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NoCo Jr is in town and always opinionated. Where did he get that? Tune in for a fast paced show with a dad and a son.
Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, ìBut we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour ,î so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.
In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isnít for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as weíre called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.
Hereís our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.
Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry, my name is Mike Abendroth. And for the, how many times, Luke, the umpteenth time, how do they do the umpteen? Whatís the umpteen? Umpire. Seriously? We need an umpire between us.
Okay. Job 9. Job 9. Job 9. Well, in the studio today with me is my son, Luke Abendroth, 25 years old, is that true? Quarter of a century. Okay. Why wouldnít you be smarter if youíre already 25 years old?
Well, you know, I didnít, unfortunately didnít inherit the genes from my mom, it was mostly the male side.
I so tend Seminal headship, is what thatís called. I so, well, we donít believe in that, do we? I know.
Well, in that one category we do, with genes. Okay, okay, good.
Anyway, itís good to have you back in town, Luke, for the Christmas holidays and everything else. And seriously, this is what, maybe the fourth or fifth time weíve had you in the studio?
We do a couple shows at a time. At least ten, yeah. Maybe four separate instances, butÖ. Right.
Ten shows or something? Now, this is a, sounds gonna, itís gonna sound serious, but itís not really that serious. If I would have died in the hospital from the COVID pneumonia, not just COVID pneumonia, but the COVID pneumonia, would you have carried on the no compromise tradition?
What would you have done with the show? I mean, all the rights and privileges and everything, all the money was gonna be yours. Would you have carried on?
I donít know. I think the wisest thing that I, the wisest attribute that I have is that I know Iím not that smart, so maybe I should wait a couple years, you know, like ten years of ministry, then you restart.
No co-coming back after a ten-year hiatus. Yeah, yeah.
Well, seriously, sometimes Iíll talk to pastors and, I mean, Iím sane about myself, too. Everybody wants a podcast, but a 35-year-old man in ministry or a 40-year-old man, they got kids in the house and itís a new church.
I always say thereís plenty of time for podcasts.
Yeah. I mean, if I did it, it would mostly just be marriage advice that Iíd be giving out. Oh, that would be good. You know what I think you should do? And child rearing. Write a parenting book. Yeah, thatís my plan.
Iím working on it now. Got the first draft done. I wanted to give it to you and correct all the mistakes that you made.
So since last time, you have not moved, but youíre thinking about going to seminary. Tell us about that.
Yeah, I actually, I have. I think last time I was here, I hadnít moved yet. I moved to San Diego about eight months ago. Oh, yeah, it was. Okay. So, yeah, I took a new job down there, and Iím thinking about enrolling in seminary hopefully in the next year or two at Westminster, California, Westminster Seminary in Escondido.
Soó. Yeah, but I know that thing when you and Scott, Scott Clark, got in that big fight and stuff. Oh, yeah. Fisticuff alteration. Oh, right. Yeah, I would lose that.
Is he still letting you come back? I think so. I donít remember that, but I think I must have lost. Okay. Okay. Are you truly Reformed? No. Iím not TR.
Does it even bother you? Not really. All right. Letís talk seriously with Shop. Tell me, Luke, a little bit about where do you fit in the spectrum if youíve got dispensationalism on one side, truly Reformed, kind of Pado-Baptist covenant theology on the other side.
Weíre not talking about baptism now. Thereís a 1689 Federalism with some nuances in the New Covenant. Where do you line up and why?
Nice. Thatís a good question. Thatís what you always say in a podcast, right? You say thatís a good question if you need time to think. I know. You say thatís a good question and youíre thinking. And then you repeat the question.
And then you repeat the question. Oh, thatís a great question. What was the question again? You know, I think I just believe what you believe.
So, what do you believe? Sometimes Gracie will text me when sheís at a chapel or something and she asks a question, ìDad, do you like or do we like a particular person ?î. Do we like a particular person?
Yeah. Do we believe this? Uh-huh. And then I just have to tell her what we believe. Yeah. Hereís what we believe, Gracie.
I think, you know, the last couple of years, especially with all of your friends at Westminster Escondido and just sort of reading those guys and listening to their podcasts, itís hard for me to get on board with everything in the 1689 Federalism scheme.
But I will admit I havenít studied it much. But I do think, you know, when you get to things like Abraham being, in a sense, an administration of the covenant of works, that seems to run intoÖ I run into issues with that with Galatians when you have the sharp contrast between Moses and Abraham and things like that.
So, I donít really know the answer to that question. But I think I would lean more towards a traditional Presbyterian scheme of covenant theology without infant baptism. I donít know if youíre allowed to do that.
Yeah. Iím sure there are people who would say youíre not allowed to do that. But it just seems like there is a covenant of grace before the New Covenant.
But itís on our show, so we do what we want, right? I guess itís your show, so you do what you want. No, itís ours now, because Iíve passed the mantle down. Oh, wow. Okay, wellÖ Yeah, no Code Junior at the helm here.
Okay, I donít know.
See, thatís why I donít have the show, because I donít even have a clear answer to that. The answer is, I donít know, but thatís where I lean towards.
Right. I think one of my problems is, I have not read Barcellus as much as I should, and the Renehans and others, you know, Ron Baines, who hasÖheís not written as much as the other guys. But anyway, I donít know if Iím just that smart.
Part of it is, you know, Iím not calling covenant theologians dumb. Iím just saying the Renehans and Rich are pretty smart. But so is Clark, too. Yeah, theyíre all pretty smart. Yeah, okay. I didnít have any idea what we were going to talk about, Luke.
I just wanted to get you back on the show again. I read David Calhounís book, A Sheep Remembers. It was a book about Psalm 23, and itís got commentary, then some quotes, and then a little bit of his own testimony, because he had cancer for so long, and it was really tough for him.
Heís since with the Lord. But I just want to say something about this, and I know you can kind of come back toward at me. Iím listening to the snowplow outside. It snowed how many inches last night? Seven, do you think?
Seven inches. Something like that, yeah. Remember Vance Havner? If I ask you who Vance Havner was, would you know? A seven-inch man. Yeah, I know. Southern Baptist, kind of Arminian, revivalistic guy.
He was sharp on his feet in terms of his wit. Havner quoted Matthew 11, 6, ìBlessed is the one who is not offended by me .î And paraphrased it, ìBlessed is the one who does not get upset by the way I, God, run things.
This, he said, is the forgotten beatitude .î. Donít you like that? Love that. I love it, because this is the way God runs things. ÌBlessed is he or the one who does not get upset by the way I run things .î Thatís good.
I know. Iíd probably underline that if I had a book. I think you did in that book. Whatís your theology of underlining?
I underline everything that I consider unimportant, and then the parts that are not underlined is what I really like. Okay. It just helps me focus when Iím reading.
I think some of the Qumran texts do the same thing.
Yeah, thatís where I got that when I visited the Qumran caves. Qumran.
Now, you spent a summer, or a semester, rather, in Israel. You went to Qumran. I did, yeah. Anything come to mind if I say Qumran? What did they think, believe, the Qumranites? I donít know. I donít really remember.
Dead Sea Scrolls. Thatís all I know. Masoretic. Didnít they come up with that? The little dots or something? I donít know. I donít know anything about that. Okay. Tell me what youíre reading these days at home.
You know what? Iím reading theÖ I know youíre reading a lot of secular stuff, and QAnon and stuff, but I mean, the biblical stuff. QAnon.
Come on, man. January 6, ìMoment of Silence .î Anyways, Iím reading ìThe Gospel Mystery of Sanctificationî by Walter Marshall. Iíve been kind of reading through it for a while now, but Iím really trying to finish it up.
So Iím about a third of the way through. Iím going to hopefully finish it in the next couple days. All right. Let me stop you there.
Sanctification, the work of the Spirit of God by grace, lots of times we think itís holy living or obedience or faithfulness, which really, itís the Spirit of God working in our lives is sanctifying us, and the fruit of that is holy living and obedience.
Why do you think the evangelical church is so messed up on one of the key doctrines for a Christian that is sanctification? I donít even think we know how to define it. Is it because of biblicism? Is it because of, ìWe just want holy living in the church ?î I mean, I think everybody wants holy living.
Doesnít Marshall want holy living? Yeah.
I think thatís why he wrote the book. But the answer to the question is, why are people messed up? Why are we so messed up? Yeah. I donít know. Itís probably something to do with Satan.
Could it be Satan? Could it be? So anything highlighted in the book that comes to mind? I mean, he repeats a lot of the things over and over and over.
Yeah, I think itís just helpful to read somebody, you know, I think Walter Marshall died in 1680, if Iím, you can correct me if Iím wrong, but I donít think he really wrote anything else, but he was a contemporary of all those Puritan guys, and just reading him and seeing the things that he targets and calls out as something that is unbiblical or neo-gnome is really interesting.
Some of the things that we think today are new crises in the reformed world, quote unquote, he has already addressed. So things like, he says that people who are afraid that the gospel is going to lead to license, that free grace, the offer of Christ made to each and every man, the scandalous offer, as some say, he thinks thatís going to lead to abuse, to license, or some people think that, and he addresses that by saying, or basically the way that they address that, those people who are afraid, the neo-gnomians, is they, instead of using language like rest, trust, receive, they talk about making some kind of commitment to obedience to Christ, commitment to following Christ, and we canít just have this idea of faith, of resting alone in the finished work of Christ, instead we have to have some kind of surrender, some kind of swearing allegiance to Christ, I donít remember what page it is on in the book, but Iím sure you could post it in the show notes or something, chapter 4, yeah, but anyways, thereís this idea that the neo-gnomians came up with, that thatís going to preserve people from abusing grace, if we just say trust, rest, receive, people are going to abuse that, and itís just so interesting because you hear that language today in certain circles, and you think, oh thatís just how we define faith, surrendering to Christ as Lord, and although we do surrender to Christ as Lord, we do submit to him as Lord, we do follow him, we do take up our cross daily, deny ourselves and follow him, that is not in the category of faith, itís in the category of sanctification, so I just think things like that are interesting where you see these issues really arenít so new.
Itís fine for Christians to want to be more committed, right? To have a greater allegiance, to be more surrendered to Godís will? I think itís a necessity. Right, thatís good language for the Christian, but we do believe in sola fide, and we have said this on the show numerous times, there are no antecedent conditions to faith, in other words, you donít have to do something in order to believe, you donít surrender first, or commit, or yield, or, would you ever use a word like ìdesireî for God, or ìtreasureî?
I donít think thatís a good one. Here, let me just, I can read the quote, here we go.
Alright, this is, now this is when the show gets interesting.
Hereís the Walter Marshall quote, this is regarding the Neonomians, ìAnd that they may the better secure the practice of holiness by their conditional faith, they will not have trusting in God or Christ for salvation to be accounted the principal saving act of it, because, as it seems to them, many loose, wicked people trust on God and Christ for their salvation as much as others, and are, by their confidence, hardened the more in their wickedness.
But they had rather it should be obedience ,î so this is how theyíre going to redefine faith, ìbut they had rather it should be obedience to all Christís laws, at least in resolution, or a consent that Christ should be their Lord, accepting of his terms of salvation, and a resignation of themselves to his government in all things .î.
So they want to say, itís not just faith, itís not just trust, because thatís going to lead to wicked living, it has to be a resignation to the government of Christ. And of course, we resign ourselves to the government of Christ, but is that how the Bible describes saving faith?
And Walter Marshall says, ìNo, this is the Neonomians .î.
I think, isnít the Neonomian the show out, Matrix Resurrections or something? Thatís the Neonomian show. Isnít he the main guy?
Yeah, Neonomian, yeah. But heís winning, thatís why you know itís a satanic show, because the Neonomians always lose. The Neonomians have what kind of pill? Blue pill. Red pill is the gospel, free grace.
Well, just to come back at you with all that, what shall we do? Keep on sinning so God can keep on forgiving? I should hope not. If we have left the country where sin is sovereign, how can we still live in our own house?
Ooh, what is that? Thatís the, what is that, the message? Yeah, the message fromÖ. I just gave that away as a white elephant gift to somebody. Oh.
Thatís a pretty good one, huh? I had from Ray a Jack Van Empey prophecy Bible that was genuine leather, super nice, it was a gift edition, and I used that for a white elephant gift when the elders were over and Cooley got it.
The Tuesday guy got it. The Tuesday guy was happy with that one. He does his devotions in that still, I heard. He does, and he actually, he wanted me, kind of like the Witch of Endor calling up Samuel, he wanted to call, have me call up Jack Van Empey and I would sign it, like, in lieu of Jack Van Empey.
So weíd have an autographed copy. Thatís cool. Now we need Kathy Kuhlman next. Whatís her name? Kathryn Kuhlman. Yeah. Why, why, oh, hereís another question, since youíre going to go to Westminster Seminary.
Why is Robert Godfrey obsessed with Kathryn Kuhlman? Would you ask him that if you see him walking around campus, even thoughÖ I thought it was Sister Amy. Oh, I, I stand corrected. Sister Amyís America.
Thatís right. Because thatís the world we live in.
Uh-huh. Thatís right. Come on, baby, until you disappear. Well, she was the one that disappeared, right? She went off, ran off with the piano player, uh-huh, down to Mexico, faked her own death, and then she came back to ministry.
Thatís, thatís what you do. That sounds like whatís going on these days with Christianity, where thereís that website, if you want speakers, and you can pay for a speaker to come, and itís got David Platt, $10 ,000 to $20 ,000.
Wow. Radical. Thatís a radical price. I know, uh, Shevigin, Tulian, I think itís $10 ,000 to $20 ,000 as well. Uh-huh. Christine Kane, $10 ,000 to $20 ,000.
Uh, Tim Keller, $10 ,000 to $20 ,000. Have you ever seen that, that, uh, whatís that, uh, the Lutheran satire video where itís the, itís the evangelical guy, and heís talking to the, the Roman Catholic, and he says, ìYou donít need to do this whole thing where you move them secretly to another parish after you, after you commit these sins.
Just take a six-month hiatus. Come back and tell anybody that tries to criticize you they just donít really understand the gospel and grace, and youíve been forgiven, so just come right back into ministry .î.
See, there we go. See, thatís a great plan.
Mike Abendroth with Luke Abendroth here on No Compromise Radio Ministry. Weíre going to do a little fun thing. I have a treasury of quotations, evangelical press, uh, put together by John Blanchard. Mm.
You remember John Blanchard? Yeah, when he came over to the house that one time, helped us plant the garden. He did. Iím just kidding. That was Daniel Bloch. Yeah, Iím just kidding.
John Blanchard. John Blanchard. With the ìUltimate Questionsî book. He gave it out. Yeah, thatís right. I wonder if we re-read ìUltimate Questionsî if we still would like it. I donít know.
Is this the royal ìwe ?î. Uh-huh. Royal. What do we believe, Dad?
Yeah. I donít think I text you that anymore. Iím just going to open this up and just give you a quote, and then you just tell me something about the quote. Okay. Okay?
Spurgeon. I think our friend calls this ìNo Content Radio .î I call thisÖ This is called ìLate Night Pool Radio .î I canít think. I stayed up too late last night playing pool. Okay.
ÌFree will, I have often heard of, but I have never seen it. I have met with will and plenty of it, but it has neither led captive by sin or held in blessed bounds of grace .î. Isnít that funny? Thatís good.
ÌIíve heard of it, but Iíve never seen it .î.
Itís a nice principle. The island of goodness around your will.
Why is that? You know, that goes back to the whole inner light with the Quakers and the ìFriends ,î they call it. And you donít really need much of the Bible, because the inner light will guide you. Whatís wrong with that?
Well, it didnít really work. There arenít many of them around anymore. How many Quakers do you know? I know, Will. You know, thereísÖ You eat Quaker oats, though. There are fewer Shakers than there are Quakers, because Shakers said no sex, and Quakers said okay.
And they didnít have too many conversions, Shakers. I know. Whatís up with that? Well, I think whatÖ Thatís why they made good furniture. Yeah. They had nothing else to do. Nobodyís converting. No evangelism.
No evangelism, yeah. I donít even remember the question anymore. Free will or something. No, I know. Okay, soÖ Free Willy. I know right where we are. Iím a pro at this. What other books are you reading?
Oh, okay. Cool. You know what? Iím taking my time through the Institutes. So I think Iím almost done with Book 1. I should finish it in the next week or two, hopefully two weeks.
What version of the Institutes, Calvinís Institutes? Itís the Lewis Battles.
Lewis Battles? Thatís the good one, right? Not the beverage one. I think the beverage oneís fine, but I donít like to be reminded of drinks when Iím reading. Okay, thatís good.
I think when he wrote the firstÖ The first time he sat down and wrote the edition of the Institutes, he was 25. Is that about right? Man, that makes me feel dumb. Just tell me about that right now. Thatís really interesting.
Another episode of I Am Dumb. But it was a lot shorter. Yeah, it was a lot shorter back then. Well, yeah, thatís right. So, that makes sense. Okay, so Institutes, thatís good. One of the things, Luke, that we talk about regularly is the response to Calvinís, you know, criticizing Calvin, when they havenít even read the Institutes.
We had to read the section on prayer, warm, rich, devotional. I mean, Iíve since read the whole thing, but I donít know what people are thinking. Justification section. Itís great.
Well, and the whole thing is great. I mean, the thing with Calvin is it really, once you start reading it, itís like this is totally written for new believers. Super easy to read, and people are like, ìOh, Calvin, you know, heís so boring ,î or something.
But then you start reading him, and he does like a little systematic theology section, and then he just goes off blasting somebody, you know, and then the sophists are going to be, ìDamn for this ,î and then he goes back to defining some kind of theological terms.
So, I think, you know, I had a theory the other day. I think all these books about, you know, hereís what Calvin thought, and Luther, and Owen, itís like you got to keep the book industry going. So, we canít really point people to the original authors.
We got to just write books about what we think about what they thought, because if people just read them, we wonít make money anymore.
Itís hard to get a doctorate without some dissertation or something. But I donít know.
Itís just like these people. I mean, I know Owenís hard to read and stuff, but you can read these people, and itís really ñ. Iím not the smartest guy in the room, but itís not that complicated.
Years ago when someone told me, ìPick a theologian and read his stuff ,î I was dabbling with trying to read Edwards, and Iím glad I never fulfilled mine. That would have been bad.
I donít know what to say about that. I just know that I had some ñ I got to sit and listen to Fesco and Dr. Clark talk about that, and I just walked away with maybe Edwards isnít so great after all. A lot of it was over my head, but thatís the one part that I got.
Okay, Edwards, not so great. Some kind of thing about him being, you know, not understanding classical theism and some kind of weird animism thing, and then the other thing about Edwards is people have all these arguments.
They write all these different books about what he believed about justification by faith alone. Itís like, you know, if you have one goal in ministry, maybe it should be that people arenít confused about what you think about justification sola fide.
I donít think people are going to be confused when you die about what you think about justification sola fide.
Luke, it is so true. Iím thinking about Doug Wilson and why we donít support Doug Wilson or would want anybody to read Wilson. A myriad of reasons. Right, but at the top of the list is, if you donít get justification by faith alone sola fide right, I donít really care what you have to say, short of, you know, youíre my neighbor and you were in Vietnam and we can talk shop about that and you can just teach me, but theologically, if you canít get that right, then I donít ñ itís the same thing with Baxter, same thing with Daniel Fuller and all that stuff.
Well, at least Baxter and Fuller didnít write sex novels, so, you know, that doesnít really ñ I always thought, you know, why would you write a sex novel? Why would you, if you believe in final justification by ñ thereís some kind of final justification, why would you think that itís good to start writing dirty novels with quotes that are so inappropriate you would never even read them over the air and then everybody is freaking out about how great Doug Wilson is because heís supporting fake vaccine cards and anti-mask.
Itís like, you just get your politics from politicians, theyíre a lot more interesting and stay away from creepy sola fide deniers. I see ñ I feel like weíre just talking, but I forget this is going to be on the air.
I know. What about Joe Rogan? Should we have him on NOCO? I think TJ ñ I like Joe Rogan a lot more. Iíd rather listen to Joe Rogan than that.
Oh, man. Okay, so Institutes, Walter Marshall, both of those weíd highly recommend here on the radio show. Walter Marshallís book on sanctification, John Murray said, was the most important book ever written on sanctification.
I just disagree a little bit. I think Galatians would be, but ñ Yeah. Romans. Romans. And so then youíve got, you know, youíve got, youíve got, youíve got, youíve got, and you have Institutes, good, so thatís old school going back to some of the original things.
What else, anything?
I mean, I kind of always got too many things going on at once. Iím listening to 1984 which is kind of fun to listen to, pretty interesting. And then Iím reading a book, Iím reading some different novels, Iím reading Once an Eagle itís called.
Itís pretty interesting when you get, you start seeing Big Eva stuff, itís got a lot of parallels between military stuff, people sucking up to each other and playing the politics game, and unfortunately, you see that in a bunch of churches, so that's pretty good.
And then I'm also reading, oh, I know I gave you this recommendation. By the way, you can take your mask off. It's okay being in here. I don't, you know, even though I think this is a safe place and everybody's been quadruple boosted, I just feel like if our neighbors drive by and look through the window there in the snowstorm and they see I don't have a mask, I might not be able to win them over to the gospel if I don't have a mask on.
Winning people over with winsomeness. Right.
Right. Right. That's, I mean, that is the most important thing. As long as people see that we are tolerant, no matter what it is, even if the government says, you know, you need to wear a sombrero because it's for the sun, it's just a show that you love your neighbor.
So we need to do that. It's not a sin. It's not a sin to wear a dunce cap. We always need to let the world define what loving your neighbor means. Are you interrupting me on my show? I don't think so.
Everything I learned, everything I learned, you taught me, so I'm just blaming you for anything I say. Even bad things. Yeah, that's true. That's true. That's true. Like my pool shot last night. But anyways, I think the, and then I've just recommended to you and you got from mom, the Ralph Erskine book.
Oh, Gospel Sonnets. Gospel Sonnets. Awesome. Yeah. So good. I wish we had a copy of it in here. I think it's some kind of, it's some type of poem. No, no, no. William Shakespeare has some good sonnets.
That's what I know. Uh-huh.
I think somebody should name their daughter Sonnet. What if she couldn't sing and she was like an athlete and she wasn't really artsy? That's perfect. That's what you want.
Sonnet. No, that's really good. Just gospel centered. You know, it's like a, it's all poetry, but it's systematic theology in poetry form. But it's all these antinomianism, neonomianism, free offer of the gospel, sanctification by faith, why we always go back to works, all these different things, how to be sanctified.
It's like every page. I think actually it was John Patton's. Something about either one of either his favorite or one of his favorite books that he brought with him to the new Hebrides, you know, cause he's a Scottish guy and he's got the Bible, obviously.
And then he's got Ralph Erskine's gospel sonnets.
Do you ever abbreviate covenant of works as cow ever say cow? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Every day. Hey Luke, thanks for being on the show. My name is Mike Avendroth with Luke Avendroth here. If you ever want to get ahold of Luke, you can write me Mike at no compromise radio .com.
I almost couldn't pronounce my own radio show's name.
Well that's how it goes.
No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Avendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.
Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.