An Essential For A Good Church

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, but we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, 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 isn't for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry.

Worship That Is God-Centered Rather Than Consumer-Centered

My name's Mike Abendroth, and that Pete's coffee is kicking in. I think it's kicking in. Is it true the other day that the Starbucks Big Shot said something like, if you aren't a proponent of gay marriage, I don't want your business?

I'd like to know if that was true or not. I'd like to know. Might have to grant him his wish. If I only had more Pete's coffees around, that would be helpful. Of course, in New England here, we've got the Dunkin' Donuts everywhere.

I mean, everywhere we've got the Dunkin' Donuts. Well, what do I have here in front of me today? I received a wonderful email from a visitor, and I, at the risk of back slapping, we know that in me dwells no good thing and that I'm just a conduit for the Lord's word and preaching and giving messages.

But I'm very thankful for this, and it's a teaching opportunity for you. If I were to visit your meeting, your local assembly, your church gets together on Sunday, if you want to have a Saturday night service, in addition to Sunday service, great.

If you want to have a Saturday night service instead of Sunday morning, you need to rethink your Lord's Day worship, but that's another topic. But you don't understand, we don't have enough room. But you don't understand, I want to stay home and get some stuff done on Sunday.

There's a game and all that stuff. Get it out of the way on Saturday night. Did you say you're Roman Catholic? But if I were to visit your church, worship service, Sunday morning worship service, Sunday night, what might I take away from that?

Well, there are Christ-centered songs. There are songs about redemption, forgiveness, God, the creator, God, the redeemer, God, the sustainer. There are opportunities to worship in giving, in having the scripture read.

Somebody stands there and reads the scripture, offers a pastoral prayer that's longer than, now lay me down to sleep, pray the Lord, so that I may be filled with the glory of his holy name. Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest, let us be blessed, amen.

I almost did the rosary, but I decided not to. Just beside myself, I did. My grandmother was Roman Catholic, and I loved her. My other grandparents were Lutheran, and I loved them. But in their desire for assuaging their consciences, they both found religions that granted them via baptismal regeneration, a false acceptance before God.

So that was too bad. But when visitors come to the local church, when I visit a church, if the songs seem older or newer, if the scripture reading seems shorter than I prefer, if the guy will stand up and say, he doesn't have to say these words, but this is what it demonstrates.

I am under the word of God. I'm a steward, and I am here to deliver via heralding the truth. My own opinion, book reviews, popular culture, media, intelligentsia, Ivy League schools, German higher criticism, it does not matter.

This is who the Lamb of God is. This is what his word says, and we need to know about it, and we are under its authority. And therefore, I will preach the word in season and out of season. Those are the only two times I preach, in season and out of season.

So when a visitor came to our church from North Carolina, and then she wrote an email, I was happy because it's by the grace of God, but it's something that we're trying to do. It's something that I want you to pray for at your local church.

It is something that we strive to do in terms of being a New Testament church that focuses on the Lord, on the Lord's day. This is the Lord's day. If you wanna be a Sabbatarian, you can do things in light of your Sabbath piety and necessity and those types of things.

I'm not, that's not even my concern today, but it is the Lord's day. That's why Father's day, well, we never celebrate really Father's day anyway. Dad gets some eggs and a tie. That's about what he gets.

And Mother's day, we make a big deal on that because of the guilt ridden consciences of America and the husbands never do anything right, but half the time we don't. So maybe we should be guilty, trying to make up for it on that day, shame on us.

But it's not Mother's day. We can honor mothers and say we're thankful for them, but it's the Lord's day. So what would a Lord's day worship service look like? Of course, in scripture, we have some regulating principles that tell us what a New Testament worship service should look like.

And I'm one of those people that I would rather be governed by scripture, do these things, and then we just do those versus it doesn't say not to do them. So we can do them. I guess we have announcements that's not in scripture, but that's not really technically part of the worship service.

