June 17, 2016 Show with Jim Winder on “The Pilgrim’s Progress & its Relevance Today”

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

Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

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

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

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

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

Now here's our host, Chris Arntzen. Good afternoon

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming.

This is Chris Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you a happy Friday on the 17th day of June 2016.

And by the way, I want to start receiving happy anniversary emails and calls and texts soon for Iron Sharpens Iron because we are now celebrating our first year of broadcasting as the all -new

Iron Sharpens Iron, which began this month in 2015. Obviously, Iron Sharpens Iron, my program, began in its infancy in 2006, but as far as broadcasting live from Pennsylvania, this is our first year now.

June marks our first year. We thank everybody for making this program possible, not only those who sponsored it and did everything else that was required of getting this program launched or relaunched, but we also thank you, the listener, who have been growing, our listeners have been growing in number, it seems, every day now.

And we thank all of you for listening, for encouraging me, for sending in good questions for our guests via email, and just being the very reason, other than Christ and His Gospel, the very reason that we are broadcasting this program.

So, thank you so much for getting me through the first year of rebroadcasting here on Iron Sharpens Iron out of Pennsylvania, and we look forward to,

God willing, many years to come. Today we have a guest, for the very first time, that was strongly recommended to me by a friend of mine that I've known for quite a long time,

Pastor Jim Harrison of Red Mills Baptist Church in Mahopac Falls, New York.

Pastor Jim has not only been a guest of mine on this program, but he's been a dear friend over the years, quite a brilliant brother in Christ, quite a powerful preacher and teacher, and when he gives me a very strong recommendation, which he doesn't do a lot,

I take it seriously, especially since he, like myself, is a

Reformed Baptist, and Reformed Baptists have a reputation of being very fussy and are very cautious about who they recommend, and you might even say that many people would call us anal retentive as a group, but so when

Pastor Jim Harrison gave me this plug or this encouragement to get my guest

Jim Winder on the program, I took heed to his recommendation, and the rest is history.

We now have Jim Winder on the broadcast, and Jim Winder today is going to be discussing the

Pilgrim's Progress and its relevance today for those of you who are either new

Christians, or perhaps you're not even Christian at all, I do have listeners that are not

Christians from varying religions, even once in a while I know that atheists and agnostics are listening, but the

Pilgrim's Progress was a classic work written by John Bunyan.

John Bunyan, who was a tinker in England in the 1600s, was a man imprisoned for his faith.

He was imprisoned for his faith by the Church of England, but he was a good one because he was preaching without an

Anglican minister's license, and he went home to be with the

Lord in 1688, and his most classic work that he wrote while in prison is the

Pilgrim's Progress, and it has been said that there is no book that has sold more copies and has been translated into more languages other than the

Bible than Pilgrim's Progress, and we are going to be discussing why this is such an important book to our guest, and why he thinks it's so relevant today, and even probably more specifically we are going to be introducing you to a live dramatic musical retelling of the

Pilgrim's Progress called Journey to the Celestial City, which is basically performed in churches and theaters and auditoriums all over the

United States by our guest, and you can find out how you can invite him to a theater near you or to a church that you are a member of during this broadcast.

But let me, without further ado, introduce you and welcome for the very first time to Iron Sharpens Iron, Jim Winder.

Well, thank you. I'm really happy to talk with you guys, and I love to talk about Pilgrim's Progress.

It's been such a great influence on my own life, and we have seen the fruit of bringing that story to people who know it and many people who don't, and one of the things that I guess we'll talk about today is why is it appealing to every age group, and that's what we find.

People often hear about our program and they go, oh, that sounds like a really good children's program, and I say, well, yes, it is, but it's also great for people that are in their late years and they're going to cross that river soon.

They need this story. It's there for the brand new teenager Christian who just became born again yesterday, and it's especially powerful for, as John would say, the young men.

He says, I speak to you young men because you are strong and the

Word of God abides in you and you have overcome the evil one. They are in the middle of the

Valley of the Shadow fighting Apollyon today. So everybody, everybody, every age group, every brand, every

Christian who's at different places along this journey needs the story. And we will be getting more into detail about what this story is that John Bunyan, one of the great heroes of the

Christian faith, wrote about so many centuries ago that is still selling millions of copies today and just an amazing feat when you consider that this man was uneducated and was merely a mender of pots and pans.

And when I say merely, I'm not denigrating the blue -collar labor that not only he was involved in, but that many are involved in today, even bivocational pastors are.

I'm not denigrating that at all by saying merely, but what I say is that it obviously takes many by surprise and even shocks many to learn that someone with no formal education who did manual labor would be considered one of the greatest literary geniuses of all time in the

Christian church. And so much so that even in his day, someone who had much higher learning and was highly respected as a brilliant scholar and theologian,

Dr. John Owen, a non -conformist pastor in England that same century who befriended

John Bunyan, actually had Bunyan preach in his own pulpit, which is quite a sign not only of Bunyan's great gifts, but of John Owen's humility.

But I also want to quickly introduce, at least publicly, because we've already introduced you two off the air, but my co -host,

Reverend Buzz Taylor, why don't you greet our guest, Jim Winder? Well, hello, Jim. I'm looking forward to hearing what you have to say.

And let me start by protecting my reputation by saying that I have read

Pilgrim's Progress. However, I have to say it was back in the late 70s when

I was in college. So this is going to be a good refresher course for me. Well, first of all, let's start with you personally,

Jim, as an individual. Let's hear something about your own upbringing, the religious background, or perhaps even lack thereof.

I'm unfamiliar with your personal story, but tell us about how you were raised and how you eventually came to embrace

Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. Well, ever since I was a little boy, my parents brought us to church.

I was raised in the Catholic Church, and there was a heartfelt love for God in our family.

And I was actually an altar boy in the sixth, seventh grade,

I think it was. I played guitar and spoke Mass and things like that. However, I can say from those years up and through my college years,

I had a real desire to have a sense of assurance with God, and I was hugely lacking that.

And it therefore compromised my relationship with God. And of course, I was a

Ten Commandment liver. I was trying to live right, and I knew that I wasn't.

I can articulate it much better theologically now than I could then. But all I can say is, during those years,

I knew that I did not really have the right understanding.

I wasn't anyone in my life at the time, and it wasn't until I got my very first job at New Jersey Bell.

I graduated from college and started at New Jersey Bell as a programmer in 1983.

And one of the guys in the class, his name is John Alessi, a good friend of mine. He was from North Plainfield. He had a born -again

Christian sticker on his car, and I thought, oh gosh, one of those people that no one else is.

But he and I were like, we just got headed off like crazy. And I ended up renting a room in his home.

And he had some room, and I was kind of ready to move out of my folks' house and start living on my own. And John and I were on our way down to the

Jersey Shore to go to Ocean Grove, just go to the beach one day, and we started talking about living right and God and all that.

And he said, Jim, I just have to tell you something that might really bother you, but I just want to make sure you get this.

When you feel close to God, when you're being good, you're not. And when you feel far away from God, when you're sinning, you are.

He said, you're not in a position to be close to God at all right now because your sin is separating you from Him.

You need to be born again. You need to be made into a brand new creation. You need a

Savior who will bear your sin, who will be your perfect righteousness. And I'm probably saying it more theologically than he did, but this is what he said to me.

And he said, that's what you need. And I said, well, okay, okay. I've heard that before, but that's not what I've been told.

And he said, keep an open mind and ask God about it because you can talk to God and ask

Him for that assurance, and He will confirm what I'm telling you. And in the meantime, here's a

Bible. Read John. And so I read John, and I prayed, and I asked a few close friends about some of the things

John was saying. And I don't think I understood it theologically completely, but I knew that I had a very strong hunch that this was the right direction.

And one night I sat down in my room in his house, and I shut the door, and I sat in a chair, and I talked to God about it.

I just said, you know, I want so much to be confident and assured that I am securely in your love, that it doesn't waver back and forth, that I know

I have eternal life. I confessed my sin. I said, open up any part of me.

I faced the light. Shine your light into any part of me. Show me.

Show it all. I'm laid out here on this floor. I need a

Savior. And I just came completely like that, and it was not likely it might be both.

And I would say over the next couple of months, I had swings of confidence and lacks of confidence.

And in fact, by the way, this tracks just like Grace Downing to the Chief of Sinners. If you read

John Bunyan's life, he probably was saved securely and for real saved, and struggled through a long time of ups and downs.

And John Piper says there was a defining moment for John Bunyan, because most people think this was when he conclusively had the sense he was saved.

He was walking in a field, and he said, and with my eyes I beheld the Son of God, Jesus Christ, at God's side.

And I said, there is my righteousness. And he said, all of a sudden, the chains fell off my legs.

I realized that whether I was in a good frame or a bad frame, there was Jesus Christ, my righteousness.

I always stood in his right. And then my chains fell off my legs, and I went home rejoicing.

Amen. So I think it took a few months for me to comprehend better what had happened.

But it was a real conversion. And of course, by the grace of God and his saving power keeping me, my faith was real then, and it's just real now, and it's stronger now.

And he has used my music, my love of music, and my sort of James Taylor, Dan Fogelberg, Simon &

Garfunkel upbringing music, and sort of moved it in a Christian music direction.

That's the style of my music. That's how I became a born -again Christian. Yeah, and I love all those styles of music, by the way.

Yes, yes. I was going to say, we're off to a good start. And have seen, many years ago,

Dan Fogelberg in concert at least three times. Oh, wow. Always loved

Simon & Garfunkel far better as a duo than I did Paul Simon alone. And who else did you mention?

Oh, yeah, James Taylor. Yeah, I love James Taylor as well. Well, you know something? I'm going to pick up where you left off, but I want to play one of your musical pieces here, just so our listeners will immediately get a grasp of where we are headed in this discussion as far as your performances that you conduct all over the country live.

And I hope that you all are blessed with this song that we are about to play.

And we are going to be right back after this song, so don't go away.

But here is Jim Winder with just a taste of what you will experience in his live performances.

In the fields just below a small house, a man walked slowly, bent over by the weight of the great pack heaped up over his back and shoulders.

The breath of the wind pushed the wheat heads in ripples around him, and every third step seemed to spring a pheasant, all aflutter into the air.

But the man did not notice. He walked on, holding an open book and turning the pages slowly, slowly.

Beyond him the sun was setting over the western mountains, gilding the sides of the peaks with a light so red that they seemed on fire.

When the man saw this, he stepped back, startled. His hands flew to the burden on his shoulders, and he cried,

What shall I do? If he expected an answer, he received none.

Nothing changed, except the light which faded to a pale violet. He shuddered and turned back to his house, staggering under the weight of his burden.

One day he walked further than usual. He went eastward, glancing fearfully back over his burden to the mountains that glowered behind him.

His burden had grown heavier with the passing days, and the book he read had become more and more distressing.

So when he topped a small rise and saw mountains ahead of him, he fell to his knees and shouted to the wind,

What shall I do to be saved? He did not look up.

He did not expect an answer. But one came. Along the path ahead of him,

Christian saw a man walking briskly. He stood quite still when he came up to Christian, and quite straight, waiting for the burdened man to speak.

Sir, groaned Christian, can you help me? Perhaps, nodded the man.

Sir, this book tells me that I will die. You hardly need a book to tell you that.

Look around you. All things die in the city of destruction. But this burden will sink me lower than the grave.

If you already know this, said the man, why are you standing still? Sir, are you willing to point the way?

I am evangelist. I am willing. Do you see the gate past that second field?

No. Do you see a light at least? I think so.

It is enough for now. Keep it in your eye and run. When you reach the gate, knock.

So Christian began. Well, that's just a touch of what you're going to experience at these live performances.

And I will be playing more excerpts, musical excerpts throughout the broadcast, as many as we can get to.

But you had a testimony of salvation that is basically being echoed by many

Christians across the globe who were raised either in Roman Catholicism or some other religion.

They may have even been raised in an evangelical church, but did not really know what the gospel was.

And I happen to be somebody whose background, other than the musical part,

I am not a musician, never was, but I was raised Roman Catholic, was an altar boy, and have some of the same background experiences that you no doubt had.

And the discovery of grace is such a phenomenal event in the life of someone who is enslaved in a false religion or a misunderstanding of the gospel.

It revolutionizes your whole thought process about how much you owe

God for being saved. It is no longer a treadmill that you're on, trying to earn his favor and knowing that you will never be good enough.

And in fact, you had mentioned earlier that as a Catholic, you did not have an assurance of your salvation.

Well, the Roman Catholic church actually teaches that to have an assurance of your salvation is the sin of presumption.

And they never want you to have any kind of a place of certainty on this earth that you will be in heaven, because obviously the whole system requires the priesthood and the sacraments to maintain, not only to become regenerate, but to maintain a regenerate life until you're dead.

And even after death, the period of cleansing called purgatory that they have invented, which further detracts and mocks the finished work of Christ on Calvary.

And I want to be clear to everyone, I'm not trying to be mean about these things.

I don't despise or dislike Catholics. I love Catholics. There are many folks who are

Catholics in my family. I have friends who are Roman Catholic whose company

I enjoy even more than some born -again Christians I know. So that has nothing to do with it.

This has to do with the truth of the gospel. I mean, wouldn't you say that one of the most loving acts that a human being can possibly do...

In fact, I'm going to quote St. Augustine. I just recently posted this on my Facebook page.

In fact, I think it was a Catholic who originally posted it, and I reposted it. It's a quote by St.

Augustine, "...the greatest kindness one can render to any man is leading him to truth."

And that is supposed to be on a higher level of importance than sparing someone's feeling, is it not,

Jim? Well, yeah. I mean, immediately I think of several Proverbs that speak to this, that the loving thing to do is to lovingly and carefully and thoughtfully and with humility to share the truth.

You know, just as a timely example, I'm sharing Christ with my mother -in -law who's 94 years old, and somehow we struck on being loved completely is what seems to be resonating with her.

She wishes that she had in her lifetime been loved completely, and I was trying to explain to her that you can experience an absolutely complete love from your

Father God, and she said, she goes, you know, there's these people up the street, and they've invited me to their church two times, and they just seem kind of cushy to me.

And I said, I said, Claire, have you ever heard the story about the guy who was driving down the road, and he realized the bridge was out, so he pulled over his car, and everybody came screaming down the road.

He was flagging them down so they wouldn't go driving into the ravine. I said, they're flagging you down.

Your life isn't going to last many months, maybe, it may be a year, maybe two, and they're flagging you down.

God loves you so much, and those people don't even know you, but they love you enough to risk your reaction to flag you down, because they want you to know what's real, what's true.

Amen. And we're going to go to a break right now.

If you would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

That's c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the good old

USA. And if it's a personal and private matter that you're asking about,

I mean, it would seem unlikely during a topic like this that that would be the case, but we may have somebody who is still

Roman Catholic and they have something to say and they don't want to identify who they are. They may even want to say something critical in opposition to something that is said.

You may remain anonymous if it makes you feel more comfortable, but if you could, we would prefer if you give us your first name, city and state, and country of residence if you have a question.

That's chrisarnsen at gmail .com, chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

Don't go away. We're going to be right back after these messages with Jim Winder. Iron Sharpen's Iron Radio is sponsored by Harvey Cedars, a year -round

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Solid Ground Christian Books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Welcome back.

This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron. If you just tuned us in, we are speaking with Jim Winder, who is part of a musical ensemble that puts on a presentation called

Journey to the Celestial City, which is a 90 -minute live dramatic musical retelling of Pilgrim's Progress with original

Christian songs amplifying the storyline. If you'd like to join us on the air with a question for Jim about anything at all regarding his faith, regarding his musical background, regarding this specific performance,

Journey to the Celestial City, regarding the life and teachings of John Bunyan, anything in regard to what we've been discussing, our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

That's chrisarnzen at gmail .com. And as I said earlier, please give us your first name, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside of the good old

USA. And again, that's chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

And so where did you actually wind up attaching yourself as a member of a

Bible -believing Christian church during this pilgrimage of your own that you were going through? Well, as soon as I became a believer,

I started attending a CMA church up in Warren, New Jersey.

It was called Warren Bible Church at the time. That's a Christian and Missionary Alliance? Yes, exactly, exactly.

And now it's been changed to, I think it's called Stonecrest now, but it's a

CMA church, and I still happen to attend a CMA church, Grace Bible Fellowship up in Bedminster, New Jersey.

And I had one foot in the Catholic church and one foot in the CMA church, so I would go to two church services.

It took me a little while to not feel guilty not going to a

Catholic church. You know, and that was the process the

Lord brought me through. I have a couple of really terrific friends who are Catholics who are, they are

Christians, and they are firm believers, and they understand grace, and they still remain there, and they're great witnesses to folks there, but God clearly called me out of that.

And that's where I had a really solid preaching under Pastor David Luck, but the real deep, the deeper, more solid step happened about two or three years later when

I married my wife Paula. We met in that church. We were introduced by some friends.

They were doing a Revelation Bible study I went, and she was dating somebody else, but they introduced me to her because they didn't like her boyfriend.

And so I managed to swing a dinner date, and the next day

I went over to take her for a walk, and I said, look, you gotta get rid of that guy, because I'm the guy.

You know, I'm the guy you want, and we want him for you. So we got married in 1986.

We moved down to the Jersey Shore. We went to the Shark River Hills Nephew, and we went to Community Baptist Church, Pastor Jim Loveland.

Oh yeah, yeah. And he's just absolutely great. We spent a long journey in Roman, and there

I was introduced to a really solid... obviously it was

Reformed theology there, but I didn't know it was called that. You know, I just was hearing a confident, really well -executed, clear -as -day...

and also illustrations that Jim Loveland can make you... Jim Loveland cries when he preaches sometimes.

He is a real, genuine communicator. He knows how to take you somewhere and help you understand from the

Word and from really solid illustration what something means. What's the problem?

I'm in sales, by the way, in software, so I understand what's the problem, what's the solution, why now? And he was excellent at that, so I got my foundation in that.

And then when Paul and I moved, we left the shore and we moved up here for work to Bridgewater, where we've been ever since.

We went to a Presbyterian PCA church, you know, really solid preaching there, really, really solid preaching there.

And that's where I learned what Reformed theology was, to put a name to what I believe.

Yeah, that's the denomination that my co -host, Reverend Buzz Taylor, is a member of? Yeah, so that was really terrific.

So that's where I sort of went, and it was probably in the tail end of being under the preaching of Jim Loveland when

I started to write some Christian songs. I played in restaurants down there every Friday and Saturday night down at the

Jersey Shore, all that James Taylor, Dan Fogelberg, I mean, Garfunkel stuff was doing that.

And then sometime around 2001, a little before that,

I did a first CD, which was just a collection of my first Christian songs, and then

Fogelman's Progress came around 2001, a little bit later. And you keep mentioning the

Jersey Shore. I'm wondering if you're familiar with one of my sponsors, Harvey Cedars Bible Conference. You know what?

I hear about it a lot, and you know, the thing is, we lived right near Ocean Grove, so that's where we went to the beach.

Ocean Grove, Belmar, those sorts of areas, and we vacationed down in Wildwood every year.

We stayed in one of those Naugahyde -laden hotels. Ocean's Edge, I think, is the one we go to.

And so we kind of drive by all those middle pieces. We weren't a family that vacationed down around New Long Beach Island area, and that's where Harvey Cedars is, right, in that general area.

Yeah, and I've been to Ocean Grove, too. I remember the years that I worked for WMCA Radio, which was then in, started out in Rutherford, New Jersey, then wound up in Hasbrook Heights, New Jersey, now is in New York City.

But during those years they were in New Jersey, they had annual events every summer in Ocean Grove, and had some fun memories of that.

Beautiful area, a dry town, as I remember, at least the area that they had these events at, with the old -school circuit preaching

Methodists that were dominant in that area, whose facilities still stand in some of that area.

We've been blessed to do music in most of the venues in that town, and some of the ones surrounding.

In fact, I'll be up on the boardwalk in the pavilion doing some music before a pastor,

July 1st, 2 o 'clock in the afternoon, and then I have my own 45 minutes a lot later.

But we've done Pilgrim's Progress and the Tabernacle twice, and the Youth Temple once. We've never been in a great auditorium, but believe it or not,

I'm glad because the place is so large that it wouldn't look like anyone was there, even if a thousand people came.

You know what I mean? And I've personally found that the most intimate performance

I've ever had was at Tuscarora with about 15 people that were on an

Overcomers in Christ weekend. It was the single most powerful evening we've ever had, and it wasn't for a big group in a big fancy place.

It was in a drop ceiling, fluorescent lighted room. Yeah, I've been to Tuscarora.

The Lutheran Brethren run that establishment, and in fact,

I had a groundbreaking performance there myself. I have to send you the mp3 of my musical tribute to Martin Luther King.

Oh, is that what that was? Party Hardy Marty and the Protestors. Oh my god, wow.

And I will send that to you right after the show at some point. But I'm going to interrupt us again with another treat for our listeners so that they can have another musical taste of what they will experience at Journey to the

Celestial City. So I hope that you are blessed by this as well, and we're going to be right back with our discussion right after this song.

Down. It's very heavy from the guilt and shame that I've carried around.

Now there's a cross before me and this burden rolls away.

And now I'm free to travel the hard but right way.

And wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads a man astray.

But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads a man to the light.

It's a rugged road and it's hard, but it's right.

If you're willing, you can come along.

We'll walk together and we'll find those joys that never fade.

In a shining city where all our tears will be gone to stay.

Oh, it's worth the journey, the hard but right way.

And as sure as the promise I hold in my hand, we're bound for the promised land and by His grace.

We've been saved to make this journey home. Oh, we've been called to walk this way.

This hard, this hard but right, this hard but right way.

This road is long. Oh, but it's the right way.

Wow, that was tremendous. That was The Hard But Right Way by our guest

Jim Winder and his group that performs Journey to the Celestial City, which is the

Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan put to music and with original songs.

The concept of Pilgrim's Progress, obviously, and it's not a word for word musical adaptation of the book, but it's thank you for that,

Jim. That was quite beautiful. Looking forward to playing some more songs during the program.

How did you first discover Pilgrim's Progress or The Pilgrim's Progress, as it's officially titled?

Did you discover Bunyan first in his life or did you first discover his book?

Well, a good friend of mine in college, and interesting the timing of this because I wasn't a believer then.

I was a struggling works righteousness guy, I guess. He gave it to me as we were leaving college.

I went to Rider University down in Lawrenceville. I tried to read it.

I think he gave it to me as an allegory, classic literature. Back then, I was reading stuff like K .Lil

Gibran and all sorts of poetry.

I was at that time in my life where if you're a singer and player like me, you go through these creative places, and so that's where I was.

So he gave it to me. He thought, you know, he might like this story. I have no idea how he found it, but I found it very difficult to read because I had the old

English type version of it. Now I read that, and now that's the only one

I read. I absolutely love the language. There's a whole bunch of King James only

Baptists jumping up and down applauding right now. Well, you know, there is something about the salt sprinkles on that language.

It's tasty. I just want to mention that in concert, when

I deliver the story dramatically, I've memorized a different version, which was a retelling by Erdman.

You guys probably know E -E -R -D -M -A -N booksellers. So they have one that Barry Moser illustrated, and Gary Schmidt was the writer.

I found that one on a business trip to Colorado Springs for my job.

I stopped at the bookstore, focused on the family, went through that, found that one, read it on the way home, and that one really moved me.

And that was the one that I sort of broke up into pieces, because obviously in 90 minutes we can't tell the whole story.

We do nine short acts, and each one of them begins with a scripture to give the context for what the story is going to be about in this section.

So there's a Bible grounding first, then there is the delivery of the dramatic story section, and then the band cues in, and I have a full four -piece band, so if you want to, you just heard our music.

I think James Taylor, that's really kind of what we're like. We're sort of folk -acoustic, but we have bass, drums, electric guitar.

We're very tasteful in the churches we go to. In fact, Pastor Jim referred us to a church up in Rhode Island, and when we were going in there to set up a sound check, someone said, you realize a drum kit has never crossed this foyer yet.

I said, well, we'll make sure we will pave the way for drummers to come and do music here.

Yeah, so that's kind of how it works, and so that's nine acts, and then

I do a little bit of the Old English at the end, because after he goes into the

Celestial City, I like to use his poem at the end where he says, you know, now reader, I've told my dreams to thee, thee have thou kind of interpreted to thee, put by my curtains, look within my veil, and all that.

It's a great way to say, you know, I usually say that, and I'll say, well, what do you think

John Bunyan means by all that Old English? Well, what he means is the story is great.

That's the apple, but the core is the gospel, so don't throw away the whole thing, you know, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater, and don't just love the story.

The whole purpose of the story is there to deliver the gospel. It's a vehicle to deliver the gospel.

It's not meant to be its own thing. Amen, and one of the things that you were saying when you were finding different editions of The Pilgrim's Progress, although there are good ones, my dear friend of many years,

Dr. Barry Horner, who is quite an expert on the life and teachings and writings of John Bunyan, and does a phenomenal seminar on The Pilgrim's Progress that I have seen,

I think I've seen him do it like five times at least, and it's quite a long seminar that he actually adapts to the length that you request.

He can do it over a two -day period, a three -day period, a one -day period, three hours, six hours, more, etc.

But anyway, he says that you have to be very careful though, because there are aberrant religious groups that have adopted

The Pilgrim's Progress with their own versions of it that really strip the whole story of the main meaning of it.

There is even a Roman Catholic version of The Pilgrim's Progress, and there are clearly non -reformed versions that really remove the true grace -focused theme throughout.

Wow, there's nothing sacred. Yes, but I'm going to play another song right now.

I am waiting with bated breath to hear this one, and we're going to be returning to our discussion after this next song, which my computer is so sensitive now,

I have a new computer that I quickly, without even intending to, click off of things that I'm about to listen to, but here we go.

Save Me is the next song that we're going to be hearing by Jim Winder, so sit back, relax, and praise the

Lord with Save Me. When all

I have, I've been trying to work my war so long.

There are some things deep inside me that I'm afraid to let you see.

I've been hiding them from you, and hiding them from me.

Lord, won't you save me? I've been trying my best to do the right thing, but there still is this emptiness inside.

I just can't seem to do good enough to satisfy.

I've read the way to heaven isn't what

I say or do. I'm assured a place with the

Father through faith in you, need of your grace that can cover my disgrace and lead me home to you.

Oh, Lord, I want to be your son, to know the only one who came and died for me.

I want to be your son, to know the only one who gave his life for me.

Lord, won't you save me? I want you to save me.

That was Save Me by Jim Winder and Journey into the Celestial City.

What another gorgeous song praising our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

So you've discovered in the timeline that we've been discussing of your life and testimony, you've discovered

Pilgrim's Progress. How did you come up with the concept of getting together with other musicians and creating this whole concept of the live dramatic and musical and instructional performance that you have developed?

Well, that's another really terrific turn, a great way that God works.

If you've heard of Max McLean? Oh, yeah. In fact, I've had Max McLean on my program and he wrote a very glowing endorsement of Iron Trip and Zion.

I had Max on my program when I was broadcasting out of New York and he was starring in the

Screwtape Letters Off -Broadway, the C .S. Lewis play.

Sure. Well, when Paul and I moved up here to New Jersey, we were a state church there, and Max was going to do

Mark's Gospel at Raritan Fountain College sponsored by, I guess, a local Christian group there or a church or something like that.

And so my pastor said to me, you know, you've got that kind of thing, you could do an opener for him, you know, play some of your music and see if you could do that before he does his show.

And at that time, I had no Pilgrim's Progress stuff going. I just done my first CD, which was just a bunch of singer songwriter type

Christian songs. And so I looked into that, but there was already somebody doing that.

But I pressed in there and I reached out to him and I'd like to do openers maybe at one of your other events.

So he invited me to come with him on several excursions where he would do

Mark's Gospel or, you know, Genesis or what have you. And so I would open for him by doing three songs.

And then, you know, my payback was that I could have my merch table right next to his. And I got to play for, you know, some pretty big groups of people in different places.

And that was the seed for me getting more opportunities to go out and do gigs and ministry and stuff.

And I met Marquis Laughlin through that, whose voice you heard on the epilogue.

Marquis did the epilogue and the closeout story section on the album that we made so that we would bookend our music with a little bit of the story on either side.

And it was there, going to do openers for both of those, that I was exposed to dramatic storytelling.

I wasn't raised or taught to be an actor, but I've learned through their ministry how to do that and have experienced the incredible, incredible joy of having a text well -memorized and to be able to communicate to an audience in a way that really touches their heart.

And so that was it. And so once I started to see that, all of a sudden my thoughts were, you know, this

Pilgrim's Progress thing's been percolating in me for a long time. I bet I could take this story and break it down into pieces and do what they do.

And that's how it started. It started with, you know, working out that stuff. And I went out on the road with this show early on, doing the music and reading.

Oh, it was actually not very good. I was like reading out of a notebook sections of the story.

And it went through evolution until I finally memorized the whole thing and was completely free.

So I can do this show solo. I can walk out on a stage and have a guitar and do the whole thing all by myself.

Or I can have a full band, which I have now. So it's second nature now, and it's totally a joyful thing to do.

But that's how I got into it. Great. And perfect timing there, because we are just exactly at the point where we take our next break at the top of the second hour.

And we do have Aaron, a listener, who has a question that we will get to when we return from the break.

Aaron, if you're listening, could we have your city and state of residence? I'm just curious, because I know that you have been a new listener and have been communicating with us, but I don't know where you're from.

I think our listeners might like to know where our listeners, the different parts of the country and different parts of the world where our listeners are residing.

So if you could email us back with also your city and state of residence, Aaron, we would love to hear from you. And if you'd like to join

Aaron and a couple of other people who are waiting to have their questions asked and answered on air by Jim Winder, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

That's C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Don't go away.

We're going to be right back with Jim Winder and Journey to the Celestial City. Transcribed by Transcription Outsourced to https://otter .ai

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That's the Thrivent story. Welcome back.

This is Chris Zarnes. And if you just tuned us in, our guest today is Jim Winder. And I might as well give

Jim's website while I'm at it. It's Jim dash Winder, spelt just like you would think,

W -I -N -D -E -R. And it's pronounced Winder, not winder. And it's jim -winder .com.

And you will find out everything that you need to know about his performance, his live dramatic musical instructional performance, which is a retelling of the

Pilgrim's Progress with original Christian songs, amplifying the storyline.

And it's titled Journey to the Celestial City. And so if you'd want more information, not only on booking

Jim yourself and Journey to the Celestial City, but also to find out where he may be across the

United States. Have you traveled overseas yet with this, Jim? I haven't gone like Europe or anything like that, but I have been to Alaska.

I had a really terrific little tour up there. And that was pretty exciting.

Yeah. So perhaps even some of our overseas listeners, which we do have a number of them in Ireland and England and Australia.

And we actually have listeners in about, that I know of from the emails that have come in with questions for my guests, about 15 different foreign countries at least, and about 40 different U .S.

states so far that we know of at least. And so we love the fact that Iron Trip and Zion audience is expanding.

On my old show, when we were broadcasting from New York, we had every state but Hawaii I had heard from listeners.

We may have had listeners in Hawaii, but just never heard from many. But even Alaska, we had some listeners from time to time sending in questions or even calling in because I used to have a call -in show.

But tell us also about Blessed Assurance, another 90 -minute word for word.

Well, this is a word for word delivery of John's first letter, unlike the Pilgrim's Progress presentation, which is not a word for word presentation.

Tell us about Blessed Assurance. Well, Blessed Assurance, as you said, it's an

ESV version, a delivery of the book of 1 John. I used the same sort of formula here.

I wrote songs to go with each of the chapters, each of the five chapters, and delivered that.

It's just a little bit shorter than the Pilgrim's Progress because it's not quite as much dialogue. And, you know, it's the same kind of music,

I mean, in the sense of the style of music. All the songs are brand new. They're all original, and they're all written to amplify the text that we're in.

So each chapter has a song that goes with it. And as your listeners could tell in the prior two songs that you showed, the hard but right way is the song that goes with Christian leaving the city of destruction and fleeing to the

Wicked Gate, which is symbolic of Christ, and Save Me, which you played, is the song that pairs with Christian coming to the cross and losing his burden at the cross.

And so there's a purpose for every song. What I'm finding is that the delivery of the word, the delivery which is just auditory, and then delivering a story which gives a visual in your mind and gives you another connective way to connect to what the word is saying.

And then music, and the lyrics that go with the music, it's like a three -punch truth punch, if you will.

It really hits a listener, an audience member, in three really good ways.

So when they come out of that section of either of the shows we do, I think they understand what it was all about.

I'm going to play another song right now by Jim Winder from the Journey to the

Celestial City performance, and I hope that you enjoy this just as much as the other songs we've played so far.

So sit back and relax, and here's Jesus on My Side by Jim Winder.

Well, we thought that Jesus on my side was going, there we go. I could see it coming a thousand miles away.

Temptation calling me, so I begin to pray. I've given in before, but this time ain't like the rest.

I'm calling on Jesus to help me stand the test, and now

I'm standing firm and fast. When I'm calling on Jesus to rescue me at last, and I've got

Jesus on my side.

I'm not gonna give in this time. Jesus on my side.

Well, Jesus, He's my guide. Well, you know

I've been born again, but the evil in me stays. Walking in righteousness is harder every day.

The good I want to do is tainted by my sin. I thank

God for Jesus, my Redeemer and my friend. He keeps me standing firm and fast.

When I'm calling on Jesus to rescue me at last, and I've got

Jesus on my side.

I'm not gonna give in this time. Jesus on my side.

Well, Jesus, He's my guide. God tells me to flee temptation's call, but Satan is wicked and he wants to see me fall.

My soul has been redeemed, and this is why I sing. Evil has no hold on me when

I call Jesus' name. And He'll keep me standing firm and fast when

I'm calling on Jesus to help me stand the test. No weapon of evil can be formed to take my life, but on Jesus to help me do what's right, and I've got

Jesus on my side. I'm not gonna give in this time.

Jesus on my side.

Well, Jesus, He's my guide. Jesus on my side.

I'm not gonna give in this time.

Jesus on my side.

Well, Jesus, He's my guide. I'm not gonna give in,

I'm not gonna give in, I'm not gonna give in. I'm not callin' on Jesus.

Not gonna give in, not gonna give in.

That was Jim Winder, Jesus on My Side, and this is from the

Journey to the Celestial City performance that Jim is involved in, that he has created along with his band.

And why don't you plug your other band members by name and instrument. Oh, absolutely.

Let's start with Jim Oakley, who is my drummer. He's from South Jersey. He's a terrific guy, great player.

Mark Gazo, bass player, he's from Frenchtown, New Jersey. And Mike Lozinski, who is from Surgentsville.

So those are my guys. Oh, and I also have Fast Eddie Humphreys, who is our lighting guy.

Fast Eddie. I have a friend, Pastor Ed Moore of North Shore Baptist Church, and we call him Fast Eddie from the famous Paul Newman movie.

Cool Hand Luke, I think that was. No, that wasn't Cool Hand Luke. That was, oh, I can't remember the name of the movie with Jackie Gleason.

It just totally flew out of my head when he was the pool shark. Paul Newman played a pool shark that beat

Minnesota Fats. I can't remember the name of the movie, but anyway. Aaron from Indianapolis, Indiana asks, where can

I appreciate or experience this wonderful performance? Well, obviously, anywhere that you invite them,

Aaron. But other than that, what's next on your calendar that is either near Indianapolis or perhaps it's just anywhere that she's willing to travel?

You know, we're not, we're New Jersey based primarily, and we do a lot of tri -state area work.

And I don't have anything planned going out that way. I would certainly be willing to do that. And we're right now in the summertime, things tend to die a little bit in terms of schedule because vacations and a lot of churches, they don't do a lot of this sort of stuff during the summer months.

Planning one of our events, you know, to get folks back to church other than to just go to church isn't very easy, you know, and to do a special event.

So we find that there's a lot that happens just after, you know,

Christmas and the holidays up through Easter, and then things kind of chill a little bit for the summer. So we're planning our full schedule right now.

So I would really encourage folks to reach out to us because we are looking for places to go share this ministry.

And if you look at the pastor's testimonies on our website, you know, we're not on the

Christian radio, you know what I mean? Or get your music on the Christian radio if you're not from Nashville and you don't have a record deal.

But we bring a high quality program that has proven itself for a decade and a half.

And we love to go share this. Yeah, I've been very disappointed. I've been in Christian radio for 30 years approximately.

I've been very disappointed with a lot of Christian DJs who refuse to even listen to anything unless it's just sent to them by a major label and specific songs that the major label wants them to play, where they're just imitating, directly imitating the world.

Now, I don't want to be overly harsh because I also know that Christian DJs get flooded with CDs from non -professional folks, some of whom are no doubt very gifted, but some of them who unfortunately have been deluded into believing that they are gifted when they should definitely find another hobby or profession.

That was very diplomatic. Yeah, because I've heard some of the things, when I was actually complaining to a friend of mine who is a

Christian DJ, he said, well, you know, this is the kind of thing that I get in droves, and he played something for me.

And obviously someone is not practicing what

Augustine had said about leading somebody to truth. And somebody in those folks' lives are not obeying the principle of Proverbs 27 .8,

faithful are the wounds of a friend, but deceitful are the kisses of an enemy. So obviously there are some people who are being encouraged to keep in the musical industry who don't have any business being in there.

Well, you know, what I've found over the years looking into that and talking to some

Christian DJs and stuff, even at my local Star 99 one back in the day, was they are what they called a reportable station,

I think was what the word they used, is they have to sell Nashville what they play. And they are told what to play, in a sense.

So you're going to hear Chris Tomlin and other folks like that, when they come out with a record, it's going to be on the railway.

But that's okay. There is a place for groups like ours that are out doing really high quality stuff, that okay, our medium isn't necessarily going to be the radio, but you know what,

I'll take the 15 people at Overcomers up at Tuscarora any day and enjoy the power of God's Holy Spirit working in people's hearts.

That's all I want to see. It's absolutely not about notoriety.

That's not the goal here. My hope for this show is that there's some people with gospel hearts that want to reach their people with something unique and different, because nobody's doing what we're doing.

This way of telling the story, and this music, is rather unique.

And in terms of Pilgrim's Progress, there's no one else in the world doing it like we're doing it. Well, I can tell you right now that I want to begin the process,

I want to get the bowl rolling to get you out here locally to Carlisle at the

Carlisle Theatre. It's a historic, beautiful theatre from the early 20th century.

It was built in 1930 or thereabouts. It's a real gorgeous, old -fashioned, historic theatre that has been restored and is now being used not only for movies, a lot of art films and things, but also live performances and plays, and some very famous bands and recording artists have performed there.

Even the actor Kevin Bacon, he's in a musical group with his brother, and they've performed there twice, and some other groups that you would definitely recognize.

I don't have a list in front of me, but I would definitely love to have you guys come out here if I can, by God's grace, pull something off and get you into the

Carlisle Theatre. Well, that would be a real terrific opportunity. We would love to come for sure.

And a thank you, Erin, in Indianapolis. She reminded me of the title of the movie that I was grasping for.

It was The Hustler, starring Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason, where Paul Newman played

Fast Eddie the Pool Shark, and Jackie Gleason was Minnesota Fats. But anyway, thank you, Erin.

We also have a Christian in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who wants to know, have you ever performed this musical,

Journey to the Celestial City, in either non -evangelical or even non -Christian venues, and what, if so, has been the response?

Oh, that's a great question. Well, yes, certainly. One of the most interesting places was my old

English teacher back in Sterling, New Jersey, Mr. Evans, Lee Evans was his name, he taught me some guitar.

I already knew how to play, but I took lessons from him for a couple of years, and we became really good friends for many years after that, and the year that he retired,

I had reached out to him and I said, you know, this is classic literature. And that's, by the way, one of the greatest things about it, is that it can stand in, like,

I could go down to a gazebo in the center of a town and I could do this show and say, come hear classic literature.

This is up there with Shakespeare. Yeah. This is on the list of, you know, top ten, you know, classic literature examples.

So, you know, so I did it, I actually stood on the stage at Central School in Sterling, New Jersey, and did it for the seventh graders there.

And he was able to bring it in. So that was a good example of one. I've done it in prisons, a couple of prisons

I've done it in, which was a really gratifying thing. I'd love to do that more.

The guys really responded well for that, and the two persons that I've been to. And I would say, you know, those are typically the ones where it hasn't been a religious environment, but by and large it happens to have been in churches.

That's just where it seems to fit best. You know, I did have, I remember when I first visited your website,

I did have heart palpitations when I saw that you were performing at a Roman Catholic church. But I just wanted to hear from you what was the experience like there and what the response has been.

It was great. And it was my drummer's girlfriend's church.

She said, you know, I really would love to bring this program to our church. And we've done this at another

Catholic church way up in Massachusetts. Another buddy of mine that I worked with had us come in and share it there.

And, you know, it's all about sharing the Gospel. Amen. And being in every environment where we can be.

Amen. We can speak the truth in love, and God, you know, uses that truth.

And I've never had any bad reactions, you know, in those settings.

I think that we have pretty good rapport with folks. Great. Well, I would be thrilled to hear about you even playing in Mormon settings and Jehovah's Witnesses settings.

Not that that would probably ever happen with a Jehovah's Witness, but obviously you don't want to only preach to the choir.

You want as many people that don't understand or believe or perhaps have never heard articulated clearly the

Gospel of the Reformation that we believe is the Gospel of the Bible, the Gospel of sovereign grace, that salvation is all of grace, which is really the core of what the

Pilgrim's Progress is about. Yeah, it really is. Although, you know what I would say, and I've thought of this a lot over the years, obviously the first impulse of every

Christian is to want to go tell the unbelieving world about Christ, right? That's natural.

But I have found in my own life that it just might be that the mission

God's given me is more to come to the Church, which we know is...

And when I say Church, I mean if I'm standing in front of an audience in a church, an evangelical church, for instance, the chances are good that there are people in there that have a false and dangerous assurance that think they're believers, but they're really not.

Amen, amen. The easy believism and cheap grace are rampant in the evangelical church.

Right, so if I can make the Gospel clear in that setting,

I can still reach people that need to turn from where they are, where they need to be, and I can also encourage and make stronger...

And when I say me, of course, I mean God through His Spirit, of course, but I'm devoting my energy just to strengthen the true believer to be who they are, to listen to the

Holy Spirit and follow what He's telling you to do, love your brother, you know, all those things.

You know, so primarily I'm in churches. I haven't really had the pull or the success or the yearning as much to be a street -corner evangelist as much as I am in churches, making grace clear and helping people align with it.

Amen. Well, we're going to hear another song right now called The Race. So sit back, relax, and enjoy as we hear

Jim Winder's The Race. I'm a sinner saved by grace

And I'm a runner in a brand new race

I was headed for a dead end, I got turned around I was nothing but a lost soul, but now

I'm found This ain't no short race, it's a marathon

And though the way is rugged, I keep pressing on Through the rain and the thunder,

I'm going to keep the pace Moving with the Spirit, I've got speed and grace

The saints before me, you know they cheer me on I hear them from the sidelines, they're singing me a victory song

Keep your eyes on Jesus, He's the author of your faith

And God speed you in the race

There's lots of runners alongside of me, running free

They run for the fame, I'm running to win A crown of salvation at the race's end

Christ ran before me and you know He paved the way And He will receive me at the finish line someday

He has prepared me a brand new place to rest Where I will be forever there

I'm a sinner saved by grace

And I'm a runner to my destination

I've been saved by grace And I'm a runner, I'm going to see you around Well, I'm a runner

Wow, that was phenomenal. They're getting better each time, I think. Jim, if you saw me, you would never know

I was a Reformed Baptist. I was moving around like a Pentecostal at a Holy Ghost revival. Well, we have a little bit of blues in there, as you can tell.

Oh yeah, that was phenomenal. I love that. And just to give you context where that song goes, well, if I back up,

Jesus on my side is paired with Christians fighting Apollyon in the Valley of the

Shadow of Death. In the race, as soon as Christian comes out of that valley, he sees his friend

Faithful up ahead and he catches up with him, and the story says that these two walked on together and they spoke of their journeys, and after that they go into Vanity Fair.

Evangelist comes along and he says, you're doing well, keeping your eyes on the crown, but your race is not over just yet.

Amen. And it reminded me immediately of one of the precious truths of the doctrines of Sovereign Grace, the perseverance and preservation of the saints.

Yes, absolutely. Indeed. Amen. And so, the theme of the

Pilgrim's Progress, do you think that one of the reasons why it is timeless is not only because it is so thoroughly biblical in its allegories,

Charles Spurgeon once referred to, in referring to John Bunyan, he said that his blood is bib -line and if you prick him anywhere, the

Bible will begin to ooze out. That was a paraphrasing because I don't have his quote in front of me, but Charles Spurgeon was a great fan, for lack of a better term, of John Bunyan who lived two centuries prior to Spurgeon.

Yeah. But it seems that the story not only will really involve the journey that nearly anyone who has been delivered from darkness can say in a hearty amen to, because there's something familiar in their own journey, but also the obstacles that we as Christians face along the way that are trying to derail us and trying to rob us of not only the joy of our salvation, but to drag us back to hell.

If we could lose our salvation, we would, as some great reform scholar once said, and obviously

I don't believe we can lose our salvation, but those who are true believers can definitely be dragged into a season of unrepentant wickedness, as it's commonly called, backsliding.

And the sign of the true believer is not that he doesn't sin, but that he repents of it. Right. If you think about what you're describing, it's the

Descendants of Doubting Castle in our story, which is a very vivid picture where Christian and Hopeful, now they've escaped

Vanity Fair, and they're on this path together, and it says that there's a point around noon where the path departs from the river and it grows rough and dry and filled with sharp stones.

And Christian, all of a sudden, sees this beautiful meadow called Bypass Meadow, and he says, hey,

I'll paraphrase, he goes, why don't we walk over there? I mean, it's so much easier walking. And Hopeful is like, yeah, but what if that meadow leads us away from the path?

And without answering, Christian hops over the fence and Hopeful follows, and what ends up happening is they can't find their way back, they get dragged by giants and spirits to Doubting Castle, and they are now in his prison for three days where they're beaten every day, and culminating with the giant's wife,

Gnidus Diffidence, sending down a way that they could even kill themselves. She sends down a knife, a rope, and poison, and it says that Christian would have used any one of those.

But what I like to say in concert is I walk right down into the audience tonight, and I'll stop the story and I'll say,

Folks, this is when you sin and you feel so guilty about what you've done that you become paralyzed, you're stuck.

But I said, who does Christian have next to him? And I hear whispering in the audience,

Hopeful, Hopeful, Hopeful. And I go, exactly. So God puts a

Hopeful next to him, and Hopeful says, Perhaps if we read the promises of God in our roles, even in a place like this,

God would encourage us and get us out of here. And that's exactly what they do. And that's when

Christian says his famous little speech where I do the old English on this, where he goes,

What a fool I've been to lie in a stinking dungeon when I could have easily walked free. I have a key in my chest pocket called

Promise, which I'm convinced can open any door in Doubting Castle. And, of course, his friend says, Well, you take it out of your pocket and pry it in the door.

In concert, I'll say to them, I'll be kind of funny, I'll say, Well, actually, what he said to them was,

Really? You've had a key in your pocket like all this time? The guy's been coming down here and beating us up, and you've had a key the whole time?

But, you know, the way out of it, as you said, it's repentance, but it's also going back to the promises of God, which we know are true, and the

Spirit moves in our hearts and says, All this stuff that you're thinking are lies. You think

God doesn't love you? That's a lie. But I sinned, and I did the grievous thing. It's a lie.

He loves you. He still loves you. You're still his child. It's heart -breaking that you haven't turned to him yet and received the forgiveness he's so ready to give you.

And as soon as Christians did that, boom, they're out of the castle, they're back on the path, they're moving again.

Yeah, and one thing that I have been warning some young people I know, who have expressed to me, much to my joy, very recently, that they want to start coming to church on a regular basis.

And I said, Well, now that you have that conviction that's been gnawing at you, be prepared that the devil is going to unleash his minions to prevent you, in any way possible, from hearing the word taught, from hearing the gospel, from being discipled, from being instructed.

Just be prepared. It might even come in the form of laziness, where you don't even want to get out of bed on a

Sunday morning. It may be the attractions of the world that are seducing you to do different things.

It may be that you have your friends starting to mock you, and say that you are some kind of a nut, or a weirdo, or a sissy, or whatever the case is.

I'm trying to guard my tongue from using the language that they would actually be using in this day and age.

But we have to be prepared. If you who are listening are going to start to follow the call of the

Lord that you believe you are experiencing, you're going to be distracted. You're going to be facing obstructions and everything.

That's another one of the reasons this book that millions have cherished for centuries,

The Pilgrim's Progress, is still as relevant today as it ever was.

Am I right? Yeah, I think so. I think so. I wanted to relate another part of the story where they meet atheists.

And this is right before they get to Gula land, and they go up into the city, you know, across the river, which is symbolic of dying out of this life.

And they meet atheists, and atheists says, you know, I laugh at you. You're such a fool to take a long and hard journey for no reason at all.

There is no celestial city. And Christian says, you know, but we've heard that there is a place to be found.

And atheists gives all the reasons why he says it's a big fake, and he goes down the other way.

And Christian, at this point, of all points, he's come through so much, he turns to Hopeful and he goes, could the celestial city really be just a dream?

And Hopeful is like, it's not a dream. Look, you've seen the evidence all along the path. I saw the celestial city gates from the

Delectable Mountain. Let's get up the city that the sun is higher and fuller around than ever before.

Let us follow this path to the east, and we will find the celestial city. And so, you know, it can be even late in life when you're really, you think you're strong, and something will happen, and you're going to get rocked.

But I want to temper it with what you said before. Those who truly are His, He will not lose.

So if you're sitting there thinking, ooh, perseverance, I'm a little afraid of that.

Maybe I won't survive that. I promise you, you will, and it won't be because of you.

It'll be because of the grace of God. He will not lose you. He will bring a Hopeful along. He will give you the

Scripture. He'll do whatever has to happen to keep you in the faith. Amen.

And that reminds me of in John chapter 10, where Jesus says,

I am the good shepherd, and I know my own, and my own know me, even as the

Father knows me, and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep.

I have other sheep which are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will hear my voice, and they will become one flock with one shepherd.

For this reason the Father loves me, because I laid down my life so that I may take it again.

No one has taken it away from me, but I lay it down on my own initiative.

I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment

I have received from the Father, and he also, the

Lord talks about how no one can snatch his sheep from his hand.

And we just rejoice with the Lord for these precious promises.

And I want to, before we run out of time, I want to play another piece from Journey to the

Celestial City, Vanity Fair. And I hope that you listening enjoy this as well.

Here is Vanity Fair by Jim Winder and Journey to the Celestial City. There's a fire in the sky, a storm cloud.

I need a little shelter, and there's a little town up ahead.

I'm passing through, I don't plan to settle down.

And I've been warned about the dangers of this town.

Lord knows what I'm going to find there in Vanity Fair.

The buyers and the sellers surround me like an angry sea.

What will you buy, my friend, a voice calls out to me.

But I don't want anything they have to sell.

It's all deceiving, and I know that really well.

All signs are saying, beware, you're in Vanity Fair.

The jewels are merely painted glass, the rings are plated gold.

The price they are demanding is the selling of my soul.

The selling of my soul, no, no, no.

Every man into this world is born.

And we are tempted to make this world our home.

But we must live like we're strangers in this place.

In reverent fear and in the power of God's grace.

It's a struggle we all share in Vanity Fair.

It's a struggle we all share in Vanity Fair.

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Welcome back. This is Chris Arnzen, and we've only got about seven minutes left of the broadcast.

We have been interviewing Jim Winder about his absolutely phenomenal live musical, dramatic, and instructional performance,

Journey to the Celestial City, which is basically the story of John Bunyan's classic

The Pilgrim's Progress adapted for a musical performance. If you'd like more information about this phenomenal event, you can go to Jim -Winder .com.

Jim -Winder .com I also want to plug, since my friend

Jim Harrison is the one who first introduced me to the ministry and talent of Jim Winder, I want to plug his church, or the church that he pastors,

I should say. Red Mills Baptist Church in Mahopac Falls, New York. Their website is redmillsbaptist .org.

redmillsbaptist .org There's no official connection between Red Mills Baptist Church and Jim Winder.

It's just that Jim had performed there with Journey to the Celestial City, and Pastor Jim Harrison is the one, as I said, who urged me to invite

Jim Winder on the program. One of the things that is great about what you're doing is that even though there are going to be those of more the fundamentalist stripe who are hypercritical of different types of music styles and melodies and rhythms, the music that you use for this is really broadly appealing enough that I think there will be a far more tiny group of those opposing what you do, or disliking what you do.

This seems like it would be within the comfort level of the vast majority of Christians, even those that are ultra -conservative in their musical tastes, what they think is appropriate for anything related to a

Christian service or evangelical outreach. Where would you stand on that,

Jim? Do you think I'm right on that? Yeah, I think so. The history is the proof.

Like I said, we've been doing this program for 15 years, and we've been in a whole bunch of different churches.

And some of them have been extremely, you know, very conservative, and the pastor has said, you know,

Jim, you really gotta be careful with volume and energy and stuff like that.

And I say, Pastor, we're all about the poor. We don't not want to let anything get in the way of communicating what the gospel is.

So, you know, we make sure that everything we're doing contributes tastefully in that direction.

In fact, I'll tell you a funny thing. When I was soundchecking at Pastor Jim's church, we were playing, and he was sitting in the back, and I said to the whole group,

I said, stop a second, and I said, Pastor, can you understand what I'm singing? And he said, no.

And I said, okay, all the music goes down. Leave my vocal where it is. Let's—all the music comes down.

And we mixed it so much better, and we played a little bit more of one, and I said, stop. And I said, how's it now?

And he goes, I can hear you crystal clear. That's perfect. So, you know, we work with pastors to make sure, because there's no sense in standing up there and blowing people away.

I mean, we're not about that. We really want to be tasteful, and you can tell our style of music is rather easygoing.

Well, I want to basically go out today on the program with a song by you, and so, therefore,

I'm going to wish you a blessed weekend, and eagerly look forward to not only you returning to Iron, Sharp, and Ziron, but also to seeing a live performance of Journey to the

Celestial City and Blessed Assurance as well, and also helping to orchestrate that right here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

And once again, the website for Jim Winder is jim -winder .com, jim -winder .com.

Thank you so much, Jim Winder, and I'm going to be playing a song of yours called Preach the

Word, but I hope that you join us again soon on Iron, Sharp, and Ziron, Jim. All right, and by the way, you're going to hear my wife,

Salute, playing on this song, so I'm very proud of her. My wife, Paul, is just an amazing musician, so you're going to get to hear her play on this one too.

Amen. Well, I want everybody listening to know for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater

Savior than you are a sinner, which I think is the main theme of The Pilgrim's Progress.

And now here's Preach the Word by Jim Winder and Journey to the Celestial City. Preach the word in season

Your heart prepared to bring good news

He is the way, the light, the reason

So tarry not, they must receive what you have heard

So preach the word, preach the word, preach the word

When men won't listen When ears won't hear

And eyes won't see With great patience give direction

The cross of Christ remains the power to set men free

So preach the word, preach the word

Someday the race you're running will be over Your life a sacrifice, an offering

But a crown of righteousness awaits the faithful Who share the word that others might believe

So preach the word, preach the word For souls are dying, for souls are dying

The harvest's ripe, the harvest's ripe The day's not long, it won't be long

Till He comes to take us homeward

Fill your heart with His word and sing His song