Examining the Christian Nationalism Debate

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You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart And with all your mind and with all your strength

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So why do we hear some of today's most prominent pastors saying things like this? it had everything to do with how we talk about the

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Bible and Specifically or along with that what we point to as the foundation of faith which for most

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Christians unfortunately is the Bible We need to do better we need to love

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God with all our hearts and stand unashamedly on the rock of his word We need to love the

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Lord with all of our souls And respond to the worldview issues of our day with the wisdom and discernment that comes only from him

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We need to love the Lord with our minds and understand the calling of God's people in every area of life in God's world

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We need to love the Lord our God with all our strength and face the work of building a life -giving God honoring culture

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Join us for 10 days at the runner Academy for cultural leadership as we consider how the gospel

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Influences all of life and culture and the role that we have to play in applying foundational

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Christian thinking to every area of life Non rockabodas must stop.

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I don't want to rock the boat. I want to sink it Are you gonna bark all day little doggie, or are you gonna bite?

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Delusional yeah delusional is okay in your worldview. I'm an animal. You don't chastise chickens for being delusional You don't chastise pigs for being delusional.

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So you calling me delusional using your worldview is perfectly. Okay, it doesn't really hurt Desperate times call for faithful men and not for careful men

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The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men lauding them for their courage

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Going to all the world and make disciples not going to the world make buddies not to make brosives, right?

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Don't go in the world make homies, right? Disciples, I got a bit of a jiggle Nick That's a joke pastor when we have the real message of truth, we cannot let somebody say they're speaking truth when they're not

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And Behold my servant whom

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I uphold my chosen and whom I sold the lights I have put my spirit upon him. He will bring forth justice to the nations

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He will not cry aloud or lift up his voice or make it heard in the street that bruise read He will not break in a faintly

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Bernie wick. He will not quench. He will faithfully bring forth justice He will not grow faint or be discouraged till his till he has established justice and the earth and the coastlands wait for his law

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Isaiah 42 1 through 4 One of my faves your voice sounds good today.

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Does it? Yeah, that was a solid reading. Nice. I'm glad to hear that Yeah, I don't know what you did, but it's that sinus infection.

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I have yeah, that'll do it I thought maybe you were doing some vocal exercises Just that old the old sinus infections give me that old deep bass.

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Well, I'll take it. Thank you Merry Christmas Zach. Merry Christmas It is

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Advent season. It has been here for a while. But yeah, I've been season starts like what? But we can play songs without getting harassed too much.

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Yeah, it's time now Welcome back to another episode of apology radio Luke the bear once again hosting

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Pastor Jeff is Hopefully heading back tomorrow From that state.

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We're not allowed to mention the both baby girls have been released. They are reunited just a little bit ago here

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So, yes, I don't know if he'll be back next week

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They got a drive home and they can only go like 90 minutes at a time. That's what I heard So it's gonna take them several days.

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Oh my yeah, god bless. Yeah But welcome back a little Z's errs.

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We'll see Yes, see now that one I can get on board with I like it yeah little

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Z's errs was was sick last week That's why I forgot to mention that you missed it. You missed you missed

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Mr. Cooper. I know I was upset. I figured you were. Yep. It was that morning I woke up and I knew that I would need to make certain changes that day and one of them would be not having the pleasure of Conversing with mr.

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Skillet himself. Yeah Such as life such as life Next time.

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Well, I'm glad you're back and feeling better Thanks. I'm glad to get to this conversation. This is one. We've been wanting to have for a minute.

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Yeah hot minute We just haven't had well, I shouldn't say we haven't a time It's like been stuff that's popped up that was needing to be addressed right away

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I love what Bill's doing. Oh And as a reminder, he's also going to be teaching our man camp this year, which

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I'm especially excited about Anyways Let's get into it.

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We'll talk about end abortion now at the end because we got a lot to talk about there as well. Mm -hmm. So Like I mentioned

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This this Christmas song, I'm not feeling here When we were

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Not not feeling that one, let's just let's just shut that down so We went to g3 for a day or two or something like that.

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Yeah our whole trip Yeah back in September and I don't remember cuz I just got back from Germany and so I couldn't tell you what day and time it was but we got to go to the pre -conference conference and We we missed dr.

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White speaking, but we got to see the panel discussion on Christian nationalism and So we're gonna get into that when we we watch it live and we're like we have to discuss this and we've literally every week

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Been like we're gonna discuss this. It's just we haven't been able to get to it. Yeah, so major topic on Internet's it has been and to be fair it you know, it says friendly debate

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If you go to it there's more of a panel discussion they just called it a friendly debate but you know, it's

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Christian nationalism post -millennial ism and Smaller topics or something like that So it's up on their

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YouTube channel. You can go check it out so we're gonna kind of work through some of that we're not gonna do all of it because it's an hour long and We'll need like five shows to do that.

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And a lot of it was dr. White talking and I don't need to Correct anything he said so no need to play those parts really

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I do think it's interesting though that he had the lion's share at the time and I Think that's because his perspective out of everyone's on the panel was the most

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Minority position for sure given that he you know holds a particular eschatological bent, right?

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and that seems to always draw the Share of the questions. Yes in a panel like this because of the

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Ties and I think we'll see this in the discussion the ties between Post -millennial ism and the label of Christian nationalism.