There's a couple of announcements and then worship begins with the call to worship. Then we sing some songs. And so I think you can find a place for scripture reading and songs and communion and baptism and giving prayer, preaching.

So back to the email here. I visited your church this Sunday and enjoy the service. It was so good to not worry about what was being taught and it wasn't superficial. There was some depth to it. Sorry, there was depth to it.

I met some nice people. I really liked, they mentioned a person's name. She has a lovely, kind demeanor. I especially enjoyed being able to worship appropriately. Giving worth to Jesus is worship. There was nothing from Hillsong or Jesus culture.

Come on, but that'll draw in the young ones. Where are those college students? I'm not trying to say I don't want the college students. I'm not crass in the sense that they just take up seats. They don't serve and they don't give.

Actually, some college students do serve and they do give. And over the years, we have had some of those very ones, I'm thinking about Andrew and Anitra off the top of my head, who get involved, who say to themselves, I might not move away.

And they get married, they have children, they grow up in a local church and they have been servants since they got here. Well, almost since they got here, they needed to become members and stuff. No Hillsong or Jesus culture.

What a joy. I felt blessed by the worship alone, since it was about God, not about what God did for me, me, me. Not bragging about what I'm going to do for him. Not a lot of repetition, not a loud, distracting rhythm.

It was worship. She goes on to say some other things. But this lady, I think she understands something very basic. Of course, we are glad that God redeemed us and there's praise in scripture for the risen lamb, the lamb standing as if slain, Revelation 5.

Of course, no one's saying anything different to that. But God is to be worshiped for who he is. And if he didn't do anything for us, he's still to be worshiped. Did you get that? You dig? We come to scripture and we see this God is to be praised, simply for who he is, simply for what he's done.

And if it happens to be for us, well, then it gets even better. Of course, it becomes more personalized and we are the recipients. But God's salvation is first about who he is and how he gets glory for it, being the just and justifier, being both holy and gracious at the same time, and keeping the righteous holy law and also being loving enough and knowing a way to uphold the universe and still save sinners.

She said, when she went to other churches, as a visitor, here's what she got out of the churches. As a visitor, I got free coffee and a bag of swag, a plastic cup with a cover, a thumb drive, sunglasses, and a few other silly things.

I wonder what that little gift bag costs. When I was in medical sales and we'd have big conventions, Las Vegas Convention Center being the largest that I know of. Is that the largest convention center in the country?

At least it used to be. It was a medical deal. And so doctors and nurses would come in and then you would have bags of stuff to give them. Pens, cups. What are those things that you put around a 12 ounce can?

A koozie, a koozie, a bob koozie, an insulator that's squishy. You get all that stuff. And of course it's cheap because there are companies that sell that kind of stuff. Here, put your name on it and everything else.

For years here at Bethlehem Bible Church, Bethlehem Baptist Church back in the day, I never had to order any pens because these pen companies send you one for free. And it says Bethlehem Bible Church on it.

And then it's got the address, phone number, and you can give it out to visitors. Now there's nothing wrong with giving a little gift to visitors. We have a little swag bag that we give out, except it's just a bag that has a Bible in it.

And I think ultimate questions by John Blanchard and some information about the church and Bible studies and stuff like that. Letter from pastoral staff, i .e. Steve Cooley. And so I'm not saying there's anything wrong with giving stuff out, but coffee, plastic cup, thumb drive.

What's in the thumb drive? Maybe there's a sermon on there. That might be a good idea. And sunglasses, probably have to keep buying different sunglasses throughout the seasons because first you had 25, 30 years ago, the original Ray-Bans.

Then you have the Ray-Bans. Now they're in style. Aren't they more of the flight type, flight style? I don't know. I bought some spy glasses. They're not the brand spy. A few years ago at a discount kind of garage sale, a sample sale.

That's what it's called, sample sale in Santa Cruz. So I just started wearing them, but I think they're already out of fashion. My kids, kids are like, dad, you're wearing those? Yes, they're polarized.

Yes, they're nice. Better than my $2 ones that I picked up in London. The swag sale. She writes, if I hadn't gone, it would have been hard to believe regarding what was in the bag. They were very solicitous, but about the wrong things.

In a city with so many churches, it's been a struggle to find a good one. So many people go to church, yet it seems more like belonging to a club than any real commitment to God. And doctrine doesn't even seem to be considered by most.

And then she asked for a reference. To a church where she, you know, the town in which she lives. Love that email. Love the email. So I wonder if we walk into the church worship service when the church is gathered on Sunday, where you are, what happens?

What do they get? Do they get sound doctrine? Do they get a swag bag? That's a new NoCo video. Sound doctrine or swag? Now we need a word with D for bag. What was that? I don't know. I'm not sure. New York Times, Mike Ebenruth here.

I don't work for the New York Times, but I have the New York Times in front of me, at least an article from September 1st, 2015. I mean, this is New York Times science section. What's wrong with this picture?

It talks about psychology. And to make it even better, as we talk about sola scriptura, the sufficiency of God's word, as Paul writes to Timothy, what do you need to be a pastor? Well, if you're a car mechanic, what do you need?

I guess you just need a Phillips screwdriver and a Chris wrench. Is that all you need? If you walked into a garage, a car repair shop, and on the board they have, what's that pegboard that they have in the back with all those holes and you can hang tools.

Some people, I think my grandpa, he used to put a tool up on that board in the garage and then he would take a magic marker and mark around there the exact shape so you would know what went on that particular thing.

Ever seen that? Yeah, of course you have. What's that called? It's holes, you can hang things from the holes, pegboard. I don't know. So you can email me, but that's gonna be too late because I do this show.

The show's now being recorded on September 11th. It's not being played till the 30th, 31st, something like that, October 1st. But what about pastors? What kind of tools do they have? They have a lot of tools, psychology degrees, sociology, clinical studies, all scripture, breathed out by God.

Timothy, it's profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness that the man of God, the preacher, that's the Old Testament term for preacher, may be competent, equipped for every good work.

Sufficiency of scripture. You can read Psalm 119, wonderful, acrostic, 22 sections, 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. You can read a shorter version, Psalm 19, general revelation, specific revelation.

You can look at Jesus's view of scripture. Here we have all scriptures breathed out by God. And if you are a pastor, you have your toolkit, and it's called the Bible. That's what you have. That's all you have.

I mean, what else do you have? Your own street smarts, your own philosophies, a bunch of degrees with letters after your name. Here in the New York Times, in the sciences section, an article by Benedict Carey, many psychology findings not as strong as claimed.

Study says, I must've printed it on nine one because here it says August 27th, 2015. The past several years have been bruising ones for the credibility of the social sciences. A star social scientist, sorry, a star social psychologist was caught fabricating data leading to more than 50 retracted papers.

A top journal published a study supporting the existence of ESP that was widely criticized. The journal Science pulled a political science paper on the effect of gay canvassers on voters' behavior because of concerns about fake data.

Now a painstaking years long effort to reproduce 100 studies published in three leading psychology journals has found that more than half of the findings do not hold up when retested. The analysis was done by research psychologists, many of whom volunteered their time to double check what they considered important work.

Their conclusions reported Thursday in the Journal of Science have confirmed the worst fears of scientists who have long worried that the field needed a strong correction. The vetted studies were considered part of the core knowledge by which scientists understand the dynamics of personality, relationships, learning, and memory.

Therapists and educators rely on such findings to help guide decisions. And the fact that so many of the studies were called into question could sow doubt into the scientific underpinnings of their work.

Now this article goes on, but let me just quote something else. More than 60 of the studies did not hold up. Among them was one on, are you ready? This is the drum roll. Okay, remember, this is no compromise radio.

I am Mike Avendroth, at least I think I am. I have a split personality sometimes. It's the good Mike today. New York Times, many psychology findings not as strong as claimed study says. Benedict Carey.

