February 14, 2022 Show with Dr. Richard Caldwell on “Spirit Empowered Preaching”

Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century Gospel Minister George Norcross in downtown

Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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

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

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

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

And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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

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

Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Valentine's Day on Monday, February 14th, 2022.

It's not a very happy day for me because I turned 60 this morning at 12 midnight, and I guess

I should be happy. I should be very thankful to God that he has preserved me this many years, and I trust that he will preserve me for many more, not as many as he has already preserved me, but I look forward to as many years as the

Lord in his sovereignty and providence and mercy will give me. Today we have a first -time guest.

I'm looking forward to interviewing him. He is one of the speakers at the upcoming True Church Conference.

His name is Richard Caldwell, and he is the pastor teacher at Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas.

Today we are going to be addressing the theme, Spirit -Empowered Preaching, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Richard Caldwell.

Thank you, Chris. Good to be with you. Happy birthday to you, and look forward to our discussion. Thank you, brother.

And I want to add to today, we are conducting this interview in a prerecorded fashion.

This will not be live when you're hearing it, 4 to 6 p .m. Eastern time, folks.

So please, this is one of those rare occasions when I'm asking you not to submit questions to Pastor Caldwell because this is, as I said, prerecorded.

It is being recorded, however, on Monday, February 14th, the same day that it is airing.

Tell us something about Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas, and even specifically about the name.

Yeah, Chris, our church has been in existence over 40 years.

I've been at the church for 24 years. When I first came to the church, the name was

Spring Memorial Baptist Church, and it had been planted by a church in our area called

Memorial Baptist Church. After I'd been there for just a while, we recognized that Spring Baptist Church was right down the road from us, and Memorial Baptist Church, the mother church, had recently moved locations and moved right down the road from us.

So you had Memorial Baptist Church on one side, you had Spring Baptist Church on the other side, you had Spring Memorial Baptist Church in the middle, and it was just confusing.

At the same time, my coming to the church had led to sort of a theological reorientation,

Calvinistic doctrine, an understanding of church governance that was somewhat different as well.

So elder -led, elder leadership, elder rule instead of congregationalism, and through that whole process, we began to re -evacuate a name change.

And so at that time, 24 years ago, the Founders Movement was just kind of getting off the ground in Southern Baptist life.

Yeah, with Dr. Tom Askell? Absolutely. And so we appreciated that and admired that, and we wanted people who would come to visit our church.

Our church still is a Southern Baptist church. We wanted people to understand at the outset where we were coming from, what our theological commitments were.

And so that was just a way to sort of combine the new direction we were headed with sort of a clarity amongst

Southern Baptists about where we stood. So that's why we selected the name we did, Founders Baptist Church. Great.

Well, I am so delighted to hear that Founders Baptist Church has the same doctrinal convictions that I cherish.

And although I don't always interview people who are theologically identical with me when

I broadcast Iron Sherpa's Iron Radio, it is just an extra joy to know when I've got a guest on who is echoing the precious doctrines of sovereign grace.

If anybody wants more information about Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas, the website is foundersbaptist .org,

foundersbaptist .org. Before we move into our main theme of the day,

Spirit Empowered Preaching, and also a promotion of the

True Church Conference, I'd like you, as a part of our tradition here on Iron Sherpa's Iron Radio, whenever we have a first -time guest,

I'd like you to give a summary of your salvation testimony, which would include any kind of religious atmosphere you may have been raised in, and what kind of providential circumstances our

Sovereign Lord raised up in your life that drew you to himself and saved you. I would love to do that.

I came to Christ when I was 16 years old, between my junior and senior years of high school.

I thought that I was a Christian from the time that I was 7. So I was raised in a home where there was a very basic intellectual understanding of the gospel among my parents.

I was very grateful to say that just in God's good providence, I was raised in a loving home.

My parents were great parents from a natural point of view. They loved us, took good care of us, and all of that, and taught us good moral lessons and were good moral examples for us.

And one of the things that they wanted us to know, me and my brother at the time, I later had another brother 10 years after I was born, but in my early years

I had a brother a year and a half younger than me. They wanted us to know that God is, and that there was a need for salvation.

And so we were taught those things. But I do not believe that either of my parents were genuine believers at that time.

So we would go to church very sporadically. Somewhere around 7 years of age,

I attended a Baptist revival meeting, and there was an altar call, and I went forward, and a preacher prayed with me there, and I prayed a sinner's prayer, and I was baptized thereafter, and held on to that from 7 to 16 years of age as a genuine salvation experience.

But I had no hunger for the things that believers hunger for.

I had no real hunger to know more Scripture. I had no real understanding of the Bible. The times as I would get older, the times

I would attempt to read it, there was no real understanding of what I was reading. When we would attend church,

I was happy to get out of there as soon as I could. I wasn't really enjoying it very much.

And then when I was about 15, my dad was genuinely converted. My mom may have been converted earlier, but around that time, she took off spiritually too, and there became no doubt that the

Lord had graciously brought her to Himself as well. So our home changed a lot in the course of the year.

And all of a sudden, I was in worship services morning and evening on Sunday and evening on Wednesday evenings, and sitting under a young pastor who was a verse -by -verse expositor to the level that he understood how to do it.

I look back now, and there was definitely some immaturity there, but he was doing his best.

And so we were going through the Book of Romans on Sundays, and everyone thinks I'm a believer.

I claim to be a believer. I quickly sort of conformed to my surroundings. But at a youth camp, the summer of my junior year of high school to my junior and senior years of high school,

I'm listening to a pastor preach a sermon, and I come under conviction, and it wasn't by any means a classic sinner's prayer.

I simply cried out to the Lord and said, I don't know whether I'm born again or not, but tonight

I know what it means to follow your Son, and I want Christ. And Chris, from that day until now, and I'm 58 years of age now, it has become apparent that that's when the

Lord saved me. In fact, I struggled for a time after that with whether or not I needed to be baptized on the right side of my conversion, whether I was saved at seven or whether I was saved at 16.

And so when I was 19 years old, I submitted to Believer's Baptism. Amen. Because it became plain to me through my growing understanding of Scripture that where there's genuine conversion, there's fruit.

Amen. I wish more Baptists would do that. There are many

Baptists who have a right understanding of what might be nicknamed

Lordship Salvation. They have a right understanding that a faith without repentance is a dead faith and is not a real faith.

But very often you will have people who were wrongly baptized because they made some kind of a profession either as a young child or even later in life that proved to be a false profession and a false conversion.

And when the genuine article comes about by the grace and mercy of Christ, many of them who were biblically baptized in regard to the mode they were immersed as a so -called believer, they weren't really biblically baptized because there was no repentance involved.

And many of them just think that since we do not as Baptists believe that baptism is a requirement for salvation or regeneration, but at the same time, in order to,

I think, properly obey the command repentance is required. So I think that folks who have been even baptized by immersion after a profession of faith, if they realize later in their lives, when they truly get saved, that their earlier profession was false,

I believe they should be rebaptized. And I applaud you for what you did. Absolutely, Chris.

I mean, baptism is an external sign of an internal reality. And so if the reality is missing, the sign is empty.

It means nothing. It would be like wearing a wedding ring before you get married. You've got a wedding ring on your finger, but you're not married.

And so the wedding ring only becomes a genuine sign of marriage after marriage. And then the same is true of salvation.

It's only after a genuine new birth, a genuine life, baptism has meaning.

Yeah, or another analogy might be you're wearing a wedding ring after you got married, but you're a habitual unrepentant adulterer, and you're not actually living according to the vows you made.

Right. So, yeah, I appreciate that testimony very much. And how was it that you became introduced to and embraced the doctrines of sovereign grace, also nicknamed

Reformed theology or Calvinism? Early on in my

Christian life, I was exposed to the ministry of John MacArthur, and I began to listen to John's preaching ministry.

And through that, I came to a decision early on that I know that the authority is

Scripture alone, but this man is a faithful teacher, and so I want to learn everything

I can from him. So I just sort of made it a point of mine for a couple of years to get my hands on anything that John wrote or anything that he produced so that I could learn ministry, ecclesiology, preaching from someone that I knew was a good example.

And in doing that, I began then to read faithful men whom

John had read. So my reading expanded, my learning expanded. And through that,

I'm introduced to Spurgeon, I'm introduced to others who, and even, of course, outside of Baptist circles.

So we're talking about R .C. Sproul and others who had a big influence on my thinking and began to help me understand the

Scriptures, which ultimately answers why any of us believe these things. I believe these things not because MacArthur taught them or Spurgeon taught them or Sproul taught them or Calvin taught them.

I believe these things because the Scripture teaches them. Amen. In fact, when I came to embrace the doctrines of Sovereign Grace, I don't know how many months it was after I came to Christ and was baptized, but my pastors and some folks in the church knew that I was really struggling with these doctrines called

Calvinism and I was really vehemently rejecting them. I was angry about them.

And a brother in the church from England, Nigel Stone, who's now in heaven with the Lord, he said to me,

I've heard that you have some troubles with the doctrines of Sovereign Grace. Let me give you this booklet.

And he gave me George Whitefield's letter to John Wesley on election. Yes. Published by Chapel Library.

I did not know who John Wesley was. I did not know who George Whitefield was.

I did not know who John Calvin was. I did not know who Charles Spurgeon was. So the issue was that George Whitefield so biblically refuted

John Wesley's arguments against Calvinism, and John Wesley had a lot more biblical arguments against Calvinism than I had, and George Whitefield so beautifully and biblically refuted all of them that my initial reaction was, oh no, this is true, but I still hate it.

But then within, I don't know, a month or two, I fell madly in love with the doctrines of Sovereign Grace, and it really revolutionized my own understanding of salvation, and it personalized the substitutionary atonement provided by Christ on Calvary, because instead of Jesus dying for a sea of faceless, nameless humanity, dying hoping that these people for whom he was dying would be saved, it just totally transformed it to Jesus Christ died for me,

Chris Arnzen. Chris Arnzen was on his heart and mind when he died on Calvary, and he finished the mission.

He 100 % accomplished the mission that he set out to do, and he guaranteed my salvation through that precious act of redemption on the cross.

Amen, 100%, yeah. That's wonderful, Chris, and that's right. And as you know, Chris, it doesn't just transform our understanding of soteriology, but it also transforms our understanding of everything, really.

It becomes a paradigm by which now we see the world. When you understand the sovereignty of God, everything else comes into a new focus, and even when it comes to things like evangelism, you no longer are someone trying to persuade a person by your own argumentation or some sort of personality influence or anything like that, emotional pressure.

Rather, you are presenting the gospel, trusting the Spirit of God, yet genuinely exhorting someone to come to faith in Christ because God's at work through personality, and you genuinely love this person you're sharing with.

Nonetheless, you leave the results to God because you understand who saves and who converts, and it's not us, it's the

Lord. Amen. In fact, I think that only Calvinists can logically and consistently say that they owe 100 % of the praise, honor, and glory for their salvation to Christ alone.

Arminians and other non -Calvinists will say that, but they're really not being logically consistent when they do.

I love the way you express that. I think they're genuine believers. Their desire to give glory to God alone is genuine.

They're sincere about that. They just haven't thought through how logically inconsistent it is. So I love the way you put that, and you're right.

It's only those who believe in the sovereignty of God and salvation that can logically, consistently give all praise and glory to God.

I want to make it also clear, folks, that I am making no such false argument that all

Calvinists are superior Christians to all Arminians and other non -Calvinists.

That's ridiculous. There are brothers and sisters in Christ whose Christian faith, their walk with Christ, their obedience to Christ, far exceeds and is far superior to my own.

Folks who are even in the Arminian camp, who are more obedient Christians.

They are better spouses than I was. They're better children to their parents.

They're better parents to their children. They're better employees, employers, citizens, and on and on I could go, even though they have not been given the insight into the doctrines of sovereign grace and have not yet embraced them.

So I'm not claiming that just because somebody may be correct in their theology and in agreement with me that they are superior to other

Christians outside of the Calvinist camp. I'm not saying that at all, and I'm certainly not saying that you must be a

Calvinist to be saved. There is a group out there, I'm sure you're aware, brother, who believe that if you do not believe in the five points of TULIP, you are lost, you are damned.

And some of these folks have even come to assign

John Calvin to the ranks of the reprobate because Calvin did not believe you had to understand and agree with every tenet of his faith to be saved.

Some of these folks go as far as if you give an open door or extend a hand of brotherhood to a non -reformed person, that you are also damned, regardless of what your doctrines are yourself.

I mean, it's really crazy, isn't it? It is crazy, and I love that you add that, Chris, because, and I'm not saying that this proves any sort of point,

I think it's just the result of salvation history in the country that we live in.

But it is interesting to me that most Calvinists today were one faith in Christ by Herminian.

Some of us were evangelized by people who don't believe what we believe. And so to me it's humorous to think that somehow, as you put it, we're superior just because we have come to grasp these things or by the grace of God seen these things.

It's not any sort of superiority. Like everything else in the Christian life, it's just a mercy. Yeah, you just reminded me of something that most people in the

Restoration Movement, also known as the Church of Christ, revere Alexander Campbell as a hero.

And yet they would, many today, not all, but many would insist today that even a

Baptist who comes to genuine faith in Christ has to be rebaptized because you must believe it is a requirement for the remission of sins in order to be saved.

And yet Alexander Campbell, who was baptized by a Baptist, was never rebaptized. Wow, that's amazing.

But tell us about the True Church Conference, where you are one of the speakers on a really phenomenal roster of speakers.

And I just thank God that I will be attending this conference by God's grace. Tell us about the

True Church Conference. Well, this will be my first time attending myself.

I've been aware of the conference, but I've never been able to attend, and this will be my first exposure to it.

So I don't think I'm the best guy to ask about its history or what most characterizes it.

But what I do know is the respect that I have for Pastor Jeff Novelet. And Jeff has been in our church.

He's preached at our conference, which is Truth in Love. We have that in January every year. And I just admire

Jeff's conviction, which is genuine and immovable, about what makes for healthy churches and what it means to be a faithful ministry.

I've found Jeff to be courageous, and he doesn't wait for someone else to do what is right before he's willing to do it.

He takes the first step when the Lord has put something on his heart. I know their church pulled out of the

Southern Baptist Convention, and he gave reasons why, and I can't disagree with his reasons.

As I said, our church is still affiliated. We're not very involved, but we're still loosely affiliated.

Nonetheless, I appreciate Jeff's convictions, and just watching what the Lord has done through his ministry, the

Lord has made great use of him. So have great love and admiration for that brother, and look forward to being with him. Yes, there is an error, actually, on the website, folks.

So when you go to anchoredintruth .org forward slash true -church -conference forward slash, you will see that it states on the website that the conference is

February 17th through the 20th. It is actually February 18th through the 20th, this

Thursday through Sunday. So just keep in mind that that is a typo, and I hope somebody at Anchored in Truth Ministries is listening so that they can correct that.

That may make or break some folks' plans to attend. If they wrongly think,

I should say, it's starting on February 17th, but it's starting on February 18th, which is this Thursday. And once again, that website is anchoredintruth .org

forward slash true -church -conference forward slash, anchoredintruth .org

forward slash true -church -conference forward slash. We're going to be going to our first station break, and when we return, we're going to be getting into the heart of our discussion today, spirit -empowered preaching.

Once again, folks, this is one of those very rare prerecorded interviews.

It is being recorded on Monday, February 14th, 2022, but it is being recorded at an earlier time of day than our live broadcast, and it will be airing during that live slot,

God willing, 4 to 6 p .m. Eastern today, February 14th.

So since it is a prerecorded interview, when you're listening to it during the live slot, please don't bother submitting questions because there's going to be nobody here in the studio to answer them.

So save your questions for the next time we have a truly live interview occurring.

But we're going to be right back after these messages with more of Richard Caldwell, pastor -teacher at Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas, on the theme,

Spirit -Empowered Preaching. Don't go away. Why can't we see

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Anchored in Truth Ministries has hosted the annual True Church Conference at Grace Life Church of the

Shoals in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. This conference began as a training conference for pastors and church leaders who are striving to build true, biblically healthy churches.

Conference themes have included church discipline, repentance, discipleship, conversion, hyper -Calvinism, the family, the doctrine of sin, and the pretenders.

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Hope to see you there! Sweet home

Alabama Yeah, I'm heading down to Alabama. Actually flying into Nashville tomorrow and getting a ride on Wednesday from my friend

Pastor Bill Sasser of Grace Church in Franklin, who's taking me to Muscle Shoals, Alabama for the

True Church Conference. And I hope as many of you as possible will join me there.

That's this Thursday through Sunday, February 18th through the 20th. And for more details, go to anchoredintruth .org

true -church -conference/. That's anchoredintruth .org true -church -conference/.

Keep in mind that the website and the ad you just heard has a wrong date for the beginning of that conference.

It's not Wednesday the 17th, it's Thursday the 18th of February. So I hope to see as many of you there, and I hope that many of you who come to the conference will look for me and introduce yourself to me, especially if you're an

Iron Trump and Zion Radio listener. And we are now back with our guest today, Richard Caldwell, Pastor -Teacher at Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas.

We are discussing Spirit -Empowered Preaching. And by the way, I wanted to clarify something that we were talking about before.