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There's a lot of association between the two labels Unfairly, so we'll get to that And and again if you're new to this conversation, we are not

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Arguing for the Christian nationalism nationalist position We're not jealous for the name or the term

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We'll actually get into that a little bit But just if again if you're new and you're wondering what we're talking about, we are not defending that position

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But before we actually get into the panel discussion, I really wanted to lay out Some really important stuff that kind of happened prior to this.

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So Dr. White had done a talk earlier. We had just missed it on The Navy SEALs and the vaccine mandate.

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Oh, I said it cookie mandate And hopefully I knew to doesn't shut us down He had done a talk on that and right after that Owen Strand Got up and did a talk on Christianity and kinism now

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Right. I'm gonna play a small clip just to kind of lay out the conversation where he in his own terms defines three

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Separate Christian nationalism positions. So I'm gonna play that real quickly We're gonna discuss that and then get into the

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Panel discussion, which I think I think it'll be helpful if we play this first. So here I'll go ahead and play

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Let's set six minutes here CN today first Gospel driven

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CN which I would argue grounds itself in the death and resurrection of Christ and is often

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Connected to post mill eschatology. Its focus is gospel Proclamation and I would say that is a good focus and we heard a representative of gospel driven

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CN about 25 minutes ago He's referring to dr.

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White. We'll get to that. I just wanna I never actually heard Clip that he made cuz I know that he you know, he's about to get yeah called out for that But I never actually heard him reference it and I don't know

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Owen personally I've never actually met him seems like a really sweet guy really brilliant guy, but it's important He's referring to dr.

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White here Just so you know This is a movement that deserves

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Engagement and respect it is a it is a serious movement. It is not to be lightly

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Dismissed for sure. Then there's what I call law driven Christian nationalism this seeks the recovery of the moral law in the public square and it's focused on government going lawful

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It's more theonomic and flavor its focus is political engagement though not severed from the church in promoting the law in public and this too is a movement that deserves serious engagement and respect a figure like a

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Greg Bonson for example would be Associated with a form of this and Greg Bonson was an absolute baller to use a technical theological term

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So interesting I It's good to have this context, yeah,

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I'm confident I Can't say this for sure because Greg Bonson is no longer with us.

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I'm confident though that he would not ascribe to this position so Again, this is important.

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Basically everything he just described sans Christian nationalism term describes us

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Plus Everything he just said about dr. White sans Christian nationalism term describes us again.

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So yeah, there's kind of a dichotomy here that that I would reject up front and say

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Everything that you just described, you know our desire for God's law to inform Public policy and standards of justice and government and then the emphasis on gospel proclamation

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I don't see how those two aren't friends with each other, right? I think there's there's an ally

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Right. I mean the relationship the fact that he's like again, these are his own Categories he's made the fact that he's separating the two.

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We're like that's everything that we are in one package and I would say the same Was dr.

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Bonson Again, except none of us are using the term Christian national list

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And there's a reason why I think he's doing this. I'm gonna get to that here in a few minutes I'd like to hear that. Okay Then There's a third element of CN that has caught my attention and the attention of a good number of you and it's called in my

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Handling working with my colleague Jeff Moore who you heard earlier monoethnic

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CN mono ethnic one Ethnicity or one race.

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I guess you could say if you wanted to already be in problematic territory this last form of CN has been represented at the book level in the most serious way among all the streams recently of Christian nationalism the most extended case for CN to to date is

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Called the case for Christian nationalism and it is written by a figure named.

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Dr. Stephen Wolfe Okay, we'll just we'll just stop there. I just want to lay out those three positions

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He's gonna spend the rest of the talk, I mean, this is eight minutes into a 49 -minute talk on This issue and Ken ism and I I'll be honest.

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I haven't read Stephen Wolfe. We've talked about this before I I'm not really familiar with the book. I know Doug Wilson has talked about it

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And I'm not I'm not gonna try to defend the book. I'm not gonna try to defend anything He said in there because I just haven't read it, right

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You know what he goes on to say about the book if it's true, I would reject What Stephen Wolfe was saying?

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I've heard Doug respond to this later and it's according to Doug He feels like Owen misrepresented some of the things that Stephen Wolf said, but that's that's not the point of this

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I just wanted to lay out those three positions So Again, it's important to have that context.

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Yeah good helpful categories to start. So again, that was right after dr. White spoke now we're gonna get right into the panel discussion here, so it's about a minute almost two minutes in and Owen's kind of the moderator.

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So we kind of just did some small talk and then the first question goes right to dr.

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White This is the only part of dr. White I'm gonna play because it's important No, seriously

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Psalm 2 I Agree completely with what you said Here's my question.

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Do you see? Psalm 2 Calling Kings to kiss the

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Sun As a gospel call to repentance and faith

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Something separate from that something more from that How would you see that? Well, you know since it says lest his wrath be kindled you could certainly apply that to a general

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Gospel call, but this is specifically directed to Kings and to judges. So it has

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Kings and judges have a specific application And I think We didn't get into this today and and I don't think we will have time to at all even during this conversation

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But I see Daniel 7. I don't know what you you see in Daniel 7 but I see Daniels 7 as the enthronement of Christ after his his ascension and So when we talk about his active ruling

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Eschatologically there has to be some discussion of What is Christ doing now is he actively ruling and is there a full a prophetic fulfillment in Psalm?

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Because because again remember what he does in his in his trial in in Mark chapter 14

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He conflates Psalm 110 and Daniel 7 and that's what causes the high priest to say

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Well, you've heard the blasphemy. He tears his clothes and what what what more evidence do we need?

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So if that is the fulfillment then what is the nature of Christ reigning right now

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And how should that then impact our interaction? With the world and with our presentation, for example right now

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Let's let's use the big things going on right now transgenderism Can I can

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I have 30 seconds to tell the story I was on to it I was on The dr. Drew show on CNN.

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I think it was in 2016 Transgenderism I was on with the same guy. Did you all see what that that former army pilot who?

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Manifests as a woman now when Ben Shapiro was on he took this big old honking hand and he put it on Ben Shapiro's Shoulder and threatened him in a deep manly voice as a woman.

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I was on with him and At one point during the conversation

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I quoted Matthew chapter 19 where Jesus says from the beginning

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God made them male and female and The one thing one of dr. Drew's sidekicks basically says well, you know, that's just one religious leader

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And my response was this is a religious leader that predicted his own death burial and resurrection

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Then died was buried rose again the third day and ascended to heaven when you can pull that off we'll worry about your opinions about these things till then he's

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Lord and He had absolutely no idea what to what to even say in response to that.

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So what I'm saying is What do it when we say the magistrate are we talking about an enthroned

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King who is reigning right now? And I think That's that's that's to me something that has been clarified since 2020 we've all had to think about this more than I Would you all agree?

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I could tell you want to say something So just real quick and let you speak to this and then I'm I probably started this way sooner than I should have so forgive me

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Which I don't think dr. White is capable of telling a story in 30 seconds, but that's okay Neither is other people that we know

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I was just thinking It's a good story from the same cloth But I mean the point in in relation to this conversation talking about Christian answer nationalism and Postmillennialism is

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Christ ruling and reigning and the point of Psalm 2 is to say like yo Christ Israel ruling and reigning and he's speaking to the the magistrates like kiss the

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Sun unless you perish in the way and My favorite translation from Ben Merkel president new st.

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Andrews is kiss the Sun unless you get smoked alright, you know and so that's

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That's that's what we're saying We're saying yeah, I don't care who you are

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I don't care what position you're in Christ is ruling and reigning and you should kiss him

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Bow down before him call him Lord lest you perish in the way Yeah, and I think

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James is being consistent with the type of Positions he's taken exegetically in his theological career and what he's written about when it comes to reform theology

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I think his answer is right in line with You know the the grace of the gospel, of course being for all kinds of men all classes of people

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Which is what Psalm 2 is addressing right Psalm 2 is addressing the kings of the earth who have set themselves against the

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Lord and against his anointed who are bursting or Attempting I should say to burst his bonds apart and cast away his cords from them to throw off all restraint essentially and the response of the father in heaven is to laugh at that rebellion upon what basis because The father has installed a king on Zion and we know that the installation of that King began with the cross in the sense that Jesus mediatorial work in salvation and then his

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Resurrection from the dead and the vindication of that sacrifice by the father gave him that title of resurrected

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Lord Bible speaks to this in a number of different places in the New Testament and I just lay that foundation to say

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James. I mean James quoted from Mark 14 Where Jesus attributes the

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Daniel son of man passage to himself which then causes the religious leaders to tear their clothes and Pronounce the sentence of death upon him because they knew what he was claiming, right?

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He's he's the son of man He's the one that comes up to the ancient of days and is presented before him and to him is given dominion and glory and a kingdom and and Men of every tribe language and nation are gonna serve him

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His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not pass away in his kingdom There is one that shall not be destroyed very important language there

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I just I find it interesting that the question that Scott asked again posits this sort of dichotomy that I wouldn't draw when he asked the question is

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The call for the Kings to kiss the Sun in a salvific sense Or is it a call for them to do something else or whereas I would say

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Yes The call is universal in scope and application because I think the problem and Again, I think there's a mechanism in their system that forces them into this position where it's either grace

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Salvation or it's law over here and we have to those two can't meet. Yep And I saw that in no, sorry.

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I mean in Owen's talk. That's what he was right trying to do I think you're just seeing the application of it coming out in a question form

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Because when the call goes forward for the kings of the earth to kiss the Sun to pay homage to the

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Sun Yes, that is religious But because it is religious doesn't mean it's disconnected from the call for them to do justice and to rule in such a way is is

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Upholding of God's judicial standards in the earth because and as the last thing I'll say I think on this point for now

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We can talk and say so much more about it is That God wants men to have faith, but he also wants justice in the earth

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Mm -hmm and his answer for both of those problems, right because men don't have faith in him

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And there is a great deal of injustice in the earth in the public square which the prophets

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Speak to over and over again. What's God's answer for both of those? Well, it tells us in the scriptures.

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It's God himself bearing his own arm of salvation and Clothing himself in vengeance

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To do what to ensure that justice and the wrongs of man are righted in the public square so that there is human harmony and Healing among social relationships and the way that men exercise their authoritative role of government and the way that the church works together with that to hold the rulers and Kings in authority accountable to the

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King of Kings right and to his law there's a there's a symmetrical harmonious relationship with that and the proclamation of the gospel of grace in the world that the church is responsible for and again,

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I just don't see the reason for driving this artificial wedge between grace and The Kings needing to obey

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Christ. Yeah Well, well what if they're not believers, is that what you're saying that they still have to honor the

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Sun yes Yes, because we're not to Kingdom. They must honor the Sun. Does that mean that they'll have faith in him?

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Religious saving faith that results in you know them taking refuge in him and then being saved of their sins

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Well, the call is encompassing of that but not necessarily exactly, but here's the question.

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Is that bad news? Is it bad news that God not only wants men to have faith but he also wants there to be justice in the earth and there's gonna be

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Unbelieving judges that need to have their feet put to the fire by God's people to point them to the reality that there will be a judgment

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For them and the way that they exercise their office again. I don't see the reason for the the dichotomy it strikes me as artificial

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Yeah, just because it is Sorry, and by the way,

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I meant to mention Like I said, I've not met own I've not met Scott We love the g3 dudes like Josh's fantastic Virgil is one of my guys.

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I talked to Virgil every once in once in now and again and He's a good guy.

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We love g3. We were grateful to be a part of this And I will say I so James is the only post -millennials on the stage.

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I believe everyone except for I forget the other guy's name That's a mill. I think everyone else's

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His name escapes me yes as soon as I see him This again, that's why James is answering a lot of the questions in the in this discussion because he's the lone representative of What everyone's critiquing basically, so anyways, let me continue

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That this would have been a very different conversation in 2019 and if so, why and Which direction has it moved?

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because I remember when grace reopened and John MacArthur preached that sermon.

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I'm sitting here going hot dog. Listen to that because I've gone We aren't moving the other direction.

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We're moving much toward much more toward a direction that says to the state Christ is

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Lord and he he you there are there are limits here. And by the way, you've already gotten me in trouble.

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Thank you very much Because you started off your your talk Identifying me as a

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Christian nationalist, which I've never identified myself as if Christian national if as I as I said in my dialogue with Doug Wilson if Christian nationalist means blessed as a nation whose

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God is Yahweh and Sin is a reproach to any people. I think we'd all probably fall into that category but obviously much more is being said now than that type of a simplistic type of a situation and so Yeah, you you you got me.

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You got me in trouble with that one. So I it's not terminology. I use myself so unless you're gonna say all post -millennialists are

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Christian nationalists That that causes a problem so Again, this that's why

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I played Owens clip earlier. James is like I've never said that about myself. I don't claim that title

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Why would you say that I'm in that camp, you know, and it's not something I hold to I mean, he's gonna give an explanation here, you know, but it's a big deal.

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And again, I don't know Oh, and I don't want I'm not trying to attack him personally, but you know, we strive to be clear about what we say and and Know our facts, right?

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And so we should just as a brother. I'm saying hey, man, you probably shouldn't be saying that about someone

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And and again the question comes up then like why why is he doing this and I'm gonna get to that I promise it's coming up.

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I I think I I think I know why I don't I'd speculation But I think I know why did you want to say anything that or keep going?

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No, you can go So I just real quickly. I want to hear our own own response into James Sorry What I was what

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I was trying to get at in all seriousness Genuine apologies for the error what I was trying to get at was that there are people who track with you

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Who would claim the label? Yes a nationalist Yeah, they are post -millennialist as you are and Yet their approach to the issue would be based on the gospel and what

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I was thinking there Was more like how a Doug Wilson has framed things in his recent book mirror.

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I think is it mere Christendom? Yes Yeah, and so I attributed that to you directly what

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I meant what I was trying to get at was there's a stream here That would affirm some form

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I was I wasn't offended I it's just not terminology that I use and I've done two sweater vest dialogues with Doug one on the wolf book and one on mere

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Christendom and if anybody's listened to those my concerns about sacralism the breaking down of the distinctions between family church state the

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Sphere sovereignty has been consistent in all of that. I've tried to be very very straightforward in that but at the same time,

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I think there's I Tried to explain that the why we did what we did with masks vaccines

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The seals why all of that stuff has a foundational basis

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And I think in all of this we're all seeing that what we what we were and we're all old enough

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Well, okay. Sorry Jeff most of we'll just I'll stop right there because that made the point I was trying to get to there

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So, yeah, I Lost my train lot. Sorry But the Owens response is just kind of whoa, you know, sorry

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I the point is that people are are kind of following you and it's like, okay, there's there's a difference there between You know people that might agree with James and call themselves

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Christian nationalists and James calling himself There's definitely a tremendous tremendous difference in those two things there.

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Yeah, and James would obviously reject the foundation That wolf is essentially arguing from with the tomism and we are all of those things

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I mean as would Doug as far as I know because they're both presuppositions they start with the prick the principium being the word revelation of God as that should inform our ethical structure and The laws that govern our nation.

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I mean both of them would be On -that -side -of -things contra to yeah to wolf.

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Yeah, and like James said if you guys haven't checked out They did two sweater vest dialogues on this

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Jameson in and Doug and one of them was on Stephen Wolfe's book They're both really really helpful

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And and Doug I believe would claim some version some flavor of Christian nationalism

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But it's different than Stephen Wolfe's he's been very critical about some of Stephen Wolfe's positions

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And so again, just try just lumping everyone into one One category is and it almost sounds and I mean in a sense like well,

34:10

I mean Doug Wilson voiced this and and and people are gravitating towards that and it's like well

34:17

People will gravitate towards a lot of what a lot of what Doug says Yeah, like like it or not what they're doing in Moscow is highly compelling sure

34:26

It just has except the Kevin DeYoung, right? Well, yes Exactly.

34:32

It it has I mean, but there's a reason for the compelling nature of it There's a worldview that goes underneath what they're doing

34:40

Just like there's a worldview going underneath what we're about and what we're trying to establish.

34:45

Also, I Mean, there's no getting away from that You know, you might perceive it to be worldly in a sense

34:53

Yeah, right like trying to advance the kingdom by the sword and too much involvement in the political realm yeah, and those kinds of things but You know, it is what it is like it's it's it's the system that we ascribe to and again,

35:06

I think trying to to pit us into a corner of saying You know you either fall into this bucket of gospel proclamation to the world post -millennialist or Civic public engagement

35:22

Postmillennialism calling for God's moral law to be the standard of society and it's like once again

35:28

Like I have my feet in both of those things. Yeah firmly planted. Right? Those are foundational things.

35:34

Yeah Yes. Okay, so we'll fast forward here a little bit Um, so this is Josh Bice's kind of response to this whole thing.

35:42

And when I heard this I was like, okay There there it is. I think this is why own

35:47

Seems so allergic to the term Christian nationalists, which again I'm not saying that's me.

35:54

But I I think this is gonna get to the point. So here was Josh at ten and a half minutes What would you like to say at this moment you you didn't present today you have many commitments this very week

36:08

But what what have you seen as the course of the conversation has gone on with Christian nationalism at the center?

36:14

What have you seen that you want to comment on today that Would help the church

36:21

Think well today Yeah, thank you. Oh, and I think a few things should be obvious to us.

36:28

Obviously if we look back at Recent political landscape we see what's been happening in in our culture.

36:36

We look at January 6th, then we see the news media Immediately using language like what if you go back and search on Google and you start just just reading the headlines

36:49

What you see is a common phrase it is white Christian Nationalism now the problem with this

36:57

I think is that you know, we can have all sorts of conversations about Eschatology and we can have all sorts of conversations about where we might differ on that But what

37:07

I see is a danger to the church would be the idea of saying, okay Well, we as Christians need to embrace this title this label

37:16

That's been bombed by the leftists and I could see it in many ways as a trap

37:22

So that as you know a great swelling, you know group of Christians embrace this label

37:28

Then what ends up happening is the next tragedy that you have like a January 6 or whatever

37:34

It might be in the political sphere is they immediately start pointing at the

37:40

Christian nationalists And so I just don't like the label So that's one problem.

37:45

I think okay, so I understand that right? I don't disagree. Yeah, I understand the trepidation

37:52

Yeah because again, I mean this has been talked about elsewhere to with you know properly distinguishing like there is a

38:02

Is a reality of those who hold the political left position where they emphasize globalism and Then the reaction to that has been from the conservative side what the nationalism?

38:14

Yeah and so I Understand not wanting to adopt the label.

38:21

I think of course if you're a biblical Christian in public Making public statements.

38:27

You're gonna be called a Christian nationalist and I think he knows that I mean We all do that's just how we're gonna try to be caricatured and dismissed.

38:36

Yeah so whether or not you Address it or not. I'm curious to hear from your perspective like you're saying

38:45

Is it because that they've heard this in the media? Yeah, they don't want to be lumped in under that Is that where you were gonna go with your yeah.

38:53

Yeah, and so I'm gonna play one clip I it's it's crazy because this clip this is from like five days ago That I think illustrates their concerns and their fears so this was

39:05

Excuse me. James Carville was on Bill Maher the Guinness like five days ago, and they're gonna be there he brings up Mike Johnson, and I think y 'all are familiar like yeah familiar with how we feel about Mike Johnson's this isn't

39:19

Necessarily a defense for Mike Johnson, which but I mean he's a he's a Christian brother like he's he's solid in a lot of ways we have issues and how he's handled abortion, but This is this is important here, this is at the five -minute mark here

39:32

Mike Johnson he's from your home state of Louisiana the speaker of the house I read today

39:37

He wrote a forward in a book that conscribes to conspiracy theories and homophobic insults

39:43

I thought Mike Mike Johnson wrote the forward to the Bible Larry's Do you think

39:50

Mike Johnson can hold his party together now that he has taken the mantle? First of all

39:55

I don't think he can hold his party together second Oh, you're exactly right Mike Johnson, and what he believes is one of the greatest threats we have today to the

40:05

United States Okay, which again

40:20

Christians who believe the Bible right on all of the hot -button Issues today right exactly right and so and there's more to that clip.

40:28

I'm not gonna get into I actually just John Cooper just released a Cooper stuff. We went talked about this for a whole show, and it was really really good

40:36

Because Carville just goes on to completely misrepresent Mike Johnson I would argue probably intentionally, but the point is when

40:43

I saw that I was like there it is Okay, so I think the reason again.

40:49

This is speculation, but it seems like they're trying to distance themselves from any Even being loosely connected to Christian nationalism because you have people on the left saying that's more dangerous than al -qaeda

41:00

Right and so all of a sudden like you're a terrorist if you hold to that position And so I think that that's maybe why he's trying to separate and be like I'm not even in the same camp as these people now my my

41:15

Encouragement to Owen is to say Fair enough, but please do it in a way that you're not then

41:23

Lumping people into that that shouldn't be lumped into that as well So that so that was

41:28

I wanted to make sure I laid that I I think that's really important to this whole entire conversation So before I get any more into the into the the panel discussion though.

41:36

This was We were talking about this earlier Andrew Sandlin had had done an episode of the

41:44

Ezra Institute podcast and Man, I love that man so much He said look he's his argument was there's basically three perspectives

41:55

Christian nationalism, which we're talking about here Christian pietism, which He would argue and I would argue is yeah, everyone else on the panel

42:03

Yeah, he lumped in g3. Yeah, and then well not so much and I think even then we should be careful because Josh I Mean Josh and them have done a fantastic job of you know, addressing the magistrates this last year

42:18

Yeah, of course, and if you ask Andrew, he would probably say well, it's not derogatory. It just kind of describes

42:25

You know their their perspective for lack of a better term So and then the third position which

42:30

I would wholeheartedly ascribe to is if you want to call it something it was Christian culture That's what

42:36

Andrew's been promoting for years and it's perfect It's like we're just we're just trying to promote

42:42

Christian culture And so not that to me accurately describes

42:50

What we're trying to do from bottom up, right? You build the culture from the bottom up to the top

42:55

Christian nationalism is more like top -down and we've been speaking out against that for years

43:01

And he actually goes on Andrew went on to make a point that The Christian culture view has a much smaller civil government than the

43:09

Christian nationalism view does which I agreed with But you want to say something?

43:15

No, I think that's it's a good point to remember about all of this because you have ideally speaking self -governing

43:23

Christians who are creating that culture from the floor with Themselves their families and then of course the institutions that they build that flow forth into the culture and Create.

43:36

Mm -hmm. It creates a certain kind of culture and that's just that's a gospel proclamation

43:42

But it's also gospel good answers. You're talking to a young sir. It's gospel proclamation

43:48

But it's also gospel living that makes a certain kind of public square

43:54

Which I've just never understood about you know the men that hold the to their particular system obviously when you have a

44:02

Christian people or people that are self -consciously Christian in their ethics and their public morality do we think that there's not going to be an effect in the public square from those types of people living and I don't believe that their system allows for that to be a successful endeavor

44:19

Hmm, I believe that they think that's how it ought to be just later Yeah, right after yes the final coming.

44:29

Yes of Christ. They their their System disallows them from believing it to even be a possibility at this point in time.

44:38

Yep, exactly, right okay, so I'm gonna move a little bit further here into this discussion

44:47

So this question pops up and again, even in the question I'm gonna stop it right off the question because even the question itself

44:54

I believe has some misgivings in it, so So here's a question at Owen asked the group and then we'll

45:02

I want to talk about a couple of responses man, who is Now calling himself a

45:10

Christian nationalist he has come into your church or the church you serve or a member at and he

45:17

Is upset that you or your pastor your elders are not doing enough

45:25

All you're doing is preaching the gospel preaching the gospel. He says to you is It's just not gonna cut it anymore.

45:32

That's not enough Not going to any one person popcorn grab bag before us.

45:39

How do you respond to this? Young man, what do you say to him? So, I mean even in that question anyone

45:49

Anyone that I know that would be like that would say that the gospel is more than just Salvation by grace and it's like a reformed soteriology

46:01

Yeah By grace through faith a gospel that we all obviously affirm right a

46:08

Reformational gospel that says we're saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.

46:15

That is always the Soteriological aspect of the gospel that we proclaim. But once again bringing the gospel down into how a person is reconciled with God is

46:27

Whether you like the term or not Truncated. Mm -hmm. It's a truncated understanding of what the good news is

46:36

The good news is not just about forgiveness It's also about what

46:42

God intends to do in the earth in setting things right in the public square Which is something that he uses his people who are justified by faith to do in the good works that they walk in Yeah, I mean we're in Christmas season.

46:57

The gospel goes as far as the curse, right? It's fun We sing that at Christmas every year and Sandlin's made the point that says which is everywhere

47:05

Yeah, the curse is found everywhere that includes in the halls of our legislators exactly right and you know

47:12

Christ didn't come Just to bring His people to heaven with him, right?

47:19

He came to vanquish the works of Satan And so like that again includes the civil realm like we're to go into the world with all this authority and preach the gospel so like I love

47:31

I've learned this a lot from from from Andrew, but All these things that we're doing Like when we go to the civil magistrate when we're calling them to repentance and we're we're calling them to kiss the

47:41

Sun Like it involves the gospel. It's part of the gospel, right? Like Or that is part of the gospel

47:48

I should say I said it reversed but like the gospel call is in there and it and again this this assumption that they must be

47:56

Separated and that they're two separate things Like I just don't know anybody that's doing that that feels that way, right

48:06

Yeah, and the gospel comes with a call to obey Jesus as well, right, you know, this is a call of repentance, but it's a call for those in authority to Kiss the

48:20

Sun going back to Psalm 2 so that's both and it's not either or so I think we should stop pitting it as such exactly right exactly, right.

48:33

So, let's see. I think Okay, so let me

48:38

I wanted to get specifically and we'll end on this point Here because we're already down to 12 minutes so play this end at this point and then hopefully

48:52

We'll have one more show this year. I think maybe we can Maybe we'll get some more of this discussion next week, which by the way,

48:58

I forgot the mentions at the beginning Two days ago Was I believe our 12 -year anniversary for GeoRadio?

49:07

So I was trying to do the math. I think it's 12 years It's either 11 or 12, but I think it's 12 the 5th of December So happy anniversary apology radio, it's kind of a right over a decade

49:21

Okay, so this is what I'm gonna get here is this is James Coates response

49:28

Again I've never met James. I have a lot of respect for that guy, man He was amazing during kovat and said strong if you don't know who he is.

49:36

He's the Canadian pastor. They got put in jail And a lot of respect for that man.

49:42

I was very we were talking about this. We were both very Disappointed in some of his responses.

49:50

It just seemed like his the way he Acted during kovat which was courageous doesn't match

50:00

He's promoting in this discussion. So anyways, I mean, I don't want to talk about him.

50:05

He's he's an amazing dude, but yeah He's a hero. Yeah, he is a hero, but we were just kind of surprised. We're like, oh, it doesn't really seem to match

50:11

Anyways, this was James's response to that question about the young man so I think if we read it in the question a little bit we would assume the young man is

50:24

Coming under the influence of post -millennials and would we not is that fair? So again Just that immediate assumption.

50:31

Oh, so he must be post mill which probably yes But I mean sure yeah, yeah,

50:39

I mean this Here's the thing and I think James said this recently too on Dividing line.

50:46

I think it was yesterday like like it or not theological positions Produce a certain outcome, right?

50:54

there's only one real eschatological system that causes us to ask questions like Am I building and laying foundations for my great -grandchildren?

51:05

Right, okay, it's it's not Certain eschatological positions that are even asking those questions

51:11

Right one of them is right And so if you want to say that there's a necessary tie between this and just assume that yes

51:19

But ask for what reason? For what reason can we say? well the men especially the young men they're being

51:27

Won over by this in many ways. They're starting to ask those questions How can I put myself in a position where I can be a blessing not only to my children?

51:36

Yeah, but generations from now and build for the future yeah, exactly and I think

51:42

I think what kind of Gets under my skin about the question and then even that just immediate response there is it

51:50

I feel like the question Was kind of presented in a way as if like this isn't a good thing

51:58

Right, like you have it's almost like there's a troublesome Young man that comes in and he's telling you you're not doing enough, right?

52:05

You know, so it's it's like there's like undertones were like we're not for this sort of behavior and then

52:12

Response James coach responses. He'd be like, oh he must be post -millennial then and it's just kind of like guys

52:18

It's like why is it that? Why is it that this is a bad thing? That's my question. What what's what's everyone's beef?

52:25

Yeah, and of course, there's something to be said for honoring authority Yeah, and raising this in the right way because you do get zealous Young men who act like punks sometimes sure, but their zeal isn't something to stamp out.

52:39

It's something to redirect, right? and it's something to listen to because the gospel is more than just how a person gets

52:50

Their sins forgiven and taken to heaven one day. Yeah, and so If that's you know something there's a reason people are wanting more.

52:59

Yeah Because there's genuine issues facing us in our day that need to be addressed.

53:05

That reminds me what I was gonna say earlier is you know, we got this from from Joe boo, but he always says that people say that he has an over realized eschatology and He's like my response is no you have an under realized soteriology and I would agree with that And again, it's because of this

53:26

It's because of this desire to separate the two That you know, it's like no we think that actually the gospel does go as far as the curse is found

53:37

And that you know Christ or that Abraham's, you know descendants will be out and where the stars like I Guess if you want to say that's over realized, you know

53:48

I would I think that like Joe said like you just you think that not that many people are gonna be saved

53:54

But let me finish James's response here See the reason why

54:03

I say that is This can kind of put to the test your grasp of the

54:08

Great Commission, which Jeff addressed today Because if if a church is faithful in making disciples baptizing and teaching and That's considered dead weight as it relates to Christian nationalism or even even just a post -millennial realized eschatology

54:33

Then something's amiss Because if if every church on this green earth was faithful in the preaching of God's Word and making disciples baptizing teaching the whole nine yards

54:46

We would have an incredibly healthy Powerful church. The fact of the matter is that's not there that the issue with an imposter there.

54:55

Yeah, great I agree. Yeah. Yeah Absolutely, but this the fact that to say that well, they're only doing those things in this dead weight

55:02

I'm like who's saying that and what we've been saying all along is if you're doing those things faithfully if you're teaching

55:10

What? Commanded yeah, and that's the point like If you're being faithful to the

55:18

Great Commission, then you're teaching all that Christ has commanded not just some of it and I agree if The churches if more churches were like that and they were healthy and they were being faithful Absolutely, then guess what that creates?

55:32

Yeah a Christian culture. Yeah, and you're Taking scripture and you're applying it to the cultural issues of the day.

55:41

Mm -hmm in such a way as to authoritatively call those who are espousing these false

55:49

Worldly ideologies to turn away from them and submit to the Lordship of Christ That's what he's talking about.

55:58

Yeah, he's talking about preaching the whole counsel of God's Word and applying it to every area of life

56:04

Oh, wait a minute That's our position right, but that's that's the position that says that Everyone's accountable to God's law word.

56:15

Yeah, and they all have to obey him So bingo bingo bongo, let me finish his response here

56:23

Mimic church is a lack of the preaching of the Word of God And that's where I think this whole thing just moves the focus away from where it needs to be

56:30

We need to come back to a bold faithful proclamation of the Word of God when it comes to faith

56:36

I mean as even as you think about our church that battle came to us because we were being faithful It sought us out and when it came we stood we stood firm if he's in six

56:47

So I just think the question is wrongheaded that there are there are behind that question is a whole bunch of misunderstanding about the role of a pastor about the the

56:58

Great Commission the mission of the church and So I think that there's a whole lot that needs to be addressed in that context for sure

57:07

I think Jonathan Edwards, so okay, so Um There's there's more they get into we're not gonna have time to do that today, but Because they're gonna get into they're gonna

57:23

I forget it is but I think someone's gonna start making the claim that it's not the role of the pastor to Have that public proclamation or to the magistrates.

57:31

I believe is the point they're gonna make And again, I was agreeing with a lot of what he said when you know, he did have that He did stand strong during code and when they were confronted they did have a bold proclamation

57:47

And we're like yes, and amen. Thank God for that. Yeah, but why why is it that that?

57:53

Only can occur as he says when it comes to them. Hmm. Why can't it be all the time?

58:00

Why can't we? Go to the gates of hell as the church. Yeah and kick the gates of hell down.

58:07

That's one thing Yeah, one thing another thing is what system? What theological system makes sense of that kind of resistance?

58:16

right and secondly as you said there's a difference between just waiting for the fight to come to you, which

58:25

I'm not saying they were looking for a fight Obviously none of us were right but the state especially there where he lives told them right, you know

58:33

Take your pick Christ or Caesar and he chose Christ and praise God for that man in his faithful stand

58:40

You know and for the victory that he was vindicated in it'll also but to your point

58:50

Our Conservatism in general in the West has us in a reactive posture towards the world

59:00

Whereas Christ commands us to be the initiators and to take the fight to the darkness as well and not to say that We do that, right every time but for those young zealous men that are coming to your office and saying hey

59:15

Let's take the fight to the kingdom of darkness. Mm -hmm. Be careful not to turn them away so quickly Yeah, I mean,

59:21

I love how you just worded that a second ago. It's the the gospel is should be offensive not defensive

59:29

Right the the gate. I asked this question a lot. It's like what a gates do They protect

59:36

They're not They're not offensive. They're defensive, right? So the the church or the gates of hell will not be able to stand against the church

59:45

Well, they sure can if the church is staying behind their own doors their own gates and they're not going out

59:52

They're not going forth and that's the point of the Great Commission of going out into the world

59:58

And again that includes the magistrates that includes everyone. It's not just It's not just standing on a street corner, you know on Mill Avenue or something like that It's it's everyone everywhere everything

01:00:14

And you know as it says in Colossians Christ came to reconcile all things to himself all things

01:00:19

Yeah, and so listen all the arts politics architecture You name it

01:00:27

Amen dude, well Hopefully we'll see about next week. Maybe we can get into some more of this

01:00:32

There's a lot of really good stuff in this conversation, but yeah, I'm glad to be able to finally Get to it.

01:00:38

Like I said, we've been wanting to for a while. So As we're we're nearing the end of the year here

01:00:45

Mr. Director of communications for an abortion now What's going on with an abortion now and abortion now is shaping up to have our busiest year on record that's for sure

01:00:56

So we're involved in a number of states legislative battles Going on there.

01:01:02

I think What goes really underneath all of that that isn't focused on enough is what we're talking about the need for an offensively minded church

01:01:12

We need the church to know what's going on where the fight is and what to do What to put the screws to on the ground in their state so that we can actually end abortion

01:01:22

Because it's not gonna end without the church and it's not gonna end without Christians holding their magistrates accountable.

01:01:29

Mm -hmm, so That's what we're strategizing about how to best handle is the commitments in all these different places and where to expend resources and and how to Allocate the troops so that way we can have the most productive and fruitful year

01:01:46

Yeah ever and make progress in this fight because we're we're coming to win

01:01:51

All right, we're not we're not we're not coming to just do complete activity

01:01:59

You know what? We're not coming to just go through the motions with something. We're actually coming to end abortion

01:02:05

Something that the pro -life movement for a very very long time You know hasn't done so yeah 18 states

01:02:15

We're looking at that's a lot and we have we keep saying this and it's the honest truth We have a very small team.

01:02:22

So yeah, we're we literally had a meeting this week. We're like, okay we're gonna divide this up and you take ownership of this state in this state and I'll take ownership of this state and you know, we're just trying to figure out the best way to You know attack all these different states and when

01:02:41

I say attack I mean in a good way but Attack the gates of hell really and like we were saying and trying to figure out how to do that in a way where we're faithful Like you said, so thank you everyone.

01:02:53

That's been supporting in abortion now. I mean, obviously it's the end of the year This is our big fundraising season

01:03:00

The majority of the funds we raise For the entire year comes in this last month and so we've been putting a lot of stuff up Please if you're able to help help help save some babies help in abortion in 24, we'd greatly appreciate that and Yeah, anything else you'd like to add?

01:03:23

No, that's it. We need you. We need you. Well Merry Christmas everyone.

01:03:29

Like I said, we're back next week. Interesting. It's like at Oregon You know when you do royalty -free, you just don't know what you're gonna get

01:03:38

Unfortunately, like last week I did, you know played some skillet songs with John Cooper from skillet and what happened

01:03:45

YouTube struck the copyright stuff. I'll see that's not cool because you actually had his approval and I can't even get it on the show

01:03:52

I can't even get his approval has to come from the label. So it's been well, man He had to connect me with management and managers got talked about it says

01:04:00

I still haven't got it approved It's like goodness gracious. So Yeah, so we just we gotta go royalty -free which is kind of Liam sometimes

01:04:08

All that to say Merry Christmas, everyone. We'll see you next week, and we will have an after show

01:04:14

So if you are an all -access member Didn't want to forget to thank you Thank you

01:04:20

And we will be just right after this will be hopping on All access for the after show you guys can ask us some more questions.

01:04:27

We can continue this conversation. So Next week. Hopefully pastor Jeff will be back.