The one study that they're mentioning here on page two, second paragraph, of the 60 studies that didn't hold up, one of those that didn't hold up was on free will. It found that participants who read a passage arguing that their behavior is predetermined was more likely than those who had not read the passage to cheat on a subsequent test.

Well, the details of the study, I don't really care about, but it was on free will. That is a lark. That is a laugh. That is a knee slapper. So now what do we do? Well, as a Christian, we say to ourselves, when you hear science and psychology, I would argue that both science and psychology, if not built upon the foundation of the word of God, they're both going to be built on then something else.

Correct? So you either build your house on the rock, the word of God, or you build your house on the sand. If you build your house on the rock, well, scripture, since God is eternal, since God is unchanging, since God is immutable, scripture doesn't change either.

We know that philosophically, theologically, experientially, manuscriptually, that's true. But if you build your whole philosophy on something less than scripture, you ignore scripture, you discount it, you say it's not true, then you're just blown around by the wind.

And you call yourself science, but you have to keep updating things. You have to keep changing things. How empirical is empirical truth that has to be changed with a new philosophy of science? Let alone psychology.

I don't know how many different schools of psychology, depends on how you define them, 300, biology, economics, neuroscience. What is neuroscience, by the way? That's an interesting thing for me to consider.

In a conference call with reporters, Marsha McNutt, the editor-in-chief of Science said, that's capitalized, I caution that this study should not be regarded as the last word on reproducibility, but rather a beginning.

In May, after two graduate students raised questions about the data in widely reported study on how political canvassing affects opinions of same-sex marriage, science retracted the paper. Well, this is a call for action, but I don't think the psychologists and the scientists are going to call this action.

We've got to quit, we've got to do things the right way, we've got to stop doing these bad studies, analysis focused on studies published by Psychological Science. That's just a funny name to me, Psychological Science, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, and the Journal of Experimental Psychology, Learning, Memory, and Cognition, incognito.

Dr. Schwartz, Nabet Schwartz, USC. There's no doubt replication is important, but it's often just an attack, a vigilante exercise. See, it won't hold up, 35 studies did hold up, 62 did not. Okay, enough quoting.

Oh, it does say here, correction, August 29th, 2015, the picture caption on Friday with the article about the findings of the reproducibility project misspelled the surname. I have one of the researchers, she is Courtney Soderberg, not Soderberg.

There you have it. See, we even have to change the name at the end. Friends, Christian friends, you have the rock, you have the anvil, you have the word of God. It's like a hammer, Jeremiah says. It's like bread, it's the bread of life.

It's not shifting sand. It's to be trusted. What does 1 Peter say? 1 Peter just popped in my mind. God just told me to read 1 Peter. Of course he didn't tell me to read 1 Peter. He knows I know 1 Peter, and I would be very happy to say the spirit of God was leading me to talk about 1 Peter.

I'd be happy to say that if you'd like. It says here, the living and abiding word of God, discussing that in 1 Peter 1 .24, then says, four, all flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass.

The grass withers and the flower fails, but the word of the Lord remains forever. And this word is the good news that was preached to you. We have the Bible, but do you read the Bible? When's the last time you read 2 Samuel?

I've been reading 2 Samuel, it's amazing. The Davidic covenant. If the right man is in charge of the Davidic covenant, what can happen? And we realize David isn't the right man. We had a flash of maybe the right man, and Moab is defeated in chapter 10, and then Meshubbeth, we have not only the power of the Davidic covenant, but we also have the kindness of the one who has the Davidic covenant, and then David commits adultery, murder, deception, lying, and we know he's not the right David.

But there is the right David. You begin to study 2 Samuel, and you think there needs to be a better David. We have the word of God abiding true. You need to read the Bible. And when these studies come out to be found as not true, I'm not shocked, are you?

I'm not shocked when science changes. I'm not shocked when especially psychology changes, and I especially am not shocked when we call people who are into psychology scientists. But anyway, that's another matter, nocoradio .com.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth 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 bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.