Episode 11 The Here I Stand Theology Podcast: Interview with Chris Rosebrough

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Episode 11 The Here I Stand Theology Podcast: Interview with Chris Rosebrough

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Here we go. All right, here
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I stand. I can do no other. God help me. We are the Here I Stand Theology Podcast.
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We are a podcast focused on spirited and pointed defense of biblical doctrine with application to our day and to our time.
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We are pumped. We have a special guest in the studio. Chris, I'm actually gonna move you to the middle between us.
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Okay, sounds good. We have Pastor Chris Roseborough.
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Pastor Chris Roseborough is a pastor at Kongsvinger Lutheran Church in Oslo, North Dakota.
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Don't you know? No, it's Minnesota. I live in North Dakota, but it's Minnesota. Minnesota.
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Oh, I apologize. My fault. Chris also is the captain at Pirate Christian Media.
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Is that correct? Correct. All right. Chris is a filmmaker, a photographer, a husband, a father.
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And again, sir, we just want to say thank you for taking the time to be with us today. Very much so.
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My pleasure. I'm glad to be here. So we want our small audience, hopefully growing audience, to get to know you a little bit better because you have such wonderful insight into the teaching of heresy that goes on within the church, has gone on within the church.
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We understand that you have come out of heretical movements from long years ago.
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We'll talk about that through the interview here. So, Matt, do you have anything that you want to say before we get going here?
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No, let's get right into it, I guess. All right. All right. So, Chris, we'll just shoot some questions.
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OK. Are you ready? I'm ready. I don't have a cigarette and a blindfold, but I think
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I can use myself. We're not going to shoot at you. Just shoot questions towards you.
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OK. They're really more like softballs. So the first question that we want to ask is a question that we ask anybody who's on here with us.
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It's a question that kind of really gets you thinking, really gets you to question whether you trust yourself or not.
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So we'll ask this question about you and your son, Josh, right? So if you and Josh had to arm wrestle, who would win?
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Oh, he would. No doubt. He towers over me.
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The man is huge. You know, he's got his mother's height and girth.
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Oh, forget it. And so I learned a long time ago that if I wanted to pick on him,
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I better be able to run faster than him. So that was going to be my second part of the question.
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If you did notice he was winning, would you kick him in the shin underneath the table to get an advantage?
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No, no, no. I would just flee the scene and taunt him from a distance.
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All right. All right. So we'll get into some current events here. So let's talk about the
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Ed Litton plagiarism scandal. Yeah. So, you know, so I've been on vacation for a couple of weeks, you know, went across the
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Michigan peninsula, went to visit some people in New York and Pennsylvania when this whole thing was blowing up.
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And my good friend Justin Peters, he just put out a video on this.
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And there's no doubt about it that Ed Litton, he straight up plagiarized some of J .D.
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Greer's stuff. And I don't know if you guys have ever heard of what's called the Streisand effect.
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But this is clearly in play here because they've gone and deleted 140 sermons.
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That's what Matt was saying earlier. 140. I mean, there's nothing to see here.
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So the funny thing is, is that this particular practice is one that we've noted over the years of me doing the podcast of Fighting for the
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Faith. Plagiarism is alive and well in seeker driven and mega churches. And so Ed Litton, this is a guy who has eight people on staff writing sermons for them.
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I'd fire them all, by the way. Of course, as a pastor, as busy as I am,
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I still have to research, read, translate the biblical texts that I'm preaching on every given weekend.
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And so I got to put in the time just like everybody else. And the thing you can't, you cannot phone this stuff in.
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And it calls his integrity into question. It calls whether or not he is even taking his study of the scripture seriously.
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This is something that is so ginormous as it relates to the character of the man that I could personally consider this to be a ministry disqualifying type of thing.
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We've seen guys resign for less. But J .D. Greer has come to his rescue and they're working the spin machine now.
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And it's really, this is quite a thing. And of course, Newsweek has covered the story yesterday.
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Newsweek magazine wrote an article about it. So let's just say the news media knows the ramifications regarding plagiarism and just how unethical it is.
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So, I mean, if the world is having to say, you know, wait a second here, there's something wrong.
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Then then there's something wrong. That's what we talked about just before we came on.
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Yeah, that's the the number one. Priority of the preacher, the pastor is the preaching and teaching of the word.
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Yeah. If the preacher is not doing that, what are they doing? Yeah, I have no idea.
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And not only we were called to study and show ourselves approved as a workman who did not blush with embarrassment, but who can rightly handle the word of truth.
