February 6, 2018 Show with Interviews from the 2018 G3 Conference Part 3: Ray Rhodes, David Woollin, Bobby McCreery, AND Matthew Stahl

Iron Sharpens Iron

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Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania it's iron sharpens iron a Radio platform on 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 27 verse 17 tells us Iron sharpens iron

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So one man sharpens another Matthew Henry said that in this passage quote we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and Directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour

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And we hope to hear from you the listener with your own questions

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Now, here's our host Chris Arnton Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania Lake City, Florida and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at iron sharpens iron radio .com

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This is Chris Arnton your host of iron sharpens iron radio wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this sixth day of February 2018 and today we are once again going to be airing more of The interviews that I conducted on -site at the g3 conference, which took place in Atlanta, Georgia This past January just a month ago from the 18th through the 20th at the

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Georgia International Convention Center and Once again to remind you you're going to be hearing a lot of crowd chatter in The background because as I said, these were interviews conducted right on site at the g3 conference

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And there were thousands of people literally milling around Even many right around the iron sharpens iron exhibitors booth, but without further ado

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Here is the first of today's on -site interviews Conducted at the g3 conference this one featuring

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Ray Rhodes. Hope you enjoy it Chris Arntz in here again on -site at the g3 conference in Atlanta, Georgia 2018 and Continuing the interview marathon that we've been doing all day long and Finally have the opportunity once again to have as a returning guest and iron sharpens iron radio for the first time face -to -face

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Ray Rhodes the pastor of Grace Community Church in Dawsonville, Georgia.

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He's also an author first introduced to me by my first pastor

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Mike Gaydosh who is currently running solid ground Christian books and has been for quite a number of years and It's been great to get to know

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Ray. It's been great to get to know his co -pastor there at Grace Community Church Colonel Kevin Girard, I understand that he was

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Exalted From the from lieutenant colonel to colonel or will be or has it happened? Yes, Ben.

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Yes, and he is a dear brother It was spent a year with us at Grace Baptist Church in Carlyle, Pennsylvania as he was

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I guess it was he continuing education at the War College or what was he exactly doing at the

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War College in Carlyle? Yeah That's a good question Vacation Well, no, he was definitely busy working yeah

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Yeah, he got a degree there through the War College. He's got a number of degrees, but that was the latest part of his ongoing training with Marine Corps and It is such a great pleasure to have you on the program.

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Why don't you? For our listeners who are hearing about you for the first time because we have people joining our audience

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It seems every day for the first time and they may not have heard previous interviews with you So our list was about Grace Community Church of Dawsonville, Georgia Thank you,

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Chris. Good to be with you again today. Thank you for having on the show. Grace Community Church is

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Located about an hour north of Atlanta and Dawsonville, Georgia the furthest

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North Metro County in Georgia It's about 13 years old

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The church that's committed to expository preaching and God -centered worship Services are pretty simple a couple of three scripture readings prayers preaching and not a lot of bells and whistles, but a good a good sweet church, and I'm thankful to be there and You folks proclaim the doctrines of sovereign grace.

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That's right. We do we're Connected with the founders movement and the Southern Baptist Convention fire the

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Fellowship of Independent Reformed Evangelicals And we're we're Southern Baptist congregation. Yes, a very good friend of mine just joined fire very recently a pastor

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John Sampson who is the pastor of Kings Church and Is it

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Tempe, Arizona Kings Church? It's in Arizona not far from Phoenix. I can't remember if it's

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Tempe and I Messed up the last time I was trying to remember. But anyway, he's a dear brother from the

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UK originally and Was amazingly saved out of the

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Word of Faith Pentecostal movement where he not only was a Member of that movement. He was a pastor in that movement and a

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TV talk show host in that movement. He became Rescued out of that by the mercy of God and is now a reformed

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Baptist but Well, I want you to also now

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Give our listeners before we get into our discussion and before I forget to mention this later

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I want you to give our listeners a list of books that you've written so that they can look for those books and be blessed

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By them. Okay. Thank you Well, our mutual friend Mike Michael Gaydosh at solid ground

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Christian books published my first three books family worship series family worship for the

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Christmas season family worship for the Thanksgiving season and family worship for the

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Reformation season and along with that I have a few booklets on marriage and student books for students and Presently working on the biography of Susanna Spurgeon for Moody publishers to be released.

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God willing in September Oh, so you're still working on the book still working I was supposed to turn in the first draft in a couple of weeks and they they really want to publish it in September and That's affiliated or connected to the fact that you wrote your doctoral dissertation on this.

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That's right I did my doctoral thesis on the marriage of Spurgeon, but and she's Charles and Susanna, but A lot with their spirituality the role of Bible intake and prayer in their marriage.

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And by the way, I just remembered it's Peoria, Arizona Kings Church in Peoria, Arizona where John Sampson is a pastor.

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Sorry about that. Oh, that's fine. Yeah, and I want you to You know,

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I've said this already with someone else who I've interviewed during the conference Sometimes we who are reformed when we get together

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Especially if we're doing something for media in any way radio or television or what -have -you we tend to be pointing fingers

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Religious movements even within Christendom outside of our own circles. I want you to Perhaps let our listeners know our reformed listeners, especially what concerns you

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About things that are rising up within our own ranks with our own churches and congregations and so on perhaps even seminaries that is perhaps a departure from our history and our

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Biblical pedigree Yeah, I think there as you

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Indicate there are a lot of things to be Delighted about in the reform movement in the country just behind us here

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There's founders ministries the long work that they've done bringing reform to Southern Baptist Convention this conference

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Together for the gospel banner of truth. I mean, there's so many good things happening and it's a pretty diverse group folks that United around the doctrines of grace, but may have a different ecclesiology

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And we might join one another's churches in some cases But we appreciate the love for the gospel.

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And so there you go together for the gospel for example But as I as I shared with someone else this this morning

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I think we do have to be careful that with the popularity now of reformed theology

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Comes some in dangers inherent with that because we we've not been that popular

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Historically and now it's somewhat cool to be Reformed and there's a whole and sometimes don't you think that?

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When it is cool, it is often. I'm not gonna say it's every time that somebody might be from a a background that tries to connect

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Calvinism with coolness that it's not true Calvinism, but it's it would seem

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To be that if it if it becomes popular it must be redefined in some way

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Because there's something inherently unpopular about The doctrines of grace because you are telling people

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You can't do anything to please God in the flesh Salvation is all of God Salvation has or at least coming to Christ and being born again, of course

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Being justified has nothing to do with you I mean what what does have to do with you is your walk in obedience and your sanctification?

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But but but how can how can Calvinism possibly be cool? Right. Well, I think there's the danger we typically

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Calvinistic people tend to gravitate towards Intellectual pursuits typically are very well read love to discuss theology and that's good.

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That's all good and sometimes and of this true with any group, but We develop into little subcultures and little groups and we we may sit around staring at our navels and thinking about our

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Our particular interest and I think a lot of times when a person comes to the reform faith They are so excited about the freedom that they now have in Christ as they understand grace and joy

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I don't think I understood joy until I came to understand the doctrines of grace because it's liberating

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I'm set free not by my works, but through the works and death of Jesus Christ I'm set free and for the first time

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I can Enjoy life under the Sun as it is Ecclesiastes when I'm tethered to God and I can eat my food

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I can drink I can dance I can interview on iron sharpens iron

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With joy all of life is for the glory of God. I think that excitement sometime

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He who has been forgiven much loves much that's exactly right. Yeah, and It's not such a big deal.

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That's not so amazing If a good person or a not -so -bad person is quote -quote saved because obviously if a person is good

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They don't need to be saved anyway, but when a wretch is saved that's reason for a celebration.

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That's right That's right. Someone told me that an old Methodist preacher once said That before you can ever get a person saved you have to first get them lost

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Yes, and I've been I was told that by an old preacher in Mississippi back in the 1990s

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He's when he found out that I was from New York. He said you guys in New York You got it easy. All you got to do is get people saved.

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We got to get him lost That's Exactly right, but but the good news is

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Christ saves sinners. Amen, and He saved us by grace and it's certainly

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One moment of introspection. I realize even I mean I have the scripture to remind me of that But one moment of introspection,

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I know there was nothing in me You know God did not look down through time and say well there's a lovely young man,

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I think he's worthy of rescue He'll he'll he'll go far in Kingdom work Just the opposite just the opposite.

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Yeah, I was shocked one time when I was listening to a Speaker at a business

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Christian businessmen's luncheon and he said the reason why Jesus approached the young rich ruler was because He said he knew that that guy had it what had what it takes to get things done

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He knew he was a mover and a shaker and and somebody that could really be useful in the kingdom of God So that's why he approached that person.

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I'm like, excuse me. How did you get that out of that whole? Scenario out of that whole event in the scripture that we have recorded for us.

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That's called ice to Jesus It's really reading into the text. What's not there's nothing

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But being from, Georgia This is kind of on the tails of what

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I said and faculty what you said about getting people lost before the save There there are unique challenges,

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I'm sure about being a pastor in the Bible Belt as opposed to places like New York where Where I'm from and Especially when you get into the inner city you have a culture that is more openly pagan perhaps that lip service to biblical

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Christianity is Very rarely heard and then in the deep south and in the

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Bible Belt areas in the Midwest Even you have more of a respect and a reverence for things considered

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Christian Might not be actually genuine in their faith themselves when they have those attitudes if you could explain

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What would be some unique challenges you would have in Georgia being a pastor? Of course, I may

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Have a very outdated understanding of of what it may be like Culturally in your area of Georgia anyway, and maybe perhaps it's not something that you

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Witness all around you where where Christianity has become a part of Americana if you like I Think that was a probably more true a few years ago.

