February 1, 2017 Show with Interviews from the 2017 G3 Conference! Part 3: Les Lanphere, John Crotts, Toni Brown, Mike Wieszchowski, and Andrew Rappaport

Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister

George Norcross in downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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

Now here's our host Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania and the rest of humanity who are living on the planet earth listening via live streaming.

This is Chris Arnzen your host of Iron Sharpens Iron wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this first day of February 2017 and we are going to be resuming the airing of pre -recorded interviews that I conducted while live at an exhibitor's booth at the

G3 conference held January 19th through the 21st at the

Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta, Georgia hosted by Pastor Josh Bice and Praise Mill Baptist Church in that area and I was so thrilled with that event as I have told many of you.

I was so thrilled not only to interview men that I had first met there at the conference for the first time and interviewed them face to face for the first time having had interviewed them previously on the phone but also interviewing some folks for the first time ever and also meeting many of you who are the having the opportunity to interview a handful of you.

So this is the third segment that we are airing featuring the interviews that I conducted there and I eventually intend to air all of the interviews that we recorded so be patient as we try to squeeze those other remaining interviews during live broadcasts that I'll be conducting over the days and weeks ahead but the first interview that we are going to be playing today is an interview that I conducted with Les Lanphier who is the creator of the film

Calvinist that's the full title of the documentary film

Calvinist so here is that interview with Les Lanphier and I hope that you thoroughly enjoy listening to it and if you want to take note that Chris Arnzen here again at the

G3 conference in Atlanta, Georgia and I have with me a brother who is involved in a new film coming out called

The Calvinist. Calvinist yeah. Without the the. Without the the. Just Calvinist. Yep. And brother if you could introduce yourself to our listeners and tell us something about how you came about to develop this film.

Sure yeah my name is Les I have been sort of I've been doing a podcast with a friend for about three years and we have sort of a pretty good circle of young reformed guys and I found myself

I've worked in the film industry in the past movies like Transformers and Smurfs things like that but in post -production and I found myself in a place where I was unemployed and I like film production and I love

Calvinism so I started a Kickstarter and said you know if you guys want this movie to be made and I made a budget and then the budget was tripled by the end of the you know that I got three times as much money as I asked for so it was clear that people like the idea and so for the past six months

I've been traveling all over the country just interviewing my heroes so it's just been an amazing experience a huge blessing.

Hey great and uh Les how do you pronounce your last name? Lanphier. Okay because isn't that was it

Jeremiah Lanphier who was a part of the New York City revival in the 19th century? Yeah I tell it's a

Huguenot name originally so I got any relation to him I don't I don't think so I don't I don't know

I don't know uh so tell this uh film is it more of a documentary or is it involved actors or how is it how is this yeah it's a documentary um uh it's basically

I mean I was a product of the young restless reform movement you know Mark Driscoll and John Piper and all that um so and and I know that there's a huge group of people out there that have the same experience like we watched the

Paul Washer video and it blew our minds and that either saved you or made you a Calvinist you know um so uh we just have

I just know a bunch of people have the same sort of experience we went through and I just think it's a fascinating story about how

God took this I mean just a generation that you think is ADD and loves video games and does and hates the truth and all of a sudden um became very interested in this old theology that's offensive to people uh

Calvinism so yeah it does militate uh against the natural man's uh sensibilities uh it the the concept as um

I can't remember the priest's name in in uh Boy Town uh the the famous movie with Spencer Tracy Spencer Tracy in the role of the priest but I remember him saying at one pivotal point in the movie there is no bad boy uh that that concept of the goodness the the innate goodness of humanity that is only tainted by external forces and experiences oh yeah that seems the

Doctrines of Grace has turned that upside down absolutely yeah and there's and you know we just have this uh uh just every there's no such thing as truth everybody's entitled to their own opinion sort of and then you know even like gender and stuff now so the way this the the culture and the way our even our generation has been going is just is just insane uh in in their worldview and I just think it's so amazing and um counterintuitive and countercultural that and you know this is maybe a controversial thing to say but I think to some degree

Calvinism became cool and like why did that why in the world would that happen and there's all the dangers that come along with that of you know let's and that's kind of what

I want to say in the movie is let's not let this just be a trend uh because that would be that'd be the worst thing in the world like let's actually let this impact our hearts let's find ourselves in confessional churches so that's really the the mission of the movie is to encourage these young guys to actually become reformed don't just take your five points put them in your pocket go back to your non -denominational church and nothing changes so the primary intention then would be not not that it would be exclusively for this but the primary intention would be for those who are already professing to be reformed or Calvinistic to improve the way that they live out that faith rather than evangelizing both the lost and Armenians with these truths it's primarily intended for those already professing

Calvin yeah I think it's going to serve all those purposes um I do think you could bring this movie to somebody who doesn't like Calvinism it's going to explain the doctrines of grace it's going to run through all these all these things and it's hopefully do it in an entertaining way and but uh and along with that an approachable way so you're going to see like why uh your buddy is a

Calvinist now and so you don't just think he's this crazy person that joined a cult it's like oh okay this is rational um you know the church has very bad theology over the past 30 years especially and um we just got tired of it and we went back to biblical doctrines and it's going to show scripture and where where these things came from so I think it will serve that purpose but um and and maybe that'll be even the bigger purpose it serves but my mind is

I know what I would want to see in a movie about this topic and uh

I'm hoping other people will enjoy watching that as well uh those of us who have been reformed uh long enough know about a classic documentary called amazing grace the history and theology of Calvinism Eric Holmberg produced and directed uh along with Jerry Johnson and uh that has been become a vital tool in yes sharing uh the doctrines of grace with others and I can't speak highly enough about that documentary how would you compare and contrast what you're doing to that documentary yeah so I I was watching that documentary a lot when

I started the process of this one um and I've seen it before when I first became a Calvinist I was obsessed with it um so I think there's a segment of this movie that would be a modern version of that because there is there's going to be like literally just doctrine um at specific points um but then on top of that it's a human interest piece also you know you're learning about these these people and their their testimonies and and how the churches they were in and um yeah you and you also just get to hear the heroes of the faith talk about the reformation and uh some of the greatest um living theologians that were willing to speak to me well

I know that one of them is Dr. James R. White yeah Alpha Omega Ministries has been a dear friend of mine since 1996 or 1995 is actually when our friendship began over the phone yeah um tell about tell us about some of the others uh so while I was in Arizona with James White I got

Jeff Durbin I know Jeff Durbin's been on your show yeah and also Joe Thorne I think he's been on your show as well definitely has um

Joe Thorne has been has rescued me on a number of occasions by his willingness to be available even with a matter of minutes notice yeah yeah

Joe's cancellation or something on a radio show yes um we got uh

Ligon Duncan, R .C. Sproul, Kevin DeYoung, Tim Challies um oh man

I'm forgetting there's I've I had nine people picked out uh at the beginning when

I was doing the Kickstarter still and as I've been traveling I've ended up interviewing 30 more than 30 theologians, teachers, rappers,

Shy Lynn, Timothy Brindle um and so that's that's another sort of way this movie will be different than some of the more traditional uh movies that have been on this topic um

I like I want to explore how hip -hop has been a tool that God has used to distribute

Reformed theology in just ways that nobody would expect but it's been impactful I learned there's a song by Shy Lynn called

Atonement Q &A and it is literally a catechism in the form of a hip -hop song and I have it memorized and I and my kids have it memorized and you know you're actually reciting theology because of hip -hop songs so God has just done incredible uh unexpected things in this movement and and before this all came about obviously you had to be someone who uh reached a point in his life where you came to embrace these truths uh what is tell us something about your own background your upbringing uh what kind of religious atmosphere you were raised in if any and what providential circumstances the

Lord used in your life to draw you to himself and to this discovery of these things that we hold dear called the doctrines of grace um so I didn't grow up in a

Christian family um so when I was 19 I was into drugs and stuff like that and my friend saw that I was super depressed preached the gospel to me and so I had a very dramatic conversion experience um but I had no church context to enter into so I just had it was worse than Arminianism I don't even know what you would call it was like um the

IHOP sort of churches oh yeah oh really really bad um but so over the years we ended up uh at the best possible you know popular kind of church you which was

Calvary Chapel and as James White often points out uh Calvary Chapel makes more

Calvinist than anybody because they encourage you to read your Bible and but they deny the doctrines of grace so when you come across these things about election and you bring them to the pastors and they want nothing to do with it um you start to wait a second you know something's not matching up here so um

I was really big into the sinner's prayer I was doing a great job at Calvary Chapel converting people through the sinner's prayer and then one day some one of my friends walked up to me and said hey you know the sinner's prayer doesn't save anybody by itself right and I was like ah get out of here so he sent me a

Paul Washer sermon I knew what Calvinism was I hated it I argued against it he sent me this

Paul Washer sermon about weeping for the souls of the lost and Paul Washer said you are not saved by walking down an aisle you are saved when

God takes out your heart of stone gives your heart of flesh to supernatural work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of a person and just the way he explained it blew my mind my mouth hung open and all of the links and he so he he got me on irresistible grace and he got me on total depravity all in that one sermon and all the links and the changes

I was like it was like a bear trap closed around my leg like I just became a Calvinist immediately and it messed with me for a week

I walked him up to my wife and said I think I'm a Calvinist and she's like oh boy because all she'd heard is all the negative she said you'll know for sure when people start hating yeah and that happened yeah

I got kicked out of that church pretty quickly uh well I'd like you to conclude the interview by letting our listeners know how they can view this documentary that I almost said the

Calvinist that's okay Calvinist uh well it is not it'll be out this summer um if you go to CalvinistMovie .com

I'll be continuing to update information there um the trailer uh just launched today so the trailer will be available and uh yeah you'll be able to buy it on DVD and stream it great somehow well

Les Lamphere it's been an honor and privilege to have you on Iron Sharpens Iron and I look forward to your return after the the documentary is out and we can perhaps uh discuss it even further thank you so much

I've arrived I've been on Iron Sharpens Iron well I'm honored that you have that high view of what

I'm doing absolutely thank you sir all right god bless you thanks again yes that was a great uh tribute he even told me that prior to the uh interview

I have arrived I have been invited to appear on the upper echelon of reform broadcasting

Iron Sharpens Iron that was quite a kind uh and perhaps undeserved compliment but uh

I'm going to go to a break earlier than I normally do because I want to try to keep my next uh interview intact without cutting into the middle of it

I wanted to keep it uh I should say as one whole without interruption uh so we're going to go to a station break right now and we'll be right back after these messages with an interview with John Kratz and I hope that you enjoy that interview with uh author and pastor

John Kratz so uh don't go away we will be right back after these messages from our sponsors welcome back this is

Chris Arnzen and now we are going to hear an interview I conducted with pastor

John Kratz of the Faith Bible Church in Sharpsburg Georgia uh he is also an author

I have interviewed him a number of times previously on Iron Sharpens Iron and this is the first time

I interviewed him face to face and it was a joy to do so and uh so sit back and relax and enjoy the interview with pastor

John Kratz of Faith Bible Church Chris Arnzen here again at the

G3 conference in Atlanta Georgia and I am here with pastor John Kratz who is pastor of Faith Bible Church in Sharpsburg Georgia which happens to be the congregation where some former members of my uh former church where I was a member before I moved from New York to Pennsylvania uh including the parents of one of my uh most recent former pastors uh pastor

Mark Grimaldi of Grace Reformed Baptist Church of Long Island his his parents who are precious dear friends of mine absolutely that have filled my life with a lot of memories precious memories of laughter and fellowship but uh

Dale and John Grimaldi are members there and I know that uh Tim Daly who's a retired police officer member there and uh and pastor

Mark's brother John that's right is also in his family and Vinnie uh Greco and his wife and I'm sure there are others that I can't think of right now but uh

I know that uh that those of those in my audience who have been listening to back to the old days of New York may remember that I have interviewed pastor

John Kratz on a number of occasions and uh first of all why don't you tell our listeners something about Faith Bible Church in Sharpsburg Georgia.

Well we're we are trying to be faithful we're on the about 30 minutes south of the

Atlanta airport and about I have about 350 on the

Lord's day and um just a very simple clear seeking to be faithful to God's word preaching through books of the

Bible is our main diet and um we have a really neat counseling ministry as well that the

Lord has raised up having Martha Peace as part of our church for many many years.

Published author? Yes uh and uh so we've become a an

ACBC the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors we we're an official training center and so we have a number of our people that try to use

God's word to help people with their problems and here in the south one of the distinctives of our culture is many many people are churchgoers many people think of themselves as Christians even though they might not be in strong churches when they might not even attend church like for example if I went to the coffee shop nearby and said who's a

Christian many many hands would just shoot right up which is so different than other parts of the country and and certainly other parts of the world well consequently if you say hey we're a church that offers free counseling from the

Bible many people say oh well yeah that's for me I need help with my problems and and uh so if you can help me for free that would be great and it has proven to be a wonderful gospel opportunity wow

I can imagine so yes what you said um about the Bible belt reminds me and I know uh those who listen regularly to my program perhaps have heard me repeat this before but I just can't help but remember a funny conversation

I had with an old preacher from Mississippi many years ago back in probably the 90s when he uh during the conversation realized

I was from New York he said in this very deep gravelly voice

New York you got it easy all you got to do is get people saved we got to get them lost and then get them saved yes yes there's some truth to that of course he was a

Calvinist so he didn't really mean he had to get anyone saved he couldn't but it was just a humorous way right but uh and you are also a published author yes of a number of books tell us something about those books well

I wrote a book uh my first one was more like a little booklet Mighty Men the Starter's Guide to Leading Your Family kind of the nuts and bolts of spiritual leadership and I wrote one called

Craftsman uh that Shepherd Press published which is Christ -centered proverbs for men so many of my books are more conversationally written as opposed to scholarship uh heavy duty ones because I just want guys to read books that will help them and so that's kind of takes some themes from proverbs and applies them then

I wrote Loving the Church trying to help people see that that as a

Christian we should have a passion for the local church and I wrote a book with Martha Peace called

Tying the Knot Tighter that PNR published 19 areas of marriage with little reminders and application questions that a couple could take on a marriage retreat

I know of some couples using it for premarital counseling and some people don't need they don't need the big thick book they just need to be reminded of what they already know and so that's what we tried to do with that and then a couple that are are less known uh in the bite -sized biography series that Evangelical Press uh published um

I did the one on John Newton which was just a joy for me to get to do a little study of his life oh yeah fascinating story writer of Amazing Grace that's right of you who are unfamiliar with John Newton yes he was a former slave trader that became a pastor and never got over how

God was gracious to him so Amazing Grace wasn't just a one -hit wonder it was really the theme of his life and ministry there in only

England and then down later for many years in London which I hadn't really realized

I had always heard about him out about 90 miles from London with William Cooper and some of those stories out in the country but even more even longer part of his ministry was was in the heart of London just preaching the gospel in a simple way for many years of faithful service and then the one other book that I wrote is kind of an exposition of Acts 17 it's called

Upsetting the World and it's it's trying to motivate myself and others toward evangelism taking initiative in evangelism let's look at Paul's ministry in Thessalonica Berea and then

Athens and then make some applications for our lives in church look at the way he took initiative there in the marketplace you know how is how is that how's

Paul's situation in Athens similar to ours and what what could we do to take a step out in sharing the gospel of Christ and what specifically were you speaking on at the

G3 I spoke on graciousness so how can we cultivate graciousness in our hearts while maintaining a passion for the truth so many people here at the

G3 conference are going to be the very high on the passion for truth side and as the old expression of the the cage stage

Calvinist you know where where we ought to be locked up for a couple of years we're so excited about the doctrines of grace zeal without wisdom usually that's right that's right well

I wrote the book on that I was that before before it was a trending topic when

I first came to the doctrines of grace and so over these past 20 -25 years

God has worked slowly and carefully in my heart to help me to become more gracious as I hold still tenaciously to the truth and want to cut it straight and be precise and yet do it in a loving way yes it is ironic that many of us perhaps all of us in some degree or another who love and cherish and believe and understand and proclaim the doctrines of sovereign grace we sometimes sadly react to those things in the very opposite way that those teachings should drive us we some of us have become more proud than others but unfortunately there is a reputation that we who are theologically reformed