For those of you unfamiliar with the Founders Movement and the Founders Conference, the reason why that movement and conference and Founders Baptist Church use the word founders is because every single founder of the

Southern Baptist Convention in the 19th century were thoroughgoing Five -Point Calvinists, unlike today where we see those that believe in the doctrines of sovereign grace being a tiny minority of those within the

Southern Baptist Convention. Any knowledge as to why you believe this switch, this swap occurred where the doctrines of grace were the dominant teachings of the

Southern Baptist Convention for quite a while, and now the reverse is true, that even anti -Calvinism and non -Calvinism flourished there, where those who are

Calvinists, such as yourself, are a tiny minority? You know, Chris, I don't—I haven't studied the history of how that shift happened.

What I can say is, you know, Bible -ism sort of took root in our country.

Large crusades, crusade preaching, Billy Graham's influence, etc.,

and of course thankful for every genuine conversion that came through those means. But I think that sort of led to what

I see today as plaguing the convention, and that is pragmatism. Decisional regeneration versus the idea that regeneration precedes faith, that has taken root.

And so the result is now evangelism is sort of a battle of wits and a battle of the wills, and that's all across our convention.

And I don't think people would put it—I don't think those who don't believe as I do would put it as starkly as I just did, but nonetheless

I think it's what it boils down to. I trust God's means to do

God's work, and I trust His Spirit to do what I can't do, and so I'm not trying to engage in a battle of wits or a battle of wills to bring someone to the kingdom of God.

I just want to share the gospel faithfully and trust the Lord to do His work in our hearts. So I think our convention is plagued by pragmatism.

It's a man -centered strategy for doing God's work.

Amen. And today we are highlighting spirit -empowered preaching, which is the theme of your message at True Church Conference.

Some of our charismatic and Pentecostal brethren might look at that and either think, that's strange,

I didn't think that Calvinists believed that the Spirit empowered anybody to do anything, or they might think that we are charismatic by using a phrase like that.

But the irony is, and I'm assuming you would agree, that those who believe in the doctrines of sovereign grace, we actually believe that the

Holy Spirit has an infinitely more vital role in the

Christian life than most Charismatics and Pentecostals do, who are predominantly

Arminian, because we believe that somebody can't even possess faith without the

Holy Spirit's involvement. And the Holy Spirit is the one that sanctifies and preserves us.

I mean, don't you think that we have a more vital role in our understanding of the

Scriptures that is involving the Holy Spirit? Yes, I think that's probably true,

Chris. But rather than sort of a comparative, I just think it's, what I want to say clearly and plainly is that if you believe all that the

Scriptures teach, then you understand that without the

Spirit of God's work, we don't have faith, and without the Spirit of God's work, our faith is not maintained.

Without the Spirit of God's work, we're not conformed to the image of Christ. Without the Spirit of God's work, we can do nothing.

I mean, just as our Savior told us, for without me, you can do nothing. The Spirit of God is our helper, and so without Him, we can do nothing.

So in every area of life, the most basic things, to the things that we usually associate with the

Spirit's power, it doesn't matter, in every aspect of our lives, without Him, we will not be conformed to the image of Jesus.

And so if you believe the Scriptures, then you understand the vital role of the Spirit of God in the lives of believers.

Well, tell us about this specific theme, Spirit -empowered preaching. It was a theme that was assigned to me, and I rejoice to be able to preach on the subject.

The text that I will deal with Thursday night is 1 Corinthians 2, 1 -5, and let me just read that text because it will sort of serve as a launching point.

It says, And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom.

For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and much trembling.

And my speech and my message were not implausible words of wisdom, but a demonstration of the

Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

And when you look at that text, Chris, in its context, what you discover is that those verses are really sort of mid -argument in what

Paul is talking about. What he's talking about are problems in the Church of Corinth, and specifically the problem of division, and those divisions related to personalities.

I'm of Paul, I'm of Cephas, I'm of Apollos, I'm of Christ. So you have these parties, these divisions arising within the

Church of Corinth surrounding personalities, and the reason why that was going on is because that church existed in a culture that had a high regard for Greek rhetoric and for philosophy.

And so they tended to evaluate speakers based upon how rhetorically skillful they were, and how lofty their ideology seemed to be.

And Paul is reminding them that that doesn't even explain your existence in the

Church, it doesn't explain your experience as believers, because when I came there, I purposely avoided that kind of approach.

And he talks about what he rejected in his preaching ministry, so that their faith would not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

So here's what I think is interesting. I think today, if we were to ask, what do you think of when you think of Spirit -empowered preaching?

Most people think in terms of presentation. They'll think about what they consider to be sermons that affected them in the moment, that seemed fiery, that seemed impassioned, that seemed emotional, that seemed, you know, name it.

But they're thinking in terms of presentation. When I look at the New Testament, and what it says about Spirit -empowered preaching,

I find that it focuses not on presentation, but on production. What is left after the preaching?

What is the result after the preaching? What is left in its wake? And what you find is where the

Spirit of God has done His work, there are lasting results that match what

God promises that His Word will accomplish. So in the case of rejecting the

Gospel, there's a sense in which you've been confronted by the truth of God, and you've knowingly turned your back on what you met with.

In terms of conversion, salvation, you find a people who last. You find a people who are genuinely converted, and the result is they're deeply rooted, that the

Word of God has taken root. They're the good soil by God's grace, and the Word of God takes root, and there's fruit that follows, and the fruit is stable.

So where there's Spirit -empowered preaching, there is what I describe as sort of a gentle wind, a helping wind that has an accumulative effect over time.

As the Spirit of God adds the rain and the sunshine, you find healthy churches and healthy believers.

So we tend to be mesmerized by what I would call tornado preaching. We love the big moment where what's really emphasized in the

New Testament with Spirit -empowered preaching is the work of a farmer, plowing the soil, sowing the seed, trusting the

Lord to do what only He can do. And over time, you see the Spirit of God's work in the lives of people who've been transformed.

So you seem to be emphasizing not only Spirit -empowered preaching, but Spirit -empowered hearing.

Oh, yeah, without question. I mean, how you hear the Word of God is... We're as dependent as hearers on the

Spirit of God as we are as preachers. Unless the Lord is at work in my preaching, it's ineffective.

At the same time, unless the Lord is at work in my hearing, the Word of God never takes root in my life. So the emphasis has to be on both.

