September 26, 2017 Show with Phil Johnson on “Tim Keller & the Pressure Against Christian Leaders in the Public Eye to Cave into the Leftist Agenda (Is There Only ONE WAY to GOD?)”

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Now here's our host Chris Arntzen.

Good afternoon Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida and the rest of humanity living

on the entire planet listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

This is Chris Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this

26th day of September 2017 and I'm delighted to have back on the program

one of my favorite guests, one of my most frequently interviewed guests of all time, Phil Johnson,

executive director of Grace to You, the radio, TV and literary ministry of John

MacArthur.

And today we are going to be continuing a discussion that we began some time ago

on the theme Tim Keller and the pressure against Christian leaders in the public eye to cave

into the leftist agenda and today our focus is on an interview that Tim Keller

had with Martin Bashir, the British journalist, on the theme, Is There

Only One Way to God?

And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Phil Johnson.

Thank you, Chris. Good to be with you.

And in studio with me is my co -host, the Reverend Buzz Taylor.

Hello, everybody.

It's good to be here again.

And if anybody would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com,

chrisarnzen at gmail .com, that's c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state and your country of residence when writing in.

And please only remain anonymous if it's about a personal and private matter over which you are asking.

And I also have a caveat to once again state at the outset of the program

that please confine your questions to the

pressure against Christian leaders in the public eye to cave into the leftist

agenda because our guest, Phil Johnson, does not consider himself to be an expert on the life

and theology of Tim Keller.

So if you start asking specific questions about Tim Keller,

he may not be able to answer them because of the fact that he is not an expert, nor does he profess to be,

on Tim Keller's life and theology.

So keep it to the broader topic if you could and things related to it.

And you might as well, it's hard to believe that anybody in my audience would be

unfamiliar with Grace to You, but in the event that some of our new listeners, we seem

to get new listeners contacting us every day, in the event that there are people unfamiliar with

John MacArthur and Grace to You, I got to just tell you something funny

in regard to that.

A number of years ago, it wasn't that long ago, but I was at a Christian businessmen's fellowship

and I was telling the men there about my program,

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and they were asking me, who have you interviewed?

And I'd say, well, people like R .C. Sproul and John MacArthur.

Coach McCartney?

No, John MacArthur.

Coach McCartney?

No, I said John MacArthur.

This was during like the Promise Keepers craze and Coach McCartney was a big name

people were tossing around.

But so obviously there are people out there that, believe it or not, are not that familiar with John MacArthur.

So if you could explain to our listeners exactly what Grace to.

You is all about.

Grace to You is the media ministry of John MacArthur.

He is the pastor of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California.

It's a large church.

It's been around for a long time.

John MacArthur has been there since 1969, so he's approaching his 50th

anniversary as pastor of Grace Community Church.

Over the years, he has preached verse by verse through the entire New Testament and all of those sermons

were recorded.

Every sermon he ever gave at Grace Church.

And so what we do is make those available.

You can download them freely over the internet.

We play them on the radio.

And so it's more or less to expand the outreach

of John's teaching ministry by the use of mass media as much as we can.

And for those of you who want.

To look up more information about Grace to You, the website is gty .org,

gty .org.

Well, without further ado, I am...

Hold on a second.

Our Reverend Bruce Taylor has something.

To say.

Well, before we get too far into the subject, and I think I mentioned to you before, Phil, that, you know,

I've got hundreds of John MacArthur tapes because I used to be on the tape lending library.

And I used to get a lot of the stuff that wasn't aired on the radio.

And I thought that was some of the most interesting stuff.

But he had...

I remember hearing John talk about once somebody came up to him and showed him a cassette

tape and said, your messages are going to go around the world or something to that effect.

Do you remember?

Are you aware of that incident?

Yeah, yeah.

In fact, I was just reminiscing about that this weekend with Pastor Jim Harris in Boise,

Idaho.

He was one of the first people on staff at Grace Church back in the 60s who helped to put

John MacArthur's messages on cassette tape.

He may have been the person that showed John MacArthur his first cassette tape.

Jim was telling me that in the early days of the ministry, they actually published a brochure explaining

what would know how to use them.

Can you imagine that?

So I didn't want to ask right.

Up front because, you know, I don't know you personally.

I wasn't going to say, was that you.

Since you said he's been there 50 years or so?

Yeah, no, I've only been here since 1983, so we're coming up on my 35th

anniversary, but well, that's still quite a while.

That's about.

The time I became familiar with John MacArthur.

It was 84 when I used to hear him on the radio.

That's when I started listening.

Right.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, now, without further ado, I'm going to I'm going to play

the clip of an interview that Tim Keller

conducted with Martin Bashir, the British journalist with the BBC, and

we'll have Phil respond to the contents of this interview after we're finished.

So here we go.

Here is Martin Bashir interviewing Tim Keller.

Do you believe that there is only one God and that there is only one way to

approach that God?

If yes, if.

Okay.

Yes.

If I'm speaking as a Christian here, if Jesus Christ

is who he says he is, that is, if he is the son of God from heaven, if he is

if he really was bodily raised from the dead and if he was our original creator,

if all that's true, that's what he says, then, of course, it'd have to be just one way to God because our

souls would need him or they would shrivel eternally, just like your body needs

food or it would shrivel.

I mean, the fact is my body needs food or it will shrivel.

That's not narrow minded to say that's just the way it is.

If Jesus is who he said he is, then our souls would have to get him in order to be

eternally full and thrive.

And if we don't get him, then we would eternally shrivel.

So to say it seems so narrow to claim

that there's only one way to God to say that actually precludes the

possibility that Jesus is who he says he is.

I mean, if he is who he says he is, then that's what we're that's what we have to say.

If he's not who he says he is, then, of course, it's narrow.

So basically, you have to sit down, ask yourself the question about the facts of Jesus' life and look at that and not

say, I don't even look at Jesus.

I don't even.

Want to hear the claims of Christianity because they seem so exclusive.

So where does that leave the millions of Muslims, Sikhs and Jews?

Are they sadly and completely deluded?

People who never heard about Jesus or never really got a hearing about Jesus.

I'm not.

Talking about them because some of those people have heard about.

I'm talking about the millions of Muslims, Sikhs and Jews who have heard about

Jesus.

Where does your thesis leave them where.

They are right now?

That means that if there's never any change, they don't get Jesus.

If he is who he said he is, then long term, they don't have God.

If on the other hand, you know, all I can always say about this is

God gives me, even as a minister with a scripture, a lot of information on a need -to -know basis.

And a need -to -know basis means here's all I can tell you.

Unless you get Jesus Christ, who created you to start with, unless you are

reunited with him sometime, there is no eternal future of thriving.

It just makes sense.

Again, I'm trying to go back to this idea that if he is who he says he is, you've got to have him.

If right now a person doesn't have him, then he or she needs to get him.

If they die and they don't have Jesus Christ, I

don't know.

In other words, I have a need -to -know basis.

This is the only thing I know.

You need Jesus.

I certainly know that God is wiser than me or merciful than me.

And I do know that when I finally find out how God is dealing with every individual soul, I won't have any

questions about it.

Okay, but if this is the only way to God, and if Christians

are heading for a place called heaven, does that mean, therefore, by

deduction, that millions of Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus,

Jews, all of whom hold their faith with enormous integrity,

all of them are heading for hell?

There's a lot of people who were born in Indianapolis, Indiana, and they grew up in First

Baptist Church there, who are also headed for a Christless eternity.

Every human being chooses an identity.

It's either chosen, it's either based on the grace of God, or it's basically based on your own

performance and your own ability, and therefore on your own self.

And if a billion years from now, you've put your hope in the grace of God, you will be beautiful and

happy.

If you, a billion years from now, you've put your, you base your identity on your own self and your own abilities and your own

performance, you'll be miserable.

In fact, you can see it even now.

Self -centered people are miserable even now, not a billion years from now.

So, there are plenty of people who are raised Christians.

There's plenty of people who were raised in First Baptist Church, but in their hearts have not turned toward the grace of

God.

People in other religions, unless they find Christ, I don't know any other way, but I

also get information on a need -to -know basis.

If there's some trapdoor or something like that, I haven't been told about it.

But I also don't know, I guess I want to know this.

I want to know, when a person says, I need to know everything about how God is going to deal with, in all

eternity, with all individuals before I can bite down on Christianity.

I feel that you actually are maybe projecting your American democratic,

individualistic understanding of, you really want a president or a governor or a mayor.

You don't really want a king.

And I can understand that because human kings, human beings are flawed and therefore

monarchy was not a very good approach to things.

But if you have a perfect God, perfect king, comes and suffers in Jesus Christ,

then at this, at a certain point, I trust him.

How is your position fair and rational?

Well, look.

How is that just?

I actually don't know that people.

In other centuries or other cultures were nearly as bothered about this as

people in this room.

And you're doing a pretty good job of articulating how nervous, upset they feel about this.

But this idea that everybody needs to have an equal chance is not something that most people have felt was self -evident.

I mean, just because everybody you know feels that way doesn't mean, and that your culture feels that way, doesn't mean you can now

come to the Bible and Christian teaching and say, because we Western individualistic

people don't like this part of biblical revelation, it can't be true.

The fact is, in the Middle East, where people are not nearly as bothered by this idea that some religions are right and some religions are wrong,

that's not their problem.

With Christianity at all.

For more information about the Veritas Forum, including additional recordings and a calendar of upcoming events, please

visit our website at veritas .org.

Well, that was the interview that Martin Bashir released to the segment that was on that particular YouTube

clip of Martin Bashir and Tim Keller.

And I'd like to start off, Phil, with you commenting on what you liked about what

Tim Keller said, if anything, and then we'll move on to criticisms.

Oh, I wish I'd known you were going to ask me that.

Because honestly, I didn't like this.

Interview at all.

I didn't either.

I just thought that we might be charitable and have something.

Of virtue involved in it.

Yeah, trying to be charitable.

I think at least he hinted in there that, you know, your works, your good works are not going to save

you and all of that.

But I think the negatives so outweigh the positives on this interview that it's pretty hard for

me to say.

Anything negative about it.

The only thing that I could find redeemable about the entire interview was his saying that

the idea of fairness might not have been such an issue centuries ago.

It might be more of a factor in modern society, especially in

societies where there is a democratic republic or something.

But other than that, it was pretty horrible.

Yeah, well, that's true.

I mean, what you just pointed out, what he said is true.

He didn't answer the question he was asked.

And that was my main complaint throughout this whole interview.

He didn't answer any of the questions he was asked.

He was asked very pointed, direct questions, and he sidestepped every one of them.

And that's not good apologetics.

I know he's revered and respected by a lot of people who think that his approach to

evangelism and apologetics is ingenious because he avoids making people angry who the rest of us might

make angry.

But when you're asked a pointed question, do you believe that there is only one God, there really is only

one appropriate answer to that question.

And he didn't give it.

It isn't that he gave the wrong answer.

It isn't that he denied anything that I know he believes.

I mean, because he's in the PCA, he has to affirm the Westminster Confession of

Faith.

So I know he knows and believes the answers to these questions, but he just seems

incapable of giving a direct response to a direct question.

Do you believe there's only one God?

How can you.

Not answer that question?

Right.

And first of all, I think that he did deny

something essential in regard to the Scriptures by saying and implying that

it is not knowable what happens to those who.

Do not embrace Christ.

Yeah, no, you're right about that.

Yeah, I mean, that's one of the maybe further into it.

But just from that very first question, I just cringed.

Do you believe there is only one God?

He's being asked what he believes, and there ought to be a straightforward answer to that.

But he immediately goes into this hypothetical if, and he says, yes,

if, okay, yes, if I'm speaking as a Christian here, if Christ is who he says he is, if he's a son of God, he

uses the word if nine times before he ever completes a sentence.

It's all hypothetical.

If Jesus is who he says he is, if.

Well, he's not asking for how an unbeliever should be thinking

hypothetically.

He was asked, what do you, Tim Keller, believe?

And I don't know why we can't get a straight answer to that question.

Yeah, well, that is frankly one of my concerns about Tim Keller

across the board.

It seems to me he always shies away from direct language, direct

answers.

You know, he likes to be coy and a little bit ambiguous.

And this whole thing,.

Every answer he gave here is ambiguous.

And if the disciples of the first century answered questions like that, the likelihood is that they would

never have been martyred.

And in fact, if it were not ordained by God himself, Christ might not have been crucified if he answered questions

with that kind of ambiguity.

Yeah, and the fact is, they did.

Not answer questions like that.

And because they didn't answer questions like that, and they answered every one of these questions, all Tim Keller really

needed to do to answer these questions was quote scripture.

He could have simply said, well, the Bible says this, the Bible says that, and, you know, quoted what the

Bible says about these questions.

But he didn't make a single.

Reference to scripture as far as I noticed.

Yeah, no, I didn't hear a single one myself.

And this is obviously, this does not demonstrate the heart

of a shepherd either, the heart of someone who is passionately concerned

over the souls of those who hear his voice, of those who he is

responsible over those who are have an

eternity ahead of them, as we all do.

And these are vital questions on which eternity is hinged.

And the fact that he even brings up the the if

element, it's as if he is, is demonstrating, I'm not saying that he is a doubter,

or somebody who is not fully convinced or convicted of the truths of Jesus Christ and the claims that he made about

himself.

But he is giving the impression that he is that he has a question mark over his own beliefs.

Wouldn't you say that?

Yeah, well, I thought it was more.

An impression.

I thought he pretty much said that he did not know the answer to the question whether there was another way to

heaven or not.

He certainly left that.

And he just hasn't been told about it because he hasn't been told on a need to know basis.

That's just wrong.

I mean, that is that is not at all in keeping with what Scripture says about the exclusivity

of Christ, that he is the way the truth and life and no one comes to the Father except through him.

It seems that people like Dr. Keller, and Billy Graham,

and Joel Osteen, want to make the gospel more

palatable, more sweet, and syrupy, and acceptable to the

lost than it was ever intended to be.

They take the fangs out of the gospel, because there's a bad side of the gospel

that if you reject it, you will be damned for eternity.

There is no good news without bad news, and there's nothing amazing about

grace if the flip side of the coin isn't something terrifying and horrible.

And he, just like when Billy Graham preached at the

National Cathedral after 9 -11, when he specifically used a

phrase that Tim Keller also used in this interview, but before Billy Graham was

actually giving the elements of the gospel near the end of his message at the

National Cathedral after the attack on 9 -11, he said, I'm speaking to the

Christians now.

This is for the Christians that totally took any urgency

or any kind of declaration that you need to repent whoever

you are if you deny Christ, it took that completely out of the equation

when he said that this is for the Christians, because everybody else was able to sit back, relax,

and ignore the clarion call to repent and follow Christ,

because it wasn't for them.

Jesus is the God for the Christians, but nobody else.

And when Tim Keller says, I'm speaking here as a Christian, don't you think that that, even though

in and of itself might be innocuous or benign, but don't you think that that really does take

the fangs out of a message that deserves to have within it an element of fear?

Yeah, well, there's no question that it does, but in fairness to

a majority of evangelicals today would, if they were honest,

and without any reluctancy, I think most of them would tell you, yes, they prefer that kind of

presentation about Christ to just a clear declaration about the

exclusivity of the gospel.

That's how people today think the gospel is supposed to be given.

And I honestly don't understand it, because Scripture is clear on these

very points.

I mean, again, the very first question, do you believe there is only one God?

How much in Scripture stresses that?

I mean, that was the Shema in the Old Testament.

Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God.

And it's also repeated several times in the New Testament that there is one Lord, one faith, one

baptism, one God and Father of us all.

Scripture is so clear on that.

I don't know why it wouldn't be a simple answer just to say,.

Yeah, this is what Scripture says.

Now, don't you think that someone who is behaving like a true ambassador for Christ,

a true shepherd, a true theologian, a true

spokesman, if you will, for Jesus Christ, his word and his gospel, don't you think that would

be a level of excitement to have an opportunity to sit before a global audience and

proclaim the truths about Christ rather than seemingly be apologetic for them?

And I don't mean apologetic in the sense of apologetics, but as if you're embarrassed

by the truths of the gospel that are uncomfortable.

To those who reject it.

Yeah, well, that's why the Apostle Paul continually said things like, I'm not ashamed of the gospel.

I think this has been a tendency in every age to sort of be ashamed of the

message, because it is a stumbling block and a rock of offense, and because people

do mock and deride those who proclaim the gospel, clearly.

So, you know, there is a sense in which there's a strong temptation to be

embarrassed by the message, because you get made fun of or you get a lot of pushback if you preach it.

And to be fair, you know, if you're on national TV,

that's an intimidating place to be.

I don't think this was a televised interview, but nevertheless, these days, you know, pretty much everything you say is going to

live on the internet forever.

And, you know, put in a situation like that, I admit, I would be somewhat fearful.

What if I mess up?

What if I say the wrong thing?

What if I touch off a firestorm of controversy because I've said it wrong, or I wasn't

sufficiently clear, or whatever?

But what we have to—and that's legitimate, you know?

I am prone to mistakes.

I feel like Moses sometimes, that, look, I'm slow of speech, and I stutter a little bit, and I'm prone

to say the wrong thing, and I sometimes offend people needlessly, and I don't want to do any

of that.

But we have to condition ourselves to think, look, when we're proclaiming the Gospel, knowing that it is

a stumbling stone, a rock of offense, the cross is a—if

that's what upsets people, because we've proclaimed it clearly and accurately, then fine, you know?

Blessed are you when men persecute you and speak evil of you and mock and deride you.

We have to be willing to take that kind of punishment

from.

The world.

Yeah, and speaking in human terms, I think I would be

more afraid of what my brothers in Christ would say after I was finished than I would about what the

liberals would think,.

And the leftists, and so on.

Yeah, well, there's that, too.

There's that, too.

But I admit to you, you know, John MacArthur was on Larry King numerous times in the decade

just preceding this one, and I used to watch him and think, because he was so

good at saying exactly the right thing at exactly the right time, in a way that I know I wouldn't be able to do.

I just can't think that quickly or put my words that clearly and correctly on the

first attempt.

I'm a writer, not a speaker, and I need to think over something, usually, before I say it right.

And it wasn't like that with John MacArthur, but he would always answer those hard questions directly, and I think it was

Larry King who told him that he liked having John MacArthur on his broadcast, because he knew he'd get an honest

answer from him.

Yes.

He told him, most of the evangelicals I get on this program, I'll ask them the hard question.

Larry King, who was Jewish and married to a Mormon woman and all, he thought about these things a lot,

and you knew if he had an evangelical on there, he would always ask this very question, what about

Jews who don't in Christ?

Are they going to go to hell?

You knew that question was going to come up, and if you were an evangelical and agreed to be interviewed by Larry King, you

better have your answer to that question prepared, because he is going to ask it.

And it used to just amaze me how many evangelicals would fumble that question and answer it

wrong, or try to sidestep it and never answer it at all.

And trust me, Larry King noticed, and

he appreciated the honesty of someone who answered an honest question honestly, even if he didn't agree with the

answer.

And I think most people in the world are like that.

And the Reverend Buzz Taylor has something to say.

You just sort of almost grabbed my thunder here, because I was going to ask you, and I'm still asking it,

but turn the tables just a little bit.

Now you just said that you can't answer like John MacArthur, because you're a writer, not a speaker and all that stuff, but

to the best of your knowledge, how would John MacArthur have answered that question in a similar

situation?

The first question?

If he were the one being interviewed, do you believe that there's only one God and only one

way to Him?

How do you suppose John MacArthur would have answered.

That question?

Well, I bet you there would not have been the long pause of silence before he.

Answered it.

He would have answered it right away, and he would have said, yes, I believe that, and I believe that because this is what Scripture says.

And then he would have quoted two or three verses that make the point.

And he told me once that that was his approach on Larry King.

He tried not to ever just give his opinion.

When asked his opinion, he would always say, well, this is what the Bible says, and yes, I believe it.

So you know what his opinion is, but his opinion is not the authority.

It's the Word of God that's ultimate authority.

And if you're in a public interview like this, people asking you those difficult questions in front of an

audience that may or may not even know the Gospel, much less believe it, that's the

right one.

Because if you really want to reach anybody, it is the Word of God

that is...and the Word of God is sharper than any two -edged sword,

and than anything I could say.

So you have to be prepared to, you know, quote the Scriptures and give a biblical answer to these questions.

And I think that's what Peter means when he says you need to be prepared to give an answer to

those who ask a reason for the hope that's within you.

He's not saying cook up an answer out of your own personal...he's saying you need to know the

Word of God well enough that you can answer these questions.

We have to go to our first break right now.

If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

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capable and gifted speaker.

And as I said this time around, it's going to be Pastor Bill Shishko, who is the Regional Home Missionary for

Reformation Metro New York, and he is a member of the Orthodox Presbyterian denomination.

I have known him since the mid -80s, and he is a truly gifted brother in Christ and a dear friend.

And I assure you, you will not regret attending this pastor's luncheon.

It will not cost you a penny.

In fact, you'll be leaving with a sack, a very heavy sack, filled with

a couple of dozen, at least, brand new books that have been donated to us

or will be donated to us before the 26th of October by nearly every single

major publisher, a major Christian publisher, in the United States and the United Kingdom.

So it's not only free, but you're leaving with hundreds of dollars worth of new

books and a sack to bring home with you and stock your library shelves with.

And so I hope that as many of you listening who are men

in ministry leadership can attend as possible.

So please send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com, and

put pastor's luncheon in the subject line.

And that's also the email address for you listening who have a question for Phil Johnson

regarding his response to Tim Keller, who was questioned by Martin Bashir on, is

there only one way to God?

And if you have that question that you'd like to join us on the air with, just send an email to

chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com.

And Phil, we have already a number of listeners who have questions for

you.

And we have, let's see, we have Arnie in Perry

County, Pennsylvania, who says, I have heard people on Facebook

posting not only regarding this interview, but your previous interview with Phil Johnson

in regard to Tim Keller, that this information on these

videos that have been made available to the public involving Tim Keller in these

interviews with the Veritas Forum took place a number of years ago.

Why are you bringing them up now?

And shouldn't the PCA denomination be the only ones critiquing Mr. Keller

since he is a PCA -ordained minister?

Well, that's kind of an odd thing to say.

First of all, wouldn't you say, Phil, it doesn't matter how old the interviews are

if the responses are the same?

I've heard of no recantation of these interviews from Mr. Keller.

Have you?

No, that's right.

And you see him referred to a lot.

I've actually had people send me links to these Veritas things and saying, this

is how you should talk to unbelievers rather than, you know, quoting scripture at them.

So there are a lot of people who think, you know, this is a good model to follow when you're dealing

with unsaved people.

And as for the question of shouldn't the PCA be the only ones to critique this, I definitely think

the PCA ought to be—they probably have the greatest responsibility

to critique them.

But any person who is a shepherd responsible for sheep and his

flock, if the sheep and the flock are being either led astray or

confused by the shepherd's responsibility to teach and correct

and point.

Out why this is not a good model.

But obviously, there is no Christian mandate that this be restricted to the scrutiny of the PCA

when this is public information.

I mean,.

The argument sounds like just an attempt to really squelch any

criticism.

Right.

And I agree with you.

And it's, in fact, there is no there's no mention of the PCA at all in the, at

least in the clip made available of the interview.

No, but the listener's right that that is who Tim Keller is accountable to,

and the responsibility does fall on their shoulders.

But if they're not going to do it, and as far as I know, they haven't as an official body.

I think Tim Keller's too influential in the PCA to be the target of any kind of

teaching

and an example of evangelism.

And that needs to be answered.

I mean, this is a significant problem in our generation.

This isn't just something, you know, that somebody went digging for to try to find a far

out or I think

most evangelicals in this day and age are inclined to try to tone down the gospel as

much as they can.

They think that's a good thing, when in fact, that isn't what Scripture instructs us to do.

Amen, I agree with you.

Well, thank you, Arnie and Perry County.

And well, by the way, Phil, I have heard though, to counterbalance the posts that

Arnie has read, I have heard from PCA ministers after our first interview, responding to

Tim Keller, who were very happy that we had.

That interview.

So yeah, I you know, I think I think Tim Keller's influence, to be honest, is a little bit

of a dividing line within the

PCA.

And I'm not PCA.

So I mean, honestly, this is not just, it's not like you're looking for an error.

That very first question could not be any more clear.

Do you believe that there's only one God and that there's only one way to approach that God?

It's as if Martin Bashir took 1 Timothy 2, verse 5, and turned it into a

question and asked, you know, is it true that there's one God and one mediator between

God and man, the man Christ Jesus?

I don't know of any Christian who has even the most meager

knowledge of scripture who would not know the answer to that question.

Yes, that's what we believe.

That's what Christianity has always taught.

Amen.

And we have a listener who's actually,.

Not only has he been a guest on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, but his parents have

both been guests on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

And I'm speaking of Jeremy Volo, or Volo is the correct

pronunciation, I believe.

Jeremy Volo, who is a former San

Antonio Scorpion soccer player, professional soccer player, and now a pastor

in Texas.

I know Jeremy.

Oh, you do?

Yeah,.

He's in Laredo, Texas, which is right on the border of Mexico.

It's a dusty place.

I appreciate.

Jeremy and what he's doing down there.

Amen.

And he's also married to one of the Duggars.

And he says, listening to, or should I say, listening in from Laredo, Texas.

So grateful for you and Phil Johnson.

Specifically, Phil has been such a tremendous gift to Christ Church in being a bold voice, clarifying

the lines of doctrine, which so many are attempting to blur in our watered down evangelicalism

today.

He is a man prepared to give an answer from God's word, and thus a trustworthy one.

We are excited as a church to have Phil down for a conference this November.

He's going to preach on the five solas.

Let's get in touch soon, brother.

I know you are busy, but I'd love to catch up with you.

Okay, Jeremy, well, if you're still listening, I would definitely love to get you on the program.

And we were already discussing having you and your wife on the program, and I'd love to do that.

And email me more details about your conference so I can get more specific in

promoting it, the conference with Phil Johnson in November.

Thank you very much for contributing to the show today, Jeremy.

And we have, let's see, we have

here Joe in Slovenia.

Joe in Slovenia says, I'm dumbfounded by this topic in general.

It is very difficult for me to understand why a Christian leader would even entertain the idea of equivocating and

caving to the pressure to the leftist agenda.

We have no examples of this type of behavior commended in scripture.

We have no examples of this type of behavior robustly and, I'm sorry, we have no

examples of this type of behavior commended in the lives of heroes of the faith in church history.

If a leader in Christendom does not want to robustly and unashamedly declare the whole and

unadulterated truth of God's revealed will in scripture, why bother being a pastor, elder, or otherwise a leader

in the church at all?

I just don't understand what could be the attraction of being so vapid while claiming to be a Christian

minister.

Why not just excuse yourself and go sell life insurance?

It is inappropriate to entertain the query about whether or not Tim Keller is possibly a false

professor.

Is it, I'll repeat that, is it inappropriate to entertain the query

about whether or not Tim Keller is possibly a false professor?

Okay, well, can you answer that?

Yeah, I would say based on, and as you said, I

have not studied the life and complete ministry of Tim Keller, so I don't speak as someone who is

infinitely familiar with all of his works.

I've read a bit of them, and I, you know, you asked me mainly to comment on this

video that you played.

Based on that, I would say, no, I don't see any justification there for

questioning the genuineness of his profession of faith.

It's not like he denied anything that's essential.

Like you said, he came pretty close with the question of, is there a,

even that, listening to that, I think it was his intention to be ambiguous, to say,

there's things I don't know, to really avoid the question.

He avoided questions that I don't think he should have avoided, but he didn't deny any truths, at least I

didn't hear him denying any truths that would make me think, this man can't possibly be a believer.

I have heard him preach the gospel, and like I said, he subscribes to the Westminster Confession, at

least formally.

Doubt his belief in the gospel.

I just wish he'd be more clear in his proclamation of it.

Well, I would like to reinsert, though, I think he did deny a truth of the Scripture when he

said, when he implied it is unknowable what happens to those who reject Christ.

Yeah, no, like I said, I agree with that.

I just don't think that's, I don't think he did, again, that was ambiguous enough

that, you know, I don't see that as a denial of some cardinal doctrine of

Christianity, more that he murky something the Scriptures

seems to me to be clear on.

You'd want to, you'd really want to question him further and say, what did you mean by this?

What, I don't think on the basis of what he said on that video alone, it would be fair to judge him

as an unbeliever.

How firm is your conviction?

How ambiguous do you want to be?

But I don't think, even though I think the way you titled this broadcast talks about the leftist

agenda, and the questioner did as well, I think it's actually even bigger than that.

I think what Tim Keller is trying to do is contextualize the gospel so that it fits,

not with a one wing of the political, it's

into this post -modern era where dogmatic truth claims of any

kind are looked upon as something you shouldn't do.

So he's trying to contextualize that he's not

making, and he didn't, you notice in that entire interview, he does not make any definitive

truth claims.

He makes everything ambiguous, and that's why he refused to answer those

questions.

He's trying to avoid making any truth claims that would seem like he's

saying, yes, I know this to be true, or I believe this to be true even.

He just didn't want to come across in any way as dogmatic.

And I think in a way that's worse than trying to promote a leftist agenda

because it's, it subtly undermines the whole idea of truth, and particularly revealed

truth, the revealed truth of Scripture.

Scripture is one divine truth claim, and if we can't say honestly, yes,

I believe this, I believe this to be true, and not just, well, imagine if, you

know, and make everything hypothetical, then

presenting what Scripture itself says, because Scripture does not back away from making

authority, speaks with authority.

And when we proclaim the Word of God,.

We therefore have to convey that authority.

Well, thank you, Joe, in Slovenia, and keep spreading the word about Iron Trump and Zion Radio in Slovenia and beyond.

And by the way, Jeremy Volo said that the conference featuring Phil Johnson

in Laredo, Texas, will be held November 9th through the 12th, and if you want more

information, you can send an email to gcclaredo, and that's L -A

-R -E -D as in David O, gcclaredo at gmail .com,

gcclaredo at gmail .com, or you can register at www

.gcclaredo .com forward slash services.

That's gcclaredo .com forward slash services.

If you would like me to email you a YouTube presentation promoting this conference, you

can send me an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at

gmail .com, and I will forward you the YouTube clip that promotes this

conference with Phil Johnson that Jeremy Volo just sent to me.

Thank you very much, Jeremy, and we look forward to having fellowship with you again the next time you are in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

We're going to go to our midway break right now, and we have some more listeners still waiting to have their questions

asked and answered, but if you'd like to get in line and join them, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail

.com, chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

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

and please only remain anonymous if it makes you feel more comfortable because the question regards a personal and

private matter.

Don't go away.

God willing, we'll be right back with more of Phil Johnson right after these messages.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said,.

Give yourself unto reading.

The man who never reads will never be read.

He who never quotes will never be quoted.

He who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves that he has no brains of his own.

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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 Lukens, pastor of Providence Baptist Church.

We are a Reformed Baptist Church and we hold to the London Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689.

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We strive to reflect Paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how God views what we say and what we

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

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If you live near Norfolk, Massachusetts, or plan to visit our area, please come and join us for worship and fellowship.

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Or go to our website to email us, listen to past sermons, worship songs, or watch our TV program, entitled,

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Call Linbrook Baptist.

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Hi, I'm Buzz Taylor, frequent co -host with Chris Arnzen on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

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And we are now back to our discussion with Phil Johnson in response to Tim Keller

and specifically to an interview that Martin Bashir had with Tim Keller, which was

basically focused on the issue, Is There Only One Way to God?

If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

Before I return to the discussion, I have some important announcements to make in regard

to upcoming events that some of our sponsors are conducting.

First of all, we have coming up in the, actually it's this weekend,

we have the Gospel of the Reformation, a 30th, not a 30th,

a 500th anniversary of the Gospel of the Reformation,

which is being held at the Word of Truth Church in Farmingville, Long Island, New

York.

And that is being held on Fridays, September 29th and Saturday, September 30th.

I intend to be there, God willing, with an Iron Sharpen's Iron exhibitors booth.

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You could go to their website, which is gracebfc

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at 717 -652 -5229, 717 -652 -5229.

And then, coming up after that, in November, we have,

from the 17th through the 18th, the Quaker Town Conference on Reformed Theology, which is an event

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That is going to be on the theme for Still Our Ancient Foe, referring to Satan from Martin Luther's classic

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Speakers include Kent Hughes, Peter Jones, Tom Nettles, Dennis Cahill, and Scott Oliphant.

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And then, coming up in January, from the 17th through the 20th,

on the 17th, it will be exclusively a Spanish -speaking event, and from the 18th through the 20th, it will be exclusively

an English -speaking event, and I'm speaking of the G3 Conference in Atlanta, Georgia.

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

And speakers include Stephen Lawson, Votie Baucom, Phil Johnson, Keith Getty, H .B. Charles

Jeter, Tim Chalies, Josh Bias, James White, Tom Maskell, Anthony Mathenia, Michael Kruger,

David Miller, Paul Tripp, Todd Friel, Derek Thomas, Martha Peace, and Justin Peters.

And if I need to repeat it, our guest Phil Johnson is one of those speakers.

At that event, and I am so delighted that I will be there, God willing, once again, with an Iron Sharpens Iron

exhibitors booth.

Thanks to the folks at BatteryDepot .com, and thanks to the publishers

of the New American Standard Bible, and thanks to Josh Bias of Praise Mill Baptist

Church, and those that are orchestrating the G3 Conference.

I'm looking forward to being there to greet many of you who are already in my audience, as

I did last time, and also meet people that

hopefully will promise to start listening to the program.

And it was just such a fun time also interviewing folks like Phil, who I've already had on

the broadcast, but also interviewing people that I had never interviewed before.

I'm very much looking forward to the G3 Conference in Atlanta, Georgia.

So I hope that you join me there as well.

If you are registering for any of these events, or just contacting these organizations to find out more

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And now at the request of my co -host Reverend Buzz Taylor, I'm going to play, since it is brief enough to play

again, I'm going to play the interview, at least the section of the interview with Martin

Bashir, the BBC journalist, the interview he had with

Tim Keller, the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York

City, on the issue of, is there only one way to God?

And then we will follow up once again with comments and reflections by our guest

Phil Johnson.

So here we are with the interview.

Do you believe that there is only one God, and that there is only one way to

approach that God?

If, yes, if, okay?

Yes, if.

I'm speaking as.

A Christian here.

If Jesus Christ is who he says he is, that is, if he is the son of

God from heaven, if he is, if he really was bodily raised from the dead,

and if he was our original creator, I mean, if all that's true, that's what he says, then

of course it'd have to be just one way to God.

Because our souls would need him, or they would shrivel eternally, just like your

body needs food, or it would shrivel.

I mean, the fact is, my body needs food, or it will shrivel.

That's is, then our souls would have

to get him in order to be eternally full and thrive.

And if we don't get him, then we would eternally shrivel.

So to say it seems so narrow to claim

that there's only one way to God, to say that actually precludes the

possibility that Jesus is who he says he is.

I mean, if he is who he says he is, then that's what we're, that's what we have to say.

If he's not who he says he is, then of course it's narrow.

So basically, you have to sit down and ask yourself the question about the facts of Jesus' life, and look at that, and not,

not say, I don't even want to look at Jesus, I don't even want to hear the claims of Christianity, because they seem.

So exclusive.

So where does that leave the millions of Muslims, Sikhs, and Jews?

Are they sadly and.

Completely deluded?

People who never heard about Jesus, or never really got a hearing about Jesus.

I'm not talking about them, because some of those people have heard about.

I'm talking about the millions of Muslims, Sikhs, and Jews who have heard about

Jesus.

Where does your thesis leave them?

Where they are right now, that means that if they, if there's never any change, they don't get Jesus.

If he is who he said he is, then long term, they don't have God.

If on the other hand, you know, all I can always say about this is,

God gives me, even as a minister with a scripture, a lot of information on a need -to -know basis.

And a need -to -know basis means, here's all I can tell you, unless you get Jesus Christ, who

created you to start with, unless you are reunited with him sometime,

there is no eternal future for, of thriving.

It just makes sense.

Again, I'm trying to go back to this idea that, that if he is who he says he is, you've got to have him.

If right now, a person doesn't have him, then he needs to, he or she needs to get him.

If, if they, if they die and they've never, if they, if they die and they don't have

Jesus Christ, I don't know.

In other words, I have a need -to -know basis.

This is the only thing I know, you need Jesus.

I certainly know that God is wiser than me, more merciful than me.

And I do know that when I finally find out how God is dealing with every individual soul,.

I won't have any, I won't have any questions about it.

Okay, but if this is the only way to God, and if Christians

are heading for a place called heaven, does that mean, therefore, by

deduction, that millions of Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus,

Jews, all of whom hold their faith with enormous integrity,.

All of them are heading for hell?

There's a lot of people who were born in Indianapolis, Indiana, and they grew up in First

Baptist Church there, who are also headed for a Christless eternity.

Every human being chooses an identity.

It's either chosen, it's either based on the grace of God, or it's basically based on your own

performance and your own ability, and therefore, on your own self.

And if a billion years from now, you've put your hope in the grace of God, you will be beautiful and

happy.

If you, a billion years from now, you've put your, you base your identity on your own self and your own abilities and your own performance,

you'll be miserable.

In fact, you can see it even now, self -centered people are miserable, even now, not a billion years from now.

So, there are plenty of people who are raised Christians.

There's plenty of people who were raised in First Baptist Church, but in their hearts, have not turned toward the grace of

God.

People in other religions, unless they find Christ, I don't know any other way, but I

also get information on a need -to -know basis.

If there's some trapdoor or something like that, I haven't been told about it.

But I also don't know, I guess I want to know this.

I want to know, when a person says, I need to know everything about how God is going to deal with, in all

eternity, with all individuals, before I can bite down on Christianity.

I feel that you actually are maybe projecting your American, democratic,

individualistic understanding of, you really want a president, or a governor, or a mayor.

You don't really want a king.

And I can understand that, because human kings, human beings are flawed, and therefore,

monarchy was not a very good approach to things.

But if you have a perfect God, perfect king, comes and suffers in Jesus.

Christ, then at this, at a certain point, I trust him.

How is your position fair and rational?

Well, look.

How is that just?

I actually don't know that people in other centuries, or other cultures, were

nearly as bothered about this as people in this room.

And you're doing a pretty good job of articulating how they, how nervous they, upset they feel about this.

But this idea that everybody needs to have an equal chance is not something that most people have felt was self -evident.

I mean, just because everybody you know feels that way doesn't mean, and that your culture feels that way, doesn't

mean you can now come to the Bible and Christian teaching and say, because we Western individualistic

people don't like this part of biblical revelation, it can't be true.

The fact is, in the Middle East, where people are not nearly as bothered by this idea that some religions are right and some religions are wrong,

that's not their problem.

With Christianity at all.

For more information about the Veritas Forum, including additional recordings and a calendar of upcoming events, please

visit our website at veritas .org.

Well, Phil, there's a couple of things that we didn't address after the first hearing of

that brief interview, or that segment of a longer interview.

First of all, I think it would have been more appropriate for Dr. Keller to say that many people

from Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan are heading for hell rather than First Baptist Church of

Indianapolis, Indiana, to be.

More fair about things in regard to...

Well, yeah, and it may be true about both places, but it still doesn't answer the

question he was asked, which was about Muslim, Sikhs, and Jews, and he doesn't give an

answer to that.

Not only that, when Martin Brashear asked him that question, did you notice that he called it your

thesis?

Your thesis, as if this is his personal theory about how things work.

Now, my understanding is Martin Brashear himself professes to be a believer, and so he has a

Christian background.

He has some knowledge.

I don't know how much of the way he was asking that was trying to provoke

Dr. Keller to be more straightforward, to give clear answers to these questions, but

whatever.

In the end, he treats it like this is a thesis, and that's where Tim Keller sort

of defaults to describing it as if, well, maybe my thesis, and I don't

have all the information, I've only been told on a need -to -know basis, and he doesn't ever

answer the actual question, and there are numerous biblical verses that give a direct answer to

that.

I mean, we always quote John 3, 16.

Two verses later, Jesus says, whoever believes in him is not condemned, but

whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he hasn't believed in the name of the only Son

of God.

I mean, that's a clear statement in Scripture of the very truth that Tim Keller was trying to

dance around and not say, and there are others.

John 5, 24, Jesus says, truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes

him who sent me has eternal life and does not come into judgment, and he makes faith

there contingent on believing and knowing.

Or 1 John 5, 12, whoever has the Son has life.

Whoever does not have the Son does not have life.

Scripture's very clear about this, that that is the dividing line between those who have life and those who

don't.

Do they believe in Jesus?

Have they obeyed Jesus?

Have they actually put their faith in Christ?

And there just isn't any easy way to tiptoe around that

truth in Scripture, and when you're put in a national forum and asked these questions, you really ought

to have clear answers.

And Reverend Buzz Taylor has something to say.

I was trying to take in a lot as I was listening to this, but he gave that

big if that you mentioned earlier.

Did he actually get around to answering the question as to whether Jesus really was?

I mean, if I said, if he is who he says he is, I would at least follow that up with, and he is

who he says he is.

Right, he never said that in that interview.

He never did say that, and the question even was simpler than that.

It was about, the question that was put to him was, what do you believe?

Do you believe this?

He never answered that.

Now, I'm certain if we put that question to him privately, he'd

answer, yes, I believe that.

Why he won't say that in front of an audience of unsaved and potentially hostile people, I don't know.

But as one of you said earlier, that is not the apostolic approach to preaching the gospel.

Yeah, and these are the alternatives Tim Keller gave in regarding

to belief in Jesus.

You will either believe in Jesus and be eternally full

and thrive, or you'll shrivel, or you'll be happy

or be miserable if you reject him.

And in the long term, if you reject him, you don't have God.

Now, are those compelling reasons for somebody whose heart beats

for fornication or adultery, who absolutely loves

extramarital sex and every day, or as often as they can are participating in that,

people who are drunkards or drug addicts, people who are enjoying, of

course, this is a temporary enjoyment, but people who are enjoying their sin so much, is it a

compelling reason to repent of that and follow Christ if the goal

is to be eternally full and thriving instead of shrivel?

In fact, there are a lot of very overweight sinners out there that might want.

To shrivel a bit, but how do you respond to that?

Yeah, well, in fact, you don't even have to go that far.

A lot of religious people who just don't have time for Christ would not be made, they would not be

provoked to fear God based on anything he said.

In fact, I actually sort of wrote that phrase down because I think it's the lamest

expression of hell, eternal punishment, that I've ever heard of.

He says, for those people, there is no eternal future of thriving.

How far do you have to stretch language to avoid the notion of divine wrath,

no eternal future of thriving?

You read that and you think, it just, there's nothing about that that provokes

the law and fear,

legitimate fear of God that.

Scripture says is the beginning of wisdom.

Amen.

And let's see, we have some more listeners here that we will go to.

Rose in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania says, regarding Tim Keller's approach as found in today's video that you're

discussing, doesn't Mr. Keller skirt very close to

Matthew chapter 10 verse 33, but whosoever

denies me before men, I will also deny him before my Father who is in heaven.

It seems as if that's exactly what he did in this video.

Well, I agree that he skirted very close.

I don't think he overtly denied Christ.

It was interesting how he danced around that.

He answered questions in a way that neither affirmed nor denied.

It was just hypothetical.

If Jesus is who he says he is, and he never answers the question of what he believes, and I'd be

hesitant to learn from that that he doesn't believe Jesus.

Of course, I think he'd say, yeah, I believe Jesus is who he says he is.

My question then would be, why can't you say that in front of hostile unbelievers?

Right.

What favor are you doing.

Them by softening and candy coating everything?

You're actually, you're really demonstrating that you do not love them or care

about them enough to let them know the bad news of their indifference or their

rejection of Christ.

It's like, would you speak this way to a beloved family member who is a drug

addict or an alcoholic who is destroying their life and also destroying the lives

of their spouses and children?

Would you speak to them in this kind of ambiguous way?

Would you soft sell your message to them that they have to go to a

rehab facility or do something to go cold turkey and get off of this

substance that they are killing themselves with?

You wouldn't speak to them that way if you really loved them and really cared about them.

Their feelings would be infinitely less important than their lives.

Am I right?

Yeah.

I mean, he says anyone.

Who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

When you're asked that question, you really have to say that.

I don't understand the reason for trying to muddy the answer to that question.

I don't see that it does unbelievers any good at all.

It may keep them from, you know, tripping over the stumbling block that is the gospel,

but that's not a good thing.

Paul would, the apostle Paul would never have treated that as a good thing.

And in fact, he spent a great deal of space in first Corinthians explaining the Corinthians that

he refused to come to them with great words of human wisdom.

And he just came and his only goal was to declare the

gospel.

He preached Christ and him crucified.

And that's what's missing from all of these answers.

There's no gospel here.

And he's specifically being asked about the exclusivity of the gospel.

What an opportunity to give the gospel, and it's just not there.

And another thing that was odd in his answers, when he was referring to people

in regard to their decision on whether or not to believe upon Christ or reject him,

he was referring to billions of years from now or a billion years from now.

I didn't even understand why he included that in the statement.

Do you know what I'm speaking of?

Yeah, I suppose.

I think that was just his way of saying, look, eternity is a long time.

You have to look further into the future than where you're going to be next week.

That didn't particularly offend me, though, you know, the way you ask your question there prompted another thing that stuck out to me.

He says at one point, every human being chooses an identity.

That just struck me as an odd thing for a Christian minister to say,

especially a Presbyterian, you know, Calvinist.

Every human being chooses an identity.

That's exactly what the world thinks, you know.

And in fact, if you want to choose, if you're a man who wants to choose to be a girl or a dog, you know, you're free to do that

these days.

You choose your own identity.

That isn't how Scripture describes the problem of human sin.

We are in bondage to sin, not free to choose, but in bondage to

sin.

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

And we desperately need the grace of God.

Now, he goes on to mention grace, but he doesn't really explain what it is he's talking about there.

And I think for an unbeliever, that section of what he said

is basically it's based on your own performance and your own ability and therefore on your own self.

And if a billion years from now you put your hope in the grace of God, you're going to be beautiful and happy.

That just, why not biblical

language?

Use biblical terms to describe biblical truth.

This idea of thriving, you know, or being beautiful and happy.

Rather than heaven.

And of course, the descriptions of hell being merely shrivel, miserable, and

you don't have God.

Well, if you didn't want God on this earth, why is that any kind of compelling reason to have him in the afterlife?

Yeah, I thought the same thing.

He said something at one point about, well, then they won't have Christ.

And I think to people who don't love Christ.

Right.

In fact, they'll be, you know, probably be propelled into deeper sin because I don't want

Christ.

The mere thought of him is the only hang up I have in enjoying my sin, you know?

Yeah.

Well, you hear people say silly things like that.

I don't care if I go to hell because that's where all my friends will be.

That's a really foolish way to think.

And yet you hear that all the time.

And you wouldn't expect to hear something that sort of provokes that kind.

Of thinking from a Christian minister.

We're going to our final break right now.

It'll be much briefer.

And if anybody would like to get in line and ask a question to Phil Johnson before we run out of time, our email address is chrisarnson

at gmail .com.

Chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Don't go away.

God willing, we'll be right back after these messages with more of Phil Johnson.

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Welcome back.

This is Chris Arnzen, and this is the last 25 minutes or so of our interview today with Phil Johnson of

Grace to You Ministries, the media ministry of Dr. John MacArthur.

We are responding to an interview that Martin Bashir conducted with Tim Keller on the question,

is there only one way to God?

If you'd like to join us on the air with your own question, our email address is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, and I would do so quickly because we are rapidly running out of time.

And before I get to any more of our listener questions, just imagine he is speaking,

Phil, to Martin Bashir, who is from Pakistani

descent, Christians who lived in Pakistan, and who are very often

risking their very lives being Christian.

And you're supposed to compel someone to leave the religion

that is the only thing keeping them alive, that is preventing their execution.

And you're compelling them to convert to a religion or to repent and follow Christ

and claim him as your Lord, God, Savior, and King at the risk of being executed for

the compelling goal of being eternally full and thrive and to be beautiful

and to be happy.

That's really the only compelling argument that he's giving there.

Yeah.

Yeah, you know, I've seen an interview Martin Bashir did with Rob Bell, in which he

challenged him pretty strongly.

Look it up on YouTube, it's very interesting to watch, because as I said, Martin Bashir does profess to be a Christian,

and he challenged Rob Bell for things he was saying that

weren't all that different from what Tim Keller is saying here.

I was sort of wishing Martin Bashir would press a little harder on Tim Keller.

Yeah, and we have

Tony.

In Rock Hill, South Carolina, who says, I must say that the below

statement from Phil is somewhat alarming to me.

And this is a quote from you, she has written,.

Keller is a PCA pastor, so I know he believes the Westminster Confession.

In light of that statement, would Phil be kind enough to define a wolf in sheep's clothing?

Also, if he could expound a bit on the passage of scripture below, and no wonder for

Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light, it is not surprising then

that his ministers also masquerade as ministers of righteousness.

Well, she asks a good question,.

And she's right about that, actually.

And I said earlier, I'm a writer, not a speaker.

I don't always, what comes out of my mouth isn't always what I would say

with a little more time to prepare it.

What I meant to say, what I really meant by that statement is, I know he's PCA, so he formally

subscribes to the, he has to profess to believe what's

in the West.

She's right, that doesn't mean, that's not proof,

are wolves in sheep's clothing?

Does it even prove that he.

Really believes in the Westminster Confession of faith?

Because there are lots of Episcopalians who have the 39 articles down on paper as their

statement of faith, and they disagree with all of.

Them.

I've often said, it's best to judge people not by what they formally subscribe to, but by what they preach.

Right.

And so in this case, you know, I think there's a valid question to be raised.

How strongly does he believe?

He's very clear on the eternal

status of those who don't.

Know Christ.

Well thank you Tony, keep spreading the word about Iron Trap and Zion Radio in Rock Hill, South Carolina and beyond.

And we have Daniel from San Jose, California, who says, Hello brothers, though Tim Keller

shows some considerable concerns, people can still benefit from his preaching and teaching.

When do we say enough's enough regarding someone like him?

When did Tim Keller start showing these signs of concern, and what was it that grabbed the attention of

the discerning about him?

What are some key aspects that we can keep an eye out for in our own churches to prevent

this left -leaning influence?

Thank you for your grace to you, ministry.

I look forward to next year's Shepherd Conference, Lord willing, I'll see you there.

That's Daniel in San Jose, California.

All right, I'm looking forward to that conference as well,.

And look forward to seeing you there.

That was a lot of questions, but basically he's saying, I think, how far back does this go with Tim Keller?

What was the first thing that...

Well, I'll go through his questions one by one.

He says, let's see, when do we say enough's enough regarding someone like him?

Like, where do we draw the line where we continue to say, well, he's a sound preacher, but we

just have some caveats regarding some things that he says.

Where do we go from that to saying, don't listen to this guy, he's dangerous.

Yeah, I mean, there's a spectrum, I think, rather than a line you cross and say, don't

listen to this guy, or this guy's a believer and this guy's not.

There's a murky area there in between where it's okay to have concerns about somebody and

refuse to recommend their material without judging them to be not a believer, you understand?

And I think somewhere in there is where I would put Tim Keller.

I'm not prepared to publicly declare that he's an apostate or anything like

that, but I

don't ambiguity that you see in this interview.

The first time I ever...

And this was another question he asked, when did you first notice this?

It was actually years ago, I think more than 10 years ago.

I saw a video that for some reason, I think it was at Berkeley, but it may

have been somewhere else where he had a group of secular college students asking questions, and the

issue of homosexuality came up.

And he began to explain why Christians believe

homosexuality is sinful.

He wasn't in any way

admitting that this was where he stood, but one of the students got angry and I think may have gotten up and left the audience, and

he apologized for having to tell them that homosexuality is a sin.

He changed the subject and withdrew from it.

I thought, why wouldn't, when such a clear question is asked, and there is a

clear answer, why not give the clear answer?

It might make people angry, but if that's what Scripture teaches, it's not my fault if people

get upset about it.

If all I'm doing is explaining what the Bible teaches and that's what the question was, then if somebody

gets angry, I may feel bad that they got angry, but I'm not going to apologize to them.

It just seemed to me that Tim Keller was more concerned, at least in that moment,

with what people thought about him and what people thought about how he was communicating than he was with

the actual question that was on the table and giving a clear answer to it.

That's what originally prompted my concerns, but pretty much every time I've seen Tim

Keller in that kind of environment where he's being asked difficult questions by non

-Christians or in an audience of non -Christians, you get the same sort of

studied ambiguity, deliberate ambiguity,.

And that concerns me.

And he is asking basically for some helpful tips, some advice, some counsel

to help churches be more aware of

how to prevent this left -leaning influence from encroaching.

Upon their own churches.

Yeah, churches in the first place, and Christians in the pew, need to be more concerned about

drawing the lines between truth and error and not bristle every time someone's

teaching is critiqued, especially when it's so deliberately ambiguous.

When there's a clear question like, do you believe in one God, and you can't even give that a straight answer, that

warrants criticism.

I'm sorry, I don't care who it is.

If he's purposely ambiguous when asked a question like, is there one God and one

mediator between God and men, and he can't give a biblical answer or won't, then that

warrants some fairly strong criticism, and I think words of warning, because someone who teaches like that

is not giving you an example to follow, and you can't trust them to teach you any of the hard.

Truth.

Well, thank you, Daniel, and keep spreading the word about Iron Trip and Zion Radio in San Diego,

California and beyond.

And don't you think that it is ironic that someone who

claims to be reformed is using, in my opinion, a very

Arminian tactic.

It's almost as if you can trick a person to

come to believe in Christ in the same way that a frog is boiled alive in a kettle.

You know what I mean?

You keep the discussion on a very low simmer, and then later on you

could turn up the heat until they're eventually sucked into the religion of your choice,

and it's the same kind of approach that even a non -Calvinist

Arminian of a much more conservative bent or fundamentalist bent could use.

Like, for instance, I've seen and heard fundamentalist preachers use very theatrical means

to scare people about hell, as if that kind of a performance from a pulpit

will scare a reprobate person into eternal life, if you follow what

I'm saying.

It seems to be a very Arminian approach for somebody who's reformed.

Yeah, that's right, and in fact,.

It isn't really all that different from how, say, Rick Warren might answer those very same

questions, because Rick Warren isn't a member of a Reformed denomination, doesn't

really profess to be Reformed, although I think he told John Piper that he loves John Calvin.

You don't hear him say that very often, and he doesn't really make any pretense of being Reformed.

And so when Rick Warren says it, the Reformed world, of course, is going to argue back, but for whatever

reasons, Reformed Christians, and particularly some of my Presbyterian

friends, are far more one of their own, and I suppose that's a

natural tendency, but it's one we really ought to resist.

Reformed Baptists, on the other hand, pounce very readily upon their own when they make public statements that

they disagree with far too quickly.

Yeah, you're right about that.

I don't know why that is, but maybe that's why I'm more of a Reformed Baptist than I would be a

Presbyterian, but don't ask me to explain that phenomenon.

And, you know, as we said on the outside, you're no thoroughly knowledgeable

expert on the person, work, and theology of Tim Keller,

but this could be anybody, especially somebody that has a very large,

global, loyal audience.

These are the kinds of things that remind us that we have to be very careful about turning

our modern -day heroes into idols.

Yeah, that's right.

In fact, honestly, I wish it were possible to critique this style without

actually naming Keller and dealing with him in a personal way, because it seems personal.

I think that puts people's defenses up, and they think, well, there must be some other agenda, some

personal...

I honestly don't have any Tim Keller as a person.

It's what he teaches and how he teaches that concerns me, and it concerns me deeply, because it goes across the board

into all doctrines.

You know, he's been a member of, frankly,

their agenda to disabuse evangelicals from any

kind of belief in the book of Genesis.

He has denied Adam, the historical,

scientific theories of evolution and the age of the earth and all of that, that they look with contempt on

believers who take Genesis at face value, even to the point of insisting that

Adam is a true individual, a

real... and

deny the historicity of Adam.

I don't know why he would lend his reputation and clout to an organization that

has... so it undermines the authority of Scripture.

It undermines the confidence of believers in the truth of Scripture, and

it just bothers me that he seems drawn to those kinds of things, and it needs to be critiqued.

Yeah, I wish it was possible to do it apart from his personality, but I know from experience that if you

just keep a critique like that in theoretical terms, people don't get it.

You have to point to... and that always

involves naming the person.

Yeah, as it did, as the Apostle Paul found it necessary with

Hymenaeus and Philetus.

And on many other occasions.

The first hyper -preterists.

That's right.

And the Apostle John, the Apostle of Love, singles out diatrophies.

And so there are times when it's necessary to do that.

I learned that from experience years ago, working with John MacArthur.

When the Gospel according to Jesus came out, it hit like a bombshell, because he

named the names of two or three people whom he disagreed with, Charles Ryrie and other respected teachers, mostly from

Dallas Seminary.

This was not the first book John MacArthur wrote on the Lordship issue.

One of his original books, his book on the Beatitude, that had been published several years before by Moody Press,

stands on the same doctrine, but nobody really noticed because he didn't quote.

But when

you bring it down to where you point out an

example of bad teaching and play a videotape and say, look, this is bad teaching, this is not the way

you answer these questions, then it becomes very clear, but you get a lot of pushback from

people who think, now you've gotten too personal.

And I just want to emphasize, it's not my intention to be personal.

In fact, you were the one that picked the subject, so.

Right.

And I still think it was a good subject.

It is an important subject.

It's something that's, like, one of the questions asked, why do this that's been out there for so long?

Well, for that very reason, that's been out there for that long and floating around, and try to find anybody

who does any kind of analysis or critique of it on the internet, and you're going to come up mostly dry.

That is why I just recently discovered these videos.

People, as this one listener brought up earlier, that somebody was complaining

that I'm talking about this now when these interviews with Tim Keller took place years ago.

I didn't know about them years ago.

I don't know why that is, but I just heard about them within the last few months.

So that's why I had you do the first interview, and now we're doing the second on the...

I was utterly astonished that he was that bad in answering those vital

questions.

I always had my doubts and

apprehensions about Tim Keller going way back before he was famous, because in the 1990s,

in the early 1990s, might have been even in the late 1980s, I can't remember, but

a former member of his congregation, who is either a member or

frequently attended the Redeemer Presbyterian Church, left that congregation because

Tim Keller refused to answer a question during a Bible study.

The question was, are homosexuals who are unrepentant going to hell?

And he refused to answer the question, and this individual who later became a member of the church where I was a member,

Calvary Baptist Church of Amityville at that time, he showed me a

photocopy of a multi -page letter that he wrote to Tim Keller pleading with him

for an answer to the question, because he said if you cannot answer or will not answer this question, I'm going to depart from

Redeemer Presbyterian, and he never got a response to it, which to me... and this is before he

was famous, where he could not realistically claim that he had thousands of letters in a

stack that he couldn't.

Get to, but anyway.

Yeah, well, there are enough

research at YouTube for Tim Keller answering that

question or questions like it, and you'll find he really is

sexually about, and openly about, sexuality.

He always wants to soften it or dance around it or.

Refuse to answer it.

And he does like that, and it's odd that he insinuates that one of the worst

sins, and I agree with him on this, that someone could be guilty of is to

take credit for yourself or to yourself

for earning in some way or for meriting

your own salvation, viewing your own goodness as being meritorious for salvation, and yet

he adores some of the Catholic mystics and participates in

the Roman Catholic mystic meditation and so on,

and also the open and unashamed...

well, I don't want to say adoration, but the high esteem with which he holds N .T. Wright and so on

publicly.

Wouldn't you not say that N .T. Wright is a dangerous false teacher?

Yeah, I would.

I would.

I would say, I mean, there's an example where I think, despite his fame and acceptance among

a lot of evangelicals, N .T. Wright has so

corrupted the doctrine of justification by faith and the principle of the imputation of righteousness to

believers, which he denies.

I see that as a fatal compromise of the gospel.

I would regard him as someone...

We have a question from B .B. in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania,

and B .B. says, What is it about some conservative

evangelical Christians that so desperately want the approval of the liberal elite?

I cannot figure it out for the life of me.

Do you have any thoughts on this.

Subject?

Yeah, I do.

In fact, I've preached a whole message on it, and it isn't just the liberal elite.

There are different quarters of evangelicals who want different kinds of approval from the

world.

It all boils down to the same thing.

You've got the young tattooed guys who talk more about beer than they do about Christ, who

crave the world's approval for how cool they are.

You've got the academic types who desperately want secular academics to recognize

their gravitas.

You've got people involved in politics who crave political influence and

approval from the world on that level, and it's just a gross temptation for

evangelicals.

I think it's probably been true since the beginning of the Church, because there's so much in Scripture that tells us,

love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.

And marvel not, brother, I think, among the people of

God, to wish we could have the world's approval, and yet what we really ought to be obsessed with

is God's approval.

Amen.

Well, I'd like you to.

Close with about two minutes of a summary of your thoughts on this subject.

We understood that our.

Duty is not to create clever arguments and novel

apologetic strategies, but simply to proclaim the Word of God and do it accurately and

clearly, because it is the Word of God that has the power to transform hearts and cut

through human pretensions and human error and cast down those

ideologies that have imprisoned people and bring every thought captive to Christ.

Only the Word of God has the power, sharper than any two -edged sword, and certainly more

effective in reaching unsaved people than all my cleverness and philosophical arguments ever could be.

And if you find yourself wanting to tiptoe around something that's really clear in Scripture, you're

not doing a good job of fulfilling the Great Commission as Christ commanded us to do.

We're to teach people to obey all things that Christ has commanded, and not to tiptoe around the hard issues,

not to try to sand the sharp edges off of truth, but to make it as clear and

prominent and accurate as we possibly can.

Well, thank you so much, Phil, for being my.

Guest today.

And by the way, Phil returns this Thursday as well as my guest for two hours,

so mark your calendar for this Thursday, 4 to 6 p .m. Eastern Time, when Phil Johnson returns to Iron

Sharpens Iron Radio.

And if you'd like to attend the event at Grace Bible Fellowship Church in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania,

where Phil will be speaking this weekend, go to gracebfc .com,

gracebfc, which stands for Bible Fellowship Church, gracebfc .com, and of course the

website for Grace to You, the ministry of John MacArthur, where Phil serves as executive director.

That website is gty .org, gty .org.

And Phil, don't forget, is also in January going to be speaking at the G3 Conference, and you could go to

g3conference .com, g3conference .com to register for that event.

Thank you so much, Phil, for being my guest today.

Thank you.

Thanks for having me.

Look forward to Thursday, and I want to thank not only Phil, but everybody who listened, especially those who wrote in questions today.

I want to thank my co -host, the Rev. Buzz Taylor.

I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than you

are a sinner.