Calvinistic that there is an arrogance uh and there is a a pride when when the very doctrines are supposed to humble us to dust right realizing that we nothing in us is attractive uh to God in the realm of goodness or worthiness and of course uh that that stereotype may be exaggerated uh by the opponents of these things but as with many things stereotypes exist for a reason and there are that's right there are those among us who excel in that sin of pride more than others but it does exist which is why you uh i'm sure had one of the reasons that you even spoke on that absolutely yeah i started by comparing uh comparing it to if you had a situation in your life where you really had a need to learn something from someone so whether it be how to be a better mom or or whether it be how to improve your golf swing and you got to have good one -on -one time with somebody who could really help you uh like if you were here in Georgia and Bubba Watson came by and said i'm going to spend the afternoon perfecting your golf swing but we're going to be in really close quarters but then suppose that expert came with all of their wisdom and insight but had a horrible horrible breath you know you you need to talk to them you need to get up close and work on on this area of their expertise but it's so bad you were repelled and you're gonna tell me something right now not at all not at all just an illustration but but you know you know what i mean you get with uh all you can hear all you can think about is i've got to get away from this guy or this or this lady and um and yet they have wisdom and insight that you need to hear and i made the comparison that's sort of how it is when we are abrasive and harsh and arrogant and condescending as we interact with one another with the truth we use god's truth like a hammer and everybody is like a nail you know and and i'm going to correct you uh i'm going to speak the truth and let god worry about the results as opposed to being like christ full of grace and truth so sometimes we have to say a hard thing sometimes a brother or sister needs a rebuke or somebody is falling into sin we've sought to be gracious and now like christ we have to kind of call them out but even behind that ought to be a gracious intent we're trying to rescue you from your sin we're trying to help you we're not trying to belittle you or look down upon you or win the argument our goal ought to be to be a blessing to the people we interact with and i'm afraid for many years i was more trying to win instead of instead of trying to be a blessing yes and i think that this proclivity that many of us reform faith have to look down upon those that don't see things the way we do forgetting ourselves that was only by god's grace that we even believe anything that we believe um i think we have to remind ourselves that uh that all men who are sin all men who sin and that includes all men yes uh whatever their proclivity may be it taints that area in their life that that uh train of thought uh with sin and makes it worse for instance uh the the uh the proclivity that most theologically reformed people seem to have which is a good thing is a meticulous nature about truth and doctrine we want to make sure that what we are believing and teaching others is accurate from the scriptures we want to be very careful and meticulous and we don't want to misspeak or or diminish the severity or the importance of things that we find in scripture but sometimes meticulousness uh and some might call uh fussiness or what have you if when it's mingled with sin and as i said we were all sinners right that could make us less patient with others it could make us prone to mock others perhaps right look down on them and we also forget that that person even though they may disagree with us on the five points of calvinism or other things they may have an area in their own walk with christ or even as uh an innate part of their theological system that has a superiority to something in our own life that we are have a blind spot to absolutely absolutely i completely agree that it seems to be something of an unintended consequence for our passion for truth and our precision if we're not careful it can have kind of the dark side of of coming across in that harsh unkind critical way you know how many of us took years to fight with the lord before we came to the doctrines of grace and then we expect our brother to to get it in in two weeks you know when it took us two years uh could ought we not to be as patient with them as the lord was with us in some of these ways yes one of my illustrations was the church in ephesus in revelation chapter two so the lord commended them for their passion for truth you test these false apostles you hate the deeds of the nicolaitans we don't know much about the nicolaitans but they were they were obviously bad guys in the in the first century and the ephesian elders the leaders that the members of the church uh confronted that sin hated that sin the lord himself says i also hate these things so there's a very we don't ever want to diminish our passion for the truth but of course in that very context is where jesus says but i have this against you you've left your first love now most of us have heard sermons that talk about they lost their love for the lord but if you consider where jesus goes he says now you need to repent and do the deeds you did at first that could well indicate and i think it does that it's not just talking about a love for the lord but a love for other people well if that's the case what jesus is saying is i commend you for your passion for truth but if you don't repent for your lack of love for the lord and for people then i'm going to come and snuff out your lampstand now there's many things in revelation i don't know about and symbols and things like that but at the very end of revelation one he tells us what that symbol means the lampstand means the church itself so in this major city of ephesus jesus said it would be better to have no church than to have a church filled with rabid tigers who are passionate for truth but are eating one another they're not showing love for one another that's a sin we need to repent of so it's you might think wow isn't being passionate for the truth in this day and age of squishy as wayne mcguincan sloppy agape everywhere and just nobody cares about anything with truth isn't that enough and the answer is no it is not enough we must have the corresponding graciousness that goes with it so when we minister we speak the truth absolutely but we speak the truth in love as we seek to build one another up and even correct one another perhaps we could conclude this discussion with your counsel advice to fellow believers in sovereign grace although not necessarily exclusively those of us who believe in that system but i have noticed and perhaps you've noticed the same thing that one of the greatest areas of disappointment amongst theologically reformed christians is that perhaps we take our rightful rejection of the modern ecumenical movement yes too far and many of us have brought that mindset to such an extreme that the pastors within our churches and perhaps even many of just the members in general don't even want to associate in any kind of fashion in gatherings or in opportunities for either fellowship or just informal gatherings of some kind with those that we disagree with theologically those who may be charismatic or arminian those who may be from a host of different theological points of view and and we wonder or i wonder sometimes how is it that these men who believe what they believe meaning the reformed christian they believe what they believe is so vital and so precious and so true and it's as if they want other christians to hear understand and embrace these things by osmosis without any of our yes patience and activity with them right involvement with them friendship with them if you have any yeah well i think uh just made me think of john newton again the man who never got over god's grace to him remember that quote at the end of his life i don't remember much i remember that i'm a great sinner in christ as a great savior well that attitude was pervasive and so although newton chose to stay within the anglican structure of his day this is the day of of whitley whitfield and wesley uh you know in the in the 1700s um he chose to stay there because he thought it would give him a greater platform for ministry in england at that time even though he would agree with our concerns about much of what was happening even then within the church of england but he was so kind and had so many friends outside of the church of england including baptists and when uh when william carey was preparing to leave for india he wanted to stop and have some time with john newton when he was in london and uh that kind of spirit i think is great it's a great one to follow and you know even though that means we'll have to rub up against some people that might do things or say things a little bit different than us do they have the gospel right do they have gospel sweetness well there needs to be a place for us to share a meal at the table with brothers and sisters like that and i think we benefit and i think they benefit uh proverbs 13 20 one of my favorite proverbs he who walks with wise men will be wise but the companion of fools will suffer harm my modern translation is you become like the people you hang around if you are around gospel sweet people uh and you have a chance to influence them and uh in those areas they're strong by god's grace they help us as well and hopefully in god's providence we will all help each other uh make it across to the eternal city together amen well pastor crotts if you could let our listeners know about your contact information how they can find faith bible church in sharpsburg yeah sure our website is is faithbiblechurch .us

so kind of a simple one and uh my email right there is jcrotts at faithbiblechurch .us

c -r -o -t -t -s correct and uh so we're on the south side of of atlanta so if you're passing through the big atlanta airport which i hear you have to change planes even when you go to heaven in atlanta but uh you know come see us we would we would love to have fellowship with you well it's been a pleasure and an honor and a joy to have you on the program today thank you so much god bless you well i hope you enjoyed uh that interview with pastor john crotts of faith bible church in sharpsburg georgia as much as i did and now we're going to go immediately to an interview with a listener a long time listener of iron sharpens iron tony brown and uh i hope that you enjoy listening to her this is chris arnson of iron sharpens iron radio again here at the g3 conference in atlanta georgia and we have uh right now tony brown who is a listener of iron sharpens iron who is also here in attendance at the g3 conference it's great to see you here tony good to see you and nice to finally meet you that uh put a face to that voice that very very very definite commanding voice that we love thank you and uh tell us uh how you actually discovered iron sharpens iron radio well actually there are lots there's lots of christian radio you know this but what i was looking for was something that's a little bit deeper sometimes a little bit the guests you know it's not i guess depth depth as far as scripture digging into scripture digging into theology uh having different those a lot of your guests in different areas you can tell are very knowledgeable and really sought god's truth in these different subjects and i think if it's what someone's looking for it's a nice mix you will have cultural you know cultural happenings and things that we're all thinking about too but you really do have a bent toward theology and and getting people on there that can really discuss that deeper than than a lot of stations do you do more of that and how did you actually find out about the program i was just researching during research doing research on some things that were actually troubling me in the church i mean just to be honest and some things i'm seeing that i'm really burdened and in that research i came across one episode that you that you had done with someone that was warning about certain things and it just from that time on i was like hooked you know i'm always checking to see what you're doing that day i'm always listening if i can't listen you know live you can go back to the archives it's just you know it's been a great a great i guess tool to to help to educate myself to even like like you say have a discussion with people about these things that are troubling me so uh it's been excellent and where are you from i forgot to i should have asked you that right away where are you from rock hill south carolina that's right now i remember uh that city and state now and i uh have seen your name come up through the emails and uh where do you fellowship or where are you a member uh right now i'm going to uh creekside bible church it's in indian trail north carolina so being right there on the state line in the northern part of the state of south carolina it's it's not too far so i'm i'm going to church there and tell us something about that church uh well the pastor is a graduate of the master's college master's seminary so that was a plus for me when i was looking and uh it's a small church right now still growing but very faithful church and very the members are very committed to the scripture and to equipping the saints so well i appreciate you taking the time to be interviewed today briefly for iron sharpens iron and i also appreciate your you listening to the program to you spreading the word about the program and to you contributing with your questions uh very often to iron sharpens iron radio and it's great to finally meet you face to face and good to meet you and keep doing what you're doing thank you god bless yeah i enjoy uh meeting uh and interviewing folks that have been blessed by iron sharpens iron just as much as interviewing the very well -known and famous folks that i interview so uh you don't know how much it blesses me to hear that iron sharpens iron is touching the lives of people all over the world it is something that is mind -boggling to me it is amazing it is humbling uh it is such an encouragement and i'm going to move on now to another interview with a brother in christ who really blessed me phenomenally uh the last day especially of the conference because the conference got out early in the afternoon and he spent the entire afternoon with me uh until i caught my world till i was supposed to catch my train at the atlanta amtrak station but was delayed six hours in that waiting room but before uh he dropped me off uh somewhere in the neighborhood of 7 p .m

uh he spent the entire day with me and it was a real blessing to get to know a pastor mike wishkowsky it sounds like i have a lisp when i say his name but that's i think exactly how you're supposed to pronounce it it's mike wishkowsky so i hope you enjoy this interview as much as i did chris arnzen here again at the g3 conference in atlanta georgia and i'm here with pastor mike wishowski yes that's correct did i actually say it right very very good and he is the pastor of westminster chapel in ball ground georgia or is it ball grounds ball ground just uh one one singular yes yeah ball ground georgia and uh he is also here at the g3 conference obviously and as it wraps up and is now being broken down as people are packing up and getting ready to leave we're one of the few stragglers left here and i finally have the opportunity to to speak with my brother i wanted to get uh first of all uh i wanted to be have you be able to share with our listeners something about a westminster chapel uh and i'm assuming perhaps it was named in honor of the congregation that was pastored by dr martin lloyd jones in the uk yes which is a extremely big shoes to fill unfortunately it's a blessing and and a curse but uh yeah you know we're just um really we're just a small reformed body of christ uh in ball ground and um my whole philosophy of ministry as a pastor is very similar to that of what martin lloyd jones was and uh he believed in the faithful exposition of the scriptures verse by verse and i believe that as well i've been preaching through the book of romans for almost two years and we're on chapter nine and uh he was you know the same way and i just so appreciate his faithfulness to the text and you see so many especially young preachers today they they tip their hat to expository preaching but you actually listen to the content of their sermons and it's it's not expository uh and may read a text to begin the sermon but uh then the whole thing is sort of topical in nature from there and has little to do with the actual text and so i was listening to a sermon by steve lawson once and it really convinced me of the importance of expository preaching when he said that it traps you in the text and i really liked that language especially as a young pastor that you know the foolishness of my youth would come out less and less as long as i was trapped in the text and and so um you know providentially the church was already named that before i became pastor it was already in existence for about three years or so i've pastored a church for two years in colorado before this one called wetmore community church and um made the transition down here me and my wife and children and we've we've loved it so martin lloyd jones was one of those rare christians that was a calvinist methodist i'm not a calvinist methodist i was just curious what uh is the specific fellowship association denomination of westminster yeah it's a great question um we've really got uh i think a healthy uh plurality of uh i don't want to say that we're interdenominational in any sense we are a reformed church but uh we've got presbyterians we've got reformed baptists um we've probably got maybe a few uh calvinist methodists even uh but uh we um we're just we're reformed and um i personally i would probably be best described as sort of a reformed baptistic preacher in terms of how i preach and um you know what i say when i get to texts that deal with baptism and that kind of thing but we do allow for both pedo and credo baptism in our church right now which uh you know is rare and uh of course there are difficulties with that uh you know practically speaking how that works out in the life of the body of christ but um but i have heard from other men in churches that are similar to that like for instance i don't know if you're aware the free presbyterian church of north america and also known as the free presbyterian church of ulster for their uh uk uh headquarters there uh they uh also have men that are both reformed baptist and men who are pedo baptist the presbyterian in the name being exclusively in reference to the church government the polity of the denomination right and they basically have a uh a rule or a uh way of conducting uh both credo and pedo baptist baptism i should say uh in that if someone has a an infant or a young child that they want baptized and the pastor of that local congregation in the free presbyterian church happens to be a reformed baptist they will call in another pastor who is a pedo baptist because obviously a man could not violate his own conscience baptize an infant if he doesn't believe in it how does that work itself out yeah you know um so far we we haven't had to baptize any infants particularly but uh but when the time does come uh we may do something similar you know our biggest my biggest concern is that uh if we do have a pedo baptist in the church we don't want to them to have to go down to you know joe schmoe's you know presbyterian church down the street to you know hold to their convictions and uh you know there's such great men of history on both sides you know you've got uh you've got men like john owen and jonathan edwards and then you have men like charles spurgeon and john bunyan um you know on two opposite sides here and uh you know we want to respect both and i don't think that you have to be wishy -washy on the subject in order to do that i think when you come to the texts where baptism is explicitly taught you can preach those texts and uh you don't have to necessarily hold back on them or anything we're going to be right back after these messages so don't go away we will continue with the interview that you were just hearing paul wrote to the church at galatia for am i now seeking the approval of man or of god or am i trying to please man if i were still trying to please man i would not be a servant of christ hi i'm mark lucan's 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 nofolk 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 apostles priority it must not be ours either we believe by god's grace that we are called to demonstrate love and compassion to our fellow man and to be vessels of christ's mercy to a lost and hurting community around us and to build up the body of christ in truth and love if you live near massachusetts or plan to visit our area please come and join us for worship and fellowship you can call us at 508 -528 -5750 that's 508 -528 -5750 or go to our website to email us listen to past sermons worship songs or watch our tv program entitled resting in grace you can find us at providence baptist church ma .org

that's providence baptist church ma .org or even on sermonaudio .com providence baptist church is delighted to sponsor iron sharpens iron radio thriving financial is not your typical financial services provider as a membership organization we help christians be wise with money and live generously every day and for the fourth year in a row we were named one of the world's most ethical companies by the ethosphere institute a leading international think tank dedicated to the creation advancement and sharing of best practices in business ethics contact me mike gallagher financial consultant at 717 -254 -6433 again 717 -254 -6433 to learn more about the thriving difference we know we were made for so much more than ordinary life lending faith finances and generosity that's the thriving story we were made to thrive iron sharpens iron welcomes solid rock remodeling to our family of sponsors serving south central pennsylvania solid rock remodeling is focused on discovering understanding and exceeding your expectations they deliver personalized project solutions with exceptional results solid rock remodeling offers a full range of home renovations including kitchen and bath remodeling decks porches windows and doors roof and siding and more for a clear detailed professional estimate call this trustworthy team of problem solvers who provide superior results that stand the test of time call solid rock remodeling at 717 -697 -1981 717 -697 -1981 or visit solidrockremodeling .com

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we bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you and we invite you to visit the pastor's study by calling in with your questions our time will be lively useful and i assure you never dull join us this saturday at 12 noon eastern time for a visit to the pastor's study because everyone needs a pastor linbrook baptist church on 225 earl avenue in linbrook long island is teaching god's timeless truths in the 21st century our church is far more than a sunday worship service it's a place of learning where the scriptures are studied and the preaching of the gospel is clear and relevant it's like a gym where one can exercise their faith through community involvement it's like a hospital for wounded souls where one can find compassionate people and healing we're a diverse family of all ages enthusiastically serving our lord jesus christ in fellowship play and together hi i'm pastor bob waldeman and i invite you to come and join us here at linbrook baptist church and see all that a church can be call linbrook baptist at 516 -599 -9402 that's 516 -599 -9402 or visit linbrookbaptist .org

that's linbrookbaptist .org hi i'm chris arnzen host of iron sharpens iron radio here to tell you about an exciting offer from world magazine my trusted source for news from a christian perspective try world at no charge for 90 days and get a free copy of r .c

sproles book relationship between church and state i rely on world because i trust the reporting i gain insight from the analysis and world provides clarity to the news stories that really matter i believe you'll also find world to be an invaluable resource to better understand critical topics with a depth that's simply not found in other media outlets armed with this coverage world can help you to be a voice of wisdom in your family and your community this trial includes bi -weekly issues of world magazine on -scene reporting from world radio and the fully shareable content of world digital simply visit wmg .org

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forward slash iron sharpens today welcome back this is chris arnzen and if you just tuned us in we are airing another episode of iron sharpens iron featuring interviews i conducted while on site at my exhibitors booth at the g3 conference in atlanta georgia which lasted from january 19th through the 21st and i was just in the middle of an interview with pastor mike wishkoski of westminster chapel in ball ground ball ground uh georgia i almost said ball ground washington because my dear friend bill webster is a pastor in battleground washington but this is ball ground georgia pastor mike wishkoski of westminster chapel in ball ground georgia we're going to return to that interview in a moment but i wanted to take this opportunity to remind you that iron sharpens iron is an urgent need of sponsors of more sponsors uh to be able to remain on the air uh so if you know of business owners pastors parachurch ministry leaders or anyone else who has a passion for what we are doing on iron sharpens iron perhaps they don't even know about the program yet but you know that they would agree with what we are doing please let me know about them so i can pursue perhaps getting them to sponsor iron sharpens iron their financial backing is urgently needed and your donations are urgently needed if you are blessed enough to provide them go to iron sharpens iron radio .com

iron sharpens iron radio .com and at the very top you will see the third thing on the top of the page you can click uh is support and you click on that and it gives the address where you can mail checks who to make the check out to in addition to cruciform media which is which is listed there on the website you can now make checks out to iron sharpens iron radio as well so we really thank you for your support we thank all of you who have already supported iron sharpens iron with their hard -earned money in way of a gift but now we return to the interview that i was in the middle of airing just a few moments ago before the station break this is the interview with pastor mike wiszkowski of westminster chapel in ball ground georgia and one of the things that we most urgently needed to hear from his discussion is do not go to joe schmoe's presbyterian church i'm just kidding but we were right in the middle of a discussion on how his church functions having members who are credo baptists or believer only baptists who believe in believer only baptism and those who are pedo baptists those who also believe that infants should be candidates to the baptismal font so we will pick up that discussion in midstream right where we left off anything like that so now uh let us let our listeners know specifically what you have gleaned what your uh reaction is uh to what we have experienced here at the g3 conference here in atlanta yeah well i've just been really encouraged especially you know as a as a pastor um really i think that the common thread that was woven into the sermons throughout this was the folly of pragmatism and the necessity to get back to a biblical centered god -centered church and you know the the theme being at the conference of course the 500th year of the reformation and there's a temptation to you know come here and pat ourselves on the back that we're not roman catholic and uh you know that we're reformed but i think the speakers have done a really good job of guarding against that really what they've done is is they've come here and said look we we have need for further reformation especially in this day and age where pragmatism rules in the body of christ this idea that what works is what we should do and um you know i think that's really really uh an important message especially for our generation and a lot of the a lot of young preachers like me especially to to hear and to to heed to uh that it doesn't matter what works uh it matters who we're called to be as as pastors we're called to be faithful and uh so i was very very encouraged by that and very encouraged by the uh i would really encourage the listeners if anybody ever hears this uh to uh to go listen to conrad and beway's uh message hey don't knock iron sharpens iron on friday no okay all right all right i thought you might you might just leave this one out okay all right i'm only kidding but um well in fact um i probably should have opened uh with this question as i do very often when i'm interviewing folks but how did you come to uh know and embrace and cherish the doctrines of grace what kind of a religious atmosphere if any were you raised in and what uh circumstances providentially did our sovereign lord bring about in your life to draw you to himself and yeah understand these yeah that's a great question i i um i have one of those humbling uh testimonies uh where you know you get to the end of it and you don't really have anything to to boast in or anything like that i i grew up actually um my dad was uh southern baptist he was a he's an evangelist and um he was reformed in his soteriology and he you know was faithful to teach us the scriptures me and my sisters and my brother uh and bring us to church every sunday and really instilled in me not necessarily uh the doctrines of grace as explicitly taught from from a child but he instilled in me a very very very high view of god um and when i was 13 he passed away and um it just left kind of me you know wandering and i uh when i felt called to the ministry i ended up attending an assemblies of god ministry school and it was there that uh that i became thoroughly convinced of the reformed doctrines of grace which is interesting because it's the opposite of what's taught they're wonderful people um but uh i really became more and more convinced of what the scriptures taught with regard to um reform theology how did how did that actually happen in a setting well it it happened just by uh really focusing on reading the bible all the way through front to cover and utilizing good resources uh that you know have been god has blessed us with men like r .c

sprole and um john piper and john mcarthur and dr james white and they were actually referring to these folks no they were not so i i i was i was seeing these things in scripture and i and i needed to go um find them and and and i i think i really think that uh a lot of my childhood growing up and what my dad kind of had instilled in us uh in me particularly um with regards to these doctrines kind of resurfaced and uh and i rediscovered them but um so that that's really my journey but i you know i think one of the real mistakes uh especially of of young preachers is to grab hold of these doctrines of grace and predestination and super lap syrianism these meaty things and uh and you know they'll kind of centralize them to where that's all they talk about that's all they preach about you know somebody is only talking about super lap syrianism yeah i'm not gonna hang out no you're right you're right about that you're right about that but i think i i think i think there's a real there's a real danger there and uh that's that's why expository preaching uh real expository preaching is so important because uh i think it was dr white who mentioned uh this weekend that there is a balance that is built into the scripture itself yes it prevents hobby horses exactly it sure does and and so um so that that's that's my story and i've just really ever since then i've labored in in self -study i studied uh in colorado for a couple years um under a man named eric loody and um was in a program up there and sat under his teaching and some you know and and we didn't always agree on everything he's more of more of an aw tozer kind of guy not not fully reformed but but the reformed community seems to almost universally uh uphold tozer as one of the great heroes isn't that interesting isn't that interesting at tozer and and even ravenhill my friend mac tomlinson who is a reformed baptist pastor in texas wrote a biography of leonard ravenhill yeah well i think that's important i think it's very very very very important um that uh that we maintain fellowship with armenian brothers and sisters in christ and and that we you know it was george whitfield who said that john wesley would be closer to the throne than him and he actually requested that wesley preach at his funeral that's right which he did he did and at the same time he wrote wesley that long 10 page letter asking him to please recant of his uh his free will musings and that's the letter that the lord used to bring me to embrace the doctrines of praise god and and at first i opened up that booklet that chapel library has in print and i read it and said it's true but i hate it but then within a matter of maybe two months and that might be even a stretch it might have been shorter i came to love and i just fell head over heels in love with these precious truths of the scripture thank you praise god yeah that uh that's that's great and that's what we want that's what you know that's how i think these resources these great men of god throughout church history are to be utilized and you know that's really something that that uh that i believe in strongly as well is um you know i keep mentioning young pastors because i am a young pastor but uh even even for the older minister um i think there's a tendency to want to be innovative um to want to be original uh to and yet i think it's really important that we utilize the commentaries and the language resources and all of these things that god has given us to make sure that you know we're in check not just the confessions i know um the the confessions are are good and helpful and you know of course we confessions heavily influence who we are as a church at westminster chapel but um but also just really good christian resources i will not preach a sermon uh any any doctrine unless i can find that there is uh a a group of reformed scholars who who will also affirm that that same interpretation of a specific text that i'm i'm preaching i i will never uh preach it i tell my congregation all the time if i if i say something new uh it's it's not true if it's new it ain't true and and that's that's really important in this generation where people are trying to continually be original and and i you know and it's even a danger um for me uh you know i've talked to interviewing some churches with some churches um when i came out of uh ministry school i you know they would they would ask me they would say how do you think you can build our our youth program or how do you think you can draw youth into our church as younger people and uh and i'd say well the same way that i that god draws older people is the same way he's going to draw younger people through the proclamation of his word and um so it's always confusing to me you know why why i was looked at as some person who could who could draw in the younger crowd i mean look at you know a lot of young people are you know flocking to john piper and and these guys it doesn't always work that way so um so yeah well i'd like you to make sure you give our listeners all of the contact information you care to share about westminster chapel in ball ground georgia yeah well we're uh it's a www .westminsterchapel

.net um all of the sermons are posted there um you can you can listen to them right now we're working on the audio uh it kind of sounds like i'm just in a bathroom yelling but but we're working on getting the audio right i actually have audio of me in a bathroom yelling okay okay okay well i i kind of would like to hear that but uh but westminsterchapel .net

and um uh we're you know we're in ball ground georgia and you can visit our website and you know we love love visitors and love new faces new people like i said we're uh we're small congregation and and we're you know we're growing and and still in some ways we're still figuring out you know who we are and uh trying to conform to the scriptures and in our ecclesiology you know bacham talked about last night um and uh in our methodologies and and those kind of things we want to be in line with with so well i hope and pray that this is not the last time we meet or communicate and i'm looking forward to uh hearing you or or should i say reading questions from you that you god willing will submit to my guests on iron sharpens iron yeah we give away a lot of free books by authors that i interviewed so i i hope you become a regular part of the listening audience okay absolutely absolutely well thank you for your ministry and uh god bless you god bless you too brother and i really want to thank again pastor mike wishkowski for the sweet time of fellowship there in georgia i so hope that we get together for a future opportunity of sweet fellowship together i just can't stop talking that way after i say his name wishkowski um but he was a great guy is a great guy uh and i so appreciate the patience that he demonstrated as i was searching for hours for a gift for a friend uh from uh atlanta uh well the gift meaning that i was searching for a gift from atlanta for a friend in pennsylvania and he took a lot of time and patience and joyfully doing so treating me to lunch and uh just made the time fly by much faster than it would have if i was sitting in a train station for many many hours because it as i said wound up being even after he dropped me off at the amtrak at 7 p .m

it wound up being a seven hour wait from the time he dropped me off perhaps even longer um when the train finally arrived due to the the storm damage on the tracks uh that the tornado had created the there were trees that had fallen on the tracks in alabama i believe preventing the train from arriving on time but i am going to go now to a quick station break and when i return we're going to hear an interview with andrew rappaport of striving for eternity ministries so don't go away we are going to be right back after these messages with more interviews from the g3 conference charles headens burgeon once said give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own you need to read solid ground christian books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the prince of preachers to heart the mission of solid ground christian books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to christians in the present and future and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world since its beginning in 2001 solid ground has been committed to publish god -centered christ exalting books for all ages we invite you to go treasure hunting at solid -ground -books .com

that's solid -ground -books .com and see what priceless literary gems from the past or present you can unearth from solid ground solid ground christian books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of iron sharpens iron radio hi i'm pastor bill shishko inviting you to tune into a visit to the pastor's study every saturday from 12 noon to 1 pm eastern time on wlie radio www .wlie540am

.com we bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you and we invite you to visit the pastor's study by calling in with your questions our time will be lively useful and i assure you never dull join us this saturday at 12 noon eastern time for a visit to the pastor's study because everyone needs a pastor iron sharpens iron radio is sponsored by harvey cedars a year -round bible conference and retreat center nestled on the jersey shore harvey cedars offers a wide range of accommodations to suit groups up to 400 for generations christians have enjoyed gathering and growing at harvey cedars each year thousands of high school and college students come and learn more about god's word an additional 9 000 come annually to harvey cedars as families couples singles men women pastors seniors and missionaries 90 miles from new york city 70 miles from philly and 95 miles from wilmington and easily accessible scores of notable christian groups frequently planned conferences at harvey cedars like the navigators intervarsity christian fellowship campus crusade and the alliance of confessing evangelicals find harvey cedars on facebook or at hcbible .org

hcbible .org call 609 -494 -5689 609 -494 -5689 harvey cedars where christ finds people and changes lives i am chris arnson host of iron sharpens iron radio here to tell you about an exciting offer from world magazine my trusted source for news from a christian perspective try world at no charge for 90 days and get a free copy of rc sproles book relationship between church and state i rely on world because i trust the reporting i gain insight from the analysis and world provides clarity to the news stories that really matter i believe you'll also find world to be an invaluable resource to better understand critical topics with a depth that's simply not found in other media outlets armed with this coverage world can help you to be a voice of wisdom in your family and your community this trial includes bi -weekly issues of world magazine on scene reporting from world radio and the fully shareable content of world digital simply visit wng .org

forward slash iron sharpens to get your world trial and dr sproles book all free no obligation with no credit card required visit world news group at wng .org

forward slash iron sharpens today welcome back this is chris arnson of iron sharpens iron and now we will uh air my interview uh conducted on site at the recent g3 conference in atlanta georgia with andrew rappaport founder of striving for eternity ministries and for those of you who just tuned in keep in mind that the background noise is nothing to do with a problem with your equipment or mine it is because of the fact that there were nearly 3 000 people milling around at this huge conference hall the georgia international conference center while we were conducting these live on -site interviews at the g3 conference so i hope you enjoy uh the uh interview that i conducted with my friend andrew rapport and uh he is a dear brother in christ so sit back relax and enjoy the interview this is chris arnson again of iron sharpens iron radio here live at the g3 conference i don't mean you're necessarily listening live when you're hearing this but i'm live at the conference and in atlanta georgia and we have one more day of the conference friday i'm sorry uh saturday tomorrow is the final day and the theme has been the 500th anniversary of the protestant reformation and with me right now is a gentleman that if anybody listening is someone who has listened to iron sharpens iron daily with regularity they may recall i have interviewed in the past uh andrew rapport the founder of striving for eternity ministries he has an exhibitor's booth just like i do here at the conference and i am delighted to be able to interview him here at the g3 conference and welcome back to iron sharpens iron andrew rapport well it's good to be here good to actually get to meet you in person yes we've had a lot of good conversations both on air and off air yes but uh this is first time getting to meet each other face to face amen and uh tell our listeners something about striving for eternity well i think you'll get over the nightmares of seeing me face to face in a few weeks but i hear wears off over time striving for eternity is a uh a discipleship ministry so we have online courses in our academy we also have conferences that we do we do it in jersey ohio in san jose california those are geared toward this year we're going to focus on the attributes of god we're going to do some novel and not talk about the reformation this year we'll probably be the only conference in the entire country not talking about the reformation but we uh and then we also have seminars we do we come into churches and do a what we call a bible interpretation made easy seminar where in one weekend we can teach people how to interpret the bible by rules not by their feelings not by their systematic theology not by their experience but these are the rules of interpretation so they can start to say okay this is i was always listening that guy on the radio and sound it off now you know the rules he's breaking and you as i learned the last time that we had our interview and i interpret sorry you are a jewish believer yes i am and tell us something about how the lord brought you to himself and saved you uh well i i was saved at the age of 16 and i have discovered that i'm i guess maybe different than most christians who heard the gospel over and over and over i heard it once before i got saved wow and it was a three and a half hour conversation and the thing that a lot of people don't understand i think i'm you and i may have talked about this but for especially my generation after the holocaust we were raised to believe that jesus christ is hitler's god we had no love for christ we had a hatred for christ if anything so when the guy was sharing the gospel with me i didn't i wasn't looking for christ definitely because i had a hatred for him he represents the inquisitions the crusades the holocaust and for folks that may find that hard to understand it's because for a jewish person we can't we didn't distinguish between the protestants and the catholics it's all one thing you know just like many for many christians they see judaism it's just as one thing i don't realize all the different sects that are there are within judaism but what ended up happening is i just saw that as that's you know hitler was supported by by the catholic church so that's what that's what christ represents you know that was my thinking and uh guy who led me to christ just he was sharing the gospel and i literally told him i he shares the gospel and i just went dude i'm god's chosen people i'm in like flint i thought i was going to heaven just because i was i was jewish that's what i had always been told and uh you know he i ended up telling him if you give me a logical reason to believe i'll believe and one of the things i always i always think interesting the way god works he takes a guy who is very proud of his intellect a guy who is i've got 168 iq you know i've passed the test for mensa you know so i'm one of the intellectual types back then i was very proud of that here's a guy that doesn't even pass the sixth grade and he's teaching me things about the bible and he just i said i want a logical reason he just gave me all these fulfilled prophecies and i would take some of them and say well that's that's self -fulfillment you know that anyone can make happen but there were others i saw as coincidence so the coincidence i'm start running numbers in my head to go what's the chance of that happening what's the chance of this now happening what chance of this one now happening and i got beyond statistical impossibility which is 10 to the 48th power and i said look it is impossible for the new testament to not have been written by god i didn't believe in christ but then he started so what does new testament teach so he starts talking about christ he talks about his death his burial his resurrection i was like stop people don't raise from the dead and without reading you know josh mcdowell's evidence demands a verdict i had all the false views of the resurrection i still have one that's original with me i said maybe maybe the disciples dug a hole underneath the tomb came up underneath pulled the body out and he's like in three days they didn't have heavy equipment back then i was like i couldn't explain the resurrection and i literally i sat there it was on steps of a dairy queen in san francisco california and i said if jesus christ rose from the dead that means he was god and chuck goes yeah i said that means that i'm accountable to him he said yeah i said what do i got to do wow so praise god for that that was when you were 16 i was 16 i didn't tell i didn't tell anyone for two years i was so afraid of my parents when were they orthodox jews nominal they were raised orthodox and i was i was bar mitzvahs conservative so we started they started getting a little bit more liberal uh which conservative is actually more liberal than that's like confused to be away no sounds conservative well it's more conservative than reformed right right but uh they they actually when they found out i was 18 years old when they found out they actually were planning to bury an empty casket wow i was going to be dead to them and something happened in the family that got them to rethink that and so they they told me all right we were we were out chopping for caskets wow so they were they were planning on just having me dead to them now is it is it just that they are at the point where they accept the fact that you're a christian or they also joined you in this thing uh when i was 18 and my mom found out she's the first and was for many years the only person to ever hit me when sharing the gospel wow uh but not to be outdone at the age of 46 a couple years ago uh thanksgiving i was talking to my dad and trying to explain to him things of christ and he decided he would follow suit so i guess even yeah he was in his 70s at the time but he the fact of me trying to talk to him about christ so angered him that he got up and squared off and and my dad was a golden gloves boxer so i knew he knows how to throw a punch wow so i knew i had to get up and get in a position where i could block it or defend myself because i could be in trouble and he you know when he squared off so he squared off and and socked me one and uh so it it was something that was not the most uh enjoyable thing but this past thanksgiving uh closest my father could come to apologizing by saying that we're both wrong i was always not sure what i was i did wrong was it my face getting in the way of your fist or i'm not sure there but i think what he thinks i did wrong was you know i wasn't supposed to tell him about christ right and uh so he feels that was wrong on my part and uh he feels he was wrong in his response but uh that's that's it's hard it's hard having family who you care for that just are will literally turn violent if you talk to about the things of christ so i just keep i keep praying for him keep trying to show love to them keep trying to see how i can reach out to them and and just pray that one day the lord's gonna open their eyes amen and uh we are in this building that we were in here at this event the g3 conference is obviously the primary focus has been the celebration of the 500th anniversary of the protestant reformation and as you probably know there are jewish believers that have different opinions on that some do not want to recognize the reformers at all as any kind of beneficial contribution or blessing to the body of christ because of some of the unfortunate very horrible things that luther has said about the jews which unfortunately were uh taken to an extreme physically by later generations including the nazis using some of his words and so on but there are others that i know who realized that luther was a sinner saved by grace just like any man those were some of his sins but they are they can look past that and embrace at least the fact that god used him as a figure to bring about a revolutionary change in europe which spread globally and open up the the gateway for bibles being translated in the native tongue of people wherever they lived and the gospel spreading i mean where are you with that whole situation well before i became a christian i actually i thought what luther did was good but maybe not in the way you might think i thought that luther was good because he helped in my mind to diminish the power of the catholic church the catholic church was no friend and has never not been a friend of jews right for you know a long time and so the thing is is that i remember learning in in hebrew school how luther what he helped do was to weaken the power of the catholic really really and so that was the only good thing well that's about luther and calvin that i ever had learned before becoming a christian that is interesting because i had never heard that there was any positive rhetoric if you will coming from uh jewish sources about luther and that it does it is true though because in spite of his rhetoric he nor neither he nor his followers actually physically uh did anything to persecute jews whereas the church of rome and the the inquisition and so on that was yeah a horrific thing that went on and one of the things it's like you know people say wait you mean jews today still think about the inquisition and and we we train our children that way i would go through hebrew school and learn the history of what christianity has done to our people that's how it would be explained in fact i heard that there is a film i'm not sure which holocaust museum it may be the one in israel or it might be another one um perhaps you know but i heard that there is a film that is shown and it might even be the final words of the film where they say something to the effect um and then arriving on the scene a baby was born named adolf hitler uh christened a roman catholic or something like that i'm not sure to kind of tie in that whole thing which is really unfair even in spite of the fact that i am very opposed to the the false gospel of rome to categorize hitler a catholic it is really a stretch yeah he was an occultic uh person who was vehemently anti -christian in any way shape or form but to the jewish people we wouldn't know the difference i i remember in hebrew school as as maybe 10 to 12 years old but i remember them lining us up all this all the students along the wall and i remember the hebrew school teacher just sitting there making like a machine gun and just going that's what that's what jesus christ would do to you now that is that is also interesting uh there's some things unique about uh striving for eternity ministries is that many jewish individuals who who embrace christ become christians in fact many don't even use the word christian they'll say they're completed jews or messianic jews but uh that that very often and i'm not even saying that there's necessarily anything negative about the fact that that is often a focal point of their ministries when they go into a parachurch group or something but that doesn't seem to be the focal point of striving for eternity ministries at all now i got saved the same way everybody else did there's nothing more unique because of the fact that i'm from a jewish background it's the same miracle that happens when someone that's from a roman catholic background becomes a christian it's the same miracle of god doing something that's completely we're completely unworthy of it and he chooses to do it for whatever reason he's chosen to do so and i don't see my salvation being that for jewish background being any different than anybody else and i know for a lot of christians it's like oh you're jewish tell me your testimony and it's like do you go to that and do that with everyone else right you know it's it's a thing where i i know a lot of christians seem to look to the jewish people with a with some special awe almost yes and i i think that it's just as difficult for a traditional jewish person to come to christ as it is for any other religious groups a roman catholic who's buried in that tradition has a hard time letting that go so that they can come to christ on his terms uh or you know any cultist you get you know someone that's joe witness or or a mormon it's just as difficult for them to walk away from all that now another thing that's interesting about you is that you are a believer in the doctrines of sovereign grace yeah and that seems to be a rarity amongst jewish believers which to me is very puzzling and ironic because if you are a any at all knowledgeable about the history of the jewish people they were chosen out from among the nations not because of their specialness and being better than them innately being a beautiful wonderful obedient people or anything like that so that that concept i would think would be driven home in the minds of jewish people who are relate who are raised with some kind of awareness even if it's a nominal jewish home some awareness of the biblical account of why they are considered a special and chosen people and yet for some reason when many jews have come to christ that seems to be totally anathema that concept of a certain group chosen out of humanity uh by the sovereign grace of god it seems to be an ironic thing i often find what they do is they say well a people were chosen not individuals and they start they start you know and i've seen this with a lot of people who don't just don't like the doctrines of grace they see election they know elections in the bible how do they how do they explain it away oh it's an elect group of people so israel as a nation was elect and now the church is elect um and i just go yeah and if you read romans 9 that sounds kind of personal right he's talking individual there i'm sorry jacob isaw yeah and when you start going well cc one represents the no that's not how you do harmonetics and how and i don't even understand how it is more palatable more uh pleasing to people more comforting to say he doesn't choose individuals over others he troops he chose a group over others how is that even more of a comforting factor if you go if you're going to be against that concept i had a gentleman who once came to me and he was like look if you're going to believe in calvinism you're going to believe this stuff what i mean what do you do if you have a child that doesn't believe in christ i said well i don't i'm not the one with the problem you are he's like what do you mean i say well for me i rely on god's sovereignty what do you rely on if you have a child that doesn't believe in christ your words you i mean you you're going to feel the guilt over i didn't do enough i didn't say enough i didn't do something to force him to believe i just rely on christ and say god knows better than me amen and he looked at me and went that's a good point amen uh before i move off of this uh subject but uh what is your reaction to some of the messianic jews that uh at the risk of offending people listening have gone either to the border or even crossed it in my opinion of really resurrecting the judaizers where they are binding upon people these the whole ritual and the garb and the and all that kind of thing much of which is not even from the hebrew scriptures but rabbinical custom yeah the the hebrew roots movement is really popular and people always ask how does it get to be people who are really putting themselves back under the law and trying to live as old testament jews and what you often find with a lot of those people and i'm going to take a step back and say so we could just defend everybody right so but the reality is that you'll see this in every group if you're if you have the charismatics if they get saved then a second blessing and when you're really spiritual when you get the second blessing if you're reformed you get a lot of people who are like you get saved but then you get reformed now you're spiritual when you understand the doctrines of grace and and for those guys those type people everything's about the doctrines of grace with the hebrew roots movement you get saved then you understand the law and and it becomes a thing where they find a spiritual pride in putting themselves back under the law because they're more spiritual than other people i had one woman who years ago i used to work at bell laboratories and one of the security guards was you know went to a messianic temple and she's telling me about this festival that she there's oh so great we are in synagogue and this is what we were learning about this jewish festival and she's explaining it to me and i said i don't know any jewish people that celebrate that i've never heard of this and she goes she was just jealous because i'm more jewish than you i was like really i was bar mitzvahed how about you i'm from the line of levi i mean come on you know my family's from korah we're the ones that actually take would have taken care of the the elements of the temple so i'm like you're more jewish than me but but that's what you end that happens and there's people who look for something other than christ to satisfy their feeling of spirituality yes and that's what i think the law does for many people it gives them a sense that they're more spiritual that they have something they can tangibly see that they're clinging to other than christ for their spiritual maturity and and it's kind of sad to see you see with every group has people who who have a spiritual pride in something that takes their focus off of christ and really what the for those people the goal is to try to bring them back to christ trying to argue over well that you you know shouldn't be under the law you shouldn't be doing this doing that becomes a futile thing for a lot of people and they try to struggle with loved ones to say you're putting yourself back under the law let's read galatians let's see what it says and it becomes just as futile as i think paul had struggling with the judaizers in his day my view is to just say let's let's get back to christ let's look at where your focus needs to be back on christ and don't lose your first love yes it's a it's interesting that you use the phrase that some people are looking for anything but christ it's interesting how a dear friend of mine richie saxon who's now retired from the ministry but used to be involved in a messianic congregation even though he's a gentile and he was not of the extreme uh judaizing realm in fact he would be very very opposed to that but he said that he had heard of a messianic congregation that would never use the name jesus it was always yeshua yeshua yes and he related to the the fact that a woman in the congregation when she found out that she had been a member of this congregation for uh quite a long time and when she found out that yeshua was jesus she was horrified and left she was willing to accept this messianic figure whoever he was if it wasn't jesus just because of the hebrew name yeah yeshua but as soon as she found this is jesus and she left but um what might surprise you to know that most of the messianic jewish congregations are made up of gentiles yes and and a lot of them are also led by gentiles and i have also heard that that is highly offensive to many orthodox jews because the very flippant way where where the the term and title i should say and role of rabbi is given to people in in a very um easy way to to a gentile individual or even a jewish believer that does not involve the arduous years of training that a a jew goes through to become ordained into an orthodox rabbinic role yeah what most people don't know is that many of the jewish ministries are seen as a joke right within judaism like a halloween party or something yeah well the rabbis the rabbis will joke about how the fact that many of the jewish ministries are led by people who change their name to sound jewish right and they'll talk about that and yeah i remember listening to one rabbi who said you he calls up to the programs when you have these jewish ministry guys on and i'll say what was your birth name it's one of the questions he loves to call in and he would ask why because he it would expose that they're trying to sound more jewish and he would like to point that out uh but the reality is is that they're for many of the jewish people they are they're suffering from their own problem that they're so separate themselves from gentiles that they can't hear the true gospel and they don't want to hear the true gospel because as soon as they hear the name christ they shut down that's why i tell people if you're going to evangelize to jewish people you want to first explain the law something that they understand but get them to see that their judaism is not going to save them they need a savior because they first have to see a need for a savior before you bring christ up once you bring christ up it's a it's a conversation ender with many uh the the more orthodox they are the more you're going to have that and so i tell people you want to you want to try to not use christian language because most christians don't even realize how much christianese they they speak and using language that to a jewish person they're not going to understand i mean if you if you try to deal a lot with muslims and they have their own way of speaking they have their own greetings they immediately can tell someone's the orthodox muslim or not same thing with with jewish people you know we're going to have a different way of speaking different terminology we're going to use and be able to identify one another that way now one of the things that is puzzling about the groups that are legalistic in regard to ceremonial law and things like that perhaps even going to the extreme of equating something salvific about it aren't most messianic jews dispensationalists which would militate against any kind of concept of salvation by law yeah they're a lot of them are dispensational they're also often charismatic right which is one of the reasons why i never people say oh you're a messianic jew i don't use that term because it has way too much that label has way too much overtones that i don't want to be identified with i am dispensational but i don't so i don't have a problem with that aspect of it but i don't think they even see for many of the groups that start getting back under the law they don't see that separation between israel and the church they're starting to blur those lines and put themselves back underneath it and by the way even though i'm not a dispensationalist obviously one of my greatest living heroes is john macarthur who i know is uh so uh but the the last time you were on the program you were discussing your book uh what do they believe and uh you could go through a summary of that but i want to highlight right now since i've already interviewed you on that uh the new book that you have well the what do they believe is a systematic theology of the major western religions so we go into judaism catholicism islam mormonism jehovah witness and then christianity and in those six religions we i what i've actually done is gone to their sources and i cite tons of their sources so people see the context of it and see all because i figure most people don't have a talmud at home they don't have a quran at home things like that so i'm citing the sources so they can see it in its context and then what i do is i i'm looking at that and i'm looking at what's their authority what's their view of god specifically the trinity what's their view of christ specifically his deity the view of man salvate man's sinfulness man salvation and then in times with each of those six doctrines i go through each of those religions and with things like islam that's the only systematic theology that they have i don't know of any other systematic theology in islam and or mormonism for that matter and so what you end up with is something that what i tried to do is not refute those religions but actually say this is what they believe from their sources and so now that i've done that i'm trying to do the counterpart to that which is really take that last chapter and expand on it and say what do we believe and that's the title of the next book and it's really going to be a christian theology but i'm trying to write it for all ages someone that doesn't know anything about theology there's they're going to be able to pick up a lot but even people who study theology there's going to be a lot of things i of of because i try to be very precise with things that i think they're going to pick up the precision that comes out of it one of the things i'm also trying to do with this is that there's one chapter in there on biblical reliability one of the things that i feel as you know i'm an open -air preacher so i'm on the street evangelizing regularly and i'm constantly coming up with the arguments of carl of not carl bart erman constantly dealing with the issues of we can't possibly know how what the original meaning of the bible was and his argument would be there's 400 000 textural variances and i mean we have no we can't have the original therefore we can't know the meaning his best argument that he has in his book misquoting jesus is that some manuscripts say jesus christ was a carpenter and others say he was the son of a carpenter like like wow i know so many doctrines based on that not you know but the reality is is that i try to make easy to understand and the way i tested this is we have a one of the fellows in the church who is it just not you have you not one of those kind of guys that likes to study and so i ran through the chapter with him and to see if he can understand because textual criticism is typically something that guys like james white deal with at a very high level and you got to know a lot what i'm trying to do is make it so easy like exactly like bart erman did he made his argument easy to be understood so that it could be repeated over and over and people could believe it i want the truth to be repeated over and over and make it easy to understand so what i did was i went through and said all right let's let's take a look at this let's not look at all the variant readings in other words jesus christ christ jesus jesus the lord the lord jesus christ has four different variant readings but that's one variant so if you break it down that way we end up with about 6 700 hundred variances in the new testament that's 6 700 out of you know about 138 000 greek words that still sounds like a lot but when you break that down 75 of those things are spelling errors so that's easy to fix the 19 of them don't affect the meaning in any way five percent of them even though the meaning may be affected we can get back to what the original text said so we're only dealing with one percent of the new testament where we can't get back to the original meaning and the meaning changes so that's about 67 words out of 138 000 words in other words we're going to say that the bible is 99 .96

accurate i'll put those numbers up against cnn any day and uh are is there uh an approach that you take that tries to and i don't think anybody could do this perfectly but tries to avoid any kind of sectarian denominational division uh where like for instance you mentioned before you're dispensationalist will this be a clearly dispensationalist book no it's not i mean there you'll see actually uh where you might see it the most is the chapter on the church and that chapter was i worked on with a covenant theologian so we worked on that together on writing that because i wanted to make sure that i wasn't you're going to see that i'm going to up until the point you're going to see it very clearly there's going to be just a giving a history of the term church ecclesia how that's changed from a very general term to being more and more specific through through history puritans had more specific the reformers each you know throughout history it became a thing more and more specific now i will say that i think in the in this last hundred years it's even more specific and seeing a separation between israel and the church but that's probably the only spot you're going to see that come out you're going to see some of what i believe come out when it comes to the doctrine of salvation there's going to be some things there but i'm trying to be pretty general for the most part but give some of the precision that needs to be there so you know one of the guys that wrote a review for the book said you may not you're you can't deal with theology without having differences right but the way that he said the way that i had handled it even if you disagree it helps you understand how others are thinking about it and helps you think about the way you're thinking about theology now just like uh john macarthur who i mentioned earlier uh although he is dispensationalist it seems that most of his closest allies are theologically reformed and even covenantal uh and he at least associates a lot and fellowships with a lot and speaks publicly a lot with someone from that persuasion uh how do you if at all differ from some of your dispensationalist brethren and not exclusively jewish dispensationalists but because even gentile dispensationalists have been known to say these things but who would accuse those of different eschatological positions of being anti -semitic just because they're all mellow post mill for instance yeah i i focus very little energy on end times and that's surprising wait you're dispensational that's what dispensation no that's not what dispensationalism is you never define a system by its byproduct premillennialism is a byproduct of a harmoneutical system and that's what dispensationalism is and this is one of the things that a lot of people don't understand covenant theology or let's be proper about it because covenant theology technically was something that was the roman catholic church what we would believe is reformed theology which people misuse and call that calvinism but right but covenant theology or reformed theology and dispensational theology are harmoneutical systems how you interpret the bible and they're using different rules of interpretation and so i see both of them as a systems of interpretation not in time systems which is what so many people argue for and i understand like john mcarthur i'll talk about how much of the the percentage of the bible is focused on the second coming and it's true but i don't focus on all the details you don't see me do charts and all that unless i'm trying to have fun making fun of you know myself as a dispensationalist because the reality is that there's so much of that i like what a friend of mine fred zaspal had said he said that the the end you know when you look at like the book of revelation it's kind of like a political cartoon if you think of it that way if you see a political cartoon you get the big picture but you shouldn't be interpreting all those little details and assuming you can figure all those things out and i really liked that and i've always held to that that you know we look at the end times we're gonna miss so many of those details that we thought we had right just like those in the first coming missed it when they thought they had all of it right and when the net that generation afterwards has all the hindsight that we have on the first coming they're gonna know where everyone including the dispensationalist got all their details wrong by the way say hello to fred for me uh he's a friend of mine as well yeah i've had him on the program and i'm sure he would want me to clarify that he's historic premill not a dispensation he's a new covenant theologian yes which is which is might be new for some folks but it's a it's really kind of i i i joke with them that the difference between new covenant theology and dispensation or at least progressive dispensationalism is just our views on end times other than that as long as we're not talking in times work we're kind of all in agreement and he also wrote a a book a biography of bb warfield that was his doctrinal dissertation yes and i look forward to having him back on the program well i'd like you to summarize what you most want our listeners to have etched in their hearts and minds when they leave this interview after they hear this interview and obviously definitely don't forget to give our listeners a contact information and a url for striving for eternity ministries well i'll i'll get what i'll leave folks with is what's behind the name striving for eternity when that is the idea that we really have when paul writes to the philippians that he'd rather be with christ he'd rather be dead but he's hard pressed between death and life because in life he could be ministering to to the philippians what he's saying there is he'd rather be with christ he'd rather see death that's the idea is that we would be striving for that which is eternal to we would have a mindset and everything we do in life that we have a mindset for that which is going to last for eternity that we're looking forward to being with christ that that is what motivates everything we do in life because when we have that mindset that the struggles of life the things of sitting and and having these these temptations and trials in life they grow strangely dim in fact what they end up doing according to second corinthians five paul makes the argument they're gonna as our body starts to fail it gives us a greater reason a great cause to want to be with christ and want to see christ and if we're striving not just for our salvation but in our sanctification to want to see christ then that's going to motivate everything we do and it's going to affect everything we did it's going to affect how we do things and it's going to be the thing that it's the thing that gets me to get out there and in the streets of new york and open up in an open air and start preaching the gospel in an area that i know will be hostile to it why because i care where they spend eternity because i know the reality is they're going to face a judgment it's appointed under man wants to die and then that judgment and that that is something that they don't want to think about but i can't stop thinking about and so you know that's what motivates me and that's what i hope would motivate more and more christians they put away the silliness that we see in american christianity and start focusing on that which matters and so striving fraternity can be found at striving for eternity dot org and we have our academy there we have our store there so that's a great place to go find everything about it great and by the way uh this october 31st or at least the closest weekend to that i don't have a calendar with me but god willing new hide park baptist church is having a celebration of their 75th anniversary over that over a three -day period and fred zaspel who you mentioned earlier is going to be one of the speakers because he spent time as an interim pastor there yeah so and i know that that's not that far from new jersey where you're no no actually i i was able to get fred to be one of uh the seminary profs at a fundamentalist baptist dispensational school they wouldn't let him teach on certain topics but but yeah he was an adjunct professor at my seminary really which seminary is that calvary baptist theological seminary lansdale pennsylvania because i found out that uh fred's dad also named fred zaspel is a beloved fundamentalist preacher oh yes yeah and so they knew his father very well which meant they knew he was he went off the rails as as the dean had said but uh but he has so much knowledge and so much yeah i think i think if there's one man's brain who i could steal for myself it would be his yeah he's a great guy well it's been such an honor and privilege to have you back on iron sharpens iron especially face to face this time amen and i look forward to having you back on brother thanks for having me all right god bless well we're out of time and i hope that you tune in tomorrow to iron sharpens iron and tomorrow we are resuming live interviewing uh tomorrow we have pastor ron glass of wading river baptist church wading river long island new york who is going to be addressing why millennial millennials are leaving the church so you can get your questions ready right now and email them to chris arnzen at gmail .com