often. We also have

Gordy in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. What do you believe is the biggest pitfall for those in ministry?

I'll start with that. He has two questions. What do you believe is the biggest pitfall for those in ministry? He's asking me the question, what do

I believe to be the biggest pitfall? Yes. Okay. Chris, I would have to say what really comes to my mind is passivity.

There's a world difference between waiting on God and being passive. And I do not believe that ministers by and large, and I include myself, as well as the laity, are aggressive enough in their faith.

I mean, if there's one principle that's continuously underscored in the

New Testament, it's the principle of diligence. And I think oftentimes it's so easy in this day and age to become victimized by the barrenness of business, that what we do is we sit back and wait for things to happen rather than recognizing that God uses means to do

His work. In reading, once again, some of these men in church history, brother, they were epistles of diligence, as Spurgeon said, epistles of diligence in the king's household.

So there was no room for sitting back and hopefully this is going to happen.

And I've prayed and committed this to the Lord, but they're not willing to be the means that God perhaps could use to answer their own prayer.

So I would really encourage people to guard their hearts against this plague of what

I would call passivity in ministry or in missions or in life. And the second question from Gordy in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania is,

Do you believe that reception to the gospel is worse in Eastern Europe or in the

United States since you minister in both regions? I think obviously it's worse overall in the

United States. The difference between East and Western Europe by and large is the prosperity element.

We remember there in the scripture that God has chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom.

It doesn't for a minute mean that God is not using ministries in a very effectual way in affluent cultures to bring men into the kingdom, but I find there's a far greater receptivity in places like Asia or Africa or even

Eastern Europe because you get out in the rural communities, the people are very poor.

You know, ministry in Moldova, Serbia, Romania, and also

Ukraine, there's a poverty there at times in the villages that God has used and God has of course confirmed in his word that he honors in bringing men into the kingdom.

So I would say overall Eastern Europe is far more receptive and open to gospel elements than the

United States is. Do you think a part of that could be because in some sense, even though there is a history of rich, biblically sound preaching and teaching that has existed, perhaps not so much in Asia, although it has been there obviously, but it seems that as far as recent history, it's a new phenomenon for the gospel to be spreading in those areas, whereas in the

United States people are yawning because, oh yeah, we've heard that before or what have you.

I mean, you have the Bible Belt where you have millions of people who think they are

Christians because their daddy, their granddaddy, and their great granddaddy were

Baptist preachers or because they were in Baptist or some other evangelical denomination for centuries in the family, and they're as dead as a doornail spiritually.

Do you think that could have something to do with it? It's like a new thing? Yes, absolutely,

Chris. What we might call the contempt of familiarity, taking these things lightly.

Of course, there's a number of factors that have contributed to that. One is a deficiency of experimental religion.

They look at people in the church, and they don't see much animation that is spiritually wrought.

It's more something that's superficial and more entertainment -oriented, and consequently it's a turn -off to people.

But yeah, I think that they've heard it over and over and over again, and with the deficiency of spiritual reality behind it and a lack of experimental religion, it's almost like a death warrant to so many people.

Well, thank you so much, Gordie. In Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, please keep listening to Iron, Sharp, and Zion and spreading the word about the program in Mechanicsburg and beyond.

We have Mark in Corpus Christi, Texas. My question for Brother Don is, when are you coming back down to visit us at Sovereign Grace Community Church in Corpus Christi, Texas?

Whenever I get the invitation, Brother. Well, now it's up to you, Mark. It sounds like an invitation to me,

I don't know. And I'm curious if Mark knows an old friend of mine who used to be in Corpus Christi for quite a number of years,

John Otis. He's no longer there, but he was pastoring at Presbyterian Church, I think it was Christ Presbyterian Church in Corpus Christi, and he wrote a phenomenal work exposing the

Masons, Freemasonry. He was on a board for the PCA at one time, when he was still involved in the

PCA, where they had to vote as a denomination whether a member in good standing could be a

Mason. And he was a part of the group that was opposing the acceptance of Freemasonry as something that a

Christian could participate in. Thank you, Mark. And keep listening to Iron Sharpens Iron.

And by the way, Mark, since you are a first -time listener, or should I say a first -time questioner, because you may have been listening before,

I don't know. But you have won a free New American Standard Bible, compliments of the publishers of the

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ship that new New American Standard Bible out to you. That's new twice in a sentence, new

New American Standard Bible. And we hope to hear from you again soon. And I want to get back to church history.

Do you think that it is wise for us, I mean, we could really go on and on for years discussing

Luther and Calvin and Zwingli, there are still many things about those heroes of the faith,

John Knox and others, Spurgeon, and the list goes on.

There's a lot that many of us don't know still about those famous figures from church history.

But don't you think it's wise to keep things fresh by including the unsung heroes of the past in part of our learning in regard to church history?

Like, for instance, Girolamo Savonarola, I can't even pronounce his name,

Savonarola, Savonarola. There you go. Tell us about that figure. And do you agree with my statement that we should be really letting our friends, family, loved ones, and congregations know about some of these more obscure or unknown folks who had a great legacy that they've left?

Chris, all men are our teachers. Savonarola, by the way, there were some real glitches in his theology.

There's no doubt about it, you know, he was, you know, he counteracted the

Catholic movement, and I don't question the reality of the new birth in his life.

He preached the Atonement. There was an outpouring, according to S .M. Houghton's book on church history under his ministry.

But we learn. We learn that sometimes there's chaff among that which we would deem as weak in their theology or their preaching.

But I'm intrigued. I learned something from these guys. I'm inspired either from something negative or something positive in their lives.

But I think, yes, the best of men, as George Whitfield wrote to John Fennick when he was being drawn into the

West End movement of that day, he just cautioned them in love, and he said, the best of men are men at best.

And the thing is, even though Spurgeon and Luther and a host of others, they had their glitches of character, to me that just underscores the beauty and the power and the majesty of God that God could use mere men like you and I, Chris, to advance his kingdom.

So, yes, I just see a vital link. I feel like we're depriving ourselves so much individually and collectively as a

Church of Jesus Christ in not exploring Church history and particularly not dwelling like we should upon these men and their ministries.

We're going to our final break. It will be a briefer break this time. If anybody would like to join us, now is the time to do it because we're running out of time.

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Harvey Cedars, where Christ finds people and changes lives. Welcome back.

This is Chris Arnzen, and now we are entering into our final 25 minutes of our interview with Don Curran from Don Curran Ministries and the

HeartCry Missionary Society and the Providence Gospel Church in Tuscumbia, Alabama. We are talking about For the

Love of Church History, and if you'd like to join us, our email address is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, and we do have RJ from White Plains, New York.

Don, RJ from White Plains, New York, wants to know who your favorite figures from church history are that are not necessarily commonly known names today.

Hmm, oh, I would say that's a very good question.

Chris, in reflecting back, I have to say it's an assortment of what we might refer to as Armenians, as well as people that believe very strongly in the

Reformed faith. For example, one man that I have been rather intrigued by is praying high,

John High, Missionary to India. There's no doubt that there was something gloriously, uniquely different about John High.

For example, just a few nights ago, just delving back into the biography of John High and then reading alongside

Spurgeon, most men believed in when a crisis or a trial came, they responded in childlike faith.

It wasn't like they're going to different people saying, what are we going to do about this financial crisis? What are we going to do about this spiritual domestic dispute between two brothers?

It was a call for them to go to God in prayer. They weren't going around trying to solicit support or even solicit counsel on how they had to handle these issues.

They went directly to the Father. It's amazing how

God would respond. The people that are giving the accounts of these lives are not trying to be overdramatic to wow you, but they're just reporting what these men would do.

I would say somebody like John High, Missionary to India, has had a significant impact on my life.

Is that H -Y -D -E? Beg your pardon? H -Y -D -E?

That's correct. That's correct. I would say other men, you know, you mentioned

Shabba LaRolla, you know, just going through S .M. Houghton's book on church history, who

Martin Lloyd -Jones highly recommended, who Houghton was a very good friend of Lloyd -Jones, but they bring up men in that volume, he does, that you've not heard of before, that God used mightily.

Let me give you some others to think about to get back to the original question. People like Alexander Pedan, who was the prophet of the covenant.

There's an excellent book on Pedan's life and ministry by John Johnston called

Alexander Pedan, the Prophet of the Covenant, that has been very impactful on my life.

Another man like C .T. Studd had a significant influence on my life, you know, just reading about how the

Lord used him in various mission contexts. But maybe some people would say this man was, you know, well known.

I don't know if I could say that, but people like David Brainerd, people like Hal Harris, that was a very good friend of George Whitfield, that God used during the awakenings.

People like this, reading their lives once again, gleaning from their works, their sermons, and how

God impacted their own culture of the day, has had a significant impact on my life, you know, spiritually and in my walk with God.

In fact, I'll add another name that I had never heard of before, before having

Mack Tomlinson, our mutual friend, on the Iron Trip and Zion program,

Conrad Murrell, or Murrell, is someone that I had not heard of before, that Mack Tomlinson devoted much time, effort, and love into creating, writing a biography of Conrad that is quite a substantial biography that I would recommend to anyone.

You can go to ConradMurrell .com, and that's C -O -N -R -A -D, M as in Michael, U -R -R -E -L -L .com

to find out more about that biography. There is a biography that I absolutely love,

I don't know if you've ever heard of it, Don, but this biography should be turned into a movie someday.

The Life and Times of Spencer Cone, C -O -N -E, that's the subtitle, the actual title of the biography is

A Pastor in New York, The Life and Times of Spencer Cone. Spencer Cone was pastor of the

First Baptist Church of Manhattan in New York in the 19th century, quite a remarkable brother in Christ who has as a part of his life such things as going from a school teacher to a lawyer to a stage actor, theater actor, to a war hero in the

War of 1812 to a pastor, and truly a remarkable life of someone that I had never heard of ever,

I'd never heard his name even uttered by anybody until I read John Thornberry's biography of Spencer Cone.

I strongly and highly recommend that to you. John Thornberry, dear brother in Christ who shares our convictions and the doctrines of Sovereign Grace and was for many years the pastor of a

Sovereign Grace Baptist Church in Winfield, Pennsylvania, and he is now retired and living in Kentucky, and his son is the current president of the

King's College, Jonathan Thornberry, but I strongly recommend that. Also Stephen Ting, I don't know if you've read anything by Stephen Ting, he was a 19th century low church

Calvinist Episcopal minister in New York City and quite a remarkable brother in Christ, and you can order books that have been brought back into print by Stephen Ting from Solid Ground Christian Books, solid -ground -books .com,

that's solid -ground -books .com, but truly a remarkable brother that I'm sure you would be blessed by as well.

I would like you to make sure that you have several minutes uninterrupted by really giving a summary of why church history is so important before we go to any additional questions from listeners.

Well once again, I think you mentioned at the beginning of the program today, we learn a lot of things as what not to do, and what we can do and what we should do by learning from the blessings and benefits versus the mistakes that so many in church history, men, women, made.

To me that's a very important aspect of it. Another reason is,

I'm inspired, Chris, by these people, these monuments of grace.

Poor, pitiful, weak, inept men, even though oftentimes we have a tendency to magnify their assets, yet I'm inspired that if God can use a man like Martin Luther, who had his warts, wart upon wart, then

I'd say there's hope for me. If God can use men like Martin Lloyd -Jones, given over to depression, and Spurgeon, given over to depression, and Martin Luther, given over to depression, there's hope for me.

I used to oftentimes justify my problem, my struggle with melancholy, by saying, well,

Luther and Spurgeon got depressed, until one day I realized that's all we had in common.

But I was inspired by these men, that in spite of their frailties,

God used them. It's interesting, as someone asked J .I. Packer years ago, who is the greatest preacher in the world today?

He very quickly responded and said, you don't know him. He's in some little remote region somewhere, totally isolated, nobody's heard of him, and yet God has reserved that minister for his own glory.

So sometimes some people think they have a monopoly on spirituality or success in ministry or whatever, and yet there are scores of people around the world that no one will ever read a book that they've written, nobody will hear about them, that God has mightily used in their weak state.

If I could say something just to kind of connect with what

I've just mentioned, let me get back to the subject of revival, and maybe this will dovetail with the fellowship conference there in Portland, but we're believing

God for another spiritual awakening. I'm looking to the Lord Jesus Christ to rend the heavens and come down, and I think the thing that we can do, as I once again go back to church history, and I draw from church history, the purest revivals, the purest spiritual awakenings, came as a result of the gospel being at the center.

Quite honestly, the Reformation was a spiritual awakening. You look at the first great awakening in our country, the second great awakening in our country under men like Asa Heldman Nelson, and then of course the

Kentucky Revival. These are the three major awakenings in the United States, but it's interesting, at the heart of those awakenings, look at the preaching, it was all on Christ and him crucified.

Now yes, we're to preach the whole counsel of God, and we well should do that.

I think that's the reason Paul could say, I'm pure from the blood of all men. However, though, you find that what seems to propagate the work of grace in the hearts of men is when it comes to our responsibility, our part of preaching the gospel.

That gospel, God has not only given us for salvation, but also for sanctification.

And once again, before I say anything else, let me just mention to you, in these awakenings, particularly in our country, you see where, for example, when

Whitefield preached, what was at the heart of his message was the atonement. You look at the titles of his messages that are recorded in some of the books that house the sermons of George Whitefield, the titles, and when you study these messages behind the titles, they were just blood soaked.

Same way with Spurgeon in the revival of 1859, in his own pulpit, you find that throughout that whole year, he's bringing people back to the atoning beauties and the glories of Christ and him crucified.

So I see, humanly speaking, when we talk about preaching the greatest catalyst for another awakening, whether it's at the

Fellowship Conference in New England, or whether it's at a local church somewhere around the world right now,

I think that what we need to do is we need to make the center of our message the atonement of Jesus Christ.

Amen, and by the way, one of your colleagues and friends speaking at the

Fellowship Conference New England wrote the book that I mentioned earlier, Reviving New England, The Key to Revitalizing Post -Christian

America. That's Nate Pickowitz. Our listeners should go to Amazon and get a hold of that book, or better yet, go to cvbbs .com,

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, and order that book, and cvbbs .com actually sponsor

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and ask Todd and Patty Jennings, if they don't already have

Reviving New England in stock, to order it for you. And that's by Nate Pickowitz, one of the speakers at the upcoming

Fellowship Conference New England, August 3rd through the 5th. And let's see, we have, oh, by the way,

I also wanted to plug, since you brought up Asahel Nettleton, I wanted to plug another book by my friend

John Thornberry, God Sent Revival, The Story of Asahel Nettleton and the

Second Great Awakening. That's another book that you can get from cvbbs .com,

cv for Cumberland Valley, bbs for biblebookservice .com. And as I said, if they don't already have it, they can get it for you at a very good price.

So thank you for bringing up Asahel Nettleton, and reminded me of this great work by John Thornberry.

And of course, Ian Murray wrote Revival and Revivalism that contrasted

Asahel Nettleton with Charles Finney, who was a part of what might be called a false revival.

Mm -hmm, mm -hmm. Go ahead, I'm sorry. No, no problem at all.

You know, it's interesting, talking about shallow evangelism today, and how there's so many still parading around the country in the name of evangelism that is more manipulative than it is something that is sent from heaven.

But Nettleton, what a refreshment. They estimated around 30 ,000 people came to Christ under his ministry.

Almost everywhere he went, there was a manifestation of God's glory and power in revival.

But unlike so much of the evangelists today, his preaching was highly theological,

Chris. If you read the messages, I'm looking at a book right here in my library, Asahel Nettleton, Sermons from the

Second Great Awakening. Those sermons struck terror, fear in people's hearts, but they were solidly biblical, just full of theology.

So a lot of people say, well, that won't work for today. Well, on the contrary,

I believe God honors truth, and the Spirit will bear witness to the truth if it's presented.

And you'll not get as many professions of faith, but I think you'll come a lot closer to seeing genuine conversion.

Reverend Buzz Taylor has something to say. Yeah, I was going to say that maybe it hasn't been tried, I don't know. But talking about church history,

I'm sure a number of listeners want to look into it more as a result of today's program.

Could you direct us to two or three books that you would recommend as a good place to start to get a good background of church history?

Thank you for the question, Brother. First of all, I would say it's a good book, it's accurate, but it's called

Christianity Through the Centuries by Carnes, C -A -R -N -E -S.

It's just a basic, you know, it's a fairly thick book, but just a good basic presentation of church history.

But I would say the one that I could highly recommend would be a publication by Banner of Truth called

Sketches from Church History. This is the one I've alluded to twice today by S .M.

Houghton, who was a very dear friend of Mark Lloyd -Jones. And I took, you know, our men and I, we went through this volume back about a year and a half, two years ago.

So even for homeschoolers, people that want to take their children to church history, this would be excellent, because it has a number of pictures of different sites where God visited

His people, as well as portraits of some of the men and women that God used in the work of Revival.

So it's an excellent treatise, Sketches from Church History by S .M. Houghton.

Thank you for that, and thanks for the question, Buzz. We have another question, this time a more serious question than just an invitation to come to Corpus Christi.

We have Mark from Corpus Christi again, who asks you, do you know anything about the revivals that followed in preaching, in the preaching of Rolf Barnard in the 1940s and 50s?

And if the listeners are not familiar with him, you can find some recordings on sermonaudio .com.

Yeah, I just, I would say maybe two years ago for the first time, discovered who

Rolf Barnard was. Quite a fiery fundamentalist preacher, but from a sovereign grace perspective, very fascinating brother in Christ.

Yes, outstanding. I was first subjected to Rolf Barnard, his ministry in Townsville, South Carolina, years ago.

Pastor, friend of mine, Jeffrey Scott, was pastoring a church there, and he introduced me to Rolf Barnard, and I remember listening to him,

I was gripped, not only by the content of his message, but also by the aggression and the sense of anointing.

It's interesting, he would go into nominal Baptist churches, not sovereign grace, and not

Reformed. Back then, they almost did not exist, but here he is, very Reformed in his message, and he goes in and preaches, and they see a real move of God.

Some people would even assess this as true revivals, and just as a passing note, one church he was in, a gentleman told me that there was such a radical work of God, that at the end of the meeting, which by the way was extended, they rewrote the entire doctoral statement, which formally was very

Arminian. They made it extremely biblically Reformed, and so to me, that might be a real test when it comes to true revival in our day and age, are people willing to go back over and consider what they've written away of what they believe concerning doctrine, and if there's anything that's not biblical, are they willing to change that?

A transformed doctoral statement, to me, is a tribute to the work of the Holy Spirit. Well, thanks

Mark and Corpus Christi. We also have Murray in Kinross, Scotland, who has a word to help out

Benjamin in Dublin, Ireland, who emailed us earlier. Murray in Kinross, Scotland says,

Malcolm Watts pastors a Reformed Baptist exclusive psalmody church in Salisbury, England, and is just setting up a seminary.

Benjamin in Dublin, Ireland would do well to contact him. Ask him to contact me.

I can put him in touch with other exclusive psalmody folk, even though I'm not one myself.

So that's Murray in Kinross, Scotland, and I will do that, Benjamin in Dublin, Ireland.

I will pass on Murray in Kinross, Scotland's contact information for you so that you two can become acquainted and he can help you out.

Well, I wanted to make sure, before we conclude, that our audience has all of the primary websites that they need to have in order to contact you and learn more about you.

First of all, we have doncurranministries .org, and that's d -o -n -c -u -r -r -i -n -ministries .org.

We have the HeartCry Missionary Society, which is heartcrymissionary .com,

heartcrymissionary .com. And we have the Providence Gospels Church in Duscumbia, Alabama, providencegospelchurch .com,

providencegospelchurch .com. If you could, in about two minutes, summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today,

Don. Well, Brother Paul Washer has shared with me quite often,

Chris, some thoughts about revival and just personal walk with God. And he said to me one day, and he's said it to me since a number of times, he said, you know, brother, when we get to heaven, we'll know a lot.

And I said, yes, we will. And I'm thinking in our glorified state, we will know a lot. But he said, you know, brother, when it comes to the gospel, we'll be hunting down, pursuing the beauties and the glories for all eternity.

And I think he's got a valid point. I think that what will fuel our passion for revival, spiritual awakening, and even for church history is if we learn to immerse ourselves daily in the gospel.

I know some of the people have coined the term gospel driven. It's an OK term.

I think it captures this very concept. But brother, we need to take the time to daily look upon, contemplate the atoning wonder of Jesus and what he has accomplished in his death on the cross.

Amen. That we will find to be a driving force in all that we do in ministry and will enable us to overcome seasons of discouragement.

Amen. Well, also, folks, don't forget about the Fellowship Conference New England, where Don Curran will be speaking

August 3rd through the 5th. Go to fellowshipconferencenewengland .com, fellowshipconferencenewengland .com.

Don't forget about Solid Ground Christian Books, also, for a treasure trove of books on history, solid -ground -books .com,

solid -ground -books .com. For those of you wanting to get the booklet Decisional Regeneration by James Adams that I mentioned earlier, go to chapellibrary .org,

chapellibrary .org. I hope you all have a blessed evening. I thank you so much,

Don, for being a part of our program today. I thank Buzz Taylor for being my co -host today. And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater