June 7, 2017 Show with Mike Abendroth on “Things that Go Bump in the Church: Explaining the Bible’s Most Misunderstood Teachings”

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, Lake City, Florida, 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 Radio, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this seventh day of June 2017, and I am so delighted to have back on the program someone who has definitely proven himself to be an excellent guest on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and that's

Mike Abendroth. He's pastor of Bethlehem Bible Church of West Boylston, Massachusetts, adjunct professor at the

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is author of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Preachers, and the

Sovereignty and Supremacy of King Jesus, Bowing to the Gracious Despot, and he's co -host of the

No Compromise radio program. Today we are going to address his book, Things That Go Bump in the

Church, Explaining the Bible's Most Misunderstood Teachings, which he co -authored with Clint Archer and Byron Yawn.

Not a very good name for a pastor, that's for sure. Byron Yawn, but we'll hopefully we'll have

Byron on the program at some point. But it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very,

I was just about to say for the very first time, I can't believe I said that. It's a delight to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Well guys, I'm glad to be back, and I think I did such a good job the first time, that's why you canceled me the last time.

I didn't cancel you, I think I double booked you or something like that. Well, that's okay. You can take the

PhDs over the D -mins any day. There's a pastor here in New England, and his name is

Wes Pastor, and so I guess they call him Pastor Pastor, or Reverend Pastor. Yes, I've heard of Wes Pastor.

I've never had him on the show, but I have heard of Wes Pastor. Yeah, I want to say it's a New England, some kind of adjunct teaching school for the

Southern Baptists in Vermont. Okay, and the book that we are going to address, published by Harvest House, is something that I'm sure is going to help our listeners today with some misunderstood issues in the scriptures.

And by the way, also in studio with me is my co -host, the Reverend Buzz Taylor. Hello. Hey Buzz, good to hear from you.

If he remembers to turn my mic up, I am here. No, now he's here, unfortunately. Well, as we usually do when we have pastors on the show, even though they've given this description before, since we have new listeners it seems every week, tell our listeners about the

Bethlehem Bible Church of West Boylston, Massachusetts. Sure. Well, we're just in the center of Massachusetts, just north of a city called

Worcester. It looks like Worchester, and that's how the GPS pronounces it. And we have been here,

I've been here for 20 years, and we just try to teach the Bible verse by verse.

We confess the 1689 Latin Baptist Confession as a statement of faith, and it has been a joy to pastor these folks as I've got to see them learn and grow over 20 years.

I know some pastors go to a place and stay for a few years and then leave for the right reasons, but it's just been really a joy to watch these people learn and grow and watch the

Word of God change them. I've often said to people, how do you change a church? I mean, it's impossible, but the

Word of God is very powerful. And so when I got to the church, it basically was Arminian, Egalitarian, Pragmatic, Seeker Sensitive, and the list goes on.

And now, just because I've taught the Bible verse by verse, the Spirit of God is pleased to work, and so I would say the church is

Calvinistic, Complementarian, Cessationist, etc. And I think of Luther.

I just got back from Wittenberg, Germany, and Luther said, you know, how did you start the Reformation? He said,

I just preached the Word of God, and then I went and had a Wittenberg beer with Philip and Amsdorff, and I went to bed.

I think we need to correct something here. He didn't actually see Luther there. I know, but I saw about 14 statues.

I went to Germany, and Luther said... No, I was there for a

Reformation 500 conference with the European Bible Training Center, and James White and I were both staying at the

La Correa. That's the building where the Wittenberg University used to be, and so, of course, that is where Luther was, and he taught theology there and began to teach the

Psalms and Galatians and Romans, and so it was neat to spend a week there with a lot of like -minded friends from Europe, and James White and Steve Lawson, those kind of guys, too.

Great, yeah, and you interviewed them simultaneously, I understand. Yeah, this is a good backdrop story.

So James was going to debate someone, a Roman Catholic, and I guess the Catholic backed out, and that was probably a wise move by the

Catholic, but he backed out, so then... He somehow did some background check on James, and he said,

I'm supposed to be debating who?! He backed right out of that. And so the leader of the

Reformation 500 conference asked me if I could just kind of talk to James, and maybe we'll pull in Steve Lawson as well.

Well, James got there, and we talked privately. He said, listen, here's what we do. I, James, will be the

Roman Catholic, and you, Mike, can be the evangelical. And I looked at James, and I said,

I'm dumb, but I'm not stupid. There's no possible way I'm going to do this. I'm a pastor and a preacher, and you're the apologist, you know, debate guy.

So he submitted to the leadership, and we had a good interview with Steve and with James about gospel ministry, the importance of sola fide, and the impact that God could have through a frail, you know, sinful man named

Martin Luther. Just amazing, the powerful Word of God as Hebrews 4 .12 talks about.

Yeah, you know, I have to ask James if he has actually ever done that, where he has played the devil's advocate, as they say.

In this case, it would be quite appropriate if he was defending the Roman Catholic Church. I saw,

I don't know if you have, but I've seen a debate that was, it was really a mock debate that took place years ago between R .C.

Sproul and his mentor, the late John Gerstner. And John Gerstner played the devil's advocate and was an atheist.

And R .C. Sproul was trying to defend the existence of God, and Gerstner was obviously playing the role of someone defending the position that God does not exist.

So I think that was their theme, but it was quite interesting to see that. Well, when you talk about John Gerstner, it reminds me, he was in San Diego for a

Ligonier conference, I believe in 1992, and that was kind of really what turned my mind to think in a

Calvinistic fashion, in the Doctrines of Grace fashion. And he had a message entitled, How to Escape Hell, and then he said,

I have to amend this message, it's How to Possibly Escape Hell. If anyone ever tells you that you can escape hell for sure, he's a false prophet.

So anyway, I was thankful for the ministry of John Gerstner. Yes, he was one of my early heroes in my new life after rebirth, and I had seen him preach a number of times, once at the

Philadelphia Conference on Reform Theology, once at the Westchester Orthodox Presbyterian Church, and at least one other place,

I believe. And I can remember seeing James Montgomery Boyce turn white as a ghost, sitting behind Dr.

Gerstner at 10th Presbyterian, as Dr. Gerstner said from the pulpit,

You cannot be an Arminian Christian. Actually believe what you say you believe and be saved.

Let me repeat that. You cannot be an Arminian Christian. Actually believe what you say you believe and be saved.

And I think that was quite horrifying for Dr. Boyce to hear, even if he may have agreed with him,

I don't know, but the fact that the Bible study hour was such a popular program, spanning denominational lines, that I think he was a bit taken aback by that public statement.

Well, the first time I went to the PCRT was in, I think, 1989, and I don't think it was that year, but it was another year where Boyce, and of course he's got the gravelly voice too, he preached a message and the message was entitled,

Jesus was a Calvinist. And of course he explained what he meant, but I was sitting there looking around thinking,

I brought a bunch of people from the church that I pastor here. This is going to be a long weekend as I'm trying to have these

Arminians think properly. Well, we want to make sure that we get as many of the biblical issues or biblical teachings that are misunderstood covered in your book, things that go bump in the church.

Just briefly, how did you collaborate with Clint Archer and Byron Yohn on this project?

Yeah, thanks for the question. What I do in my life is, while I might not be talented,

I know how to recognize talent. Those, both of those men are excellent writers.

I think Clint actually taught an English class or was an English teacher when he was in the secular world.

And so we'd all been to Master's Seminary and we were, we had the same book agent at the time, and we thought, you know what,

Harvest House is known for other things, but they maybe need a little platform with some

Reformed thinking, and so let's try to approach it this way. I remember the old

Amityville Horror movie in the probably early 70s, and so we thought, what if we put kind of like a haunted looking church on the cover, and instead of things that go bump in the night, things that go bump in the church, these kind of hard things that, you know, some of us, we've been

Christians for a long time, we don't even bat an eye at these doctrines because we just believe them and take them by faith, they're in the scriptures.

By the way, did you know that I'm from Amityville? I did not know that. I was born and raised in Amityville and did not move out of Amityville until I came here to Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

Did flies have anything to do with it? And the movie actually came out probably closer to either the late 70s or the 80s because the actual murders occurred in the early 70s, where Ronald DeFeo murdered his entire family, including one of my friends who was my classmate in Catholic school, and his original story after being arrested was that demons told him to do this.

He later changed his story, but that's where the horror story came into play when the family that moved in after that murder left and wrote the book, and there is some question as to whether it was just to make money because they could not even afford the mortgage on the home, or if it was actually supernatural things going on.

And you know, I used to scoff at the story and immediately dismiss it, but I am wondering now at this point in my life whether there could have been supernatural things not connected to the house, but to George Lutz, the man who was the husband and father and co -author of the book, because he was involved in the occult.

He dabbled in it, he was like a high priest in the Church of Satan or anything, but he dabbled in the occult and was reading occultic books and so on, books about spells and seances, so you never know.

I mean, I don't know what goes on in the demonic realm. Sometimes we reform people to easily dismiss it.

But anyway, I went a little bit too far with that segue, sorry about that. Oh no, I think that's interesting because sometimes the charismatics will say that demons are behind every human vice, and you've got the demon of drunkenness, etc.

But as we well know, Satan is alive and well, and demons are real, and there's an invisible warfare that's going on.

And so I can't tell when I see something what it is, but it has that possibility, because I think demons are still around.

Well, that helps to understand a question I've always had too. This is the Reverend Buzz Taylor, by the way.

He keeps saying that because everybody says I sound like him, and he doesn't want to take credit for what I say. The blame is a better way of putting it.

But I've heard those things. I was charismatic for a while myself, and I used to hear about the demons of this and that, and I used to wonder, what did the demon of smoking do before we came over here and discovered smoking?

Well, I know, and I just have been in Germany and Europe for the past two months, and so their common vice is not certainly smoking.

It's every time you sit down, it's alcohol. So is there a demon of alcohol, but a different demon for drunkenness?

I mean, it's just these inconsistencies. But with the book, what we thought was

Jesus, when he said there are some hard sayings, these are hard truths, there are in fact some things in the

Bible that are difficult. And so what book could we give to a brand new Christian that they could read through and just deal with some of these issues, not from necessarily a scholastic kind of exegetical format, but more popularly written kind of radio host style with some funny anecdotes in it to give to kind of a new

Christian. So that was the idea. And I've been very thankful that the book has been used by the

Lord in different churches and some new membership classes. So I think it's not been selling very well so much that Harvest House doesn't carry it anymore, but that's beside the point.

Yeah, well, I'm going to read some commendations from some folks for the book.

The aforementioned James White, a mutual friend of Mike Ebenroth's and mine. Things that go bump in the church is a wonderfully readable, communicative, and comforting nightlight for the inquiring

Christian seeking guidance through the tough questions that are so often kept in the shadows of the fellowship.

That's an excellent commendation there. Stephen J. Nichols, who's also been on this program. This is certainly outdated because now he is the president of Reformation Bible College in Sanford, Florida.

This is a professor of Christianity and Culture at Lancaster Bible College, so this is a little bit outdated there.

But anyway, Stephen J. Nichols says, imagine always eating chocolate cake and never partaking of vegetables.

That's James White! Have we simply become too addicted to the comfortable, too addicted to being affirmed, too soft?

Even nature knows the dark night of the soul precedes the light of the dawn. Read this book and you'll see how these hard doctrines, like our daily dose of broccoli, can be so good for us.

By the way, I just want to give a disclaimer here. James White is quite a health enthusiast, but the food aspect of his

Olympic -level training and cycling and so on does not match his diet at all.

Well, when James and I were in Wittenberg together, I told him where I found some protein powder, so he was quick to text me to make sure he figured that out.

I guess there are exceptions. And my friend Jeffrey C. Waddington, who is with the

Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals and he's also an Orthodox Presbyterian pastor not far from where I'm sitting, about an hour away

I believe, who is coming back to the program, God willing, in the near future.

In fact, this may interest you. I don't even know if you know this about Jeffrey, Mike, but Jeffrey is one of the very few

Orthodox Presbyterian pastors who does not accept Catholic baptism. Well, then he used to be a friend, now he's a better friend.

Well, he is coming on to discuss that at some point.

But Jeffrey C. Waddington says, This book proves that sound teaching can be engagingly written and served with a dash of humor and punch.

Things that go bump in the church is hard -hitting yet pastoral in the best sense of that word.

The authors are experienced pastors and students of God's Word and the history of theology. You'll find yourself caught up with the flow of the text, unawares, as various controversial yet important doctrines are discussed.

I recommend this book to Christians everywhere who desire to become mature disciples of Christ.

Let me also just read the background, a brief bio, of Clint Archer and Byron Yawn.

Clint Archer is pastor of Hillcrest Baptist Church, South Africa, and he holds an

MDiv, a THM, and a DMin degrees from the Master's Seminary.

When he's not preaching or writing, he likes to date his wife, wrestle with his three kids, and ride his motorcycle.

Byron Yawn is the senior pastor of Community Bible Church in Nashville, Tennessee and a much -sought speaker.

Byron has an MDiv and DMin degrees from the

Master's Seminary as well, and is married to Robin and has three children, but I guess he doesn't like wrestling with them because that is absent from his bio.

Well, since he's from Nashville, that would not be wrestling, that would be raffling. First of all,

I want to give my email address out for our listeners. It's chrisarnson at gmail .com.

If any of you would like to join us on the air with a question of your own for Mike Ebendroth, that's chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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

USA, and you may remain anonymous if you're asking about a personal and private matter.

Well, what is sin, and if you could define it, and it's interesting that you give it the title in your book, the hairy wart on the witch's nose.

Well, it's interesting to me, especially in the day and age we have now with some big shots in evangelicalism.

They sound like Kierkegaard, and they would say things like, sin is making good things ultimate, and of course that's an aspect of sin, when we take a good thing and make it ultimate, but that's not a good biblical definition.

When you think of sin, if you don't think at the very root, unbelief, which leads to lawlessness and then manifests itself in idolatry or immorality or licentiousness, you wouldn't be thinking properly, and so that is really the key.

The root of sin has to do with not taking God at His word, not believing

Him, and so when I wanted to write about sin, I thought, you know what, we believe in sin as Christians, but we really have to have a good background and plumb line, because otherwise, if we don't recognize what sin is, then why would we ever desire a righteousness that's not our own, or why would we want to mortify the flesh and honor the

Lord? So I hated to put it early in the book, but it needed to be there, because we are realists, as I think maybe

John Gershner said, when it comes to sin, and we have this pathology of blame. We blame everybody.

I'm only human, and you know, God made me this way, and I was born this way, and that's just not the right way to think about sin.

So I wanted to just start early on, as you know, people try to blame

God. It's nothing new. So let's not do that. Let's just, you know, accept what we've done, confess it.

That's what confession means, to agree with, and start from there. So that's why I started with sin. Yes, and I can still remember vividly when

I first became a born -again believer. I was on a car ride with a

Missouri Synod Lutheran friend of mine, and I love my dear

Missouri Synod Lutheran brethren, but those that are truly regenerate would have to admit that there is rabid nominalism within that denomination, and many of the mainline denominations, and my friend at that point was a nominal

Christian, a Lutheran, but you know, lived his life like every other average non -believing individual, not to any excess or anything like that, but just, you know, your average secularist.

And when he was asking me about my new faith, he said to me, now, you don't think

I'm a sinner or something, do you? And I said, well, the fact that you don't think you're a sinner is the first reason

I think that you really are not born again, because isn't that a crucial aspect of the

Christian life is that we are aware that we are sinners and that we are in desperate, urgent need of a

Savior because there's nothing beautiful or meritorious or deserving of salvation from a holy and righteous

God? Absolutely, and when you think of Romans 7 and 8, I always think of the wide world of sports that used to be, remember on ABC on Saturdays, if you wanted to...

You know, the skier tumbling down the hill, the mountain. Yeah, and it was the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.

I didn't even hear what you said. What did you flub that? Yeah, the agony of defeat, you know, and so that's switched around with Romans 7 and 8.

You've got the agony of sin, oh wretched man that I am, but all because of the work of Christ.

Chapter 8 begins in this triumphant way, this thrill of victory. There is no condemnation, therefore, for those who are in Christ.

And so we realize when sin is that bad, our Savior's work is greater, and so no sense running from it.

I don't think we sin that grace should abound, obviously, but let's just recognize how bad we are because it will prove our

Savior greater than that sin. I don't know if you ever read the late

Jerry Bridges book, Acceptable Sins, but, or if you've ever heard of it, but he was basically saying that many

Christians are so focused on those scandalous, overtly wicked sins that even your average person who is not even a

Christian might view as aberrant behavior, and we forget those things that are more subtle in regard to how those not only in the community, in the lost world around us view it, but even as the church tends to view them with less severity, but they are still serious sins nonetheless, and that we need to examine our hearts for these things, you know, things like gossip, things like pride and arrogance, things like bigotry, covetousness, and even lust and things that are more easily gotten away with, not with God, of course, but with our authorities in the church and our brethren in Christ, things that are private sins and so on, but we as Christians sometimes are looked upon as those who are always pointing out the sins of others, like homosexuality and adultery and fornication and dirty movies and vulgarity and things like that, but we really have to be constantly examining our own hearts for those sins that may escape the attention of others, am

I right? Well, that is so true, and I was thinking about Romans chapter 1 and 2 as you were talking about that, because we understand unrighteous behavior as sinful, but sometimes we forget that self -righteousness is just as sinful or maybe even more sinful, and you can just watch

Paul set people up in chapter 1 of Romans with homosexuality and sexual immorality, and you can just sense people who are reading it saying, yes, those things are true, these people are wicked sinners, and then

Paul says in Romans 2 .1, therefore you have no excuse, oh man, every one of you who judges, and I think it's

Byron who says, Byron Young, who says, well, after reading that, the person says, yes, but I'm not gay, but the writer

Paul says, you might as well be, because you don't measure up to complete conformity to God's law, and therefore you stand condemned, so it's so easy to look at other people and see how wicked they are, yet we self -righteously stand condemned before God as well, and I think it even manifests itself in testimonies.

If you listen to a testimony with someone, and they get saved out of the medicine drug cartel, and then get baptized, we would all clap, but then if we talk to somebody and they're a pastor's kid, and they're 15, and they say,

I profess Christ now, I never was a rapist or a murderer or anything else, but I was just self -righteous, we just kind of yawn, and I think that is a sad indictment on our acceptance that unrighteousness is a bad sin, but self -righteousness, we just give a pass.

Did you bring up your co -author again? I heard yawn somewhere. But at the same time that you say that,

I have to say, I don't know if you share my concern with this, I hope you do, but there is a backlash to what you have said in the church, where there are even very prominent speakers, even some that would be within the

Reformed faith, who, I don't know if they're intending to do this, but it appears that when they're giving their public sermons and lectures and writing and so on, they very often, in my opinion, give the appearance that they're equating homosexuality and other sins of that nature as being on the same level of severity as gluttony and lusting after someone's wife but never consummating that, and coveting your neighbor's bank account, that kind of a thing.

We have to be careful, though, when we say that all sin will send us to Hell, to Christ, it's certainly true.

But isn't it true that we cannot blur the lines of distinction between sins, because there are sins that are much more heinous, and the way that the church responds to those sins must be different.

I mean, obviously, you're not going to treat a member of the church who is known to be a glutton at the church picnics, you're not going to treat that person in the same way as an unrepentant homosexual.

Well, Chris, I think we're on the exact same wavelength. We as evangelicals are very quick to somehow, because of the homosexual agenda, to just say everything's the same, homosexuality is a sin, but it's a forgivable sin, and it's just like immorality or fornication.

That's just the way we talk. And on one level, it's true, it is a forgivable sin.

But what Paul says in Romans chapter 1 makes it a different kind of sin. It's not only a lawless act, but it goes against the nature.

So sexual immorality with someone of the opposite sex, it doesn't go against nature, but it's still sinful.

So I just think we're so PC these days, we can never say, look, there is a different degree to this particular sin of homosexuality.

But we just want talking points, and we want to just make sure we don't offend our homosexual friends.

And, you know, listen, what Paul does is he just, he just slays everyone in Romans 1, 2, and 3a.

You don't have enough righteousness to stand before the thrice holy God. I think about that little o -ring with the space shuttle years ago, it was one small o -ring destroyed.

So if you have one tiny piece of your own righteousness, which is tainted by sin, and you want to stand before God, and you don't have all of Christ's righteousness, it's going to be a nuclear winter for eternity.

And so I would agree with you that we have to be careful when we talk about homosexuality, because people just want to put it in the same category as everything else.

And so I think there's a right way and a wrong way to talk about that particular sin. Yeah, especially because what happens is everyone who is a

Christian recognizes that they still sin. The scriptures clearly say that he who says he is without sin is a liar.

So therefore, if everybody sins and all sins are the same, then why not ordain homosexuals?

Active, unrepentant homosexuals, or even those that would be chaste and believe in monogamy, and they think that that is somehow acceptable before God because they're not running around having all kinds of anonymous affairs and all that kind of a thing.

Well, you know, along those lines, though, Chris, keep in mind that the Apostle Paul in Galatians, when he was listing the deeds of the flesh, he said that he looked at the temperamental sins of just hatred, jealousy, envy, things like that, and said, those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

But yet he never put a death penalty on those things in the scriptures either. Right, exactly.

And so basically what I was trying to say is that if you try to force all activity that is sinful on the same plane and same level of severity of evil and disobedience and rebellion, and therefore since all of us sin, then you're going to be making all kinds of exceptions for not only membership in the church, but leadership in the church, and even one being viewed as a true brother or sister in Christ, those litmus tests, if you will, are out the window, and you're basically welcoming nearly anybody as a brother and sister in Christ who says they love

Jesus. Well, that's exactly right, and I think we have to make the distinction between identifying something as sin, and then there's people that repent from their sin and are sorry for their sin and want to turn from sin.

I think the other factor, too, Chris and Buzz, we have to say to ourselves, all right, let's just look at Israel and the other nations.

Those nations were judged for not loving the only

God with their heart, soul, mind, and strength, but they were judged to a lesser degree than Israel, because Israel had the oracles of God.

And so, you know, every sin will forbid you from entering into heaven if it's not forgiven, but there are different categories of sin and ways we could kind of parse harmoniology.

So the good news for us as Christians is thinking, you know what, if I had to stand before God with any of my own righteousness, how sincere do

I need to be? And it reminds me of my old days when I was a liberal Lutheran, laying there at night trying to make sure

I could come up with all my sins and confess them all. I mean, this was Luther, remember?

Luther, before he's converted for six hours, he's confessing all his sins, and he's going to his mentor,

Stoppitz, and he's saying, you know what, there are more sins. I've got to get those, you know, eradicated by confession, because he realized that God is righteous, and he's completely holy.

But the dawning moment for Luther was when he realized that the righteousness of God can also be the righteousness from God, and so God can provide that righteousness, because Jesus Christ never did lust.

He never did sin. He always loved his neighbor, etc. So we can really be glad whenever you think of sin.

We've always got to talk about the sin bearer and the one who earned righteousness, and that's our Lord.

And of course, now I'll be thinking of awards on witch's noses. Well, I don't know if I've ever met a witch, but I live close to Salem, Massachusetts, and I always tell people, you know, when you think of Salem, Massachusetts, Christian, what do you think of?

And they immediately say the witch trials, and I say you are a complete pagan, because the main thing in Salem that Christians think about is that is where Adoniram Judson left the shores to be the first missionary from this particular soil.

I wish that was the first thing that I thought about, but unfortunately it is the Salem witch trials. Well, I didn't even know what you just followed up with, though.

Well, sometimes you should read the Cotton Mather biography, because once you abandon sola scriptura, there's no possible way to deal with any of this stuff.

And so with Mather's impressions and subjective feelings and hearing from the Lord outside of Scripture, if the witch trials could have been done from a cessationist perspective, we would have had the problem solved, but it was utter chaos once it was the

Bible plus. That's a definite idea for a book.

I would look into that book theme if you were into writing a book on that subject.

Well, I have a few planned, but that's not in the pike here lately. We have to go to a break, and we have a whole bunch of listeners waiting to have their questions asked and answered.

So let's go to a break right now, and if anybody else would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, email us at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Chrisarnson at gmail .com. C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

And please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the USA. Don't go away.

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God views what we say and what we do than how men view these things. That's not the best recipe for popularity, but since that wasn't the apostles' priority, it must not be ours either.

We believe, by God's grace, that we are called to demonstrate love and compassion to our fellow man, and to be vessels of Christ's mercy to a lost and hurting community around us, and to build up the body of Christ in truth and love.

If you live near Norfolk, Massachusetts, or plan to visit our area, please come and join us for worship and fellowship.

You can call us at 508 -528 -5750. That's 508 -528 -5750.

Or go to our website to email us, listen to past sermons, worship songs, or watch our TV program entitled,

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We hope that Iron Sharpens Iron Radio blesses you for many years to come. Lynnbrook Baptist Church on 225

Earl Avenue in Lynnbrook, Long Island is teaching God's timeless truths in the 21st century. Our church is far more than a

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Hi, I'm Pastor Bob Walderman, and I invite you to come and join us here at Lynnbrook Baptist Church and see all that a church can be.

Call Lynnbrook Baptist at 516 -599 -9402. That's 516 -599 -9402, or visit lynnbrookbaptist .org.

That's lynnbrookbaptist .org. Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, inviting you to tune into A Visit to the

Pastor's Study every Saturday from 12 noon to 1 p .m. Eastern Time on WLIE Radio, www .wlie540am

.com. We bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you, and we invite you to visit the

Pastor's Study by calling in with your questions. Our time will be lively, useful, and I assure you, never dull.

Join us this Saturday at 12 noon Eastern Time for a visit to the Pastor's Study, because everyone needs a pastor.

Welcome back. This is Chris Arnsen, if you just tuned us in. Our guest today for the full two hours is

Mike Abendroth. We are discussing his book, Things That Go Bump in the Church, Explaining the

Bible's Most Misunderstood Teachings, and some of the issues that we hope to have enough time to address today are sin.

We've already gotten into a bit of that. Not that we are actually practicing sin. I mean, as far as the discussion that we're having, and also some other chapters that Mike has specifically written on in the book, like hell, and like unconditional election, and discerning the voice of God, and church discipline, and others.

So, in fact, there is a chapter on homosexuality. We were just discussing that, but that was written by Byron Yawn, but I'm assuming that Mike is familiar enough with the chapters he did not write where he can have something to say on them as well.

But if you'd like to join us on the air, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

And let's take a question from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and this is

Ted in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and I have to enlarge the font on Ted's email because it is microscopic.

Okay, here we go. You have made it abundantly clear that you prefer verse -by -verse exposition to topical preaching, and hey, who wouldn't?

But what is the biblical foundation for this preference? Did the apostles go verse -by -verse through Isaiah?

If so, I must have missed that part of Acts. Wow, Ted's got a little bit of a sarcastic bite to him there, and he obviously has some knowledge of you,

Mike, for him to draw a conclusion of something like that. But if you could respond to Ted's comment -slash -question, if there is really a question there.

Sure, well, I'd be glad to. I don't know who Ted is from Tuscaloosa. Maybe we've met or something like that.

Maybe just let's take two tacks. Number one, when I was in Zurich just a few days ago,

I stood by the pulpit of Ulrich Zingli, and he began teaching the book of Matthew verse -by -verse, and he went away from the lectionary and the liturgy of the

Roman Catholic Church and just began to teach the Bible. I don't think it's a sin to teach a topical sermon.

I do regularly, but it needs to be a textually -based sermon. But if I had to make a defense for expository preaching,

I would go to Jesus in Luke chapter 4 and discuss what was happening with Jesus and the scrolls and what happened with his

Isaiah scroll in Luke 4, 14 and following. And so maybe we could do that another day, but I think if you read the account of Luke, as Jesus handed the prophet

Isaiah, he opened the book and found the place where it was written, and then he began to preach from that particular passage.

I don't think it just happened to open to that passage. I think it was week -by -week read, and Jesus stood up and he begins to preach from the prophets.

So if I had to say, why would I believe in verse -by -verse teaching? I would say, number one, that's a good way to teach through any book of the

Bible, because I don't want to miss anything, and I think it makes me not go on hobby horses.

Number two, I think God has used that kind of preaching in the Reformation to change people.

And number three, I think you could make a good case for it, sequential teaching in Luke chapter 4 with Jesus and his

Messianic ministry. And couldn't you also add to that that the New Testament writers were receiving new revelation, you are not?

You know, the fact that you don't hear an exposition of the Old Testament by the writers throughout the

New Testament is because largely due to the fact that they were receiving new revelation.

There is a New Testament, there is a new covenant. Yes, well, that and what lies behind, you know, there's always reasons for questions.

So what's the reason for Ted's question? You know, maybe he doesn't like expository preaching, maybe, you know, someone has given it a bad name, because some people, they drone on and on, and it's like a running commentary with a micro look at, like,

Adam's in the text versus telling us about the threat of redemption that goes through the complete, you know,

Old and New Testament. And so people have been burned maybe by quote -unquote expository preaching, but the opposite of exposit is to impose, and I don't want to impose anything on the text, so it is just easiest for me to teach the book of Hebrews.

And I would also say it helps me because if I had to do Hebrews today and Ephesians tomorrow, now

I have to know all the background of Ephesians, but I already know the background of Hebrews now because I've been preaching through it for 30 weeks.

So Ted could always email me at No Compromise Radio if he has a particular bone to pick, but maybe it's just a good honest question, and I hope my answer suffices.

And the Reverend Buzz Taylor has something to add there. I would think the main argument for expository preaching is simply believing in the inspiration of the

Bible. You know, I remember years ago when there was a lot of talk on Christian radio about the

First Amendment and original intent and all that. We should be more concerned about original intent when it comes to the

Scriptures. And if the Bible really is inspired, we have no business talking about anything but its original intent.

We need to get back to that, and I can't think of any other way than expository preaching. And it also is helpful in preventing hobby -horsing, isn't it?

Well, everybody's got a hobby horse, and so now if you do lectio continuum, that is, verse -by -verse versus lectio selecta, you pick and choose, then you know what?

Often I had to say it as a new pastor. You know what? I didn't write these next few verses. This is in God's Word, and whether they're hard sayings about reprobation or hell or about selective grace and love of God, this is what

God's Word says, and we have to submit to it. So I think it's just easier. There are times,

I mean, I preached sola fide last Sunday at the church, and that's a topic, but I preached through Romans 3 because I wanted people to see that that particular doctrine was rooted in Scripture, and so I think there's a way to teach a topic.

Eric Alexander, if he taught on regeneration, he would always go to Titus chapter 3 or John chapter 3 to teach on it.

So I can't prove lectio continuum from the Bible per se, but that seems to be the logical, rational, historical, best way to do

Bible teaching. As a matter of fact, I think that's how you read a book anyway, at least how I read a book, and so that's what

I'm going to keep doing. Eric Alexander, you just brought back a fond memory from one of the first, in fact, perhaps the first,

Philadelphia Conference on Reform Theology meetings that I ever attended. He was one of the earlier regular speakers there.

Well, interesting as you said that, I just got an email from Ted, and now I know who this Ted is. Friend or foe?

Ted is my friend. I just didn't know he was from Tuscaloosa, and so he said, if I thought you would have forgotten me this quickly,

I would have toned down the sarcasm. So Ted is a linguist, and I think years ago when

I started No Compromise Radio, he fed all my no -co shows into some computer for analysis, and then he told me the things that I talked about the most.

And I think back, you know, six years ago, he said, I regularly said, the Bible says, that was my number one quote, and my second quote,

I don't know if I should admit this or not, my second quote was, according to Ted's linguistic

Noam Chomsky kind of style, was John MacArthur said. Well, believe it or not, we already have to go into another station break, but hey

Ted, thanks for your question, and you have also won a free copy of Things That Go Bump in the

Church by Mike Abendroth, Clint Archer, and Byron Yawn. Thanks to our friends at Harvest House Publishers, we shipped out to you, thanks to our friends at Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com,

who ship out all of our winners in the Iron Sharpens Iron audience, their free Bibles, books, DVDs, and other things they win by sending in their questions for our guests.

So we thank Todd and Patty Jennings, owners of Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, for their faithful support of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and we are going to a break right now.

If anybody else would like to join us, if we have time to squeeze you in, we do still have quite a number of listeners waiting to have their questions asked and answered, and we'll get to as many of you as we can, but our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away, we'll be right back, God willing, with Mike Abendroth.

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Welcome back. If you just tuned us in today, our guest on the program for the full two hours, with about an hour to go, is

Mike Ebengroff, pastor of Bethlehem Bible Church of West Boylston, Massachusetts, adjunct professor at the

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and author of a number of books. He is also co -host of No Compromise Radio, and today we are addressing things that go bump in the church, explaining the

Bible's most misunderstood teachings, a book that he co -authored with Clint Archer and Byron Yawn.

And before we return to that discussion, I have a few announcements to make. Some of our sponsors have events that they do not want you to miss.

I will be, God willing, heading out to New York City, my old stomping grounds, this

June 22nd through the 23rd for the Foundations Conference, which is an event being held by Sermon Audio, and that is going to be held in the

Chelsea area of Manhattan, featuring guest speakers, including Dr.

Steven J. Lawson, who our guest Mike Ebengroff was just speaking about earlier on. Had an interview with him recently in Wittenberg, Germany.

Dr. Joel Beeky, who's been a guest on this program a number of times as well. Phil Johnson, the

Executive Director of John MacArthur's Ministry, grace to you, who may have been interviewed more than anybody else on this program.

Todd Friel of Wretched TV and Wretched Radio is also going to be featured on that panel.

And Rev. Armin Tomassian, who is actually my guest tomorrow for the second hour on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, so you might want to tune into here,

Rev. Armin Tomassian tomorrow, and back tune into the whole program, both the first and second hour, and Rev.

Tomassian is on the second hour. And if you'd like to register for this conference, go to thefoundationsconference .com,

thefoundationsconference .com, and mention Chris Ornsen and Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, if you happen to do that.

And then after that, in August, from the 3rd through the 5th, in Rev. Buzz Taylor's old stomping grounds in Portland, Maine, at the

Deering Center Community Church, there is going to be the Fellowship Conference New England, featuring

Pastor Don Curran, who is with HeartCry Missionary Society in Radford, Virginia, which is an organization that was founded by Paul Washer.

My dear friend Pastor Mack Tomlinson, who is an author and also the pastor of the

Providence Chapel in Denton, Texas, it was so great to see him unexpectedly at the

Banner of Truth Conference in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, and he introduced himself to me as Joel Osteen, because even though I had interviewed him a number of times,

I had never seen him face -to -face, other than a photograph, so I knew immediately who he was when he approached me.

But it was great to see him and share a fellowship with him. Pastor Jesse Barrington, who we've had on this program, he is the pastor of Grace Life Church in Dallas, Texas, which is a sister church, a

Grace Life Church in Lake City, Florida, who runs the radio station that airs our program there in Florida every day,

Grace Life Radio, and Pastor Nate Pickowitz, who is going to be my guest here on Iron Trip and Zion Radio in a couple of weeks to discuss his book,

Reviving New England. He is the pastor of Harvest Bible Church in Gilmanton Ironworks, New Hampshire.

If you'd like more information on registering for that event, go to fellowshipconferencenewengland .com,

fellowshipconferencenewengland .com, and remember to mention Chris Arns and Iron Trip and Zion Radio. After that, the

Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals is having their Quakertown Conference on Reformed Theology from November 17th through the 18th at Grace Bible Fellowship Church in Quakertown, Pennsylvania.

The theme is, For Still Our Ancient Foe, which is a line from Martin Luther's hymn,

A Mighty Fortress, and speakers include Kent Hughes, Peter Jones, Tom Nettles, Dennis K.

Hill, Scott Oliphant, and others. If you'd like to register for that event, go to alliancenet .org,

alliancenet .org, click on events, and then click on Quakertown Conference on Reformed Theology, For Still Our Ancient Foe.

And then, last but not least, in January, January 18th through the 20th, to be precise, the

G3 Conference returns to Atlanta, Georgia for G3 2018, and I will,

God willing, have an exhibitor's booth there as well. The theme next year is,

Knowing God, a Biblical Understanding of Discipleship. Speakers include, God willing,

Paul Washer, Stephen Lawson again, Votie Baucom, H .P. Charles, Jr., Tim Challies, Josh Bice, my mutual friend with our guest,

Mike Abendroth, Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries, Tom Askell, the president of Founders Ministries, Anthony Methenia, the pastor of Paul Washer, Michael Kruger, president of Reformed Theological Seminary, David Miller, Paul Tripp, who is going to be a guest here again in a couple of weeks.

Actually, he's going to be a guest for the first time. I've interviewed his brother, Ted, many times. Todd Friel of Wretched TV and Wretched Radio, and Derek Thomas, who

I've had on this program as well. If you'd like to register for the G3 Conference 2018, go to g3conference .com,

g3conference .com, and click on G3 2018 and register for that event.

Please let all of these organizations know, if you contact them for any reason, including registering for the conferences they're having, please let them know that you heard about them from Chris Arns and Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

And now I do want to, although it makes me uncomfortable, I'd like to now make a public appeal, as I've been doing for the last several months, for donations.

My advertisers have been urging me to do this because we are in an urgent and desperate time financially.

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio has gone for years without making any public appeals for donations, but we ask of you, if you are blessed well above and beyond your ability to comfortably provide for your own church and provide for your own family, we would love to receive a donation of any amount that you are able to give by going to ironsharpensironradio .com,

click on support, and mail a check made up to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio to the address that you see there on the website.

You can also make out the check to Cruciform Media, but Iron Sharpens Iron Radio is much easier to remember, obviously.

And if you would like to advertise on this program, whether it be your church, your parachurch, your business, your professional practice, like a law firm, a medical practice, chiropractic practice, or if you're having a special event, if as long as what you do or are advertising is compatible with the theology expressed on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, we would love to promote what you are doing and just send me an email at chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com, and put advertising in the subject line. I thank everybody from the bottom of my heart who has already donated to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, some of you multiple times.

I cannot thank you enough, and I cannot thank you adequately enough in the English language. You mean more to me than you can possibly know.

I am very grateful to you and grateful to God for you, for your generosity and benevolence.

So just keep us in mind and definitely keep us in your prayers. Now we are returning to our discussion with Mike Ebenroth on things that go bump in the church, explaining the

Bible's most misunderstood teachings, and let's go to some more of our listener questions.

We have Jenny in Ben Salem, Pennsylvania, and I am enlarging

Jenny's email because the text again, the font is microscopic, so here we go.

I am enlarging it now, and it's quite a long question. She has actually three questions here.

For once and for all, can you address the following passage? I'm sick and tired of the absolute misapplication and misuse of this

Bible passage, especially by word -of -faith believers, yet many Christians also fail to.

In Matthew 18, verses 18 through 20, verily

I say unto you, whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Again I say unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them by my

Father which is in heaven. For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am

I in the midst of them. So if you could interpret that or exegete that.

Sure. Well, that's a good question, Jenny, and like most Bible problems, it's solved by context.

You probably already know the answer, that's why you're asking the question, but it comes right from the church discipline passage.

Jesus is talking, and he said, okay, if there's a sinning brother, you tell him his fault, and if it's solved between you and him alone, you've gained your brother.

If he doesn't listen, take one or two more along with you to establish that charge, just like it would say in Deuteronomy.

If he doesn't listen to that, tell it to the church. Why? So they could pray and come alongside as well.

And then finally, if they don't listen, treat them as a tax collector. Excommunicate them.

Then Jesus says in the same paragraph, truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven.

And then he goes on to say, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them.

Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them. So the whole context is church discipline, and not only does

Peter have authority, but that authority is given to all those in the church, and Jesus himself will be there in the presence of the church discipline process.

You can think about evangelism. Aren't you glad Jesus is with us when we evangelize the Great Commission?

And lo, I'm with you always. I have had to do some church discipline in my life, and if you ever think to yourself,

I really would like to have Jesus with me as I do this now, that's one of those times. And so Jesus gives his authority to do that, and also his presence to do that, so you can function and deal with his church.

So it has nothing to do with word faith. You know, lots of times people think, even well -meaning

Christians, you know, let's just have two of us get together, or three, and we'll agree, and we'll pray for something.

The context has to govern. You might want to have a principle someplace, but the context is church discipline, and when you do it according to God's word, these decisions have already been rendered in heaven, and now we recognize them on earth, and Jesus is with us.

Yeah, I think in addition to the word of faith movement, I think the Roman Catholic Church uses that text inappropriately, don't they, for the power of the priesthood?

Well, absolutely, and just being back in the Reformation cities, I was in Geneva and Wittenberg and Erfurt and Zurich, just to see the confessionals there, and the power that they would have, whether it's purgatory or indulgences or anything else, and no wonder the

Council of Trent said, if you believe in faith alone, sole imputation of Christ's righteousness, you're a curse, because we have to keep the system going, and how do we control the people?

And so we've got to control the people via the sacerdotal system, the priest system, and there's just another aberration, as you mentioned,

Chris, right there in Matthew 18. And I usually don't do this, but since Jenny apparently has been a long -time listener but only began asking questions about a week ago,

I'll indulge her and ask all three of her questions. She says, this

Bible passage is often misunderstood and misapplied, especially by the Mormons, but many

Christians simply don't understand the reference to Psalm 82, or Psalm 82,

I should say, verse 6, that Jesus is quoting from, John chapter 10, 31 through 38.

The Jews picked up stones again to stone him. Jesus answered them,

I showed you many good works from the Father, for which of them are you stoning me?

The Jews answered him, for a good work we do not stone you, but for blasphemy, and because you, being a man, make yourself out to be

God. Jesus answered them, has it not been written in your law, I said, you are gods?

If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken.

Do you say of him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, you are blaspheming, because I said,

I am the Son of God? If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe me.

But if I do them, though you do not believe me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the

Father is in me, and I am the Father. And Psalm 82, verse 6,

I said, you are gods, and all of you are sons of the

Most High. And not only do, although that was, I'm going on to the next question, apologize, but if you could comment on that.

Sure, well, Jesus in John chapter 10 is addressing these men, and he says to them, is it not written in your law?

And when Jesus begins to talk like that to people who should know better, you know the hammer's going to come down.

When he deals with the woman at the well in John 4, he's kind to her, but now when these men begin to distort the scriptures and then tell him he's not the

Messiah, he really goes after them. And Jesus is just simply making a comparison.

If Psalm 82, that's the third class conditional, since Psalm 82 talks about judges that were just regular people, they're not angels, they're not a deity or anything like that, they're just human judges.

If you can call them gods in some role because they're judging for God, if you can call them gods, then it is really proper to call

Jesus the Son of God, who is the ultimate ruler, who's the ultimate judge. And that's the only thing he's saying there.

Well, let me now go on to the last of the third of Jenny's questions.

And I actually clicked out of that page here, so now

I'm frantically looking for where she was here. In the meantime, I'm going to repeat our email address.

It is chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com.

And please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. And please only remain anonymous if it's about a personal and private matter.

Okay, now we have the third question from Jenny from Ben Salem, Pennsylvania. Not only do atheists throw

Matthew chapter 7 verse 1 at Christians, but many Christians simply do not understand the passage nor the application from Matthew chapter 7 verses 1 through 5.

Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged, and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you.

Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your eye?

Or how can you say to your brother, let me take the speck out of your eye, and behold, the log is in your eye, is in your own eye?

You hypocrite! First take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.

Thank you, and I appreciate your teaching on these questions. That is very true that you will hear everyone from a modern evangelical pastor to a liberal

Christian or professing Christian to Bill Maher or some secularist on TV that doesn't even believe in God, you'll have that verse thrown up.

Well, everybody has a life verse, and that's the world's life verse. Judge not lest you be judged. They know that, but of course, they don't look at the rest of the context.

And by the way, Jenny, I'm glad to have these questions in light of the Bible Answer Man Hank Hanegraaff abandoning evangelical faith and becoming

Orthodox. Maybe we need a new Bible Answer Man. Are you throwing in your hat there for him?

Well, if his reported salary is true, then I guess I am throwing in my hat.

Matthew chapter 7, let's think about what Jesus is saying. If we just said, like the world would say, this means you can't judge in any way, shape, or form, then this passage becomes ridiculous.

Because he does say, deal with your own issue, so then you can deal with your brother's issue.

There is going to be judgment there. Of course, we never want to judge someone unto hell or unto heaven.

Jesus is the judge there. But Paul says, Paul, Jesus' apostolic messenger, the

Apostle Paul, examine everything carefully. We have to judge things all the time. That is right, that is wrong.

This is correct, this is false. This is biblical, this is unbiblical. This is something that I'm basing my own feelings off of.

This is a truth that's revealed in Scripture. We're always judging. And so what Jesus is saying, you know what?

Self -righteous judgment isn't good. And he's been blasting self -righteousness on the Sermon on the Mount back in chapter 5 even.

And so he's not saying you can't ever judge someone. He's saying, you know what?

If you're going to have this self -righteous judgmental attitude towards others, it's not going to be good for you.

And so I'm sad people just take these verses out of context, but that's one that's often taken out of context.

Well, thank you, Jenny, from Ben Salem, Pennsylvania. And guess what?

You have also won a free copy of Things That Go Bump in the Church, Explaining the

Bible's Most Misunderstood Teachings by our guests Mike Ebendroth, Clint Archer, and Byron Yawn.

And you'll be getting that, God willing, within a week or so from our friends at Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.

So keep your eye open in the mail for a package with a return address on the shipping label that says

CVBBS .com CV for Cumberland Valley, BBS for BibleBookService .com.

And we also thank Harvest House Publishing for these books, for these copies of the book.

And keep listening to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio and spreading the word in Ben Salem, Pennsylvania and beyond.

Let's see, we have another listener. We have

David, and David is in Ada, Ohio.

And I'm assuming that's the correct way to pronounce that. It could be Ada, but I don't know. Let's see.

You know, I'm going to go on to a different question because I did not know that David wanted to remain anonymous.

So I'm going to have to go on to another question. Uh, sorry about that, David. I did not know that you were going to be asking anonymously because it did not say that in the subject line.

So let me... You know, I think he was asking, Chris, how can I get the copy of the book? And the only way you can get a copy of Things That Go Bump in the

Church is through NoCompromiseRadio .com. So good question. By the way,

David, if you want to email me back, if it's okay to read that question identifying you, you could do that.

But I apologize. That was my fault, but I did not look at your question until I opened it up and already had said your name.

a Joe in Slovenia says thinking about things that go bump in the church

I'm wondering why so many preach that Jesus is high priestly prayer in John 17 is a request for a display of outward unity within the visible church since we know that the visible church has and will always be composed of the elect and false professors side -by -side wheat and tares how could

Jesus be praying for us to display unity since we know that there are whole supposedly

Christian denominations that have apostatized how could Jesus be petitioning the father on our behalf that we show that we belong to him by unity with unbelievers if unity is what he prayed for how do we explain the fact that his prayer has gone unanswered isn't it clear that Jesus is praying for perseverance of the saints in John 17 that the father would keep us united to him as he and Jesus are one what revival would sweep our churches if we could recover a robust preaching of John 17 in the way that Jesus intended it and that's

Joe in Slovenia so if you could comment on his comment slash question I think it's more of a comment than a question yeah it is of course

Rome is going to say see this is why Protestant faith is not correct because of all the schisms and differences and everything else and so people go to John 17 and they'll say see you know

Christians aren't unified because we have Presbyterians we have Baptist etc I would just tell everyone that they should reread

John 17 sometime tonight and just walk through it and ask yourself the question does

Jesus get his answered or does he not I think often we say well this hasn't happened look at all the stuff that's going on in the world with all these churches fractured but the question is does the high priest who intercedes for us does

God answer his prayers and does he get answers that are perfectly in one with the father unity should be the norm this unity should be happening yes but when you think about unity you ought to think about the father and the son's relationship and how they have the same purpose the same love the togetherness that's revealed that should be in a local church certainly but I think when you study it you're going to say

Jesus got his answer and you better look at the answer from Scripture not necessarily do we have an

Episcopalian so those are my comments and thank you

Joe in Slovenia also thank you for providing an American address where Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service can ship your free copy of things that go bump in the church by our guest

Mike Abendroth and it is always a help to them to not have to send books overseas because it really mounts up in shipping costs when we do have listeners all over the globe so thank you for providing an

American address where your daughter lives in Georgia and tell her to keep her eye out for a shipping label with a return address of cv bbs .com

cv bbs .com for Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service and please continue to spread the word in Slovenia and beyond about iron sharpens iron radio we have

Seth in Greensboro North Carolina who says in fact

I'm going to read you the question and have you respond to it when we return because we're going to go to a station break so I'll read you the question and you can respond afterward

Seth in Greensboro North Carolina says in Romans 7 was Paul referring to himself as a believer or prior to his conversion would like to hear your thoughts that's an excellent question because even

Calvinists disagree over that Christians of all denominational stripes and theological persuasions disagree over that issue and we will have you respond with your own insights into that after the final break that we are going to now and if anybody else would like to join us you better do it now because we are quickly running out of time our email address is

Chris Arnson at gmail .com Chris Arnson at gmail .com please give us your first name your city and state and your country of residence if you live outside of the

USA don't go away we'll be right back God willing after these messages from driving financial is not your typical financial services provider as a membership organization we help

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Chris Arnzen and we are continuing our discussion with Mike Abendroth on things that go bump in the church explaining the

Bible's most misunderstood teachings and before we went to the break

Seth from Greensboro North Carolina asked whether or not

Paul was referring to himself in the past before he was regenerate or in the present while he was a born -again believer in Christ Jesus when he was writing in Romans 7 and let me read at least a portion of that so our listeners who are unfamiliar with that may have a bit of an understanding of where we are coming from or where our listener is coming from starting in verse 14 of Romans chapter 7 for we know that the law is spiritual but I am a flesh sold into bondage to sin for what

I am doing I do not understand for I am not practicing what I would like to do but I am doing the very thing

I hate but if I do the very thing I do not want to do I agree with the law confessing that the so now no longer am

I the one doing it but sin which dwells in me for I know that nothing good dwells in me that is in my flesh for the willing is present in me but the doing of the good is not for the good that I want

I do not do but I practice the very evil that I do not want but if I am doing the very thing

I do not want I am no longer the one doing it but sin which dwells in me

I find then the principle that evil is present in me the one who wants to do good for I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man but I see a different law in the members of my body waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members wretched man that I am who will set me free from the body of this death thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our

Lord so then on the one hand I myself with my mind and serving the law of God but on the other with my flesh the law of sin is

Paul reminiscing about his unregenerate life before Christ or is he talking or speaking in the present tense well now

I know why the Bible Answer Man got such a high salary. Well it's a really good question and I edited an

S. Lewis Johnson commentary called Discovering Romans and he has a great section there and there is an argument within evangelicalism between good men about this but I would just say briefly three things

I think the flow of the epistles argument supports the view that Paul is talking as a saved man that's the theme justification moving into sanctification then into security that seems to be like the believers experience secondly the burden of proof rests with those who oppose this view in other words

Paul uses first person he uses present tense in this section he says

I myself present tense we've got to assume that he's expressing his feelings at the time of writing and then thirdly it's hard to imagine that somebody who's not saved could diagnose himself like this and affirm such things of an unsaved person so those would be my three main argument you can look at a variety of commentaries from John Murray to Schreiner to Moo to get some other views but I think that's a saved man in Romans chapter 7 well thank you

Seth and you have also won things that go bump in the church by Mike Abendroth Clint Archer and Byron Yohan compliments of Harvest House publishers and also compliments of our friends at Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service who are shipping that out to you we have a first -time questioner

I don't know if she is a first -time listener but she's a first -time questioner

Allison in Shrewsbury Massachusetts in Jeremiah chapter 29 verse 11 we read for I know the plans

I have for you declares the Lord plans to prosper you and not to harm you plans to give you hope and a future are we to take this personally and I'm I assume she means literally as well right well

I know Allison because there's not too many Allison's from Shrewsbury mass so I know she's listening

I know who you are and when I see you on Sunday you're gonna be in big trouble and I was just wondering if she is the

Allison that Elvis Costello was singing about but anyway well at least you like Costello's version instead of Linda Ronstadt's version see

I used to be a punk rock disc jockey so once you get me down the line of the clash and you know well

I was a hello I was a unfortunately a frequenter of punk rock clubs when

I was in my early 20s all right well CBGB's and stuff like that I guess we should talk about that another

I didn't hear a word you said right now we need to talk about Alice that's right

I hope she's not in too bad of trouble I mean I know Todd Friel Phil Johnson and Steve Lawson are gonna be in town where you mentioned that in one of your promos the 22nd or something like that of June yes

I'm having a medical procedure done in New York next week and Friel said you know what what's the date because if we're in town the three of us are going to come visit you in the hospital and so I said too bad that's not the time but I thought

I should probably reschedule my procedure just to have those three guys walk in and talk to me oh yeah definitely so when it comes to Jeremiah chapter 29 you know we we hear these verses a lot and we want to take them and apply them to ourselves and so you have to ask the question this

Bible verse is for me right because all Scripture is for me so I can understand who the

Lord is and who I am but is it written to me and so when the text says for I know the plans

I have for you declares the Lord plans for welfare and not for evil you'll see those on a thousand graduation high school cards you know even this weekend and they don't have anything to do with a person although do you know what

I guess by implication if you want to go to the New Testament and think when God saves someone and adopts them as a son or a daughter that's exactly the case of what happened so it may be a truth but that's not the truth in Jeremiah 29 verse 11 because you only have to read it a little bit farther and you'll realize that has nothing to do with me that has to do with Jeremiah and the false belief and speaking against what's going on in Judah and Babylon and those things so as Allison knows that's a good one where you can say to yourself am

I the audience am I Israel am I Judah and then extrapolate from there so good question

I can give her a book in person she probably already has a book so don't send her one okay and we have buzz who wants to say yes yes before we get too close to where it'd be rushed we were talking about you know

Amityville and things that go bump and all that so I want to know about those voices from chapter 9 in the book oh yeah hold on a second

I want to get the exact title of the chapter discerning the voice of God well one of the things we see in evangelicalism everywhere is that people say

God tells them something outside of Scripture and you know maybe it's a private prayer language maybe it's just God told me

X Y & Z that's just the way evangelicals talk sometimes it's as simple as new

Christians don't know the nomenclature of a biblical Christian but a lot of these other times with charismatics and Jesus calling and the

Beth Moores of the world God somehow is talking outside of Scripture and BB Warfield would say listen there's two kinds of religion and the first kind of religion is a revealed religion and that is

God's Word comes to us from the outside the other is an unreal revealed religion and that is

God talks to us from the inside but the second one can't be true because of the fall and because how could we trust ourselves if we've got our bosoms burned or if we've got you know our livers quivering or whatever those things are so the real question is how does

God speak today in these last days Hebrews chapter 1 verse 2 says in his son and of course is apostolic messengers and so if you look at the the

Mount of Transfiguration there's a more sure word more sure than what more sure than hearing the father this is my beloved

Son in whom I'm well -pleased and seeing the Son on that mount you've got something more sure than even eyewitnesses are ear witnesses and that is the

Word of God and I think Justin Peters is correct if you want to hear God speak audibly you know with volume and decibels you ought to read your

Bible out loud yes I read that quote so everywhere you go now you see a functional denial of sola scriptura yes

God talking outside of Scripture and it's sad because people say oh you you believe in the

Bible and you you worship the Bible and you adore this book I don't think that's the right way to look at it at all even

David in Psalm 138 says I give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness for you have exalted all things your name and your word so you know you think about Wycliffe excuse me

Whitfield and he said you know what God told me that I'm going to have a boy his name is going to be John and he's going to be a great evangelist well he did have a son named

John who died at four months of age and he said I mistook faith for fancy and that those are sad things when when people say

God told me I have a dream I hear a still small boy that's not how God God talks today

Reverend Buzz Taylor is something else well it seems to me that there's that there's a big trend in evangelicalism that when people talk about I'm going you know

I I'm going to obey God and everything he wants me to do if he wants me to start a campground

I'll start a campground if he wants me to start a church I'll start a church and it's all these other considerations that God told me to do thus and such and I did it in my look how he blessed and and that you know because I heard the voice of God could you address that kind of thinking yeah sure

I mean for the real Christian I think that that mystic Christian and that charismatic Christian says to themselves and to the

Lord I want to honor you God I want to do the right thing and I need to make a decision and so instead of saying you know what

I've looked at scripture I've for wisdom I've consulted other people and getting their wisdom now

I have to trust the Lord with my whole heart and not lean on to my own understanding in all my ways acknowledge him and he'll make my path straight

I just now make a decision and then it's not presumption it's just you know what

I think these are the best ways to make a decision it's not biblical it's not a wisdom issue I'm going to make the decision and then you know what

God can rearrange and God could circumvent and God can change I think we need to walk by faith and not by sight and think how big the

Bible would have to be if the Bible had to give these roadmaps for all these different decisions we'd have to make instead what does

Solomon say get wisdom seek after wisdom and then make a decision my son is in Switzerland today and I trained him he's 20 years old these are the decisions you should make and this is the wisdom

I hope he doesn't call me every two minutes and say it and say dad where shall I have lunch what shall

I do can I talk to this girl how shall I evangelize this person no son I've taught you the principles and now go ahead and live by them and so a lot of it is just silliness by people saying

God needs to tell me exactly what to do and that's not walking by faith that's walking by sight are we content with the canon of Scripture and when

God stops speaking we ought to just say you know what Lord now we have to make a decision I'm content with that now having said all that do you think it's appropriate to believe and say out loud to people things like like this would be a very typical thing that you may hear from a pulpit even by someone who is in our circle of theology those that are

Calvinistic or reformed and perhaps even cessationist you might commonly hear a pastor saying something like I know that we are going through the book of Romans in our expository series here at the church but I really believe the

Lord has placed upon my heart to enter into another chapter because of circumstances that we are facing and he opens up the

Gospel of John or something to use phrases like I believe the Lord has placed it upon my heart and things like that do you think that that's inappropriate or mystic respond to to that sure well that just it's just that's just common parlance that we have today

I'm preaching through the book of Hebrews I went to Europe for two months I'm concerned about Sola Fide we all say we believe it but I see the inroads against it and so I said in light of the trip at the

Reformation I'd like to talk about Romans 3 today and Sola Fide and why it's so important and we'll look at that next week as well obviously the

Lord is using things in my life that I'm noticing and and he's doing it but I didn't say he's put it on my heart

I've just been studying it I know my people I think it's really relevant so while I don't think it's wrong per se

I wouldn't chasten someone it just seems like it's so commonplace why do

I even have to say it we're gonna have a small deviation from Hebrews 3 to look at Romans 3 and Sola Fide I think you'll be encouraged there's not a more important truth as Luther said this is this is the chief point here of my and you're gonna be thrilled that's easier to me than this kind of mystic

God put it on my heart I mean think about it let's read Providence backwards in other words let's look backward and say do you know what that was the working of God to have him preach that sermon on Romans 3 because even this week

I talked to a Roman Catholic we look back and read Providence we don't look forward and somehow divine Providence well we could obviously take at least a full two -hour program on that one issue and perhaps do a week -long series on it so that is a fascinating discussion and by the way

Allison in Shrewsbury who knows our guest although we ran out of things that go bump in the church anyway a pastor

Mike but since Allison is a first -time questioner she is a winner of a new

American Standard Bible a brand -new new American Standard Bible compliments of our friends who published an

NASB and it will be shipped out to you by Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service CV bbs .com

are they allowed in your church I've been preaching from the

ESP but my my favorite is the New American Standard you know favorites if we only had about 50 more

Allison's and her husband at the church we'd be better off a dear saint who wants to serve and I'm a

I'm privileged to pastor her well I'm sure that our advertisers who publish the

NASB are very happy to hear that that is your preferred translation the NASB I think that's what you said isn't it oh yeah you know what it's hard for me to do public scripture reading with ESP because my default is

NAS it slips in there the Bible that I study with at home

I just got that nice new Schuyler Bible s -c -h -u -y -l -e -r -n -a -s it is great well

I am starting an NASB only movement especially since they sponsor my program but but Allison I need your full mailing address though to ship have

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Services ship that new New American Standard Bible not often that you use new two times in a row in a sentence but new new

American Standard Bible off to you so please give us your full mailing address and that will be shipped out to you

God willing within a week or so we have let's see well before before we go to another question

I actually want you to summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners first and then if we have time we'll take another question well you could pick your your choice on that you could pick your whatever if whether you want to summarize the book or what you most want to etch the hearts and minds of our listeners in general okay well what

I would say is in light of the sermon that God put on my heart left I would say that since we don't have righteousness and we need complete righteousness that only the

Lord Jesus can give we receive that by faith alone and we have only to believe that is to say it is not faith plus our works faith plus baptism faith plus anything else when you believe on the

Lord Jesus Christ you are justified and when you read people that begin to put in all kinds of works and other things and conditions because they don't want maybe antinomian behavior or something you ought to just say to yourself

I have no condemnation because I am in Christ and I love the

Belgic Confession that says if in fact we had to appear before God relying no matter how little on ourselves then alas we would be swallowed up and so we are very thankful that it is redemption in Christ Jesus and that all our sins are forgiven because God the

Son has paid for them and God the Son has earned a righteousness that he grants to us freely as a gift and we receive that by faith alone and that is a doctrine that's being lost today amen and by the way

I know that you just quoted from the the Belgic Confession are you aware that there is a

Baptist version of the Heidelberg Catechism well I am NOT I'm aware that the number one

PCA Presbyterian in all the world has a non -denominational catechism but that's a different show.

This is called an Orthodox Catechism and it is by I believe his name is

Hercules Collins but you could get that you could get that from through Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service cvbbs .com

cvbbs .com and I believe Michael Haken contributed to that who

I just had on the program but you could get any book that is mentioned on Iron Trip and Zion Radio through cvbbs .com

if they don't have it already they can order it for you and that is an Orthodox Catechism which is a

Baptist version of the Heidelberg Catechism which is a part of the three forms of unity which the

Belgic Confession is also a part of but we have time for one more listener question and that is

Scott in Bryan, Ohio. I am a musician. I fill in on the drums and have played acoustic guitar on the platform.

If our expression is to glorify God why is there so much resistance to drums in particular?

That's interesting question yes I know that it particularly my fundamentalist Baptist friends cringe with horror if they enter into a church building and they see a drum set on the on the platform.

There are reformed churches that believe that too. Yeah so what is your do you have a particular opinion on drums?

Yeah well I mean it probably takes more than five minutes to flesh out but I would say when it comes to music and artists and wanting to express themselves before the

Lord there are different manifestations of local churches and those musicians need to make sure that they submit to the elders whether they like it or not and if the elders want a certain type or kind of music

I think they the musicians must deny themselves and say you know this is what

I want but it's not what the elders want and the elders are the ones who are in charge of the worship service and they should be thinking in a regulative way and how does the scripture regulate the worship and you know whenever I think of drums

I always think of Buddy Rich because you know he he's such a he had so many good quotes about things you know he said there are only two types of music good and bad and that has nothing to do with anything but I wanted to get a

Buddy Rich quote in there. Well this has been a very successful hour.

I know so when it comes to drums I think if they help the congregation to sing

I wouldn't have a problem with them if they're so loud I can't hear myself sing then

I'd rather go to a coffee shop on Friday night and hear that versus having the drums assist me in congregational singing.

The congregation must be able to hear itself sing. Well I want to make sure that our listeners have all of the important website addresses.

The website for Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston Massachusetts is bbcchurch .org

and I still insist you have too many C's in there. bbcchurch .org and what is the website for No Compromise Radio?

Sure it's nocompromiseradio .com and that's nocompromiseradio .com. I wanted to say to the group as well that I'm leading a tour to Israel next

February so if you want to bring your NAS Bibles and do some no -code questions that'll be on the website.

Great. Well it's such a pleasure to have you on the show again in fact Mike if you could hold on I want to schedule another interview with you and I want all of you to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater