Owen Strachan Talks About Nations - AD Comments

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Alright everybody, we are going to be doing this video here. You know, a lot of recommendations came through, a lot of you wanted me to do the

00:07

Doug Wilson article about no enemies on the right, and we're gonna do that, but I'm just gonna put a pin in it for right now because Doug has said he's gonna come out and put another article out about this whole situation today.

00:22

So we're gonna wait and let him have his peace and then we'll talk about it. But in the meantime, somebody else recommended this

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Eschatology Matters video, which I started watching earlier today, watched about 20 minutes or so, and it was pretty good,

00:36

I really liked it. It's between Dr. Owen Schron and Dr. Josh Howard on post -millennialism,

00:43

Christian nationalism, theonomy, things like that. And it's good, you know, one of the things when you have two guys that are gonna be disagreeing on a topic, what you hope for is you get at least some clarity, right?

00:57

You don't go into these expecting your mind to be changed, that's not really what this is about. This is more about clarity, and I think we get a lot of that with this video.

01:05

So we're gonna talk about it, we're gonna look at it, we're gonna comment on it the way I normally do, should be a lot of fun.

01:11

One thing I did want to say though before we begin is I really appreciate Dr. Josh Howard's style.

01:17

You know, you might not think this about me, but actually the content that I watch is usually a little bit more winsome than my own content, it's just the style

01:25

I like to listen to. Not too winsome, but a little bit. And I'm grateful for this, you know,

01:33

I've never been against people that have a different tone than me, in fact I've always supported it, I've always said that the body of Christ needs different members, different roles, different styles, different everything, because it's helpful for conversations like this.

01:48

Because Owen Strawn would never talk to a guy like me, and that's fine, I'm not saying this is to his detriment, he would never talk to a guy like me.

01:54

But he would talk to Dr. Josh Howard, which I think Dr. Josh Howard does a pretty good job in this conversation.

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In my opinion, I've never spoken to Dr. Howard, so I'm not speaking for him here, but in my opinion

02:09

Dr. Josh Howard recognizes that Owen is very sensitive. He's a very sensitive guy, and so when he pushes back and when he seeks clarification, he has to do it in just the right way.

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And this is really important, you know what I mean, you have to talk to different people differently, depending on your goals of course, you have to always consider what are your goals in the conversation, and what kind of person are you dealing with.

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I recently watched a DUI stop with a female police officer, which, you know, I don't think women should be police officers, but this female police officer, it was so interesting, because it was a

02:46

DUI of a cop, right? And the cop was very, like, she was also a woman, but kind of very masculine woman, and just very loud and boisterous and obnoxious.

02:56

And the way she dealt with her was totally different than the way she dealt with the victim, the guy who got crashed into, which was totally different than the way she dealt with the witness.

03:06

She approached them with nuance, each one of them was spoken to differently. And it was interesting, because it was like, it was perfect,

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I mean, she had a different tone with the boisterous cop, she basically said, sit down right now. And then with the victim, she's like, hey, she needs a little time, what happened?

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And then with the witness, she approaches the witness like, hey, I know you're just a witness, so don't worry, you know, what happened? Like it was just, it was so interesting, you know, and I think that that's something to always consider when you're considering tone, what are your goals, and who are you dealing with?

03:39

Anyway, that I've said enough. Let's get into it. Let's go. And a good handling of these issues, so so you may well disagree with me, but the way you've done that has has not seemed like it's chasing controversy or that sort of thing, or you're trying to dunk on me, and that's part of why

03:57

I wanted to talk with you. I am perfectly good, though, for you to disagree with me. And at the outset, before I just quickly say about the

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Great Commission to get us started, disagreement is not hatred. Disagreeing with me does not mean you're hating me.

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It doesn't mean that, you know, your team then wins over my team or my team is supposed to win over your team.

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And and this this is not theological ping pong, you know, at summer camp. So let that be said, it's often the case that that there can be truth in numerous places and no one has a perfect grasp of the truth on this side.

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And then everyone else has no purchase on the truth and no points to make and and that sort of thing. So that's a little bit of how

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I approach it. Some folks out there will view even those words I just said in a very skeptical, jaundiced way.

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But I mean them from my heart and before the Lord. And so I don't really care what they think. And again, disagreement is not disagreement, is not hatred on my part or on your part.

04:53

It starts a little slow, but we're going to get we're going to get to the Great Commission. And so we were talking about a tweet.

05:00

We were debating whether to situate this debate contextually and how much there was a tweet. We wouldn't have to name the person in question, but it was over the apostles turning the world upside down, according to the witness of Acts 17.

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And the person in question has been doing a lot of political work. And it's

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I'm very glad that Christians get engaged in politics. But I think we have to get engaged in politics in the right way. That would be my point.

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And so I challenge that point a little bit respectfully, intending to be respectful, genuinely. And I said the way the apostles turn the world upside down was not through Christianization of society.

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It was not through theonomy. It was not through a postmillennial vision, I would argue, in which they're going before kings and rulers and trying to get laws passed.

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And that's the way the world gets turned upside down. As I read the book of Acts, and again, feel free to discredit me, the way they turn the world upside down is through what today might be called loser theology by some in the younger crowd.

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I won't put those words in your mouth necessarily, but honestly, just preaching the gospel is called loser theology by some.

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So I gave us permission to disagree with you, Owen, and I'm going to go ahead and accept that gracious gift from on high.

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So, no, that's not what loser theology is. That's not what loser theology is. Loser theology is when you say just preach the gospel and then also say any attempt to do anything else or to win the political game or to do

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Christian things outside of preaching the gospel is either shut down right away because that's not our mission or shade is thrown that way.

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That's loser theology. It's not the preaching the gospel part that's loser theology. There's not a single person who would say that.

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But it's the preaching the gospel and then throwing shade at literally every other opportunity or every other action that seeks to win in any other sphere besides the one that the church is engaged in primarily, which is making disciples of all nations and baptizing them in the name of the

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Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, which we're going to get into very, very soon because he takes exception to that, the way that a lot of people understand the

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Great Commission. So I do want to talk about that. But let's continue, Owen. I read the

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Great Commission, and I'll leave it here and let you respond. I read the

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Great Commission as being about Matthew 28, 16 to 20, making disciples, baptizing those disciples, teaching them to observe everything

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Christ has commanded that the New Testament lays upon us. All authority has been given to Jesus and then by extension to the apostles to do that.

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But the authority that Jesus has given is not ordered at me going to the local city council and flipping it to Christian.

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Jesus is the total authority of the cosmos without any limitations, but his authority is to be directed to the work of church building, missions, evangelism, the traditional understanding of the church's mission,

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I would argue, in Baptist circles. And so Jesus has all authority. Just to put this on record, because I get lots of tweets saying, you know, quoting it at me as if I don't believe it.

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I do believe it. But the magistrate is not the one who is charged with stewarding the kingdom of God, the churches.

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I've said a lot already. I'll shut up. Thank you for shutting up. So this is this is the thing, because Owen, Owen is

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I said that there's a lot of clarity brought to this, but a lot of it is accidental.

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Owen is very confusing, actually, because if you notice, he said numerous times he has all authority, all authority has been given to me.

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Go therefore, right? So he has all authority. I believe that people get accused for not believing that.

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But I believe that all authority. But the magistrate isn't the one doing the gospel work or the evangelism or all of that kind of stuff.

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And he has these two ideas. And it's like we know that. Right. But but but all that authority, though, is still

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Christ. Right. The authority over the magistrate. I mean, very clearly it says that the that Jesus is the king of all the kings.

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He's the lord of all the lords. The government, the civil magistrate is God's servant, is his deacon.

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So he has that authority, too. And so even though it's not the the the the civil magistrate doesn't have the authority about the gospel ministry or whatever, it still has authority.

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And we ought to be using that authority in a self -conscious way. Why not?

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And so one of the themes of this entire video that that I think is going to keep coming up, you know, and and I'm going to expand on it more as it comes up.

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But Owen has this very poisonous, pastoral, centric view of of Christianity where the role of the pastor is the central thing that a

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Christian ought to be considering. The pastor is the center, really. And I don't mean that, you know,

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Jesus is not the center. Of course, he believes Jesus is the center. But when it comes to human action, though, the role of the pastor is what really counts.

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It's what really matters to Christ and to the Lord and to the life of a Christian. Right. And the reason why it's not it's not totally awful is because he also assigns that role to everybody.

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Everybody kind of does the same thing the pastor does. The pastor does it in a unique way, in a way that's ordained and all of that kind of thing.

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But everybody should be going about the work of the gospel in essentially the same way as the pastor should.

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Right. The pastor should be evangelizing people and taking people out to coffee. He keeps bringing up this coffee thing as if evangelizing equals bringing someone to coffee and talking to them.

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I mean, it's just it's really funny how he does that. But but that's the real work, the real

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Christian work at any other work. It might be good, Owen says. Yeah, I want more Christians in politics, but that's not really gospel work.

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That's not the true meaning of Christianity, the true reason we're here. And so it's a very it's a very pastoral centric mindset is like, yeah,

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Christ has authority over the civil governing authority. But that's not really the important work.

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That's not really doesn't really matter that much in comparison to this gospel work. You know, it's not the

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Great Commission, you know, that kind of thing. And it's a very it's a very pastor centric view of what it means to be a

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Christian. And this is rampant. I don't I don't blame Owen for this, because Owen was taught this and almost everybody believes this.

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If you if you if you if you ask a kind of a typical person like, what does Christian maturity look like?

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Right. What is what is Christian? How do you abide in the love of Christ? What does Christian maturity look like? You would get answers that basically betray this pastor centric view of what it means to be a

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Christian. People would say things like this. You pray a lot. You study the Bible.

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You really deep study, too. It's got to be deep study to word studies. You read theological works and these are all good things.

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I don't think Christians shouldn't do these things. Right. But this is what people think of when they think of Christian maturity.

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It's someone who prays a lot, who reads a lot, who studies a lot and all of that kind of thing. That's the life of a pastor.

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In fact, that's why we have pastors set aside specifically so they don't have to do all the logistics.

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They can pray. So I have deacons, right? The deacons were invented because it wasn't right for them to to have to serve tables when they should have been studying and praying and evangelizing and all of these things.

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And so if you if you ask people, what's the mature Christian life? They basically describe to you what the pastor's life ought to look like.

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And they really have no other concept of what a mature Christian life could be. That pastor centric mindset is no bueno.

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It's no bueno. You know what I mean? Because we need pastors.

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Yes. And they're so important. I'm not every time I say this, people think I'm saying pastors don't count. They don't matter.

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You shouldn't listen to them. That's not what I'm saying. I'm not saying the things I didn't say. I'm only saying the things I did say. We need pastors, but we also need lots of other things, lots of other vocations done

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Christianly, authentically Christianly. Let's let's let's see what Dr. Howard has to say, because Dr.

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Howard does a great job in this, at least in the parts that I saw. You know, he's not going to be like I am. He's not going to push back in the same way like I am.

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But that's good. And I think Dr. Howard pinpoints a lot of the the weirdness of what

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Owen has to say. And he does it in such a and I'm not saying this is a dirty word,

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Dr. Howard. I don't know if you know who I am, but I'm going to say you're winsome in a good way, though, in a good way that that's that's good.

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And like you said, there's so much packed into what you just said. So I'm going to try to I'm going to try to walk into a little bit of maybe the maybe the broader areas of disagreement.

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It's going to be like, you know, time permitting. Hopefully we can get into the weeds because I know there's a lot there with the language work. I think

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Jeff already said some things that that I would just see a little differently there in the Great Commission. But broadly speaking, if we were to look at if we were to look at the

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Great Commission, I think that let me just say this, Dr. Howard, I do fully appreciate the the background of reformed typical reform podcasts of all the books.

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You got to love it. It's it's just a meme at this point. You got to have your books back there. 80

14:55

Robles doesn't do it the same way. You know what I mean? But everyone has to have all their books and stuff. But I just I wonder,

15:01

Josh, why did you blur them out? I want to see what you're reading, man. I want to see what you're reading back there.

15:07

It might seem. Well, let me just ask you this. Do you see in the Great Commission anything that would prohibit either

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Christians from being engaged in politics or the church bringing the gospel witness to bear on political situations?

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And I'm saying it that way, because obviously we can find a lot of guys that are saying some some some strange things on the fringes.

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But for most of us within, let's just say, conservative evangelical circles or however you want to frame that, most of that run in our shared circles would say the gospel, yes and amen,

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Christ at the center, keeping the main things, the main things. I think where we're disagreeing is what else and how are those things to be added?

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Most within our circles are not looking for a church overstate set up. I know

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Christ overall, they've done Andy Nacelli who did that taxonomy and hopefully walked through a lot of those paradigms. Most of our friends are not talking about church overstate.

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So we're talking about different spheres of authority. But how are those spheres to relate to one another? So I know this is a really rambling question, but how would you frame that with the

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Great Commission? Is there anything in the Great Commission that would prohibit somebody from saying yes and amen, preach the gospel, make disciples?

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And yet part of that is speaking to those in places of authority and having a Christian influence in whatever way we frame that with the state.

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OK, this was a shrewd question, Dr. Howard. I again, I cannot say enough.

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I don't know you at all. I don't know your work. I don't know what you're like. You know what I mean? But this was shrewd and it was a very, very good question, especially the way he asked it, because the way he asked it is, is there anything that prohibits these other things being legitimate

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Christian actions, you know, and part of how you fulfill the Great Commission? And it's a very particular question because you can't you can kind of answer.

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Yes. But you kind of have to answer no, because there's so many other legitimate things that a

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Christian should be doing in as far as disciple making. Right. Owen's going to keep bringing up, bringing someone to coffee and teaching them the gospel.

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But that's obviously that's not the only way to to make disciples, which is essentially students, right?

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Making students, teaching them. Right. And when you understand disciple making like that, you know, there's lots of ways to do that.

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Making disciples, teaching them, making students. There's lots of ways to do that. In fact, every single law that has ever been enacted is teaching someone something.

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The law is a teacher. I think that's a Bible verse.

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Is that a Bible verse? I think so. Anyway, very, very important way to ask it.

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So Owen's kind of got to say no, but he's going to want to say yes, that something does prohibit it because he wants to.

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He has this pastor centric view where the legitimate stuff is the stuff that the pastor does.

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And everything else, while it may be beneficial, it's not truly Christian. This is a very, very shrewd question.

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And I think the other thing about the shrewdness of this question is he's asking Owen this question.

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And there's a reason why he's asking Owen this question, because Owen is one of these guys that throws shade at all political action if you call it

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Christian. If you say, oh, we want it should be we should be self -consciously,

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Christianly trying to do these things. He tries to shut it down. He tries to throw shade at it.

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So he's asking Owen a question that he's kind of got to say, no, I agree with you, Josh. But he's asking in a way that that, you know,

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I'm asking you because shouldn't we agree on this? Anyway, let's let let's let

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Owen answer. Good job, Josh. Yeah, good question. I appreciate what you reference there.

18:54

I would just say the Great Commission is not the great Christianization. And so I'm not coming from a post -millennial viewpoint and unapologetically so.

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I don't think the Great Commission is saying to us that the way this commission is going to be fulfilled is by you and me bubbling up and getting involved in the public square and being

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Christian magistrates, as we're able to be at whatever level of government, and then bringing Christian laws into action and then watching as a populist, the argument goes and becomes more formally

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Christian or something like this or goodness like. Like Dr. Josh gave him every opportunity to agree because he didn't say that the way it's going to be fulfilled is through all this other stuff to the exclusion of the gospel.

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No, he actually went through pains and he said, this is kind of rambling. And the reason it was so rambling is because he was trying to find some kind of agreement.

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No, no. Yes. Amen. Preaching the gospel, you know, evangelism. Yes. Amen. That is all great.

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But the disciple making part, the part about teaching, there's a lot more there, right,

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Owen? And it would have been very easy for Owen to say, yeah, yeah, there's a lot more there. But I worry about emphasis.

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No, no. But he doesn't say that. He immediately his pastor, his pastorally centric brain just takes over.

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I don't think that the commission says that the way this happens is to pass laws.

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Who who who's saying that who's saying that that's the way the that's the only way to the exclusion of the gospel, because the that's for losers.

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Nobody's saying that nobody's saying that. But when it comes to making disciples, there's a lot more to it than coffee.

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Dr. Owen Strawn, he hasn't mentioned coffee yet, but I promise you he will. Legislation turns the hearts of the people toward God and so and and so that culminates in a in a what you could call a

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Christian nation. I don't see that in any fragment of the Great Commission.

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I do altogether see in the New Testament. Disciples of the

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Lord Jesus Christ taking the gospel and the truth of God into the public square.

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So two examples very quickly. John the Baptist and Matthew 14, one through twelve. I've preached on this numerous times.

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I've written about this in my book, The Colson Way, for example, which is really a book about Christians in the public square from 2015.

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John the Baptist isn't shy about taking God's truth. And specifically, interestingly, for right now in January 2024, biblical sexual ethics with him and says to a ruler, very powerful.

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It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife. Right. And gets beheaded for doing so. Why? This is the thing like I'm sorry, but the pastorally centric mind is incapable of thinking these kinds of things through incapable, maybe not incapable, but unwilling, unwilling.

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You have to think about when it comes to the John the Baptist example where he confronts Herod, right? Why did

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John do that? Why did John go to Herod knowing it would cost him his head?

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And and think it was so important that he go to him and say, you can't have your brother's wife, it's unlawful for you to do that.

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Why? Why would that be so important? We don't really know, because we don't get into the mind of John the

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Baptist all the time. But there's probably a number of reasons, and I'd be willing to bet that one of the reasons

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John went to Herod to do that. Because he could have easily gone to just random people.

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He could. There's there's probably other guys that had their their their brother's wife in in in the area.

22:57

Right. There's probably a lot of them. And don't you think his time could have been better spent going to the masses and telling them each individually?

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No, he went to Herod. Why? Because he understands that the law is a teacher.

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That the civil governing authority is a very powerful teacher. And so if Herod is flaunting

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God's law so so ridiculously, that's going to affect and teach everybody else that sexual ethics, who cares?

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We do what we want to do. So he went to Herod and said that.

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Because that is part of discipling, making disciples.

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The law is a teacher. And the civil governing authority is is is is is is executing that process, essentially.

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So we went to Herod and said that. It's important. Because the thing is, like a guy like Owen, like you go to Herod because trying to save his soul, you're trying to, you know, stop him from sinning.

24:07

Yeah, that's part of it. That's part of it. But really, when you go to a guy like Herod, it's really not so much about changing

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Herod's mind. It's about everybody else. Everybody else. You got to think through these things, because disciple making is very broad.

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There's a lot that goes into disciple making. And in the Great Commissions, we are commanded because all authority is

24:32

Christ's to make disciples of all nations. I am all in on that.

24:39

I preached a sermon at Midwestern when I was there. I think it was called Your Best Life Now Beheading Edition.

24:44

And what I was saying is we've got to press into the public square. So it's funny now,

24:50

Josh, by the way, that I'm like this neutered political voice to some, because in my context,

24:58

I've actually tried to very much encourage Christians to not do the neither left nor right, you know, political program where we make no waves and we're just known for being nice and we pass the winsomeness test.

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And that's all that really matters. Sin doesn't really matter. I'm not for that. And I've not been for a hard understanding, at the very least of R2K, Reform Two Kingdoms.

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I don't even really hold strongly to Two Kingdoms theology, though I very much overlap with a lot of people who do.

25:29

I'd be more in the kind of Kuyperian camp thinking of Kuyper being a kind of John the

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Baptist. We got to get Owen Straughan on right response ministries. I think that Joel and Owen would get along.

25:41

Not not in the sense like that's not an insult to you, Joel. So please don't take it that way. But I think you guys have some similarities where you could actually have an effective conversation.

25:53

And you're and you're and you're both willing to, like, go into sidetracks about your various, you know, you know, beliefs and stuff.

26:00

I think that would be so good because Joel's no pushover and it would be really good.

26:06

The public square. Not that Josh is. Here's the last thing I'll say, Josh. Sorry, I'm going to be good. Yeah, I would see

26:12

John the Baptist is a very important distinction, as I understand it. I see not not owing to me, but others.

26:18

I think John the Baptist as working out the. That's the fruit of the

26:23

Great Commission. Christians being engaged in politics. Praise God. More of that, please.

26:30

That's the that's not how you act, though, Owen. And that's the problem. That's why the question even needs to be asked.

26:35

That's why Josh had to ask it. Because if you were like, oh, that's the fruit of the Great Commission and praise

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God and you saw people calling it, oh, yeah, you know, I'm going out there and we're doing Christian politics and you didn't like that.

26:47

But you wouldn't be. You'd say, I'm a little not crazy about that, but good. Praise God. Praise God.

26:52

That's not what you've been doing the last two years, though. You've been throwing shade in every possible way you can.

26:59

You've been pulling out every leftist playbook you can. All the racists, ethnocentrists, all this stuff.

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That's what you've been up to. We'd have no problem if you were like, I'm not so good, crazy about calling it

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Christian, but praise God. If that's really your attitude, I think you need to take a look at how you've been going about that and maybe make a few changes, make a few adjustments, because I don't think that's what you've been doing.

27:23

That is not the Great Commission itself. Very similar to Christians engaged in the business world or the artistic world or the athletic world.

27:32

I'm not talking about direct gospel proclamation. I'm talking about their vocational engagement, OK, for a minute.

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That vocational engagement, you building a great business and being a Christian CEO, OK, we're not talking about your gospel testimony, per se.

27:44

We're bracketing that. That's great. Pete, I want way more of that. I love good art.

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I love good business. I love good food. Please start a bakery. I don't know. Whatever. Please make great movies.

27:56

We'd love them. That itself is not the Great Commission. That's you living as a disciple of Jesus Christ.

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That's essential. That's wonderful. But the Great Commission is disciple making with a focus on the love.

28:10

OK, OK, this this was very interesting, because as soon as I heard

28:15

Owen say that, I was thinking to myself, you know, we're talking about bakeries. He's talking about, you know, businesses.

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He's talking about movies. And of course, he's very careful to say, well, what about the ones that directly proclaim the gospel?

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That's exception. That's real gospel work. That's the Great Commission. But like normal movies, right?

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And he's talking about all these things. And I'm pretty sure Josh is about to say it. But I remember when he said that,

28:42

I thought to myself, yeah, yeah, yeah. Those are interesting. But like. Those aren't actually institutions that God himself created, right?

28:53

Like he didn't institute the movie industry or the bakeries, you know what

28:58

I mean, the bakery association of the world. He did institute the civil governing authority.

29:04

The civil governing authority is actually his deacon. So in the Bible. So in the

29:09

Bible. He is actually the king of kings and the Lord of Lords. Yeah, he's king over the bakeries, too.

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But like the civil governing authority is actually an institution that he says an awful lot about, you know what

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I mean? And he's in an awful lot of control over. It's a little different. It's a little different.

29:30

I'm pretty sure Josh mentions that here. We'll see. So no, I appreciate that clarity on that.

29:36

So I'm thinking, too, because you brought up Kuiper. So I'm thinking to how how to engage.

29:42

Really, I want to push in on the Great Commission as a prohibition or as an instruction. So so this is this is important because he was not satisfied with Owen's answer, and it wasn't a satisfying answer because he said, does the

29:54

Great Commission prohibit these kinds of activities as part of disciple making? And Owen kind of said yes, which is the wrong answer, of course.

30:02

But he kind of didn't because he was like, oh, yeah, you know what? Yes. And amen. Yes. And amen to John the Baptist, you know.

30:08

So he's he's not he's kind of saying in a nice way. Try again. Try again.

30:16

Kind of from like a broad perspective, because I think that's where some of the rub comes in with, like, for example, you brought up the example of John the

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Baptist. So you've got these these biblical examples of John the Baptist speaking essentially biblical sexual ethics to a ruler in power.

30:29

You have, you know, everybody. Well, most Christians are familiar with the fact that the disciples all persecuted pretty much as political, you know, troublemakers or rabble rousers or even rebels.

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Christ's, you know, the sign over over Christ's cross indicating that he proclaimed himself to be king of the

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Jews. So these are all like political indictments of this, too, because he's going to get into it. He's talking about like understanding disciple making in the

30:54

Great Commission more broadly. And again, I promise you, Owen's going to bring up like four times about having coffee, you know, with someone that's disciple making.

31:03

But, you know, I got to be honest, like. I think back in my own life and learning how to be a

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Christian and stuff like that, it's so much of it is not through direct like pedagogical.

31:19

I'm sorry for using that word. I don't even know if I pronounced it right. I guess I can be excused for not pronouncing it right.

31:25

But like like instruction. Right. Like when I go and I talk to a pastor about theology, that's that's not really where I get discipled that much.

31:36

I mean, yeah, there is some aspect of discipleship there. So much of it, though, is behavior.

31:42

It's like looking at how they act. How does my how does my pastor or my mentors or whatever interact with waitresses?

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And when something happens like we're out fishing or something and, you know, they get snagged on something.

31:57

Right. How do they respond to things not going quite right? How do they respond to situations in the political realm?

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How do they respond to ethical dilemmas like so much of my learning and my discipleship, like true discipleship is not over coffee discussing

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Kuiper. I'll be straight up with you. That's great. If you do that, I'm not throwing shade your way.

32:21

That's great. But if you want to limit discipleship to that, getting coffee with your pastor and discussing the latest political or I'm sorry, theological issue.

32:33

If you're limiting discipleship to that, I'm sorry, but you've been infected with this pastoral because so much of what the pastor's life is, is studying theology.

32:43

I don't think that that's what discipleship is, is, is excluded to. And so he's asking, he's asking, is this an exclusion or is it like, is this more broad?

32:53

State, right. Much has been said on this in the last few years, the power of the state to suppress those who proclaim

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Christ as Lord. But thinking back to Kuiper, then if you were to take the Great Commission, which, again,

33:04

I'd love to talk a little more on that specifically, but just at face value, you take the Great Commission, you say this is a disciple making venture of the church as you've been laying out.

33:13

Um, what is wrong with then saying, yes, and there's also a political component, a political engagement model involved there.

33:21

And I think that's, that's where some of the rub for me came in, just kind of looking at some of the discourse. I would,

33:26

I would look at the Great Commission a little differently, maybe than some, um, but at the same time, even if you were to take the

33:31

Great Commission as a, uh, you know, kind of a, I don't want to say truncated, but like a very definite command, like here is exactly the parameters of the

33:39

Great Commission. I would say it's not to the exclusion of things that come later. So if someone was to look to Kuiper, you know,

33:45

Kuiper made the case, obviously different, different setting than we're in, and we could talk about all the details, but Kuiper made the case that for the

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Christian, you must be politically involved, almost at the risk of sinning by not proclaiming

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Christ's Lordship over all spheres. So he's looking at spheres, but he's saying Christ's Lordship is over all of those spheres and you must engage them again, not with some sort of top -down theocratic model, but in whatever details you work that out.

34:08

Um, does that make sense? What I'm getting at? Like, how do you see that as far as the Great Commission, not being a prohibition to political involvement, or are you seeing it that way?

34:17

Yeah, that's, that's a great way to ask it. I thought that was even more clear than the first time. Um, he, what, what, what

34:24

Josh Howard, Dr. Howard is trying to say is like, you know, you look at the

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Great Commission and it's a sentence or maybe two sentences. And so there's not a lot of content there.

34:37

So we're looking at the disciple making process and thinking, yeah, there's more to it than, than just having coffee and talking about the gospel, there's a lot more to it, in fact, and, and I think that, you know, you know, what, what

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Owen tries to do is say, look at what the disciples were doing, that's the actual Great Commission. They were, they were doing the stuff that the disciples are doing.

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That's, that's the legitimate Great Commission. And then everything else might be good, but it's not the

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Great Commission because we didn't see the disciples doing it. The problem is that the disciples were in a very particular context, in a very particular time, in a very particular political situation that we do not find ourselves in right now.

35:18

And so there's a lot of parallels and we can do a lot of the things that they were doing, but we can do other things too, because there are lots of Christians that are governors or are, you know, state senators or mayors or legislators or whatever it is, police officers.

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And none of the disciples were. And so, so their disciple making process might be, there might be some differences there.

35:46

That's what Josh is getting at. Or are you saying, no, no, no, literally the only disciple making practices that we can do are the things we see the disciples doing.

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And maybe they didn't have coffee, but they were eating and making disciples. So we can do that.

36:04

We can bring someone to dinner and make disciples because we saw them doing that. I'm not,

36:09

I'm not, I'm not trying to sound stupid here. Like that's kind of what Josh is getting at and you'll see what

36:14

Owen has to say. No, I'm not. And by the way, I have a little more time than I signaled to you.

36:19

Let's, let's talk for, for a good little bit here. Cause these are, we can't do this in 27 minutes.

36:25

We, we could talk for six hours. I'm guessing we won't quite do that. But anyway, publicly here again,

36:34

I think I would say, let me go back to building a good business. Building a good business is what a disciple may very well be called to do.

36:42

There's no prohibition against it. But I just don't want a guy who starts a great bakery to think he has just fulfilled a great commission.

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He is being a faithful disciple. He, that is going to let him in all sorts of good ways.

36:58

I'm guessing being a witness and, and, and promote the gospel and be a Christian in light and dark times, like we're in, in 2024, that's all great.

37:08

So, so actually the great commission is going to come back in, uh, to, to any disciples life.

37:13

It's, you know, he's gonna, he's gonna say to a struggling employee, do you want to read the marks of manhood by Ken Hughes or I don't know, all of a sudden he's doing discipleship or whatever.

37:23

Do you, do you see what he's doing? He's like, you can be a great baker and that's wonderful.

37:29

You're, you know, good, good job. We need bakers. I praise God for them, but you're not doing

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Christian work unless you have a struggling employee and you recommend a good

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Christian book to him, then you're doing Christian work. Do you see the pastorally centric mindset?

37:48

There's one way to be a Christian. And that is doing the work of a pastor, even though you're not a pastor.

37:57

So if you're just a baker and you never recommend, you know, I don't know what book he just said, but if you never have the, the, the prayer, uh, breakfast weekly at your business, which

38:09

I don't know why you wouldn't, but if you'd never do that, it's not legitimate Christian work. You've got to do the gospel work.

38:18

You've got to do the work that I do as a pastor. I mean, I don't know if Owen's a pastor, but I'm just saying like pastor work.

38:25

Otherwise it's not, it's, it's, it's, it's so I'm not going to,

38:31

I'm not going to say that it is very, very much pastor centric.

38:38

You got to watch out for this. We're not all pastors. We're not all called to be teachers.

38:44

If you're, if a lot of these guys make it seem like everyone's called to be a teacher, the Bible has a warning for that.

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And I don't think it means that if you're not called to be a teacher, then you're not doing legitimately

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Christian work unless you're a pastor. Unless you're teaching your Baker employees about the, about the, the theology and the gospel and everything.

39:05

You're not really doing Christian work. Bible's got a warning for that. People, so many people make it seem like all of us have to be doing the work of a pastor and it's just not the case.

39:18

It is just not the case. I'm going to leave it there.

39:23

We're going to start, we're going to continue with this because Owen goes in a little bit more on this kind of thing.

39:29

He starts talking ridiculous things like taking the nation of, nobody, nobody thinks that we should take the nation of Sweden to coffee to teach them the gospel.

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So how can they be disciples? How can, how can we baptize the nation? We're going to get into that because it gets really ridiculous here.

39:44

It gets really, it gets really stupid. I mean, I think I'll be honest. I think Owen's very disrespectful in this, in this conversation.

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In my opinion, I don't think Josh would see it that way. I see it that way. I'll just say it.

39:55

You know what I mean? Josh is trying to talk on an adult level and Owen is over here and he's, he's acting like a child.

40:03

Hey, what are you, what are you? We're going to baptize Sweden? The whole nation is going to baptize him?

40:10

Anyway, uh, let's continue. If you like this, let me know. If you don't like it, let me know that too, because I always like to hear people that don't like certain content because it gives me an idea of what to, what to, what to make for you guys.