WWUTT 2300 Q&A Christian Liberty, Christian Music, Mother of God

If we're not supposed to do something that could cause a brother to stumble, how far do we take that? Where is the line between worship music and what we listen to for recreation? And should we call Mary the mother of God?

The answer's when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word, that we may be conformed to the image of Christ. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .wutt .com.

Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

Thanks, babe.

You're welcome.

What's happening?

Uh, life.

We had a great Thanksgiving.

We did.

It was wonderful.

I hope you all did as well.

We missed family, but church family.

It was our church family that we were with, yeah.

Yes, it was wonderful.

Always wonderful to have. Maybe we can get some family out this way for the holidays.

Hoping so.

We've been scheming.

Yeah.

Looking for ways to get some family. I don't think we've had anyone but your parents come and visit us since we've been in Arizona.

We've had a lot of people come and visit us. We've had a lot of people come and visit us.

Family wise?

Yeah, family wise.

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

We're just way further out west than we've ever been before, but always appreciate your love and support. You can find out how you can support this ministry going to www .wutt .com. If you click on the Give tab, it still takes you to our church's website.

And if you want to give a tax deductible donation, you can give to us that way.

Mm-hmm.

Questions to this broadcast can be sent to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com, or you can send a voicemail to www .wutt .com.

Thank you. Bye.

Bye.

Bye. Bye. Bye.

Bye.

Christian Liberty and Causing a Brother to Stumble

To Christian liberty, because one of the things that we've often talked about is, you may have the freedom to do that, but don't use your liberty in such a way that would cause someone else to stumble.

Remember us talking about those kinds of things? So this question comes with that in mind. Hello, Pastor Gabe and Becky. I have an appreciation for your podcast. The Bible study leader at church turned me on to your podcast and I do enjoy them.

Aw, that's awesome.

That's great. You have mentioned a couple of times that if your conscience is clear on doing something, but it will trip your brother up, then you should not do it. I've heard this many times and it confuses me a little bit in the manner that anything I do can make my brother trip.

So should I not do anything which makes no sense or don't worry about it, which seems to be anti-biblical? A very simple example would be taking aspirin. If a fellow believer does not believe in modern medicine, should I take it at all?

Should I not take it only in front of them? Should I leave it out of my life forever? Because every time they see me, it could be on their mind, so I have to stay concerned about that. This can be multiplied over everybody in my life.

Thank you so much for what it is that you do. That's an interesting conundrum.

Yes.

I don't know that

You can take it extreme, sure.

Sure, yeah. I mean, there is a certain extent to which you can't run yourself ragged over, well, this might cause somebody to stumble.

Yeah.

Stepping on eggshells or not stepping on

No, you've got it right, yeah.

Stepping on eggshells, yeah, okay, is just not a way to live your life.

Exactly.

You can't give glory to God while you're trying to step carefully.

Especially when we are

I mean that carefully, you know what I mean?

Yes, especially when we're called to be gracious toward others. And so if you are constantly walking on eggshells and you're not practicing grace, you're not even putting your brother in a position to have to practice grace.

That's what I was gonna say, yeah.

You know, the instruction that we're given in Romans 14 with regards to Christian liberty issues, it begins with, as for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but do not quarrel over opinions. Now here's the real question, which one is weak in faith?

Is it the one who thinks that I can't eat this food or is it the one who thinks that I can eat anything and it's not a bother to anybody? Which one is weaker? Now, of course, where Paul is coming at this from in Romans 14, it's the person who believes that he can eat anything and his conscience is not defiled.

That's the person who's more mature in their faith. The person who's still holding to dietary laws and believing that eating certain things would actually defile you and make you impure, that person is weaker in their faith.

So that's what Paul means there. But there can still be persons who think so high and lofty of their doctrine that they think that they're the mature one when their arrogance actually makes them less mature.

Right.

And so there is, this instruction really is upon both sides. You have to be accepting and gracious toward your brother. So to a certain extent, you know, this is gonna be on a case-by-case basis. I really don't know what to tell you with regard to the aspirin thing.

That one wouldn't bother me so much. I wouldn't care about taking aspirin.

Well, I mean, you have to use your discernment there as far as like who you're around. Are they going to be offended? And is it going to cause a quarrel? And if so, you can talk to them about it, about why you do take it or why you don't think you should or so on and so forth.

And that's what begins the conversation to where everybody is able to give grace to one another.

Right.

And so I think you know who you hang around and if you don't, you need to get to know them better and then you can have those conversations as far as like, I see this is bothering you and can you tell me about it?

Right.

You know.

Yeah, that's good. You know, even with regard to what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 8 .13 about eating meat, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never eat meat lest I make my brother stumble. What's Paul's intention there?

His intention there is not to draw these lines and create these legalistic boundaries. The point is loving your brother.

Right.

It's having a mindfulness and a heart for your brother, for brothers and sisters in the Lord. So even when we talk about these things, I'm not trying to draw lines either. I'm not trying to tell you, you should or should not do these things.

You may feel like it's perfectly fine in your conscience to do it and I'm not gonna tell you not to, but just be mindful of it.

Yeah.

Just be aware of it. What people are.

That it could cause somebody else to stumble.

Right.

And that it might be something that they're struggling with. Like if you're taking a prescription pain medicine, that could be somebody else's struggle or addiction at the moment. And so that might really bother them whether they've gotten past that or whether they're still struggling with it.

Yeah, and see there.

But you do need to have that open conversation.

Yeah.

Now see there, you're talking about an addiction issue.

Yeah.

This isn't just an opinion issue.

Right.

So like if it's true, if it's just a difference of opinion, well, that's fine.

Right.

If my brother's offended by that, I don't care.

You need to get over it.

That's a completely different matter.

Yes.

I'm talking about.

Show love at it, but yes.

I'm talking about more of behavior sort of thing.

Okay.

Now at the same time, there are certain topics that I may not want to bring up because I know it just sets this guy off.

Yeah, true.

And let's just not deal with that today. It might cause all of our other brothers and sisters to stumble like, oh my goodness, what are you guys talking about?

Right.

So just with a matter of a difference of opinion, I mean, we do need to have differences of opinion. We need to work through and talk through those things, exactly what you're talking about. But if it's something that's behavioral, that's actually going to cause a brother or sister to do something sinful, that's what I want to watch out for.

Right.

Now with regards to music and movies and things like that, because oftentimes when we've discussed this topic, that's where it comes back to is music and movies.

Sure.

I've said that I don't discuss those things, like the stuff that we engage in as much. It's not that I don't talk about it at all, but there's a lot of topics I just tend to avoid where I won't say what I'm watching, because while it's fine for me and it's not defining my conscience, it may be something that causes you to stumble.

Right.

You end up watching it and there's content in there that makes your mind go places. You're like, why in the world did Gabe recommend this to me? Or why is he watching this?

Right.

And so that's why, and again, it's a behavioral thing. It's not an opinion thing.

Right.

So I don't want to do something that might cause you to sin. But it's not, like I said, it's not like I don't talk about this at all, because there are circles of friends of mine that may watch the same show or listen to the same kind of music.

And I can have that discussion freely with them.

Right.

And I'm not causing any of them to sin and they're not causing me to sin. So in the right audience, I'll still talk about it. Now, I still won't wear like brand name shirts or shirts with logos on them or things like that, because I'm a pastor and I don't want people thinking, what does Gabe do in supporting that organization when they're LGBTQ approving or something like that?

I know that as a pastor, I'm sending a message with something that I'm wearing. So, and again, that's just my own personal discipline. That's not something that I'd necessarily, I'm telling somebody else they have to follow the same discipline.

Recreational Music, Corporate Worship, and Apostate Christian Artists

So on that note, we come to this question. It kind of continues the theme, furthers the theme here. Hey, Pastor Gabe and Becky, I hope that the sickness has passed from your household. Stomach bugs are no fun.

Oh, yeah.

Hard to believe that was a week ago already.

No, it's not.

I was just saying, you weren't on last week because Bubba was stomach sick. That was on Friday.

It was rough.

So in any way, anyway, Christopher says in last week's.

So thank you.

Yeah. Yes. In last week's Q &A episode, you covered the issue of Christian music from artists who since publishing their work have deconstructed or apostatized. My wife and I listened to the episode while traveling and hit pause to discuss internally.

We covered a couple of angles on this issue. So angle one.

Okay.

Recreational listening versus corporate worship. There are musical styles that seem better suited for corporate worship and styles that are not well suited for corporate worship at all. We hold to the opinion based on the regulative principle of worship that corporate worship should draw the attention of the congregation away from themselves and upwards to Christ.

The lyrics should contain sound doctrine extolling the attributes, actions, and promises of God. The style should be simultaneously lofty and accessible. The music should be congregational and not a professional performance.

Personal listing, sorry, personal listening is not as regulated. So various styles and genres are subjective to the individual. That's a good point.

Yeah.

Okay.

So yeah, corporate worship has a different set of standards.

Big time.

With regards to what we use in corporate worship versus what you're just listening to recreationally.

Yeah.

Obviously the thing that I was mentioning last week with regard to contemporary Christian music artists, that did not have to do with corporate worship.

Right.

Because DC Talk and Reliant K and Jars of Clay, they're not writing songs that you're using in corporate worship.

Right.

Angle two. Source of hymnody and Christian music. What degrees of separation should we employ with regard to the sources of our music? My own conviction on the matter is that I will only listen to or sing doctrinally sound Christian music recreationally or corporately.

I will not partake of music from sources such as Bethel, Hillsong, Elevation, Maverick City, or others of similar stripe. Does Maverick City even write corporate worship songs?

You're asking the wrong person. I have no idea.

I haven't even heard of them.

I'm not aware. Yes, you have.

Oh.

Yes, you have. I won't tell you on air how you know them. But yeah, that's

That's fine.

I just, names don't stick with me as easily as songs do. So like I'll remember a tune, but as far as like the name of it or the artist or who produces it or whatever, yeah. Even when it came out, I have no idea.

I know Maverick City has written worship-esque songs. They probably are sung as worship songs in certain circles. But anyway, when I listened to them, it's just not what I thought of. It seemed like kind of a branch of Elevation music, but stylistically something that kind of went beyond what really works as a worship song.

Anyway, I'll tell you how you know them off air.

That's totally fine.

And your eyes will be big as hubcaps. You'll go, oh, that's how I know who they are.

Okay, fair enough.

So anyway

So apparently I know.

Yep, you do.

But I'll know later.

Going on, I will not introduce that to my household for groups like DC Talk and other artists who have compromised their faith or apostatized altogether. Now, again, that's only Kevin Macks.

Oh, okay.

He's of the three members of DC Talk, he's the only one that has left the faith, just to clarify that. Now, Jars of Clay, yeah, they're gone.

Yeah.

And Jennifer Knapp, I think was another name that I mentioned. But Christopher goes on.

Katie Perry.

Well, yeah, so she was Kate Hudson.

Yeah.

And then became Katie Perry. Was she Katie Hudson?

I don't know.

No, Katie Hudson's the actress.

No, that's Kate.

Kate Hudson, okay, so then she went by Katie Hudson.

Okay.

And then changed it to Katie Perry.

Okay.

Something like that, yeah, because Kate Hudson was the actress. So when she went big in pop music, no longer a Christian artist, but a pop artist, she changed her name. Anyway.

Yeah.

I don't know why her name sticks with me.

Yeah, yeah.

Those two names specifically, but.

Now, my claim to fame is that I was an independent musician at one point and her debut album. So Katie Perry's debut album as a Christian artist on Red Hill Records, I think was the name of the record company.

Only sold 300 copies. So I can say my claim to fame is that my debut record sold more copies than Katie Perry's debut record.

Well done, babe, well done.

CD to the kids out there if they even know what that is anymore. So going on, I will not introduce that to my house. Okay, he said that, I think I'm gonna have to finish that sentence anyway. For groups like DC Talk and other artists who have compromised their faith, is there a distinction between them and the aforementioned heretical groups?

Were DC Talk and other artists doctrinally sound when they were putting out music in the 90s? No, probably not. Since I have never been interested in such groups, I am not inclined to listen to their music now.

It's not my preferred style for Christian music. Of course, yeah, that's fine. However, that is a preference of mine that I should not impose on others who are not bound by the same conviction. So again, going back to the consideration last week, even though those artists, many of those artists have left the faith, is it wrong now to listen to that kind of music?

And what I had shared is we still listen to it. My kids will even listen to it. But they will ask me questions about the artists because they know that I knew those guys and would hang out with them backstage and the concerts that we did and all this other kind of stuff.

So they'll ask me, did you ever meet this guy? Yeah, in fact, I have a picture with him and we'll pull up my old photos and show them that's him right there, you know? And it'll be sad to them that they'll find out that they're not walking with the Lord anymore.

But that prompts that discussion with them of you need to be careful because even though these guys were Christian artists singing Christian music in concert 250 nights out of the year, however many shows they were doing per year, that was not enough to save them.

That was not enough to guarantee that they were genuine in their faith. And so you must cling to Christ and don't think that just because you grew up a preacher's kid, I grew up in church, we went every Sunday or whatever else, don't think that that's enough to get you into heaven.

It is your relationship with Christ.

That's right.

It is trusting in Jesus and only by faith in Him are we forgiven our sins and have everlasting life.

Amen.

So then Christopher says, what additional guidance do you have on this issue? For my part, I've greatly benefited from Scott Annul's videos on the subject on the G3 YouTube channel. And he echoes many of the thoughts that I have as well.

I hope you and your family have a great Thanksgiving, Chris from North Carolina. Well, I can't say anything to Scott's stuff, although I did do a conference with him. Was it a conference? Yeah, that's right.

We did a conference together in Georgia back in September.

Yes.

And one of the questions that he and I both had when we did our little Q &A on stage had to do with family worship. And Scott's had some great insights with regards to that. He is way more strict on his music preferences than I am.

So I can't say that I share Scott's convictions on that necessarily, but he is a good resource for helping to guide family worship and things like that.

Yeah.

Now, when we do family worship, we're not singing DC Talk and Michael W. Smith songs or something like that. We pull the hymnal out.

Yes.

Yeah.

And we're either gathered around the keyboard or playing the guitar, or we'll just sing a Macapella.

Yep.

We know it by heart.

That's right. And the kids love to do that. But this is just what you were talking about with angle two. This is entirely based on recreational listening and what's appropriate for recreational versus what's appropriate for what we sing in worship.

Now, I've said before that in your church, it is not wise for you to be using Bethel, Hillsong, and Elevation just because those churches are heretical.

Right.

But I have not gone as far as saying you shouldn't even be listening to them in your car. Now, I would never give Bethel or Elevation my money.

Right.

I would not purchase their songs. I don't even find their songs that good anyway. But I will say, full admission here, there are some Hillsong songs that I've really liked.

Oh, really?

And still like.

Yeah.

And they're solid. They are doctrinally solid, even though we know things about that church that are not only heretical, but have been predatory towards certain people. It's awful some of the things that Hillsong has done over the years.

And so I don't wanna give them my money either. But if there's artists that I like listening to and they've covered Hillsong songs, I'm not just right there at the radio going, nope, can't listen to that.

Click, move it over to the next one because it's a Hillsong tune. I think you have the right idea, Chris, about is this music honoring of God? Is it praising of him? And we're thinking about that with regards to some of those lyrics.

The artists that we listened to may not have been all that doctrinally sound. Part of the reason why I didn't make it, this isn't the only reason why I didn't make it, but part of the reason why I didn't make it is because I wouldn't play the game.

So I did not make it in contemporary Christian music because I just wasn't interested in doing it the way that they were doing it. For me, it was an approach that was like, here's the songs I write, here's how I'm going to sing or preach in concert and you can like it or not.

And they generally didn't. And that's not to say that I was good enough to make it. I think that I was fairly mediocre, all things considered. I wasn't like an American Idol caliber performer or anything like that.

But I had a very dedicated work ethic. I worked really, really hard.

Yeah.

And was hoping that I was putting in the work that eventually was going to, I could make it a career. I could do it for the rest of my life. God had other plans.

Yes.

And a lot of that had to do with this woman right here.

I'm pointing to myself.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Putting her in my life and directed me on a different path. So very

I remember that conversation when we were dating. Of, are you okay with being a musician's wife?

Yes.

And are you okay with me being gone most of the time? And I was like, well, I think so, but I don't know.

I think at that time, you were willing to say yes to anything. We were still kind of like love struck enough that

We would have made it work.

That's right.

Yes.

But praise the Lord, I'm not out on the road all the time. And my kids will still ask me, daddy, why don't you go out and sing anymore like you used to? And I say, because I want to be home with you guys.

Yeah.

If I was out doing that again, that just, it would make me less of a family man than I am. And I love being at home with the wife and kids.

We love having you.

That's right.

I appreciate that everywhere that I've been a pastor, they have told me whatever church I've been a pastor of has said to me, your ministry first is to your wife and to your children. Anyway, last question here as we wrap this up.

Mary as the Mother of God and the One Mediator

Hi, Pastor Gabe, this is from Ari. How do you refute the claims of Roman is claiming that Mary is the mother of God? It sounds heretical and it probably is, but not sure how to refute it. Well, I don't use the term at all.

And really when it comes to talking to a Roman Catholic, I don't see it necessary to have to convince them that Mary is not the mother of God because in a certain sense, she is. So that's just one of those points that I don't argue.

A Roman Catholic is gonna believe, and an Eastern Orthodox as well, they're gonna believe that Mary is the mother of God.

Fine.

There are other things that I wanna get to. That's not an argument over words that I wanna get into.

The first argument.

Right. Because she is in the sense that Jesus Christ is very God and very man. And Elizabeth in Luke chapter one refers to Mary as the mother of my Lord. So you can make a biblical argument for Mary being the mother of God.

I don't use the expression. I've never used the term in preaching or anywhere else. The reason why I don't is because

It gets confusing.

Right.

Yeah.

And Roman Catholics believe Mary is someone that can be prayed to and bowed down before. So I'm not gonna use that expression, mother of God, and cause them to stumble because of that expression since we're on that subject.

Yes.

So again, it may not really be an argument that you wanna get into, that you wanna try to refute because there is some credibility to saying that she is the mother of God. It's just not something that I'm going to use because of everything that's attached to it.

It's a loaded term. It needs a lot of qualification.

Yeah.

And it's more of a discussion rather than an argument because you can't really make your point of where exactly her title lands her until they're ready to hear it and you're ready to talk about it.

Now, when it comes to using the expression queen of heaven, oh yeah, I'll object to that one all day long. She is not the queen of heaven.

They use that?

Oh yes.

Oh.

Yeah.

That's one of the titles for Mary in Roman Catholicism. She is the queen of heaven.

Yeah.

I don't remember that one.

Because she's Jesus' mom.

Right.

And so

Oh, I get it. I get why she has that.

Right.

But yeah, I don't remember that.

Because Bathsheba was Solomon's mom and she's referred to as queen. Of course, she's also David's wife.

Yes.

So

She's just not queen. Right, by virtue of being the king's mother. But anyway, yeah, it's to say that she reigns or rules over heaven to some degree and that's just simply not true.

Yeah.

And also in the Bible

I remember being very confused about why we prayed to Mary.

Even when you were Roman Catholic?

Yeah, like just, it didn't make sense to me. I was like, why are we praying to Mary? I thought we were praying to God, you know?

That is such a common sense question. Why would you bother praying to anyone else when you can go straight to God?

Right.

And it's just this idea that, well, that's his mom. Jesus is God and it's kind of scary to just go straight to God. But Mary's a little bit more, she's softer.

Yes.

And she's caring and gentle. And maybe I can pray to her and she can take my words to Jesus and be more convincing of him.

Yeah, that's more or less how it was explained to me.

Yeah.

And I just didn't, I still didn't understand. I was like, well, I mean, I guess, but

But it's still

I was very much that type of child too, so.

Yeah, it's directly contradictory of scripture. There is one mediator between God and man. Yeah, there's one mediator between God and man. The man Christ Jesus, and that's 1 Timothy 2 .5. And you don't find any example whatsoever in the New Testament of Christians praying to anyone other than God.

There's not one example of it.

True.