We're talking about what the Spirit of God does in and through preaching. That involves both the preacher and the hearer.

And let me say, for the sake of argument and get your response to it,

I agree with everything you said, but isn't there an important role for homiletics in the public proclamation, vocal proclamation of God's Word, also known as preaching?

There are many folks, both in and outside of Reformed theology, who don't seem to think homiletics is a very important issue.

You will have folks get up to a pulpit and talk about life and death situations, matters of urgency and eternal consequence, who will be presenting those truths as if they are reading a bus schedule, and just very calmly and very quietly and very impotently and very weakly talking about the things of God in such a monotone way.

And although God has saved countless numbers of lost souls, even through that kind of preaching, don't you think that it is important that we preach with passion and urgency as if the eternal souls of those listening is at stake?

And Charles Spurgeon, someone we both think very highly of, he believed that it was important.

Don't you also believe that? I absolutely do, Chris. I think that gets misjudged sometimes, though.

I don't think it's a matter of volume and sweat. I think it's a matter of...

I forget now who was described this way, but his preaching was described as blood earnest. And I think that's the key right there.

Yeah, I've heard a lot of fundamentalist folks preaching with a lot of volume and power and boldness, but sometimes their messages were very shallow and sometimes, dare

I say, silly, and sometimes heretical. And I am not broad -brushing.

I have friends, very close friends, who are independent fundamentalist Baptists, even of the

King James Only variety, who are wonderful brethren, who love Christ, who are very biblically literate.

I just disagree with them on certain issues. So I'm not broad -brushing. So the volume and the fury is not all of the package either that a biblically -driven,

Spirit -driven pastor should be involved in. Yeah, no doubt.

And so what I would say is what characterizes men of God, and that's what we're talking about when we talk about Spirit -empowered preaching.

I would sort of divide the subject up into two parts. A man who is filled with the

Spirit as he's preaching. That's Spirit -empowered preaching. At the same time, for preaching to be everything

God intends for it to be, it means we embrace what God has given us in His Word describing how the work is to be done.

And so it's both. I am a man who has the Spirit, and I'm walking by the

Spirit, and I'm carrying this work out in the power of the Spirit, relying on the Spirit.

At the same time, I'm embracing what God designed for preaching to be. And I believe what He designed for preaching to be is read the text, explain the text, apply the text, but in a way that is skillful.

So you raised a very important issue, and I'm going to deal with this Thursday night. I don't want to preach my sermon before I preach my sermon. But Paul rejected what the

Greeks had come to love in rhetorical skill and oratory, which brought attention to the speaker.

He did not reject rhetorical skill and oratory skill.

He did not reject that. In fact, you read Paul's letters, and you see he was a powerful presenter of truth.

He was very careful in how he organized his ideas. He was very purposeful in the way that he would take his readers from one subject to the next and build a case.

All of that is important in preaching. And that gets to what you mentioned, homiletical skill. So yes, this is not a rejection of homiletical skill, carefulness, training, preparation.

What it is a rejection of is a kind of presentation that draws attention to the speaker, that gets in the way of the text.

That's what we have to reject in our preaching. So when Paul, for example, in my text talks about lofty speech, that Greek word is a word that points to sort of a pompous way of speaking, an elevated, preeminent, superior kind of speaking.

So that's what he was dealing with, not the idea that we would be skillful in our presentation of God's Word. By the way,

I'm going to plug a book. In fact, I'm going to plug it after I come back from the break. I've got to go to our midway break.

Please, folks, be patient with us as the middle break is longer than most breaks in the show because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Don't go away. We're going to be right back with more of Richard Caldwell on spirit -empowered preaching right after these messages from our sponsors.

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Send that email to chrisarnson at gmail .com and put the Pastors Luncheon in the subject line. We are now back with our guests today and I am really enjoying this interview a lot.

I hope he's enjoying it as much as I am. Richard Caldwell, pastor teacher at Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas.

We are addressing Spirit Empowered Preaching. Right before the break I just wanted to strongly recommend an excellent book that is on the subject of homiletics something that we were briefly discussing before the break

My dear friend Gabriel Grossi has written a book that is truly extraordinary and even has glowing endorsements with such powerful men of God as Dr.

Joel Beeke and others. Preaching with Biblical Passion. This is a self -published book but don't let that allow you to underestimate its power and its biblical truth.

And it's just an extraordinary book and he gleans from the best of Protestant history in regard to this subject from Baptists from Presbyterians from Congregationalists, from Anglicans and Lutherans and this book should be on the shelf of every pastor on the face of the earth as far as I'm concerned.

If you have problems getting a hold of it anywhere because it is self -published just send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

and I'll make sure I get you in contact with Pastor Gabriel Grossi. As I said before we are addressing the theme, very important theme

Spirit Empowered Preaching and don't you think that there is far too much timidity and cowardice when it comes to those even those that have correct doctrine who ascend into pulpits because they are not relying on the spirit they are capitulating to the whims of the day.

They don't want to offend people in the audience. They don't want to risk losing their jobs as the pastor of a particular church.

They don't want the wrath of the community surrounding them to be outpoured on that congregation.

We could go on and on and on. It might be just something as simple as the pastor craves being liked by everyone.

Don't you think that they are not relying enough or at all on the spirit to empower their preaching?

I do Chris. I agree with you. If we rely on the spirit then we say what the spirit said. You think about those seven letters of the churches in Revelation and our

Savior is communicating but drives home the point that the churches are to hear what the spirit of God is saying.

So to rely on the spirit is to say what the spirit said. What the spirit said is scripture and so we preach the word of God without apology.

One of the things that Paul says he avoids in 1 Corinthians 2 is he avoids the kind of communication that is not straightforward and plain.

Cowardice is not what the spirit of God produces. Boldness is what he produces. I do think we have those two things going on at the same time in our culture.

We have a lack of carefulness on one end of the spectrum.

We have men who are so desiring to be bold and faithful that I don't think they always practice carefulness like they need to in what they communicate.

On the other end of the spectrum you have men who never say anything. They're so nuanced they say nothing.

And so what we need is communicating the truth and the love of God. It's straightforward. It's clear. It's plain.

It's unapologetic. It says what the scriptures say and yet communicate that in a way that you understand that unless the

Lord built the house, the laborers labor in vain. So we're going to trust the Lord to do His work in hearts and we're going to communicate the truth in the same spirit in which it is meant to be communicated, which is ultimate and supreme loyalty to God but genuine love and care for the souls of men.

And when you talk about passionate preaching, I'm going to try to get that book you just mentioned. I wasn't aware of it.

But it sounds like something I would enjoy. And I think that the key to passionate preaching is what you and I talked about before the break.

And that is, and I couldn't remember the name, but Thomas Chalmers was the preacher that this was said of him, that he was blood earnest.

And I think that's the key right there. Do we believe what we preach? And if we believe it, if you're talking about hell and you believe in hell, that's going to come through in your preaching.

If you believe in heaven, it's going to come through. If you believe that men are lost and blind and enslaved and need to be delivered from the domain of darkness, that comes through if you really believe that.

And so what I'm afraid, Chris, is we have men preaching who don't really believe what they preach. And that's why it becomes just sort of data dump, data dump sermons versus impassioned preaching.

But I don't think that impassioned preaching is measured, as we said, by volume or sweat.

It's earnestness. It's genuineness. It's sincerity. It's conviction, do I believe it?

I listen to Martin Lloyd -Jones, one of my favorite preachers. And Lloyd -Jones is not loud, but he's blood earnest.

I listen to John MacArthur, not overly animated, but blood earnest.

And I think that's what characterizes spirit empowered preaching. We believe what we preach. Amen. I agree with every word.

Now, if we leave out the more obvious flawed or even false preaching of modern evangelicalism, we leave out

Joel Osteen's, and we leave out those that are just trying to build up the self -esteem and the happiness of the listener, regardless of what their state before God is.

If we leave those folks out, what would you say, from your experience, from what you've heard from the pulpits of other men, is the greatest flaw within the pulpits of churches that would claim the same doctrines that you and I cherish?

Oh, that's a great question. I would say one flaw that I'm concerned about is not allowing the argumentation of the biblical writers to actually form the sermon.

So I think we're doing preaching the right way. The sermon actually arises out of the text. All I'm doing is recognizing the organization that's already present in the text.

So that I'm a man whose own mind and heart must be submitted to the text before I declare the text.

I think it was Stott who had the book Between Two Worlds, and so as we preach the Word of God, I have one foot in the world of Scripture.

I have the other foot in the world I'm living in. And my task is to bring what was in the day in which that Word was first delivered to understand it in that context and bring it into the world in which

I'm living. I think what happens too often is we try to bring the message over too quickly. We don't really we have to go back before you can bring it forward.

And we don't do a good job of taking our listeners back to the world of Scripture and allowing them to hear those verses as the first audience would have heard it.

And then bridge into our world and make valid applications, bring forth valid implications of that text and apply those things to our heroes.

So if there's something I would criticize among our own circle, where we're like -minded, it would be to work really hard at that.

To allow my sermons to be shaped by the shape and the form of the text itself.

Not use it as a launching point. In other words, I think, Chris, what we have is a lot of theological preaching instead of expository preaching.

We have a theological point that is based on the text. We're not wrong that it's in our verses.

We sort of preach above the text of Scripture so that we're making our theological point based on that text instead of allowing the text to say what it says, and from that, anchor theological truth.

From the context that was intended, or the context that surrounded the original author and the intent of the original author.

As my friend James White of Alpha Omega Ministries has frequently said, I think this usually comes up when he's debating someone who is misrepresenting him.

And he will respond to his opponent that if you're going to quote someone, quote them honestly and with integrity as far as what they are truly saying in their own writings and taking them in context and so on.

And there are preachers who violate that when it comes to the God -breathed perfect word.

So true. So right on. Yeah, exactly. That's my concern. I trust, again, we're talking about faithful men.

That was the point of your question. So the motives are good, but I just don't think we're careful listeners.

As Dr. White was making his point, he's saying you can't really critique me until you hear me.

Right. Critique me accurately. Exactly. So I think we have to do the same thing with Scripture.

We've got to listen to it before we can deliver it. And listening to it means I've got to hear it in its original context.

Yeah, one thing about the original context, I think that a lot of the problems, and maybe you agree or maybe you disagree with me, but I think a lot of the problems that non -Calvinist, non -Reformed

Christians have, those that reject the doctrines of grace, when they are attempting to exegete certain passages, especially those that in the

English language and perhaps even in the original languages reflect a universal idea of certain things.

The uses of the words all and everyone and so on.

Don't you think that sometimes this is occurring when people are actually applying or exegeting a universal salvation, whether it be a full -blown universal salvation like a universalist might teach or the more common amongst evangelicals, the idea of a universal atonement that is intended for everyone, every single human even though a minority of them will actually benefit from that atonement.

Do you think that sometimes it is a failure to comprehend or realize the context of certain passages that use universal terms because in certain cases the audiences were

Jewish and the idea of the Gentile nations being offered the gospel and an opportunity to become children of God was a scandal.

It was something that was completely foreign to the minds of many if not most

Jews in Christ's day and earlier. They had a bigoted notion of Jewish exclusivity, ethnically

Jewish exclusivity, and even Peter got himself in trouble and required the rebuke of the

Apostle Paul when he was not eating with the Gentiles and so on.

Am I making sense here? Yes, you are making sense. And what you're talking about is context.

The word all doesn't always speak of universal in the sense of the entire world.

Sometimes it speaks of universal in the sense of a particular class of humanity, a particular category of humanity.

So yeah, you have to listen to those terms in their context. Just like in the book of Revelation we have

John referring to those from out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation and the concept of all being out from all of those groups, not necessarily every single person that has ever lived or ever will live in the future.

Well, one example of that, for example, is Romans 5 .18, which says therefore as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification in life for all men.

If you don't understand the two uses of all in that verse contextually, you get universalism in salvation.

Adam's one trespass led to the condemnation of all humanity, all those who have been born of Adam.

And he says one act of righteousness, that's Christ's finished work, leads to justification in life for all men.

Well, if all means the same in the last part of the verse as it meant in the first part of the verse, then you have universalism in salvation.

So you have to hear these terms carefully in their context. I have to bring this up if we're going to be trying to clean house in our own camp.

One of the major flaws, I believe, of those who share our confessions, those who share a profession of the doctrines of sovereign grace, is that very often you will ironically and tragically have pride and arrogance as the fruit of those who claim to believe these things, which is 180 degrees opposite from what those teachings intend to bring about in the mind and heart of a sinner, which is humility.

And don't you think that we have to be very careful as much as we want to be meticulous, and rightly so, about the accuracy and truthfulness of doctrine and theology?

We cannot think that our possession of those things, our understanding of those things at whatever level we understand them, makes us superior to others who have been purchased by the same blood of Christ as we have.

Well, I have a question. In fact, I agree with this. I go so far as to say that you don't even understand doctrines if they puff you up.

The truth that they represent does nothing but humble men to the dust.

I was dead in my trespasses and sins, blind, enslaved, deaf, unable to do one thing to help myself.

And God in His sovereign kindness opened my heart, opened my spiritual eyes to see the truth as it is in Jesus Christ.

I did nothing for that to happen. That was entirely

God's work. And so if there's anything in that message that exalts me, I don't know what it would be. And then when you go on beyond that and you ask, you know, what have

I received since, what will I receive for forever, what part of that did I earn? What part of it did

I deserve? What part of it is explained by me? The answer is none of it. And so, you know, this was

Paul's question to the Corinthian church, what do you have that you didn't receive? And if you received it, why do you act as if you didn't?

Why do you boast as if you didn't? So wherever you have pride, you have people who have wrongly assumed to themselves what is only explained by God.

And so if we understand these doctrines, they will not puff us up. They will humble us to the dust and show us what we really are without Jesus Christ, and that's nothing.

Now one thing that is a controversy amongst, even amongst those with the same profession that you and I have is the debate over what to include in a sermon even if you're involved in expository, exegetical preaching.

And what I mean by that is there are some brethren who may have our same profession and so on who will say

I am not going to bring up controversies of the day such as the heresies of the woke movement such as same -sex marriage such as other things that are on our

TV screens and on our computers and in all forms of media on a daily basis because I'm just going to stick with the text and if the text doesn't specifically mention things like that I'm not going to address them and as much as I might be personally opposed to those things

I'm not going to bring them up in a sermon. And there are others that say that even if they are involved in expository preaching that there will be texts that do address the very root of why something is a heresy or an abominable act.

So they will specifically mention by name the heresies of the woke movement. They will mention infanticide that's going on in the abortion mills.

They will mention the abomination of same -sex marriage and things like that.

Where would you stand and how would you respond to what I just said? Yeah, I don't know if you'll completely agree with what

I'm going to say which is perfectly fine and press back if you don't. But I'll tell you what my view of that is. So we talked a moment ago about having our one foot in the world of the text one foot in the world of today.

And that's necessary for faithful preaching. So I am of the mindset that as we see those principles in Scripture declared, lived out in the first century,

I've got to ask how does this affect my life the lives of my hearers the sheep

God has assigned to me as a local church pastor to our elders. How do I apply this?

And you cannot faithfully apply Scripture without recognizing the issues in your own day to which these principles speak.

And that would include wokeness, which we've dealt with that in a conference at our church. It would include homosexuality, gender confusion, which we've addressed in a conference at our church.

So we're not shy about making those applications. However I must remember

I don't shepherd the world I don't shepherd churches plural.

God called me, God called the elders of Founders Baptist Church to shepherd the flock among us. I guess you're not the

Pope then. Exactly, Chris. And so what I think is hurting us right now in many cases is through social media, through the exposure we have to instant news all over the world, we act like what is happening in every place in the world at any given time is happening in our back door and it's not.

And so we're constantly being distracted. We're constantly being upset It's almost as if we have an omniscient existence, which is that belongs to God alone.

We were not meant to live in an omniscient sense. And so what I think we would do well to pay attention to is what is going on in our church right now what needs to be addressed in this congregation

I don't mean in a way that turns a blind eye to what's happening in the rest of the world. I don't mean in a way that doesn't care about our brothers and sisters in Christ all over the globe.

I don't mean we don't pray for one another and care for one another, but I've been given an assignment. And one day

I'm going to stand before the Lord and give an account for how I've watched for the souls that God assigned to our church and to our eldership

I want to be faithful there So yes, address all the issues of the day as you come to them in the text.

You've got to make those connections But I am not going to stay constantly upset about what's happening all over the globe at one time because I have an assignment and I want to be faithful to the flock that God has assigned to us.

Well if you didn't hear it, I just gave a very loud sigh of relief after hearing your answer because I agree with you 100 %

And here I am picking on independent fundamentalists again and remember folks

I'm not broad brushing. There are many fine men in that group. But one of the things

I find interesting is that over the years I have heard fundamentalists preaching

They very often will be very quote -unquote bold and uncompromising preaching against sins that are not known to be committed with any frequency or there may be no known committing of certain sins at all in their congregations and those are the sins and those sins perhaps even only that these fundamentalist preachers will be quote -unquote bold and uncompromising about and preach against with much fervency and elevated voices

But don't we need to remember that the people in the pews right in front of that pastor need to be rebuked and challenged and exhorted over issues that may be more common in that church the sins of pride and gossip and not that we would ever take a woke movement spin on this but the sin of racism.

