Session 8: Round Table Discussion - Jim Osman, Justin Peters, John Samson, and Dan Phillips

Kootenai Church

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Okay, so we have some questions here that have been submitted by the audience. Some of this is going to be some rather straightforward questions.

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Some of them more of a discussion. Dibs. We'll fight over that.

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All right. First this question, and Dan and I were discussing this during the break here, actually.

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How does one stratify error in categories like nonessential and secondary?

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Isn't all error essential? Or isn't error, all error, an essential issue?

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Can you speak into that? That's why we did the test. Well, I think probably the way functionally people do it is those errors which will determine a person's eternal destiny, whether they are take this position and you're not a

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Christian, take this position and you're within the Christian pale. So essential issues, first tier issues would be the doctrine of God, the doctrine of salvation, even the doctrine of scripture,

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I'd say. Yeah, so Dan, you said you wanted to argue with me sometime about whether cessationism is a secondary or primary issue.

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And we talked a little bit about what makes something a secondary or primary issue. I made the statement that cessationism is though it's a secondary issue, this issue of continuationism, cessationism always feels like it has ambitions to become a primary issue because it affects something that is so practical and has to do with the outworking of our lives.

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So if you're talking about theologies that have more influence upon our day -to -day life,

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I wouldn't say there's any theology that affects our day -to -day Christian living more than the cessationist, continuationist issue.

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But it does not affect whether or not we're a Christian. So if we're talking practical, we would say it is a primary issue in that sense.

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But if we're talking about salvation, we say it's not a primary issue. But then you had kind of rejoined her to that. Well, first of all,

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I thought that was a really excellent point and really well made. I wrote that down. That was a really, really good point. And then

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I thought, okay, it's true that in terms of the scope of doctrine, this is not a primary issue, but it is a primary practical issue.

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The doctrine of justification, your view on that determines on whether you're believing the true gospel or not. But this issue determines how you marry, where you go to church, how you make decisions, how you think things through.

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And then I thought, but then doesn't it also sneak back around and determine and affect the way you think about primary issues?

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So that often a person in that camp, you present them with the doctrine of the sovereignty of God, or you present them with what scripture says about the perfection of Christ's work and predestination, election, and they don't feel right about it.

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They don't feel a witness in their spirit about it. So they don't accept that doctrine because really the locus of authority has been relocated from scripture to me.

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Where I rest really is how I hear God's voice and not what scripture says to me.

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So that secondary issue comes back and affects the way I think about primary issues.

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So my secondary view of cessationism affects how I view scripture, then that can become a primary issue because it becomes my view of scripture.

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Would you say that the doctrine of scripture is a primary issue? What one believes about the word of God? Well, I would.

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I think God in grace has saved people who have defective views of scripture. Like C .S. Lewis had a defective view of scripture, but somehow he muddled out the lordship of Christ and the need to believe in him and looked to him alone for salvation.

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God is very gracious. I know we all would thank God for that. But if it were thought through consistently, it would lead to a heretical conclusion.

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So really maybe what makes something a primary or secondary issue is the degree to which we work that out.

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That's kind of where I was going at with this session. If we take this approach to scripture, hearing still small voices to its logical conclusion, then that's where it bleeds into primary issues.

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Absolutely. That was a really excellent point. Thank you. Would you like to tell me

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I had an excellent point? That's an excellent point. That was the thought between my ears. Justin, anything you want to add to that before we move on?

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Yeah, no, I agree. I give a hearty amen to all of that. Mostly that that was an excellent point? Mostly that that was an excellent point.

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Well, do you agree with my agreeing with the point? That's what I wanted to know. I agree with your agreement and everything. Kumbaya. All around.

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Yeah. Yeah, it's, you know, men like Wayne Grudem and Sam Storms and John Piper, they would agree with all of us here with a high soteriology, high view of God's sovereignty.

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They're right on the gospel, but they are continuous. And let me say this, though, and maybe this is a little bit of a rabbit trail,

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I fully expect to see those men in heaven. They're right on the gospel. But they are the fringe of the charismatic movement.

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You need to understand that. They are the fringe. Jim was talking about, in his message, painting with a broad brush, and that's one of the common criticisms that has come our way as cessationist, strange fire conference.

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Oh, you're lumping all the charismatics in, you know, this painting with this broad brush, and you're lumping them all in with Kenneth Copeland charismatic.

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I mean, Kenneth Copeland, Benny Hinn, all those kind of guys. You need to understand that the fringe of the charismatic movement is not

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Benny Hinn and Kenneth Copeland. The fringe of the charismatic movement is Sam Storms, Wayne Grudem, and John Piper.

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That's the fringe. That's the fringe. The few men who are continuous to have a right understanding of gospel, that's the fringe.

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But sadly and practically, it is their position that opens the door to Benny Hinn and Joel Osteen and Joyce Meyer and Kenneth Copeland, Joseph Prince and Andrew Womack and all these others.

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It's a very, very slippery slope from where Wayne Grudem and John Piper are, it's a very slippery slope down right into Benny Hinn land.

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And there's no practical, there's no logical, theological reason to put on the brakes once you take their position, to put on the brakes and not slide right into word of faith and you have salt reformation.

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But the difference is one of degree and not of substance. It's one of degree and not of substance, that's right. But let me just also tack on the second generation phenomenon.

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You know, so you'll have a man who is fundamentally sound, but he'll teach these aberrant positions and because he's fundamentally sound, he won't follow them through to their horrible conclusions, but his students will, lacking his anchor, they'll take these things and they don't have his restraints.

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And you see that in the history of Fuller Seminary. It's defection in the error started with men who are fundamentally

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Christian, but they were weak and inconsistent in their doctrine of scripture. And the disciples they taught, the students they taught, lacked their core and followed the doctrines, followed the aberrant positions to their bad conclusion.

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The second generation, third generation phenomenon. Where these folk are sound, they are sound because of influences outside of charismatic land.

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They're sound because they've been instructed by reformed theologians through the centuries, not because somebody has prophesied something.

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Yeah. Yeah, I made the point last night, men like Matt Chandler, we recognize that they are sound in terms of their doctrines of salvation and God.

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And they hold to a reformed structure in terms of theology, though they have these continuationist and charismatic leanings.

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But they're like men who see the boundary around where they should be standing. They see the barriers in which they are theologically, and they acknowledge them, and we're all grateful that they acknowledge them.

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But then they step over them. They transgress those barriers. And a lot of people give them a pass in doing so because they affirm that the barriers are there.

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They don't realize that they're transgressing and going outside of the confines of reformed theology, historic reformed theology, by holding a continuationist perspective.

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So they acknowledge the parameters, but then they step right over them and transgress them. But then, like you say, the next generation is not going to do that.

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And as a great and sad example of what Jim's just saying, just a few weeks ago,

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Sam Storms, who is as careful of a continuous as you can be, and as there is, he's as careful as they come.

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But just a few weeks ago, he was being interviewed by this YouTube channel called Remnant Radio. And the whole subject of their particular video was called something like the

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Benny Hinn Prophecy. And not a prophecy that came from Benny Hinn, but about Benny Hinn, but anyway.

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In this video, Sam Storms said, and he acknowledged that Benny Hinn has some serious error in his theology and practice, but he said, but I believe that he loves

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Jesus and he's a brother. And I'm like, are you serious?

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I mean, if Benny Hinn is not a false prophet, then the term has no meaning. The term has no meaning.

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And so here you have Sam Storms, who is as careful, as a charismatic as there is, and he thinks

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Benny Hinn is our brother in Christ. So it's a shocking, shocking lack of discernment.

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This is kind of along the same line. Naming names amongst the more orthodox, and I just throw this out in case you want to add anything to this with some of these names.

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What do you do with the continuationists, John Piper, Bill Farley, etc., in the church? The black would be experiencing

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God in the Southern Baptist Church. How do we approach those men? What should our stand toward them be?

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How do we approach them? How do we deal with them? Do you quote them in a sermon? Yes, to refute.

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Yes, to refute them I do. Yes, I've written about the black abusive pyromaniacs, and I would refer to that, but to warn is a cautionary tale.

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Sometimes I will quote something that's good from some of those men, but I, as a pastor, don't want to provide the name.

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But rather than saying I said it, say someone said it, I just don't want to point people to someone that, should they go further and deeper into their blog and their ministry, will be then faced with deep and dark errors to deal with.

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That's with my pastor hat on. So I still want to, not everything they've said is bad, and a lot of what they've said is good.

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But I don't want to point people to secondary issues, perhaps, but issues that, as we've brought out already, are very, very vital and important.

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I don't want to send folk to something that could really hinder them. Justin, any of that?

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I would not, just because I know how, and I'm not trying to disagree here.

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I wouldn't simply because it's so, even if I were to quote someone who is absolutely right on whatever subject matter we're dealing with, but they're a charismatic or they're a continuous, nowadays it's so easy to just do a

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Google search of that quote, and then you find out who it is, and oh, well this must be okay. I'm just very, very careful about that.

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I think you can find the same information just as good from people who don't have that charismatic baggage.

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I agree with that. I'd be very reluctant to do what I just said. So you wouldn't follow your counsel at all?

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No. I'd listen to another voice inside here competing with the first voice.

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I may have misunderstood the question. If it's somebody who is influential, I might name them to warn against them.

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That's the way I took the question at the outset. But I think I may have quoted a John Piper now and again saying, now

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I have some significant concerns about his teaching, but on this I think he's exactly right, and may quote him.

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But there's a risk in that. But if I do, it's always with a disclaimer in a case like that.

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It's always with a warning. But usually you can find somebody else saying it who is sound, who says the same thing, and just quote that.

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You can't just litanize the quote and quote it without making any reference to who said it at all. That's true.

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Do we all know the three laws of quotation? The first time you quote, you say, as the

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Reverend R .T. Barnaby said. Second time you quote, as someone once said.

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The third time you quote, like I always say. Do word -faith charismatics ever use, oh, use the verse, the books could not contain all that Jesus ever said or did.

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From John 21, 25, to defend the frequency of miracles, that the writer just didn't write them all down.

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So would we ever say that Jesus did more miracles than are recorded in the New Testament? Well, yeah.

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I mean, clearly Jesus did a lot of things and taught things that are not recorded in Scripture.

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That's what the Apostle John was talking about. There are passages where his many miracles are not delineated in terms of he did this and he healed this person, he did that, cast a demon out of this person.

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But just, he healed all who were brought to him, the sick, the lame, the demon -possessed, etc. And they're just grouped into these passages, particularly in Matthew, I think, that you find that quite frequently, that he just was healing everybody who was brought to him with all of these various illnesses where they're not necessarily specifically enumerated.

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So for instance, Scripture doesn't say he did 52 miracles on this day and 48 miracles the next day and 10 the next day. You don't get anything like that.

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So you just get these groupings of miracles or references to miracles in general. So if Jesus...

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Could you then say that that is an argument against what Andrew presented in terms of the fading of New Testament miracles?

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No. I think it would buttress Andrew's point in that you would even have more miracles then, but still done in that same period of time by Jesus and by the

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Apostles. Yeah. They would always support it. Yeah. Now they do quote the fact that there are prophecies that are not recorded in Scripture.

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There's allusions to... Obviously, in the Corinthians Church, people were prophesying. We don't have those all written down.

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So that's a good thing to be ready to respond on and to understand what we believe.

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We don't believe that the doctrine of sufficiency means that Scripture contains every word that God has ever said.

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We believe that Scripture contains every word from God that we need on any given subject.

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And that's the way I think theologian John Frame puts it, and I wouldn't recommend him on everything.

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But I think... See? That's how you do it. You just framed the quotation.

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Moving on. No, I think the way he puts it is very good, that the doctrine of sufficiency of Scripture means that Scripture contains every word from God that we need on any subject.

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What is the difference between, or the distinction between, hearing the voice of God and the illuminating work of the

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Holy Spirit? John?

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Illumination is the present -day work of the Holy Spirit and the believer. We do not believe

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God is speaking in the same way that we would say Scripture is. I don't believe

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He is speaking. He has spoken. Hebrews 1, verse 1, seems to, as I understand it, speak of Jesus as the final word.

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Revelation, at the back of our Bibles, says if anyone adds to this book, and it's certainly true of the book of Revelation, but I think there's a reason why it is at the back of the book.

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We're not adding to Scripture anymore. So I'm not sitting in a chair hearing from God as a believer now, but I'm asking the

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Lord to illuminate what He has spoken in Inspiration. Another way would be to say that Revelation is receiving a word straight from God.

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Illumination is receiving light on a word already given by God. And the latter is happening rather than the former.

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Scripture is the product of Revelation and Scripture is the subject of illumination. Yes. That's a good way to say it.

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I don't come up with stuff like that very often. Did Piper say that? I don't think so. I think

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I said it. As he likes to always say, right? Yeah, I think I said it. Another key thing to remember is that if you're reading

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Scripture and you suddenly see the meaning of that passage in a way and to a degree that you've never seen before, that's not

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God speaking something new to you. That's God opening your eyes to what was already there. That truth is already there.

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It's already contained there. It's already clear there. It's already been revealed there thousands of years ago. When you come to understand it, you're not learning anything new in terms of something new that's been given.

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It might be new to you because you see that passage now in a way that you have never seen it before. But here's a key to remember.

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If you're seeing something new in that passage that that passage is not teaching, that's not illumination. If you're misunderstanding the passage, that's not illumination.

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You're still confused about the passage. And that's not Revelation because God's not taking a passage that means one thing and revealing to you a meaning that that passage never had.

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Or new information. New information from that passage. So, for instance, um, um, what's the, uh, um,

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I forget the guy's name who wrote, uh, Frequency Batterson, uh, uh, Morris. Morris, Robert Morris.

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Robert Morris talks about, um, reading in a passage of scripture and having a phrase jump off of the page at him and takes on a whole new meaning, giving him instructions that, that, uh, to build his church or what to name his church.

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And that meaning was not contained in that passage of scripture. When God wrote that, that is not what he meant. That is not the meaning of the passage in its context.

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That's not illumination. So don't think that. That's not what we mean by illumination. Nor is that continuing revelation.

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That's perverting scripture is what that is. It's twisting the meaning. When I was in the charismatic movement, there was a pressure, especially if you're going to speak at a conference, to come up with something new, something that no one's ever heard of.

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But just think, think that through. And it is pride in a massive way to think that God was waiting for me to come along before he kind of stopped this revelation from coming till I showed up.

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Ladies and gentlemen, that's how cults get started. Joseph Smith, everyone else is wrong but me.

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And so I believe in going to the scripture with the church. One of the things that the

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Lord has done in Ephesians 4 is he's given gifts to men, which are not simply people in our time, but pastors and teachers through the centuries who have labored in the scriptures for decades of their lives.

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And we're impoverishing ourselves if we don't take into account, what did Jonathan Edwards do as he looked at this passage for 15 years?

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What are the Lucis and the Calvinists, these guys are not in any way would they themselves, nor we would say that they're infallible.

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But if the big guns in church history have never seen what we're seeing, it could be that the

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Lord was waiting for us to come along, but more likely we're out to lunch and we're missing it.

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So read the Bible with the church. How does the Holy Spirit move today outside of the illuminating work?

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He sanctifies us both judicially and positionally. He changes our desires, he changes our affections.

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When you go from darkness to light, your desires are changed, your affections are changed.

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You begin to love what God loves, you hate what God hates, you hate every false way because God hates every false way.

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You have a love for the brethren. And some of you may have heard me say this, by God's grace,

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I've been able to preach all around the world. And it does not matter what country

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I'm in, what culture I'm in. It doesn't matter what language is spoken, it doesn't matter how much or how little melanin we have in our skin.

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When I'm with like -minded believers in Christ, there is an instant bond, an instant fellowship, and an instant love for these people.

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Even though we may have just met, but we love each other because we've been adopted into the family of God.

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They're my family. They're my brothers, they're my sisters, and we love each other. So that is one of the beautiful works of the

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Holy Spirit in our lives that I've been able to experience. Not that you can't experience it domestically, but it's just a beautiful thing to see it around the world.

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He changes our desires and affections. We hate sin. We grieve over our sin.

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And I think it was Paul Washer that said, one of the surest ways you know you have a new relationship with the

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Savior is if you have a new relationship with sin. If you have that godly sorrow over sin that Paul speaks of in 2

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Corinthians 7. So all of these things, all these are elements of our sanctification and it's a work of the

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Spirit in our life. Did you add to that? No, I just affirmed that.

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I think I can attest to the fact that you can go to places in this world where there is nothing in common for Christ.

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There's not a language that's similar. There's not a dress. There's not a culture that's similar.

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But none of it matters because you're in Christ. They're your brothers and sisters. There was an experience

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I had in India where there were folk from a different denomination and I was going there as I was.

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And knowing that I was going to a place that could possibly mean great persecution and them the same, it did not matter that there were denominational differences between us.

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We prayed together and we happened to come back the same day. I didn't know that would take place.

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And we were able to hear of what the Lord did with them in their mission and they heard what happened with us.

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And it was just this camaraderie that you cannot have in any sports community or political club.

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We're brothers and sisters, and when they win, we win. We're on the same team. Amen to all that.

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The Holy Spirit is the agent of our new birth. He's the efficient cause of our being born again, and His word is the instrumental cause of our new birth.

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And He powers us to walk in accord with the Word of God. That's what it means to walk in the

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Spirit. He's the power by which we grow in holiness. If you by the Spirit put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

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He produces His fruit, as Justin said, in us. And He's the

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Christian's life in Christ. He glorifies Christ to us. Well, as I always like to say,

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Charismatics have an under -realized and an over -realized pneumatology. It's under -realized in the sense that, in their mind, the only thing the

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Spirit of God ever does is give to them special revelations. It's the supernatural stuff.

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They don't see any of the long -term sanctification, the hidden work of the Spirit, the things the Scripture says that we're not necessarily feel each and every single day.

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So they have a very diminished view of the Holy Spirit, a very diminished theology of the Holy Spirit, because they have no room for Him.

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Yeah, a very truncated view of the Spirit. But at the same time, it's over -realized in the sense that they try and attribute to the

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Holy Spirit every random thought, every circumstance, everything, to turn it from being ordinary into extraordinary.

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And so then when you come along and you correct them and you say, no, the random thought that you had just popped into your head, that's not the voice of God speaking to you.

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That circumstance is not God trying to get a message to you. That's not the work of the Spirit of God. That's not how the Spirit of God works. They think you've taken the

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Holy Spirit entirely out of the equation and removed Him. And then they say, well, what then do you think the Holy Spirit does?

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You see, that demonstrates the truncated view of the Holy Spirit, that they can't envision Him doing anything except for these supernatural things that they try and attribute to Him.

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So they attribute to Him all these works that He's not necessarily doing to make them supernatural, and then they fail to see all of the things that He is doing that are not supernatural, that end up having supernatural effects and results upon us over the course of time.

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If I can tag on, and I want to go back to what you said earlier, just a moment ago, about illumination.

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So it's the work of the Holy Spirit that takes that Bible out there and makes it God's Word to me in here.

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He applies it personally to me. And so like you're saying, when a Christian reads through, and I've had this happen to me many times, it's very dear and very important.

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You're reading through Scripture, you see something you've read a dozen times, you've believed it without any reservation, and suddenly you see how that's you.

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The truth that you've always believed out here, you see, oh, this is where that goes. That's what I call that phenomenon.

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The, oh, this is where that goes phenomenon. You see God's love as that verse portrays it. You see

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God's care, God's providence. That's the Holy Spirit taking His Word. I mean, one of the great crimes of the charismatic movement, ironically, is their depreciation of the

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Spirit's greatest work apart, well, how do you say the Spirit's greatest work? But His magnum opus in producing

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Scripture. Scripture is given by the pneuma of God, by the breath, the

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Spirit of God, and the Holy Spirit takes that living Word and makes it life to us.

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So that's how that, you know, they dismiss as a form letter becomes a personal letter without changing a bit.

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It's just exactly what it means. It's just me saying, oh yes, that's God speaking to me in that Word.

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The Reformation was a back to the Bible movement, as we all know. And the formal principle was sola scriptura, who or what speaks for God.

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And for Rome, it was the Roman Catholic Church. And for Protestants, it's the

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Bible alone is the Word of God. And charismatism actually challenges that because it's not the

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Bible alone. The Bible is good, you need the Bible, but it's not enough. And that is the beginning of the serious error.

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Can or does God use dreams and visions at the present time to lead Muslims to Himself by directing them to His Word and by seeking out a

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Christian believer to witness to them? So this is a continuationist, cessationist issue.

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Is God leading Muslims by the millions to faith in Christ apart and outside of Scripture through dreams and visions? No. We'll take a poll.

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John? Because I believe in the sovereignty of God, could

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God give someone a dream whereby they have Scripture come to them?

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It has to be that or else how can they be saved when the Scripture says you're born again by the incorruptible seed of the

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Word of God? I don't want to say God can't do that, but if that would be true, why would we need to evangelize?

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Why would we lay down our lives to get the Gospel to someone when we can just say, Lord, show up and give someone a dream?

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Go into all the world and pray that people have dreams? Is that what your Bible says? Oh, sorry.

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Go ahead, Dan. Go ahead. Are you in Romans 10? I am in Romans 10.

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Take it. That's just where I was going to go. Did you have the same thought between your ears?

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Yeah, there you go. Great minds think alike. First, let me just say quickly, are

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Muslims having dreams about Jesus? Well, yeah, probably, because Jesus is part of their religious fabric.

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They believe He was a prophet. They do not believe He was God, but He is part of their religious fabric. So I've had a dream about Muhammad before, but I don't think that was

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Muhammad trying to show up to me and reveal himself. It's just a stupid dream. We dream about weird things all the time.

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But Romans 10, 14. This puts on the brakes, along with Hebrews 1, but this really puts on the brakes for this whole notion.

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How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard?

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And how will they hear without a preacher? Yeah, not a dream or vision, a preacher.

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How will they hear without a preacher? God has not only ordained the ends, He has also ordained

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His means to His ends, and the ordained means to God's ordained end of the salvation of His elect is preaching, evangelism.

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Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. So not dreams and visions.

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And kind of tagging off what John said, too, if I were

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Satan, and I wanted to come up with something to throw cold water on the evangelism of Muslims, I could honestly think of nothing better than to get it in the heads of evangelicals that Jesus is showing up to Muslims in dreams and visions.

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Because hey, if Jesus is showing up to Muslims in dreams and visions and they're getting saved that way, I don't need to go off to the mission field.

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I don't need to witness to my Muslim neighbor. I don't need to share the gospel with them because Muslims, they've been known to be kind of trigger happy and kind of violent.

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So hey, Jesus has got it covered. He's just showing up in dreams and visions. Honestly, I think this whole notion, and sadly,

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David Platt has forwarded this amongst Southern Baptists as well. I think it is a satanic deception.

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I think it's demonic, and I think it's an extremely injurious thing for evangelicals to believe.

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We have a great commission, and we're to go out in all the world preaching and teaching the gospel.

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So do you have any firm opinion about this? Other than that, I have no strong feelings one way or the other. Isn't there a passage in the book of Acts where someone is instructed to go hear someone with the gospel, and it says, and he will tell you words by which you will be saved?

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That's right. Even the angel wouldn't bring that to Cornelius. He said, you get Peter and he'll tell you how to get saved.

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Exactly, that's a really good point. So faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God, except if you're a

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Muslim. It doesn't say that. And listening to you, I think you see Satan really scoring a twofer there.

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On the one hand, he discourages evangelism, and on the other hand, he does downplay the word of God, the necessity of the word of God.

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That's why this doctrine is so under attack today from every part. Because if you want to defeat an army, what's one of the best ways to do that?

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Destroy the supply line. No army can survive without a supply line. And what's our supply line?

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You say, well, it's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit dealing with us, how? If you continue in my word, you're my disciples, we still have to continue in his word.

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And if he succeeds in getting our eyes off the word, and like you said, that was such a good talk you just gave, that the degree to which we look elsewhere is the degree to which we don't look to God's word.

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Thank you. John agrees. Good, there we go. Justin, still hold on? It's not just evangelism, it's

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Bible translation into languages that would be curtailed.

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I would say that Muslims can have dreams. There's nothing in my theology that says a Muslim can't have a dream and can't have a dream about a spiritual subject.

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I think probably everybody who's spent time contemplating spiritual subjects in the word of God has probably had some religious type of a dream with religious symbolism.

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But then when that Muslim ends up getting saved, in a Muslim theology, their theology, the theology is a theology of dreams where dreams must be interpreted and God speaks through dreams.

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So a lot of times a Muslim will have an experience, they have that dream, then they get saved later on. They're going to interpret that dream in light of the syncretistic approach to bringing their

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Muslim theology into their Christian theology and blending them. And then they're going to be taught by well -meaning but very uninformed missionaries on the field that, oh yeah, that was the means by which

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God saved you, was he gave you that dream, he revealed this to you, that's how you got saved. And then you take that story, and that story becomes even more elaborate the more that it's told, and then it gets brought back across the ocean to American shores, and the telling gets even better when it comes to raising funds for our ministry and outreach to the

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Mormon community because we've got to give Bibles to these people and do things to these people because God's saving them and they're without a church. And there's that secondary dock and just bumping up more and more.

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It is, yeah. All right, sometimes it's easy to see the lie when miracle workers fleece people for money or look totally immoral lives, but sometimes it seems tricky, as with stories of miracles authenticating the gospel to Muslims or other religions.

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Is there truth to these reports of miracles? What is your interpretation of Matthew 12 when the Pharisees attribute

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Christ's miracles to Beelzebub? Do the miracles happen?

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Are miracles happening overseas? Are miracles happening? Are miracles happening? Is there truth to these reports of miracles?

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Well, I think it's convenient that that's where they're happening where nobody has a camera phone and nobody has a camera.

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And it's always, you know, that my brother's sister's hairdresser's aunt went to a church where somebody told a story that they'd heard happen in a missionary.

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And again, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Faith in God does not require us to be credulous, does not require us to put our discernment aside.

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There is a universe of difference between saying, I'm not necessarily going to buy a 30 -second hand story about a miracle and, you know, hootootoo or whatever to make up,

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I hope I made up a place. There's a universe of difference between saying that, I'm not necessarily going to buy that, and saying over Jesus' whole career of miracles,

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I know where he got that supernatural power, that's Satan. That's what the Pharisees did. They're a brilliant answer for how he was able to do what nobody else could ever do.

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And this is, you know, it'd be a poor one for a charismatic to point to because the situation in Jesus' ministry was exactly the opposite of what the charismatic situation was.

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In Jesus' day, his enemies were all in a flutter trying to explain away his miracles.

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Today, charismatics are in a flutter trying to explain away their lack of miracles. So, for them to look at that lifetime of miracle and to say, oh yeah, you know, we figured out where that power comes from because you can't deny the power.

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It must come from Satan. And that's not at all related to saying, I don't necessarily believe 27 -hand stories.

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So, you're saying that's a great observation. And I'm not even required to say they're of the devil.

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I don't necessarily believe they happen. Yeah, so in the life of Jesus, they tried to take the supernatural things for which there was no other explanation and explain them some other way.

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And no question. Charismatics take things for which there are a dozen possible explanations and attribute them as a miraculous thing to prove miracles still exist.

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And as you said, that's a great observation. 180 degrees the opposite. No unbeliever could deny Jesus miracles.

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No unbeliever would affirm charismatic miracles. That's actually... That might be the money paragraph of the whole conference right there.

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That's a rock in somebody's palms. Say it again. Say that again. I don't think I could. That's the thing.

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No, I think what I said... Like Dan Phillips always says. As I said once.

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No unbeliever could deny Jesus miracles. No unbeliever would affirm charismatic miracles.

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There are not panic papers coming out. There would be, if these were Jesus level miracles happening today, there would be panicked papers coming out in medical journals and Huffington Post and New York Times and every one of them trying to find some alternative explanation for this undeniably supernatural event.

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And that has never happened. It's the first century. The very fact that there is a debate today as to whether or not the signed gifts continue is inherent proof that they don't.

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That's right. Because if they were, if the signed gifts were operative today, there would be no question.

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There would be no question about it. No believer certainly would doubt it. No believer would stand against it.

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They'd be happening in all our churches. Yeah, they'd be happening in all our... They'd be undeniable miracles.

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Not Todd White lengthening your leg by a half an inch kind of a miracle. Real miracles.

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Acts chapter 3 miracles. One of the points I heard John MacArthur say, which

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I thought was very profound, as normal for him, but he said, if you're God, it's hard to even go there in your head, but if you were

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God, wouldn't you give your power to someone who at least proclaimed the true

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God and the true gospel? Yep. Selah. Yep, that's right.

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Yeah, I had something really profound I was going to share, but I forgot what it was.

38:51

We can wait. Churches until what? Oh yeah, continuationists will make the claim that these miracles are continuing today and that they're happening just like they did in the time of the apostles.

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But then when you compare that with what went on in the time of the apostles, they're not the same thing. Another statement that they will also make is that I believe that these gifts are continuing in the church, but we don't see any miraculous gifts at Kootenai.

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And you don't see any miraculous gifts in your church. I'm assuming the churches that you gentlemen attend, you don't have miracle workers, but those gifts exist out there in the church somewhere else.

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And so therefore, though they're not happening at Kootenai, I still believe that those gifts are being given. And my rejoinder to that is, other than the signed gifts, what other gifts do you say are given by the

39:37

Holy Spirit that are not present in every church? Because I think you could walk into every church of every guy that's spoken here this weekend and you would see the gift of teaching, the gift of encouragement, the gift of faith, the gift of giving, the gift of helps.

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You would see all of those gifts of service and helps manifested. So what is it about the other spiritual gifts that if we need them, why are they not taking place in the churches of the guys that are here?

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The fact that you don't see those gifts in every church, I think is an evidence that those gifts are not genuine in any church.

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Amen. See if I can get Justin to set me up here. What would their response to that be? Oh, because you don't believe them.

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Now I have a question. Thank you. Of the original tongue speakers, how many of them believed in tongues?

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If your number is greater than zero, it's the wrong answer. Not one original tongue speaker believed in tongues.

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Second question, follow up. Of the original tongue speakers, how many of them were seeking the gift of tongues?

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Again, if your number is greater than zero, it's the wrong answer. Yet the Holy Spirit gave them because, well, why would he do that?

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If only there was a scripture telling us how the Holy Spirit decides to give gifts. But wait, there's 1

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Corinthians 12. He distributes his gifts as he pleases. What prevents him from doing that today?

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Now, if they say a lack of faith, the only faith that affected where Jesus chose to do miracles was whether or not they believed in him.

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So are you going to tell me that all these churches preaching the whole word of God and the whole truth of Jesus and the whole gospel, none of them has any faith in Jesus?

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They don't have even a mustard seed? Jesus says that's all it takes. You tell me John Calvin didn't have a mustard seed of faith?

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Charles Spurgeon didn't have a mustard seed of faith? John Knox, John Owen, you could just go all the good

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Johns. John MacArthur. We can leave John Piper outside.

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But I said good Johns. But at any rate, you see, that just is an answer that doesn't answer anything.

41:39

It's an evasion. Okay, I think I heard Kevin Hay say that to be an apostle, you must have seen a witness to the risen

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Christ. Is that correct? Kevin, is that what you said? Yep, he said that. No, he's right back there in the room. He's here.

41:53

Do you believe that any miracles performed by Charismatic can be attributed to demonic activity?

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And how should Christians articulate a biblical explanation for demonic activity? The answer is what miracles?

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Yeah. In the 70s, it was popular to explain away and to wrestle with this issue are these demonic miracles or not?

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But now I think we're in a position to say what miracles? Why are we working so hard to explain away something that has not yet been demonstrated?

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Yep, that's right. What's John Samson's favorite football team?

42:35

I'm sure I got that in there. Liverpool Football Club. It's an illumination that everybody needs.

42:48

Given the connection between tongues being heard by the Israelites and judgment, is there any theological significance to the fact that 1

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Corinthians predates Paul's last trip to Jerusalem and that it was written in the window before the worship in the temple came to a close via the judgment of God?

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So I think the connection is to the 70 AD. Is that the judgment that tongues forecasted when tongues were first signed to unbelieving

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Jews? 1 Corinthians 14. Is there a connection to that coming in Corinthians being written before Paul's final arrival in Jerusalem and the eventual destruction of Jerusalem?

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Is there a connection there? I think it's about that.

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Again, I think the tongues were, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14, 20 through 22, tongues were for a sign, not to those who believed but to unbelievers.

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It was a sign of God's judgment, I believe, in two different ways. One, the partial hardening that God brought to Israel, the judicial hardening against the gospel that God brought to Israel that remains to this day.

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One day, Romans 11, I think is very clear, God will return to Israel in a very dramatic way, but until that time comes,

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God has brought a partial hardening to the nation of Israel, to Jews, against the gospel.

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That's one way, but I think it also foreshadowed the destruction in the 80s, 70s.

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I think it was a twofold. What would you say to a friend whom you believe is saved but who claims to receive visions and dreams?

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Hey, friend. That's how I'd start. That's how you'd start? Anything beyond that?

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I'd have to think about it.

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I would discourage them from seeking visions and dreams.

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I mean, look at even, not only the Scriptures, but the man God used most in church history.

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Luther summed up the Reformation, and he said, I sought neither dreams nor visions. All I wanted to do was preach the word of God, and it was not anything but the word that weakened the papacy, and that was his recollection.

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So what is it that's, what I would ask my friend would be, what is it that motivates you to want that?

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What is it that motivates you to think that is more of an insight than what you have in the

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Scripture? Again, I think it's, it's a faulty understanding of what Scripture is. Again, this is not enough.

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It's kind of a dead book till the Holy Spirit comes upon it. I don't know what, I would challenge them, what's their view of Scripture?

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Because if it isn't Jesus' view of Scripture, you're in error. Jesus is not only the

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Son of God, God the Son, he's the truth, and everything he said was true, and his view of Scripture, if we esteem him to be

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Lord, we need to come under his view of Scripture, and that was not his view.

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He did not teach the pursuit of visions of dreams, friend, why are you?

45:59

Regarding family and close friends, how would you deal with those in your life who attend a church that tries not to take a stand on essential doctrines?

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Tries not to take a stand on essential doctrines? That's what it says. Then I would look at them as prospects for evangelism, because if a church will not take a stand on the essential doctrines, then that's not a church.

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That's a goat farm. How about the non -essential doctrines? They're evangelistic prospects.

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They don't love Jesus. Jesus said, unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins.

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That's Jesus, John chapter 8. Jesus through Paul, we have the book of Galatians, which is all about Jesus through Paul making it clear that if you add to the gospel in any sense, justification by faith alone, it's a false gospel.

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And those who proclaim that false gospel are pseudo -adolphoi. They are false brothers.

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And that's Jesus through Paul, who in the same book said, the fruit of the spirit is love.

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And so there's no contradiction in Paul's mind between calling out those who proclaim a false gospel as non -brothers and walking in love.

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And a church that will not take that stand doesn't love people. Right. And I might try to say to them, well, you're actually, you're not going to a church.

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You need to find a church because the definition of the church to Paul is it's a pillar and bulwark of the truth.

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And if the church won't take a stand, these are far too serious and dangerous times to be in a non -serious religious organization.

47:40

You just raised a great verse because that verse is teaching that the church's mission is to hold something up other than itself, the truth.

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And if they're not doing that, they're not functioning as a church. So Paul's express charge to Timothy is preach the word, be instant in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort for the time is coming when they will not endure sound doctrine, they'll have itching ears.

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And in the context, he said dangerous times are coming. Well, if the church isn't being led by people who are willing to be that person, then it's not the church for this time if it's a church at all.

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A lot of churches refuse to take stands on secondary issues because their desire is not to divide the church body.

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So that's at least their stated desire. They say we don't want to sow division here by taking a stand on eschatology or baptism or assurance of salvation or eternal security or election or any of these other issues.

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And so we're just not going to be... Better all over the Bible. Yeah, we're just not going to be solid on any of these because we want people to come and we want to have unity here.

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And the minute we take a stand, we're going to divide the church on this issue. What they fail to realize is that if everybody in your church agrees on every last one of those things, there is unity.

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But if everybody in your church disagrees on all of those things, they may come, but there's no unity. And so the minute something gets raised, the disunity is there, not because the issue is raised, but because you collected a bunch of people who don't agree with each other, never have, and thought that that was unity just because you met in the same building.

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So if you have a church that is precise on their doctrine where every last thing is spelled out, as it is here in this fellowship, the people who come here, though they may disagree on a few of the minor things here and there, for the most part, we've spelled out everything we teach and everything we believe.

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The people who come here, they agree on all of that, and there is a level of unity here that is not seen in a lot of other places, simply because it's all out on the table and we say, this is what we're going to unify around, and it's all clear.

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But when you haven't laid that out on the table, there's nothing to unify around. So you collect a bunch of people, and then somebody says,

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I believe this about the millennium, and all of a sudden, you have a church exploding and the elders don't know what to do with it.

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You've been disunified the whole time, but nothing has exposed it. Whereas a precise and clear doctrinal statement taking a stand on those essentials sows unity and creates unity because it puts all of those things out and asks people to unify around them all the time, every single

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Sunday, and that's the key to biblical unity. And a church that does what you said is a church that has given up its birthright.

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It's important to know because that church has said, here's how I'm going to define our church mission.

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But that's not how God defines the church mission. The church's mission, according to God, is to preach all the counsel of God that people agree on.

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Remember that place where Paul says that? Never. He says, I didn't shrink back from preaching to you the whole counsel of God.

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So if it's in the Bible, that's what we ought to be teaching, and if it makes people mad, well, praise alleluia.

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Our reward's great in heaven. But we're not here to make people happy. We're here to make people whole.

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If it's been true, it's been true for more than 10 minutes, more than 10 years, more than 100 years, and the creeds and the confessions of the church, while not infallible, are faithful.

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I would say going around a mountain, there are these boundaries, these fences that tell you where the road is and where sudden death will be, and there's no power in those rickety fences around Switzerland.

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I remember this trip I went on with my mother, the one and only time we went on a trip of that length together, and it was harrowing, and I'm thankful that those rickety fences were erected to show the drivers where they could drive and where they would die.

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And so are these creeds. Rather than Alan and Steve making up something in the garage last night, that's what we believe.

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If it's been true, it's been true for a while, and there's safety in going back to these creeds while they're not infallible.

51:58

When Christians through the centuries, sometimes those were the last words they ever spoke. I believe in God the

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Father. I believe in God the Almighty. They go through the Apostles' Creed, the

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Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed, and this is historic Christianity.

52:17

That's a safety, because truth does divide, but it also unites. All right.

52:25

While in agreement theologically, this is our last one, while in agreement theologically with everything in the cessationist ideology, what do

52:32

I do with unexplained things that seem in line with the Word of God, things

52:37

I've experienced on the mission field, and yet disagree with cessationism? In other words,

52:43

I have an experience that I cannot explain. This happened, and I have no explanation for this, but I agree with everything that you guys are saying.

52:52

What do I do with that experience? Well, I guess

53:00

I would be curious as to the exact nature of that experience. Let's say the experience was somebody who had learned a little bit of a foreign language, sat down at a table on the mission field where this foreign language was spoken, and though they could not have, probably before they left

53:15

America, articulated anything clearly in that language, they sat down and was able to communicate clearly in that language.

53:23

Or they saw an exorcism that worked out, or they saw something that's just a supernatural -looking thing.

53:34

You hear these reports that so -and -so was a missionary, went out to wherever,

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Burkina Faso, or some deep, dark jungle somewhere, and all of a sudden they were able to communicate to the natives in their native tongue.

53:46

You hear these reports, but they're kind of like Bigfoot. There's lots of rumors, lots of grainy photos, but no proof that these things actually exist.

53:56

There's no proof that that actually happened. Even if something like that specifically were to happen, if someone were to go to some foreign country and be able to speak that language fluently, having never been taught it before, that would certainly be a miracle.

54:13

I don't know that that's ever happened, but let's just say for the sake of argument, it has, which I'm not convinced of.

54:19

But that would be a miracle, but I would still not call that the gift of languages as it's described in the

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Book of Acts, as it's described in 1 Corinthians, because that gift had a specific purpose as a sign of judgment.

54:35

That's not what would be happening in this example of a mission field.

54:41

That would not be a sign of judgment. Let me think aloud about this and see if you can make my answer better, assuming there's anything to work with here.

54:51

The way you premised it, though, is somebody saying, this happened to me. This is not a 34th -hand story. Correct.

54:56

I experienced this. What am I supposed to make of this? I think the first thing I'd say is

55:01

God in Providence can do anything God wants to do. I'm not obligated to explain every act of Providence.

55:09

There are many incredibly intricately timed things God has done over history.

55:15

God can do whatever God wants to do. Now, one time Paul sent out sweatcloths to people and they were used for healing.

55:24

One time. We never read that he ever did it again. So people we know take that and they make an industry out of that.

55:31

So what I'm saying is when you look at something like that and you say, my

55:36

God is good. Isn't God gracious? It doesn't change a thing that Scripture teaches. It doesn't change a thing about how

55:43

I'm to live my life or what I'm to preach. It doesn't have an impact on the sufficiency of Scripture. God is a great and powerful

55:50

God. And I'll just add a brief word about the open but cautious. And then if you can make this into a better answer then please do.

55:58

But I don't believe in open but cautious at all. You see the open but cautious says so we should accept something but test it by Scripture.

56:07

And my response to that is how about if we test that by Scripture first? How about if we test by Scripture the idea that I'm to be open to anything but just test it by Scripture.

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And I don't find that in Scripture. So that doesn't work for me. And so what did

56:22

Paul do isn't it wonderful? We've actually got a letter preparing a pastor for the post -apostolic era.

56:30

Where do we live? Post -apostolic era. We've got a letter where Paul tells a pastor like me like y 'all what to do in those days.

56:39

And what does Paul say to Timothy? Does he say now remember God will give you visions and dreams as you need them?

56:45

Nothing like that. Does he say well remember everything I taught you about listening for God's voice in your heart?

56:51

Things are going to be very difficult. You're really going to need to get those continuing words from God. He doesn't say anything like that.

56:57

What does Paul say to Timothy? Remember what I taught you and teach other people that.

57:03

And he says remember from your mother's breast you've known the Old Testament the sacred writings.

57:09

And remember that all Scripture and there he takes in the Scripture of the apostles as well. It's all

57:14

God breathed. It's profitable for teaching, reproof, correction training in righteousness that the man of God may be equipped thoroughly equipped for every good work.

57:24

So he doesn't point Timothy forward to the slightest notion of further information or thoughts.

57:30

He says stick with what you've already been given. You keep preaching that even if nobody listens. Amen. Alright.

57:39

We are done. I will close in prayer and then we'll be dismissed with a couple of instructions. Bow our heads.

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Our Father we are so grateful for your word and again for directing our hearts and our minds and our affections toward it.

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We pray that the effect of this conference and our time here would truly be to ground us in the truth of your word that you would grow us in the grace and the knowledge of Christ through it that you would sanctify us according to your truth.

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We know that in your word you have provided everything that is necessary for us for life and godliness and we pray that we would trust in that rest upon it and may your word characterize all that we say and that we do that you would be glorified in and through us in your church both now and forever.

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We thank you for this time that we have had. It has been a blessing to us and we pray that that blessing may rest upon us as we go from here in the name and the power of Christ and of your spirit.

58:29

We ask these things in the name of your son. Amen. Well thank you everyone.

58:34

Thank you. I want to thank... Yeah. I want to thank again and I did this privately but I want to do this in front of all of you.

58:47

I want to thank again the filmmakers for giving us the opportunity to do this and for the speakers.

58:53

Each one of these guys flew up here. They didn't need to do that. We could have had this conference at any one of the seven churches that have been represented here but these guys took time away from their families in many cases their wives and their children and their churches and their ministries to come here to be part of this to help out with this so my thanks to all of the speakers who were part of this from Kevin Hay all the way to the last one.

59:16

Oh that was me. Never mind. Yeah. Everybody except for me who traveled to come to this. Thank you very much.

59:21

Let's give him a round of applause. If somebody has the gift of miraculous healing surely all he needs to do is to prove it but let's face it we've been battling with COVID and the so -called miracle workers went into hiding together with us.

59:50

Cessationism is the view that certain miraculous gifts that stood as signs of an apostle speaking in tongues healing prophecies interpretation of tongues gifts like that ceased with the apostles.

01:00:05

Cessationism has fallen out of favor because commitment to the authority of Scripture has fallen out of favor.

01:00:12

When you turn on Christian TV you don't see expositors of Scripture John MacArthur or Steve Lawson you see

01:00:19

Joel Osteen Joseph Prince Kenneth Copeland Benny Hinn Joyce Meyer Paula White that's who you see because that's the mainstream.

01:00:28

Speaking in tongues you're going to speak out of your spirit don't worry about what it sounds like Our understanding of speaking in tongues must be guided by the

01:00:40

Scriptures not our feelings. They were known languages that were capable of interpretation and not everybody speaks in tongues.

01:00:47

If God speaks it must be infallible inerrant and authoritative. And the Lord said to me will you howl for me?

01:00:56

I said don't ask me to do that Lord. There's no longer the need for the gift of prophecy speaking forth divine revelation from God.

01:01:13

We have now the whole counsel of God. This word is the final word.

01:01:22

The apostolic gifts have gone. They were never intended for our generation. We have everything that we need from the

01:01:28

Holy Spirit today. It's hard to get anyone who's gone through that to come back and take a serious look at faith in Christ focused on the gospel rather than focused on these phony miracles.