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Which means that, you know, it is it is not a small part of the duties of the pastor.
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It's one of the major pieces of being a pastor is the study of God's word and the faithful proclamation of God's word rightly divided between law and gospel.
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I mean, this is a clear command of Scripture. Yeah. Yeah. Isn't there isn't there something in the scriptures about when you set something forth is true, but it's not.
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What is that called? I think it's called lying. You know, bingo. Oh, I didn't know we were playing prophecy bingo.
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I got it suddenly. Way to go. All right. You happen to suddenly upon the lie of Ed Litton.
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Right. There we go. I think the timing of this coming out is very interesting, too.
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So just who knew what and when did they know it kind of thing? Yeah.
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Yeah. No, it's it's it's it's kind of I hate to invoke the you know, this this particular person, but it's very
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Clintonian. That's the way I could put it. You know, it just kind of harkens back to the the
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Clinton administration spin machine. And the next thing you know, we're going to be getting press releases.
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We're going to have to be parsing words, you know, you know, there'll be double meaning behind these things.
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And that's that's what's really coming out. Double entendres right and left.
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Yes. Yeah, that's right. So you mentioned the importance of a moment ago about sermon preparation.
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And that was actually our next question. So personally, how do you balance your sermon prep, your work with fighting for the faith, pirate media and the things that you do with family and friends?
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How do you balance that? Yeah, poorly is probably the best way to put it. So obviously, there's a lot on my plate and some weeks are worse than others.
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But I live and die by my routine. And so I have a very rigid routine that I follow week after week after week.
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So my sermon prep begins the Saturday before, you know, Saturday and a half is like a week and a half.
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It begins. So. So eight days before, you know, I actually teach a men's
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Bible study. Sermon prep begins by looking at those biblical texts and then in our men's Bible study, working through them and working out some of the themes.
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So then by Tuesday morning, I translated the text that I'm going to be preaching on from either
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Greek or Hebrew. And I've picked out what I would consider to be what is a good exegetical theme here.
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And then question is, what do the congregations I serve need to hear? So you not only have to exegete a text as a pastor, you have to exegete your congregations.
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So the idea then is that sometimes, you know, some years when I'm preaching through a particular text, my congregation is struggling with this particular thing.
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And that's where we really need to emphasize. But, you know, but everything changes.
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And so I follow a three year lectionary, which is helpful because it makes it so that every time the readings come around every three years,
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I can go back and look at what I preached on, you know, what my notes were, what I thought the congregation needed to hear.
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And then really kind of dig a little bit deeper. So I find that the more I'm a pastor and the more often
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I come back to certain passages, I find more nuances and things that we can preach on and stuff.
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So, you know, so altogether sermon prep, probably anywhere from 16 to 24 hours per week.
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And, you know, so on a long week, I'm beating my head against the wall. But part of my prep also includes reading sermons by the church fathers on how they have handled these biblical texts.
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Because the one thing I want to do is I want to plagiarize the Scriptures, but I also want to make sure that my preaching is in accord with what
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Christians have been preaching for millennia. You know, I want to make sure that I've got the most unoriginal take on these passages ever.
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You know, it's like, oh, you sound just like Christos, you sound just like Aaron Higgins, you sound just like Augustine.
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You just, you know, that's kind of the point, you know. So, yeah, but so there's a lot of different avenues.
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And then what I find is, is that, you know, a large portion of my sermon prep is just wandering down these bunny trails to see how other people handle these texts.
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But my favorite book, by the way, in my preparation is a book that has like a comprehensive list of cross -references.
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You know, I think it's called The Treasury of Scriptural Knowledge or something like that. And so when
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I'm working through a text and I find the theme that I'm working from exegetically that I really want to highlight, then
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I'm in that resource looking at what other passages are saying. And always and again,
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I find it very helpful to be able to find an Old Testament text if I'm preaching on the gospel or an epistle and find a way to work old and new together because a lot of people don't know how to work the
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Old Testament. And so to bring those stories to the pulpit and give them, you know, kind of a fresh airing, this is just a joy.
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It's a lot of fun. Hey, man. Hey, man, that was good insight.
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Appreciate that. So 16 to 24 hours a week. Yeah, yeah. On top of, of course, your family.
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But what about, tell us a little bit about Pirate Christian Media, how that came about, how all that transpired.
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Okay, so that's a little bit of a longer story. And then the current iteration of what we're doing, you know,
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I kind of hit the wall as far as what I can handle every week as far as heresy.
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So let's kind of back up in history. So middle 2000s, you know,
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I began blogging. I had been formerly trained as a
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Christian apologist in counter -cult ministry. And that's really where I cut my teeth, you know, kind of, you know, a street apologist talking to Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons and working with ministries reaching out to them.
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And in the middle of the 2000s, about 2006 -ish, I changed focus from the cults to what was going on in evangelicalism as a result of the
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Bible twisting of Rick Warren. And the fad that was the purpose -driven life and the travesty that the book
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The Purpose -Driven Church was and all of the radical changes that were taking place in the church as a result of this man's innovations.
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But he was building off of, you know, Peter Drucker and Robert Shuler and guys who preceded him, but he kind of took it into a whole other thing.
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And the thing that alerted me to this was, you know, somebody said, you know, you just need to read like the first couple chapters of The Purpose -Driven
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Life. I remember when it came out, so I got a copy of it. And I applied the same kind of exegetical rigor that I would if I were reading the
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Book of Mormon or something the Watchtower and Bible Track Society came out with. And when I got to chapter 2 and started looking, just doing the comparative work, okay, here's what he says the
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Bible says and here's what the Bible says in context. I went, whoa, something's really off.
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And so I began blogging against the purpose -driven movement and became really good friends with Ken Silva as a result of that, the late
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Ken Silva. And then in 2000, oh, I want to say 2007, I had the idea for what would become
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Pirate Christian Radio. And I noticed that in Christian broadcasting, there was a notable move away from sound theological doctrinal program and a move towards stuff that was just kind of,
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I don't know, like, you know, advice on how to raise kids and stuff, you know.
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So at that point, I was really kind of distraught at what was happening to Christian radio.
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So I actually called and spoke with a guy who was an executive with Salem Broadcasting in Southern California, took him to lunch.
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We sat down and we were talking about kind of the general trends that were going on in Christian broadcasting.
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And I pitched the idea for what would eventually become the Fighting for the Faith podcast.
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And after pitching the idea, he said to me, you know, no, that would never work. Becky wouldn't go for that.
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And I said, Becky, who's Becky? Now, I think that's the name he used, you know, but I said, who's
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Becky? He said, oh, Becky's our target market. And I go, what? And so he said, yeah,
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Becky's, you know, she's married. She's in her late 20s. She's got, you know, 2 .4 kids.
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You know, she spends a lot of time in her minivan taking her kids to soccer. And she's not into anything that's like really theologically heady and stuff like that.
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And she would never go for a program like that. And basically said, you know, we'd be happy to take your money, but your program would never take off.
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And I was really mad. It's like Christian broadcasting has been brought to its knees because of Becky.
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So it was at that point that I began working on the business plan for what would become
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Pirate Christian Radio. And I named it Pirate Radio, Pirate Christian Radio, with the idea that, you know, that a pirate radio station is something that broadcasts from outside of the normal system.
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My mother, when she was growing up, she spent some time in Oxford in the
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United Kingdom because her stepfather was in the military. He was an Air Force fellow.
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And so she told me when she was growing up, she used to listen to a pirate radio station that broadcasts from a
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Liberty ship in the Channel. And I thought, that's cool. So that's where we got the name Pirate Christian Radio.
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And so back in, is it 2008 or 2009? I'm forgetting now.
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But back in June of, I want to say 08, June of 08, we launched
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Pirate Christian Radio. The Issues, etc. radio program was canceled by the
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Missouri Synod. And I vetoed their cancellation and brought Issues, etc.
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onto Pirate. And, you know, so when we launched it, we actually had a pretty good audience to begin with.
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And so I did the Fighting for the Faith podcast five days a week for more than a decade.
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And then, you know, a couple of years ago, I just couldn't motivate myself to do it.
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Listening to all that heresy, my son calls it the swamp of sadness. You know, it's so dark all the time that I just,
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I had to find a way to pull back from the quantity of heresy that I was listening to.
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And I found that being a pastor and being able to preach positively, you know, from the word was what
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I really desired to do. And I knew that warning people like I had done in the past is still an important thing.
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But I had to find a way to strike a balance so that I wouldn't lose my mind, you know, in the process.
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Because, you know, even though I'm the guy who invented prophecy, bingo, this is dark humor.
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And what we're dealing with are people who are listening to people who are going to be sending them to hell if they persist in this stuff.
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And so striking a balance between good biblical content.
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And so I pulled back and decided that what I was going to do is work on quality rather than quantity.
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And cover only the heretical teachings or the false teachings that gave me the opportunity to springboard and spend a lot of time in the biblical text.
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So that people would come away feeling like they had, they didn't just get a, you know, like a news report on the latest heresy.
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But that they had received something biblical to help them work through these things that they could share with others.
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And then they can sort out what's going on in their own faith. So and then along the way, you know, I, you know, photography is something
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I've been doing since I was in seventh grade. And I've recently kind of upped my photography games because when
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I'm doing photography, I'm turning off the heresy altogether. And finding something that is, you know,
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I think is meaningful and beautiful and bringing it into the world. Art is one of these things that a lot of people do not recognize how important it is.
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But it really is. Good art really is. So I think the pursuit of finding things that are beautiful and sharing them with the world.
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I kind of consider that to be an act of defiance or civil disobedience against the other that's in the world.
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Well, that was actually going to be our next question about have you talked about your photography and you've done that.
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So that's good. And if if folks follow you on Facebook, they see you post in the pictures.
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And they never can tell if you're in if you're in their neck of the woods, you might be hanging around outside their house taking a picture.
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I generally so when I'm traveling, I don't like to broadcast it because I don't want somebody to walk into my house and take my stuff.
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Because they always tell you, you know, it's like, you know, if you're ever traveling, don't announce it.
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Don't let everybody. Hey, we're away from the house for three weeks. Come on in. But from time to time,
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I'll post photos while I'm traveling and people say, are you where I am? I was like, no, I was there last week.
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So not only are you a photographer, a pastor, a husband, a father, a photographer, you're a filmmaker.
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Many folks probably don't realize this. And how would you feel about us sharing your award winning film from 2020?
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Go ahead. Would you like that? Sure. I've got that. And it would be good for our watchers to see this.
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So let's take let's take five minutes. Don't don't take a don't don't run away from your phone or your computer screen.
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Stay here. We're going to show the award winning video that Chris Roseboro and Joshua Roseboro made in 2020.
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Here we go. What is the current temperature outside?
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Negative 12 degrees. Currently 15 degrees colder than Anchorage, Alaska. Was that last part really necessary?
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Yes. Swine phone. I need an upgrade.
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Yellow. Hey, James, we still go for 1130? Uh, yeah.
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I'll see you in about 10 minutes. I'll call you when I'm on my way. Sure thing. Bye. Bye.
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See who can identify with this? Best part, the drama.
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And is there any man watching this who who would not admit to the fact that they've made a toilet paper bandana on their head?
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I've protected part of my life on this territory. The back door.
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Yeah, we actually, you know, we won some awards from the
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North Dakota Film Festival for that. So, yeah, that was fun. Yeah, that was that was awesome.
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I think there's probably there may not be many of your watchers and listeners who realize that that's out there.
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Yeah, it's on our channel. You know, and so, yeah, we even on our title screen for it, we have the awards that we won.
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Yeah, yeah. Film dash. So, yeah. But yeah, I'm looking at our poster up here.
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So, yes. So I was going back to kind of the pirate
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Christian radio. You talked a lot about just covering a lot of heresy for our listeners.
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I think we hear that word a lot. How would you define that? And how would you compare that to false teaching?
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Are they the same? Would you differentiate between the two terms? Yeah, you do need to you do you do need to differentiate between the two terms.
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So false teaching or erroneous teaching is going to be on doctrines that you don't want to say they don't matter, but they're secondary or tertiary in the levels of as far as doctrine is concerned.
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So, for instance, I'm a confessional Lutheran, and we have a different view of the sacraments than the reformed do or evangelicals.
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And so we recognize that they're brothers and sisters in Christ. And so we take the sacraments and we say there's a secondary and tertiary issues.
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To err on those doesn't put you outside of the faith. Heresy, though, on the other hand, is a is a teaching that contradicts one of the primary doctrines of the
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Christian faith. These are non -negotiables. And as a result of it, when somebody is heretical, they're believing in a false
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God or a false Jesus or a false spirit or a false gospel. And that's how
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Scripture defines these terms. And so you think of Apollos. Apollos was a fellow who his baptismal theology was incorrect and he needed to be corrected by Aquila and Priscilla.
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And and he took that correction. Well, but it doesn't say that he was a heretic. But then you look at the the
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Judaizers who who Paul writes against, who had come into the churches of Galatia and said that unless you're circumcised, you cannot be saved.
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Well, they they were guilty of preaching a different gospel altogether. And Paul gives an invokes anathemas twice against them.
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He says you he says even if we are an angel from heaven should preach to a gospel other than the one already preached.
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Let him be damned anathema twice. And so Scripture itself gives us these distinctions.
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So heresy puts you outside of the Christian faith error. You're still a brother, but you're an erring brother.
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And you need to be called to repent and submit to what the Scriptures say. Amen. I think that's a that's a good explanation.
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Because I think what I see more and more, you hear people throw out the term heresy quite a bit where I think it's an overreach.
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And you got people out there looking for, like I told Claude, looking for a heretic under every bush.
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So, yeah. So Justin Peters and I, we have different view of baptism. He's not a heretic.
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Stephen Furtick claims he's God almighty. He's a heretic. So Furtick, what a miserable deity that is, too.
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I mean, seriously. I mean, you know, Kenneth Copeland, heretic.
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Stephen Furtick, heretic on steroids. You know, so you get the idea. Literally. We agree 100 percent there.
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And so in our last episode we did with last week or week before last, we we focused on creeds, confessions and catechisms and the importance of creeds, confessions and catechisms in the local church.
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So, I mean, would you care to talk a little bit about how the church historically has benefited from creeds, catechisms and confessions throughout history?
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Oh, my goodness. Yes. OK, so we'll start with the with the lesser known. The one that sounds painful, catechisms.
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I mean, you ask somebody, have you been catechized? They go, I don't know. But, you know, I've got a lower back problem. Do you think it'll help?
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You know, so but when you talk about catechism, a catechism is basically an instruction booklet that teaches you the basics of the
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Christian faith in a question and answer format. That's really kind of what a catechism is. And I got to tell you that as somebody who teaches the catechism and I've got several classes that I teach,
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I teach youth, I teach adults, I teach adults and youth. So I'm I'm in the catechism teaching classes probably three times a week now.
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And I never tire of it. It's the best thing ever. And the more
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I teach the basics of the faith, the deeper my understanding of the scripture goes. And so the idea that it's that Christianity is we're disciples and we're lifelong learners.
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And so the catechism, a really well put together catechism will drive you into the basics of the
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Christian faith and give a pastor the opportunity to kind of unpack certain things. And that and so when
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I teach, when I catechize folks, it takes two years. It takes two years to work through the basics of the
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Christian faith. There's no way you can in a 10 week intro course walk through something.
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It just it just doesn't work that way. So, you know, I'm a firm believer that, you know, you take your time, slow down and really help equip people to be able to read their
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Bibles for themselves. You know, I mean, that's that's that's a big part of this. Now, creeds have always played a role within the
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Christian church. And I would go back if you look at Aaron Neis's Contra Contra Heresies.
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He wrote he wrote a multi volume set in the ancient world against the Valentinian Gnostics and the doctrines that these folks were putting out.
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I mean, it sounds like sci fi kind of stuff. I mean, it sounds like Scientology, weird kind of things. But early on in one of his books against heresies, he talks about what's called the rule of faith.
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And the rule of faith was something he learned from the man who discipled him, who was Polycarp.
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And Polycarp was discipled by the apostle John when John was living in Ephesus. And and when you read the rule of faith, in fact, you can
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Google this Aaron Neis rule of faith. OK, you can find a place where it's laid out.
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When you read this thing, it sounds like an early prototype of the Nicene Creed. That's the best way
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I can describe this thing. And Aaron Neis makes the claim in Contra Heresies that if you believe contrary to the rule of faith, then you're not a
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Christian. And and so, you know, so the role that creeds play and this is where we have to make a distinction.
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A creed is not the scriptures. The creed are creeds are normed by the scriptures.
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And so we make a difference between two categories, Norma Normans and Norma Normata.
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These are the Latin phrase Norma Normans. The scriptures are the norming norm, Norma Normans. The creeds are
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Norma Normata. They're they're normed by the scriptures. And the reason they're true is because they say the same thing as the scriptures.
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So the three ecumenical creeds that we would point to the Apostles Creed, Nicene Creed and the
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Athanasian Creed. The reason they're true is because they say the exact same thing as the scriptures. And the thing is, is no heretic can confess these.
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You know, the Aryans couldn't confess the Nicene Creed. They and they and they they wept bitterly about the fact that they couldn't.
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And I remember years ago, I'll tell you a little story. So do you remember Elephant Room 2?
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You may not have remembered this thing, but. Was that Furtick or T .D. Jakes? T .D.
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Jakes, Mark Driscoll and James MacDonald. I think Furtick was there for both one and two.
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So so when James MacDonald announced that he was inviting
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T .D. Jakes to Elephant Room 2. You can find this in my broadcast archives.
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I went on air and on social media and I basically said unless T .D. Jakes is willing to confess the
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Athanasian Creed, I will not believe that he's a Trinitarian because he's a modalist. OK, you know, and so, you know, that got out to James MacDonald and James MacDonald publicly said that me insisting that T .D.
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Jakes confess the Athanasian Creed, he said it was outrageous. That was the word he used.
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It was outrageous of me to demand that of him. And I stuck to my guns.
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And so I actually purchased a ticket to attend Elephant Room 2 at the primary campus where everybody was.
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I paid one hundred and ten dollars to go to this thing. And when I showed up,
35:58
I was I was there with another researcher. When the two of us showed up, the security guards met us at the door, escorted us out into the parking lot, said that you're not allowed to come here.
36:10
And if you come back, we will have you arrested for trespassing. So, you know, anyway, but I did, by the way, get to talk privately with James MacDonald before Elephant Room 2 and told him that T .D.
36:24
Jakes is a heretic. He's a modalist. He'll never repent of it. And so what did Driscoll do?
36:29
If you go back and you watch the video, Driscoll is the guy who's walking him through the the the Apostles Creed.
36:35
And so so you're saying one God, three persons. And T .D. Jakes said, yeah,
36:40
I think I can say that. And Driscoll goes, ta -da, ta -da, ta -da. And then no sooner do they stop celebrating,
36:48
Jakes goes, well, by persons, you mean manifestations. Well, then, yeah, you know, failed coaching.
36:56
He failed the coaching exercise. Right, right. And I would note that, of course,
37:03
Mark Driscoll had a spectacular failing and Mars Hill imploded as a result of his control freakiness.
37:12
And James MacDonald long ago got drubbed out of ministry and, you know, for good reasons.
37:17
And the stories that have been coming out about him are just horrifying. So that doesn't surprise me. So this this might be a good a good confession that we can promote and have the heretics say.
37:30
Here we go. I'm stupid. You're smart. I was wrong. You were right.
37:36
You're the best. I'm the worst. You're very good looking. I'm not attractive.
37:43
All right. As long as you're willing to admit that. That's all we ask.
37:49
That's all we ask. I don't think I do think that they might consider that to be an ad hominem type of.
37:58
Yeah, yeah. You're right. You're right. But it was funny. No, we we agree.
38:07
I think there's a lot of a lot within Christianity today of so many
38:13
Christians that truly just they don't they don't know what the gospel is. They don't know who
38:19
God is. They don't know the doctrine of God, the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine of creation, the doctrine of the scriptures.
38:25
They don't they don't understand biblical doctrines. And therefore, they're not able to defend when they are.
38:34
And they are literally sneak attacked by so many within the church today.
38:39
Yeah. No. And the thing is, is that they're complicit in their own deception because of their unwillingness to actually obey the scriptures.
38:47
You know that that we are. You know, Scripture tells us to test teachers, to test prophecies, test these things.
38:54
And the only thing the only thing we have to test them with is the actual word of God, which requires you to be in in in in dialogue with God in his word.
39:05
And then I would note that Christians for years, for centuries, millennia have been called what disciples, a disciples, a learner.
39:13
You know, it's like, don't tell me you're a disciple when you haven't read Matthew, Mark, John or actually read the epistles of Paul or the
39:23
Catholic epistles. Don't tell me this, you know, seriously.
39:28
You know, and Walter Martin, who was who had a profound influence on me early on, I only had one conversation with him.
39:34
But, you know, he used to talk about the fact that that, you know, Christians in Scripture are described as actually being in in warfare and our warfare against the devil.
39:44
And he said that so many people do not know their Bibles and they're and they're sticking their heads in the sand.
39:51
And the flaming darts of the evil one are sticking out of their posteriors as a result. He didn't he never pulled any punches.
40:03
Yeah, I appreciate that about him, though. He was, I mean, direct and to the point. Something we've talked about often and just how current times, so few people really want to focus on the knowledge of the scriptures.
40:19
It's become all about all about emotionalism. And I feel like a definite waning interest in church history, the creeds, catechisms, confessions.
40:32
And I've said numerous times I grew up in church my entire life. And it wasn't until probably seven or eight years ago that I even had a clue what a confession or catechism or creed was.
40:47
Yeah, yeah. And you'll note that, you know, there's there's there's an anti -intellectualism that is part of the main undercurrent of of Christianity or evangelicalism.
40:59
Now, you know, I remember when I first started studying, really studying theology and apologetics proper.
41:07
I was I was intrigued by the fact that there was a whole body of works throughout church history that dealt with these topics.
41:15
But at the same time, people were taking me aside and going, you know, Chris, you know, that's head knowledge.
41:21
And God only cares about heart knowledge. And so, you know, and so they would they would tell me, you know, doctrine, you know, it divides.
41:30
And, you know, and so, you know, this is how they would talk. And it's like they don't they don't even know their biblical categories correctly.
41:38
So it's really fascinating to me that, you know, and so you start.
41:44
I've had people who've been listening to my podcast or been watching our YouTube channel. You know, they've started studying the word and sharing it with people and stuff like that.
41:52
And they've been rebuked, you know, you know, that's just a little too much Bible. You know, you got to be careful with that Bible stuff.
42:00
So I love Jesus, but I don't need theology. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah.
42:07
There's a pastor friend of mine who did an interview on issues, et cetera, a few years back, and he lives out in Chicagoland.
42:15
And he was invited to a luncheon where some people from Bill Heibel's Willow Creek were also part of the lunch there.
42:22
And so he sat at a table with a bunch of Willow Creekers. I think that's what they call themselves. And and so in the middle of the conversation, this this
42:30
El Simas pastor, he says, you know, you know, as it says in the Apostles Creed.
42:36
And one of the ladies at the table said, Apostles Creed, what's that? And he says, you've never heard of the
42:41
Apostles Creed. And she's not. What's that? And so from memory, you know, he just rattles off the
42:47
Apostles Creed right there at the lunch table. And the lady says, well, that's interesting. I don't believe that, but that's really interesting.
42:58
Well, the gentleman that was on the Creed and Confessions and Catechism podcast with us last week, he actually graduated from Liberty University.
43:10
Four year degree. And he said never once in four years was he taught anything about specifically what was his statement.
43:18
Like you said, like the reformers, the church fathers, kind of the. Yeah. And Confessions.
43:25
Historical. Yeah. The Confessions never came up. Yeah, that it's absolutely true.
43:30
There's something like in the water in America here. The Peanuts cartoons years ago,
43:38
I know that you can if you Google, you probably find it. I think it was Charlie Brown's sister,
43:45
Sally, I think is her name. And so in one of the cartoons, she was given the assignment of doing a term paper on church history.
43:54
And so she starts her church history. It all began in 1932 when my pastor was born.
44:05
That's awesome. So so we have we have talked through that their next one of the next questions concerning Christians being largely undiscerning.
44:20
We've talked we've talked through that. And my wife wanted me to ask. And I have to ask this in order to be able to go to bed tonight.
44:29
I don't want you to sleep in the doghouse. So basically, it's what drives you personally to be faithful and continue to put out such solid content like Fighting for the
44:41
Faith, particularly in reference to Fighting for the Faith and Pirate Christian Media.
44:48
What drives you personally? It's that Jesus is that good. So the best way
44:54
I can put it is that I always find motivation in the fact that what the
44:59
Bible says is so much better than what's being said out there. And who Jesus is and what he has done for us.
45:06
It's described as the gospel is good news. It is such good news. It is the only thing that gives me hope.
45:14
It's the only thing that keeps me sane. And so it's all about telling people about Christ and what he's done for us.
45:23
And so every opportunity that I can springboard off of a bad teaching so I can tell people about what the
45:29
Bible really says and connect it to Christ. That is a day well spent.
45:34
And that's the day that I feel like I've served people well. And so it's really all about using heresy as an excuse to tell people how great
45:43
Jesus is. Amen. Amen. Amen. So I was going to ask if you with, like I said, kind of the lack of discernment, the no interest in biblical knowledge.
45:59
Do you feel like there's any one or two particular heresies or false teachings that are kind of rising above that are creeping in the church these days because of that?
46:12
Yeah. So here's the thing. Jude and also Peter describes these false teachers as as wandering stars, which means you can't navigate by them.
46:22
And scripture also describes them as deceiving and being deceived and then going from bad to worse.
46:28
So the thing is, is that the current crop of heresies that is plaguing that are plaguing
46:34
Christianity today, the flavor is going to change a little bit five years from now and a decade from now.