In fact I believe that one of the primary heresies of the woke movement is ethnic and racial quote -unquote bigotry

I believe we only have one race of humans from God. I use that just because the common vernacular of our day uses the word race but I think the woke movement those involved in it today are the chief proponents of actual racism anti -white racism but we need to preach against racism especially if it's known to exist in our own congregation or in our community am

I making sense? You are making sense and I think what illustrates what you said in an amazing way are the seven letters to the churches in Asia Minor in the book of Revelation because you have churches existing at the exact same point in time existing in the very same general region of the world so they're very much all exposed to the same sorts of things and yet each of those letters is different and each letter addresses specific sins in the case of those churches that were corrected addresses specific sins occurring in their congregation so when the

Lord of Glory walks in the midst of his churches and addresses us he's not general he's specific this is what's going on where you are and so I think and this gets back to what we talked about earlier

Chris we've got to begin if we aren't already to be men who submit our mind to the text as we're preaching it we let the text because when you do that you're going to address there's going to be a great variety in your preaching something's wrong if no matter what text you preach the sermon sounds the same because every text has great variety in it and if we're faithful to do that then we're going to address all the sorts of sins that would affect any congregation and yes when we know of specific issues in our particular congregation we must be faithful to reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering that's the part of shepherding people and we preach publicly in house to house too so we preach what we do from our sermons but then we also meet with people and shepherd them individually and help apply scripture in a way that deals with a specific individual weaknesses, issues going on in our own congregations but you look at those seven letters each one of them is different seven churches existing in the same region existing at the same time yet all those letters are unique to those congregations and we have to practice the same kind of shepherding we have to go to our final break right now it will be a lot more brief than the others don't go away we'll be right back with Richard Caldwell right after these messages

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Hope to see you there. And look for me if you attend the

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Thursday through Sunday, February 18th through the 20th, and I would love to see as many of you as possible there.

Go to anchoredintruth .org anchoredintruth .org forward slash true -church -conference forward slash.

And we are back with our final moments with Richard Caldwell of Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas, one of the scheduled speakers at the

True Church Conference. We have been talking about spirit -empowered preaching, and if you could,

I want to make sure that you have a few minutes of uninterrupted time, Pastor Caldwell, to really bare your soul, to really have etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today what you most want them to remember when they leave this program.

Thank you, Chris. First of all, I just want to say what an excellent job you do, and I mean that sincerely.

What a great interviewer you are. I appreciate it very much, the way that you've conducted the program together, so I appreciate you having me on.

Well, that's the best birthday gift I've received today, that's for sure. Well, I appreciate you.

Yeah, I think what's most on my heart these days, Chris, is I think we all recognize we're sort of in a new season, at least those of us listening who are

United States citizens. We're in a new season in our country. We recognize there are not only dangerous things already happening, but even more dangerous things on the horizon.

I think our instincts are that what we need is some sort of movement to address those things, and so there seems to almost be, and I'm about to be in a conference.

We host a conference every year, so I'm not against conferences. There seems to be this mindset that what we need is more and more conferences to address the big issues of the day, and what

I want to say is I don't believe that's the need. I believe the need, as the

True Church Conference will address, is healthy churches. Most spirit -empowered preaching is not taking place in conferences in our day.

I'm not saying that conference preaching isn't spirit -empowered, I'm saying most of what the Spirit of God is doing in our day is happening in obscure places, in fields for shepherding, all over this planet in local churches.

Faithful men, largely unknown, who love

Christ, love His Church, and are faithfully opening the Scriptures every week, and so what

I want to say to those listening to us today is, if you're in a healthy church, thank

God for your church. Thank God for your pastors. Encourage them. Pray for them.

Attend to their ministries. Let them guide you well. If you're not in a healthy church, time is too short.

If you have the opportunity to be in a healthy church, go be in one. Time is too short to sit in unhealthy places.

Make the most of the time you have for Christ. Spend your life well, don't waste it.

And so the burden on my heart these days is faithful pastors engaging in faithful pastoral preaching, faithful churches, healthy churches, that's the need of the moment.

Now, you said something very important, and I don't want to insult those that have said this and are doing it, because they may be actually making inroads, by the grace of God, in less than adequate churches.

But very often I will hear from brethren that are right on the money in their personal, their theological positions, their understanding of the scriptures, their life seems to be glorifying to God.

But I am very often shocked to hear that the churches where they are members are really abysmal.

They are perhaps not in the actual category of being a cult or a false church or a liberal apostate church, but they are really known even across the board and the community where they are as being compromising and very weak.

And don't you think the excuse that I am here to make improvements,

I'm here to have a positive impact, even though that can be an occasion where that is truthfully being conducted and it's bearing fruit, that is an excuse that's too often made, and it's really stunting the growth of the ones saying it?

I do, Chris. I think there's a difference between churches that have had a good foundation and have had good teaching, and they're in a season where something, you know, is afoot in the church that isn't as healthy as it once was.

There's something to be said for fighting for that. I understand that. You know, I think the church at Corinth represented that.

I mean, that's why Paul takes them back in that second chapter to how it all began. Can we remember how it all began?

So you have a true church that is going through some challenges.

Well, that's different than to be in a church that it's off at the very foundational level, and you have opportunity to be in a healthier church right there in your area.

There's a difference between those two situations. So if you're in a church that has a healthy history and you have an opportunity to make a difference, to see that restored, that's one thing.

But to just remain in a church where your growth is going to be stunted, where things are not going to change, where it's off at the very foundational level and you have opportunity to be somewhere else,

I don't know why you would stay there. I would go be a part of a healthy congregation. Well, folks, please join Pastor Caldwell and myself at the

True Church Conference in Muscle Shoals, Alabama this Thursday through Sunday, February 18th through the 20th.

And for more details, go to anchoredintruth .org, anchoredintruth .org, and click on the

Conference tab at the top of the page. Also, don't forget about Founders Baptist Church in Spring, Texas.

Their website is foundersbaptist .org, foundersbaptist .org. I want to thank everybody for listening today.

I want to thank Pastor Caldwell for doing such a superb job, and I want you all to remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater