June 20, 2025 Show with Dr. Joseph C. Morecraft III on “A Reformed Christian Response to the Ted Cruz-Tucker Carlson Dispute Over the Modern State of Israel & Genesis 12:3”

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Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer

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George Duffield, 19th century gospel minister George Norcross, and sports legend

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Jim Thorpe. It's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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

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

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

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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.

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

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

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

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Chris Arnson, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Friday on this 20th day of June 2025, and I would appreciate the prayers of my listeners today.

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As today is a very bittersweet anniversary for me, today would have been my 34th wedding anniversary, and the

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Lord saw fit to take my precious bride, Julie, home with him back in 2010, in December of 2010, and she has been with him for eternity ever since.

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But today was our wedding anniversary date, so I appreciate your prayers for me today.

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But I am absolutely thrilled to have one of my favorite guests of all time and also one of my favorite guests, one of the favorite guests that I have on the program in the minds and hearts of my audience, a growing number of my audience members, who absolutely love this guest just as I do.

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His name is Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft III, and it's been a while since Joe has been on the program, far too long, and I'm so glad that he has returned today.

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He is pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, and author of an eight -volume commentary on the

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Westminster Larger Catechism titled Authentic Christianity, and the author of other books as well.

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We are going to be having a very timely discussion today. We're going to have

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Pastor Moorcraft give a Reformed Christian response to the

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Ted Cruz -Tucker Carlson dispute over the modern state of Israel in Genesis 12, verse 3.

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And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Shepherd and Zion Radio, Dr.

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Joe Moorcraft. Always an honor to be on your show, Chris. Amen.

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Well, the pleasure is all mine, brother. Many of our listeners will know that just recently

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Tucker Carlson had an interview with Senator Ted Cruz, and I don't know the exact date that the interview took place, but I know that Tucker made it public, or at least an excerpt from it, on X on June 17th, so the interview likely just occurred three or four days ago at the most.

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And it turned into a very heated discussion over the issue of should

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America be siding with and supporting the modern nation of Israel in all they do, in all their conflicts, etc.?

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And Ted Cruz said the number one compelling factor for him, for America to support the modern -day state of Israel, was that he heard and remembered from the

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Bible since the days of his youth that the Lord said, I will bless them that bless thee and curse him that curseth thee, and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed, referring to Israel back in the days of Genesis when it was written.

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And this would have been specifically a citation from Genesis chapter 12, verse 3.

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And Tucker Carlson pushed back on Mr. Cruz, challenging him as to whether or not this was actually referring to today's modern state of Israel.

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And we're going to have Dr. Joe Moorecraft give his opinion, which is the opinion of many, if not most,

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Reformed Christians. So why don't you tell us about that,

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Joe? Is Genesis 12 .3, and even all references to Israel in the

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Old Covenant, can we trust that throughout the millennia that everything that God promised to that nation in the

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Old Covenant, should we be taking it for granted that he is intending us to view this modern state of Israel in the same way as a fulfillment of biblical prophecy?

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Joe, are you there? Yes, sir. I'm right here. Did you hear what I said? Yes, sir.

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And this is one of my favorite topics. It's one of the most important topics that we can consider.

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But in order to get to that question, we've got to go back to the 1600s in the colonies.

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America has always been shaped in its politics and in its society by its understanding of the kingdom of God.

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That concept has changed through the years. And every time

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America changes its view on what the kingdom of God is and how it shows itself in time has caused a great change in American politics and American society.

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So if you don't mind, I'd like to go back just very quickly and talk about the kingdom of God and the concept in America.

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Go all the way back to the 1600s with the coming of the pilgrims, the coming of Jamestown and the coming of English Puritans to New England and of Gary to the

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South. They did not come over here just to sit on a hill, learn how to play a guitar and wait for Jesus to come.

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They came over here to build a city on a hill. Now, that phrase,

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Ronald Reagan used to use that phrase a lot. But that phrase comes from the

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Puritan themselves that came over here. They wanted to build a city on a hill.

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That is a nation and a society that would be based on Christianity and which would lead to the conversion of all the

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Indians of this continent and would also result in being a model for all the various nations of the world.

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So as a result, the colonies continued to grow and America grew from sea to shining sea.

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There was a phrase they used in the early 1800s called Manifest Destiny.

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They believed that the destiny of America was from the Atlantic to the Pacific. In fact,

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I like to use a trivia question to fool people, and that is, who was the governor of Illinois, the first governor of Illinois?

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His portrait is in the rotunda of the capital of Illinois. And of course, most people do not know the answer to that question, not even people from Illinois, but it's got a great answer.

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The first governor of Illinois was Patrick Henry. Patrick Henry was also governor of Virginia when

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Virginia was a nation that went from sea to sea, and Illinois was a county in Virginia.

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So the early founders of this country wanted to build the kingdom of God for people, how

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God's word wants them to build society, establish churches, create governments, and relate it to the various other governments in the world.

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That view dominated on up until the middle 1700s.

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And then in the late 1700s, the view of the American view of the kingdom of God began to change because there was a

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European transplant that came to America in the late middle 1700s called

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Unitarianism. And Unitarianism had the same view of the kingdom of God in that it would be victorious over all the world.

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But that's the only similarity. The Unitarians did not believe in the

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Bible as the word of God. They did believe there was a trinity. They believed that man is basically good and he can be perfected by compulsory state -supported education and the control of society and businesses by the federal government.

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And so that view spread all over New England, and it was described in terms of progress.

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If the federal government can control everything, there will be sufficient progress for mankind to be perfected.

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And as a result, the great Puritanism that was so strong in the early 1700s began to weaken, and it began to be replaced by Unitarianism.

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And as a result, by the end of the first of the 1700s,

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Unitarian was the dominant religion in New England. It had replaced the powerful

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Puritan empire. And there is a book that we talked about a while ago.

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It's one of the most important books that I've read. It's a short book, and it is readable.

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You can read it two or three times. And the point of the book is why the

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Puritan empire in New England fell. Why did it fall to Unitarianism when it had been so strong for decade after decade?

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And the name of that book is The Guise of Every Graceless Heart.

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The Guise of Every Graceless Heart. And it was written by a man in western

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North Carolina named Terry Elniff. E -L -N -I -F -F.

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So go to Amazon. It's published by a Russian news organization.

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Go to Amazon and buy it and read it. I've tried to memorize it.

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In fact, I have memorized sections of it because it is so important. Why did

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Puritanism fail in North America?

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And the answer is, number one, it secularized its understanding of the kingdom of God.

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Rather than the old Puritan view, and the Puritans always believed in a victory orientation of the kingdom of God.

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Another great book to read, published by Banner of Truth, written by E .M. Murray, is

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The Puritan Hope. That's one of the most important books in my life. The Puritan Hope shows that throughout the life of Puritanism in England and New England, they believed in the victory of the kingdom of Christ all over life by faithful Christian living and by the preaching and teaching of the word of God.

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But the Puritans had a weakness, just like we have a weakness today. The Puritans had a weakness.

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And that was, even though they were all Calvinistic and they were all Augustinian, there was a section of their thinking that was so weak that it eventually brought down their whole house.

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And the way I say it, the way Eldon said it, is their Calvinism ate up their

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Augustinianism. Now, Augustine lived in the fifth century and wrote great books that we ought to read, like Confessions or like The City of God.

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In particular, The City of God is about the Augustinian view of the future of the kingdom of God on Earth.

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It's talked about two cities, the city of man and the city of God. And the city of God was comprised of people who love

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God. And the city of man was comprised of people who love man and worship man.

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And eventually the city of God would win over the city of man in time and space and in history.

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And as long as that was a prominent view in the old

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Catholic Church, there were good people in the Catholic Church. But then about the 12th century, a man named

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Thomas Aquinas replaced Augustine in terms of influence.

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And Thomas Aquinas said, although we do need the Bible to understand some things, we don't need the

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Bible to understand everything. And we can understand some things without the

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Bible by the proper use of reason. And it was that view of reason on par with the

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Bible by saying that some areas of life can be understood without the

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Bible and by proper use of reason that eventually spread and brought down Puritanism.

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It caused humanism to rise and it took over the North. Humanism was socialistic.

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It believed that the kingdom of God was going to increase and the world was going to get better and better through education and through philosophy and through all these secular means.

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And that had to be by the compulsory education of children by the state and the control of what man did on his own property.

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So by the late 1800s, early 1800s, there was that dominant religion in the

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North called Unitarianism, Socialism. It didn't get anywhere in the

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South because the South was not influenced by Unitarianism nor by Unitarianism's understanding of the kingdom of God.

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The South, particularly in Presbyterian and Baptist churches, the

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South was still dominated by a covenantal view of life, believing that God's relationship with man is based on his covenant relationship to man.

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And that covenant was a union, a communion, a fellowship that God had established with man through Jesus Christ and which man would be his people and they would enjoy that relationship through faith.

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So the South, the Unitarians of the North had to break the back of the influence of the

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Southern Christians because they had a greater influence on the federal government than the

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North did for a while. And so they were for limited government. They didn't want to make the government any stronger.

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And they understood the kingdom of God involved Christian education, Christian churches,

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Christian businesses. In fact, one man once said, and this is a great statement, he said the last nation of medieval

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Christendom perished in 1865.

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Now what he meant by that is, is the South during the Middle Ages, Europe tried to be

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Christian. It didn't do it well. It wanted to establish Christendom where every aspect of life was dominated by Christ and by Christianity.

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They didn't do it well, but they tried. So we talked about the Middle Ages as Christendom.

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The South wanted to establish Christendom in the South after Unitarianism had secularized

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Puritanism and taken over the North. The South, Unitarianism influenced the

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South, but the South tried to be Christian. It didn't do it well, but it tried to be

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Christian. And you have some of the greatest preachers in the history of the Christian church that preached in the

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South in those early and middle years of the 19th century. They kept their view,

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Christian view of the covenant and of kingdom. They believed that God's kingdom was based on the life, death, and resurrection of Christ and that it would advance through the word of God and in the power of God until the world's nations were converted to Christ.

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Well, the Unitarians knew that if they are going to take over the federal government and establish a secularized nation, they had to break the back of the influence of Southern Christianity.

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And so they hired a man named John Brown to try to start a revolution among the slaves, which he couldn't do.

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In fact, the first man he killed when he came to the South was a black man. The Unitarians started a civil war.

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They wanted to break their influence on Washington. And so they sent troops into the

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South to try to break that influence, and the South fought to keep them from breaking that influence.

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Well, of course, the North Northern Unitarianism won. And if you want a great book on that history, get

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The Secret Six by Otto Schock, a great book on six wealthy

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Unitarians that financed the military destruction of the South.

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And it's a great book. You can get that on Amazon as well. The Secret Six by Otto Schock.

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So by 1861, the South is in shambles. Southern Christianity, which was largely reformed, had been broken.

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Its influence on Washington had stopped. The Unitarians were in power.

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And then there was a period right after the civil war called Reconstruction, when the

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Unitarians fought to destroy the last remnant of the

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Christian social order in the South. With that came

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Unitarianism all over the United States. And this view of progress, that there will be progress, you can enter into a perfect world as it gradually evolves based on evolution, as it basically evolves, and as children go to public schools and all aspects of society are controlled by the state.

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So by the end... Now, when do you want me to quit talking? Tell me. You can keep going, brother.

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Okay, I will. Oh, that's what, by the way, that's what Trump said to Israel the other day, right after they bombed the nuclear facilities in Iran.

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Trump said to Israel, keep going. But anyway, so by the late 1800s, the

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South was totally defeated. It had this defeatistic spirit.

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The great preachers that had this Christian, that once had this victory orientation, the life, the kingdom of God, the kingdom of Christ, were now so depressed.

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Particularly Robert L. Dabney, he understood what had just happened better than some people.

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He understood that Christianity was broken by Northern Unitarianism.

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And nobody grieved as much about the fall of the South than Robert L.

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Dabney. He understood what happened. So even before the Civil War, most of the

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Baptists and the Presbyterians were Calvinists and had a victory orientation to life.

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But after the breaking of the South, by the end of the 1800s, the many former people who believed in victory of the

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South changed their views. And they became defeatists. Even Dabney himself, who stayed victory orientation all his life, nevertheless, in his systematic theology book, which was 800 or 900 pages long, he only had one short paragraph on the victory of the kingdom of God, so that he was extremely pessimistic.

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And then on the shoulders of that emotional pessimism that dominated things in the

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North and the South, of course, there were still Christians in the North, and they were defeated, too, because the

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Unitarians had taken over their churches. And so with this widespread

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American pessimism, theological pessimism, stood on the shoulders of this emotional pessimism that dominated the country by the end of the 1800s.

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Now, what is theological pessimism? Well, there was another view in Northern England, came to America, largely influenced by a man named

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C .I. Scofield, and a Bible with notes that he wrote called the

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Scofield Reference Bible. And he had a completely different view of the kingdom than had ever been held in America before.

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We call that today several things. We call it dispensationalism, or we call it rapturalism, or we call it a pre -tribulation, pre -millennialism.

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And that is the view in America. And that is totally un -American. America never believed that.

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But he spread it largely because he was conned by a group of wealthy non -Christian

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Jewish businessmen in New York who were willing to pay for the publication of his

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Bible if he included Zionism in it. Now, these guys were not

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Christian. And Scofield was a Christian. And so what's he doing making a deal with non -Christian

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Jewish businessmen to introduce them to America, something called

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Zionism? Well, here's what dispensationalism did.

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So dispensationalism stood on the shoulder of American pessimism with its different view of the kingdom.

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And then modern socialism and liberalism and Marxism stood on the shoulders of Scofield to continue this destruction of America that we saw clearly throughout the 20th century and the 21st century, and especially during the four years of Biden.

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What they taught was this. They taught that man's only hope is not to try to reform or improve society.

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They were not Unitarian. They believed that there would not be any progress in society.

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The older Christians believed there would be in terms of Christ. The Unitarians believed there would be by everybody getting better by culture.

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But this new view now of dispensationalism taught that there's not going to be any progress in life.

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That the world is going to get worse and worse. And our only hope is that a rapture will come, that Christ will cause a secret, solid rapture to take place in which all

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Christians will be snatched out of this world and taken to heaven.

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And the world will be left in the hands of non -Christians with seven years of horrible tribulation, the rise of anti -Christ, the persecution of Christians.

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And at the end of that seven years, Christ will come back and create a 1 ,000 year government on the earth that will be predominantly

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Jewish. And many of Ophiel's disciples believed that there would also be the re -institution of the sacrificial system in the temple.

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And at the end of that 1 ,000 year period, I'm not making any of this up, at the end of this 1 ,000 year period,

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Christ will come back. And he will rule the world from his capital in Jerusalem until he's trapped in his capital by being surrounded by various anti -Christian forces, troops, tanks, and all the like.

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Can you imagine? That's the second humiliation of Jesus Christ, the son of God. So he's trapped in Jerusalem and God has to rescue him.

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And that's basically the worst part of this dispensation. All through American history in the early days, they understood that our law to enhance liberty and justice for all, that the laws of the kingdom must be based upon the law of God in the

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Bible. And that if our laws are not based upon the laws of God in the

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Bible, then it is the kingdom of Christ, of Satan, that will prevail in this land.

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So Scofield, and of course the Unitarians, Scofield and his dispensationalists and raptures and people influenced by them, believed that the laws of God were for the

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Old Testament and not to be applied today in modern

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America. That they were in the old dispensation and were for the

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Jews and not anything today. And that's still the popular view, unfortunately.

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Even many evangelicals believe it. I was on a television show one time on PBS, and we were asked the question, as Christians, what do you believe should be the legal foundation of American jurisprudence and American civil law?

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And all of us who were on the show said that we believe that the laws of America must be based upon the laws of God contained in Holy Scripture.

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And we gave such passages as Romans 13 and life. Well, they needed somebody from another perspective.

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So they asked a man, a famous guy from Dallas Seminary, which is the largest dispensational seminary in the country.

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They said to this famous man, do you agree with these men that biblical law should be the basis of civil law and jurisprudence in the

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United States and modern America? And he said no. And then this little reporter who didn't realize how important the question she was asking, she said to this man, well, since you're a

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Christian, if not biblical law, then what? And he said, the

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Code of Hammond Lobby. Wow, really? The Code of Hammond Lobby.

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Hammond Lobby was a Malonian king thousands of years ago who codified the laws of Hammond Lobby.

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And until recently, all that was lost in the sands of Iran. The Code of Hammond Lobby.

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And another. So I can tell y 'all about that. Well, we have to go.

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We have to go to our. Yeah, we have America comes into the 20th century.

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It leaves many of its strengths behind in the 18th century.

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OK, brother, we have to go to our first commercial break right now and we can pick up where you left off. OK, great. And if anybody wants to join us with a question of your own.

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Our email address is Chris Arnzen at Gmail dot com. Chris Arnzen at Gmail dot com.

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Give us your first name, at least city and state and country of residence. Don't go away. We're going to be right back. I am still praising

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James White here of Alpha Omega Ministries announcing that this

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September I'm heading out to Pennsylvania to speak at two events that my longtime friend

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Chris Arnzen has lined up for me. On Thursday, September 18th at 11 a .m.

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I'm speaking to men in ministry leadership at Chris's Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Free Pastors Luncheon at Church of the

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Living Christ in Loisville. Then on Sunday, September 21st at 1 .30

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p .m. I'm speaking at Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle on the theme, Can We Trust the

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Bible is the Authentic and Inerrant Word of God. I hope you can join Chris and me for both events.

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For more details on the Free Pastors Luncheon, visit ironsharpensironradio .com.

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That's ironsharpensironradio .com. For more details on Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle, visit trbccarlisle .org.

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That's trbccarlisle .org. God willing, I'll see you in September in Pennsylvania for these exciting events.

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I'm Simon O'Mahony, pastor of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

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Originally from Cork, Ireland, the Lord in his sovereign providence has called me to shepherd this new and growing congregation here in Cumberland County.

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At TRBC, we joyfully uphold the Second London Baptist Confession. We embrace congregational church government, and we are committed to preaching the full counsel of God's Word for the edification of believers, the salvation of the lost, and the glory of our

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Triune God. We are also devoted to living out the one another commands of scripture, loving, encouraging, and serving each other as the body of Christ.

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In our worship, we sing psalms and the great hymns of the faith, and we gather around the Lord's table every

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Sunday. We would love for you to visit and worship with us. You can find our details at trbccarlisle .org.

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That's trbccarlisle .org. God willing, we'll see you soon.

39:13

I'm a loyal Iron Sharpens Iron radio listener here in Atai in County Kildare, Ireland. Going back to 2005, one of my very favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron is

39:23

Dr. Joe Moorcroft. If you've been blessed by Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Dr. Moorcroft and Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia are largely to thank since they are one of the program's largest financial supporters.

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Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming is in Forsyth County, a part of the Atlanta metropolitan area.

39:41

Heritage is a thoroughly biblical church, unwaveringly committed to Westminster standards, and Dr.

39:47

Joe Moorcroft is the author of an eight -volume commentary on the larger catechism. Heritage is a member of the

39:53

Hanover Presbytery, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone, and tracing its roots and heritage back to the great

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Protestant Reformation of the 16th century. Heritage maintains and follows the biblical truth and principles proclaimed by the

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Reformers, scripture alone, grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone, and God's glory alone.

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Their primary goal is the worship of the Triune God that continues in eternity. For more details on Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, visit

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HeritagePresbyterianChurch .com. That's HeritagePresbyterianChurch .com,

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or call 678 -954 -7831. That's 678 -954 -7831.

40:37

If you visit, tell them Joe Reilly, an Iron Sharpens Iron radio listener, from Attoy in County Kildare, Ireland, sent you.

40:47

Welcome back, and if you just tuned us in, our guest today is the very man who was being raved about in that commercial with Joe Reilly from Ireland.

40:59

Speaking of Dr. Joseph C. Moorcroft III, pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church in Cumming, Georgia, and we are today responding to a key moment of dispute between Senator Ted Cruz and talk host

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Tucker Carlson, very recently, when it came to a correct way of understanding

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Genesis 12, verse 3, that is basically a blessing and a warning that all those who bless

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Israel will be blessed, and all those who curse Israel will be cursed. And there are many

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Christians today, including Senator Cruz, who believe that is referring in perpetuity to the nation in the

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Middle East. Even today, it is referring to the modern state of Israel, even though it is a secular state, even though it is predominantly governed by atheists.

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And if you have a question for Dr. Moorcroft, our email address is chrisarenson at gmail .com.

42:13

Before the break, you basically gave us a lot of background as to what led to the climate being ripe for an adoption of Zionism amongst

42:27

Christians in America, which, of course, spread throughout the world. And the dispensationalists and others who are

42:37

Christian Zionists, they base a lot of their understanding on believing that the modern state of Israel, which was founded in 1948, is the direct result of biblical prophecy.

42:53

And I want to read a couple of these biblical verses that are claimed to be evidence of the

43:04

Jews returning to the land, and that we should view the return of the

43:11

Jews to the land to mean that the modern state of Israel, founded in 1948, was a fulfillment of those prophecies.

43:23

And I'll give you a couple of these prophecies. One is Ezekiel 37, 21 through 25.

43:58

Ezekiel 37, 21 through 25. Ezekiel 37, 21 through 25.

44:29

They will live on the land that I gave to Jacob my servant in which your fathers lived.

44:37

And they will live on it. And they, their sons, and their sons, sons forever.

44:44

And David my servant will be their prince forever.

44:49

And in Isaiah 60, verses 18 through 21. violence will not be heard again in your land, nor devastation or destruction within your borders.

45:01

But you will call your wall salvation and your gates praise. No longer will you have the sun for light by day, nor for brightness will the moon give you light, but you will have the

45:12

Lord for an everlasting light and your God for your glory.

45:19

Your sun will no longer set, nor will your moon wane, for you will have the

45:25

Lord for an everlasting light and the days of your mourning will be over.

45:31

Now, Dr. Moorcraft, could we in any way interpret those verses to mean that that is what we witness in the modern state of Israel?

45:45

Well, because in the 20th century, Unitarians quit reading the

45:51

Bible and Christians have forgotten how to read the Bible. One of the biggest frustrations in my life is that Christians who say they're

46:01

Bible -leakers have absolutely no idea how to read the Bible. For instance,

46:08

Luke said in the last chapter of Luke, quoting Jesus, that the

46:14

Old Testament from the Law and the Prophets and the Psalms is about him. So these prophecies in Ezekiel and Isaiah and all the rest of the prophets are messianic prophets.

46:30

Their ultimate fulfillment is in the Lord Jesus Christ and in the establishment of his kingdom when he came to earth 2 ,000 years ago.

46:41

All of his parables, for instance, are about his kingdom. And it says that his kingdom came in power when he was born in Bethlehem.

46:55

And that kingdom continues to grow in power and influence until it is consummated at the end of time.

47:05

And you see the parables talking about the seed. The seed of the kingdom was planted in the first century, in the coming of Christ.

47:17

The seed continues to grow and develop to maturity and then throughout history.

47:24

And then at the end of history, there'll be a great day of harvest. You remember the dream that Nebuchadnezzar had that Daniel interpreted for him.

47:39

Nebuchadnezzar, great Babylonian king, said that he saw this statue and the head of the statue was gold, the chest was silver, the abdomen was broad, and the legs and the feet were iron and clay.

48:00

And then he says that he saw a little stone not made by man, that is made by God, a little stone cast against that statue at his feet.

48:16

And when it hit the statue at the feet, the whole statue fell down.

48:22

And then the little stone grew to fill the whole earth. Now he interprets that dream for Nebuchadnezzar.

48:31

He says it's a statue of the nation to the world. And the golden head is you,

48:37

Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian empire. The chest of gold is the

48:43

Persian empire, not as great as Babylon, but nevertheless great. And then the abdomen of bronze is the

48:51

Greeks, Alexander the Great. The Greeks whipped the Persians, the Persians whipped

48:57

Babylonians, and then the legs of iron and clay were Rome. Ugly and nowhere near as powerful as the

49:07

Greeks or as the Persians or as the Babylonians. And so it's all the great nations and empires of the world built upon the principle of revolt against almighty

49:18

God. And then that little stone, says Daniel, represented the kingdom of Christ.

49:25

And that stone was thrown against the statue during the time of the legs, the iron and the clay.

49:34

That is during the days of the Roman empire that caused the whole statue to fall.

49:39

Now, can you think of something that's significant that took place during the days of the Roman empire?

49:45

Yeah. It was the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, his incarnation and his life and his death and his resurrection.

49:52

And it was the coming of the king of the kingdom and his kingdom that guaranteed the defeat of all nations in rebellion against God and the universal establishment of his kingdom over all the kingdoms of this world.

50:07

So we could go on over and over and over that the prophecies of the

50:13

Old Testament are about Christ and his church. For instance, the names of Israel in the

50:21

Old Testament became metaphors for the church, even in the

50:26

Old Testament. In the New Testament, the church is called Israel. The church is called the sons of Abraham.

50:34

And it's given all kinds of Old Testament names. But even in the Old Testament itself, it's a bit dissolved.

50:42

And in the book of Isaiah and Jeremiah, which is finished preaching through Jeremiah, talking about all these things, that these names with Jerusalem or Zion or the seed of Abraham were all metaphors, not just for the literal city, but for the church of Almighty God.

51:07

And I can remember when I was very young, I was a dispensational.

51:15

And I looked at all these prophecies in the

51:23

Old Testament. And I kept saying, oh, I wish

51:28

I had one drop of Abraham's blood in me so that I could be an heir of all these great prophecies about Israel in the

51:38

Old Testament. And then I read the third chapter of Galatians, where the third chapter of Galatians is that Abraham is the father of all who believe in Jesus, where it says that in Christ, there's neither

52:00

Jew nor Greek, and those who belong to Christ, regardless of ethnic origin, are the seed of Abraham and heirs to all the promises.

52:14

Now, that hit me between the eyes and changed the rest of my life.

52:20

I knew now how to read the Old Testament, that when it talked about the seed of Abraham, Galatians 3 clearly said, you can just get it and read it and leave me to commentary.

52:32

It says that the seed of Abraham is Christ and all those who belong to him by faith.

52:39

And it says that someday the seed of Abraham, that is, all who belong to Christ by faith, regardless of ethnic origin, the number of those could be greater than the stars in the sky, than the sand on the seashore.

52:59

And then it says that in the 12th chapter of Genesis, where the seed of Abraham will have communion with Christ, God will enter into a covenant with him, that is not the physical seed of Abraham, that is

53:17

Christ and all those who belong to him by faith, regardless of ethnic origin, they're the heirs to the promise.

53:24

And every family on earth, it says in Galatians 3, every family will be blessed by the sons of Abraham, i .e.

53:34

Christ and those who belong to him by faith, regardless of ethnic origin. R .A. We'll pick up where you left off there, brother.

53:40

We have to pick up where you left off there, brother, because we have to go to our midway break. But we have to pick up where you left off because we're going to the midway break.

53:49

Okay. R .A. Don't forget the main point, and we'll be right back.

53:55

Don't go away. I'm Dr. Joseph Piper, President Emeritus and Professor of Systematic and Applied Theology at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

54:12

Every Christian who's serious about the Deformed Faith and the Westminster Standards should have and use the eight -volume commentary on the theology and ethics of the

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It is much more than an exposition of the Larger Catechism. It is a thoroughly researched work that utilizes biblical exegesis as well as historical and systematic theology.

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Dr. Morecraft is pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, and I urge everyone looking for a biblically faithful church in that area to visit that fine congregation.

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For details on the eight -volume commentary, go to westminstercommentary .com, westminstercommentary .com.

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For details on Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, visit heritagepresbyterianchurch .com,

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heritagepresbyterianchurch .com. Please tell Dr. Morecraft and the saints at Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia that Dr.

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Welcome back. Before we return to this fascinating conversation we're having with Dr. Joseph C.

01:06:07

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01:08:54

Joseph C. Moorcraft III, and we have been discussing or allowing

01:08:59

Dr. Moorcraft to give a response to the recent dispute that Senator Ted Cruz had with Tucker Carlson during an interview, where they were vehemently disagreeing as to whether or not we are to view the modern state of Israel, founded in 1948, as the

01:09:20

Israel that is mentioned repeatedly in the Old Testament, where many promises and blessings are given and warnings of curses are given, and in particular,

01:09:35

Genesis 12, 3 was brought up, although neither man remembered the exact text.

01:09:41

They knew what vaguely what the context was, or the contents,

01:09:47

I should say. And we, both of us today on the show, disagree that Ted Cruz knows what the context is.

01:09:55

But anyway, if you could, Dr. Moorcraft, pick up where you left off about a confusion over how to view some of these promises that we read in the

01:10:06

Old Testament, where you believe these promises are actually referring to fulfillment in Christ.

01:10:13

Yes, sir. All this talk that I've given is basically been background to be able to answer

01:10:21

Ted Cruz's comments to Tucker Carlson. And that is, as we finished,

01:10:30

Genesis 12 is one of the first sections of God's establishment of a covenant with his people in the

01:10:42

Lord Jesus Christ. And he promises his people in the 12th chapter, he says,

01:10:49

I'll be a God to you, and you'll follow after you down through the generation. In an everlasting covenant,

01:10:56

I will enjoy fellowship with you and communion with you. I will give you a seed that eventually will be greater than the stars in the sky.

01:11:09

And that seed will bring blessings to every family on the face of the earth. And I'll give you a land to live on where you can raise that seed and build cultures to the glory of God.

01:11:23

Now, the important thing to realize, as Jesus said in Luke 4, that the

01:11:30

Old Testament, Psalms, Law, all of them is about me.

01:11:38

And so we've got to realize when we come to these prophecies, what are they telling us about Christ?

01:11:47

All right, and here's how the New Testament interprets it, just like it interprets Ezekiel and all the rest.

01:11:54

We let the Bible interpret itself. The Bible is the only infallible interpreter of the

01:12:01

Bible. And in Genesis 3, that's what finished my mind.

01:12:08

Go to Genesis 3, read it over and over and over. It'll answer all your questions and it will show you why

01:12:15

Ted Cruz is dead wrong in his understanding of the state of Israel today.

01:12:21

Number one, the sons of Abraham are those who belong to Christ regardless of ethnic origin.

01:12:31

That's what Galatians 3, 28 and 29 say. We're not racist.

01:12:38

We do not believe that the sons of Abraham refer to a particular race.

01:12:45

In Christ, there's neither Jew nor Greek. So that the seed of Abraham, the sons of Abraham, says

01:12:53

Galatians 3, are Christ supremely and all those who belong to Christ regardless of ethnic origin, that is believers in the

01:13:04

Lord Jesus Christ. And it says that all the families of the earth are going to be blessed through that seed, through Christ and his church, those who belong to him.

01:13:17

And then Galatians 3 goes on to spell out what those two blessings are. That all the families of the earth will experience.

01:13:24

It says, number one, that all the families of the earth will experience justification by faith in Christ alone.

01:13:31

And number two, it will experience the power of the gift of the Holy Spirit right there, right there in Galatians 3.

01:13:40

Those are the gospel blessing that Christ and his seed are going to bring to all the people on the face of the earth.

01:13:48

And that seed, the church of Christ, will be more numerous someday than as far as the sky, the sea, the sand, the seashore.

01:13:59

And then in Genesis 12, God says, I'm going to give you a land so that you can live all and you can raise a godly family and build a godly culture.

01:14:13

And then God said, Abraham, basically, the boundaries around the land of Canaan.

01:14:19

Within those boundaries, the promised land was the down payment.

01:14:25

That wasn't all the land that God gave. But the land of Canaan was the down payment, that promise, that God would give his people a land.

01:14:37

And in Psalm and in Isaiah, that land is universalized to include all the nations of the earth and to include the earth itself.

01:14:52

There is a great statement in Romans 4 where it says that Abraham is not simply the heir of Palestine, but Abraham, quote,

01:15:05

Abraham is the heir of the world. And then it says that Jesus said, blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the land of Palestine.

01:15:22

Nope. Blessed are the meek, blessed are those taken by God, for they shall inherit the earth.

01:15:32

And then the Bible, particularly the book of Revelation, speaks of the new heavens and the new earth.

01:15:39

So that promise is expanded to include the whole earth on this side of the second company and the new heavens, the new earth on the other side of the second company.

01:15:53

So there is a clear statement to say that the land of this world was given

01:16:03

God's people, i .e. the church. They were given names in the

01:16:08

New Testament that apply to the people of God in the Old Testament because it's always been one church.

01:16:15

There's been people that think, misunderstand this, that they think that we believe that the church has replaced

01:16:24

Israel. But we don't believe that. We believe there's only one church. And it is

01:16:30

Israel in the Old Testament and the new Israel in the New Testament. So that in Genesis 12, where it says,

01:16:41

God says, I will bless those who bless you and I will curse those who curse you.

01:16:48

He's talking to the seed of Abraham. And who's the seed of Abraham? Christ and all those who believe in him by faith, regardless of ethnic origin.

01:17:00

He's not talking to unbelieving Jews. He's talking to Christians and to the

01:17:05

Christian church. And so there is, that is it.

01:17:11

It's not that difficult an answer that the covenant is made between God and Christ and his people in him by grace and faith alone.

01:17:25

And all these promises are ultimately aimed at fulfillment in the body of Christ, the church of the

01:17:34

Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Israel, the Israel of Baal, the seed of Abraham.

01:17:42

Just read Galatians 3 and look at all the things that it says are fulfilled in Christ that were mentioned in Genesis 12.

01:17:54

Now there's one more thing. And ultimately this one answer is sufficient to answer

01:18:01

Ted Cruz. Ted Cruz is a great man. I appreciate

01:18:08

Ted Cruz. I was hoping he won the presidency when he ran against Donald Trump. That is true.

01:18:16

So I appreciate Ted Cruz and I appreciate Tucker Carlson. But this one thing will refute it.

01:18:25

This will refute it. God made no promises to Israel in unbelief.

01:18:37

God made no promises to Israel in unbelief.

01:18:44

All of the promises of God in the Old Testament and the New Testament presuppose faith in the

01:18:51

Lord Jesus Christ. Galatians 3, 29. If you belong to Christ by faith, regardless of ethnic origin, you are heir of the promises of God.

01:19:05

God has never entered the Old Testament anywhere promised to give

01:19:11

Israel, the state of Israel, as we know today, the state of Israel, the land of Palestine, as long as Israel stays in unbelief.

01:19:25

Now, I'm not anti -Semitic. I don't hate the Jews. I don't hate them at all.

01:19:32

I just know that they were all excommunicated from the church in the Matthew 24, 23 and 24, because they rejected the head of the church as the

01:19:45

Messiah. And so with the destruction of Jerusalem by the

01:19:50

Romans in 70 AD and the destruction of the temple, Israel ended as a state.

01:19:59

The temple was destroyed and they've been wanderers throughout the earth ever since.

01:20:08

And it was not Christ that established the state of Israel in 1948.

01:20:15

It was the pagan United Nations. That's right. That God never makes promises to Jews or Gentiles in unbelief.

01:20:30

Yes. And so, in fact, it may shock us to defend itself when it's under attack.

01:20:37

I think Israel has the right to defend itself from Iran, like it did from Egypt in the

01:20:44

Six Day War, back in the 60s. But Israel is an anti -Christian state.

01:20:51

It is not made up of Christians. Hardly any of the citizens of Israel are

01:21:02

Christians. Most of them are unbelieving Jews. They persecute

01:21:07

Christian pastors. They have a socialist government.

01:21:15

And so it's not a Christian state at all. It is full of unbelief and the promises of God to his people were not made to them in unbelief.

01:21:28

All God promises his people in unbelief is his wrath and his curse.

01:21:35

So the land, which is this entire earth before the second coming and the new heavens and new earth after the second coming, was promised to all of God's people, regardless of whether they're

01:21:50

Greek or Jew, if they believe in Jesus Christ as their Messiah and Lord and Savior and the

01:21:57

Son of God. Tom Horner And it may shock a lot of our listeners to know that the

01:22:03

Orthodox Jews, nearly to a man, and especially the

01:22:08

Hasidic Jews, rejected the forming of the modern state of Israel and strongly opposed

01:22:17

Zionism because they believed it to be an artificial, man -made, manufactured fulfillment of prophecy, which was not a fulfillment of prophecy at all, according to them, because they believed their

01:22:33

Messiah had to usher in the new restored state and they didn't believe, they don't believe that their

01:22:40

Messiah has come. And to this day, the majority of Hasidic Jews totally reject, vehemently reject the modern state of Israel.

01:22:49

Oh, let me tell you my experience. Let me tell you my experience with an

01:22:55

Orthodox Jew rabbi. The ACLU, you know, which is socialistic and anti -American, yet the

01:23:04

ACLU often has forums in Atlanta and they, when they want some religious right -wing fanatic, they always want me to be on their show and I always show up.

01:23:18

And so I was one time on a forum and there were about 20 people in the room and I and my wife and two other friends were the

01:23:26

Christians. All the rest of them were humanist Jewish people and there were only two, only about four of my mother's that were

01:23:35

Christians. So they lambasted me. I mean, they were cutting

01:23:41

Christianity and they were crushing republicanism as well as socialism.

01:23:48

And then this new rabbi and he made some point and I said to him,

01:23:58

Sir, I'm glad you're here because although I'm a

01:24:04

Christian and you're Jewish, we ought to have more in common than anybody else in this room because I believe

01:24:13

Yahweh and the Torah are essential to public justice.

01:24:19

And he said very angrily with this German accent, you have misunderstood

01:24:26

Judaism. Judaism is not a religion of the Torah. It is a religion of rabbis.

01:24:34

It is a religion of what? Of rabbis? What he just said was

01:24:39

Judaism has nothing to do with the Old Testament. That it is, its basis is the individual arbitrary writing of these men through the ages called rabbis who stood up as they went along.

01:24:58

So I think that one of the causes of most of the war in the

01:25:05

Middle East has been the influence of America's foreign policy concerning Israel determined by pre -Militanism and dispensationalism.

01:25:18

And of course, Israel is a secular state. It is not, it has excommunicated from the church in Matthew 23 and 24.

01:25:32

It no longer stands as God's people because they had rejected their

01:25:38

Messiah at the head of the church. I believe that someday that God will cause the

01:25:47

Jews to come back to Christ and to believe Him and in Him as their

01:25:53

Savior. Amen. John Witherspoon, the only preacher who signed the

01:26:00

Declaration of Independence said that one of the goals of his life was be to baptize the

01:26:07

Jew in the name of the triune God. And we must not hate them.

01:26:14

It is the liberals that hate them. It is the leftists that hate them.

01:26:20

And they're trying to make the world think that we are the ones that hate the Jews. We are not the one that hates the

01:26:27

Jews. We are the ones that look forward to their salvation someday.

01:26:35

We are those who are thankful, as Paul said in Romans 3, that the

01:26:40

Jews have a great privilege and that is to be given the oracles of God. The oracles of God are divine revelation in fixed form.

01:26:53

The Word of God that we depend upon as Jews and as Jewish Christians and as Gentile Christians.

01:27:03

And we praise the Lord that salvation is of the Jews. Christ is Jewish and there's the

01:27:10

Savior of the world. The oracles of God were held in the hands of the

01:27:15

Jews and there's the Word that we depend upon. We look forward to their conversions someday and their return back to the church of the living

01:27:27

God. Hallelujah. Now we do have a listener question. We have

01:27:33

Jeremiah in Spanish Fork, Utah, who says, how do you respond to Christians who may even agree with much of what you said, but they still believe that it is our duty to support

01:27:47

Israel because they are our only true ally in that area of the world?

01:27:56

Well, that is a thing that we must think about however. The Bible teaches us that our

01:28:06

Christian society are to enter into no alliances with non -Christian societies.

01:28:16

Now, Muslims I think are enemies of God and I believe someday they'll either be erased from history or converted to God.

01:28:30

I believe Jews today are enemies of Christ and someday they'll be erased, will be converted.

01:28:40

But the Bible clearly says, and George Washington said it the best, I wish I had this quote memorized, but George Washington said it the best, we have no business interfering or making alliance with other nations, particularly those that are of a different world order and religion than ours.

01:29:05

And well, thank you. Thank you very much, I'm sorry,

01:29:11

Jeremiah. One of the things that adds to that that belief of supporting

01:29:17

Israel is the open vehement hatred of the Muslim nations against us, calling us the great

01:29:24

Satan, calling for our destruction along with Israel. We're the great

01:29:30

Satan, they're the little Satan. So there is some strategic logic and a desire to stand with Israel in military conflict.

01:29:43

Yes, sir, there is. And I'm glad that they are destroying one of the greatest enemies of the

01:29:51

United States in years and years and years. That Iran is in shamble, the

01:30:00

Atollah have surrendered, they bombed this bunker, soldiers in Iran are fleeing every day.

01:30:10

The crowd in the city of Tehran are cheering the feet of the

01:30:16

Atollah and his Muslim radicals. They've threatened us, any nation that threatens us with nuclear power and has the authority to the ability to carry out the threat, in my opinion, must be dealt with thoroughly by the

01:30:39

United States. I take Iran's threats against us seriously and I want to destroy them as a threat to the

01:30:48

United States and to the rest of the world. And another thing about, even if you want to give the

01:31:00

Zionists a pass, who will insist that the prophecies of the

01:31:12

Old Testament prophesy and promise that Jews will return to the

01:31:21

Middle East and restore that specific nation as the modern state of Israel, that they think that that is

01:31:29

God's people and that that is a chosen people there.

01:31:36

How on earth could they possibly believe that that coincides with one of their verses of the

01:31:46

Jews returning to their land when in Ezekiel 37, that I read earlier in 21 through 25, they will no longer defile themselves with their idols or with their detestable things or with any of their transgressions, but I will deliver them from all their dwelling places in which they have sinned and will cleanse them and they will be my people.

01:32:10

How can they possibly, these Christians, possibly believe that that is an accurate description of an atheistic secular state?

01:32:19

Now, obviously, there are Christians there. I've interviewed two

01:32:24

Israeli Christian pastors. You know, there are Christians there, but that is not a way that you could ever in a million years identify the people as a whole or even in general.

01:32:40

Yeah, true. And I think the thing to remember is just two main theological points.

01:32:47

Number one, the Old Testament is about Christ. The prophecies of the prophets in the

01:32:55

Old Testament are prophecies that must ultimately be fulfilled in Christ.

01:33:02

They had a precursor fulfillment with the return of Judah to Jerusalem when

01:33:10

Cyrus VIII, the king of Persia, destroyed the

01:33:16

Babylonians and let them go back to the city of Jerusalem and rebuild after 70 years of Babylonian captivity.

01:33:25

That is an illustration of the

01:33:30

Messianic complete fulfillment, but it doesn't exhaustively forbid illustration.

01:33:39

And moreover, these were believing people. These were people who wanted to bring

01:33:45

Jerusalem to the holy city, rebuild the temple so they could worship Almighty God. And God has made no prophecies to the

01:33:56

Jews of unbelief. Okay, we have

01:34:01

Tony in Westchester, New York, who says, how do you respond to the argument that says replacement theology is racist and bigoted?

01:34:18

Well, go ahead. I would say I don't believe in replacement theology.

01:34:24

I don't think there is any such thing as replacement theology. That is a misunderstanding of what we do believe replacement theology says that the church has replaced

01:34:40

Old Testament Israel. I don't believe that the church has replaced

01:34:47

Old Testament Israel. I believe that there's always been but one church and that church goes all the way back with East Abraham and his family.

01:35:01

It says that in the Book of Acts that Moses belonged to Plasia or the church in the wilderness.

01:35:14

And that's the church I'm talking to because the word for church there is the same

01:35:19

Greek word for church in the New Testament. So we don't believe that the church has replaced

01:35:26

Israel. We believe Israel was the church and the church needs us to take

01:35:33

Israel off. And someday all the Jews are going to be converted and brought back to the true church and that the sons of Abraham are true church, covenant people of God.

01:35:53

So I'm glad you asked that question so I can clarify it because I'm against all forms of racism.

01:36:01

And I think racism a replaced theology could be looked upon as racist and I do believe it's a replaced mythology.

01:36:11

Yeah, the accusation, really, when you hear people who accuse post -millennialists and amillennialists of being bigots and anti -Semites, they describe our views as if we are saying that the

01:36:28

Gentiles have replaced the Jews, which obviously is something that we don't believe.

01:36:36

There are still Jews in the body of Christ, and there always were. But, I mean, it is so clear in 1

01:36:42

Peter 2, 9, where Peter says, you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

01:37:03

Isn't it true that that could only be speaking to Christians? The unbelieving

01:37:09

Jew is not proclaiming the excellencies of him who called them out of darkness into marvelous light.

01:37:18

Yes, particularly Peter. You have

01:37:23

Peter referring to the church in terms that God spoke of Israel in Exodus 19, the very same words.

01:37:37

Yeah, and we have... There is a book that I recommend to you, a relatively new book by a man named

01:37:46

Palmer Robertson. Can you repeat his name? You could have... There are all sorts of books on this.

01:37:57

It's hard to get it in my mind because we've been misled for so long.

01:38:04

When the church... Jews rejected Christ as their

01:38:11

Messiah. They were excommunicated from the church according to Matthew 21, 22, 24.

01:38:21

When God sent the Romans to turn down the Muslims and particularly destroy the temple in Jerusalem.

01:38:30

Can you... Can you repeat the title of the book and the name of the author because he broke up?

01:38:39

Sir? Can you repeat the title of the book and the name of the author because he broke up?

01:38:44

Oh, yes, sir. The Israel of God by Palmer Robertson.

01:38:52

Old Palmer Robertson. Yes, sir. Owen Palmer Robertson. Right. And also, we can't forget

01:39:03

Paul's words that are very clear. For instance, when Tucker was asking

01:39:11

Ted Cruz to define who

01:39:17

Israel is or what Israel is, Ted Cruz, who was raised by a pastor, should know that in Romans chapter 2, 28 through 29,

01:39:30

Paul says, For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh, but he is a

01:39:39

Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is of the heart by the spirit, not by the letter, and his praise is not from people, but from God.

01:39:51

Amen. I preached on that just the other day. Amen. Well, we have to go to our final break right now,

01:39:58

Dr. Moorcraft. If anybody wants to send in a question, do it now or forever, hold your peace. We're rapidly running out of time.

01:40:05

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. Don't go away. We're going to be right back. I'm Pastor Keith Allen of Lindbrook Baptist Church, a

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And we are now back with Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft III, and we have

01:49:50

Terence in Searcy, Arkansas, who asks, what do you think of the ministries that are funding the return of Jews from Russia and other areas of the world to Israel, and they believe this is going to hasten the return of Christ?

01:50:11

Yeah, I remember in the radio station I used to work for, they had an advertiser called on eagles' wings or wings of eagles, one or the other, and they were all gleeful about flying

01:50:26

Jews back to Israel. And the thing that amazes me about this is that dispensationalists believe that two -thirds of the

01:50:38

Jews are going to be slaughtered and killed in Israel in the end times.

01:50:47

One of the verses is Zechariah 13 .8, and it will be in all the land, declares

01:50:53

Yahweh, that two parts in it will be cut off and breathed their last. What do you have to say about what our listener asked?

01:51:04

Well, two or three things. Number one, I think it's a waste of money that rather than flying

01:51:12

Jews back to Israel, we ought to take that same money and send missionaries,

01:51:17

Christian missionaries there to lead them to Christ. Right. And secondly, there is no prophecy anywhere in the world that says that building

01:51:29

Jerusalem as an independent state is a sign of the second coming.

01:51:38

I challenge you nowhere. Now, the reason people come to that is they don't know how to read the

01:51:45

Bible. If I had the privilege of speaking to Ted Cruz, I want to emphasize that I really do respect him and like him.

01:51:57

And I'd like to say a couple of things. Number one, the view that says that Genesis 12 applies to the literal

01:52:10

Jews is a part of a system. And you just can't pick a

01:52:16

Jews. You've got to take the whole system with you. The same system that says, according to the same system, it says that God's going to bless those who bless the

01:52:32

Jews and those God's going to curse those who curse the Jews. A lot of people say, all right, so you can be more known with the stars than the sun, sand, and the seashore.

01:52:46

Now, that's a lot of people. And it says it's going to bring the blessings of justification by faith alone.

01:52:54

And the Holy Spirit to all the peoples of the earth, you just don't even believe in justification by faith at all.

01:53:01

That if you can't pick Jews, if you believe one of these promises applied to the literal

01:53:07

Jews, you've got to take a whole shebang. And the important to realize is that that view, somebody asked a while ago if replacement theology wasn't racist.

01:53:26

And I said, it could be, I don't believe it in any way. But the other thing I would say is, the view that the seed of Abraham only applies to the

01:53:38

Jews is racist. And there is no racism to the gospel.

01:53:46

Read Galatians 3. The promises of Abraham are not just directed to the

01:53:53

Jews because that would be racist. They are directed to those who belong to Christ by faith regardless of ethnic origin.

01:54:06

Throughout history, Romans 11, throughout history, there will be a remnant of Jewish people saved, not many, but a few here and there.

01:54:19

And then later on in history, the rest of the Jews are going to be converted to Christ.

01:54:26

So you have those two words, Romans 11, the word remnant and the word rest or remainder.

01:54:35

Throughout history, there's going to be a remnant of Jews saved, many, but some for example.

01:54:42

And then as we proceed, under the grace of God, by the power of the gospel, the remainder of the

01:54:50

Jews are going to be brought to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and brought back into the church.

01:54:56

There's only one church. God is not a bigot. He does not have two brides. He only has one bride.

01:55:04

He's always had one bride. And that one bride is those who belong to Christ whether they're

01:55:10

Jews or Gentiles. Hallelujah. And it's a tragedy that many will still exclusively say that God's chosen are solely the

01:55:23

Jews, whereas we, you and I, and Reformed Christians in general, believe that it is those from out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation,

01:55:35

Jews and Gentiles. That's true. So I want you to summarize in the two minutes that we have left what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners about this very important topic.

01:55:50

I want to say, you want me to do it? Yes. All right.

01:55:56

First of all, I would say that America from its very beginning has been all connected with its understanding of the kingdom of God.

01:56:06

And whenever its understanding is correct, it is blessed and it grows. Whenever that point of God's kingdom is unbiblical, it crashes.

01:56:19

When our founding fathers came to this country, their viewpoint was that the kingdom of God will be victorious over all other peoples of the world.

01:56:31

And God will bless the church when we look at Jews and Gentiles. And those who curse the church will be cursed.

01:56:39

And those who bless the church will be blessed. It's not talking about modern Jews. That's a racist statement to say that Genesis 12 only applies to the

01:56:50

Jews. It doesn't apply to unbelieving Jews at all. It is directed toward the church believers and the

01:57:00

Lord Jesus Christ. And if anybody curses our heart, the church of the

01:57:07

Lord Jesus Christ, God will curse them. And if anyone blesses the church of the

01:57:14

Lord Jesus Christ, God will bless them. That's the great gospel. There is no racism in the gospel.

01:57:23

To say these promises only applies to the Jews. God promised the Jews a land.

01:57:29

God promised the Jews that if anybody harmed them, those are all racist statements.

01:57:36

And there is no racism in the gospel of Christ. Study Galatians 3. Hallelujah. Well, I want to make sure our listeners have your websites.

01:57:48

First of all, the website of the church where Dr. Joseph C. Moorcroft III is the pastor is heritagepresbyterianchurch .com.

01:57:59

heritagepresbyterianchurch .com. That's for Heritage Presbyterian Church in Cumming, Georgia. If you want to order

01:58:04

Dr. Moorcroft's eight -volume commentary on the Westminster Larger Catechism titled

01:58:10

Authentic Christianity, go to westminstercommentary .com. westminstercommentary .com.

01:58:17

And you can find out about all of Dr. Moorcroft's books that he has authored at comprehensivechristianity .com.

01:58:28

comprehensivechristianity .com. Also, if you want to find out more about dispensationalism, its origins, and so on, well,

01:58:37

I would urge you to go to the Iron Troupe and Zion Radio website, irontroupeandzionradio .com,

01:58:45

and type in the name Dan Hummel, H -U -M -M -E -L.

01:58:51

I interviewed him twice, a two -part interview on The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism.

01:58:59

Phenomenal interviews. I want to thank everybody who listened today, especially those who took the time to write.

01:59:05

I want to thank Dr. Moorcroft for being such a superb guest. I hope you all have a blessed and safe and joyful and Christ -honoring weekend and Lord's Day.

01:59:14

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