46:41
So, you know, so when I was coming up to the ranks, I mean, you had you had
46:46
Fred Price, Ken Copeland, Benny Hinn. Price's dad died of COVID despite the fact that he was a guy who believed that, you know, your healing was paid for in the atonement.
46:56
That's a lot. That's awkward. And, you know, and of course, Ken Copeland is, you know, he's looking demonically possessed more and more by the day.
47:05
And, you know, and he's falling. He's not he's not the current version. And so I would say that things have subtly changed.
47:13
And so the heresies of 10, 20 years ago aren't as nearly as predominant as they were back then.
47:21
And now, you know, I would say really narcissism has kind of really is the thing that's kind of taken over the church.
47:29
I would say that CRT and the social justice agenda are really tearing away at the fabric of rightly understanding law and gospel.
47:37
And it's a form of slander. And in fact, CRT is nothing but racism just disguised as not being racism.
47:45
And so, you know, so I would note that progressive concepts really are the things that we're facing right now, especially with the absolute insistence that that Christians recognize same sex marriage and attraction and things like this.
48:03
That's really where the push is going right now. I don't know if that's going to let up anytime soon, but that seems to be where the primary fight is currently.
48:12
But the fight always changes, you know, because, you know, that's the thing. The truth always stays in the same spot.
48:18
It never moves. Whereas, you know, the heresies, they kind of run.
48:25
They're like fads. They run through the church and they run their course. And then you always got some people who kind of stay with it.
48:31
But the younger generations always coming up are attracted to different things. So basically just recycled or just heresies, just recycled from generation to generation.
48:43
Yeah. Yeah. Or they kind of kind of mate with each other and create hybrids, you know, you know.
48:49
Yeah. Is that is that appropriate to say here on the here?
48:55
I stand theology podcast. It's a point of defense of biblical doctrine. So I think that was a point of defense. OK. All right.
49:01
All right. We are absolutely good to go there. So any other questions that you have for Chris, Matt?
49:10
No, I think we've covered a lot. Yes. And again,
49:16
Chris, we certainly appreciate you being with us. We are looking forward to our listeners and watchers.
49:25
Hopefully you'll see an even larger uptick. I know you have like 15000 friends on Facebook and so on.
49:32
I have a lot of friends, just a ton of friends, man. But truly, sir, we do want you to know that seriously and truly from from our hearts.
49:42
We appreciate you taking the time to talk with us, to go through this and to put up with all the messages that I sent you.
49:51
And I know you were you know, you were on vacation. Yeah, but we certainly do. Patience while I was on vacation.
49:57
Oh, no, sir. This again, this is certainly a privilege. We pray for you regularly. I pray for your ministry.
50:03
We appreciate the work you do. Yes, we do. Thank you again for all you you have done for the
50:09
Lord. So we are going to let Matt close us out to talk about real quick what the what the driving factor is in the for the podcast.
50:21
What do we always want to get to? Chris touched on a little bit earlier. Our our main focus is always to bring things back to the gospel.
50:29
And as you said, and kind of your media ministry talking about these heresies and talking about being discerning leads into what is the true gospel.
50:40
And you said the gospel is the good news of the person and work of Jesus Christ is born of one of a virgin, lived a perfect life.
50:52
Died a substitutionary death, raised again on the third day, ascended to the father where he sits today, reigning and ruling.
51:02
And for those who believe he guarantees everlasting life. And it's only only through him that we are given salvation by no other name.
51:14
So always, as you said, point people to Christ. That's the goal. Yeah. Amen.
51:21
Yeah. There's nothing else. I mean, I'm a one trick pony. I tell you about Jesus.
51:28
As the scripture said, the gospel is the power of salvation. Nothing else is.
51:35
That's right. And it's got to be the true biblical gospel. He's all we got. He's everything.
51:41
He's enough. A false gospel will not save. That's right. Well, Chris, would you care to make your closing statement like you or what you used to close your podcast out?
51:54
That's how we'll end here. Yeah. Always. And again, I want to point people to the fact that Christ is bled and died from.
52:02
So, you know, I always, you know, close off with the idea that, you know, that that may
52:08
God richly bless them in the grace and mercy won by Jesus Christ and his vicarious death on the cross for all of their sins.
52:15
And that's the best closing statement that I could ever give. Amen, brother. Amen. All right. If you don't care, stay on here.
52:21
We're going to play the closing outro. Stop recording. We'll talk for just a minute. OK, fun. All right.