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We're more Pronounced cultural Christianity, but something's happened to Georgia over the past number of years a lot of folks from New York I Used to belong to in Long Island is living in Georgia now or at most in Georgia and other parts of the south

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That's right. Yeah, in fact in our church there. They're all we're in North, Georgia, and I would say true

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Southerners are a minority in our congregation Wow Even our mutual friend

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Al Yerkes and his wife, which we're delighted to receive his wife in a membership. We're struggling

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Your acceptance to work for Todd Freeland Richard radio as does my guest

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Ray Rhodes son -in -law, that's exactly right He is Adrian rank who you see very often carrying a camera on the wretched

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TV program and also Involving comedy skits with real you're right hilarious, by the way

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Yeah, Adrian's the what if there's the producer there and he's from Minnesota So he moved in from Minnesota found our church met my daughter got married we have four grandchildren through Rachel and and an owl moved from Just north

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I guess about 40 minutes north of New York City To Georgia just a few months ago to work at wretched and and he attends our church as well.

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So now delightful delightful folks So I think the Georgia is a very diverse state now

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When I was younger, it seemed that everyone you met would profess to be a

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Christian I mean just about everyone now not as much the case especially on our campuses

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There's not that but there's still some of that I think probably there's more residual cultural Christianity in Georgia, so that does bring problem when you when you enter with a presumption of Salvation That's not based on reality

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Then that's an issue those folks have a form of righteousness and you've got to chip away at that through the the law of God and and Help them to see their sin and need need neediness and to see the grace of God But it is it is a challenge in the

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South. Maybe there's not so much in in you or another person And can you tell us more about perhaps your personal?

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philosophy of ministry and even the philosophy of ministry of the Grace Community Church in Dawsonville, Georgia because Just because just because of the fact that you share a theology with Thousands of other churches across the globe who claim to be reformed doesn't mean that you're identical in every way to those other

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Churches there are different approaches as long as one is obviously faithful to What is required of us as a church and as Christians within the scriptures there?

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There are obviously different I hate to use the word flavors, but there are flavors.

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There are different approaches to how They do ministry what they may emphasize in their own church and in their own pastoral

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Ministry, can you tell us something that might be unique about you personally and the congregation where you pastor in that regard, right?

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Everyone would say this but we really do sincerely seek to be

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Driven by scripture in our worship services. And so there there's not a lot of innovation.

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It's Yeah, that's right We do say we do have a couple of dramas in our church.

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One is baptism and the other is the Lord's Supper So we're not opposed to all drama but if you but we also want to have a large heartedness appreciation for Diversity among people who love

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Christ love the gospel love the truth And so but if you were to come into our worship services, you would you would you have a call to worship with scripture and prayer?

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You have a couple you have three songs that would be rooted in the Gospels songs It might be at traditional hymns or the

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Gettys or Bob Coughlin those, you know Sovereign Grace music to scripture readings and Old Testament reading and New Testament reading

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Then the reading of scripture and the preaching of the word, so it's a very word centered church

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So that's why one for readings of scripture in the context of the church and I've often an hour -long sermon

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Which my other ministry nursing the word I'm on the road doing retreats and conferences. That's different.

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So I go into a church I'm typically not going to preach an hour But our folks are we started the church.

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That's what we've been raised on our folks appreciate Detailed exposition and so it's it's very it's very word driven and all that we do and What how do you see?

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Your writing ministry as far as we know that your latest book is

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About the marriage of Charles and Susanna Spurgeon What do you see is the future of your writing ministry any particular focus of it that you may be spending time on or is it going to be a very diverse spectrum of things that you

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Are going to be writing? Yeah At the moment, I'm hoping

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I'm going to live through All the edits that will be happening in the next few months to get the biography of Susanna Spurgeon out

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But I want to follow the biography of her with a book on widows

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Based on her widowhood Wow, and the things that she wrote about being a widow the loneliness that she felt

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I mean it's it's tears come to my eyes reading some of her accounts of how lonely she is how much she misses

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Charles and Yet how she's depending on Christ through that and so I'm thinking of a book that just that will describe her feelings her experiences her needs and deduced from that ways

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That we can better minister to widows or widowers in that regard

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You know, I I think that they must exist already, but I can't even think of one book

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Specifically for widows right now. I mean, I know that there are books on grieving and R .C.

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Sproul wrote a phenomenal book called surprised by suffering and We have the book trusting in God even one life hurts by Another brother who's now in heaven

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Wow bridges Jeff Jeff Bridges who I had the privilege of interviewing also And James White who's at this conference wrote grieving our path back to peace

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I can't think of one specifically for widows. I think there are a couple out there and were formed

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That's a good question, I'm not sure this would have a biographical Perspective to it as well

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But I think there's a real need I think that you know, the Bible says we True religion and undefiled before God is to visit orphans and widows in their affliction

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So there's sort of an assumption that that widows are going to be facing

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Affliction of various source may not be always physical affliction. That's probably going to come as they get older but the affliction of the mind of loneliness and sadness that comes from the loss of a loved one and Are we as the church faithful to minister and as individual believer, that's

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There's lots of things that constitute true religion that's spelled out pretty clearly. We we care about orphans.

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We care about the widows and lonely Churches. No, I know you haven't written the book yet, but can

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Can you share anything about Susanna's? Susanna Spurgeon's ministry to the widows that might be unique that we can learn from today.

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Yeah Interestingly, you know when Charles died in 1892

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Susanna was at his bedside He was in on the French Riviera where he went often for recovery

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She had never been able to travel with him because she was physically afflicted essentially homebound

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But in the province of God, she was able to make that trip. They didn't know it would be his last trip and it was a

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They described as a perfect three months together until the last couple of weeks When he died and she was there at his bedside she knelt and prayed and thanked

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God for the gift of Spurgeon She had been Administering a book fund for a number of years prior to that.

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She Continued with that before she died. She'd given away 200 ,000 cop 200 ,000 books to poor pastors and they were they were pastors who were

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Seriously impoverished in the British Isles and other places and she had a heart for that but also

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So as a widow, she's afflicted She's aging She's lonely and yet she continues this ministry.

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She's writing. She writes five stand -alone books herself most of that's done as a widow and She helps to plant a church

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That's a story that few people know about Susanna Spurgeon that in 1896.

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She's visiting the coastal town Just south of London She says where's the local

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Baptist Chapel the response is there's not one and She's burdened by that.

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And so she begins praying she goes back to London. She prays about it. She organizes an effort

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She essentially chooses their pastor and she sends him on this mission longtime friend graduate from Spurgeon's College pastors

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College and he goes and starts this Baptist Chapel with her Oversight her supporting it financially her helping to raise support for that and it's a she she had a few requirements one debt -free

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Spurgeon didn't believe in in debt. Secondly. No what she called worldly means to raise money

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She wrote a little book called a protest against bazaars And so she was opposed to using bazaars as a fund

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So they were doing that in the 19th century, too. Yeah. Yeah, they maybe they do that more up north now

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I don't see a lot of that here. But yeah, she she wrote that They I've definitely been witness to a lot of evangelical churches doing things like that Were they trying to raise money from the world?

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They write support their own. Yep Ministry and the third thing was that she didn't want it named.

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She didn't want Spurgeon's name in the title likes Charles Spurgeon Baptist Chapel or something she wanted it to be a memorial to him but not contain his name so his sons went down and they laid the foundation stone in memorial in memory of Charles Spurgeon and There's a

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I got I had the opportunity to go to that church a few months ago And there's a beautiful memorial there to Susanna Spurgeon as well

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And they they credit her with the planting and starting of that church. So it's still a functioning.

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It's still evangelical church Seems seems to be relatively conservative as part of the

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Baptist Union now, but You know, there are a lot of churches the Baptist Union is a mix like the

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Southern Baptist Convention their conservative churches and Non -conservative churches, but it seems to be conservative evangelical the sermon.

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I heard the day I was there was excellently delivered biblical sermon and we were edified by our tennis beautiful beautiful almost like a

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Middle Ages sort of building that she led the two buildings still still standing still beautiful Still adhering to the doctrines of sovereign grace,

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I don't I don't know for sure about that I'm not a hundred percent, but they seem to have a high view of God and they have a few relics of Spurgeon there one of his clocks they have a

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Pulpit that was dedicated that was built out of Timbers from the tabernacle after it burned

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I believe and a few other things well, I want you to Summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners before you go today

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And then of course conclude with contact information for Grace Community Church of Dawsonville, Georgia And and thank you again,

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Chris. It's always good to be with you now face to face but always the the essential thing is

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Do you know Christ? You know God is a holy God We are simple people

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We because of our sin we have we are fallen and we can't get up And we're if we are going to be saved it will only be by the power and grace of God The good news is that God has provided That grace in the person of his son the

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Lord Jesus Christ that God saves sinners I'm a sinner Jesus died for sinners.

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He lived righteously. He died on the cross for sinners like us He was buried and he was raised again and the

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Bible says if we will call on the name of the Lord It will be safe. We'll come to him humbly repenting turning from our sins trusting in Christ alone

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For salvation that God will forgive us of all of our sins He will declare us to be in a right standing with God and he will count the very righteousness of Jesus to our account and We will for the first time know what life and life abundant is and have the hope of Forgiveness to have the promise of forgiveness down with the hope of heaven

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Eternally. Amen. So how can our listeners? Either just find out more about your teaching or even visit the

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Grace Community Church of Dawsonville, Georgia. Yeah Well a couple of things Grace Church Dawsonville Dawsonville .org

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that's the church website. I've got a few other websites. That's the the best way to get in touch with us Well, I'm happy to give up my personal

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Email address if someone would be interested in me speaking at their church or contact me about our church.

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It's a B T N B as in boy T as in Tom N as in Nancy B T N pub pub at gmail .com

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Praise God. Well, thank you so much pastor Ray for taking the time to be here with us today

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And I look forward to your return to iron triples iron very soon. Thank you Chris. Thank you for your ministry You didn't you didn't

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God's work and we appreciate you brother. I really appreciate that comment. Thank you Always interesting to hear mistakes that I make while listening to a an interview that I conducted earlier of course trusting

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God even when life hurts was not written by World -renowned actor Jeff Bridges son of Lloyd Bridges and brother of Beau Bridges.

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It was written by Jerry Bridges the late Jerry Bridges now in eternity with Christ highly recommend that book

30:35

I have purchased many copies of it trusting God Even when life hurts, but we're gonna be going to our first commercial break right now and don't go away

30:44

We'll be right back with more interviews that were conducted on site at the g3 conference in Atlanta, Georgia Chef exclusive catering is in South Central, Pennsylvania Chef exclusives goals to provide a dining experience that is sure to please any palate

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Eastern Time for a visit to the pastor's study because everyone needs a pastor and now we're going to hear another interview

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Recorded on -site at the g3 conference in Atlanta, Georgia This one featuring

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David woolen who is a member of grace Emmanuel Reformed Baptist Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and he's also on the staff of Reformation Heritage Books.

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And here's that interview I hope you enjoyed as much as I did This is Chris arms and again live on site at the g3 conference in Atlanta, Georgia Which began on the evening of Wednesday 17th of January when dr.

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James are white had a debate with a Muslim apologist. It was a wonderful event on is the cross necessary for salvation and this is the first day of the actual conference on January 18th and Right now

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I have with me David woolen who is the sales and marketing director for Reformation Heritage Books?

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Which is a publishing ministry that was founded by a friend of mine who I've had on this program a number of times dr

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Joel Beakey and the Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, Michigan, but it's great

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To have you for the very first time on Iron Shepherd's iron radio David woolen. Thank you so much for having me so thankful that you've given to many of our authors over the years and Promoted many good books over that time.

35:05

Yeah, why? consider it an honor to always have a working relationship with Reformation Heritage Books and You know,

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I know that you've made a lot of our listeners happy when you have provided us books to give away during those interviews

35:19

Can you tell us something about how Reformation Heritage Books started? Yeah, you mentioned dr.

35:25

Joel Beakey a moment ago It was really his vision as a young man to sell books through his denomination and Then around the time when he started

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Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary he also began a publishing ministry, so this was 1994 and by 1995 we brought out our first book by Thomas hooker poor man's thoughts morning and evening

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And from there we've developed into a seminary bookstore we're in under the same roof as Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary to a point now where we have a beautiful bookstore on on site and We publish around 40 titles a year in multiple languages and At multiple levels.

36:14

We're trying to get people to read important reformed Experiential which is an important word works

36:22

From children all the way up to the academic. So we we have quite a spread of books that we produce yes, and it has been a pleasure to see that the

36:38

Reformation Heritage Books is not exclusively published books by those within the heritage reformed denomination, but even reformed

36:48

Baptists like the Gentleman, I just interviewed moments ago pastor John Krotz Obviously there would be a a

36:57

One very important thing in common is the shared Reformation heritage that all of these

37:05

Authors have but there is a bit of a diversity. There is diversity and there is an appropriate level of humanism

37:15

Where we we will publish, you know reformed Baptist heritage reformed people and PCA pastors and quite a spread on on important subjects, of course many of our titles

37:30

From authors who have long since gone to glory. We bring back a lot of important works

37:36

We do a lot of original works particularly on the Puritans. That's that's the emphasis and I mentioned the word experiential just a moment ago or our emphasis is that we

37:47

We want these to get beyond just the head to the heart and to the hand and experimental or probably more helpfully

37:55

Experiential emphasis is is first and foremost in all that we do. Yes, and dr.

38:01

Beeky has Brought that to life in many of his sermons that over the years that I've heard very vital factor in his

38:10

His philosophy of ministry is experiential Calvinism. That's right Now, how did you become involved with reformation heritage books?

38:19

Well, I was working for another Reform publisher in England called evangelical press. Yes, they do some some very well -known

38:26

Books as well. Probably the most well -known is ultimate questions by John Blanchard.

38:31

So I was managing the West African French and the Russian in Minsk Belarus at work and then moved to manage the

38:42

English side and I would travel over to the US from England nine ten times a year to major conferences just like this and would interact with authors and sell our titles and In that process got to know a reformation heritage books and specifically

38:59

Joel Beeky very well personally We would often arrange it so that we were on booths next to each other so we could help each other out practically and I would buy

39:08

Reformation heritage books for England and Europe and they would buy our titles and distribute them in the u .s

39:14

and so when my role at evangelical press came to an end at the end of 2011

39:23

I Was in touch with dr. Beeky and was offered a job only 20 hours a week in Michigan with dr.

39:31

Beeky because my full -time Role then was to begin an MDiv master of divinity at Puritan seminary and I finished that just about 18 months ago.

39:43

And now I'm working full -time for the publishing company reformation heritage books and part -time doing things like Logistics for dr.

39:53

Beeky's travel and conferences all over the world. So that's the role I've grown into but with the

39:58

MDiv that I have I'm also preaching most weekends and looking for pastoral ministry alongside this important work

40:06

No, I'm assuming perhaps I'm wrong, but I'm assuming that you speak multiple languages

40:11

If you were involved in those different branches of the publishing. No, I'm afraid not I can maybe order order food and find directions in three or four languages

40:22

Wherever I go, I need a translator. Okay now let's back up a bit and I want to hear something about your own

40:29

Personal testimony what kind of religious upbringing you had and what were the providential circumstances?

40:36

To draw you to Christ and save you and and also to the particular theology you embrace today yeah, my my parents were in the

40:45

Methodist Church in the north of England in Yorkshire, West Yorkshire and They came to the doctrines of grace in their 20s

40:56

Now in the Methodist Church around then there was good one week and bad the next week you never knew in fact my

41:03

My great uncle and my grandfather were both lay pastors and would preach a very simple but authentic gospel message

41:10

So these were not modern liberal Even apostate

41:17

Methodists that have a totally different gospel and Christ and do not even

41:23

Embrace the inerrancy of the scriptures. This is a different kind of it was yeah, I guess it was your local church

41:29

It was within walking distance and you would have you know good

41:34

Christians in those within those churches and then as you know technology advances and cassette tapes my parents would start listening to those of reformed preachers and Then would have the ability to travel further afield

41:48

And so the first step was on a Sunday afternoon to drive 25 miles to a little village where they knew there was a reformed

41:56

Pastor and they would go and support that work But then would be back at their home Methodist Church in the evening over time and it wasn't easy they let their parents know that they were leaving the

42:06

Methodist Church and they were two of six people to start an evangelical church in a town of 70 ,000 people and Since then that's grown.

42:18

It's about a 200 person church, which in England is a megachurch nowadays And forgive me

42:25

I may have forgotten why I definitely forgot I should say the city Or the area in England that you're talking about this

42:31

West Yorkshire There's a major city within 10 miles of there called Leeds. Yeah, and so just north of there is the area that John John Wycliffe was from That village has since been destroyed

42:44

I think the account states since gone over by the plow It's near Richmond in North Yorkshire and the late

42:50

Errol Holtz Errol Holtz He's very very involved in that area Leeds reformed Baptist Church in the north and my

42:56

My father -in -law has just retired from a church in the village of Howarth which you might know

43:02

William Grimshaw he was one of the Great people Wesley Whitfield and Grimshaw, but he's lesser known

43:09

But there's a great book by banner of truth by Faith Cook on William Grimshaw Which is well worth reading in the tourist village of Howarth My father -in -law was a pastor there until just two weeks ago

43:20

He's just retired and I was an elder at that church for for a few years before going to seminary

43:26

You asked me about my my coming to Christ. So by the time I was born 1976

43:32

My parents had been in this church for a number of years now. They called a pastor Who was was trained in in Wales and So every week

43:45

I would hear the gospel message and Sort of brush it off and I would say

43:50

I was regularly challenged and regularly shown my own sin, but I think my testimony is is different to many other people's because I Claimed to become a

44:07

Christian twice before I actually did and Went to the elders twice was interviewed twice and sort of they came to the conclusion that I wasn't truly

44:16

Regenerate and they were absolutely right. So Once is about an 11 year old.

44:22

My parents took me to a Billy Graham crusade pluses and minuses there And I would say that my main motivation for going forwards that evening was that he was a soccer stadium

44:34

You got to walk on the hallowed turf of the soccer stadium And I was told that night by a well -meaning gentleman that I was now a

44:43

Christian You know you hear it but I actually heard it to my own ears that you should write the date in the front of your

44:49

Bible and never doubt and Of course many of those people who gave counsel to the people that came forward were from a mixture of churches and that's one of the issues that we have and and so I claimed that I was a

45:03

Christian and The elders came to interview me and found out that I really wasn't and then some years later.

45:10

I was probably 13 or so One of my friends genuinely became a

45:16

Christian and there was an element of peer pressure there. I wasn't in there in the club anymore and I Did pray

45:23

I did follow You might call the formula the ABCs. This is what you need to include in the prayer in order to be saved

45:30

It's like almost like a cookie recipe These are the ingredients that you need and then you get the cookie at the end and so I Prayed this prayer without really engaging my my heart and said

45:40

I was a Christian again Again, my parents are excited, and you know this is possibly

45:46

David coming to saving faith and again It turned out that I really wasn't Saved and I did a very strange thing the heart is you know you know deceptive

45:56

It can do this thing to us for about five years. I fooled myself Well, I've I've done everything

46:03

I need to do I've prayed the actual prayer But God didn't save me and therefore it's not my fault.

46:08

Hmm. It's God's fault and so if I die Because I was fearful Now that was a huge part of my testimony that I knew

46:18

I was a sinner and deserving of death and hell I Justified it. I said if I was to face

46:23

God on Judgment Day, then I'd be able to say well God I prayed the prayer and you didn't save me Which is just plainly ridiculous when you look back at it goes back to the same

46:32

Kinds of excuses that Adam and Eve gave in the garden right and so but when I was 17 I Yet again was on a summer

46:40

Christian camp in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales people will have heard of James Harriet and things like that those rolling hills and stone walls and mountains and things like that and I was just convicted by my sin and The preacher a man called

46:54

Phil Arthur who's a Cambridge historian the pastor of Lancaster Reformed Baptist Church and he's written a couple of books for banner of truth and He was preaching on how

47:05

God owes us nothing He was talking about how many times we've heard the gospel and I was 17 by this stage looking around the room

47:13

And there were people in there who were hearing the gospel for the very first time and I must have heard the gospel

47:19

From being less than a week old my my parents took me to church that first Sunday And I don't think

47:25

I've missed it. Well, maybe one or two Sundays through illness as a young child I must have heard the gospel thousands of times and He was talking specifically about those verses where?

47:37

You're more easily able to then just let it bounce off. I've heard it before your Turns to stone and I was just terrified and over those weeks

47:46

Some people helped me we slept in tents and It was wet and rainy and and we were driven out of the tents into the chapel building sleeping under pews

47:57

And I was I was 17. I had all the red herring questions that you can think of, you know excuses and everything and eventually all these people that I was asking questions of just said

48:08

David if If you need to know the answers to these questions, God will give them to you First and foremost you must be right with God The first thing is that you need you need a

48:19

Savior you need to be saved you need to repent of your sins you you need to come to him humbly as as Lord and Savior and trust and and that's what

48:29

I did so I Mentioned earlier why we were washed out of our tent and into the into the chapel building this old chapel in the

48:37

Yorkshire Dales And so I wonder if I'm one of the only people to be saved underneath the pew Lying in my sleeping bag rather than sitting on a pew

48:46

So we were sleeping in that in the churches that those evenings and the problem with that.

48:51

I say it's a problem It's a blessing really I was brought up in a

48:57

Christian home So my pattern of life was always church Sunday Wednesday prayer meeting

49:02

Friday youth youth group Well, okay after I actually was saved the pattern was the same church

49:09

Sunday Wednesday evening prayer meeting And Friday night youth group. And so my life didn't

49:15

Didn't change too much I didn't think my parents saw a difference and eventually asked if I wanted to Speak to the pastor and go to baptism classes and things like that but I Should be reprimanding

49:29

Reprimanding myself here because you should never despise having Christian parents and a pattern of life in it in a church because you see people

49:36

Who do have those radical? Conversions you have full assurance straight away and that's a blessing too, but let's never despise

49:44

God bringing us up in Christian homes but I did see the end result of that as Struggling with assurance for quite some time, but also because I'd confessed that I'd become a

49:56

Christian twice before I was always thinking Okay, is it true this time?

50:03

Am I truly born again this time? Have I truly repented of my sins is Christ truly my

50:09

Lord and Savior. Am I following him? Am I trying to be obedient to his commands and follow him?

50:15

and so this it was a battle for for some time and and for that reason I didn't tell anybody that I'd Become a

50:23

Christian for a few months because I wanted to be certain myself and actually most nights

50:28

I was there praying and praying and praying over and over that God would save me at time and time again

50:35

So but over time God was gracious and has given me assurance and the knowledge that it's all about his work

50:42

Not not my work. I'm resting on him Fully all my weight is on him and what he has completed on the cross in the plan of redemption.

50:51

And so since then slowly and surely I started leading youth groups and Then was thrown into the pulpit a few times and Testing testing gifts and and then that that ultimately led to me becoming an elder and then eventually on to to seminary

51:08

Where I I did the MDiv and now I'm doing, you know Jail ministry and preaching fairly regularly around the place with a view to fairly

51:17

Shortly becoming a pastor of a local church. Amen. Now. Do you have you found that church yet?

51:22

Well, it's difficult to it's my own church and it's difficult because obviously and rightly it's up to the congregation and That's possibly something coming up over the next few months.

51:36

They've welcomed us since we joined seminary. That's the church we've been in and I've recently been attending elders meetings

51:44

With with a potential view to becoming maybe a part -time pastor, but still Working with dr.

51:51

Beeky and with this book ministry alongside and what's what is this church grace Emanuel reform

51:57

Baptist Church? So we'll see what the congregation thinks. That's the one in Grand Rapids. It is I didn't know that that was the church

52:05

I'm obviously a friend of pastor Greg Nichols and I've interviewed him many times on my program and That's a small world.

52:15

I had no idea that you were a pastor. That's right well, I will be praying for many wonderful things to happen as a result of that and why don't you

52:23

Give our listeners the contact information for Reformation Heritage books Yeah, we have 3 ,000 titles from other publishers and about 300 of our own titles

52:33

And so you can find those on our website www .heritagebooks

52:39

.org Heritage books dot o -r -g and that's for Reformation Heritage books the full title of the company, but it's heritage books

52:49

RG David it's been an honor and privilege to have you on the program for the first time. I look forward to your returning

52:55

I'm also looking forward to interviewing many more authors of Reformation heritage books titles.

53:01

Well, we look forward to sending them your way. We've got some very interesting books coming up soon great Well, God bless you, brother.

53:07

Thank you And that was certainly a joy to interview David Wollen after Working with him behind the scenes for so long.

53:16

He has provided our listeners with many books Who listeners who have written in questions to our guests on iron sharpens iron radio?

53:25

We're going to our midway break right now. It's a longer break than normal. So please be patient and God willing we will be back with more on -site interviews from the g3 conference in Atlanta, Georgia So do not go away

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01:04:42

This is Chris Arnzen, and I just have a brief announcement to make before we return to our on -site interviews from the g3 conference that was

01:04:53

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01:06:52

Well now we're going to that on -site interview at the g3 conference with Bobby McCreary And I hope you enjoy it as much as I did

01:07:02

Chris Arnson at the g3 conference on -site here in Atlanta, Georgia and finally after much prayer and Patience I am finally interviewing the very elusive and hard to find

01:07:19

Bobby McCreary Pastor of Harvard, I'm sorry Harbin's not not the pastor.

01:07:25

Oh, it's just evangelist evangelist at the Harbin's Community Baptist Church in Dekula is that right

01:07:33

Dekula Dekula? Georgia and I have been told to remember how to spell that by just spelling

01:07:41

Dracula and then taking the R out of it that's it and It's an honor and privilege to have you here

01:07:49

Bobby. I first met Bobby McCreary at a conference in Pensacola, Florida and That was the

01:07:58

Jeremiah cry conference, right? Yes, sir. Jeremiah cries Herald Society. That's right and you were there because that is predominantly a

01:08:08

Conference made up of speakers not exclusively but predominantly made up of a conference featuring speakers that are known to be street preachers

01:08:18

That's right. That's right. We did we did also have dr. White and he kept remembering to remind us. Why do you have me here?

01:08:27

Yeah, well, that's not true, I mean the speakers are Predominantly at least if not exclusively

01:08:35

Reform. Yes exclusively. Yes, and that might appear to be an oxymoron to a lot of folks that have a stereotype about not only

01:08:46

Calvinists, but also street preacher street preachers, they might think that a Person who's theologically

01:08:53

Calvinistic Would not care enough to evangelize the lost to be a street preacher

01:09:00

But obviously you guys defy the stereotype well, praise

01:09:06

God brother, I think a Lot of what I spend my time doing here at g3 is talking to pastors and saying

01:09:15

That's that's exactly what we do is defy that stereotype. I hope Uh interesting

01:09:22

University of Georgia where I minister twice a week there was one of these, you know, Pelagian abusers out there this year calling everybody names and he ended up getting arrested and a pastor friend of mine said

01:09:35

None of these kids are gonna want to talk to you now for the whole rest of the semester And it's funny because more came and talked to me after that But he said how are you gonna distinguish yourself from from this guy?

01:09:45

And I said brother I hope I distinguish myself from this guy every time I It's interesting because you know, even a lot of students they came and said like that You know, they'll give me a hard time a lot of times when those guys don't come around for a year or so But after brother

01:10:02

Jed rolls in the next few weeks, you know, not my brother Jed But after he rolls in the next few weeks,

01:10:08

I hear a lot of thanks for not being like that guy You know and we can see a real difference

01:10:15

Now in your experience are most of the street preachers that you at least that you have encountered

01:10:21

Are they typically non -Calvinist? So I would say what's what's

01:10:27

I think is dominated the street preaching culture over the last maybe century are primarily sinless perfectionists and Pelagians Independent fundamental

01:10:39

Baptists, you know get out at some they I love those brothers They do a lot of what

01:10:45

I might call them beer and cigarette preaching, you know It's kind of like if I don't drink

01:10:50

I don't smoke. I don't cuss. I'm a Christian kind of thing, you know Oh, okay Cuz I was puzzled there for me because I thought that you were talking that a fundamentalist standing there with a beer and a cigarette

01:10:58

No, no, no You know put down that beer center put down your cigarette, you know, well everything be okay

01:11:07

Then if you don't have those two things, no, you need it. You need regeneration, you know, I mean we're preaching

01:11:12

Christ But I think that's a lot of what's out there You know when

01:11:17

I'm here at the g3 most pastors I talked to they say tell me what you do I say I'm a street preacher and there some kind of look comes out.

01:11:24

They might try to disguise it a little but I say Hopefully not like the picture that comes into your mind when you first hear that And I've got a little booklet.

01:11:33

It's called the agency that transformed a nation by JC routes the first chapter of Christian leaders of the 18th century

01:11:40

And he talks about the 19th century Casey wrote 1800s

01:11:47

Well, he's he's writing about the Christian leaders of all he wrote about Yeah, and then an original publication was

01:11:54

Christian leaders of the last century Okay, and my friend Jeff rose from Jeremiah cry actually got me a he's a great rare book dealer

01:12:01

He got me a first edition of that So I always knew it as of the 18th century, but the one that he got for me is of the last century

01:12:09

But it's the first chapter that book and he talks about the condition of England prior to the preaching of Whitfield and Wesley those guys coming on the scene and how it was extremely high infant mortality rate rampant alcoholism and Bishop Rau would make the case that Open air preaching was the the agency

01:12:30

He calls it that the Lord used to bring England back from the brink of maybe you know

01:12:36

Just sort of falling out and almost of existence. It was in such dire straits and yeah,

01:12:41

I know that the the Anglican Church at least in England Was very opposed to Wesley and Whitfield doing the open -air preaching.

01:12:53

Mm -hmm. Yeah, I don't think it's ever been a You know a widely accepted thing even within the church, you know when they threw

01:13:02

Whitfield out of the church, you know You probably know it's Chris a lot. He said now the world is my pulpit and So it's it's funny.

01:13:12

I think you know street preachers There's there's kind of a lot of club frustration going on because we feel like why doesn't the church, you know embrace?

01:13:19

No, it never really has the establishment my dear friend Al Baker of Presbyterian Evangelistic Fellowship passed for many years

01:13:26

And I interviewed Al many years ago when I was broadcasting out of New York Yeah, he said though he said

01:13:33

I'll never forget this brother He said the Lord has never done anything great through the establishment because the establishment

01:13:40

It no longer expects great things from the Lord. And hmm, so, you know in that in that little chapter

01:13:47

Bishop Ryle really Sort of he believes that God transformed

01:13:52

England through open -air preaching. So when I talk to pastors here I say Well, I hope you know,

01:13:57

I I refuse to labor with or have any association with really brother other than trying to evangelize heretics

01:14:07

People like Jesse Morrell or Jed Smock. Yeah, Jesse is quite active on the internet and Facebook Yeah, anybody listening, please don't

01:14:17

Google them if you never But I'm already on their dartboard already so it's okay

01:14:24

But I refuse to labor with anyone like that and and So I I'm hoping that through it's the grace of God who brought me to an understanding of the doctrines of grace and the importance of local church membership and submission to elders and Those are the types of men that I labor with and in the harvest fields of the

01:14:47

Lord. So I tell these pastors I'm hoping maybe not in my life but maybe in the next generation there'll be a conference like this and someone will say

01:14:56

I'm an open -air preacher and people would would think of someone like Whitfield who's on the cover of that book or they'd have a positive thought rather than like a

01:15:07

How'd this guy get in here thought, you know, so, you know brother I've been shown much grace by the

01:15:13

Lord I want to be a minister of grace those guys that are out there Here's the thing brother. Here's what you can help with Chris.

01:15:20

Let's stop calling those guys open -air preachers those Pelagian Deceivers, they're open -air abusers

01:15:27

They're not preachers. They don't preach the cross You know, they're all law all hell all condemnation.

01:15:33

They mentioned Jesus name a lot I had a discussion with one I said, you know, my biggest problem with you guys

01:15:39

You don't talk about Jesus a lot. He said he just the guy preaching just said Jesus name I said well, you mentioned his name a lot, but you don't talk about his person his work his

01:15:47

Majesty Who he is what he can do for sinners, right and I said, is it possible that you can't talk a lot about someone?

01:15:54

You don't know. Yeah, and That would go inside with Pelagianism because for those of our listeners unfamiliar with that term

01:16:05

Pelagius and those who followed him Either consciously or unconsciously.

01:16:11

I'm not sure that Charles Finney Knew that he was a Pelagian I'd be surprised if no one accused him of that but Basically, you're removing the necessity of grace from the equation of salvation and Not only are you born?

01:16:32

innocent a clean slate Where you have a potential of living perfectly?

01:16:42

But Grace is not required for you to come to a saving knowledge of Christ and to labor and produce the works that would be satisfying

01:16:56

God's wrath, basically and Charles Finney a lot of people who

01:17:02

Lawned him as a hero. They don't even realize that he did not even believe that the

01:17:07

The death of Christ had redemptive value to him Hmm it's tragic.

01:17:15

I think a lot of the people even today that practice a lot of Finney ism if you will don't even realize where it really comes from Don't understand the false doctrines that it's rooted in and of course most fundamentalists today that say they love

01:17:32

Finney They are not really Pelagian most of them would be non or anti Calvinist But they would not be pure Pelagian as most of them in fact none most of them would not even permit someone who was

01:17:47

To be members of the church and yet they laud Finney. Yeah. Yeah well, tell us something

01:17:53

I try to do this every time I Interview a person for the first time

01:17:59

I don't always successfully do that because I forget sometimes or sometimes they don't have enough time to do it but I'd like you to give a summary of Your testimony of salvation of what kind of religious?

01:18:13

Atmosphere you were raised in if any and what providential circumstance? stances

01:18:19

Rose in your life by God's grace that drew you to himself and saved you and then of course

01:18:25

I'd like to know how you came to the doctrines of grace Great Wow I'll try to make it a radio -friendly length

01:18:34

I Was raised by my father's parents primarily my parents divorced

01:18:40

I was a year old and 18 months went to live with them Had a mother that took off a father that was present, but not

01:18:49

Not really a part of my life too much so my grandmother. There's the only Christian in my family that I know of She took me to church

01:19:00

And I you know prayed the prayer. I don't know half a dozen times You know as a young boy and was put in someone's water

01:19:08

Tank several times and when I became a teenager. I was just a rebel I Was a wicked sinner.

01:19:16

I'd say it like this once my grandparents couldn't control me anymore. They couldn't control me anymore so I went out into the world brother and you know all the defilements of this world were in enjoyed and Promoted by me.

01:19:30

I was the epitome of the Romans one they not only know that those who do these things deserve to die, but encourage others to do them as well and So when

01:19:41

I was 22 years old I married my wife Kara. She was 19. We were both unsaved

01:19:48

She comes from a family of her parents are agnostic and even still today You know we were lost we were young but in God's providence he preserved our marriage and So fast forward 11 years into that and I was very horrible husband

01:20:06

We had a daughter Hannah who's now 13 when she was 4. I had a client at my job

01:20:12

I was working commercial landscaping and this guy kept inviting me to his church And when I say kept inviting me

01:20:18

I saw him once a month and every time the first time I met him You're a Christian. Oh, yeah, when people ask me if I was a

01:20:24

Christian Chris, I'd say yeah, and hope they change the subject real quick So I'd say yeah, he said where do you fellowship?

01:20:31

I said, you know me and God got our own thing going. I don't need a church all that No, you need a church come to my church so the third time this guy asked me

01:20:41

I was either gonna tell him to you know, take your church and shove it and probably get fired from my job and then not know what to do or Say, okay,

01:20:52

I'll go and that's what I did Hoping that I would just go and he'd leave me alone All right.

01:20:57

So the first time we go to this church, which is an interesting church Seeker sensitive modeled after Saddleback Rick Warren's Church God works in mysterious ways, right?

01:21:08

So he saves my wife First time we ever go there. She's born again She has the desire to live a holy life and pray and read

01:21:16

God's Word and I'm like, oh no You know now what? So we're there a year and a half and I'm still living in sin.

01:21:25

She's praying for me like Peter talks about a wife who wins her husband without a word and I Began to listen to well, here's what happened one day they had an announcement for a mission trip to go to Bolivia and I felt compelled to go.

01:21:42

I can't explain it. I was not regenerate and I was So the guy who was leading our trip wanted to use the way of the master to train us to go evangelize so we went through this basic training course and All all these obstacles

01:22:01

I thought I wouldn't be able to go because of money Lost people were sending money for me to go on this trip, right?

01:22:07

So Lord removes all these obstacles, but I'm still not saved so after we go through this training there's a couple months left to go with it for our trip and I Order some things from Ray Comfort's ministry one of them being a message called true and false conversion

01:22:20

And he talks about a lot of the parables in there the weed amongst the tares good fish bad fish in the same net

01:22:26

It's really challenging brother. He's kind of like what are you? and so the

01:22:31

Lord used that in his grace to bring me to an end of myself and there was a day in early 2009 where I was driving up 85 north in my work vehicle and I Had literally probably brother over the course of three weeks listen to that sermon

01:22:47

Maybe a hundred times every moment that I was not talking with a client or a co -worker That I was driving for work.

01:22:54

I was listening to it and I just began to weep and cry out to God and confess all my sin and I Can remember saying if I can't have

01:23:03

Jesus I'd rather not live Please just save me. I don't You know and I knew enough from growing up in the church as a kid

01:23:12

To hear words like the elect and so I'm saying to God if I'm not that just kill me.

01:23:17

I'd rather not go on and you know God is a The poor man cried out to the

01:23:24

Lord and he delivered him from all his troubles. So I'm 34 He made me poor in spirit.

01:23:30

I know that now. I don't think I knew that then and that was Nine days before I left to actually go on that mission trip that I signed up to go home.

01:23:39

I wasn't sick. Hmm. God is a amazing God and so he works in these

01:23:46

Strange ways and so how I came to the doctors of grace is

01:23:51

I started reading the Bible Started reading the

01:23:56

Bible and for the first year I was a Christian. I didn't read any Extra biblical books.

01:24:02

All I did was just start just eating the scriptures up and After I was a

01:24:08

Christian about a year. I signed up to go on an evangelistic outreach to the Super Bowl and I had a 15 -hour van ride

01:24:16

With like 12 guys in a van to Miami from Atlanta and the whole way down and the whole way back

01:24:22

There was two brothers sitting in front of me talking about Tulip and the doctor and I didn't know there.

01:24:30

I never heard of such things. I'd never heard of Calvinism I never read John Calvin I never I didn't know there was terms these kind of terms and but what

01:24:38

I and I mostly listen sometimes ask questions but I remember thinking was This all sounds like what

01:24:46

I've been reading in the scriptures over this last year And I had a dear brother who was with me on that outreach and we're great friends to this day

01:24:56

We separated doing ministry for a while, but because when we got back from that outreach

01:25:01

I went out and bought the Potter's freedom and he went out and bought what love is this? Ah, so we immediately began to go sort of on separate trajectories, but uh, you know, we've now since you know reconciled and He would say now maybe he's a four -point

01:25:18

Calvinist or something like that and I'm like it's all or nothing brother, but uh we're good brothers now and So, yeah, that's how the

01:25:26

Lord saved me That's how I came to the doctor grace People would accuse me point a finger at me Calvinist sister that and I say well kid

01:25:32

Can you be that if you've never read John Calvin? Can we do we need these labels? Can we just open our

01:25:38

Bibles and see what the scripture says and my favorite thing that Calvin's ever written to this day? I've people are like institutes is so great.

01:25:46

I mean, have you really read all of it? I haven't brother hunters. I've read a good portions of it. But my favorite part is still prayer

01:25:52

Hmm, I think this section in prayer on prayer and institutes is The greatest thing

01:25:58

I've read by Calvin, maybe the greatest thing I've ever read on prayer There's a lot of other good stuff.

01:26:03

But that that section on prayer is phenomenal What you told me reminds me and I'll try to make this fast

01:26:11

But years ago when I was working for WMCA radio selling airtime. I did not have my own talk show at that time.

01:26:19

I Approached by a fundamentalist Baptist pastor who was not a Calvinist who said

01:26:26

I know a Jewish journalist who's a senior citizen he's retired and He considers himself a student of the

01:26:38

New Testament And he wants to debate me on radio and he wants to purchase some airtime to do it so I he gave me the person's number and I called the

01:26:50

Jewish individual and sold him a two -hour block of airtime to debate this fundamentalist

01:26:56

Baptist pastor and I'm listening at home to this live broadcast

01:27:02

And at some point during the debate this Jewish Journalist who it claimed to have read the

01:27:09

New Testament many many times might have even been as many as a hundred or more of course he being remaining an

01:27:17

Orthodox Jew did not believe in the teachings of Jesus being the Messiah and so on but he

01:27:24

Knew the Bible very well, and he said to this fundamentalist Baptist pastor So let me get this straight

01:27:31

You believe that before the foundations of the world? God chose a certain group of people to be saved to eventually bring to heaven with him

01:27:46

But he passed by all the others and did nothing to save them and the fundamentalist pastor

01:27:54

Interrupts and says uh -uh Ira hold on a minute. Hold on a minute. No, no, no. No, you're talking about Calvinism this

01:28:01

Jewish guy says, excuse me You're talking about Calvinism. I'm talking about what?

01:28:08

Calvinism I'm not a Calvinist What is that? I've never heard this word I'm talking about your

01:28:15

Bible the New Testament. I almost fell off my chair Praise the

01:28:20

Lord and I called the radio station and I said to the engineer you got to have this Jewish guy stick around after the debates over because I got to talk to him and I let him know that he was accurately interpreting what the

01:28:34

New Testament said about election and And that his opponent even though he's a Christian was very flawed in that area and I But I told him

01:28:43

I was going to pray that he actually came to Believe and embrace Christ as his

01:28:49

Messiah and so on I hope I can find that tape somewhere.

01:28:54

I've got to try to find that pastor and see if he'd be willing to Sell me or give me a copy of that recording because it's classic

01:29:05

That'd be great, I'd love to hear it Well, one of the things that I wanted to go back to that I want to make sure that we clarify when you were speaking of I believe it was

01:29:14

Ryle who said that God Either rarely or never has used

01:29:22

Institutions can you repeat what you were saying? Oh, no, that wasn't bitch Ryle. That's my friend Al Baker. Oh, okay. I'll Baker. Yes I You know he and I may

01:29:31

I may quote him wrong he may just have to get on here and correct me sometime but God has never done anything amazing or remarkable through the establishment because the establishment

01:29:43

No, no longer demands Excellence, you know, it's sort of this, you know, they're happy with the status quo

01:29:51

And so, you know, he kind of he kind of describes how God uses got people that are

01:29:56

You know, maybe a little bit outliers or something like that. I heard Pastor Phil Johnson Described us as weird or something like that in one of these

01:30:07

Q &A's and and I said well I mean it in a derogatory. No, no. No, I don't think it was derogatory he said, you know, maybe take open -air preacher so it takes a guy's a little weird or something and And and even if even if it did

01:30:19

I would say I'm very fine with that because I've been called far far worse by lots of folks

01:30:26

You know, I think that's what Al was getting at is You know, well certainly I think open -air preachers are sort of a strange

01:30:34

Strange breed we always have been But that doesn't you know to be clear that doesn't exclude us from Some guys they take that and they say well,

01:30:44

I don't need the church. I don't need to submit to anyone They're a law unto themselves, you know, we've talked about those guys a little bit already.

01:30:50

Yeah, that's why I wanted to totally unbiblical Yes, and in fact, in fact, one of the things

01:30:55

I admired about all the guys that I spoke to from the Jeremiah cry conference that I went to Tony Miano and some of these other guys in fact have interviewed

01:31:06

Tony on a number of occasions They have a very strict policy that they will not go street preaching with anyone

01:31:15

That does not belong to a local church and also Who does not

01:31:21

Have the blessing of the elders over him to do this because he believes this is actually a calling

01:31:28

It's not something that anybody should do Just because they feel like they have some kind of a gift

01:31:35

Any and unfortunately from what these men have told me and perhaps you can concur

01:31:42

Sadly most street preachers aren't even connected in any kind of membership to a local church Yeah, I would say sadly that that is true

01:31:50

Chris I'm in a hundred percent in agreement with what you said those brothers share with you One of the first things

01:31:56

I ask a person that wants to potentially labor together is what's your church? What are your elders think a lot of times

01:32:04

I ask him? What's your spouse think believe it or not? there's a lot of guys out there that are calling themselves to this type of ministry and their shipwreck in their home and Marriage because their wife is is not on board with it and that's your first ministry isn't any to any any

01:32:20

Christian That's your first ministry I would even go so far as to say and Tony believes this.

01:32:25

I think he's written about it in his book. I Believe that it that a man who's going to do this

01:32:31

Should really meet the biblical qualifications and first Timothy 3 and Titus 1 for for an elder

01:32:38

It's it's going out and preaching and teaching the Word of God and you'd be surprised brother how upset some guys doing it

01:32:45

Yeah, when you say that and first of all, I'm like shouldn't any Christian man have an aspiration to meet those?

01:32:53

Qualifications, you know, that's not the qualifications of a Christian Superman Alright, I mean it's sort of Christianity 101.

01:33:01

Sometimes I'll say to a guy Do you think he could be a husband of two wives? Is that what we're gonna you know what I mean?

01:33:06

It's not like these are you know so I think you know, I yeah, brother and I and I have to be

01:33:13

I'd have to be transparent when I get when I Left my job to go into this ministry full -time.

01:33:20

I had the approval of my Pastor and elder but I think I rushed it.

01:33:25

I think I pressured it I think I drove it and it was over time that the Lord reformed me

01:33:31

Through friendships with guys like Tony dear brother named John speed wrote a book called evangelism the

01:33:36

New Testament little booklet where he talks about that and he did some extensive blog writings about that and Boy, it caused a lot of friction and in the open -air community because some guys just wouldn't

01:33:47

They refused to see what the what the scriptures say, I believe But yeah, and then then eventually as the

01:33:55

Lord really began to reform my heart we when we found our church in Athens Which is not where we are currently that church split

01:34:04

Sadly, but I went to the elders and they said we've talked to your previous pastor.

01:34:10

We know what you're doing We've seen some video. We're for it But if you want this to be a ministry of this church, which

01:34:17

I do and I believe every evangelist should be sent by the church I believe that's the biblical model You know

01:34:24

Paul and Barnabas sent out by the church in Antioch Continuing to come back there and report reporting back to the mother church in Jerusalem they said we're gonna have to watch over your life and we're gonna have to look at how you are as a husband and a father and and that was a two -and -a -half -year process that those guys did that and Was frustrating at times because I'd been doing the work full -time for two years prior to going there

01:34:49

And I'm like Lord when's this gonna happen, but the Lord was gracious to me and helped me In the times

01:34:55

I was frustrated and eventually those guys after two and a half years came for me and said we think you're ready to sit before a formal ordination council and everything like that and you know,

01:35:05

I mean, I think I think every guy that Was out doing this work should be at least pursuing that and you know, we can't be rogues.

01:35:14

We can't Tony calls it nomads You know, that's just not a biblical model for evangelistic work well,

01:35:22

I'd like you to Summarize in about two minutes what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today

01:35:29

Well, a lot of people ask me brother. What why do you do what you do? And and I say well, it's very simple faith comes by hearing and hearing by the

01:35:38

Word of Christ I was saved out of a lifestyle of just extraordinary sin and I love going to places like downtown

01:35:48

Athens where there's 50 bars and four square blocks University of Georgia's number one party school three out of the last 12 years

01:35:56

I I used to live in Lindenhurst Long Island, and I don't know if it's true, but many people Not associate but not associated with each other

01:36:04

Told me that Lindenhurst Long Island has more bars per square mile than any town in the

01:36:10

United States Yeah, I don't know if it's still true Yeah, so places like that people, you know, you go out there and preach and people say did you come to beat up the drunks?

01:36:19

I say no friend God saves drugs God saved drinks. He saved me but I would

01:36:25

I would like the church to hear out there is most of these type of folks that you encounter out in the street are not going to come in to our churches and So if that faith is going to come by hearing someone has to take

01:36:39

How will they hear unless someone preaches to them right and how will they preach we just talked about unless they're sent

01:36:45

So not at not every Christian in church is a preacher or whatever we're all called to be witnesses and all called to Proclaim the gospel be heralds to wherever we are in whatever context we are.

01:36:57

So I the Lord's called me to preach but he also appointed evangelists to equip the

01:37:04

Saints for the work of the ministry, so Half of what I do honestly brothers preaching to the lost but on the college campus

01:37:10

I want to also encourage and equip the Christians that are there these young people who are literally afraid of their

01:37:18

God -hating professors and Peers and things like that. So I want to put resources like we see around here at the g3 into their hands

01:37:27

I want to pray for them. I want to get them in my home and encourage them. I said, this is your campus I'm just visiting here

01:37:35

So but you know and another thing I'd love listeners to hear is that Yeah, when you hear open -air preacher

01:37:43

Hear him out. Listen to a guy you see a guy preaching on the street. Listen to what he says

01:37:49

Rather than just you know, let that stereotype rule over you That stereotypes there for a reason and I get it

01:37:57

But brother, uh, you know, I'm a simple. I'm a pretty simple guy I'm not

01:38:03

I'm not a theologian. Well, sorry RC forgive me. Every Christians a theologian

01:38:09

You know, I'm just not the the sharpest guy. I'm a very simple man. I love my wife and my four children

01:38:17

I'd I'd rather anyone remember me as just a regular guy trying to obey what the Lord's called him to do

01:38:22

I'd rather my children know my dad loved me more than anyone ever knew me for evangelistic work.

01:38:29

I'm just a regular guy Wanting to obey the Lord and what he's called me to and and anyone that wants to get out there into those harvest fields

01:38:38

You can you can contact me I'll pray for you. I'll help you any way that I can I don't know all the answers, but whatever ones

01:38:45

I know you can ask me. I'm an open book And how would they contact you?

01:38:51

so Bobby McCreary and it's Bobby at I Wish I would thought this through better in the beginning brother to the end of the earth org all spelled out

01:39:02

So and even the longest email is not a number T. Oh, right. Yeah T O T H E E N D O F T H E E A R T H dot org, right?

01:39:13

Why would anyone? They can contact me that way they can find me on Facebook how would they contact the

01:39:25

Harbin's Community Baptist Church in Tequila, Georgia I think I pronounced it right Harbin's church org is the website and that's

01:39:33

H A R B I N S Correct. My elders there are Demar Webb and Jeff Thomas and uh, you know if your listeners think to pray we've been back at Harbin since our other church split and It's a long way from the

01:39:47

UGA campus And my goal is to bring students into the church God saves people into the church and we need the church

01:39:53

So Harbin's is a little far away. I love them dearly The Word of God is preached faithfully there

01:39:59

Christ is held in high esteem But we believe the Lord would have us be closer to where we're trying to minister to so that we can bring people in When we had our church in Athens, we had college students.

01:40:11

They're in real meaningful membership They're picking up people that can't older folks that can't drive themselves anymore

01:40:18

I'm saying glean from these people don't just sit in a pew on Sunday because you feel like your parents

01:40:23

Aren't gonna pay your tuition if you don't go to church, you know come in here and love the church

01:40:29

And that's what I want to do So we're seeking the Lord Long term as to whether or not, you know, maybe there'd be a church plant there or or if we need to move to it to another

01:40:41

Place, so that's how folks could pray for us as well. Well brother

01:40:46

Bobby It's been such an honor and privilege to finally hit you on iron chirping's iron radio people listening don't know that I have bumped into you at various conferences and we always intended to sit down and have an interview and it just never happened our paths kept crossing and so on and Not ever when we could both sit down and actually conduct an interview until now when

01:41:09

God's providence permitted it But thank you so much I look forward to having you back on the program again, and I look forward to also sharing fellowship with you in the future

01:41:18

Chris and Eric, thank you guys It's an honor and a privilege to to be with you and very thankful for what you're doing brother press on god bless you

01:41:26

Thank you you too Well, we're gonna be back after this brief station break with our final on -site

01:41:34

Interview from the g3 conference for today. There's more to come in future broadcasts, but don't go away

01:41:40

We're gonna be right back. God willing after these messages from our sponsors Hi, I'm pastor

01:41:46

Bill Shishko inviting you to tune in to a visit to the pastor's study every Saturday from 12 noon to 1 p .m

01:41:53

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01:42:02

We bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you and we invite you to visit the pastor's study by calling in with your questions

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Eastern Time for a visit to the pastor's study because Everyone needs a pastor Hi, I'm buzz

01:42:27

Taylor frequent co -host with Chris Arnson on iron sharpens iron radio I would like to introduce you to my good friends

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CV bbs .com at their toll -free number eight hundred six five six zero two three one eight hundred six five six zero two three one

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Purchasing on CV bbs .com or tell them verbally The discount coupon code iron if you call eight hundred six five six zero two three one and now here is our final

01:44:41

Interview from the g3 conference on -site from this past January. That's their final one for today

01:44:48

We'll have more to come in the future. God bless Chris Arnzen here again on -site at the g3 conference in Atlanta, Georgia.

01:45:00

This has been a phenomenal conference Probably the best experience in regard to iron sharpens iron radio

01:45:09

That has ever occurred more people than ever before Approaching me who knew exactly who

01:45:17

I was They must have recognized my face from the internet or recognized my voice some of them actually said they heard me talking and recognized my

01:45:23

Voice because they listen to iron sharpens iron radio people from all over the country in different parts of the world

01:45:29

It has been absolutely mind -blowing and in fact my webmaster who's sitting next to me

01:45:35

Eric Nielsen we were walking down the hall and I was telling him some kind of a joke and I Yelled out the name of the program iron sharpens iron radio and sure enough somebody

01:45:48

Ran up to me and big smile on his face said I recognize that voice anywhere

01:45:53

I listen to your show all the time. It's just been Totally amazing and there's also some new opportunities that have opened up I'm very excited about that could even expand the audience of iron sharpens iron much farther

01:46:07

But right now I have with me as far as an interview is concerned I have Matthew Stahl who is director of administration at IRBS IRBS Theological Seminary and IRBS for those of you who are unfamiliar with that acronym

01:46:23

Institute Institute for Reform Baptist Studies is what IRBS stands for and Many of you may recall interviews that I've conducted already with Jim Renahan the president of IRBS Theological Seminary but It's it's great to have you here with us today

01:46:43

Matthew. It's We've been waiting a long time during the course of this conference to have this interview, but we finally have the opportunity

01:46:50

Yeah, thanks Chris. I'm very excited to be with you on the show today It's of course a great blessing for me to be here.

01:46:59

This is actually the first conference that IRBS Theological Seminary Has been represented at since we've made our official name change for the last 19 years

01:47:10

We've been of course named the Institute of Reform Baptist Studies, but we're now making a transition

01:47:15

With the seminary moving from Escondido, California to Dallas, Texas And so we're now representing the seminary with a new name and we've of course

01:47:24

We're attempting to rebrand ourselves with a with a new logo and and color scheme and everything

01:47:30

And of course, we're excited to be here We've made a lot of good contacts already this week and met a lot of great folks that are excited to see the seminary project

01:47:40

Move forward and as you mentioned Jim Renhen is our president Many people are familiar with Jim's work and excited to see a confessional reform

01:47:49

Baptist seminary established in the Dallas area Why don't you explain exactly what that means because your average evangelical

01:47:58

When they hear the term confessional, they may be totally clueless. This is what that means

01:48:04

They may think now. Wait a minute. They do like the sacrament of penance Denomination or that church when they hear the term confessional, obviously, it's referring to the fact that we adhere to the 1689

01:48:17

London Baptist Confession of Faith as our Summary of what we believe the

01:48:23

Bible teaches That's correct. Yeah, there's obviously many good seminaries in the evangelical world that people can attend but one of the things that makes us

01:48:32

Distinctive is the fact that we are a confessional reform Baptist seminary And what we mean when we say that is that our professors are going to be teaching from the perspective

01:48:42

Of the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith. And so that makes us a little bit different than everybody else

01:48:48

We are distinctively confessional covenantal and Calvinistic and our theology is reflected in the

01:48:55

London Baptist Confession of Faith. And so for that for us, that's very important We want to see men trained for gospel ministry according to the theological standards of our confession of faith and of course we want to see men trained according to those standards because we want them to be trained and sent back to the churches so that they can plant churches and hopefully be

01:49:16

Pastors in our association and of course outside of our association as well. Yes, and also to further clarify

01:49:23

What we mean by confessional and what we specifically mean by the 1689 London Baptist Confession It's also known as the second

01:49:30

London Baptist Confession This confession is it's not some aberrant or novel or strange document that only a tiny tiny handful of People adhere to as their official statement of faith

01:49:48

This is a confession of faith that Charles Haddon Spurgeon adhered to and many other well -known

01:49:56

Christians who were Baptists and who were theologically reformed in their soteriology

01:50:02

Adhered to in fact, I had heard that the Metropolitan Tabernacle has sealed within their cornerstone a copy of the 1689

01:50:13

London Baptist Confession and Benjamin Keech's catechism Yeah, so Tell us what you specifically do as director of administration

01:50:23

Well, that's that's a tough question to ask. I wonder how much time you have on your radio program

01:50:30

We have a small staff That's a part of that's a part of our team

01:50:36

Myself, I'm the director of administration Jim Rohn and of course is our president. We have a project manager

01:50:42

Jeff Massey who's Who's a pastor in our Association of Churches and we of course have a director of development

01:50:49

And so we've got a small staff and so all of the staff have many responsibilities as the director of administration.

01:50:54

I'm primarily tasked with thinking about accreditation Making sure that we are legal in the state of Texas And so I'm working with various state entities to ensure that we're doing everything correctly in the state

01:51:07

I'm also in charge of the financial Responsibility of the seminary as well.

01:51:12

So I'm working with our our CPA to ensure that things are in order there So I've got a lot of other responsibilities.

01:51:17

I'm here recruiting Of course this week at the conference, you know speaking with various people who might be interested in coming and attending our seminary of students and so I'm doing a lot right now there's a lot of Preparations that we're making and we're moving along.

01:51:31

Well, the Lord seems to be really blessing the work We're doing well in our fundraising efforts and we just published an application in fact on our website and people can find that at irbs seminary org

01:51:43

We've got an MDiv degree we've got an MA degree and all the curriculums available online for people to see and so we're actually starting to take in applications now and So we're very excited to see how the

01:51:54

Lord Blesses that we've already had 10 applications that have been put in in just the last week

01:51:59

Wow, and so we've got a lot of people who are interested in being a part of this very exciting project

01:52:04

Oh, why don't you list some courses that would be available there? at a confessionally reformed

01:52:12

Baptist seminary sure. Sure. What would a student expect to find there as far as courses?

01:52:20

Sure. Sure. Well within our two degrees as I mentioned our MDiv our Masters in Divinity and our

01:52:26

Master of Arts and Religion degree We've got a number of courses a lot of them are going to be standard for a

01:52:32

Reform a curriculum in a reformed seminary. So we've got a strong language component to our

01:52:38

Curriculum, we've got a lot of Greek and Hebrew that's going to be required systematic theology historical theology those sorts of courses

01:52:44

But what's maybe distinctive about our curriculum is that guys are going to be able to sit under dr

01:52:49

Jim Renahan and take symbolics symbolics one and two so we've actually got four Credits for units that are committed just to the study of the confession.

01:52:58

We have a theology of ministry course that dr Renahan teaches as well That has many components related to pastoral ministry distinctively

01:53:08

Baptist theology And so those are some of the courses are going to make us a little bit different and are going to help us to stand

01:53:15

Out from what other seminaries are doing and of course I'm sure many people are going to want to come study the confession under Jim Renahan Who is really as far as I as far as I can see the foremost expert on the confession of faith right now?

01:53:28

well, you reminded me that I have to get started on organizing a week's worth of Programming on iron chirping's iron radio.

01:53:40

I have always intended to do this but never have I wanted to have a week's worth of programming

01:53:45

Where each day one of the major confessions was addressed by somebody who is very knowledgeable That confession and who also personally adhere to that confession.

01:53:56

So I wanted to have obviously since I am a reformed Baptist 1689 covered and also the

01:54:03

Westminster which might Be covering a lot of the same territory because they are very very similar and the three forms of unity in the

01:54:11

Savoy Declaration maybe even do a program on the 39 articles of the

01:54:16

Anglican Church, which are very reformed as well, but Who is

01:54:23

Permitted to become a student at IRB s theological center.

01:54:31

Sure. Sure well as you can imagine and as we try to make very clear in in what we publish on the website in our our printed materials our

01:54:40

Program is primarily directed towards men. We want to train men for pastoral ministry. So that's the primary focus of our of our program and Women are allowed to participate in our program.

01:54:52

We have an MA degree That's not just for that's not just for you know, men who are not intending to go into ministry

01:54:58

But that's also for women who are looking to serve the church In better more formative ways. And so we want to welcome them into our program as well.

01:55:05

Yeah, the Bible never Prohibits women from learning. That's right. That's right. That's right But our

01:55:11

MDiv is obviously directed towards men and so it's intended to train men for pastoral ministry As it relates to you know, some of our admissions requirements, you know

01:55:19

We require what we primarily lean on in our in our application is that people are being sent to us from a church from which they?

01:55:27

Have a commendation That's one of the primary requirements so that assumes naturally that they're going to be believers in the

01:55:32

Lord Jesus Christ that they can Confess and agree with the Apostles creating the Nicene Creed and and just basic forms of Christian doctrine

01:55:40

You don't have to be a reformed Baptist to attend IRB s theological seminary we fully expect and we want people to come from outside of our circles because we want people to learn more about the confession and Come to the same convictions that we've come to believing that the line of Baptist confession is the very best expression of what the

01:55:57

Bible teaches So why don't you tell our listeners exactly how they can?

01:56:04

Find out more about what you're doing Absolutely. Yeah. Thanks Chris. You can of course go to our website

01:56:09

IRB s seminary org You are more than welcome to email me. My name is

01:56:15

Matt stall My email address is install at IRB s seminary org If you go to our website, you can begin the application process

01:56:23

We also have an inquiry form that you'll find easily accessible on the website And so you can begin that process and I'll follow up with you via email or telephone and this is both for Students that are attending courses in the

01:56:39

Dallas Facility and Online students or have you come to that point?

01:56:44

We do not have any intention at this point of becoming of offering online courses.

01:56:50

We're strictly going to be a residential seminary The nature of our program is it's just going to be more conducive to a residential program and there are other

01:56:58

Seminaries out there that are doing a very good job with online as an education. So we want to have a strong mentor component and a strong Internship component that's built into our

01:57:09

MDiv Especially and the languages of course are best done in a residential program and not online

01:57:15

And so for those reasons we've decided to strictly make our program a residential program. Well, I want to thank you so much

01:57:22

Matthew for being a part of the program today and once again repeat for our listeners your website.

01:57:28

That's right IRB s seminary org Well, God bless you brother. I'm looking forward to future contact with you and also

01:57:36

Brother Jim Renahan, and I will be praying for a much fruit To come from this wonderful new opportunity in Dallas, Texas.

01:57:46

Thanks, Chris Well, that's it for today and we will be as I said airing more of the on -site g3 conference interviews

01:57:56

As God permits in the hopefully near future. I want to thank especially

01:58:02

Josh Josh Bice pastor of Praise Mill Baptist Church in Douglasville, Georgia and Director of the g3 conference for enabling me to be there

01:58:12

In January, I want to thank and by the way, the website for that conference is g3 conference .com

01:58:18

g3 conference .com I also want to thank some sponsors that enabled me to travel there including

01:58:27

Linbrook Baptist in Nassau County, Long Island. Their website is linbrookbaptist .org.

01:58:33

That's l -y -n -b -r -o -o -k baptist .org and then of course battery depot .com

01:58:41

Battery depot .com and last but not least the publishers of the New American Standard Bible nas

01:58:47

Bible calm that's nas Bible calm who all sponsored my iron trip and siren radio exhibitors booth tour

01:58:58

The g3 conference was my final Tour stop for the 2017 sponsorships that I received even though this occurred in 2018 and now they have these same sponsors have sponsored my 2018 tour which will begin shortly.

01:59:19

God willing. Thank you so much for joining us today on iron sharpens iron radio And always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater