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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ. Based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, "...but we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.".
In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.
Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry. Pastor Steve here in the Deutschlandhaus.
And I am here to pump you up.
This started off as a serious Tuesday show. When? I thought I would just have Steve, three and a half years ago, sit in and we could talk about biblical issues, provocative issues, issues in that sequential order.
Was? I watched that new David Bowie video with all the Potsdamer Plots and stuff like that, but you didn't like it, did you?
I could only get about a third of the way through it, and I just thought, okay, there's, you know, interesting background stuff going on and everything, but it's just too weird. I mean, David, you know, it's like only now can I sort of appreciate what David Bowie was doing in the early 70s.
So, you know, maybe in another 40 years, I'll look back and go, oh, wait, 50 years. I'll look back and go, yeah, that was kind of interesting.
All right. Well, see, Steve and I agree theologically to a great extent, but music tastes, musical tastes. I win, you lose.
Come on, your own wife says you only like people who can't sing.
Well, Steve, in jazz, that's no big deal. Yeah, jazz. Miles Davis couldn't sing. Well, I have not, no, I don't know if you've done this or not, but you can change your music or your intro on Saturday shows to your own pleasure, whatever country singer you want to put in there.
Oh, no, it's going to be Elvis. Beer and trucks and stuff like that. It's going to be Elvis. Costello? Yeah. Okay, you can. Watching the detectives. I just sent the new intro music for No Compromise Radio Monday through Friday shows to Charlie, and so by the time this airs, it'll probably have the new music.
English Beat and the White Stripes are out. Really?
Yeah. So no more Seven Army Nation or whatever.
No more. But I can't tell you who the new band is. You'll have to soundhound it. Do you have soundhound on your? No, I don't.
You know what soundhound is? I'm sure it just kind of listens to it, and then, yeah, it's like, what's that other thing? Shazam or
Shazam. Remember watching ISIS and Shazam and all those shows back in the 70s?
No, but there really is a Shazam, and I think that's what it does. Okay. It listens to the music and then tells you who it is.
Now, on No Compromise Radio, we don't like to ask for money, but why don't we ask for help and someone could make an app, a NoCo app. NoCo a day keeps the confusion away app. Where's our app people? Don't we have people who have apps?
Don't you think that'd look cool in black with a little NoCo there and kind of a little red spilling blood there, No Compromise to the point of blood?
Yeah, and what would it actually do, the No Compromise app?
Well, you wouldn't have to go to iTunes or anything else. You just push NoCo, and then all the Grace to You shows would come up, and we could hack MacArthur's site, and so every time someone wants to listen to John's download, they hear Tuesday Guide, Questions to Mormon Friends.
And they go to the No Compromise app.
Sure. So if you go to iTunes in No Compromise and type No Compromise Radio in, and then you click on No Compromise Radio, it's the first one, top left, then you see a bunch of the shows, Steve. Maybe 40 shows are listed, and they're in chronological order, and at the top is the show that was just played yesterday, and then at the bottom it tells you people who subscribe to NoCo also subscribe, too.
And any guesses of some of those shows? This is true, by the way.
Grace to You, maybe. Reasoning from the Scriptures, what's the Ligonier thing, what's it called? Ligonier? Renewing Your Mind.
Oh, yes! Renewing Your Mind. Well, pretty close, but not quite. Okay. Things like—. Westminster Seminary would be—. Oh yeah, I wish. Evangelical Philosophical Society. Oh, nice! No, actually, I think the first one is Glenn Beck and something about his blog.
So his audio blog. So that's true. So we have a lot of Glenn Beck listeners. There would be the Ray Comfort Living Waters deal, Wretched Radio, James White, Phil Johnson.
Now we're getting into the rarefied era. See?
That's right. But I did think it was interesting that Glenn Beck would be number one. People that like No Compromise also like Glenn Beck.
Well, hey, if it says so on iTunes, then it's true. Yes, yes. Okay. Ticket to the bank.
So 1 Corinthians 16 has an interesting verse in the King James, and Steve, in the ESV it says, Act Like Men, in the NAS it says, Act Like Men, and in the King James, what's it say? Quit ye like men. Yes.
Now, when you have to quit a job, do you do it in a manly fashion? What would that mean?
That means you walk boldly in, adjust your tie, hand them your resignation and say, Sir, with all due regard, I hereby resign my position forthwith.
So if you ever leave Bethlehem Bible Church and all the perks that go along with it, including No Compromise Radio, is that how you'll do that?
Actually, I'll probably send it in via sled team. I'll have my little dogs bring it in.
Well, since we don't have any internet at the church building today, it'll probably have to be the sled.
Our internets, they're missing some information.
Paul at the end of 1 Corinthians is giving pretty much some preventative maintenance orders. Well, they're not preventative maintenance for the Church of Corinth. Flesh the plumbing. Yeah, cleanup there.
But for us, I don't think we're Corinth at the church, do you? Do you think we're at our church, Corinthian? No, but we're heading that way.
We'll have people at the first service. Well, you know what I like though, you know, because you have to preach the sermon twice there and then he'll say to the second service, he'll go, I didn't tell the first service this.
It's called special Gnostic stuff. But anyway, for a church that's not carnal, good preventative exhortations. If you're carnal, here are some exhortations, and there are these five present imperatives.
But one of them is, act like men. And so today on No Compromise Radio, Steve and I are going to talk about that a little bit. What does it mean to act like men? We're actually going to do some, maybe some exegesis today, some expositional exhortation.
Really? You should see his face. Now, we're starting that new feature soon, NoCo90, the 90-second video blog. But how is that going to work for Tuesday, Guy? How can we do that on Saturday? Do you need, how much time do you need?
Well, at least 90 milliseconds.
I think I can just boil things down to the bare essence in 90 seconds, but I'm thinking maybe you might need a little more time. I don't think so.
I can name that tune in 45 seconds. I bet you could.
Now, it's interesting, Steve, that in this command, act like men, he doesn't just give it to men in the church. He gives it to the entire church. How are we able to tell ladies, act like men? When was the last time you said to a woman, act like a man?
Are you kidding? In my previous—I used to tell the ladies to man up all the time. Seriously? Well, yeah, because, you know, I don't know if I can do that or not. Policewomen would say that? Yeah, and I'd just go, let me look at your shoulder, you know, and they'd kind of turn and they'd have this tiny little patch because they have the ladies patch, and I'd go, well, it looks to me like it says, L .A. County Sheriff, although my eyesight isn't as good as it used to be.
Very good. Well, what Kim, my wife, likes to tell ladies in ladies' ministry and ladies' discipleship, do you know what she says to ladies? Man up? She says woman up. Oh, woman up. But here Paul says, act like men to the entire church.
Now, he's not saying women are bad. Is he saying that?
Well, is he saying that women should wear suits to act like a man?
Well, of course, Paul says to the Church of Thessalonica in 1 Thessalonians 2 that he was like a mother in terms of his affection towards them. There's crossover here, right? What's good for the gander is good for the gaggle.
Yeah, it's good for the goose or the geeses. Is it a gaggle of geese? I think it is. I think it is a gaggle. But you know what this reminds me of, and it's going to sound like I'm going way off topic, but I'm really not.
That's my job. I just read this thing the other day where they were talking about how there are no women in Tolkien's novels, which really isn't true, but, you know, the Lord of the Rings and all that.
But what does he do? He's focusing on the males. Why? Because so much of it has to do with adventures away from home and warfare. And so I think the idea of acting like a man, and this is where I'm getting back into it.
See, that's nice. Good transition. Yeah, as Tolkien is really saying, there are aspects of life that are supposed to be handled by men. And that's what Paul's saying. Look, there are things that you need to do that are typically thought of as manly.
I mean, you would never tell your daughter, you know, well, hit the guy in the face or what, you know, maybe you would. But you know, I mean, there are just things that we, I mean, we have to acknowledge, first of all, there are differences between men and women.
So you wouldn't tell a church to act like a woman, you know, because that would, you know, suggest softness.
Right. And here there are people at Corinth, and they aren't not doing the right thing. And they need to be courageous, and they need to be bold, and they need to stand firm in the faith and do the right thing.
And instead of contrasting men to women, he's contrasting men to children, or to babies, or to toddlers, or to infants. And so you could probably translate this, Steve, in the Message Bible, grow up. Grow up is excellent.
I wonder how the Message, how does it, you didn't mention that on.
You know, I might have mentioned that on another show, but that was like on NOCO 900.
So a hundred shows ago, I mean, ancient times. Besides, it really seems appropriate to me, you know, to have this magic moment while we're talking about this passage.
Well, there's actually five present imperatives in the original, and I know that because I just studied the passage. And here, I don't think we have them all. Keep your eyes open, hold tight to your convictions, give it all you've got, be resolute, and love without stopping.
So here, in the ESV, it's be on the alert, which would be translated by the message, keep your eyes open. Okay, fair. Hold on tight to your convictions, stand firm in the faith, okay. Give it all you've got, and here it says act like men.
Give it all you've got. I mean, that sounds like a halftime speech. That is horrible.
Give it all you've got. All right, guys. Give it all you've got. Is that what they said at halftime of the national championship game to Notre Dame? Give it all you've got.
You're only down 28 -0. Well, I think that somehow it was like touchdown Mary instead of touchdown Jesus that they tried to acknowledge. I have to say I enjoyed it a lot. Steve, why is it that you have such a propensity for being anti-things?
You know, any team named Our Lady, you root against. How is that?
What would that mean? Well, I don't know, some deep psychological need that I— I think so.
So here he says act like men, and many of you in No Compromise Radioland would know some Greek words, I'm sure. You might know the word amen, right? Or anthropos. Or anthropos, see? Men. I just pulled it out, you know, randomly.
Anthropology. See? Isn't that amazing how this all coalesces together? It's kind of—it's a sign, I think, I'm sure. But here it's not the word anthropos for act like a man. It's where we get the word Andre, like Andrzejek, one of the NoCo supporters.
He's manly. And crack staff. So you know, I always talk about Andre the Giant when I think of this verse. Tell me a little bit about Andre the Giant and how he would be a good biblical example.
My ways are not very sportsmanlike. That's Andre the Giant. Yeah, that's from a movie he was in. Andre the Giant was 7 '4", and I think—you know, I think he was generously listed at 400 pounds. I mean, that guy was Hugh Bungus.
He was the eighth continent while he was alive. So I mean, that is just one big guy.
Steve, would it be fair to say that if men don't lead in a local church in a courageous way, in a valiant way, in a robust way, in a strong way, that the vacuum left by the lack of male leadership will be filled by some kind of leadership?
Well, nature abhors a vacuum, and it'll be filled by female leadership. Well, just think about what you're saying, though. If you look at why was he telling them to act like men, well, because of all the issues going on in the church, we pretty much know that they were not acting like men, right?
This was a church that was crumbling because its leadership was inept. I mean, we don't know that much about it. Here's what we do know. They had all these problems. Well, it wasn't because they had strong leadership running the place.
Well, maybe the leadership, they dropped their binky. I think that's what it was. They dropped their binkies, and they didn't know what to do. So what would we tell men who are listening today? They're no-compromise guys.
They like the show. They want it bluntly and forcefully and straightly delivered. So what would we tell the guys who pretty much let their wives run the show because the wives are thinking to themselves, my husband won't lead spiritually, so somebody's got to lead?
Put your blanket in the basement, throw your pacifier in the trash, and man up. Is that too—am I beating around the bush?
No, I think that's excellent. Doesn't this remind you, Steve, of the Old Testament language with Joshua? Be strong and courageous. That's exactly right. We're the courageous people. My wife always says this.
A lot of people like to talk about courageous men and women, but not many people want to be them.
Well, and I would dare to say a lot of women don't want to marry one. I mean, seriously, isn't that sad? Well, I'd like a spiritual leader, except then I might have to submit to him, right? Right. Yeah.
It's a magic moment, pretty much, I think. Listen to what Tozer said about the Church and male leadership. The Church at this moment needs men, the right kind of men, bold men. God will not revive mice.
He will not fill rabbits with the Holy Ghost. Got to be manly. Manly men. He will not fill rabbits with the Holy Ghost. No.
And you know what? I think if you look around the so-called evangelical church today, you see a lot of churches being led by, at best, rabbits.
What would be the solution? Let's say there's a church. They recognize there's a problem with male leadership, and they want to right the ship. And so how would somebody go about acting like a man? What would be one of the first thing they'd have to do?
Would go to the gym, shave their chest?
You're saying there's problems with the current leadership?
Yeah. But they recognize it, and they'd like to make a difference.
Okay. Well, I mean, I think the first thing to do would be to sit down with leadership and talk about who's spiritually qualified. You know, go to 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 and decide if any of those men are fit to lead the Church.
You know, and if not, then see if there's anybody at the Church that is. I think one of the—probably the biggest problem is there are just men who are in leadership positions, whether they're deacon, elders, pastors, whatever, and they have absolutely no business doing—being in that role.
They don't know the Scriptures. They're, you know, picked for all the wrong reasons. They've been there the longest. They make the most money. Whatever the reasons are, they're not—. It's their turn. Yeah.
It's their turn. It's my turn in the barrel. Like leadership is something you just get stuck with.
Well, Steve, this might step on some toes, but one of the first things I would do after we made sure everyone was qualified biblically to be a leader, either an elder or a deacon, is to get rid of the anti-man-up, anti-act-like-men clause found in almost every constitution of Baptistic churches.
And that is three years on for leadership and then one year off.
What is that even about? I mean, term limits—well, we don't want anybody getting too comfortable.
Well, basically that means, yeah, don't get too comfortable. Don't get too much power, right? Right. Because if you're a president for, you know, four terms or three terms, then you can have too much power, and too many people would follow you and follow along with what you want to do.
But 1 Timothy 3 talks about if you aspire to be an elder, it's a good thing, and as long as you're able to and as long as you are willing to, you should be in leadership. And what happens is, people don't want to have to fire a bad elder, so they say we'll just ride him out, and he's only got two more years left, and he's a lame duck.
Well, what's wrong with this? We just nominated a bunch of people, and whoever gets 75 gets to be an elder.
Well, I think that should probably be about 76%, kind of like the Baseball Hall of Fame, 52 or whatever. Who made the hall this year? Now, part of this manliness and courageousness that Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians chapter 16 has to do with being resolute in times of trouble.
So when there's trouble in the church, when there are controversies and difficulties and attacks from within or from without, there need to be people who stand up with determination to do the right thing, no matter what the outcome.
We've had to do that at the church before, haven't we, Steve? Where we think, well, you've got to do the right thing, and, well, whatever happens after that, come what may.
Let the chips fall where they may. Well, I mean, just think about the guy who has his stepmother for, you know, is having relations there with his stepmother. Oh, in 1 Corinthians 5, yes. And so what do you suppose, you know, a church that finds out about that, leadership that finds out about it, what should they do?
And then, you know, he says, I actually hear, you know, that this is going on at the church. Well, it should have already been handled, right?
When pagans think that the church is carnal, more carnal than they are, I think you've pretty got a, you've got a pretty, you know, grande problema. You've got a big problem.
You've got a big problem. I mean, what should the church be known for? It should be known for being serious about sin, okay, and that's why we do church discipline. And it should be known for the love and the love within the church.
And people get those two things confused. They say, well, if you really love somebody, then you just... You'll let them go. Yeah, you just have to let... You just have to... Yeah. And then if they come back, they're really yours.
And if they don't, they're... Whatever. Rump spring up.
Steve, what about this aspect of courageousness and maturity? Wasn't Paul a good model of fighting the beasts and standing up against Alexander the coppersmith? I don't really like conflict too much, do you?
But what are you going to do if you're a leader?
My favorite thing is where he goes to Peter. He says, I withstood him to his face. You know, and the reason I love that so much is because, you know, Peter was allegedly the first pope. And I'm going, talk about bold.
Paul went right to the pope's face and told him he was wrong.
No. Yeah. St. Peter's Square or something. Was that where that all happened?
Well, yeah. And then it turned into St. Peter's Ring because they went 15 rounds. It was...
Well, one of the best things you can do if you'd like to grow in your manliness, either if you're a man or a woman, is to study the scriptures. How is maturity and courage related to manliness via the scriptures, Pastor Steve?
Well, because you get conviction.
You know, once you know what God has said, you're not going to compromise on that. You know, you could say, well, look, if it was left up to me, I'd let the guy, you know, have his affair with his stepmother.
But it's not up to me. This is God's standard. It's God's house. It's his church. And we have to do things His way, not the way we might, you know, think is more loving or nicer.
See, what happens when you study the scripture, you become stable and mature and confident of what God has revealed about Himself and what He desires in His church that His Son has purchased. And then you aren't tossed to and fro by every wind and wave of doctrine or controversy or anything else.
Right? Yeah. Ephesians 4, right? So, you want to be mature and not tossed about by every wind and wave of doctrine.
That's right. Listen to 1 Timothy, excuse me, 1 John chapter 2, I write to you, young men, because you are strong and the Word of God abides in you and you have overcome the evil one. And so you have little children in the faith, and of course, there's nothing wrong with being a child.
You understand your salvation in the Lord Christ Jesus, but it's time to move on. You can't stay a child. If we have, you and I have children, if you take our seven children combined and say, you know, at four years old, they never got any bigger, we probably would have taken them to the doctor.
Yep. Because there'd be a problem. Children are to grow. And so immaturity isn't bad as long as you don't stay as an immature person and you grow in the faith. And so, how great was the day, Steve? And I know it didn't dawn on you in a day, but when you came to realize that the Lord, through His grace, through His providential arrangement of teachers and John MacArthur and others, that you understood the Bible for yourself and that you weren't going to be snookered by Satan ever again.
You weren't going to be discombobulated because God showed you from the Word what was true.
To be honest, I was a little freaked out. A little freaked out.
I was freaked out. Now, of course, we don't really think about it, and it doesn't dawn on us, you know, now we have arrived. And I don't mean that. But there are stages. Children, young men, and spiritual fathers in 1 John 2.
And I love it that God, by His grace, has made me a spiritual young man where I'm not tossed all around when things come up or issues arise.
Well, it is amazing to me. And I think one of the things is just, you know, as I grew, it was like bodybuilding in this sense. You know, as you listen, as you read, well, then you're just able to recall more things to mind and to think to yourself, well, wait a minute, I know that's not right.
You know, I'm going to be the Berean. I'm going to compare that to Scripture. And you know, it becomes easier all the time. And not because I'm more judgmental than I ever was, but because the more steeped in truth you become, the less flapped you are, the less bothered you are by something that you know is false because you know what the truth is.
I think bodybuilding is a good illustration. Instead of kind of being flabby, you're toned up and you understand these things. Last night, Steve, I had Gracie lay on top of me. She's 11. And then I was doing push-ups.
And she thought that was quite the fun thing. And I was straining big time to try to do it.
I'm squashing Daddy and he can't push me up. I know.
So if you'd like to grow up in the faith, you'd like to act like a man, well, certainly there's lots of things that you can look at in terms of leadership and things. But Steve, I think the best is to get yourself in the Word and study the Word.
And I think that you'll grow by it with respect to salvation.
Well, amen, because that's right out of Peter. But here's the other thing, too. I just think if you're at a church and you compare what your church is doing to Scripture and you just go, this place is not meeting up, then maybe it's time to confront the leadership or talk to the leadership and then maybe move on.
The Bible says we want to hold fast to the Word of life in Philippians chapter 2. And so let's avoid charismatic zaps and Holy Spirit slayings and let's just do the hard work of studying the Bible. Man up.
Man up. Woman up. Quit being like men. Act like men. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.
Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.
The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.